Chapter Title: What's in a Name?
Author: Sam
Story: A Picture Perfect Crime: 03 of ?
Series: Side of the Angels
Setting: AU: Just before Christmas, 2015: London
Note:
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Turning, John studied the wall display. "A doll . . . a mine . . . I see four or five cathedrals . . . I don't see a prison, Sherlock."
"That's the Cowbridge Town Hall in Wales. It contains the Cowbridge Prison Museum," Sherlock informed them, his vast knowledge of all things crime-related coming handy. His eyes roved the pictures though his focus seemed impeded. "And that mine is in Cardiff, as well."
"How do you know?" asked Molly from her perch on the chair across the room.
Sherlock focused his eyes on the forensic pathologist and said "my grandparents took us as children. Mycroft nearly tripped down an air vent." He began to scroll through sites on his smart phone, apparently ignoring the others in the room once more.
"Right," John stood and walked over to stand by Molly, studying the pictures. "That's the Dylan Thomas Centre."
Molly gestured to the last building in the top-most row. "The Doctor Who Exhibition Centre in Cardiff."
"What's that?" John turned, surprised as he detected a pattern in the pictures.
Annoyance sounded in Sherlock's voice as he replied, "an amusement exhibition based on a popular television series concerning an alien traveler through time and space. It's been running since the 1960's."
Stunned, John whirled around. "I know 'Doctor Who'. I didn't think you did."
"Well, not personally," slight amusement colored Sherlock's voice. "If not the show, what are you questioning?" Something about the detective's demeanor told John that Sherlock already knew the answer.
"Four museums in Wales . . . three of them in Cardiff. . ."
Sherlock nodded his agreement.
"Wouldn't it make more sense to put the doll with the Cathedrals?" Molly asked. "Or is the point that it's an antique doll? Or is it just the poster's signature?"
The three studied the groupings in silence for several minutes before Molly added, "four mice? Or is it seven rodents?" She touched the fourth animal picture, a small brown mouse.
"Garden dormouse," Sherlock gave the animal its common name.
That seemed to draw Mrs. Hudson's attention and she looked up, saying "on the endangered species list, that one." Her eyes darted over the animals and she gestured to the eighth. "The sea otter. Also nearly extinct."
Sherlock pulled himself straighter on the divan. "Number eleven is the European Mink . . . also on the list."
"And the Palla's cat is the last picture. Are these all endangered?" Molly turned to question Sherlock, who appeared to be fighting to stay awake. "What do endangered animals have to do with an antique doll, Welsh museums, and a number of cathedrals and other buildings?"
Surprise lit Sherlock's face and, despite his drug-induced lethargy, he grabbed his cane and struggled to his feet. "Of course. I should have seen it sooner! It's a code. Oh, wonderful!" Excitement fairly vibrated through him.
"Something to do with Cardiff," guessed John, frowning in concern for his unsteady friend. He did not, however, try to stop Sherlock from coming closer.
Nodding, Sherlock stopped on the other side of the chair Molly still stood on. "Possibly. If each group is a number we have . . ."
John jumped in, "eight – four – five – twelve – twelve – five – four."
"Not a cell number," Molly said. "There aren't any twelves in the dial."
"Letters," Sherlock stated, sounding certain. He pulled out a felt-tip marker from a cup of writing utensils on the nearby desk and wrote 'H' on the photograph of the prison, stretching to reach the top row. He then went down the rows, marking the first picture of each with a letter.
John shook his head as Sherlock finished. "H-D-E-L-L-E-D? What's that mean?" He recalled his mistaken Morse code up in Dartmoor five years back.
"Idelle . . ." Sherlock became noticeably pale and John sprang forward to clasp the taller man's arm, tugging him back towards the divan. Sherlock pulled his arm away with a low growl. He lifted his hand to touch the photo of the doll. "Sister . . . The doll is part of the first row, bringing the number to nine! The last four aren't part of the original message. She tacked those on as an afterthought. It's a personal message." His eyes rapidly scanned back and forth over the pictures as if trying to read some hidden text. "This wasn't sent to you, John. It's meant for me."
John drew his breath in sharply. "Moriarity?"The implications sent horror through the former military man. The consulting criminal had wreaked havoc in their lives for two years before faking his suicide. After two years he'd come back and announced it publicly. In the three years since, the British government had been 'holding its breath' so to speak while Sherlock periodically went out looking for his psychotic nemesis, unsuccessfully thus far.
Sherlock pulled his hand from the wall and turned an annoyed look on the older man. "I told . . ." he stopped and his eyes widened. "No!" He whirled back to the pictures. "Mycroft wouldn't be so stupid!"
Molly finally broke in, frowning softly at Sherlock's reference to his older brother. "Who is Sister Idelle? And how was Mycroft stupid?"
Ignoring her questions, Sherlock began to fix the letters on the pictures, crossing off the 'H' on the prison and placing an 'I' on the doll, instead. He then crossed off the 'D' on the picture of himself as a child. Pausing, he scanned the photographs. Excitement ratcheted his voice as he raised the marker again. "There's more to this than the primary alpha-numeric code. There's a reason these specific pictures were chosen." Sherlock wrote a 'C' on the picture of the prison museum in Cowbridge and another on the mine from Cardiff, as well as the exhibition center in Cardiff. "John, where's the Dylan Thomas Centre?"
John thought a moment, watching as his friend impatiently scrolled on his phone one-handed. "Swansea," John said. "Mary and I visited it. And that picture after is of a poet's house in Harlech . . . Wales, again."
Sherlock stopped writing, a frown pulling his face into a somber mask. He looked over the top row and shook his head. "No!" He scrawled a line through each letter, except the 'I' on the antique doll. His eyes ran back and forth rapidly in the eerie reading motion he often displayed when thinking.
A long moment passed as the group silently tried to figure out the secondary code.
Suddenly, Sherlock screamed "Shut up! Shut up . . . shut up! You're all thinking too loud!" As Victoria responded with a startled cry, Sherlock tried to pace away from the wall but stumbled as he injudiciously left his cane behind and over-balanced on his injured ankle.
Instinctively, John sprang forward to support the other man though he glanced over at his whimpering child, worry coursing through his body.
"Sherlock, please don't shout. You've scared the baby," Mrs. Hudson scolded as she sent an exasperated glare towards her tenant. She scooped up the toddler into a hug. "And did you think that maybe the letter is the first of the name of the building, and not the town it's in?"
"Or perhaps places your Sister Idelle has been to?" Molly asked, her voice tentative after Sherlock's reaction.
Annoyance flashed across the young man's face, but his odd-colored eyes scanned the pictures again; he didn't bother to apologize. Scrolling on the phone once more, he glanced at the screen then at the wall of photographs and limped carefully back to the wall. "Still a 'C' for the Cowbridge Town Hall," he rewrote the 'C' on the picture. On the mine he had recalled, he wrote 'R', followed by a 'D' on the next photograph. "What's the name of the poet's house?"
When John paused to think, Sherlock glared at him and insisted "John, the name."
"Something with a 'Y'. It's in Welsh, Sherlock. I don't speak Welsh." John moved to pick up his now sobbing daughter, patting her back as she laid her head on his shoulder and stuck her thumb firmly in her mouth, tears running down her pudgy face. He shot a look of pure annoyance at his friend.
Sherlock merely turned back and wrote a 'Y' on the photo then put a 'D' on the last in that row. "We need the rest." He flicked his thumb over the scroll on his phone and typed on the pad. "Searching museums in Wales," he said, his voice sounding absent-minded. He smiled suddenly, eyes widening as he apparently felt a jolt of energy. "You may not speak Welsh, John, but I do. That first row is most likely Caerdynn, Welsh for Cardiff. The second building is Aberconwy House." Another flick of his thumb brought another satisfied smirk. "And Errdig Hall, Wrexham. The green building second to last is Dolaucothi Gold Mines, another place my grandparents insisted we visit." When he had finished putting on the first letters, the top line read I-C-A-E-R-D-Y-D-D. Satisfaction seemed to radiate through the tall detective.
Molly pulled out her own phone. "I'm checking the endangered species list, as four of them are on there. We have the garden dormouse fourth in. Eighth is the sea otter and eleventh is European mink. Last is the Palla's cat." She continued trying to match pictures from the listed animals to the wall, but there were thousands of names to go through.
John sighed, lips pressed firm, as he walked over, still cuddling Victoria, and took the marker from Sherlock. He gestured to the divan. "Sit, Sherlock. I can write these." Before the man could respond, John pulled over a second chair and stepped up on it.
His friend merely grabbed his cane, still scrolling, and moved back to his original seat, sinking down and positioning his casted ankle on the pillow once more. "The second row is a problem," Sherlock seemed distressed as his eyes drooped. Apparently he had more trouble fighting his medications while sitting. "All of those cathedrals would be named 'Cathedral Church of. . .' Perhaps the beginning of the rest of the name?"
"Right," John responded and pulled out his own phone to begin researching the religious edifices. "None of these are in Wales," he murmured then cleared his throat and said louder "These aren't in Wales. I'm checking throughout England now."
"I'm checking only mammal lists, since all of the animals are mammals." Molly called out. There seemed to be a match on her search, so she pointed to the photo right of the sea otter. "That's called a dingiso."
Nodding, John put a 'D' on the appropriate picture then scanned the revealed letters. "Three blanks, a 'G', two blanks, a 'D' and an 'S', two blanks, an 'E' and a 'P'." He shook his head and went back to scanning cathedrals before smiling and writing 'H' next to the second cathedral. "Cathedral Church of the Holy and Undivided Trinity in Cambridgeshire. Oh!" He wrote an 'S' on the fourth. "Also in Cambridgeshire: Cathedral Church of St. Peter, St. Paul, and St. Andrew. That gives us a blank, an 'H', a blank, and an 'S'."
Eyes moving to the second row of photographs, Sherlock studied the four cathedrals then shook his head. "The second one is Ely Cathedral in Cambridgeshire," he said, his voice softer than before, his eyes slightly unfocused.
John glanced back at Sherlock then at the pictures. He searched his phone and noted the official name of the cathedral. "Cathedral Church of the Holy and Undivided Trinity," he reaffirmed his earlier identification. Frown matching Sherlock's, he typed in 'Ely Cathedral,' and the same picture, from the exact same angle, popped up. Softly, John murmured, "she used common names, not official names?" Quickly he typed in the name of the fourth cathedral and came up with the common name 'Peterborough Cathedral'. With a sigh, he glanced at the photographs and wrote a second letter on each of those he'd identified, so the second row read D & blank-H & E-blank-S & P. He turned to Sherlock trying to keep annoyance out of his voice; John didn't like having someone correcting him constantly, as Sherlock was inclined to do. "Can you work on the third row?"
Sherlock shrugged and glanced over the five groups of buildings then started searching with his phone.
"Don't tell me you've got crime scenes all over Wales!"
The exasperated voice of Detective Inspector Greg Lestrade brought the trio whirling around, none of them having noticed when Mrs. Hudson let in the brown-haired medium-built law enforcement officer. With a shake of his head, a frown firmly in place, Greg strode into the room and right over to the wall of photos, a forgotten folder in his hand. Pointing at a pair of pictures in the fifth row, he said "That's Caerleon College and that one's the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama. What's happened, then?" He turned and fixed Sherlock with a gimlet stare.
John sighed, "Hello, Greg. We've received a puzzle on my blog." He glanced back at the wall and gently rocked Victoria against his shoulder. "Sister Idelle sent them, we think, and we're trying to work it out."
Sherlock frowned suddenly and turned to Greg, his voice sounding tired and grumpy as he challenged "What are you doing here? John won't let me help out with my ankle."
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Continued in Chapter Four: when written