The Devonshire Squires Chapter Ten:
John spent Sunday morning fretting. To someone who didn't know him, he might have looked like someone enjoying a leisurely breakfast and then reading the paper. Mary knew him better than that. She tried to coax the story out of him, and got the bare bones. A dead body, an accountant, who died in some kind of illegal fight club. Yes, Sherlock had been there. No, John didn't want to discuss it.
And yet, he sat there in silence, obviously chewing it over in his mind all morning long. They were not due back in the surgery until Tuesday, having decided to spend a Monday trying to find am affordable venue they both liked for the wedding. The idea of doing that while John continued to stew about this case just didn't seem like much fun. After the third sigh from him, finally Mary had had enough.
"If you don't tell me why this is annoying you, I'm going to call up Sherlock myself and ask him what's going on."
"No, you're not." Then he paused, "Actually, it wouldn't matter if you did. Apparently, he isn't answering anyone's calls or texts, not just mine."
"So, tell me exactly what happened."
"What's the point?"
"I want to know."
"Didn't anyone ever tell you, curiosity killed the cat?"
She entwined him in a hug, gave a soft meow into his ear, and then purred, "Go on. This cat wants to know."
John sighed. "I arrived and Sherlock asked Lestrade why he had called me. Greg explained about the Medical Examiner being unavailable. Sherlock was a dickhead and just walked off. I examined the body, while Greg tried to compensate by being polite about me finding the cause of death. But, I felt about as useful as a spare wheel. Then Sherlock called us over, told us what had happened, who the guy was likely to be, and what needed to be done next. It was like a general ordering the troops about. Then he stomped off, still in a strop."
"So, he's in a mood. Your blog says he was often in a mood. You made a lot of fuss about that in…what was it called? Um- the Geek Interpreter. Said he was so grumpy he made the teenagers look positively adult in comparison. And about the Speckled Blonde, too."
He gave a wry smile. "Yeah, he was a pain in the backside on that one. But that was because he kept deducing the wrong thing and never solved it. He doesn't like to be proved wrong."
"So, there. Maybe this is just another one like that. Or maybe he just got out of bed on the wrong side yesterday. Don't take it so personally, love."
She was relieved when John cheered up a bit over Sunday lunch, so over the roast pork loin with home-made apple sauce, she teased out the rest of the Saturday night details out of him- his work at St Bartholomew's mortuary, the discovery of the fingerprint, and his deduction that there was a medical person involved.
She beamed at him. "You're really good at this, figuring all that out."
The smile faded a bit. "Yea, well, I had a good teacher."
He picked at the last bit of crackling on the pork. She play slapped his hand away. "Off- that's tomorrow's supper, cold, with some nice salads. We've both got a full day of researching and looking at venues, and won't have time to cook. I'll do a potato salad tonight, so we can just eat in front of the telly when we get back in tomorrow."
Lestrade called just as they were doing the washing up. She listened intently, able to get the drift, even though she was only able to hear one side of the conversation.
"An RAMC officer?" John's incredulity made his voice go an octave higher.
Then he slowly said a name, as if trying to place it, "George Hayter? ….Never heard of him. Which regiment?"
She kept wiping the wine glass, trying to use the tea towel to get the last of the water spots off. Eavesdropping came naturally to her; some things you didn't forget, no matter how long since she'd needed the skills professionally.
"Oh. That's before my time. I'll see what I can come up with."
Mary smiled. Good, something that is right up his alleyway. She knew John's tenacity would mean he'd keep digging.
He came back into the kitchen. "That was interesting- the first solid lead in the case- a name. Lestrade says that when they went to his address in Clapham, the suspect wasn't there. I'm going to spend some time on the computer this afternoon, maybe phone a few people. Might be able to help out Lestrade after all."
She beamed at him. "Good. Serve his Nibs right. When you come up with the clues that crack the case, he just might get off his high horse and start treating you with the respect you're due." She blew a kiss at him before turning to put the wine glass back on the shelf.
oOo
By supper time, John had a potted history. George Hayter had been a member of the RAMC alright- and a field surgeon to boot, but had served as a para, rather than regular army. His outfit, the 23rd Parachute Field Ambulance, had seen action in Africa and the Balkans.
"Bloody hell."
Mary looked up from the Sunday cryptic crossword. "What is it?"
"When he was a major, Hayter won a QCVS*."
"Well, it takes one decorated war hero to know another."
He pulled a face. "No, the surprise is that it was in Africa, so not an active battlefield. He was working in the refugee camps, where he was part of the field surgical team that managed one hundred and eighty sixsurgical procedures in four months."
She gave a low whistle of astonishment. "That is one hell of a work rate."
"Yeah, that's what I thought. How does that compare with the sort of stuff you got involved with?"
She put the crossword aside. "Well, to start with, most of my camp work was disaster-related, not war zones. You know, Haiti after the earthquake, Sri Lanka after the tsunami. The only African stuff I did for International Medical Corps was in southern Somalia in 2011- but that was famine. Not much surgery involved". Mary had been very careful to build herself a credible back story. If she was going to make a new life, she had to manufacture a believable old life.
John was still looking at his laptop. "Well, this Hayter managed to find the battlefields. Two years after Africa, the 23rd Paras Field Ambulance Service was with the UN's IFOR in Bosnia-Herzegovina."
By tea time, he'd managed to piece together more about the guy's service record. When she deposited a cup of builder's tea, one sugar, next to the laptop, she read over his shoulder. Two years after Bosnia, the owner of the fingerprint was back in the Balkans, as part of Operation Agricola, preparing for KFOR deployment into Kosovo.
"Quite the action man, isn't he?"
John gave a hum of agreement. "Yeah, Hayter was part of a helicopter insertion in the Kajanik defile, dropped behind enemy lines, to treat casualties as the main UK force passed from Macedonia into Kosovo."
"I thought there weren't any NATO casualties in Kosovo?"
John grimaced. "No NATO forces- but there were plenty of Kosovans and Serbian militia men wounded, and thousands of civilian casualties, for months. Ethnic cleansing and all that. Pretty hard core medical work for back then."
"So, did he get to Iraq?"
"Nope- I can't find any reference to him after late 1999. I'm going call a few people and find out what happened next."
She watched the latest episode of Downton Abbey, with one eye on his internet use. A piece of her wanted to invent a reason to follow him into the kitchen when he disappeared in there with his phone. She waited for the commercial break, which gave her an excuse to go put the kettle on.
John was pacing. She tried to block out the sound of the kettle as the water started to boil; she really wanted to know what he was finding out. Wonder if he'd like an assistant on this case? And almost immediately after that thought, another came to choke it off. No, don't let your guard down. Mustn't arouse any suspicions. Within the first few days of knowing Sherlock, she had come to realise that the Consulting Detective would be able to deduce something about her past. The more she read about John's blog and got the details of how Holmes and John had cracked the Gunpowder Plot, the more she realised that it was only a matter of time before he figured her out. She filled the teapot, and stirred the two tea bags.
It had been almost a month, and yet Sherlock had done nothing, said nothing to John. About a week ago, she'd realised that he must have made a decision not to be a threat to her. That is his gift to John. And she knew it, and knew that Sherlock knew it, too. That made them co-conspirators in a way, and she was grateful for it. It had made her like Sherlock even more than her initial first impression. Even so, she did wonder whether her secret had something to do with Sherlock's recent efforts to keep his distance.
"You still there, Bill?" John was frowning. He walked a few steps closer to the living room. "Yeah, that's better now. You were breaking up." He was listening intently, then leaned over the kitchen counter to grab a pen and the shopping list pad, scribbling a number. She filled the two mugs with milk, and then poured the tea.
"Okay, I'll give her a call. Thanks. Cheers, mate."
She handed him the tea with a question in her eyes.
John smirked. "If you think army surgeons are bad, wait 'til you meet Bill in person; he is the king of gossips. "
She smiled. "Then he's definitely on the wedding invitation list." She knew about Bill Murray- the Army nurse who knew John at Barts and ended up in the same field hospital in Kandahar. He was the one who saved John's life when he was shot. John was trying to limit the number of army men he would invite- just Bill and Major John Shloto. She was grateful that John was determined not to upstage her, accepting her story that she had been in the country for too short a time to make a lot of friends, and that her friends from the IMC were too committed and poor to leave disaster zone medicine to attend a wedding in the UK.
John took a sip of tea, and she mirrored his action. They'd started talking about the wedding now. It still gave her a most peculiar thrill. The very idea- getting MARRIED. How was it even possible that she could manage to get something so wonderful, so normal?
He made a shooing gesture. "You know it bugs me to make calls to people I don't know, so a little privacy would be appreciated."
She smothered a grin and left him in peace. It was one of his quirks. He didn't like talking on the phone at the best of times, even with people he knew. It always surprised her that for a doctor, John wasn't at all extroverted. Typical surgeon. When the land line rang in the flat, he never picked it up. "It's going to be for you, so you should answer it," was his argument. "Could be a junk call," she would tease, provoking the inevitable response, "well, that's even more reason for you to answer it."
She went back out to the living room and resumed the episode of Downton Abbey, trying to concentrate on the adventures of Edith, the third daughter of the Earl, as she struggled to find a way to hide her pregnancy from her parents. It made her think about marriage, children, family life- all the things she had told herself would never be possible. And now they are. Just like that. Once again, she gave a wordless thank-you to God for putting her in the path of John, and then she added another one to Sherlock, for not exposing her secrets.
Mary was still smiling when John came out of the kitchen, wearing a thoughtful expression. She turned the TV off and patted the sofa beside her, pulling him into a hug. "So, what've you found out?"
He sniffed. "Bill's contact is a former QARANC* nurse, now working at Derriford in Plymouth. Turns out she served on this fellow's last tour. She thinks George Hayter is an old fashioned hero- brilliant surgeon, all-round great guy, career army man from three generations of serving officers."
"So, why'd he leave the service?"
"In late 1999, the Para field ambulance unit was merged with another- you know, part of the endless re-structuring the army went through. Nancy – that's the nurse- left at the same time he did. But, Hayter quit medicine altogether and went to work in the City. He retired two years ago, but she's stayed in touch- Christmas cards and all that. Gave me his address and phone number."
He was looking down at a scrap of paper. "He lives in Reigate, apparently. Has a flat in London- that's where Lestrade must have gone. But the nurse says Hayter inherited a big house down on the coast." He was turning the paper over in his hands, a tell that she recognised as his way of showing indecision.
"You're thinking of giving him a call, aren't you?"
He gave a wry smile. "Yeah, well…the proper thing to do would be to pass this info to Lestrade and let him go through channels. Get the Kent police onto it and bring the guy in for questioning."
"What would Sherlock do?"
John snorted. "Turn up on the guy's doorstep and demand an explanation."
"I can't imagine his interrogation technique."
That made John giggle. "You've got to see it to believe it. He scares the hell out of the person, deduces their guilt without a shred of evidence and gets them to confess." Then he shrugged, "Or he lies through his teeth to provoke them into some sort of reaction which usually proves they are either the guilty party or innocent as a new-born."
"Wow- that sounds…um…effective."
"Yeah, and Lestrade hates it when he does it within his earshot, because it is so not police procedure."
"But it works?"
John nodded.
"Right. Go take a look on the web for train times. Tomorrow morning, I fancy a trip to the seaside. Coming with me, Doctor Watson?"
"I thought you wanted to look for reception venues."
She made a face. "Boring. I'd rather watch you sweet talk some old Army doctor into explaining how his fingerprint got onto a body."
John smirked. "Yeah, well…if you're sure. Why not? I've never been to Reigate."
Mary smiled, as John opened the laptop and started hunting for train times.
Author's Note:
*QCVS= Queen's Commendation for Valuable Service
**QARANC = Queen Alexandra's Royal Army Nursing Corps