With the sixth pearl, she received a letter asking for a meeting, claiming that she is a 'wronged woman'. Four years later, Mary answered an anonymous newspaper advertisement that said it would be 'to her advantage' that she reveal her wherabouts after replying with her address, Mary received a valuable pearl in the post, a gift repeated once a year for six years. Mary contacted Major John Sholto, a retired convict guard who was her father's only friend in London however, he denied having seen Morstan, and nothing further has been heard of the Captain. He requested her to meet him at the Langham Hotel, but was not there when she arrived. She explains that, in December 1878, her father, Captain Arthur Morstan, arrived in London, on leave from his post as a convict guard in the Andaman Islands.
Miss Mary Morstan then arrives with a case. Holmes claims that his mind 'rebels at stagnation', and that he needs a problem to solve in order to stimulate himself. Watson remonstrates with Holmes about his cocaine usage. Doyle wrote four novels and 56 short stories featuring the fictional detective.
The Sign of the Four (1890), also called The Sign of Four, is the second novel featuring Sherlock Holmes by British writer Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. How often have I said to you that when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth?
