Maxine
After a taxi ride, the three of us arrived at the New Scotland Yard and followed Detective Inspector Lestrade across the general office toward his private one. I was glad he was back; Dimmock wasn't one I wanted to work with again, unless he'd learned his lesson about being a stubborn ass.
"You like the funny cases, don't you?" Lestrade said to Sherlock. "The surprising ones."
"Obviously," Sherlock replied.
"You'll love this. That explosion..." Lestrade trailed off and I realized he was talking about the one that went off outside our flat.
We passed Donovan's desk at that moment and Sherlock exchanged a small glare with her as we went by before responding to Lestrade. "Gas leak, yes?"
"No." Lestrade shook his head.
"No?" Sherlock echoed.
"No. Made to look like one," Lestrade said.
"What?" John asked, his brows rising.
We reached Lestrade's office and Sherlock paused by the desk to stare down at a white envelope lying there. I went to Sherlock's side, John just behind me, and the two of us looked at the envelope as well.
Written there in elegant handwriting are the words: "Sherlock Holmes."
"Hardly anything left of the place except a strong box—a very strong box—and inside it was this." Lestrade pointed at the envelope.
"You haven't opened it?" Sherlock asked.
"It's addressed to you, isn't it?" Lestrade said.
Sherlock reached toward the envelope.
"We've X-rayed it. It's not booby-trapped," Lestrade added.
"How reassuring!" Sherlock hesitated for a moment before picking the envelope up. He held it close to the bulb of the angle-poise lamp on the desk and examined both sides. "Nice stationary. Bohemian."
"What?" Lestrade blinked.
"From the Czech Republic," Sherlock explained. "No fingerprints?"
"No," Lestrade said.
Sherlock eyed the handwriting. "She used a fountain pen. A Parker Duofold—iridium nib."
"She?" John said.
"Obviously." Sherlock continued to frown at the envelope.
"Obviously!" John repeated in exasperation.
I leaned closer to the detective, peering at the writing. "You've never met a man that has nice handwriting?"
"It's not an impossibility, but the odds are highly stacked against it," Sherlock said.
"What if he just wants you to think he's a woman?" I asked.
"Who would want to do that?" Sherlock replied in a clipped tone. He snatched the letter opener from the desk and carefully slit the envelope open. Peering inside, his mouth opened a little in surprise and he carefully took out what was inside: a pink iPhone.
"But that's-that's the phone, the pink phone," John stammered.
"What, from the Study in Pink?" Lestrade asked, startled.
"Well, obviously it's not the same phone, but it's supposed to look like..." Sherlock trailed off and turned to face Lestrade. "The Study in Pink? You read his blog?"
Donovan stepped inside the office and dropped off some files down on a desk near the door. She glanced toward us, but didn't say anything.
"Course I read his blog! We all do. D'you really not know that the Earth goes round the Sun?"
Donovan sniggered loudly, earning her a sharp glare from Sherlock as he took off his gloves. John pursed his lips in embarrassment and I patted him on the shoulder in an effort to console him. When Donovan left the room, Sherlock returned his attention back to the phone.
"It isn't the same phone," he repeated. "This one's brand new." He examined the connection sockets as he spoke. "Someone's gone to a lot of trouble to make it look like the same phone, which means your blog has a far wider readership." He shot John an accusatory glare.
"If John was able to describe the phone down to the last detail, I don't think he'd have as wide an audience," I said. "Too much description gets dull; it bores the reader. Who cares about the phone other than it being pink? No—whoever did this didn't use John's blog, they had other means to know what type of mobile it was."
Sherlock's irascible look fixated on me now. Clearly, he didn't like being told he was wrong, but I knew he was just trying to pick on my brother because of that whole Sun thing. John had been trying to show the intricacy of Sherlock as a person; he hadn't meant harm.
Finally looking back to the phone, Sherlock powered it on and blinked when it immediately gave out a voice alert.
"You have one new message," the robotic voice declared.
The message played, but there was no words—just the unmistakeable sound of the Greenwich Time Signal. However, while the Greenwich pips consist of five short pips and one longer tone, this recording had only four short pips and the longer one.
"They changed the pips," I noted softly.
"Is that it?" John asked.
"No. That's not it," Sherlock said.
A photograph had also been uploaded to the phone. Sherlock opened it and Lestrade came around to look over his shoulder at it with the rest of us. The picture was of an unfurnished room with a fireplace on one wall that bore wallpaper that was peeling down. A tall mirror was propped on one corner and a smaller mirror was standing on the mantlepiece.
"What the hell are we supposed to make of that?" Lestrade demanded. "An estate agent's photo and the bloody Greenwich pips!"
Sherlock stared into the distance. "It's a warning."
"A warning?" John said.
"Some secret societies used to send dried melon seeds, orange pips, thing like that," Sherlock explained. "Five pips. They're warning us it's gonna happen again." He briefly looked down at the photo again before brandishing the phone at the others as he started to leave the office. "And I've seen this place before."
"H-hang on," John stammered. "What's gonna happen again?"
Sherlock turned and raised his hands dramatically. "Boom!" Then he headed off out of the office with the three of us scrambling to follow after him.
Arriving back at 221 Baker Street, Sherlock, John, and I got out of the back of the taxi while Lestrade hopped out of the front seat. As Sherlock unlocked the door, the Detective Inspector glanced over at me.
"You always just squish yourself in the back with them?" he asked.
I shrugged. "John and I are small and Sherlock's thin, so it works out."
John shot me a small glare.
"I don't understand why you're sensitive about it," I muttered to him as we followed Sherlock inside. "It's useful a lot of times."
Inside the building in the corridor leading to Mrs. Hudson's flat, Sherlock paused by a door that led down to a basement flat. Above it were the letters: 221C. There was a padlock attached to the door—a sturdy one at that.
"Mrs. Hudson!" Sherlock called loudly toward our landlady's front door.
"Honestly, Sherlock, you could go knock," John muttered.
Nonetheless, Mrs. Hudson came out of her flat and came over with a confused frown.
"What's going on?" she asked, looking between her tenants and Lestrade.
"The keys," Sherlock insisted, gesturing to the padlock.
"For the basement?" Mrs. Hudson blinked. "What—?"
"Please, Mrs. Hudson—now!" Sherlock snapped.
Mrs. Hudson winced slightly before turning and going back toward her flat.
"Sherlock..." John said in a low tone.
"This is important, John," Sherlock replied tightly. "We don't have any time to waste."
After a moment, Mrs. Hudson came back with the key. She didn't seem upset by Sherlock's previous sharpness; I was guessing she was just used to the detective's demeanor by now.
"You had a look, didn't you, Sherlock, when you first came to see about your flat," Mrs. Hudson said.
Sherlock peered closely at the door's keyhole. "The door's been opened recently."
"No, can't be," Mrs. Hudson replied. "That's the only key."
Sherlock pulled off the padlock and switched keys to unlock the door itself. His expression was troubled. I couldn't help but wonder if this was the first time a case found him rather than the other way around.
Abruptly, I recalled the first case I ever went on with Sherlock. Jeff Hope, the serial killer cabbie of A Study in Pink, had told us that someone warned him about Sherlock Holmes. Then, with his last few breaths, he'd given us a name: Moriarty.
Hope had called Moriarty Sherlock's fan. Could it be possible that it was Moriarty who sent the phone? Who set off the bomb?
"I can't get anyone interested in this flat," Mrs. Hudson said. "It's the damp, I expect. That's the curse of basements."
Sherlock opened the door and immediately went inside. I was just behind him with my brother and Lestrade following.
"I had a place once when I was first married," Mrs. Hudson rambled on behind us. "Black mould all up the walls..."
Her voice was cut off as Lestrade closed the door behind him. I saw John's face twinge a bit, but in all honesty it was probably for the best our landlady didn't get too involved in this.
The four of us descended the stairs and Sherlock slowly pushed the door to the living room open before striding inside. The room before us looked exactly like the photograph that was sent to the phone with one exception: there was a pair of trainers placed neatly side by side in the middle of the floor with their toes pointed toward the door.
"Shoes," John said, as if stating the obvious would help him understand why the hell they were there.
Sherlock began to walk toward them, but John held out a cautionary hand toward the detective.
"He's a bomber, remember," he said.
Sherlock hesitated for a moment, then continued toward the trainers with delicate prudence. I walked after him, waving my brother off when he shot me a bewildered look. As Sherlock crouched down, I knelt beside him.
"Sherlock, you know who this is," I whispered to him.
He glanced toward me, blinking. "Do I?"
I stared into his eyes meaningfully. He blinked once more, then his gaze sharpened.
"Of course," he breathed, looking back at the trainers. "Obvious."
"What're you two on about?" Lestrade asked.
The detective put his hands on the floor and and leaned forward, ignoring Lestrade altogether. Lowering his body down, he moved closer to the shoes. Just as his nose was almost touching them, a phone rang.
Everyone in the room jumped. Sherlock closed his eyes momentarily, as if frustrated with himself for being startled. He then got to his feet and pulled off his glove to take out the pink iPhone from his coat pocket. Standing up beside him, I peered over his shoulder to see that the caller I.D. read "NUMBER BLOCKED." Sherlock paused for a second, then switched on the speaker and held the phone a few inches from his mouth.
"Hello?" he said softly.
On the other line, a female voice drew in a shaky breath before speaking tearfully. "H-hello... sexy."
Sherlock and I looked at one another while John and Lestrade exchanged a bewildered glance. The woman gave out a sob.
"Who's this?" Sherlock asked.
"I've... sent you... a little puzzle... just to say hi," the woman replied between teary gasps.
"Who's talking?" Sherlock demanded. "Why are you crying?"
"I-I'm not... crying... I'm typing..." the woman went on, still shaky and full of tears. "...and this... stupid... bitch... is reading it out." She sobbed again, clearly unable to hold in her rising hysteria.
Sherlock's gaze lifted and he stared off in thought. "The curtain rises," he murmured.
I nodded. It had to be Moriarty. It was the only explanation.
"What?" John said.
"Nothing," Sherlock replied.
"No, what did you mean? And why did Maddie nod along like she's in on it?" John demanded.
Sherlock half turned his head toward my brother. "I've been expecting this for some time."
"Twelve hours to solve... my puzzle, Sherlock..." the woman went on, her breaths coming in almost ragged now. "...or I'm going... to be... so naughty."
The line went dead.
I sat next to Sherlock in the exact same lab at St Bartholomew's Hospital that John and I had met him in. I'd been back here a few times with Sherlock since we'd moved in to 221B Baker Street for some of the cases he worked. Sometimes, he preferred to do some of the forensic work himself. Other times, he came in here to perform random experiments. There had been occasions where he would pester me for nearly an hour long to come with him. With John working, I was often the only one around to listen to Sherlock ramble. As he regularly reminded me, he did better when he thought out loud, and Mrs. Hudson still hadn't given him back his skull.
Right then, Sherlock was looking into a microscope while a computer screen beside him displayed a scanner of some sort running tests. He'd gotten samples off of the shoes earlier and placed them in the dish he was peering into. John was pacing up and down on the other side of the bench.
"So, who d'you suppose it was?" John asked.
Somewhere, a phone trilled a text alert. Sherlock ignored it and absently said, "Hmm?" to John's remark.
"The woman on the phone—the crying woman," John said.
"Oh, she doesn't matter. She's just a hostage. No lead there," Sherlock replied.
I knew what was coming after that remark. John had taught me too well when it came to phrasing things correctly.
"For God's sake, I wasn't thinking about leads," John said in exasperation.
"You're not going to be much use to her," Sherlock told him simply.
"He's right," I said, earning me a sharp look from my brother. "The best we can do for her now is figure out this puzzle. Try to find out more about the bomber."
Find out more about Moriarty, I thought, and after a small glance with Sherlock, I knew he was thinking the same.
"What is going on between you two?" John demanded. "I feel like I'm missing something—or you two are sharing an inside joke or something."
"It's hardly a joke," Sherlock murmured.
"Sorry?" John asked, clearly not hearing the detective properly.
"It's like Sherlock said, he's been expecting this," I said. "Back with that cabbie in A Study in Pink, Jeff Hope? He mentioned Sherlock had a fan. He said someone put him on to start killing and was paying him."
"What—Moriarty?" John said. "No. Really? You think this is him?"
"Seems logical," Sherlock said. "Though, not certain if the bomber himself is Moriarty or if Moriarty put the bomber up to all this."
"Either way, he's connected," I said.
"But why? Why would this guy take an interest in you?" John asked.
"Perhaps while Sherlock is a high-functioning sociopath, Moriarty is a high-functioning psychopath," I suggested.
"Are-are they trying to trace it, trace the call?" John asked as the screen near Sherlock flashed the words: NO MATCH.
"The bomber's too smart for that," Sherlock said.
The same phone from before trilled another text alert.
"Max, pass me my phone," Sherlock said.
I blinked, glancing around. "Where is it?" I asked.
"Jacket," Sherlock replied.
I snapped my head around to stare at him in disbelief, but Sherlock merely kept his hands on the microscope.
"You are joking," John said.
"No, it's fine," I assured. I stood up and slipped behind Sherlock before slamming one hand on his left shoulder and roughly pulling open his jacket with the other.
"Careful," Sherlock said irritably, still without looking up from the microscope.
I rummaged in his inside pocket until I found his mobile and looked at the screen.
"A text. It's Mycroft," I said.
"Delete it," Sherlock replied without any hesitation.
"Delete it?" John echoed.
"Missile plans are out of the country now," Sherlock said. "Nothing we can do about it."
I looked down at the message. It read: RE: BRUCE-PARINGTON PLANS. Any progress on Andrew West's death? Mycroft.
"Well, Mycroft thinks there is," John said as he came to my side. "He's texted you eight times. Must be important." He peered at the mobile's screen from over my shoulder.
Sherlock raised his head in exasperation. "Then why didn't he cancel his dental appointment?"
John let out a sigh. "His what?"
"Mycroft never texts if he can talk," Sherlock said. "Look, Andrew West stole the missile plans, tried to sell them, got his head smashed in for his pains. End of story. The only mystery is this: why is my brother so determined to bore me when somebody else is being so delightfully interesting?"
With that, he looked back into the microscope. John held an expression that seemed to convey the words: I am going to kill him. I switched off Sherlock's phone and placed it on the counter next to him while chewing my tongue.
"Try and remember there's a woman here who might die," John said tightly.
"What for?" Sherlock said, looking up at him. "This hospital's full of people dying, Doctor. Why don't you go cry by their bedside and see what good it does them?"
John turned away in disbelief. I glanced between my brother and Sherlock, a conflicted twinge hitting my gut. John had always taught me the right way to think, the proper way. That people carried feelings and that to intentionally hurt them was wrong. That people's lives were precious and innocence was something to be preserved.
He'd taught me all these things, but the thing was... I never connected to them. I never understood why all of it was so important. I never could grasp why it mattered how I spoke to someone, or why I should lie in order to protect someone's feelings. It was a bizarre and twisted reality that I had no place in.
I cared about my brother—I cared about him enough to feel off when he was upset, to get angry when he was being threatened, and to actually make an effort to be normal for his sake. However, I cared about Sherlock too, and in all honesty, my views were closer to the detective's on this one.
Perhaps I could use some of the tools John had taught me over the years to try and smooth this over a bit.
"I think what Sherlock meant," I began slowly, "was that there's no use in focusing on the woman right now. We need to figure out the puzzle—whatever it is—that the bomber sent us. That requires all our attention right now."
"Not entirely what I meant, but sure, if it makes your brother feel better," Sherlock muttered.
I was tempted to thwack him on the back of the head, but he was still peering into the microscope and I didn't want to mess anything up. John looked about ready to smack the detective for me, but before anything could be done, the computer beeped a result.
"Ah!" Sherlock exclaimed delightedly.
The screen was now flashing SEARCH COMPLETE. Of course, what the search was, I hadn't the faintest idea. While being clever, this was not my area of expertise; probably why Sherlock would always be the grand detective and John and I his sidekicks. I honestly didn't mind the arrangement.
"Any luck?"
Molly Hooper had entered the room and she seemed to notice the level of excitement on Sherlock's face. She looked about the same as when I'd briefly seen her the first time I'd come here: long ginger hair, thin lips, a pleasant face with wide, bright eyes. It was a bit odd; I hadn't seen her in any of the other times I'd come here with Sherlock. Part of me wondered if he'd planned it that way. I wouldn't put it past him to know all the employees schedules here at the hospital.
"Oh, yes!" Sherlock said triumphantly.
Given how Molly greeted Sherlock, I assumed she had seen him when he first came in. John and I had gone to grab lunch while the detective started on his lab work, which meant we'd missed her. Now, she glanced at the two of us with slight confusion.
"Er..." I began, wondering if I should introduce myself, but then someone else opened the door to the lab.
It was a man in his thirties, wearing slacks and a T-shirt. He halted when he saw the room was occupied and blinked apologetically.
"Oh, sorry. I didn't..." he began.
"Jim! Hi!" Molly greeted cheerfully.
Jim made to leave the room, but Molly called out to him again.
"Come in! Come in!" she said.
Sherlock glanced over at Molly briefly, running his eyes over her form and apparently making an instant deduction. He then looked back into his microscope. I frowned, wondering what the hell he just figured out just by looking at her.
"Jim, this is Sherlock Holmes," Molly introduced when Jim came further into the room.
"Ah!" Jim said in way of acknowledgement.
John turned toward them and Molly looked at him blankly. "And, uh... sorry."
"John Watson," John said, saving her from trying to recall a name I doubt she'd ever heard. "Hi."
"Hi." Jim smiled briefly before looking at me.
"Oh." I placed a hand on the back of my neck nervously. I hated introductions. "Maxine Watson."
"Oh, so you're married?" Molly asked, her eyes darting between John and me.
"No-no," John said instantly as I shook my head. "She's my sister."
"Oh." Molly looked a touch disappointed, though I had no clue why.
"So you're Sherlock Holmes," Jim said as he gazed admiringly at the detective. "Molly's told me all about you. You on one of your cases?" He walked closer to Sherlock and John and I backed up to give him room.
"Jim works in I.T. upstairs," Molly explained. "That's how we met. Office romance."
Oh. Oh. This made more sense now. I recalled the first time we met Sherlock how obvious it was that Molly fancied him, and how he would use that to his advantage. It would make sense why he would make sure she wasn't working when he brought me here. Molly had been disappointed that John and I were siblings because that meant Sherlock was keeping a woman around. If Sherlock wanted to keep on using Molly's yearning for him to help him get away with doing experiments and such here, he couldn't very well have her thinking he might be involved with someone.
Now Molly was bringing around this other man, perhaps in an attempt to make Sherlock jealous. She and Jim giggled as Sherlock glanced briefly round at Jim before returning to look into the microscope.
"Gay," he said off-handedly.
Molly's smile faded. "Sorry, what?" she said.
Sherlock raised his head as if he realized what he'd just done. John and I exchanged a small glance that was both weary and uncomfortable.
"Nothing," Sherlock said and gave Jim a false smile. "Um, hey."
"Hey." Jim smiled back at him, but his was anything but false. I was starting to get what Sherlock was getting at.
I went around Jim to stand at Sherlock's other side. I peered at the screen he'd been using, hoping that we could get back on task and away with whatever uncomfortable exchange this was turning into.
"Sherlock," I said, gripping his shoulder to get his attention. "Shouldn't we...?" I nodded toward the screen indicating we had work to do.
"Oh, sorry," Jim said instantly, glancing between the two of us. "Erm... are you two together? I didn't mean to butt in. Perhaps we could do a double date?" He looked up at Molly hopefully.
Molly looked appalled for a split second, then an awkward smile stretched across her face. "Er, yeah."
"No, Sherlock and I aren't together," I said. "We're just flatmates. John too." I nodded toward my brother.
"Oh!" Molly and Jim said in unison, both with strangely mirrored expressions of relief.
Jim had brought his hand to his mouth in an apologetic gesture. "Sorry, I didn't mean to assume," he said. "It's just... You two seem to have a sort of connection, I suppose. Um..."
He lowered his hand and knocked a metal dish off the edge of the table. He instantly scrambled to pick it up, giggling nervously.
"Sorry! Sorry!" he said.
John turned away, running a hand over his face. Sherlock's expression flashed with irritation as Jim put the dish back on the table. When he had bent down, I noticed the waistband of his underwear was peaking about his trousers. They were light blue and seemed to be of high-quality material.
Jim scratched his arm and wandered back over to Molly. "Well, I'd better be off," he said. "I'll see you at The Fox, 'bout six-ish?"
"Yeah!" Molly agreed.
Jim gently put a hand on her back before looking back toward Sherlock.
"Bye," he said.
"Bye," Molly said softly.
"It was nice to meet you," Jim added, his eyes still on Sherlock.
Did I look like that the first time I'd met Sherlock? Mrs. Hudson had noticed me staring at the detective and commented on it, but that was for different reasons, I'd imagine. I'd wanted to draw Sherlock for the challenge of his angular eyes and curly hair. I supposed his features were mesmerizing.
Sherlock didn't respond to Jim and merely continued to stare into his microscope. Jim gazed wistfully at him for a long moment until John finally broke the silence.
"You too," he said.
Jim blinked at John, his expression suddenly awkward. He then turned and left the room without another word. Molly waited until the door closed before turning to Sherlock.
"What d'you mean, gay?" she demanded. "We're together."
Sherlock looked over at her. "And domestic bliss must suit you, Molly. You've put on three pounds since I last saw you."
I saw John grimace and my brows furrowed. One thing that my brother had drilled into my head was that commenting on another person's weight was never something to do in social situations.
"Two and a half," Molly countered.
"Nuh, three." Sherlock turned back to his microscope.
"Sherlock..." John began.
"He's not gay," Molly insisted. "Why d'you have to spoil...? He's not."
Sherlock snorted. "With that level of personal grooming?"
"Because he puts a bit of product in his hair?" John asked. "I put product in my hair."
"You wash your hair," Sherlock corrected. "There's a difference. He takes better care of his appearance than Max here. No-no—tinted eyelashes; clear signs of taurine cream around the frown lines; those tired clubber's eyes. Then there's his underwear."
"His underwear?" Molly repeated in disbelief.
"It was blue," I said before thinking about it.
Molly latched her angry glare on me and I raised my hands in surrender.
"They were kinda hard to miss," I muttered.
"Visible about the waistline—very visible; very particular brand," Sherlock said. He reached for the metal dish Jim had knocked over. "That, plus the extremely suggestive fact that he just left his number under this dish here..." He picked up a card and showed it to Molly. "...and I'd say you'd better break it off now and save yourself the pain."
Molly stared at him for a moment before turning and running out of the room without a word. Sherlock blinked, startled by her reaction. I frowned after her, rubbing the back of my neck again.
"Charming," John told Sherlock. "Well done." His tone was quite sarcastic.
"Just saving her time," Sherlock said. "Isn't that kinder?"
"'Kinder?' No, no, Sherlock." John shook his head. "That was not kind."
"It wasn't?" I asked.
John gave me a shocked look. "You too?"
"What?" I shrugged. "I mean... perhaps wording it more tactfully would have helped. I know you always say bluntness isn't the best approach. But why let her go through that only to find out in the end he isn't interested in her at all?" I reached across Sherlock and plucked the card off the table. It was Jim's business card, but I was willing to bet the number listed was his mobile.
"The wording was the entire problem; and the tone," John said.
Sherlock shook his head before reaching over and gripping the trainers from the desk behind us. He plopped them onto the table in front of John.
"Go on, then," Sherlock prompted. Clearly, he was done with the previous conversation.
"Mmm?" John looked at the shoes blankly.
"You know what I do," Sherlock said. "Off you go."
The detective sat back and folded his arms expectantly. John gave off a few incoherent negative noises and looked at his watch.
"No," my brother said.
"Go on," Sherlock urged.
"I'm not gonna stand here so you can humiliate me while I try and disseminate..." John said.
"An outside eye, a second opinion," Sherlock interjected. "It's very useful to me."
"Yeah, right!" John scoffed.
"Really," Sherlock insisted.
"Then have Maddie do it," John said.
Sherlock quirked a brow. "What's the different between the two of you doing it?"
"You won't berate her," John said.
"Oh no, he will," I said.
"Yeah, well it doesn't seem to bother you when he does that," John muttered.
"I want both of you to look at it," Sherlock said. "I just know that I have to convince you. Max is always game for looking evidence over."
John let out a tight sigh and held Sherlock's gaze for a good number of seconds before saying, "Fine."
Clearing his throat, my brother picked up the shoe and looked at it and its partner on the table. I put Jim's card down and grabbed the other shoe to start examining it. I'd been waiting for Sherlock to let me handle them—he always got testy if I messed with evidence before he'd run all the tests and other diagnostics he needed.
"I dunno—they're just a pair of shoes," John said. "Trainers."
"Good," Sherlock said.
"Umm... they're in good nick," John went on. "I'd say they were pretty new... except the sole has been well-worn, so the owner must have had them for a while."
Sherlock, who had started to look frustrated when John said they were new, breathed out a silent sigh of relief that his friend wasn't that stupid.
"Uh, they're very eighties," John said, "probably one of those retro designs."
"You're on sparkling form," Sherlock told him. "What else?"
"Well, they're quite big, so a man's," John said, though there was a hint of hesitation in his voice.
"But...?" Sherlock waited patiently for John to go on.
My brother looked inside the trainer, then gestured for me to let him see the one I had. I held it out toward him and he peered inside it as well.
"But there's traces of a name inside in felt-tip," he said. "Adults don't write their names inside their shoes, so these belonged to a kid."
"Excellent," Sherlock said with a proud grin. He glanced toward me. "Max?"
"Well..." I looked over the shoe, examining the mud caked on the soles and the state of the leather. "John said a retro design, but... what if they were original?"
"Original?" John echoed. "But how? They look brand new."
"The owner might have taken really, really good care of them," I suggested. "He very well might have adored these shoes—so much that he kept them in top condition. Look on the inside again, it seems more worn than the outside, doesn't it?"
Sherlock had started leaning toward me as I spoke. His eyes were wide and fascinated. He began to smile.
"Yes. Yes, Max," he breathed. "Both of you are doing brilliantly. What else?"
"What else?" John looked over his shoe again. "Er, nothing."
"Max?" Sherlock prompted.
"Uh..." I looked at the shoe again and shook my head. "Sorry, that's all I've got."
"How did we do?" John asked.
"Well John; really well," Sherlock said. He paused for a brief moment. "I mean, you missed almost everything of importance, but, um, you know..." His expression was full of sarcasm as he held out his hands for the shoes.
John handed his to him with a frustrated look while I sighed and plopped mine into his palm before sitting back down at his side.
"The owner loved these," Sherlock said. "Scrubbed them clean, whitened them where they got discolored. Changed the laces three... no, four times."
John put his hands on the desk and lowered his head. I leaned over and glared at the trainer closest to me, wondering how in the hell the detective was able to tell that.
"Even so, there are traces of his flaky skin where his fingers have come into contact with them, so he suffered from eczema," Sherlock went on. "Shoes are well-worn, more so on the inside, which means the owner had weak arches. British-made, twenty years old."
John straightened up. "Twenty years?" he repeated. "Maddie was right on that?"
Sherlock nodded and grabbed his mobile. He showed the screen to John, where there was an image of the shoes. "Limited edition: two blue stripes, nineteen eighty-nine."
"But there's still mud on them," John argued. "They look new."
"Someone's kept them that way," Sherlock said, examining the trainer thoughtfully. "Quite a bit of mud caked on the soles, like Max said. Analysis shows it's from Sussex, with London mud overlaying it."
"How do you know?" John asked.
Sherlock nodded toward the computer screen. There were two dots flashing on a map of Britain, one around the borders of East and West Sussex and the other to the south-east of London.
"Pollen," the detective explained. "Clear as a map reference to me. South of the river, too. So, the kid who owned these trainers came to London from Sussex twenty years ago and left them behind."
"So what happened to him?" John queried.
"Something bad," Sherlock murmured. He looked at John. "He loved these shoes, remember. He'd never leave them filthy. Wouldn't let them go unless he had to. So: a child with big feet gets..." He trailed off and stared ahead blankly. "Oh."
John looked across the lab, trying to see what our flatmate was looking at, but I knew Sherlock wasn't seeing anything we could. He was lost in his own mind. I gripped his shoulder.
"What?" I said.
"Carl Powers," Sherlock breathed.
"Sorry, who?" John said.
Sherlock was still staring into the distance. "Carl Powers, Watsons."
"What is it?" John pressed.
Sherlock's eyes finally focused and they flicked back and forth between John and me. "It's where I began."