How to Think Like Sherlock (18 page)

Answers to Quiz 12 – CSI Baker Street

1.
He used a block of ice to stand on to kill himself.

2.
He was jumping out of an aeroplane but his parachute failed to open.

3.
Benny and some friends had hired a hot air balloon to inspect the scene of Kenny’s death. The balloon got into problems and started to lose height. The people on board threw any extraneous items overboard, including their clothes, in the hope of halting their plummet but to no avail. In the end they drew straws to see who would sacrifice themselves to save the others by leaping out and reducing the weight still further. Benny picked the short straw.

4.
Dave was sucked out of the sea into the water tank of a fire service aeroplane, which was collecting water to dowse the forest fire.

5.
Bobby was the name of the snowman the boy had made the day before but which has melted overnight.

6.
The car is a convertible. The roof is down. The murderer simply shot him from the pavement and dropped the weapon into the back of the car before fleeing.

Answers to Quiz 13 – Holmes Trivia

1.
John (though on one occasion in the stories he is referred to as James).

2.
The Vernets.

3.
Stamford.

4.
Opera singer and adventuress.

5.
Mary Morstan.

6.
Professor Moriarty.

7.
University of London.

8.
Mycroft.

9.
The Diogenes Club.

10.
The Reichenbach Falls.

11.
221B Baker Street.

12.
Consulting detective.

13.
The Sussex Downs.

14.
In the toe of a Persian slipper.

15.
A drunken unemployed groom or a clergyman.

16.
Devon.

17.
Wiggins.

18.
The ‘Gloria Scott’.

19.
They were narrated by Sherlock Holmes himself, rather than Dr Watson.

20.
In a tin dispatch box in the vaults of the bank of Cox & Co. in Charing Cross.

Answer to Quiz 14 – Elementary, dear reader … Part I

At number eighty-one. For the police to be sure they had the right property, the answers they received from the informant must have offered up only one possible number. The only way this is possible is if the informant answered no to the first question and yes to the other two.

Answer to Quiz 15 – Elementary, dear reader … Part II

Billy Goldfingers. If it was Tom, Billy and Joe would both be telling the truth. If it was Jack, then each of the other three is being honest. And if it was Joe, then neither Jack nor Billy is telling lies. But if it’s Billy, then only Joe is not fibbing.

Answer to Quiz 16 – Elementary, dear reader … Part III

The riddler’s sons are aged two, two and nine. The mugger saw the riddler count out thirteen pounds (unlucky for the assailant). He had got as far as working out the eight possible combinations of three numbers that when multiplied together equal thirty-six.

1, 1 and 36

1, 2 and 18

1, 3 and 12

1, 4 and 9

1, 6 and 6

2, 2 and 9

2, 3 and 6

3, 3 and 4

However, two of these combinations add up to thirteen (1, 6 and 6, as well as 2, 2 and 9), leaving the mugger confused as to which ages the children are. But he should have listened carefully to the riddler, who spoke of his ‘eldest’ son. This confirms that his boys must be aged two, two and nine.

Answers to Quiz 17 – Say What?

1. Watson bring your gun. (A simple code based on numbers in place of letters, with a = 1, b = 2 and so on).

2. Sherlock Holmes made his debut in
A Study in Scarlet
. (A Caesar cipher, with the alphabet shifted along by one letter.)

3. Dr Watson was his best friend. (A more complicated Caesar cipher, with the alphabet shifted twelve places so that ‘M’ represents ‘A’.)

4. To break this code requires just a bit of lateral thinking. In this code, the last letter of each word becomes the first letter of the proceeding word. The last letter of the whole sentence moves to the start.

5. He took a magnifying glass from his pocket. (This is Morse code.)

6. The hansom cab sped down Baker Street. (This is semaphore.)

7. Help me. (The key to this code is to read the first letter of each word.)

8. Plan discovered. Send man with money immediately. (The plaintext is revealed by reading every third word, much like the code Holmes broke in ‘The Advenure of “Gloria Scott’”.)

Answer to Quiz 18 – Elementary, dear reader … Part IV

The clock on the dashboard was digital, and the top-right vertical stroke of the last digit was not working. Therefore, when Archie looked at the clock at five to six, it read:

A minute later:

Two minutes later:

instead of