Because it is his birthday.
And here is some of the more entertaining chaos that happened over winterfest.
He turned up when I was looking after Delilah. We were hiding behind the curtains in the sitting room and pretending to drink tea. Delilah suddenly froze, her face a pantomime of disbelief and horror. “Listen! Is monster!”
I head a low ironic snort.
Delilah was peeking out from behind the curtains. “He’s there!” she announced, sounding scandalized.
“I see she’s mastered the basics,” commented the presence which had snorted earlier. The voice made me think of elocution lessons gone rusty, of Jermyn Street, of pipe tobacco and Lock&Co hats.
“It’s Pevency!” my niece told me, ducking behind the curtains once more.
“No, I think you’ll find that’s Holmes,” I corrected.
“You do your country proud, dear girl,” ‘Pevency’ murmured.
“Quick - give me sword!”
Whilst I find it the easiest thing in the world to deny small sprogglings treats or things I believe they are undeserving of, when it comes to flights of imagination I am as biddable as a new recruit under a master drill sergeant. Come to that, this specific niece has quite a bit of the Sergeant about her full stop... I reached up and took an imaginary Roman gladius from the edge of the window glass. “Here you go.”
She held it half like a sword, half like a gun; I’m not sure she differentiated between weapons - after all, if it kills monsters, who cares about the mechanics? She dived out from amongst the curtains, shouting and growling the sort of noises and dialogue that would make the 1960s Saturday-morning Batman series feel proud. She squealed, and then redoubled her smiting efforts.
Counter-poised between her noise I heard mock-snarls of a lower timber and then a long and drawn out death of the sort that would make even Monty-Python blush.
Delilah rocketed back under the curtains. “I killed him!” she said, proud and a little breathless.
“Decapitation,” came a mutter from the other side of the curtain. “Why haven’t you taught her about decapitation? Then one could forgive the fact she didn’t check for a pulse...”
I lifted up the smallest corner of draped fabric. “You’re meant to be dead,” I warned.
“Not the way she stabs things...”
“Monster’s alive!” Delilah shouted. “Give me sword!”
“You’ve got a sword,” I pointed out.
“It broke.”
“What is the smithing trade coming to?” There was a rustle followed by a rattle and then a sandpaper-y noise and the soft near-silent breath of a flame.
I took down a main-gauche from the windowpane to the left. “Here,” I handed it to Delilah. Then I muttered, “Corpses don’t smoke.”
A pause. “They do if they’re on fire.” It was said blandly but with a hint of wonderment.
I exploded out from behind the curtain at the same time as Delilah, wondering just how flammable real-imaginary fires would prove to be. I beheld Holmes stretched out on the rug with his arms crossed behind his head, black every-day pipe lit between his lips, a smug look curving his mouth.
“You... you... bastard!” I hissed beneath Delilah’s war cry.
“Raaaah! Got you! Rah! Pow - pow - pow! HA! Pow!”
There was a satisfying death rattle.
Delilah hustled me back behind the curtain. “I’ve killed him!”
I heard the shift and indrawn breath. “Monsters who want to smoke their pipes in peace,” I offered swiftly to the world in general, “Would do best to keep quiet.”
“Noted,” came the mutter from the other side of the curtain.
“Let’s have dinner!” Delilah announced, holding an imaginary skillet and heaping amounts of something-or-other onto my imaginary plate.
=========
It was evening; supper had been weathered and the eve had moved into that interesting stage where my sister was fractious, Delilah didn’t want to go to bed, my father wanted to watch a BAFTA film but had ‘one or two’ emails to attend to, and I was left to tidy the kitchen and put the sittingroom in readiness.
SH was on the sofa in an attitude that was caught somewhere between lounging and huddled. “It’s cold,” he informed me bluntly. I’d just fetched another basket of logs in from the woodshed; the kitchen was half cleared and my sister was calling for me from upstairs, I was in no mood to be sympathetic. “Does your father habitually keep such a cold house? I would have expected better hospitality from...”
That pissed me off. “It’s not my father’s fault he can’t see you to offer you a glass of wine! For gods’ sake - you’ve got hands. If you’re cold, light the fire.” I had prepared it scarcely an hour back with paper, kindling and logs.
“Can’t,” he said, proving - if any proof was required - that he kept to rules only when it inconvenienced someone other than himself. Being out of arm’s reach meant he received a filthy look instead of a swipe to the side of the head. Yes, Watson had advised against Holmes being close to anything incendiary due to his tendency to set himself or other items alight, but himself was only obeying the rules because it made more work for me.
“I’ll light the fire when there are others here to appreciate it - in the mean time there’s brandy in the cupboard, go drink that if you’re that cold!”
SH huffed. I went to see what my sister was shouting about.
Half an hour later, everyone was in the sittingroom. The fire was lit, my father had given up on emails and my sister on text messages for the evening. A DVD was on, and SH was stretched across one of the sofas, his feet and calves across my lap.
As the film progressed, (‘Anonymous’ - a sort of Shakespeare conspiracy theory based on extremely shoddy reasoning,) I became aware of a caustic muttering to my right. I couldn’t swear at what specific point the detective lain on the sofa snapped out, “Cock spittle!” in a gutter growl of a voice, but whatever point it was I realized that there probably wasn’t any more brandy in the cupboard...
As a piece of cinema, ‘Anonymous’ is nicely made and superbly acted. As a plot it vexes and when it doesn’t vex it bores. It is, however, much more entertaining to watch when a commentary is provided by a mildly inebriated consulting detective who has slipped into ‘gutter cant’ mode and is rattling on like the most foul-mouthed Dickensian costermonger.
=========
That night he remained downstairs, playing the violin - strange melodies which sounded like rain and frost. He came into my room at 4am, spun, remembered to close the door, and dropped full length on the bed. He then got up again with a mutter, shambled around to the table near the window: stole the last of my laudanum cough medicine, and crashed out fully-clothed on top of the duvet. He grabbed a corner, rolled over and started to snore. I was too exhausted to care.
Dawn came and went. I got up, dressed and breakfasted. Delilah invaded my room and tried to hijack my computer. Holmes remained unconscious, occasionally mumbling things that were both oddly apt and very surreal at intervals throughout the morning. He finally awoke at noon-ish, whereupon there was an argument about bathing. (Whilst he wasn’t coal-begrimed and stinking of opium and cat pee, he was none the less decidedly on the grubby and rumpled side.) I gave him the choice of hot bath or freezing hosepipe. He snorted and made it clear that thanks to his greater strength and marshal prowess I would not be able to get him under a hose.
I raised my eyebrows and gave him the sort of blank 'so you think you're clever?' look I'd been dishing out to Delilah rather a lot. "I'm very persistent. And yes, you're very kick arse. Lovely. Are you really telling me, you'd rather beat me up than have a hot bath?"
Something flickered behind his eyes, changing attitude and expression in an instant. "Don't be obtuse,” he scorned. “Do you have clean towels and a shaving kit?"
"You have a shaving kit in your bag. The towels are clean - as well you know, you saw me carry them up yesterday. And I'm going downstairs to make mince pies so you won't be interrupted.” I rolled my eyes and a parting shot: “Have a bath."
=========
He reappeared whilst I was cooking, damp and tousle-haired in a clean shirt and a waistcoat I’d swear wasn’t his. I was feeling tired and frazzled; he combated this by quizzing me on my life and attitude and how I hadn't lost a quart of blood recently. I shrugged; it was true, I'd managed at least a month possibly two without stabbing myself which must be some sort of record. He gave me an appraising sideways look from the other side of the kitchen. “These days you’re less neurotic. And less interesting.”
I smiled queasily, not really in the mood for such revelations. "I thought I'd give sanity a shot." A further grimace, and I leant my back against the nearest cupboard and slid to the floor. "Trouble is, if there was any poetic justice in the world I would now find my perfect vocation and my true love - as if my insanity was the only thing holding me back."
He took a bottle from the larder, pulled the cork and took a swig. Dark eyes pinned mine. "He's dead," he said, in what for him was a gentle tone.
“I know!” I did know. I wasn’t in the mood to discuss ghosts and failed necromancy. “And I'm pissed off that I can't talk to him any more!”
“You're talking to me,” he pointed out reasonably.
“You're not bloody dead!” I griped.
He looked slightly wounded, as if I'd pointed out a failing.
=========
There was a tap on the French windows at 10pm. I ignored it. Two minutes later SH let himself in, hunched and shivering in a shapeless pea-coat and boots several sizes too big.
“Where the hell have been?”
A diamond grin as he kicked off the boots. “Your local, dear girl.”
I managed not to utter ‘What? The Ravensbourne?’ as that would just have been silly.
“The Cuckcoo’s Nest - or is it Rest?” he was trying to rub feeling and warmth back into his fingers. “The sign’s in a deplorable condition...”
“That's derelict!” I objected. (It is, of the no roof and failing walls variety.)
He shrugged and shuffled to the fire, folding himself into the lee of the chimney-breast and holding his hands alarmingly close to the flames. He dozed, slumped contentedly against the chimney.
I understand now how he is set alight so often. And I am still none the wiser as to the mystery of the abandoned pub.
=========
The following day I say him only twice. Once, he appeared to ask, “Whitsuntide. When is it?” And the second time to loiter in the archway and mutter, “You look like you could do with a brandy dear girl,” give a sympathetic quirk of his eyebrows at my predicament, and to bugger off again.
The day after, he’d gone, leaving his bag in my room and a plethora of tools and a kilner jar full of phosphor and bat shit (or something equally caustic and unspeakable) in the workroom. No goodbye or warning, which didn't exactly please me.
On the other hand, he did wire Mycroft to send me help. And Mycroft, being Mycroft, didn’t send one or two of the domestics over. Instead he vanished my sister’s husband (really - no one knew where Benjamin was for 24hours, Katie was phoning the police and everything) so he never arrived at the Oast or at any of the subsequent gatherings, thereby cutting my stress and workload by about a third.
Devious, devious boys =)
He turned up when I was looking after Delilah. We were hiding behind the curtains in the sitting room and pretending to drink tea. Delilah suddenly froze, her face a pantomime of disbelief and horror. “Listen! Is monster!”
I head a low ironic snort.
Delilah was peeking out from behind the curtains. “He’s there!” she announced, sounding scandalized.
“I see she’s mastered the basics,” commented the presence which had snorted earlier. The voice made me think of elocution lessons gone rusty, of Jermyn Street, of pipe tobacco and Lock&Co hats.
“It’s Pevency!” my niece told me, ducking behind the curtains once more.
“No, I think you’ll find that’s Holmes,” I corrected.
“You do your country proud, dear girl,” ‘Pevency’ murmured.
“Quick - give me sword!”
Whilst I find it the easiest thing in the world to deny small sprogglings treats or things I believe they are undeserving of, when it comes to flights of imagination I am as biddable as a new recruit under a master drill sergeant. Come to that, this specific niece has quite a bit of the Sergeant about her full stop... I reached up and took an imaginary Roman gladius from the edge of the window glass. “Here you go.”
She held it half like a sword, half like a gun; I’m not sure she differentiated between weapons - after all, if it kills monsters, who cares about the mechanics? She dived out from amongst the curtains, shouting and growling the sort of noises and dialogue that would make the 1960s Saturday-morning Batman series feel proud. She squealed, and then redoubled her smiting efforts.
Counter-poised between her noise I heard mock-snarls of a lower timber and then a long and drawn out death of the sort that would make even Monty-Python blush.
Delilah rocketed back under the curtains. “I killed him!” she said, proud and a little breathless.
“Decapitation,” came a mutter from the other side of the curtain. “Why haven’t you taught her about decapitation? Then one could forgive the fact she didn’t check for a pulse...”
I lifted up the smallest corner of draped fabric. “You’re meant to be dead,” I warned.
“Not the way she stabs things...”
“Monster’s alive!” Delilah shouted. “Give me sword!”
“You’ve got a sword,” I pointed out.
“It broke.”
“What is the smithing trade coming to?” There was a rustle followed by a rattle and then a sandpaper-y noise and the soft near-silent breath of a flame.
I took down a main-gauche from the windowpane to the left. “Here,” I handed it to Delilah. Then I muttered, “Corpses don’t smoke.”
A pause. “They do if they’re on fire.” It was said blandly but with a hint of wonderment.
I exploded out from behind the curtain at the same time as Delilah, wondering just how flammable real-imaginary fires would prove to be. I beheld Holmes stretched out on the rug with his arms crossed behind his head, black every-day pipe lit between his lips, a smug look curving his mouth.
“You... you... bastard!” I hissed beneath Delilah’s war cry.
“Raaaah! Got you! Rah! Pow - pow - pow! HA! Pow!”
There was a satisfying death rattle.
Delilah hustled me back behind the curtain. “I’ve killed him!”
I heard the shift and indrawn breath. “Monsters who want to smoke their pipes in peace,” I offered swiftly to the world in general, “Would do best to keep quiet.”
“Noted,” came the mutter from the other side of the curtain.
“Let’s have dinner!” Delilah announced, holding an imaginary skillet and heaping amounts of something-or-other onto my imaginary plate.
=========
It was evening; supper had been weathered and the eve had moved into that interesting stage where my sister was fractious, Delilah didn’t want to go to bed, my father wanted to watch a BAFTA film but had ‘one or two’ emails to attend to, and I was left to tidy the kitchen and put the sittingroom in readiness.
SH was on the sofa in an attitude that was caught somewhere between lounging and huddled. “It’s cold,” he informed me bluntly. I’d just fetched another basket of logs in from the woodshed; the kitchen was half cleared and my sister was calling for me from upstairs, I was in no mood to be sympathetic. “Does your father habitually keep such a cold house? I would have expected better hospitality from...”
That pissed me off. “It’s not my father’s fault he can’t see you to offer you a glass of wine! For gods’ sake - you’ve got hands. If you’re cold, light the fire.” I had prepared it scarcely an hour back with paper, kindling and logs.
“Can’t,” he said, proving - if any proof was required - that he kept to rules only when it inconvenienced someone other than himself. Being out of arm’s reach meant he received a filthy look instead of a swipe to the side of the head. Yes, Watson had advised against Holmes being close to anything incendiary due to his tendency to set himself or other items alight, but himself was only obeying the rules because it made more work for me.
“I’ll light the fire when there are others here to appreciate it - in the mean time there’s brandy in the cupboard, go drink that if you’re that cold!”
SH huffed. I went to see what my sister was shouting about.
Half an hour later, everyone was in the sittingroom. The fire was lit, my father had given up on emails and my sister on text messages for the evening. A DVD was on, and SH was stretched across one of the sofas, his feet and calves across my lap.
As the film progressed, (‘Anonymous’ - a sort of Shakespeare conspiracy theory based on extremely shoddy reasoning,) I became aware of a caustic muttering to my right. I couldn’t swear at what specific point the detective lain on the sofa snapped out, “Cock spittle!” in a gutter growl of a voice, but whatever point it was I realized that there probably wasn’t any more brandy in the cupboard...
As a piece of cinema, ‘Anonymous’ is nicely made and superbly acted. As a plot it vexes and when it doesn’t vex it bores. It is, however, much more entertaining to watch when a commentary is provided by a mildly inebriated consulting detective who has slipped into ‘gutter cant’ mode and is rattling on like the most foul-mouthed Dickensian costermonger.
=========
That night he remained downstairs, playing the violin - strange melodies which sounded like rain and frost. He came into my room at 4am, spun, remembered to close the door, and dropped full length on the bed. He then got up again with a mutter, shambled around to the table near the window: stole the last of my laudanum cough medicine, and crashed out fully-clothed on top of the duvet. He grabbed a corner, rolled over and started to snore. I was too exhausted to care.
Dawn came and went. I got up, dressed and breakfasted. Delilah invaded my room and tried to hijack my computer. Holmes remained unconscious, occasionally mumbling things that were both oddly apt and very surreal at intervals throughout the morning. He finally awoke at noon-ish, whereupon there was an argument about bathing. (Whilst he wasn’t coal-begrimed and stinking of opium and cat pee, he was none the less decidedly on the grubby and rumpled side.) I gave him the choice of hot bath or freezing hosepipe. He snorted and made it clear that thanks to his greater strength and marshal prowess I would not be able to get him under a hose.
I raised my eyebrows and gave him the sort of blank 'so you think you're clever?' look I'd been dishing out to Delilah rather a lot. "I'm very persistent. And yes, you're very kick arse. Lovely. Are you really telling me, you'd rather beat me up than have a hot bath?"
Something flickered behind his eyes, changing attitude and expression in an instant. "Don't be obtuse,” he scorned. “Do you have clean towels and a shaving kit?"
"You have a shaving kit in your bag. The towels are clean - as well you know, you saw me carry them up yesterday. And I'm going downstairs to make mince pies so you won't be interrupted.” I rolled my eyes and a parting shot: “Have a bath."
=========
He reappeared whilst I was cooking, damp and tousle-haired in a clean shirt and a waistcoat I’d swear wasn’t his. I was feeling tired and frazzled; he combated this by quizzing me on my life and attitude and how I hadn't lost a quart of blood recently. I shrugged; it was true, I'd managed at least a month possibly two without stabbing myself which must be some sort of record. He gave me an appraising sideways look from the other side of the kitchen. “These days you’re less neurotic. And less interesting.”
I smiled queasily, not really in the mood for such revelations. "I thought I'd give sanity a shot." A further grimace, and I leant my back against the nearest cupboard and slid to the floor. "Trouble is, if there was any poetic justice in the world I would now find my perfect vocation and my true love - as if my insanity was the only thing holding me back."
He took a bottle from the larder, pulled the cork and took a swig. Dark eyes pinned mine. "He's dead," he said, in what for him was a gentle tone.
“I know!” I did know. I wasn’t in the mood to discuss ghosts and failed necromancy. “And I'm pissed off that I can't talk to him any more!”
“You're talking to me,” he pointed out reasonably.
“You're not bloody dead!” I griped.
He looked slightly wounded, as if I'd pointed out a failing.
=========
There was a tap on the French windows at 10pm. I ignored it. Two minutes later SH let himself in, hunched and shivering in a shapeless pea-coat and boots several sizes too big.
“Where the hell have been?”
A diamond grin as he kicked off the boots. “Your local, dear girl.”
I managed not to utter ‘What? The Ravensbourne?’ as that would just have been silly.
“The Cuckcoo’s Nest - or is it Rest?” he was trying to rub feeling and warmth back into his fingers. “The sign’s in a deplorable condition...”
“That's derelict!” I objected. (It is, of the no roof and failing walls variety.)
He shrugged and shuffled to the fire, folding himself into the lee of the chimney-breast and holding his hands alarmingly close to the flames. He dozed, slumped contentedly against the chimney.
I understand now how he is set alight so often. And I am still none the wiser as to the mystery of the abandoned pub.
=========
The following day I say him only twice. Once, he appeared to ask, “Whitsuntide. When is it?” And the second time to loiter in the archway and mutter, “You look like you could do with a brandy dear girl,” give a sympathetic quirk of his eyebrows at my predicament, and to bugger off again.
The day after, he’d gone, leaving his bag in my room and a plethora of tools and a kilner jar full of phosphor and bat shit (or something equally caustic and unspeakable) in the workroom. No goodbye or warning, which didn't exactly please me.
On the other hand, he did wire Mycroft to send me help. And Mycroft, being Mycroft, didn’t send one or two of the domestics over. Instead he vanished my sister’s husband (really - no one knew where Benjamin was for 24hours, Katie was phoning the police and everything) so he never arrived at the Oast or at any of the subsequent gatherings, thereby cutting my stress and workload by about a third.
Devious, devious boys =)