Birthday present for SecretMoustache 2. A 221B chosen with our trip to a certain famous door very much in mind - will he knock... or maybe that might be dangerous...
His hand rose towards the knocker and then fell limply to his side. He sighed mournfully before striding away with more purpose than at his arrival. He pulled his scarf tighter around his neck, raising his collar, partly against the unseasonal fog but mostly to hide his identity from anyone looking closely.
It wasn't the first time he had lived through this charade. He'd lost count of the times he had come to the door, touched the number lovingly and then hurried away into the night. Using that knocker would negate all the self-deprivation of the past two years.
He'd once stopped at Speedys to order one of John's favourite almond croissants, but pulled back before going in. Someone might recognise him - a casual word in the wrong ear and they'd know he wasn't dead and that could be dangerous.
Faking his own death had not been an easy matter and he didn't want to have gone through hell for nothing. All that blood that he'd donated in the cause would have been bled in vain - or should that be vein - he smiled to himself at his little joke. Who said that solitude was bad for the intellect - his faculties were as finely honed as ever.
... And no one, not even the late, great, Moriarty would waste his own blood.