From sirensbane: Flicker

"Watson, do you know why you are so bad at cards?"

He may not have seen the thoughts from reading my face, as he was so adept at doing, for my back was turned. However I was certain my silence spoke more loudly of my guilt than anything else could. I turned, nevertheless, to face him from where I had been reaching for my chequebook which I left out of habit in the top drawer of my writing desk.

"I have no idea, Holmes."

"Then I shall enlighten you." He pointed to his eye. "You have a flicker."

"Excuse me?"

"Yes. A definitive flicker of the eyebrow when you are bluffing, or lying, or otherwise being dishonest. You have no gift for deception, I am afraid."

"I have never lied to you," I offered in my defence. "Merely-"

"Bent the truth?" He smiled impishly. "No need for apology, dear fellow. But Lestrade has just sent a telegram with what looks an intriguing case. Perhaps that might offer a better alternative to the betting tables, this evening at least?"

I glanced again to the open drawer, my depleted chequebook within. "I suppose so. Yes."

"Your eyebrow is flickering again."

"You cannot even see my face!"

"But I can see your reflection, in the very corner of the mantelpiece mirror. What is troubling you?"

I shook my head. "Nothing." But I could see that flicker now, faced as I was to the same mirror in which Holmes had seen me, and now he had pointed it out I could spot it myself. Beside my own face I saw his as he stood, smirking, behind me. "Oh, very well! This evening is one thing, Holmes, but once the case is finished? The temptation remains."

"Then might I offer a solution?" He came now to look at me direct, no longer in the form of a reflection, and reached for the drawer that held my chequebook. "What if I keep this, for a little while? You can still ask me for it, of course."

"Like a schoolboy begging his parents for pocket money?"

Holmes barked a laugh. " I should hope not! No, no, I need not know the amount or even what it is for. Simply say you need your chequebook and I shall give it to you - flicker or not."

I thought on this for a moment. This added layer of shame, that of Holmes knowing exactly where I wasted my money, might prove the extra, vital barrier to my vice. It was worth a go, at least.

"Very well then." I handed him the chequebook. "Now, you mentioned a case?"

He tucked the book away, the rest of the evening was spent in concentrated efforts to solve a bank robbery, and for many years afterward I did not gamble at all.