Whether on the bright shores of a sun-kissed beach or surrounded by the warmth of a roaring fire on a chilly winter day, there was nothing that could transport you to other climes quite like a good book. Wherever you were, whoever you were, the hopes, fears, passions and dreams that lurked in the hearts of men could all be revealed within the span of a few delicately-crafted sentences, whisking its reader into an escapist haven―and, at the end of the journey, returning them to their own world wiser for the experience. The mellow gentleness of an unfolding story, the soft sound of a turning page...truly, literature was a pleasure to be savored slowly, like allowing an excellent wine to bloom in its bouquet.
"...as we gazed out over the cold Brighton sea DONE!"
Soseki Natsume, ex-schoolteacher, scholar of English, and extremely impoverished man, slammed the covers shut and gently frisbeed the aged tome onto a pile of its discarded compatriots to his right. Snatching another from the relatively tidy stack to his left, he rapidly pattered to himself: "It is a truth universally acknowledged that..."
That is to say, literature was usually a pleasure to be savored slowly. But rent had come calling, the wire transfer from the Empire was late by a few days, and with no substantial liquifiable assets, his only hope was to blaze through as much of his makeshift library as he could and pawn the lot. Though it did leave something to be desired in the field of appreciating subtlety and nuance, speed-reading was of the essence in a climate where every extra book meant a potential extra penny, and each potential extra penny could mean food for one more day.
After about half an hour of skimming and skipping he slid it onto the pile. Scribbling a hasty summary into the notebook next to him (allowing 'marriage: good' to join a line of equally rapid scrawls which included 'everyone dead and miserable', 'passion: possibly good, evidently dangerous' and 'try not to upset ghosts'), he thumped one hand onto his desk and pushed himself to his feet. Using a makeshift contraption of old clothesline and discarded planks, he strapped the mountain of literature onto his back, staggering under the combined weight of nearly 24000 leather-bound pages.
Giving Wagahai one last scratch behind the ears (and nearly tottering off-balance in the process) he opened his door, engaged in the life-threateningly precarious descent of his lodging house's rickety stairs, braced himself...and set off into the frigid London air, the snow sloshing around his feet.
At the same moment and a few streets down, Wendy Saints sighed, resting her elbows on the counter of her cramped pawn shop. The shelves were packed with a haphazard accumulation of knick-knacks and trinkets, all different and seemingly all unsorted. Scanning the room at large, the store was packed to the brim with wares of the same eclectic description; tin soldiers posed in porcelain cups, modern shirts draped over worn-down chairs, and a broken gramophone reappropriated as a flower display.
On days like this, when the wind was biting too hard for any potential customer to venture outside and the dust hung thick and undisturbed in the air, she knew she should probably be getting her wares in order. Still...what would be the point? None of this stuff was worth anything, anyway. The people who lived in this area tended to keep vice grips on what little they had, only yielding in times of true desperation, and the barest essentials of the deeply impoverished never amounted to much. The main thing keeping her in business was a few too many poor souls who'd parted with items of great personal value and who trudged in, month after month, to pay off their ever-increasing interest.
There was the occasional solace, at least. Every so often, people who'd spent their whole life accumulating something or other found themselves in dire enough straits to flog their entire collection. These were the moments she lived for, so she made sure to keep a keen eye on many disparate fields of curio, from cigarette cards to phonograph cylinders to badges to books. Information was worth its weight in gold, and she prided herself on being able to keep up with the jargon of niche enthusiasts, never one to overestimate or undercharge.
...So when a small, hunched man carrying what seemed to be the approximate contents of the Library of Alexandria on his back stumbled through her front door, she had the feeling things were about to get interesting.
The mystery man approached, his wooden sandals clacking against the hardwood of the shop floor in slow, trembling steps. Wendy didn't move a muscle, watching the spectacle in the same tranquil way as one might watch the first few flakes of snowfall. As he finally reached the counter he pried one of the straps off his left shoulder, immediately teetering hard to the right and desperately counterbalancing in the other direction, frantically clawing at his shoulder before managing to free himself of the other strap, sending an avalanche of novels tumbling to the floor. "G-good afternoon. I've come to...my apologies, give me a moment―" He straightened his spine with an audible crack, gasping as he doubled over once more. Placing one hand on the counter he slowly pushed himself up, wavering slightly as he met her eye. "I've―I've come to deposit some books!"
"Oh, really?" She threw one slow glance at the pyramidal heap of pages to his side, then back to the jittery stranger. "You don't say." She leaned back, making a beckoning motion with one hand. "Let's have a look at them, then."
"Right, yes―" He stooped over, scooping the many volumes into small stacks and lifting them onto the counter one by one. She started inspecting the covers, leafing through them as they were deposited; most of them were classics ranging from the common to the obscure, and most in good condition, though well-worn. She took a red volume from the stack, flipping open its cover, and...froze.
The mystery man's head resurfaced across the counter as he dropped off the next stack, throwing a hurried glance over at the one she was currently staring at. "Er, someone―someone's scribbled a bit in that one, but the contents are all perfectly legible!" He descended again to scoop more of his collection off the floor, only barely missing a glimpse of her small, taut smile.
She found herself musing, in a loose, philosophical way, on the many coincidences of the universe that could lead one to substantial fortunes. At one point, some sucker must've had this book in their possession and sold it without realizing what they had, to another, equally-sized sucker, who'd gotten it without knowing what he was getting; with the result that here at her fingertips was an autographed first edition of the first of the Chronicles of the Rivener Family.
Her poker face remained steady. You didn't go far in this business by leaping at every opportunity that came around.
After giving the rest of his offerings a cursory once-over, she clasped her hands, drawing her features into a sort of weary sympathy. "See, the thing is...I hate to let you down, but none of this is exactly valuable." She ran one finger down the dust ingrained on their spines, inspecting the clean furrow critically. "Honestly, for most of these, you'd have to pay me for the privilege of taking them off your hands."
"W-what?" His brows arched, and he drew himself up to his full height―which, unfortunately for the purpose of asserting himself, still came up to a fair bit shorter than her. "How so? These are English literary classics!"
"Yeah...nice to have on the shelves, but they don't exactly fly off of them, do they?" She scratched her chin, drawling on. "The tastes just aren't there. People want adventure, romance..."
"They have all of that, too!" Some protesting was to be expected, but he was a hard one to read; he seemed more defensive on the topic of their literary merit than your average salesman talking up his wares would be.
"More cutting-edge than the turn of last century, I mean."
"N-nonsense!" There was a slight spark to his eyes as he jabbed at one of the books in the stack. "In chapter 3 of the Withingstone Legacy, there's a swordfight between the returned lord of the mansion and the blueblood upstart that's simply―"
She raised a firm hand, silencing him in his tracks. "This is a pawn shop, not a book club." She made a show of looking contemplative. This was a precarious moment, placing her finger on an amount that wasn't comically low but not high enough that he suspected he might have something valuable on his hands. Still, there was something rare about the purebred desperation in this man's eyes. It was audacious, but..."Seventeen shillings. You take it, or you leave it."
"S-seventeen?" He echoed, trying to keep the note of excitement out of his voice to avoid giving anything away in the negotiations. That'd tide him over for a week or two, at least! "That is, I mean, yes!" He cleared his throat, pressing his fingertips together. "Yes, that should be...acceptable."
"Right, just sign here―" She said, practically shoving a fountain pen into his hand as she thrust the ledger recording exchanges towards him. He leaned forward, and as the ink had just touched paper...
"Hold it right there, my good man!" Soseki gave a start, following the direction of the voice and jolting backwards, the pen clattering from his hands and onto the floor. While logic and common sense dictated that he must've been there for some time, he seemed to have materialized out of nowhere; a gangly man, his hands raised to his eyes as he kneeled on one end of the pawnbroker's counter. Mimicking the snapping of a camera, he hopped onto the floor and rolled his shoulders, uncoiling to his full height. "Do forgive my excitement―" The towering man unfolded his arms into a loping shrug, beaming with a blindingly wide grin. "I rarely get such a good view of fraud in broad daylight."
Soseki found his blood boiling, his eyes twitching, and his moustache quivering. That coat, those goggles, that unacceptable height, but above all, that obstinate obnoxiousness...
All the rage of his wrongful arrest, and all the repressed anxieties of his days of imprisonment, sprang to his lips in one furious bound. "Herr Lo―"
"Shush for a moment, my dear fellow!" Sholmes pressed one finger to his lips, reducing him to silent, seething indignance with barely any effort. "You see, I couldn't help but avoid noticing that you're being bilked out of rather more than you may be expecting. While they may not all be antiques, these are timeless classics in good condition..."
"Y...yes? Yes! My words exactly!" He echoed, slightly baffled at the side he was taking; while his disdain for the Great Detective had far from subsided, an unexpected ally was always a boon.
"...this one especially." With a flourish Sholmes indicated the red volume, now shut and tucked away inconspicuously into the rest of the stack. "Signed by the author in her collegiate touring days, I believe. Not an irreplaceable edition, but one worth an arm and a leg to a particular breed of collector, and you know it, madam!"
"He's already signed it!" She snapped, marking a definite contrast to the neutral professionalism of earlier, yanking the ledger off the counter and slamming it shut. "You're too late!"
"Oh, come now! A spot of ink hardly comprises a legally-binding signature; otherwise, each of my dress shirts would be a contract in itself." Sholmes paced in a leisurely half-circle around Soseki, his eyes closed and his voice mellow. "But supposing you did accept that exchange, that raises another question: What would the locals say if they knew their local pawnbroker was short-changing them, hm?" One of his gloved hands shot up, brandishing a waggling finger. "More to the point...where would they take their business?"
Her brows lowered, wrinkles bagging around her eyes as she scrutinized the man before her. Soseki's eyes darted from one to the other, finding himself completely relegated to the sidelines of this negotiation. "Is that a threat?"
"Not at all! For the moment, it's just idle conversation." His hand clapped onto Soseki's shoulder, prompting him to jolt slightly; the last time someone had grabbed him like that, he'd ended up in a prison cell. Sholmes continued, oblivious to his sudden tension. "And it can stay that way if you do right by my moustachioed friend here!"
Wendy sneered, falling into pointed silence. Soseki took one step to the side, letting Sholmes' hand drop from his shoulder. Sholmes folded his arms, tapping one finger over his elbow. After the stalemate had hung in the air for a few seconds, he drew a quick breath, nudging it along.
"He can walk, you know! I'm sure there are plenty of pawn shops that can appreciate the value of a find like this."
"What? Sh-Sholmes, wait, no! I―" He caught himself just slightly too late, realizing that at this stage in negotiations it wasn't exactly delicate to bellow that he needed the money now. He drew back, twiddling his fingers; Sholmes' gaze bounced across his twitching eyes and quivering hands and he sighed, adjusting his cap.
"But, possessed as we are by a spirit of magnanimity, you can claim this treasure for no more than ten pounds. In the words of countless businessmen: Take it or leave it!"
Sholmes had made the proposal in quick, measured tones, but the sheer potency of what he was saying sent waves of shock resounding through Soseki's ribcage. All things considered, it was probably a good thing he was stunned into silence or he would've cannonballed their chances of success right then and there. From his nonchalant entrance to his shameless commandeering of the situation...the way this man struck a silhouette, brash as a bullet and bold as brass, was something he found profoundly frustrating, and something he had the disheartening suspicion he could never hope to emulate.
The pawn shop owner glared daggers at Sholmes. His own blank eyes reflected them back at her. Finally, she slammed one clenched fist onto the desk with tremendous force; as if on cue, the register popped open with a cheery cling. "...Fine. Fine!" After scrabbling around in its drawers, she slammed a combination of crisp, untouched banknotes and grubby coins onto the counter, alongside the ledger confirming exchange. "Take the money and rot, Mr. Great Detective!"
"A victory for all involved, then!" Sholmes slid the book in Soseki's direction without giving him a second glance. "Sign the ledger, my good fellow." His hands shaking and his brain fizzling in the steam of the rapid turnaround, he was operating on pure muscle memory and halfway through signing his name in kanji before catching himself and reverting to English.
Alternately shooed and shoved out onto the brisk air of London's cityscape, Sholmes beamed down at his impromptu companion, shuttling the eclectic combination of bank notes and coins over into his stiff hands. "I believe this belongs to you. I had some business in the area―fair spot of luck that you ran into me, wasn't it?" From one of his pockets he fished out his pipe (which, against all odds, seemed to still be lit) and placed it to his lips. "Of course, to the unassuming observer, any encounter with Herlock Sholmes is a fortunate occurrence!"
After many deep breaths and dead-eyed stares, the weight of the coins cemented the reality of the situation. Keeping his fists clenched tight and both his eyes focused on them at all times, he craned his neck slightly towards the detective. "Sholmes, this is―this is more money than I've ever seen in my life!"
"Really?" He pushed one index finger to his cap, setting it at a slight angle as he mused. "That implies some rather worrying things about your professional life, my dear fellow."
"I was a schoolteacher, Sholmes. Believe me, this is more money than I've ever seen in my life." The sum manifested a gravitational pull in his brain, causing all other thoughts to spiral around it, mentally converting it into a series of solved problems. Food for months, books for weeks, rent covered for―actually, more than enough to cover another place, wasn't it? Lodging somewhere more upmarket, somewhere without the pointed stares or hostile neighbors, at least in the brief time he'd remain here before getting his hands on a ticket back to Japan, a ticket this would not only cover but trivialize...
"Herr Lock Sholmes, I―I―" Possibilities danced before his eyes, and when he shook himself out of his daydreaming, he snapped his gaze towards Sholmes with fury proportionate to his newfound hope. "Herr Lock Sholmes! As infinitely, incessantly infuriating as this position is, I cannot deny that I now owe you a debt of gratitude!" His hands carefully went to his inner jacket pocket, depositing his newfound fortune and letting it settle, weighty around his heart. "How can I ever repay you? And answer as quickly as you can, so that I can return posthaste to cursing your name!"
"Well, today's your lucky day!" Soseki felt a twinge of disappointment as the hostility either rolled right off him or simply didn't register. "You can repay me this very moment. Dinnertime's coming up, after all, and my peckishness has reached unforeseen peaks."
He gave his unexpected savior a scrutinizing stare then shook his head, gesturing with his arm to a back alley that somehow managed to project an air of intense seediness even in daylight. "Bah. Fine. Pete's Eatery's just across the road, and his potato slush is―"
Sholmes' features contorted into disgust, leaning forward to give Soseki a full-frontal view of his scorn. "Heavens, no! More upmarket than that, my good man!"
"Ah?" He scratched his head, throwing a glance down the street past a boarded-up boardinghouse. The phrase 'take it or leave it' Sholmes had so freely deployed wasn't exactly one that came easily to him. "Um, well, I believe Gormandez's emptied their mousetraps yesterday, so they should have fresh meat..."
"No, no, no―" Sholmes drew back, giving Soseki's forehead a series of rapid taps with the end of his pipe. "Connect the dots, my dear fellow! You're a rich man now, aren't you? And a rich man deserves to eat like a king, doesn't he?"
"He―he does?" Soseki raised one hand, massaging his head as he squinted up at the disdainful detective. "I mean, I do?"
"Of course!" Sholmes brightened, already beginning to swoop down the road. "And as luck would have it, the Gilded Fork should be open around this time of day. I'll hail a cab!"
"It is? You will...?" He found himself staring into empty space, the cogs whirring in his head, as Sholmes indulged in his customary practice of dematerializing on the spot. After a few moments, the sensation of his common sense catching up to him was like a stun gun to the spine, jolting him into action. "...wait! Wait, Sholmes, I―" As he heard the sound of wheels creaking behind him he whirled around and sprinted down towards them, arm outstretched and hand raised in the universal signal of 'stop'. Sholmes, perched comfortably in the seat of a just-pulled-up carriage, grinned wide, grabbed his sleeve and hauled him inside.
Soseki pressed himself up against the elegantly floral wallpaper of the reception area of the Gilded Fork, drew a deep breath, and wished he was anywhere else. He couldn't quite identify how he'd wound up in this situation (Sholmes had deployed a bunch of rapid words in the carriage and while they'd all sounded very good at the time in retrospect he couldn't quite trace what they'd been, all wiggly and avoidant), and among the lush carpeting and impeccably-hewn marble decorations he felt more out of place than ever.
Sholmes, meanwhile, had clapped him on the shoulder, thrown him some words of encouragement then pulled another of his disappearing acts, leaving him to sort out the matter of arranging their tables. To most people, this might've been an easy task, but the few establishments Soseki could afford to frequent typically used no system more elaborate than flinging a menu in the vague direction of anyone who entered. Utterly unequipped to deal with any socialization beyond that level, he hid behind the corner, quaking hard enough that passing observers might conclude he was trying to vibrate through the wall.
Still...it wasn't like this was going to get any easier, right? And if he crashed and burned, Sholmes would have to accept that, right? And the sooner he got this over with, the sooner he could seal himself back up in his flat, right? So, with his mind a foggy haze of nerves, and feeling half-removed from the world around him, he forced himself to walk the small yet imposing distance to the maitre'd; a tall, slender man with a grave tranquility and cheekbones that could cut glass. Before he could steel his nerves enough for eye contact, the man glanced down at him and, for a moment, arched his eyebrows.
This was clearly a man who practiced his contempt the same way others might indulge in a bout of morning exercise, and Soseki provided him with an impeccable regimen. The man's gaze crawled slowly upwards, starting at the bottom; from his wooden geta sandals to his tattered off-the-shelf suit to his cat-hair laden sleeves to his bristly moustache, meaning that when he finally met Soseki's twitching eyes he'd accumulated enough disdain to be equivalent to a pinpointed laser blast.
Body language crosses many international barriers, and what the man's titanium glare said, firm and unwavering, was "You do not belong here." What Soseki's errant jitters and quick, darting looks replied was "I know."
Soseki swallowed. Even though the conversation seemed to be over before it had started, he felt the compulsion to make it official. "I―hello. I, uhm―that is, good evening. I..." As he stammered under the man's gaze, his nerves and discomfort began curling around his heart, coalescing into loathing of the situation, loathing of himself, and finally spite. What was wrong with him? Had this country really turned him into the sort of man that couldn't even announce his intentions to eat? He steeled his nerves and straightened his back, facing the maitre'd head on. "I-I would like a table for two!" His determination to remain bold and unfaltering lasted until the man returned eye contact, at which point he drew in a quick breath and returned to twiddling his fingers. "...If that's fine."
"Indeed you would, sir." Somehow, the man's tone of voice reminded him of a placid lake covered on ice; and somehow, Soseki felt like he was at the bottom of it. "No reservation, I presume?"
"Ah, well―well, no, but I thought perhaps...?" He trailed off, knowing full well he hadn't any optimism to muster.
"All our tables are booked up to two months in advance, sir. So I'm afraid―" The man's eyes, previously half-lidded, shifted to a new arrival and widened. In the span of a moment, his tone shifted from icy to sunny. Soseki whirled around to see what he was looking at, immediately struck by a complex surge of relief and dismay. "―well, if it isn't Mr. Herlock Sholmes!"
"And none other!" The detective bellowed brightly, having shed his outdoor attire and cutting a dashing figure in a trim grey vest. He sashayed up to the stand the maitre'd loomed behind, his leather satchel swinging behind him and its assorted bottles clinking in harmony. "I was just having a chat with your cloakroom staff―do you know, they don't have even the most basic training in handling chemical reagents? Surely a must for anyone, in this day and age!" He pushed one hand to his temple. "I suppose technology marches at half-step for the rest of the world, but I don't mind bringing my bag with me. You never know when you might need to analyze a bloodstain!"
"Of course, Mr. Sholmes." The maitre'd replied, clearly accustomed to tuning out half of what the man was saying. "Your usual table is ready. This gentleman was just lea―"
"This gentleman is dining with me." He said, his hands clamping around Soseki's shoulders (who found himself silently, fervently wishing he'd stop doing that). While there was no change to the great detective's customary cheerfulness, a sharp edge entered his voice as he continued: "I trust that won't be a problem?"
"I―" The man's eyes widened and, had he not been grasping the sides of his stand, he seemed like he would've physically reeled backwards. In the up-until-then one-sided sparring match of social status, decorum and etiquette, being the companion of Herlock Sholmes seemed to pack the equivalent punch to unexpectedly pulling a gun. The man backpedalled harder than a cyclist careening off a cliff, rapidly regaining his composure. "―certainly not, sir. Right this way."
The duo was led into a sizeable main hall, its domed ceiling decorated with elaborate wooden trimmings. Soseki lacked the words to properly categorize it; the newspapers would sometimes croon about this building or that as 'neo-classical', 'Romanesque', 'Rococo', 'Italianate'. Not having been accepted into many of these hallowed halls himself, he wouldn't have been able to know which label applied to which style. Nevertheless, two words sprung to mind: 'Enormous' and 'ostentatious'.
Glaring back at the maitre'd as he returned to his post, Soseki huffed in a deep breath and straightened his lapels aggressively in the man's general direction. Despite that burst of bravado, he nevertheless felt himself shrinking away again as he took his seat, his fingers brushing by the luxurious silk of the tablecloth and his eyes taking in the overabundant amount of forks and knives.
The room was vast and airy, but he could already feel it closing in around him. At the edges of his vision, he felt stares; at the edges of his hearing, he sensed whispers. He didn't belong here. He may have been allowed, but he certainly wasn't accepted. He felt like a rat in a mansion. Perhaps living well, temporarily, but never more than an intruder. He closed his eyes, drew a deep, shuddering breath, and glanced up at his dining companion. And yet...Sholmes, who seemed to him to be every inch a trickster and charlatan, leaned back and lit his pipe, seeming as nonchalant as if he'd been in his own living room.
"Coq au vin and the lobster, to start." Soseki frowned at him, then glanced to the side and jolted; from out of nowhere, a prim young woman had manifested by their table, receiving Sholmes' order with a curt nod. "How about you, my good fellow?"
Soseki took one look at the menu then gently shut it, put it aside, and rested his head in his hands. The prices were giving him vertigo.
"S-soup. Soup, please. Is the soup cheap?"
"The bouillabaisse or the bouef bourgignon?" The waitress replied, with a rehearsed neutrality.
A third language? English already made him conscious enough of his accent, he wasn't about to take a gamble on pronunciation here. "The―the―whatever has less French in it."
Sholmes beamed, snagging Soseki's menu from his side of the table and passing it along to the slightly puzzled-looking waitress. "You'll have to excuse my friend, he can't contain his wit! The bouillabaisse will do wonderfully."
As swiftly and silently as she'd appeared, the waitress vanished into the ether, leaving the dining duo to their own devices. Sholmes leaned back and let his bag drop to the floor with a worrying clatter, posture slouched and legs extending far across the wine-red carpet; Soseki hunched over, groaning into his hands. "What am I doing...? What am I doing here?"
"You're having a delicious meal with a renowned global icon! The least you could do is buck up a little." Sholmes puffed at his pipe, waving his hand in a light, forgiving gesture. "No need to thank me for the table, of course. Spreading rays of delight into the glum lives of the less fortunate is one of the many callings of a great detective!"
He raised his head a little, fingers parting to make eye contact with the grinning man across the table. "Rays of...Sholmes, you―" Soseki jolted once more as a bowl clattered down in front of him, brought within moments by another of the establishment's seemingly-infinite supply of materializing women. "Th-thank you, um―" And, with a click of her heel and a twirl of her shoulders, she'd vanished into the dinnertime bustle.
"This place prides itself on its speedy service!" Sholmes said, enunciating remarkably clearly through the twin intrusions of a lobster tail and half a chicken breast. Soseki scrutinized the bright soup before him, laden with a hodgepodge of various marine life. He cautiously brought the spoon to his lips, froze, experienced an electrifying, overwhelming surge of sensory activity, and, after a few seconds, swallowed.
He'd seen and heard a great deal of things since coming to England, but one taste of this had reminded him of the existence of the concept of flavors. The fish market of Nihonbashi, the whiffs of sea air that drifted across the streets of the capital in summer...sensations and memories washed over him, all of them pointing to one incontrovertible fact: That he hadn't eaten properly for the better part of a year. A new, soft warmth permeated him, coiling through his heart and diffusing through his fingertips. A hearty broth and a touch of nostalgic reminiscence were just right for dispelling the gripping chill of winter.
For a while the two ate in silence, surrounded by the gentle bustle of conversation by the other patrons. Halfway through his soup, Soseki grew to notice Sholmes' pinpoint pupils, fixed unwaveringly in his direction as he tore through small fragments of lobster.
"You know..." Sholmes began, his hand narrowly missing a napkin and instead wiping his mouth with the tablecloth. "Ever since this morning, my brain has been abuzz in a flurry of muffled activity." He placed one hand to his temple and closed his eyes, musing. "There's something overwhelmingly familiar about you. Have we perchance met before?"
Not for the first time today, Soseki found himself knocked out of his reverie and stunned into silence, his eyes twitching as he stared into Sholmes' blank, sincere expression. This man. This man...
"No? My apologies, my work brings me in contact with a great deal of―"
"We've―we've met." He croaked, brows furrowing, his arms stiffly returning to his sides. "We've met! You've had me arrested twice!"
"Have I?" Sholmes didn't even bother opening his eyes, seemingly still adrift on a wave of recollection. "That would explain it―my finely-honed detective's instincts indicated a note of animosity."
"You―you led the British bloodhounds to my doorstep! You've insulted, diminished, and condescended to me in nearly every way imaginable! This is the second time I've had to remind you who I am! I―" Under the table, he could feel his fists clenching. "I don't believe you! After impeding me every step of the way, after cursing my fate, after―you haven't the slightest pangs of guilt about jailing an innocent man?!"
"I don't make a habit of shying away from the truth, my good fellow." Sholmes' eyes opened, suddenly piercing, and his voice carried a nonchalant bluntness that caught Soseki off guard. "It's coming back to me now―twice the Yard inquired into your whereabouts, in connection to a crime, and I informed them. That same truth showed your innocence on all charges, and as such, your grievances should have disappeared into the wind!" He clicked his fingers, leaning back in his seat. "So why do you hate me so much, hm?"
Brain still boiling, Soseki felt his tongue move faster than his thoughts. "B-because! You make it exceedingly easy!" He pulled himself back, eyes wide and flinching slightly at his lapse in judgement―true or not, he shouldn't have said it. No matter how little regard he had for the great detective, it was generally inadvisable to start a fight over dinner, especially in a place that might bill them for damages. Sholmes, on the other hand, just burst into a fervent guffaw.
"Ahahaha! How true, how true!" He brought up two fingers to toy idly with a curl of his hair, his face decidedly neutral. "But in any case, I don't mind. I have a great deal of friends in my social circle―it's only right that I spice it up with a few enemies."
Silent and pensive, Soseki tried to get a read on his expression, but it was no use. Sholmes seemed to bounce back and forth at his own ping-ponging pace, alternating between being exactly the sort of inconsiderate boor he'd come to expect and being something else entirely. "Your social circle...Sholmes, there's something I've noticed―" He tried to find the right phrasing to zero in on a curiosity that had cropped up over the course of the evening, twiddling his thumbs as he spoke. "You keep saying 'my dear friend' and 'my good fellow' and all that, and...is that just one of your avoidant Britishisms? Or―or do you mean it?"
"...To be quite honest." Sholmes mused, then thrust a finger aloft, meeting his gaze with a bold sparkle in his eye. "I have forgotten your name!"
"...Yes, of course." He nodded, running his hands up and down his face. "Of course you have. Why on earth should I have expected―"
"But!" Sholmes waggled his finger, getting Soseki's attention in a manner not unlike waving a feather in front of a cat. "They do say introductions are the most important part of any budding relationship, and it may behoove us to attempt another one." He extended his hand across the table, smiling. "Herlock Sholmes, brilliant consulting detective. Perhaps you've heard of me?"
"..." He scrutinized his hand for a moment, teetering on the edge of whether to play along or slap it away, before grasping it with a heavy sigh. "Soseki Natsume. Ex-teacher, current student...and future author, I suppose."
"There, you see? We have a much better grip on the other already! Building the foundation for a friendship long to come, I'm sure."
Subject to Sholmes' insufferable, irrepressible amiability, and looking once again into those blank but sparkling eyes, Soseki could feel himself giving up. Any sort of rivalry with this man would have to roll with the punches of his spontaneous bursts of friendliness, and any sort of acquaintanceship with this man seemed to require constant consideration for his nonexistent long-term memory. He shook his head, stirring his soup slowly and watching the shrimp and mussels bob and sink within. "...Not particularly long, I don't think. I'm departing back to Japan as soon as I can."
"Ah, yes...you mentioned something along those lines after your last trial, I believe."
Hm. Perhaps his long-term memory wasn't nonexistent after all, just extremely inconsistent. He pressed on. "Misfortune has hounded me every step of the way in this place, and the longer I spend in this stifling city...the more it seems to overpower me. Even now, they're all..." He tried to keep his eyes fixed on Sholmes but couldn't keep them from darting and twitching, catching faint, blurry glimpses of the surrounding patrons and their murmured conversations, and dropping his voice low. "I can feel them. Staring at me. Whispering behind my back!"
To Soseki's horror, Sholmes swung his arms out in a wide gesture towards the room at large, seeming to share none of his anxieties about bringing attention to themselves. "Look again, my dear fellow! Eyes may be inclined to wander, but today, I doubt they're wandering in your direction."
Soseki studied Sholmes' face for a moment, then, very slowly, began to inch his head around and properly scan the room. He seemed, for all intents and purposes, to be right―most dining parties were embroiled in their own little universes. Every so often someone would glance and mutter, but...their glances were more awed than critical, and their mutterings were more stunned than sneering.
What these incidents all had in common was that, for once, they seemed not to be directed at him. Sholmes leaned forward and rested one cheek in his hand, joining him in surveying the area. "Today, their gazes are transfixed on the Great Detective, Herlock Sholmes!" As he spoke he threw a wave to a couple of starry-eyed young women, which prompted them to gasp, blush and descend into giggles―then proceeded to do the same for a gaggle of young men at another table. "And today, you are merely 'the great detective Herlock Sholmes' dining companion'."
Soseki glanced around for a moment more, the actual distance between him and the other patrons suddenly much more apparent. With the hall's sense of claustrophobia diminished, the pressure at his chest seemed to lighten, at least for a little while. He looked down again, continuing to morosely shuffle shellfish around the bottom of his bowl. "Well...be that as it may, there's nothing for me here." Slowly, he shook his head. "Not a day goes by that I don't regret coming to this country. The siren call of England's culture brought me here, but now..."
His fist clenched around his spoon, knuckles whitening in an instant as his jaw tightened. "I-I want to revel in familiar joys with my countrymen! I want my experiences to be useful as a light shed on our shared human weaknesses! I want..." Mid-sentence he could feel his voice cracking and his eyes wavering. Soseki swallowed, forcing his words through as a murmur. "I-I want to go home."
Sholmes let a few moments go by, contemplatively puffing his pipe, as Soseki brought his fingers up to his eyes and wiped away a few budding droplets. Eventually Sholmes set his pipe down onto an empty plate, focusing on the feast before him as he spoke. "Well, the experience should have taught you one thing, at least."
To stay away from the streets at night, to not take a gamble on the kindness of strangers, that trust was too precious to give away on a whim...a dozen options sprung to mind, but as the inner workings of Sholmes' brain had consistently eluded him thus far, Soseki gave a soft sigh and decided to let him come out with whatever condescending remark he was planning. "And what's that?"
"That you possess the mental fortitude and strength of spirit to survive a year in a foreign land, friendless and lonely." Sholmes gave a bright flourish with his slim silver fork, a piece of pheasant still affixed to its teeth. "That, Mr. Natsume, is no mean feat!"
"..." Soseki scrutinized the remark from all angles, picking and choosing between multiple interpretations, but he was forced to conclude that it sounded suspiciously like a compliment. "Yes, I...suppose you're right." He finished off the remaining few dregs of his soup, drew a deep, contented sigh, and...felt a small kernel of information suddenly gnaw at the corner of his mind.
...Pheasant? They hadn't ordered pheasant, had they? His eyes, which had up until that point been largely focused on Sholmes himself, drew away and finally noticed the abundance of plates and bowls stacked around the man before him, beginning to crowd onto his side of the table. He blinked. When had he...
Seized by an internal mental storm, Soseki found himself recollecting a few other things. The waitstaff's tendency to materialize silently and be gone in a flash; Sholmes' frequent, grandiose gestures, perhaps not just made for emphasis but to draw attention; and, most prominently, the fact that Sholmes had never handed over his own menu, the corner of it still protruding from behind a small stack of plates. Soseki reached across the table and snatched it into his hands, skimming through its pages and trying to match the remnants of Sholmes' dishes up to each description.
He realized all the different terms for money, £, s and d, shillings and guineas and bobs and pounds, had melted into one coppery glop in his head. Pulling one exquisitely monogrammed silk napkin to one side and retrieving a pencil stub from his pocket, he began scribbling some calculations. Halfway through them, he found sweat beading on his temples. When he was done, all the color had drained from his face. "Ah, um...Sholmes?" His voice wavered.
"Mhm?"
"I hate to be...discourteous, but I-I assume you will be covering..." He tilted his head back and forth, but no matter how he looked at it, this number wasn't getting any smaller. "...some of your side of the payment?"
The great detective spread his arms wide, giving a nonchalant shrug. "Quite impossible, I'm afraid. You see, I'm poor as a churchmouse."
"..." Soseki blinked, and blinked again. Against all odds the rest of the world seemed to still be there, even though it felt like it had dropped out of existence. When he spoke, he heard his own voice as though muffled through a thick blanket of cotton. "Ex-excuse me?"
"Last week's shipment of alkaloids and acids for the Analytiscope ran dearer than expected, so I quite literally haven't a penny to my name. I was just heading into the pawn shop to drop off a golden trinket from a past case, in fact." His grin lit up like a magnesium flash, and was equally blinding. "And then I ran into you! What a stroke of good fortune!"
"Sh-Sholmes, you–" Soseki was finding it took substantial effort to speak, think and breathe. It seemed his spirit was off somewhere else at the moment, leaving him piloted by only a writhing mass of tightly-wound nerves, glassy-eyed and dry-throated. "You said you were there on business!"
"Yes! The exchange of goods for money is the customary definition of 'business', no?" Sholmes rested his chin in his hands and shut his eyes, the very picture of tranquility. "I must say, I would've thought a literary man would know that."
"Y-you..."
"Consider your debt of gratitude paid in full, to the tune of nine pounds and three shillings!" His hand swung to the side, fingers splaying. "And after all, you're still seventeen shillings richer than you were before the whole affair. The pawnbroker's original estimate, in fact―so it's like I was never even here! All things considered, you should count yourself lucky, hm?"
"You..."
"Anyway, pleasantries aside, I really must dash." He swung his leather satchel once more across his shoulders, the smile on his face exceedingly gentle. "I trust you to settle the bill, my dear fellow."
"You―" Soseki finally burst through his broken-record stint, feeling his soul rush back to his body as blood surged to his face. He slammed his fists onto the table, gritted his teeth nearly to the point of cracking, then spat a scathing series of syllables in speedy succession. "Sholmes, you sanctimonious self-serving scoundrel! You rapidly-retreating reprehensible reprobate! You―"
"Now, now, my good man―" Sholmes raised one hand as Soseki paused for a couple of quick, shaking breaths. "―I advise you to put down that vocabulary before someone gets hurt! I may just have something to soothe your ruffled feathers, let's see..." He went through each of his pockets in turn, turning up assorted bits of lint, the nib of a fountain pen, two bullets, one stained wad of paper, the mouthpiece of a trombone and a clump of moss. "Ah, I think I have it!" He grinned, rifling through his satchel.
"I'd never sink so low as to accept anything from you! Keep it, whatever it is! I said―" With a heavy thump, Sholmes dropped a tied-together pile of looseleaf paper onto the table, thick and weighty enough to rattle the cutlery. Though Soseki's eyes had been clamped shut in fury, he blinked, throwing it a skeptical but curious glance. "What is that?"
"Some author or another gave it to me as reward for finishing a case." Sholmes said, puffing at his pipe. Soseki attempted to give him the most disdainful glare he could manage, but as the man seemed to exist within some sort of force field against the concept of societal pressure, gave up. "Of course, I'd have preferred a heftier sum of cash, but she seemed insistent that I should have it as a souvenir. The written word can never hold my interest for very long, though, considering I lead such an eclectic and exciting life." He raised one finger, beaming confidently. "As such, I concluded it'd be perfect for you!"
Soseki sneered at the back-handed compliment, leaned forward, scanned the page, and...blanked. The implications of the plainly-typed letters presented on the front cover were of such a magnitude that he couldn't process it all at once. He looked again, and―
―knocked his chair over behind him with the force with which he pounced across the table, snagging it into his trembling hands. His eyes didn't leave the cover for a good long while, as if he thought it'd turn out to be a mirage if he looked away. After several stretched-out seconds, he glanced up at his amused acquaintance. "Sholmes! This is―this is the―" As his voice bounced and echoed around the vast dining hall, he froze, realizing the rest of the room had fallen from its customary dinnertime bustle into total silence.
Throwing a few quick glances around him, he saw scores of well-dressed and well-to-do citizens, staring at him with reactions ranging from shock to confusion to annoyance to amusement. In any normal circumstance, raising that amount of attention would've made him dart from the scene like lightning then hide in his room for days; at present, with his brain fully occupied by this new discovery, all he did was set his chair back upright.
He returned to his seat and leaned over the table, throwing his voice into a surreptitious, hissed whisper. "Sholmes, this is the last of the Chronicles of the Rivener Family! The one they said couldn't be published! The one that contained 'ideas too radical for a female author'! How―where―this―you―how―" After several cycles of Soseki looping through the same set of monosyllabic words, Sholmes concluded it was his turn.
"Oh, yes, she said something to that effect. Said the typed-up copies were worthless to her, just taking up space around the house. That she'd like them to go to someone who'd appreciate them. So, in a way, it's a shame... " He smiled, extending one gloved hand. "That you'd never sink so low as to accept something from me. I suppose it could still be put to use around the office, though! My desk is developing a bit of a wobble, and it might just do the trick."
"I―I―" Soseki stared into Sholmes' deadpan, earnest eyes, his moustache quivering wildly from the frantically mixed signals his brain was sending about whether to grin, shout, or burst into tears. Finally his arms clamped around the manuscript, hugging it tight to his chest like a newborn kitten, as he hissed through clenched teeth: "I still hate you!"
"Ahahahaha! I'd expect nothing less, my good man!" Sholmes sprang to his feet and whirled gracefully on his heel, bowing as he backed away. "Thank you for a delightfully entertaining dinner. Now, if you'll excuse me, I had a meeting with the Chief of Police. I believe I am..." He threw a quick glance at the grand clock adorning the far side of the wall. "Four hours late."
Soseki's half-lidded eyes lingered on Sholmes' retreating form for a moment, every muscle in his body tense to the point of rigor mortis with fury, before he let out a long, defeated sigh. Within moments, he heard the sound of quiet shuffling on the carpet behind him. He turned to face the source, which turned out to be a waitress approaching their table; judging from her slightly-audible footsteps, her mildly askew hairpins, and the fact that her features hadn't yet been frozen into polished neutrality, she was a recent hire.
"We hope you've had an excellent dining experience, sir." She said, the line clearly rehearsed, as she gently slid the bill onto the table. "And, um―I know I'm not supposed to ask this, sir, but was that the great Herlock Sholmes?"
"Yes, it was that blasted―" Soseki drew a deep, rattling breath, trying to massage his forehead free from the oncoming twinges of a stress headache. "...yes, it was."
"Incredible!" Her face lit up, seemingly too starstruck to acknowledge the clear animosity in his voice. He drew his hand into his jacket pocket and retrieved the money, then gritted his teeth as he summoned the herculean strength required to actually let go of it. As he threw a longing look at the scattered coins and bills that constituted most of his newfound fortune, she continued: "Are the two of you friends, sir?"
"Rgh. With friends like him..." He began, and then paused, feeling the weight of the rare artifact in his arms. With very, very great reluctance, he had to admit, dinner had been wonderful...and he'd been gifted this book, a one-of-a-kind example...and anyway, he was still seventeen shillings richer, wasn't he? That could buy a lot of potatoes, and a few novels, and contribute to a steamship ticket near the engine room, and...
He felt himself trying to rally against the great detective's madcap optimism, seeping through his veins like a confounding poison, but...perhaps the day hadn't been so bad, after all. " ...Yes." Was the conclusion he finally reached, his puzzled eyes fixed on the gangly, gallant man currently swooping through the exit. "Yes, I believe we are."