Kate knew exactly what Sherlock would say. He would say that the conclusion that Adrienne Holmes had taken her own life wasn't the only possible explanation action of all of the facts; that it was one possible explanation of some of the facts. There were other possibilities, there were always other possibilities. The crime scene could have been interfered with, evidence could have been destroyed; the pathologist who did the post-mortem could have been paid to turn a blind eye to a bullet wound, or a dose of strong sedative on the toxicology tests. There were dozens of alternative possibilities, but somehow she knew that John was right. Adrienne had killed herself, and the only cover-up was the French authorities giving her the benefit of the doubt, and recording it as an accidental death. In a Catholic country, that would have been important, to allow her to die within the grace of the church, and not outside it.
The why seemed obvious - depression, severe depression, and perhaps the knowledge that her youngest son was showing signs of the same illness that she had struggled with for most of her life. Kate found herself becoming irrationally angry with Adrienne for what she had done to Sherlock. How could she have left him? Sherlock had adored his mother, had relied on her, had survived his terms at school only with the promise of getting home to her, so how then could she take that away from him, irrespective of her own suffering? And how, above all else, as John said, were they ever going to tell Sherlock what had happened.
She was aware of John's quiet presence in the seat opposite, watching her silently, allowing her time to process it. The train was pulling into a station. York, already, Kate thought, it had to be, and was rewarded by the sight of the station sign sliding into view outside her window.
As the train slid to a halt, she noticed a man carrying large cardboard box waiting by the door to the First Class carriage, talking energetically to the guard. The guard finally nodded at him and he entered the carriage at the far end. He never emerged into their part of the carriage, but he re-emerged a few minutes later without the box. His step was lighter without it, Kate thought, watching him stride away across the platform, and wondering how long it would have taken Sherlock to work out what was in that box.
The appearance of the steward next to them, clearing his throat to get their attention as the train pulled out of the station made her jump.
'Delivery for you,' he said, sounding slightly perplexed. 'It would appear that someone has arranged for a take away for you from a local restaurant. Would you like me to plate it up for you?'
'That would be very kind, thank you,' John said. And then as the man turned to walk away, 'Wait, did they say who it was from?'
'A Mr Mycroft Holmes, I believe,' the steward said, and Kate made the mistake of catching John's eye, and the pair of them dissolved into giggles. The steward gave them a quizzical look as they struggled to control themselves. 'I believe there was a bottle of wine delivered too, if you would like-' but that only made things worse, and he gave them a curt nod and retreated to serve up the mysterious contents of the box.
'God, I needed that,' John said, wiping his eyes several minutes later. 'Good old Mycroft! How does he do it?'
'Anthea, I presume,' Kate said, still giggling. 'How many Michelin stars do you think the restaurant that meal came from had?'
'At least five, I would imagine' Johns aid solemnly, well aware that was several more than was possible. 'Oh well, beats a soggy sandwich, or a baked potato.'
The food, when it arrived, was definitely up to even Mycroft's high standards, and the expressions of their fellow passengers when it arrived, followed shortly after by the arrival of their predicted sandwiches and baked potatoes, reduced Kate to giggles again, as the steward fielded whispered conversations as the other passengers politely pointed to Kate and John's food, and the steward time and again explained that this was not standard East Coast Line fare.
'Do you think that he's explaining that the food only comes courtesy of a fairy godfather?' John asked, and then, 'How much of that wine have you actually drunk?' As Kate exploded into giggles yet again.
'Less than you,' she replied smartly. 'But talking of Mycroft, has it occurred to you that a lot of what we're discovering may impact on him as much as it does on Sherlock?'
'The Ice Man?' John said incredulously. 'Kate, I've never really seen him affected by anything. There was a slight chink in his armour when he was telling me about Sherlock's childhood, but other than that, I've never seen him show the slightest emotional reaction to anything.'
'I have,' Kate told him. 'That night when a Sherlock ended up on the roof. He cared, John. About Sherlock, about what had nearly happened. They need each other those two, much as they might both deny it.'
'But this is about the past, Kate. And Mycroft is so logical, so analytical. I don't believe that emotion will come into it.'
'If someone told you that your mother had killed herself, John. Wouldn't you care?'
'Of course I'd care, but then I'm not Mycroft Holmes, am I.'
...
In his office in The House of Lords, Mycroft Holmes was sitting in his leather armchair, whiskey in hand, flicking through the police file that Lestrade had couriered across to him at his request. The French report of course held no challenges for him; he spoke four languages fluently, with a smattering of another three. Enough to make himself understood, and to conduct business deals which were best done without the presence of an interpreter. The file on the side table next to him contained a print-out of John's database and transcripts of his interviews with the house staff, together with the first draft of the report that his was formulating for Sherlock. In a technological age, Mycroft still preferred the feel of paper beneath his fingers when it was possible. It wasn't that he disliked or distrusted electronic formats, it was simply that he enjoyed the clarity of black type on white paper, enjoyed the ability to scribble notes in the margin as he was now.
'Police officers
Crime scene investigators
Pathologist
Inquest'
His list read. The meaning was clear to him, as it would have been to Sherlock. Those were the possible sites of corruption - of falsified evidence. He would have all four investigated - interviews, character profiles, retrieval of missing data. The laptop that he had lent to John was encrypted and entirely impossible to hack into, of course. But it downloaded automatically to Mycroft's office computer once a day. He had never told John this, and he had never asked, but after five years working with Sherlock he would be disappointed to think that John wouldn't have assumed that this was exactly what he was doing.
There would be nothing, of course. He knew this, but he was also aware that Sherlock would need the hard proof. Without it his mind would veer off on tangents of possibility in its attempt to find an alternative explanation for their mother's death. Mycroft couldn't say that he was surprised. His mother's suicide explained many things; his father's rage, the rapid and formulaic nature of the funeral, the choice of a Church of England rather than a Catholic ceremony, when she had been baptised a Catholic and had attended mass intermittently for the whole of her life. It seemed unlikely that his father had feared the priest's questions, more likely that he had simply considered a Church of England funeral to be less complicated, less fussy.
'The dead are dead,' he had told Mycroft when he had queried the decision. 'Funerals are for the living, not for the deceased. If your mother has such a thing as an immortal soul, which frankly I find extremely unlikely, then it will reap it's just rewards, and no quantity of incense or requiem masses will atone for that.'
Mycroft had considered the use of the word atone odd at the time, but caught up in his concern for Sherlock, had thought little more of it. Now it seemed to him a clear indication of his father's awareness of the probable cause of his mothers death.
So - the dead were dead, as he said, and yet their influence lived on in others. In Sherlock. He scribbled a note, detailing the investigations he required, fixed it with a paper clip to the police report, and picking up his overcoat with one hand, opened the door to the outer office, handing the sheaf of papers to Anthea, who was still sitting there typing.
'See to this, would you?' he said. 'I have other business to attend to tonight.'
He barely registered her murmured acknowledgment as he shrugged on his coat and headed out of the door. Tonight was not a night to be alone with his own thoughts. Tonight was a night for company and distraction. He strode in the direction of his club, contemplating dinner and a few more drinks. He imagined that John considered him cold and emotionless in his management of his shared past with Sherlock. The truth was that he simply dealt with it differently. There was guilt there if he allowed it, over the damage that he had allowed to be inflicted on Sherlock by their father, but he was a practical man. He allowed these emotions to flow over him like water; watching, observing, never allowing them to penetrate his core. Emotion, sentiment could be useful at times, but for now it was simply a distraction to the task at hand, and that was so something that he would not permit himself the luxury of.