A Scandal in Bohemia

One night Dr. Watson was returning from attending a patient, and Sherlock Holmes spotted him and called him to his house. As they were talking Holmes received a letter and read it out loud to Watson. The letter said that there was a gentleman who required his services upon a matter of deepest importance. They were both suspicious about it, because the letter didn’t have an address or name in it. The mysterious person comes, and reveals himself as the king of Bohemia. He said that there was a woman named Irene Adler who was trying to ruin him, because she wanted  to make public a photograph of them on the day of the king's engagement with the daughter of the king of Scandinavia, that was planned to be announced in three days. Since the king of Scandinavia was very strict, he would get in trouble, and his engagement would be at risk. 

He said money was not an issue, and he wanted the picture back no matter the price.
The king said that he had hired burglars and thieves, but they could`t never find it. Sherlock Holmes followed Irene Adler to a chapel, and saw that she was getting married with another man. Dr. Watson and Holmes planned something to retrieve the photo: Holmes dressed as an old man, and Watson as a criminal. Watson was “beating up” Holmes in front of Irene`s house, and she came out to help him. She placed him in a couch, and Holmes was acting like a dying man. When Adler went to bring him a cup of water, Holmes opened a window and gave Watson the signal to fire a smoke bomb. When Adler came to the room she quickly went to grab the photo, and Holmes saw where she was hiding it. Then she recognized him, then she knew it was acted. The next day Sherlock Holmes and Watson went to Irene Adler`s house, since Holmes already knew the location, but he didn’t find anything. The house keeper said that she went out of Bohemia with her new husband, and that she had left a letter for him. When they both read it, they found out how clever she was. She took the picture and promised that she would keep it as a security against any actions the king would take against her in the future, but she would not use it to harm him. 

I really liked this short story, because it`s is full of mysteries. At first I thought that Irene Adler was a bad person. I thought that she really wanted to blackmail the king to get an economic benefit, but I think she was trying to defend herself, or perhaps she even was in love with the king, and that is why she was acting the way she did it. I also think that the king had some sort of feelings for her, but he preferred the royal status of the new bride to be, who was the princess of Scandinavia. There is one part in which the king seems jealous that Irene Adler got married, and he said that she would have been an excellent queen, if she would have been part of the royalty. I like the way the author narrates the story, that one never knows what is going to happen. I thought that she was trying to ruin the king`s life, but she was really a victim of the king's affairs. He did not know how to treat women, and played with her feelings. Holmes at the end refuses an emerald ring that the king offered him to thank him for his job, but asked to keep a picture of her that the king had. I think this demonstrates that there are more important things than material things, and that there are values, like the ones she demonstrated that cannot be purchased.