Fic for Meredydd: The Problem of Bees
Title: The Problem of Bees
Recipient: Meredydd
Author: rodlox
Dialect Coach: Thesmallhobbit
Beta-Reader: destntoast
Verse: Ritchie Films
Characters/Pairings: John Watson, Sherlock Holmes. Brief Mary Morstan. Mentions Mycroft Holmes/Lestrade, Mary Morstan/John Watson.
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 2,791 words.
Warnings: Offscreen character death.
Summary: In 1910, years after failing to defeat Moriarty, Sherlock reunites with John and offers his help with a case…as hard as it is to believe the case is about bees.
Disclaimer: None of these characters are mine; they are property of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. These are the work of those who have reimagined his creations over the years - of which I am only playing in the sandbox of their silver-screen work. Any and all errors within this, are entirely my own.
Spoilers: Sherlock Holmes: a Game of Shadows, as well as mentions of Sherlock Holmes: the Golden Years movies, & They Might Be Giants.
Note: I hope I did not misunderstand or misinterpret your prompt request regarding Mary. If I did, please let me know.
.---------.
“But Raffles is dead.”
“Retired. As I was meant to be.”
--John Watson, Sherlock Holmes; Sherlock Holmes: The Golden Years.
.-----------------------------------.
Time has passed since the day of the Great Assassination, so called as it began the Great War. On that day in Meiringen, Switzerland, Sherlock Holmes, John Watson, Sim, and Mycroft Holmes failed to stop the machinations of Moriarty.
But Moriarty was made to fail as well, with Holmes working with Mary Morstan to bring down Moriarty’s financial empire, while Holmes was in Switzerland. The war would happen, but evil would not profit one cent.
The team split up afterwards, to draw out and end Moriarty’s last loyalists, weakening the forces of evil further. Nothing beyond that was planned.
That was ten years ago.
The man who strode down the country road on this fine day, he had been a thief and a recovery artist and a solver of problems; he had been called a hero and a showman and the world’s greatest detective.
And now he was returning.
He had never been here before - witness the looks he got as he passed one house and then another and another, making him think he had accidentally left on part of his most recent disguise. No, he was returning to the life of the only living non-relative who utterly understood him.
As he passed the gate barring his old comrade’s property from strangers, he recalled him saying ‘and there’s none stranger than you.’ And his old mate was not presently at home, he noted. It had not been easy to find this place, so well-tucked-away was it - and he had no doubt that was deliberate. More cautious than he was before. Good man.
It occurred to him that he could go inside, make himself at home, and wait. But a persistent buzzing drew his attention to the back yard.
It was a beehive. A baker’s dozen of them.
He elected to pass the time by observing the social little insects. Watch their comings and goings. See how a hornet fares in an encroachment on the hive furthest from the house.
A house where the cry of “Holmes!” was hollered at him after some time.
Glancing over, Sherlock smiled and said, “Ah, Watson. Bit of an odd hobby you have here. Good to see you.”
“And you,” John said. “Come inside when you’ve finished stalking my bees,” with a muttered “Some things never change.”
Sounds no more exhausted at my antics than he ever used to - which is odd, I grant, given that its been ten years. But he did sound pleased to have my company.
To his honed and refined senses, Watson’s country home possessed the expected great domesticity…only mustier. An effort has been made to keep the dust from winning its reconquesta to cover everything, but from habit rather than desire or love of the work.
It could be presumed that Mrs. Watson had simply spent more effort fighting dust in rooms other than this one; or that she was a woman for whom housecleaning was not a personal strength - my own mother was one such woman, Sherlock knew.
But then one sees that the photos - always of the pair of them, John and Mary - abruptly stop. No clues or cues within the photos or the frames, and a part of me wonders how deliberate that is.
He could hear Watson clanging away on thefamiliar old typewriter, judging from its sound the same one that had been in residence on Baker Street - standing near the doorframe did help hear, certainly - so Sherlock went exploring the house. No Mary in sight, but no doubt she was on errands or a walk; Mycroft swore by that exercise habit as well.
In a spare room rife with bric-a-brac, Holmes found two interesting piles of typed pages, with each pile bound together in reams of a local twine. One stack, Sherlock saw, was all about bees and beekeeping, Watson’s observations in particular. The other was a collection, an anthology of…
“The Adventures Of The Doctor,” he read the title page. And then he read the rest to himself. Though(,) scarce had he begun, than Sherlock’s attention was held by the dedication:
-- To My Watson --
As he processed that and set one part of his mind to working out meanings of that, Sherlock read on.
“Interesting,” Sherlock said after finishing the second pile; John had come in and sat down early into that pile, so Sherlock had muttered his thoughts on the text from time to time - though John never took the bait and replied.
“All of it, or only my bee-keeping?” John asked.
“The various adventures were novel in their own way - venturing into fiction these days, I see.” I confess, I was pleased to see Irene alive, even if only in words. And her offer to me…
“I went where my muse took me. And Mary had more plot ideas than you’d think.”
“I never doubted the woman’s cleverness.” Though it’s the first one that puzzles me most - The Adventures Of The Doctor being a romantic tale unless I’m wrong, and I may be about fictions.”
“What about it?”
“Nothing,” Sherlock said. “Its strange. Though I’m not sad it avoids saccrine clichés.”
Watson waited. He was used to doing that, and falling back into the habit was easy enough.
Obliging, “Also, strange because I thought you’d dedicate a tale such as that to your dear wife.”
“I did,” John said. “She loved it; and if you can’t even decipher what -“
Sherlock said, “It means the personal anchor, the confidant supreme and dearest friend one has ever had, the best reason to endanger yourself. Someone you always wish to know.”
“I stand corrected,” John said.
“Seeing as it had no mention of the Falls, yet it takes place in the future, I’m at a loss as to where it fits in your chronology of my deeds.”
“Outside,” John said. “The ‘Doctor’ story was an exercise in what makes us who we are, even when the rest of the world is different.”
“In that, you succeeded,” Sherlock said. “And what have you sherlocked of late?” Holmes asked.
“I take the occasional case. Presently, it involves bees.”
“Ergo the hives.”
“They’re also a hobby - three of them were. Circumstances grew their number to thirteen.”
“Huh.”
“I raised bees before I joined the Army,” John pointed out.
“Not a veering away, so much as a return.”
“Exactly. And you? John asked. “Making trouble or stopping it?”
“Oh come now, Watson, why must there be an or? I suppose if I must pick one endeavour of late of which I’m most fond, I’d name a little joke I played at the expense of some of Moriarty’s academic allies.”
And by ‘joke’ you mean… “Piltdown, I presume?”
“Yes, just so. A pity about that writer who got drawn into the matter.”
From that point on, lunch passed in silence, with each man wondering if the other’s silence was a cause for concern, or a sign of how much had changed in their absence.
There was not a peep. No questions regarding if anything was simmering in the flytrap of his mind; no comments about bliss, domestic, occupational, or other. No remark at all about one’s ability to keep out of trouble. And for all that a doctor could be the worst patient, surely Watson would note if he had a medical issue. And, on that note, where was Mary, anyway? But this was the home of Mary and John Watson, to which he had not been expected and perhaps no more welcome than his reception thus far hinted. For those reasons and others, their friendship included, Sherlock held his tongue, no matter how it ate at him to be silent. The tactic had been suggested many times by John, so perhaps he was immune to it. Still, try.
For his part, Watson wasn’t sure what to make of Sherlock’s hushedness. Knew the man had held his tongue before, though this’d be a record in not even telling me.
With the end of the meal, John said, “Whatever you’re trying not to say, say it.”
Sherlock nodded. “While I am relieved you haven’t spent your entire retirement writing about me… No, rephrase,” he said to himself. “The mind demands work; I am as much an exemplar of that as yourself,” he said to John.
“But?”
“Bees, John?”
“As you took Gladstone, I had to raise something.”
Not hearing any quips asking ‘surely little Watsons would be sufficient’ or something to that effect, John wondered if his old friend knew; felt there would at least be a suspicion.
“Watson?” Sherlock asked when each had nearly cleaned their plates.
“Mary died last year,” John said, preempting any remark Sherlock might make about the state of things here, or about anything else. “Allergic reaction.”
“At which point you began slowly working towards your revenge - the bees evidence that their care has decreased over the past eleven months.” Taking note of how he was not interrupted or contradicted at the mention of revenge, but that was not why Sherlock stopped and dipped his head. “I do possess an inkling of how you feel. For you, she was The Woman.”
Well recognizing the reference, John said, “Thank you.”
“Now, where do you want me?”
“I don’t -“
“Watson, my good man, surely you know exactly what I mean,” Holmes said. For all the times that you were there to assist me in my cases and lighten my own workload, I would be delighted to let you take the lead. In the case of your revenge, I will play the role of John Watson, while you lead the way.
Watson raised an eyebrow.
As that didn’t work, Sherlock tried another tac, and asked, “Are we old, John?”
You’re neither drunk nor maudlin; therefore… “What brought this on?”
I mean it as a tactic to help you. Though there were moments - brief, fragments of seconds - in my time alone of late, when I did indeed have the…feelings that you wrote into the elder me. But you will either deduce that on your own, or it need not be said. “Not physically old. I mean in mind. That hoax took far too much time. In the span since we were bested the once, I did that, solved a case in the Orkneys, and learned Manx.”
“And having a more normal workload clearly didn’t set your brain on fire.”
“This is serious, Watson.”
“As am I,” John said. “From what you’ve told me, all you’ve done is prove you don’t need to pace yourself like a maniac to get from day to day. Ah,” forestalling the objection he knew his friend was about to make, “You’ve neither done nor said anything to make me think your mind is at all less sharp than it once was.”
“Likewise. And, on that note, I had a glance at your drafts in your absence.”
How unshocking. “Your thoughts?” as ready to hear literary criticism, as housekeeping advice, and allusions to trousers and pants.
“I’m oddly reassured you feel I’d live so long, John. Though frankly hurt that you’d have me doubting myself for even a moment.”
“We lost to Moriarty -“
“Once,” Sherlock said, as close to stomping his foot in finality as John had witnessed in years of knowing the man. And it was your Mary who had a vital role in bringing down Moriarty’s industrial and financial empire before any troops were mustered.
“Significantly, then, as a war involving the Continent and Colonies must be. More to the point, everyone has moments of doubt -“
“Not me.”
“- and hesitation,” John finished.
“Again, I say it.”
‘I am its author, and thus have the last word’ never worked with him before; I won’t bother starting now. So John said, “Even the great Dr. Bell had it.” Smiling at his friend. “It’s a fictional event,” John offered, though he suspected the fictional moment of self-doubt didn’t ring false in the corners of his friend’s mind. “This is one you won’t win, Holmes.”
So you think. In the meantime, “And how, pray tell, did you divine Mycroft’s relationship?”
“Myc- What rela- What, my mention of Mycroft and Lestrade? I made that up.”
“You believe so.”
“I’m going to have to cross that line out from the story, aren’t I?”
“Expunged in the name of national security,” Sherlock agreed.
“I’d extend my congratulations to them, but I suspect they’d look at me strangely were I to do that - and they already do so.”
“That leaves casework. Come, Watson, we’ve no time to -“
“I already have a case, thank you for asking.”
“Is that so?”
“That’s so.”
“And your notes? You never begin a case without them.”
“You mean the pages you accused me of misspelling the Latin name of bees?” John asked.
“A case of bees? Watson, what have you got yourself into?” And here I had entertained the thought that bees were a hobby in these somewhat-retired days. Even as a return to what you used to do, it would still be a hobby.
“It helps fill my day.”
Unlikely, but I will bear him out. “Go on.”
“The village hired me to help solve a mystery for them. Before I tell you what it is, I’ll forewarn you that it will sound familiar. They asked me to find out what stopped their still-thriving hives from producing the quantities of honey they once did.”
Even that much of a description rang too familiar for Sherlock to not say “Your answer to them involved cats.”
John nodded.
No, surely not, Sherlock thought. The problem was familiar because it had already struck and been solved, decades ago.
But then, genius often means having to repeat your answers - and those of others’ - to people. Sherlock knew that quite well.
But another possibility came to Sherlock’s mind: “Or are you perhaps proofing Darwin’s work, John? Seeing if another answer could have been provided.”
“No,” John said, his voice more controlled than it had been a minute ago.
Of course! More fool me, I’d forgotten, “Eleven months. The immediate cause are mice invading the hives for the honeycombs, as it had been in the past. But the true culprit is the man who brought the mice here, and managed the dearly missed late Mary Watson nee Morstan. Is that closer?” he asked.
“Not closer - that’s exactly it,” John said. “Mary gave me the final clue a day before she passed away.” If she hadn’t done that, she’d still be alive. And with as often as I come close to death in your company - however much I underplay the risk to me in my written accounts - what could be more Watson than that? Aside from what you mentioned before, granted.
“Then you and she have learned everything quite well, and there’s nothing left for me to teach you. Which leaves only one question.”
John raised an eyebrow.
What would I have done had I never known either of you?” Sherlock asked.
John said, “The mind boggles.”
“Good,” Sherlock said, pleased with that answer. And also - about to ask once more what he could do to help John, this time knowing there was a manhunt to come.
“Oh, and a letter came before you arrived. It’s for you,” Watson said, and handed Holmes the envelope with the detective’s full name on it.
Sherlock smelled the letter, “Ah, Irene Adler,” he recognized. Breaking the wax seal and opening it, he read through the message it contained, including his own observations unsurprisingly: “Sepia ink in the ornamentation she’s illustrated alongside her words. ‘I do not know if this will reach you in my lifetime, as it is not a conditional delivery. With or without me, you will have met Moriarty - it is your nature.’ Yes.”
Continuing on, “♪Da ♪da ♪da ♫dee-da, ‘Always you are in my thoughts, as I am in yours -’ presumptuous but true, ‘my Watson.’”
Sherlock looked at that bit of handwriting, then at his old friend. “You read this already,” stated matter-of-factly, no ire or disquiet or pleasure or anything else coloring the texture of his words.
“I did not,” John said. “Need I remind you of what you used to tell me about perfect lines?” be their meanings shared precisely or near enough.
“Obvious to anyone of skill,” Sherlock said. “Apologies, then. Shall I make it up to you with a mad dash in pursuit of some nefarious criminal?”
“You may,” though you’re already forgiven and you know it. After we solve my bee case.” I was on the verge of catching the culprit myself - this will just end it sooner.
Sherlock thought, Though I highly doubt your current case - now our case - will come to an end without a dash, “Agreed.”
THE END.
Recipient: Meredydd
Author: rodlox
Dialect Coach: Thesmallhobbit
Beta-Reader: destntoast
Verse: Ritchie Films
Characters/Pairings: John Watson, Sherlock Holmes. Brief Mary Morstan. Mentions Mycroft Holmes/Lestrade, Mary Morstan/John Watson.
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 2,791 words.
Warnings: Offscreen character death.
Summary: In 1910, years after failing to defeat Moriarty, Sherlock reunites with John and offers his help with a case…as hard as it is to believe the case is about bees.
Disclaimer: None of these characters are mine; they are property of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. These are the work of those who have reimagined his creations over the years - of which I am only playing in the sandbox of their silver-screen work. Any and all errors within this, are entirely my own.
Spoilers: Sherlock Holmes: a Game of Shadows, as well as mentions of Sherlock Holmes: the Golden Years movies, & They Might Be Giants.
Note: I hope I did not misunderstand or misinterpret your prompt request regarding Mary. If I did, please let me know.
.---------.
“But Raffles is dead.”
“Retired. As I was meant to be.”
--John Watson, Sherlock Holmes; Sherlock Holmes: The Golden Years.
.-----------------------------------.
Time has passed since the day of the Great Assassination, so called as it began the Great War. On that day in Meiringen, Switzerland, Sherlock Holmes, John Watson, Sim, and Mycroft Holmes failed to stop the machinations of Moriarty.
But Moriarty was made to fail as well, with Holmes working with Mary Morstan to bring down Moriarty’s financial empire, while Holmes was in Switzerland. The war would happen, but evil would not profit one cent.
The team split up afterwards, to draw out and end Moriarty’s last loyalists, weakening the forces of evil further. Nothing beyond that was planned.
That was ten years ago.
The man who strode down the country road on this fine day, he had been a thief and a recovery artist and a solver of problems; he had been called a hero and a showman and the world’s greatest detective.
And now he was returning.
He had never been here before - witness the looks he got as he passed one house and then another and another, making him think he had accidentally left on part of his most recent disguise. No, he was returning to the life of the only living non-relative who utterly understood him.
As he passed the gate barring his old comrade’s property from strangers, he recalled him saying ‘and there’s none stranger than you.’ And his old mate was not presently at home, he noted. It had not been easy to find this place, so well-tucked-away was it - and he had no doubt that was deliberate. More cautious than he was before. Good man.
It occurred to him that he could go inside, make himself at home, and wait. But a persistent buzzing drew his attention to the back yard.
It was a beehive. A baker’s dozen of them.
He elected to pass the time by observing the social little insects. Watch their comings and goings. See how a hornet fares in an encroachment on the hive furthest from the house.
A house where the cry of “Holmes!” was hollered at him after some time.
Glancing over, Sherlock smiled and said, “Ah, Watson. Bit of an odd hobby you have here. Good to see you.”
“And you,” John said. “Come inside when you’ve finished stalking my bees,” with a muttered “Some things never change.”
Sounds no more exhausted at my antics than he ever used to - which is odd, I grant, given that its been ten years. But he did sound pleased to have my company.
To his honed and refined senses, Watson’s country home possessed the expected great domesticity…only mustier. An effort has been made to keep the dust from winning its reconquesta to cover everything, but from habit rather than desire or love of the work.
It could be presumed that Mrs. Watson had simply spent more effort fighting dust in rooms other than this one; or that she was a woman for whom housecleaning was not a personal strength - my own mother was one such woman, Sherlock knew.
But then one sees that the photos - always of the pair of them, John and Mary - abruptly stop. No clues or cues within the photos or the frames, and a part of me wonders how deliberate that is.
He could hear Watson clanging away on thefamiliar old typewriter, judging from its sound the same one that had been in residence on Baker Street - standing near the doorframe did help hear, certainly - so Sherlock went exploring the house. No Mary in sight, but no doubt she was on errands or a walk; Mycroft swore by that exercise habit as well.
In a spare room rife with bric-a-brac, Holmes found two interesting piles of typed pages, with each pile bound together in reams of a local twine. One stack, Sherlock saw, was all about bees and beekeeping, Watson’s observations in particular. The other was a collection, an anthology of…
“The Adventures Of The Doctor,” he read the title page. And then he read the rest to himself. Though(,) scarce had he begun, than Sherlock’s attention was held by the dedication:
-- To My Watson --
As he processed that and set one part of his mind to working out meanings of that, Sherlock read on.
“Interesting,” Sherlock said after finishing the second pile; John had come in and sat down early into that pile, so Sherlock had muttered his thoughts on the text from time to time - though John never took the bait and replied.
“All of it, or only my bee-keeping?” John asked.
“The various adventures were novel in their own way - venturing into fiction these days, I see.” I confess, I was pleased to see Irene alive, even if only in words. And her offer to me…
“I went where my muse took me. And Mary had more plot ideas than you’d think.”
“I never doubted the woman’s cleverness.” Though it’s the first one that puzzles me most - The Adventures Of The Doctor being a romantic tale unless I’m wrong, and I may be about fictions.”
“What about it?”
“Nothing,” Sherlock said. “Its strange. Though I’m not sad it avoids saccrine clichés.”
Watson waited. He was used to doing that, and falling back into the habit was easy enough.
Obliging, “Also, strange because I thought you’d dedicate a tale such as that to your dear wife.”
“I did,” John said. “She loved it; and if you can’t even decipher what -“
Sherlock said, “It means the personal anchor, the confidant supreme and dearest friend one has ever had, the best reason to endanger yourself. Someone you always wish to know.”
“I stand corrected,” John said.
“Seeing as it had no mention of the Falls, yet it takes place in the future, I’m at a loss as to where it fits in your chronology of my deeds.”
“Outside,” John said. “The ‘Doctor’ story was an exercise in what makes us who we are, even when the rest of the world is different.”
“In that, you succeeded,” Sherlock said. “And what have you sherlocked of late?” Holmes asked.
“I take the occasional case. Presently, it involves bees.”
“Ergo the hives.”
“They’re also a hobby - three of them were. Circumstances grew their number to thirteen.”
“Huh.”
“I raised bees before I joined the Army,” John pointed out.
“Not a veering away, so much as a return.”
“Exactly. And you? John asked. “Making trouble or stopping it?”
“Oh come now, Watson, why must there be an or? I suppose if I must pick one endeavour of late of which I’m most fond, I’d name a little joke I played at the expense of some of Moriarty’s academic allies.”
And by ‘joke’ you mean… “Piltdown, I presume?”
“Yes, just so. A pity about that writer who got drawn into the matter.”
From that point on, lunch passed in silence, with each man wondering if the other’s silence was a cause for concern, or a sign of how much had changed in their absence.
There was not a peep. No questions regarding if anything was simmering in the flytrap of his mind; no comments about bliss, domestic, occupational, or other. No remark at all about one’s ability to keep out of trouble. And for all that a doctor could be the worst patient, surely Watson would note if he had a medical issue. And, on that note, where was Mary, anyway? But this was the home of Mary and John Watson, to which he had not been expected and perhaps no more welcome than his reception thus far hinted. For those reasons and others, their friendship included, Sherlock held his tongue, no matter how it ate at him to be silent. The tactic had been suggested many times by John, so perhaps he was immune to it. Still, try.
For his part, Watson wasn’t sure what to make of Sherlock’s hushedness. Knew the man had held his tongue before, though this’d be a record in not even telling me.
With the end of the meal, John said, “Whatever you’re trying not to say, say it.”
Sherlock nodded. “While I am relieved you haven’t spent your entire retirement writing about me… No, rephrase,” he said to himself. “The mind demands work; I am as much an exemplar of that as yourself,” he said to John.
“But?”
“Bees, John?”
“As you took Gladstone, I had to raise something.”
Not hearing any quips asking ‘surely little Watsons would be sufficient’ or something to that effect, John wondered if his old friend knew; felt there would at least be a suspicion.
“Watson?” Sherlock asked when each had nearly cleaned their plates.
“Mary died last year,” John said, preempting any remark Sherlock might make about the state of things here, or about anything else. “Allergic reaction.”
“At which point you began slowly working towards your revenge - the bees evidence that their care has decreased over the past eleven months.” Taking note of how he was not interrupted or contradicted at the mention of revenge, but that was not why Sherlock stopped and dipped his head. “I do possess an inkling of how you feel. For you, she was The Woman.”
Well recognizing the reference, John said, “Thank you.”
“Now, where do you want me?”
“I don’t -“
“Watson, my good man, surely you know exactly what I mean,” Holmes said. For all the times that you were there to assist me in my cases and lighten my own workload, I would be delighted to let you take the lead. In the case of your revenge, I will play the role of John Watson, while you lead the way.
Watson raised an eyebrow.
As that didn’t work, Sherlock tried another tac, and asked, “Are we old, John?”
You’re neither drunk nor maudlin; therefore… “What brought this on?”
I mean it as a tactic to help you. Though there were moments - brief, fragments of seconds - in my time alone of late, when I did indeed have the…feelings that you wrote into the elder me. But you will either deduce that on your own, or it need not be said. “Not physically old. I mean in mind. That hoax took far too much time. In the span since we were bested the once, I did that, solved a case in the Orkneys, and learned Manx.”
“And having a more normal workload clearly didn’t set your brain on fire.”
“This is serious, Watson.”
“As am I,” John said. “From what you’ve told me, all you’ve done is prove you don’t need to pace yourself like a maniac to get from day to day. Ah,” forestalling the objection he knew his friend was about to make, “You’ve neither done nor said anything to make me think your mind is at all less sharp than it once was.”
“Likewise. And, on that note, I had a glance at your drafts in your absence.”
How unshocking. “Your thoughts?” as ready to hear literary criticism, as housekeeping advice, and allusions to trousers and pants.
“I’m oddly reassured you feel I’d live so long, John. Though frankly hurt that you’d have me doubting myself for even a moment.”
“We lost to Moriarty -“
“Once,” Sherlock said, as close to stomping his foot in finality as John had witnessed in years of knowing the man. And it was your Mary who had a vital role in bringing down Moriarty’s industrial and financial empire before any troops were mustered.
“Significantly, then, as a war involving the Continent and Colonies must be. More to the point, everyone has moments of doubt -“
“Not me.”
“- and hesitation,” John finished.
“Again, I say it.”
‘I am its author, and thus have the last word’ never worked with him before; I won’t bother starting now. So John said, “Even the great Dr. Bell had it.” Smiling at his friend. “It’s a fictional event,” John offered, though he suspected the fictional moment of self-doubt didn’t ring false in the corners of his friend’s mind. “This is one you won’t win, Holmes.”
So you think. In the meantime, “And how, pray tell, did you divine Mycroft’s relationship?”
“Myc- What rela- What, my mention of Mycroft and Lestrade? I made that up.”
“You believe so.”
“I’m going to have to cross that line out from the story, aren’t I?”
“Expunged in the name of national security,” Sherlock agreed.
“I’d extend my congratulations to them, but I suspect they’d look at me strangely were I to do that - and they already do so.”
“That leaves casework. Come, Watson, we’ve no time to -“
“I already have a case, thank you for asking.”
“Is that so?”
“That’s so.”
“And your notes? You never begin a case without them.”
“You mean the pages you accused me of misspelling the Latin name of bees?” John asked.
“A case of bees? Watson, what have you got yourself into?” And here I had entertained the thought that bees were a hobby in these somewhat-retired days. Even as a return to what you used to do, it would still be a hobby.
“It helps fill my day.”
Unlikely, but I will bear him out. “Go on.”
“The village hired me to help solve a mystery for them. Before I tell you what it is, I’ll forewarn you that it will sound familiar. They asked me to find out what stopped their still-thriving hives from producing the quantities of honey they once did.”
Even that much of a description rang too familiar for Sherlock to not say “Your answer to them involved cats.”
John nodded.
No, surely not, Sherlock thought. The problem was familiar because it had already struck and been solved, decades ago.
But then, genius often means having to repeat your answers - and those of others’ - to people. Sherlock knew that quite well.
But another possibility came to Sherlock’s mind: “Or are you perhaps proofing Darwin’s work, John? Seeing if another answer could have been provided.”
“No,” John said, his voice more controlled than it had been a minute ago.
Of course! More fool me, I’d forgotten, “Eleven months. The immediate cause are mice invading the hives for the honeycombs, as it had been in the past. But the true culprit is the man who brought the mice here, and managed the dearly missed late Mary Watson nee Morstan. Is that closer?” he asked.
“Not closer - that’s exactly it,” John said. “Mary gave me the final clue a day before she passed away.” If she hadn’t done that, she’d still be alive. And with as often as I come close to death in your company - however much I underplay the risk to me in my written accounts - what could be more Watson than that? Aside from what you mentioned before, granted.
“Then you and she have learned everything quite well, and there’s nothing left for me to teach you. Which leaves only one question.”
John raised an eyebrow.
What would I have done had I never known either of you?” Sherlock asked.
John said, “The mind boggles.”
“Good,” Sherlock said, pleased with that answer. And also - about to ask once more what he could do to help John, this time knowing there was a manhunt to come.
“Oh, and a letter came before you arrived. It’s for you,” Watson said, and handed Holmes the envelope with the detective’s full name on it.
Sherlock smelled the letter, “Ah, Irene Adler,” he recognized. Breaking the wax seal and opening it, he read through the message it contained, including his own observations unsurprisingly: “Sepia ink in the ornamentation she’s illustrated alongside her words. ‘I do not know if this will reach you in my lifetime, as it is not a conditional delivery. With or without me, you will have met Moriarty - it is your nature.’ Yes.”
Continuing on, “♪Da ♪da ♪da ♫dee-da, ‘Always you are in my thoughts, as I am in yours -’ presumptuous but true, ‘my Watson.’”
Sherlock looked at that bit of handwriting, then at his old friend. “You read this already,” stated matter-of-factly, no ire or disquiet or pleasure or anything else coloring the texture of his words.
“I did not,” John said. “Need I remind you of what you used to tell me about perfect lines?” be their meanings shared precisely or near enough.
“Obvious to anyone of skill,” Sherlock said. “Apologies, then. Shall I make it up to you with a mad dash in pursuit of some nefarious criminal?”
“You may,” though you’re already forgiven and you know it. After we solve my bee case.” I was on the verge of catching the culprit myself - this will just end it sooner.
Sherlock thought, Though I highly doubt your current case - now our case - will come to an end without a dash, “Agreed.”
THE END.