4. The Mouths Of Babes


Supper that evening was spaghetti bolognese, soft food that Sherlock could cut up and eat in small bites without having to gnaw at it unattractively at the table. Mummy and Mycroft had glasses of red wine, with milk for Sherlock. "For strong bones and teeth, darling," Mummy had said, ignoring Sherlock's withering glare. He wasn't interested in the wine, which smelled sour and unpleasant, but he could at least have had grape juice.

Mummy steered the conversation at the table, interrogating Mycroft in great detail about his daily activities at Oxford, about his classes and his friends and his amusements. Mycroft answered in fond, indulgent tones, and Mummy seemed pleased with what she heard. But Sherlock watched as Mycroft avoided making eye contact with Mummy when talking about particular topics. He had done the same thing at breakfast with Sherlock that morning, and Sherlock realized that Mycroft was once again deliberately not talking about those topics. Sherlock camouflaged his gaze behind his milk glass and decided that he would soon be making another foray into Mummy's family health reference.

After they had eaten, Mummy sent Mycroft upstairs to pack while she did the washing up. Sherlock followed Mycroft and sat on his bed as Mycroft stuffed his clothes and overnight supplies into his suitcase.

"Will you come home again soon?" he asked.

Mycroft shrugged. "At the end of the term, I suppose. For a little while."

"Could I go up to Oxford with you? Just for a few days, just for the hols?"

"No." Mycroft chuckled a little. "There's nothing for a kid to do there. I've got lectures. You'd be bored. Don't worry, you'll get to go to university in your own time."

"I wish I could go now," Sherlock said. "Just skip Harrow and go directly to uni."

"Well, you can't." Mycroft snapped the suitcase shut. "That's not how the world works. Harrow will help you get into a good university. Just keep your mind on that."

He gave Sherlock a quick, angular embrace. As soon as he was released, Sherlock fled to his room and threw himself down on his bed. He listened as Mycroft went downstairs, and heard the sounds of the front door opening and closing, and then the car starting and driving away, taking Mycroft to Paddington Station.


Because it was the hols, Sherlock slept later than usual on Monday morning. By the time he had woken up, washed, and dressed, Mummy had finished her breakfast and was chattering on the telephone to one of her friends. "Oh, I know . . . It's just terrible, he's amazingly irresponsible about these things . . . If it doesn't arrive in the post today, I will give him a piece of my mind . . . Oh, I know." She spared a brief glance for Sherlock as he went to the kitchen to get himself a bowl of cornflakes.

He managed to eat the cornflakes without incident as he contemplated what to do with the day. Mummy would probably suggest going out to play with Jamie Simpson from next door. She had assumed for years that Sherlock and Jamie were friends simply because they lived in the same street, but Sherlock considered Jamie to be a menace whose greatest pleasures in life appeared to be shoplifting and harassing Sherlock. However, the idea of going to the shops on the main road without Jamie did appeal to Sherlock. He could watch adults going about their business and stop in at the library if he got tired.

He put his bowl in the sink and went back to Mummy's study, where he stood in the doorway until she hung up the telephone and noticed him. "Yes, darling?" she said.

"May I have some pocket money? I want to go to the main road."

Mummy sighed. "Do you need much? Only your father's cheque hasn't arrived yet. Honestly, does he want me to have to go out and become a shop girl?"

"Just a few pounds. For a magazine or an ice cream."

Mummy pinched her mouth together into a thin line. For a moment, Sherlock thought that she would refuse, but then she glanced at him from beneath her lashes. "Bring me my bag."

Sherlock fetched the bag from the hall table. Mummy rooted around inside it and came up with a crumpled note. "Here. Go out and have a nice long walk. Get a sandwich if you're hungry. Don't forget your keys." She turned away and reached for the phone again.

Sherlock put the money in a pocket in his trousers, fetched his keys from the rack, shrugged into his coat, and left the house.


The main road was populated mostly by young mothers wheeling babies or dragging small children on errands. Sherlock amused himself for a while by following them into shops and pretending to look at the goods on offer while secretly sneaking glances and eavesdropping on the women's conversations. It was astonishing how much he could learn about them, just from listening to what they said and how, and by noticing how they were dressed and what sort of things they bought. Sometimes the toddlers would stare at him, and he stared back until they went and clung to their mothers.

Eventually, Sherlock made his way to a small corner shop. It was one of his favourites on the main road. Mycroft had taken him there ever since he was old enough to walk, at first to buy sweets, and later coffee for himself and fizzy drinks for Sherlock. Mr. Patel, the owner, smiled when Sherlock came in. Sherlock managed a small smile in return, but headed straight to the newspaper rack. One paper had a small teaser headline about the drowning, one had a short article below the fold, and the Mirror had a large photograph and a headline that screamed TRAGIC CARL DIED. Sherlock picked up all three papers and bought them with the pocket money that Mummy had given him.

The local library was not far away, and Sherlock took the newspapers there to read them in relative peace and quiet. The librarians let him sit at a table in the adult room, and he pored over the stories. One story opened with a rather maudlin description of the meagre contents of the locker that Carl Powers had used. "His Parents' Final Mementoes," read the headline. The list of items was short, consisting mostly of clothing, a watch, a novel, and a Walkman with a tape inside of a band that Sherlock did not know.

Another story, even more sentimental than the first, featured a photograph of Carl Powers. The photograph showed an unremarkable little boy with dark, spiky hair sitting in his bedroom showing off his swimming awards. Sherlock's eye was drawn to Carl's shoes. They were high-topped trainers, popular and stylish and expensive. A few months earlier, while out shopping for new clothes with Mummy, Sherlock had seen a pair in the shoe shop, and had been instantly taken with them. He had begged Mummy to buy them for him, but she had refused. They were hideous, she had said, and it was far too much money to spend just so he could grow out of them before the year was out. Sherlock allowed himself a small pang of jealousy that Moira Powers had bought those shoes for her son.

As he contemplated the unfairness of mothers, a thought struck him, and he returned to the first news story. The list of items in Carl's locker was detailed, clearly intended to wring the maximum sympathy out of the young-parent segment of its readership. Every item of clothing was listed, down to pants and socks, but there was no mention of the shoes. Sherlock knew what those shoes cost, and he could not imagine that the Powers family could have afforded a second pair of trainers for Carl. He had to have worn them to the tournament. But what had become of them?

Someone must have taken them, he decided. He could easily imagine a schoolmate coveting the trainers for himself. But the paramedics had been the ones to collect Carl's things, and Sherlock had watched enough medical dramas on television that he didn't think that the adults would have allowed a boy in a swimsuit anywhere near Carl's locker. Whoever had taken the trainers had also left the watch and the Walkman behind. The thief had clearly wanted nothing but the trainers, and had been fast enough to get them before the paramedics did. Perhaps the thief had wanted to hide the trainers from the paramedics.

At that thought, Sherlock sat bolt upright in his chair. It all made sense. From what he had read in Mummy's family health reference, Carl's seizure had been too sudden and too severe to be normal in an eleven-year-old champion athlete, and there was no mention of epilepsy medication in his locker. And someone had gone to the trouble of stealing Carl's trainers even before the paramedics had got him into an ambulance. What if the thief had wanted to hide the trainers because they were evidence? What if Carl Powers had been murdered?

The more Sherlock thought about it, the more he became convinced that he had to be right. Carl's death couldn't have been natural, and someone had had something to hide. It made too much sense to be wrong. Although Sherlock knew that he ought to be frightened at the idea of a child being murdered in a pool where he himself had been swimming only a few hours previously, he was excited. This was far more interesting than simply walking around or going to the common to chase squirrels. If it were in fact murder, the next logical step would be to inform the police.

Sherlock chewed his lip as he considered how best to do that. The local police station was not far from the library, and he could walk there, report the murder, and be done in time for lunch. But he knew the constables who worked there, and none of them were especially keen; even Jamie Simpson had managed to evade them carrying an armload of stolen comic books from the corner shop. The murder of a child deserved no less than Scotland Yard. Lunch would simply have to wait.

Sherlock tore out the relevant pages from the newspapers, stuffed them in his coat pocket, and took the rest of the papers to the bin. Then he went to the reference section and found the London directories. He looked up the address of Scotland Yard and learned that he could get there by Tube. The day was already looking much brighter as he trotted out of the library and hurried down the street to the Tube station.


When he got off the Tube at St. James Park, he took the nearest Way Out and found himself on Petty France. He went the wrong way at first, but quickly realized his mistake, doubled back, and found Broadway, which he followed around the corner, past cafés and banks, to the large steel-and-glass office building with a sign in front that said New Scotland Yard. Near the sign was a Visitors' Entrance. Sherlock took a deep breath and went inside.

The lobby was impressively large and bright, and adults strode around purposefully. Sherlock was so entranced by the activity that at first he did not notice when someone spoke to him.

"Hello? Kid? Can I help you?"

He snapped out of his daze and looked around to see a young woman sitting at a reception desk. "You called me?"

"Yes. Can I help you find something?"

Sherlock nodded. "I want to see a detective."

"Any particular detective?" the woman asked. "Looking for a particular division, maybe?"

"One of the detectives who investigates murder."

The young woman raised her eyebrows at him, but made no further comment. "Mmm. All right. Sit down there and I'll call someone for you."

Sherlock sat down on the hard wooden bench that she indicated. He watched as she picked up the telephone and spoke quietly to someone on the other end. He couldn't hear what she said, but a few minutes later, the lift doors at the far end of the lobby opened. Two men in cheap suits emerged and strode over to Sherlock. The older of the two men smiled at him.

"I'm Detective Sergeant Potter and this is Detective Sergeant Evans. Are you the kid who wanted to speak to homicide detectives?"

Sherlock stood up. "I'm Sherlock Holmes, and I want to report a murder."

DS Potter nodded. "Right. Come with us, then. We'll get you a cup of tea, and you can tell us all about it."

Sherlock followed the detectives into the lift and from there into a small office equipped with a sofa, two chairs, and a low table. It reminded Sherlock of the dentist's waiting room, and he sat down gingerly in one corner of the sofa. DS Potter smiled at him.

"There's no need to be nervous, Sherlock. You just relax. Evans'll get you some tea, and then I want you to start from the beginning. Take your time."

DS Evans handed Sherlock a foam cup of tea and a dish of sugar packets. Sherlock took two, poured them into the tea and sipped at it. After DS Evans sat down, Sherlock pulled the newspaper pages out of his coat pocket and spread them on the table. "It's about Carl Powers," he said.

DS Potter frowned. "Who?"

"Carl Powers. He was a kid, a swimmer. He came up from Sussex the other day for a swim tournament. They closed down the free swim at the pool early to get ready for it."

"Were you there?" DS Evans asked.

"I was at the pool for the free swim," Sherlock explained, "but not the tournament. I had to go to the dentist."

"I see. Go on."

"Carl Powers died at the tournament. He had a - a seizure, or a fit, and he was dead when they pulled him out of the water. It was on the news, and it's in the papers. I suppose no one's really investigating, because they all think it's just epilepsy or something, but it wasn't. Carl Powers was murdered, I'm sure of it. Will you find who did it?"

The detectives exchanged worried glances. "You didn't see him die?" DS Potter asked.

"No. I already told you. I was at the dentist." Sherlock pulled back his lip to show the gaps in his teeth.

"Did anyone tell you that something was wrong? Did you overhear something?"

"No."

DS Evans sighed. "Then why do you think it was murder?"

"Because of his shoes."

"His shoes?"

Sherlock pointed at the newspaper pages. "Really nice trainers. They went missing from his locker when he died. Look, you can see them in the picture, but they're not listed in that article. Someone took the shoes because they were a clue, and they didn't want anyone to find out about the murder."

Neither of the detectives was smiling now. But they made no move to start investigating. Instead, they both looked weary and exasperated. Sherlock was intimately familiar with the expression, having seen it on the faces of his parents and his teachers many times before. "You don't believe me," he said.

DS Potter put on what he clearly believed was a conciliatory face. "Look, Sherlock, I know that you want to do the right thing. But murder, well, that's a pretty serious charge. There's a world of difference between theft and murder."

"I know that," Sherlock said, fighting to keep his temper. "I'm not stupid."

"No one said you were. It's just . . . well, you've got no proof of murder."

"I do!" Sherlock said. "The trainers. I told you."

"Someone nicked his shoes," DS Potter said. "I understand that. Lockers like that aren't nearly as secure as people want to think. But that's theft. It isn't murder." He regarded Sherlock for a moment. "Listen, maybe there's something else you want to talk about. Is everything all right at home?"

"It's fine!" Sherlock cried. "Everything's just fine! Why won't you listen to me?"

There was a knock on the door, and a balding man in a suit poked his head into the room. "Is everything all right in here?"

DS Potter stood up. "Everything's under control, guv. Got a kid here who's just looking for a bit of attention. Evans and I'll take him home."

DS Evans nudged Sherlock to his feet. "Of course I'm looking for attention!" Sherlock snapped. "I've got something important to say! Why won't you listen?"

"Come on, kid," DS Potter said. "We'll drive you home, make sure you get there safely."