Ronan took a few moments just breathing silently. I wondered if he imagined Sherlock Holmes to be the man he expected him to be. I also wondered whether he entirely trusted us, as he still spoke quite coldly.
"Like you say Mr. Holmes, My father is a quack, or I think he is anyway… as nobody ever left his practise alive. People just call in claiming they feel unwell and then my father would perform his 'miracle amputation' after he collects a large amount of money for his work."
I shuddered greatly after hearing that. It appeared to me that Ronan's father was not a quack but a rather ingenious criminal, stealing people of their fortune before murdering them. I didn't even want to know what this 'miracle amputation' was.
"The practise itself is rather small as it is run by two adults, being my parents, and five other children as employees." Ronan continued.
"Can you please describe these children for me Ronan?" Sherlock asked
Ronan nodded. "The only one who I've ever spoken to was Daniel Broadhurst. He was 13, the same age as me, and was charged with going round all over London finding new 'customers' in which to be operated. I know this doesn't look good for him but I promise to you that Daniel never knew the truth about my father's work... or the results from it."
Sherlock nodded "Prey, continue."
"There was only one other person who worked outside of the practise before this mess, and that was a 14 year old boy by the name of Holland. He was asked with sorting out the various documents the practise came across. He was paid quite handsomely, about 5 times as much as any other employee for his secrecy as some of those documents contained some rather touchy information which I am sure my father doesn't want going anywhere else."
"So there are just 3 other people in the practise?" I remarked quite astonishingly.
"Yes." Ronan replied. "One of them has nothing to do with the operations themselves. That would be Timothy Handler. It is his job to deal with the financial side of things; however he is locked in a room all day being watched by my mother, as she didn't trust him with the money. That just leaves the twins, Harrison O'brackley and Dick Brackley. Apparently Dick Brackley wasn't called O'brackley as it didn't sound right."
Sherlock stopped smoking his pipe again. "You seem to be quite a happy practise, despite its criminal intentions. I find it interesting how your father could possibly make enemies, if no one leaves his practise alive?"
"It happened about 8 months ago" Ronan said quietly. "My father had friends in high places. One of these friends was Vincent Von Galore. He was a very fat. Short man, with ginger hair displayed in a fashion not too different from mine. He also had a son Vincent Von Galore Jr. Despite having near identical facial features, junior was a tall skinny man, about the same height as me. Now, Vincent Von Galore senior's weight issues didn't go unnoticed with his health. He fell ill on December 14th, and requested to be treated at my father's practice to receive his 'miracle amputation'."
I gasped as I heard Ronan's last line that his father had actually murdered one of his friends just to get paid. I instantly lost all sympathy towards the boy's parent's deaths, as they must have left hundreds more to die. I merely hoped that the father used anaesthetic, but I dared to ask.
"Of course the man died as a result, but despite his best efforts, he couldn't protect the truth from Vincent Von Galore Jr. According to Daniel, Vincent turned up at my father's practise a week afterwards. He wanted the practise's employees to 'join him' although Daniel didn't understand what he meant by this. Apparently both Holland and Harrison did join and was never seen since by any of the other employees."
"But I take that you have seen them since?" Sherlock added.
"Yes" Ronan answered. "Although I've never seen these children beforehand, Daniel had provided me with descriptions of them. The child butler who poisoned my mother matched Holland's description, whilst the boy who stabbed me looked like Harrison".
"Which is why you approached him in the first place?" Sherlock deducted
"Exactly, I was hoping to interrogate him on my parent's deaths, and trying to seek out whether Von Galore has any plans for me. Sadly I never had the chance."
"So what exactly do you want us to do?" Sherlock asked.
"I want you to go out there, and find the evidence necessary to take Vincent to court for his crimes". With that Ronan took another breathe. "Do you have any questions?"
"What are the names of your parents?" Sherlock asked.
Ronan just sat where he was flabbergasted, even looking at me for some sign of sanity. "They're called Collin and Mary Eelstone. They changed their surnames so as no family member of their murdered patients could ever track them down."
"Thank you." Sherlock said.
With that Ronan got up, went towards Holmes and gave him a card. "This is where I'll be if you wish to find me." And with that he left the building.
"What do you think about this case Watson?" Sherlock asked.
"Just seems like an ordinary stabbing case to me Holmes. A child who has just gone renegade over the death of his father."
"The problem with you Watson is that you take everything our clients say on face value, whilst I try and look a bit deeper within our client's claims, and today is no different. There is number of things Ronan said which disturbs me." Sherlock smoked his pipe a bit more and said "Come on Watson, it's about time we got a start on this case."