My Greatest Performance
By Cybra
A/N: A small plot bunny that decided to gnaw incessantly on my leg ever since "What the Blind Man Saw." A female Basil is just such fun.
Disclaimer: The Great Mouse Detective and the Basil of Baker Street Mysteries belong to the Walt Disney Company and the late Eve Titus respectively. The original name of "Sherringford" for Basil's first name and Myerricroft Basil are the creations of Mlle. Irene Relda.
Dawson once said that the stage lost a fine actor when I turned my attention to crime. After that case, I nearly laughed myself sick in my room while muffling the sound in my pillow. Little does he know that I have been fooling everyone since university.
In this male-dominated society, a woman like me stands little chance of making much of anything of herself.
Yes, I said "woman." Gifted with Mother's looks,1 I have the ability to pass for a male just by stepping into a pair of trousers. To look like the young lady that I truly am, I just need to attire myself in the suitable dress. Nothing could be simpler.
Of course, I always made a better male than a female. Maybe it is because my father was a little indulgent in my siblings' and my education, allowing me to learn more than most women choose to. I did not want to learn simple housewifery—no offense to my dear sister Brynna2 who puts up with not only a husband but a pair of twin girls along with another child on the way—but also the sciences, mathematics. This interested me. I could truly care less about how to bake a pie.
I believe I frightened off every possible suitor around our home in Sussex. More often than not, I was berated by my sister for playing mind games with some of the slower members of the opposite sex. (This was truly, as the Americans say, the pot calling the kettle black since she occasionally did the same.) Most of the men around our home were looking for someone meek and stupider than them; I was exactly the opposite, which unnerved them.
When my father found me unmarriable, I managed to convince him (with the help of Myerricroft and Brynna) to send me off to university. It was ludicrously easy. The dean did not even bother to check a birth certificate to make sure I was male. One private dorm flat and four years of hard work later, I walked away from Oxford as (possibly) the first woman to receive a degree from Oxford University in music…even though I had taken multiple side courses.3
By this time, I had done two things: one, I had heard about Mr. Sherlock Holmes and decided to follow in his footsteps; two, I had made an enemy of Professor Ratigan. On top of that, telling Father of my decision had been less than well-received. It seemed that going to Oxford had been the easy part.
Finding Mrs. Judson and her having flat 221B open had been a stroke of good fortune. She even took delays on the rent when I was struggling to build up my practice. We had our squabbles, but she was always gracious. And she had good business sense since as time went on, I received more and more clients, making up for missed rent and paying for my stay multiple times over.
There are times that I think she suspects something. When I feel just awful every month and doing my best to hide it from Dawson, she always knows exactly what will make me feel better, sometimes slipping me a bottle of aspirin when Dawson is not looking with a wink. Actually, it would not surprise me. Mrs. Judson is quite perceptive. If she does know, I am truly glad she did not raise a fuss when Dawson came to live in 221B. That would have ruined everything.
On my very rare visits to Sussex, and when I travel alone to do so, I have to dress as a female. It must seem bizarre to some that there seems to be two Sherringford Basils occasionally coming and going from the old house: one male and one female. Some of the local residents who have known me for years will look at me and shake their heads. Some of the old women look at me as if I am some sort of fallen woman. Nobody says a word.
Perhaps I am some sort of fallen woman. After all, I am unmarried and living in the same flat as an unmarried man. This is certainly less than proper behavior. I dress in trousers, I have handled dead bodies in the pursuit of knowledge about how they died and why they died, I work with all types of chemicals. Hardly the behavior of a proper young lady.
But I have something those proper young ladies do not have: freedom. I can do what I want, say what I want, and think what I want. At the expense of hiding my sex, I do not have to hide me. Proper ladies' behavior seems to only cripple women and trap them in the prison called "marriage."
May I never fall prey to that cage! On those few trips to Sussex where I must be a lady, I have actually drawn the attention of some men though why continues to escape me. So far my head games have served me well, but one of these days they are not going to put someone off. Then the next thing I will know, I will be bound to some man who will want me to bear him as many children as possible and raise them along with keep his household in order.
It makes me shudder to think of that future. I see my mind slowly fading away until I am nothing but a silly woman who needs her husband to do all of the serious thinking for her. I see an old woman who has nothing but the faintest images of her glory days of youth that were swallowed up by the unholy trinity of children, husband, and housework. I can see even possible death in childbirth from one child too many. My family has always been cautious—no more than three—but not everyone will be so.
Brynna was lucky to find Peabody.4 At least he appreciates her mind and does not wish to go farther than three children. He even takes care of the twins when their mother is tired. Even though she can never be his equal in society, she is his equal in the home. But while she lives in wedded bliss, I am under no illusions that every man out there would be the same.
I do admit, however, that some traitorous part of my mind does wish to take the easy path of marriage. My life is fraught with dangers and not just the life-threatening ones.
I have to be careful not to slip and reveal my true nature, or I will lose everything I have fought so hard to gain. And I know I would lose everything. Few men appreciate it when a woman can do something better than they can. In the matters of crime, women are supposed to faint upon seeing a dead body, not lean in close to further examine him as I have done.5 Women are not supposed to discover the truth before the Yard does. They are to admire the heroic efforts of the police force and feel safer at night.
Yet I would rather die than marry! I will keep the dangers that go along with keeping my mind and freedom. So be it.
And when I do die, and everyone finally knows the truth, I will have left the stage, having done my greatest performance.
1 In my twisted view of the universe, Amelia Basil—my name for Basil's mother—passed on her looks to her son, so mother and son look almost identical. This was noted in "Mystery of the Red Violin" during the examination of Amelia's bedroom.
2 In the Basilian Canon, Basil mentions a sister named "Brynna." Whether this sister was older or younger is under debate.
3 It is unknown what degree or even what university Holmes or Basil went to. Holmes dropped out after two years, but according to Mlle. Relda's site, Basil remained and received a degree though a degree in what is not mentioned.
4 This is a reference to Brynna's husband Emerson Peabody—a creation of mine—from "Mystery of the Red Violin." I am willing to share if you ask permission.
5 In Jeremy Brett's portrayal of Sherlock Holmes in "The Six Napoleons," he leans in very close to a dead man's body to examine the face.