Part Three: Flowers in the Cemetery
Click
As soon as the door to 221B clicks shut I turn the corner to the next street over. Calling for a taxi I hop in and tell him my destination.
"The cemetery? On a day like this?" the cabbie asks. It's warm and sunny, a rare occasion for this town. A normal person wouldn't want to spend today in a cemetery.
"It's never a bad day to visit a friend," I say pulling out the receipt John dropped this morning. It's a receipt for two types of flowers, begonia and gladiolus flowers.
When I jump out of the cab I pay the driver and he takes off. I'm the only person in sight near the cemetery. I enter and begin my search for the headstone with begonia and gladiolus flowers.
Soon enough I find the headstone I'm looking for. It simply reads, "Sherlock Holmes." The dirt around the flowers shows that they're newly planted. That must be the reason John comes to the café if he isn't living in the neighborhood anymore. He visits Sherlock's grave.
Suddenly I get the feeling that someone is watching me. I whip my head around to see an empty cemetery, but then I catch something more. There are footprints in the dirt. Large ones, clearly too large to belong to John, the man who made them was light on his feet, most of his weight was on his toes making it appear that he had been sneaking through the cemetery. The prints are fresh. Someone has clearly been watching me. I would have seen the prints when I came in if they'd been here.
I quickly stand up to leave. I've already had two unwelcomed meetings today. I don't need a third. I walk out of the cemetery and start down the street. Again, I have the feeling I'm being followed. I pick up my speed.
I call a taxi over and have it go quickly to my flat. It's not until I'm in my flat that I begin to breathe again. Something doesn't seem right here. Why is someone hanging out by Sherlock's grave? Who has been working on all those experiments in 221B? There's one logical answer
He must be alive.