Sherlock Holmes and The Case of The Bulgarian Codex

Chapter XXIII AFTERWORD

A FEW weeks after their return from Bulgaria, a package addressed to Watson arrived at 221B Baker Street from Capri. It contained a magnificent cat’s-eye and diamond tie-pin. A note in the Prince’s hand accompanied the gift: ‘To my great friend Dr. Watson, a small memento of your visit to my country. I am certain the blood of a Crusader runs in your veins. I feel that, should circumstances require it, you are quite capable of rising in your stirrups and dealing an infidel a blow with a mace which would cause him profound astonishment.’ A separate card stated: ‘This pin was purchased in Constantinople in 1890. Worn for 10 years by the Prince Regnant and future Tsar of Bulgaria.’

Accompanying it, for Holmes, was a scarlet shirt of the Tirailleurs de la Garde, ‘In token of sincere regard - and to brighten up your wardrobe’.

Six months after Holmes and Watson returned to England an unsigned note in a woman’s hand arrived at their Baker Street lodgings which read, ‘It may please you to know the ashes of the young woman found dead on Mount Vitosh have been retrieved from their resting place in the Church of St. Louis at Philippopolis and reburied in a quiet and beautiful glade in the grounds of the Kalchoff estate.’

‘Foxy’ Ferdinand did eventually remarry, in February 1908. His bride was the Princess Eleonore Caroline Gasparine Louise Reuss zu Köstritz. She was considered “a plain but practical... capable and kind-hearted woman.” It was another marriage of convenience and dynastic necessity.

In October 1908, Ferdinand proclaimed Bulgaria’s de jure independence from the Ottoman Empire and titled himself Tsar. A few years later he made a rare but grave error of judgment by taking his adoptive country into the Great War on the side of Kaiser Wilhelm. In 1918, by now a widower again, Ferdinand left Bulgaria for luxurious exile in Coburg for the final thirty years of his remarkable life. The ex-Tsar of Bulgaria died peacefully in his sleep during the night of September 10^th 1948, at the age of eighty-seven. His surviving children, daughters Eudoxia and Nadezhda, were at his bedside. Heaven’s gift to the political cartoonists of Europe from his accession to the Bulgarian throne in 1887 to his fall in 1918 was no more.

Sir Penderel Moon remained for a while as British Legate to Bulgaria. On his departure from Sofia he received an official despatch from Sir Edward Grey, as follows:

‘I desire to take this opportunity to convey to you the high appreciation entertained by His Majesty’s Government of the manner in which you have filled the post of British representative at Sofia. Your interesting and able reports on the situation proved invaluable to His Majesty’s Government in their efforts for the maintenance of peace, and the moderating influences which you successfully exerted.’

Ten years after the events portrayed, Sir Penderel Moon, now honoured with the Most Distinguished Order of (military saints) Michael and George, was appointed British Ambassador to the great white Capital St. Petersburg. He was ambassador at the time of the Russian Revolution in 1917.

His autobiography titled My Mission to Bulgaria Recollected at Leisure was published in 1923.