The Guttering Candle, Track 3-Sherlock Holmes

[00:14] It was the long and terrible summer of 1880. [00:17] And I was stationed with my regiment in Afghanistan. [00:24] At Kareshk, we had been routed, betrayed by our native allies. [00:29] Afterwards, as orderly a fashion as could be managed, we had retreated and made camp at Keshkenakhud, 45 miles from Kandahar. [00:39] Information was scarce concerning the whereabouts of the enemy. [00:43] We knew only that the forces of the rebel leader Akbar Khan were messing somewhere in the bleak and rocky wilderness by which we were surrounded. [00:52] Twilight had begun to fall on the evening of 25 July, when taking an hour or so away from the field hospital upon the absolute insistence of my orderly, [01:02] I retired to the makeshift mess with about a dozen offices. [01:06] I had intended to play a hand or two of cards, some of my companions having turned to such distractions by the almost intolerable nature of our circumstances. [01:15] However, I soon grew uneasy in such pursuits and elected instead to take some air. [01:23] I strode a short distance to the edge of our ramshackling encampment to smoke and gaze out into those mysterious sands. [01:35] I had just lit a cigarette when I saw in a distance, out, amidst the desert, the figure of a man, who appeared to be moving towards us with some rapidity. [01:47] It soon became apparent that the fellow was a native who belonged to no tribe with which I was familiar. [01:53] Some sinister purpose seemed to me to be revealed in the silent implacability of his approach. [02:01] And as I watched him draw near, I felt, as I never had before, an overwhelming presentiment of evil.