A character in BBC One drama, Sherlock, Dr John Watson writes about a previous case, The Hollow Client.

2nd July

The Hollow Client

Jack Griffin certainly knew how to make an entrance. We'd been to a suit-fitting for the wedding and when we got back, there he was. Or rather, there he wasn't.

Because there, sitting in my chair, was Jack Griffin's suit. Just his suit. Without him in it. He'd emailed us a few days earlier asking for our help. A student at Goldsmiths University, he'd wanted us to investigate what he described as his 'invisibility'. It had started a few weeks before when his flatmate, Alan Flanagan, had bumped into him, claiming that he literally hadn't seen Jack standing there. They both just dismissed it but then it happened again. Alan had gone to sit down in a chair that Jack was already sitting in. And then it happened again and again.

He'd told us he'd be arriving that day but we'd been late back because Sherlock had been obsessing about us wearing the right shoes. And then, when we got back, there was his suit.

As we stared at the suit, Sherlock quickly formulated a number of solutions. Alan had been winding Jack up to the point where Jack genuinely believed he was invisible. Jack had wrapped himself in a complex set of mirrors so that it appeared as if he was invisible. Or had been wrapped up in the mirrors by Alan. He briefly considered invisible paint. Perhaps Jack and Alan were highly-advanced scientists (they weren't, they were media students). We'd been drugged on the way in and taken to an exact replica of 221B Baker Street where a camera was projecting the suit into the chair. I did stop him at that point and ask who'd have done that. He shrugged and suggested ninjas. Then he continued... the suit was a hologram, Jack had never existed, Jack was dressed up in the same fabric as the chair...

At that point I had to stop him and point out that, as students, perhaps Jack and Alan were just winding us up. And that perhaps it was just an empty suit. Sherlock accepted, grudgingly, that I might be right. And when we checked the chair, sure enough it was just an empty suit. He was disappointed. I think he preferred the idea of it being some elaborate plot involving ninjas and a complex set of mirrors.

Bet he doesn't talk about that one at the wedding.

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