[A Brief A/N Of Recommendation and Appreciation Before I Begin – Ladies and gents, there is a very talented and flattering young cartoonist on deviantart who has decided to grace this story with illustrations By. The. Chapter. This artiste goes by the username butteronmycuffs and so far the art ranges from a convincingly-stoned Sherlock and Ruby discussing the semantics of bumming a fag, to… I'll let you discover, but it's cute, and it's wrapped in a duvet, and its eyes want all living things to burn. Please check it out (and major thanks to said-talentpot for the support.)]
Jim
Moran was the one that realized we were only fifteen minutes from Danielle's place, and that with Thames Water on last night there was no way she could have copped off. Probably. Hopefully. That was decision made. She's one of those mad morning people I was talking about. The thought, initially, was that there was bound to be breakfast over here, even at this ungodly hour. But now we're standing at the door I'm getting the feeling we might not be getting fed.
All around our feet, like a welcome mat, are spatters of dark, foul smelling water, just starting to dry up and leave brown tidemarks at its edges. There's a smear of the same stuff on the door, by the keyplate; it's the mark of a steadying hand, when the other was shaking, when the key didn't quite seem to fit. And there's another smell, even stronger and stranger, out of place at seven in the morning. I mean, I could be wrong but… But it smells like tomato soup, full of hot pepper. So rather than knock, I go for the spare key. She keeps it duct-taped to the underside of the windowsill at the end of the hall.
But then I give it to Moran, and Moran can go first. He sighs at me, but I could not possibly care less. He lets himself in and creeps around the door calling, "Dani? Dani, pet, s'only us." No, I'm sorry, but it's definitely tomato soup. There's not even a coffee smell anywhere, it's just tomato soup. Moran is still ahead, looking around for her, so he's the one who trips first. We both look down at once and see the muddy wetsuit abandoned in the middle of the floor. Moran looks back up, slowly, "Danielle?"
Then there's a sneeze from round the corner, and she comes shuffling out of the bathroom, shivering in leg warmers and sweater and wrapped in a parka, Fame-meets-Trainspotting, looking dead and pointing at me; "I swear to God. I swear to God, James Moriarty, if the Toxic Water Scandal doesn't open this country down the centre like a stomped-on fly, you're paying me damages." Stumbling on her blanket, she passes us waves dizzily round the breakfast bar, and starts pouring the boiling soup off the stove into a mug and directly down her throat still steaming.
And Moran and me just sort of look at each other and think, Shit, because we passed six or seven nice places for breakfast on the way here…
"I'm not sure it's not toxic actually," Danielle growls, hoarse. Then tells the story. I'll spare you her colourful technique of telling it, but in short, the break-in and the release of the doctored email went fine, as did even her escape back into the reservoir. But as she swam back to her clothes there was a German shepherd sniffing at them, and apparently the night patrols round there look for that, because they love nothing more than apprehending a midnight skinny-dipper. All of this Dani heard while she was pressed in against the bank at their feet, trying not to breathe too loudly, for the better part of an hour until they stopped watching for her. The wetsuit only did so much in the first place, and then when they got bored waiting they kicked her clothes over into the water. A long way home drenched. Hence the soup, and all the sneezing, which I don't really want to be around, thanks…
I'm actually about to make my excuses and get off in search of poached eggs, but then she hits on the obvious question; "What are you two doing here anyway, at this time?"
Um, well… funny story, true story…
Moran says, "Went to meet Peter Lorre."
Incipient hypothermia is utterly forgotten. Like a teenager, gossiping, "So what's he like then?"
Moran considers very carefully. Getting his thoughts together. In the pause, I could almost swear Dani cuts her bleary eyes over at me but maybe she's just having trouble keeping them focussed. They could just be following sound, because they go back to Moran when he speaks, "Like if the blonde one off The League of Gentleman was the Hulk, and worked in Subway."
"You're kidding… And," looking to me, "What was all this in aid of?"
I'm glad she wasn't around last night. I've got a feeling she's going to try and talk me out of this even now that it's done and in motion and can't be stopped. Not knowing what else to tell her I say, "Scorpio."
"Scorpio as in fits between Libra and Sagittarius? Or Scorpio as in shot lots of people in San Francisco, don't pass out on me now, cop, didn't feel so lucky sort of Scorpio?"
"The latter." Oh, here it comes, all the arguments and recriminations and the probably-actually-very-good points that won't make any difference except they'll annoy me, everything that would have made me not go this morning. She's a bitch, y'know, she just likes making my life more difficult than it needs to be. But Dani just nods. Gets up, opens another tin of soup and dumps it into the still-smoking pot, takes the lid off the pepper and just slugs it in. "What? No witty put-down, no devil's advocate? You're not going to pull me up on this and argue with me and say it was a stupid thing to do?" She bundles the blanket up tighter around her neck and face, burying her streaming nose for a disgusting second, shakes her head. "Why not? You don't think it's a good idea, do you?" Danielle laughs, and after a second Moran joins in. They're both looking at me. "What?"
"Do you think it's a good idea?" Moran grins. "'Cause from the way you're talking about it…"
"Don't be soft; I wouldn't have done it if I didn't think-"
"Then what difference does it make?" Danielle adds. And she's right, too, y'know. It wouldn't. I mean, the thing is done, as I said. None of it would make any difference. So let them laugh, I suppose. In an ideal world where I'm perfectly comfortable I'd be able to join in with them. But it's all… how did my new friend put it? Strange but good. It's just new territory. I'll be fine.
I tell Danielle, "I'm sorry I wouldn't let you in yesterday."
She tries, "I'm sorry I got you thrown out of the casino." But her eyes show, and down inside her blanket her shoulders are shaking with the effort of keeping her giggling quiet. Sorry, my arse. Not for a bloody second…
Sherlock
Lestrade texted back before silence and craving got the better of me. Happy for me? Or are you disappointed? Maybe it's just the mood I'm in but I can't help but feel I might be more interesting to the average, everyday man-on-the-street when I'm failing. We love weakness because it makes us feel strong. There but for the grace of God go I. Can't get that phrase out of my head, lately, but it's because I see it everywhere. Now that I can, most days, go out among the public without being the object of the platitude, I see it. Everybody who's ever bought a Big Issue, I see it on your faces. Whether you know it or not, whatever interchangeable deity you plug the gap with, that's why you do it, what you're thinking. There but for the grace of whatever…
You know, I was going to say it's a very human thing to do, but it probably has more to do with some deeper, evolutionary memory, left over from being animals. The weak are doomed and will fall away, leaving more room and resources for the strong. That's very probably where that instinctual schadenfreude has its source.
I'm sorry, you'll have to forgive me. Too long waiting, too long tapping my foot; I'm probably not on the very best of form just now. And I'm wary too of saying it's all about to get better, because I remember quite distinctly the last time I met Lestrade at his place of work, and what sort of conversation that turned into. So I'll keep my hopes small and private for now, just enough to keep me straight and sane on the way over there.
He hasn't come down to meet me this time, but is expecting me. I'm given directions at the front desk and make my own notes on the way up. Lestrade probably hasn't realized the trust involved in letting me learn my way around New Scotland Yard. Whether he ever comes to regret that is entirely up to him. But I note the signs, both the ones on the walls and the less physical ones, that lead to Forensics, and Photography, and all other on-site operations. Of course most the analysis and laboratory work is farmed out, but it all ends up back here eventually. There are some things in this life which are just good to know.
Today, though, I go straight to him, more or less. It's only fair I give him a chance.
His office is on the far side of a room full of desks, all stacked high, most of them messy. Only one or two are occupied at this time of the morning. In a far corner, the young office, Sally, is arguing with someone about the speed of results coming in. She looks like she hasn't slept since we last met. Another good sign. Some part of me hopes it never gets beaten out of her. For the most part I know she hasn't a chance.
Lestrade is on the far side of glass which is frosted to chest height, and steamed up above it from the coffee pot. I knock as I open the door and see he's already got two mugs set out. Which is nice of him, but he's also holding his head at a strange angle, and is slightly slumped from below the waist. I look around the office. His coat is on the back of his chair, which would be fair enough if there wasn't a hook for that on the back of the door, if the bottom wasn't doubled up over the top to make the layer thicker.
"You slept here. What happened?"
"Too much on," he says. "Grabbed an hour, that's all." No. No way he'd develop that loud a crackle in his vertebrae in a grabbed hour. Waiting for the coffee to boil he gets distracted by something on his left hand, rubs at it like a spot of grease that won't shift. When he turns round I see it's his wedding ring and, well, enough said. I won't push him, not this early in the morning. "So," he goes on, naturally changing the subject, "you got stuck on the same thing I did?"
"Can I see the crime scene photographs from yesterday?"
"I'll take that as a 'Yes, but don't rub it in'." He takes pleasure in that. What have I ever done to him that he gets to take pleasure in that? When I don't respond, he softens, "Soon as they get back."
"You mean you haven't got them yet?"
"Listen, let me tell you something about how the police service works, Sherlock-"
"Out the front door, turn left, five minutes down Broadway to Victoria Street, turn right, another couple of minutes' walk and it's on your right, opposite Sainsbury's. I saw it in the cab on the way over."
"Saw what?"
"Boots the bloody Chemist; could have had them back in an hour."
He's giving me that look like I'm not funny. Which is good, because I'm not trying to be. That must come across in my expression because he moves on, "They'll be here this morning. What do you think you're going to see, though, that's the real question here.
True. And a harder one to answer, at that. But there isn't a doubt in my mind that something will connect them, some factor like that hair in every unmade bed and… "The beds. The beds, God, Lestrade, it was right there. Staring us in the face. The hotel didn't touch the beds, firstly to preserve the evidence in case it turned into a crime scene, every London hotel knows that much. After that, I presume whether you intended to investigate or not you told them there was something ongoing, am I right? So the rooms were never cleaned, never made up. Those beds were in exactly the same state they were left in on the night of the murders." He has this set of photographs. He has to do a bit of desk reshuffling to free them, but he gets there in the end. I put them in front of him, one of every room before the mattress were picked up and taken apart – Christ, as if that shouldn't have given it away from the very first second – and show him. The businessman's pillow pulled down sideways, as though he held it against him in the night. Everything in the honeymoon suite pulled towards the centre. The little girl's blanket kicked off to the floor.
"So the killer left it like they'd just got up and vanished. If it wasn't part of the cover-up it was part of whatever… whatever picture he was putting together."
"The latter," I tell him. "The stitches were on the underside of the mattresses. The bedding was made to look slept in again once it was put back on."