Chapter IV. The Brixton Road Mystery

Sherlock put the content of the envelop on the table. It seemed to be several different photographs, all of various artefacts that clearly belonged in a museum. One of the photographs showed an ancient looking, golden Egyptian statue of the god Anubis, while others showed a Chinese Vase, a painting of a rural landscape done by either a Dutch or Flemish master and a collection of golden coins. All these items looked impressive on their own.

"What are those?", I said laughing, looking through the photographs one by one. "Are you also consulting art dealers in your spare time?

-"Ha, I wish,", Sherlock said, with a cold laugh, "I could have saved some people a lot of money if they came to me first."

"You mean these aren't valuable?"

"My dear Watson, they are priceless. Expressions of artistic desire, performed in such dedicating and precision show the true passion of a person. Look at the detailing on this one.", she said, holding up the picture of the statue. "They even got the pedestal right this time… Well, almost at least, but you've got to admire the effort, Watson."

"The effort? You mean these are fakes?"

-"No, all of them are perfectly real. Real forgeries, that is. And some of them quite good at that. People don't appreciate the skill and effort of a good forgery. Doing something once with incredible skill is one thing. But looking at an artefact and copying all that talent and skill so precisely that people, even trained people, mistake it for an original? Now, that is artistry! If you ask me, these forgeries are masterpieces in their own right, just because they aren't what they claim to be. They tell a story about skill and precision as much as the originals do."

"I take it back. You'd be a terrible art dealer."

"I would. But changing my career is not what interests me at the moment. This is."

Sherlock hold up a folded note that was in the envelop too. Sherlock opened up the note and began to read aloud:

"MY DEAREST SHERLOCK HOLMES," she began. "Oh boy, he's in big trouble, isn't he?"

Seeing my lack of understanding, she added, "He always calls me his 'dearest' when he's in way over his head. Typical. He think he hopes that being called someone's dearest appeals to my 'feminine craving male approval'." She snorted. "If only he knew how stupid he really was. It's exactly this old-fashioned thinking that keeps him from actually accomplishing something. That, and the fact that he is usually very wrong."

-"Who are we talking about?"

"Here are the photographs from the forgery case you requested," she continued reading, ignoring my question. "I don't know if it will help you in anyway, as our experts have already checked all items very thoroughly . But since you've helped me on several occasions before… - he means every occasion of importance –" she said, looking away for the letter and at me. The gesture made it dramatic, like an aside Hamlet would have done in the first Act. I smiled despite my annoyance of Sherlock not telling me the writers identity.

"I'd be very glad if you could take a look at them for me. The coming days I'll be very busy with some other case. There has been a bad business last night on Brixton Road. One of our man saw a light there around two in the morning. Since the house was known to be empty, he suspected that something was amiss. He found the door open, and in the front room, which is bare of furniture, discovered the body of a man. There had been no robbery, nor is there any evidence as to how the man met his death. There are marks of blood in the room, but there is no wound upon his person. We at the Yard are at a loss as to how he came into the empty house. The whole affair is quiet a puzzler if you ask me. If you can come round to the house any time before twelve tonight, you will find me there if you want. We've have left everything in status quo until I hear from you. If you are unable to come, I would esteem it a great kindness if you would at least favour me with your opinion.

Yours truly,

Garry Lestrade."

"Garry is the smartest of the Scotland Yarders," my friend remarked; "he and Gregson are the pick of a bad lot. They are both quick and energetic, but conventional— even shockingly so. They have their knives into one another, too. They are as jealous as a pair of professional beauties." Sherlock chuckled. "There will be some fun over this case if they are both put upon the scent."

I was amazed at her calm, almost uncaring way. "Surely, there is not a moment to be lost," I cried, "shall I go and call you a cab?"

"I'm not sure about whether I shall go." She said, hanging back in armchair.

My mouth dropped open. Sherlock spread an impish grin.

"I am the most incurably lazy devil that ever stood in shoe leather—that is, when the fit is on me, for I can be useful sometimes. Besides, my dear, dear Watson, what does it matter to me?" she said, throwing her arms in the air.

"Suppose that I unravel the whole matter, you may be sure that Gregson, Lestrade, and the entire empire of dumb, government chauvinist that is the Scotland Yard will pocket all the credit. That's the price of being an unofficial personage."

"But he seems at a loss and asks specifically for your …"

-"Expertise?"

"I was going to say 'overcomplicating perception on the world around you and the people that live in it', but expertise also works."

Sherlock snorted.

"He knows that I am his superior, and acknowledges it to me. But he would cut his tongue out before he would say it to any third person. However, we may as well go and have a look. I may have a laugh at them if I have nothing else. Come on!"

She jumped out of her chair with a surprising agile jump and hustled on her dark blue overcoat,

"What are you waiting for? Get your shoes on!" he said.

"You wish me to come?"

"Yes, if you have nothing better to do. And since you have no friends…"

-"HEY!"

"Oh, spare me the drama, John. You don't have any friends that will come visit you in the next couple of hours, will they? You wanted to know what I do for a living. I'm giving you a chance to see for yourself."

I hesitated for a moment.

"If I come with you, will you promise me one thing,"

-"Anything, my dear Watson."

"I'm not your sidekick!"

-"My dear doctor, I wouldn't dream of it!" Sherlock smiled, while she called for cab.

It was a foggy, cloudy day, who couldn't really decide if it wanted to rain or not. A grey-brown coloured veil hung over the housetops, looking like the reflection of the mud-coloured streets beneath. My companion, however, was in the best of spirits. She babbled away about Italian cellos, and the difference between the 'Davydov' and the 'Amati King'. Seriously, had she been talking about the latest episodes of Downtown Abbey, I couldn't have been more lost. I was silent, for the dull weather and the melancholy business upon which we were engaged, depressed my spirits.

"You don't seem to give much thought to the matter in hand," I said at last, interrupting Holmes' musical disquisition.

"No data yet," she answered, shrugging her shoulders. Her hair bobbing by the bumps of the road. "It is a capital mistake to theorize before you have all the evidence. It biases the judgment."

"You will have your data soon," I remarked, pointing with my finger; "this is the Brixton Road, and that is the house, if I am not very much mistaken."

Brixton Road number 3 wore an ill-omened and menacing look. It was one of four houses which stood back some little way from the street. Number one and four were being occupied, the other two were empty. The latter looked out with three tiers of vacant melancholy windows, which were blank and dreary, save that here and there a 'For Rent' sign hung like cataract upon the bleared panes. A small garden sprinkled over with a scattered eruption of sickly plants separated each of these houses from the street. It was traversed by a narrow pathway, yellowish in colour, and consisting apparently of a mixture of clay, sand and of gravel. The garden was bounded by a three-foot brick wall with a fringe of wood rails upon the top. The whole place was even more dreary by the drizzle of rain that - in fact - had decided to fall. I remember people saying on television that crimes like these were always so unexpecting and shocking. But looking at Brixton Road 3 looked and felt like a murder scene. Even from the outside, the place felt like decay and death.

Against the garden wall leaned a big police constable, surrounded by a small knot of curious bystanders, who craned their necks and strained their eyes in the vain hope of catching some glimpse of the proceedings within.

I had imagined that Sherlock would have hurried into the house and plunged into a study of the mystery at once. Nothing appeared to be further from her real intentions. With an air of nonchalance which, under the circumstances, seemed to me to border upon affectation, she lounged up and down the pavement, and gazed vacantly at the ground, the sky, the opposite houses and the line of railings. Having finished her scrutiny, she proceeded slowly down the path, or rather down the fringe of grass which flanked the path. All the while, she kept her eyes riveted upon the ground. She stopped twice, and once I saw her smile, and heard her utter some sounds of satisfaction. There were many marks of footsteps upon the wet, clayey soil, but since the police had been coming and going over it, I was unable to see how my companion could hope to learn anything from it. Still I had had such extraordinary evidence of the quickness of her perceptive faculties, that I had no doubt that she could see a great deal which was hidden from me.

At the door of the house we were met by the tall, dark-faced, bald man Sherlock called Lestrade. He stood in his brown overcoat, with a small notebook in his hand; Upon seeing Sherlock, he rushed forward and shook my companion's hand. His hands were so big, that they completely encased her hand.

"Sherlock!" he said, surprising me with a heavy, but warm baritone voice. "It is so kind of you to come," he said, "I have left everything untouched."

"Except that!" my friend answered, pointing at the pathway. "If a herd of wildebeests had passed along in a state of total panic, there could not be a greater mess. No doubt, however, that you had drawn your own conclusions, Garry. Before you permitted this, I mean?"

"I have had so much to do inside the house," the detective said evasively, actually shuffling his feet. "My colleague, inspector Gregson, is here as well. I had relied upon him to look after this."

Holmes glanced at me and raised her eyebrows sardonically. "With two such fine men as yourself and Gregson upon the ground, there will not be much for a third party to find out," he said.

Lestrade rubbed his hands in a self-satisfied way. "I think we have done all that can be done," he answered; "it's a queer case though, and I knew your taste for such things."

"Did you come here in a cab?" asked Sherlock Holmes.

"No."

"Nor Gregson?"

"No, we came together," said Lestrade, whose features expressed his astonishment.

"Very well then, let us go and look at the room." With which inconsequent remark she strode on into the house.

I tried to follow her, but Lestrade held up his hand. "I'm sorry, sir." He said, towering over me like a pillar. "No civilians allowed on the scene of the crime."

-"It's okay, Lestrade. He's with me." Sherlock said, not turning her back.

"I can see that, but still, regulations and all…" he said, with a sympathetic face.

-"Regulations?" Sherlock said, a note of surprise in her tone of voice, "now that's strange. Last time I checked, you wanted nothing more than my help on the scene..."

-"Well, yes, but…"

"...and as far as I know I'm a civilian..."

-"Yes, well Sherlock…"

"...a civilian who, I might add, had no form of formal police training or even the slightest inkling of ever joining Scotland Yard."

-"Sherlock, don't be like that!"

"Do you even know who this man is, Lestrade?"

-"Isn't he your boyfriend?"

"Why does everyone keeps thinking that we have a relationship?", I said, getting annoyed by the fact.

-"What? You're not?"

"Not even close!"

-"Then why do you live together?"

"We just share a living space together." Sherlock said exasperated, clearly as sick from explaining it as I was.

-"You share an apartment!" Lestrade said, looking from one to the other. "Don't make it sound that you just have a common living room or just share a hallway bathroom or something. I've been to your place Sherlock! You share everything!"

"Even more reason to know that we don't live together!", Sherlock said, turning on Lestrade. "If so, where were the framed pictures of us together in the apartment? Where, would you say, is our shared birthday calendar? Do you think that, as his girlfriend, I would let him sit in his pajamas eating breakfast while I have clients over? Did he ever introduce himself to a man who visits my apartment several times a week, to see me behind closed doors? Did you ever seen us share a kiss, a hug, hold hands, share eye contact or do something anything remotely that shows our immediate affection towards each other? "

-"I just thought…"

"No, you didn't. You jumped to conclusions without having all the data at hand." Sherlock looked and me and held her hand up in a gesture indicating a perfect example. "Voila, my dear Watson. A prime example of an hypothesis without all the data. Really, Lestrade, it's not your finest."

-"That doesn't change the fact," Lestrade said, clearly annoyed by Sherlock's sharp tongue, "that he's a civilian and doesn't belong on a crime scène. Dead bodies isn't something everyone can stomach as easy as you can, Mrs. Holmes."

I laughed. "There's nothing new to me about a dead body, inspector. With all due respect, I think I've seen more death and horror in my short career, then you've seen in yours."
Lestrade stared daggers at me. "I'm professor John Watson, lieutenant-colonel brigade surgeon in the Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers. " I said, raising my hand so he could shake it. He didn't take it yet.

"As you can see, Lestrade, he is a doctor with experience in both traumatic environments and a history with autopsies. He might even be useful."

"Not to mention, do you think someone who enjoys crimes scenes as much as she does is completely sane?", I said in a low voice to Lestrade. "I think it's for the best if I come and keep an eye on her. Just for her own good, you know. She's a civilian after all."

Lestrade looked at me, eyes frowning. Then his eyes crinkled into a smile.

"I can see why you like him, Sherlock!"

-"I know, right!" Sherlock said.

He took my hand in a firm grip. took it and shook firmly. "Inspector Garry Lestrade, also not Sherlock Holmes 's boyfriend! Please to meet you."

-"Nor my sidekick," Sherlock mentioned off hand to me. "I'm going in now!" Sherlock turned around again and went inside the house.

I tried to follow her, but Lestrade held me there. He looked at me sternly.

"Listen, mister Watson, and listen real well. I don't know who you are yet, but I can that Sherlock thinks highly of you. However, she's still new with this. Dead bodies are interesting for a while, but trauma tends to catch up with you sooner or later. It leaves scars."

I shook my head in understanding.

" You keep that eye on Sherlock, will you? I wouldn't want her to get scarred as well. Even if it solves all my cases."

I nodded, feeling like I just made a new friend. He released me and we both entered the house after Sherlock.

A.N. Hello everyone! I split this chapter as well, to improve the flow of the story a bit. Thanks for reading the story! It means a lot to me!