Chapter Sixty-One

Down in the basement kitchen diner, Sherlock had put the kettle on and was busy setting up a tray with tea things. Molly, having admired the kitchen – especially the huge sheet of solid granite that formed the worktop of the island, and the enormous three-plate, four oven Aga - was standing at the bi-fold doors, working out how those two particular items had been installed in the basement. She concluded that they must have been lifted by crane from the street in front of the house, over the top of the building, and lowered into the courtyard garden, from whence they were manoeuvred into the kitchen through the bi-fold doors.

Satisfied with her solution to that particular mystery, she could now admire the garden itself, especially the fact that a huge variety of plants were contained in such a small area yet none seemed to be competing for space with any of the others. The over-all effect was one of complete harmony.

Molly heard footsteps on the stairs and turned to see Charlotte descending to the basement. She was visibly emotional but the earlier signs of stress and strain had eased significantly and she looked genuinely happy.

Sherlock glanced up too, as she stepped down into the room, and raised a questioning eyebrow.

'They're fine,' Charlotte assured him. 'Just fine. Thank you for making a start on the tea. I can take it from here, if you like,' she added.

'No, that's quite alright,' he replied. 'I think I've got this. You just relax.'

'Well, if you're sure.'

Quite sure. And besides, I think Molly would love a guided tour of your garden but is just too polite to ask.'

Charlotte looked at Molly, who blushed instantly.

'Of course!' she exclaimed. 'I'd be delighted.'

She crossed the room to the bi-fold doors and opened the one on the end that served as the entrance and exit when it was too cold to have all the doors open at once. She stepped outside, with Molly in tow, and closed the door behind them before beginning their slow stroll around the courtyard garden, stopping frequently and bending down to take a closer look or reaching out to rub a leaf, stroke some bark, squeeze a fruit or sniff a late-blooming flower.

Sherlock observed them through the glass, marvelling at how quickly and easily women established relationships with one another. It seemed to him to be a specifically female trait, though John Watson would probably contradict him on that since he had always insisted that, as soldiers, men did exactly the same thing, instantly becoming a band of brothers. Sherlock's only experience of anything similar had been boarding school and he definitely didn't immediately bond with his housemates nor they with him, though they may have with each other. Perhaps it was him, then, who was the fly in the ointment, the grit in the lens.

The kettle boiled, he made the tea and carried it outside on a tray, along with three cups and all the fixings, and placed it on the cast iron patio table just outside the doors.

Charlotte was just in the middle of explaining how she had espaliered some fruit trees against the south-facing wall to increase the yield. They included two pear trees – one a Conference and the other a Comice – two different types of apple, a plum and damson.

'So, you don't need a lot of space,' she concluded, 'just a convenient wall or fence to attach the frame to.'

Sherlock poured the tea and added milk and sugar, as preferred, by himself and the two women, then handed out the cups. Both ladies took theirs with a smile and a nod of thanks and continued with their conversation. Sherlock looked up at the first floor of the house – the master bedroom windows, as it happened – wondering how the reunion was going between father and daughter.

He didn't imagine there would be any conflict. Eurus had never expressed any negative thoughts about their father. All three Holmes siblings seemed to be of a similar opinion where he was concerned – out numbered, out-voted, outsmarted and outmanoeuvred by Rudi, the Machiavellian master manipulator. Sherlock suspected that Eurus would be fully employed assuring her Daddy that he must not blame himself for anything that had happened, though it would, of course, be a lost cause.

His thoughts were interrupted by Charlotte addressing him directly. While he had been away with the fairies, the two women had completed their circumnavigation of the garden and come to rest by the table, next to him.

'I see our watchdogs have been called off,' she said.

'Oh, really?' he replied.

'Yes. When we went to bed on Sunday night, there they were. When we got up, Monday morning, they were gone.'

'How interesting,' Sherlock mused.

'We assume it's because it took them a week to set up hidden cameras and listening devices in the house, though we're not sure how or when they did it because we've hardly been out of the place. But now the devices are in situ, the human monitors are no longer required so they've been stood down.'

'Well, that's a theory,' said Sherlock, being purposefully noncommittal whilst making very brief eye contact with Molly and giving the tiniest of headshakes, virtually invisible to the human eye.

'Anyway, we've looked everywhere we can think of but we can't find any hidden devices so we just hope they haven't put them in the bathrooms. That would be just too embarrassing.'

'I can have a look for you, if you like. I know my brother's methods so I can usually spot them quite easily.'

'That would be much appreciated,' Charlotte replied, seriously, this time. 'We don't really know what we're looking for.'

Just then a movement inside the kitchen caught Sherlock's eye, through the glass, and he turned to see his father and sister approach the end door, open it and step outside, hand in hand and smiling broadly.

'Sherlock!' Eurus exclaimed, dropping her father's hand and throwing herself at her brother, who managed to put his teacup down just in time to catch her. 'Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you for coming all this way and for bringing Daddy to see me!'

Sherlock, chuckling at her delight, hoisted her into the air and swung her around, leaving her in no doubt that she was most welcome.

'I brought someone else to see you, too,' he added, lowering her back to her feet.

Eurus turned to look at Molly, cautiously, from beneath her lashes.

'Hello, Molly Hooper,' she said. 'I'm so sorry for what I put you through. I do hope you can find it in your heart to forgive me.'

'Actually, we both hope you can, since we're both equally to blame for your ordeal,' Charlotte put in.

Molly shook her head, momentarily lost for words, then,

'There is absolutely nothing to forgive,' she exclaimed. 'Desperate times call for desperate measures. You did what you thought was necessary and no one could blame you for that.'

She looked from Eurus to Charlotte and then to Sherlock and said,

'We're both extremely grateful to both of you for forcing us to face facts.'

'FaceFacts?' said Sherlock. 'Isn't that a social media platform?'

'What?' Eurus was confused.

'Just ignore him,' Molly advised, pursing her lips and shaking her head as Sherlock feigned innocence.

'Is there any tea left in that pot?' Siger enquired, eying everyone's teacups enviously. There was but Sherlock determined that it was 'stewed' and proposed a second pot might be in order.

'Why don't we have lunch?' Charlotte suggested. The large pot of soup simmering on the Aga, and the aroma of freshly baked bread, emanating from the warm oven, had not escaped anyone's notice. The idea seemed to meet everyone's approval so, to that end – and because they were all beginning to feel the chill, being outside without coats – they all moved back inside and congregated around the dining table, apart from Charlotte, who went straight to the kitchen, and Eurus, who volunteered to set the table.

'What was it you wanted to talk to me about?' Eurus asked, as she laid out the place mats, cutlery and water glasses.

Sherlock's brow wrinkled. He didn't really feel the conversation he needed to have was exactly compatible with a social setting like 'lunch'.

'Perhaps we could eat first, talk later?' Molly suggested, reaching under the table to rest her hand on Sherlock's thigh.

'Oh! OK,' Eurus shrugged, intrigued to know what was so important to come all this way but could wait 'til lunch was over. She exchanged a look with Charlotte but didn't pursue the issue. Instead, she took her place at the table, sitting between her father and her brother, looking for all the world like all her birthdays and Christmases had come at once. She had always dreamed of being part of a family again but never dared believed it would ever actually happen. Her smile was radiant, her cheeks glowed, her eyes sparkled with pure joy.

The 'soup of the day' was sweet potato and carrot, served with hot bread rolls and butter, and was absolutely delicious. The conversation was light and engaging - for everyone, it seemed, but Sherlock. He had slipped back into introspection and sat still and sullen in the midst of all the jollity. He was barely touching his soup and Molly was acutely aware that he would rather have been anywhere but sitting right there so it came as no surprise when he suddenly pushed away form the table and stood up.

'Sherlock?' his father queried, looking and sounding concerned.

'I'm sorry, Charlotte, I'm really not hungry. I thought I'd just go and check out those things you asked me about, earlier?'

'Oh, of course! Thank you,' Charlotte replied.

He nodded his apologies to everyone at the table and disappeared up the stairs.

As the break in the conversation stretched awkwardly towards a minute, Molly jumped in to fill the gap, asking Charlotte how they had managed to get the Aga and the work top into the building which, as it turned out, was exactly as she had imagined – by crane, over the top of the house.

'There were a few dodgy moments, I must confess,' Charlotte recalled. 'Especially when a gust of wind caught the work top and it very nearly took out the chimney stack! But the crane driver had it all in hand. He just hoisted it up a few feet and it sailed straight over the top. Missed the chimney by at least a metre.'

The hardest part, it turned out, was lifting the work top into place on top of the island because it had to be done manually.

'It took eight men just to pick it up and carry it over to the island. And then they had to lift it high enough to position it on top, and get it centred in just the right place. It was a bit like watching the Chuckle Brothers – 'to you, to me, to you, to me'.' Charlotte, it turned out, did an excellent impression of the stars of Chuckle Vision, the kids' comedy TV show.

When everyone had eaten their fill, Charlotte suggested they should retire to the comfort of the sitting room and she would bring up a tray of coffee.

'Actually,' Molly enquired, 'could I use your bathroom?'

'Of course,' Charlotte replied. 'There are plenty to choose from. Just pick a colour scheme you like.'

While Charlotte made the coffee, Eurus volunteered to clear the table and load the dishwasher and Siger insisted on helping. He didn't want to waste a second of the time available to spend with his long-lost daughter.

Molly excused herself and took the stairs to the first floor, intent on checking up on Sherlock before making use of the facilities. She found him in the sitting room, standing at one of the windows, looking out but not really seeing.

On entering the room, she gave an audible gasp, struck by the sheer elegance laid out before her. Everything about the room spoke of restrained refinement – the antique furniture, the Tiffany lamps, the Persian rugs, the tasteful art work and the luxurious soft furnishing, particularly the silk brocade curtains. The original Georgian oak floor boards would once have been painted a glossy black but they had been stripped and oiled to bring out the glowing colour and grain of the wood. This room was like something from a Tattler magazine. It put even Mycroft's Knightsbridge drawing room to shame.

But Molly could only spare a brief glance around the room. Her priority was to see how Sherlock was coping. She came up beside him and slipped her hand into his.

'Are you OK?' she asked.

He brought her hand to his lips then wrapped his arms around her, resting his cheek against the top of her head.

'She's so happy,' he observed. 'The happiest I've ever seen her. And now I'm going to spoil everything.'

He was referring, of course, to the 'elephant in the room'. They had to talk about Victor. The final piece of the puzzle was about to be slotted into place and he was eager to get it done. He was, of course, apprehensive about what the consequences might be of his little stunt, especially for Eurus. But he had come this far and there was no turning back.

'You're not spoiling anything, Sherlock,' Molly insisted. 'You're doing what you always do – getting to the truth. You know she didn't mean to kill Victor; she was tricked into it by that evil bastard. She deserves to know that truth, however painful the journey to find it might be.'

'Hmmm,' he replied, unconvinced, but then hugged her even closer. 'Thank you for being here,' he murmured. They stood together in a silent embrace for several seconds but Molly had a second agenda that needed her urgent attention.

'I'm so, so sorry,' she whispered, 'but I really, really, really need to pee.'

Sherlock chuckled and dropped a kiss onto the top of her head then released his hold on her. Molly stood on tiptoe and pressed her lips to his jaw then scurried from the room to answer the call of Nature.

Charlotte wasn't joking about the bathrooms. In addition to the cloakroom on the ground floor, there were two en suites and a family bathroom on the First Floor and a further two en suites on the Second Floor. And they were each designed in a different style and colour scheme. Molly didn't bother exploring the options but, instead, chose the most convenient - the family bathroom, off the main First Floor landing - which featured a white ceramic free-standing roll-top slipper bath, a separate walk-in shower, a Victorian-style lavatory with a high-level cistern, flushed by way of a long, dangling chain, and a ceramic pedestal hand basin with chrome taps, to match those of the bath, shaped like dolphins with open mouths where the water came out. The lower half of the walls were tiled a leafy shade of glossy green and the upper half were painted in white with an egg-shell finish. The floor was covered in a green and white chequerboard patterned vinyl and enjoyed the benefit of underfloor heating.

In different circumstances, Molly would have happily spent the rest of her day in that bathroom. It represented to her the height of luxury and sophistication. But she heard Charlotte, Eurus and Siger climbing the stairs and knew she was needed somewhere else.

She met the coffee detail on the landing and opened the sitting room door for them to enter. Sherlock was still at the window but turned when he heard the others entering the room. Charlotte placed the tray on the central coffee table and began to serve coffee for everyone, while Eurus turned on all the lamps, illuminating the room with pools of coloured light, curtesy of the Tiffany glass lampshades.

Siger sat at one end of the sofa and patted the cushion beside him, inviting Eurus to join him, leaving a space at the other end of the sofa for Charlotte. So, Molly noted, Eurus would have all the support she needed when things got difficult.

'Please, take a seat,' Charlotte urged her remaining two guests, indicating the two wing-back arm chairs. Molly took the one nearest the door, leaving the one closest to the window for Sherlock.

Once everyone was furnished with a cup of coffee, Charlotte took the remaining space beside Eurus and both women looked to Sherlock, smiling but with an air of cautious expectation.

He took a long, slow sip of his coffee, savoured it on his tongue then swallowed, placed his cup and saucer on the coffee table and sat back in his chair, resting his forearms on the armrests, just as he would were this his leather and stainless-steel chair in his flat at Baker Street.

'Eurus, do you remember your very first day at Sherrinford?'

'Sorry?' she said, her face fell, the smile fading from her lips. 'I thought you wanted to talk about something you'd remembered?'

'Yes, I do. But first I need to know what you remember.'

Her demeanour changed, visibly. She seemed to deflate, shrinking into herself, diminishing in size before their very eyes.

'Why are you asking me about that?' she gasped.

'I'm curious about the conversation you had with Rudi on that day. Do you remember what you talked about?'

'You already know what we talked about,' she exclaimed, her distress manifesting itself as petulance. 'You've seen the security footage from inside my cell. I know you have because Daddy told me. You brought it to Mummy and Daddy's house and showed it to them but he couldn't watch it because it upset him too much.' The rising pitch of her voice caused both Siger and Charlotte to place comforting arms around her and Charlotte gave Sherlock a puzzled look, wondering why he was asking a question to which he already knew the answer.

'Yes, I know what was said in that conversation but I need to know what you remember.'

Eurus remembered every detail of that awful day. It was branded on her brain like a tattoo. It was the stuff on which all her nightmares were made.

'I remember that he told me that Daddy and Mummy didn't want anything more to do with me, that's what I remember!' Tears started in her eyes, testament to the fragility of the veneer of happiness and how close to the surface the trauma lay. 'He said you didn't love me anymore, either' she whispered in a broken voice.

'Why?'

'What?' Eurus was confused.

'Why didn't I love you anymore?'

'Sherlock, is this entirely necessary?' Siger interjected. 'Can't you see how upsetting this is for her?'

'Yes, Pa, I can see that and, yes, it is entirely necessary,' Sherlock retorted, tartly. 'That's why I'm asking you again. Eurus. Why didn't I love you anymore?'

'Because I killed your friend!' Eurus shrieked. 'But I told Rudi I didn't mean to and that I was sorry and I wouldn't ever do it again!' The tears were streaming from her eyes, now, laminating her cheeks and dripping down to form wet patches on her t-shirt top. Her body was wracked with sobs. Even the best efforts of both Siger and Charlotte could not calm or comfort her.

'But why did you tell Rudi that?'

'What?' both Siger and Charlotte exclaimed together.

'Why did you tell Rudi that you killed Victor?' Sherlock insisted, keeping his tone cold and his expression neutral, though Molly knew how much this confrontation would be hurting him. It was shocking for everyone to witness Eurus's distress from this encounter but especially so for Sherlock. It was exactly as he had predicted.

'Because it's true!' Eurus sobbed. 'I killed him! It was my fault he died!'

'Sherlock, I can't allow this to continue…' Charlotte began to rise from her seat but Sherlock jumped to his feet and extended the flat of his hand in her direction, demanding she not interfere.

'But that's not true,' he declared, keeping his focus on Eurus. 'You didn't kill him. It wasn't your fault.'

'Yes, it was! I put him down the well. I did that!' Eurus hiccoughed.

'But who told you to do it?' Sherlock insisted, stepping around the coffee table and dropping to one knee in front of his sister.

'What? What do you mean?' She stared into his eyes, searching for the answer to her question.

'Whose idea was it to put Victor down the well?'

Eurus sat up straight and put her hand to her mouth, thrown into a sort of fugue state by the question.

'Well…it was my idea, of course. I wanted to join in your games and the only way to do that was to hide Victor and then I could help you to find him and then you would let me play with you.' Her voice had taken on the tone and timbre of her five-year-old self, as did her movements and mannerisms. 'I just wanted to play with you, that's all. Please play with me!'

Sherlock could feel the tension emanating from Charlotte and his father, both deeply troubled by the direction this interrogation had taken, but it was vitally important that this process be allowed to play out. They had come this far. If they were to stop now, they might never get to the truth, ever. He focused all his attention on Eurus and hoped that her two minders would trust him enough to hold their nerve.

'Who made up the song, Eurus?' he asked, softly, gently taking her hands in his. 'The Musgrave Ritual. Who made it up?'

'I did!' she replied, in her little girl voice.

'No. You didn't.'

'But I did! It was my song!'

'No, it wasn't.'

Eurus was becoming angry now.

'Of course it was me! Who else could it have been?' she snapped, peevishly.

'Uncle Rudi wrote the song and he taught it to you. And it was his idea to put Victor down the well.'

'No!' she shrieked. 'That's not possible! Why would he?'

'Because he wanted you to get the blame.'

Charlotte, being the only person in the room other than Eurus who was not privy to Sherlock's recent revelations, was staring at him, open mouthed.

'How…how do you know this?' she gasped.

'Yes! How would you know that?' Eurus demanded. 'You weren't there! How would you know?'

'Where wasn't I, Eurus? Where wasn't I, that I wouldn't know?'

'You weren't in Uncle Rudi's car or on the train, going to my violin lessons. You weren't in Uncle Rudi's house, when we used to have afternoon tea. You weren't in Uncle Rudi's study when I sang the song to him…'

'Yes, I was.'

That bald statement caused Eurus's eyes to open wide in surprise.

'Was where?' she scoffed.

'In Uncle Rudi's study when he asked you to sing the song.'

'No, you weren't, how could you be? You never came to Uncle Rudi's house!'

'Remember the day Mummy and Mycroft went to the palace to see Uncle Rudi knighted by the Queen?'

'Yes, but…'

'I was there that day, at Rudi's house.'

That brought her up short. Yes, she remembered that day. And, yes, Sherlock was there, that day.

'Alright, you were at Uncle Rudi's house but you weren't in his study.'

'Yes, I was,' Sherlock insisted.

'No, you weren't! I would have seen you!' Eurus snorted, derisively.

'Remember all those African artefacts Rudi had in that cabinet in his study?'

'Oh! The masks and drums and things?'

'Yes, those. You told me about them.'

'Yes, I remember…' Eurus's voice was sounding a little more like her own, again.

'Well, I was bored at Uncle Rudi's house so I went looking for the treasure that you told me about, the carved wooden artefacts.'

Eurus was mesmerised, listening to Sherlock recount his recollections of that day. In her mind, she was back at Uncle Rudi's house, imagining little Sherlock stalking through the dark, dingy corridors on a hunt for Rudi's treasure.

'I snuck into Rudi's study and I was looking at all those carved wooden objects when I heard you and Rudi coming down the corridor. I couldn't escape so I hid. Under the chaise longue, by the window.'

Eurus could see herself and Rudi approaching the study door, opening it up and walking in.

'You went into Rudi's study and he shut the door. Then he went and sat behind his desk and you climbed on the chair, in front of his desk.

'I always used to sit in that chair,' she murmured, wistfully, reliving the scene in her imagination. 'When I was little, it seemed so big. I had to climb up on my hands and knees. But, in the end, I could just sit in it, like I'm sitting here now.'

'Yes, you climbed up on your hands and knees and sat in the chair and Uncle Rudi asked you about your project…'

At the word 'project', Eurus's eyes seemed to lose focus and her expression became quite blank as the seed of a memory took root in her mind and began to grow.

'Practicing my project…' she mused.

'Yes, your project. Can you remember what that was?'

'Yes, it was…the song!' Her eyes narrowed and she fixed Sherlock with a puzzled expression.

'Yes, it was the song, the ritual song. He asked you to sing it…'

'Yes, 'Let me hear it,' he said…' and she began to sing the first verse of the Musgrave Ritual.

'I that am lost, oh, who will find me

Deep down below the old beech tree?

Help succour me now; the East winds blow.

Sixteen by six, brother, and under we go.'

Her voice faded out towards the end and then she said,

'That's a funny word, 'succour'. What does it mean?'

And her eyes clicked into focus, fixed on Sherlock.

'You sneezed,' she whispered. 'I remember…'

ooOoo

Phew! That's Part Two. Part Three to follow...