Chapter Text
“Yoohoo, Sherlock?” Complying with some ridiculous notion of privacy, Mrs Hudson raps her knuckles perfunctorily against the frame of the door that is standing open wide before entering the flat.
The fact that the door isn’t closed doesn’t mean she’s welcome, however. Rather, Sherlock couldn’t be bothered to push it shut before collapsing onto the sofa.
“Go away,” he growls, pulling his dressing gown even tighter around his shoulders and launching himself onto his other side, to present his back like a bulwark against the inquisitive sniffing of falsely gay landladies.
“Oh, Sherlock,” Mrs Hudson sighs. “John’s only been gone half a day and look at the mess you’ve made already. He isn’t going to be pleased about that, you know.” Resolutely ignoring his demands to remove herself from the flat, she walks over to the nearest window and yanks open the curtains, allowing the bright glare of a convivial summer afternoon to sparkle on the white crests rising from the sea of papers that has overrun every flat surface in the living room.
To keep himself from jumping from the sofa and physically bundling her out of the flat – for he would never do that, never mind that the prospect looks most tempting just now – he braces his feet against the armrest and groans in his most theatrical manner. The headache that has been hovering just behind his eyes since John left has by now fully manifested itself and sits throbbing painfully and insistently. Mrs Hudson, in blissful oblivion, prattles on, rearranging the papers strewn over the coffee table.
“At least it looks like the weather will be holding out for them,” she chirps. Then she has the audacity to pat him on the shoulder. “Cheer up, Sherlock. It’s only a weekend. A true friend would be happy for John making a go of it at last. And she seems like a nice enough girl. A bit young, perhaps.”
The inane chatter does nothing for Sherlock’s headache. With the object of burying his head beneath it he reaches for the nearest cushion at hand, only to find it is John’s Union Jack cushion, which he has curled around in search of comfort earlier. Snarling, he hurls it across the room, missing Mrs Hudson, who has just bent to pick up some of the stray papers in the middle of the carpet, by a narrow margin. The cushion sails over her and lands safely in Sherlock’s chair.
“I’ll make you a nice cuppa first,” she continues, unaware she has narrowly escaped falling victim to a collision with a fast-flying object. “There’s a rerun of Miss Marple this afternoon. I know you’re not one for watching telly but it’s a murder mystery so that will make you happy. And you can deduce to your heart’s content for I’ve seen them all twice, so I already know who did it anyway.”
***
Straight after breakfast, Sherlock runs to the gatehouse.
Though it’s still early the morning is already unseasonably warm and with each slap of his feet against the ground, the clammy blanket of sultry air he’s pushing against is wrapped a little tighter around him. After no more than two hundred metres sweat trickles in rivulets down his spine and over his ribs. The trees and shrubs stand motionless in the sweltering heat. Not a bird lifts its voice in song. A few tits scurry in the undergrowth, pecking listlessly at the earth.
Sherlock feels his back ripple with unease. Yesterday he was so intent on seeing John that he had no eye for the evidence of neglect sprawled all over the park. Looking about him as he runs, he spies the half-hearted attempts at keeping up appearances but on the whole the borders and copses look eerily unkempt. The grass under his feet reaches as high as the top of his shoes and the big pond is covered with a thick layer of duckweed.
“John!” he shouts when he nears the gatehouse. He tears around the back and pulls open the door. Inside it’s cooler and even more quiet than it was outside. “John?”
John is not in the living room. A trace of body warmth lingers in the small depression in the sofa and the Union Jack cushion lying next to it. The unfinished bust of Daddy is standing on top of the desk. Sherlock picks it up. The collar is more defined now, so John has been working on it after Sherlock left him yesterday. He returns it to the desk and checks the kitchen. A freshly washed cup stands in the draining board to the left of the sink, the kettle next to it still warm to the touch. On the table that stands beneath the window, Sherlock discovers a slip of paper.
Feeling much better. Am in the shed.
The vines climbing its walls have run a little wild but inside the shed everything is as neatly organised as ever. John is busy filling the lawnmower with fuel.
“Thought I’d start with the lawn,” he says when he spies Sherlock. “You can do the parts further from the house if you want to.”
As Sherlock despises both the noise and the smell of the mower, he shakes his head. “No, I saw the vegetable garden could do with some weeding.”
John winces. “Yeah, I suppose so. Here.” He picks a straw hat from a hook on the wall to his left and sails it with a twist of his wrist at Sherlock. “Better wear that.”
Catching the hat and dunking it onto his head, Sherlock says quickly, “You don’t look better.”
“My, you do know how to cheer up a fellow, don’t you?” John mutters, his eyes crinkled in amusement. With his lopsided smile and his dirty hands, he almost looks like the old John again.
“I nearly lost a stone, Sherlock,” he goes on, reaching up to briefly rest his hand on Sherlock’s shoulder and give it a squeeze, “and Lord knows I had never much to begin with. We’re both members of the skinny blokes club, aren’t we?”
Sherlock shrugs. John’s fingers slide from his shoulder. “This morning I felt like a weight was lifted off my chest and I had my first good cuppa in weeks. God knows I’ve neglected my duties long enough.”
“If you say so. But you didn’t come in for breakfast.”
“Fancy you reminding someone to have a bite,” chuckles John. “I’d rather not overdo it. I might join you for a spot of lunch later. Now be off with you, I want the grass decent again by the end of the afternoon.”
He starts pulling open the big doors so he can drive the lawn mower out of the shed. Once John has properly installed himself on the driver’s seat he turns towards Sherlock.
“You’ve got questions,” he says. “ ‘Course you do. But not now, okay?”
Without waiting for Sherlock’s answer he starts the engine and guides the mower out of the building.
***
Thanks to the drone of the lawn mower in the background the warm air feels even more oppressive. Sweat drips into Sherlock’s eyes continuously, despite the precaution of a handkerchief tied beneath the hat. Earth cakes the moist skin of his hands, making it impossible to wipe his forehead. Nevertheless, he plods on at a furious pace, searching the scourge of the discomfort to distract him.
Sherlock has finished weeding the carrot and onion beds and is about to shuffle on his knees towards the rows of salad when Cook calls out to him. She’s arranged a tray with a cup of tea and a slice of cherry cake on the bench in front of the wall and hands for him a deliciously cold wet flannel when he walks up to her.
“So he’s pulled himself together,” she huffs. “It’s very good you’re trying to help him, Sherlock. You’re a sweet boy. But John is ill, and he’s a fool for refusing to visit that doctor.”
When John joins them for lunch she screws her mouth shut. The seam between her lips is the only straight line in the round orbs of her face. She slaps the serving dishes onto the table and retires to her stove to create an awful din with several large pots and pans.
Mary ladles the food onto their plates, glowering at Brenda when the girl opens her mouth. With an audible snap, Brenda shuts it again.
John eyes his plate a long time before he picks up his fork and starts shovelling Cook’s excellent ham and pease pudding into his mouth. It’s obvious he could be eating dirt and wouldn’t taste the difference. His hand lifts the fork and lowers it again with the perfect synchronization of a finely attuned robot.
“Are you feeling better, John?” Brenda ventures hastily, just when Mary has taken a bite.
“Much better, thank you.” John smiles at her and brings up another forkful to his mouth.
“You don’t look it,” Mary asserts, before focusing her attention on Brenda and addressing her in a sharp tone. “Stop messing with your food and finish up. The conservatory looks a fright and I want it spick and span before Mycroft arrives.”
“Right. That was lovely, Cook,” John says after he’s laid down his cutlery on his plate. He shoves back his chair and picks up both Sherlock’s and his own plate to place them in the sink. “Come on, Sherlock. That is, if you want to help me for the rest of the afternoon as well.”
Outside, John turns to Sherlock. “Those women. Sometimes.” He rolls his eyes. “They thrive on making mountains out of molehills. Speaking of which, I must do something about that.” He nods his head in the direction of a molehill poking up from the turf.
“They’re worried about you.”
“All worrying does, is make you sick,” John dismisses the observation with an airy wave of his hand. “And now you’re starting as well. Please don’t, Sherlock.”
“But John, after what you told me yesterday–” begins Sherlock.
“Not now, I said!” John interrupts, almost rude. “Oh Christ,” he swears, catching sight of another molehill, “bloody vermin. Sorry Sherlock, but I’ve spent the whole spring chasing those ruddy buggers and now here’s another, damn it.”
By now they’ve reached the kitchen garden wall.
“There.” Pushing his fists deep into the pockets of his trousers John gazes up at Sherlock, scrunching his eyes against the harsh glare of the sun. “I’m embarrassed, I guess,” he says, almost contemplative. His gaze slides away from Sherlock and down to the ground, at a point exactly between their feet.
“Yeah, that’s it,” he sighs. “Ashamed for forgoing my work and stewing in my own juices and feeling sorry for myself. I was a little wobbly, mind you, a few weeks ago. Nothing serious, just shivery. But I sat down and gave in and then I hadn’t the spunk to get going again. I’m not tough, you see, not like Mycroft, and you. It all seemed so pointless, somehow. And then, yesterday was a really bad day, you caught me at my lowest, Sherlock, you did.”
The blinding light has washed nearly all colour out of his face. John’s body looks even smaller to Sherlock than he remembers, than it seemed yesterday or in the muted shadows of the shed. As if he’s wasting away, Sherlock thinks, or have I grown that much? He went through another growth spurt this spring, the bones in his legs hurting like hell and almost visibly lengthening. Each morning he’d stood tottering like a newborn foal after levering himself up out of bed, adjusting to the idea his legs would not betray him and collapse under his weight.
Clearly John expects an answer, preferably the kind where Sherlock says he understands and won’t prod any further. He’s actually craned his neck and is looking up at Sherlock, the set of his eyes demanding Sherlock to release him. The set-up reminds Sherlock of the ‘little talks’ Mycroft engages him in on a regular basis. His resentment of those. As well as his resentment of Mycroft for initiating them and expecting Sherlock to endure them and answer his probing enquiries.
“All right,” he says. “You’re better now.”
“Yes,” John smiles, gripping Sherlock by his bicep and rubbing his sleeve, so apparently Sherlock has forwarded the right answer. “Much better. Nothing for you to worry about. Let’s get a move on. See you in the shed in four hours, okay?”
***
The next morning Sherlock narrowly avoids running into Brenda who comes staggering out of the kitchen, half hidden behind a tray overflowing with breakfast paraphernalia.
“Fuck it!” she exclaims. “Oh, I’m sorry, Sherlock. I never meant… But you always do rush about so, and I always forget when you’re off to that school of yours. You’re to breakfast upstairs. Mycroft’s orders. He rang Cook yesterday evening.”
“But he won’t be home for another week.” Three days ago, Mycroft had rung to say he wouldn’t be able to collect Sherlock from school and had arranged for David to meet the five o’clock train instead. The instant Sherlock had opened his mouth to argue against this plan, not because it wasn’t sound but because of the principle of the thing, Mycroft had said ‘don’t’, in a tone that brooked no argument. In the background Sherlock had heard a shower running. From this Sherlock had concluded Mycroft was phoning him from his flat, perhaps still in the bed where he’d spent the night with Michael, and he’d ended the conversation by tossing the receiver onto the cradle.
On his way back to his room to fetch his foil for that year’s last fencing lesson, Sherlock had rubbed his hands up and down his thigh to keep himself from slamming his fists into the wall of the corridor. His hands had shaken as he threw his windows open and lit an illegal cigarette. It hadn’t even taken the edge off his vexation. After some pacing the length of the room, cursing Mycroft under his breath all the while, he’d given in and swallowed two of Mummy’s pills – the little blue ones that, now that he’s laid off of them for a few weeks, once more do exactly what the leaflet promises and have the additional advantage of gliding down his throat all by themselves.
“Well, he’s here now,” comes Brenda’s dogged reply. “Or not here. Nanny just happened to look out the window when he arrived. She said he had one look at the front steps and later she saw him making straightaway for the shed. Mum said John is in for a tongue lashing. Eeep.” The tray lurches dangerously to the left. Two small silver saucers with jam commence their inevitable descent down the slope. It seems that years of narrowly avoiding every disaster that may befall an inept girl burdened with an overloaded serving tray have paid off. Brenda’s movements to prevent calamity are almost graceful, though the sight of her tongue sticking out between her lips spoils the overall effect.
Sherlock turns and hurries back up the servant’s stairs in front of her. Outside he finds proof of Mycroft’s arrival in the – already wilting – clumps of weeds pulled from the cracks between the steps and flung aside in anger. The tracks in the gravel and the careless arrangement of the pair of expensive travelling bags and the two silk – Sherlock feels his eyes roll in his head when he fingers the material – umbrellas on the bottom steps bear further testimony to his brother’s state of mind. Mycroft has skidded to a halt in front of the steps, jumped out of the vehicle with uncharacteristic agility, had a go at the weeds, hurled his bags and umbrellas out of the car and driven off at a dangerously high speed in the direction of the garage.
The recently cropped grass obscures Mycroft’s tracks on the lawn. Sherlock reasons he must have cut the shortest route from the garage to the shed and sure enough, he spots the occasional footprint when he joins the tack halfway. Just after he’s rounded a great clump of rhododendrons he catches sight of Mycroft rapidly walking in his direction, his face a mask of enforced composure.
By way of greeting he says, “I’ll have you know I won’t tolerate such insolence in the future. Not from you. You know full well I’d have come to collect you myself if I could have spared the time.” While delivering his address he slaloms around Sherlock without sparing him so much as a glance, and continues his course back to the house.
For a full fifteen seconds Sherlock stands dumbfounded. Then insight hits him and he gallops off after Mycroft. “It was quite obvious you had more important things to do,” he jeers. “And now you have quarrelled.” Syrupy commiseration oozes from his voice when he adds, “oh, poor Mycroft.”
“Don’t,” Mycroft warns, pivoting on his heels and growing very still, very suddenly. “Just don’t.”
The quality of his tone, its implicit assumption of Mycroft’s right to direct Sherlock, together with the fact Mycroft has issued the same order only three days ago, pulls a red veil over Sherlock’s eyes. He takes another step towards Mycroft, until they’re almost chest to chest, their eyes locking. Vaguely, Sherlock reflects he might yet grow bigger than Mycroft. Now, wouldn’t that be funny?
“I’m not a child anymore, Mycroft,” he growls. “Stop treating me like one.”
“It will be my pleasure, brother mine, the moment you stop acting like one. Allowing for your usual mode of ending a perfectly normal telephone conversation, I’m afraid we’ve a long road ahead of us yet.” For Mycroft to resort to such low tactics, he must be truly upset. But Sherlock didn’t run after Mycroft to gauge his sibling’s mental state.
“You’re the one who’s always going on about decent behaviour so I suppose you didn’t let John bear the brunt for your precious Michael letting you down.”
The mask remains firmly stuck to Mycroft’s features. The image of Mycroft practicing the expression in front of a mirror enters Sherlock’s mind and he almost giggles at the silliness of the idea, until he becomes aware of the transformation of Mycroft’s eyes. His brother’s pupils are smaller than pinpricks in the washed out milk of the irises. Such is the colour of the ocean, sweltering under the blazing sun, without so much as a breeze to set the waves undulating. Beneath the glassy surface, sharks patrol. An involuntary shudder ripples down Sherlock’s spine.
“I expressed my chagrin, naturally,” replies Mycroft, his pupils dilating again. Is it possible for a human being to control the widening and retracting of his pupils, according to his wishes? “John admitted my right in doing so.”
“He’s been ill, Mycroft.”
“He is ill,” Mycroft says. “I can’t command him to visit a doctor but I strongly advised him to do so. His illness is no excuse for shirking his duties, though. Mummy is feeble and Nanny’s legs aren’t as dependable as they once were. In letting the steps and the terrace fall to such a state of neglect, John has actively endangered them. Imagine one of them had stumbled and broken a limb.”
“What do you mean, he is ill?” Sherlock latches onto his main point of interest amidst Mycroft’s torrent of information.
“Didn’t you look at his face? The man lost a stone at least. That’s quite a lot for such a small frame.”
“Of course I noticed,” flares up Sherlock. “But he assured me he felt better. He ate very well at lunch yesterday.” The moment the words leave his mouth, he regrets them, for they show him as one who is unobservant and easily fooled. As if John’s mechanical ladling of his pudding yesterday afternoon hadn’t told him the truth? He’d brought it up later, back at the shed but John had demurred, said he was too tired to talk now, they would do so tomorrow.
“Who’d have thought you would fall for such a ruse?” Mycroft chides. The set of his eyes hardens again. “Well, there’s one of your tasks this holiday: persuading our gardener to come to his senses and visit the doctor. You’ll have to do it this week. I understand Mr Whitall will be back from his concert tour Thursday next so your afternoons will be accounted for.”
The casual reference has Sherlock ball his fists at his side. Only through the greatest effort of will can he refrain from rubbing his fingers along each other. That would be a display of nervousness he doesn’t want Mycroft to enjoy.
“Why do you always insist on calling John our gardener? As if he is nothing but a servant?”
“Why?” The question appears to sincerely puzzle Mycroft, creasing the skin between his brows. “Because he is, of course. What else should I call him?” He regards Sherlock, and for a split second Mycroft’s eyes widen, his face completely open and honest. But all too quickly, his eyes narrow again as he regains control of himself. “Ah,” he says, at length. “I see.”
They both stand silent. Inside the cavity of his chest Sherlock can feel his heart thumping violently against his ribs.
“Tell me,” Mycroft demands. Though Sherlock knows this to be impossible he appears to have grown two inches in the last three seconds and now appears to be glancing down at Sherlock again, who, equally impossible, has lost a few inches at least, “ought an affair that ended nearly thirty years ago, before both of us were born, affect us in the present? Reckless youth and a lack of proper guidance led to our father committing a gross error of judgement. I, for one, am relieved he came to his senses in due time. Only imagine the scandal he would have brought down upon our family!”
“It must be such a relief then, to realise you wouldn’t have been around to savour it if Daddy had chosen otherwise,” quips Sherlock. For he can quip, can’t he, if Mycroft is intent on treating him like an ignoramus.
“All your glib answer does, Sherlock, is to make me despair whether you will ever understand the workings of our world,” Mycroft replies. His shoulders, usually so straight and proud, droop a little inside the suit jacket. His hand dips into one of the pockets of his waistcoat and pulls forth a pocket watch. Sherlock snorts. Mycroft ignores this, favouring the watch with his attention instead.
“Apart from that, I’m disappointed you didn’t care to inform me of John’s illness. You do, after all, keep up a correspondence with the man,” he continues, his tone flat.
“He never wrote a word,” protests Sherlock. His mind races back to the letters he received last term. They had been the same as ever, hadn’t they? Descriptions of the beauty of the gardens, the changes to the planting on Daddy’s grave, a little gossip about Cook and Nanny, nothing out of the ordinary. Though, perhaps, they had been a little listless. But then, that had struck a most harmonious chord with Sherlock’s own state of mind as he sat suffering through interminable hour after interminable hour in that awful prison.
Snapping the watch shut and stashing it back into its pocket, Mycroft informs him, “If you had read between the lines you might have spotted his condition easily enough. But fine.”
The subject, it appears, is closed as far as Mycroft is concerned, for he announces, “It’s nine thirty now. I have to make a phone call at ten fifteen exactly. Afterwards, I will visit Mummy. You and I will continue our talk in the study at eleven. Have you seen Mummy? What was she like?”
Still reeling from the blow Mycroft has just dealt him, Sherlock answers sullenly, “After five minutes she turned her back on me and told me to get out.”
“Oh.” Mycroft’s shoulders droop a little further. “I’m… I’m sorry, Sherlock,” he stammers. The slight twitch of his mouth betrays how much Sherlock’s careless reply has rattled him. “That’s cruel. She shouldn’t do that. I’ll talk to her.”
As if Sherlock cares a fig for Mummy’s actions. He’s ceased being hurt by her, being afraid of her, a long time ago. She’s his enemy and he’s perfectly willing to be hers. That’s the deal they’ve struck and as long as she keeps him in supply he’ll honour their arrangement. What he can’t abide, though, is the idea he’s supposed to love her, and she him. Yet, that’s the fiction Mycroft, with all his so-called love of truth and pretence at penetrative wisdom, clings to with the birdbrained confidence of a small child that believes its Teddy will protect it against the monsters that live under its bed.
“Yeah, go ahead and talk some sense into the madwoman,” he cries out, not bothering to keep his voice down despite the fact they’re close to the house and might be overheard. Suppose Brenda would be listening in on them? Wouldn’t Mycroft just hate that? Serve him right. He opens his voice a little louder to scream at Mycroft.
“You must love this, staunchly putting up with the burden of your beastly family. A degenerate with a predilection for the lower classes for a father, a lunatic for a mother and an ungrateful good-for-nothing for a brother. And there’s you, suffering under the infliction with all the patience of Our Lord Jesus Christ!”
“Sherlock!”
“Why don’t you shut it, Mycroft? Just this once. Go and stuff your mouth with scrambled eggs. The sound of your jaws munching makes more sense than the opinions you insist upon inflicting on me.” The windows rattle in the panes as he slams the French door shut in front of Mycroft’s face, which is nearly purple with rage. A sense of triumph surges in his chest, only to dwindle just as fast and give way to a feeling of infinite sadness.
I admired him once, didn’t I? he thinks.
Brenda, of course, is nowhere in sight. Only the breakfast table, all dressed in silver, crystal and porcelain and with a grand bowl of roses to top it all off.
Behind Sherlock, Mycroft wrings open the door with a great deal of ferocity and noise. “I had been looking forward to enjoying a quiet and amiable breakfast in the pleasant surroundings of my own home,” he snarls. “Trust you to smash the concept to pieces within fifteen minutes of my arrival. You’re to go up to your room right now. Don’t let me catch sight of you before eleven. In the study, Sherlock. I’ll be expecting you.”
***
The door to 221A is standing open invitingly so Sherlock doesn’t knock but barges straight into the flat and Mrs Hudson’s sitting room to catch his landlady arranging her best tea service on the coffee table in front of the sofa. A plate of his favourite biscuits, still warm from the oven, sits next to the teapot and an amalgam of nostalgia wafts up from a pair of plates covered with tea towels. Anchovy paste and fruitcake. His hostess is attired in a new dress in a violent shade of violet, with a string of purple amethysts around her neck.
“You could have put in a bit of an effort,” she tuts disapprovingly after she’s taken in his ensemble of pyjama trousers, his grey sleep T-shirt and the blue dressing gown. “I may be your landlady but I’ve still got eyes in my head.”
“Fine, I’ll be off again,” grumbles Sherlock, but Mrs Hudson scrambles for his sleeve and motions for him to somehow plant himself amidst the products of her various handiwork classes which have taken over every inch of the sofa like some exotic parasite. “Really, Sherlock. You’re impossible when John’s away. Now sit down and behave.”
“Do I look like a dog?” Sherlock growls, trying to look indignant while wriggling down between a quilted tulip and an excess of needlework depicting some drooping roses in hideous off-beige. The setting rather spoils the intended effect.
“Don’t be grumpy. Here.” Mrs Hudson lifts one of his hands to shove a plate of thin-sliced and neatly cut anchovy paste sandwiches into it. “I know you haven’t bothered with breakfast or lunch.”
Before Sherlock can protest, Mrs Hudson switches on the telly and begins fussing with the tea set. He watches the opening credits with a scowl on his face and can feel it deepening when the story starts to unfold, all nostalgia for fake jolly old England. Mycroft would wholeheartedly approve, if not of the spirit, then of the atmosphere at least.
Perhaps this is, to the casual observer, a portrayal of his childhood. The good bits. Checking the hives in the apiary together with John. Or cycling to Mr Whitall’s cottage, for such it had become in Sherlock’s thoughts. Mr Whitall had a photograph of Mr Mancini in his glory days on the wall in the living room, next to the great bow window, but, as Sherlock has never known that version of Mr Mancini, the picture was devoid of meaning to him.
Ten minutes into the programme Sherlock announces, “That hotel is a sham.”
“Do you think so, dear?” Mrs Hudson replies, absently. From the depths of the sofa she has pulled forth a canvas bag with knitting needles and a great quantity of wool in a poisonous green that prickles the back of Sherlock’s neck with vague memories. “It looks real enough.”
“It’s a sham. Money laundering probably but I’ll know for certain in five minutes.”
“Fine, dear. But do shut up now, would you? I can’t remember this episode at all, I was sure I’d seen them all. Oh look, what a lovely dress...”
Sherlock ventures a peek at Mrs. Hudson’s knitting. “What do you think?” Mrs Hudson asks. “It’s for Mrs Turner’s great-nephew, he’s just turned six.”
“It’s perfectly hideous,” answers Sherlock, one eye on the screen and the other on the green eyesore. “There, that was the clue I needed, definitely money laundering. Nanny knitted me a jumper in that exact shade when I was six. I loathed the item but of course I had to wear it because of all the effort she’d put into it. Couldn’t you have chosen a decent colour at least?”
“It’s a nice colour,” Mrs Hudson corrects him, unperturbed. “You must have cut a dash in that jumper.”
“No, I didn’t. And it itched horribly.”
“I’m glad there aren’t that many dead bodies,” Mrs Hudson ignores his remark. “Though you must be disappointed. Have another sandwich, Sherlock.”
“The owners and…” Sherlock commences his explanation in the patient tone he adopts when relating a case to Mrs Hudson, but she flaps her hand at him with the impatient little wave she adopts whenever his elucidations threaten to overwhelm her.
“Oh, hush,” she says. “I’m all caught up in it now. Don’t spoil it, Sherlock. That lady friend of Miss Marple looks suspicious to me.”
***