Disclaimer: nothing mine. A.N. Sorry about the cliffhanger….I couldn't resist! ;D
Holmes really planned to visit the Watson household first thing in the morning. But one incident made him postpone it for a while. The train conductors knocked on his door the following morning. He'd expected some result from that line of enquiry, of course. But not so quickly – these people were busy enough that one odd event should not, he'd thought, push them to ask about it as soon as possible. Certainly, he didn't expect what they had to say.
"You need to come witness for us, Mr. Holmes, before they send us both to Bedlam!" they chorused, as soon as Mrs. Hudson introduced them.
"I certainly will, if I can be of any help. But what seems to be the problem?" the sleuth replied.
"That obituary –"
"Yesterday –"
"Inside the window –"
"It disappeared!" they announced, apparently both so overwhelmed that neither could manage more than a couple of words before snapping their mouth shut, as if in reflex after being ordered to do so often lately.
"Are you sure?" the sleuth asked, before kicking himself mentally for it. These people knew trains like he knew his tobacco ash, out of long familiarity. There was no chance that they'd simply mistaken the carriage or something as simple. This was becoming more and more odd. Let's imagine that Moriarty managed to switch window panels, to threaten someone. Why would he go to the bother of switching it back again? The obituary should mean nothing to any passenger but the one it was meant for.
"Of course we are," one of the two announced, sniffing in outrage.
"But we inquired about it – not just for you, see, but because we were puzzled ourselves – and now our superior thinks we were into our cups!" the other explained, wringing his hands.
"Nothing of the sort was ever authorized," concluded the first, in a soft voice, as if somehow that was the most worrying point of their tale.
"I'll send your supervisor a telegraph confirming I've seen it too, if you think it'll help you avoid an unjust reprimand. Just write down where I can reach him…somewhere," the detective said, gesturing towards his table, currently occupied by a number of books and newspapers, as he'd spent a good part of the night trying to track down all he could on Watson's death. Thank God that he had a few good friends that didn't mind lending him copies of anything he could need after hours. "I promise I'll do it today, but at the moment I am expected – in danger of being late, actually, so you'll have to forgive me if I hurry you along, too," he added. A little white lie was necessary if he wanted to be on the first train for Farnham.
His guests looked lost for a moment, but then one wrote an address on the corner of the topmost newspaper and traced a rectangle around it, hoping it would make it noticeable enough, before both scurried away, mumbling thanks. Their host had offered before they could ask, so making him late would be a poor repayment of his kindness.
Holmes spent the trip to Farnham re-examining all the data he had about the Watson's case, and Moriarty in general. There were definitely some things that made him suspect foul play…but he shouldn't forget the possibility that the professor could have some accomplice(s) in the household. The man certainly wasn't inclined to doing his own dirty work when his victims weren't children.
The Watson's house showed signs of having seen better times, but it was evident that its owner, despite loving and caring for it at his best, couldn't restore it to its former glory. Whoever Moriarty's accomplice(s) were, they didn't live here unless they'd been servants in the first place and the professor cautioned them against suddenly leaving their employment, which could draw undue attention. Or possibly relatives that hated Henry Watson themselves and would have done it even without Moriarty's egging, if possibly in a more blatant way, getting caught in the process.
When he rang the bell, the door was opened by the current owner himself: a former army officer, obviously, with blond hair further bleached by the unforgiving sun of the Afghanistan campaign. His clothes, despite being practical, were a tad too fine to be allowed to the servant of a household whose means had trickled away.
"Are you here for a consult?" the man asked, surprising Holmes for a moment before a more careful look (damn his propensity for soldiers, *that* deduction always derailed his thoughts) revealed the man for an army doctor.
"To give one, not to receive one. I'm sure you can observe I'm perfectly healthy," the sleuth replied.
"Then, I am sorry, but I'm afraid you have the wrong address. I didn't ask for a second opinion, Mr…" he said, already closing the door.
"Holmes," the detective replied, putting a foot forward to stop the other from slamming the door in his face, "and forgive me if I am rude, but I don't want you to send me away because you assume I am here seeking a compensation. My consultations are free, if the problem is interesting enough, and in this case, the puzzle is indeed most fascinating."
"Puzzle? I still think you might be mistaken. Though possibly you wanted to discuss your problem with my brother, but he sadly passed away," Watson pointed out, still not allowing him in.
"His death is the puzzle I'm referring to," Holmes explained, not retreating yet.
That shocked the doctor into action: he pulled the mad stranger (as far he was concerned) inside and slammed the door behind him, instead of in his face, hissing, "Puzzle? Puzzle, you say? He drank too much, thought climbing on a tree was a great idea, fell down and broke his neck. Not a mystery, is it?"
"Such is the official report indeed. But your actions are evidence enough that you know there was more behind his demise. What is so eerie that makes an army doctor afraid to discuss someone's death out in the open? It should be something you are more than accustomed to," the consulting detective retorted, a challenging look in his eyes.
Watson barked a laugh. "Not a brother's death, no. Not really accustomed to that one. But even if there was something else to it, what business is it of yours?"
"Apologies. I'm a consulting detective. My business, as you say, is to solve cases the police are unable to end satisfactorily on their own. So, you see, doctor, a murder is my business as much as pneumonia is yours," Holmes explained, shrugging.
"Even if it might be so, I don't just ring the bell of anyone I've heard coughing. Shouldn't you advertise in the newspaper and let clients find you that way?" Watson objected, raising an eyebrow.
"I have recently angered professor Moriarty," the sleuth revealed.
Before he could continue with his suspicions about the man's involvement in the senior Watson brother's death, the doctor sighed deeply. "You couldn't just go out there and kick a wasp nest or something equally as innocuous, could you? Come with me, we need to have a talk and tea is definitely in order."
This was so much better than having to persuade someone of the chance that their relative had indeed been murdered! For some reason, even the innocents never liked when one raised that hypothesis, no matter how much evidence one could adduce.
Watson smiled gently to the girl who peeked out of what had to be the kitchen (the only help he'd kept, Holmes would wager) when asking her for tea. As soon as they both sat down in a sunny room, half-turned into a library, he said, "I need a premise to this talk, Mr. Holmes. I have not gone to the police with my information because I don't fancy visiting an asylum as a patient, but I swear that everything I am going to tell you is no more nor less than what happened to my brother. Go to the 5th Northumberland Fusiliers and ask if John Watson was inclined to flights of fancy, if you want. Just don't dismiss what I have to tell you because it's unusual."
"I don't need any witnesses for your character, doctor. The mere fact that you wanted to dismiss me until you heard I might have to fight against your late brother's enemy is proof enough that you don't want to dupe me. And while I agree that most people are woefully close-minded, especially in Scotland Yard, it's always been a principle of mine that having eliminated the impossible, what remains, no matter how improbable, must be true," the detective assured, offering what he hoped was an encouraging smile.
"That's the point," Watson said, "what I have to tell you should be impossible…I would have deemed it impossible and suggested that anyone mentioning it lay off the drink and the narcotics and take a long, reviving holiday by the sea. That was, of course, before witnessing what my unfortunate brother had to go through."
