Work Text:
The problem with chess is that there are an infinite number of moves, yet only a few pieces to work with.
“Why is it you’re always sacrificing your rooks, Edith?” Eudoria chides, pushing through the final barriers she had placed before her King and check-mating her without much preamble.
Edith stares at the board for a few moments. She heaves a sigh. “I suppose I trust castles more than I do people.”
Eudoria smiles with only the corner of her mouth. It always makes her look particularly sly. “Very often people topple castles, you know.”
Edith shakes her head with a smile of her own. Sometimes, Lady Holmes’ dreams of revolution make her laugh. A visionary she may be, but she has no sense of proportion.
“I do think you’ve been distracted lately,” Eudoria adds, tilting the pieces back into their case. “You’re not losing your head over it, are you?”
Edith’s hand stills on her teacup. “Over what?”
“The upcoming meeting, of course.”
“Oh.”
“What else did you think I mean?”
Edith releases a small breath and raises the china to her mouth. She busies herself with the tea so as not to answer. For what answer could she give? I thought you meant your son? That would be preposterous. She promised herself she would stop letting thoughts of Sherlock cloud her judgement, but it seems she has lost that game too. She must try harder from here on out.
“I must admit to some nerves,” she musters after she feels certain she’s mastered herself. “This is the first time we would be meeting in public. It’s a risky endeavour.”
“That is why I am only relying on you and myself. This is a courting operation. We cannot do it but on Madame Gascoigne’s terms. She wishes to meet in Vauxhall Gardens, and we must indulge her.”
“But can we really trust her?” Edith inquires. “I know your Vernet relations have vouched for her, but –”
“Of course I don’t intend to trust her and neither should you. But we could help ourselves to her money and connections. She can have no interest in exposing us, for she would be exposing herself. The French government is only waiting for a pretext to keep her on house arrest. We may bemoan the situation here in England, but France is faring much the worse.”
“Is continental revolution the ultimate goal, then?” Edith wonders, tightening the belt around her waist. She must be off, soon. Pity, since Lady Holmes’ hotel rooms are always a pleasant diversion.
“Ideally, yes,” the lady nods, dropping a few leaves in her pipe. “But you know it won’t be easy. Darling old Europe has always been a bitch about it.”
Edith chuckles. Yes, a pleasant diversion indeed. She rises from the chair and brushes the folds of her skirt. “All right then. Let me see if I got it right; the checkpoint will be at the Turkish Tent, then we’ll pass under the Triumphant Arches and take the Lovers’ Walk where we can talk more privately. Is that accurate?”
But Eudoria is clearly not listening. She’s staring at Edith in an appraising fashion.
“What do you plan on wearing?”
Edith frowns. She points to her day dress. “This?”
Eudoria raises an eyebrow. “That won’t do.”
Edith blushes. “I do not have many fancy gowns in my repertoire, nor do I see the sense in them.”
“Oh, but I do. They often serve their purpose. And I will not allow Madame Gascoigne to condescend to you.”
“I am a business owner,” Edith reminds her proudly. “I did it all by myself. She can condescend as much as she likes.”
Sweet-smelling smoke shrouds Eudoria as she speaks. “Why certainly, but she must realize she is talking to her equals. After all, if we are to start a movement, we must be sisters, not ladies and shopkeepers. Now, obviously, I know some women will persist in being foolish, but we must not encourage them. So, I will provide your dress for the evening.”
Edith shakes her head. “I can’t and won’t accept that, kindly though you mean it.”
“Why not? I’ve always wanted to give you something lovely to wear. My own daughter, you see, does not appreciate the uses of a beautiful dress.”
Edith folds her arms. “I would only attract unwanted attention.”
“Darling, it’s Vauxhall. All attention there is unwanted. In a sense, that is what makes it such a perfect location for secrets. Everyone is looking, but no one is really looking, if you catch my meaning. And anyway, you haven’t even seen the dress yet.”
“You – you already planned this.”
Eudoria smiles and exhales more fragrant smoke. “Would I be me if I didn’t?”
Edith feels queasy. The silk is cold against her skin. She is oddly reminded of skimmed milk in winter, of carrying the pail from the stables to the house. By the time she reached the kitchen the hot milk was already chilled, and the cook would give her the first cold glass. And she remembers the one night when the cow bled milk, when the milk was rosy, and there were black clots like dark flowers blooming on the surface and a few nights after that, the cow died and she cried so many buckets of tears. It’s strange to feel all this about a dress, yet the rich taffeta of dark salmon reminds her exactly of those times when she was still too raw and young to know any better. She loved all things, back then.
“Bottoms up.”
Eudoria sticks the glass of port under her nose. She has managed to snatch it off a waiter’s tray.
Edith takes the glass gingerly.
The drink is pungent with spices and the air is faintly perfumed too. She can also smell burning wood. There’s always a bonfire roaring in the gardens. That or the traveling circus will have a fire-eater in their midst. Vauxhall is like a cauldron of whispers, the background hum of chatter and rustling hems and clinking glasses giving her the sense of a ship at sea, battered by waves of laughter and slightly drunken jollity. She is not averse to it, though Edith has always found these pleasure gardens rather unsettling. The light, such as it is, is always too dim, even with the advent of electricity. When she turns her eyes towards dusk, she sees the red wound of the sun behind the orchestra stand and she fears the coming night. From here on out, the lampposts will flicker to life in a show of brilliant innovation, but no light can truly pierce the foliage of trees and shrubbery, the shadowy corners of tents and supper-boxes, the nocturnal dangers of pillared saloons and illicit groves where young couples ambled easily. Vauxhall has always had a rather spotted history, alluring and dangerous in one.
“Stand still a moment,” Eudoria tells her, untangling the pearl earrings which had got caught in her hair.
Edith looks away. “I can see why Enola rebels against your ministrations.”
Eudoria chuckles. “Rebellion is always a matter of proper timing, I find. Oh, speaking of timing…there is our Madame Gascoigne now.”
It would be difficult to miss her. Madame Gascoigne makes her entrance into the Turkish Tent with the subtlety of an ostrich. Her flaxen hair, fashioned in a rounded pompadour shines with all sorts of bejewelled pins and her fascinator looks like a giant bird of prey. The brilliant chains of her sapphire necklace hang heavily down her bosom and the pendant itself could probably blind a fellow. The bustle of her magnificent midnight-blue dress makes her look as if a briar of dark roses constantly trails behind her. The lady looks like the protagonist of a vaudeville, and yet she carries the whole ensemble perfectly. Edith now understands why Eudoria insisted on dressing up, though, compared to Madame Gascoigne both of them look almost provincial.
Madame Gascoigne is not alone, however. Behind her walks a tall gentleman of middling age, whose attire is almost as impeccable as hers, though it is clear from his careful attentions that he is the lady’s inferior and assistant, tonight.
He stops before the ladies and doffs his hat before introducing his mistress in a cool, collected voice, as if he were introducing an esteemed member of Cabinet. His painfully accented English sounds less French and more Yorkshire. Polite “how do you do’s” are exchanged and Madame Gascoigne touches both their arms, her lips stretched into a queer, febrile smile. Edith notes that she doesn’t bother to introduce her companion but quickly launches into an elaborate speech about having wanted to meet Eudoria in person for such a long time. Her eyes glide over Edith uneasily and then return to Lady Holmes, as if looking for safe anchorage. Her French is a torrent of pebbles that pelt Edith’s ears unpleasantly, but she keeps abreast of the conversation, even though none of it is directed at her.
Eudoria asks her pointedly in English if she finds the country much changed since her last visit, and the Madame seems to make a Herculean effort to reply in English.
“I should speak slower, for your friend, should I not?” she asks merrily, staring at Edith.
Edith smiles a cool smile. Sometimes, though not often, it gives her real pleasure to prove people wrong. She replies without missing a beat, “Vous pouvez parler aussi lentement ou aussi vite que vous le souhaitez. Je suis parfaitement heureuse de vous accueillir.” (You may speak as slow or as fast as you wish. I am perfectly happy to accommodate you).
Madame Gascoigne was clearly not expecting her to speak French so well, or at all. Two pink spots colour the layers of powder on her face. But she grins and claps her hands. “Then, as you English say, we shall get on swimmingly!”
Though Madame Gascoigne still looks at Edith as if she were a particularly impressive trinket, the two manage to keep up a steady dialogue, in no small part thanks to the revelation that Madame Gascoigne has visited Haiti, and Edith is hungry for information regarding the famed nation. But the conversation dwindles as they pass through the Triumphant Arches and turn down Lovers’ Walk. Soon enough, Eudoria takes her place beside Madame Gascoigne and Edith finds herself walking with her companion instead. In fact, the gentleman steps up to her and offers his arm. Edith feels rather put upon, but she places her gloved fingers in the crook of his elbow. A courting operation, she remembers. These people must be wooed.
It soon becomes obvious Madame Gascoigne’s companion is more or less attempting an interrogation. He asks Edith about her mother and father (both deceased, but he doesn’t have to know that, so she tells him a fable about a cottage in the countryside), her teashop (there too she feeds him a story about her father having bought shares in the East India Company and a lucky investment bearing fruit, allowing her to buy her shop), her book collection (she only tells him that she has scavenged many disused libraries), who taught her to read and write (Edith’s smile is colder than night and her silence is answer enough) and whether she has always lived in London (here she smoothly turns the question on him, “haven’t we all? haven’t you?”).
All in all, she’s rather proud of her evasion techniques, but she’s also aware that the nosy gentleman doesn’t quite believe her. He smiles benignly and nods his head and, from a certain vantage point, even seems to approve of her deception, but she is aware that he works for his mistress and that he will tell her that Miss Edith Grayston is not who she says she is. So be it. It only matters that she knows who she is.
And because she is Edith, or maybe because a certain detective has rubbed off on her, she notices that the gentleman has an odd little mannerism of fiddling with his pocket-watch, picking it up and letting it drop in his pocket like an ornate talisman. At first, he seems to be doing it randomly, but it is very much by design, for it happens every five minutes or so, as if he were keeping time on a schedule.
“Are you expecting someone?” she asks him lightly.
“Pardon?”
“You keep looking at your watch.”
“Why, no, not really. But there was mention of fireworks earlier. I heard some ladies talking about it at the Rotunda. I must say I’m rather fond of fireworks. They make an occasion much jollier, don’t you think?”
Edith stares at him. This man is anything but jolly, but she gives him a pale imitation of a smile in acquiescence. The stiffness of his accent has not dissipated and she wonders if he is trying to cover his nerves. Yet what should he be nervous about?
The road soon becomes coarser and more difficult to navigate as they reach the end of Lovers’ Walk and veer left into a deserted alley. Edith tries to recall the map she memorized at home. She knows that if they walk straight ahead they will reach the rather fittingly named “Dark Walk”, which is a maze of closely-knit shrubbery and ivy-shrouded nooks. She can faintly see the silhouettes of Eudoria and Madame Gascoigne in the distance, but she feels no urge to join them. She’d rather stick to the Lovers’ Walk, thank you very much. She is about to propose to her companion that they walk back to the Turkish Tent, when she spies something glinting in the muddied grass at her feet. She gasps. Her earring has fallen off.
Edith bends to pick it up. The pearls feel like water between her fingers. She slips the earring in her ear and turns around to find – no one.
The gentleman has disappeared.
Edith whirls on the spot, stunned. The alley is completely empty.
Yet he couldn’t have gone much farther, and he couldn’t have turned back either, because she would have seen him. The only way he could have absconded is by diving straight into the prickly shrubs. Edith inhales. She will not lose her cool over a trick, though her stomach clenches with apprehension. Perhaps the gentleman ran into some kind of trouble while she was distracted. She must try to find him.
Edith picks up a hazelnut branch from the ground and begins to beat it against the shrubs, checking for any hidden bodies. She can’t help but feel rather ridiculous, trussed up as she is in this gown, armed with a branch whose twigs rudely tear into her fine gloves. She has a right mind to drop the branch and use her hands alone, sacrificing the gloves in the process, but such plans she never has a chance to put into motion, for halfway through her task she does find something – or someone.
Except, it isn’t Madame Gascoigne’s gentleman.
No, the arms that come around her and pull her roughly towards the bushes are a stranger’s. A very drunk stranger, whose breath alone could probably start a fire.
“Come’ ere, da’lin’, give your uncle a kiss,” the stranger mumbles groggily, hobbling out of the bushes like a walking corpse. Edith is too shocked to push him off at first and his scratchy, smelly beard rubs against her cheek most offensively.
“You’ll be ‘appy to know I love all beauties, ‘specially dark ones,” he says with a satisfied leer and goes in for a wet kiss, which is right about the time when Edith recovers her wits and knocks his breath away with a well-rounded punch to his solar plexus and a knee to his groin.
“I feel so special,” she mutters, watching him collapse at her feet.
The man struggles to get up, wormy fingers reaching out for her. Edith makes a disgusted noise in the back of her throat and turns to leave, but his hand suddenly wraps around her ankle. He tugs and Edith almost loses her balance. She huffs. All right. She wasn’t going to do much worse to him, but now the idiot has earned a proper thrashing.
Yet she is denied the pleasure of teaching him some manners when someone else takes up the task. The drunkard is hauled to his feet by the scruff of his neck and thrown violently down the darkening alley by a tall man with wide shoulders. Wait, she knows those dark curls.
“Sherlock?”
The detective brushes his hands and turns to her, but whatever question he had on his mind is evidently lost as he takes in her appearance. His jaw slacks a little.
Edith folds her arms self-consciously. “It was your mother’s idea, all right?”
His wandering gaze feels unbearably warm, but it is not the warmth of affection or familiarity. It’s something quite distinct. After a few moments, he seems to remember where they are.
“Remind me to thank her later,” he says, though there’s little humour in his voice. The night is strangely reflected in his eyes and she can’t help but look back.
“What are you doing here?” she asks, wishing she had not dropped the hazelnut branch.
“I suppose I have to thank Mother again. She sent me a rather cryptic message about tonight’s rendezvous, something about requiring back-up.”
Edith exhales. “She does plan for everything, doesn’t she?”
Sherlock takes a step towards her. “I don’t suppose she planned to desert you in the middle of Vauxhall, yet here you are, alone.” His voice is soft, yet she can tell he’s containing the anger underneath. It gives her a strange thrill.
“I handled myself quite well before you arrived,” she replies, equally soft, though the statement seems to hint at something beyond their current situation.
Sherlock takes another step closer. “All the same, I’d rather you did not have to fend for yourself all the time.”
Edith lifts her chin. “That sounds a little patronizing, don’t you think?”
“How so?”
She notes that he keeps getting closer and for some reason she is not moving out of his range.
“I teach others how to defend themselves. I have done it all my life. You may see it as unladylike but I enjoy it as much as you enjoy boxing.”
Sherlock cocks his head to the side. “Surely, you did not enjoy the altercation with our drunken friend.”
Edith smiles a wry smile. “Maybe I did.”
His eyes seem to sharpen, seem to slowly peel off the silk from her shoulders.
“I do not think your methods are unladylike. I merely care for your wellbeing,” he says, in that honest way of his which always cuts her up a little.
Edith swallows. “I suppose – I do too. For yours.”
That was a foolish thing to say, but she feels strangely euphoric, as if about to tip over a precipice.
“I’m glad we are in agreement about our mutual concern,” he rasps and tucks a loose curl from her face, his thumb lingering on the side of her cheek. “Because I was very tempted to kill that fellow.”
Edith’s heart is in her throat. His body traps her against the shrubbery, but she doesn’t quite mind it. No, she doesn’t mind it at all.
“What a dangerous man you are,” she teases, though it comes out a little hoarse.
“You have no idea,” he murmurs against her lips, and whatever safeguards she always keeps up around her crumble helplessly, like rooks in a game of chess, as he kisses her deeply, his hand wrapped around her throat, thumb tracing her jaw and eagerly pulling her closer in a way that suggests he has been waiting for quite a while to do this, and, as he’s established before, he doesn’t like to be kept waiting.
He also seems to apply himself very vigorously to the task at hand, because all his focus is on making sure she won’t be able to stand for very long. One of her knees is in danger of giving in, which has only ever happened in a fight, but then isn’t this its faithful mirror? Edith moans into the kiss, which seems to him invitation enough to trace her bottom lip with his tongue and wrap a possessive arm around her waist, fingers deftly exploring the small gift of bare skin at the back of her dress. There seems to be a frenzy in her blood as he tilts her head up and kisses the side of her throat and she can’t help but lean into it and wrap her own arm around his shoulder. If someone were to come down this alley – and there are many chances they will, any moment now – they might not find it so surprising to chance upon a couple down Lovers’ Walk, yet their current position would be considered rather scandalous. When exactly did he pull down the straps of her dress and why does he have her pulse between his teeth? He soon returns to her bruised, neglected mouth and Edith forgets all about potential onlookers and gardens and London and herself, and she doesn’t feel too bad about it, because the great detective has clearly erased those things from his mind as well, judging from the way he’s angling her mouth against his, as passion tips them over the precipice, again and again.
In fact, their lips only part after the explosion.
Already unsteady on her feet, Edith falls into his arm and Sherlock cradles her to him as they both look up in shock.
The sky is ablaze with comets and smoke.
“Fireworks?” she asks, dizzily.
“I’m afraid not,” he says, tightening his grip on her.
Edith looks over his shoulder. Over the flaming heads of shrubs and topiary she sees a flag atop one of the Triumphant Arches. It wasn’t there before. It’s white and green and distinctly not English. Why does it look familiar?
Terrified screams and shrill cries for help suddenly fill the alleys, coming from all directions at once.
Slowly, as if through a fog, Edith remembers Madame Gascoigne and her companion who was always checking the time. He had disappeared only minutes before.
“Sherlock, something bad –”
“Yes. We must find Mother.”
Luckily for them, Eudoria is only halfway down the Dark Walk when they run into her, but Madame Gascoigne is not at her side.
“Darlings! You’re all right! Have you seen the flag?” Eudoria cries out in one gulp. “It’s the Fenians! They set off a bomb! The Prince’s Pavilion has been blown to pieces!”
The Fenians, Edith realizes. Of course. That’s why the flag appeared familiar. She had seen their attacks before. The Irish “radicals” and “terrorists”, as they were often called.
Sherlock takes hold of his mother’s arm. “Let’s get out of here before they seal this place. You two do not wish to be caught in the midst of it.”
“But –”
You’re coming with me, both of you.”
The tone of his voice brooks no argument, and for once, both women listen.
Edith was never very curious about Sherlock’s lodgings, but she takes everything in now as if it were a private museum of indiscernible artefacts. So this is where the man lives. She is surprised at the neat orderliness of his drawing room, the cosiness of the fireplace, though he quickly informs her that he has to thank Mrs. Hudson for all that. She forgets to ask who Mrs. Hudson is as he guides her to a sedan chair and places a shawl over her shoulders.
To be fair, she has been rather bowled over since leaving the gardens, and the explosion is not the only cause for discomfiture. She can barely meet Sherlock’s eyes, much less think about what has happened.
Eudoria, on the other hand, is brimming with energy.
“Of course! I should have realized we were her alibi! Madame Gascoigne was already a radical, just of a different faction. I suppose she even sympathizes with our cause, though her heart belongs with the Fenians.”
“Please do not tell me that you now see common points between Irish nationalists and yourself,” Sherlock drawls, leaning back against a writing screen.
“Of course I do, though perhaps our methods are a little different.”
Sherlock shakes his head. “We know about your stash of explosives, Mother, so in terms of methods, perhaps you are not so different.”
Eudoria pauses in the middle of the room. She shrugs. “I am more elegant about it.”
“Oh, you would not kill innocents in the process?” Sherlock asks sternly.
Eudoria scowls at that. “I know far more about innocents than you, darling boy. We should thank the stars there were no casualties tonight.”
“Only the maimed and the injured,” he mutters under his breath. “It was rather a close shave.”
“And what would you have me do?” she snaps. “I did not plan for it. I plan for everything, but even I couldn’t foresee that.”
Edith has never seen Eudoria quite so angry, all at once. The woman’s expression is forbidding, but Edith suspects she is also angry at herself.
“I want to kill that woman for putting you both in danger. But I cannot. There are certain things this government has done that ensures we shall be bombed and cut open for centuries to come and if you believe that is unjust, you don’t know the half of it.” Lady Holmes’ words are full of rage, yet also despondent. Edith knows the feeling. Sometimes, helplessness is a bitter pill to swallow.
Sherlock lowers his head. “I see.”
“I wonder if you do. I am not justifying violence,” Eudoria adds in a softer tone of voice, “but do not ask me to render it meaningless.”
Sherlock chews the side of his mouth. He suddenly looks up and meets Edith’s gaze. She is almost tempted to look away, but she sees the struggle in his eyes, how much he wants to understand his mother, how much he disapproves, yet how deeply he sympathizes. She nods to him, as if to say, I know how you feel, and that seems to fortify him a little.
Edith clears her throat, finally finding the ability to speak again.
“At least we’ll have nothing more to do with that woman and her lackey, for I’m sure he was the pyromaniac. He was also Irish. I could not pin his accent, at first, because he was trying so hard to conceal it. But I’m sure of it now.”
“Well deducted,” Sherlock commends from his corner of the room and Edith smiles and folds her hands in her lap.
Eudoria, however, is barely listening.
“Nothing more to do with her? Why, that’s nonsense. I want to work with her now more than ever.”
“What?” both Sherlock and Edith exclaim.
“You said you wanted to kill her only a moment ago,” Sherlock reminds her, more than a touch exasperated.
“Of course I do. And yet, I shall have to stay my hand for the moment. Don’t look at me like that! You must admit she planned it brilliantly. She found the perfect outdoor location to strike, and she did it in plain sight, with little to no effort. Not to mention, she played a simpering coquette for much of the evening, flashing that theatre gown everywhere, making me believe her money would be the only useful thing about her. But there is actually a lot we could learn from her. We cannot let her be the Fenians’ tool alone when she could do some actual good for us.”
Edith groans. She lets her head fall in her hands. Gods, the Holmeses. She understands now why Mycroft is such an unfeeling bastard. She could use a drink, or several.
She feels a presence at her side.
When she looks up, Sherlock is holding a tumbler of brandy before her.
How did he know?
“You look like you need it,” is all he says.
Edith takes the glass gratefully and their fingers touch for a moment. Though she withdraws her hand, that current of electricity is unmistakably there. What happened in the gardens was real, after all.
“Are you two even listening?” Eudoria demands, one eyebrow perked. She has stopped pacing and is looking at them with narrowed eyes in marked suspicion. “Or are you already conspiring against me?”
Edith stammers a response, but Sherlock gets there before her.
“I believe there has been sufficient excitement for one evening. We all need rest and perhaps time for reflection.”
Eudoria stares at them for a moment longer before her shoulders give in. “I suppose we do.”
“You are both welcome to stay here for the night,” Sherlock says, gesturing with his arm towards the rooms above.
“Oh no, I cannot stay, for I don’t intend to sleep just yet,” Eudoria replies, picking up her hat. “But Edith should, for it is too late to go back to your shop now, darling. And the streets are probably crawling with officers.”
“I couldn’t possibly stay. I’m sure we could find a carriage.”
“Not very likely,” Sherlock intercedes. “The traffic will be impossible. Besides, it’s much safer for you to be here. I would not think of letting you go back to your shop.”
His gaze, at once, is both gentle and authoritative. It seems to coax and command. Edith swallows.
“It’s settled, then,” Eudoria concludes, seemingly oblivious to their exchange. “You will take good care of my Edith, won’t you, Sherlock?”
The detective smiles, though it looks more like a smirk from where Edith is standing. “Certainly, I will.”
Edith clings to Eudoria for an embrace that goes on for too long, but she’s loath to see the woman go, for she will then be alone with Sherlock.
But as Eudoria walks out of the room, another woman walks in. Elderly and quite beside herself.
“Dear heavens, Sir, I heard the most awful news about a great explosion at Vauxhall! They say Prince Eddy might be buried under the rubble! What has the world come to, I ask you –” The elderly woman pauses, staring at Edith in surprise. “Oh, hello there dearie. Who might you be?”
“Edith, this is my esteemed and rather put-upon landlady, Mrs. Hudson. Mrs. Hudson, this excellent young lady is Edith Grayston and she will be staying with us tonight. Would you be ever so kind as to fix one of the rooms for her upstairs?”
Mrs. Hudson smiles agreeably at her, but then frowns at Sherlock. “What, in half an hour? Why did you not let me know in advance, Mr. Holmes? Why, she will think we are complete slobs!”
Edith assures her she thinks nothing of the sort, but the poor landlady storms out in a rush of activity, muttering something about cold dinners and a rasher of ham she was saving up for personal use.
Sherlock turns back to Edith. “You see? This house is the epitome of propriety.”
“I had no doubts,” she comments, setting down the tumbler and rising from the chair.
Sherlock watches her intently. “I hope my mother did not see the bruise.”
“Bruise?”
Sherlock lifts his fingers to his throat, gesturing at her own. Edith gives him a questioning look. He guides her to a tall mirror next to the curtained windows. He stands behind her and removes the shawl he had given her. He gently traces his knuckle down the steepness of her neckline. Edith almost gasps. She knew she had felt teeth there. There is a small, mouth-shaped bruise like a violet constellation at the confluence of veins and shoulder.
“You should be ashamed of yourself,” she says, half in joke, half in earnest.
“And you should only let me see that marking,” he says, half in joke, half in earnest.
Edith turns towards him. He shouldn’t talk like that. She shouldn’t let him. But she does not know where they stand anymore, if she ever did.
What does it all mean? That he wants her for himself? Even he – even he must know how foolish that would be. But as long as they don’t talk about it directly, perhaps they are safe.
Still, it would hurt her awfully if Sherlock was only toying with her, if this was only a bit of fun, after all. She had told him she was not his plaything, but the way he’s looking at her - well, it feels like much more than that.
But she must keep a level head, at all costs. She lost it once tonight.
Upstairs, they hear Mrs. Hudson do violence to the bed sheets.
“I should…” she points to the door.
“Why not stay for another glass? We could talk about my new case.”
“Oh, no, I’m not fit for that at the moment. My mind is all scattered. Besides, I can’t wait to get out of this bothersome dress.”
His eyes darken like wine as they take their fill of her. “I am sure I would not mind your doing so.”
Edith shakes her head. Stop it, before I actually believe you.
“Good night, Sherlock.”
“Good night, Edith. I will see you in the morning.”
But as she walks out of the room she thinks, I will leave before dawn.
She feels his eyes on her even after she closes the door.