Digging through bins in an alley in the increasingly gentrified Earl's Court did not go unnoticed the way it might have done a few years ago. Or so John discovered when a police community support officer told him he was not permitted to do it. "Look, if you're hungry, there's St Barnabus Church 'round Addison Street. Got their coffee bar on today."
"What? Oh no, I'm not-" He looked down at himself wondering what about his current state of dress read "homeless." He could almost hear his sister mocking him – the fugly jumper that looks like it was plucked from the charity bin, you git. "I'm, uh…"
The officer eyed the bags lined up just inside the narrow alley, fetid bundles spilled onto the paving. "Are those - are those nappies, sir?" His voice had gone up an octave and he reached for his citation pad.
John opened his mouth and, miraculously, a lie came right out. "'Fraid so. Wife's back to work, I'm on nappy duty 24/7, or it seems like, and damned if I don't lose my wedding ring in…" He jerked his chin to indicate the offending items. The PCSO gave a small grunt of sympathy very close to laughter. John held up gloved hands. "Don't suppose you'd like to help me look? Community support and all?"
The man snorted, put the citation pad back in a pocket. "Nooo. You're on your own with that, friend. Just make sure you don't leave any of it lying about." And he walked away, giving the all-clear into his radio.
Didn't even ask for ID!
If only Sherlock had been there to see it. A performance worthy of a fist bump and a hearty boo yah. His imaginary version of Sherlock would totally do that. Imagining imaginary Sherlock bumping knuckles with him in appreciation put John in a remarkably great mood for someone who'd been counting dirty nappies at the behest of the real Sherlock. Which is why he didn't notice the woman come up behind him until she said, "excuse me," and he jumped out of his skin.
"Ooh, sorry, love. Didn't mean to startle you like that. It's just, I saw you down here and I was curious. Are you the other one lives in number twelve?"
"Good morning, sir," the annoying cheerful man said. "Is this the home of Mr. and Mrs. Bret Harriman, proud new parents of twins?"
Bret blinked at the man standing at his front door, all white-teeth smile under a white billed cap. His shirt had short sleeves and a name tag. A pair of Clark Kent glasses and a clipboard completed the picture of either a satellite TV subscription salesman or a Jehovah's Witness.
"Well, that would depend upon who wants to know, and what that person is selling."
"Ted Potter," the guy said, pointing at the tag above the breast pocket. "I'm with Cottontails Nappy Laundering Service. Couldn't help but notice you aren't using us." His smile got even wider, if that was possible, and he aimed a thumb at the bin with flies buzzing around it.
"Oh, right. I think I got something online from you guys. We looked into it, but …"
"I'll bet you thought it too costly, right? What most new parents don't realize is that they're paying the same amount for brand name disposables as they could be for soft, luxuriant pure cotton nappies delivered to their door weekly."
"Really?"
"And you could be paying even less. Did you know your council offers a subsidy for using a nappy service? That's a savings, Mr. Harriman – you are Mr Harriman? – super! a savings of five quid a week over the cost of name brand disposables. Two hundred and eighty pounds a year on average! Plus, much better for the environment, right? What are we saving the planet for if not for our kids?" He handed Bret some coupons for discounts on baby products, and a couple of brochures about the service. "We also provide specially treated deodorizing bins and biodegradable bin liners. You just put the soiled ones out for pick up and get fresh ones in return. Neat and easy."
"Thanks. Sounds great. I'll talk to the missus."
"We're offering a special introductory offer if you sign up today. First week free."
Bret looked up quickly from the brochure. "Even for twins?"
"Oh. Oh right. Well, the offer is for the usual one, you understand - but you'd still be getting half a week's worth of two happy little bottoms and that's better than no happy little bottoms, wouldn't you agree? 100% pure cotton. No chemicals or gels—"
"Like I said, need to parlay with the wife -"
"Or maybe I could speak with her? Didn't take long to convince my wife once she heard how eco-friendly and cost effective a nappy service could be."
Bret wondered why Ted would have to convince his wife since employees probably got a discount anyway. "She's resting," he said, adding a bit of gravity to his tone. "Not feeling like herself these days."
"Imagine she's knackered most of the time, eh? Goes with the territory. And double the joy too. Blimey! Twins! My wife was a wreck for weeks after, and we only had the one. Can't imagine what she'd've been like with two of them." Ted's gaze looked momentarily far away, into a fond memory presumably, and he chuckled, "I remember this one time her saying as how she'd happily murder someone for three hours uninterrupted sleep. She was looking right at me. Terrifying."
"Postpartum depression is nothing to joke about. It's very serious. Some women experience suicide ideation."
"Oh, no sir, she wasn't that gone. Just exhausted, you know. All those hormones, and the feedings at all hours –" Ted drew in a breath, eyes wide on Bret in sudden realization. "Oh. Oh, you meant— Yeah, that's-that's nothing to joke about, you're quite right there." Bret almost laughed, watching the struggle between Ted's social discomfort and his desperate scramble to save a potential sales commission. "Uh, but, you know, most of 'em get past it. Really. Tell you what helped mine, shall I? Fresh air. Sunshine." There was something in the way he looked at Bret in that moment. Such focused, unwavering attention, smile as cool as ice cream.
A tiny alarm in his head went beep. He looked past Ted, past the bins at the kerb, looking for a delivery van or an unfamiliar car. Didn't see either. Still…
"Tell you what, Ted. How about you take care of your wife and I'll take care of mine? That work for you?"
"Right, sorry, sorry, of course, no offence intended."
"None taken." Bret gave the man a tight smile of his own, crumpling the brochure in his fist. "Thanks for the info," he said, and moved to close the door.
"It's just, you know, nothing cures the baby blues like freshly laundered nappies delivered weekly to your—"
And then he shut it in Ted's face.
Sherlock walked around the corner briskly and kept walking until he was sure he was out of sight before pulling off the cap. He scrubbed his fingers through his hair to get the feeling of it off his scalp.
He didn't like wearing hats. Even as an infant, when there was little choice in the matter of what he wore, he'd made it very clear, very loudly that he didn't want a hat on his head – at least, so his mother claimed (with a certain amount of fondness), and corroborated by his brother (with considerably less). As a small child he harbored the belief that wearing a hat kept his thoughts trapped in his head. As an adult, he knew many people who'd be glad for him to wear a hat if it actually kept some of his thoughts from getting out. But really, the aversion to hats stemmed from the same distracting irritation he experienced with clothing tags and certain fabrics: For example, Ted's poly/cotton blend with the scratchy maker's tag at the back of his neck.
He headed towards Stafford Road and the one-hour dry cleaners where he'd left his trousers, shirt and jacket to be cleaned while he went door to door dressed as Ted Potter. He considered how best to handle Bret Harriman.
The nappies in Harriman's bin had been all rolled up and taped as if soiled, but none of them were. And the amounts in the bin had been constant without variation. The man was rolling and taping up one hundred and sixty eight tiny unused Huggies per week. Sherlock imagined him in front of the telly with a glass of chardonnay, rolling and taping up the day's allotment. For this reason alone, he decided, Bret Harriman needed to go to prison. As a ruse to fool neighbors it wasn't particularly inspired, despite his having gone to the trouble of dumping food waste in on top. Of course, once the bags were at a landfill who would notice or care?
But Bret wouldn't be able to keep up the ruse much longer as the weather improved. Even neighbors who'd been given the lie about postpartum depression (a lie Bret had intimated to a complete stranger at his front door just minutes ago) were bound to wonder why they never saw Mrs. Harriman or her infants. There was a twin stroller - the tandem kind not the double buggy side by side - neatly folded and propped against the stairs in the entry. It had clearly never been opened out into its strolling utility. And there were none of the usual signs of chaos that infants brought with them. Things new parents didn't – couldn't – anticipate. He'd been in homes where children lived and there was always some indication of their messy occupancy even in the tidiest of them. Harriman's house was neat as a pin, inside and out, with all the necessary accoutrements for the children of modern parents kept pristine and waiting. Bret intended that his children would drop into their picture-perfect home in picture-perfect Wallington (with its top rated primary schools and sunny little playgrounds) as if carried there by a stork, as far removed from chest freezers and the murder of their mother as they could possibly be.
The stork had not yet arrived though. Their mother was still alive somewhere, although not for long, Sherlock believed. Bret had used the phrase "suicide ideation," a clinical term, plucked straight from a psychiatric website on postpartum depression, no doubt.
Sherlock knew from experience that one could grow a lie into an approximation so close to the truth that it might as well be the truth. He knew that Bret was telling his lie often, not just to others but to himself as well. With continual reinforcement, it would eventually be felt as a heartbreaking truth. And all would follow his lead - oh, poor Mr. Harriman, left a widower to raise those children on his own. Let us dandle his babies and bring him casseroles and soups and pasta salads and puddings.
The house in Wallington was one of the several possible places Sherlock had determined Amber might be, based on several factors, not merely the trail of nappies that led to Bret Harriman's door. But that had been early on, before the body was found in the sewer. The connection of Amber Call to the Copper's granddaughter Alison made it possible for him to narrow the field considerably. Since Alison's husband Bret also happened to be great-nephew (one of many) to Arthur Harriman, CEO of Copper-Harriman Industries, a huge tangle of shareholdings and inheritance rights and stipulations in wills came into play. After that, he'd easily narrowed the game of "Where's Amber?" down to three, then two. An address in central London and Bret Harriman's recently purchased home in Wallington, Surrey.
As he crossed to the drycleaners he rang John. "She's not here."
"Well then," John replied, "you'll be interested to know that Jason La Beau and his mysterious partner have a live-in nanny. A neighbor saw her about three weeks ago, very late at night, getting out of Jason's silver Audi SUV – what the hell does anyone living in central London need with an SUV anyway? Cost a fortune to park it and Christ, where would you even—"
"It's Bret Harriman's. Get on with the story."
"The neighbor witnessed Jason escort the nanny into the house first then come back for the babies about ten minutes later."
"Irresponsible and suspicious."
"Gossip has it the nanny doesn't speak a word English, and that she drinks or uses drugs, or that she might actually be some sort of Russian sex slave. I don't know how gossip reconciles that with the gay couple that supposedly owns the flat but—"
"It's not a townhouse?" He had a mental map of the area but hadn't bothered to look at satellite images of the address. If he'd made an erroneous assumption—
"More like terraced with delusions of being semi-detached. End of the street, only shares one wall. Recently renovated. Neighbor says the previous owners expanded into the cellar, wanted to make a media room or something down there but they never finished. There's a look-out window cut but not framed. Boarded up or covered over from the inside."
"My goodness, John, that's a wealth of information you got out of counting used nappies."
"You want to know how many there were?"
"Not any more."
He heard the lift of shoulders and the short huff of a sigh. "I fucking hate you right now."
Sherlock laughed and thumbed "exit." The declaration of hatred combined with swearing meant things were nearly back to normal, and he preferred to leave it on that note. He handed the Turkish woman behind the counter his claim slip and phoned Lestrade.
"I strongly suggest you pick up Jason Le Beau aka Jason Lebowitz for questioning regarding the suspicious death of Amber Call. I'll text his address as soon as I ring off." He tucked his mobile between chin and shoulder as the woman passed the hangers across to him. "Yes, yes, Amber … well, if you'd put your brain to work for a moment I'm sure you'll – ah, got it now? Terrific." He slid an extra tenner across to her and gestured to the back room where he'd changed out of the clothes earlier. She lifted the hinged counter and let him through. He could hardly wait to be out of Ted's uniform and onto the north platform out of sodding Surrey.
"As soon as Jason opens his mouth," he told Lestrade, "I guarantee you'll have a search warrant in hand by morning. Let him stew until I get there though."
He didn't mention it would take him two or three hours to get there depending on trains and traffic.
After swearing quietly into his mobile for a few moments, John dropped it into his pocket and began to shove the overstuffed plastic bags back into the bins. He pulled off the gloves, threw them in after and realized he had no idea what was expected of him next.
He felt certain Amber was in the house, likely in the basement, likely being kept compliant through a combination of drugs, isolation, and maternal anxiety. He walked around to the front of the house again and saw Chatty Neighbor looking out her window at him, now with a great deal more suspicion. He waved cheerily. The curtain dropped back over the window. Seemed like a good time to start walking. There was a tavern on Earls Court Road, imaginatively named Earls Court Tavern and he headed off in that direction.
It was mad luck that he spotted the silver grey Audi SUV pulling into an impossibly narrow lock-up garage on the next street over by one.
She heard the two men moving upstairs, muffled sounds of conversation above her head. She assumed that meant they'd all be going to the other house for the video chat with Jason's granny.
Amber didn't look forward to visits with the granny as these involved drugs in a glass of orange juice or diet Pepsi. One of the date-rape drugs, ketamine most likely. What little she knew of the effects of club drugs (aside from their chemical properties and their effects on the brain), was limited to the warnings from friends about not leaving drinks unattended, which had never been a concern really since she didn't party much. Or at all really.
It was patently unfair that a good Christian girl like herself had ended up pregnant and drugged (in that order) without having partied even a little. Jason and Bret weren't much for parties. Or rape. At least they hadn't done that. So far.
The visit with the granny was overdue by Amber's reckoning, although time had started to lose a lot of meaning for her. Down here, only the constancy of the babies' needs for nourishment, clean bottoms, sleep, cuddles and stimulation kept her anchored to any sort of concept of time passing. The incremental changes in their growth and development were the only evidence of change. When the babies slept she escaped into dreams. Or if sleep wouldn't come (and after the visits with granny it often wouldn't) she played games of mental agility or practiced tricks of recall. The periodic table was good for that, naming and listing properties, trying and failing not to cry when specifics danced out of the range of her memory.
Running under everything, like the little can-do engine of her sanity, was a prayer dialog with the Lord on a continual loop. Sometimes the Lord answered in the voice of her mother, sometimes He sounded like her adviser Dr Mitchell. Once she'd awakened serene in the knowledge that she was safe, that everything was going to be fine, all because the voice of Sherlock Holmes had said, "Hold fast, little sister, I'm on my way," words she was sure he'd never say in waking life, especially since he said them like a native Alabaman.
Something was off about the tone of the voices above her head even without being able to hear the words. She'd jolted awake to the babies fussing with a churning dread in her gut. Or maybe that was just the hunger talking.
Jason's increasing apathy towards her presaged a coming change in her status. Until recently he'd been the kind one. Even now, he made sure the babies had clean clothes and plenty of diapers, and that they were fed - Amber had formula and distilled water and a bottle sterilizer for them in the room – but he hadn't brought her an actual meal in a while. He hadn't brought her upstairs to use the bath for a while either. He'd only done that, she realized, when they were going to video chat with his grandmother. She remembered very little about the actual chats in the room in the other house except for beautiful curtains and a rocking chair, but she did remember the luxury of the bath that went before.
She'd been bathing the babies and cleaning herself in the tiny sink in the en suite toilet. She really, really didn't want to die with stringy hair, and zits on her chest, dressed in ratty old pajamas, and reeking of baby spit-up. Everyone was beautiful in the eyes of the Lord, of course, but—
But.
Jesus, I cannot leave my babies with these men.
Thick, hot tears clogged her throat, threatening to choke her. The tenor of the conversation upstairs peaked suddenly. The front door opened and closed. A few minutes later Bret Harriman unlocked the door to her prison. He'd brought her a glass of orange juice.
Jason pulled his jacket tighter around him as he walked to the pub, a pub, any pub would do. Bret had told him to leave the house and stay gone until last call.
Looked like a well-deserved night out if he squinted hard. After all, he'd been doing most of the work. Laundry and washing up and taking out the rubbish. He was due a respite. Except he'd never been much of a drinker. Mostly went to bars for karaoke and chatting up. Couldn't do that here. Not now. Couldn't even call Ali—
Don't think.
Right, yes. A pub. Pretend to watch a match or something. Men in shorts running back and forth. What's not to love? Or he could see a film. A film would be better distraction. Then the pub. Then food maybe. Something light so it wouldn't come back up later—
Don't. Fucking. Think.
"Mr. Le Beau?" It took him a second. Oh yeah, him. Shit. Shit shit shit. Who could be looking for - "Jason Le Beau?"
He turned a pleasantly confused face to the speaker. Looked into the eyes of a lovely brown-skinned woman with fabulous hair. "Yes?"
She held up a badge. "Sgt Donovan. We have a few questions we'd like to ask you, if you wouldn't mind coming down to the station."
It was not framed as a request, and he was pretty sure she didn't give a fuck whether he minded or not.