Work Text:
June --, 1891
My dear Sherlock,
You will think it very sentimental of me, writing you a letter this long at my time of life--all the more so as I cannot possibly send it to you. It is doubtful, indeed, that you will ever read it at all. Well, my dear boy, the future is uncertain; and once I have committed this to paper and taken the necessary precautions to prevent its premature exposure, I will know that if I am in fact carried off by an unfortunate accident today or tomorrow or a week from Sunday, there is at least a record for posterity of the remarkable conversation that took place in the Strangers' Room of the Diogenes Club at five o'clock this evening. I have lived a long time keeping the secrets of other people; and have always, out of habit and necessity, most closely guarded yours. I have amused myself for years developing a kind of taxonomy for secrets, based on a series of graduated scales assigned to each secret's possible aspects, which I group together under the headings of Content and Consequences. Content I divide into: Strategic, Tactical, Personal, Perilous. Under Consequences: Embarrassment, Scandal, Shame, Ruin, Prison, Death, Change of Government, War. Each secret stored is plotted on a graph and assigned a file number based on its position. This system is of no utility to anyone but myself; I must have some way of retrieving information when called for, and the process of classification may as well amuse me. It is instructive, however, that I have been unable to assign coordinates to this conversation. It is personal, and perilous, with any number of potential consequences. It must not and cannot be generally known. I have determined, however, that the one person from whom this secret must not and cannot be kept is yourself.
You will appreciate my astonishment when, as I sat in the common room of the Diogenes Club with my papers and my tea, the porter handed me a card indicating that a Mr. Victor Trevor had presented himself in the lobby and requested an interview with me in the Strangers' Room. I turned the card over, and wrote a few words to the effect that before I agreed to the interview, I should like a basic physical description of the man requesting it. They are used to me at the Club, and the porter accepted my instructions without demur. A few minutes later, he reappeared to hand me another card, upon which I read the words, "Thin, pale, middle-height, square-jawed, clean-shaven, dark suit, bowler hat." I sighed. The years go by, and yet every time I ask someone for a description of even the most trivial object or event, I am pained all over again by the pathetic limitations of the ordinary human intellect. It was as if I had specifically requested a description which would be entirely useless to me from either a practical or aesthetic point of view. However, given that my chief concerns at the time related primarily to persons usually adorned with mutton-chop whiskers and top hats, and given that I had taken to keeping a small revolver in my vest pocket, I agreed to meet this man and his alias, requesting to the porter that I be shown into the Strangers' Room first.
Having taken the opportunity to satisfy myself that nobody was concealed in the room and that the walls, floor, and ceiling had not been tampered with, I took my seat in the room's largest armchair, and arranged my vast bulk in what I hoped was an imposing and intimidating fashion.
I should not have allowed myself to be surprised when the door opened to admit Dr. Watson. In my defense, the description entirely omitted the black hatband which would have revealed to me that he was in mourning, and the "clean-shaven" detail was not entirely accurate. Your doctor was, as always, embellished by his mustache; but like the rest of him, it was reduced to a shadow of its former self. You are not reading this now, and possibly will not read it until much later (if at all), and therefore the pain this description is bound to give you will fortunately be deferred to a later and let us hope happier time. I saw all the marks, large and small, of a serious illness that had lasted for at least a month and been diagnosed, at least, as brain fever, though you are aware of my skepticism regarding that malady's empirical existence. The sloppy thinking of the average medical man of our day is constantly enraging me, and no more so than when they are happy to apply the same categorical term to a whole host of ailments ranging from inflammation of the brain to nervous prostration. Whatever had really happened, it had been severe enough to knock fourteen pounds off his frame, keep him bedridden for weeks, and evidently keep his wife and servants too busy to press his clothes, polish his shoes, or brush his hat. He carried a cane, showing that he did yet feel steady upon his feet, and when gesturing with his right arm displayed a slight hitch which suggested to me the re-aggravation of an old and imperfectly healed injury. Allowing the door to close behind him, he stood in the center of the room, one hand on his cane, with what he meant to be a resolute expression.
"My dear Doctor Watson," I said, waving a hand to indicate the other armchair. "Pray come in and take a seat. I must confess I was not expecting you."
He made no move to sit down. "I know. I gave a different name to your doorman."
"Why on earth...?"
"I can trust you, but I don't know that I can trust your doorman, your porter, or any of the other members of this club."
"But why Victor Trevor?"
"Because I knew you would immediately want to see anyone who had given that name."
Doctor Watson is not the ablest pupil you ever had, Sherlock, but he is definitely the most tenacious and devoted. I own I was impressed, somewhat against my will, by this stratagem. I saw at once, of course, that you had most imprudently confessed to him one of your secrets, perhaps not appreciating at the time that in the ten years that have passed since your intimacy with Trevor, that secret has been rendered more Perilous and acquired anywhere between one and three new Consequences.
"Lestrade's been trying to speak with you," he went on. "You've given him the brush-off. I couldn't let you do the same to me."
"My dear fellow, as if I ever would!" I said, for I saw now the vital importance of retaining his good will. It was, if I may say, a grave tactical error to reveal as much as you obviously had revealed to someone whose antecedents are so uncertain and whose character you have only had a year or two to study. "You were my poor brother's closest friend, and I am overjoyed to see you. Please." I again indicated the chair.
"You never came," he said.
"I beg your pardon?"
"To express your condolences. You never came. After the papers announced my return, I had half of London in that sitting room. Lestrade came, Hopkins came, Gregson came--Mr. Melas, if you can believe it, came. Even Mr. Jabez Wilson. But not you."
My circulation is not the best, but I felt what might have been the beginning of a blush. There was in fact no secret meaning or subtle plan behind my non-appearance. I did not call upon Dr. Watson because I never call upon anyone. Moreover, it has been so long since I dispensed wholesale with all social formalities that it never once occurred to me that etiquette might demand that I should call upon him. If he had called upon me in my rooms at Pall Mall, I should not have known it; they all know there that I am never at home and that it is useless to send up anyone's cards. It occurred to me at that moment that this may have been among the secrets you divulged to him. Well, after all, it is not a state secret. Merely something about me that I should prefer that strangers not know.
"My dear fellow, I apologize for the oversight. I have not been myself these past weeks. I feel Sherlock's loss, myself, more keenly than I could have imagined--"
"You might have told me."
"Told you what, Doctor Watson?"
"That--your brother--is in fact alive."
I was now sincerely alarmed. I had myself only deduced that information that morning, and I had taken the most elaborate precautions to prevent anyone else from deducing it. If the news had reached Dr. Watson, there was no telling how many other people knew, or how many of those villains might now be scouring the Continent in search of you.
"Doctor Watson, I am grievously disappointed in you," I said, rather hotly. "I should not have suspected this cruelty from you of all people. You were yourself at the scene when his death was discovered by the authorities. You reported his death to the British press. If you were lying then, then you are a villain; if you are lying now, you are a monster; and if you think both reports can be true, you are a madman. Explain yourself, sir, and at once!"
Conceited as you are about your own histrionic talents, you must own that your older brother can on occasion be worthy of the limelight. Dr. Watson was instantly and completely convinced, and his manner towards me changed dramatically. He began, as I had of course intended he should, to explain how he had come to this conclusion. He blanched slightly, stammered a bit, and then thrust his hand into his waistcoat pocket. From it he drew out a folded square of that peculiarly stiff German paper which you have secretly coveted ever since your escapade with the King of Bohemia, folded in quarters and spattered with blood. He began, haltingly and anxiously, to explain. I did follow him; but I confess most of my attention was riveted on the paper. Once again! Once again, even at death's door, you had committed your follies to paper and left them for the world to find. You, who know and have had dealings with so many of the blackmailing vultures who batten daily upon the paper feast prepared for them by all those unwitting hands! How could you, after everything I have fixed for you--have been fixing for you ever since that disastrous visit to Donnithorpe--expose your corpse prematurely to such predations! Would I never be able to rest? Was I to spend not only the rest of your days but the rest of mine defending my infuriating little Prometheus from an unending stream of eagles with a never-satisfied appetite for his vitals? Why must you write? Why must you hoard documents as if they are stock certificates? Why do you never burn anything?
By the time I was cool enough to speak without further betraying either your secrets or my own, your doctor had nearly finished his tedious explanation of the laborious process whereby he had come to conclude, with the assistance of his wife, that you had written--what you wrote--and placed the note on the rock shelf under your cigarette case before Moriarty attacked you. I am still angry enough to hope that it pains you to hear that Dr. Watson had made the laughable blunder of assuming that you had written the note afterward, while your hands were still bloody from the attack. Does the man not know of finger-prints? Has he never heard of a magnifying lens? What could possibly have induced him to assume, in the absence of lines or loops or whorls, that these bloodstains had been created by human hands?
"Yes, yes, I follow the explanation," I said, with a strategic touch of irritation. "But the history of this note is not proof, one way or another, that Sherlock is not dead. All it proves is that the note was written before you...if I heard this correctly...murdered Professor Moriarty?"
Your doctor drew himself up straight in his chair. "It was self-defense."
"My dear--" I decided not to give him the benefit of my knowledge of international law. "I hope I will not cause a relapse when I tell you, Dr. Watson, that logically all this proves is that the state of mind reflected in his note to you might have and probably had changed after Moriarty's death. Your deduction justifies us in assuming that Sherlock did not destroy himself. It does not, however, rule out the possibility that after your departure he might have slipped into that chasm...or been pushed."
He had, evidently, foreseen this objection, for he replied without turning a hair. "No, Mr. Holmes. I had investigated the scene pretty thoroughly before I discovered the note. At first I feared he might have been swept away by an avalanche. But it is clear that after the boulders struck the path, someone ran along the path and into the woods. I had just come to the conclusion that one of these confederates might have followed us to the spot--after all, someone had to send that infernal letter from the Englischer Hof--and seen Holmes hiding himself. He would in that case have waited for me to go and then sent the boulders down from above. In that case, what would Holmes do? First, get down from the ledge; and second, get off the path. Third, he would put as much distance between himself and his pursuers as possible. That's what I thought had happened and then--and then I found the note--and--"
Here, I feared he might be about to have an attack, but fortunately he rallied.
"Holmes told me--on our very first case together, he told me: when a fact appears to be opposed to a long train of deductions, it invariably proves to be capable of bearing some other interpretation." He was obviously quoting you verbatim. I would not have thought he possessed such powers of recall. "And did I remember? No. I let this one piece of evidence outweigh all the rest of it, simply because it confirmed my worst fears. I am a very weak and limited man. But you are not. You must have seen the true solution. And if he were to apply to anyone for assistance--which he must have most desperately needed--it must have been either to me or to you. I have not heard from him. Therefore, by process of elimination, he must have applied to you."
Your friend had no idea of the pain he was causing me. You know well, you wretch, that I have not had a single line from you. Evidently your post-death existence is to be free from my influence. Instead I had to read in the international press that you had exposed yourself--once again!--to detection, imprisonment, and worse by gratuitously embroiling yourself in someone else's murders out of an utterly misguided and atavistic sense of chivalry. You know perfectly well that you simply cannot afford exposure. And yet you go on making a spectacle of yourself, even in disguise, even after death. Facing your friend in his too-big clothes, holding on tightly to his cane, I was not thinking of his troubles at all. What was in my mind, I will have you know, was this: Damn you, Sherlock, for a fool in love.
Dr. Watson's voice had gone quiet. He must have perceived, and then misinterpreted, my anger, for he sighed, and said very sadly and solemnly:
"I let him down, Mr. Holmes. I know that. I'm not proud of any of this. Not of my blunders at the scene, nor of my erroneous reports to the press, nor of my abandonment of your poor brother in his hour of direst need, nor of my abject failure to cope with the truth once poor Mary showed it to me. Even now, I find I can't entirely trust my own judgment. That's why I came to see you."
I sighed. An expression came to his face that I realized, eventually, must be panic.
"I--I'm not wrong again, am I?" he cried. "He is alive? You have heard from him?"
"I have not heard from him."
His face fell. And though I was kicking myself for it all the time, I could not help rushing to comfort him.
"But you are not wrong. He is alive."
He sighed with relief. "Then--how do you know?"
I reached over to the newspaper rack and selected the Voice of Hungary. I folded it to the appropriate page, and pointed out the relevant item. He read it. I saw, growing in him, something like a faint reflection of my own lifelong anger and frustration.
"Well," Dr. Watson said, at length. "If you were wondering--"
"I am not wondering. I know."
"--well at any rate, the alias is a bit of a giveaway."
"Almaviva?" I said.
Dr. Watson nodded.
"What exactly does it give away?" I said, bracing myself.
He looked at me in surprise. "Hai già vinta la causa!" he said, rather melodramatically.
"You have won what case?"
He looked down, a bit sheepishly. "No, no. The aria. It's his favorite. From Figaro. Haven't you ever heard him sing it?"
I need hardly observe, though I shall observe it precisely because I want you, my dear brother, to have a long time to appreciate my slowly simmering exasperation, that it required all of my powers of self-control to reply, calmly and nonchalantly, "No, Dr. Watson. I never have." I most particularly did not add that the only other person who you were in the habit of favoring with your barely passable baritone was Victor Trevor, and that in my experience impromptu vocal performances by Sherlock Holmes for one of his intimate friends tended to lead, by degrees, to concupiscence, recklessness, murder, and panicked letters written in skip code and sent by courier to my suite at Pall Mall: "Poor Inspector Trevor knows who has most likely killed Sir James Hudson. And yet I fear he could fail and not soon enough prevent more of it. Any further discovery, I fear, is probably not imminent. However, just for my edification, the dedication and love he shows of his profession, God, his country, and the truth, if understood rightly, you have to love. For bless me, brains won't save criminals from him."
I was so inflamed with fear and anticipatory rage that I would have whipped that letter out and shown it to your doctor on the spot if I had had it with me. Which I did not, because I, like a sensible person, have burned it. As you should have burned all the other letters, including and especially Trevor's. How much did you tell him, Sherlock? Does he know how long I have been your fixer? Does he know that I wormed my way into this wretched government job so that I could continue to be your fixer?
"What are we going to do?" Dr. Watson said.
"What do you mean, Dr. Watson?"
"How are we going to find him?"
"My dear Doctor Watson," I ejaculated. "The worst thing we could possibly do would be find him."
"This is no way for him to live. He shouldn't be alone. I don't know what he thinks became of me. He could be thinking--he could be thinking anything. We have to find him. We have to bring him home."
"He can't come home," I said.
"Why not?"
"You know why not!" I am afraid I raised my voice, though fortunately the Strangers' Room is entirely sound-proof.
"How many of them are there? Colonel Moran and who else? You must know who they are and how they can be got to. Surely--"
I laughed. This confused him, and finally, blessedly, he stopped talking.
"Colonel Moran?" I said. "Colonel Moran. Colonel Moran is not the problem. I can do nothing, Dr. Watson. I cannot move in this matter at all. I can only repeat that you must not find him and that he cannot return to this country."
"I don't understand," he said, hotly.
"What is the matter with you?" I burst out. "Have you never heard of the Criminal Law Amendment Act? Do you not know how Lord Holdhurst has been spoiling, ever since Cleveland Street, to make a high-profile example of someone? Can you doubt that Sherlock is on his list? Why do you think he does all that unpaid work for Whitehall? For the love of the game?"
Dr. Watson stared at me in horror. I could not stop myself from going on.
"They can prove nothing, but they have been slavering for the chance to do it. Now that he's dead they must leave him alone. He cannot come back to life and he most certainly cannot come back to you."
To see Dr. Watson, after all this, rise painfully to his feet and unleash himself upon me was something like watching a rabbit turn and chase a greyhound.
"I would never call you a coward, Mr. Holmes," he said. "But I must say that you are certainly talking like one."
"Imbecile," I snapped back. "Infants, both of you. If I never called upon, Dr. Watson, that is because my every move is watched by a small army of spies and intriguers. That is why I hardly ever move. In my rooms and in this club I am safe. Everywhere else, I am dogged and observed and reported upon. You're so proud of being a Briton--you don't even know what it means. You don't even know where you live. This is not a teeming womb of kings, it's a writhing nest of serpents. There are informers everywhere. There is a spy in your house right now!"
Dr. Watson shook his head.
"Her name is Margaret Hopkins and she's been sending in regular reports on you for seven months."
"What?" he demanded.
"I haven't seen any since the week you returned. They are beginning to freeze me out. Soon they will begin trying to take me down. Or take me out."
Your Doctor gave his head a shake, like a dog coming out of the water.
"Mary sacked Margaret after I fell ill," he said. "After what you've told me, I certainly shan't replace her."
I heaved a small sigh of relief. "No, Doctor, you shouldn't. I'm sorry; it will be damned inconvenient, but you can't take the risk."
"Mr. Holmes," he said. "This has been...I can better appreciate...many things, now. But your brother must be found. And if you will not find him, I will."
"Doctor Watson, be reasonable," I said. "You are looking for one man, with a nearly endless talent for disguise, and an out-of-the-ordinary intellect, who might be anywhere on the Continent right now. He won't be using the Almaviva alias any more and he's almost certainly not still in Hungary. You have no leads and I have no resources that I dare dedicate to the search. You yourself are hardly strong enough to travel. You can't attempt this. It is not a job that can be done by one man."
"No," he said. "It cannot be done by one man. But I will see it done, all the same."
I may as well admit to you, Sherlock, that I have always found your Dr. Watson to be an ordinary, tedious, and slightly ridiculous man. Handsome enough, certainly, to account for your interest. But as for the light in your eyes whenever you spoke of him, the look of pride with which you introduced him to me, the frankly adoring glances lavished upon him whenever he did or said anything that was even slightly intelligent or useful--I could never, with all my powers of deduction, detect an objective source for any of it. It was only at this moment, as he stood there defying not only me and my wisdom but the laws of logic themselves, that I saw something else in him. I had thought, after I met him, well, at least this one will be a steadying influence. This one, at least, will keep him out of trouble for a while. He's not liable, for instance, to run off to the south of England and assassinate the man who hounded his father to death. I won't have to hide any bodies or pay off any constables or falsify any internal memoranda for him. I've always been so much older than you. I've always seen so much farther into the future. I've always played the game thinking so many, many more moves ahead. And it never matters, my dear boy. You and your idiot heart checkmate me every time.
Yes. Don't even ask me. Yes, I will save him, and save you, as I always have and apparently always will. Anything that mediocre little man can believe is possible, I can bring about. And I will enjoy it. I am at this moment quite ready to burn Whitehall down if that is what it takes to bring you home. But it need not come to that. Your doctor will see you again. Perhaps even I will see you again. Perhaps I will have the pleasure of delivering this letter to you and making you read it before me. And then, I will stand there and watch you burn it.
Ever your affectionate,
MYCROFT.