Once or twice a year, upon occasion of a birthday or more commonly at Yuletide, it is considered custom to bestow a gift, a card or sentiment to those whom we deem close to us.

Somehow, down through the years, I had accumulated a fair boxful of china gewgaws, books, utensils, once wrapped in plain or decorated paper, tied with ribbon or with bow, handed to me with a smile, a wink or occasionally, embrace. A man may not, however, possess the necessary space to display such objects quite as much as he might wish to. For myself, and my own calling with my roaming regiment and then, latterly, at a succession of hotels in London, it took until I had set my boots upon firmer ground – namely 221B Baker Street.

The box had lain in storage for some months with certain other disjecta membra from my travels. When finally I came around to collecting the heavy parcel and transporting it to my small but cosy quarters upon the second floor, I had quite forgotten half of what it contained. In curiosity, then, I snapped the securing twine string with my pocket knife, and opened up the lid to peer inside:

Half a dozen pipes, far too ornate and oddly shaped for commonplace.

Embroidered handkerchiefs (a great many: initialled, flowered, patterned).

Pen wipers, match-book holders, a silver engraved card case, a pewter tankard, a china ashtray, several volumes of folk stories.

I lifted out the ashtray, unwrapped it from its protective cotton. A gift from Murray, my faithful orderly, I seemed to recall, before our parting. A delicate white china, a reclining, smiling lady in high relief upon its rim. A small black cat, attentive, crouched by her side. Upon the outer edge, a quotation neatly painted:

"Where there's a cat, there's a mouse."

Astonished this humble artifact had survived the knocks and rattles of rough foreign roads, I remembered, then, that Holmes had complained only the other day of a dearth of ashtrays in our sitting-room. Stubs and butts aimed at the fireplace tended to be somewhat hit-or-miss, and a sound scolding from Mrs. Hudson seemed likely imminent. With this in mind, I held on to my prize and trotted downstairs to my friend.

Sherlock Holmes was, at that moment, seated at the breakfast table and engaged in examining a bootlace at close quarters. He set down his magnifying glass – guiltily, it appeared to me – as I entered the room.

"Watson," said he, "Well, well. Where have you been? What are you up to? What do you have there?"

"A pocketful of spare letter 'W's. I heard that you were running short." Chuckling, I set the ashtray on the table. "Actually, I have this. It is for us both to use."

He stared at the china, frowning. He prodded at it, shunting it several inches across the plain cloth with the handle of his lens.

"What is it?" he enquired at last.

"For heaven's sake, my dear fellow. It is clearly an ashtray."

"It has a woman stuck to it."

"Yes," I replied patiently. "As a decoration."

"Why is she laying down? Was the craftsman unable to fathom how to model a chair? Is she detachable?" my friend asked, petulant. He tapped at it again with his handle.

"I regret that she is not," I said. "And you need not use it if you do not wish to. I shall set it on the small table close to our armchairs, all the same. I find it rather charming."

I positioned the ashtray just so. Holmes regarded it suspiciously from across the room.

"But what does the wording mean?" said he. "There is no mouse."

"I do not know," I said, honestly. "The cat perhaps is looking for one and is cross that he cannot find it."

My friend exhaled loudly. Affecting irritation, he returned to his bootlace scrutiny.

And that, I supposed, to be the end of it. I returned upstairs to my room to unpack the remainder of my box. It did not take so very long. For there is a place for everything, and everything in its place. I looked around in satisfaction at my small collection of nostalgia. I rearranged several items. I opened my bedroom window to let in the air, and stood a moment to admire the majesty of the plane tree, now fully green and lustrous, in our yard. I very almost missed hearing the loud gasp that emanated at that second from below. The gasp turned to an exclamation. It was sufficient for me to turn and head downstairs again to trace its origin.

Holmes was standing by the fireplace, a lit cigarette gripped between two fingers, an elbow on the mantel. The expression on his face, when he turned it around to look at me, was scandalised.

"Watson!" said he.

At least, that was, I assumed, what my friend had attempted to say. It sounded more as the bleat of a lamb that has had its tail slammed in a barn door.

"Holmes!" I said. Then: "What have you done?"

By way of reply, he thrust out an indignant index finger towards the side table.

I looked. I could not see anything amiss.

My friend released an exasperated grunt. He moved to pounce upon the innocent ashtray that I had placed there only a short while previous, and to wave it in my face.

"Your... your... your thing," he said.

My bewildered expression infuriated him the greater.

"Look!" he squeaked. He turned over the ashtray to reveal its underside.

"Let me see that," I said, fascinated. I took the ashtray from him, lifted it to inspect it more closely. "My goodness, I never noticed that before."

For a section of the base had been carved away and smoothed, to reveal a secret from its topside, peeking through the hole. A lady's skirts rucked up, a pale and exposed rump, and there beside it, curled a tiny, hiding mouse.

I burst into laughter.

"Oh, you knew," said Holmes, accusingly. His cheeks were flushed high pink.

"I promise you, I did not," I said. "The ashtray was a gift. I never thought to peer at its bottom. Ha ha! Bottom... You do not approve," I added.

"I do not," said Holmes. "It is horrid." He sniffed. "Peculiar friends you have, Watson."

His disapproval only served to amuse me further.

"I am sorry," I said." I shall remove it so as not to irrevocably scar your sensibilities." I smiled. "But at least we found the mouse."

The little ashtray ended back inside my room, upon the dressing table.

And that should have been the end of it, except for the fact that it was not.

The following afternoon, I returned home from one of my pondering walks around London (a new routine of mine to stretch my weaker leg). I certainly did not expect to fling wide open the door to my room to find Holmes standing there, the guiltiest expression upon his face.

"Watson!" said he, "I – I can explain."

"I am sure that you can," I replied. "But allow me to do so for you. You crept into my room to ogle at my china ashtray, is that not the truth?"

"No!" He appeared horrified. "No, no!"

I shook my head.

"Then why else are you here?" I demanded. "Can a fellow not keep his own private space?"

"No!" said Holmes. He hesitated. "No, I mean, yes."

"No, you mean, yes?"

"No!" My friend tugged at his hair in confusion. "What?"

I sat down on my bedside chair and rubbed a hand across my face.

"Holmes," I said gently, "would you prefer the ashtray to be back in our sitting-room? I have no objection to that."

"But I don't want the dratted ashtray," said he, still all of a flap and flummox, his black hair wrenched up into mad tufts. "I-I-I want to be excused, please." He edged towards the door.

I waved him out, and heard him clatter gratefully down the stairs, the sitting-room door clicking shut in his wake. For a man possessed of genius such as Holmes so undoubtedly was, his emotional state was more often reminiscent of a nine-year-old child. I looked around the room. It was curious that the ashtray – for all the trouble it had caused – did not appear to have been displaced by the slightest fraction. I frowned. I looked about me again.

Holmes's head was bowed over his microscope when I entered our sitting-room. I walked over to his desk and sat down by him. A grey eye darted to me and away.

"Holmes, all of my bootlaces are missing," I said. I felt torn between trying to comfort the man or to throttle him. "Are you able to tell me why?"

"I borrowed them," he wailed, "to examine the various flecks of mud. I am hoping to write a monograph upon the subject." He flinched slightly. "Please don't hit me."

I stared at him dully. I looked down at his work table. My bootlaces were spread about it, higgledy-piggledy, like so many worms.

"A monograph upon mud flecks..."

"Yes," said he, uncurling a little and puffing up with pride. "There are more varieties in London than one might at first suppose. You take such interesting rambles, Watson."

I began to chuckle at my lunatic friend. He beamed at me broadly in return.

"Holmes, you might have just asked," I told him, "instead of creeping up into my room and ransacking my wardrobe." I paused. "You really weren't interested in that ashtray in the slightest, were you."

"Oh, Watson," said he, "do please give me some credit. What manner of man do you take me for?"

"A strange one," I said, with a clap to his back, "but one I am extremely honoured to call my friend."