Title: Bad Luck Comes in Three
Author: Pompey
Universe: ACD
Rating: PG
Warnings: mention of miscarriage
Word count: 200
Summary: Watson has had quite the year.
Prompt: July 21 – Rule of Threes
Watson had lived through more than one annus horribilis. 1880 had been rather volcanic on a personal level. 1891 . . . well, all of London understood why he was so reluctant to revisit that particular year.
But 1893 started out well - very well. He and Mary became expectant parents, his grief at losing Holmes was healing, his practice was thriving, and his new contract with The Strand was becoming lucrative.
And then, disaster. The economy, which had been rather anemic for the past ten years, worsened with the American panic which had erupted in February. The British net capital flows abroad dropped by over fifty percent. Watson watched with concern as his foreign investments dwindled just when his little family was growing.
Until it stopped growing, abruptly and terribly. Mary lost the baby in a frightening hemorrhage. Watson fought to save her life, grieving their child but knowing its fragile life was already lost. He thought he might have beaten back death when the hemorrhage finally slowed.
The next day Mary succumbed to the blood loss and shock.
And 1893 was added to the small but painful list of years Watson would just as soon forget ever existed.