Chapter 10: Flashbacks and Discovering the List
"What happened?" Mrs. Judson asked when the two gentlemen returned to Baker Street.
"Olivia and Andrew were kidnapped by Fidget," Basil replied.
"What about Clover?"
"She's with her friend, Eve, who will help her get her family back," Dawson told the housekeeper.
"If anything happens to Clover and Eve, it's my fault," Basil lamented.
"Come now, Basil, Clover and Eve can take care of themselves," Dawson said, putting his hand on the young detective's shoulder, "They've been through worse situations."
Basil, feeling guilty for being mean to Clover and Eve, went to his room and started to sing a song about Clover, whom he started to have feelings for.
And in my twisted face,
There's not the slightest trace
Of anything that even hints of kindness.
He covered his face in shame, wishing he could take back all the things he said to his new friends.
And from my tortured shape
No comfort, no escape.
I see, but deep within is utter blindness.
He fell to his knees.
Hopeless,
As my dream dies.
As the time flies,
Love a lost illusion.
Helpless,
Unforgiven,
Cold and driven,
To this sad conclusion.
The detective sighed.
No beauty could move me.
No goodness improve me.
No power on earth, if I can't love her.
No passion could reach me.
No lesson could teach me.
How I could have loved her and made her love me too.
If I can't love her, then who?
Basil stood up and paced around the room.
Long ago I should have seen
All the things I could have been.
Careless and unthinking, I moved onward!
Basil remembered how he was ungrateful to others, including his parents. The detective could've been giving, but took everything for granted, since he was spoiled, although he had everything he wanted. Now he wished he could appreciate what others do for him and be nicer to others. He looked out his window to see a happy couple walk by his house, reminding him of what he could do if he had Clover.
No pain could be deeper.
No life could be cheaper.
No point anymore, if I can't love her.
No spirit could win me.
No hope left within me.
Hope I could have loved her and that she'd set me free.
The detective removed himself from the window. He started to warm up to the elder Flaversham girl, but he was too late.
But it's not to be.
If I can't love her,
Let the world be done with me!
"Basil, it's not too late," Dawson assured him, "Eve is a good friend to her and she'll help her get her family back."
"I misjudged Eve, but you're right. She's Clover's friend and I got in the way. We'll find them after we examine this list you were telling me about; I should've listened to you."
...
Basil turned on his kerosene lamp to get a better view at the list Fidget dropped with Dawson behind him to watch. "Offhand, I can deduce very little," complained Basil, "Only that the words are written with a broad-pointed quill pen which has spattered, twice. That the paper is of…" He put away his magnifying glass in his pocket and closed his eyes, while feeling the texture of the list and making it flutter lightly in his right hand. "Native Mongolian manufacture, no watermark. And has…" He began tasting the paper a little in his mouth. "Been gummed, if I'm not bit in much error…" He sniffed the paper to get its scent and held the paper by his pointer finger and thumb as he said to Dawson, "By a bat who has been drinking Rodent's Delight." Basil showed the paper to Dawson as Basil comfortably smiled and shrugged his shoulders. Dawson quickly took out his reading glasses to look at the paper as Basil ended his hypothesis, "A cheap brandy sold only in the seediest pubs."
Basil stopped revealing Dawson the paper and brought it over to his chemistry set that involved cups, bottles, glass beakers, and tubes with many-colored chemicals. "Hmm, amazing," Dawson said, interested in his partner's theory.
"Oh, not really, doctor. We still don't know where it came from," Basil corrected, as he pulled out a microscope and slid the paper underneath it. "Perhaps a closer inspection will tell us something." He brought the lens to focus to see black splattered spots, humming while doing so. "Coal dust. Clearly of the type used in sewer lamps."
Just as Basil walked away, it took Dawson merely a second to examine the list through the microscope before Basil snatched away the paper, much to the doctor's surprise.
With his tongue out, Basil cautiously grasped the paper over the Bunsen burner and adjusted the knob, making the flame increase, burning a hole in the paper. Then, he turned the Bunsen burner down to let the paper steadily burn.
Seeing the list in flames, Dawson protested, "B-But Basil I-"
"Shh! Don't speak!" Basil cut him off as he let the burning paper leisurely turn to ash inside a wooden bowl. He plucked a wooden grinder to mix the ashes into a dusty matter. After that, he poured it into a glass beaker with yellow liquid, making the liquid turn blue.
Dawson scrutinized the blue liquid, but Basil returned with a beaker and a bottle of red liquid, while commanding, "Excuse me, Dawson." Attentively, Basil gently tipped the bottle over the beaker. "Steady hand." A small drip of red liquid landed, creating a blow as it turned into a darker shade of blue.
Dawson looked on curiously at his companion's unexplained experiment.
Basil, on the other hand, placed the beaker underneath the equipment with the Bunsen burner and the end with a boiling green liquid in a bottle container and attached to where the twisting that led all the way to the beaker. Turning the small gas burner, the green chemical started to bubble in high speed as it swirled through the tubes. "Yes. Yes. Good," Basil said as the liquid whizzed and wound through the tubes. "Come along, come along, come along, come along, come along. Yes, yes. Good, good. Mmm, no, bad. Good, good. Go yeah. Come along. Come along, come on. Don't go back up. Yes. Come along. Come on." When the liquid finally hit its end, it assembled to a single drop on the beaker.
Basil's eyes broadened as he said excitedly, "Yes...Yes!" The drop plunged into the beaker, forming another blast as the liquid's color changed to red with fizzing and bubbles afterwards.
"AHA! We've done it, old fellow!" Basil crowed, wrapping his arm around a dumbfounded Dawson. "This reaction could only have been triggered by the paper's extreme saturation with distillation of sodium chloride." With that said, he headed over to a basket of rolled maps.
Dawson went over to the beaker with great regard while putting on his reading glasses, analyzing the liquid, which changed colors until it turned pale white. "Salt water? Great Scott."
"It proves, beyond a doubt," Basil said excitedly as he scoured through the maps in his basket until he found the correct one. "This list came from the riverfront area." He pinned the map he found to the wall.
"Now, now, steady on there, Basil," Dawson warned sternly to prevent his partner from being overconfident.
"No, no. Elementary, my dear Dawson," Basil replied dismissively, waving a finger at him. "We merely look for a seedy pub at the only spot…" Basil placed the dart on the riverfront area in the map. "Where the sewer connects to the waterfront."
"But what about Clover, Olivia, Andrew, and their father, and their bat friend, Eve?" Dawson asked, turning his focus to the Flavershams.
"Well, I'm glad you brought that up. As soon as we get ready, the better chance we'll get them back, I promise."
Dawson remembered Basil's words back in the toy store: There's always a chance, Doctor...As long as one can think.
…
"It's alright, guys," Eve said when they came to free Andrew and Olivia.
"It's us," Clover added and the two girls popped open the bottle and pulled out the children. Then they went over to Hiram to let him out of the prison.
The four mice and female bat went outside for fresh air.
"You saved us," Olivia said.
"That's what sisters and friends do," Clover said with a wink.
"Yes, indeed," Eve agreed.
"It's nice out here," Andrew mused.
"This beats building the robot queen," Hiram said.
After an hour of being outside, Hiram, Andrew, and Olivia were brought back to their prisons, unseen by Eve and Clover.
"Father! Olivia! Andrew!" Clover shouted, finding that her family was no longer with them.
"Come on, Clover," Eve sighed, feeling blue, "Let's go to The Rat Trap."
Clover followed her friend to The Rat Trap.
AN: My take on Basil's backstory is based on the Beast's backstory.