CHAPTER 27: BLOODY MARY, MARY

TUESDAY, MARCH 3, 2015

'Sherlock? You still with me, mate?'

Sherlock's pale, colourless eyes came gradually into focus as he looked for who had spoken his name. For Lestrade, it was a little like watching someone waking up or coming out of a trance—the gradual brightening of a light bulb that had already been burning too long. Concerned, he stepped a bit closer and placed a hand around Sherlock's upper arm.

There was a small recoil at the touch and a look of discomfiture on Sherlock's face in the form of a furrowed brow and uninhibited frown. Any other day, Lestrade might have backed off. Not today, though. Today, Sherlock was inattentive, enervated, like he was coming on ill. He was not at all his normal self: he hadn't made a single snappy insult, not a solitary deduction. He was an even lesser shadow than the soul-starved man at the trial the day before. Today, he just stood there, insentient, while Lestrade nattered on about press reactions to the hearing and public reactions to the press.

Lestrade tightened his grip on Sherlock's arm.

'It's fine,' said Sherlock, giving his head a shake and trying to step away, but he lacked the fortitude to pull himself free of Lestrade's grasp. 'Continue.'

'You haven't heard a word I've said.'

'Of course I have.'

'Prove it.'

Sherlock's mouth fell open—a conditioned response to such a directive—but nothing came out. Lestrade waited. 'How is Molly?' he asked instead, but even Lestrade saw through it to the avoidance tactic that it was.

'I'm here, Sherlock.'

Sherlock twisted around to see Molly standing on the other side of the counter. They were in the lab at Bart's, the three of them, having what Lestrade had believed was a three-way conversation. Now he wasn't so sure. Sherlock almost looked surprised to find himself standing there, as if he hadn't remembered leaving the flat. A trance indeed.

'She's been here the whole time,' Lestrade said carefully. 'Sherlock, are you feeling well? Are you sleeping?'

There was a glazed look to his eyes and surrendering sag to his shoulders, but his skin looked its usual sun-shy pale, wearing neither flush nor sheen.

Waving away the question like a fluttering moth, Sherlock finally extricated himself from Lestrade's hold and repositioned himself in their triangle as the most distant point. 'Yes, fine. I sleep fine. Go on with'—he gesticulated vaguely between the two of them—'what you were saying.'

'I was saying,' said Molly, 'because I thought you'd want to know . . . They'll be cremating the remains.' When he didn't react, she clarified, 'That is, what's left of the body.'

'Whose?'

He really hadn't been listening. Lestrade and Molly exchanged unhappy expressions. They had stayed up half the night talking about recent revelations and the more-than-apparent deleterious effects they were having, not only John, but on Sherlock. Lestrade knew about John's nightmares, and now Molly knew about how Sherlock had been at the trial. They were over feeling guilty for sharing these things. Instead, they felt helpless, and the one person Lestrade thought had the greatest chance of successfully handling Sherlock and restoring him to some semblance of normalcy was still ignoring his phone calls.

'Moriarty's,' answered Lestrade. 'The Brooks won't pay to have it reinterred, obviously, and the state won't either. It'll be incinerated.'

'When?'

'It won't be for a little while yet,' said Molly. 'People are already crying hoax and demanding that other labs test the body as well. We'll be scattering him like William Wallace at this rate, just to prove he's really dead.'

'Still laughing at me.'

At least, that's what Lestrade thought he heard Sherlock murmur under his breath. He was sliding away again, enveloped in whatever was happening inside his head and losing track of the things and people around him. Then, from behind gritted teeth, Lestrade heard more clearly: 'Solve it, solve it. Think.'

'Sherlock.' Lestrade braced, half expecting to be physically reproved for his forthcoming suggestion. 'Come on, I'm taking you back to Baker Street. You're not well. I'll bring John home myself, when he's finished at PT.'

Sherlock shook his head again, harshly this time, as if the dust kept settling and he couldn't shake it off fast enough. Ignoring Lestrade's declaration, he said, 'His network wants to keep the people in doubt, don't you see? As long as there's doubt, Moriarty still lives. He's the cat in Schrödinger's box. So what does it matter when the box opens and nobody looks?'

'People are looking, Sherlock. They are beginning to see the truth. The Brooks won't even talk to Kitty Riley anymore, and Michaela Warner is the best thing to happen to journalism since the invention of the printing press. People all over the country are reading her article about the Bruhl kidnapping. She's unabashedly defending you in every line of that story.'

He didn't mention the slew of online comments already expressing doubts about the accuracy of the young girl's memory or questioning how a photograph disproved Sherlock's involvement. Sceptics were hard to kill, evidence or no evidence, reason or no reason. But that didn't mean they weren't gaining more to their side.

'Then Moriarty will work twice as hard to silence her,' Sherlock said.

'Moriarty's dead,' Lestrade corrected sharply.

'His people. They'll not be happy to see his body treated like a lab specimen, not if they have even half the hero-worshiping devotion of Sebastian Moran. And burning the body will be a sacrilege. Moriarty won't stand for it.'

'How sacred, really, could the man be now?' Lestrade reasoned. 'They were content to let him lie under an entirely false name.'

'Content because it was the ruse that drove me to my death, truth that remained veiled even with his own demise. A triumph. A legacy. He destroys me, and he gets the last laugh. Strip that away from him, and—'

'No, Sherlock,' said Molly.

'Yes! Think, why don't you people think?' Trembling, he took two steps back, hands out in front of him as though to keep them at bay. 'Moriarty was never about facts or truth. He was about manipulating people. Dead or alive, he is still manipulating them! If the people don't believe it's Moriarty who died on that rooftop, then it's Richard Brook who is dead, I'm the one who killed him, and Moriarty lives—and he has beaten me. He's won. But if the people agree with the facts, then Moriarty was defeated, and his people will need to make of him a martyr. Cast me as the slayer, tear down those who defend me, rip to shreds those whose demise will be my undoing. Don't you see? Any way this plays out, he's won. Alive or dead, it doesn't matter. He wins in the end.'

He was despairing. Lestrade heard it in his voice, saw it on his face. For once, he couldn't mask it. Molly looked frightened, and Sherlock looked just about ready to bolt. Surreptitiously, Lestrade repositioned himself between Sherlock and the exit.

'You give a dead man far too much credit,' Lestrade said, an edge to his voice. 'Do I need to remind you whose corpse is down in the morgue at this very moment? Whose skull was blasted apart? He designed your death, and you outsmarted him. You did. And along the way, you saved my life, and Mrs Hudson's, and John's. That was bloody brilliant, by the way. You think he orchestrated everything that came after? No. There were consequences, yes, but not of his design. He's gone, do you hear me? James Moriarty can't hurt you anymore. There's other evil at play here, so let's focus on that and stop fearing a dead man.'

Sherlock's eyes were wide and wet. Slowly, he shook his head. 'He won't let me, Greg,' he whispered.

Molly stepped forward, silent and slow. She took his arm. This time, he didn't recoil.

'What do mean?' Lestrade asked. 'I don't understand, Sherlock.'

There was long and pregnant pause. Sherlock drew in a long breath. 'He's still too real.' Hands arose, fingertips pressed to his temples. 'Every night—'

But whatever he was about to say was silenced when his mobile sounded in his pocket.

He started visibly, almost like he'd been shocked, and scrambled for his pockets, saying, 'That's John.' He dug a hand into his coat. 'Something's wrong, he never calls.' He pulled out the phone, nearly dropping it in his haste to answer. Even his usually dexterous fingers were inoperative.

'I'm sure it's fine,' said Lestrade, though his words were hollow, rather than bolstering. 'He probably just finished early.'

'He never calls,' Sherlock repeated, even as his thumb hit the screen to answer. He turned away from them, as though to create the illusion of privacy. 'John?'

Lestrade held his breath, and he and Molly drew together. She gathered a fistful of the sleeve of his suit coat into her hand and held on. Through the phone, and in that eerily silent lab, he heard John's voice come clearly through the speaker.

'Sherlock . . . This is going to sound a bit barmy . . .'

John didn't sound like he was in a panic, Lestrade thought, but his tone was unnaturally casual.

'. . . but you didn't, erm, send me flowers, by chance. Did you?'

Sherlock's eyebrows knit together. '. . . No.'

'I thought you hadn't.' A loud pause ensued. Then, 'If you're not busy . . .'

'I was just leaving.'

'Thank you.'

'But don't go anywhere.'

'I'm not.'

'Stay in the office.'

'I am.'

'Was there a card?'

A pause. Lestrade thought he heard John's voice catch, but when it came through again, it was steady. 'Just come.'

Sherlock grabbed his coat and headed for the door. Waiting for neither invitation nor permission, both Lestrade and Molly followed after him.

They found John in the waiting room, just outside Dr Harper's physiotherapy office in a far wing of the hospital, nowhere near intensive care, the forensics labs, or the morgue, which was just as well. He was alone, save for the receptionist, and he sat in a dark-pink upholstered chair, elbows locking his arms straight while he clutched his knees and stared at the floor between his legs. Two chairs away, a bouquet of flowers, cradled in a cornucopia of green cellophane, lay neglected on the seat, seemingly unclaimed.

Before the glass doors even opened, John lifted his head, as though he sensed rather than saw Sherlock's approach. His face registered momentary surprise to see Lestrade and Molly as well, but he quickly smoothed out the lines in his brow again, resuming an expression of both acceptance and resolve. He took the wooden cane in hand and pushed himself up to meet them on his feet.

Sherlock observed that John's face was a little flush, and his hairline slightly damp. This was perhaps because of his exertions during his physical therapy session, and the way he shifted the weight off his left leg to give it reprieve seemed to support the hypothesis that he had possibly overworked it today. But then, the manifestation of ghost pains might have been because of the flowers.

'All right?' he asked John, before acknowledging the bouquet that had apparently terminated John's session early.

John gave a clipped nod and a cut-off smile, eyes skipping over Sherlock's face to Lestrade's, Molly's, and back. Then he gestured toward the chair. 'You'll want first crack at it, I expect.'

The flowers were of three kinds: a small, rose-coloured periwinkle; a dark-purple orchid; and a collection of soft-white, bell-shaped blossoms growing on a narrow branch. It was the oddest collection of flowers he had ever seen, none of them the sort he would expect from a London florist, whose standard fare would more likely consist of daisies or tulips, carnations or roses. And it was their oddity that suggested deliberation in their selection. Nevertheless, Sherlock could not reason out what they suggested, precisely. He observed their arrangement, fingered the leaves, sniffed the petals—but he could make nothing of it. Not a thing. He felt like the flowers were a foreign language, and he an illiterate.

'I hope you don't mind,' Lestrade was saying to John in a low voice, as Sherlock examined the bouquet. 'We were with Sherlock when he got your call, and I wanted to make sure—'

'I don't mind,' said John, placating.

Now Sherlock's attention turned to the card, speared on the end of a long, plastic stem. It read:

For John, heartfelt condolences for your loss

He frowned. The sentiment was generic and suspiciously timed, and if Sherlock recalled correctly—though he didn't fully trust that he did—it was the only form of sympathy John had received for any of his losses since the convent. In hospital, colleagues from St Elizabeth's had sent flowers and notes to get well soon, but any sympathy cards regarding Mary, few in number though they were, the hospital staff had redirected to Samantha Hillock while John had been fighting for his life. Why this condolence, and why now?

'I had wanted to say, John,' said Molly, in a voice that seemed to be wary of breaking glass, 'but I never knew how—'

The handwriting . . . felt-tipped marker, obviously, but was it the script of a man or a woman? Why couldn't he tell? He could always tell these things.

'Don't,' said John, equally gently. 'You don't need to. Not anymore.'

'But what if I should want to?'

Slowly, Sherlock turned the card around to see if there was anything written on the back.

'Let's not talk about it right now,' said John.

'Rosemary and Thyme.' Sherlock read aloud to spare John from a conversation he apparently didn't want to be having. Then, he commented on the address: 'Roman Road near Victoria Park.'

John's head came around. 'What did you say?'

'Name of the florist, apparently,' he said. 'It's on the back of the card.'

'Rosemary and Thy— Oh.' His eyes fell sheepishly and his jaw clenched shut as he stretched forth a hand and took the bouquet away from Sherlock. 'I didn't think to look. I only read the— That is . . . It was nothing after all.' Head bowed, he read the back of the card himself; Sherlock could tell that he was holding his breath.

Standing frozen, his hands positioned as if he were still holding the flowers, Sherlock stared. Something had happened, and he didn't understand what. But if Lestrade's and Molly's identical pitying expression was any indication, he was alone in that regard.

'Problem?' he asked.

'No problem.' John answered too quickly. He sniffed and shifted his weight more fully to the cane. 'Sympathy card. No problem at all. Thing is, no one has sent any— that is, I wasn't expecting— Nothing. I shouldn't have been so startled.'

Was that all it was after all? A sympathy card and flowers. Kindly and innocuous and end of story? No, that didn't seem right. Something about it didn't sit well with him. But he couldn't say what. The pictures were usually so clear to him! Now, it was like he was looking through fogged glass. Not right, not right. He needed to discern the mystery, he needed to clear his head, he needed to think. Why could he not think!

But it was Lestrade who got there first. 'I think, rather, that your instincts are correct, John. The flowers were delivered here, weren't they? To this office?'

A quick dip of the head. 'Yeah,' John said. 'Receptionist brought them to the back.'

'And you didn't see the delivery boy yourself?'

'No.'

Lestrade did an about face and turned to the receptionist. 'You signed for the flowers?'

She was just setting the phone into its cradle. 'I did, yes,' she said, uncertain about his interrogative tone.

'The delivery boy. What did he look like?'

'Just a kid,' she said. 'Sixteen, seventeen years old. Ginger. Seemed all right.'

'Are there security cameras around here?'

She pointed. 'Nearest one's just outside the door there.'

Lestrade turned back to John. 'Likely the boy was just doing his job, but we'll check the footage. All right, who knows you're here? Who knows you have PT today, at this hour?'

'. . . No one. I don't think.'

'Then how did the florist know to deliver them, here and now? Why not send them to Baker Street?'

'Because he wouldn't have answered the door,' said Sherlock, a little clarity punching through the fog. What Lestrade was saying made sense, though he couldn't figure out why he hadn't thought that through himself. To John: 'Someone wanted to make sure you received these.'

'So what is this, a joke?' said John tightly. His face started to redden. 'God, this is a joke. Sick bastards, sending me these from Rosemary and Thyme!' He shook the flowers in a closed fist and thrust them back into Sherlock's hands.

He was still missing something. 'I don't understand . . .'

Lestrade cleared his throat and stepped a bit closer, lowering his voice as a gesture of sensitivity. 'It's not just a flower shop. It's a greenhouse and nursery. Mary worked there.'

Several things clunked roughly into place at once. The herbs Mary had grown on her windowsill, the trimmed houseplant, the books on gardening on a shelf in a flat with no garden, the inimitable scratch marks from rose bushes on the backs of her hands. He had assumed a hobby gardener, but he had never verified this. John never talked about her, and Sherlock had respected that choice and never asked questions. As for Lestrade—Mary's murder was his case; he would have learnt everything there was to know about her. And Molly. She looked unsurprised. She had known, too.

Now it made sense why John had believed, for an instant, that he had received sympathy flowers from Mary's former workplace. It made sense, too, why he was so upset now, realising he hadn't.

John straightened his coat and rubbed a hand under his nose. 'You'll be heading to Roman Road now, I expect,' he said to Lestrade, though he wasn't quite looking at anyone.

'I'll find out who ordered the flowers,' Lestrade concurred. 'I can get a credit card number, or a visual description if they were paid for in cash—'

'I'm coming.'

'I understand why you want to, but I want you to go home. You and Sherlock both.'

'No.'

'This is a police matter, John.'

'And I'm a consultant. Last I checked, my status hadn't been revoked.'

'You're not going without me,' said Sherlock, a little panicked at the thought of being left behind.

'Wasn't planning on it,' John returned.

'No,' Lestrade said again. 'I'll tell you what I learn, but I want you both to stand back from this one. Yeah? I want you to trust me to do my job. How 'bout it, John? Sherlock? Will you trust me?'

John lifted his eyes to Lestrade's. Both men recognised that look, and Sherlock thought there was something military about his stance now. 'I do trust you. But I can't stand back from this, Greg. I can't. Leave me and Sherlock behind, and we'll be two steps behind until we're ten steps ahead. I'd rather work alongside you, but either way, I'm going to Roman Road. Right now.'

He started for the door, and Sherlock followed in his wake. Lestrade called after them, half-heartedly: 'I could put you under house arrest.'

'You could,' John said, pushing open the door, not looking back. 'But you won't.'

The bell tinkled, and all four of them walked into the front end of Rosemary and Thyme: Floristry and Nursery. The air was warm, fragrant, and a little dewy. John held the bouquet, Sherlock held the door, and Lestrade held Molly's hand at the fingertips, just briefly, until they had cleared the threshold and he became all business again: a detective inspector of New Scotland Yard investigating an 'incident'.

'Oh my God, it's John Watson,' said the man behind the counter, a splayed hand over his heart. 'Janelle!' He raised his voice to call to someone in the back of the shop. 'Come here! It's John Watson! Mary's John!'

Sherlock's eyes darted quickly to John, to discern whether such an announcement was objectionable or upsetting, but if he was bothered, he hid it well. In the time it took for John to approach the counter, Sherlock, trying to grease the wheels turning too slowly in his head, had grazed the twenty-something shop attendant from the top of his spiky, bleached hair sporting a single blue streak down one side, past the 1950s' retro bowtie, to his multi-coloured braided belt. A fashion boy who hadn't made it in the industry and ended up at a flower shop, a second choice, or possibly a third after cake decorating. He held a length of pink ribbon in his hand, which he was fashioning into a carnation-style bow to affix to the three long-stem roses lying on the countertop. Harmless.

'Freddy, wasn't it?' said John, setting the bouquet on the counter beside the roses.

'Oh my God, how are you?' said the young man, Freddy, hand still over his heart. He glanced quickly at the flowers with an o-shaped mouth before continuing to explicate his astonishment. 'We haven't seen you in ages and ages. We've just been so torn up around here, ever since we lost Mary. A sunbeam, that's what she was.'

'Yes, she was. Thank you. Um.'

'Oh John!'

They turned and saw a middle-aged woman in a green apron coming from the back. Her hair was shorter than Freddy's, grey and brown, and she wore red rectangular frames. She came right up to John and embraced him, but she seemed to sense more quickly than Freddy that the company he kept precluded this from being a social visit.

'Forgive me for not coming by sooner,' John said.

'No no, not a word of apology from you,' said Janelle. 'We know this has been harder on you than on us. Tell me. How was the funeral? We arranged with a florist in Calgary to have a wreath sent, but we never heard anything.'

John's smile was pained. 'I wasn't able to go, I'm afraid.'

'Oh.' Janelle looked embarrassed now. 'Sorry, I shouldn't have—'

'It's fine.' John was saying that an awful lot lately, Sherlock thought, and never once did he believe it. 'Listen, Janelle, I was wondering if you could tell me about these flowers. They were delivered not quite an hour ago, and—'

'Oh, you're the John at St Bart's!' said Freddy. 'God, if I'd known, I would have spent more time on the arrangement. Added some baby's breath or Queen Anne's lace . . .'

'We need to know who ordered them,' said Lestrade, fishing into his pocket and pulling out his ID. 'Detective Inspector Lestrade,' he said. 'New Scotland Yard.'

Both Janelle and Freddy went owl-eyed. 'A detective?'

'When did the order come in?' Lestrade said, likely used to such a reaction after so many years in his profession. He pulled out a notepad next and flipped to a blank page.

'Uh, first thing,' said Freddy. 'We'd not been open five minutes. First customer of the day. Nine o'clock.'

'Man or woman?'

'Man.'

'Describe him.'

'Uh . . .' Freddy ran a hand down the front of his chequered shirt and looked to the ceiling, thinking. 'Not so tall, a bit scruffy, dark beard you know. Wore a coat that was too big for him, ratty parka with the stuffing coming out at the seams. Grey or green, I don't remember. I thought he might be homeless, you know, but he had a wad of cash on him.'

'So he paid in cash?'

Freddy bobbed his head. 'Handed me five twenty-pound notes.'

Lestrade looked up from his writing. 'How much were the flowers?'

'Ninety-six pounds thirty.'

'Jesus, for flowers? For that?' He stabbed his pen at the bouquet John had set on the countertop.

'Been a while since you've sent anyone flowers, eh?' said Molly teasingly.

'He requested some pretty unusual flowers, detective inspector,' said Janelle. 'He came in with a list, didn't he Freddy, and he was adamant that we stick to it to the letter.'

'Do you have the list?'

'No, he took it with him.'

'What else did he say? Every detail you can remember.'

There was a loud pause. Sherlock was staring blankly into a pot of marigolds while he tried to concentrate on the questioning and suss out the wheat from the chaff. He felt the pause more than heard it, and he shifted to looking at Freddy, who was now looking at him with an expression of great chariness.

'You're him, aren't you?' he said. 'The fake detective.' His eyes jumped to John, looking suddenly afraid for him. 'The papers, they said—'

'Please just answer DI Lestrade's questions,' said John tightly.

'Oh right. Um. The bloke.' But Freddy looked distinctly nervous now, and Sherlock thought to himself, I shouldn't have come after all. 'Well, he didn't say much. Came in just after nine, like I said. Handed me a paper with the flowers written down, and—'

'Written by hand?' asked Lestrade.

'Yes.'

'Could you tell if it had been written by a man or woman?'

'I wouldn't know.'

'Go on.'

'He seemed real edgy, so I asked him if they were for anyone special, you know, just trying to be friendly, put him at ease. But he kept looking out the window while I was doing the arrangement, like he couldn't wait to be gone. But they were sympathy flowers, weren't they? So I just thought he was acting that way because, you know, he'd lost someone.'

'Was there anyone out there waiting for him?'

'Not that I saw.'

'What did he say when you asked who they were for?'

Freddy nodded at John. 'He said, "They're for John." That was it. Didn't say who John was, of course, no last name or anything, no relation. And he had me write the card.' He indicated the card still stuck in the bouquet. 'I wrote it, just as he told me.'

'He dictated.'

'Yeah, but the words were also at the bottom of his little paper. He said my handwriting would be more legible than his, and that I needed to write it exactly, word for word. Then he said he needed them delivered.'

'What were his exact instructions?'

'I wrote them down,' said Freddy. He opened a ledger book and found the pertinent page. 'St Bartholomew's hospital, physical therapy ward, office of Dr Westley Harper, care of "John". To be delivered at 13.30 precisely.' Freddy looked up. 'He paid and left, and I put the flowers in the refrigerator to keep them fresh.'

'Lucky he came to us,' Janelle added, 'because he couldn't have ordered those flowers at any other shop. They're not exactly common in bouquets and deliveries. They're blossoms from bushes and trees. I tried to tell him no, in fact, but he insisted. Seemed a bit, erm, unstable, if you follow me, and I didn't want to push him.'

Lestrade's pen hadn't stopped moving since Freddy started talking. 'Tell me about the flowers.'

'We grow them in the greenhouse,' said Janelle. 'They're not indigenous to Britain, so we have to regulate the conditions they grow in. Humidity, light, UV, that sort of thing.'

The pen stopped. 'Show me.'

'Of course.' She began to turn, but she paused. 'John, can I find you a chair? Maybe get you off that leg for a bit?'

Sherlock doubted that anyone else could see it (maybe Lestrade), but Sherlock recognised clearly the expression of tightly controlled affront hidden behind John's mask of complacency. 'Thank you, no,' he answered. 'I'm fine.'

Janelle led them to the back of the shop, past the bonsais and decorative ferns, the snapdragons and birds of paradise, the lilies and daisies and tulips and carnations and roses, through sliding glass doors and into a large greenhouse, which they hadn't seen from the street. It was like entering a sauna—the humidity and the heat made Sherlock's already heavy head swim, and he loosened the scarf around his throat. The cement beneath their shoes was wet and sloped so the water could slip into drains spaced evenly throughout the greenhouse. Visions flashed in his mind of a different drain, spotted with blood, set immovably in orange titles, and he halted abruptly at the end of their queue while he waited for the vision to clear. He looked to John, but John was looking directly ahead. No one noticed his pause.

She led them first to the periwinkles.

'Catharanthus roseus,' she said. 'Native to Madagascar. They're ornamental, for gardens, primarily. People around here like to plant the shrubs along their walkways come spring. We hardly ever use them in bouquets. Once, a bride wanted them, but that's the only time I can remember.'

'Is it, I don't know, poisonous?' asked Lestrade.

Janelle smiled. 'Only if you eat it. Historically, it has been used medicinally, but I don't think it is anymore. I don't know much about it beyond that. I mostly just know how to grow it.'

All right, think! Sherlock coached himself. You can do this. He started making new files in his head. Flowers—botany and flower lore—had not held much interest to him before, so his own data was shoddy at best, the files old and dusty. But it was critical that he see the meaning behind that selection of flowers. They were symbolic, of course they were, but how? He quickly ruled out their colouring (pink, white, and purple) as inconsequential at best, or coincidental at least. It had to be something else.

'All right. And how much would these run you?' asked Lestrade.

'Not much, these,' said Janelle. 'We used five in your bouquet, John. Ran less than ten pounds.'

'Show me the next.'

They continued on down a row, turned left in the middle, and came to the edge of the greenhouse where a small tree stood in a large pot. 'This is the one he fought me on,' said Janelle. 'This is a snowdrop tree, from the family Halesia, endemic to southern China. This one is young, very young, but she's already blossomed, as you can see.' She pointed to the white blossoms like overturned teacups hanging in clusters from the individual branches. 'He wanted a branch! You can see where I finally relented. I hate to trim them so young, especially if it's a healthy tree, but like I said, he was getting agitated. So I gave it to him, one small branch. I charged him fifty quid for it, too.'

'And is there any medicinal value in these?'

'Not that I know. They're primarily ornamental. Like the periwinkles.'

Lestrade was asking useful questions, questions that, to his great frustration, were making no appearance in his own head. Sherlock scratched toxicology off his list of subjects to pursue. But was it their origin that was significant? Madagascar and China? What did one have to do with the other? There were so many plants that could come from either location. Why the periwinkles? Why the snowdrops?

'Last one,' said Janelle, and she led them to a table on which stood a row of the spidery, dark purple orchids. 'They're expensive, so he bought only one. From Belize, Prosthechea cochleata. Known as the black orchid natively but around here, it's more commonly called the cockleshell—'

The word pierced Sherlock's brain and exploded like a supernova, whiting out his vision and ringing in his ears. The pages of the Peter and Iona Opie Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes fanned their razor-sharp corners into the folds of his mind like a thousand miniscule paper cuts as he combed the tome and sought to recall the pertinent rhyme. Simultaneously, dozens of web searches arose before his eyes, obscuring his vision of those pages and providing an onslaught of information from countless hours of research over the last six weeks. Research from decades before surfaced too, casual reading in his father's library, his mother's horticulture books. And more: conversations with John echoed in one ear, with Lestrade in the other, as fresh as if he were hearing them for the first time.

'. . . all of them have to do with falling.'

'Yesterday, we discovered'

'. . . our dreams haunt us when we're awake.'

'that some evidence recovered'

'. . . our names are in their deaths.'

'from the convent'

'Get me out of here, Sherlock. Please.'

'has gone missing—'

'—orchid.'

'Damn it, Lestrade!'

He staggered backward, his hands clutching the sides of his head. A sharp pain pulsed deep within the cavern of his skull. He pressed his palms into his eyes and away, trying to clear them, but everything was bursting stars.

'Sherlock?' said John, his voice suddenly very near. Had John been so close before? Or was his hearing overly sensitive? He felt someone take him by the shoulders. 'Sherlock, what's wrong?' The voice echoed, fading, swelling, fading again.

'I know what he wants with me. I've known it all along . . .'

'You want insight into the machinations going on at Scotland Yard, you need me.'

'He was behind you, all the time behind you!'

'. . . men with malice in their hearts and blood on their hands.'

'He's coming on ill,' said Lestrade. 'He wasn't looking so good earlier.'

'Is there a chair somewhere around here?'

'We should take him home, let him rest—'

'No no no,' said Sherlock, pushing the heel of his hands more firmly against his temples, squeezing. 'Three items. Three flowers. God god god.'

He felt John's hands over his own now, angling his head to pull his chin away from his chest. Hardened thumbs gently lifted his eyelids, and as the exploding black spots of ink faded away, he saw John looking up at him with large eyes, bright with concern, trying to see the state of his pupils; behind him stood Molly and Lestrade, appearing alarmed and resolved, respectively; and just a little further on down the table, still lightly fingering one of the nonsucculent leaves of the orchid, was the florist, who had just proved her usefulness.

'Now now, look at me,' said John. 'Focus. Greg, hand me that light.'

'It's Mary,' said Sherlock. 'Mary, Mary—'

'Shh, stop,' said John, a little more firmly now. He shone a light into Sherlock's eyes and away, back and away. 'Breathe, Sherlock. You're not breathing.'

'I still want to play.'

'No.'

'Don't you know?'

'No.'

'He's an amazing plaything.'

'Agh!'

'Right, we're going.'

He felt John take him by the shoulders again and turn him around, then press a firm hand against his back to urge him forward and guide him out of the greenhouse.

'It's the flowers, John,' he said. This was important, important, and he needed John to listen. 'The flowers—'

'We'll talk about it at home, yeah?'

They stepped out into the too-bright world—a white sky reflecting in the windows of the surrounding buildings, white pavement beneath their feet, snow snow snow and he was

jostled jarred jammed into the backseat an engine roared and a train quaked the earth rumbled bones weary and bending can't take the pressure bending breaking falling blood like rose petals on the pavement a gasp of stolen breath and cast in the flickering fluorescence, shiny teeth gleaming red flesh choked and quivering silverbells silver bells and silver wires it's called a stress position السجن beneath the pitiless sun, he burned bones wrenched muscles tearing like paper escape to what? he wondered, knowing that behind the bars or beyond them he was dead dead dead why couldn't you just stay dead? pretty maids, so contrary hands and knees and say hullo, Johnny and the pungency of blood urine vomit semen I do believe it is the end of the world—

'There we go, in the chair. Easy now.'

He felt himself sinking into cool leather already configured to his bony frame, and he smelt the stale coffee hanging in the air; soft lamplight pressed past the seam of his eyelids—when had he returned to the flat?

A hand touched the side of his face. He prised his eyes open, and the image before him slowly came into focus.

'Hey. Don't go too far, okay?'

John. His face was close, still trying to get a good read on Sherlock's pupils, and his voice was low. Don't go too far. John wasn't talking about leaving the chair.

Straightening, John turned aside to speak to someone else in the room.

'You're sure we shouldn't take him to see someone?' Lestrade's voice now. Sherlock's head felt heavy. He closed his eyes, squeezed them shut.

'I'll keep an eye on him. Look.' The voices softened a bit, enough for Sherlock to hear the clock on the wall ticking, ticking. Only, they didn't have a clock in this room. Did they? 'You were right. We should have let you handle this. I'm sorry.'

'Don't be sorry. None of us knew he was so unwell.'

'But I should have. That's why he needed me around before. To always make sure he was . . . Don't worry. I don't think he slept well last night, what with the trial and all. He's probably just exhausted.'

'You'll call us if things don't get better,' said Molly.

'I promise.'

'And I promise you,' said Lestrade, 'that I'll get my boys on this description. The man who ordered the bouquet was obviously a dupe, probably didn't even know what he was doing. But if we follow the trail, he may very well point us to who paid him off. I'll take the flowers down to evidence and— John? What is it?'

'God, I'm such an idiot,' he said under his breath.

Practically everyone is, thought Sherlock. Then, No, not John. Not John, no. Stupid, stupid!

'What?'

'They're . . .' His sigh was nearly a groan. 'They're from Kitty Riley.'

'Kitty Riley?' repeated Lestrade. He sounded both surprised and disgusted.

'Must be. They're some sort of apology. God, I should have guessed it. Lestrade, I . . . We should probably forget it. Forget all of it. I overreacted.'

Not Kitty. Not Kitty. Why weren't they listening to him? He was screaming to wake the dead! God, his head hurt so badly.

'Why would Kitty Riley send you flowers?' asked Molly.

'Out of guilt, I suppose.' There was something that sounded like a forced laugh. 'She was probably too embarrassed to sign her name to them, but . . . Damn, I'm such a fool. That's what this is about.'

Periwinkles. Snowdrops. Orchids. Not Kitty Riley!

Lestrade didn't seem to be buying it either. 'John, you're not making sense. That woman has a mountain of things to feel guilty about, but why would she suddenly—'

'Because of Friday.'

A slight pause. 'What did she have to do with that?'

'She, erm, tracked me down . . . somehow.'

'When? Wait. Was this right after your appointment with Dr Thompson?'

'Yes.'

'Let me get this straight. Kitty Riley cornered you on Friday. She found you in Kilburn and she cornered you.'

'That's the long and short of it,' John mumbled. 'She found me in the bistro.'

'How could she have known where you were?'

'I don't know.'

'John, if she followed you there . . .' He fell silent, working it out in his head, and when he spoke again his voice was infused with excitement. 'If she knows about your therapy sessions with Dr Thompson, she probably knows about your sessions with Dr Harper as well. And if she's gone so far as to send you messages, we can nail her for stalking and harassment.'

'For flowers?'

'If they are perceived unfavourable, as unwanted advances or an invasion of privacy, absolutely. The two charges together? That can carry jail time. Not much, not more than six months, but it's a start. It'll stop that bloody pen, at least. The Sun will be forced to sack her.'

'I suppose . . .' said John, sounding a little unconvinced. He was probably remembering Ms Riley's army of solicitors, courtesy of The Sun.

'What did she want?' Molly asked now.

'She's the one who, you know . . . gave me the report.'

'The coroner's report, you mean?'

'Yes.'

Molly gasped. 'But she wouldn't have been given access to those records! Not legally. They're sealed. No one at Bart's would have given them up without a warrant because Mary's case is still an open investigation.'

'You mean,' Lestrade started, but he stopped himself, seeming to realise something. 'I'm sorry, John. I figured you had sought out the coroner's report on your own. I should have asked—'

'It's done. Don't worry about it.'

'I have to worry about it, because if she bribed someone for those records . . . We've got her.' Lestrade sounded both stunned and thrilled. 'We have the photocopy she gave you, and your testimony. She can't hide behind stalking and illegal possession of classified police materials. Besides, she already has a prior: those photographs of the kitchen she published. The charges were dismissed, but we can charge her again under a new case.'

'You think it'll stick this time?' It was the scepticism of one who had not known a turn of fortunes in a very long time.

'I do. This time, I really do. I won't let this sit and get cold. I'm going to get right on it. Just watch, John—Kitty Riley won't be writing anything else for a very long time.'

Movement toward the door. A repetition of promises to phone, offers to help, assurances that all would be well. Then the door clicked closed. What followed felt like a long stretch of nothing, and in that silence the chaos inside his head began once again to encroach from a deep, unacknowledged place and push outward in a rhythmic throb against his skull. That's when Sherlock heard the creak of John's old chair. A foot knocked against his, gently but with intent, like the knocking on a door. And John let himself in.

Lestrade drove her back to Bart's. As much as he would have liked to, he couldn't keep her at his side while he worked, and she had her own responsibilities in the lab to attend to. The charges against her for falsifying documents more than three years ago still stood, and though no one was rushing to resolve them, it was best not to rock the boat.

As he parked the car to walk her inside, he said, 'If all goes to plan—God willing—she'll be in custody before dinner. We'll probably let her stew in jail overnight.' Then he smirked. 'Coppers don't like working past five if they don't have to. Paperwork and processing and her convoy of solicitors will just have to wait until morning, I'm afraid.'

'Look at you.'

He killed the engine and turned his head. 'What?'

'You're smiling.' She was, too, and she stretched a hand across to where his rested atop the gear lever. She ran a finger across his thumb; he felt it travel down his spine.

'God, am I?' Perhaps it wasn't the most appropriate time, or cause, and he tried to control it, but it couldn't be helped.

'Don't stop.' She leant in. 'You're quite handsome when you smile.'

'Oh?' He inclined toward her, as well. 'I should try to do that more often then.'

'I should help you find more reasons.' And she kissed him, thin lips tickling his smile, and though her touch was light, her fingers tightened around his. 'I wish I could be there,' she said without pulling away, speaking against his skin; she kissed him again, 'when you make the arrest.'

'Mm?' He put his free hand around the back of her head and slid her hair between his fingers. 'Why's that?' He drew her in, kissed her more firmly.

When she surfaced for air, a short while later, she said, 'I want'—a kiss—'to see the look'—and another—'on her rat-like face.' She pulled away to see his eyes while leaning her head into his palm. 'And to see the smile on yours.'

'God forbid I should be so unprofessional. But some things can't be helped.' He kissed her deeply, and she giggled as she kissed him back.

Before Molly, he'd never kissed someone so expressively happy to be kissed, had barely known that it was possible to kiss and laugh at the same time. (Molly was teaching him that one could do all manner of things while laughing.) It made him forget, for a moment, that he was in a parked car on the side of the road, with people passing by them on the pavement. He forgot, too, that he was an on-duty officer who needed to be about his business, detecting something-or-other. But for that moment, a brief, glimmering moment, like the sun peeking through a dense haze of cloud after a long and endless winter, he couldn't be arsed to care. Lately, with Molly, those bright patches had been coming more and more frequently, and either the weather was teasing him or spring was definitely on the way.

This was unconventional, and he knew it. They were unconventional. Their relationship, that was. Inappropriate, some might even call it. They had flirted over dead bodies, had fallen steadily in love alongside a stretch of serial killings, and had shared kisses at the news of exhumations and arrests. Perhaps that was what came with the territory when a homicide detective gave his heart to a mortuary attendant. None of that bothered him, though. If he felt guilty about any of it, it was that he and Molly were discovering such happiness in each other while their friends were mired in such seemingly inescapable misery.

'You should go while the trail is fresh,' said Molly, begrudgingly pulling herself away.

'Maybe I'll get wise and sneak a photo for you. Which would you prefer? Kitty in cuffs or Ms Riley's mugshot?'

She giggled again. 'Naughty. But both, if you can manage it.'

John had seen it before; he recognised the signs: the retreat from conversation and from direct engagement with his surroundings, the walls coming up as a preventative measure against external stimuli, the pinpoint focus in Sherlock's eyes as he scrutinised something invisible to everyone else but which he had stored away in that palatial repository of information. There was no sense talking to him at times like that. In the past, it had often just been best to leave him to it, to wait for him to emerge again having reached the conclusions he sought or having untangled a thread that had been vexing him.

This time was different. This time, he seemed lost, like he couldn't remember his way back. Not on his own. His silence in the floristry had been just about as disconcerting as his subsequent outburst, his repetition of the words flowers and Mary in the backseat of Lestrade's car on the return to the flat—something was happening inside his head, something important, but he seemed incapable of articulating it. The words weren't coming, and in his bewilderment and distress, he had again fallen silent.

'Sherlock.'

His fingers were steepled in a familiar pose, but they shook a little. Rather than his usual taut, poised position, he sat limp and legs spread. His expression was left unchanged at the sound his name.

'Are you here with me?'

Still nothing.

'I wish you would talk with me, let me in. I never said, but it bothered me, sometimes, when you didn't talk for days. Back then. I know you warned me, but . . . I couldn't help it. There were times when the things that came out of your mouth drove me up the wall, but I always preferred it when you talked. I still do.'

Sherlock blinked. Gradually, his eyes shifted, focused, this time on John. And suddenly, he was there. 'Do you?'

John blinked back, almost surprised to have gained sudden access. 'Of course I do. I don't like feeling like I can't reach you.'

'Oh.'

It was a perplexed kind of oh, the kind he used when he didn't want to admit that he didn't understand.

'You're not ill. But you don't look well.'

'I need a cigarette.'

'No, you don't.'

'Where's Lestrade?'

'He just left. With Molly.'

'Oh.' There it was again.

'I'm going to need to bandage that hand.'

'You changed the bandages this morning. That was today, wasn't it?'

'I'm not talking about that hand.'

Because Sherlock's hands had lowered to his lap, and the nails of one had begun to reblaze their familiar track across the back of the other. At John's words, they stopped.

'Why do you do that?'

His hands parted to grip the armrests. 'I don't know. A stimulus-seeking compulsion in response to a heightened state of anxiety. Maybe.'

'Or maybe it's time you talked to someone—'

'No.' He made an attempt at an appeasing smile. 'I was lying. I don't really need a cigarette.'

'Talk to me, at least. You need to tell me what happened in the greenhouse. You were acting pretty scary, to tell you the truth. And on the way home, you kept muttering about flowers and . . . about Mary.'

'John.'

He waited.

'I should have known about Rosemary and Thyme. But I didn't. I'm sorry I never asked about her. Properly, I mean. My observation-based conclusions were wrong. It may be none of my business, but I know very little about someone who was very important to you. I expected you would prefer not mention her, and I was determined to respect that, but under the circumstances . . .' He trailed off, noticing John's clenching fist. 'I've upset you.'

'No,' said John, making a sad go at a mollifying smile of his own. He flattened his hand along one thigh, flexed the fingers, tried to relax. 'It's fine. Ella, she says I need to work on talking about . . . Mary. Without getting upset, that is. I was never able to do that before. With you, I mean. I could barely say your name.' No, this isn't where the conversation was supposed to be going. He needed to pull it back on track. 'About the flowers—'

'Did Molly leave, too?'

John frowned. 'She left with Lestrade,' he repeated. 'He's taking her back to Bart's. Then he's going to arrest Kitty Riley.'

'What for?'

'All right. You're not well.' He moved to the edge of his chair, about to rise, and he took the wooden cane in hand. 'I'm going to take your temperature, and then you are going to sleep—' But as he began to push himself to his feet, he found his wrist caught in Sherlock's clammy hand.

'You were right, John. When you guessed that Irene Adler was Riley's source, you were right. They were feeding each other. Kitty knows your habits, your patterns. She knew where you would be today. She told. But she didn't send the flowers.'

John didn't stand, didn't move. Slowly, he set the cane aside. 'How do you know? How do you know they aren't from Kitty?'

'Because Kitty Riley would not have chosen those flowers. Those flowers, John, they . . . They're too specific to you. And to what happened to you in the convent. They're part of the pattern, they fit the rhymes, it's pointing to number eight, it's all happening again—!'

'Sherlock, slow down. I'm listening, yeah? I'm here. Just, just talk to me.' Gently, he extracted his wrist from Sherlock's grip and eased back into his chair. 'Go on, then. Tell me about them. The flowers, I mean.'

'You heard it yourself, John. You did. The cockleshell orchid, you heard her say it—'

'Yes. Yes, I did. But you know me. Slow brain and all.' He had hoped the simple joke might calm Sherlock somehow, but he only seemed more agitated: he kneaded the floor with the soles of his shoes and squirmed in the chair. 'Walk me through?'

'And the snowdrops. I remember now. They go by another name: silverbells.'

'Okay . . .'

'The periwinkles, too. Old maids. They're called old maids, John.' He nodded vigorously and spread his hands like he was revealing his cards, the whole deck, laying the evidence before John. When John didn't react straight away, he shook his hands violently in fists. 'Don't you see? Silverbells and cockleshells and—'

'. . . and pretty maids all in a row,' John finished, propelled by the old childhood impulse to finish a recognisable verse.

'Yes!'

'Okay. Okay, I see it now. The rhyme. Mary—' And he saw that now, too. Mary, Mary, quite contrary . . . When he spoke next, he could barely get the words out. 'The flowers came from Mary's garden. My Mary.'

'Yes.'

'That's what you were trying to say. In the car.'

'I don't remember what I said in the car. It was all noise, John, just noise, everything screaming at me, all of it, all at once, I couldn't think.'

'You're thinking now, though. Aren't you? You've figured it out, the rhyme. What it means. You said yourself that they all have to do with, you know, falling. Show me.'

Sherlock, already so pale, seemed to drain even further, making him appear almost transparent. 'Do you know the rhyme, John? Do you know where it comes from, its history?'

Whatever recollection he had of it, from school, was hazy and unspecific. In any case, his knowledge would pale in comparison to the thorough research Sherlock had probably performed in recent weeks in his quest to learn anything and everything under the sun about nursery rhymes, their origins, their variations, their interpretations. So he answered simply: 'Not really.'

'Highly contested, but there are popular theories, most of them stretching back to Mary I of England.'

'Bloody Mary.'

'Yes. Known primarily for her execution of hundreds of Protestants in her campaign to restore England to Catholicism. She burned most of the dissidents at the stake. Others she had tortured. The word garden in the rhyme is sometimes given as graveyard: How does your graveyard grow, Mary? A garden of the dead. Look at all those you have killed. And how.'

'With silverbells?'

'A euphemism, John. The flowers in the rhyme all speak to devices designed for torture. Silver bells refer to rudimentary mechanisms of iron used to extract confessions. They were instruments of unrelenting pain, like thumbscrews, or the foot press.'

John felt his mouth drying out, but he ignored his rising temperature and quickening heart. 'And . . . cockleshells?'

Sherlock looked away. 'Genital clamps, or possibly the pear choke. It bears a resemblance to the flower in both size and shape.' In a small voice, he started to ask, 'Do you know what—?'

'I know what that is,' John answered quickly. His hands were beginning to sweat, and he felt a constriction in his chest, but he pressed on. He had to know it all. 'Okay, go on. The pretty maids?'

'I'm not sure. That could refer to many things. There was the iron maiden, of course, a man-sized box of steel with spikes on the inside, though its use as a medieval torture device is highly suspect. But it may more accurately refer to the Maiden, a Scottish gibbet introduced during the reign of Mary Queen of Scots, used for beheadings. A sort of preliminary guillotine. Some scholars contend that it was she, Mary Queen of Scots, to whom the rhyme refers. She herself was beheaded. Famously, it took two blows, as the first strike of the axe failed to sever her neck entirely.'

'God,' John gasped softly. Just breathe. Five in, five out. You're not back there. She's dead, not dying. Look at the hearth, the bookshelves, the man seated across from you. You're on Baker Street. But he was so thirsty, and a sudden chill permeated the air and sank through his skin like a thousand small knives.

'We should stop.'

'No, we're not finished,' he countered. 'Tell me what you are saying. These flowers, they're what? Some sort of sick tease? A perverted gesture of courtship? Reminders? As if I haven't enough of those already?'

Sherlock held his breath, answered slowly. 'Symbols. Eight weeks ago, evidence was stolen from the Yard. Three items.'

'God,' he moaned, again, but when Sherlock closed his mouth, looking like he was about to shut up, John pressed forward. 'Three items,' he repeated, and the glare he gave Sherlock told him to finish it.

'Silverbells. Like thumbscrews or the foot press, a silver instrument of unremitting pain. The cilice.'

He could feel it now, the skin ringing each thigh—pulled tight into the teeth of the barbed metal belt.

'Cockleshells. Like the pear choke, an analogous kind of violation, represented by the underwear.'

'You need to say it.'

'No. I don't.'

'You do. Because you've never said it.'

He shifted forward in his chair, trying to relieve the sudden pressure.

'But I'm not certain about the third. The dog dish. It fits, it must, but I don't see how.'

John saw himself on the floor, the bones of hands and elbows pressed painfully into the tiles as he dipped his head to lap at the water like a dog. Just a dog.

'It's the Scottish Maiden,' he said without breath, moving his hand to shield his eyes. One, two, three . . .

He interpreted Sherlock's silence as a question.

'When a person is about to get his head chopped off, that's exactly the position he takes. On his knees.'

'Oh.' This time, there was no misunderstanding.

'Okay,' said John, dropping his hand. His voice pitched a little. 'I'm about a six right now, borderline seven. I need to stop for a moment.'

Next he knew, Sherlock was on his feet. 'I'll get us water.'

'Thank you.'

Sherlock stepped past him and into the kitchen, moving quickly. 'Are you breathing?'

'Yes.' It was laboured, and somewhat painful, but yes, he was breathing, and his mind was still his own. Nevertheless, he continued to stare at Sherlock's chair, avoiding the darker corners of the room, just in case. 'We need to tell Lestrade,' he said, endeavouring to maintain the guise of sanity through a demonstration of reason. He swallowed, and a little whine died in his throat.

'I'll call him.' The opening of a cupboard behind him. 'Any intrusive images or noises?'

'Not yet.'

'Keep breathing.' The sound of the tap, a steady rush of water. He licked his dry lips.

'God, I wish you still had your violin,' he murmured, and only when it had left his mouth did he realise he had spoken aloud.

Sherlock returned with slower steps. He passed John a glass and held one of his own. 'Me too,' he said, resuming his chair. 'But you're doing well. We'll talk of other things. Bring you back down to a two. Good?'

John nodded. He drank from the glass, deciding not to ask about how this rhyme pointed to the fall, not until he could bear to hear it. Truth was, he could see it for himself. He just didn't want to.

It had gone six o'clock that evening when the official letter was hand delivered, and with trembling fingers, Anderson set it aside and picked up his mobile even as he sank, weak-kneed, into a chair.

'I thought I told you to stop calling.'

'I'm sacked,' he said. Shit, even his voice quavered. He ran a hand down his scratchy face, across his sticky brow, smearing the sweat around. 'The inquest is over. They made their official decision this morning, and I've been served with discharge papers. They're not even calling it redundancy. They're calling it a discharge.'

He heard her sigh. 'I'm sorry, but this isn't my problem—'

'I'm out of a job! I've not been paid for a month, and now I've no work at all! I can't even afford to live in London anymore. I can't pay my bills, I can barely afford to eat, I'll lose my flat. Who's going to hire me? My face, my name, I'm all over the papers, your papers.'

'Hey,' she said, hissing at him through the phone.

'You said you would protect me! You said you would expose him for the fraud and criminal that he is, but look at me! He pummels me senseless and gets a fine, just a few thousand pounds, and I lose everything!'

'Hey. I'm not the one who told you to play it like that.'

'You said—!'

'Nothing. I promised you nothing. You're not even supposed to be calling me, we agreed.'

'Kitty, please.'

She sighed in exasperation. 'It's fine. It'll be fine. You'll be—' The sound cut off abruptly, and he thought he had lost her.

'Are . . . are you still there?'

'What have you done? What did you tell them?'

'What? Who?'

'The police are here, the DI, they're . . . What did you tell them?'

'N-nothing!'

'Dammit! Damn you, you coward.'

'It was an inquest! What could I do? They were digging, things came out, and—!'

In the background on the other end, he heard a familiar voice. 'Ah, Ms Katherine Jane Riley. I come bearing gifts. Another warrant . . .'

This time, the line really did go dead.

It was a bitterly cold March night. Bone-cracking cold, and Karim couldn't stop shivering. This coat the Christian shelter had given him, it was no good. Too small for the length of his arms, too thin for the skin on his back. Every sweep of wind caught up his sleeves and down his collar. Four winters now, and he still hadn't adjusted to this terrible climate, neither the chill nor the damp.

'Oi, mate, you're looking a bit frosted over tonight.'

Teeth chattering, he turned and saw a man approaching from around the corner. He adjusted his cardboard sign to make sure that it could be read in the orange light of the streetlamps: Cold and hungry. Every little bit helps. And in smaller print underneath: جزاك اللهُ. The man's eyes skimmed the sign quickly, then he pointed at the tiny script.

'Don't know how much good that'll do you 'round here. You might wanna try throwing something from Proverbs or Revelation instead. John 3:16.'

'I am . . . grateful for helps,' Karim said, not quite understanding. His English was still very poor, and it embarrassed him, how little he could communicate. He was fluent in three languages, was a well-educated man, could build a motherboard beginning with a single microchip, and yet this confounded English eluded him. In his own country, he had been somebody. Now? The words refugee and asylum meant so little in this country for people like him. He held out his cold hand, thinking hopefully that the man might press a coin into his palm.

'Nonsense, old boy,' said the man, instead placing a hand around his shoulders and turning him. Deftly, he removed the sign—Karim, fingers numb and uncooperative, lacked the strength to grip it—and tossed it to the pavement. 'What good would a few pence do you?' They began to walk together. 'Let's get something warmer in you, eh?'

'We eating food?' He gestured toward his mouth with his fingertips and thumb together at a point, just in case his words failed to convey his meaning.

'Oh sure. Hope you've an appetite, Karim.'

Startled, his feet came to a stop and he tried to look at the man and get a better measure of him, but he was urged along. 'You are knowing me?'

The man cast a sidelong glance at him and grinned. 'Karim Omid Niazi. Sure, I know you. I know lots about you.'

His heart skipped a beat. 'You are immigration?' He tried to pull away, distance himself. Things weren't good, but he didn't want to be deported. He didn't want to be sent back.

Grip tightening, the man steered him around a corner where the winter road stretched long and quiet. 'No need to be nervous, Karim. I'm not from immigration.'

Headlights behind them cast their shadows long and dark, but as the vehicle rolled nearer, those shadows shrank and reversed. A dark transit van pulled to the side of the road, and the brake lights glared. The back door opened. As two men jumped out, Karim panicked. He broke the man's grip, twisted to run, but he was apprehended. An arm wound round his neck and he was pulled off his feet. He kicked, but his legs were seized. He tried to scream, but his windpipe was crushed. Then he was hauled into the back of the van. The van doors slammed closed; the van rolled on.