My heartfelt appreciation and everlasting gratitude to my lovely and long-suffering betas Wynsom and Fang's Fawn, and to the wonderful and generous mrspencil, who is the Brit-pick extraordinaire and a fount of valuable information.
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Sixteen-year-old Mary Morstan, newly orphaned and placed with strangers, was brutally assaulted by the man legally appointed to protect her. How did she survive? Within the fortress of memory; with the power of words. . . .
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Her thoughts slowly emerged from the protective blackness into an awareness of suffering. Nothing existed in her nearly-conscious mind at that moment but unadulterated pain. Every nerve ending in her body was standing on end, screaming in agony, crying out for attention: Do something! She curled in on herself, her breath coming in short, painful gasps. Her hands didn't know whether to try to sooth her throbbing head or the feverish agony that was her stomach. As she became more aware of herself, the nausea grew; she retched painfully, ending in a quavering cry of anguish as the action contracted abused muscles and organs. Vague thoughts flickered through her, floating in a haze: "What happened? Where am I?"
Then with a sudden brutality, the memories came flooding back: entering the kitchen; being backed into a corner; resisting her assailant; great hands, bigger than her head, striking; steel-capped boots kicking; meaty, sweat-slicked fingers groping; a broken bottle wielded in fury; falling into blackness. Now she was aware that she was lying on rough ground, no longer inside, freezing, hurting, bleeding. Panic rose within her chest and took her breath. Her fingers clutched at her arms in a self-protective gesture and she bit her lips. What if he were still here?
Feeling the familiar material of her coat helped to calm her, to ground her into sanity. Her first thought was relief that it was still there. In the past month, she had lost nearly everything she had—now it seemed she had lost even the right to her own person. But this precious thing had been left to her. So many years ago, the coat had been given to her by a kind stranger, along with a gift of words: "I like your persistence. Keep up that stubborn streak and you can do anything you like. Just keep trying and don't give up."
She could no longer remember what he looked like or the sound of his voice, but the words had woven themselves into the very fabric of the old, brown suede so that they whispered to her with every movement. The words, so simple, so profound, had brought her through many difficult days, hours, moments in her life. She had often found herself pondering them: "Would he like my persistence today? What does 'not giving up' look like in this situation? How do I 'keep trying' this time?"
'Not dying' seemed to her the only way of 'not giving up' at the moment. The coat would help—perhaps she would not die of hypothermia. She drew it close around her and tried opening her eyes to see where she was, but only one of them seemed to be in working order. Unable to focus, she could tell nevertheless that she was not where she had been. He had taken what he wanted from her, done what he pleased to her, and dumped her in an unfamiliar alley by the rubbish bins. Indignation rose in her and she tried to grit her teeth only to discover her jaw was not working properly. A swift vision of a vicious boot aimed at her head made her squeeze her eye shut again and shudder, not daring to make a sound. What if he were still near? What if he heard her and attacked her again? She stroked the softness of the suede and tried to control her shaking breath.
But nothing happened for a long time. Perhaps he was truly gone. Blindly, gingerly, she explored the rest of herself with trembling, cold-thickened fingers. He had not bothered pulling off the coat, but her jumper and bra were pushed up around her neck. Her bruised stomach felt hot and swollen to the touch. Torn skirt and knickers were in a tangled heap beside her; she was naked from the waist down except for her gym shoes and socks. A tentative touch found open wounds slick with blood, and she gave way to a horrified wail of agony as she realized he had made good on his furious promise to make use of the bottle she had broken over his head. She wept, the tears hot on her frozen face, biting her lips, trying to stay quiet, sobbing with cold and despair and terror and fury.
Footsteps crunching over the gravel of the alleyway stopped her tears and froze every muscle as she steeled herself for another assault. 'Not giving up' might now mean fighting back—although her struggle against her assailant had been futile the first time, she would not allow him to touch her again without some cost to himself. She tried to control her breathing, which was still coming in short, painful gasps, and clutched her coat close around herself.
A cursed exclamation. "Bloody hell! Call 999, Dave!" a voice cried.
"Don't put your coat over her, you moron! We gotta get outa here! Cops'll think we done this!" another voice hissed.
"Well, I'm calling, anyway," the first voice insisted.
She could hear him talking to the emergency call-handler as their footsteps receded quickly back down the alley. She let out a long, shaking breath, both relieved and bereft. A long, cold, painful time passed. "Keep up that stubborn streak," the brown suede rustled gently into the frigid air. "I'm not giving up," she wanted to reply, but her mouth was broken. She thought the words instead, hard—imagined them solid and warm and wrapped around her like armour. And then she heard a siren's wail in the distance. She clung to her coat with numb fingers and allowed herself to slip into oblivion.
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Ten years earlier, a young John Watson picked a half-frozen child up out of the snow and gave his spare coat to her, along with a few casual words of encouragement. For a man who went on to spend his life in serving others—saving perhaps hundreds of lives both as a soldier and as a doctor—this simple act of kindness to an anonymous six-year-old might seem to be the least significant of his many noteworthy deeds.