Chapter Ten: A Proposal

The next two days were strange ones.

I have spoken before now about how well my friend Sherlock Holmes could speak when he wanted to, and in fact I find that I took a great deal of pleasure in the intricate conversations which I could have over the breakfast table with him. Even his periods of long silence were followed up by brilliant repartee which amused us for hours, so that we reveled in each other's company, and were never lonely, alone as we were in the world.

So of course you can imagine my chagrin when, for the two days after our night of revelation, we sat in silence, not unfriendly, but without that comfort that comes from a long and intimate acquaintance. I felt that our lives had taken on a sort of distastefully outré romance which would stand in the way entirely of our being at peace.

Holmes was uneasy, and his manner to me became extremely polite, and painstakingly formal, as if he wanted to keep me at a distance even as he had reached out to me so recently. In my confusion, I followed his every lead, and contented myself with my writings and with each day's news, or with being lost in my reminiscences of the way things had been long ago when we were both younger, more innocent men.

I spent a good deal of time in my own room, therefore, to keep away from the awkwardness between us, and only heard the doorbell ring now and again. I occasionally could make out the tones of Mycroft Holmes, and once he and my companion had a long conversation, although, from Holmes' easy cadence, and Mycroft's own polite friendliness, I determined that he had not yet reached the subject of Miss Fairchild's faithless heart.

It was not until the third day that I was roused to action by an unfamiliar female voice from the downstairs rooms. I had been sitting on my bed as I had taken to doing lately, contemplating heaven only knows what, when the bell rang, and I heard Holmes padding over to the door. He opened it, and then he stood stock still for a moment, and there was complete silence in the house. A soft woman's voice floated up to me through the floor, and I strained my ears, trying to make out the words of Holmes' reply. In my curiosity, I opened my bedroom door, and started on to the landing.

Even as I did so, Holmes snapped around to face me, and there was dark trepidation in his eyes. Looking past him, I was unable to see the woman to whom he spoke, who was standing just beyond the armchair, obscured from my view.

"I need a moment, Doctor," Holmes was saying, "if you'd be so good. Only a moment."

As I slunk back into my room, I heard Sherlock Holmes take the young woman outside, and close the door behind her. As they left, I saw a sliver through my door of the back of a blond head following Holmes out into the sunlight.

It was perhaps only twenty minutes before he returned, but when he did so, his face was ashen and bleak, and his hawk like features were drawn together in worry. Four days ago all of this would have roused my suspicions against my friend, but since then I had learned too much to believe that he could have personally done anything. It seemed that the whole world, in fact, was against him, and my heart went out to him as he quietly settled himself on to the sofa. Here was a man whom, in trying to assuage my misfortunes, had encountered far too many of his own.

"Bad news?" I asked, peering over the landing at him. He looked slowly up at me, and smiled distantly, shaking his head.

"Don't trouble yourself," he assured me. "but come downstairs and do not let me keep you any longer from your liberty in the house. I fear that I have taken control of the sitting room for too long."

It was not, then, an invitation to join his company, but an apology for having asked me to remain in my room for the duration of his conversation. Confirming my suspicions, even as I started down the stairs, Holmes was heading towards them, apparently en route to his own bedroom.

I smoked a solitary pipe for a few minutes, and perused an article in the paper that was lying on the side table concerning Holmes' capture, and subsequent acquittal. The authorities had not, it seemed, uncovered the actual murder, and yet I was sure that no one had called on my friend to assist them. In deed, it would be far too embarrassing and shameful for the official forces to ask the man that they had so wronged and falsely accused to help them. I was not sure that, were I myself in such a position, I would be so keen to assist. Yet I knew that despite all of his wrongs, Holmes was always eager to begin a chase, and that the police erred in not calling on him.

Even as I sat, there was yet another ring at the bell, and I answered it to find Inspector Lestrade waiting on the front steps. He inclined his head politely at me, his small beady eyes scanning the space behind him for any trace of my friend.

"Good day, Doctor Watson," he said with a little curt nod and a smile. "I know that this is really very awkward, but I was hoping to call on Mr. Sherlock Holmes." He gave me a little wary, sidelong glance. "I should just hope to remind that throughout all of this I have been your friend, and that you and Mr. Holmes have no reason to turn up your nose at my visit."

I shook my head, ushering him in and seating him on the sofa. "You don't need to remind me," I said with a smile. "There is no one else to whom I feel more grateful to at this moment, Mr. Lestrade. I am sure that my companion feels most the same way, I shall just get him for you. One moment."

He waited, after a murmur of thanks, and I went upstairs to knock on my friend's door. He did not answer it, and so out of habit, perhaps, I opened it and found him standing at the window in the far corner, his fingers tapping against the windowsill as he stared out across to the other side of the street. "Holmes," I started, but he turned on me with a wild, wary look in his expressive, darting eyes.

"Is she back already?" He asked with a fearful exhalation. "What, has it been longer than I thought?"

I shook my head, endeavoring to calm him even as my own hackles rose at his apparent fear. "It's just that Lestrade has come to see you. He is waiting in the front room. I should think it has something to do with the murder of which you yourself were accused." I attempted a little laugh. "Don't you find it ironic, that after all you should be approached to be the savior of the police?"

Holmes didn't laugh, but smiled, relaxing his previously rigid frame against the wall. "Exceedingly," he agreed, and then started out of the room and down the stairs to meet Lestrade. As he went, there was an ease and charm in his manner that I had seen in him so often, a particularly theatrical ease which I knew was characteristic of Holmes when he was forcing his humor.

Holmes consulted with Lestrade for several minutes, and it seemed that the official police were still unable to provide us with any particular information about the case. Holmes was hardly surprised, and assured the agitated Lestrade that he would contact Scotland Yard the next morning to throw himself whole heartedly into the case, with no misgivings or hard feelings.

"Provided," he finished with a smile, showing Lestrade to the door, "that I am not molested or forced into custody upon my arrival. I have had very little experience of the bad side of the authorities, and yet I can say with conviction that I've had quite enough of it to last a lifetime."

"Well?" I asked, when Lestrade had started, looking much encouraged, down the street. "What's this all about? I trust that we aren't going to have any more secrets between us."

"No, no, Doctor, no more secrets." Holmes slipped into his armchair, and folded his fingers under his chin as he looked at me. "It is quite as you suspected. Friend Lestrade wishes for advice upon the case, and he seems to be completely at a loss as usual. Not a bad sort, as you and I both know better than most, but hopeless in his profession as far as he personally goes. It is well, however, that Lestrade has learned not to shy away from asking for help and advice, and he seems to take no more offense in doing so. I should hardly refuse his call for assistance, especially after he has so nobly answered my own. It does seem a very long time since that incident of the Drebber murder. I fear that all of us have gotten older, and it seems that we've all matured in our age."

Looking at Holmes, I felt, with a whimsical inward smile, that he was ageless, timeless, and could not be judged from the Sherlock Holmes of age thirty, except that his face was darker now, more lined with all the horrors that he had seen, which would of course affect any man. His demeanor, his manners, his moods and his habits were just as capricious and youthful as they had always been, and there was a charm in that, despite its frustrations.

"That is not," I said, "what I meant." I stood in front of him, one hand planted on my hip, feeling that staring down my timeless friend was a foolish venture, no matter how badly I wanted honesty. "I heard all that you heard about Lestrade and his case. I want to know who called earlier and why you're in such dread of the lady."

He sighed, and I knew that he had been expecting the question. He fixed me with a rueful, almost approving grimace, and shrugged with a little shake of his head. "Of course, as I've said, there will be no secrets. But perhaps there will be some waiting on your part, Watson, as you are a long suffering man, and you do understand the way my mind works. All things in their time."

Again, I shook my head. "It will hardly do to hold out mysteries at this point," I began, but Holmes was speaking again, seemingly unaware that I had opened my mouth.

"I should like, however, to take that little holiday that I had mentioned to you. Do you remember?" He cocked his head at me, trying to determine my expression. "I see you don't. I once spoke to you of the health and vigor that two aging men could glean through a little holiday in the country, as you yourself have so often remarked upon. I have a friend who I've been meaning to visit, and I think that I would like you to accompany me, if you would be so obliging and flexible."

"What," I asked, somewhat surprised, "so soon?"

"Now, in fact," replied Holmes with a nonchalance that was tellingly contrary to the terror I had seen in his eyes. "Immediately."