Thank you.

Thank you very much

Thank you for a minute. As our tale begins, an elderly countess returns home to the Hotel Cosmopolitan after a begrudged afternoon

of Christmastime shopping. Requiring fortification from her trying day, the servants prepare

her tea and a hot bath. When suddenly, the countess is heard screaming violently through the halls of the palatial domicile.

Rushing in, the servants find her clutching at an empty silver box, terrified and furious.

Lady?

No car bungle! Lady? Blue carbuncle. The blue carbuncle

is stolen.

And so begins the adventure of the Blue Carbuncle.

Elsewhere, John Horner and his young wife Window Shop, seeking Christmas gifts for their two children,

when Horner is abruptly apprehended by the police.

Charged with the theft of the valuable gem, the blue carbuncle, he resists, and protesting

his innocence is carted off to prison as his wife weeps.

At 221B, the street sweepers attend to their work, and Mrs. Hudson waves to Dr. Watson,

as he sets off to make a few of his own holiday preparations.

But before she can close the door, the good housekeeper is accosted by a strange commissioner holding a goose.

Music by a strange commissioner holding a goose.

In his book, A Study in Celluloid, producer Michael Cox recalled the lead-in to this episode. He wrote,

Nearly 14 minutes into the film, we arrive at Conan Doyle's starting point,

but everything we've seen up to that point is implicit in the original story.

The dramatist simply altered the structure and put some additional flesh on the bones.

...