We climbed back into the Land Rover and John and Mary immediately embarked on their first domestic in sixteen years.

Well, probably.

Admittedly she'd been back in the country for several days and I'd only been around them for less than twelve hours so I have no proof of my hypothesis.

"So," John said.

"Yes?" Mary purred.

"Ajay Lakhari. Spy, assassin, your group's technical boy."

"You…" Mary hesitated, "You did read that drive, didn't you?"

"Uncircumcised."

"Yeah," Mary snipped.

"So that's what you did after me."

"I mean," Mary said, "Technically Ajay bracketed you, but yes."

"An international man of mystery totally seems like the best potential stepdad material I can think of," John snapped.

Mary arched her spine and puffed out her fur to make herself look more intimidating and said, "Do you want to think about that sentence for thirty seconds and see if it sounds any cleverer than it was? If you have a problem with Ajay then you have a problem with me and he would never, ever harm a child."

"I mean the interesting thing is really that he's probably not actually dead," I said mildly from my seat in the back, "Not so much that he used to shag Mary."

John glared at me in the rearview mirror. Mary turned around and glared at me directly.

"Fine," they snapped in unison, and faced front again.

"Item: a shooting of a corpse intended to duplicate one of the residents of the house. The housekeeper probably wasn't in on it, the friend and the wife almost certainly are. Item: a possible love affair between the putated Mrs. Corpse and his handsome best friend. Item…"

I hesitated.

"An intercepted internal correspondence of a consulting criminal society directing me to the crime. Because there's half a dozen motivations for it otherwise: commonplace insurance fraud, a trick to invoke probate on an absent but not dead rich man… but that message is the worrying bit."

"So what are we going to do?" asked John

"So I'm going to go and be a total bastard to one of our suspects until it all falls into place."

"That's still your main method?" Mary asked.

"It's a classic," John sighed.

About a quarter mile from the house, I said to John, "Let's just park here and walk up." So he did, pulling the Land Rover off at a flat place in the road.

"Mary," I said, "They haven't seen you before. So I'd like you to wait five minutes and then follow along after us. Keep an eye out."

"What for?" Mary asked curiously.

I smiled.

"Oh, you know. Anything of interest."

John and I then headed up the curving path to the Chandrasekar house, only to find Nora Chandra and Cecil Barker sitting in the garden, next to one another on a bench tucked next to the yew hedge, heads close together… probably too close for mere friendship, hand in hand. Their expressions were serious, intense, and they practically leapt apart when they saw us approaching. John scowled. I, meanwhile, said into my mobile, "Yes, Macdonald, I do think we'll want your lot to come out here and drag the moat. There may well be a piece of vital evidence concealed within."

Then I rang off from my completely fictitious phone call and made a selection of victim at random.

"Mrs. Chandrasekar," I said, with a sympathetic smile, "May I introduce my associate, Doctor John Watson. I'd like it if we could just have another brief word with you? In private?"

Nora Chandra glanced nervily at Cecil Barker, and then said, "Of course, Mr. Holmes, Doctor Watson. Won't you come in?"

She dithered. Insisted on making us tea, etcetera. Totally, gratifyingly suspicious behavior.

Tea and biscuits in hand, we sat down in the house's elegant main sitting room. Mrs. Chandra toyed with the rings on her right hand, but maintained a calm demeanor overall.

"You probably don't… I hope that what you saw out in the garden doesn't make you think that I'm somehow…" she hesitated.

"Oh, it's been made quite clear to me that we're not to have opinions about women and what they do," John replied, taking a sip of his tea.

"I always have opinions," I rejoined, "But in this case I'm somewhat mystified. The case, as presented by you and Mr. Barker, is as follows. Your husband was alone when he was surprised by an intruder carrying a sawn-off shotgun. After a brief struggle he was shot, killing him instantly. The murderer then escaped across your moat. This is a lie. The police realize that just as much as I do."

Nora had gone white, and she set down her cup with a shaking hand.

"The crime which the police believe you and your lover to have committed is almost as simple. Either he or you shot your husband, and attempted to stage it as a home invasion gone wrong. Poorly, I might add, that single footmark on the windowsill was very clumsy. Your footmark, I believe, Mr. Barker has much larger feet, althouth I doubt I'd be able to prove it in court assuming you had the minimal amount of sense needed to wash your feet from then 'till now. This crime would carry a murder charge for at least one but probably both of you, possibly with an additional count of conspiracy depending upon whether there's any evidence of premeditation. Murder carries a mandatory life sentence, of which you can expect to serve approximately sixteen years, most likely at Wormwood Scrubs. You're pretty, though. That does influence sentencing in your favor."

"Mr. Holmes, please-" Nora began pleading.

"And that story's just as much a lie as the first one, which is why it's unfortunate that you're preparing to be imprisoned over it," I interrupted her, "This is what I think happened."

I rose to my feet and started to pace out my thoughts. At this point I do need to confess it might have been better to have John compose this segment for me, as when he does it you can envision the deductions swirling around my head in a sort of data cloud.

This is not in any way an accurate description of how I think, incidentally, but it's quite a striking visual, and I have no idea how to get it onto the page.

"Your husband killed a man who had broken into your house. A man who had a striking resemblance to him in ways that couldn't be coincidental and which enabled him to be a reasonable approximation of Mr. Chandrasekar's corpse. His history had prepared him for something of the sort, but he had not prepared either you or Mr. Barker. Fortunately, you had some time… your deaf housekeeper hadn't heard the first shotgun blast. He fled the scene with your knowledge and connivance. You and Mr. Barker dressed the corpse in Sachi's clothes, attempted to stage the scene accordingly, and fired another shot… this one out the window, where it echoed against the downs and woke your housekeeper."

I whirled upon her, and said, "So I must now ask, Eleanora, where is-"

Just then, completely stomping on my denouement, Cecil Barker came in, hands in the air, a sopping wet parcel in one of them. Mary walked directly behind him, one hand on his broad shoulder.

"Nora, look out, she's got a gun!" he exclaimed.

"Indeed I do," Mary cooed, pressing something into the small of his back, "Now toss that over to Mr. Holmes, please."

Barker did, tossing what turned out to be a light cashmere sweater wrapped around a small, silenced revolver, and a wickedly sharp hunting knife.

"That's a good boy," Mary said, "You can lower your hands now, dear. It's not a gun, it's a lipstick."

Barker whirled around, to see Mary tucking a small gold tube back into her pocket.

"A lipstick?" he spat, high color on his cheeks.

"Not a psychic one, but 'tis enough, 'twill serve. Inspector River Song, at your service. Sherlock, I saw this one hooking that out of the moat with a fishnet. Thought that might count as "anything of interest.""

"Indeed it is," I said, putting on gloves to pick up the small but deadly assassin's gun. The magazine was full. It hadn't been fired. But the knife had one severe chip on the cutting edge. You see that sometimes, when it catches on bone.

I rose to my feet, balancing the knife in my right hand.

"Where is Mr. Chandrasekar, you two? The real one."

At this moment a panel in the wall opened and a haggard man, pallid under his olive skin tone, staggered out. He carried a gun in his right hand, and his left was clamped over a dark red stain that had spread over his ribs.

"Rose?" Ajay asked shakily, "Is that you?"

Author's note: Sorry that took so long, everybody. There were life and holidays and then I was inspired to write Sherlolly porn and then required to write Sherlolly AU fluff and it just took me away for way too long.