CHAPTER 24: SNOW FALLS ON LONDON

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 27, 2015

At five to three, the bell tinkled and Sherlock Holmes stepped inside the bistro, shaking the flakes from his hair. It was coming down in earnest now, the kind of snow that was sure to turn the city white before London fought back with its grime and gunk. Whatever was white today would be grey by tomorrow.

He sat himself by the window to watch for John, who would be with Ella up to the hour, if she had her way about it. From here, squinting through swirling white, he could just make out her front door. Eyes fixed on it, he thoughtlessly picked at the bandaging around his hand and which extended up his arm. The burnt skin beneath was drying out and itched like mad; he would need John to help him administer more of the cream when they got home. In the meantime, he would try not to think about how much sensitive skin was to the touch. Each nerve felt like it was still red as an electric coil, and only the cream seemed to do anything to ease the burn. John knew just how to administer it, too, to cause him the least amount of pain. Instead, he would think about KON. Or, as he presumed, K O'N. That narrowed the field considerably to O'Neil and its few variations: O'Neill, O'Neal, O'Niall (or, less likely but not improbably, the Gaelic version: Ó Nualláin). Statistically speaking, though, the next victim was probably Irish.

Lestrade was handling it. And Donovan. Finding K O'N, that was. 'Rest up, both of you,' Lestrade had told him quietly in the kitchen, while John slept on the sofa. 'We'll need you soon, I'm sure. But until then . . . take care of yourselves.'

But there was only one victim to go, before the pattern was complete. They hadn't stopped a single murder yet. What chance did they have of stopping the next? And even if they could, would it really stop anything? Moran would simply come at them from a new angle.

'Something from the menu, love?'

He started a little from thought, which aggravated him; he was not one to startle so easily.

'Just tea,' he said. 'Two cups. Bring the pot.'

It would be ready once John arrived out of the deepening cold, just in time to get something warm in him before heading back to the flat, which was too quiet these days, what with Mrs Hudson gone—a quiet that astounded Sherlock, given that she had never made any noise above a peep. Maybe it shouldn't have made as much difference as it did, her absence from Baker Street. She didn't live with them, after all, nor was she a permanent fixture on the wall they had to pass by to get to their flat. But in a way, she was Baker Street. She had been there long before either of them, and had remained after both had parted, as certain to be there as the street itself. And they had seen her there, every day since their joint return; they had taken evening meals with her, and tea times, and quieter times when no one spoke, just felt one another's presence like the walls of the room: fixed, secure, reliable. But a wall had been taken away; the cold had pressed its way inside.

They'd learnt that Ginny Woodhouse was Mrs Hudson's niece, a niece who had only very recently expressed much interest in her aunt's welfare at all. Lestrade, being appalled regarding the situation of 221 and simultaneously unimpressed by the threat of a non-molestation order delivered by two probate solicitors, of all people, had looked into it himself and discovered the story: After Sherlock's death and John's departure from Baker Street, Mrs Hudson had gone into a depression severe enough that she had stopped caring for herself, or the property, a thing not noticed by anyone until the days she fell down the steps, broke her wrist, and exacerbated her already troublesome hip. Upon returning home, the current tenants off flat B found her at the foot of the stairs where she had been lying in agony for hours. They called for an ambulance, which took her to hospital, and there called the only family she had left: a niece in Norfolk.

It was agreed—between the doctors and the solicitors and the Woodhouses—that Mrs Hudson, though expected to make a more-or-less full recovery, was getting on in years; and that, should ever the time come when it appeared her mental faculties were waning, when her decisions became questionable and her wellbeing compromised, the Woodhouses would step in, exercise power of attorney, and take over the decision-making on her behalf. She resisted such actions, in the beginning; but the Woodhouses and the doctors and the solicitors persisted, and in time she was persuaded. There was no one else to look after her, after all. Those she would have thought to entrust herself and her property to were now gone, either dead, or haunted by the dead. She signed the papers.

Several months passed without incident. Then, Sherlock Holmes returned from the dead. Not long after, stories circulating around Mrs Hudson's tenants began to emerge, and the Woodhouses, suddenly concerned, decided to act. They came for her one day, in the morning, before Sherlock and John returned from hospital. She had thought her family were coming only for a visit, to take her out to breakfast and maybe a ride in the country. She had gone willingly, happy to see the niece who so seldom visited, wishing they had brought the children. They left London and drove north, and it was only then that they told her they would send for her things, but they wouldn't be turning back.

'That's kidnapping!' Sherlock protested, at the conclusion of Lestrade's report.

'We'll get this sorted, don't worry, Sherlock,' Lestrade said. 'Mrs Hudson hasn't even been seen by a doctor yet. They'll need one to attest to her mental health before any of this can be legal, strictly speaking, and you know she'll come out right as rain. But right now, there's a lot of legal tape, and the Woodhouses are concerned she might try to contact you. So they're restricting her from using the phone or internet. But we'll get this sorted. Maybe, though . . .'

'What? Maybe what?'

'Maybe, until we get our end sorted, it would be best that Mrs Hudson stay somewhere . . . safe. For now.'

John said very little about the whole ordeal, but he was clearly fretting over it, especially when he learnt that Mrs Hudson had been so poorly at the time, had taken a bad fall, and he'd not even known. No wonder she had asked him for prescriptions for her pain meds, in the aftermath. He'd been under the impression that they were for arthritis, but he should have asked. He'd been so lost in his own haze of sorrow and anger that he hadn't taken the time for her.

Maybe, thought Sherlock, they would actually talk about it, now. Over tea. Just the two of them. Or maybe John would want to talk about the session, though more likely not. John made very little mention of therapy outside acknowledging appointments, as if determined to pretend that whatever happened in Dr Thompson's office had no bearing on his real life. Sherlock often wondered, after seeing him return from sessions haggard and depressed, time after time, whether it was ultimately doing him any good. For a few weeks, it seemed like it had, but lately . . . Well, it had been a bad week. Only a week.

The hour struck, then passed. At five after, Sherlock shifted in his chair a little restively, head against the window to look further down the street, but it wasn't just the angle that was obstructing a clearer view; it was the swirling snow. He took his new mobile out of pocket and set it on the table in front of him, waiting for it to light up, wondering how long to wait before he texted.

At ten minutes past, he took the mobile in hand again and stood, leaving his coat (more of a jacket, really; he was running out of proper coats) behind while he stepped out of the bistro to scan the street from a better vantage point. They'd agreed on three o'clock, as always. Hadn't they? He sent a quick text:

I'm at the bistro.
On your way?
SH

But another three minutes passed, and there was still no sign of him. His phone remained quiet.

So he called. And the phone rang, and rang, and rang.

He chided himself for his paranoia, but it was not unfounded, so there was no way he was going to stand even five more minutes pretending everything was all right. They had met at this very bistro after every session, and never more than two minutes past three o'clock. So he re-entered, returned to the table, and dropped three quid to cover the tea. While he was putting his arms through the sleeves of his jacket, a waitress approached.

'Leaving so soon, are we?' she asked. She was already collecting the coins off the table.

He double-checked the screen of his phone for any missed calls. 'If my friend comes in looking for me,' he said, 'tell him I've—'

'What, the little bloke with the cane? Been in here with you before, yeah?'

He paused with his thumb over John's name in his phonebook, intending to try him again. 'Yes.'

'Already come and gone. Didn't even pay for his tea. I s'pose you missed each other.'

Come and gone? Why? 'When?'

'Dunno. Twenty minutes. Thirty.' At his scowl, she defended herself. 'We don't make customers clock in and out, you know.'

He thanked her curtly and strode to the door, but she called after him.

'Oi, he's a mate of yours, yeah?'

He nodded sharply, as if daring her to doubt it.

'Like I says, he didn't even pay.'

Sherlock rolled his eyes and thrust a fiver at her.

'Cheers,' she said, pocketing it.

Out on the street, he put the phone to his ear again and listened to it ring. After twenty rings (John still hadn't set up his voicemail), he finally ended the call, huffing in frustration.

All right, think it through. What did he know? He'd definitely gone in to see Ella. He'd seen that himself. And left early, if the server was to be believed. Early enough to have gone to the bistro, order a cuppa, and leave before Sherlock, who was early himself, could cross paths with him. Why? He must have been . . . upset? Afraid? Pursued? Oh god, what if . . . ?

He needed more information to eliminate or verify the most likely of possibilities. Leaving the bistro behind, he returned to the office of Dr Ella Thompson.

He had never stepped foot inside before, but the smell (a mixture of sandalwood and sterility) and the watercolours on the walls (meadows and seascapes) recalled him instantly to his childhood of psychoanalysis; of doctors poking at his rare mind with questions and quizzes; of the hushed exchanges between his therapists and his mother on the other side of the room while she cast sidelong glances at him, alternating between embarrassment and displeasure; of needles and pills and IQ tests and 'behaviour nannies' and therapy games that weren't games at all but ways to control his outbursts and explain and counteract his antisocial tendencies. God, how he'd hated it. He hated this place. And he hated that John had to come here, three times a week, every week.

He walked straight past reception, ignored the girl trying to detain him with a ruffled, 'Excuse me, sir. Excuse me!', and pushed open the door to the office.

Ella Thompson was sitting with a patient, whose face was red and puffy, wads of snotty tissues in her lap. Both women stared at him in shock, aghast at the intrusion, and Dr Thompson started to her feet.

'John left your office early today,' he said, forestalling her protests. 'Why?'

'Mr Holmes,' she said sternly, 'I'm with a patient.'

Sherlock looked at the weepy woman. Fifty, maybe fifty-two, but still trying to pass as youthful given the state of her dress and heavy eye makeup, most of which was now smeared on the tissues. Recent pill addiction, given the pallor of her skin. And a current affair. The shoes told him so.

'She needs a moment to pull herself together,' Sherlock said, and he took Dr Thompson by the elbow and steered her out of the room where the receptionist, on her feet now and leaning over the desk to peer into the office, was gawking.

'I'll ring the police!' she said, lifting the receiver.

'Nonsense, Naomi,' said Dr Thompson, removing her arm from Sherlock's soft grip. 'Mr Holmes and I just need to have a quick word.'

She directed him now to an adjacent room set aside as a parlour and closed the door. There, they faced one another squarely. 'What's the matter, Mr Holmes?'

He hated to repeat himself, but he knew that his first inclination to snap at her was mostly due to a building sense of panic, and he didn't want to acknowledge that sensation by displaying its signs. 'Your session with John terminated early today,' he said.

'Yes.'

'Why?'

'You know I can't talk about that.'

'Did he terminate? What time did he leave? Was he upset?'

'I protect the privacy of all my patients, Mr Holmes. John is no exception.'

'He's missing. We meet after these sessions at the corner bistro, always at three o'clock, but he wasn't there when I showed; he'd left already, and now he's not answering his phone. I don't need the details. I just need to know three things: who terminated the session, what time, and was he distressed? You'll violate no confidences with that.'

He watched her eyebrows pinch a little as she considered him carefully. 'It's not quite half three. Don't you think it's a little premature to declare him "missing"?'

'I do not, in fact.'

Again, he let her think. Then she walked over to the phone sitting on a side table of the room. 'Naomi, could you please get John Watson on the line?'

Sherlock suppressed a huff of annoyance. He turned to the window where the snow fell softly on black London streets, watching cars roll by and people hurry along. He vainly hoped that he'd see John among them, but of course he didn't.

A few moments later, Dr Thompson said, 'All right. Thank you.' She hung up the receiver.

'Not answering, is he?' Sherlock said stiffly.

She took a long breath, debating whether to speak. Then, 'John was upset, but not distraught. I would not have let him leave my office otherwise. Things did not go so well today, and he's frustrated. He chose to leave early, at about twenty minutes into the session.'

'About?'

She smiled kindly at him. 'It might have been twenty-one.'

'And you can't tell me anything about the session? What might have brought it on, the general subject matter?'

She shook her head. 'No. I'm sorry I can't be of more help. All I might suggest is that he went home. He may have been seeking the comfort of a more familiar place.'

He nodded sharply and started for the door.

'Mr Holmes,' she said.

He turned back.

'Trauma, the kind John is suffering, can feel dreadfully isolating. But it touches everyone who cares for him, and it can be hard on them, too.'

'I'm fine. I don't need'—he waved a hand at the room—'any of this.'

'That's not what I am saying, exactly. Thing is, it's one thing to be a support. But sometimes being strong means showing weakness. It might do to let him know that he's not suffering alone.'

His eyes narrowed, but he didn't reply. He had to get out of there, the sooner the better. As he left the office, he rung John's mobile again, feeling nauseous and afraid.

He returned to Baker Street alone, thinking, hoping, that John had done the same. But no one answered to his shouts as he pounded up the stairs, and the flat was empty, every corner. The sitting room, the kitchen, the bathroom, either bedroom—empty.

Sherlock swore loudly and went for his phone, once again.

'To what do I owe the pleasure this time?'

'Mycroft, I need help. It's John.'

There was a short pause on the other end. Then, 'What's wrong?'

'He's missing. It's been nearly an hour now, and don't tell me that's hardly time enough for something to have happened. Don't tell me I'm getting worked up over nothing. We meet at three, we always meet at three, after therapy, and I got there early, like always, but he'd already gone, and he's not answering his phone. I don't know why, the waitress was useless. But he might have been compelled. God, Mycroft, if they spotted him, if they cornered him, made him leave—'

'Sherlock, slow down.'

'They must have been watching. They knew our patterns. We should have met in a different place each time, somewhere unpredictable. No, I should have met him at Ella's, every time. Oh god—'

'Sherlock. Stop moving.'

Sherlock realised he was pacing erratically around the sitting room, on the verge of kicking something over or throwing something into the mirror. But Mycroft's words halted him.

'When did you last see John?'

'Kilburn. On Ashborn Road, just outside the office of Dr Ella Thompson.'

'All right. I'm having my people track his phone. If it's in one piece, we'll find him.'

If it's in one piece. He started pacing again.

'Sherlock, sit down.'

He did, perched on the edge of a chair.

'Well?' he asked, after long pause. 'Have you found him?'

'It takes a moment,' Mycroft said, not unsympathetically. 'You know that. Stop counting the seconds in your head.' This Sherlock could not do. 'Are you still scratching?'

'Are you still sneaking brandy snaps?'

'Sherlock.'

'Is that a yes?'

'Sherlock.'

He looked down at his unburnt hand, surprised to see it bleeding freely. He must have been scratching on the cab ride over, fingertips and nails poking out of the gauze wrappings and tearing through the skin of his opposite hand. Without his gloves (he'd not replaced the ones he'd lost), there was no barrier anymore to stop the damage.

'Have you phoned the police?' Mycroft asked next. He must have known he wouldn't get an answer to the last question.

'No. Not yet. I was hoping . . . I'd find him here. At home.'

'We'll find him. We will. And I'm sure he'll be perfectly safe.'

'They took him so fast, with the cabbie.' He was shaking now, unable to stop. With the phone pressed to his ear, he held his head with the hurting hand as he bent himself double and began to rock. 'They had it all planned out, every step, there was nothing he could have done. And then, just the other night, they knew, they knew, how to get him on his own. If they've planned it out—'

'Sherlock.' Mycroft's authoritative voice cut into Sherlock's thoughts again, hushing them. 'Breathe. Stop counting those damned seconds, you're not a metronome.'

Sherlock shot to his feet. 'You can't pretend this is all right!'

'I'm not. And I promise you, we'll move heaven and raid hell to find him again. But you're letting your feelings cloud your thinking again. You cannot do that.'

'My mind is perfectly clear!'

'Then why haven't you called Lestrade?'

It was the first time Lestrade had even crossed his mind.

'He has resources,' Mycroft said.

'You have resources.'

'And he's good at his job. Don't be so quick to discount him.'

'I'm not—'

'You're not alone in the world, Sherlock. Not anymore. Neither you nor John.'

'What? What's that supposed to mean?'

'Mummy was wrong.'

Sherlock almost threw the phone. Instead, his grip on it tightened. 'Don't. Not right now.'

'I was too. The evidence is clearly to the contrary, so you need to stop thinking like that.'

'Evidence? The city hates me, Mycroft. Everyone wants me dead, and to be the one to do it.'

'Not everyone. There are those who are on your side, who always have been. They are why you are alive today, and why John is, too. Do not forget them.'

'I—'

'Ah! We've found him.'

Sherlock almost cried. 'Where?'

Mycroft read out the address on Ashborn Road; immediately, Sherlock pulled up the map in his head.

'That's the bistro,' he said. 'He's gone back.'

Finding a cab to take him back was a tricky affair, as most empty cabs now made a habit of avoiding his stretch of Baker Street, a thing the neighbours hadn't failed to notice. But on the promise of double fare, he convinced one cabbie to hurry him back to Kilburn. By his estimation, John had not been seen by anyone in nearly two hours.

He was constructing the most likely of scenarios: John's session had not gone well. Dr Thompson had said as much. So he had left, arrived early at the bistro, and ordered a cup of tea. But whatever had upset him, whatever had wormed itself into his mind, only aggravated him further while he sat at the solitary table—he needed to get up and move, cool off, calm down. So he had gone for a walk. Perhaps he had lost track of the hour; perhaps he was not yet ready to talk about it. His phone was on silent, in a pocket, so he had missed Sherlock's calls. It's why he wasn't answering his calls now. But return he had. He knew the bistro was their rendezvous, and he would wait until Sherlock came.

Yes, in the end, it all made perfect sense, and Sherlock was perfectly willing to concede that he had overreacted.

He wrenched open the door, and the cold and snow swirled indoors alongside him. His eyes swept the tables.

But he didn't see John.

The clenching fear once again began to encroach. He walked the floor, end to end, and checked the loo. Nothing. Yet again, he went for his phone and called John's mobile.

A familiar ringing came from the rear of the bistro.

'Oi, Dean, it's that damn phone again. It just won't shut up.'

'It's locked. I can't figure out how to turn it to silent.'

'We should just flush it, eh?'

The voices emanating from the back room broke out in hysterics. With the speed of a storm, Sherlock crossed the room to the swinging door and pushed past the sign reading Employees Only where he found the waitress from before and a young man in an apron, holding John's phone. They were laughing together as the kid tapped futilely against the locked screen.

He tore it out of the kid's hands.

'Whoa, hey man. I didn't know it was yours!' The kid held up his hands in surrender.

'Where did you get this?' Sherlock demanded, shaking it in the kids' face.

'Ease off, mate,' said the girl.

'Found it on the table while I was doing the washing up,' the kid said. 'I wasn't stealing it, I swear. Put it in lost and found, but it's been ringing like a fire's gone off somewhere. Can't figure how to turn it off.'

Sherlock punched the password and unlocked the phone. Then he swiftly scrolled through all the missed calls. All but two had been his—the one from Dr Thompson's office . . . and one from Mycroft. The reality hit him. This had been in the bistro all along. John had left it behind.

His heart stopped beating.

'Come back for your gloves and stuff too?'

'What?'

The kid turned to a box that was set by the door. 'Found some other stuff left with the table,' he said. He pulled out John's scarf, hat, and gloves. Sherlock took them numbly.

'And you didn't see him leave,' he asked, trying to keep his voice steady but hearing the ever-increasing number of seconds ticking by in his head.

The girl began to shake her head, but the kid answered, 'What, the fellow with the cane?'

Sherlock nodded tightly.

'Yeah, I seen him go. Seemed to be in a rush, you know? Didn't pay, and didn't look too happy. Left with a woman.'

Sherlock's brain whited out for a moment, and all he heard was an internal protest, like the high-pitched scream of wrenched metal. 'What woman?'

'Never seen her before.'

'What did she look like!'

Images of Irene Adler conjured suddenly in his mind: hair the colour and sheen of a raven, skin cold as alabaster, eyes sharp as steel. His heart squeezed and drained of blood.

'Dunno, man, I wasn't really looking,' said the kid.

'Weren't looking?' He couldn't fathom such an answer. Idiot boy!

'Hey, a bloke doesn't always look, you know,' he said. Then he straightened and said proudly, 'I got a girlfriend.'

Sherlock scowled and spat bitterly. 'You call your right hand your girlfriend, do you?'

He turned abruptly, leaving the boy standing dumbstruck and the waitress keeled over with laughter.

He called Mycroft, whose people were already tracking CCTVs.

He called Lestrade, who wasted no time putting out a description and dispatching units.

He wanted to call Molly, but could fashion no reason.

Not knowing where to turn or what he was looking for, he began a wandering, frantic, trackless search. The snow was already collecting in a thin blanket of white on the ground, driving pedestrians indoors or into cabs. So how he came upon it, he could not fathom. He had no reason to take a right out of the bistro other than inclination, no cause or clue to take the first corner, and no need to cross the street where he did. But looking down, in the gutter, he saw a twisted bar of aluminium, crushed almost beyond recognition but for the hard rubber grip, which remained intact with the imprint of John's clutching fingers.

Oh god oh god, he thought.

John had left behind his phone, hat, gloves, and scarf—he'd been forced away, hurried away. By a woman. The woman. He had dropped his cane. Sherlock's mind exploded with visions of John being wrested into the boot of a car or the back of a transit van, his cane falling into the street, being crushed by rushing tyres, and landing ultimately in this very gutter. How long ago? How long! An hour? More? Had Sherlock been sitting placidly in the bistro the whole while, stupidly ordering tea and watching the street in the wrong direction while an unmarked vehicle stole John away?

Don't kill him, he thought desperately. Please. Oh god oh god, let me find him alive.

He waited for his phone to alight with a cryptic text, a horrific photo, a threatening call.

He felt like he had been waiting for it for weeks. Years. A lifetime's worth of fear culminating in this moment.

His eyes burned as he stood there on the pavement, the snow whipping around him, and he began to tremble.

Then the phone lit up in his hand, and his heart jumped.

But it was Lestrade.

'Sherlock, you there?'

He had forgotten to speak. 'What do you have?' he asked weakly for lack of breath.

'Okay, listen, it's not confirmed, but I got a possible sighting.'

'Tell me.'

'An emergency dispatcher received a call from a barman about thirty minutes ago. A man matching John's description had been jumped just outside his pub. Four men tried to mug him, but he had nothing on him, so they started to beat him up instead. A bunch of blokes from the pub put a stop to it. Officers arrived to get statements from witnesses and the victim who called himself John but gave no surname, declined to go with the officers, and refused any kind of medical treatment. Afterwards, my boys heard the description of a missing person come over the radio and phoned it in. I can send them straight back, Sherlock.'

'What's the address?' he asked. Blood rushed to his brain so quickly it was making him dizzy.

Lestrade gave it to him, and Sherlock mapped it out in his head. It wasn't far. If he took a cab, he could be there in less than ten minutes.

'Was he still at the pub when they left him?'

'Yes. He was okay, they said. He was just fine.'

'Don't send the cops,' said Sherlock. 'I'll go. If he's not there, or if I need you . . . I'll call again.'

'I won't call off the search just yet.'

'Thank you.'

Sherlock lifted his arm to hail a free cab, but it sped straight past him and into the white.

The Poor Sailor was a hole of a run-down pub tucked down a narrow byway in a shadier corner of the city. Half of its neon-lit sign had gone dark and its sills were crusted with grime, rather like its clientele. But Willy Myers hardly noticed these things anymore. It wasn't his problem, he didn't own the place. He just poured drinks and wiped tables and made sure the lads didn't get so pissed they were in danger of alcohol poisoning. That, and he broke up fights, like the one that happened tonight. Only this time, it had taken place just outside, not inside, the pub.

Four against one were hardly good odds, but what was more, the punching bag was a sorry sod of a cripple without a pound to his name and smaller than his assailants, who were just some low-life needle dicks. Willy and the boys had come at them hollering and broke it up fairly easily (they were cowards, really, when it came straight to it) and helped the man inside. It wasn't easy, given that every time someone tried to touch him, even just an arm, he flinched or jerked away. So they kept a respectable distance—far enough away not to make him nervous, close enough to catch him if he fell. Despite the man's monotone assurances that he would be fine, Willy called 999.

Even after the coppers had collected descriptions of the attackers and gone, the man who called himself simply John had given no indication of leaving. Instead, he had disappeared to the toilet for a good fifteen minutes and come back red-eyed and limping, bottom lip still split but no longer bleeding, and sat himself at the bar, saying nothing, even when Willy asked if he could get him a drink on the house or call someone to come get him. Just a slow shake of the head. Willy couldn't remember seeing anything sadder in his life, though he didn't understand why he thought it.

More minutes passed, with Willy watching the man concernedly out of the corner of his eye while he served other customers and wiped down the bar. What would he do, come closing time, if the man was still here? Call the police back, he supposed. He didn't feel right turning the man out into the cold with no money, no phone, maybe nowhere to go. He tried to imagine what had happened to the poor sod. He was dressed well enough, clean shaven, nice coat. Not a homeless bloke, not yet, at least. But maybe he'd been sacked. No, that couldn't be in. The blokes who came in fresh from redundancy were angry, not sad. Maybe he'd lost someone, then. A wife—but no, no ring. A lover, perhaps. A close friend. Willy knew that look, too, and he thought maybe this was nearer the mark.

Then the stranger had put up a finger to summon him, and Willy had to lean far across the bar to hear him properly: 'Scotch malt,' the man said, not meeting his eye. And though Willy didn't want to pour it for him, not something so strong, he did, and set the glass at his elbow. 'You sure there ain't nobody you want me to call? Someone to come get you?' he asked again. This time, he got no response whatsoever.

Relief flooded through him like numbing alcohol when, after nearly an hour had gone by, someone did come for him.

Sherlock stepped into the pub, dampened, out of breath, and overheated from his unavoidable long run; but his eyes fell at once to John, as irresistibly drawn as though he were a candle in a cave, though flickering faintly. In the dim lighting, John's hanging face was cut in profile, and he was unable to make out any sort of expression. But it was him. In that moment, all of Sherlock's incapacitating fears evaporated, seeing his friend safe, and whole.

But he had to quell the impulse to rush over or cry out because his brain, an agitated, whirring mess of machine wheels and electric wires on the verge of breakdown or explosion, suddenly cranked and clunked into gear and began working properly again and he could see, from the doorway, that John had ordered a single malt scotch whiskey. His fingers were curled around the glass, which sat squarely on the bar. The glass line suggested that he hadn't taken even a swallow, but the faint, smudged, repeated imprints of a lip along the rim meant he had tried. Even as Sherlock approached, John lifted the glass and tried again, but his hand shook too terribly that he couldn't even bring it halfway to his split bottom lip before returning it to the bar, his head sagging in defeat.

What had happened since they last parted? What had Dr Thompson made him do or say or remember? What of the woman in the bistro? Why had he abandoned his cane? All these questions and others, he knew, would have to wait, because one thing was obvious above all of them: John stood once again on the brink.

Softly, but with enough sound to make his presence known, Sherlock slid onto the seat beside him. John stiffened, the only sign he gave to acknowledge him. Sherlock knew then that John was perfectly sober. But just as clear was that he didn't want to be. And one more thing was bottled: rage. He radiated it. Perhaps no one else in the pub could see it, sense it, but Sherlock knew something delicate and volatile was storming inside of John. He just didn't understand it.

Cautiously, Sherlock set John's phone in front of him, but he didn't even look at it; his eyes were fixed on the mirror of the stagnant amber liquid.

He thought of ordering a drink, just to sit alongside John and nurse a glass in quiet solidarity. But, he thought, perhaps it was wiser not to draw attention at all. Fortunately, the barman, seeming to sense their need for privacy, kept his distance, though he couldn't help but cast sidelong glances in their direction.

A long minute passed while Sherlock contemplated what ought to be done, what he might say, or how long he should sit there saying nothing. In the end, though, he didn't need to decide. It was John who broke the silence.

'Did you know?' he asked. His lips barely moved, and Sherlock might not have heard him had he not so long been attuned to John's frequency.

But hearing didn't translate to understanding. 'Did I know . . . ?'

John lowered the zip on his coat and reached inside. He pulled out a single sheet of white paper, a little rumpled, folded twice. Carefully, treating it as if it were brittle, long-aged parchment, he unfolded it and lay it flat on the bar. Then he slid it down along the bar for Sherlock to see.

He saw right away that it was a photocopy of a form, full of boxes, lines, tight template text, and typed and handwritten responses; it took him less than half a second after that to recognise that it was a coroner's report, like the hundreds he had seen before. His eyes snapped to the line at the topped marked Decedent and read the name Morstan, Mary Sadie.

He felt his stomach plummet and his throat go dry.

Eyes closing, John asked again. 'Did you know?'

And then Sherlock knew what he was asking, exactly what he was asking, before his searching eyes even found the pronouncement, below the boxes labelled External Injuries and Internal Injuries and Determination of Cause of Death, to the list of pathological assessments, including lab results. He remembered—sharply, the cutting of a razor—what Molly had found in the blood work, and there it was, typed in bold ink, that which the autopsy had later revealed—1.6 centimetres long, a mere 1.13 grams in weight, an estimated eight weeks' gestation.

His breath was hardened like a stone lodged in his chest as he shifted forward in his chair, leaning close to John. For a moment, a hand hovered at John's shoulder as he debated whether he should touch him. He let it rest on the back of the chair instead.

'When we found her,' he said gently and in a tone so low he ensured that only John could hear him, 'Molly ran tests . . .'

With that, John abandoned his drink and was suddenly marching for the door. Startled, Sherlock scrambled to collect both John's phone and the coroner's report he had left behind and followed after him into the cold.

The leg was surely unforgiving in its pain. From behind, Sherlock saw how he hitched forward asymmetrically, leaving in his wake a shoeprint and a dark line in the snow from where he could barely lift his leg and had to drag it along instead. Without the aid of his cane, he nevertheless moved at a precipitous speed on the slippery pavement on which he was sure to collapse at any second.

'John,' said Sherlock, hastening to catch him up. 'John, I'm so sorry. Please slow down. We can talk. Or not talk. Whatever you need.'

'Go away, Holmes.'

'Not this time.'

'You knew!' John cried. His voice startled an alley cat out of hiding beneath a stoop, and it streaked across the street. But it also jarred something deep inside of John. He stumbled, catching himself on the side of a postbox, but the moment Sherlock tried to take his arm, he shook him off and continue on again.

'I knew,' Sherlock said. 'But I didn't know how to . . .' His voice trailed off hopelessly. He didn't even know how to finish that sentence.

'Not a word,' John said. 'Not a damn word.' He crossed the street at a corner, oblivious to the world around him, and cut in front of a car that had to slam on its brakes to avoid a collision. The car skipped on the wet road but stopped in time, and still John carried on like nothing had happened.

'Please, John, stop,' he said when they had reached the next street. 'You'll hurt yourself.'

'Molly, too,' said John, as though not hearing him. 'Who else? Lestrade? Mrs Hudson? Mycroft? The doctors and the coppers and the damned reporters—!'

'Only Molly and Lestrade,' Sherlock assured him. 'And only because of their involvement in the investi—'

'Agh!'

His leg finally gave out, and he caught himself again, this time on the brick of a building that stood on the corner of a narrow alley that dead ended in rubbish bins and wet cardboard boxes. Even before he could right himself, he flung himself down that empty byway. He was shaking so badly he couldn't move straight. Sherlock followed.

'How could you not tell me?'

'How could I, John? Knowing this, this, is the kind of pain it would cause?'

'So all of London can know, but not me?' He whirled on Sherlock, his face bright red with fury, twisted with anguish. 'She was my wife! She was carrying my child! You had no right, Sherlock, no right!' Then he covered his mouth with both hands and turned away in agony, doubling over as though ill.

'Perhaps,' said Sherlock, desperately, drawing nearer, 'perhaps you can take some comfort, however small, in knowing the foetus was then unknown to you both. Eight weeks, not even a child yet—'

John sprang upright and punched Sherlock square in the face.

He fell hard against the alley wall, and his head cracked dully on the brick and exploded in pain. Losing both vision and balance, he slumped to the ground. His sight cleared slowly, and when it did, he saw that John had thrown himself at the opposite wall. He kicked, punched, again, again, bloodying his knuckles, damaging an already impaired leg. Then he took to pacing, though he could barely stand upright, both legs unstable beneath him, one from the injury, the other from a phantom pain, returned. He pulled at his hair, scratched his neck and face; his mouth stretched wide in a soundless, silenced scream. But finding no release, he returned to the wall and beat himself against it.

Sherlock forgot his pain and scrambled to his feet. He rushed to John's side, pulling him back by the shoulder. 'John, stop!'

John shoved him away roughly with a war-like shout.

The world paused. The snow fell softly. They faced one another squarely. John's whole body heaved with furious breath and bursting heart, and he glared at Sherlock, who stood stolid but with arms spread, palms exposed. For a long moment, no one moved. Then John rushed forward and shoved him again. Sherlock fell back two paces. Again, and he rocked back but held his ground. A fourth time, John came at him with a cry of rage, pushed him back, back, again, again, a hand flat against his chest, a fist driving into his side, his shoulders, his stomach, and with every blow and cuff that Sherlock absorbed, John broke a little more, hard stone cracking, an outer shell crumbling. Tears pressed beyond the seams of his eyelids. A sob tried to tear from his throat and caught.

It was too much for the broken man, too much. Sherlock received the next weakening blow to his shoulder, but at last he grabbed John's swinging forearm and held him, pulled him close, and wrapped his arms firmly around his friend. In this unyielding hold, he crushed John's hands between their bodies and pinned his upper arms to his sides, and he held on fiercely. Still, John fought. He twisted and tried to wrench himself free, push back, undo this hold, but Sherlock was immovable. 'I'm sorry, I'm sorry,' he whispered. His arms tightened even more; he pressed John closer to his breast.

Something shattered inside of John; one need drained, and another came to life. What had seconds before been a violent impulse to get away became a desperate need to hold fast. Sherlock felt John's fists curl around the front of his open jacket in a ferocious, clutching grip. His forehead came to rest just below Sherlock's chin at the collarbone. But weariness and torment overcame him. As his full body began to quake, he unleashed at last his wild anguish, his ghastly sorrow, and with mouth gaping wide against Sherlock's chest, he screamed.

And Sherlock took it inside himself. He let that horrible cry of despair seep into his bloodstream, resound in every nerve, chill every bone. As John lay his head against Sherlock's shoulder and sobbed against his neck, Sherlock held him tighter still, until John, his strength depleted, no longer had to bear himself up at all.

There they stayed, locked in a fierce embrace, on an empty street, in a lonely corner of the world, while the snow gathered at their feet and covered them in white.

End of Part 2