JWP #29:

To the Makeup Table! Focus on Holmes and/or Watson in disguise – for a case, or for any other reason.

"Watson?"

"Holmes?"

"Why are you wearing that?"

I glanced down. I wore a ragged overcoat over an equally ragged workhouse suit that served to draw attention from the slightly too-new shoes I was wearing.

I shrugged. "I guess you could call it a disguise," I finally answered.

He stared at me for a moment. "Why?"

I huffed a laugh, continuing to organize my medical bag to make sure I had everything I might need. "Because my normal outfit would put a target on my back today."

"Where are you going?" The question was quiet, almost worried, and I glanced over to find him scanning me, searching for any clue he could find as to my plans.

"You mean you cannot guess?" I said with a smirk.

He frowned at me. "You are going to a poorer end of town, but I have no idea why you would do so, nor to which poorer section you would go."

A knock sounded on the door, and I picked up my bag. "I am sure you will figure it out. I hope to return in a few hours."

Leaving him staring after me, I hurried down the stairs and out the door. The front step was empty, as I had known it would be, and I hurried down a block, then turned right. A shape appeared from the shadows, meeting me at the other side of the alley.

"What took you so long?"

"Sorry, Charlie. Holmes was trying to figure it out."

The young Irregular skipped along beside me. "Why don't you want him to know where you're going?" she asked. "He knows where it is."

We turned off one street and ducked through another alley. "That is why. After that case last spring, he dislikes me going to the East End alone." I could not exactly blame him—we both still had nightmares from that case—but that did not mean I had to like how persistent he could be on the matter. It was simpler to let him figure out where I had been rather than where I was going.

"But you're not alone. You're with us!"

I smiled, following the young girl through yet another alley as our surroundings got more and more decrepit. "He would not see it that way."

She waved the comment off in a manner so like her older brother I nearly laughed. Charlie Wiggins was a rowdy eleven years old, and she and her brother had been Irregulars since she was eight or nine, if not longer. Holmes had never told me when he started the Irregulars, but I knew the Wiggins' were two of the first. Her brother was basically raising her, and after so much time on the streets, she acted more like her brother than she did their long-dead parents.

We rounded a corner and halted, scanning our surroundings as we came to a more dangerous section of the city, but she waved me forward a moment later. Ducking into the next alley, I slowed my steps as high walls blocked out the morning light. I was here to treat a patient, not become one.

Charlie waved me forward, trying to hurry me.

"I do not know this alley as you do," I told her, watching my path carefully to ensure I did not trip on something in the half-light.

Her gaze flicked to the stick on which I occasionally leaned instead of merely carrying, and she slowed, trying to take my hand. Moving my stick to the hand that held my bag, I let her, and she led me down one dark alley and up another before finally stopping in front of a rotting pile of wood. With a glance up and down the alley, she pushed aside two boards, revealing a door, and led me into a courtyard.

I was aware of only fifteen or twenty Irregulars, but the courtyard seemed to have many more people than that. Children were everywhere, chasing each other in a game of tag, talking around a small table, and surrounding a figure huddled into the blankets in a makeshift bunk. It was to this last area that I directed my steps.

"It happened yesterday," Charlie told me as we moved closer. "He was climbing and hunting down by the docks when he fell. The fever started last night."

The crowd moved away, and fever-bright eyes peered at me from under a blanket as I set down my bag. "Hello, James," I said softly.

"Doctor," he greeted quietly. He started to move but winced.

"Stay there, James," I told him. "It's alright. I need to have a look at your leg."

I gently moved the blankets aside, keeping a running commentary with the occasional question as I examined where a piece of metal had cut a long gash in the boy's leg. The cut was relatively shallow, for all that it was nearly three inches long, but the skin around it was bright red. The scab leaked yellow as I examined it, and I frowned as Wiggins came up behind me.

"I am going to have to lance it," I answered Wiggins' quiet question. "The wound is infected, and that is what is causing his fever."

He glanced between James and me for a moment. "'Lance it?'" he repeated.

"I have to reopen the wound to clean it," I answered. "The metal had something on it that is making him sick."

"What can I do?"

I chuckled as brother and sister frowned at each other, irritated at having spoken at the same time.

"Hold him down. Charlie, do your best to distract him. He is not going to like this."

Charlie started talking, blocking James' view and chattering about a litter of kittens she had found a few alleys over while her brother held him still, and I carefully lanced and cleaned the wound. It only took a couple of minutes, but James' movements showed how painful it must have been.

"Done," I finally told them, and James breathed a sigh of relief. "You did well. You remember how to change bandages and clean a wound?" Wiggins nodded at me. "Good. Just keep that clean, and I will leave you some extra bandages. The fever should subside in a few hours, and he will be up and running in a few days."

"Thank you, Doctor," Wiggins said as we moved away from James to let him rest. "What do I owe you?"

I shook my head. "I already settled fees with your sister."

He glanced around, clearly searching for where his sister had gone, and movement near the table caught his eye. Charlie stood talking to one of the small groups, and they slowly got up and walked closer.

"Hello," I told them gently as Wiggins looked on.

A young boy peeked out from behind his older brother. "Charlie says you're a doctor."

That had been more question than statement, and I nodded, smiling at the young lad.

"I am Doctor Watson" I answered, speaking to them all but directing my words at the one who had spoken first. "I came to help James, and I would like to check everyone else while I am here."

The older children hung back, wary, but the youngest one moved forward. "What's that mean?"

I opened my bag to let the boy see into it, taking out my stethoscope. "Someone does not have to be sick to go to the doctor. Many people come to me just for a check-up, to make sure nothing is wrong."

The boy frowned, thinking about that. "Does it hurt?"

I chuckled. "No, lad. Can I give you a check-up?"

He hesitated for only a moment, glancing at Wiggins, before nodding, and he followed me a few steps away from the others. I kept a running commentary, explaining what I was doing and why I was listening to his heart and lungs, and I finished a few minutes later.

"That's it?"

"That's it," I told him. "Will you send another over on your way back to the group?"

He nodded and ran off, and a moment later an older girl walked toward me. In this manner several hours passed, giving check-ups, treating injuries, advising the older ones on how to care for the younger ones. I was just finishing when a familiar voice came from the other side of the courtyard.

"Wiggins!"

"Sir?" The young man looked up from where he had been talking with one of the other boys, standing to move to where a certain consulting detective waited near the entrance, and I turned back to the boy in front of me.

"Take it easy for a day or two," I told him, wrapping a brace around his swollen ankle, "and it will heal soon enough. If it still hurts in a week, let me know."

The boy smiled at me and hurried off, jogging in an awkward limp that was most certainly not taking it easy, and I shook my head with a grin and turned back to my bag. Rummaging through my supplies, I took a quick inventory while waiting for Holmes to leave. There was no reason to announce to him that I had spent all day in the Irregular's headquarters, and I would get Charlie to lead me back to an area I knew better after Holmes had gone.

Pieces of his conversation carried across the courtyard, probably related to his current case. He had not included me on this case, and I tried not to listen, but I could not avoid hearing some of it.

"In an alley…cane…lost...trail…watch…not far from here."

I put the last few supplies in their places, noting which ones I would have to replenish, and Wiggins' voice carried, too quiet to make out the words besides a call for Charlie, then a faint question.

She skipped over to me a moment later. "My brother wants to know if you have your watch."

"Of course, I—" The pocket I patted felt empty, and I shoved my hand into it only to find a hole in the bottom. "I do not, apparently," I answered, looking over at her. "Did he say why he needed a watch?"

"Mr. Holmes followed us," she answered. "He found your watch in an alley, and he's trying to get my brother to help search for you."

I released a half-irritated chuckle. "Of course, he followed us. The stubborn..." I trailed off, closing my medical bag and grabbing my stick from where I had leaned it against a wall. "We shall go calm down a detective then," I told her. "Perhaps you can give him pointers on tracking people through alleys, since he obviously did not track us here."

A faint giggle sounded from beside me, and I left the alcove I had claimed for the evaluations to find my friend pacing in front of an amused Wiggins.

"Do you have it?" he asked me.

I timed my answer for when Holmes was pacing away from me. "No." Holmes froze, and I smothered a grin as I continued. "I apparently have a hole in my pocket."

My friend spun to face me, utter surprise crossing his face for the briefest moment before it disappeared, and I smirked. "You lose the trail in an alley only to find me on accident? I thought you could find anyone in London."

He shrugged. "I found you, did I not?"

I chuckled. "No, you asked the Irregulars to find me. They just happened to know where I was."

He rolled his eyes at me, and I turned to Wiggins, who quickly killed a grin. "Let me know if James' fever does not recede by morning, and try to keep young John off that ankle for a couple of days."

He nodded, showing us to the door. "Thank you, Doctor. Am I still to meet you at Baker Street tonight, Mr. Holmes?"

My friend nodded. "At seven."

Wiggins closed the door behind us as I followed Holmes out, and I held out my hand.

My pocket watch landed in my palm, and I slipped it into a different pocket as I glanced at him.

"Why did you follow me?"

"You said you would be back hours ago," he scowled. "Of course, I followed you."

I shrugged. "I said I hoped to be back in a few hours, not that I would be. Besides, you have a case. I would have thought that would be more interesting than following me through several dark alleys."

He glanced at me. "You took that route on purpose?"

"No, Charlie chose that route. She wanted to make sure we did not lead anyone to their headquarters."

He frowned, possibly remembering the incident Charlie had alluded to. "Why would you not answer me this morning?"

"Because the last time I tried treat a patient in the East End, you insisted on coming with me and made a nuisance of yourself in the process. Not all of those children know you, and it was hard enough getting some of them to trust me."

He stared at the sidewalk in front of us, his frown remaining, and I let him think, leaning on my cane as we walked.

"You need a better disguise," he finally said.

I smothered a chuckle, seeing through the comment to his dislike of my being in this section of town. "I am not exactly trying to sneak into a warehouse unrecognized."

"You still need a better disguise," he repeated. "I will teach you how to use my materials."

I grinned but made no reply, deciding to see if he followed through with that, and the rest of the walk back to Baker Street passed in silence.

The next day he had without a case, he pulled out his plethora of disguise materials and started teaching me how to use them, and I enjoyed every minute of it. I had always been interested in how he made his disguises, but I would let him find out for himself just how little talent I possessed at making a detailed disguise believable.