"I'm Mickey, by the way," the driver said as he pulled away from the Grant Estate.

"Sean," Sherlock said shortly.

"John," John added.

"That place has been getting quite a few visitors in the past few months," Mickey remarked. "Ever since they stopped doing inside tours."

"Really? Any particular reason?" John asked.

"Thought you folks would be in the know, since you're here on a weekday and all," Mickey replied.

"Well, curiosity is what it is," John hedged.

"Folks say that the Grant Estate is haunted," Mickey said. "'Course there're plenty of reasons with an old place like that. All the Grants were born in there, you know? And pretty much all of them die there, too. They bring in doctors and equipment and all that these days, but they keep the family tradition of dying in their own beds."

"I thought you said the past few months," John began. "That's when the surge of visitors started."

"That's right."

"If people've been dying there for centuries, why did the surge start only a few months ago?"

Mickey smiled widely. "Dunno. But there was an incident with Old Man Grant about three months ago, then they closed the whole of the place off for nearly a week, then they stopped doing tours inside. Folks who've tried said that when they get too near the house, they can feel something there. A presence, you know?"

"That's ridiculous," Sherlock replied.

"Ridiculous things can be true," Mickey said slyly.

"Any particular place people mentioned this bad feeling?" John asked.

"I've heard it all over," Mickey said quietly. "People try to get in around dusk, just after the last tour. They'd go around one side or the other trying to get in, but they'd have a bad feeling and shove off. Got nearly a dozen calls for emergency pickup because of it. That never happens, not this far out from the downtown."

"Tell me," Sherlock said, leaning forward. "Was there a woman who called you more than once for an emergency pick up at night? In the last month."

"That's a strange question."

"Well?" Sherlock asked.

"She's a cousin," John invented. "She told us about this place, said we should visit. Mentioned a driver but I don't recall his name offhand."

Mickey smiled. "A young woman did have me drive her out here at night, but not with emergency calls," he replied. "Just two times, there and back into town. She said she was gonna tell her family about this place. Look at that."

"Did she tell you why she wanted a ride out here at night?" John asked.

"Bird watching, star gazing, that kind of thing," Mickey replied. "She went on and on about it."

John spotted something along the back wall that separated the driver from the passengers. Sherlock had already noticed it and casually reached out for the sign. It read DO NOT LITTER over an artistic photograph of some kind of owl. The sign had been taped down, so Sherlock reached two fingers behind it and pulled out a small index card, tucking it into a pocket.

"Bird watching?" Sherlock repeated. "Sounds lovely."

They arrived back at the Old Thurman Estate and had a proper breakfast. Sherlock was oddly quiet, which was unnerving to John. The lovely morning was ended unceremoniously as Sherlock stood up to go back to his own room.

"I need my violin," Sherlock announced. "And you should get some sleep."

"Why's that?" John asked.

"We're breaking into the Grant Estate tonight, and you need to be rested."

"Sorry, what?"

Unfortunately, Sherlock was completely serious about breaking into the Grant Estate. Not only was the interior sealed from tours, but visitors of any kind were completely banned.

John tried to sleep, and managed an hour or two, but it was fitful sleep, broken by negative thoughts and sunlight.

Later that evening, Sherlock reappeared to have dinner with John in his room.

"We can't break into the Grant Estate," John pleaded. "You? You're dead, and I'm a doctor, not a detective or an investigator."

"Weren't you paying attention during the tour?"

"No, no, I wasn't. But I saw the security signs posted, so unless you have a very elaborate scheme to get past security – "

Sherlock interrupted, "They don't have security."

"What?"

"The front of the house has post for ARD and in the side windows have stickers reading SFH, and the back windows have RTS."

"Meaning they have three security companies," John concluded.

Sherlock replied, "All three of those companies have automatic motion detectors, door alarms, and they wouldn't work with one another."

"So just the one, then."

"Don't be foolish. They don't have any. They just put the signs out to scare people away."

"How could you possibly know that?"

"Because as I said, all three have door alarms," Sherlock replied, clearly annoyed. "All the outer doors would set off the alarm unless the code is entered within a short window of time, usually about sixty seconds. We walked around the entire house, every single door is either made of glass or has a window, and – "

"There were no code boxes inside," John completed. "That you could see."

"Anyone entering from an outer door would need to get to the box to enter the code quickly. One or two doors not having nearby security boxes? Fine. But all eight of them? In a house that size? No. The only explanation is that they don't have a proper security system in place and use the signs and stickers to keep people away."

"Why would an expensive estate like that not have a security system?" John asked.

"I'm certain they'll have something," Sherlock added mildly. "But we need to get inside."

"Why? What the hell are we even looking for?" John asked.

"Indigo Kendall Berwyn came here for a month. A month, John. We don't know why, but she went on that tour more than once a week! Clearly whatever she was looking into here was connected to that house. At the time, inside tours had been discontinued for nearly two months."

"Maybe she used cash," John said. "I mean, if I was investigating something, or someone, I wouldn't leave a credit card trail to follow."

"They don't accept cash, only charge and check," Sherlock replied.

"How do you know she wasn't looking into something else with cash and used this as a red herring?" John asked.

"You've been reading detective novels, haven't you?"

"I thought you were dead!"

There was an awkward moment that passed. Telling Sherlock that he missed him was uncomfortable for John, mostly because Sherlock didn't readily understand sentiment, but he couldn't pretend that statement was some kind of non sequitur. And, oddly, Sherlock was connecting the dots.

"What I meant," Sherlock began, circumventing his uncomfortable apology, "is that Miss Berwyn was quite clever, yet she failed to hide her identity or otherwise protect herself."

"Maybe she didn't think it would be dangerous," John said.

"Or maybe she was purposefully leaving a trail," Sherlock replied. "Which is the only logical conclusion for a clever person investigating unknown events away from home. She knew it was dangerous, and if anything were to happen, someone could follow her recent history here."

"Again, you're giving her a lot of credit," John replied.

"I'm observing the facts," Sherlock said. "The Yard is trying to track her activities in London and failing because she used no credit cards. Everything was cash."

"So why would she leave a trail here?"

"For us to follow," Sherlock replied. "Her spending pattern here was similar to her habits in Bristol. Also, there's this."

Sherlock produced the index card he retrieved from the car service. On one side was the skull and crossbones symbol accompanied by a paw print, and the other side had stenciled lettering impressed inside a deep, velvety-blue splotch of ink: ROLLOVER CAF PM.

"That's it?" John asked. "It's not like she could've known we'd end up with that car service, let alone in that car."

"Except she put it on her credit card," Sherlock said. "She used her name and paid every other car service in cash, but she paid that one driver with credit. She was leaving a trail, John."

"Do you ever sleep?" John asked. He wasn't sure if he should be surprised or annoyed at Sherlock's precision.

Sherlock passed John a number of short memory sticks. "We'll need these."

"USBs?"

"Actually," Sherlock said. "Two are cameras, two are voice recording devices. Black is camera, blue is recorder."

"Where did you get these?" John asked.

"I've had to improvise to protect my identity," Sherlock replied. "These have helped me obtain data. Small enough to hide and lacking the compromising information usually held on a mobile."

"Fantastic," John said as he pocketed them. "What is it we're looking for?"

"Anything out of place."

"So, you've no idea, do you?"

Mickey was more than happy to return them to the Grant Estate at night. Sherlock insisted they walk most of the way, as to avoid detection by headlight. So they found themselves on the opposite side of the river about a mile from the house.

"Why couldn't we cross the river by car?" John asked.

"A river has current, John. This is a man-made structure with one sole purpose: to keep people out."

"Sorry, are you telling me this is a moat?" John asked.

"We're near the ocean," Sherlock pointed out. "Why would you add a river or man-made pond when you could go about a mile to the beaches? The river that was here dried up a long time ago."

They crossed the bridge on foot at run, hoping not to attract attention. Sherlock led the way, blundering from the south edge of the property toward the fountain that they saw earlier today.

John realized how profoundly stupid this was, yet here he was, on someone's private property with a dead man, acting like this was a normal Tuesday night.

"John," Sherlock whispered. "We need to run."

"What? Why?"

He had been so enveloped in his thoughts that he wasn't minding their surroundings. Then he heard it. There was a low, whining growl and a snarl. John's heart started to pound hard in his ears.

"RUN!" Sherlock said as he took off.

John followed, racing away from the booming barks of what were clearly guard dogs.

"This is what that damn paw meant!" John yelled to Sherlock.

"Yes, I know!" he replied, throwing something perpendicular to their path. "Damn! I should've brought more dried meat!"

The two dogs following them veered off to investigate the meat.

"You knew about this?" John said, catching up with Sherlock.

"I had an idea – oh!"

A third dog joined the chase, coming straight at them, forcing them to change direction.

"Sherlock, I'm going to kill you!" John whispered through his bared teeth.

They were near the house now. Before they were coming towards the south entrance, but the change in direction drove them toward the western entrance. John was running out of breath, and Sherlock wasn't doing too well, either.

"IDIOTS!" someone yelled. It was strange, though, like she was yelling at a whisper. "THIS WAY!"

Sherlock grabbed John's arm and guided him towards the woman, who was standing up through the cellar. She tossed a bone, clocking Sherlock and bouncing off him, distracting the third dog.

John shoved Sherlock ahead, and the woman grappled them both into the cellar. She took care in shutting the door slowly as the two men made their way down the stairs.

"What. The. Hell. Are. You. Doing?" she said in an angry whisper.

"Why are we whispering?" John asked.

"That's what people do when they're trespassing, isn't it?" she hissed. "Now who the hell are you?"

"I'm John, this is... Sean. We're..." John had invented a good lie earlier, but the dogs chased it out of him.

"Looking into a kidnapping," Sherlock replied, keeping his voice low. "And we've connected it back here. We needed to look inside the house."

"Kidnapping?" she replied. "Who?"

"We don't have time," Sherlock insisted. "We need to look inside this house. Can you help us do that?"

"Why should I believe you?" she asked.

"Because we're not the first," John panted out, finally catching his breath. "We're not the first to come looking."

"I don't know what you're talking about," she replied.

Sherlock started in and somehow managed to keep his voice quiet and low. "You don't? How's this. Either you walk around with bones on you, which is unlikely given the state of those guard dogs out there, or you're prepared to smuggle someone or something – or I'm guessing from time to time, both – into this cellar on a fairly regular basis. You didn't allow the dogs to catch us, and you certainly haven't called the police. If you were waiting on someone, you'd still have your ear to the cellar door, but you don't. So it's obvious that no one else is coming. Which means you just saved two strange trespassers and welcomed them into your cellar on purpose. You've at the very least guessed why we are here."

She glared at Sherlock for a long time. "I won't let two strangers get ripped apart by half-starved dogs. But I assure you, it's not for your sake. If those dogs attacked you, they'd be put down. All because some idiots wanted a look-see around the house. Look at me, Sean, and tell me if you thing I'm lying."

The woman made Sherlock shrink back.

"You are," John whispered. "You're terrified."

She glared at him. "What's it to you?"

"We're trying to help," John whispered. "Just tell us what's going on, we can help you."

"I don't know what's going on," she whispered. Then she stopped and hushed them.

The distinct sound of someone walking on the floor above them echoed out. She looked even more scared than before.

"This is what's going to happen," she whispered. "I am going to sneak you into the north wing of this house. You will hide. You understand? Hide. I will distract the grounds keeper and the dogs, and when that happens, I will ring the bell on the porch. Then you two will get the hell out of this house. You understand?"

"Who are you?" John asked.

"Alexandra," she replied. "And you bet your asses I will let the dogs maul you if you don't clear off when I give you a go."

"Understood," John replied.

"The grounds keeper, Edward, he's keen and suspicious of me already," she said. "If he catches you with me, you're burglars, you understand?"

She waved them up to the door into the house and stopped them.

"Wait till I knock three times on the door, then come out. Can you do that?" she hissed.

Sherlock nodded.

She went out and shut the door behind her.

Sherlock pushed his ear against the door to listen in. He looked ridiculous, and it was unnecessary. The wall was thin enough.

"Edward?" she said quietly. "Edward, please," she said more loudly.

"Car – Alexandra," a man said. "What're you doing in the cellar?"

"The dogs were barking something fierce, and he doesn't get any sleep as it is," she said.

"So you just went out and tried to feed them? You're a foolish woman!"

"You're supposed to keep them quiet like," she replied. "Under control."

"Don't do that," Edward replied. "I'm doing my job. How did you know that there weren't people out there?"

"Because they would be screaming like loons," she replied. "Come on, where's you head?"

"Fine," he growled. "You want them to shut up? You feed them tonight, then."

Edward stomped off in a huff. Not long after, three knocks hit the door, forcing Sherlock to jerk away in surprise. John couldn't help himself from smiling as he opened the door.

"Wipe that smile off your face," she growled. "Follow me, and keep quiet. And when that bell rings, you leave, yeah?"

Both nodded and followed her.