notes: cross-posted from ao3. cw for holmes' drug use, which is generally treated throughout the fic as something that he should be weaned off.
"Do you include violin-playing in your category of rows?" he asked, anxiously.
"It depends on the player," I answered. "A well-played violin is a treat for the gods– a badly-played one–"
"Oh, that's all right," he cried, with a merry laugh. "I think we may consider the thing as settled–"
[Holmes' knowledge of] Geology – Practical, but limited. Tells at a glance different soils from each other. After walks has shown me splashes upon his trousers, and told me by their colour and consistence in what part of London he had received them.
- A Study In Scarlet
Holmes' easy confidence had reassured me that he was a seasoned player– yet the first time he drew the taut bow across the strings– it is a time I would rather forget.
My niece plays the violin, so I know a thing or two about bad violin-playing. Let me just say, there is nothing in Hell or Heaven as unpleasant as the squeak and twang of a string pitched wrong, or the abrasion of a bow forced over unyielding strings.
I digress. Holmes is too trying, and I fear that unless I expunge the memory of hearing his violin through writing I may soon lose my mind. He had assured me on various occasions that he could play the violin well, and I had no reason to distrust him– after all, his prowess in chemistry and sensational literature were unforged.
After each of his long leisurely walks around London, he makes it a point to sit me down and patiently point to each and every mud splotch on his pants and explain its origin– often in excruciating detail. It is more than once that Mrs Hudson has witnessed the two of us hunched seriously over a fire, conversing intently over Holmes' pant leg. It is beyond embarrassing, I find, for the landlady to catch us in such positions. While Holmes I found endearing, if I had to listen to him talk sediment as though it were sentient one more time–
I interrupted him during one of his speeches, and gestured at the violin on the wall.
"Ah, Holmes," I said, rather desperately, pretending to have very good-naturedly let my attention drift to the very inconspicuous violin sitting on the shelf. "Why not play us a tune? I've never heard you pick up your violin before."
How I rue the day I uttered those words.
"Oh," Holmes looked up from his pant leg, and looks consideringly at the violin, and then at me. He must have been oblivious to my distress. I pride myself on being the opposite of an open book. Very hard to read.
He walks wordlessly to the violin, and picks it up expertly in one smooth motion. Perhaps my expectations were beguiled by that deceptive ease with which he holds his instrument. I thought that such ease signalled hours of practice, which should rightfully translate into a certain flair and mastery on the violin.
Now that I think about it, surely my niece has had hours of practice on the violin too. My sister told me that she practiced it for hours on end during the weekend, and whenever she was finished with school during the weekday. This certainly did not alchemise her into a capable violinist, so I did not know why I expected it to have worked with Holmes.
"Would you like to request any particular piece?" he asked, poised like a statue. One that is about to ruin your life.
"Kazan," I said, "Glass Passions, by Kazan." It was all the rage nowadays. And then added, "if you don't mind," because I didn't want to come across as being high-handed.
Holmes' eyes glinted, and then with a grand gesture he pulled the bow of the violin in one continuous motion across the neck.
My ears strained– the opening note didn't quite sound right, but I couldn't entirely be sure that it was wrong.
And then Holmes continued playing.
How do I say this– It was a suspicion that grew stronger and stronger with each note, that Holmes might be off-key. The notes were not incorrect in relation to each other, but they dragged across my ears in a way that other renditions of the song I had heard did not.
Before he could continue on to the second movement, I knew I had to do something.
"Dearest Holmes," I trembled, "I would not dream of insulting you, but perhaps you have played the first movement in the wrong key…?"
I trailed off, fearing that the damage had been done and that I had mortally wounded Holmes.
"The wrong key?" Holmes looked quizzically at me.
"Yes," I said, like a man whose soul has left his body. "I have a meagre knowledge of music, but– forgive me– something about the Kazan does not sound right. It could be the key– or the chord, or– or just, something is off to me."
It frustrated me to no end that I could not describe exactly was wrong with the way Holmes was playing, and I prayed that he would not take offence at my statement.
Holmes hummed, and played a chord from the piece again.
"That's exactly what I mean," I felt myself screeching as I heard in my mind's ear nails raking over a chalkboard. "Surely, my dear Holmes, that cannot be right."
Holmes looked at the violin, and looked at me, and looked at the violin again.
"Watson," he says sombrely, "my opinion of you has just increased tenfold. For you to catch such an aberration that even trained ears miss– you must be understating your own musical talents."
I was so relieved at that moment that Holmes had not taken offence that I collapsed into my seat.
"You were right that something was off," Holmes continued, "in fact, I was half a pitch too low while playing. Let me correct this mistake right this moment, and proceed onto the second movement."
"Oh, don't be so hard on yourself–" I started to say, but Holmes paid me no mind, for he had started dragging his bow across the violin again.
Holmes did raise the pitch– that I could tell, but instead of the lowly rumbling grating, his violin now produced a high-pitched screech. It was so horrible that I felt the hair stand on the back of my neck, and my teeth began to clatter unwittingly against the onslaught of my senses. I daresay I expected our landlady to burst through at any moment, demanding an explanation.
Holmes seemed to notice my discomfort, and his bow-hand paused for a moment.
"Watson, is something the matter? Is it too cold?" he inclined his head towards the fireplace, where a merry fire was roaring along.
"No," I almost shouted, grateful that the playing had stopped. "I was just thinking, could you finish telling me about the golden brown stain on your pant leg?"
"Ah yes," Holmes said, eyes gleaming. He strode to the shelf, and set the violin down to my enormous relief. In one smooth motion, he settled into the couch across me again, and pulled his pant leg taut so that I could better appreciate the splatter and shape of that particular stain against the material (which looked indistinguishable from all the other stains on his pants).
"As I was saying–"
Glass Passions was completely ruined for me after that. It was one of Kazan's most delicate works to date, and Holmes' rendition of it drove me spare. Every time I tried to listen to the piece again, I only heard Holmes' off-tune playing of it layered over the crisp violin solo.
I barrelled out of my sister's living room in record time when she announced that her daughter had started to learn this most paradigmatic piece by Kazan, called Glass Passions, and would you be so kind as to stay and listen–
Holmes didn't seem to realise this, because when I stumbled into our living quarters wearily one day after a long day of work, he was sitting at the couch reading with his extraordinarily long legs curled comfortably into the chair like a cat's, and the gramophone in our apartment was playing–
"Is that Kazan you're listening to, Holmes?" I asked with dread, already knowing the answer.
Holmes shifted in his seat, and his face brightened when he saw me.
"Halloa, Watson!" he greeted. "Since you went to the trouble of requesting Kazan from me the previous time, I took the trouble of procuring a disc with his most famous compositions for violin and cello– Glass Passions, Songs After Dark… Do you like it?"
The violin in the recording produced a most tremendous warbling sound, and I cringed as I heard Holmes' screeching chords in its place.
Holmes wiped at his eyes. "What a lovely vibrato," he said.
"Yes," I said, smiling through clenched teeth. "Very lovely."
That night, when Holmes had retired to his bedroom, I quietly stole the disc from the mantle where Holmes had placed it and hid it under my large winter coat. Adrenaline pulsing through my veins, I could hardly think as blood rushed past my ears. Gallantly hopping down the seventeen steps to the first floor, I dashed into the street and forced the disk into the hands of the first stranger I saw. The urchin boy staggered backwards a few steps, and his grimy face broke into a smile after a moment of shock. I notice that he is missing his front teeth.
"Hi, here's a disc of Kazan's greatest works," I rushed out all in one breath, "please take it off my hands, thank you, good bye, God bless you," and ran back into our apartment, slamming the door.
"What's the matter?" Holmes asked, when I had raced up the stairs, heart pounding against my chest.
His eyes were wide, tinted a warm orange by the glow of the gas lamps in our living room, and I noticed for the first time how very grey they were. Holmes was standing close to me, and I wondered how the artless state his calculating eyes could take on at times had escaped me for so long. And his expression– his concern, at seeing me pale and breathless, stoked the unimaginable fire of shame in my belly of having disposed of his possession in such a way– A queasy feeling began to bloom in my stomach as a potent mixture of guilt and triumph fomented.
Seeing Holmes, the haze of adrenaline which had clouded my judgement began to clear, and I realised that I had taken a most unreasonable and extreme route. Why, were not easier options available? I could have chosen to articulate my discomfort to Holmes! Nothing warranted the crime, the awful disposition with which I have acted towards my honourable companion. If only I could jump on the time machine of H.G. Wells' imagination to reverse my own act!
I thought of immediately throwing myself upon his feet and confessing of my heinous act, yet something treacherous and unimaginable force stalled my hand. Perhaps it is cowardice, at imagining the look of heartbreak and horror that would flash upon my fellow lodger's face. And then– he would be quite within his rights to withdraw from our living arrangements at once. My heart ached at ruining the beginnings of a friendship with my impulsiveness. I gulped.
That night, I dreamt of cold grey eyes and crackling vinyl discs. And when I woke up, I felt that Father Winter must have crept into my duvet as a bedfellow during the night somehow, for I felt chilled to the bone.
"What a pity," Holmes said, a few days later. He was pacing the room, probably puzzling over one of the details of a recent disappearance of the Earl of Fairfax, while I was reading the paper by my usual couch by the fire. He had just gotten back from another one of his walks, and I watched tensely from behind my newspaper as I saw him turn towards the mantle for the disc–
"The landlady said she mistakenly threw the Kazan disc away while cleaning."
"Mrs Hudson did?" I said, looking up from my newspaper with eyes wide. I had rehearsed this moment for a while– the appropriate amount of shock to display at Holmes' announcement that the disc was missing, essential to not alerting him that anything was amiss. I didn't expect him to chalk the disappearance up to Mrs Hudson, or for Mrs Hudson herself to admit to such a doing, At that moment, I felt eternally grateful that the landlady would go to such lengths as to cover up on my behalf.
"Yeah," Holmes said, plainly. He seemed down, and for a moment I felt guilt stir in me for having betrayed my roommate's trust in such a way. And then I remembered that I could not stand hearing Kazan another time, and that if Holmes had the disc–
My heart resolved itself.
"No matter," Holmes said, seeming to brighten up. He scooted in his couch towards me, and pointed at a round, dark reddish blot on cuff of his pants.
"Look at this spot," he said excitably, "I've never seen this pattern of soil before– usually, they aren't so dense or rich in colour. I do believe that it comes from outside of the greater London region…"
Outside of the violin-playing, Sherlock Holmes held no more unpleasant surprises. He is a regular man for the most part. His nicotine-intake is as bad as mine, but on languid days he takes to his "seven-percent solution"– an oblique term I have coined to refer to his terrible cocaine habit.
Mrs Hudson seemed to appreciate Holmes' violin. This surprised me, obviously.
On one evening where Holmes had vanished into the foggy London night to pursue some business or other, I rang the bell to call for some coffee. While I expected the housemaid to answer the bell, it was Mrs Hudson who came, carrying a tray with my cup. She seemed as surprised to see only me, as I was to see her.
"Oh," she says, setting the tray down, "I thought Mr Holmes might be here. In fact, I was hoping he would be, so I could request a song from him."
"On– on the violin?" I felt I had to clarify, because surely she could not be referring to his violin-playing. Perhaps Holmes had a secret talent in opera, or something of that sort, that he had kept concealed from me.
"Yes, have you not heard him play?" Mrs Hudson levelled a look at me. "I was under the impression that the two of you were close."
"He has played," I said, feeling wrong-footed. "It was–"
I did not want to finish the sentence. Luckily, Mrs Hudson jumped in, her eyes gleaming.
"It was lovely, was it not, Mr Watson? He just has such a flair on the violin, and I thought it must have been the loveliest rendering of Bach that I've ever heard–"
"Er," I said, lamely, wondering idly if the word flair had meant something else than what I was familiar with in Mrs Hudson's time. "Yeah. He's very– he's very good."
Mrs Hudson looked embarrassed to have had such an emotional outburst in front of me.
"Excuse me, Mr Watson. Now, I'll be downstairs– ring the bell again when you're done, and I will collect the cup."
I mulled over the coffee, and tried to employ Holmes' method of deduction over this puzzling mystery, no less mystifying or riddled with mysteries than some of the cases that Holmes had taken on.
Perhaps Mrs Hudson was tone-deaf, and a rather mediocre playing was thus elevated to her untrained senses, whereas my ear had been sharpened by my exposure to music. Perhaps a baroque Bach was easier to play than a more modern Kazan, erratic and unpredictable. Or maybe Holmes was actually a good violinist, and he was just fooling with me.
I dismissed the third possibility immediately, because it was downright impossible. Why would a good fellow, unprovoked, pull such a stunt on me? The second, while more likely, was nevertheless improbable nonetheless– my niece's bad playing remained consistent, regardless of whether it was a baroque or classical or contemporary piece. That left the first option– which while egoistical and left me slightly embarrassed by the inflation of my humble self, explained the phenomenon perfectly.
Alright then.
I suddenly remembered that I had Mrs Hudson to thank for covering up for the Kazan disc incident, no doubt taking a black mark against her own name for my sake. Ringing the bell, I summoned her up again.
"Mrs Hudson," I said, warmly, "I really must thank you for covering up for me."
The landlady looked at me oddly. "Whatever are you referring to, Mr Watson?"
"The–" I coughed, trying to be discrete, "Mr Holmes' Kazan…"
"Oh yes," Mrs Hudson had a far-away look in her eyes now, "I really must ask him to play me a Kazan sometime, yes… thank you for your suggestion, Mr Watson…"
She hummed as she made her way down the stairs, leaving me confused as to whether she had grasped my meaning. I decided against such a fancy– maybe Mrs Hudson was simply a better actor than I had given her credit for. I must say, I am quite impressed with her brand of quiet subtlety.