Author's note: Hello, Reader. I'm sorry for not writing the second chapter sooner, but I had two monstrosities to deal with: school finals and NANOWRIMO. Now that both are over, I can once again focus on "The Angels That Wept." I have only two notes. One, I moved the contents of the second chapter to the end of the first, to make a longer chapter and to make less chapters with which the reader has to deal. So, this is technically the second chapter, and the first chapter is now comprised of more material.

Disclaimers are as mentioned in the prologue.

I looked up the meaning to Seamus Aherne's last name, and Aherne means 'Lord of horses'. Considering that Seamus is a cabbie... you get the coincidence. I do not have much else to say, other than that this: Please sit back, and find out what Sherlock Holmes plans to do. And remember: the review button does NOT turn you into a gas-mask zombie. Thanks!

TARDIS Blue Carbuncle

Sherlock Holmes slowly leaned forward in his chair and stared at Mr. Seamus Aherne. Through clenched teeth, he hissed, "Pardon me if my hearing is lax, but did you say that a Professor Moriarty employed Edward Marshall?"

I must make a confession; I had never heard of this professor before that dark night in January. At the time, the name meant nothing to me, and I would have missed the connection altogether if it weren't for Holmes. With the hindsight that I have now, that name sends the coldest of shivers up my spine.

"You know tha' yer hearin's sharper than anyone's," Aherne replied, "Does tha' name mean anythin' to ye?"

"No," Holmes muttered to himself, "It can't be a coincidence! There is no possible way… And yet..." Holmes shot up from the couch and began to pace the room vigorously. Aherne opened his mouth to speak, but I placed my hand on his arm and shook my head. After years of living with Holmes, I learned that it was best not to disturb him. Holmes maneuvered around the room, his head sunk upon his breast, his eyes to the floor, and his thin hands behind his back. Before Aherne or I dared to speak, Holmes said only one thing. He said, "That's the link."

"What link?" asked I, "And what do you know about this professor?"

A knock on the door prevented Holmes from answering my question. He halted, grinned, and muttered, "Lestrade has an urgent case for us."

"How can you be certain that it's Lestrade?"

"You know my methods. I heard the distinct noise of a police boot upon the stair, and the rhythm of the steps was quick, too quick to be that of a man walking up the stairs. Therefore, it must be a policeman with an case that needs my urgent attention. Lestrade, unlike most men at the yard, knocks twice quick, pauses before a third knock and a gentle kick to the door, a trick I taught him many years ago. Therefore, it must be our Lestrade. Do come in, Inspector!" This he directed toward the door, and Lestrade entered. The rodent-faced inspector glanced at the three of us before asking, "Am I interrupting something, Mr. Holmes?"

"Where?" Holmes asked. "The crime, where did it occur?"

Momentarily dumbfounded by the suddenness of the query, Lestrade was barely able to stammer, "Montague Street."

Dashing out the door, Holmes shouted, "Lestrade, give me the details in the cab. We haven't a moment to lose!"

"His name was Mr. Tobias Lee," Lestrade said gravely as our cab rattled to our destination, "He was a geologist at the British Museum, and he rents an apartment at 103 Montague Street, which was where we found the body."

Holmes grunted, and he chewed at the end of his clay pipe in agitation. Lestrade continued with, "Apparently, two hours ago, at about three-thirty this afternoon, the landlady, Mrs. Turner, admitted a client who wished to speak with Mr. Lee about some stones he had. Ten minutes later, the landlady heard the client scream, and then the scream suddenly cut off. Then, she heard her employer shout for her in earnest. Mrs. Turner claimed that she took a while to climb the stairs, but when she entered the study, she found Mr. Lee lying on the floor, dead. By the time she found a constable, it was three-forty-five. I made sure then scene was secure before I left to fetch you."

"What about the client?" Holmes asked.

Lestrade glanced up to Holmes, a weary look on his face. "That is precisely what is bothering me, and why I went to get you so quickly. There was no sign of the client. At first, I thought that Mrs. Turner murdered her employer and made up the client. Yet, several people in the neighboring houses saw him. No one can bribe that many people and get away with it, so she must be telling us everything. So where did the bugger go?"

Holmes smiled at the inspector. "Lestrade," he gasped, with a little mockery and perhaps a little pride in his voice, "you seem to have more than your typical amount of wit about you today."

Lestrade blushed and shrugged, murmuring, "Mr. Holmes, a man does not spend fourteen years working beside you without learning something. Back to the crime, I must warn you to prepare yourselves; the scene is… gruesome."

"In wha' way?" Mr. Aherne shouted from the front of the hansom. At Holmes' request, the Irish cabbie drove us in his own hansom to the scene; I could only fathom that Holmes believed that there was a connection between Aherne's problem and Lestrade's, though what that connection was, I did not know.

Lestrade tugged at his collar and answered, "I can find no words to describe the scene. It's… impossible. The very atmosphere is a bit… constricting."

At that moment, the cab rolled to a stop in front of 103 Montague Street, a brown brick building in decent condition. Sherlock Holmes was the first to emerge from the cab, followed by Lestrade. While Aherne tied the horse to a nearby post and threw a blanket over the hardworking creature, I watched Holmes as he conducted a desultory examination of the ground, the police gathered around the building in question, and the buildings around us. He murmured something about needing light, and I called over one of the constables to allow the use of his bulls-eye. After a few minutes, Holmes stood and finally joined Lestrade and Aherne inside.

Mr. Lee's sitting room was in good condition, though a trifle cluttered; in my mind, it was only to be expected of someone his occupational field. The only decoration to grace the green-patterned walls was that of science: a periodic table, a chart of several types of what I perceived as rocks, and the like. Several rocks and various tools lay on the mantle of the fireplace, which still had ash lying in its bowels; even more rocks, some gorgeous and some dull, lay on the two tables that sat in the room, and the air smelt quite dusty despite the lack of dust. The air was cold, and I shivered from the physical cold as well as the cold of dread and death that settled upon my shoulders.

Upon the red carpet lay the unfortunate Mr. Tobias Lee, late geologist of the British Museum. His body laid face-up, with his glassy, unfocused brown eyes staring up at nothing. His brown hair was shot with gray and receding; his long, well-kept beard was the same, and his mouth was twisted into what I can only describe as a silent scream of pain and terror; I had seen faces like his, but only on the battlefields of Afghanistan that I had left twelve years ago. Mr. Lee wore a threadbare, brown suit stained with mud, yet his shoes were immaculate. His right hand lay open and empty, stretched out to his side, but his left hand grasped a chisel, which was coated in a fine layer of white dust.

All of this attracted my attention as an author, yet only one thing pulled at my instincts as a doctor: Mr. Lee's head lay at a ninety-degree angle to his neck.

"Holmes," I said as I knelt down by the cadaver to look for any other signs of injury, "this man died of a broken neck." I ran my fingers along the bones of the neck to confirm my suspicions, and I added, "In fact, the second cervical vertebra has been completely separated from the third."*

"Thank you, Watson," Holmes said as he, too, knelt by the body. In that familiar fashion of his, Holmes drew out his magnification glass and immediately set himself to examining the body. His piercing eyes took in the dirt under Mr. Lee's fingernails, the stains on his suit, and other minute details that I myself did not see. Then, Holmes leaped to his feet and went around the room, running his glass over the windowsill of the only window in the room, scurrying across the floor on his hands and knees, and often staring into space and mouthing to himself. Holmes moved to the door that led, in all likelihood, to the bedrooms and tried to turn the knob, but it refused to budge. Holmes frowned, and moved back to the window, and examined it. All the while, my friend reminded me of a bloodhound searching for a lost scent. Then, he moved to the fireplace and examined the ashes in the fireplace. His eyes brightened and he let out a gasp of success as he withdrew his hand, revealing a partially burned photograph.

Lestrade, Aherne, and I rushed over to Holmes and stared at the photograph he delicately held in his hand. In the portion of the picture that was there, I saw a tall, thin, pale man in his fifties dressed in a black suit. His watery grey eyes were deeply sunken into his head, which had a high, domed forehead and a protruding face. The man had one hand outstretched to his side, his legs crossed at the ankles, and his body leaned toward the outstretched arm, as if he was leaning against something. Yet, from the inch or so of paper that remained between the hand and the burnt edge, I saw nothing. Holmes turned to me and grinned as he pointed to the photograph and muttered, "This is it… this is his trip. A tiny one, Watson, but it will cost him!"

Lestrade turned to Holmes and asked, "Him? Who is this 'him' that you refer to, Mr. Holmes?"

Holmes ignored Lestrade's question and grasped Aherne's shoulder, handing the photograph to him and asking, "Mr. Aherne, is this Edward Marshall's employer, the man you saw at the asylum?"

I studied Aherne's face as he studied the photograph. For a moment, I read confusion in his eyes, and his mouth curved into a frown. I grew worried, wondering for that split moment if Holmes was, for one of the few times in my time with him, wrong. Then, a sigh of relief escaped my lips as those dark brown eyes suddenly lit up with recognition and Aherne whispered to Holmes, "Yes. I must admit, I dinna recognize 'im at first. The domed forehead is the same, the eyes the same, and tha' grin is exactly the same, Mr. Holmes. I'm thinkin' tha' the man at the asylum was in disguise."

"Excellent, Mr. Aherne," Holmes exclaimed, "I knew I could rely upon your ability to recall faces rather than height or clothing, both being highly alterable. Lestrade, will you take me to Mrs. Turner? I need to speak with her about the missing client."

Lestrade nodded and motioned for a constable standing by the door to begin the rest of the police procedure. Then, we followed Lestrade downstairs and into the kitchen, where two other constables stood by a stout middle-aged woman. The woman fiddled with the handkerchief in her hands, and she let out a few sobs. She glanced up at our entrance, and I noticed that her blue eyes were red with tears. Those desperate eyes moved to Holmes, and brightened. "Mr. Holmes," the lady gasped in a high voice, "I haven't seen you since you moved out ten years ago!"

"Ten years and seven months ago, Mrs. Turner," Holmes sighed.

Lestrade and I both turned to Holmes, and Lestrade asked, "You know this woman, Mr. Holmes?"

"Oh, you don't remember, Lestrade?" Holmes said with a roll of his eyes, "These were my old lodgings before I moved in with Dr. Watson.** Now please, Mrs. Turner, tell us everything you know about what happened here. Leave nothing out, no matter how insignificant the detail."

Mrs. Turner nodded and, between sobs and wrapping her finger around a curl of her light brown hair, stated, "Well, this afternoon, I was in the kitchen. The doorbell rang at about three-thirty, and it was a client. He handed me his calling card, and then went upstairs as fast as he could go. He was short man, bald, and had beady eyes. He had a pair of pince-nez* perched on his nose and I remember that he had a brown folder with him. After he disappeared into Mr. Lee's consulting room, I went back into the kitchen. For ten minutes, everything was fine. Then I heard a scream. I didn't recognize the high voice, so it had to be the client. The scream went on for about a second, and then just cut off. Then, I heard Mr. Lee call for me. I went upstairs as fast as I could, but you know about my arthritis, Mr. Holmes. It has gotten worse since we last met, and I took a while to get up all those stairs. By the time I did…" Mrs. Turner collapsed into hysteric sobs. Holmes laid a comforting hand on her shoulder and asked, "Do you still have this client's calling card, Mrs. Turner?"

Mrs. Turner nodded, stood, and walked to one of the counters in that small, tidy kitchen. Opening one of the drawers, she muttered, "I never throw away anything that isn't older than two years, so I have it here somewhere." Then, she pulled out a small slip of paper and handed it to Holmes. Holmes glanced at it for a few seconds before handing the paper to me. This is what the card read: 'Mr. Martin Cable, electrical engineer and experimenter. 56 Wordsworth Road.'

"Thank you," Holmes said to Mrs. Turner. Then, he turned to Lestrade and motioned for him to step aside. Lestrade, Aherne and I followed Holmes as he swiftly exited the house and into the crisp, winter air. By this time, the night was pitch-black, and the only light by which we had to see was that of the constables' bulls-eyes. Holmes took one and continued to walk, fast and unceasing, and it was all I could do to keep up. Holmes shouted over his shoulder, "Lestrade, I take it that your men have searched every room of this building with no success in finding the client?"

"Yes, sir," Lestrade said, panting, "I even tried that trick of yours for finding secret rooms. The client, or his body, is not in the building." Holmes showed no sign of slowing down, and had circumvented the building and came to a stone wall. Lestrade shouted, "Holmes, what could you give me? I need answers, and I need them now."

Holmes swiftly turned on his heel and faced the three of us. His eyes darted from Lestrade to me to Aherne before cryptically whispering, "There's more than just a client missing from that room. There is also a rock specimen gone."

"What d'ya mean?" Aherne asked, "How d'ya know?"

Holmes sighed, then said, "The chisel that Mr. Lee held in his left hand was covered in white dust, which told me that he was taking a sample from a specimen, yet when I glanced through the rooms, I saw no specimen that matched that particular type of rock. However, I did notice some of that same dust on the floor. This trail led to the window, yet when I tested the window, I saw that it was locked from the inside, and with my glass, I saw that the lock had been rusted over, yet some of that rust has recently been scrapped off. This meant that the window had not been open for a long time prior to the murder, and it meant that Mr. Lee was also a very cautious man and was scared of possible theft. Yet, the damaged rust told me that it was the means of escape for either the client or the murder, or both. Because of Mrs. Turner's presence, the client could not have gone out through the front door. The door to the sitting room was also locked, therefore the client could not have gone to the roof. You said yourself that you had searched every room in the house, and I know from experience that there are no secret rooms. This leaves me with three questions, Lestrade: Did the client climb out the window and Mr. Lee locked it behind him, did Mr. Lee toss him out and then lock it, and if so, why?" Holmes moved closer to the fence, and continued with, "The trail of dust, as I said, led to the window, which I saw led to the back courtyard. The amount of dust on the chisel was a large amount, too much to be a sample from a small specimen. Therefore, the specimen has to be something of considerable size, perhaps as large as a man. I decided to follow the dust, and it leads me here."

Holmes tossed the bulls-eye upon the top of the black stone wall and placed one foot on a crate that lay near the wall, which was at least a foot taller than my friend. I cried, "Holmes, what the devil—", yet before I could continue, Holmes vaulted over the wall in one leap and disappeared on the other side. Patting my pocket to make certain that my gun was there, I ran after Holmes. Behind me, I could hear Aherne say, "Well, dinna have much of a choice, Inspector." With much effort, I pulled myself to the top of the fence, and at least looked about before I leaped down.

The garden was small, roughly the span of a small room, and covered with snow, and therefore I located Holmes quickly. He was on his hands and knees, examining the ground by a large indentation in the snow. This was roughly three feet by two feet in diameter, elliptical, and went deep into the snow. I turned, and saw Aherne and Lestrade run up. Holmes jumped to his feet, pointed to the indentation, and cried out, "Lestrade, there was something here, something heavy, not too long ago!"

Lestrade glanced at the imprint, nodded, and stroked his chin, saying, "Mr. Holmes, is this what's left of the so-called specimen?"

"There is no other alternative," Holmes replied, a frown playing on his face, "and yet there is something here that defies all laws of nature."

"What is it?" asked I.

Holmes pointed to the gap, then to the ground around us, and said, "Watson, please look carefully. Do not merely see, but observe!"

I did as he bid. My eyes darted from the tall, sparse figure of my friend to the white ground beneath me. I stared intently at the gap, then at the ground around it, which had no marks whatsoever save the footprints of Holmes, Lestrade, Aherne, and I. I took notice of the walls, the wooden door that led to the inside, and the eerie shadows that the bulls-eye played upon the scene. I glanced back up to Holmes in defeat, but Holmes did not chide me for my inability to see. He merely shrugged and said, "There are no footprints. Watson, aside from the prints we have made, there are no footprints leading from the window, not to this imprint, nor away from this."

"But, if there are no footprints, then no one could have come out this way," Lestrade added.

"Precisely," Holmes said through clenched teeth. For a moment, he stood still, his chin upon his breast in thought. The rest of us waited for him in earnest; Lestrade checked his pocket watch, Aherne shuffled his feet in the snow and shivered from the cold, and I watched my friend as his mind raced. Then, Holmes brought his hands up, blew on them, and rubbed them together. "There is nothing more I can learn out here," he sighed, "Lestrade, I shall not keep you any longer."

"What should I do?" Lestrade asked. "This case is becoming more and more complex by the minute!"

"Under normal circumstances, I would disagree," Holmes muttered, running one of his thin, delicate hands through his black hair, "Under normal circumstances, the unusual crime has more damning clues than an average one. Yet…" Holmes drifted off, his eyes downcast in thought. Then, he ordered, "Lestrade, keep an ear open for any missing persons report that matches the description Mrs. Turner gave us. That way, if the calling card is false, we may still have a name to this client. Watson," he added, lifting his eyes to me, "You and Aherne shall take a cab to Albion Hospital. I need you to interrogate Mr. Edward Marshall, and extract as much information as you can."

I nodded, though many doubts swirled through my mind, one of these being how I would gain information from Mr. Marshall when Aherne, his closest friend, had little luck. I asked, "What shall you do, Holmes?"

Holmes did not answer my question right away. He waved at Lestrade as if he were dismissing a student and insisted, "Go, Lestrade, I am certain that you have official duties to attend to." My friend turned to Aherne and ordered, "Pull your cab up by this fence. Watson shall be waiting for you there. Here," Holmes withdrew some bills from his pocket, took Aherne's small hand in his own bony one, and thrust the bills into Aherne's hand. "This is for the work you've done tonight. And do not protest," Holmes insisted when the shorter man opened his mouth in objection, "Your service is appreciated." Aherne glanced at the bills in his hand, raised his head to my friend, and gave a short nod before turning away and running for the fence.

Holmes turned to me, glanced furtively around for bystanders, then whispered, "Watson, this case… you know my maxim. 'Eliminate the impossible, and whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth'. However…"

"What is it, Holmes?" asked I.

Holmes pulled out his pipe and chewed at the end. "Watson, I confirmed the fact that there was only one way for the client to have disappeared: out the window overlooking the courtyard. However, there are no footprints here to support that. Yet, there is no evidence to support a theory that he vanished in any other direction, or is within the house. I have eliminated the impossible, yet in doing so I have also eliminated my probable and my improbable. I am left with nothing save the impossible. This case is a paradox. An unsolvable paradox…" Holmes shook his head and smiled, muttering, "I do not depend upon emotion and intuition often, Watson, yet my intuition tells me that I am missing something vital to this case and to Aherne's. Either that, or…" Holmes sighed, and whispered, "I merely require time to think. Perhaps Lestrade will find the identity of the client, and that will lead to further information. This trail is cold, and I cannot make bricks without clay."

Holmes and I slowly walked to the wall. Without the crate to assist us, Holmes used my hand as a foothold, and then reached down to pull me up once he was on top of the wall. After my feet touched the ground, Holmes grasped my shoulder and said, "Watson, report back to Baker Street at, say, seven o'clock. I perceive that you have your gun; you might need it."

"I shall," I said as Aherne's cab pulled to the curb next to us. As I climbed in, Holmes shouted, "Aherne, go inside with Watson. If his presence as a doctor fails him, Mr. Marshall might be more inclined to speak with you."

"Understood, Mister Holmes," Aherne shouted back as he whipped the reins and rolled into the street. I stared out, and watched Holmes stand on the curb, staring after us, a shadow in the dim light of a lamp. I continued to watch until the darkness swallowed Holmes. Aherne remained uncharacteristically silent, focused on maneuvering his way in the dark toward our destination and avoiding the other drivers that were out. I settled in my seat and prepared myself for the meeting at the asylum.

* The cervical vertebrae are the bones in a human's neck, seven in all. The first one, the C1 vertebra, is protected by the skull and has a stable, less mobile joint with the C2 vertebra than the rest of them, so a break is hard in that position. The break in Mr. Lee's case is high in the neck.

** In 'The Musgrave Ritual', Holmes tells Watson that he took lodgings in Montague Street, close to the British Museum, right after he left college.

Thanks again to all who have reviewed so far, to Gollum 576 for editing this for me, and I'm again sorry for making you wait for this chapter. This might be boring right now, but I promise you that this is the most boring bit. The story will get more exciting and the Doctor will appear very quickly…