For all my intentions, several hours later saw me more focused on his experiment than my monograph, and I set my pen down to lean against his desk.
"What are you trying to accomplish?"
He barely looked up from the vial he held carefully in one hand. "MacDonald had an experiment half-completed when something called him away," he answered, referring to the blackmailer we had just caught. "I want to know what he was doing."
I did not answer as three drops of yellow-ish liquid splashed onto the heterogeneous mixture. The drops stayed on top of the heavier blend, and he carefully swirled the flask.
"Why not read his notebook?"
"I did." Two drops of something blue dissolved into the liquid now more grey than anything. "He had nothing listed except the process, and the equation suggests a mildly exothermic reaction."
I grinned but made no comment. Holmes would not be able to stifle his curiosity any time, but certainly not where an experiment was concerned, and I settled in to watch. I always enjoyed the ones with a noticeable reaction, and I could edit my manuscript later. He added a little, then stirred, then added something else and stirred again. He finally sat back, watching the flask for any change.
Nothing happened.
"Seems the reactants are wrong," I said when over a minute had passed.
He slowly nodded, adding, "or his process was." He watched for a moment more, then shrugged, beginning to clean, and a knock sounded below. Voices carried from the entryway.
"Mr. Holmes!" Lestrade called as he took the stairs nearly at a run. "The Yard just apprehended Flagson!"
Holmes' gaze shot up from the finished experiment. Flagson was a smuggler that had escaped us over two weeks ago, and with several questions still unanswered, my friend had asked to be notified should the Yard ever catch him. We could not leave the experiment unattended, but some of the officers would not wait for Lestrade to return before beginning their interrogation. A delay could cost him information.
"Go," I told him, reaching for the vial in his hand. "I know how to put everything away well enough. You can fill me in when you return."
Relief flooded his gaze with silent thanks as Lestrade reached the landing, and he passed both vial and cleaning cloth before hurrying from the room. I started putting equipment and reactants away, cleaning as I went, as the door clicked shut behind them.
I truly did not mind cleaning up while he went to the Yard. Interrogation was not my strength, and while I could certainly take notes as Holmes asked questions, that still meant I spent hours listening to the complaints and snide remarks from some of the Yarders, some of whom liked to discuss "Doctor Secretary." It hardly mattered what they thought, but that did not mean I wanted to spend the next several hours dealing with them. As I doubted I would add much by my presence, I did not mind being useful in my absence.
I soon had everything else cleaned and put away, and I turned to the flask containing the experimental solution, surprise producing a small grin when I found it to be slightly warm. Holmes had gotten his "mildly exothermic" reaction after all—extremely mild.
Putting on a glove to prevent the almost uncomfortable warmth from growing painful before I made it to the washroom, I picked up the flask and hurried across the room. I intended to pour the mixture down the drain, but I had not made it halfway to the door when the flask's temperature abruptly changed.
A cloud of flames exploded upwards, the accompanying heat smacking my face before just as quickly dying. Pain registered, and I reflexively dropped the flask into the pitcher of water to rub at the offending spot. The smell of burnt hair registered as my mustache crumbled under my finger.
My heart dropped in my chest, and I felt my lip again, hoping my first impression had not been accurate. More hair crumbled and broke at the touch, however, and I did not try to check my scowl, though I focused more on the flask and chemical product currently swimming in the water pitcher. I would deal with the results of the flames when there was no chance of more.
Slowly pouring the mixture down the drain, I caught the flask as the water level dropped, then poured out the contents of the wash basin as well to make sure everything had been rinsed clear of the pipes. Only when that was done did I look in the mirror, and it was exactly as I had feared. My mustache had been singed to choppy stubble, and on the right side, where I had felt it burn, my mustache was completely gone. I would have to shave what little remained and face days of comments. It had been years since Holmes had seen me without a mustache, if he ever had, and I could only imagine what he would say when he saw my clean upper lip.
I smothered another irritated scowl as I carefully maneuvered the razor around the burn. I would have to be doubly on my guard. It would be at least four days before I had a noticeable mustache again, and only my mustache had kept him from coercing me into some of his more outlandish disguises. He could disguise himself as a bride-to-be if he deemed it necessary, but he would not get me into a dress. I refused.
My hand froze as my thoughts registered. Holmes…disguise. Holmes would never expect me to shave my mustache for a juvenile contest.
I finished quickly, then rushed through refilling the pitcher and basin and tidying Holmes' chemistry set. I scribbled a note to leave in his chair then hurried to my room. Makeup, putty, clay, foreign traveling clothes, and a few other things fit easily into a small bag, and I made use of the drainpipe outside my window rather than risk meeting Holmes on the street.
Locking myself in a different bolt hole than last time, I set to work. The putty I shoved high in my cheeks, making my face just slightly rounder, and light touches of makeup darkened my skin tone from the light tones of a Scotsman to the more olive tones of an Italian. I carefully changed the small burn on my lip to an old scar, then darkened my hair to a deep black. Pads in my jacket changed the shape of my shoulders from a crippled ex-soldier to a young man in his prime, and in a matter of hours, I did not recognize my own reflection.
Once satisfied with the stranger looking out of the mirror, I turned to the other item I had shoved in my bag. Thompson Junior had taken a passing interest in prosthetics, and he had asked me if I would try a device he had made that was supposed to support an injury like mine, allowing the person to walk normally again. The brace had worked, and I had told him as much, but it had been too uncomfortable to use for more than an hour or so. He had told me to keep it, and I had shoved it into my wardrobe and forgotten about it—until today.
The brace disappeared beneath my shoe and trouser leg, completely unnoticeable no matter my position, and, once tightened, it distributed my weight around that old injury. With it, I could walk just as firmly as I had before that fateful battle—for a few minutes, at least. I would not be able to handle the chafing and sore knee should I try to walk in it for too long, but I could find myself a place to sit nearby if Holmes had not yet returned.
Pacing the small bolt hole a few times to ensure I had tightened the brace correctly—and smirking when I realized that removing my limp added an inch to my height—I shoved my old clothes into my bag and took a circuitous route back to the flat, practicing my story as I went. My first attempt had shown that Holmes was more likely to see through my props than my disguise, so I drew on kernels of truth this time rather than try to formulate a new case. Only time would tell if it worked—five minutes, to be precise.
Holmes had not yet returned when I strode down the street, so after hiding my bag in the alley behind the flat, I claimed a bench near the corner to wait. An unattended newspaper covered my loitering, and I pretended to scan the pages as I watched for him to return to the flat.
I did not have to wait long. A cab clattered around the corner just under ten minutes later, and Holmes paid the cabbie then slowly disappeared through the door. Flagson must not have been very talkative.
It hardly mattered. The case was closed and had been for weeks. Any information from Flagson would only have satisfied Holmes' curiosity. We had not needed Flagson to confess to charge him.
Giving Holmes a slow count of thirty to reach the sitting room and find the note claiming I had run an errand, I walked around the block to approach the door from the other direction. Mrs. Hudson answered my knock, as I had expected.
"I'm-a 'ere for Mr. 'Olmes?" I asked in a noticeable Italian accent.
"He just returned," she replied, waving me into the entry. "I can take you up. Your name, sir?"
"Mario Ganza, Signorina."
She made no reply, leading me upstairs, though I did notice her gaze scan me once. I hoped she had not already seen more than I wanted Holmes to see.
He had already seated himself in his chair when Mrs. Hudson opened the door, and he set my note aside in favor of a client.
"Mr. Mario Ganza," she announced.
I stepped through the doorway, and Holmes gestured toward the settee as she went back downstairs.
"What can I do for you?"
"My apologies forr arr-rriving unannounced," I said, rolling the r's. My long strides carried me quickly across the room, and he waved off my apologies, studying me as I took a seat.
"Do not worry about it. What brings you so far from Rome?"
No client had ever been able to accept his deductions without an explanation, and I could not be anything but what he expected. I turned my pleasure into surprise.
"'Ow did you know t'at?"
He gestured to my shoe. "That scuff could only come from a recent sea voyage, and your accent is markedly Italian. Your clothes would have been new about the time that style was current in the outskirts of Rome."
I glanced down at the scuff I had renewed just hours ago. The original cause had been a wildly swinging door on a passenger ship, but a scrap piece of wood in an alley had effectively made it appear fresh.
"Of courrse." I shook my head. "Foolish young one left a doorr oonlatched doorring a storrm-a. 'E was loocky it caught my shoe and not 'is 'ead."
A smile twitched Holmes' mouth, but he turned the conversation back to our original topic.
"What brings you to London?"
"Mi ooncle," I replied, shifting in my seat. The hurt I had buried years ago rose to the fore at the memory, and I allowed it to strengthen my story. "'E spent most of my childhood arrgoo-ing with my parents about what constitooted an edoocation forr my brrother and I, and when I was about ten-a, my brrother and I spent a yearrr in Sicily with a cousin-a. My brrother learned to drraw when we woie dere." I paused, not needing to feign the hurt that accompanied the story so similar to my memories. "Alberrto learning sooch a 'feminine' skill was de final strraw-a, and 'e called oos many t'ings best not rrepeated before storrming out de doorr. 'E nevoi rreturned."
Holmes frowned, leaning forward in his chair as his fingers met in front of his mouth. I had intrigued him. Good. I needed to keep his attention for three more minutes.
"Why do you wish to contact him now?"
An Italian would make no effort to hide emotion, and I made very little, allowing grief to fill my expression at the straightforward question.
"My brrother is-a rrecently dead-a, as arre my parrents-a, and even if RRoobio does not carre about Alberrto and I, 'e was voiy close to 'is sist-a before de brreak-a. I found let-tois t'at soog-gested 'e trried to contact 'er while still rrejecting oos-a. I doubt Mother answoied—she would 'ave felt she 'ad to choose, and she would choose 'er boys ovoi her brrother—boot RRoobio would want to know of 'er passing."
"I see. Do you have any of those letters?"
Sixty seconds remained on the clock, and I shook my head. "A firre destroyed dem trree days aftoi my parrents' deaths-a. De most rrecent addrress-a was in Naples, 'owevoi."
He grabbed a pencil and scrap of paper from my desk. "Do you remember all of it?"
I nodded, reciting a familiar address as he scribbled. Ten seconds.
"And his last name?"
"Falco."
He scribbled that down with the address. "Do you wish him to contact you should I locate him?"
I hesitated, then shrugged. "'E can if 'e wants-a, I soop-pose. I will leave t'at oop to 'im-a. All I carre aboot is-a t'at 'e knows aboot Mamma."
He nodded acceptance but made no immediate answer, deciding if he had any further questions. "How can I contact you?" he eventually asked.
The hands read five and a half minutes from the time I walked through the door, and I allowed a wide grin to escape.
"Leave a note on my desk."
He had been studying the address, perhaps already thinking about whether this would require us to travel to Italy, but his gaze shot up when I dropped the accent.
"Watson!"
I laughed aloud at his evident surprise—and irritation. "I do believe I understand why you have always enjoyed fooling me, Holmes. That was the most fun I have had this month."
He glowered at me as I spat out the putty and started removing the makeup. The hair dye would dissolve with some water.
"By the way," I added before he could speak, covering my face with the cloth as I wiped away the last of the makeup, "you might practice a bit of patience when it comes to your experiments. You missed an interesting one."
I let the cloth fall all at once, and I had the pleasure of surprising him twice in rapid succession when he realized my smooth upper lip was not an illusion. My mouth stretched in a painfully wide grin.
"It was a bit more than 'mildly exothermic.'"
His mouth moved without sound as he stared, and the burn on my lip protested another laugh.
"Have you ever seen me without a mustache?" I finally asked, still grinning despite the pain.
He nodded once before he found his words.
"It has been a while," he answered, but he said nothing else, apparently unable to wrest his gaze from my face.
"Why are you staring? Did I miss a spot?"
He made no answer, and I stood easily, shedding the padded coat on the way to the small mirror I remembered seeing on the mantle. I could find nothing besides the quickly reddening burn on my upper lip, however, and I turned around to find him now staring at my leg.
"How did you do that?" he asked.
"Do what?"
He hesitated, still studying me. "You are not limping. Your steps are as firm as my own."
I had managed to forget about the brace while pretending to be Mario Ganza, but his question brought the discomfort to mind. I would not be able to wear it for much longer anyway, and he might find the brace interesting. I seated myself in my chair and rolled up my pant leg.
"Thompson Junior has taken an interest in prosthetics," I said as I unfastened the straps securing the brace to my calf, and Holmes stood to look closer. "He gave me this hoping it would work long-term, and he refused to let me give it back when it would not. It has been in my wardrobe ever since."
I passed him the brace, and with his attention diverted, I crossed the room to my medical bag. The burn was tender but had not blistered, and I rubbed a small amount of ointment into the skin both on and near the burn. For the moment, the ointment moistened the injury, making it less painful to talk and smile, and if I applied it regularly, it would lessen the irritation caused by my mustache growing back.
He was still studying the brace when I turned around, but he looked up as I put my bag back in its place. Interest immediately changed to faint concern.
"Did the experiment explode?"
I shook my head, resuming my seat. "The product spontaneously combusted when I carried it towards the washroom, shooting up a cloud of flames rather like what your eggnog did that time. The flames did not last long enough to burn me, but they did singe my mustache beyond salvaging."
He huffed at the reminder, but while the tension did not leave his shoulders, he did stop staring at me. He looked back at the leather contraption in his hand.
"It is an interesting design. Why do you not use it?"
I shrugged. "It rubs the skin raw in several places, and something about it eventually makes my knee hurt almost as much as the scar. I can only wear it for an hour, maybe two, before I lose the ability to walk with or without the brace."
"Has he tried to make another one?"
"Not to my knowledge," I replied. I would not voice that he had offered and I had told him not to worry about it. "I do not want one, anyway."
"Why not?"
"Why would I?" I returned. "He can only make so many, and I am what I am. A half-crippled Army doctor does not need a prosthetic more than someone who lost a limb."
Not to mention that while the brace might make me more useful in Holmes' cases, relying on the equipment would also render me nearly helpless should it break while we were abroad. I would rather limp behind him than risk becoming a burden when he could use my help.
He frowned at me again. "You are not a cripple."
Of course I was, but I would not argue with him. I was glad he did not see me that way.
"The brace served its purpose today," I replied instead, another grin lifting my lips. "Without a limp and my mustache, you never recognized me. I wonder what errands I should make you do for me."
"Easy ones," he shot back, trying to feign irritation. "You know how much I despise shopping."
"Yes," I said slowly, "but you also spent nearly an hour ridiculing my disguise-crafting ability."
"A skill I taught you," was his quick reply.
"And that I made my own," I cut in, smirking at the amusement beneath his glare. "You have a wide range of impressive disguises, but I have yet to see you pull a convincing Italian accent. Or an Irish brogue, for that matter."
"Then what do you call that disguise last month?"
I quickly remembered the case he referenced, and I laughed. "Your accent on that case was atrocious, Holmes, and when you refused to listen to me, I started a rumor that you were partially deaf and had learned to speak by feel. Did you not notice the way the others always spoke up around you?"
His glare darkened, but honesty forced him to nod. His accent had been bad enough to nearly give us away, but he had never asked if I had instigated the rumor that had helped him gather the information needed to solve that case. The man responsible had not hesitated to hold a whispered conference on the other side of the room from where Holmes sat apparently asleep.
He changed the subject, ignoring my mischievous grin as he retrieved the scrap of paper he had dropped. "Who is Rubio Falco?"
"I have no idea. I invented the name while putting together my disguise."
He glanced between me and the scrap. "You cannot convince me you fabricated the entire story. What is Falco's real name?"
"What does it matter?" I claimed the brace from where he had set it and pulled myself to my feet. "His most useful quality was enabling me to trick you."
A faint growl carried from his chair, but he did not try to stop my hasty retreat. Anyone who could abandon his relatives over hobbies was no family of mine, and Uncle Edward was better relegated to history.
Some good had come from his abandonment, though. I had fooled Holmes, the master at picking me out of a crowd, for over five minutes while sitting less than five feet away. Perhaps I would do something like this again during our next prank war, if only to enjoy the reaction when either I dropped the act or he saw through me.
And we have a success! But we're not done yet. Anyone enjoy Watson's disguise? Don't forget to review! :)
Thanks to MCH1987, Dr. who, mrspencil, Guest, and Russ Acedera for reviewing last chapter and to J3rs3yG1rl for your review on Tribute