Chapter Text
To Ms. Stella Morris,
Your custom ring order has caught my attention. Color changing sapphires, 18 karat gold, and a unique design made by a great artisan. It’s a gorgeous piece of jewelry that anyone would love to have on their finger.
I will be making a trip across the Channel. I’d like to make this as painless as possible for you. If you would, bring it in a ring box and arrive for dinner at Sur La Revière on Millicent St. in your city of London. I have a reservation set for 18:00 on December 3rd under your name. I suggest wearing your best evening dress, as it’s a formal establishment.
I look forward to seeing you there.
Sincerely,
Arsène Lupin
Sherlock Holmes unceremoniously drops the letter, safely contained in a clear evidence bag, on Detective Inspector Lestrade’s desk. He states plainly, “Never heard of him.”
Lestrade shifts from leaning back comfortably in his chair to sitting at attention. With widening eyes, he asks, “What? You haven’t? You love to boast about being a living encyclopedia of every crime in the last 100 years.”
Sherlock picks at some lint on his wool coat, not meeting eyes with his friend and potential client. “I don’t speak French beyond a few swears. Vulgar language. If this famous burglar’s feats haven’t been translated into English, he must not be very interesting.” He flicks the lint away, watching as it blends into the carpet. “But rent is due. Give me the case.”
Sherlock holds out his hand for paperwork, but he receives a stern point from Lestrade’s finger instead. “You’re not running off yet. We’re waiting on a consultant.”
Sherlock sneers, “I am your consultant.”
Lestrade sneers right back, “A Lupin consultant.” He pushes his weight back on the chair and stands up. “Name’s Justin Ganimard, sent directly from Paris. He’s been chasing this guy for upwards of a decade and he caught him once.”
Sherlock quirks an eyebrow. “Once?”
“Once.”
Sherlock opens his mouth to respond, but a knocking at the office door interrupts him. He turns around to see a young man holding a damp suit jacket on his arm, who’s leaning into the open doorway. The smell of cigarette smoke overpowers the scent of rain on him. He asks, with a noticeably thick French accent, “Excuse me, am I in the office of Detective Inspector Gregory Lestrade?”
Lestrade leans to the side to look at him past Sherlock. “Yes, you are. And you’re not the Frenchman I was expecting today. Who are you?”
The man straightens up and smiles as he walks in. He moves next to Sherlock, his demeanor enthusiastic. Sherlock side-eyes him. Clearly, he thinks, this novice doesn’t have enough years on the force to break his spirit yet.
He flips open a wallet containing his badge. “I am Detective Anton-Marie-Phillippe Lavigne of the International Police. Ah, but I am not one for formalities. Please, call me Toni.” He pockets his badge, then walks up and extends his left hand halfway to Lestrade. Then he realizes Lestrade is using his right, and swaps arms for the handshake.
Lestrade shakes his gloved palm, though his brow is furrowed with confusion. “Interpol? We weren’t expecting a visit from you.”
Toni’s grip on the handshake goes slack, made limp with his own confusion. “Did…my friend’s message not reach you? Inspector Ganimard had an emergency, and he could not make it.”
Lestrade pulls his hand back and puts his hands on his hips, “I wasn’t told that, no.”
Toni’s enthusiasm shrinks as he replies, “My apologies for the last minute change, but I have worked with Ganimard regarding Lupin before. I can assure you that I am the next best person to help you with this threat.”
Lestrade sighs heavily and plops back in his chair. “Let me check my emails…” He clicks hastily with his computer mouse.
Sherlock rolls his eyes, and when his attention faces forward again, he notices a hand extended to him as well.
Toni had turned back and is now smiling brightly at him. “You must be Monsieur Sherlock Holmes. Ganimard told me he requested your expertise, as he does not know London as intimately as Paris.”
Sherlock stuffs his hands in his coat pockets. “I am.”
Toni backs off by taking his hand away. His tone stays light, despite Sherlock’s refusal to engage, “The pleasure of meeting you is all mine. I have read about you before. You have an impressive portfolio for an amateur.”
Sherlock only scoffs at him, which makes Toni nervously sputter out, “P-pardon me, maybe that was not the right word in English. Ehhhhh-” Toni drones on for a few seconds.
Sherlock narrows his eyes in suspicion before interrupting his search for another word. “You were already in London when you came here.”
Toni blinks at him in surprise, “Eh? You are correct! An ongoing case had me here. It is confidential, but it is not so urgent that I could not do Ganimard a favor while I’m in the city. How did you know?”
Sherlock hardly takes a breath as he lists off all his observations. “Your suit is pressed except the single, horizontal crease on the back of your thighs, you sat on a hard seat for a while, which means you took The Tube to get here. It was raining up until 24 minutes ago, and your suit jacket hasn’t completely dried judging by the smell, so the downpour hadn’t stopped before you found the station. You came from somewhere in the city, but not from any airports, which are far enough away that you would have been dry from before the rain began 45 minutes ago.”
Toni blinks at him again, this time incredulously, “You were…staring at my thighs, monsieur?”
Sherlock hmphs loudly through his nose and curtly turns back to the Inspector, “Your replacement Lupin consultant has proven a waste of space. I won’t be needing him.”
Lestrade points at Sherlock sternly. “Just found the email. You’re stuck with him.” Realizing quickly how that sounded, his shoulders slump and he rubs his neck. He looks back to Toni apologetically, “‘scuse me, Sherlock doesn’t inspire proper manners when he’s around. I meant ‘welcome to the team,’ Toni.”
Toni takes it in stride; he tilts his head and smiles warmly. “Enchanté! I look forward to working with both of you.”
This grown man’s youthful energy and willingness to forgive in order to do his job almost gives Sherlock acid reflux. Almost.
“Ganimard caught me up on the case before I arrived.” Toni touches two fingers to the desk, in front of the evidence bag. “This is the calling card?”
“If that’s what you want to call it, yeah.” Lestrade picks it up and passes it to him.
Toni gives it a look over while he relays more background knowledge, “These letters are part of Lupin’s modus operandi; he likes to declare what he intends to steal ahead of time. He chooses to give out details of his plans, and yet…it has never prevented him from succeeding.”
“Arrogance,” Sherlock chimes in, “He’s increasing the difficulty. It’s a game to him.”
Lestrade huffs out a laugh, “Sounds familiar. I bet you’d get on great with him.”
Sherlock says monotonously, “Only if his game is actually fun. Politely convincing the victim to hand over jewelry isn’t my idea of exciting.”
Toni, who was reading the letter over while they talked, turns his head to Sherlock, holds the evidence out to him to take, and emphasizes seriously, “I can assure you, Monsieur Holmes, nothing is simple when it comes to Arsène Lupin.”
Sherlock grabs it a little too firmly, and swipes some other police materials off of Lestrade’s desk. He heads out the door before Lestrade begins filling Toni in on the situation. He heads back to 221B Baker Street, and gets right to work.
The letter to Stella Morris is handwritten in cursive. The paper is thick and acid free; india ink doesn’t soak through or bleed on it. It was written with a nib, not a ballpoint pen or brush, judging by the varying weights of the generally thin, smooth, and unbroken lines. There isn’t a single smudge, meaning Lupin is right handed, and put in extra effort to let it dry line-by-line. The craft of this single page is perfect; Lupin is clearly a practiced calligrapher.
If he wrote it himself. Sherlock can’t even tell because this is all the data he can collect from it. There’s no sweat or oil soaked into the page, no crumbs from his lunch, not even a mark or tear on the edges to mull over. He can only make a guess about Lupin from this paper: making these “calling cards” is something he considers important to his plan, and they must reveal nothing but what he himself wants the targets to know.
It pisses Sherlock off.
“Looks like you’re having fun,” John says, interrupting Sherlock’s thoughts. He places a cup of tea on a nearby end table. He knows that putting it on the surface Sherlock's currently working at, the table between the living room windows, is liable to make a mess on the carpet.
Sherlock ignores the comment and the drink, “You took French.” He holds a thick file toward John, who’s already walking away from him. “Read these reports for me. I need more on this thief.”
John pours a cup of tea for Rosie too, and places it on a saucer in front of her. She’s sitting in the kitchen and kicking her short legs as she impatiently waits for her drink. John only looks a little offended as he replies, “I cannot believe you remember that detail, but I have to remind you of my birthday every year. That was in primary school, all I remember is adieu and un, deux, trois.”
Rosie asks, after making a loud slurp from her cup, “Can I read it, Uncle Sherlock? I’m good at reading.”
He grunts, “You’ll do as well as I can, Rosie.”
She perks up, not understanding his sarcasm. She hops from the chair, almost abandoning her drink, before John scoops her up by the armpits. He puts her back in her seat, to the 7-year-old’s disappointment.
John half-sternly says to her, “Tea first, before it gets cold.” John turns to Sherlock, voice very stern in contrast, “Just call your assigned Frenchman. That’s what he’s here for.”
“He grates on my senses.” Sherlock pulls his laptop closer, “I’ll type it into a search engine translator. I’d rather have half of it come out wrong than deal with him.”
John pours himself a cup as well. “And what’s wrong with him, exactly?”
“He’s so-” Sherlock sneers while looking out the window, as if it will reach the man of his ire from wherever he is in London, “charming.”
John shuts Sherlock’s laptop on him, which would have crushed his fingers if he had a slower reaction time, “It’s December 1st. You don’t have time for that, call him.”
Half an hour later, Sherlock can hear two sets of feet ascending the creaky wooden stairs to the flat. Mrs. Hudson is talking loud enough that he can tell she’s giddy about company who’s no doubt gotten his hooks into her. Optimism is a rarity with Sherlock’s guests. They’re more often grumpy homicide investigators or desperate clientele.
She knocks at the door gently, before opening it without any actual care for barging in. “This is it, Mr. La- Excuse me, Detective Lavigne.”
He smiles warmly at her, a hand placed politely on his chest, “We do not need to be formal, Martha. You can call me Toni. Thank you for showing me the way.”
“Not a problem, Toni,” she says, smiling bashfully. The middle aged woman giggles like a schoolgirl as she descends the stairs. Sherlock can’t imagine what he did to get that reaction out of her, and frankly doesn’t want to know. John just raises his eyebrows at her, and puts away the question for later.
Toni comes in, leaving the front door open. His steps slow as he looks the place over. He stares at the bullet holes peppering the wall to his right. “I am surprised you invited me to your home, Monsieur Holmes, rather than meet at The Yard.”
Sherlock doesn’t look away from his work when addressing the comment, “Too noisy. I prefer not to have my ears bombarded by the constant ringing of phones and scuffing on linoleum.”
“You also did not tell me you had guests.” He approaches John with his left arm outstretched, who stood up as soon as Toni came in. John fumbles the same way Lavigne did yesterday with Lestrade, swapping out his right for his left to match him. “Detective Toni Lavigne of Interpol.”
He returns the handshake firmly, despite using his non-dominant arm. “John Watson, nice to meet you. Don’t mind us, we’re Sherlock’s…uh…” The strength of his grip tapers off alongside his thoughts.
Rosie, mouth full of biscuit, finishes for him, “Walls.”
Toni smiles down at her, “Walls? In what way?” He offers to shake her hand as well.
She swallows her treat and stands up. She gratefully accepts his gloved hand with both of her’s, shaking it with more force than her father did. “Uncle Sherlock likes bouncing stuff.”
He realizes what she means quickly, “Ahhh you are his assistants on the case. Then it was very important that I meet you. What is your name, mademoiselle?”
“Rosamund Watson” She imitates Toni’s earlier gesture, where he placed his hand on his chest, “You can call me Rosie.”
He takes back his hand, his smile grows even bigger. “I look forward to working with you, Rosie.”
“Me too, Toni!” She raises her voice, joyful at her inclusion.
John huffs out a laugh, amused at Rosie’s renewed enthusiasm.
Toni stands back up and turns to her father. “I have read your blog, Dr.Watson. It is a pleasure to meet the man behind such extraordinary memoirs.”
John opens his mouth to respond, but Sherlock butts in. “I didn’t invite you over for a casual chat, Lavigne.” Sherlock holds out the file to him. “I need more information on Lupin.”
Toni hums in disappointment. “Analyzing the calling card was a dead end?”
Sherlock’s eye almost twitches, “No. I have surmised plenty about his personality from it. He’s disguised his natural handwriting with something more akin to a work of art. He won’t settle for letters cut out from magazines or something printed off a computer…he’s pompous, but careful. He was aware that anything less than perfection could reveal something about himself. It is impossible to glean anything other than what he wanted to tell us, and that awareness certainly makes him,” Sherlock hesitates to compliment his opponent, “cunning.”
“I would say I am surprised he can get past the famous Sherlock Holmes, but at this point, I think he may be a ghost that haunts all of Paris.” Toni plops down in the chair across from Sherlock.
Sherlock shoves the thick file into his hand. “Ghosts aren’t real. If I can’t start with physical data, I can make his actions predictable. Translate.”
Toni crosses his legs and opens the file in his lap. He reaches into his pocket for a pack of cigarettes, and goes to put one in his mouth.
John stammers, stopping him from putting one to his lips, “Ah, uh, sorry, please don’t smoke inside the flat. For Rosie and Sherlock.”
Sherlock shoots him a withering glare.
John returns it, “Don’t look at me like that, you asked me to help you quit. Again.”
Toni straightens up his posture, his tone apologetic, “Forgive me, I am such a heavy smoker that I do not think when I pull one out. I will not light it, just chew on it, if that is alright.”
John purses his lips, but nods, “I suppose that’s fine.”
It’s not fine. All Sherlock can think about is the delicious secondhand smoke he could be having right now if Lavigne lit that thing.
He doesn’t though. He reads aloud with the stick boobing between his lips, “Name: Arsène Lupin. Height: Redacted. Weight: Redacted. Ethnicity: Redacted. Sex: Male, unconfirmed.”
John furrows his brow in thought. “Redacted? As in, there used to be something there, right?”
Toni glances up at him, “Yes, most of it was stricken from the record. The Parisian authorities only kept his sex as ‘unconfirmed’ because he has insisted in some of his calling cards that he is a ‘gentleman.’”
Sherlock’s eyes narrow. “Lestrade said he was caught once.”
Toni replies, “Once. And they had him imprisoned for an unclear amount of time before he somehow replaced himself with an innocent homeless man. After that, the data was stricken from the record, because they could not tell what data was taken from him or the man who replaced him.”
Rosie runs up to Sherlock. She holds his wrist and bounces his arm with excitement, “Maybe he is a ghost, he went through the wall!”
Toni smiles at her curiously, “You think so? Do you have a hypothesis on how he brought the other man in?”
Rosie nearly shouts with joy, “Laundry cart!”
Toni raises an eyebrow and rubs his chin, as if he’s seriously considering her idea, “Those big ones that you see in movies? Yes, that is a possibility.”
Rosie’s smile could rival the sun in brightness.
Sherlock cuts her off, his tone dripping with impatience, “We don’t have time to write fanfiction about cold cases, Lavigne. Read.”
Rosie reads Uncle Sherlock’s bad mood too easily. She lets go and stands next to him with her hands folded, head tilting toward the floor, discouraged. John is busy cleaning dishes in the sink, and doesn’t notice.
Toni shoots a nasty glare at Sherlock. “Yes. We should get back to the file.” His lips curl up into a sarcastic grin around his cigarette, before he looks back at Rosie warmly. “But we do not have to read them in order.” He flips to another paper within the bulky folder. “I can tell you how he was arrested, Rosie, since we are already on the topic.”
Rosie lifts her head back up and her smile returns, rushing over to Toni to look at what he’s reading.
Sherlock only half pays attention, fixated on the unlit cigarette in Toni’s mouth.