Disclaimer: main characters are the creation of ACD. O'Connor is mine. Again, keep tabs on the dates.

Chapter 11

2nd October 1919

The tall Irishman stood uncomfortably before John Clay. Clay was slumped in a chair, the only chair in the room on the second floor above the shop. He toyed listlessly with a fencing foil.

"They tell me you have served the Fellowship well since you joined us, O'Connor," Clay said.

"I does my best, sir," replied O'Connor. He shifted his weight – what there was of it – from one foot to the other, repeatedly.

"And I understand you have something to tell me?" Clay was doing his best to be patient but the Irishman's slowness, and continual movement, was jarring.

"That I do, yes, I do."

"Well?"

"Ah, right you are, then. Well, it's about Mr Moran isn't it?"

"You know where he is?"

"That I do not. No. But I know who he has seen."

Clay sighed. "And that would be ...?"

"Sherlock Holmes, sir."

Clay sat forward in his chair, running his finger absent mindedly along the blade of the foil. "Ah. So Holmes is involved. She will be pleased."

"She, sir?"

"Never mind. So what can you tell us about this meeting?"

"It was a little while back, sir. Just after Mr Moran came out of jail. Back in August."

"So why has it taken this long for you to tell me about it?"

"I didn't know whether you'd be interested, sir. It was only last evening when you mentioned him that I thought it might be important, like. And then I saw him the other day when I was out, getting ready for the Piccadilly job, and there he was, all shifty like, not wanting to be seen. But I knows him from old, yes I do. And now that I've seen him again, and knowing how you're interested I thought you'd best know."

"You know him from before? How?"

"India sir. I served in his company for a time. Fierce angry fellow he was even then sir, and I don't think time has calmed him."

"Did he recognise you?"

"Oh yes, sir, on the grounds that I introduced myself to him this time round."

Another sigh from Clay. "Look, O'Connor, I'm sure you know what you're doing, but you need to keep focus on the job in hand – not getting back with old service colleagues, however nice and dandy that may be."

"No, sir. Sorry, sir. Only, he mentioned you, you see."

Clay paused again. "He mentioned me? In what context?"

"He said that he had received a message from you a while back, and had been thinking about it. 'It's been on my mind', he said, two or three times. Fierce troubled he is, I think."

"Yes, yes, I've gathered that."

"And so he says, 'tell John' – sorry sir, but those were his exact words, not mine – 'tell John I want to see him. I want to work with him. I want to join him. We can be great again, together'. That's it, really, he rushed off in a hurry then, there being a copper on the other side of the road, you know."

John Clay was silent for a moment, turning this news over in his mind. "So," he mused, half to himself, "he has tired already. I wonder what he considers to be 'working with me' to be?"

"Well, he did used to be the leader," said a heavily built man standing next to Clay.

"Yes, but he isn't now, is he, Wilkins?" spat Clay. In a flash the foil was at Wilkins' throat. "Just remember who runs things now."

"No offence, sir, no offence." Wilkins backed off. Clay turned again to O'Connor. "No indication of what he meant?"

"Just that he wanted to meet, sir."

"Thank you, O'Connor, that's useful. I think in his old age our friend has started to get soft. So, he wants to join us – doubtless to save his neck."

"He has something you want, then?" asked the Irishman.

Clay glanced at him, suddenly suspicious. "Yes, he has. Why do you say that?" The blade twitched in his hand.

"No reason, sir," said O'Connor, the nerves in his voice betraying his concern. "It just seems, you know, that him wanting to get back, and having left things a while, and this note, whatever it is, maybe he's worried about how you might receive him. You know, the old leader and the new."

"I can deal with Mr Moran," replied Clay coldly. "But you – you seem to be doing a lot of thinking. That's not what I need from you. I need cunning, not thinking."

"Ah, cunning I am, sir," replied O'Connor. "I'll just keep to the cunning, then."

"Yes. Very well, you can go." Clay turned to Wilkins as O'Connor moved towards the door. "If we can get Moran onside, then we might be able to get Holmes as well. They've obviously met, although why Moran didn't just kill him I don't know. He's definitely getting too soft. But we need that information."

"Do we tell her?"

"No, not yet. All in good time. If we tell her now, she'll want to move against Holmes straight away, just to clear things up. She does have a score to settle, I understand. And then it would get messy. You know what she's like, what with Wiggins and Foster. We'd get diverted away from the game in hand, going after that Watson fellow just to make Holmes suffer. No, that can wait. I'll put word out on the street for Moran, that he'll be safe to come here. Let's hear what he's got to say."

The door closed as O'Connor left the room. Once he had left the building and was a couple of streets away, he seemed to straighten and grow in height.

A smile crossed the face of Sherlock Holmes. It was all going to plan.