A/N: Been away a while, sorry. -csf
IV.
Sherlock is working steadfast with his sets of reagents and several sample test tubes he's brought back from the morgue. So focused he is that he hardly notices Mrs Hudson busying herself around the quiet genius, giving the kitchen some much needed tidying up. I would worry if I didn't know my son so well. He seems to have completely walled off his landlady from his working mind, except that she comes over with a damp cloth to wipe down the table and he dutifully raises the test tube racks for her to sweep by. He even hands her his empty cup in a wordless request for fresh tea. Oh, that doctor of his has a lot to answer for! Giving my quiet, hard working boy a tea addiction.
Growing up, Sherlock used to spend hours pouring over his experiments and we would hear not a peep out of him. Focused, brilliant, intense, like a capricious deity intent on ignoring the common mortals beneath him. His full attention on a mental puzzle, his bull's-eye intellect forging a path no other person could foresee. It brought him brilliant successes, built on a strong work ethic, even if he much rather allow the world to believe he does it all by stroke of luck or magic, because he knows the public admires his work the best when they don't fully understand it. Much like a magician's trick, it loses touch with the fantastic when fully explained. Bursting in to that Scotland Yard's nice detective inspector's office to declare an alkaloid toxin killed the butler is so much more exotic and attention rendering than detailing hours and hours of qualitative chemistry analysis that most Yarders couldn't even follow.
Maybe John could just about follow the complex chemical tests going on at the kitchen table, but of course the doctor is busy on his own research. Sherlock got him scanning endless publications from online portfolios of tattoo parlours, seeking a match to an odd inked mark on the victim's body. Some sort of Secret Butlers Society, I gather.
Mrs Hudson shakes her head at seeing the boys so enthralled by their work, as she polishes the kettle while it boils the water.
Of course, as a mother I worried about Sherlock's social seclusion, particularly in his teenager years. Sherlock's father was always intent on the boys going outside to socialise and interact with other boys their ages. There was even a football involved at one point, that Mycroft and Sherlock received with negative enthusiasm. They dutifully went outside and promptly came back without it. My sons are ever so generous.
For Sherlock in particular, a worry about his eating habits also crept in. Sherlock would clearly forget to eat when he had his mind deeply engaged in a challenging puzzle, which was most of the time. He's still on the skinny side, but definitely bulked up with all his jogging after criminals and muscle building by scaling urban landscapes.
Sherlock would often sleep poorly too, for he just didn't want to give up his puzzles until done, like a toddler playing in the bathtub with his floating toys refuses to be pulled out of the water without crying. Many other mothers complained of a similar difficulty, however it seemed their boys were more into specialised glossy magazine spreads than five tome compendiums about skin tensile strength and tissue decay of the recently deceased. Odd as it was, Sherlock wanted to learn more about what excited him, and I never censored his interests over what other mothers thought.
Look at him now, the best consulting detective in London, trailblazing the path for others to come. And what those other mother's sons learn during their late school nights, I wonder?
Mrs Hudson distributes freshly brewed tea all around. Sherlock receives his with a flash of a thankful smile, quickly buried under the onslaught of new chemical analysis data. John takes an old mug with a brilliant smile that lights up his face and temporarily softens the premature aging lines found there by war and injury. I receive my cup with tedium; after all, I haven't done much in this investigation yet.
Sherlock and John have their well oiled team, Mrs Hudson mothers them – and what about me?
221B is homely, it's lovely to be so close to the boys while they work, but I'm so bored right now!
I get up and pace aimlessly to the window. Mrs Hudson is promising "some blueberry muffins in a jiffy", as she heads downstairs. I sigh and study the street down below through the cold window pane.
That's when I see it.
'Sherlock, dear—' I beckon him closer.
'I'm busy, Mummy, can't you see?' he mumbles to his colourful precipitates.
'John, you too', I add, briskly.
I can sense them crossing gazes and immediately getting up and walking over, cautiously, curiously, trusting me as a team player at last.
'There!' I point out a van parked across the street. John swears under his breath and Sherlock's jaw drops metaphorically to the floor.
In one van's logo, all the answers they were looking for. The Butlers Society Symbol and the chemical components analysis, if one reads the logo just right when it says
L. Chandler
Pest Control Services
The same pictogram John has been searching for hours is depicted on the side of a white van, and it looks more and more like a stylised poison bottle, perhaps with a paper rolled up inside, like a hopeless sailor cast adrift might throw into the sea in a bid for rescue.
Who is L. Chandler, what services exactly do they provide, and why are there pests to be controlled in such nice, upscale neighbourhood such as Baker Street?
Someone enters the van as we watch from the living room window, from the other side of the vehicle.
Sherlock narrates the little we can see: 'Tall, athletic build, used to manual labour with more developed upper body strength. Dark, generic, off the rack clothes, high polyester content, washed frequently, size Large on top, Medium on the bottom.'
John adds, scrolling on Sherlock's phone: 'Absolute discretion, quick turnaround, innovative solutions for pest control, L. Chandler's Pest Control Services. They are based here in London.'
Sherlock rolls his eyes. 'Hiding a tree in a forest. Quick, they are getting away!'
The boys run for the flat's door, grabbing their coats by habit and expertise.
What they didn't expect was that I'd run after them!
'Mrs Hudson, hold the muffins!' I call out as we stomp down the front steps onto the street.
.
Sherlock and his doctor took off in pursuit on foot, the speed of a motorised vehicle offset by the heavy London traffic. As a lady of a certain age and even greater common sense, I hailed a passing cab. The driver tried protesting when I delivered the exhilarating line "Follow that car! – I mean, van" but the protests quickly became perfunctory when I told him who my son was. And I don't mean Mycroft, Mycroft's name is barely useful in London, apart from at the MI5's.
Sherlock's name, on the other hand, is a useful advantage when dropped at the right time.
'Not my business, miss—' the cabbie starts, with his thick London accent, 'but if you want their services, why not just give them a call? I can write down their number for you.'
'You're driving', I remind him.
'Plenty of red lights on this stretch of road', he shrugs.
I glance through the rear view window. No signs of Sherlock and John yet, so I fish out adequate compensation from my purse and hand it to the cabbie, immediately exiting the cab stuck at a red light queue and meandering through the stilled traffic towards the van.
I'm about to reach the van when the traffic lights go yellow. I must have mistimed them. From a distance away, I spot John gracefully landing on the pavement from a low roof corner and immediately keeping up the pace of a run down the street, in the traffic's direction. Damnation, they are still in hot pursuit, I've dropped my ride too soon.
I barely have the time to take my knuckles to the driver's window and demand their attention, just as the traffic lights go green. Someone glances my way inside the vehicle, just as they hit the accelerator. I feel rooted to the spot as I recognise that face; lady Wilhelmina. But how can that be? Next thing I know traffic roars all around me, speeding up, endangering me, and I recoil in the middle of the road, thinking what am I doing, and suddenly strong arms envelop me as a dark coat billows around the two of us, whiplashed by the oncoming traffic. An imperious hand and a brooding demeanour literally stop traffic, as Sherlock holds on to me, and guides me to the pavement, cars honking and drivers swearing nastily in their commuter rush.
We reach safety unscathed and Sherlock's strong arms still won't let go of me.
I admit to myself that my boy has grown up; he now looks after me.
.
Back in Baker Street with Sherlock I immediately share my limited success. Sherlock listens with grim determination, holding my hand in his as they meet halfway between the two armchairs.
Naturally we try to contact lady Wilhelmina, but her housemaid says she's out for the day, doing some shopping in London, and of course by that she doesn't mean at the local Tesco. She promises to relay messages to her ladyship, but as I can't quite say I need to ask Wilhelmina why she was driving a white van, I mumble something about a good book and, unfortunately, that does not accurately convey its level of importance to a non usual reader.
John comes in some time later, dishevelled and sweaty, but with a ruddy glow that seems to emanate from deep within the former soldier. He looks around quickly, recognises Sherlock and I in the living room, and his shoulders relax, as if he had been worrying about us. About two very intelligent, quite capable, Holmes family members. Knowing John is a worrier, he'd probably react much the same if we had knowingly gone to Tesco's.
Quickly we fill him in on the latest discoveries – my contribution, I'm proud to add – and John looks suitably impressed. Then he turns to Sherlock and adds: 'Your mother is spending the night with us, she's in no state to travel back in what will be the middle of the night after all she's been through today.'
Sherlock nods.
'But where would I sleep?'
John smiles. 'In our witness protection room, of course. Occasionally used also by vulnerable clients, exhausted DIs, visiting counterfeiters and rarely the occasional mass murderer.'
Feeling some age weigh on my muscles, I acquiesce, and phone my husband to let him know of the change of plans.
.
I didn't sleep too badly. Overall missing the constant presence one comes to rely upon a marital bed, but John's room, clean and modest, had everything I could ask for as a temporary refuge. John's spare duvet and pillow, Sherlock's spare reading material, and even an awkward selection of my son's half used lotions and creams that he brought up for me. The boys did what they could to welcome me into their home, much like they'd give a roof to a persecuted client or a runaway child snatched from the claws of an evil crime syndicate.
Daylight floods in untainted through the window, unhampered by soft veiled curtains. The wallpaper is faded and the bedside lamp is dented, but somehow it doesn't feel shoddy as much as it feels lived, much in keeping with Mrs Hudson's furnished lettings at 221B Baker Street. Last night, the bedroom window faced a busy street of discordant traffic pierced by acidic streetlight and tangy headlights. It was so different from the countryside's nature quiet, that only Sherlock's midnight extravaganza concerto for violin allowed me to find my grounding and some sleep at last. How John took that in his stride, sleeping on the sofa downstairs, is beyond my understanding. It seems a couple of insomniacs regularly inhabit 221B.
Coming down for breakfast I find the former army doctor already fresh faced and hard at work. Gathering breakfast items from the kitchen towards the small table, then pouring over the stove, while Sherlock sets out plates and items from the fridge. The small kitchen fills with the inviting smell of eggs and bacon, mixing in temptingly with dark, rich tannins.
Sherlock yawns wide as he brings the butter dish and the jam, his rioting hair still dishevelled and sticking out of his head at odd angles, and his bony elbows poking sharp shapes in the silk dressing gown he got from us as a home warming gift. My son mumbles something under his breath under the guise of morning greetings and sinks into the nearest chair.
John grins at the both of us as he plates eggs and bacon. The toaster pops just in time and he adds some toast to our plates.
'Did you sleep well, Mrs Holmes?'
'Yes, thank you', I reply absent-mindedly, pouring John a cup of tea. John is clearly a tea person. 'Sugar?'
'No, thank you, I don't take sugar.' He does take tea, and looks delighted that it was poured out for him. I glance at my son, trying to catch his eye, but Sherlock is studiously avoiding me and any motherly advice.
'I have found no links between the butler and the white van, Mummy. I have, however, come across an exciting conundrum in lady Wilhelmina's butler history.'
'Do go on, dear.'
'It seems that lady Wilhelmina has moved into the château with her help afresh only the day before embarking on a major cruise around Europe. The employees all settled in the manor in the absence of her ladyship, mixing in with the old staff retained with the purchase of the property.'
'Oh, I see... No, I don't see. Why is that relevant? She employed him for years, does it matter that she did not personally see him arrive hauling his things?'
Sherlock and John share a look. Or, should I say, Sherlock does a look and John tries to follow, just as unsuccessfully as me.
I open the butter dish and stop short. Sherlock glances at me, then to the butter dish, and back at me. I see a blush creeping in his handsome features. Emboldened by a lack of immediate reaction from his mother, he indolently tells John:
'We're out of milk again, John. Oh, and butter.'
'Sherlock, what is this?' I point at the well sealed lid on the butter dish, returned in haste.
'Porcelain, glazed, about fifty years old, Mrs Hudson will have got it from somewhere...'
'I mean inside, Sherlock.'
'Oh, that!' His face lights up earnestly. 'Just a small gift from Molly. It's really not edible, of course. My bad, we're out of butter it seems.'
'John...?'
The blond doctor groans. 'Told you to get rid of that already, mate. Are those the pickled toes?'
Sherlock bristles at that. 'Absolutely not! These are fresh thumbs and I will not pickle them!'
John shrugs, gets up and retrieves the butter dish, stuffing it back into the fridge. 'There's jam, though', he tells us. 'Unless—' he frowns suspiciously at his flatmate.
Sherlock shakes his head, looking put upon, and crosses his arms defensively.
'There's jam', John rounds up, not losing a beat.
No matter what the smallish doctor might think, we did not raise Sherlock like this. Manners are important.
'Sorry, Mummy', he mutters in his own time. I just nudged him along with a hard stare.
'That's alright, Sherlock dear. No more talking about it. Let's solve a murder instead.'
.
TBC
