The Case of the Man Who Was Wanted

The Case of the Man Who Was Wanted is an apocryphal Sherlock Holmes short story that for many years was mistakenly attributed to Arthur Conan Doyle. Framed as a typical Holmes adventure, it finds Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson in Baker Street confronted with a perplexing scenario: an respectable London man is about to turn himself in for a crime he insists he did not commit, claiming he is «wanted» for an old murder. Holmes intervenes to investigate why an innocent person would assume a fugitive's identity. Over the course of the story – which unfolds in cozy sitting-room interviews and a swift trip to a provincial town – Holmes unravels a mix-up of identities and a fraudulent scheme. The climax sees Holmes dramatically prevent a miscarriage of justice by revealing that the real wanted murderer died years ago, and an imposter (or blackmailer) had manipulated the situation. In classic style, Holmes produces a key piece of evidence (a dated letter or diary) that clarifies the truth in front of astonished police. Watson pens it with the usual admiration for Holmes's logical prowess. Notably, this story has a story of its own: discovered in the Conan Doyle archives in the 1940s, it was published as a «lost Holmes tale» until later determined to be authored by an architect named Arthur Whitaker. Nevertheless, The Man Who Was Wanted reads like a faithful Holmes pastiche – a neat puzzle of identity and motive, complete with Holmes's kindly deception to spare an innocent and his famous concluding remark that «what one man can invent, another can discover.»