The Adventure of the Speckled Band

The name Dr. Watson is almost synonymous with “trusty sidekick” in popular culture, and for good reason. Watson, the principal narrator of the Sherlock Holmes adventures, can be defined by a singular trait and is a flat character: the doctor, the sidekick, the narrator. He and Sherlock Holmes share a flat on Baker Street, and he shares in Holmes’s detective work as well. When Holmes introduces Helen to Watson, he refers to the doctor as his “intimate friend and associate […] before whom you can speak as freely as before myself” (142). This glowing introduction makes Holmes’s esteem for Watson clear. Watson proves himself worthy of Holmes’s praise and demonstrates his legendary loyalty when he accompanies the detective back to Stoke Moran in the dead of night despite Holmes’s warning that there is a “distinct element of danger” (153). At this point, Holmes already suspects that Dr. Roylott will unleash a venomous snake, but he does not share his hypothesis with his confidant. Nevertheless, Watson resolves to face the unknown danger at his friend’s side.

Of course, the devoted sidekick is also a trained medical doctor and a writer with a mind of his own. Because Watson serves as the story’s narrator, the reader relies on him to present the story’s events and to translate the machinations of Holmes’s superhuman brain into accessible language. The doctor demonstrates his keen eye for detail in striking descriptions, such as when he compares Helen’s “restless frightened eyes” to “those of some hunted animal” (142). As Watson soon learns, the comparison is all too accurate: Even as Helen gives her account, the relentless Dr. Roylott follows her tracks to Baker Street. As a result of his close companionship with Holmes, Watson’s first-person narration comes from the thick of the action rather than from the sidelines. This point of view heightens the story’s suspense at key moments. For example, Watson declares Dr. Roylott’s dying shriek to be “the most horrible cry to which I have ever listened” (155). Watson’s closeness to Holmes and vivid use of language make him an engaging narrator while his courage, intelligence, and loyalty prove the sidekick to be a well-rounded character in his own right. Doyle employs direct characterization through Watson’s narration.

The story’s antagonist is a round yet static character with an arsenal of formidable traits: He is towering, brutish, and ill-tempered, yet he is also worldly, educated, and cunning. Even the character’s name elicits the imagery of blackened foulness. After the death of his wife, Mrs. Stoner, Roylott became increasingly reclusive, eccentric, and violent, though these character changes precede the story.

Watson describes the doctor’s forbidding appearance when he bursts into the Baker Street flat: “So tall was he that his hat actually brushed the cross bar of the doorway, and his breadth seemed to span it across from side to side. A large face […] marked with every evil passion, was turned from one to the other of us” (148). This description showcases his malice and brute strength. Watson also notes Dr. Roylott’s mismatched clothes: “His costume was a peculiar mixture of the professional and of the agricultural, having a black top-hat, a long frock-coat, and a pair of high gaiters, with a hunting-crop swinging in his hand” (148). Like Roylott himself, his attire does not fit the expectations for a proper English nobleman and suggests a dangerous wildness of character. The exotic animals he collects and allows to roam on his estate also show his dangerous departure from societal expectations. Dr. Roylott fights to hold onto his status and power with a ferocity reminiscent of his menacing pets, but he loses his life when his avaricious plot backfires. As a villain, Dr. Roylott offers a cautionary tale on the dangers of greed.

In addition to serving as the story’s antagonist, Dr. Roylott acts as a foil character. Like a dark mirror to the dynamic duo, he casts Holmes and Watson’s attributes in an even more heroic light while their virtues only deepen his villainy by comparison. Holmes observes, “When a doctor does go wrong he is the first of criminals. He has nerve and he has knowledge” (154). Like Roylott, Watson is a medical doctor, but he uses his courage and intelligence to aid others while Roylott cares only for himself. Watson’s loyalty to Holmes contrasts sharply with Roylott’s betrayal of his own stepdaughters. Dr. Roylott is also a foil to Holmes due to their contrasting temperaments and great physical and intellectual prowess. Whereas Dr. Roylott storms through the story in a wild fury, Holmes comports himself with rationality and composure. Helen describes Roylott as “a man of immense strength” (144), which he demonstrates by bending a steel poker with his bare hands. Holmes shows his own brawn by restoring the poker to its original shape. Both men also possess remarkable intelligence. Holmes acknowledges his adversary’s intellect and laments its misuse when he sighs, “Ah, me! it’s a wicked world, and when a clever man turns his brains to crime it is the worst of all” (152). Pitting Holmes against a villain who possesses the same strengths as the detective adds to the suspense. The reader wonders if Holmes will unravel the doctor’s plot before he can claim another victim, or if the sleuth has perhaps met his match. Doyle creates a fearsome foe by combining the best traits of the hero and his sidekick.

In some respects, Helen Stoner seems like the classic, docile “damsel in distress.” She is relatively young, spotlessly innocent, and tormented by a cruel stepparent. However, Helen subverts the role of damsel in distress. She recognizes that her Prince Charming, Percy Armitage, is not up to the task of overcoming the dangers that face her, and she instead enlists the help of a professional hero. Helen resists being reduced to a stereotype because she does not swoon into her rescuer’s arms and become his love interest. Helen’s appearance also separates her from the rank and file of damsels in distress. Instead of presenting her as an idealized beauty, Doyle allows Helen’s sufferings to show in her drawn, silver-haired appearance: “Her features and figure were those of a woman of thirty, but her hair was shot with premature grey, and her expression was weary and haggard” (142). This adds realism to Helen’s plight, and she comes across as a sympathetic character. Helen has no shortage of reasons to feel distress, but she actively seeks out help rather than passively waiting for a hero to swoop to her rescue. The name Helen, derived from the Greek name Helene, means “light.” Helen’s name embodies her quest for truth.

Sherlock Holmes’s client is a round and dynamic character. She arrives at Baker Street “dressed in black and heavily veiled” (142) even though two years have passed since her sister’s mysterious death, making her devotion to her twin and the enduring pain of her grief plain. During those two years, Helen lives with fear, loneliness, and unanswered questions while men control her life and invalidate her experiences. She remains at Stoke Moran with a stepfather who is emotionally, psychologically, and physically abusive toward her, and she tries to cover up his behavior with the excuse that “perhaps he hardly knows his own strength” (147). To make matters worse, Helen’s fiancé believes that her concerns are merely “the fancies of a nervous woman” (143). However, after hearing the whistle that Julia had spoken of, Helen suddenly breaks out of her passivity and actively seeks help. She travels to London on a quest for answers even though the men in her life would not approve. At best, Percy would likely view her trip to London as an overreaction. At worst, Dr. Roylott would see her consulting a detective as a threat to his control over her. Helen resists the fate her stepfather intends for her by personally guiding Holmes and Watson around Stoke Moran and adding her own insights to the investigation. When Watson comments that he sees no reason for the construction project on Helen’s room, she agrees: “I believe that it was an excuse to move me from my room” (150). Helen’s wariness shows that she has learned from her mother and sister’s examples. Like them, she shows love and loyalty to men who do not match her devotion, but she does not give these men the final say in her fate. Helen Stoner begins as a grief-stricken woman suffering alone, propels the plot into motion by finding the courage to ask for help, and ultimately wins her freedom from her violent, domineering stepfather.

Julia Stoner is a flat, static character whose purpose is to develop her twin sister’s character and increase the story’s suspense. Grief over their parents’ deaths and the stress of living with their wild stepfather weighed heavily on sisters. Helen tells Holmes and Watson that “my poor sister Julia and I had no great pleasure in our lives […] She was but thirty at the time of her death, and yet her hair had already begun to whiten, even as mine has” (145). By making the women twins, Doyle emphasizes the parallels between them. The sisters’ devotion to one another and their mutual joy at Julia’s upcoming wedding show that the women retain loving natures despite their sufferings. Of course, these parallels also render Julia’s death all the more horrible. The reader knows what fate awaits Helen if the hero fails: Julia “writhed as one who is in terrible pain, and […] she suddenly shrieked out in a voice which I shall never forget, ‘Oh, my God! Helen! It was the band! The speckled band!’” (146). These semi-delirious last words stir up the reader’s curiosity and present a puzzle worthy of the great Sherlock Holmes. Julia Stoner’s death gives the story its mystery and paints a grim portrait of the stakes.

The story offers few details about Helen and Julia’s mother. Helen mentions that she and her twin were only two years old when “the young widow of Major-General Stoner, of the Bengal Artillery” (144) met and married Dr. Grimesby Roylott. This relatively speedy second marriage suggests that she, like her daughters after her, suffered from loneliness. Mrs. Stoner “was killed eight years ago in a railway accident near Crewe” (144). Her death not only causes her daughters the pain of loss but also places them at the mercy of Dr. Grimesby Roylott, who loves their inheritance infinitely more than them. The terms of Mrs. Stoner’s will show that she had complete faith in Dr. Roylott; she entrusted both her daughters and her entire fortune to his care indefinitely or at least until Helen and Julia married. Her misplaced trust vividly illustrates the theme of the dangers of unreciprocated love and loyalty. Although she is a flat and static character, Mrs. Stoner shapes the story by unwittingly supplying the villain with both his victims and his motive.