A/N: This plotline is a week long. -csf


4.

Saturday afternoon is as trite and commonplace as they come... usually. Today, I have John's undivided attention, and he's not even expecting me to be clever. I could appreciate a life like this.

Although I might get bored.

There's a pier with a mini version of Blackpool's fairground entertainments. Slowly I gravitate us towards it, and John pretends not to notice my eagerness.

If I would have known John would take us to such a perfect hideaway last night, I'd have made sure Mycroft didn't know we were escaping our busy everyday lives. Panicking Mycroft is my fourth favourite hobby.

Maybe John is right, and I'm finally letting go.

As for John, he is missing out on some of his regular patients, including the influencer who pretended to have cancer for attention and gained mild hypochondria from all the medical articles browsing she did to keep up the lie. John is much too kind with the neurotic, washed-up types.

That hits home, and I briskly pull John towards the Ferris wheel.

'What? No! Sherlock...'

Token protestations, as he compliantly joins the short queue.

'Why on Earth would you want to go up there?' John protests, eyeing the games arcade for the third time in a minute. John has a bit of a gambling issue, born out of the unfortunate fallacy of thinking that being a great Poker player makes him excel at fixed odds slot machines. I keep him away from the lemons, dollar signs and treasure trunks.

'I would like to have a look at the town's layout, obviously,' I lie. That misdirects John's attention at once.

'You spotted another mystery,' he erroneously deduces.

'Maybe.' No.

'Fine. We'll go up and around and around for you and your mystery, mate.'

Great. Now I need to find and solve a mystery to appease John.

.

'Pirates? Are you having me on?' John scoffs.

John's the storyteller, I'm afraid.

And my brain glitches at the moment, surely that doesn't help.

'Pirates,' I assure him with determination, making our way into the local antiques shop. Silver chimes trine overhead. The long boards hardwood floor echoes our steps welcomingly. The air smells of a nice blend of old varnish, lavender soap and rosin.

'What are we looking for?'

'Anything.'

'Ugh?'

'I mean; you'll know when you see it, John.'

'Sometimes, you have far too much faith in me, mate.'

Never, John. If there's a story untold in here, you'll find it.

Ruffled yellow linen smothering cradles that once housed now old pensioners, pendulum-waving grandfather clocks with scarred Helvetica typeface numbers, elaborately scrolled metalwork in huge bird cages, rows of laboratory glassware with forgotten chemical names in labels – I sneakily shake them to see if there's any chemical left inside. I look over my shoulder, surreptitiously, but find John openly showing me a bottle of "brimstone", with a mischievous grin. Sulphur. Toilet humour, in the olfactory sense. The pungency of a rotten eggs smell never ceases to amaze even an experienced chemist.

'Lestrade never opens the third drawer of his desk. It would be too easy...'

'Sherlock...'

That tone of voice. John's voicing a jackpot on the mystery quest front.

I turn knowing already he won't disappoint.

'I don't want to steamroll your pirates mystery,' he starts, 'but I think I found another mystery for you.'

And with that he lures me to a painting of an austere gentleman with a well-trimmed moustache. In the background is an old stained glass window with intricate patterns invoking pagan deities and seasonal shifts.

I look up, knowing exactly why John has shown me this. From my pocket I extract a sea rolled bit of glass. It's deep blue and veined in a floret pattern. It also matches the depicted stain glass window.

Who insists on having their portrait painted in front of a stained glass window, documenting it for posterity, then breaks it to pieces so it can never be seen again?

.

The killer book nestles easily in my pocket (wrapped in some tin foil from the pub, lest the arsenic leaches through my jeans pocket). A portrait, on the other hand, is not quite as portable as all that. We end up getting a stupid bus to go back to where we left the van hours ago. Getting the painting onto the bus and out is also proven to be less than inconspicuous. John and I ride roughly the curves edged by miles of stone pilled walls, the portrait roughly covered by half an old sheet, between us.

'Sorry about the pirates.'

I shrug. 'There's time for that yet.'

'You're looking antsy.'

'I would require the services of an internet browser to reverse search this painting. How am I supposed to figure anything out otherwise?'

'You managed with Queen Victoria's assassination attempt, mate.'

'I took a professional interest, I read about those. But this illustrious stranger... I'm fairly sure he's not an infamous murderer consigned to history.'

John smiles softly nonetheless.

'It's old school methods, but I think you can do it, Sherlock. We'll get to the van, study the picture and—'

He interrupts his thoughts as he sees me punch hard on the stop signal. John didn't see it, but I did. It's not an old country esquire house stained glass window. It's a church stained glass window, and I just found its location.

.

'I would rather you didn't step on the peonies.'

John and I are taken back by the quiet yet sonorous voice of a young vicar, that has spotted us outside his church. John was holding up the portrait by the actual stained glass window depicting a huge angel of mercy and an outside trim of pagan deities and natural landscapes. An odd but heady mix.

'Oh, I see,' the vicar adds, comparing the two images side by side. 'You better come inside my cottage. We can talk this through with some tea.'

I look over at John. The vicar had him at tea.

.

'All the way from London? On a van?' the vicar is young and much too interested in John's weekend getaway.

'Digital detox,' John comments patiently. John's a talker and a storyteller, that's why people love him. I'm itching to ask the right questions and get to the answers. That's why people barely tolerate me.

'Actually, Sherlock thinks he's found a bit of your stained glass window earlier, at the beach. Similar to the one depicted on this painting.'

'Oh, likely the same one. That side nave window was rebuilt after the war.'

'You had air raids all the way out here?' John is surprised.

'Oh no, not quite. I was told this church was part of that gentleman's estate and was donated by his descendants. Well, half-donated to the church and half used to pay off debts. The stained glass was then refurbished from pictures and images of the original.'

'What happened to the original?'

'Actually, I don't think I've never been told.'

I thumb the blue piece of ancient glass from my pocket.

'Likely broken by some misadventure,' I comment.

'Surely a mystery,' the vicar ponders, 'just as where did the old Earl's gold carriage got hidden away. They never did find it. Nor the rest of his fortune.'

I notice John is briefly anoxic.

'Excuse me? Gold carriage?' the doctor squeaks.

'Oh yes, hence the debts I mentioned... Oh. You want to know more.'

I look on to the odd portrait of the old Earl in his youth.

'Actually, I would rather have permission to potentially dig up your garden.' I add a winning smile. 'Your peonies will remain unharmed.'

John smiles brightly at that. John is a sucker for the unnecessary dramatics.

.

'See the hand pose, John. Contrived but artistically insignificant. He's holding a piece of paper, but we can't tell what it is. The varnish sealant on the painting has darkened considerably.'

'Hence the salad vinegar and cotton bud,' John catches on quickly. 'Won't your homemade restauration harm the painting?'

'Possibly. It's paid for and Mrs Hudson says we've got too much stuff in the flat. She cited the fire brigade, from the last time they were called in to put out a fire in the kitchen.'

'Was that the pizza incident?'

'No. Microwave popcorn. You were at work.'

'Microwave popcorn? How do you even start a fire with—'

'I forgot to take out the light bulb, alright? Cut it out already! Focus, John!'

'Alright, no need to yell. Go on. Clear up the old painting, let's see what the muck hides.'

I pass him the vinegar soaked cotton bud. John's medical precision is patent as he gently scrapes off decades of varnish to reveal a map.

'What's that?' the vicar asks gently.

'The estate map. House and gardens. All as it once was, when the church was a heathen lair, and the Earl a man of worldly vices.'

I look around. Confusion is the only identifiable reaction in the audience. I sigh.

'Explain,' John cues, timely.

'Ever heard of The Dancing Marquees, John? A family chapel converted into a theatre, a fortune squandered in a mash of arts and hedonism. Similar story here. But our man stands in front of stained glass, where the angel of mercy now stands. Seen many churches with these many pagan symbols etched into the colourful glass of the windows? It's not a church window, John, no matter what we see today in the actual church. This man stood before another type of building; a theatre, a concert hall, a brothel more likely. And in his hand, the map to its location.'

The vicar frowns. 'I've not been told any of that.'

'Local stories mashed together, when descendants needed to justify a known painting, browning with time. The angel of mercy; the descendants took it upon themselves to rewrite history, clean it up a bit. This,' I tap the canvas over the map, 'is where the fortune was spent, and I bet you, it still partially exists today. Not whole,' I take up the blue piece of sea rolled glass, 'but some.'

John frowns. 'How do you know it survived any time at all?'

'Easy. Someone knew how to complete the other side of the frame on the stained glass window. The sides are not symmetrical, John. If you didn't know what was hidden behind the subject in the painting on one of the sides, you'd naturally make both sides the same.'

'So, how do we find it?'

'We follow the estate map, John. They say X marks the spot, right?'

.

TBC