I’ll be uploading rankings of Sherlock Holmes stories from my new book, Wherever Fact May Lead Me: A Ranking of the Sherlock Holmes Stories, every day till we reach the best story. After that, I’ll share my ranking of the best villains in the Holmes canon. You can find the rankings on my website, and you can buy a copy of the book on Amazon.
Ranking the Sherlock Holmes Stories
24. The Devil’s Foot (December 1910, Last Bow)
While The Devil’s Foot has elements of originality, it also features familiar tropes. As in The Reigate Squire, Holmes has been ordered to take a vacation for the sake of his own health. He heads out to the Cornish cliffs. When called to a vicarage, Holmes and Watson find two men in the throes of madness and a woman dead, an expression of horror upon her face. Enigmatic though it is, Holmes soon solves the crime. A toxic west-African herb, mostly unknown to Western medicine and called The Devil’s Foot, has killed Mortimer Tregennis’ sister, Brenda, and driven their two brothers insane. The Devil’s Foot will, shortly after, kill Mortimer as well.
As in The Abbey Grange, a hearty, manly, and virtuous Englishman takes revenge, while Holmes and Watson act as judge and jury. In both cases, they declare the vengeful perpetrator, “Not guilty,” since he killed for the sake of protecting or avenging loved ones. In both cases (in The Devil’s Foot and The Abbey Grange), Holmes and Watson release the culprit, and, again in both cases, I believe that they acted properly. Underrated and overlooked like The Lion’s Mane, The Devil’s Foot is both deserving of greater critical attention and a good choice for a pleasure-reader’s bedtime story.
