title: A Desert Drama
author:  Arthur Conan Doyle 
description: The life of Arthur Conan Doyle illustrates the excitement and diversity of the Victorian age unlike that of any other single figure of the period. At different points in his life he was a surgeon on a whaling ship; a GP; an apprentice eye-surgeon; an unsuccessful parliamentary candidate (twice); a multi-talented sportsman; one of the inventors of cross-country skiing in Switzerland; a formidable public speaker; a campaigner against miscarriages of justice; a military strategist; a writer in a range of forms; and the head of an extraordinary family. In his autobiography, he wrote: 'I have had a life which, for variety and romance, could, I think, hardly be exceeded.' He was not wrong. But Conan Doyle was also a Victorian with a twist, a man of tensions and contradictions. He was fascinated by travel, exploration, and invention, indeed all things modern and technological; yet at the same time he was also very traditional, voicing support for values such as chivalry, duty, constancy, and honour. By the time of his death in July 1930 he was a celebrity, achieving worldwide fame and notoriety for his creation of the rationalist, scientific super-detective Sherlock Holmes; yet at the same time his later decades were taken up with his advocacy of the new religion of Spiritualism, in which he was a devoted believer.
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  A Desert Drama
  
  
    
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER I  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER II  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER III  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER IV  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER V  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER VI  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER VII  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER VIII  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER IX  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER X
  
  
  
  
  
  This page formatted 2007 Blackmask Online.
  
  
  # A Desert Drama
  
  
  ### A. Conan Doyle
  
  
  This page formatted 2007 Blackmask Online.
  
  http://www.blackmask.com  
    
  
  
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  [CHAPTER X
  
  
  
  
  
  * * *
  
  
  Produced by David Widger
  
  
  A DESERT DRAMA
  
  BEING
  
  The Tragedy of the Korosko
  
  
  BY
  
  A. CONAN DOYLE
  
  WITH THIRTY-TWO FULL-PAGE ILLUSTRATIONS BY S. PAGET
  
  PHILADELPHIA
  
  J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY 1898
  
  [Illustration: Frontispiece p78]
  
  [Illustration: Titlepage]
  
  TO MY FRIEND JAMES PAYN IN TOKEN OF MY AFFECTION AND ESTEEM
  
  
  PREFACE
  
  This book has been materially enlarged and altere