Have you read Gaboriau's works?" I asked. "Does Lecoq come up to your idea of a detective?" Sherlock Holmes sniffed sardonically. "Lecoq was a miserable bungler," he said, in an angry voice; "he had only one thing to recommend him, and that was his energy. That book made me positively ill."

Holmes glanced at me and raised his eyebrows sardonically.