Author's Note: I do apologise for the delay, but now for Chapter Two. Do enjoy!
"What do you mean 'your family'?" Melody looked to John as they rode through the woods at the end of the latter's streets. "All you have is your brother and he-"
"Okay, I overreacted!" Smith snapped as his horse rode ahead of Melody's, she herself smirking as she forced her own horse to try and overtake his, or at least stay up to speed with him as his next words were drowned by the cantering of their horse's hooves along with the sounds of twigs breaking, stone rattling and dirt flying. Deciding it was best to leave John to his own devices, the rest of the ride was fairly quiet for the pair – that was until they neared the location of the Williams' Hospital.
Trotting to a slower pace, allowing Melody to catch up while giving the duo a chance to talk before they reached their destination, Smith commented in reasonably low voice: "It's not my family, it's just me."
"What do you mean by that?" Melody looked to Smith with concern, slowing her horse to an almost stop as she continued, "I mean, tell me why Saxon would aim his violence towards you? What have you done to him to make him kill so many?"
"Melody, Melody, Melody…" John shook his head to his associate and stopped his horse, hopping off without another word and directing it to a fence by the road, Melody doing the same without a word, obviously waiting for John to continue, to which he only did when the two were walking to the little wooden building a little further up the road. "Saxon is a madman and I'm a private detective, we go back, shall I say, a few years."
"First time I've heard of this" Melody muttered, wincing as she said it and predicting John's immediate response to this.
"You sound like a spoilt brat, Mss Pond… Besides, I know fairy little about your life and I refuse to take offense for things I have yet to know" he looked to her with a smirk this time, fastening his speed as they neared the doors to the small wooden hospital building, finally adding as he reached for the handle, "but I prefer to learn from experience, so I'll let you figure out the rest of mine and Saxon's story… for now."
Leaving Melody in the lurch, John entered the building; it was a relatively new, reasonably dangerous but excellently-staffed medical centre, named after the founder whom had allegedly used every penny of his savings as a professional medical doctor to get the place built. Within of course were only three rooms. There was a main wing, filled with various beds and a few with patients, another room behind a closed door and the entrance hall to which also contained several cabinets of medical supplies, to which John instantaneously walked towards before being almost immediately pulled back by, from what he saw in the reflection on the glass front, a tall, slim, redheaded female.
"The medicines are not to be touched unless signed off!" were the first words uttered by the new female, in a surprisingly strong Scottish dialect too. About to reply with some form of sarcastic remark, John was saved when the Scots woman turned to Melody with a smile, "Lovely to see you, Aunty Mel! I take it this is 'Detective' Smith? Looks a bit young to be someone so professional – tell me Mr Smith, when did you finish school? Last night?"
"Hey!" John moaned brushing himself off, not able to stop his immediate liking for the feisty Amelia as Melody gave her niece a warning look.
"Play nice Amy, we're here to see your father-in-law" Melody muttered as she gave her niece a brief embrace.
John, however, immediately wandered into the main room; calling over his shoulder "Actually I'm after-"
"Excuse me, sir but silence is a virtue!" A kindly man with a long face and an extraordinary nose rushed around an occupied bed toward John and became the second person within a practical minute to drag the Detective away from somewhere important, John himself bemused as he decided to sit in a spare chair in the entrance hall, Melody giving him a Look while Amelia and the new male headed back into the main wing. "I was only going to look for Lady Peri…" John muttered, now sounding like a child himself; something Melody was quick enough to point out with a raised eyebrow.
"Lady Perpugilliam Brown?" John turned in the seat to see a middle-aged man with a massive handlebar moustache and short cropped brown hair. "I take it you must be Detective Smith. Good afternoon Melody" he added towards John's feisty associate.
"I am indeed!" John stood once more, moving speedily towards the newcomer, hand outstretched as he made the assumption, "I take it you must be Doctor Williams Senior?"
"Please call me Ruadh!" Doctor Williams stated happily, shaking John's hand with firm enthusiasm, "and please do forgive my son and his wife, but we do have rules."
"That's quite alright" John stated, releasing his hand, "the curious mind can sometimes face the worst of punishments after all, Ruadh" he added with a smile, "but small talk aside, where might I find Lady Peri? Being a survivor of the Saxon case I must find out as much as possible while she's available."
"Well, since we rarely come across such royalty from over the Great Pond she had her own room, so if you would please follow me…" As Doctor Williams lead John away, the Detective indicated to Melody to spark up a conversation between her Scottish niece and her husband, to find out all she could. Meanwhile, the 'private room' turned out to be a cordoned off section of the main and only wing, barriers put up to separate the bed containing the female who was wide awake and curious.
Introducing himself as the son of Constable Smith, it wasn't long before Detective Smith and Lady Brown were in discussion. Doctor Williams Snr quickly left them to their discussion as Smith talked of his late father, the estate left for him after said father's death and his inspiration for taking on cases, such as the current one of Harold Saxon, to which then lead to the related questions. It seemed that the robbery was your atypical one to start off with – horse and carriage held, her men shot and then the masked figure breaking into her carriage to demand her money and jewellery – but then it changed; after claiming her riches and shooting her as she ran for help, he had leant into her and told her a singular phrase to direct to the Detective, and when Lady Peri recounted it for John, it sent a shiver down John's spine.
"What does it mean, John?" her Ladyship asked as John himself stood, the looked of shock he could feel on his face being quickly rearranged to what he hoped would be something nonchalant.
"Not a clue!" he replied a little too quickly, covering up his tracks as he added quickly, "Nevertheless thank you for your cooperation and it's been lovely to meet you once more after all this time, even despite the circumstance. I hope your wounds heal with speed and with the Williams' treatment you shall be on your feet in no time!" Turning away before Lady Peri could reply once more, John practically ran up the aisle between beds, grabbing Melody by the wrists and dragging her away.
Despite her complaints, the Detective didn't say a word until they were back by their horses, both grazing happily. "He means to torture me through my friends and associates!"
"What?" Rubbing her forearm absently, Melody gaped for a second, her mind obviously catching up with the information just presented to her, "You got that from a ten minute conversation with her Ladyship?"
"He told her to tell me: 'Death only comes through those you love'" John muttered, looking around himself suddenly, feeling like he was being watched but seeing no one – not even the William's peeping out of their wooden hut. "I wanted to let you learn of mine and Harry's past but this changes it all; he claimed two people from my past – indirectly but still accountable – but the next one may be someone close, someone like you!"
Melody herself looking around now, it was her time to suddenly drag the detective, pulling him towards a secluded part of the nearby area, just off the road and hidden from view by an overgrown bush, stating quickly and seriously, "Tell me as best and as quickly as you can, John."
Locating and sitting upon an old tree stump, John looked up to Melody who squatted quite perfectly in front of him, eyes wide an unblinking as she concentrated on John's next words. "Harold Saxon and I were neighbours as a child, we lived in Sidarton some fifteen miles from here and just five outside of Bristol, he was always around my home yet I was never allowed around his. Turned out his father had murdered his wife, Harold's mother, and forbade his son from telling anyone, keeping her buried in their basement – something terrible. It wasn't until Harold reached puberty when things turned really nasty; as my father was the local police Constable, Harry disobeyed his father and told mine of the horrors at his house.
"And yet somehow Master Saxon was given bail, returning home and then vanishing. That too was the last time I saw Harold – I was home alone that evening when I heard Master's shouts, I remember running to the door in an attempt to get over to the house but something withheld my body in time to see my old friend and neighbour leave his home, covered in blood. He'd looked to me, his eyes I remember now to be dark and empty. He wasn't the person I knew as a boy; something had snapped within his mind. Of course, he next I heard of him was several years later, having massacred an orphanage in the City and burning it to the ground… and now this." Looking to his feet, running a hand through his hair, John added quietly, "But why at this time?"
"The question is not that" Melody's voice came sharp and clear into the Detective's clouding mind. He looked up as she continued, "You need to ask 'Why is he coming to you through the people you know?' Is it some sick thrill or simply to get as much out of it as possible?"
John stood suddenly, looking to Melody with enthusiasm as he stated, "We need a decoy to catch him!" He looked back in the direction of the hospital, "And I think I know whom…"