The Man with the Twisted Lip, one of the 56 short Sherlock Holmes stories written by British author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, is the sixth of the twelve Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. The story was first published in the Strand Magazine in December 1891.

Synopsis

After rescuing a friend's husband from an East End opium den, Dr. Watson rather improbably finds his friend Sherlock Holmes there, disguised as an old man, and apparently trying to extract information from the addicts in the den. Mr. Neville St. Clair has gone missing, and his wife cannot understand this as he has never done this kind of thing before. Making the matter even more mysterious is that Mrs. St. Clair is quite sure that she saw her husband at a second-floor window in a rather rough part of town near the docks. He withdrew into the window immediately, and Mrs. St. Clair is quite sure that there was something very wrong. Naturally, she tried to enter the building, but her way was blocked by a Lascar. She fetched the police, but they could not find Mr. St. Clair, only a dirty, ugly beggar. The police are about to put this report down to madness of some kind when Mrs. St. Clair finds the box of wooden bricks that her husband said he would buy for their son. Further search turns up some of her husband's clothes. Later, his coat, with the pockets full of pennies and halfpennies, is found in the Thames just below the building.

The beggar was arrested and locked up at the police station. Meanwhile, Mr. Sinclair is not heard from for several days. Eventually a letter arrives from him for his wife.

At first, Holmes is quite convinced that Mr. St. Clair has been the unfortunate victim of murder, but the letter forces him to think otherwise. Upon reflection he concludes something quite extraordinary. Holmes uses a bath sponge to solve the mystery, and also to create a few problems. It seems that Mr. St. Clair has been leading a double life, one of respectability, and the other as a beggar. His wife never knew what he did for a living. He will now, however, have to find a new job.

External links

• Full text of "The Man with the Twisted Lip"
• The Man with the Twisted Lip - in easy to read HTML format.
• (including The Man with the Twisted Lip)