Just a reminder that Arthur was a soldier and, therefore, fluent in barrack room Anglo Saxon. He also has quite an extensive vocabulary of slang names for gay people. Please don't be offended. I don't subscribe to any of them.

Chapter Fourteen

Sherlock passed from the bathroom to his bedroom, wrapped in one towel and rubbing his hair with another, when his phone rang. He picked it up. It was Anthea.

'We have CCTV of the snatch, we have four faces and one name. Marcus Frayne. He's known to us,' she announced, straight to the point. 'I've sent you an email.'

Sherlock diverted to the sitting room and sat at the table, opening his laptop and selecting Email. The link came up and he opened the file. He speed-read, to get the gist.

'MI5?' he spoke into the phone, where Anthea was still holding on.

'Formerly. We trained him but he went off-piste rather sharpish, once we took away his trainer wheels. He's been freelance for the last five years. But his specialism fits the bill.'

'Extraordinary Rendition.'

'Yes, he's been doing quite a bit of work for the CIA, lately. They like to contract out that sort of thing, wherever possible. But the CIA aren't involved here. I asked them and they said 'no'.'

'Give me half an hour. I'll come to you,' Sherlock stated and cut the connection, returning to his bedroom to dry off and dress.

ooOoo

Molly was in the family kitchen, at Colbert House, serving breakfast to her boys and herself. She had declined an invitation to the Nursery, feeling that Mycroft needed some time alone with his children. Violet was asleep in her travel cot, in Nelson, having had a rather disturbed night, clearly missing her night-time playmate, Daddy.

William was explaining to his little brother how worker bees did a waggle dance to show the other worker bees where the flowers were that had a supply of nectar.

'They point their heads in the direction of the flowers and they waggle their abdomens to show the other bees which way to go. And the length of time they waggle tells the other bees how far away the flowers are.'

Freddie listened with rapt attention then jumped down off his chair and declared,

'Like dis, William?' as he stuck out his head in the direction of the breakfast table and waggled his behind. 'How long sudd I wabble for de toast and marmayade?'

William gave his brother a bemused stare.

'Freddie, you don't need to do a waggle dance. You can talk and say, 'Look, there's the toast and marmalade.''

'Yes, but what if I watted to tell de bees where de toast and marmayade is. I would need to talk in dere yandwidge, wulda't I?'

'No, Freddie. Bees don't eat toast and marmalade. They eat nectar and they collect pollen. Wasps like marmalade but bees don't care much for it.'

'I can do de wabble dance for the wapses, den!' Freddie exclaimed.

'No, Freddie! Wasps don't do a waggle dance, only bees.'

'Den I will teach dem de wabble dance, OK?'

William was at a loss as to how to answer that. Freddie's logic was unfathomable, sometimes.

'Freddie, if you want to teach the wasps how to waggle, you do that,' Molly intervened, stroking Freddie's head, affectionately, then winked at William and mouthed,

'Just humour him, sweetie.'

William frowned and pursed his lips but let it go. He looked forward to the day when Freddie would understand things the way he did. He hoped it would come soon.

ooOoo

Arthur slid down the front of the sink unit and folded up on the cool lino floor. His stomach was empty, now, but the emetic that he had ingested, in the water, was still active so his muscles continued to contract and he heaved and retched, repeatedly, until his guts ached.

While Arthur had been rather preoccupied, hurling chunks of masticated Full English into the sink, Man in Black had brought a chair into the room and set it in front of the TV. The man now grabbed Arthur, roughly, under the arms and hauled him up, plonking him down on the chair, then standing behind him, holding his arms by the elbows in what wrestlers might call a 'full Nelson'.

Between involuntary spasms of his abdominals, Arthur growled,

'What the fuck…do you think…you're doing,…you meathead?'

'We want you to watch a film,' the therapist explained.

'Fine, I've got…nothing else on. But why…the wrestling hold?'

'We want you to watch.'

'Like I said…I'm available,' he rasped, then spat the bile that his stomach was squeezing up his oesophagus, onto the floor. 'But if he…holds me like this…I'm likely to CHOKE to death! Is that…what you want?' That last phrase was bellowed with all the vehemence his compromised position could muster.

At a signal from the man in charge, the other man let him go and he sat forward in the chair, holding his stomach, panting, retching and spitting. The other two men just stood and watched.

'Come on, then!' he barked, impatiently. 'Turn the fucking film on! I mean, that's what you brought me here for, isn't it, to watch your sordid little skin flicks?'

Man in Black walked over and turned on the TV then pressed 'Play' on the DVD player. Arthur rested his forearms on his thighs and stared at the screen. It was pretty much as he had expected. He settled down to watch, with a critical eye, as his guts continued to churn and his head swam with waves of nausea.

ooOoo

True to his word, Sherlock arrived at the main entrance to Mycroft's building just thirty minutes later. He was scanned and photographed and given an ID badge, which he refused to hang round his neck by the attached lanyard but clipped to his lapel, instead.

He was then escorted, in the ancient lift, to the third floor, where he was shown to an incident room. Anthea greeted him at the door and thanked the security man for delivering him safely, then led him over to an incident board. She didn't bother to explain it, just left him to scan it himself.

After a few moments of doing just that, Sherlock stepped back and spoke.

'Show me the CCTV of the snatch.'

Anthea led him to a desk with a computer terminal and pressed the relevant keys. The video image appeared and she clicked on the 'Play' icon.

The camera position – just above head height on the front wall of the bank – showed a view of the pavement, the road and the park. It was in black and white and a bit grainy but, when Arthur passed through shot, even though his back was to the camera, Sherlock recognised him, immediately, from his posture and gait.

Arthur paused at the crossing then jogged though a gap in the one way traffic, as it moved round the square. He entered the park and walked across the grass to a large tree, where he removed his jacket, placed it on the ground and sat on it. The view of him was now obscured by shrubbery and by the tree trunk itself, since Arthur was leaning against the far side.

A few moments elapsed, which Anthea fast forwarded. Having pressed 'Play' again, she pointed to two figures walking toward the camera from the opposite side of the park. They seemed to be heading past the tree but then they changed direction and veered towards Arthur. Anthea paused the video.

'Here, you can just about see that this man nods a greeting, as if he knows Arthur and Arthur knows him.'

She set the video running again and the two men crossed the grass and sat down, one to Arthurs left, where he could be seen in profile through the vegetation, and the other in front of the 'target', obscured by the tree.

'That's Frayne,' Anthea pointed out.

Frayne was talking, animatedly, and Arthur could be seen to raise a hand and gesture over his left shoulder. More conversation ensued then Arthur turned to point, with his right hand, toward the bank. At that juncture, something happened because Arthur suddenly clapped his hand to his neck.

Sherlock and Anthea watched as the young man seemed to freeze, momentarily, then toppled over, to his left. Frayne looked to be attending to him as one or two by-standers came over and, presumably, offered to help or showed concern for the fallen man but were waved away by the second man, who was now standing, with his back to the camera but in plain view, talking on a mobile phone.

Five minutes passed, while the two abductors went through the motions of attending to the man on the ground then two more men came on the scene, approaching from the left of picture, pulling and pushing a wheeled stretcher between them. They drew up beside the tree and all four of them lifted Arthur's unconscious body onto the stretcher. They secured his arms and legs with cross straps then the two stretcher bearers wheeled him away, across the grass and out of sight, Frayne and his accomplice following on behind.

Anthea clicked off the video and Sherlock rubbed his lower lip, processing what he had just observed.

'As ex-MI5, Frayne would be aware of the significance of Mycroft's role to British national security,' he said, at last

'Indeed. He would be a mine of information on that subject. But it seems increasingly unlikely that the Westminster Paedophile Ring has any relevance here. That cat is already out of the bag. But there are other possibilities, other things that Mr Holmes is working on, at the moment.

'Such as?'

'I'm afraid I'm not at liberty to say – I hope you understand, Sherlock, there are certain lines I just can't cross. Not even to save Arthur.'

Sherlock did understand but that didn't make it any less frustrating. He felt as though he was groping around in the dark.

'But our people are following up on those leads,' Anthea added.

Sherlock changed tack.

'Have your people apprehended this – ' he checked the name on the incident board ' – Marcus Frayne yet?'

'No. We tracked him from Waterloo, once we got a handle on him, from the image your witness provided. He went via the Bakerloo line to Baker Street and then the Metropolitan line to King's Cross St Pancras. There, he boarded the Eurostar, bound for Brussels, which departed at 14.04. We don't know where he got off. We are trying to access the CCTV from the train and also from all the stations on the route, all the way to Brussels. But he had a two hour head start, before we even knew that Arthur was missing. He would have been in Brussels by just after 5 pm – 6 pm local time – if he went all the way. Interpol are assisting us with tracking him down.'

What about the other three men?'

'Nothing known. We don't have anything on any of them on any of our database.'

That was a lot of 'any's, amounting to zilch, Sherlock thought.

'We have circulated those images from the bank CCTV to all the regional police forces – including the Met, of course – but they don't have Fax Rex so it will have to be a full facial if we are hoping to get a match and, as you can see, the images are not that clear.

Sherlock pursed his lips and frowned.

ooOoo

Arthur was no expert when it came to pornography. On the subject of sex, he was more of an active participant than a passive observer. But he had watched porn films, from time to time, with his army mates – mostly guy on girl action, obviously, and the occasional girl on girl, which for some reason straight men seemed to find quite a turn on. However, despite his lack of a comparison, this gay porn was, in his opinion, pretty piss poor.

He had been watching it for atleast an hour and finding it hard to maintain his concentration, particularly as his guts continued to heave, occasionally, he had the most vile taste of stomach acid in his mouth and his throat still burned from the passage of the vomit. He desperately wanted a drink of water but none had been offered. He'd really had enough.

Turning to the therapist, he asked,

'How much more of this do I have to sit through?'

'Oh, we have hours. It seems there are no limits for those who would debase themselves in this way, indulging in their corrupt practices, sodomising one another, fornicating in the name of the Devil.'

'Look, pal,' Arthur replied, 'you might find this entertaining but I certainly do not. I mean to say, I'm no film critic but the standard of acting here is just abysmal. There is no chemistry what so ever between these men! It's totally unconvincing! And look – correct me if I'm wrong, since you clearly watch a lot more of this crap than I do – if you're going to bugger someone you really do need to have a hard on. That guy's pecker is as flaccid as a burst balloon! That's not wood, mate. That's wooden. If you really want to turn me on, you're going to have to do a lot better than this.'

The blow, when it came, was not unexpected and Arthur had tensed his body in anticipation, but it still hurt like hell. As he breathed through the shock and the pain, he turned again to look at his assailant, and gave him his best Holmesian lizard grin.

'Touched a nerve, did I?' he hissed.

'You know, Arthur,' the therapist said, slapping the sjambok into the palm of his hand, 'when I agreed to take on your case, your father told me he thought you had been bewitched by this older man, your head turned, led astray. But I see now that this is far from the truth. You've made an evil pact with Satan himself, sold your soul to the Devil.'

'You don't fool me,' Arthur growled, through gritted teeth. 'Like so many of your sort, you're in denial.'

'I want you to know that it gives me no pleasure, Arthur, to do what I have to do, but you leave me no choice,' the therapist insisted.

'I've met your sort before, you know. You think you've got it beat but you can't deny your true self,' Arthur continued, arching his back to ease the tension and the muscle spasms that the sjambok blow had caused.

'I had hoped you would see reason, when I showed you the error of your ways but you refuse to acknowledge the truth that's staring you in the face,' the therapist sighed, shaking his head, ruefully.

'It's the eyes that give it away, every time. I can see the longing and the lust when you watch those guys bump and grind. You want to fuck them, don't you?,' Arthur went on, as though the other man hadn't said a word.

'Don't make me do this, Arthur. I beg you, take this opportunity to cleanse your soul and save yourself.'

'How old were you when you realised who you really were? I was eleven when the penny finally dropped but I had suspected for a long time.' Arthur persevered with his provocative monologue

'Take my hand, Arthur! Take my hand and repent your sins.' The other man was winding himself up into a frenzy.

'You think that by denouncing people like me you can change your own nature but you're not fooling anyone, least of all, yourself!' Arthur raised his voice to match the volume of his oppressor.

'Don't do this, Arthur! Don't reject the hand of salvation!'

'Why don't you just accept it? You know you want to! You're a fag! A queer! A shirt-lifter! An uphill gardener! A fudge-packer! You. Are. Gay!' Arthur shouted then curled into a tight ball, tucking his head in against his knees and covering it with his arms, as the enraged therapist roared his anger and rained blows down on his back.

ooOoo