“Mrs Hudson’s breakfasts grow more insufferable by the day,” murmured Sherlock Holmes. “Congealed porridge, soggy toast, watery eggs, all this I have long endured, consoled by marmalade alone—but this!” He shook the familiar squat jar angrily. “This brand’s been tart and witty for years, what’s turned it into this vapid slither and slop?” He picked the offending jar and hurled it out of the window.
I held my breath for the sound of shattering glass. All I heard was a dull thwock.
“Quick, Watson!” Holmes, galvanised into action, was out of the room, thudding down the stairs.
He soon reappeared, carrying a body.
The victim was a young man. Clutched tight in his right fist was the missile that had felled him.
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“Cadaveric spasm,” I pronounced, but life, it appeared, wasn’t quite extinct. Presently our visitor sat up, still grasping the jar.
“I gather you’ve had a taste of my marmalade,” he observed with an ironic smile. “But you’ve quite forgotten me. Remember this?” Drawing an old worn envelope from his pocket, he tipped its contents on the table.
Holmes and I breathed incredulously, “The five orange pips!”
Readers of these chronicles will recollect that bizarre adventure where five dried orange pips were harbingers of death—but hadn’t our client been pushed into the Thames before Holmes could solve the case?
“Oh I didn’t drown. I changed my name—I’m plain Shaw now—and the next year I went into the marmalade business. I’ve made millions out of the best marmalade in the world. Now, suddenly—but you’ve seen for yourself! The same recipe, the same method—how did it go so terribly wrong? I’m ruined Mr Holmes, unless you can help me.”
“Give me a week,” said Holmes.
*******
‘“Give me a week,’ said Holmes.” | Photo Credit: Getty Images/iStock
At breakfast the next day, the marmalade jar had been restored. Though the toast was its craven worst, I slathered it with jam. It glowed orange but there ended its resemblance to the fruit.
I was still cursing its cloying sweetness when Holmes appeared with a brown-paper bag. Out tumbled oranges in a dazzle of amber, gold, saffron and green.
“Taste, Watson, and judge!”
“All good oranges,” I ventured after we had demolished the lot.
“But which is worthy of marmalade?”
“You forgot to include the bitter Seville. It is grown specially for marmalade.” Holmes snorted rudely. “Citrus aurantium? Pah. It smells of the sickroom.”
“The sweet Valencia then!”
“Such sweetness corrupts the very idea of marmalade.”
“Which is?”
“Peel, pith, pulp, pip. Here comes our marmalade millio—” Holmes’ voice trailed away as he caught sight of our visitor.
Shaw looked haunted. His dark-ringed eyes darted fearfully as if he expected an ambush. “It is back,” he rasped, handing Holmes an envelope.
“Hmm,” murmured Holmes. “Nagpur postmark.”
A single line was scrawled inside the flap: Missing, Mr Millionaire.
And out tumbled five orange pips.
“They’ll get me this time,” Shaw wailed. “I’ll soon go missing, and then I’ll be dead.”
“Not if I can help it.” Holmes reached for his deerstalker. “Keep a close watch on Shaw, Watson. Don’t let him out of your sight!”
*******
A farmer with his crop damaged by unseasonal rains at Khamgaon village near Nagpur in 2019. | Photo Credit: S Sudarshan
Holmes strode in a week later.
“Did you get them, Mr Holmes?” gibbered Shaw. “Am I safe now?”
Holmes thrust a sheaf of papers at Shaw. “Sign these,” he said.
Shaw turned pale as he read. He looked up twice to protest, but quailed at Holmes’ stony glare.
At length he signed the papers.
“I have convinced them to hold off for six months,” Holmes observed coldly. “Keep your word if you want to keep your life.”
*******
“At breakfast the next day, the marmalade jar had been restored.” | Photo Credit: Getty Images/iStock
“A biscuit and a glass of claret first,” Holmes cut off questions as he refreshed himself. Then reaching for his Stradivarius, he began, “The orange most worthy of marmalade is the mandarin we know as Nagpur santra! When Shaw got his mysterious envelope with a Nagpur postmark, I knew where to go.” He placed two identical oranges on the table. “Both these are Nagpur mandarins, and yet they couldn’t be more different.”
I sampled the fruit and agreed. One was witty with repartee, the other was just sweet slush.
“The terroir of a fruit is the story of its land,” continued Holmes. “The orange sings of the farmers of Vidarbha: the peel of their zest, the pith of their patience, the juice of their exuberant spirit of freedom. And the pips? Those pips, Watson, are the farmers’ tears. Drought follows drought. The soil is depleted as factories open everywhere. Shaw recently set up a plant for orange juice. Nagpur santra does not juice well. So in comes this new cultivar, seedless and sweet, to put our old santra out of business. Orchards wither. Farmers die. And Shaw makes another million from first-rate orange juice and third-rate marmalade.”
“So Shaw”s letter was no threat at all?”
Holmes laughed heartily. “That was just a kind-hearted orange grower telling our millionaire that his marmalade was missing pips. The farmers found the story hilarious.”
“And cleverly manipulated the situation!”
“No, that was all me. They know nothing about those papers as yet. If Shaw keeps his word, the Nagpur santra will revive their fortunes.”
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*******
Two months later, a jar of marmalade arrived by post. Holmes gave it his grudging approval.
“Look!” I exclaimed. “He’s changed the label. It’s now called …”
“Five Orange Pips!”
Kalpana Swaminathan and Ishrat Syed are surgeons who write together as Kalpish Ratna. They are the authors of Gastronama: The Indian Guide to Eating Right (Roli, 2023).
