Chapter 3: A Little Knight Music
"How can he not be dead?" asked Lestrade. "You confirmed it yourself."
"Yeah, right after he came back from the dead," John reminded him.
Sherlock was still sitting in the chair, staring straight ahead and not paying the least attention to either of them.
"What's so bad about this underwear?" asked Matthews, apparently feeling the need to contribute something to the conversation.
"That's the underwear that Moriarty was wearing when we first met him, or at least a reasonable facsimile of it," explained John.
Lestrade had known the men long enough to look only mildly surprised at this information, but Matthews looked absolutely shocked.
"Oh, for god's sake, I'm not gay!" cried John.
"Shut up, shut up, all of you!" demanded Sherlock, rising from his chair. Clenching his fists in frustration, he paced back and forth for a few seconds. Suddenly stopping, he threw out his hands and tilted back his head as he screamed: "I know she's alive!"
"Sherlock, calm down, we believe you," said Lestrade.
"It's not you I have to tell, it's him."
"Moriarty?" John asked.
"Yes, but where is he and how do I tell him?"
"Well, if he is alive and has done all this, he must be eagerly waiting for your response?" John guessed.
"Exactly!" Sherlock said, beginning to pace again. "Oh, he's been enjoying watching me dance, seeing me go from despair, to desperate hope, to exhilaration, and then back to despair again, but where does it go from here?"
He took out his cell phone and scowled as he looked quickly through several screens.
"No calls, no texts, no messages. Nothing?" he asked, looking at John.
"No, replied John, "the only thing I've gotten recently is that text from you."
"Check again," Sherlock demanded, "even something that seems like a random misdialed number."
"Fine," he said. Taking out his phone, he began to punch the buttons.
"Maybe it's on her," said Sherlock, looking toward the corpse again.
Putting his cell phone away, he approached the slab.
"Need to check her pockets," he murmured.
"Already checked," said Lestrade, holding out his hand.
"By your people."
He reached towards the corpse again.
"Put the bloody gloves on first!" roared Matthews.
"He will," Lestrade assured him.
Sherlock took on one of the mutinous looks he usually reserved for Mycroft.
"He will," Lestrade repeated, walking over to stand beside him.
For a moment, it looked as though Sherlock was going to continue to defy the policeman, but after a pleading look from Lestrade, he sighed and shook his head and strode on over to the table pushed against the side of the wall. After hastily pulling on the loose-fitting vinyl gloves, he stepped back to the body and quickly began to go through her pockets. Finding nothing, he groaned in frustration and stepped back.
"Sorry, Sherlock, all I've had is calls and messages from Harry for the past two days," John said. "Unless you think?"
"No, your sister's just been off on a binge again," he growled, as he tore off the gloves and threw them into the bin.
"Yeah, that's what I thought, that's why I haven't responded," replied John, pocketing his phone.
"Bring me Molly's cell phone!" demanded Sherlock, looking at Lestrade.
"Uh, I don't have it."
"Her purse was not in its usual place in the lab cabinet, so your men obviously took it out of the lab, along with the files."
"No, they didn't."
"Sherlock, I don't understand something," said John, furrowing his brow.
"What?"
"How did you manage to find what you did anyway, I thought the whole place had just been hit by a bomb?"
"Oh, the lab was fine, it was only the morgue that was hit," Lestrade said. "Well, actually, it started in the store room adjacent to the morgue, but the full force of the explosion went out that way, through the morgue and blowing out the outer wall. Plus of course, the damage from the smoke and water throughout the place because of the explosion and fire and then the automatic sprinklers coming on. But the lab, which was on the other side of the storeroom, was basically untouched except for things falling over because of the force of the blast."
Sherlock had sunk down onto a stool again, this time studying the floor.
"Another conveniently 'accidental' gas explosion?" he asked.
"No, it was ether this time," said Lestrade, wrinkling his brow.
John turned back to look at him, his mouth dropping open.
"Ether?" repeated Sherlock, looking puzzled. "She keeps some in the lab, of course, because she needs it occasionally for some of her extractions. But it's only a tiny can, and she faithfully keeps it under the fume hood, even when it's unopened. But even the entire can would not be enough to blow a hole through a reinforced wall."
"There was a stack of ether cans piled up next to the wall in the storage room," said Lestrade. "A leaking pipe above them must have been dripping water down upon it for a while, because the cans began to rust through and the fumes were building up. You know how volatile that stuff is, takes just one spark for the whole thing to go up with a blast."
"As I said, it could turn out to just be a tragic accident," said Matthews.
"That ended with a magical blast that just happened to blow Molly's clothes off of her and onto a corpse?" Sherlock said.
"Oh."
"Molly would never have been that careless," he said. "Whatever ether was there she kept in the hood or in a reinforced flammables cabinet. Strange that he would go such lengths to create that set-up though."
"Sherlock?"
He turned his attention to John.
"He has contacted us already," he said, his voice quietly assured.
Sherlock jumped to his feet and grasped John around the shoulders.
"How?"
"Earlier today, I was on a chat site, talking with some other doctors who had been in Afghanistan, trading stories about our experiences when this other guy suddenly signs in and asks if anyone had ever used ether as an anesthetic while they were working in the field. Well, it struck everyone as kind of odd I think, because we all went silent, and then one guy finally typed something about 'maybe we had to work in pretty primitive conditions, but nothing that outdated.' Then the guy who had asked the question said, 'Well, it never hurts to be reminded how dangerous it can be', and then signed out. I just thought it was a bit of a weirdo at the time."
"Or some kid who's heard about sniffing it for pleasure, because he's heard that you get a buzz and energy off it before it knocks you out, depending on how long you're inhaling it," Lestrade mused.
They all looked over at Sherlock.
"Has he been sniffing ether?" asked Matthews, concerned about the way the man's eyes were darting about and he was lifting his hands to point at things in the air.
"No, he's just…trying to figure something out," replied John, figuring that was better than telling the pathologist that his friend was currently in his 'mind palace'.
He jumped back as Sherlock unexpectedly stopped and lunged toward him again.
"You need to find the site for me!" he cried.
Pulling John over to another bench, he pushed him down to seat him in front of a computer. "Bring it up for me," he commanded, standing over John's left shoulder.
"Hey, that's hospital property," protested Matthews, scowling at them.
"Yes, and I'm sure the hospital would be delighted to know that you regularly download porn upon their property," retorted Sherlock, throwing him a disdainful glance.
"Oh," said Matthews, abruptly shutting his mouth and retreating as Lestrade tiptoed around him to go stand behind Watson as well.
John had logged into the site and had retrieved his previous chat. "There," he said, pointing at the screen.
Sherlock bent down further over his shoulder and nodded, quickly reading the messages and then he reached over to the mouse, scrolling through the following posts much too rapidly for Lestrade or John to read.
"I was hoping your memory was faulty," he said, his body relaxing slightly.
"Wasn't it there?" John asked.
"When the subject was brought up, especially being in a group of doctors, you immediately assumed it had to do with a legitimate medical use: You said he asked if anyone had used it for an anesthetic. The actual quote was: 'did anyone every knock anyone out with it?'"
"And that's good?"
Sherlock glanced between Lestrade and John.
"What would you prefer?" he asked, as he lowered his voice. "That he used it merely to 'knock Molly out' as he clearly did to get her out of here without a struggle? Or that he intended to use it as an anesthetic, removing pain so that he could perform surgery on her?"
"Dear god," said Lestrade, shutting his eyes as if to try and erase the image that had formed in his own mind of Molly tied down to a table and having various body parts cut away.
Turning back to the computer, Sherlock pointed at the screen.
"But there's been no more from him since then," he noted.
"They way you flew through the screens, are you sure?"
"No, that's the last one," he said, flipping back to the screen to where he had signed off from the conversation John had remembered.
"Oh," groaned Lestrade, finally able to read the whole message.
"What is it?" asked John, looking back at him.
"Art Tinbass?" he said, pointing at the screen name. "How could you miss that, John?"
"Miss what?"
"An exact anagram for 'Saint Bart's," supplied Sherlock.
"Good work," said John, looking up at him in surprise.
Lestrade shrugged and cleared his throat. "Been doing a lot of Scrabble lately," he mumbled.
"Shh!" hissed Sherlock, his hands up to his forehead as he closed his eyes and concentrated. "I need to choose just exactly the right words myself. "
"All right," he said, his eyes bursting open and moving to lean over John again, "type the following, there will be three sentences."
"Okay," said John, his fingers poised above the keyboard.
"Tell Molly I found your calling card. How coy of you not to leave your number this time. Has death made you shy, Jim?"
John's fingers tapped out the words rapidly and then turned back to look at him.
"That's it?" he asked.
Sherlock's lips were moving slightly as he read the words on the screen, making sure they were exactly what he wanted.
"Send it," he said.
John hit the enter button and then they all stood staring down at the blinking cursor on the screen.
"How long do you think it will take him to reply?" asked Lestrade, glancing at Sherlock.
"No one else is even signed in right now," said John, pointing out that 'JHWTSN' was the only name appearing in the square showing current online activity.
But to his amazement, a few seconds later two more lines appeared, attributed to Art Tinbass.
Took you long enough to figure it out. Has death made you stupid?
"Don't let him bait you," warned John.
Sherlock shook his head.
"Where's my next clue?" he said, nodding at John to type it.
Oh, dear, Mr. Holmes, you are horribly out of practice. I sent it to Baker Street before the explosion.
Then all three men suddenly reared back as there was a loud popping noise and the screen went blank.
"You broke my computer!" yelled Matthews from across the room.
"Not your computer, the hospital computer," replied Sherlock. "Though in fact," he said, pointing at the address line that was still visible at the top of the screen, "it appears that it is only the website that is disabled."
John entered another address and the screen switched to another website. Trying the former address again, he was greeted by a "404, website not found" error.
"Permanently disabled, then?" asked John.
"I would presume."
"So, no more hints from there," said John, turning back to look at Sherlock.
"What do you think?" asked Lestrade.
"I think he's right, I am being dim-witted."
"No idea what this clue is or where it is?" Lestrade asked.
"None whatsoever," Sherlock admitted.
"So?" asked John.
"So back home we go,"
"You're leaving?" fumed Matthews. "I waited over an hour and a half for you to get here!"
"Sorry, but I do have more pressing business at the moment," he said. "Lestrade, why don't you call in Anderson to help the good doctor?" He allowed himself a small smile. "I can't think of two people who better deserve to spend time in each other's company."
#/#/#
With John following Sherlock out into the hallway, they made their way to the lift.
Leaning forward to press the button, John cleared his throat and glanced around; making sure Lestrade hadn't followed him before he asked the question.
"How exactly did you get her dental x-rays so fast?
Sherlock smirked.
"Did you know that her dentist takes the same month-long holiday each year?
The doors opened and they stepped inside.
"Sorry, was that posted on the door of the office building that she walked out of too? I suppose with speed reading, I'm supposed to have telescopic vision as well?" John asked, as he punched the button for their floor.
"Of course it wasn't listed there, John. If it had been, I wouldn't have wasted precious time this evening eliciting that information out of his answering service."
"Ooh," he groaned again, lifting a hand to his face. "Oh, please, I have the most awful toothache; I simply must see him as soon as possible. What? He's already been out for two weeks and will be gone another two? Ooooh!"
The sound reverberated within the enclosed space, and John wondered if people waiting for the lift on different floors were hearing that moaning and wondering what it was about.
"They can be so wonderfully sympathetic when you're in pain," Sherlock added with a grin.
"Good job acting," replied John.
"Well, it wasn't that hard. After all, if this hadn't worked, I would have had to turn to my dear brother to expedite the process of obtaining the records, as Lestrade initially suggested. The thought of having to ask Mycroft for a favor always causes me a great deal of agony. At any rate, I was able to control the conversation so that I managed to get the number and address of a back-up dentist from the answering service, which I made a great show of writing down on a piece of paper. Then I handed the slip to the cabby."
"But written upon it, of course, was the address of Molly's dentist, where you were headed to, anyway."
"Of course. By the time we got there, he was quite concerned about leaving me off, but I assured him that the dentist would be there shortly."
"Had you broken into the building by the time he got to the corner?" John asked, as they stepped off the lift.
"Of course not, John," he replied, sounding insulted. "I took the sensible precaution of asking two of the homeless gentlemen in the area to serve as look-outs for me before I started."
#/#/#
"John!"
He started and opened his eyes, feeling Sherlock's fingers on his shoulder as he shook him awake.
"Sorry," he said, trying to suppress a yawn.
They'd been unsuccessfully searching the flat for several hours by now. Sherlock had begun in his own bedroom and then he'd moved on to John's, even going so far as to dig out the body of the dead mouse from the trash bin.
"I thought you studied entrails to divine the future, not the past," John joked, weakly, as Sherlock began making an incision in the dead rodent's belly.
Sherlock did not deign to answer, but a moment later his eyes were gleaming in triumph.
"Oh, I think you can tell something of this mouse's past, can't you?" he said, nudging it over in John's direction.
"Ah," said John, suddenly understanding. "It died of a massive hemorrhage," he said, poking around at the large amount of congealed blood clogging the abdomen. "Which is how mouse poison works."
He drew back in his chair as he tried to work out what that meant.
"I told you it was dead when I found it!" he protested. "That's why I couldn't see why it bothered Mrs. Hudson as much as it did."
"I think it means that a mouse didn't happen to die in your room, John, it means that someone purposefully placed it there."
"Who would have put a dead mouse in my room?"
"No, John, the proper question is who could have put a dead mouse in your room."
"Moriarty, I'm guessing. Does that mean this is the clue he was talking about?"
"No!" Sherlock said, pushing the mouse off to the side and going over to the sink to clean his hands and the knife. "But it does seem to be another piece of the puzzle."
Unfortunately, that had proved to be their biggest excitement so far. Having finished off the bedrooms, they moved on to the living room, putting off the messy kitchen until last. John had sat down in his usual chair and begun to go through all the mail they had received in the past week, dividing it into stacks with Sherlock glancing over everything as well. But the doctor's tired body had finally betrayed him and he had fallen asleep with the letter opener still in his hands.
John blinked his eyes and stared down at his watch. Nearly eight o'clock in the morning. Besides that tiny bit of sleep he managed last night between one am and two, he'd been awake for over twenty-four hours now.
"Go make yourself some coffee," commanded Sherlock.
"Good idea," John replied, standing up stiffly and yawning. "You want any?"
"No," he replied, kneeling down on the hearth so that he could peer up into the blackened interior of the chimney.
"No, of course not," he muttered under his breath. "You won't take a bit of food or drink until this is over with, will you?"
John's stomach, on the other hand, was already hungry and rumbling. Going into the kitchen, he filled the kettle with fresh water and put it on to boil before spooning some ground coffee into the cafetiere. Looking in the refrigerator, he wrinkled his nose in disgust before fishing out the obviously spoiled milk in order to throw it away. He poured the milk down the sink and then dumped the empty carton into the bin.
"Do you mind if I go out to grab a few groceries?" he asked.
"You still have that sandwich from last night, eat that if you're hungry," was the reply.
John sighed and shook his head. A sandwich at eight o'clock in morning was hardly his first choice, but he supposed it was better than nothing. Hearing the kettle come to a boil, he stopped to pour the hot water into the cafetiere before turning to open up the refrigerator again. Grabbing out the sandwich, he looked down, slightly puzzled until he remembered that he had wrapped the advertisement around it when coming back to the flat. Peeling off the paper, he glanced at it again and laughed, thinking to himself that it really was a pretty ugly dog. Just as he reached out to toss the paper into the bin, however, something else on the page suddenly popped out at him.
"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," he blurted, as he came running into the living room, holding out the sheet of paper. "I'd completely forgotten about this with all that's happened."
Looking puzzled, Sherlock reached up to grab the sheet from John's hands, his soot-lined fingers making black smudges on the pink-colored paper.
"Where did you get this?" he asked, rising to his feet.
"It was posted on the door when I came back from Speedy's yesterday," John explained. "I just glanced at it, I didn't really look at it properly before."
"Obviously," said Sherlock, sitting down at his desk and laying the piece of paper down on the surface.
Indeed, all John had noticed the night before were the words 'Missing Dog' at the top of the paper, and that it was a large and fuzzy picture of a rather ugly-looking mongrel. He hadn't even bothered to look at the paragraph underneath the picture until just now.
A dear little bitch named Molly has disappeared and it's up to you to find her. You better make it quick because there isn't much time. After all, what is more important to anyone than their pets, their family and their loved ones? Ah, well, I suppose, in the end, all we have are the memories.
Hugs and kisses! JM
Below that there was a telephone number.
Taking out his cell phone, he turned on the speaker and dialed the number. After three rings there was a short hiss and then silence, and John bent down to try and hear better. He jumped back a second later as music began to play and smooth male voices began to croon:
Too much for a man..He couldn't make it…
After those few brief seconds, they heard the same popping noise as when the website had disappeared.
"Apparently only one shot at this as well," John murmured, sitting down besides Sherlock.
"At least I recorded it this time," Sherlock said. Pushing a button, they listened to the brief snippet again.
"He's mocking you?" John asked.
"Well, obviously," said Sherlock, rolling his eyes. "But there has to be more than that."
"Hey, I know that," said John, suddenly. "At least, I think I do, play it again."
Sherlock obliged by playing it back several more times.
"It's from a popular song, from a while back," John said, closing his eyes as he tried to concentrate. "Sarah used to play it all the time. But it's not really a main part of it, just a short little bit from the beginning."
Opening his eyes, he saw that Sherlock was depending on him to identify what it was, as his own taste in music was almost strictly classical.
"Got it!" he said, snapping his fingers. "Midnight Train to Georgia."
Sherlock leaned back in his chair, deep in thought.
"So does that mean it has something to do with a train…or with Georgia...?" offered John.
Sherlock shrugged his shoulders, continuing to ruminate.
"And which Georgia, the part of the United States or Russia?" mused John. "I mean, Moriarty said he had people everywhere."
"Who sings it?"
"What?"
"The song, who is singing it?"
"Gladys Knight."
Sherlock raised his eyebrows slightly.
"Those deep voices were Gladys?"
"Well, no, that bit isn't. That's her male backup group, the Pips."
As soon as that last word was out of his mouth, a thrill of excitement ran through him which he knew was matched by Sherlock's reaction.
"How many?"
"What?"
"How many Pips were there?"
"Uh, three I think. Or four," he added, sounding doubtful.
"John, when will you learn to be more observant," Sherlock muttered, picking up his phone again.
After hitting a few buttons, he waited a moment and then began to speak. "Hello, Sarah, this is Sherlock Holmes. Oh, no, he's fine, nothing at all like that; we are just playing a little trivia game and need to know how many Pips Gladys Knight had. John said you were such a fan he was certain you would know. Really? Well, thank you for that information. Oh, and by the way, he's going with a lovely girl at the moment, a real looker and one who is much more understanding of the importance of male bonding."
"You could have looked it up on the internet," said John, his annoyance clear as Sherlock hung up.
"This was quicker," said Sherlock. "And much more satisfying," he added, underneath his breath.
"So, three pips. Three puzzles for you to solve."
"Yes."
"But no picture or other clue as to where to start looking?"
"Oh, he's given us that information as well," said Sherlock, picking up his phone and dialing again.
"Where?"
But Sherlock was holding out his hand, asking for silence.
"Lestrade, please tell me that you haven't searched her apartment yet?" He listened for a few moments, nodding in satisfaction. "Thank god for obdurate judges. Very well, just keep your team away until I have a chance to look at it first, I'll let you know when I'm done," he said, smiling as he snapped off the phone.
He stood up and in answer to John's questioning look replied: "The police have not as yet been able to obtain a warrant to search her flat. And you know Lestrade is such a stickler for rules".
"Unlike someone else I know," said John rising up. "So, we're off to break into her flat?"
"Oh, no need for that," said Sherlock, smiling as he reached into his trouser's pocket, "I have the key."
