CHAPTER 56: IT TAKES TWO TO TANGO
Sherlock and Giulia walk together up to the edge of the raised platform, then the detective instructs, "John, as soon as this repetition ends and the blinking lights turn off, you'll prepare yourself for the new sequence. When the lights begin to flash again, you will start translating the Morse code into letters, writing it all down and dictating everything out loud as you go. Remember that you must always tell us four letters at a time; the first one for my left foot, the second for my right one and two more for Giulia's feet. It is imperative that we step on the right tiles at the same time to keep the balance on the pressure table. I'm not too eager to find out what happens if our movements aren't perfectly synchronised," he simpers. "Is that clear?"
Giulia and John nod. The doctor spreads out a music staff in front of him and mutters under his breath but still perfectly audible, "If anything happens to Mrs Hudson, I'll kill you both."
The girl turns her head to him with a smirk, "No pressure at all, right, John?"
She turns to Sherlock and quickly studies his impenetrable expression. "How can you be so calm and detached?"
He arches a brow, "I thought you could see right through me; I am not. I'm scared to death. Mrs Hudson is like family," he stops and frowns. "Actually no. Unlike my real family, I do like her and enjoy her company."
Giulia gives him a crooked smile. His utter disrespect for his relatives is counterbalanced only by his genuine affection for the poor woman who is currently fighting for her life.
"I'd do anything to save her," he glances away, and his voice cracks at the end.
She lowers her eyes on her feet and murmurs half-serious, "Including swaying a clumsy girl across a mortal pressure table? I still can't dance and you know it."
He shakes his head at her concerns, "Don't think of it as a dance, but rather as a sequence to reproduce scrupulously on the floor. Just focus on touching the right tiles and you'll be fine."
"What if I stumble and fall?" her eyes dart feverishly in all directions as panic takes over. Her mind starts imagining the worst possible scenarios, spinning out of control as she hyperventilates at the prospect of making a wrong move and putting everyone in danger.
Sherlock gently places his right index under her chin and guides her head up, forcing her to meet his eyes. "I'll be there to catch you," he declares – not a single note of hesitation in his words. His voice drops an octave when he whispers, "I'm here for you. Despite what you may think of me, despite what I think of myself, in the end, I'm always here for you."
She takes a deep breath, holding his gaze. He is not lying. He is being completely, disarmingly honest.
"Alright, folks, brace yourselves. The first light has just gone off; the rest will follow shortly and after a ten-seconds pause, they'll resume the sequence from the beginning. Best of luck," John mumbles, struggling to even raise his gaze on them. He isn't ready to say goodbye to either of them or Mrs Hudson. This deadly dance better work.
Sherlock turns towards Giulia, delicately places his left hand on her hip and interlocks the fingers of his right hand in hers; his cheeks redden at their touch.
"Is there anything you want to say before we risk pretty much everyone's life right now?" he asks in a low voice, as the last blinking light switches off.
She pursues her lips in a grimace, "I must say, this is the weirdest date I've ever been to."
He cocks a brow at her attempt at lessening the tension and corrects her, "It's not a date; it's an abduction."
She shrugs, "I wouldn't expect anything different in your company. Just think about it: you asked me out to an exhibition and this is the second time we dance together tonight. Not to mention that you brought me to the theatre twice and we've even had a fight: it's definitely a date," she winks at him.
The detective doesn't have time to reply because John starts guiding them across that minefield, "At first, we have India – Tango – Golf – Oscar. Then, Sherlock should put his feet on two identical tiles both representing Tango, while I have signed Oscar and Uniform for Giulia. Then you have to proceed with Golf – Hotel – Alfa – November, and after that, you go with Delta – Yankee – Oscar – Uniform. Then again, Golf – Oscar – Tango – Hotel."
They obediently follow his instructions while the doctor moves his glance back and forth between the blinking lights and the paper on which he is frantically noting the letters. Then he raises his voice to ensure that they can hear him loud and clear, "Pay attention when you jump on India – Tango – Delta – India; then turn slightly to the side with Delta – Yankee – Oscar – Uniform."
Double-checking the upcoming tiles in front of his friends with the letters he has just written, he shouts out to warn them, "Now, be extremely careful with the next moves: the next letters seem to refer to a few jumps on slightly distant tiles. It starts with Tango – Hotel – India – November, and goes on with Kilo – Yankee – Oscar – Uniform. Just another couple of complicated twists: Hotel – Alfa – Delta – Whiskey; then again, India – Tango – November – Oscar. Then swirl on Alfa – India – Delta – India, followed by November – Alfa – Hotel – Uniform. Again, Golf – November – Oscar – Golf. Then, I have registered 8 more letters and the sequence is: Alfa – India – November – India, and November – Delta – Alfa – Tango."
As they mechanically step on the panes indicated by Watson, Giulia repeats his every word under her breath to ensure the correctness of her moves. "My squares were the hotel sign and the uniform, then the Academy award and the golf club…"
She is so focused on anticipating the other two steps listed by John that she doesn't realise that she clumsily crossed her legs with her last movement, which causes her to lose her balance. Her high-pitched scream reverberates through the wall of the room, freezing the very blood in John's veins as he whips his head up and watches her tumble forward as if in slow motion.
With a lightning movement, Sherlock grabs her wrist and stops her fall with a sharp jerk, catching her right before she could touch the ground. She remains immobile, breathing heavily and staring at the floor a few inches below her face. He helps her to her feet, and they carefully position on their respective tiles last mentioned by John to catch their breath. When she straightens up, he realises that his hand is still clutching her forearm, and he gently lifts his fingers one by one, breaking off his iron grip.
"Apologies. This is probably going to leave a mark," he murmurs, glancing at her flushed skin.
She hints at a smile, "I'll settle for a little bruise. I can't even imagine what would have happened to me if…" she starts but he interrupts her. "I told you I'd catch you," he winks at her.
"Are you two alright? Is Giulia okay?" John cries out. They turn their heads to him, suddenly realising that they are almost halfway across the room.
"Yes, I'm good. That was a close call," she yells back in response – the note of relief in her voice is palpable.
"I think we have paused long enough. You can resume your precious instructions, now," Sherlock adds, stealing a preoccupied glance at the monitor showing Mrs Hudson caught in her feverish convulsions. Her conditions are worsening.
The doctor, who in the meantime has kept up his work of transcribing the Morse code on the music stave, doesn't look away from the blinking lights and lists the subsequent streak of steps. "Good. Keep moving forward on India – November – Golf – India, and then Kilo – November – Oscar – Whiskey. Later on, you have Hotel – Oscar – Whiskey – Tango. Then take a few steps backwards on Oscar – Whiskey – Oscar – Uniform, and November – Delta – Yankee – Oscar. After that, Uniform – Whiskey – India – Tango. Lastly, Sherlock should position both his feet on tiles with the Hotel sign, while Giulia has to step on Alfa and Tango."
The girl keeps her gaze fixed on the ground; all of her energy is focused on touching only the tiles indicated by John, but the task seems to be getting harder by the second and she is still shaken up by her previous misstep. When she checks out the upcoming panes, all colour drains from her face, and she murmurs in a wobbly voice, "Sherlock, this is getting extremely difficult."
He lowers his eyes on her terror-stricken face with his air of superiority, "That's because you're overthinking it."
"You were the one who told me to think about it in a logical manner," she rebuts.
He nods, casting a glance at her unsteady steps. Her mind is playing tricks on her, he deduces. If she keeps stressing that much on her every movement, she will eventually stumble and press the wrong tile.
When he speaks again, his words are reduced to a velvet caress; He knows that the last thing she needs right now is for someone to fan the flames of her anxiety. "Clearly it isn't working. You need to feel the rhythm; you have to go with the flow," he encourages her softly.
She frowns at his unperturbable face, "How?"
"Close your eyes," he whispers.
She goggles at him in horror and fear. "What? Are you crazy?"
He sighs at her stubbornness and lack of faith. "If you choose to trust me, you'll have to do it till the very last move. Just close your eyes, listen to your body, and follow my lead," he pronounces gently, tightening his hold on her hip and giving her hand a delicate squeeze. Then he starts humming the same melody that the orchestra played at the exhibition, just a few hours before.
She immediately recognises the symphony that made them pirouette in the Hickman Gallery when they swayed together without a care in the world, and her muscles instantly relax, following Sherlock's expert touch.
John's indications seem to barely reach her ear, yet her body reproduces all the right moves. "India – November – Golf – Delta, then you should step on Oscar – Yankee – Oscar – Uniform, then again on Kilo – November – Oscar – Whiskey. Slide to the right with Tango – Hotel – Alfa – Tango and go further with Hotel – Alfa – Uniform – November, then shift back to the left on Tango – India – November – Golf. One step forward with Tango – Hotel – Oscar – Uniform, and two steps backwards for both of you with Golf – Hotel – Tango – Whiskey, and India – Tango – Hotel – India."
The detective confidently guides their steps according to John's words. He looks down at the girl between his arms; she keeps her eyes closed, a tightlipped smile on her lips. She is well aware of the danger they are in, but a minuscule part of her can't help but enjoy herself. Fear is not the sole tyrannical emotion that got hold of her. While staring at her delicate features, witnessing her frailty and her strength at once, Sherlock feels like he is at the exhibition again, and for a split second, nothing else matters.
Lost in his daydream, he takes a step too far and the point of his shoe crosses over one of the dividing lines between the tiles. Another small arrow is shot in his direction and pokes a hole in his trousers, grazing against the skin of his leg. Giulia's ears perceive the whooshing sound, and she cracks her eyes open, "What was that?"
"A not-so-friendly reminder to watch my step," Sherlock replies enigmatically. Pity! That Gucci tuxedo was a perfect fit, he frivolously grumbles to himself.
"Hold on; you're almost to the other side of the room," John intervenes. "Now, you have to step on November – Tango – Hotel – Alfa. Then Sherlock should find two tiles with the Tango drawing for his feet, while Giulia has to touch on Oscar and November. After that, there's a short sequence to the right: India – Golf – Hotel – Tango, followed by Yankee – Oscar – Uniform – Golf," he recites.
The detective glances ahead to check the forthcoming panes then alerts the girl, "For the next sequence, our respective tiles are at a close-range; you should come closer."
She adjusts her moves according to John's words and closes the distance between them with the next step. Now she can feel the heat irradiating from his body. They move in sync; the actions of one mirror the ones of the other, and they keep dancing effortlessly across the room.
When Giulia moved closer to Sherlock, his breath got caught in his throat and he stopped humming. It doesn't make a difference, though; she would never be able to hear him over the drumming sound of her heart.
John enunciates the final steps of that perilous dance, "Oscar – Delta – Oscar – Whiskey will be your next move. Up next, we have November – Alfa – November – Delta and India – Whiskey – India – November…" he trails off, frowning at the blinking lights. He writes down the last letters and stares confused at the music staff while the twinkle dies out at the end of the repetition.
Giulia and Sherlock follow his instructions and come to a halt on their respective tiles – their eyes locked. After a second, Sherlock regains awareness of his surroundings and looks at the buttons still out of reach, a few feet away. "What's going on, Doctor? Did you miss the last move?" he shouts across the room with a hint of sarcasm.
Watson raises his gaze from the paper and shouts in response, "No, I didn't. But I have no idea how you are going to perform it."
Sherlock frowns, "What's the problem, Houston?"
John shrugs, confusion painted all over his face. "I was expecting four letters for each of your feet, but I got only two, instead. Apparently, your dance ends on two letters that have never been mentioned before: R and J, which in the NATO phonetic alphabet stand for -"
"Romeo and Juliett*", Sherlock completes before him, earning a baffled look from the doctor who points out, "I thought you didn't know the NATO alphabet."
"I don't, but I'm quite the connoisseur of theatre and plays," he replies, lowering his gaze on the two tiles placed just below the button with the blood droplet. The panes show the images of two young people: a man looking up at a woman standing on a balcony. There's no need for a huge stretch of the imagination – they unmistakably represent the ill-fated protagonists of the romantic Shakespeare's piece.
John squints his eyes to look into the distance at the tiles in questions, then he observes, "There's not enough room for both of you."
Sherlock simpers at him, "I can see that."
"Can't I just stay right here where I'm standing and you jump on the last two tiles, completing the dance?" Giulia suggests, but the detective shakes his head. "It won't work. We are standing on a pressure table, meaning that every move counts as correct only when you lift the weight from a place to put it somewhere else. That's the whole point. If you stay on your tiles, the moment I step on the final two, it will be registered as a false move and God knows what might happen. We both have to leave our places," he explains with a pensive look.
She bites down on her lower lip and objects ironically, "Sorry to disappoint you, but I haven't learned to fly, yet."
He smirks at her remark and argues back, "Maybe we can still remedy that."
She looks anxiously up at him, "What does it mean?"
"That we'll have to improvise," he flashes her a cunning smile. "I'm going to spin you forward in the air, and while you're mid-air, I'll position myself on the tiles and I'll catch you in my arms so that you won't have to touch the floor," he calmly presents his plan.
She gapes. "Sherlock, this is insane."
He gives her an eloquent look, "Yes, and that's why we are the only two people who would be crazy enough to attempt it. Are you ready?" he asks, looking for her eyes.
She raises her gaze on his determined face and they exchange a long glance. She doesn't need to say anything or voice her terror: he can read it all over her expression.
"We will manage to do it. I promise," he whispers, placing his hands on her hips with a firm grip. She flinches slightly at his touch; after two dances together in the last few hours, his hands on her body feel familiar and at the same time still somehow foreign. Or maybe it's just the fear in anticipation of that dangerous move, she tries to justify to herself. However, a knot has been sitting in her stomach ever since they started dancing closer, holding on to one another. And she rationally knows that it has nothing to do with fear. On the contrary, between his arms, she felt invincible.
"On the count of three," he announces, staring into her hazel eyes.
She nods and he starts counting, "One, two…"
Before she can realise it, he swiftly lifts her into the air, making her spin forward while he jumps on the Romeo and Juliett drawings. As her long dress wraps around her legs like a mermaid tail in the rotatory motion, she shuts her eyes closed, unwilling to witness her fate.
One second later, while she is falling down, he catches her: his right arm slides behind her knees and his left arm supports her torso below her armpits, bridal style. "Three," he exhales, panting.
She arches a brow at him. "Judging by the way you count, I'm fairly grateful that our dance was based on the alphabet and not the numbers," she jokes to release the tension in her nerves. Curled up against his chest, she feels her stiffened muscles relax when she meets Sherlock's gaze – an expression of exultation gleaming on his face.
He responds to her ironic remark in a half-serious tone, "Thank you for this dance, Miss, but I believe that now you should stretch your arm and press the button."
She blinks to break the spell of his magnetic eyes and darts a glance at the buttons to her left, mumbling, "Before taking on me the responsibility of Mrs Hudson's life, we all agree with John's intuition that the drop of blood is the right answer, correct?"
He nods. "Given the fact that he single-handedly solved this round and led us all the way across the room while juggling two different means of coded communication without ever losing sight of our steps, he has my utmost trust, at the moment. But yes, his diagnosis of Mrs Hudson's symptoms was correct and consistent with the historical connection to the dancing plague, matching the Muse statue and the dancing theme of the whole round," he recapitulates in a confidence-inspiring tone. "I don't doubt that it is the right button. I would press it myself, but you know, my hands are full," he shrugs and the movement makes her swing slightly.
She extends her arm until her fingertips come in contact with the drawing of the blood drop, then she takes a deep breath and pushes it.
All their heads turn simultaneously towards the screen showing Mrs Hudson's room; they observe with bated breath as one of Moriarty's men approaches the old woman while carrying a tray full of medicines. He proceeds to administer her some doses and the spasms and convulsions lessen significantly.
After a couple of seconds, Giulia taps a finger on Sherlock's shoulder to catch his attention. "You can put me down now," she notices with a foxy grin.
He looks as if he suddenly awakened from a trance and it takes him a second to register her words, then he tenderly lowers her until her feet slide down to the ground.
"We did it. I can't believe we did it," John exclaims, beside himself with joy. He takes his pencil and throws it on the tiled floor to check the reaction of the pressure table. When the pencil lands with a muffled thud, nothing happens: no arrows are shot, no darts are fired through the air. He breathes a sigh of relief and starts dragging his feet painfully across the now-innocuous surface.
Sherlock turns to Giulia. "I'm still glad that we – you and I, managed to cooperate efficiently on this one. In the end, we work better when we don't step on each other toes," he pronounces sheepishly.
She makes a funny grimace. "Is that an inappropriate dancing pun?"
He shakes his head and lifts his eyes to meet hers, dead serious. "It's a clumsy way to thank you for trusting me."
She parts her lips to say something in reply, but he lifts one hand in the air to pre-empt her. "Before you say anything, I know that you didn't do that for me and you were just trying to save Mrs Hudson. And I know that just dancing together won't wipe away how inadequate I made you feel during our previous round or any of the many mistakes that I've made with you," he affirms, a tinge of sadness in his deep voice. "But I saw something more in you during our dance – both of our dances together, actually. And I felt…" he clears his throat to dissemble his hesitancy. "I felt like we were sharing something… something more than the urge to save someone and the fear of failing. But, if I'm wrong, please tell me now," he stutters.
She does a double-take in front of his uncommon display of uncertainty. The trembling note in his voice surprises her. She cocks a brow at his nervous face. "Since when do you need someone else's confirmation to trust your deduction skills?" she smirks, shielding behind irony.
He twitches his lips to hide his disappointment as he draws one easy conclusion: She is dodging the question. Or rather, she is avoiding the answer.
"Look, this is all very new to me. And truth be told, I find it bloody difficult," he admits, evidently uncomfortable, then he takes one step forward, coming closer to her and forcing her to raise her head to maintain eye contact.
"Oh, I understand. It's not like I'm an expert of treading unsteadily over the edge of an abyss, tentatively proceeding hand in hand with someone who knows (or doesn't know) as much as I do about the next steps forward," she replies.
An overwhelming sense of discouragement invades him, digging a pit in his chest and making him drop his shoulders and head, defeated. She completely misinterpreted his words, he reflects in dismay. He thought she was clever; he believed she would get the subtext. He hoped she would understand.
He shakes his head and his curly hair wiggle slightly. "I wasn't referring to the dance," he murmurs before looking up and staring into her eyes, the intensity of his gaze almost intimidating. "I was talking about feelings and sentiment," he whispers.
She holds his gaze unflinchingly and gives him a meaningful glance. "So was I," she affirms as the hint of a smile curves up the corners of her mouth.
His eyes grow wide as he gets the underlying meaning of her previous words. She was using a metaphor to describe her way of dealing with feelings, as well – he realises. She is indeed clever; she did understand.
"To be a tad more plainspoken, though, about what you said of our dance and what you felt… You weren't mistaken," she murmurs with a timid smile.
When he smiles back, Giulia feels a sudden wave of happiness washing over her body. At that moment, a clanging sound rouses her; a door placed next to the buttons swings open automatically, signalling them to proceed towards a new room. She instinctively turns her head to the dark corridor ahead. "We'd better not keep Moriarty waiting," she says awkwardly and heads for the door.
At that instant, John staggers up to Sherlock, and the detective shoots an anxious look at his roughly bandaged leg. "How are you feeling?" he asks him, genuinely concerned.
"Crippled," Watson groans. "But I'll be okay. What about you?" he inquires, frowning at the faraway look in his friend's eyes.
Holmes steals a glance at the back of Giulia's head as she is crossing the threshold, and an instinctive smile creeps up his lips. "As good as it gets," he mutters.
John furrows a brow at his dreamy expression and follows his gaze. When he understands the cause of his state, he unconsciously lowers his eyes on the music staff that he is still holding in his hands and his face clouds over. He shows the piece of paper to his friend, commenting in a low voice, "Here are the letters that I dictated to you."
Sherlock rolls up his eyes and replies sarcastically, "I could hear you, you know?"
John remains serious. "This is for you," he insists, tossing the stave into his hands and walking out the room.
The detective studies it, observing that even though John had initially jotted down the letters in a continuous line, once they finished their dance, he had noticed something and had rewritten the entire sequence, grouping the letters into words. The final product produced this message:
It got tough and you got hit, did you think you had wit?
No aid in a hug, No gain in dating, I know how to wound you with hating.
Do you know that haunting thought within
that tonight you go down and I win?
*In the NATO phonetic alphabet, there are some mistakes or rather inaccuracies, such as the word Alfa with an F and Juliett with a double T. For the sake of coherence, I decided to stick to the NATO format.
Furthermore, you probably noticed that I didn't use the entire alphabet for the very simple reason that I realised it would be quite difficult on a practical level to represent some of the codewords through stylised designs. This is why the message itself isn't as grandiloquent as it could be expected from Moriarty (you try writing a rhyming threatening letter without using some key letters such as E, S, L or even R – which had to appear just once at the end, for added symbolism).
I hope you'll forgive me.