A short cab ride later, Max and John found themselves at the New Scotland Yard. It was the first time that Max had been here, so she couldn't help but look around as DI Dimmock led them to his desk. John, however, seemed well acquainted with the building- probably a side effect of being friends with Sherlock.
The Detective Inspector himself seemed a bit skeptical as he pulled out a box of Lukis's belongings and started rummaging through it, looking for the diary that they had requested. Max hadn't met Dimmock before- she only knew about him from what Sherlock had told her- and now that she was face to face with him, she could see why he hadn't listened to a word of advice that Sherlock had given him; he was a proud man, too proud to take anybody else's word for anything.
Dimmock cleared his throat. "Your friend-" he started.
John sighed. "Listen, whatever you say, I'm behind you one hundred percent," he told him.
"- he's an arrogant sod," Dimmock finished.
John was silent for a second, but then he chuckled. "Well, that was mild," he commented. "People say a lot worse than that."
Max hmmed thoughtfully. "I can imagine," she agreed.
Dimmock reached into the box and pulled out a small notebook, slightly bigger than the size of Max's palm. "This is what you wanted, isn't it?" he asked. "The journalist's diary?"
Max took the diary before John could grab it and flipped through it. The book fell open to reveal a boarding pass from Dalian DLC to London LHR on Zhuang Airlines; a glance at the date on the ticket told her that the trip had been recent. "Dalian DLC and London LHR... those are airports," she realized. She glanced at John. "Lukis went to China. And Van Coon was in charge of the Hong Kong market."
John nodded. "Yeah, there's... uh... there's definitely something there," he agreed. He held out a hand to Dimmock. "Thanks. We'll be going now."
Dimmock shook John's hand, then nodded politely to Max. "I suppose I'll probably be seeing both of you around, with the case and all?" he asked both of them.
Max and John shared a look, and they shrugged in sync. "Probably," Max agreed.
000
Within a few minutes, Max and John were wandering through the streets of Chinatown, both of them bent over Lukis's diary. "He said he came here after he got back from his trip," Max said. "Why, though? He spent a few weeks in China, and the first thing he does when he gets back is to go to Chinatown? Did he miss it or something?"
John's brow furrowed as he skimmed the page that they were currently reading. "No, no, look here," he told her. "He said he dropped something off- he wrote down an address here."
Max leaned closer. "We're on the right street," she realized. "I think it should be the building over- OOF!"
Both Max and John stumbled as they rammed into someone who had been walking in the opposite direction as them. It took Max a second to recognize Sherlock, his curly hair a mess and his coat a bit crooked. From the look in his eyes it was clear that he was onto something.
"Hey, Sherlock!" Max greeted. "We found-"
But the detective ignored her and launched right into a rapid-fire explanation. "Eddie Van Coon brought a package here the day he died- whatever was hidden inside that case," he told them, not even taking a breath. "I've managed to piece together a picture using scraps of information-"
"Sherlock-" John started.
"-credit card bills, receipts. He flew back from China, then he came here-"
"Hold up-" Max attempted.
"-somewhere in this street, somewhere near. I don't know where, but-"
"That shop over there," John interrupted, pointing to a shop across the street. A sign above the door said that it was called the Lucky Cat.
Finally, Sherlock snapped out of it and gave John a look. "How can you tell?" he asked.
John held up the diary. "Lukis's diary," he answered. "He was here too. He wrote down the address." With that, he turned and headed towards the shop.
Sherlock blinked. "Oh," he said. Still seeming a bit bewildered, he turned and followed after John.
Max huffed. "Nice to see you too," she muttered.
000
"Okay, this is really creepy," Max whispered.
The three of them had crossed the street and entered the Lucky Cat, and Max was glancing around the shop. It seemed to be mostly geared towards tourists, filled with Chinese teacups and dishes, paper fans with Chinese designs, and other Chinese merchandise. There was an overwhelming amount of golden decorative cats, standing on their hand legs with one front paw raised. The paws on some of the cats were waving back and forth as their eyes stared blankly into the distance. An old lady stood behind the counter.
Max wandered off towards the plates displayed on the wall, looking at them thoughtfully- it seemed like they were the most expensive items in the shop. Sherlock followed her, probably thinking the same thing, and John headed towards the front to look around.
She reached out and picked up a plate, flipping it over to see the label and frowning at what she saw. "Sherlock," she called quietly. The detective looked in her direction, and she held up the plate so he could see it. He walked over to her and leaned over her shoulder to read the label, his chest almost right up against her back: Made in the USA. "This isn't it."
"Dammit," Sherlock muttered. His words were right in Max's ear, and she tensed up, surprised at how close he was standing. It seemed like Sherlock noticed that he had startled her, because he stepped back and started walking through the shop, looking for something else that might be linked to the murders.
It wasn't until he stepped away that Max realized that it felt strangely empty without him behind her.
"You want lucky cat?"
Max and Sherlock turned around to see that the shopkeeper was holding out one of the cats to John, who looked extremely awkward. Max bit her lip to hold back her laughter, and even Sherlock seemed amused. "No, thanks," John replied. "No."
That just caused the shopkeeper to shake the cat in his direction. "Ten pound," she told him. "Ten pound!"
John cleared his throat, trying to avoid eye contact. "No," he said.
"I think your wife, she will like!" the shopkeeper insisted.
He shook his head. "No, thank you," he stated. His tone said that his decision was final.
But it seemed like the shopkeeper was determined to make a sale, because she turned to Max and Sherlock. "And you?" she asked, gesturing to Sherlock. "Your girlfriend there, she likes!"
Max's eyes widened, and she turned to look at Sherlock, who for once looked equally dumbstruck. "Uh... well... we actually-" Max started.
"We're not dating," Sherlock interrupted coldly.
The shop fell silent as they all turned back to looking at the merchandise in the shop, but then John cleared his throat. "Guys," he said. Sherlock and Max headed over to him and saw that he was looking at the label on the bottom of a teacup; there was a Chinese symbol that was exactly like the one that had been painted in the bank.
"That label there..." John trailed off.
Sherlock nodded. "Yes, I see it," he agreed.
"Exactly the same as the cipher," John added.
Max frowned. "But what does it mean?" she asked.
The three of them stared at the label for a second, but Sherlock's eyes widened. "I've got it," he muttered.
John blinked. "Sorry, what?" he said.
Sherlock turned away and started walking towards the door. "Let's go," he told them. Max and John glanced at each other, then hurried after him.
000
"It's an ancient number system," Sherlock said as soon as they exited the shop. "Hangzhou. These days, only street traders use it. Those were numbers written on the wall at the bank and at the library, numbers written in an ancient Chinese dialect."
They walked past a grocer's stall where some fruits and vegetables were displayed in boxes. Max pulled them to a stop and pointed to the handwritten signs stating the price of each item in both English and Hangzhou. "Street traders like these?" she asked.
Sure enough, there was the squiggle that had been on the wall next to the painting in the bank. John reached out and adjusted the sign so that they could see the English translation. "It's a fifteen!" he realized. "What we thought was the artist's tag- it's a number fifteen!"
Sherlock nodded. "And the blindfold- the horizontal line?" he reminded them. "That was a number as well." He pointed to another sign, where there was a horizontal line with the English translation underneath it. "The Chinese number one, John."
John grinned. "We've found it!" he exclaimed.
Max smiled happily. "We're halfway there," she said.
Sherlock took one last glance at the vegetable stand, then walked away. John turned away to follow him, as did Max, but her eyes widened when she saw the same Chinese lady who had been watching them at Baker St. The lady was standing across the street, still holding a camera and aiming it at them. Is she following us?
"Hey, Max!" John called. "Are you coming?'
Max turned to see that Sherlock had already walked away, and John was hesitating, waiting for her. She glanced back in the direction of the lady, but she was gone already.
"Yeah, coming," she replied. She cast one more suspicious look across the street, then turned and followed the other two.
000
After a mixture of arguing, pleading, and an almost-fistfight, Max and John had been able to convince Sherlock to take a break for lunch; they had been on their feet for two hours, Max had pointed out, and normal human beings needed a break after running around for that long. So that was how the three of them found themselves at a restaurant across the street from the Lucky Cat, seated at a window table so that they could stake out the shop while eating.
"Two men travel back from China," John said. "Both head straight for the Lucky Cat Emporium. What did they see?"
Sherlock shook his head. "It's not what they saw," he corrected. "It's what they both brought back in those suitcases."
John nodded. "And you don't mean duty-free," he realized.
Max, who was sitting next to John, leaned across the table to where Sherlock was sitting, scrawling something on his napkin. "What are you writing?" she asked. Sherlock held up the napkin momentarily, giving her just enough time to see the Hangzhou numbers with the English translations before he put it back on the table and continued writing.
A waitress brought over two plates of food, putting one in front of John and the other in front of Max. "Thank you," John said before the waitress walked away. He glanced over at Max's plate. "What did you get?"
She picked up the pair of chopsticks next to her and tried to hold them properly; when that didn't work, she sighed and grabbed a fork instead. "Roasted duck," she answered. "You?"
John shrugged as he took a fork. "Fried shrimp with walnuts," he replied.
Max grabbed a shrimp from his plate and ate it. "Interesting," she commented. "I like it."
"Think about what Sebastian told us about Van Coon," Sherlock interrupted before they got completely off-topic. "About how he stayed afloat in the market."
John nodded. "Lost five million..." he started.
"... made it back in a week," Sherlock finished.
Max blinked. "What?" she asked.
John shrugged. "We went to visit Sebastian after we found Van Coon's body," he explained. "He told us a bit more about him." Max nodded.
Sherlock pointed across the street to the Lucky Cat. "That's how he made such easy money," he told them.
Max frowned. "You're saying that he was a smuggler," she summed up.
Sherlock nodded. "A guy like him- it would have been perfect," he pointed out. "Business man making frequent trips to Asia. And Lukis was the same- a journalist writing about China. Both of them smuggled stuff out, and the Lucky Cat was their drop-off."
John frowned. "But why did they die?" he asked. "I mean, it doesn't make sense. If they both turn up at the shop and deliver the goods, why would someone threaten them and kill them after the event, after they'd finished the job?"
It seemed like Sherlock hadn't thought of that, because he paused and leaned back in his seat as he thought about that. But then he smiled happily. "What if one of them was light-fingered?" he suggested.
Max raised an eyebrow. "As in, they stole something?" she asked.
Sherlock nodded. "Something from the hoard," he agreed.
John's eyes widened. "And the killer doesn't know which of them took it, so he threatens them both," he concluded. "Right."
They fell silent for a few seconds as Max and John worked on their food, but Sherlock stared stoically out the window at the shop, as if he would get all the answers by just looking at the storefront. Knowing Sherlock, he just might, Max thought.
"Aren't you going to eat something?" Max asked.
Sherlock scoffed. "Digesting slows me down," he answered.
Max was about to say something else about how digestion also prevented people from starving to death, but Sherlock suddenly stiffened. "When was the last time that it rained?" he wanted to know.
Before either of them could reply, he stood up and ran out of the restaurant.
"Sherlock, what the-" Max started, but then she groaned. "We should probably go after him, right?"
John sighed. "Probably," he said.
They both looked down at their meals regretfully, then got up and followed Sherlock out the door.
000
By the time they reached Sherlock, he had already crossed the street to the building next to the Lucky Cat. He was crouching in front of the door and fingering a Yellow Pages phone directory that was leaning against the wall. It was in a plastic wrapper that still had drops of water on it, presumably from the rain.
"It's been here since Monday," Sherlock told them.
He stood up and rang the doorbell. Max glanced at the label and saw that the flat belonged to someone named Soo Lin Yao.
Sherlock only waited for a few seconds; when nobody answered the door, he turned and walked down the alleyway to the side of the flat. Max and John followed him. "No one's been in that flat for at least three days," Sherlock told them.
John shrugged. "Could've been on holiday," he commented.
They reached the back of the building, and Sherlock pointed up at the window. "Do you leave your windows open when you go on holiday?" he challenged.
Max glanced up the wall. It was made of brick, and there was a metal fire escape that led up to an open window: Soo Lin's. Without warning, Sherlock jumped up and grabbed at the end of the fire escape, lowering the ladder. He climbed up to the window and clambered inside the flat, but before Max or John could follow him the ladder swung back to the horizontal position.
"Oh, great," Max muttered.
John groaned. "Sherlock!" he shouted angrily. There was no response from the flat.
Max glanced up at the fire escape speculatively. "I don't think I can reach that," she said. She looked down at John. "You definitely can't."
He glared at her. "Thanks," he replied sarcastically. "Let's go around to the front; maybe Sherlock will be in a good mood and actually let us in this time."
The two of them headed back to the front of the apartment. "What do you mean, this time?" Max asked.
John sighed. "When we went to Van Coon's flat he left me outside," he answered. "He didn't let me in for a good ten minutes... and by that point he had already found the body."
By this point, they had reached the front of the building, and John knocked on the door loudly. "D'you think maybe you could let me in this time?!" he called. "Max would like to get inside too, y'know!"
No response.
Max rang the doorbell.
Still no response.
"I don't think he even realized that we didn't follow him in," she commented.
John groaned and pushed open the letterbox. "Can you not keep doing this, please?!" he yelled into it.
Max could hear Sherlock say something, but she couldn't make out the individual words. "Could you hear what he said?" she asked John.
"What?!" John shouted to Sherlock.
There were some more words from Sherlock, but it didn't help. "What are you saying?!" John attempted.
No response.
John turned away from the letterbox. "I'm wasting my breath," he told Max.
Max sighed and leaned down to speak into the letterbox. "Hey, are you still there?!" she called.
"Of course he is, he's just ignoring us!" John retorted. He started pacing on the doorstep, then turned back to the door and rang the doorbell again, this time a few seconds longer than necessary. "He's being an arsehole, as usual."
Max looked at the letterbox sadly, then sighed and sat down on the doorstep.
000
Meanwhile, Sherlock was in Soo Lin's flat, eying a free-standing folding screen in the corner of the bedroom. All the evidence he had seen so far indicated that Soo Lin had left the flat and hadn't returned, and that the person who had killed Van Coon and Lukis was in the flat at this very moment. But where...
Cautiously, he walked towards the screen and pulled it back, expecting to see a person hiding there. But the only thing behind the screen was two stuffed toys on the bedside table.
What...?
Suddenly a long silk scarf was around his beck, and he was being pulled backwards. Within a matter of seconds he was on the floor, and his attacker- dressed in all black- was using the scarf to strangle him.
Desperately, he tried to grab at the scarf to free himself; he was able to work it loose enough that he could shout, but not enough for him to get a full breath of air. "John!" he croaked. "John! Max!"
000
"Any time you want to include us!" John shouted outside the flat.
There was a muffled thud that seemed to have come from inside the flat, and Max turned around to eye the door warily. "Did you hear something?" she asked.
John scoffed. "Why would he say anything?!" he exclaimed angrily. "It's not like he's going to let us in!" He started pacing irritably. "No, I'm Sherlock Holmes and I always work alone-" He flipped open the letterbox angrily and shoved his face right up next to it. "-because no one else can compete with my massive intellect!" He snapped the letterbox closed.
Max sighed. "That was slightly harsh," she told him. John raised an eyebrow at her, as if daring her to say more, and she rolled her eyes. "Alright, fine. You have a point."
000
Suddenly, just as he was about to lose consciousness, the scarf loosened around Sherlock's throat. He choked and coughed, but before he could do much else, his attacker turned and ran off; from the metal clambering noises, it sounded like he had used the fire escape.
Still coughing, Sherlock sat up and loosened his own scarf so that he could take a deep breath of air. It took him a few seconds to feel steady, but then he noticed something on the ground next to him, something that hadn't been there before.
A black origami flower.
000
"What if we break down the door?" Max suggested.
John gave her a look. "We would get arrested," he answered. He sighed. "Look, let's just go. Sherlock will find us back at the flat and-"
The door opened.
Max and John turned around to see Sherlock walking out of Soo Lin's flat, looking slightly awkward. His hair was a bit tousled, but that was probably because he climbed into the flat through the window.
"About time!" Max exclaimed.
Sherlock cleared his throat as he stepped out of the flat and closed the door behind him. "The, uh, milk's gone off and the washing's staring to smell," he reported, his voice sounding rough.
Max frowned in concern. "Are you alright?" she asked. "You sound a bit funny."
He shook his head. "I'm fine," he answered, even though his voice still sounded strange. "Somebody left here in a hurry three days ago."
John raised an eyebrow. "Somebody?" he repeated.
Sherlock nodded. "Soo Lin Yao," he clarified. "We have to find her."
Max glanced at the flat. "Sherlock, if she left her flat, I doubt she wants to be found," she pointed out.
He knelt down and picked up a folded envelope that had fallen onto the doorstep. He opened it and glanced at the back, then held it up to them. "Maybe we could start with this," he said.
The two of them leaned forward to read the envelope. "Soo Lin- please ring me and tell me you're okay- Andy," Max read. She glanced at the bottom right hand corner, where the logo for the National Antiquities Museum was stamped. "Oh."
With that, Sherlock turned and started walking away. Max and John hurried after him. "Are you sure you're alright?" John asked. "You've gone all croaky. Are you getting a cold?"
Sherlock coughed. "I'm fine," he answered.
Max frowned at him. "You really don't sound like it," she said. "Do you need to take a break or something?"
"I'm fine!"