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Chapter Text

1. Full Moon, Saturday Night

“Push, Louella,” John said. “Push hard.”

“No!” the girl on the exam bed cried. She tried to struggle away, but another contraction seized her, and she howled in pain.

John gritted his teeth and tried to remember to smile. “You’re doing fine, Louella. Another few pushes, and you’ll have your baby.”

“I’m not having a baby!” Louella snapped.

“Yes, you are,” Louella’s mother said, peering over John’s shoulder. “I can see it coming right out of you.”

“It’s not a baby,” Louella said. “I ate something bad tonight. It’s stomach cramps, it is!”

“Mrs. Parsons, you’re not exactly helping,” John said.

Louella’s mother laughed. “Well, we thought it was stomach cramps, didn’t we? Came straight to A&E. But it looks like we were wrong.”

“I’m not wrong!” Louella said.

John could see the baby’s head emerging. “Can I have a cot and a warming lamp over here?” he called to a nurse. “Push, Louella.”

“I’m not having a baby!” Louella screamed, just as the head emerged fully.

“Louella, you are fifteen years old,” Mrs. Parsons retorted. “I’m your mum. I think I know better than you when you’re having a baby and when you’re not.”

“And I’m a doctor,” John added, wiping the baby’s nose and mouth with a wad of gauze. “And there is a baby that is nearly here and wants just one more little push, Louella.”

“No!” Louella screamed. “I am not having a baby!”

The baby’s body slid free, and John caught the little girl and transferred her to the cot. “Louella, it’s a girl. Would you like to see?”

“Oh, she’s adorable,” Mrs. Parsons cooed. “She looks just like you when you were a baby.”

Louella pushed herself up on her elbows. “That’s not my baby.”

John clamped off the cord. He almost offered Mrs. Parsons the honour of cutting the cord, but he caught a glimpse of her face and decided that he did not want her to have scissors in her hand at that moment.

“That’s your baby, all right,” Mrs. Parsons said. “So who else does she belong to?”

“I told you, mum, I haven’t got a baby!”

“Yes, you do! I saw it come out of you. So who’s the dad?”

A nurse arrived, and John gave her a weak smile. “I’m going to deliver the placenta. Wrap up the baby and call a social worker. Don’t leave these two alone.” He turned back to Louella, who was currently arguing with her mother about whether a non-existent baby could have a father. “Sorry to interrupt this tender mother-daughter moment, but I need you to push again.”

“I’m not having another baby,” Louella moaned.

“No, you’re having a placenta. Just do this quickly and you can go back to discussing ownership of the lovely little girl in the cot.”

After the birth was completed and the Parsons family left in the care of the social worker, John retreated to the break room for a cup of strong tea. He was contemplating whether or not to add sugar when Dr. Wendy DeNora, the A&E chief, walked in, carrying an armful of charts, her hair straggling down from its chignon.

“Dr. Watson,” she said, “I cannot tell you how grateful we are that you were able to work tonight. And how sorry I am that this was your first day with us.”

John smiled. “Well. I saw worse in Afghanistan.”

Dr. DeNora laughed. “Ah, but the night is still young. And they’re still coming in.”

John decided against the sugar in favour of a large gulp of tea immediately. “What’s up next?”

“You’ve got a choice.” Dr. DeNora consulted the first two charts. “Arse full of darts from a pub bet in one, and, in two, a granny stabbed with a knitting needle by a jealous rival at the care home.”

“Lovely. And the third?”

Dr. DeNora glanced at the other chart, and a puzzled frown crinkled her brow. “Er . . . stigmata.”

John opened his mouth, and then recalled that he lived with Sherlock Holmes, and a patient complaining of stigmata was not, in fact, the strangest thing he had heard all week. “Saturday night, I suppose,” he said. “I’m C of E, so I’ll give the stigmata a miss. How about I take the pub bet?”

Dr. DeNora flashed him a grateful smile. “Would you? I’m pants at making small talk about football.”

Just as John reached out to take the chart, the intercom crackled to life. “Royal London A&E personnel, please stand by. Gas explosion in Whitechapel, four minor, two moderate injuries coming your way, ETA five minutes. Minor burns and smoke inhalation.”

John and Dr. DeNora exchanged worried glances. John took another swig of his tea, and then they both rushed out into the main A&E area. “Clear the trauma centre,” Dr. DeNora ordered. She handed the charts to a resident. “Find some medical students. If one of them knows about football, that’s a plus. And call in Psych for the stigmata.”

“For the what?” the resident asked, but Dr. DeNora was already racing for the ambulance bay, with John hot on her heels.

The first trolleys were already coming in, and John’s heart chilled when he saw police uniforms. He nearly stopped breathing altogether when DI Lestrade and DS Donovan were wheeled in, grimy with soot and gasping in oxygen masks.

“Smoke inhalation,” the paramedic said. “Male victim’s a bit scorched on his left arm, minor second-degree flash burn, his jacket took the worst of it. Female victim has a sprained knee.”

“Thanks.” John took Lestrade’s trolley and wheeled him into an exam area. Lestrade cracked his eyes open and slowly focussed on John.

“John Watson,” he croaked. “Fancy . . . meeting you here.”

“I work here,” John said, clipping a pulse oxygen probe to Lestrade’s finger. “What’s your excuse?”

Lestrade choked out a laugh that quickly became a cough.

“Right,” John went on. “That’ll be a chest X-ray for you.” He signalled to a nurse. “CBC, metabolic profile and blood gas, and he’ll need a chest X-ray.” He picked up a pair of scissors and began to cut away Lestrade’s burned jacket sleeve.

“Started out as a murder,” Lestrade gasped. “Abandoned council house, in Whitechapel. Routine. I . . . I only called Sherlock because . . . because I wanted it done . . . quickly, so I could get home . . . end of my shift.”

John paused, scissors still in hand. “Sherlock was there?”

“Don’t know . . . what happened. The building . . . suddenly on fire.” Lestrade took a deep pull at his oxygen mask. “Sergeant Donovan got me out . . . I tripped and fell on her . . . sprained her knee . . . sorry.”

Donovan gave a weak chuckle from the next bay. “You can fetch my tea, till I can walk again.” She turned her head and seemed to register John for the first time. “The Freak’s fine, last I looked,” she said. “Got there just as the place blew, I suppose. Last I saw, Anderson was sitting on him, trying to keep him from running inside. Lunatic.”

She had no time to say anything else, as an orderly wheeled her away to Radiology. But her words were enough to calm John’s racing heart so that he could assess Lestrade’s burn, tape a temporary dressing over it, and send him away for X-rays of his own. He moved to the next police constable, and then the next.

“Dr. Watson.” All of a sudden, Dr. DeNora was at his side. “Are you all right? You’ve gone white as a ghost.”

John forced a smile. “Fine. It’s just . . . my flatmate – my friend was at that fire.”

Dr. DeNora frowned. “Shall I send you home? Won’t affect your hire, you’ll finish out your assignment here.”

“No, I’m fine. Can’t do anything about it now.” John took a deep breath. “If he’s hurt, I’ll find out. Meanwhile, I’d rather be working. Keep my mind off of it.”

“All right. But let me know if you need a break.”

“Actually . . .” John glanced around the trauma centre, where the initial flurry of activity was beginning to die down as the fire victims were assessed and sent for X-rays or burn treatment. “Something else, just to clear my head. Shall I have a look at the stigmata?”

Dr. DeNora laughed. “Be my guest.”

John worked steadily through the night. After a confusing forty minutes spent explaining to a distraught young man that the wounds on his hands and feet came from an ordinary kitchen knife rather than the Holy Spirit and that, yes, antipsychotics did have to be taken on a regular schedule regardless of how one felt that day, he went to the next bay, where DS Donovan was back from Radiology. He wrapped her knee in an elastic bandage and laid cold packs on either side.

“You’re worried about him,” Donovan said.

John nodded. There was no need to name names in this conversation.

“Don’t be. He’s weird and crazy, but he’s not stupid. Anderson was holding him back, but he stood down when he saw Lestrade and me coming outside.”

“That’s good. That’s good of him.” But just to be sure, John patted the pocket where he kept his mobile. “Be back in just a tick.”

John waited until he was on the other side of the curtain to check his messages. Nothing. Well, Mycroft would alert him if there were any cause for alarm. He went to the supply cabinet and fetched a knee brace for Donovan, and put in an order for crutches. She’d need them once she was discharged.

Dawn was just beginning to glow over the city when John’s shift ended. Weary and impatient to be home, he didn’t bother to wash his face, but simply changed his green scrubs for his regular button-down shirt and trousers and shrugged into his jacket. The Tube was mercifully empty at this hour, the end-of-the-night bar crowd gone home, giving way to early Sunday morning calm. At last, the train pulled in to Baker Street station, and John found the energy to sprint around the corner and down the street to his front door.

He barely remembered to shut the door gently so as not to disturb Mrs. Hudson, but as soon as he mounted the stairs to his front door, he saw that he need not have bothered. Filthy and dishevelled, Sherlock was pacing back and forth in the sitting room, ignoring the cup of tea that Mrs. Hudson tried to offer him. She smiled in relief when she spotted John.

“Oh, John, dear, I’m so glad you’re here. There’s been the most awful fire, and Sherlock simply won’t calm down.”

John nodded to her. “Yes, I know.” He caught Sherlock’s arm as he approached. “Sherlock. They’re going to be fine.”

Sherlock paused in his pacing and blinked at John. “What?”

“Lestrade and Sergeant Donovan. They were brought to the Royal London. I helped to take care of them. They’re going to be all right.”

“Lestrade?”

John checked his watch. “They had him in for observation and oxygen for a few hours. He should be discharged fairly soon, and they’ll send him home. Donovan’s going to be on crutches for a bit, but they are both going to be fine.”

Sherlock blinked, as if he were not sure what to do with this information. Before he could wave it away, John took advantage of his momentary silence to lead him to the kitchen table. “Sit down, I want to take a look at you.”

“I’m fine,” Sherlock mumbled.

“I spent half of my shift worrying about you. Indulge me for five minutes.” John quickly looked in Sherlock’s eyes, ears, nose and throat, and felt along his limbs. He discovered a few bruises on Sherlock’s arms, which he guessed came from the force with which Anderson had had to restrain him. But Anderson had done a good job, and Sherlock was otherwise unharmed by the fire. John allowed himself to sag with relief.

“You’re fine.”

Sherlock snorted. “That’s what I said.”

“Have a cup of tea with Mrs. Hudson. I’ll – I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

John ignored the puzzled look Sherlock shot him and stumbled off to the lavatory. He locked the door and sat down on the edge of the bathtub. Finally alone, he scrubbed his hands over his face and took a few deep, shuddering breaths. And if some moisture happened to leak from his eyes, it was certainly a side effect of adrenaline withdrawal, not overwhelmed tears at all.

Chapter Text

2.  The Noise Of Wings

Sherlock watched in uncomfortable silence as John stumbled off in the direction of the lavatory.  His intellect told him that John must have been worried about him for hours, on top of the stress of having to treat injured police officers who were also his friends, and that this stress had combined with John’s lingering PTSD to trigger an emotional overload.  It did not take a mind of his calibre to make those connections.  But Sherlock did not know what to do with the strange feelings that this realisation stirred in his own gut.  Clearly, some of John’s upset had rubbed off on him.  He wanted John to feel better, partly because it was a bad thing when John was upset, and partially, he realised, because it would make him feel better, too.

His own upset was compounded when he realised that, although he had identified the problem, he had no idea how to solve it.  He glanced at Mrs. Hudson for inspiration, for she always seemed to know how to soothe people.  But Mrs. Hudson just gave him a sad little smile.

“Drink your tea, dear,” she said.  “Don’t worry.  John will be fine.”

“Are you sure?” Sherlock asked.

Mrs. Hudson nodded.  “He’s had a fright,” she said.  “He just needs a few minutes to himself.  Drink your tea, and he’ll be right as rain in just a bit.”  She patted his shoulder and went downstairs.

Sherlock cast one more glance at the closed lavatory door, and then sipped at his tea.  It was only lukewarm, but it was still oddly comforting.

By the time that John emerged, smiling and smelling of soap, Sherlock had made a plan.  He presented John with a plate containing two slices of buttered toast, with a generous dollop of marmalade on the side.  John blinked at it.  Sherlock could see questions flitting through John’s eyes, and he wondered which one John would choose.

In the end, John settled for one that was disappointingly predictable, yet still vague enough to retain some sense of possibility.  “What’s this?”

“Toast, John.  Two slices of wholemeal bread, browned by exposure to dry heat, commonly known as the Maillard Reaction.  Spread with cow’s milk fat that has been separated –“

“Yes, yes, I learned basic chemistry in school, too.”  John took the plate from Sherlock and took it to the breakfast table in the sitting room.  “Why have you done something so suspiciously thoughtful as make it for me?”

Sherlock noted with some gratification that John’s suspicions did not prevent him from smearing a corner of one piece of toast with marmalade and taking a bite.  “You’ve just returned from a physically and, I suspect, emotionally stressful shift in one of London’s busier A&E departments.  You need nutrition and energy before we go out this morning.”

“Oh, God.”  John ran his hand through his hair.  “We’re not going out this morning.  Why are we going out this morning?”

“I need to examine the site of the fire.  Last night, the fire fighters cleared the area, said it would be hours before they could put the fire out, and longer before the site would cool enough for investigation.  It has to have cooled enough by now.”

John swallowed a bit of toast.  “You want to go investigate the fire?”

“Of course.  With Lestrade incapacitated, I shudder to think of the idiots who will be --“

“All right."

Sherlock blinked.  “What did you say?”

“All right.”  John smiled at him.  “I understand.  I saw the bruises on your arms.  I’ll come with you.  But only for a few hours.  I absolutely must sleep this afternoon, or I will be useless as an emergency physician.”

“Well, then.  Fine.  Finish your toast.”  Sherlock sat back and watched John eat.  He wondered briefly what John had meant about the bruises on his arms, but when a possible explanation began to worm its way into his mind, he quashed it ruthlessly.

By the time that Sherlock and John arrived at the site of the fire, the ruined building had attracted a squad of fire investigators.  Sherlock appreciated the tape that they had helpfully placed around the perimeter, but he did not appreciate the way that they were surely trampling delicate evidence into the ground.  He ducked beneath the tape and strode over to the chief fire investigator.  Sherlock had not worked a fire for some time, and he did not know this chief.  In that case, he decided, the best defence would be a good offence. 

“Good morning, traffic was awful,” he said.  “Let’s get started.  Show me where the body was found, and I’ll take it from there.”

The fire investigator turned around, startled.  “What?  Who are --?”

“Oh, God, not you!”

Sherlock turned around and simmered with renewed exasperation when he saw Detective Inspector Dimmock picking his way through the rubble.  “Dimmock.  I hope your men haven’t spoiled too much.”

“Not you,” Dimmock said.  “Go home.  You’re not wanted here."

“Excuse me,” the fire investigator put in.  “Who is this man, Dimmock?  Do you know him?”

Sherlock turned to him.  John nudged his ankle, and he remembered to smile.  “Sherlock Holmes, consulting detective."

“He’s a bloody nuisance, is what he is,” Dimmock grumbled.  “Sherlock, you’re really not wanted here.”

“There was a murder,” Sherlock said, gritting his teeth.  “I was called in.”

Dimmock shook his head.  “Lestrade called you in.  But he’s on medical leave now, and off this case.  Nothing here for you.  Just some junkie knifed in an abandoned building.  Even our puny minds can handle that one.  Go away.”

“Sorry, I think I missed something,” John put in.  “Was it a fire or a murder?  Lestrade wasn’t able to tell me very much.”

Dimmock stared blankly at John for a moment, and then recognition flashed in his eyes.  “Right, I remember you.  You’re Sherlock’s doctor friend.”

“Yes,” John said.  “And I was part of the emergency team on duty last night when Lestrade was brought to the Royal London.  He’s going to be fine, thank you for asking.  So what happened here?”

The fire inspector brightened.  “Oh, I’m glad to hear that.”  He held out his hand.  “Robert Collins, Chief Fire Inspector.  Greg Lestrade and I play poker together every month.”

“John Watson.”  John shook hands with Collins, in that easy way that Sherlock could never quite replicate.

“I don’t know all the details,” Collins said. “Dimmock can probably fill you in a bit more.  We got the call last night that this building had caught fire with police inspectors inside.  No obvious cause, but the cheap construction, we’re thinking gas leak.”

Sherlock looked around at the ruins of a building that had clearly been long abandoned, and knew that any gas service had to have been shut off years ago.  But he held off on mentioning this fact in the hopes that Collins or Dimmock might reveal something else useful.

“Some kids, out on a dare, they found a body in here, called the police,” Dimmock said.  “Lestrade and his team were investigating that call when the place burned.  It’s not a complicated case, honestly.  Single knife wound to the chest, the body’s already been sent to the mortuary for identification.  Just a homeless junkie, no need to be calling in Sherlock Holmes.”

Sherlock considered all the homeless men he knew.  “Knifed by his dealer.  Get his dental records, get his name, and I’ll have his murderer for you by the end of the day.  There.  Doesn’t that save you some precious time, Dimmock?”  Just then, the wind shifted, bringing a very particular odour to Sherlock’s nose.  “And it wasn’t a gas leak.  This was arson.”

Sherlock picked his way through the rubble, keeping his face to the breeze, following the one scent among the thousand other ambient smells that would lead him to the evidence he needed.  In the back of his mind, he registered that John was hurrying after him.  That was good.  He set that information aside and followed his nose to a charred corner that had once been piled high with assorted rubbish.  He pulled on his gloves and began to sort through the remains.

It wasn’t easy.  The arsonist was good, and even Sherlock Holmes had to look three times before he found the scrap of burned rubbish that he wanted.  Gently, he picked up the half-melted bottom of a milk jug and the bit of carrier bag that clung to it.  They reeked of burnt plastic, but beneath that, Sherlock could smell petrol.  “I found it, John,” he said.

There was no reply.  Sherlock turned around and saw that John was not at his side.  He stood up and looked around, and spotted John a few feet away, on the other side of the room.  He was staring into a hole in the wall.

“Sherlock,” John said quietly.  “Run outside and get Dimmock and Collins in here.  There’s another body.”

Sherlock was happy to oblige, as it meant that he could sneak a bag for his bit of rubbish in the process.  He led Dimmock and Collins back to the room where John was now crouching down, reaching into the hole.

“What is it?” Dimmock asked.  “What have you found?”

Collins glanced into the hole.  “Oh, dear Christ.”

Sherlock peered over his shoulder.  The corpse was thoroughly burned, curled into a foetal position in a tiny crawl space.  It was impossible to tell if it was male or female, but it was small enough to suggest that it might have been an adolescent.

Dimmock moved away to radio for a medical team.  Collins pulled out his official camera and began to photograph the corpse.  Sherlock tugged at John’s sleeve. 

“We can go home now,” he said.  “You can sleep.  I’ve seen all that I need to see.”

John followed him as they left the building.  He didn’t speak until they were settled in a cab.  “Find anything useful?”

Sherlock held up the bag with the bits of milk jug and carrier bag in it.  “There was no gas leak.  This was arson.”

John sighed.  “And that’s also evidence you’re stealing.”

“Borrowing.  I’ll give it back once I can tell them what they need to know about it.  Did you get anything from the second body?”

“Not much.”  John shrugged.  “You didn’t give me much time with it, and as I keep trying to tell everyone, I’m not a pathologist.  Molly can probably give you more details than I can.  But I can tell you one thing.  Whoever it was, they didn’t die in the fire.”

Sherlock raised his eyebrows at John to encourage him.  He always enjoyed hearing John’s logic, which was improving, and developing along a fascinatingly different path to Sherlock’s own.

“Flash fire like that, I saw a few in Afghanistan,” John said.  “You wouldn’t expect to see a body so . . . so composed.  Even if they were overcome by fumes or smoke.  That body was carefully positioned in that little space, whatever it was.  Someone put it there before the fire was set.  How long before, I don’t know.  You’d have to ask Molly.”

It looked as though a trip to Barts and an afternoon spent putting up with Molly simpering at him while he tried to work was unavoidable.  But, Sherlock decided, it could at least be postponed.  He could wait until the bodies had been identified, solve the junkie’s murder and get it out of the way, and then devote the rest of the time to the mystery corpse.  And in the meantime, he still had his milk jug and carrier bag to examine.  There was a story in those bits of rubbish just waiting to be told.

John had started to sag against Sherlock, but the cab arrived at Baker Street before he could pass out completely.  Sherlock nudged him awake and paid the driver, and they climbed the stairs to their flat.  John stopped at the front door and gave an enormous yawn.

“I’m going to sleep now,” he said.  “I should be up in time for tea.  Try not to make too many loud noises, and don’t burn down the flat.  One building fire is plenty.  Have fun with your experiments.”

He trudged up the second flight of stairs.  Sherlock watched him go, and then took his evidence bag into the kitchen.  In a way, this morning was ideal.  They had had a nice brisk trot around a crime scene, fresh enough that an important bit of evidence had not been disturbed.  Now John was asleep, conveniently out of the way, yet still reassuringly present, and Sherlock had most of the day free to work in the kitchen.  He could finish most of what he needed to know by tea time, and then he could go upstairs and knock on John’s door to wake him so that he could come downstairs and make a pot of tea.

With a contented smile, Sherlock donned vinyl gloves to protect the delicate evidence samples, set the bag on the table, and switched on his microscope.

Chapter Text

3.  A Drawing Band

A soft melody drew John from his sleep.  He cracked one eye open and registered that the melody was coming from his mobile.  A rarely used number flashed across the screen and instantly grabbed John’s attention.  He reached for the mobile, and harrumphed to clear the sleep from his voice before he answered.

“Mrs. Hudson, what a lovely surprise,” he said.  “You can always just come upstairs, you know.”

“Well, Sherlock’s done something to your kitchen again,” Mrs. Hudson replied.  “I didn’t like to go near it.  Takes days to get the smell out of my clothes.”

John squinted at the clock.  Half past four.  He had had a good six hours of sleep, but he still did not feel rested enough to be having this conversation.  “Thanks for the warning.”

“Anyway, I was thinking,” Mrs. Hudson went on.  “There’s something I’d been meaning to discuss with you boys.  Why don’t you come downstairs and have tea with me?  See if you can tear Sherlock away from whatever it is that he’s doing.”

“I would love that,” John said, meaning every word.  Now that he thought about it, there was a faint trace of a distressing smell wafting up the stairs.  “We’ll be down in a few minutes.  And I’ll make sure Sherlock changes his clothes.”

Not for the first time, John was grateful for whatever mysterious hold Mrs. Hudson had over Sherlock.  When the prospect of tea downstairs was dangled in front of him, he readily agreed to cover his current, rather aromatic, experiment with a bowl and put on fresh clothes, although he insisted on keeping the old ones ready so that he could change back afterwards.  “No sense in infusing another set of clothes,” he said, and John had to agree.

Mrs. Hudson was waiting for them with a smile, the good china, and a plate of chocolate digestives.  She squeezed Sherlock’s arm and made a little fuss about him.  Sherlock rolled his eyes for show, but John could see by his faint blush that he was enjoying it.  Sherlock confirmed this observation by giving John a small nod to indicate that John should sit in the armchair so that Sherlock could reserve for himself the privilege of sitting on the sofa next to Mrs. Hudson.  Mrs. Hudson poured the tea and passed the biscuits.

“I feel like I haven’t seen you two for ages,” she said.  “Sherlock’s got one of his experiments going again, and John, you’ve got yourself another new place."

“Yes, the Royal London Hospital A&E,” John said, taking a sip of tea.  “Had my first day of work yesterday.  Or night, really.  Saturday night shifts are always an interesting challenge.”

“I’m sure,” Mrs. Hudson said.  “They were talking on the radio this morning about that awful fire they had over in Whitechapel.”

“Yes, we got some of the wounded, but they’re going to be all right.”

“Well, I say they’re lucky to have had you as their doctor, John,” Mrs. Hudson declared.  John blushed at the compliment.  Sherlock sneered, although the effect was ruined by the biscuit crumbs at the corner of his mouth.

“That fire was arson,” Sherlock said.  “A bit longer in the kitchen, and I’ll have an analysis of the cause for the Chief Fire Inspector.  He won’t be able to blame this on a gas leak.”

“You’ll clean it up, of course?” Mrs. Hudson asked.  “I don’t feel right having something all smelling of petrol in the building.”

“As opposed to all the other hazardous and flammable chemicals you keep in your cleaning cupboard?” Sherlock retorted.

John slipped another biscuit into Sherlock’s hand to distract him.  “So, Mrs. Hudson,” he said.  “You said there was something that you wanted to discuss with us?”

Mrs. Hudson nodded.  “It feels a bit silly to ask, but . . . what do you boys think of having me as a landlady?”

John blinked in surprise.  That was not the question he had been expecting from Mrs. Hudson.  Next to her, Sherlock went absolutely still, frozen in the act of biting down on a biscuit.  Only his eyes moved, glancing frantically around the room as if searching for some clue to Mrs. Hudson’s imminent terrible demise.

Mrs. Hudson frowned at them in puzzlement for a moment, and then burst out laughing.  “Oh, boys,” she said.  “Silly boys.  It’s not like that at all.  It’s just that . . . well, all I meant was . . . here, look at this.”  She placed a folded newspaper on the table.  It was the section that contained the real estate adverts.  Several of them were circled.

Sherlock snatched up the newspaper before John could get much more than a glimpse of it.  “You’re planning to purchase another building.”

Mrs. Hudson nodded.  “I was having a chat with Mrs. Turner, and she told me that she was thinking of expanding.  The idea hadn’t occurred to me before, but why not?  People are always looking for a place to live.  I could cash in some bonds, enough for a down payment.  I mean, my new tenants wouldn’t be half as interesting as you two, but then, I wouldn’t live in that building.”

John couldn’t suppress a little giggle of relief.  “Expanding.  You’re expanding your business.  I think that’s a lovely idea.”

“So you’re satisfied with me as landlady?” Mrs. Hudson said. 

Sherlock opened his mouth, but John beat him to it.  “More than satisfied, Mrs. Hudson.  I think you’ll do very well with your new tenants.”

“You will, of course, maintain your primary residence in Baker Street,” Sherlock said, affecting indifference almost convincingly.

“Of course, dear,” Mrs. Hudson said, wrapping one arm around Sherlock.  “How many other tenants would know so many amusing things to do with grapes?  I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

To the untrained eye, nothing changed.  But John knew Sherlock, and he was glad to see him relax into Mrs. Hudson’s embrace.  “Let’s see those adverts,” he said.  “What sort of buildings are you thinking about?”

Sherlock spread the newspaper over the coffee table.  Mrs. Hudson showed them the pictures of buildings, and they spent an enjoyable hour deciphering the agents’ code and weighing the merits of each property.  By the time they finished their tea and all the biscuits, Mrs. Hudson had selected three buildings that she wanted to examine personally.  She underlined the telephone numbers listed in the adverts and said that she would phone the agencies first thing in the morning.

When they returned to their own flat, Sherlock insisted on changing back into his old clothes and continuing his noxious-smelling work.  John sighed, opened the windows in the sitting room, and began to flip through the file that contained their stash of takeaway menus.  He was contemplating the question of whether to order takeaway or simply go out to eat when Sherlock sprang to his feet with a satisfied “Ha!”

“Found what you were after?” John asked.

“Generic supermarket petrol,” Sherlock replied.  “Probably Asda.  No help there.  But it’s pure.”

“And the Dormouse said to Alice, ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’”

That brought Sherlock up short.  “What?”

John smiled at him.  “Don’t tell me you deleted Alice in Wonderland.”

“Of course not.  Far better than that idiotic Winnie the Pooh that Mycroft used to read to me.  But why are you misquoting Alice at me?”

“Just trying for – oh, I don’t know.  What do you mean, it’s pure?  Is that important in supermarket petrol?”

“Signature combination of additives and detergents.  It tells us that the petrol used to ignite the building in Whitechapel was never mixed with any other brand,” Sherlock said.  “Either purchased specifically for the purpose, or from a dedicated customer who never used any other brand in the car.  And it matches the remnants of the milk jug.  There are faint traces of a serial number, which come from a factory that makes milk jugs for Asda supermarkets.”

“Fantastic.”  John sighed.  “So you know that the arsonist likes to shop at the Asda.  That narrows it down to, what, how many Asdas are there in London?”

“Ten, maybe fifteen supermarkets,” Sherlock said. 

“So you’re going to check them all?  What about shops outside of London?  How do you know your arsonist is a Londoner?”

Sherlock shook his head.  “Arson is either a personal or a financial crime.  A derelict building like that, meeting grounds for junkies, there’s no insurance to collect on it.  No, someone wanted this building to burn.  The question is why.  Once we know why, we know who.”

He sank down into his armchair, but bounced up again a moment later.  “Post-mortem results.  John, I need post-mortem results on those two bodies.  How can I be expected to work without evidence?”

“Settle down, soldier,” John said.  He reached out and put a hand on Sherlock’s shoulder, stopping him before he could begin to pace.  “Look, even without the weekend interfering, some evidence takes time.  You’re a scientist, you know that.  Post-mortems take time.  People have to search databases to match dental records.  You can’t rush it.  You have to wait.”

“I can’t wait, John!” Sherlock cried.  “I’ve done everything I possibly can, and there still isn’t enough to keep my brain occupied.”  He glanced at the music stand in the corner.

John looked around the flat, but Sherlock’s violin was not in its usual place next to the stack of sheet music.  Nor was it propped against the armchairs, lying on the sofa or lurking beneath the coffee table.

“I sent it out to have the bow re-haired,” Sherlock explained with a groan.  “Even that takes too much time.  I should buy a jig and learn how to do it myself.”

John laughed.  “I’ll get you a tin whistle for Christmas.  That way, you’ll have something to play while your violin is in the shop.”  An idea struck him, and he released Sherlock long enough to dig Sherlock’s laptop out of the pile of old newspapers next to the sofa.

“Here.  Why don’t you do Mrs. Hudson a favour?  Look up those buildings she’s thinking about, see what you can find out about them.  That’ll give her something to go on when she goes out to inspect the properties.”

Sherlock looked down his nose at the laptop, but he did not immediately reject the idea out of hand.  John interpreted this to mean that his suggestion had been suitably entertaining, but that there was no way that Sherlock would admit as much out loud.  Still, it seemed to be safe to leave Sherlock alone for a few minutes so that John could order supper without having to worry about finding violent redecoration in the sitting room when he returned.

He left the sitting room to fetch his mobile, which he had left charging upstairs in his bedroom.  He paused just outside the door, and listened until he heard the soft clicking of laptop keys.  Smiling to himself, he went upstairs.

As luck would have it, John had just decided on saag paneer from the new Indian place up on Park Road when his mobile rang.  The screen displayed Sarah’s number, and John instantly decided that the saag paneer could wait.

“Hello, Sarah.”

“John, I’m so glad I caught you.”

John could practically hear the smile on Sarah’s face.  “I’m glad you caught me, too.  What’s going on?”

Sarah huffed out a little sigh.  “Listen, I know it’s totally last minute, but are you working tomorrow?”

John scrabbled through the drawer in his bedside table until he found his notebook.  He flipped through the pages until he came to the terms that he had written down when he had taken his most recent locum position.  “Er . . . not tomorrow, no.  I’ve got a stint at the Royal London for the next few weeks, but it’s Sundays and Mondays off.  Why?”

“I’ve just had a call from Dr. Milligan.  Her wife’s gone into labour, and they’re off to the hospital now.”

“Well, congratulations to both of them, in advance.”

Sarah chuckled.  “Yes, thank you, I’ll be sure to tell Dr. Milligan when I see her again.  But that won’t be till Tuesday – she’s asked for tomorrow off, which I gave her, of course –“

“Of course."

“—And I need someone to come in and cover for her.  Just for tomorrow, and I’d really prefer having someone who knows the place, so I don’t have to spend hours orientating them just for the one day, and I know it’s awfully late to call, and it’s still your weekend, but—“

John considered the refrigerator, which currently contained more food than body parts, and the flat, which he suspected would smell of pure ASDA-brand petrol for much of the next morning.  Then he considered the friendly smells of Sarah’s shampoo and her surgery, where children and old people came with minor complaints.  “I’d love to,” he said.  “Sherlock’s on a case, and I could do with a change of scene.”

“Oh, he is, is he?”  A sly note crept into Sarah’s voice.  “Good to know.  I’ll bet he’s been running you ragged.”

John shrugged, though he knew that Sarah couldn’t see it.  “Not yet.  But it’s inevitable.”

“Bet he hasn’t let you get a bite to eat, either.  One of my nurses just told me that there’s a new Indian place near you.  Apparently they do a marvellous saag paneer.”

John laughed.  “I was just about to phone them for takeaway.”

“No sense in letting Sherlock get his hands on it, not in the middle of a case.  Care to join me?  I can meet you there in twenty minutes.”

“I’ll be there.”  John ended the call, dragged a comb through his hair, and went back downstairs.  When he stopped off in the sitting room to fetch his jacket, he saw Sherlock on the sofa, looking thoughtfully at his laptop.

“Enjoy your dinner with Sarah,” Sherlock said, without looking up.

“What?  How did you --?”  John blinked.  “Was it my hair?  Something about my trousers?”

Sherlock shook his head.  “No.  This e-mail I just received.”  He turned the screen so that John could see it over his shoulder.

The e-mail was from Sarah, short and to the point.

Dear Sherlock,

John and I are going out for a bite, and then he will be working for me tomorrow.  If you disrupt this plan, I will see to it that you become his next patient.

Kisses,

Sarah

John gave a snort of laughter.  “Why is it always you who gets the kisses?” he said.  He gave Sherlock a quick pat on the shoulder, shrugged into his jacket, and left for dinner.

Chapter Text

4.  Song With No Name

Sherlock waited impatiently for the sun to rise on Monday morning, bringing both London and the labs at Barts to life.  John whistled as he descended the stairs, wearing the tie that he sometimes donned for work at small surgeries.  “Quiet day at a respectable job?” Sherlock said.  “You’re actually looking forward to it.”

John shrugged, his mood too good to be put off by Sherlock’s observations, and put bread into the toaster.  “I do appreciate the occasional break in my routine,” he said.  “Keeps me sharper for A&E work.  And it’s always nice to see Sarah.”

Sherlock chewed at his bottom lip while John’s back was turned.  “Is that what you want for yourself, then?” he asked, his voice quieter than before.  “A routine job in a dull little surgery of your own?”

John laughed.  “Oh, God, no!  You should see the paperwork Sarah has to deal with on top of her patient load.  And she’s good at it.  I’m a good doctor, but I’m a terrible administrator.  No, I like my life just the way it is, thanks.  Tea?”

“Please.”  Sherlock held out his mug, and once again, all was right with the world.

Shortly before nine o’clock, Sherlock let himself into the mortuary at Barts.  The pathologist who worked the graveyard shift was just packing to leave.  She waved Sherlock to a seat in the corner of the room.  “Molly’s running late today,” she said.  “She phoned about ten minutes ago, said there was a delay on the Tube.  Listen, I’ve got to get home, my husband will be wanting his breakfast.  Can I trust you to sit quietly until Molly gets here and not destroy anything until then?”

Sherlock considered his answer.  “No,” he said.  “I don’t think you can.  You’ve just discovered that your husband’s been eyeing the au pair – they haven’t slept together yet, small favours – and his roving eye combined with his apparent inability, make that unwillingness, to make his own breakfast at the ripe old age of thirty-nine has left you less than inclined to place trust in any man, or, for that matter, in any woman below the age of twenty-five.”

The pathologist clenched her fist, then deliberately inhaled and exhaled, opened her hand, and shoved her lab coat into her knapsack, rather more forcefully than was strictly necessary.  It was something that John would do occasionally, when he became frustrated.

“However,” Sherlock added, “I will assure you that I have no interest in destroying anything at the moment.  I require the assistance of Miss Hooper, and that is all that matters to me at the moment.”

The pathologist glared at Sherlock, and then stormed out of the lab.  Sherlock watched her go.  After the sound of her footsteps had faded away, he took his mobile from his pocket and selected a number from the speed dial.  It took a few moments for the call to be routed, longer than if it had been an ordinary number.

Mycroft answered on the second ring.  “Sherlock.  To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“That dispute you’re having with the Under-Secretary of State for Transport.  End it.  Now.  How am I meant to work if Molly’s train is delayed?”

“Why, Sherlock, how lovely to see you taking an interest in the affairs of the government after all,” Mycroft cooed.  “Mummy will be so proud.”

“If you’re looking for an incentive, try the middle right-hand drawer in your desk,” Sherlock replied.  “There’s a flash drive containing a video file.  You may find it of use.”

He heard the smooth sound of Mycroft opening the drawer, and a few clicks as Mycroft plugged in the flash drive and opened the file.  For a long moment, the only sound that Sherlock could hear was the jingling soundtrack of the video file.

“Good Lord,” Mycroft said.  “I had no idea.  I thought that had been banned years ago.”

“Obviously an oversight on someone’s part.”  Above the jingling, Sherlock heard the crack of wood against wood.

“That’s not . . . is that a bucket?”

“I think you’ll find that it is.”

“And . . . no.  The Archbishop of Westminster?”  To his credit, Mycroft’s voice did not crack, even when the concertina music on the video was briefly interrupted by a howl of pain.

Sherlock smiled.  “Shall I assume that the Tube will be running on time again within the hour?”

“Naturally.”

In fact, Molly arrived twenty minutes later, flustered and out of breath.  She dashed into the lab, and squeaked in surprise when she noticed Sherlock.

“Oh my goodness!” she cried.  “I didn’t see you there.”

“Obviously.”  Sherlock stood up and shed his coat and scarf.  “The Whitechapel fire victims.  What do you have for me?”

“Um . . .” Molly rummaged through a file on the desk.  “The older victim, that poor man.  They took dental impressions, but those haven’t come back yet.  The police didn’t find any identification on the body, but there was a tattoo on his upper back.”  She located a photograph and gave it to Sherlock.

The photograph showed an elaborate design that incorporated barbed wire, a skull, a dagger, and a calla lily.  Excitement flared through Sherlock’s veins when he saw it, and he snapped a picture with his mobile.  “Excellent.  I’ll have the body identified for the police before lunchtime.  What about the other body, the one that John found?”

“Wait, hang on,” Molly said.  “How are you going to identify a body from just that tattoo?  There must be hundreds of tattoos like that in the city.”

Sherlock sighed.  “Don’t try to act tougher than you are, Molly.  Trust me, fluffy suits you better.  If you knew anything about tattoos, you’d know that the wire, the skull, and the dagger are all much more common design elements than a calla lily.  The flower is usually a rose, but there’s one tattoo artist in London who doesn’t do roses.  Wife named Rose, died a few years after their marriage.  He does calla lilies instead.  He did this tattoo, and he keeps records of all his designs.”

Molly stared at him, and Sherlock could see the questions forming behind her eyes.  “No, he didn’t tattoo me,” he added.  “I know him through . . . an acquaintance.”  That seemed like the safest word.  Quickly, before Molly could pry any further, he asked, “What about that second body?”

Molly shook herself, and then led Sherlock to the slab where the other body lay beneath a drape.  She peeled the drape back just enough to expose the head, charred and melted, eye sockets empty above a gaping mouth.  “A girl,” Molly said quietly.  “Probably no more than fourteen or fifteen, judging by skeletal development.”  She handed Sherlock a folder that contained printouts of X-ray images.

Sherlock tucked the printouts into his coat pocket.  “Cause of death?”

“We don’t know yet,” Molly said.  “I can tell you that she was dead before the fire touched her.  There’s no soot or smoke residue in her lungs.  We’re still working on an ID for her.  Can’t use dental records, her teeth are missing.”

This was intriguing.  Sherlock snapped on a pair of gloves and probed the inside of the corpse’s mouth.  There was so much burn damage that it took him a few passes, but at last, his finger encountered the sharp edge of a broken tooth.  “Murder,” he announced.  “Teeth tend to survive fires.  Someone bashed all of hers out before the fire was set.  Didn’t want anyone to identify her that way.” 

As he turned to look at Molly, something caught his eye.  It was an oddly-shaped bit of metal, partially melted from the fire, wrapped around the corpse’s wrist.  “Molly, tweezers,” he said.

Molly wouldn’t let him have the tweezers, but pried the metal loose herself.  It was clearly the remains of a bit of jewellery, from the fragment of elaborately wrought chain that dangled loose from a flat metal bar on which the faint lines of old engraving could be seen.  Molly frowned at it.  “This looks like . . .” her voice trailed off, and her eyes went vague as she thought for a moment.  “When I was a kid.  The older girls at my school.  There was this, well, it was a fad.  All the older girls had these little name bracelets.  I wanted one, but my mum said we couldn’t afford it.”

“Hmm.”  Sherlock squinted at the bit of charred metal.  A name bracelet, probably plate, if it had been purchased for a child.  Would the engraving have been done personally, or would it have been bought already made, from a stack of popular names?  Even mass-produced, the bracelet might be able to help identify the girl.  Well, that was something that the police could use to amuse themselves.  Sherlock had more important things to do.  He took the bracelet from Molly and went into a corridor, where the mobile reception was better.

His first call was to the tattoo artist, who agreed to look at Sherlock’s photograph of the junkie’s tattoo and search his records for the recipient.  Sherlock texted the photo to the artist and only had to wait a few minutes before the artist replied with a single name.  Sherlock frowned when he saw it, as the man had been a useful member of Sherlock’s network on days when he was sober.  He sighed at the pointless loss of such a resource and rang Dimmock.

“Your murder victim is Reginald Washburn,” he said without preamble when Dimmock answered.  “Arrest his heroin dealer, Edgar ‘Snake-Eyes’ Duncan for the murder.”  He rang off before Dimmock could argue with him, returned to the morgue, and wrapped the remains of the name bracelet in a tissue.

“Taking this to the police,” he told Molly.  “Carry on.”

Dimmock had had a few choice words for Sherlock when Sherlock dropped the tissue-wrapped bracelet into his hand along with instructions to trace it to its last owner.  But the words were unimportant, the squawking protests of an idiot, and Sherlock nodded to himself as he left, observing in a security mirror as Dimmock handed the bracelet to a subordinate detective and murmured instructions in her ear.  With that end of the solution set in motion, Sherlock was free to apply his skills where they were truly required.  He caught a taxi and took it to the site of the fire in Whitechapel.

The ruin was still surrounded by crime scene tape, more as a precaution against curious children than anything else.  There were no detectives left on the scene, and only two constables remained to guard it.  Sherlock concealed himself in an alley behind a skip while he considered his next move.

The constables were very young, and both were clearly bored by their guard duty and wishing they were somewhere else more exciting.  A small, treacherous part of Sherlock winced at their predicament; it was a large part of the reason that he himself had not joined the Met after uni.  But sympathy for foolish young constables was distracting, and Sherlock pushed it away so that he could eavesdrop on their conversation.

For the most part, it was as inane as most of the conversations he overheard every day, but one of the constables had come across some moderately interesting gossip, which he elected to share with his companion.  It seemed that the building had recently been purchased by a developer who had planned on gentrifying the area.  Both constables sighed in sympathy with the man whose investment had been so capriciously destroyed.  Their sympathy lasted nearly three minutes, before they decided that it was time for a quick cup of tea.

Sherlock waited until they were suitably distracted by the steaming paper cups, and then slipped beneath the tape and picked his way through the rubble to the remains of the room where the dead girl had been found.  At the very bottom of the walls, he could still see the pattern of the ugly wallpaper that had decorated this room.  The pattern was all too familiar, burned into Sherlock’s brain from too many hours spent sitting on the floor staring at it while waiting for the hit that would focus his whirling thoughts into a laser beam of clarity.

If he closed his eyes, he could still see the room as it had been then.  Cold, dimly lit, smelling of urine and stale vomit, with mysterious stains on the horrible, peeling wallpaper whose origins even Sherlock did not dare to guess.  But there had been one corner of the room where the wallpaper did not peel, and where it was a shade brighter than the rest.  There had always been a table there, used for doing lines. 

His eyes still closed, Sherlock turned to orient himself towards the table in his memory.  When he opened them, he found himself staring at the small alcove where John had discovered the girl’s body.  He was quite sure that there had not been an alcove in that room when he had known it, which meant that it must have been blocked off many years earlier.  And that meant that the girl inside had been dead for a very long time before the fire that had exposed her and her murder to the light of day.

Sherlock smiled.  Between the fire and the two murders, Whitechapel was providing excellent entertainment.  He could easily go and investigate two or three Asda locations while he waited for Dimmock’s people to track down the source of the girl’s bracelet.  He was gone from the fire site before the constables had finished their tea.

Dimmock rang just as John’s footsteps sounded on the stairs that evening.  “Found what you wanted,” he said.  “I’m at the mortuary right now with your friend Dr. Hooper.  Can’t talk now.  Can you come over?”

“On my way.”  Sherlock strode out of the flat just as John reached the top of the stairs.  Without breaking stride, he turned John around and started down.  “Come along, John,” he said.  “We’re going to the mortuary.”

John sputtered something about having just arrived home, which was obvious, so Sherlock ignored it.  He did provide some mild entertainment in the cab by telling Sherlock about his day at Sarah’s surgery, and soon they were at the mortuary.

Dimmock met them at the door and steered them off to a side room.  “The bracelet was purchased in May of 1991 as a fourteenth birthday present for Lucy McMahon.  She was reported missing three months later.  Her parents are making the formal identification now.”

John frowned.  “Is that wise?” he asked.

Dimmock shrugged.  “Doesn’t matter,” he said.  “It’s done.”

As if on cue, the doors to the mortuary proper opened, and a man and a woman in their mid-sixties emerged.  They had clearly just had the shock of seeing their daughter’s charred body uncovered before their eyes; the man’s face was drained of all colour, and the woman was actively crying.  They stopped when they saw Sherlock, and the man raised weary eyes to him.

“You Sherlock Holmes?”

Sherlock nodded, readying himself for the punch that would surely result from the man having been forced to see his daughter’s corpse unnecessarily.

But the man did not punch Sherlock.  Instead, he held out his hand.  After a moment, feeling Dimmock’s eyes on him, Sherlock took it, a little warily.

“I’m Kevin McMahon,” the man said.  “I want to thank you.”

Sherlock blinked.  “What for?”

“For bringing my little girl home.”

Puzzled at this turn of phrase, Sherlock turned to John for help, only to find that John had slipped off to a far corner of the room to answer a call on his mobile.  Left to his own devices, Sherlock turned back to Mr. McMahon and nodded, just the way that John did when completing a tricky task.

“We won’t forget this,” Mr. McMahon said.  “Twenty years we’ve wondered, and now we have our answer.  Bess and I can rest tonight.  Now we know.”  He shook Sherlock’s hand, and led his wife away.

Sherlock watched them go.  He turned to ask Dimmock about the conversation that had just happened, but was distracted by a shout from John.

“What?” John cried into his mobile.  “Are you all right?  Where are you?  No, stay there, I’m coming to get you, right away.”  He flipped the mobile closed and gestured to Sherlock.

“Sorry.  Have to go.  It’s Harry.  There’s been another fire.”

He hurried out of the building, and Sherlock followed, caught in his wake.

Chapter Text

5.  City On Fire

As John strode through the corridors of Barts with Sherlock in tow, he only dimly heard the footsteps behind him and the crackle of a dispatch radio.  He was so focussed on reaching the street and finding a cab that he did not notice that Dimmock had run after them until he felt the man’s hand on his arm.

“Just got the call about the fire,” Dimmock said.  “They want all hands.  I’ll give you a lift.”  Without waiting for an acknowledgement, he steered John and Sherlock out to where his car was parked.

With judicious use of Dimmock’s portable siren, they sped through rush-hour traffic and arrived at a scene of chaos.  One building was on fire, blazing furiously, and it was clear that the firefighters’ main priority was preventing the fire from spreading.  People streamed out of the burning building and the buildings next door, some calm, some coughing, some panicking and pointing.  John leaped out of the car.

“Let me through,” he told the constables cordoning off the area.  “I’m a doctor.”

The constables stood aside, and John threaded his way through the crowd, bellowing Harry’s name.

After a few minutes that were more frightening that John’s entire tour of duty in Afghanistan, he spotted Harry waving at him through the crowd.  He hurried over to her and threw his arms around her, burying his nose in her dishwater-blonde bob, and breathing in the smell of smoke and sweat.  “Thank God you’re alive.  Are you all right?  Let me look at you.”

He steered Harry away from the worst of the crowd and sat her down on the kerb to examine her.  Harry’s blouse smelled of smoke, and she coughed roughly, but overall, she appeared more scared than hurt.

“I was at the club over there,” she said, pointing.  John must have made a face, because Harry grimaced back at him.  “Wasn’t like that.  It was a birthday party for Margaret, that’s Alice’s girlfriend.  I only had orange juice, I promise.  Next thing I know, all this smoke is pouring in, and we have to evacuate.  I was scared, I didn’t know what to do.  I couldn’t ring Clara, so I rang you instead.”

“I’m glad you did,” John said.  Harry huddled in a little ball on the kerb, and John put an arm around her shoulders.

“The club itself isn’t on fire,” came a sharp baritone observation.  Sherlock crouched down on Harry’s other side.  “It’s the building next door.”

Harry looked up, startled out of her shock.  “Yeah,” she said.  “The properties are connected.  I suppose that’s how the smoke must have got into the club.  God, Amanda’s going to be ruined – Amanda owns the club,” she added for Sherlock’s benefit.  “Bought it last year as a second career . . .”  Her voice trailed off, and she really looked at Sherlock for the first time.

“Oh my God!”  Harry tried to screech, but the cough at the end ruined the effect.  “You must be Sherlock!  I’ve read all about you on John’s blog.  Are you going to deduce everything about the fire, then?  Can I watch?”

“No,” Sherlock said.

“Aw, can’t I?  John talks about you all the time.”

“No, you can’t,” John put in, “because he’s going to stay here and look after you while I go and see if the paramedics need help.  And then we’re going to take you home.”

Harry pouted.  John rolled his eyes and turned to Sherlock.  “She’s fine,” he said in a low voice.  “She needs distraction more than anything else.  Feel free to tell her all about herself.  She’ll love it.”  He gave Harry a quick pat on the shoulder and strode back into the thick of the crowd.

In the end, he spent over an hour liaising between the police, the paramedics, and the overly helpful manager of the convenience store across the street, who was frantically attempting to donate his shop’s entire stock of first-aid supplies to the rescue effort.  Eventually, John managed to persuade him that the paramedics had plenty of their own supplies and that a better application of his philanthropic mood would be to pass out coffee and tea to people in need of a hot drink.  He located the hostess of the birthday party and confirmed that she had reserved the entire club for the event.  Together, they went over the guest list and checked the crowd until they were satisfied that each guest was properly accounted for.

After he was satisfied that the rescue efforts were well enough under way, he returned to the kerb where he had left Sherlock and Harry.  Harry was now wrapped in a bright orange blanket, and was deep in conversation with Sherlock, pointing at various parts of the burning building.

“Everything all right here?” John asked.

“Oh, fine,” Harry said.  “Sherlock is astonishing.  You didn’t ever say he was so . . . so . . .”  She waved her hands around in front of her, but couldn’t seem to find the perfect adjective to describe Sherlock Holmes.  “I suppose it’s just . . . he’s a Capricorn, isn’t he?”

Sherlock rolled his eyes behind Harry’s back where she couldn’t see.  John smiled.  “Best place for you is home,” he said.  “I’ll go to the main road, see if I can get us a cab.”

“No need, John.”  Sherlock punched a button on his mobile.  Within minutes, a large, sleek black car appeared, and John’s mobile chirped to alert him to an incoming text.

See your sister home safely.  Best – MH.

John glared suspiciously at the text.  He didn’t believe for a single instant that Mycroft had been motivated solely by friendly concern for the well-being of John’s sister.  But ulterior motives did not negate the presence of comfortable transport, and John decided yet again to take advantage of small favours.  “Come on,” he told Harry.  “Luxury delivery to your doorstep.”

He, Sherlock, and Harry slid into the back seat of the car.  Mycroft’s assistant was sitting on the jump seat opposite them.

“Address, please?” she asked.

John gave her Harry’s address as Harry gawked at her.  “Oh,” John said.  “Um.  This is my sister, Harry Watson.  Harry, this is . . . um . . . Anthea.  That’s not her real name.”

This earned them a miniscule, frosty smile aimed at Harry, before Mycroft’s assistant returned her full attention to her BlackBerry.

“Not bad,” Harry murmured appreciatively.  “Does she ever get any free time?”

“Yeah,” John said.  “Lots.  But not for the likes of you.  Or me.”

“Well, then.”  Harry lapsed into silence.

After they got Harry into her flat, John insisted on examining her once more.  Her cough had largely subsided, so John went into the kitchen to make tea, his usual prescription for patients who had been under stress.  While he waited for the kettle to boil, he took a bottle of milk from the fridge, surreptitiously checking to see what else lived there.  He saw more beer and takeaways and fewer vegetables than he would have liked.  On the other hand, he saw fewer human body parts than currently resided in his own fridge, so he supposed that Harry had that one up on him.

In the other room, Harry had flung herself down across the sofa, leaving the two Ikea armchairs free.  Sherlock already occupied one, and he and Harry appeared to be sizing each other up. 

“God, you were right about him,” Harry announced when John brought the tea in.  “He guessed I was an estate agent, right off.”

“I don’t guess,” Sherlock said.  “I know.  You referred to the burning building as a property.  That’s how an estate agent thinks.”

Harry laughed.  “You must be a scream at parties.  Yeah, Cocknell and Coague, six months now.”

“Really?”  This was news to John.  He’d known that Harry had been looking for a new position, but he hadn’t heard that she had found one.  For a moment, guilt at not seeing his sister more often flared in his stomach, but the lingering smell of beer in the air of Harry’s flat reminded him why he didn’t see her, and the flare died a quiet death.  He raised his teacup in Harry’s general direction.  “Congratulations.  Cocknell and Coague.  Why is that name familiar?”

“The building adverts in the paper,” Sherlock supplied.  “One of the buildings Mrs. Hudson liked.”

“Oh, right.”  John turned to Harry.  “Our landlady is thinking about expanding.  One of the buildings she’s considering is through your agency.”

Harry raised her eyebrows.  “Oh, really?  Which one?”  When John told her, she pulled herself to her feet and rummaged through some files in the cabinet next to her desk.  “Not one of mine,” she said, “but I can have a look at the specs when I go to work tomorrow.”

John frowned.  “Is that wise?  Just because I said you didn’t need hospital immediately doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t take a bit of a rest.”

“Wish I could,” Harry said, with a rueful grimace.  “But I’ve got to go in tomorrow.  It’s going to be a right mess.  That property that burned was one of ours, and there will be all sorts of emergency meetings about it.”

Sherlock straightened a little in his chair.  “That was how you knew that the ventilation systems between that building and the club were connected,” he said.

Harry nodded.  “Yeah.  I went out last week with the inspection team.  We’re a specialised company,” she added, nodding to John.  “We buy up older, abandoned properties, and we flip them.  Fix them up, and put them on the market at a profit.  That place next to the club was a recent purchase, and I was out with the team looking to see what improvements we’d have to make.”

Sherlock took out his mobile and was soon poring over information, lost to the world.  Harry glanced over at him and frowned.  “Sherlock?” she asked.  “You all right?”

John shrugged.  “He’s going to be like that for a bit,” he said.  “You’ve seen the fun part of what he does.  This is the down side.  So how is the new job?”

“Loads better than the old one.  Plus there’s a really adorable receptionist.”  Harry turned her head, but John could still see the blush crawling up Harry’s face.

“Yeah?”

Harry nodded.  “Long hair, dark, but kind of chestnut when the light hits it right.  Really sweet smile, full lips.  Killer tits.”

“A possibility?”

Harry smiled.  “Well, I don’t know for certain.  I know she’s single, but I don’t know if she likes girls or not.”

“Office grapevine could probably tell you.”

“Yeah, I know, but maybe I want to wait.  Pine a little.  That way, if she’s straight, I can have my fantasy for a bit first before I find out.”

John laughed and sipped at his tea.  He and Harry fought so much that he had nearly forgotten how pleasant it could be when they weren’t fighting.

Sherlock remained absorbed in his thoughts for some time, not appearing to notice when John declared that it was time for Harry to rest, made their goodbyes, and hauled him out of his chair.  Harry laughed as John walked Sherlock out onto the street, where the black car was waiting to take them home.  Between Sherlock and Mycroft’s assistant, the ride was eerily silent, and John found himself reciting the filthiest limericks he knew just to see if either of his companions would notice.  Neither of them did, although John thought he saw a twitch from the driver when he recited the one about the man named McSweeney.

Mrs. Hudson’s light was still on when the car drew up in front of their door, and John saw the curtain twitch as he prodded Sherlock out onto the pavement.  But when John opened the front door, it wasn’t Mrs. Hudson who was waiting for them.  Instead, it was Detective Inspector Lestrade, his arm in a sling, waiting just inside the door.

Sherlock glanced up from his mobile.  “Lestrade,” he said.

“You sure you ought to be here?” John asked, before he could stop himself.  “I thought you were off work.  How are the lungs?”

“Better,” Lestrade said.  “Not coughing nearly as much.  And I am officially on leave.  But that doesn’t mean I can’t keep up with the dispatches.”  He turned to Sherlock.  “Listen, I never said this to you, all right?  But get yourself down to the Yard tomorrow.  They need you.”

“What for?” Sherlock asked.

“Because – and I never said this to you, either – although our boy Dimmock is very keen, he’s not much in the imagination department.  He won’t think to call you, but twice on something like this isn’t a coincidence.”

“Excuse me,” John put in.  “Something like what?”

“What, hadn’t you heard?” Lestrade asked.

John shook his head.  “We had to go pick up my sister.  She’d escaped a building fire, and we took her home.  We just got back.”

“Oh.”  Lestrade rubbed his free hand down his face.  “I’d heard you were at the fire, I thought you were still there.  I suppose you didn’t hear, then.  They found another body.  Walled up, just like the last one.  Better preserved, though.  Dimmock’ll never admit it, but this is beyond him.  You’ve got to go down there and help him out.”

A slow smile spread across Sherlock’s face.  “No,” he said.  “I don’t fancy working with Dimmock, he’s an idiot.  Wouldn’t know murder if it was shoved in his face.  I need Watson.”

“Sorry,” John said.  “Shift at the Royal London tomorrow.”

“Not you,” Sherlock replied.  “Give me your mobile.”

“What?  Why?”  But John handed it to Sherlock anyway.

Sherlock called up John’s contact list and began to scroll through it.  At last, he settled on a name and fired off a quick text.  “Your sister,” he said, when he was finished.  “She can take me through that building.  It’s vital that I know something about it, and who better than the estate agent herself?”

John stared at Sherlock for a moment, and then burst out laughing.  “That’s fantastic!” he said.  To Lestrade, he added, “Harry was absolutely begging to see what Sherlock can do.”

“Well,” Lestrade said with a smile, “she ought to be careful what she wishes for.”

“Idiots,” Sherlock said.  But John detected a note of affection in his voice, and smiled as Sherlock pushed past him and Lestrade and headed up the stairs.

Chapter Text

6.  Time In A Bottle

The next morning, Sherlock added to his observations about Harry Watson the fact that she was punctual, at least when she was sober.  She met him at the new fire site at eight in the morning, as he had requested, and gave him a hard hat, which he had not requested.  He turned it over in his hands, eyeing the grimy plastic with distaste.

“Well, put it on,” Harry said.  “I haven’t got all day here, you know.  I do have work of my own to do.”

Sherlock caught her eye and opened his mouth, intending to explain to Harry that he worked much more efficiently in familiar clothing.  But she sighed and shook her head before he could get the words out.

“Regulations.  They won’t let you onto the site without protection.  You wear the hat, or you don’t get to see the place at all.”

“Ah,” Sherlock said.  Authorities could always be flouted, charmed, or befuddled.  “And who, may I ask, is ‘they?’”

“That would be me.”  Harry folded her arms and smiled up at him, a smile he had often seen on John’s face.  “Wear the hat.  I’m not about to go explaining to Johnny how I went and got you hurt.”

“Well.  In the interests of family harmony.”  Faced with the prospect of two Watsons aggressively concerning themselves with his health, Sherlock elected the better part of valour and donned the hard hat.

Harry had brought the building plans with her, as well as an inspection sheet on a clipboard.  When she reached the cordon of constables guarding the ruin, she flashed her identification card at them, said “Building inspection,” in an authoritative cadence, and the cordon parted to let her and Sherlock through.

“The coat’s a nice touch,” she murmured.  “Makes you look like you’re my supervisor.  Phew, doesn’t half smell in here.  You’ll have to get the coat cleaned later.”

“Yes.”  Sherlock turned to a constable who had followed them into the building.  “Where was the body found?”

“Er . . . right this way.”  The constable led them to what seemed to have been a space for an open-plan office.  “A girl.  Young.  Walled up, in a little room over here.  We think it was a storage room, or a supply cabinet.”

Harry consulted the building plan.  “No supply room listed here.  The plans show an indentation where a heating system was put in, but no separate room.”

“And there’s no door,” Sherlock added.  “Surely a supply room would have a door.  There’s no door here, nor any sign that there ever was a door.  No moulding, no hinges, no handle, they would have survived the fire.”  He turned slowly around.  There, on the wall nearby, was the V-shaped smoke stain he had expected to see.  At its base was a melted scrap of plastic.  Sherlock picked up the plastic and sniffed it.  As he expected, it reeked of petrol.  A quick session at Barts would probably reveal that it was the remains of an Asda milk jug.

He put the scrap in his coat pocket and stepped back.  The V of the smoke stain wasn’t quite perfect, veering off to the right, where there was a small grid implanted in the wall.  Harry came to stand beside him and followed his gaze.

“Yeah, that’s a ventilation duct,” she said.  “Bet that’s how the smoke got into the pub last night.”

“And why this room didn’t burn as fast as the arsonist expected,” Sherlock added.  “No, this isn’t a coincidence.”

Harry frowned.  “What isn’t?”

“A building in Whitechapel, recently bought by developers, is burned by an arsonist.  After the fire, a walled-up dead body is found inside.  By itself, a series of odd coincidences, but still believable as accident.  Strange things happen all the time.  I know, I’ve spent time in Florida.  But then, for the same thing to happen only a few days later, no, that’s not coincidence any more.  That’s deliberate.  Someone knew where those girls were, and it had to be their killer – or killers – because they’d have been found otherwise.  Do you follow?”

“Possibly.”  Harry chewed her lower lip as she considered.  “Where are you trying to take this?”

“What would your company have done with this building?  If it hadn’t been burnt?”

Harry looked around at the room, filthy with smoke and water damage.  “We’d have sent in an inspector with the plans, to see what the structure looked like and note any previous alterations.  Bring along a buyer if we already had one.  So we’d know what we were dealing with when we decided how to flip the building.”

Sherlock turned and pointed at the walled-off supply cabinet where the second body had been found.  “And you’d have noticed that there was a wall where the plan showed no wall.”

“Yeah.  We’re not stupid.  It’s our job to notice.”

“Exactly,” Sherlock said.  “That’s what the arsonist was counting on.  That’s why he burned the buildings – he didn’t want you to know.  But he made a mistake, they always do, he set the fire too close to the ventilation duct.  Drew the fire away from the body, threatened the pub instead.”

Harry nodded, her lips pursed in approval.  Then she turned to Sherlock with a gleam in her eye.  “He?”

“Hmm?”

“You keep referring to the arsonist, or the killer, or whoever, as ‘he.’  You ever consider the possibility that it could be a ‘she’ instead?”

“For serial murder and arson together?” Sherlock retorted.  “Either one alone, perhaps a small chance, but both?  Highly unlikely.”

“Still,” Harry said with a shrug, “you never know.”

Sherlock decided that he had seen enough of the building itself, and strode out of the room, with Harry and the constable trailing at his heels.  “Perhaps we can find out where our arsonist – male or female – is going to strike next.  Harry, your company will need to get inspectors out to all your recently purchased properties, with plans.  Have them look for any discrepancies, any walls where there shouldn’t be walls.  If they find anything, have them ring –“

“Have them ring Detective Inspector Dimmock,” the constable put in.

Sherlock stopped and glared at her.  “Dimmock’s an idiot who won’t even believe his own ballistics reports.”

“Well, he’s in charge of these investigations.  He’s got to be notified.”

At that moment, the subject of their discussion approached them.  “What have I got to be notified about?” Dimmock asked.

Sherlock drew himself up to his full height.  “Serial arson, Inspector,” he said.  “Are you willing to believe me this time, or would you prefer to wait for the next burned building with a body walled up inside?”

Dimmock had the grace to look chastened at that.  “Yeah, all right.  Got a call from Lestrade while you were looking around.  Said if I didn’t want to become the laughingstock of the Yard again . . .”  His voice trailed off.

Harry glanced from Sherlock to Dimmock, and then at the constable, who was trying her best to maintain a neutral expression.  She smiled and rolled her eyes at the constable, and then stepped between Sherlock and Dimmock.  “If the inspectors find anything, I’ll have them call me,” she said.  “And then I’ll pass the message on to both of you.  Wonderful things, telephones.  Did you know you can phone two people on them, one right after the other?”

Sherlock decided not to dignify that remark with a reply.  Instead, he drew his notebook from his coat pocket and made a show of consulting it.  As he did so, something caught his eye.  It was the other reason he had wanted to have Harry Watson involved in today’s expedition.  “Harry, there’s one other thing I need you to do.”

“Oh, but of course,” Harry shot back.  “Because I’m your loyal employee.  Is this how you treat my brother?  Because you really ought to be paying him more.”

Dimmock snickered.  Sherlock ignored him.  “Thursday.  Mrs. Hudson, our landlady, will be touring a building that Cocknell and Coague has recently purchased for redevelopment.  I want you to be the one to conduct her tour, and I want you to do it tomorrow instead.”

A slow smile spread across Harry’s face.  “I see,” she said.  “Nothing like the personal touch, right?  Step this way, Mrs. Hudson, let’s check for leaks, spiders, and dead girls.”  She glanced at the address written down in Sherlock’s notebook, and then took out her mobile.  “Cathy?” she said after a moment.  “Harry Watson.  Can you look something up for me?  Yeah.  An appointment on Thursday, name of Hudson . . .”

Sherlock removed his hard hat and gave it to Dimmock.  He had seen what he needed to see here.  If he hurried, he could arrive at the mortuary just as Molly began her shift.

Molly did not look at all surprised to see Sherlock when he appeared at the door, and led him straight to an autopsy room.  “Knew you’d be coming,” she said.  “As soon as they brought this new girl in.  Found in a fire, just like the last one, I said to myself, he’ll be here before too long.”

“And therefore you have all the preliminary work finished so I can do the important bits right away?”

“The tox screen isn’t back yet,” Molly said.  “Could take a few hours, especially if they’ve got a queue.”  She peeled back the sheet from the latest body.

This one was far better preserved than the first, retaining the basic facial features and some hair that had once been long and vaguely brown.

“Lungs are clear,” Molly said.

“Obviously,” Sherlock replied.  “The fire was set last night, and she’s been dead for years.  Be quite a trick if she did have smoke in her lungs, wouldn’t it?  Have you determined a cause of death?”

Molly sighed.  “Strangled.”  She pulled an X-ray image from a folder and stuck it up on the light board.  The image showed the body’s shoulders, neck, and the edge of the lower jaw.  Molly pointed to a particular portion of the image, just below the jaw.  “See that?  It’s the hyoid bone, broken.  She was strangled to death.”

Sherlock peered at the image, and a connection lit up in his mind.  He fished through his coat pockets and pulled out the printouts of Lucy McMahon’s X-rays.  Sure enough, there was an image of her jaw and throat as well. Sherlock held it up to compare with the X-ray of the second body, and then he saw it.  “Here, too.  The girl in the Whitechapel building.  She was strangled.”

He turned to face the body on the autopsy table.  There was a box of nitrile gloves nearby, and Sherlock grabbed a pair.  The body was laid out with its mouth closed, but it was not difficult to pry the mouth open.  A quick swipe of a finger confirmed what Sherlock needed to know.  “Teeth have been bashed out.”

“Yes,” Molly replied.  “We’ve sent tissue samples for DNA – oh!”

“Penny’s dropped, has it?”  Sherlock snapped the gloves off and tossed them in the general direction of the bin.  “Two girls, strangled, teeth bashed out, walled up in buildings – that’s not a coincidence.  They were killed by the same person.  A serial killer.  A serial killer no one ever knew about.  Oh, this is delicious!  Have to be off, Molly.  Experiments to run.”  He turned on his heel and headed for the door.

Molly trotted a few steps behind him.  “Wait!  Don’t you want to know who she was?”

“Not important,” Sherlock called over his shoulder.  “I’m going to find out who her killer is.”

Sherlock had just got the tests on the latest scraps of milk jug and carrier bag started when he heard Mrs. Hudson’s tread on the landing.  A few seconds later, she knocked on the kitchen door.

“Hoo-hoo, Sherlock!  Are you – goodness, what a smell!” 

Sherlock turned around to see Mrs. Hudson standing in the doorway, fanning her face with her hand.  “Experiment,” he said by way of explanation.

“Well, yes, I can see that, dear.”  Mrs. Hudson grimaced, but turned it into a smile for him.  “I just wanted to let you know that I won’t be able to have you down for tea tomorrow after all.  One of my appointments was moved.”

“Oh?”  Sherlock had not known that Mrs. Hudson had been planning to invite him for tea.  Well, he would just have to get John to make it for him, then.

“Yes, that third building we circled, the one being sold by that company that flips buildings.  They rang me up just now to ask if I could see the building tomorrow instead of Thursday, and you’ll never guess what else!”

Sherlock was certain that he knew exactly what else, but it was Mrs. Hudson, so he smiled at her to continue.

“They’ve changed my agent.  I get to go out there with John’s sister!  Can you believe it?  Oh, this is working so much better than I had hoped it would.  It’ll be nice to keep it all in the family.”  Mrs. Hudson giggled a little, and then subsided.  “Anyway, you’ll be able to fend for yourself for tea tomorrow, there’s a good boy.  We’ll do something nice to make up for it later.”

Mrs. Hudson turned and bustled back downstairs, leaving Sherlock alone in the kitchen to ponder this new expansion of the word “family.”

Chapter Text

7.  A Knife All Blade

“I didn’t mean it!  It was just meant to be a bit of a laugh, I swear it!”

John gritted his teeth and attempted to ignore the crying teenage boy at his elbow while he threaded a tube down the nose of the boy’s friend, who was lying unconscious and intubated on an exam table at the Royal London Hospital.  “What’s your name?” he asked.

“Andy.  I didn’t mean for him to get so sick. It was just a laugh.”

John reached for the bottle of activated charcoal.  “You poisoned your friend for a laugh?”

“He was only meant to get the runs.”

“Well, Andy, as it happens, the runs are about the only thing that doesn’t happen to someone who drinks water spiked with eye drops.”  John attached the bottle of charcoal to the nasogastric tube and started the thick black liquid flowing.

“Is he going to die?” Andy asked.

“If he survives the next twenty-four hours, he’ll be fine.”

Andy let out a thin wail that rapidly became stronger as the boy on the table started to twitch and shake.  John hooked the charcoal bottle to an IV pole and glanced around for the nearest nurse.  “Hazel, get him out of here, take him to the waiting room!”

The nurse dragged Andy away, and Dr. DeNora hurried over.  “What’s going on?”

“Paul Gillespie.  Tetrahydrozoline poisoning.  He’s seizing.”  John rolled the boy onto his side, and Dr. DeNora loosened his collar.

“Tetrahydro – how did that – ?” she asked.

“School prank.  His mate Andy over there thought it would be funny to put eye drops in his water bottle.  Liven up their history lesson a bit.”

“Oh God.  Whatever happened to bent pins on chairs?”

Paul’s seizure slowed, and then stopped.  John blew out a breath, and checked the nasogastric and ventilation tubes.  Both were still seated firmly, and the charcoal was flowing.  Paul twitched again.  With a practiced hand, Dr. DeNora slid a basin under Paul’s head to catch the splash of charcoal that Paul vomited.  John slowed the charcoal flow.  “You’d better call his parents.” 

Dr. DeNora nodded and strode away toward the waiting room to interrogate Andy.

Two hours later, Paul had been stabilised and admitted, and John had moved on to treating other patients.  He was just washing his hands after setting a small girl’s broken arm when he spotted a familiar face in the waiting room.  Lestrade was sitting in one of the chairs.  John smiled and went to see him.

“Back so soon, Inspector?”

Lestrade laughed.  “Just a follow-up appointment.  The doctor says I’m doing well, and I should be back to work soon.  I guessed you’d be here, thought I’d see if you wanted to come for a pint when your shift is done.”

“Oh, God, yes.”  John glanced at the clock.  “Another forty minutes, yeah?”

Lestrade nodded.  “I’ll wait.”

The pub was just beginning to become lively when John and Lestrade entered, and it was not long before they were happily ensconced at a table, drinks and a few packets of crisps on the table in front of them.  John savoured his cider, allowing the clean, bright taste of apples to wash away the smell of disinfectant still lingering in his nose from the hospital.  Lestrade took a swig of bitter, and sat back in his chair.

“How’s the arm?” John asked him.

Lestrade rotated his shoulder.  “Not bad.  Doc says I can go back on light duty next week.  Paperwork.”  He made a face.

“That’s good,” John said.  “Do what the nice doctor says, and you’ll be back chasing crooks before you know it.”

“Mmm.  And if I bend the rules a bit?”

“Then you forfeit the nice doctor and you get to see the nasty one instead.”  John waggled his eyebrows at Lestrade over his glass.  “Don’t think I don’t know how to restrain over-eager soldiers.  Or Detective Inspectors.”

Lestrade laughed and raised his glass at John.  “Duly noted.  And how is the nasty doctor?  Ready to squash your flatmate yet?”

“Actually, I look forward to seeing him.  Experiments, weird smells in the flat, and all.”  John dropped his gaze to his cider for a moment.  “So many bloody idiots come through A&E.  At least with Sherlock, no matter what he’s doing, there’s at least some form of logic behind it.  Even if I don’t get it right away, I know it’ll be better than ‘some bloke dared me to,’ you know?”

Lestrade nodded.  “Yeah, I get it.  I know what you mean.  It’s the same thing on most of my cases, the ones I don’t call Sherlock in on.  You probably get them after I do.”

“Yup.  Speaking of which,” John wrote the name of Paul and Andy’s school on a piece of paper and slid it across the table to Lestrade.  “Get in touch with the headmaster here.  They need a drugs lecture.  Told them I might know someone who could do it.  Be a change of pace from paperwork, and you can do it while your arm’s healing.”

“Oh God.  Anything special I should focus on?”

“General reminders that poisoning your mates isn’t funny, household medications have directions for a reason, that sort of thing.”

Lestrade grimaced.  “Got it.”

“Thanks.”  John took another mouthful of cider and smiled.  “Any of those crisps left?”

The cider turned out to be just enough of an emotional cushion that John was able to smile when he came home once again to a flat that smelled thoroughly of petrol.  “Productive day?” he asked as he opened the windows.

“Serial killer who’s gone into arson,” Sherlock said, his eyes firmly fixed on his microscope.  “Haven’t seen that combination before.”

“One for the website, then.  How’d you get on with Harry?”

“Adequately.  Aha!”  Sherlock jumped off of his stool and rushed over to seize John’s arm and drag him into the kitchen.

“Oi, Sherlock, what –“

“Look, John!” Sherlock cried.  “Oh, it’s Christmas!  Look at those two slides.”

John peered into the microscope, switching the slides back and forth.  “They look the same to me.”

“That’s exactly it!”  Sherlock rummaged around in the drifts of paper that covered half of the kitchen table and came up with his notebook.  He scribbled a few lines and then did a pirouette.

“Sorry, what am I looking at?” John asked.

“Petrol samples, droplets from the fire sites that didn’t burn.  One is from Whitechapel, the other is from the building next to Harry’s club.  They’re the same.  Pure Asda petrol, from the same pump.”

John wrinkled his nose as he thought through his cider-induced tipsiness.  “Reasonable guess that the same person started both fires.  How’d you get a serial killer out of that?”

“Why those buildings?” Sherlock countered.  “Both of them had bodies inside, young girls, strangled long before the buildings burned.  Those girls were missing for years, John.  Only their killer knew where they were.”

“Hmm.  So far, so brilliant.”

Sherlock preened a little at the praise.

“But how are you going to catch this serial killer, then?”  John gazed over the mess in the kitchen.  “You know that you’ve got one, but you don’t know anything more than that.  Even with that cabbie, you had to wait until he made a mistake.  This one hasn’t made a mistake yet.  Could be anyone.”

Sherlock flipped through his notebook and shoved a page covered with his hasty scrawl into John’s line of sight.  “Not true.  Killings took place in the early nineties, and the killer is still alive and burning buildings twenty years later.  Puts an age range on it.  Killer is familiar with London, buys petrol and milk from a particular Asda.”

“So far, you could be describing me.  Except that our milk comes from Tesco, which you’d know if you bothered to get it once in a while.”

“Stop it, I’m not finished.”  Sherlock snapped the notebook closed.  “And the killer knows when his victims are likely to be found.  That building in Whitechapel was a crack house for years, and nobody knew there was a body walled up in it.  But directly it gets bought by developers, it burns.  Somehow, our killer watches those buildings.”

John turned his attention back to the table.  Sherlock had made a rudimentary attempt to protect the surface by laying down sheets of old newspaper, and a mysterious green stain was inching towards a photo of the Prime Minister.  “Maybe the killer reads the estate notices?” he suggested.  “Seems like a properly obsessive thing for a serial killer to do.”

Sherlock nodded.  “I’ve thought of that.  That’s why I’ve arranged a little something to keep our killer off his guard.”

“Arranged a little something?”

“Got some assistance.  A sort of reconnaissance mission, in a way.”

Sherlock refused to meet John’s eyes, and that, John had learned, was not a good sign.  Getting information out of Sherlock that Sherlock did not want to give was a difficult proposition at best; Sherlock was an expert at simply saying nothing, or retreating behind a locked door if questioned directly.  The best approach was to use Sherlock’s own methods, making inferences from the evidence available and allowing him to correct those inferences, letting the truth in through the back door.  So John turned his attention away from Sherlock and let his mind go, trying to think of all the people with whom Sherlock might have had contact during the day, and which of those people he might trust to help him with his reconnaissance mission.  Fortunately, the list was not a long one.

“Oh, dear God, you’ve got Harry involved with this?”

Sherlock shrugged.  “She was eager to assist me.  I’d have thought you’d be happy about it.  A project like this, she won’t drink tonight, not if she thinks she’s doing something really important.”

John thought that was unlikely, but not impossible.  It was true that Sherlock didn’t know Harry very well, but he did have his own experiences with addictive behaviour.  So he took care to keep his voice calm for his next question.  “And just what have you asked my sister to do for you?”

“Nothing more than her job.  Show a client around a building.  If they find a wall that shouldn’t be there, they’ll let us know.  Maybe they’ll even find a body.”  He looked disturbingly excited by this prospect.

Aside from that, the idea made sense to John.  If they could locate a building with a body before the killer did, the Met could gather evidence before it was destroyed in a fire, and that evidence could potentially lead them to the killer’s identity.  For Sherlock, it was a shot in the dark, but John had learned to trust Sherlock’s hunches. 

“I suppose that could work,” he said.  “Bit risky, though, but Harry’s never been afraid of things like that. Never been afraid of anything, really.  She’d have made a hell of a soldier in Afghanistan if she were better at following orders.”

Sherlock made a noncommittal grunt and turned back to his work surface.  “We’ll find out tomorrow after they get back from their tour.  Meanwhile, I’ll go and locate the Asda where this petrol originated tomorrow morning.  Shouldn’t take more than a few hours.”

“Do you want me to be on alert to get the message?”

Sherlock shook his head.  “No, we’ll find out tomorrow.  Probably over tea and biscuits.”

It took John a few seconds to process the implication of that remark.  When he did, the last remnants of his cider buzz drained from his body, leaving a chill in their wake.  He stalked into the living room and then paced back into the kitchen, took a deep breath, and counted to ten in Pashto before he spoke to Sherlock through gritted teeth.

“Sherlock.  Please, please tell me that you didn’t send Mrs. Hudson – our landlady who treats us like she’s our mother – please tell me that you didn’t send her on a mission to go spelunking through buildings looking for bodies one step ahead of their murderer.”

Sherlock glanced up from his microscope.  “Very well.  If you insist."

“If I insist, what?”

“I won’t tell you that Mrs. Hudson is out with Harry.”

John sighed and buried his face in his hands, unable even to begin to address that statement.

Sherlock merely blinked at him.  “Mrs. Hudson would have seen the building anyway,” he said.  “All she has to do is observe the condition of the walls, which I assure you is well within her intellectual capacity.”  He gestured in the vague direction of the spray-painted smiley face over the sofa.

John was not about to let him divert from the point of the argument.  “You sent Mrs. Hudson into a murder investigation?”

“Of course.  Mrs. Hudson is quite familiar with murderers.  She was married to one, after all.”

“Yes, but . . . but . . . she’s got a hip!” John spluttered.

“Ah.  Yes.”  Sherlock sat up straight on his stool.  “I’ll have to acquire some extra herbal soothers for her when I go out tomorrow.”

“Yes.  Fine.  You do that.  And then we will take her out to dinner.  Somewhere nice, not takeaway Chinese.”

Sherlock shrugged.  “Mrs. Hudson is quite partial to the gnocchi at Angelo’s.”

“Fine.”  John laughed a little at the absurdity of his life.  “Angelo’s.  We’ll take Harry and Mrs. Hudson, and they can tell us what they saw.” 

It was a dangerous plan, but Sherlock claimed not to have forced either Harry or Mrs. Hudson into it, and, knowing both of them, John was inclined to believe the claim.  And, of course, it made more sense than the idea of poisoning a friend for a bit of fun.  He shuffled off to change for his after-work jog, marvelling at how low his standards for rationality had become.

Chapter Text

8.  Chasing Starlight

Sherlock was out collecting petrol samples from Asda locations when his mobile rang.  He grumbled in annoyance, as the only person who ever ignored his preferences was Mycroft.  He was just about to answer with a sharp snap at his meddlesome, smug brother when he took another look at the screen.  The number it showed was not any of the ones that Mycroft used, and on the third ring, Sherlock identified it as Harry Watson’s professional number.  She had said she would be in touch.

“Sherlock Holmes.”

“Sherlock, it’s Harry Watson.  I’m at the building you wanted me to examine.  You were right.  Small airing cupboard was sealed up.  I called the police, and Inspector Dimmock came over with a crew.”

Sherlock stopped in his tracks.  “You rang Dimmock before you rang me?”

“Oh, get off your high horse,” Harry said with a laugh.  “Figured you’d want all the news at once, no waiting.  Dimmock’s boys tore open the airing cupboard, and they found a body.  Just like you predicted.”

“Excellent.”  Sherlock shoved his latest batch of petrol samples into his coat pocket and headed out to the main road to hail a taxi.  “Is Dimmock still there?  Pass me over.”

There was a shuffling sound, and then Dimmock’s voice came over the line.  “Sherlock, we’ve got the scene sealed, and we’re processing it now.  There’s no need for you to come here.”

“Don’t be an idiot.  Who’s doing forensics, Anderson?”

“Ormsby.”

Sherlock considered this information.  Ormsby was as witless as Anderson, but not nearly as arrogant.  He could almost certainly be trusted to collect evidence properly, but have no real idea what it might imply, leaving the field free for Sherlock.

Dimmock’s voice broke in on his thoughts.  “Listen, Sherlock . . . I’ve – well, I’ve had a chat with Greg Lestrade.  He had some things to say to me.”

“I’m sure I don’t have time to listen to your tales of petty interpersonal contact.”

“All right!”  Dimmock’s voice squeaked, a sure sign of his discomfort with what he was about to say.  “Look, what I’m saying is . . . you go to the mortuary at Bart’s.  That’s where we sent the body.  I’ll take care of things here.  Collect the evidence, keep the ghouls away.  Divide up the labour, right?”

Sherlock hesitated for a moment only.  It was true that he wanted to examine both the body and the building, but it was also true that the body was his first priority.  And Dimmock was right about one thing.  A team of police personnel visibly working in the building would serve to keep souvenir-hunting, gawking idiots out of the way until Sherlock could come to see what the police had missed.  “All right,” he said.  “But don’t disturb anything.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it.  After all, we’re only the police.” 

The line went dead.  Sherlock spotted a taxi and waved.

Molly had the body waiting for Sherlock when he arrived at the mortuary, so he knew that either Dimmock or Harry had alerted her ahead of time.  “Adolescent girl,” Molly said, as soon as Sherlock entered the room.  “Probably about sixteen when she died.  Strangled to death, like the others.”

Sherlock nodded crisply and held out his hand.  “I’ll have the X-rays.”

Molly shook her head.  “I just took them.  They haven’t finished processing them yet.”

“Then how do you know she was strangled?”

Molly led him to her computer and called up an image, which, by the time stamp, had been e-mailed to her from the crime scene.  “Look.  The handkerchief is still around her neck.”

Indeed, the photograph showed a body, heavily decayed, with a dark blue bandana knotted firmly around its throat.  Sherlock studied the image for a while.  Even through the dust and decay, it was possible to make out an image of the girl’s clothing, which had been brightly coloured and inexpensive, but fashionable in the early 1990s.  “Do you still have the handkerchief?” Sherlock asked.

“Of course.”  Molly went to the autopsy table and pulled several plastic bags from beneath it.  “I saved it with all her personal effects.  Do you want them?”

“Just the handkerchief.  It’s not hers.”

Molly blinked.  “It’s not?  How did you – wait, sorry, silly question.  Whose is it?”

“It belongs to whoever killed her.”  Sherlock took the bag that Molly offered him.  “Maybe he was interrupted just as she died.  Maybe he knotted it so tightly that he couldn’t remove it.  Maybe he left handkerchiefs on the other girls as well, but they burned away.  But this one is his.  How was it tied?”

“I’ll show you.”  Molly pulled back the sheet covering the body on the autopsy table.  She handed Sherlock a pair of rubber gloves and bent over the body.  “Right there,” she said, pointing to a dent in the skin.  “See that line?  That’s where the handkerchief was.”

Sherlock examined the angle of the dent, picturing how the handkerchief had fitted into that groove, where the knot had been, where the ligature had compressed the trachea and the blood vessels in the neck.  He cast his gaze down the length of the body, trying to estimate the girl’s height.  “She was, what, five foot four?”

“We measured five foot three,” Molly said.

“Just like you.”  Sherlock eyed Molly speculatively.  “He pulled upward on the handkerchief – look at this dent, almost looks as though she’d been hanged.  He’d have to be awfully tall and strong to hold her up long enough to hang her, though.”

“Maybe he hanged her from a hook in the house?” Molly asked.

Sherlock shook his head.  He ran a hand over his own throat, recalling the times when people had tried to strangle him.  “No.  This was personal.  He did the deed himself.”  He considered his own six-foot frame in relation to Molly’s more petite body.  “Molly, lie down on the floor.”

“What?”

“Experiment.  On your back.”

Molly glanced around as if to check that nobody was watching, and then gingerly lowered herself to the floor.  Sherlock crouched down at her head and mimed wrapping a handkerchief around Molly’s throat.  While it was possible for him to strangle her from this position, the angle of the ligature did not match the one on the body.  He got up and came around to straddle Molly, one foot on either side of her hips.  Molly blushed, but Sherlock ignored it.

“Raise yourself up onto your elbows.”

Molly obeyed.  Sherlock bent down and put his left hand on Molly’s right shoulder.  Then, with his right hand, he wrapped his imaginary handkerchief around her neck, and twisted it several times around his hand.  He considered for a moment, then knelt down on top of Molly and pulled.  “Oh, clever,” he breathed.

“What’s clever?” Molly asked.  “Can . . . er, can I get up now?”

“What?  Oh, yes.”  Sherlock stood up and allowed Molly to wriggle out from between his feet.

“Did you find out anything?” she asked.

“Yes.  Got to go, more experiments.  I’ll take the handkerchief with me.”  Just in time, Sherlock remembered one of John’s admonishments and flashed a quick smile at her before he hurried out of the mortuary.

Sherlock arrived home shortly after two and started preparing slides of his petrol samples.  Once he had them properly prepared and labelled, it was the work of only a few minutes to determine which sample matched the two he had taken from the two fire sites.  The killer had definitely purchased his petrol from the same Asda both times, and that meant that the shop was most likely located near the killer’s home.  Despite Harry’s warning, Sherlock was convinced that the killer was male; the size of the handprint bruises on the third corpse as well as the angle of strangulation pointed to a killer rather taller and possessed of larger hands than the average British woman.

So.  A tall man with large hands, living in – Sherlock double-checked his slides – Beckton.  At the youngest, he would have to be around forty years old, to have murdered young girls in the 1990s and then started burning the buildings in which he had left their bodies twenty years later.  That thought gave Sherlock pause.  People rarely did anything without a reason, even if that reason was that bane of John’s existence, “a bloke in the pub dared me to.”

The man from Beckton had had a thriving career as a serial killer, but had stopped; all of the bodies that the police had found could be dated to within five years of each other.  Something had caused the man to stop killing.  Similarly, something had caused him to start burning the buildings where he had left the bodies.

Sherlock wandered into the living room and stretched out on the sofa.  There had to be another common factor, dancing just beyond his intellectual reach.  He stared at the cluttered bookshelf opposite him and tried, deliberately and methodically, to empty his mind.  He could never succeed fully, but sometimes, if he could quiet his racing thoughts just long enough, an idea might slip in . . .

In the space between one breath and another, a name flashed through his mind, and Sherlock bolted upright on the sofa.  All three buildings had been owned – no, recently purchased – by Cocknell and Coague.  He recalled his discussion with John about how the killer had known when his disposal locations were in danger of discovery.  John had suggested the real estate notices, but what if there were an easier way?  What if the killer had access to inside information about the activities of that particular real estate company?  A recent hire, perhaps?

Sherlock was on his feet in seconds, and composed a quick text to Harry.

Possible ID of killer.  Need names of new C and C hires. – SH

He pressed “send,” set down his mobile, and automatically reached out for his violin, in need of something to distract him while Harry found the information he required.  But the case was not in its accustomed place near his armchair, and Sherlock recalled that the instrument was not due to be picked up from the luthier’s for a few days.  He was about to go in search of John’s pistol, when another idea struck him, and he clattered down the stairs to knock on Mrs. Hudson’s door.

As ever, Mrs. Hudson proved to be one of the few people who were genuinely happy to see Sherlock.  In this case, it was because she had just decided to make tea, and had been having some difficulties.

“Oh, Sherlock, how lovely to see you!” she said when she opened the door.  “I was just going to try and fetch you.”  She was limping a little, and Sherlock frowned.  Had she injured herself while out with Harry?  Surely Harry would have told him that.

“I just finished the last of the tea bags this morning,” Mrs. Hudson went on, oblivious to Sherlock’s inquiring gaze.  “I would have gone to the shops, but my hip’s flared up again – must have been all that walking in that dusty old building today.  I think there’s a tin of loose tea on the high shelf.  Will you be a dear and fetch it down for me?  Then I’ll make us a pot, and you can tell me all about your day.”

Sherlock obligingly reached up for the tin of Ceylon from Harrods that Mrs. Hudson pointed out to him.

They were roughly halfway through their pot when Sherlock heard the outer door to the building open and close, followed by John’s footsteps in the entry hall.  They were heavier than average; clearly, John had encountered some minor aggravation at work and was not in the best of moods.  Well, Mrs. Hudson’s tea and biscuits would surely take care of that, and then Sherlock could tell John all about what he had discovered.  He hurried to Mrs. Hudson’s front door, and opened it just as John started to call his name.

“Down here, John.  Come in.  I’m having tea with Mrs. Hudson.”

John’s glare looked less than friendly, but the tea was good tea, and it was in Mrs. Hudson’s good china, the set with the flowers painted in pink and the gold leaf around the rims of the cups.  Surely John would not remain angry for long.

In fact, John’s annoyance changed to concern when he allowed Sherlock to pull him into Mrs. Hudson’s flat and saw their landlady lying on the couch instead of sitting in a chair.  “Mrs. Hudson, are you all right?”

Mrs. Hudson smiled.  “Oh, don’t worry.  I’m fine.  It’s just my hip, been giving me a bit of trouble today.  Sherlock, dear, will you get another cup and saucer from the china cupboard?”

Sherlock had anticipated the request and was already setting a third place at the coffee table.  John sighed as Sherlock poured tea into his cup.  “I hope this little excursion was worth it,” he said.  “Harry rang me at work, in tears – I could almost smell the beer over the phone – saying you think she’s a murder suspect, and now Mrs. Hudson’s been hurt, too?”

“What, Harry’s in trouble?” Mrs. Hudson asked.  “But I just spent the morning with her.  She was so nice, and so calm when we found that false wall where that poor little girl was hidden.  I was clumsy,” she added, for John’s benefit.  “When the police were cutting the wall away, I stepped where I shouldn’t have, and I twisted something.  But Harry was fine then.  What’s happened to her now?”

“I don’t know,” John said.  “She rang me up, sounding like she’d been drinking – sounded like she was in a pub already.  Said something about how Sherlock thought she was a murderer.  Sherlock?”

Sherlock heaved an annoyed sigh.  “Your sister is hardly a killer, John.  All I wanted was for her to text me the names of any recent hires at her company.  One of them might know something that could lead us to the man who murdered girls twenty years ago and is burning buildings now.”

John set his cup down and scrubbed his face with his hands.  “Well, that would explain things.  From what I could make out beneath all the blubbering, Harry’s the only person that Cocknell and Coague have hired in a full year.

Sherlock frowned.  “Then it must be an older employee.  But why now?”

“You’ll figure it out,” John said.  “Meanwhile, we owe two nice ladies an enormous favour.  Clear out your schedule for tomorrow evening.  You and I are taking Harry and Mrs. Hudson to dinner.”

“Oh, John, dear,” Mrs. Hudson said.  “You really don’t have to –“

“Angelo’s,” Sherlock said.  “He’ll be thrilled to see you again, Mrs. Hudson.” 

“Well . . . I hate to impose on you boys,” Mrs. Hudson said.

“Not at all,” John assured her.  “In fact, we should be apologising for imposing on you.”

Mrs. Hudson smiled.  “All right.  I do fancy a bowl of their gnocchi every now and then.”

“Fine.  Angelo’s.  Tomorrow night.”  John took his mobile from his pocket and glanced at Sherlock.  “Do you want to book the table, or shall I?”

Chapter Text

9.  Our Daily Bread

At seven o’clock on Thursday evening, Angelo’s was just becoming nicely lively.  Angelo met their small party personally at the door, clapping Sherlock on the shoulder and complimenting both Harry and Mrs. Hudson on their outfits.  He almost bowed as he showed them to the booth he had selected for them, a spacious affair with a round table and curving bench set into the corner of a portion of the dining room that had not yet become overly crowded.  As the others slid into their seats and Angelo signalled to a waiter, John took everyone’s coats as an excuse and hurried to the man’s side.

“We’ll forego the wine list tonight,” he murmured in the waiter’s ear.  “We’re . . . going easy on the alcohol.”

The waiter nodded.  “Very good, sir.”  He disappeared into the kitchen.

John rejoined his companions at the table, happy to enjoy the candlelight.

“Nice place,” Harry said.  “Love the décor.  A lot of Italian places do it all up, you know, red and white tablecloths, wine bottles in raffia, that sort of thing.”

“The first sign of a bad Italian restaurant,” Sherlock said.  “Child’s play.  Anyone with half a brain could deduce that.”

“Then there must be lots of people with less than half a brain running around London,” Harry said with a shrug.  “Those places are always full.”

“Of course.  City of over eight million people.  At least six and a half million are bound to be idiots.”

“Sherlock!”  Mrs. Hudson said.  But she laughed, and her eyes twinkled, and even Sherlock smiled at the mock scolding.

The waiter reappeared, bearing menus and a lighter for the candle on the table.  “Compliments of the house for Mr. Sherlock Holmes and his lovely companions.  May I bring beverages while you decide what you want?”

Harry perked up, but John beat her to it.  “Couple of bottles of mineral water, thanks.”  The waiter left, and John met Harry’s glower with a smile.  “I recommend the salmon,” he said.  “Although the chicken piccata has its charms as well, if you’re not in the mood for fish.”

“I do enjoy the spinach gnocchi,” Mrs. Hudson added. “Sherlock brought me here for my birthday one year, and oh, that was a lovely dinner.”

Sherlock actually blushed at that, and Harry laughed.  John allowed himself a moment to relax.  It seemed that the combination of Mrs. Hudson’s infectious good cheer and some light railroading would have the desired effect, and they would not have to pour Harry into a cab at the end of the evening.

After the waiter had taken their orders, Sherlock explained his relationship with Angelo to Harry, who was suitably impressed.

“You get to eat here for free?” she asked.  “That’s fantastic.”

“Well, we try not to abuse the privilege,” John said.  “Fortunately, Sherlock’s eating habits make that easy.”

“Eating habits which assist my work, John,” Sherlock put in.  He turned his attention back to Harry and Mrs. Hudson.  “Speaking of which.  The building where you found the latest body.  I presume you won’t be buying that one, Mrs. Hudson.  Sorry, Harry, I think you’ll find that crime scenes only sell to a particular type of buyer, might want to alter your marketing strategy.  Now, what did you see at the crime scene that you either omitted from your report to the police or were too distraught to recall at the time?”

John sighed.  “We couldn’t have held off on this until our food arrived?”

“Oh, I think we can,” Harry said.  She had the combative gleam in her eyes that John knew all too well.  At least she was sober tonight.  John hoped that would be enough to blunt the sharpest edges of her temper.

Harry glared at Sherlock.  “I’m not telling you one bloody thing until you apologise for accusing me of murder.”

Sherlock rolled his eyes.  “I did no such thing.  I was simply exploring a theory that a recent employee of your firm might have some connection to a recent string of arson fires in buildings purchased by your firm.”

“Same thing!”

“It’s not the same thing at all, and if you would think rationally and not allow your wounded pride to clog up your brain, you’d see it, too.”

John was glad that he and Mrs. Hudson were sitting between Sherlock and Harry.  He reached out and pinned Harry’s hand down to the table before she could shake her finger in Sherlock’s face.  “Brilliant observation, Sherlock, and I think it cuts both ways.  It wouldn’t have killed you to offer a bit more context when you asked Harry about her job, which she’s held for less than a year.  Harry, you know that Sherlock trusted you enough to ask you to show Mrs. Hudson around.  That’s like being a special informant for the police –“

“Except far more likely to turn up something important,” Sherlock muttered.

“ – as in, you don’t get to do it if the detective doesn’t trust you,” John finished.  “So, can we not have this fight right this instant, please?  This is a nice restaurant, and I’d like to enjoy my food in peace.”

Harry glowered at Sherlock, but held her tongue.  Sherlock sat back and gave her a little nod.  To John’s great relief, the waiter chose that moment to appear, followed by a busboy.  There was the usual confusion as glasses, mineral water bottles, and plates of food were distributed across the table.  The waiter had to stretch a little to set Sherlock’s linguini with clam sauce in front of him, and Harry raised an eyebrow at the crude tattoo that peeked out from beneath the waiter’s sleeve.

“Angelo likes to hire ex-cons,” John explained, when the waiter had left.  “Always says he feels he ought to give a hand to former guests of Her Majesty, seeing as how he’s one himself.”

“Good on him,” Harry said.  “You were right.  This is definitely good chicken.”

John counted it as one of the small successes of the evening that conversation remained light and pleasant throughout the meal.  Harry and Mrs. Hudson had got along splendidly at the showing before they had discovered the body, and they took the opportunity of the dinner to resume that particular chat.  Sherlock picked at his linguini and observed the other diners in the restaurant, occasionally pointing out one patron or another to impress Mrs. Hudson with his skills.  It was only during after-dinner coffee that he broached the topic of the murder again.

“Whoever your killer is, he’s absolute shit at construction,” Harry said.  “I suppose you wouldn’t have known from the burnt sites.  But we didn’t so much search out the body as stumble over it.  Literally.”

“The floorboards are uneven,” Mrs. Hudson added.  “They’d have to be replaced.  I – well, you know my hip.  I tripped over one of the floorboards, and I put out my hand to catch myself, and do you know, my hand went right through the wall.”

“Are you all right?” John asked.  “Why didn’t you tell me about this before?”

Mrs. Hudson waved his question away.  “Oh, after I spoke to the police, they took me to hospital, and a lovely young doctor cleaned it up.  Wasn’t very bad at all, mostly scraped.  I didn’t even need stitches.”

“Well, you let me know if anything changes,” John said.  “Wouldn’t want anything getting infected.”

Harry took a sip of her coffee.  “Turned out it wasn’t a real wall at all.  Just an old piece of plywood nailed up to cover an alcove and then some wallpaper slapped over it.  Real slapdash job.  Almost completely rotted away, it was mostly the paper holding it together.  Even if we hadn’t been looking, someone would have noticed sooner or later.”

Sherlock’s eyes went distant for a moment.  “Of course,” he murmured.  “As long as the building is abandoned or used only by junkies, no one would notice a false wall of paper and plywood.  No need to cover his tracks until people really start examining the building.  He knows when Cocknell and Coague buy buildings and when the walk-throughs are scheduled.  Fires didn’t start until very recently, so it has to be someone who only just gained access to the real estate company’s files.  Harry, are you sure you’re the only new hire in the past year?”

“Almost positive.”  Harry narrowed her eyes at Sherlock, but the distrust in her gaze had softened.

Sherlock gave a soft snort and pulled his mobile from his jacket pocket.

“You’re going to text someone in the middle of dinner?” John asked.  “Didn’t your mother teach you manners?”

“It’s not in the middle of dinner, it’s in the middle of coffee,” Sherlock shot back.  “I’m just texting Dimmock about what Harry said.  It’s important, the idiot needs all the help he can get.  And Mummy never said a word to me about texting during dinner when I was a child.”

Harry laughed.  “Got you there, John.”

Mrs. Hudson shifted a little in her seat, and pursed her lips together briefly.  John frowned.  “Are you all right, Mrs. Hudson?  Is your hand bothering you?”

“Oh, no, dear.”  Mrs. Hudson gave him a brief smile.  “But I’m afraid that fall didn’t do my hip much good.  We should get the bill.  I’d like to go home and take one of my herbal soothers.”

“Of course.”  John glanced around the restaurant until he caught the eye of their waiter and waved to him.  The man nodded back, and turned to pick up a folder from his station.

“When was the last time you saw a doctor about your hip?” John asked Mrs. Hudson.

“Three months ago.  Dr. Humphrey said it was just age, there was nothing to be done about it.  The soothers usually do the trick.”

“That’s fine, but would you mind terribly if I referred you to someone else?  Just because Dr. Humphrey can’t do anything else doesn’t mean that no one can, if you take my meaning.  Sarah’s taken on a new doc, a friend of mine from school, Helen Wilton.  Just moved to London.  Helen was one of the best in my year.”

Mrs. Hudson shrugged.  “All right.  I suppose it wouldn’t hurt, and if you recommend a doctor . . .”

“Great.”

The waiter arrived, and John picked up the bill, glancing at it only long enough to confirm that their meal was on the house, as usual.  He scribbled down the street address of the surgery on the spare copy of the bill and handed it to Mrs. Hudson.  “Here’s the address, in case you didn’t remember it.  I’ll write you a referral, and I’ll call Sarah tomorrow to get an appointment set up.  Shouldn’t be too hard, Helen hasn’t had time to build up a long patient list yet.”

He handed the folder back to the waiter with a smile, and then reached across the table to poke Sherlock.  “All done with that?  We’re going home.”

Sherlock glanced up from his mobile, registered the waiter’s presence, and nodded.  He tucked the mobile back into his jacket pocket and rose from the table to offer his arm to Mrs. Hudson.

On the pavement outside Angelo’s, John allowed Sherlock to work his particular brand of magic and conjure up not one, but two cabs from a seemingly empty street.  Harry climbed into the first one.  She blew good-bye kisses to John and Mrs. Hudson and, with a sigh, agreed to ring Sherlock if any further details about her colleagues occurred to her.  John watched as Harry’s cab pulled away, automatically glancing over the cab’s number plate.  He caught himself with a rueful laugh; it was a habit he had acquired after his first adventure with Sherlock.

The second cab pulled up to the kerb almost as soon as the first one had left, and John asked the cabbie to take the rest of their party back to Baker Street.

“That was a lovely dinner,” Mrs. Hudson said, as the cab pulled into traffic.  “Thank you both for taking me.”

“It was our pleasure,” John said.  “You went above and beyond as our landlady.  Dinner was the least we could do.  Isn’t that right, Sherlock?”

Absorbed in the stream of information from his mobile, Sherlock simply nodded.  “Of course, John.”

John rolled his eyes, but Mrs. Hudson laughed.  “Oh, don’t worry.  I know what he means.  Anyway, it’s good for Sherlock to get out a bit, too.  Get some fresh air.”

That caused Sherlock to glance up from the screen, a puzzled frown on his face.  “Angelo’s offers many amenities, but fresh air is not among them.  Has no one told the man that garlic is the ketchup of intellectuals?”

“Now you’re just being silly,” Mrs. Hudson said, swatting Sherlock lightly on the arm.

Sherlock sniffed, but his eyes sparkled.  “I’ll have to have a shower tonight to wash the smell of garlic out of my hair.”

“Fine.”  John leaned back in his seat.  “Just don’t use up all the hot water.  And try to get some sleep tonight.  You have that thing tomorrow morning.”

“Stupid.”  Sherlock ostentatiously turned his attention back to his mobile.

“Thing?” Mrs. Hudson asked.  “What thing?”

“Going in for a witness interview at the Crown Prosecutor’s,” John explained.  “They want to see if he’s fit to give testimony in the Phillips case.”

“What, Sherlock?  In the witness box?”  Mrs. Hudson smiled.  “That’d be a sight to see.”

John nodded.  “That’s exactly what I’m afraid of.  Fortunately, I’ll miss the fun.  Off at the Royal London, treating the unfortunates of the world.”

Sherlock remained mute for the rest of the evening, even as John paid the cab fare and ushered both him and Mrs. Hudson inside.  John bade her good night for both of them and steered Sherlock up the stairs, hoping that Sherlock would find whatever connections he sought in his mind before the next building went up in flames.

Chapter Text

10.  One Tin Soldier

The weekend proved to be a source of enormous frustration for Sherlock.  He had done witness interviews before, but he suspected that the junior prosecutor had not.  In his irritation, he made sure to inform her of his suspicions, including the ones that touched upon the provenance of her law degree.  After she showed him out, tears of anger glittering in her eyes, he went to the luthier’s, only to learn that there had been a further delay, and his violin would not be returned until Monday.  And, exactly as if the God that Sherlock did not believe in had designed the day to be as irritating as possible, Sally Donovan called him in to work on an absurdly simple homicide over the weekend.

“It was the daughter,” Sherlock snarled at her on Sunday afternoon.  “For goodness’ sake, Sally, you’re meant to be a homicide squad.  How is it that you can’t solve a simple homicide?  Even if things are closed for the weekend.”

Donovan shifted so that she could poke Sherlock in the ankle with one of her crutches.  “In case you hadn’t noticed, Freak, we’re a man and half a woman down.  Lestrade won’t be back on duty for another week, and I’m still crutching along from dragging him out of that building.  We needed a warm body, I thought I’d make you earn your keep for once.”

A chime from Sherlock’s mobile cut off his retort.  He glanced at the incoming text.

Any progress on arsonist?  -- Dimmock.

Sherlock tossed a murderous glare in Sally’s general direction as he texted back.

Diverted by homicide.  Communicate better with your colleagues. – SH

He waved the texts at Donovan, who simply raised her eyebrows at him.  “You want to teach us about communication?  Great.  Next up, we’ll have some Americans tell us how to make tea.”

She turned and crutched away.  Sherlock could only hope that she was going to arrest the daughter, as he had instructed her to do.

Between witness interview and family homicides, Sherlock did not get a chance to return his attention to the arsonist until Monday.  The morning proved difficult, as John insisted that he eat toast and tea for breakfast.  Just as he finished, Lestrade rang the bell downstairs.  Sherlock’s heart sank at the thought that there might be another idiotic crime requiring his attention, but John smiled at him. 

“Don’t worry,” he said.  “He’s not on duty yet, remember?  He volunteered to take Mrs. Hudson to her appointment at the surgery today.  It was very kind of him, and it made Mrs. Hudson happy.  I think she likes him.”

That thought was so horrifying that Sherlock did not trust himself to respond.  He turned on his laptop and began to hack into the personnel files of Cocknell and Coague and did his best to put other images out of his mind.  John ruffled his hair and walked away, and soon Sherlock heard the comfortably slow clicking of keys as John worked at his blog.  The sound faded into the background, along with the whizz of traffic and an occasional banging from the pipes, the comforting sounds of home, easily catalogued and then ignored.

Some time later, Sherlock was startled from his files by a distinct “whump.”  His first thought was that John’s leg had seized up and he had fallen, but when he glanced over, he saw that John was still in his chair, a puzzled look on his face.

“Did you hear that?” he asked Sherlock.

Sherlock nodded.  “Yes.”

“Sounded familiar,” John said.  “Sounded almost like – oh, Jesus, no.”  Sherlock had heard the phrase “the life drained out of his face” before, but he had never seen such a dramatic demonstration of its meaning until he saw John’s expression.

“John?  What is it?”

“Sounded like an IED.”

“In London?  Are you sure?”

“You don’t forget that kind of sound, Sherlock.”  John pushed himself to his feet and peered out the window.  “Damn.  I wish I knew where it was so I could call it in.”

Sherlock’s mind was already buzzing with variables as he reached for his mobile.  How big, how far away might the device have been, for them to have heard the explosion but not felt much of the shockwave?  Which direction had it come from?  Sherlock rapidly paced from kitchen table to living room and back again, trying to recall exactly what he had heard.  He could not hear any car alarms in the immediate vicinity.

He did hear sirens.  John opened the window and leaned out, almost dangerously far, craning his neck to see.  “They’re heading up Park Road.”

Sherlock listened more closely.  He picked out the sirens of at least three distinct vehicles.  “One ambulance,” he said.  “Two fire engines.”

John pulled his head back inside and turned to stare at Sherlock.  “Christ,” he breathed.  “The arsonist?”

That thought was enough to send Sherlock running for his coat.  He clattered down the stairs, with John hot on his heels, having paused only long enough to grab the first aid kit that they kept in the kitchen.  Sherlock was determined to find the scene of the fire, even if he had to chase the ambulance on foot.  Behind him, he heard John’s mobile ring.

“Hello?” John said, and Sherlock cursed quietly at the delay.  “What?  Where are you?”  John reached out and snagged Sherlock’s coat sleeve in his fingers.  “It’s Mrs. Hudson.”

Sherlock stared at John and watched as his eyes bulged from his head in shock.  Then his mouth set in a grim line, and he gave a crisp nod, although Mrs. Hudson wouldn’t see it.  “Don’t move.  Stay awake.  We’re coming to get you.”  He snapped the mobile closed.

“It’s the surgery,” he said.  “Mrs. Hudson was in the waiting room.  The building came down, and she’s trapped.”

All thought rushed from Sherlock’s mind, leaving behind only the white noise of pure panic.  The panic only lasted a moment, and then Sherlock and John raced for the door.  A taxi was just passing, and Sherlock chased it down, his long legs straining to catch it before it sped away.  John gave the address of the surgery and bundled himself and Sherlock into the cab.

Sherlock had visited the surgery before, and remembered the small, plain building, an uninspired 1960s square lump of red brick.  Now, half of the building lay scattered across the street, and the remaining portion belched smoke.  Small fires raged throughout the ruin.  Sherlock unfolded himself from the taxi and looked around.  Doctors and nurses raced through his field of vision.  Some wore the orange jumpsuits of emergency personnel, while others wore the plain short sleeves that proclaimed them to be employees of the surgery.  The air echoed with the cries of the sick and injured.  Sherlock did not notice that John had come to his side until he saw Sarah hurrying over to them.  Her hair was wild and grey with dust, and she was bleeding from a cut along her hairline.

“John!” she cried.  “Thank God you’re here.”

“What happened?” he asked.

Sarah shook her head.  “I don’t know.  A kid came in with her mum, Alice had taken the history, and I was going in to do the exam.  There was a tremendous roar, and – the whole front half of the building was gone.  We’re trying to locate and evacuate all the patients.”

“We got a call from our landlady, Mrs. Hudson,” John said.  “She said she was in the waiting room.”

“Oh, God.”  Sarah pointed to a heap of brick, glass, and drywall.  “That’s the waiting room.”  She and John ran off, and Sherlock began to follow them, only to be stopped by a strong hand on his arm.  He turned, and saw Lestrade.

“Don’t,” Lestrade said.  “That part of the building isn’t stable.  John’s done this sort of thing before; you haven’t.  Stay here.”

“But it’s Mrs. Hudson!” Sherlock snapped.

Lestrade’s grip on Sherlock’s arm tightened.  “I know.  Let John look for her.  He knows what he’s doing.”

“She’s got a hip,” Sherlock said, a bit more quietly.

Lestrade nodded.  “I know.”

Over his shoulder, Sherlock spotted John and Sarah talking to – no, arguing with one of the fire crew.  He pushed past Lestrade and strode over to them.

“. . . can’t do it.  That pile could come down at any moment,” the fireman said.

“So, what, you’re just going to leave her there?” John said, in the tight, cold voice that he only used when he was very angry.  “She’s conscious and talking.  Who knows how long that’ll last?”

“You’re going to leave Mrs. Hudson?” Sherlock asked.

Sarah laid a hand on his arm.  “She’s alive, Sherlock,” she said.  “We’ve talked to her.  Her hip is hurting, and so is her head.  She’s trapped in a pocket beneath the waiting room, but there’s only a small hole, and it’s not big enough for a paramedic team to get through to her.”  Sarah pointed to a gap in the rubble.

Sherlock looked at the hole.  Sarah was right.  None of the paramedics on the scene could get through.  “You can’t leave her alone,” he said, his voice cracking.

John glanced at Sherlock and then at Sarah.  A light flared behind his eyes, and he straightened his spine.  “Absolutely not, Sherlock.  We will not leave her.”  He turned to the fireman, and was suddenly Captain John Watson of the Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers.  “Here’s what we’re going to do.  We can’t get a paramedic team in there, but we can get a doctor in.  Sarah would fit through that gap.”

Sarah turned to look.  “I suppose . . . I’d have to crawl . . . be a bit of a squeeze, but you’re right.”

The fireman shook his head.  “That just traps the doc as well.  Won’t do any good.”

“Oh, yes it will,” John said.  “I’m a doctor, too.  I’ll liaise with Sarah from outside, pass equipment through.  Sarah will stabilise Mrs. Hudson and start treatment while your crew works on how to cut through safely.  Can you do that?”

The fireman shrugged.  “We can try.”

“You’ll do it.  We’ll need helmets for Sarah and for me, portable lights, gauze, saline, splints, blankets, and a backboard standing by.”  The fireman rushed off to fetch the items John had requested.  John turned to Sherlock.  “You can’t hang around here.  It’s dangerous, and you’d be in the way.  You do your part.  Find out why this happened.”

Sherlock nodded.  The fireman was on his way back, accompanied by paramedics bringing the gear that John had requested.  There was time for only a quick question.  “Sarah,” he said.  “Did anyone unexpected come to the surgery today?”

Sarah frowned as she thought.  “No.  Just the usual.  Patients, staff.  A few maintenance people.  Oh!”  She glanced up at Sherlock.  “There was a delivery.”

“A delivery of what?”

The paramedics arrived and began to distribute their gear.  Sarah donned a helmet and clipped the chin strap.  “Respiratory supplies.  Flow regulators, masks, a new cart, a supply of oxygen tanks –“

“Oxygen.”  Sherlock glanced around.  A milk jug full of petrol, set on fire in a storage room full of oxygen tanks . . . “Oh, that’s diabolical,” he breathed.

“Find out who did this,” John said.  He turned and offered his hand to Sarah to help her over the ruin to the hole.  Sherlock watched as she slithered through the gap in the rubble.  John positioned himself just outside, picked up a lamp, and handed it through.

Satisfied that Mrs. Hudson was in the best hands possible, Sherlock could now turn his attention to the scene of the explosion.  This fire was different to the others.  The surgery was no long-abandoned building, to be burnt at night to conceal a twenty-year-old murder.  This had been a crime directed at someone in the building, an attempted murder using the murderer’s current favourite tools.  Sherlock closed his eyes and put his hands over his ears.  He had to think.  If he could determine who the intended victim was, it might lead him to the killer.

Lestrade pulled on his arms, shattering his concentration.  “Sherlock, you can’t stay here.  You’re in the way.  Let the fire crews through.”

Sherlock took a breath and opened his mouth to shout at Lestrade, but the words died on his lips.  Over Lestrade’s shoulder, he saw something that didn’t fit, and that didn’t fit in the most glorious way.

Anyone would have expected to see the man who had delivered the medical supplies to the surgery still hanging around at the scene of the fire; after all, there was a crowd of bystanders already.  But Sherlock had seen the delivery man before, on Thursday evening, and he had not delivered medical supplies, but rather a plate of linguini with clam sauce.  It was Angelo’s new waiter, who had clearly not spent his time in prison repenting his previous crime.

In the instant before the waiter noticed Sherlock’s gaze upon him, Sherlock realized what had really happened to the surgery.  Their eyes met, and the waiter turned to flee, but Sherlock was already running, leaping over shards of the building to follow him.  He dimly heard Lestrade shouting, and sirens whining to life, but none of that was important now.  This man had hurt Mrs. Hudson, whose only offence had been to find evidence of his past crimes.

Sherlock chased the man down a residential street, dodging young mothers with pushchairs and old men taking constitutionals.  The man turned briefly to see if Sherlock was still behind him, and that action slowed him just long enough for Sherlock to put on an extra burst of speed and catch up to him.  He launched forward with a spurt that would have impressed the cross country masters at Harrow and slammed the waiter into the side of a bus shelter.  The people waiting for the bus cried out in surprise, and attempted to scatter, but a panda car screeched to a stop in front of the shelter, its siren wailing.

Sherlock concentrated on pinning down the writhing body beneath him.  The smell of petrol filled his nose and made him want to vomit, but he suppressed the urge ruthlessly.  Then there were hands on him, pulling him away, and he struggled against them until he heard Dimmock’s voice in his ear.  “Sherlock!  Sherlock, we’ve got him!  Get off, let us cuff him.”

It was only then that Sherlock allowed himself to be pulled away, and he did not relax fully until he heard the click of the handcuffs and the steady tone of Dimmock reciting the caution.  Then Sherlock looked around and spotted a mobile on the ground.  It must have fallen from the waiter’s pocket when Sherlock had caught him.  He picked it up and keyed through the stored numbers.  There were only two.  One was for “Mum and Dad,” and another one was for “Cathy at work.”  Sherlock pulled out his own mobile and pulled up the list of Cocknell and Coague’s employees while he rang “Cathy at work.”

“Cocknell and Coague, Cathy Webb speaking, how may I help you?” came a bright voice over the phone.

Sherlock quickly scrolled through his list.  Catherine Webb was listed as – of course, stupid of him to have missed it – the assistant to the managing director.  She would have access to the firm’s accounts, and know which buildings had recently been purchased, and which were due for inspection.  And she had clearly recently acquired a dangerously thrilling new boyfriend.

“Cancel your dinner plans,” he told her.  “You’ll have to reschedule at Her Majesty’s pleasure.”

After Dimmock put the waiter into the panda car and drove away, a constable took Sherlock’s contact information so that he could make an appointment to give a statement, and then the constable left as well.  Left to his own devices, Sherlock glanced around to get his bearings and then retraced his steps back to the surgery.

Lestrade was sitting on the bonnet of a nearby car, watching as the rescue crews worked on the ruins of the waiting room.  When he spotted Sherlock, he patted the space next to him.  Sherlock came to stand at his side, but did not sit.  Neither man spoke for a while.  They waited in silent companionship, watching as John passed objects back and forth through the gap and shouted conversation with Sarah over the noise of the rescue crew.

Half an hour later, Lestrade’s mobile rang, and he moved away to take the call.  When he returned, there was a small smile on his face.  “You did it,” he said quietly.  “Frank Somerset was released from prison a few months ago, after doing eighteen years for armed robbery.  Apparently, he’s one of the best serial killers the Met has ever seen; we didn’t even know he existed back when he was taking young girls off the street.  Hid the bodies so well, they just vanished.”

“Idiots,” Sherlock said.

Lestrade shrugged.  “Well, you were still in school then.  Anyway, turns out that Somerset isn’t nearly as good an arsonist as he was a serial killer.  You got him, and we’ll see him put away for life this time.”  He winced and rotated his shoulder.  “Christ, my arm hurts.  Listen, I’m not technically on duty, and I’ve got to get home and see to the kids.  Can I take you anywhere?”

Sherlock shook his head.  Lestrade patted him on the shoulder and left.

Twenty minutes after that, the rescue crews managed to stabilise the waiting room and enlarge the gap.  John went in with two paramedics at his side, carrying a backboard.  A few minutes later, they emerged.  The two paramedics carried Mrs. Hudson, strapped to the backboard, her head bandaged, and an oxygen mask on her face.  Sarah was at her side, holding an IV bag, and John brought up the rear, carrying the lights and a case that had held medical equipment.  Sherlock hurried over to meet the small procession, and saw, to his embarrassingly great relief, that Mrs. Hudson was conscious.  She smiled at him through the oxygen mask, and squeezed back when he clasped her hand.

John smiled and pulled Sherlock gently away as the paramedics loaded Mrs. Hudson into a waiting ambulance.  “She’ll be all right, Sherlock,” he said.  “We’ll go to visit her later.”  The ambulance sped away.

There was a little sigh from John’s other side, and Sarah sat down hard on the pavement.  John crouched down next to her and unclipped her helmet.  “Oh, bloody hell,” he said, looking at her head wound.  “I should have remembered this.”

“’m all right,” Sarah murmured.  “I could help.”

“Yeah,” John said.  “Only now you need to get to hospital, too, and all the ambulances have gone.”

Sherlock dug in his pocket for his mobile.  Sarah had been so good to Mrs. Hudson that Sherlock could justify summoning a car from Mycroft.  But just as he began to scroll through his contacts, a man stepped forward.  “You need a ride?” he asked.

It was the cabbie who had brought him and John to the surgery.  “You waited?” Sherlock asked, unsure whether or not to trust a cabbie who appeared unsummoned.

The cabbie nodded, his eyes fixed on Sarah.  “I watched the whole thing,” he said.  “My little girl, my Katie.  She’s in Afghanistan.”

John looked up immediately upon hearing that.

“She drives ambulances,” the cabbie said.  “She’s the bravest person I know.  I thought, well, she’d want me to make sure I could be useful in an emergency, so I waited for a bit.”  He turned to Sarah.  “You reminded me so much of her, going in there with only a helmet on.  Wouldn’t want you left behind.  No charge.”

He leaned down and helped Sarah to her feet.  Sherlock and John stayed close at hand as they made their way to the waiting taxi.  They did not speak during their ride to the nearest hospital.  When they arrived, Sherlock helped Sarah out of the cab.  John came to attention and gave the cabbie his crispest salute.  The cabbie nodded soberly and drove away.  John offered Sarah his arm, and the three of them walked toward the hospital door.

END