Sherlock Holmes: The Adventure of the Noble Bachelor

The Adventure of the Noble Bachelor, one of 56 short Sherlock Holmes stories written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, is the 10th of the 12 stories collected in The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. The story was first published in Strand Magazine in April 1892.

Lord Robert St. Simon's new American bride, Hatty Doran, has disappeared almost immediately after the wedding. The servants had prevented an old love interest of his from forcing her way into the wedding breakfast, and Hatty had been seen in whispered conversation with her maid. Inspector Lestrade arrives with the news that Hatty's wedding dress and ring have been found floating in the Serpentine. Holmes quickly solves the mystery, locating Hatty at a hotel with a mysterious, "common looking" man who had picked up her dropped bouquet after the ceremony.

The man turns out to be Hatty's husband, Frank, whom she had thought dead in America and who managed to locate her only moments before she was to marry Lord St. Simon. Frank and Hatty had just decided to go to Lord St. Simon in order to explain the situation when Holmes found them.

Public Domain (P)2016 Rick Sheridan