The name of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle on a manuscript usually spreads feverish chequebook writing among book collectors.

But the latest to come on the market will test the bank balance of even the most ardent fan. The complete manuscript of a Sherlock Holmes short story, written in Conan Doyle's elegant hand and bound for the author himself, will be one of the highlights of the Antiquarian Book Fair in London today, with a price tag of £250,000.

The 28-page edition of The Disappearance of Lady Frances Carfax, written in 1911, is one of the few complete Sherlock Holmes stories to survive the squabbles, scandals and mysterious deaths that have cursed the Conan Doyle estate.

The story follows the cocaine-snorting, pipe-smoking sleuth as he solves the case of a rich, unmarried aristocrat who has vanished on the continent and is later found in a secret section of an old woman's coffin. If sold, it will be the most expensive piece of Sherlock Holmes memorabilia since the original manuscript of The Sign of Four fetched $470,000 (£243,000) at Sotheby's in New York in 1996.
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"I think the price is justified," said Mark Hime, the Beverly Hills-based dealer who purchased the manuscript from an American businessman who had bought it at auction in the 1970s.

"There isn't another equal manuscript out there for less, or a better one for the same price."

Mr Hime sold another rare Holmes manuscript - a handwritten copy of the novel The Valley of Fear - for a similar price seven years ago and is optimistic that he will find a buyer.

Last month a rare first edition of the first Sherlock Holmes story, A Study In Scarlet, fetched £15,500 at auction after it was discovered in an Oxfam shop in Yorkshire.

In May 2004 a long-lost collection of the author's notebooks, sketches and correspondence was sold by Christie's in London for nearly £1million.


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