The Speckled Band (1931 film) Rylott screams. Holmes, Watson, and Helen enter his room and discover Rylott dead from a snake bite. Holmes forces Ali, the servant, to charm the snake so they can put it in the safe. Violet's last words about a "speckled band" were in fact describing "a swamp adder, the deadliest snake in India." The venomous snake had been sent to Violet's room by Dr. Rylott to murder her for her inheritance. Rylott had intended to do the same to Helen. The movie ends with Holmes conducting an experiment in Baker Street. Watson arrives dressed for a wedding, and Holmes therefore
The Preserving Machine (short story) chaotic, with all their beauty and harmony lost. The Preserving Machine (short story) "The Preserving Machine" is a science fiction short story by American writer Philip K. Dick. It was first published in 1953 in the "Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction", and is included in a later collection of the same name, "The Preserving Machine". "The Preserving Machine" was originally a companion piece to another Doc Labyrinth story, "Left Shoe, My Foot", later published as "The Short Happy Life of the Brown Oxford". Doc Labyrinth fears for the safety of the fragile works of high culture, particularly classical music,