A/N: Thanks to MysticNightAngel and Rosi! :)
Chapter Six
~~o~~
Several hours had gone by, and despite the fact that Holmes had told me once more not to wait up for him, there was little chance of me getting to sleep while I worried about him being off in one of the worst parts of London, purposefully joining the company of some of its roughest inhabitants.
It was sometime just after one when I had had enough and, untying my dressing gown with the thought of putting on clothes and calling for a cab to go out and see what had become of my friend, I suddenly became aware of one pulling up to the front of the house. I hurried to the window to look out and see what I could, but in the dark it was difficult to make out more than the fact that the person heading for our door was of a broader stature than Holmes himself and wearing the uniform of a constable.
Sergeant Wilkins, an amiable, stoic, and helpful fellow, was on the other side of the door when I opened it, and a momentary dread filled my heart at the thought of an officer having been sent to me with a message so very late at night.
"Dr. Watson, sir, good evening to you," Wilkins said cordially as I let him pass and then shut the door. "No doubt you know that I'm here about Mr. Sherlock Holmes."
"Yes, I suspected as much," I replied cautiously.
"Well, pardon my saying so, Doctor, but you needn't have that dreadful look you're wearing," he said with the subtlest smile. "Mr. Holmes is right enough, if that's what you were worried about."
I let out a larger breath of relief than I realised that I'd been holding in. "Good to hear that, Sergeant," I replied, returning the smile. "Just where is the old fellow, anyway?"
"Why, he's in jail, sir," Wilkins replied, doing all he could to obviously suppress his own amusement.
"Jail!" I ejaculated. "What the devil is he doing there?"
"He got arrested for brawling, sir," Wilkins answered, unable to completely hide the grin that was wending its way across his face.
"Brawling!"
"Yes, sir, at the Oxford Club," Wilkins continued.
"Oh, God," I muttered, sitting down and pinching the bridge of my nose. "Please tell me that he didn't start it."
"Oh, no, sir," Wilkins explained happily. "The Oxford's a rough place on a good night, and it's at least once a week that there's a decent fight down there. Mr. Holmes just got unlucky and happened to be there on a particularly disorderly occasion –it was one of them pub-emptying rows tonight. We had to call in better'n a score of men to get it sorted out."
"Is he injured?" I asked.
"Oh, he's all right, Doctor," Wilkins went on. "Climbed in the wagon of his own accord, but I do imagine he'll be a bit sore in the morning. Probably be sporting a shiner too, what after that big bloke hit him."
Wilkins must have seen the look of horror crossing my face and decided to elaborate further. "Not to worry, Dr. Watson, from what I could see as I arrived, Mr. Holmes was doing fine holding his own against a pair of those ruffians, at least until..." Wilkins suddenly broke off, apparently deciding that he should say no more.
"Until what?" I demanded.
"Well," Wilkins continued reluctantly, "this large bloke joined the pair and clocked Mr. Holmes good. Three on one's not very sporting odds, if you ask me, but just the same, it was then they got their hands on him and chucked him straight out through the window."
"Out the window!" I cried.
"Yes, sir, glass and all," Wilkins replied. "Fortunately he landed nearly right at my feet as I was trying to get through the door; someone else might not have known him, especially with the disguise."
"And now he's in jail," I added in summary.
"That's right, Dr. Watson. I thought I'd at least come over and tell you so that you might come round and fetch him."
"Thank you, Sergeant, I shall come straight away," I said, completely disgusted with the entire affair by that point.
"Eh, you'd be wasting your time, sir. Inspector Jones is set on keeping him overnight." Wilkins dropped his voice to a lower level. "I think it's for his own amusement, and I can't rightly say Inspector Lestrade won't get a grin at seeing Sherlock Holmes behind bars in the morning, but don't you go saying I said so."
"I wouldn't dream of it," I said reassuringly.
"You can come by to collect him in the morning at nine-thirty," Wilkins finished, heading for the door. "Good night, Dr. Watson."
~~o~~
I was up, quickly dressed, and in a cab on my way to Scotland Yard with the intent of getting there early and trying to get Holmes released from jail in time to meet Miss Hastings for our nine-thirty appointment at the police morgue. The jail and the morgue were not far apart, but it was my hope that I might convince Lestrade to allow Holmes out a few moments early in order to give him a chance to make himself presentable before we met with the young naturalist. I could only imagine the state my old friend was in, and I'd made it a point to grab a change of clothes for him on my way out the door.
At nine-fifteen I was out of the cab and headed briskly for the jail entrance, congratulating myself on my early arrival and certain that Lestrade wouldn't begrudge the ten minutes or so for Holmes to change. It was then that I found, to my greatest disappointment, that Holmes had been right about Miss Hastings, and not only was she decidedly punctual, but she was early. She spotted me hurrying along and flagged me down with a genial wave and a smile, ensuring that I saw her and I knew I was trapped.
"Good morning, Dr. Watson," she said, catching up with me quickly. She was dressed in a simple but smart blue jacket and skirt with a matching hat adorned with the feathers of a cock-pheasant, and carrying a small leather satchel.
"Good morning, Miss Hastings," I replied, noting her gaze already going to the clothes I had draped over my arm. "You're rather early."
She smiled charmingly at me. "I admit that I am rather anxious to get to see the imprints of the teeth. I'm ever so curious about what this creature is, and the bite marks could make a great deal of...oh. Oh my." Her gaze was firmly rooted on the clothes by that point.
"Should I have brought a change of clothes?" she asked, clearly bothered, and she dropped her voice to a more concerned whisper. "Is the...erm...body going to be that...erm...well, untidy?"
"No, no, no, not at all, my dear," I reassured her with a light laugh. "These aren't for me, they're for Holmes."
Miss Hastings had the good manners not to ask why I was carrying about Sherlock Holmes's clothes, but she did raise an eyebrow at my comment before she began looking around. "And just where is the illustrious Mr. Holmes?" she asked pleasantly.
"I'm off to...erm...meet him so that...erm...we can meet you," I explained quite limply.
Miss Hastings's eyebrow climbed toward her feathered hat again. "Wouldn't it be simpler if we all just met up once?"
"Yes, I suppose, but I need to meet him at the jail first and...erm...well," I fumbled, "it's not really the sort of place for a lady, now is it?"
"And the morgue is?" she asked me, a smile tugging at the corners of her mouth. "Come, come now, Doctor," she said, tucking her hand under my elbow and heading for the entrance to the jail, "all the criminals are well locked up behind bars and guarded by the brave men of Scotland Yard, so I really shouldn't fret. The sooner we meet up with Mr. Holmes the sooner we can get to work, wouldn't you say?"
I tried valiantly one last time at the door to stall my female companion. "Yes, that's true, but...Inspector Lestrade isn't keen on lots of people bustling in and out of the jail and the police morgue, you see, and..."
"All the better that you can introduce me first," Miss Hastings said, opening the door herself, "so that he can understand that I'm here on an official consulting basis for Mr. Holmes." With that she held the door open for me and I reluctantly followed her inside.
Inspector Lestrade was standing in the hallway conversing with an unfamiliar constable, but when he saw me coming towards him he excused himself from the conversation and walked my way, wearing an insufferable smirk that I wanted to wipe clean off his face. Until he saw my companion, that is. It took him but a second to check that his tie was in place and straighten up smartly once he'd had one glance at the attractive young woman by my side.
"Why, good morning, Dr. Watson," Lestrade said affably. "Lovely day, isn't it?"
"Good morning, Lestrade," I answered as evenly as I could, for I could still see the remnants of a smirk in his eyes. "May I introduce to you Miss Hastings of the British Museum? Miss Hastings –Inspector Lestrade of Scotland Yard."
The two of them exchanged pleasantries and then Lestrade turned to me once more. "I suppose you are here to collect Mr. Holmes?" he asked, quite clearly in an amused way.
"We are," Miss Hastings replied, surprising both the inspector and myself.
Lestrade gave her an appraising look and then shrugged. "Suit yourself. It's not often a lady such as yourself voluntarily enters the jail. Are you sure you wouldn't rather wait here while Dr. Watson and I go..."
"Oh, that's quite alright," Miss Hastings said, placing her hand on Lestrade's arm. "I admit a certain, shall we say, morbid curiosity, and I'm quite confident that I shall be safe enough escorted by one of the Yard's finest."
Lestrade's gaze was firmly fixed upon our engaging female companion, and so thankfully he didn't notice my own tiny smirk at how fast he succumbed to such a blatant and yet successful attempt on Miss Hastings's part to charm him. Clearly she had her reasons for going into the jail and she wasn't going to be deterred.
Inspector Athelney Jones, although infinitely amused the night before at the fact that he'd been able to briefly incarcerate the theorist, Sherlock Holmes, had however, been smart enough to make sure that there was at least one empty cell between him and the riff-raff that shared the jail with him. We were required to walk by two cells on either side of us full of vagrants, drunks and cutpurses, and then another pair of cells containing at least a dozen rough-looking sailors who had also been arrested the night before at the Oxford Club.
With the low caliber of denizen currently residing in the cells of Scotland Yard, it was no great surprise that a cacophony of hoots, whistles and inappropriate comments broke out the moment Miss Hastings set foot through the door. To her credit, although she noticeably tightened the grip she had on Inspector Lestrade's elbow, she otherwise held her head up and gave no indication that she had noticed the slightest indiscretion.
"Here, now!" Lestrade said with a stern look all around. "That'll do!"
The ruckus died down to one or two more vulgarities, and we made our way past the empty cell to the one where Sherlock Holmes had stretched his long frame across the crude wooden bench against the stone wall, lying on his back with the sailor's cap he'd worn the night before pulled over his eyes. The peacoat was rolled up as a makeshift pillow under his head, his arms were folded across his chest, and without moving so much as a muscle, he spoke as we arrived in front of his cell.
"Good morning, Miss Hastings," he said quietly, "and to you too of course, Watson."
Miss Hastings shared a look of surprise with me and then addressed Holmes where he lay.
"How did you know I was here?" she asked. "I haven't spoken a word since I came through that door."
"Nothing could be more obvious, dear lady," Holmes replied, as of yet unmoving. "To the best of my knowledge, none of Scotland Yard's finest make a habit of wearing heeled shoes, at least on duty, and although I admit that I was a bit perplexed at first as to whether the enthusiastic but indelicate reception from my fellow inmates was meant for you or the good inspector, I found that once your perfume reached my cell that it was certainly not Lestrade's preferred scent.
"Hence the deduction that my dear friend Dr. Watson had thoughtfully brought you along so as not to keep you waiting while he saw to rectifying my indisposal, for you must have not only been prompt, but early."
A round of snickering and jeers broke out from the nearest cell of sailors, and any swagger Lestrade might have maintained in his carriage up to that point was certainly gone in an instant; the very same instant that a look of intense displeasure at Holmes's witty yet embarrassing remarks darkened his countenance.
He unlocked the cell almost violently and swung the door wide with a yank.
"Get him out of here before I decide to keep him for a week," Lestrade snarled quietly at me, and then he turned on his heel and marched out of the jail.
"Come on, old chap," I said, "before Lestrade changes his mind and comes back and locks this door again."
"Very well," Holmes replied, somewhat less enthusiastically than I would expect after being detained in prison with the dregs of London society overnight.
He cast the hat from his face cavalierly and drew a deep breath in an attempt to apparently steel himself, and then, very slowly, pulled himself into a sitting position with a soft groan. There he paused, clearly needing another moment before making the attempt to gain his feet. At that point I could see that he was in better condition than I had feared, but still looking the worse for wear. His hair was tousled, his shirt torn halfway down the front and stained with splotches of blood, and while he didn't in fact have a black eye, as Wilkins had speculated he might, he did have a small gash over one eyebrow, and his lower lip on the same side was in the same ragged condition.
"I am sorry, Miss Hastings," Holmes said, as graciously as he could manage, "for my careless indiscretions of last night requiring you to begin your morning this way. My sincerest apologies for my deplorable appearance; I'm sure you and I both find it quite undignified."
"Not at all, Mr. Holmes," Miss Hastings replied gently. "I assume you pursue all your cases with such ingenuity and vigor?"
"Quite so," he said with a wince, apparently bracing himself to stand.
"Then there is nothing to forgive, as I know you must have devoted such energy to finding my brother's killer," she said softly. "We should take you away."
Holmes nodded his agreement, and with great effort, began to stand, shaky enough at first that I quickly found myself at his side, gripping his arm to steady him.
"Blasted pirates!" Holmes swore under his breath, glancing at the gang of seafarers two cells away as he finally managed to straighten up.
"Quite right!" I said in solidarity with my injured friend, as I cast a venomous look at the seagoing miscreants in the next cell and walked Holmes out of his. "Vile and dissolute creatures, the lot of them, I'm sure."
"You misunderstand, my dear Watson," Holmes replied, as Miss Hastings took his other arm and we helped him out of the jail. "I should have insulted them with much more colourful epithets were it not for the presence of the lady, but in actuality, I speak in most literal terms."
"Explain yourself, Holmes, you're not making any sense," I admonished him lightly. "I think the blow to your head must have rattled that formidable brain of yours."
"Quite," Holmes replied with a wan smile, "yet it doesn't change the fact that the Oxford Club, iniquitous den that it is, is home to all those who still, in some form or fashion, consider themselves pirates."
~~o~~
Once I managed to get Holmes cleaned up and into more respectable clothes, I could see that the cut over his eye appeared as if it would heal just fine without stitches, which was well, since there had been a delay of at least a dozen hours by then between when it had occurred and the earliest point that I might have been able to suture it up.
"Wilkins said that you'd been fending well for yourself –against two opponents no less," I commented, while Holmes shrugged himself into his jacket rather stiffly and then proceeded to rake his hair back into place with his fingers.
"You must give credit where credit is due, my dear Watson," he replied, checking one final time that no trace of make up or blood remained on his face. "You know well that I possess no little skill when it comes to the sweet science, and a contest against two men who are well into their cups is not much of a contest of all."
"But apparently it's a different story for three fellows well into their cups," I replied wryly.
"Quite true," Holmes replied evenly, a vague smile tugging at his mouth as he adjusted his tie one final time. "However, despite the fact that I am of no mean height, that fellow bettered me by at least three or maybe four inches, and even without the assistance of his two cohorts, would have tossed me as simply as the delivery boys throw bundles of papers onto the walk near the newstands.
"There," he pronounced once he was done, and he turned to me. "Am I presentable enough for our appointment now?"
"That would depend on whether you mean with Henry Matthews or with Miss Hastings," I replied, doing a poor job of keeping an entirely sober expression.
"Why on earth, Watson, would I care about being presentable for a dead pirate?" Holmes asked offhandedly, placing his hat upon his head.
"Why on earth, Mr. Sherlock Holmes, would you, of all people, care about being presentable for Miss Hastings?" I asked him pointedly, and when he found himself hesitating for a moment to find a suitable answer, I flashed him the most innocent smile I could manage and left to join our female companion before Holmes could retort.
Upon entering the police morgue, Miss Hastings – Lydia, to be more exact, had managed to ensconce herself between Holmes and myself, a sign, I deduced, that she was clearly somewhat nervous about examining the deceased remains.
Sherlock Holmes was in the midst of describing just where the injuries she would be examining were located, and knowing him as well as I did, I could feel the underlying excitement in his enthusiastic discourse, likely over the prospect of gaining another step forward in the investigation from what Lydia might discern from her examination. It was therefore that I could tell by the way he distractedly reached for the cloth that he was about to carelessly de-shroud Matthews in toto, and I put a staying hand on his wrist, giving him a pointed look that he interpreted correctly within a heartbeat with as well as he knew me: Miss Hastings might not be as prepared for that which we were already accustomed to, and in addition, it might embarrass the lady to have the disrobed cadaver laid bare before her in the presence of two gentlemen.
"Here," Holmes said, leading her around to the far side of the table and withdrawing the drape a fraction to reveal only Matthews's scarred arm. "This is the most promising..."
"Oh, my!" Lydia gasped, and both Holmes and I each instantly grabbed her by an elbow to steady her. "No, no, I'm fine," she said, quickly shrugging us off, putting on her glasses, and gathering up the arm. "Oh, my...oh, my...I need a place to work!"
Quickly she had shrugged out of her jacket and rolled up the sleeves of her blouse as Holmes and I grabbed the small nearby table and stool and brought them closer for her. Instantly she opened her valise and extracted a notebook, pencil, measuring tape, magnifying lens and callipers and set herself upon the stool to work.
"Look at this!" she exclaimed, clearly enthused enough about the imprints left by some animal's teeth to ignore the fact that they were displayed along the arm of a dead man. Holmes and I each peered over a shoulder as she pointed. "The imprint of the most rostral maxillary and mandibular arcade are here if you follow the scars –see here...the top of the forearm represents the upper teeth and the inside of the forearm represents the lower. He was bitten like this," she said, imitating jaws with her hand and clamping them around the arm of the dead man, "yet just barely at that."
"Just barely?" Holmes asked, and she turned around where she was sitting and glanced up at him.
"Oh, yes. This creature that bit him was of notable size, and if this had been anything more than a nip, he would have lost a hand and part of his arm quite easily. You said there are more scars on his leg?" she asked, peering over the tops of her glasses at him.
Holmes nodded and reached to draw back the shroud from Matthews's lower leg. "I think it quite likely they were made by the same creature during the same encounter. Wouldn't you say?"
Lydia peered closely at the horrid pale marks all along the shin and calf. "Either that or he was attacked by two individuals at the same time, which I deem rather unlikely for him to have surv...oh! Look here! These are nearly a perfect imprint of the dentition!"
Holmes and I shared a look behind her back; clearly neither of us could make sense of the jumble of scars she was examining.
"See? Here, he was bitten like this," she said, mimicking a jaw again with her hand, "with his foot in the beast's mouth. This set of scars here on the outside of his calf amidst all the others are the imprint of the left side of the jaw. I simply cannot believe that this man walked away from this animal!"
She concentrated for a few more moments and then spoke words softly, almost to herself. "Hard by the lilied Nile I saw, A duskish river-dragon stretched along."
"River dragon?" I asked, astounded. "You don't mean a crocodile, do you?"
Lydia nodded. "I do. It's the only animal that could have had teeth that large and simultaneously a jaw of that length."
"Was this one from the Nile?" Holmes asked, and even if Miss Hastings didn't perceive it, I could discern the edge to his voice that said he would be quite put out if the beast had the nerve not to be from India or the West Indies.
"It's possible," she replied, "but you must understand, Mr. Holmes, that there are twenty-one known species in the Order of Crocodilia, and while I can instantly rule out more than two thirds just by viewing these bites, I shall have to do more research to narrow down the list of individual species that could have made this particular impression. I do, however, have three or four likely candidates in mind." With that she returned to her work, scrutinizing the size of scars, distances between them and the like.
"Would any of them possibly be from either India or the West Indies?" Holmes asked with subtly suppressed anxiety.
"Why yes, both," Lydia replied offhandedly as she tried to concentrate on her counting and measuring and recording everything in her notebook.
"Is it possible to determine if it was one or the other?" he asked.
With an air of infinite patience, Lydia halted with her callipers in mid-air. "Perhaps."
"Will you be able to determine if it was one or the other, Miss Hastings?" Holmes asked pointedly, and although I knew he meant no insult, his overly direct query might have been misinterpreted by someone less familiar with his personality.
Miss Hastings set her callipers down in a calculatedly determined manner and spun on her stool to face Holmes. "If it is possible to distinguish one particular species from another with the information here, then I certainly am capable of doing so. However," she continued, peering over her glasses at him again with a patient smile and placing an almost affectionate pat on his arm, "it will be quicker for me to answer the question you seek the answer to most if you cease asking me yet others.
"A bit of patience, if you please, my dear Mr. Holmes," she finished with a light laugh.
Holmes offered her a gracious nod of apology. "Pray proceed," he replied affably, and while she went back to work trying to determine what manner of creature she was dealing with, I believe Sherlock Holmes scrutinised Miss Lydia Hastings in the same way.
~~o~~
A/N: There are currently 23 known species of crocodile, but in the 1890's only 21 had been discovered.
Lydia quotes a poem called A Crocodile by poet Thomas Lovell Beddoes (1803-1849).