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For me, boarding school was always the terror of my youth. As I first was driven towards St Bartholomew’s Towers, I remember the huge looming shadow of the building. It sat jauntily on a headland, the landscape around it crumbling and falling into the sea. The stone was old and worn, and the wind blowing off the sea always made the dormitories in the towers cold and unwelcoming. The whole building was, in fact, inhospitable. I hated everything about that school. I was bullied unrelentingly for my singular appearance and lack of academic ability. The food was awful, and the lessons tedious and impossible for my dysfunctional brain to understand. I was a sickly child, and found myself often in the infirmary under the care of the cruel Matron. There was only one thing that made my life at St Bart’s bearable, and even occasionally enjoyable.
I was laid up in the infirmary one night, and kept wide awake by the thumping in my head. I heard first the clatter of feet upon the stair, and through the door burst our chemistry teacher, Mr Holmes. “Matron!” He called “Bring me some hydroxide, Sodium preferably, though any type will do!” Matron appeared in her dressing gown, and in the foulest of moods. She scolded the stern faced teacher like a child. She declared him careless and stupid, which I could see offended him more than he would like to display. It appeared that Mr Holmes had not predicted the outcome of an experiment, resulting in the dousing of his hands in acid. Wondering why he had not simply used a simple alkaline that could be found in his lab, I watched with interest as Matron treated the welds on his big hands. His shadow feel on my bed as he towered above me, his dark curly hair hanging loosely over his high cheekbones.
When Mr Holmes prepared at last to leave, a figure sauntered through the door and blocked his way. I recognised him at once as my loathed Law and Business teacher, Professor Moriarty. I noticed immediately the change in atmosphere. Mr Holmes glared with open hatred at the Professor, which he returned with a lazy, menacing smile.
“Why, you needn’t have come all the way to the infirmary for treatment Sherlock. I’m sure your little doctor would have willingly sorted you out.” Moriarty practically glistened with charm. I saw to my disgust that Matron was blushing coyly at the professor. Mr Holmes raised an eyebrow, and spoke as if to an inferior species when replying.
“It would surely be unreasonable to wake Dr Watson at such a late hour.”
“So instead you chose to disturb Matron?” Matron simpered.
“Is it not her job?” Declared Mr Holmes in mock surprise. He glanced scathingly one last time at the professor, then pushed past him and left. Moriarty glared at me.
“You speak of this to no-one boy.” He demanded, before turning on his heel and departing without waiting for a reply.
Several days later, I attended my next timetabled chemistry lesson. I struggled greatly with the concept we were studying, and decided reluctantly to stay after class for further guidance. Plucking up my courage, I began by asking Mr Holmes if his hands were healing well. They were, at the time, still wrapped and bandaged. He looked upon me in surprise, as if wondering why anyone should care for him. Before he could answer, from the doorway came a voice I knew and liked well.
“You see Sherlock! If only you gave people a chance, you could see how you underestimated their natural kindness.” Declared Dr Watson, our Biology teacher, smiling down at me kindly.
I liked Dr Watson. He had a way of explaining things which made sense to my simplistic mind frame.
“Pah! They care not for me. Why, if they like me so, do they not complete the work I set them? Why do they distract each other during my lessons?” Cried he, and gestured as if to say the subject was not up for discussion.
“Perhaps sir,” I ventured, “If your tongue was a little less sharp, or if you were slower to scold, you would be well liked.” I feared immediately that I had said too much, for the anger on his face intensified. Dr Watson however, seemed to find the observation hilarious. He laughed heartily.
“He knows you well! Have a heart Sherlock.” He joked, but Mr Holmes scowled. He took his coat from the back of his chair and left abruptly. “Oh, we’ve offended him! Oh well, there’s no talking to him when he’s in this kind of mood anyway. Coming?” He began to go towards the door.
“Oh dear!” I sighed “I hoped he’d be able to help me, I struggled with the lesson.”
“Well, I’m not incompetent at Chemistry. What is it that you don’t understand?” So I told him, and after twenty minutes I felt confident in the field. Furthermore, he agreed that he would willingly coach me further. So I found myself outside the joint office of Dr Watson and Mr Holmes that day after lessons.
While Dr Watson attempted to help me, I could not help watching the elaborate way in which Mr Holmes was conducting an experiment. Dr Watson caught me looking, and laughed quietly. “He’s rather a show off isn’t he? Well, we’re not getting anywhere with him distracting you. “He whispered to me “He gets so uptight about things too. For example if I were to say...” He raised his voice to normal level “there you are quite right. The chemical symbol for iron is ‘In’.” He winked at me.
Mr Holmes gave a hearty sigh. “John, if you wanted my help, you may ask for it. You don’t have to coax me over. You both know very well the chemical symbol for iron is ‘Fe’.”
“Ah, but can you tell me its atomic number?”
“Atomic number or Proton number?” The question was directed at me.
“They’re the same.” John replied of rme when the words stuck in my throat. The imposing man still scared me more than I would like to admit.
“Well done! I didn’t expect you to remember that. It’s 26 by the way.”
“And still you cannot resist displaying your intellectual abilities!” John quipped.
I watched this short exchange with interest, my head flicking from man to man like watching a tennis match. Mr Holmes had reached the desk and took a seat opposite us. We spent the next few hours in a happy mix of work and joke. To my great surprise, I was enjoying myself so much that all three of us forgot to go down for dinner. Mr Holmes passed it off, but Dr Watson and I were both exceedingly grateful when one of the kitchen workers bought up some cold sandwiches. We chomped on them happily, Mrs Hudson making a welcome addition to the group. Many hours later, I made my way up to bed. I avoided all the cuel and hateful remarks, as I was late. I was full of food and happy. Never have I slept so well as I did that night.
For several months this coaching continued, progressing from Chemistry, to Biology, to every other subject under the sun, some of which Mr Holmes showed a surprising ignorance in. By the end of the year, I had collected more knowledge than I had gathered in a whole lifetime’s education. I passed all my exams, gained all my qualifications. At the end of the term, my father’s servant came for me. I should explain that my parents never came for me themselves. They were always too wrapped up in their work to bother looking after me. I’d never bothered much about my home life before. Being alone had never really bothered me, never having had any other circumstance to compare it with. It did affect me now now though.
I realised how much I would miss being around the two teachers who had become the only friends I had ever had. I decided that I didn’t want to go back home. I wanted to make my own way in the world, and be around people like John and Sherlock, who didn’t treat me as I looked; different.
On the pretence of going to fetch my bag, I escaped to my dormitory, detouring via the kitchen. I sneaked some food from a cupboard. I packed a small bag with the stolen food and drink in it, along with some tools, such as string, that I hoped I would fine useful. Then to my horror, I heard voices on the stairs. Grabbing my pack, I scuttled into a cupboard and pulled the door shut behind me. Seconds later, I heard that latch on the dormitory door click.
“...return at once.” Finished the drawling voice of the chauffeur.
“Well he’s not here” Came the cheery reply from the voice I knew to be John's. “You go and look in the infirmary. I’ll check my office. I’ll meet you in the main hall shortly.” I heard the muffled, fading footsteps of the chauffeur departing. I strained my ears for the following footsteps that would have indicated John’s departure. None came. Instead, I found myself listening to a whispered conversation, though goodness knows who John was talking to,though I supposed it could easily have been three people ascending the stairs, not two as I had previously assumed. I tried in vain to make out the voices and what they were saying. Then suddenly I pulled back from the door and huddled as close to the backing board as I could get, for steps were approaching my hiding place. A glimmer of light shone through the widening crack as the door opened to reveal... Sherlock Holmes. Smiling. I practically collapsed with relief.
“Come on” He said, beckoning “Hide in our office until that chauffeur’s gone, then you can explain.” He and John hustled me downstairs. We saw not a soul, thankfully, as most of the pupils had gone home. I hid in the store cupboard behind the desks, and waited for my friends to return. It was an uncomfortable wait. The bottles of chemicals were digging into my skin, and I was hot and claustrophobic. More than once I heard footsteps in the office outside, and I was grateful for my hiding place. My heart hammered in my chest, and my breaths came loud and fast. When finally the door opened and John helped me out, I was sweating and had bad cramp. He sat me comfortably on a chair. Then he and Sherlock stood opposite me, and the questioning began.
“The only reason we’re protecting you now” John said “Is because we think you have a genuine reason for not wanting to go home.”
I nodded dumbly.
“Are you going to explain?”
I looked at my feet, embarrassed. “Haven’t got any friends at home” I muttered. John smiled warmly at me, but Sherlock rolled his eyes and turned his back, dismissing the subject.
“How long are we staying away for?” He asked, staring out of the window on to the cliff path, which vanished terrifyingly over the edge.
“I... I don’t know” I stammered, and realisation hit me. I had nowhere else to go. I couldn’t stay here, they would lock it up. John and Sherlock would go home, and I would be stuck here on my own, no food or drink, cold and lonely. I sighed.
“I’ll get my bag” I stood up to go, but Sherlock stopped me, his eyes lighting up with excitement as he spoke to me.
“I got it already. You’ll need more than that food to feed three of us, and you need all sorts of things to sleep rough, blankets, matches, everything.”
I stopped in confusion. “What?”
“We need more than a few stale sandwiches and a couple of cans of baked beans to survive!”
“No really, stop joking. I’m going home.”
“What for? Come on, this is an adventure!" His eyes sparkled with excitement. "John, call Mrs Hudson, we'll need more supplies. Get going!” He shooed John downstairs, then turned to me. "You boy, listen to me. I know a cave we can stay in that’s sheltered from the wind and the sea, and out of sight of any prying eyes. Come, follow me." He then practically flew through the school to his own room, me struggling to keep up behind. We arrived, and he began to systematically pack things into a case, muttering to himself as he went along. I tried to catch what he was saying, but he was talking so fast that I could only distinguish single words out of whole sentences. These tiny snippets of information gave me not the faintest clue about what he was saying, but seeing as he was not directing his incessant charter at me, it was hardly of importance.
Finishing packing, he set off back down the corridor, calling for me to follow as fast as I could. We detoured past my room, where he hustled me into picking out some clean clothes from my case and shoving them into his. When we arrived back at the office, me sweaty and out of breath, Sherlock bright eyed and excited, John was waiting with a smaller briefcase, which, he informed us, was full of food and equipment.
“Have we got enough?” John worried “This pack is rather small.”
Sherlock smiled, and produced a bunch of keys from his pocket. “We can always revisit the kitchens. But that would be cheating!” He winked, and we all laughed. My split-second decision was starting to turn into a whole new adventure.
Eyes still flashing with excitement, Sherlock grabbed the second suitcase, and levered them easily through the door and down the stairs. All three of us galloped down the tower stairs at full speed, John and I following Sherlock with a mixture of trepidation and excitement. We were nearly at the bottom when things started to go wrong.
Moriarty. Standing at the bottom, smirking as if he owned us all and there was nothing we could do about it. Sherlock stopped dead, and dropped the suitcases. They clattered on the stairs.
“Well well well.” Commented the professor slickly. “Are we having a party?” He stared past Sherlock to me. “Is it legal for him not to go home with his parents? They must be very worried about him. I believe it is my duty to inform them that I have found the child. I’m sure they will be most....” He never finished the sentence. Maddened with hatred and panic, I grabbed the nearest thing to hand and threw it hard at his head. What had happened to be hanging on the wall at the time was a large metal shield, an emblem of the school’s heritage. I would never normally have been able to lift such a heavy article, but the hook was loose, and broke off as I pulled at it. As I tried to throw it, it went past my friends and by complete fluke hit Moriarty in the back of the legs as he turned to leave. His legs were smashed out from underneath him, and his whole body fell backwards. The three of us froze in horror, as he crashed into the stone steps. I gasped, but I wasn’t given time to dwell on my crime. John grabbed my arm, and all three of us escaped into the evening, Sherlock complaining that there hadn't been time to assess the body. The comments did not improve the state of my agitation, but the adrenalin soon took over my guilty conscience.
Had the lone figure of Mrs Hudson looked out the kitchen window in that moment, she would have seen three shadows taking off across the lawns and cricket pitches in the direction of the cliffs and vanishing to the night.