Saving Sherlock Holmes (6/43)
Oct. 8th, 2012 08:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
earlgreytea68Title - Saving Sherlock Holmes (6/43)
Author -![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
earlgreytea68
Rating - General (eventually as high as Adult, which will be adjusted on a chapter-by-chapter basis)
Characters - John, Sherlock, Lestrade
Spoilers - Through "The Reichenbach Fall"
Disclaimer - I don't own them and I don't make money off of them, but I don't like to dwell on that, so let's move on.
Summary - Sherlock Holmes, schoolboy. Yeah, that basically sums it up.
Author's Notes - Thank yous! Toflawedamythystand sensiblecatfor the Britpick; to the readers who read as this was being written, including chicklet73; and to arctacuda, who uncomplainingly betas massive amounts of fic.
Chapter 1 - Chapter 2 - Chapter 3 - Chapter 4 - Chapter 5
Chapter Six
“I still think this is a terrible idea,” the house master told Greg Lestrade, and Greg tapped his finger on the edge of his teacup and considered a response.
He decided on, “I don’t.”
“I’m aware you don’t, but you don’t know Sherlock Holmes. I think we should move Watson immediately, before Holmes can corrupt him any more than he already has.”
“I don’t think he’s corrupting him,” said Greg. He thought the house master might be given to hyperbole. He thought everyone at Eton might be given to hyperbole, really.
“He made him miss supper last night.”
“That’s hardly corruption. And Sherlock was giving him a tour of the grounds.” Greg left out the part where Sherlock had looked as if he’d decided to roll around in a pigsty during this tour of the grounds. “Really, they looked to me as if they were getting along.”
“Which is even more dangerous,” huffed the house master. “You don’t understand what a dangerous influence Holmes can be on this boy.”
“John doesn’t seem like a fragile kid to me. In fact, he took a legal settlement from a messy car accident that killed his alcoholic father and found a way to get himself into Eton. I think he seems like kind of the opposite of fragile.”
“You still think he is going to be a good influence on Holmes.” The house master said this as if Greg had announced that he thought the teapot on the table had begun singing to them.
“I think stranger things have happened,” Greg insisted. “And I think it’s worth a try.”
There was a tap on the door, and one of the dames poked her head in. “Sorry to interrupt, but we’ve got a rip already.”
“A rip?” said Greg, in surprise. “On the first day of term? Why wouldn’t they just give an info?”
The dame who had handed the rip over—and Greg tried to remember her name but there were 150 instructors at this place, not counting the 1,500 students, and his head was overflowing with names at the moment—gave him a smile that made Greg feel decidedly unhappy.
Which the house master confirmed. “A rip and not an info because it’s Holmes and he carries a reputation.” The house master handed the piece of paper over to him, looking smug and knowing.
“What can he possibly have already done?” asked Greg, reading what was written on the piece of paper. Apparently what Sherlock had done was to tell his chemistry master that he was not going to attend the school this term because he already knew far more about chemistry than the chemistry master did. “Excellent,” sighed Greg, wishing Sherlock could have made his job a little bit easier. “I’ll handle it,” he told the house master.
“It would be traditional for me to handle it,” the house master pointed out.
“It would be traditional to not give a student a rip on the first day of term,” Greg responded.
“It seems as if he deserved it, though,” remarked the house master.
“I’ll speak to him,” said Greg. “At least give me a week before you decide he’s a lost cause.”
“I decided he was a lost cause three years ago,” snorted the house master. “I’ve always been in favor of his rustication. His brother pours quite a lot of money into the school to keep that threat at bay. But you may have a week with Sherlock Holmes, and long before that week is up you will be back here to listen to my I-told-you-so.”
“Right,” said Greg, without meaning it at all, and stood and looked at the dame. “Do you know where he is? Is he still in chemistry?”
“Oh, no.” She looked almost gleeful about this. “The chemistry master told him that he did not want him sullying the classroom. He should have been sent to his room.”
“How do you know all this?”
“School gossip. Got to keep up, Greg.” She grinned at him cheekily and sent him a wink, as if this were all hilarious.
“Will he actually go to his room?” Greg asked, following the dame out of the house master’s office.
She shrugged. “Maybe.”
Which wasn’t especially helpful, and Greg had read through Sherlock’s file, but Sherlock’s file had not included things like “favorite hiding places.” “Where would he be if he’s not in his room?”
“God knows. Anywhere he’s not supposed to be,” said the dame. “Good luck.” She walked away from him, in the opposite direction of Sherlock’s room, and Greg sighed and tucked the rip into his suit pocket and went to Sherlock’s room.
The door was closed, and Greg knocked and didn’t receive an answer. He thought for a second, then sidestepped to John Watson’s door and knocked on it sharply. There was a long pregnant moment, and then Sherlock opened the door a crack and said, immediately, “Damn.”
“Hello,” Greg said to him.
Sherlock looked displeased. “I thought there was a slight chance you might be John, having forgotten his key.”
“Sorry,” said Greg. “No. Are you supposed to be in John’s room without him?”
“John doesn’t mind,” insisted Sherlock.
Greg made a skeptical noise but decided that was the least of his problems. “Come into your room. I’m not having this conversation in someone else’s bedroom.”
“We don’t have to have a conversation,” said Sherlock.
“About the rip? Of course we do. It’s college rules.”
“You can just say we had a conversation about it and then…go.” Sherlock looked hopeful about this.
Greg tipped his head at him. “Is that what your former tutor used to do?”
“No, but that would have been nice.”
“Get out here and into your own room,” said Greg, firmly, and Sherlock sighed but obeyed. As slowly as possible. Greg rolled his eyes, especially when Sherlock flopped onto his bed. Sherlock should be enrolled in drama, thought Greg. Greg leaned against the wall opposite Sherlock’s bed and crossed his arms and said, “Why are you even taking chemistry if it doesn’t interest you?”
“Because I had to fill my schedule. They wouldn’t let me take nothing, they said it wasn’t allowed.”
“You could have taken a science you don’t know as much about,” Greg pointed out. “Astronomy, maybe.”
“Why do you appear to have memorized my file?” Sherlock asked, looking at him suspiciously.
“Because you are by far the most problematic student in this entire college.”
Sherlock looked pleased at this. “Am I? Excellent.”
Greg sighed and hoped that Sherlock wouldn’t think that Greg thought he was at all amusing, even though Greg thought he was actually a little bit amusing. Greg thought the problem with Sherlock was obvious, and he didn’t understand how no one before him had seen it immediately: Sherlock was bored. He was more than bored. He was beyond bored. All indications were that he was cleverer than could be quite grasped, and there was no school nearly challenging enough for him on the schedule. “I’m going to talk to your chemistry master,” he said.
Sherlock made a face. “Please don’t. She’s a horrible cow.”
“You’re no prince either,” Greg replied, and Sherlock made an offended squeak. “Luckily for you, though, I’m quite charming.”
Sherlock looked dubious. “Oh, are you? And why is that lucky for me?”
“Because I’m going to persuade the chemistry master to give you credit for the school based on my assessment of your progress in private chemistry lessons with me.”
Sherlock gave him a truly epic eye roll. “That is worse,” he proclaimed.
“You should hear me out.”
“Why?” said Sherlock, sullenly.
“Taman Shud,” Greg told him. “Do you know what that is?”
Sherlock eyed him. “Another language, clearly.”
“What about The Rubaiyat? Do you know what that is?”
“Is this some sort of quiz on literature?” Sherlock complained. “Because—”
“On December 1, 1948, an unidentified man was found dead on Somerton Beach in Adelaide, Australia. In his pocket was a tiny piece of paper, two words cut from a copy of The Rubaiyat, which is a collection of Persian poems.”
“Taman Shud,” said Sherlock. “Those two words.”
Sherlock had turned fully toward him on the bed, his unusual eyes close on him, sharp with thought. Greg had his interest, which was more than he had hoped to have, really. “Yes. Those two words.”
“What do they mean?”
“You should find out. And also find out who the man was.”
Sherlock hesitated, looking torn between expressing his interest in the puzzle and giving Greg any sort of satisfaction at all. Greg saw him decide to go with indifference. “Fine,” he said, negligently, and waved his hand about. “When shall I get back to you about it?”
“Your timetable,” Greg told him, and straightened from the wall. “I’ll see you in biology. And be nice to John. I’m fairly sure he could kick your arse if you’re not.”
***
John’s first day at Eton was one of the stranger days of his life. And lately he’d had some pretty strange days. But the surrealism of being at Eton was unsurpassed. Truthfully, the news that his father had died had not been surreal. John had realized the moment it was said to him that he’d been unconsciously waiting for just that thing to happen. The rest of it had been a much different story. The news that the car accident hadn’t been his father’s fault had been more surprising than the news of the death itself. The outcome that there would be a sizeable legal settlement had been more surprising still. The fact that the guilt-stricken driver of the vehicle in question had had enough contacts at Eton to pull strings to get John to sit for an entrance exam for his final year, which Eton never did, had been, frankly, astonishing. But none of it had seemed entirely real until John finished his first day at Eton and realized that there were many more to come.
He met with his tutor, who seemed to be nice enough but was dreadfully concerned over John having switched in his last year. “That never happens; how are we supposed to predict your A level results; this is just appalling; but ah, well, we’ll figure it out.” John had a strict schedule by which he was supposed to be settled on which courses he wished to apply to and have drafted his personal statement. It was all a bit overwhelming, frankly.
He sat at supper with the rest of his year and looked around him, at the casual sumptuousness that everyone else seemed to be taking for granted, and promised himself never to find anything about this life routine.
His classmates seemed nice enough. He had almost nothing in common with any of them, but that was to be expected. Actually, he admitted that he rather missed Sherlock. Sherlock was completely mad, of course, but Sherlock didn’t ask many questions. He seemed to already know everything about John, and seemed confident of his ability to eventually learn everything he didn’t already know, and there was a relief to not having to dodge the questions about his past. Where he was from, what school he’d transferred from, how he’d managed a transfer in his final year, what his parents did. John knew these were all normal questions for people to ask him, but he dreaded answering them, and he would rather have had Sherlock at supper with him, talking to him about ways to kill people. John thought that maybe he should have accepted the therapy his solicitor had suggested together with the settlement money.
Sherlock was not at supper, however. John had not seen Sherlock since he had been unceremoniously thrown out of chemistry div earlier that day. John had half-expected to find him in his room when he’d stopped there before supper, but the room had been deserted, and John had realized then that he’d really been looking forward to Sherlock’s company. John wasn’t used to space, to aloneness. He wondered if that was partly why he hadn’t fought Sherlock harder on the impromptu laboratory. He was vaguely homesick, he thought, walking back to his room from supper. Maybe he should phone Harry.
His room was still empty when he entered, and John pushed away the frisson of disappointment and decided to go and telephone Harry. She had started a new school as well, and she was bubbling over with enthusiasm about it, and she also wanted to hear all about how Eton was. John told her all about the divs but left out Sherlock entirely. He wasn’t sure he could explain Sherlock in a way that wouldn’t make one or both of them sound insane.
When he was done talking to Harry, he hung up the phone and considered his room, the strange, unfamiliar contours of it, the sounds he wasn’t used to all around him, the quiet of the countryside and the faint murmurs of people in other rooms, the creaks of an old building settling. He’d slept poorly the night before, restless with nerves, and he felt exhausted suddenly. Maybe he would sleep better tonight, now that one day was out of the way, now that the bed was a bed he’d slept in once before.
He shut off the light and tucked himself into bed and was just on the verge of falling asleep when his door was flung open and the light was unceremoniously turned back on.
John jumped, his heart leaping with adrenaline, but it was, of course, only Sherlock, sweeping into the room and crouching down immediately to start rooting through one of the piles.
“Sherlock,” John protested.
“I’m looking for something,” Sherlock said, as if that were an answer, and began literally throwing things out of his way.
“And I’m trying to sleep,” John pointed out.
Sherlock turned to him, dropping onto the foot of his bed. He was still fully dressed in his uniform, tie-less and a bit disheveled, and his hair was a mess, and his eyes were very bright. “Lestrade has given me an unsolved murder,” he announced, looking gleeful about this. He even bounced a bit on the bed, shaking the mattress.
John gave up on the idea of sleeping, because Sherlock clearly wasn’t going to leave the room until he was ready to leave. “What does that mean?”
Sherlock looked irritated. “It means a murder where the culprit is still unknown.”
John sighed. “I know what an unsolved murder is. What do you mean Lestrade gave you one?”
“He said, instead of chemistry, that I could work on this puzzle.”
“Yeah, speaking of chemistry, was that little performance you gave this morning really necessary?”
Sherlock waved his hand dismissively. “Chemistry was a waste of my time, John.”
“Are you going to get yourself thrown out of every div? Because it was nice to have a friend in them with me.”
Sherlock gave him the oddest look, as if he’d suddenly started speaking in tongues, and John had a moment of panic.
“That is what you lot call them, isn’t it? ‘Divs’?” He’d thought he’d picked up the jargon, but everything at Eton had a different word; it was dizzying.
“Yes,” said Sherlock, slowly. “They’re divs.” Sherlock cleared his throat suddenly and settled himself more solidly on the foot of the bed. “On December 1, 1948, a man was found dead on Somerton Beach in Adelaide, Australia.”
“This is the case Lestrade gave you?” John guessed.
Sherlock didn’t even bother to confirm it. “He had a number of things in his pockets: a used bus ticket, an unused rail ticket, chewing gum, a comb, cigarettes, matches, and, at the very, very bottom of his pocket, a piece of paper with two words written on it: Taman Shud.”
“What’s that mean?”
“Finished. Ended.”
“Why did he have that in his pocket?”
“No one knows. No one even knows who the man is. Forty-four years and no one has even identified the victim, never mind the murderer. This case is like Christmas.”
“If you say so,” said John, and he couldn’t help being amused by how excited Sherlock clearly was over an unsolved mystery nearly half a century old.
“I’m going to solve it,” announced Sherlock, confidently.
“You’re going to solve a forty-four-year-old Australian murder from your bedroom at Eton College?”
“No,” said Sherlock, and grinned at him, looking irrepressible. “From your bedroom.”
John rolled his eyes. “Get out so I can go to sleep,” he said, but he wasn’t even sure he really meant it. “You’re not supposed to be barging in and out of here at night.”
“Not much,” said Sherlock. “I’m not supposed to be barging in and out of here at night much.”
“That isn’t what we agreed.”
“Yes, it is. We agreed to it this afternoon.”
“I wasn’t here this afternoon.”
“It’s hardly my fault you weren’t paying attention.”
John sighed. Sherlock was impossible. “Seriously. Go away.”
“I’m looking for something,” Sherlock told him, hopping off his bed and going back over to his piles of stuff. “I know I did an experiment on cigarettes and tobacco, I wanted to check something against the evidence from the case. Don’t mind me. Go back to sleep.” Sherlock resumed throwing things around the room in a pell-mell manner.
John wanted to point out that no one could possibly fall asleep with Sherlock making the racket he was making. Except that then John actually did fall asleep.
Next Chapter
Author -
earlgreytea68Rating - General (eventually as high as Adult, which will be adjusted on a chapter-by-chapter basis)
Characters - John, Sherlock, Lestrade
Spoilers - Through "The Reichenbach Fall"
Disclaimer - I don't own them and I don't make money off of them, but I don't like to dwell on that, so let's move on.
Summary - Sherlock Holmes, schoolboy. Yeah, that basically sums it up.
Author's Notes - Thank yous! To
flawedamythystand sensiblecatfor the Britpick; to the readers who read as this was being written, including chicklet73; and to arctacuda, who uncomplainingly betas massive amounts of fic. Chapter 1 - Chapter 2 - Chapter 3 - Chapter 4 - Chapter 5
Chapter Six
“I still think this is a terrible idea,” the house master told Greg Lestrade, and Greg tapped his finger on the edge of his teacup and considered a response.
He decided on, “I don’t.”
“I’m aware you don’t, but you don’t know Sherlock Holmes. I think we should move Watson immediately, before Holmes can corrupt him any more than he already has.”
“I don’t think he’s corrupting him,” said Greg. He thought the house master might be given to hyperbole. He thought everyone at Eton might be given to hyperbole, really.
“He made him miss supper last night.”
“That’s hardly corruption. And Sherlock was giving him a tour of the grounds.” Greg left out the part where Sherlock had looked as if he’d decided to roll around in a pigsty during this tour of the grounds. “Really, they looked to me as if they were getting along.”
“Which is even more dangerous,” huffed the house master. “You don’t understand what a dangerous influence Holmes can be on this boy.”
“John doesn’t seem like a fragile kid to me. In fact, he took a legal settlement from a messy car accident that killed his alcoholic father and found a way to get himself into Eton. I think he seems like kind of the opposite of fragile.”
“You still think he is going to be a good influence on Holmes.” The house master said this as if Greg had announced that he thought the teapot on the table had begun singing to them.
“I think stranger things have happened,” Greg insisted. “And I think it’s worth a try.”
There was a tap on the door, and one of the dames poked her head in. “Sorry to interrupt, but we’ve got a rip already.”
“A rip?” said Greg, in surprise. “On the first day of term? Why wouldn’t they just give an info?”
The dame who had handed the rip over—and Greg tried to remember her name but there were 150 instructors at this place, not counting the 1,500 students, and his head was overflowing with names at the moment—gave him a smile that made Greg feel decidedly unhappy.
Which the house master confirmed. “A rip and not an info because it’s Holmes and he carries a reputation.” The house master handed the piece of paper over to him, looking smug and knowing.
“What can he possibly have already done?” asked Greg, reading what was written on the piece of paper. Apparently what Sherlock had done was to tell his chemistry master that he was not going to attend the school this term because he already knew far more about chemistry than the chemistry master did. “Excellent,” sighed Greg, wishing Sherlock could have made his job a little bit easier. “I’ll handle it,” he told the house master.
“It would be traditional for me to handle it,” the house master pointed out.
“It would be traditional to not give a student a rip on the first day of term,” Greg responded.
“It seems as if he deserved it, though,” remarked the house master.
“I’ll speak to him,” said Greg. “At least give me a week before you decide he’s a lost cause.”
“I decided he was a lost cause three years ago,” snorted the house master. “I’ve always been in favor of his rustication. His brother pours quite a lot of money into the school to keep that threat at bay. But you may have a week with Sherlock Holmes, and long before that week is up you will be back here to listen to my I-told-you-so.”
“Right,” said Greg, without meaning it at all, and stood and looked at the dame. “Do you know where he is? Is he still in chemistry?”
“Oh, no.” She looked almost gleeful about this. “The chemistry master told him that he did not want him sullying the classroom. He should have been sent to his room.”
“How do you know all this?”
“School gossip. Got to keep up, Greg.” She grinned at him cheekily and sent him a wink, as if this were all hilarious.
“Will he actually go to his room?” Greg asked, following the dame out of the house master’s office.
She shrugged. “Maybe.”
Which wasn’t especially helpful, and Greg had read through Sherlock’s file, but Sherlock’s file had not included things like “favorite hiding places.” “Where would he be if he’s not in his room?”
“God knows. Anywhere he’s not supposed to be,” said the dame. “Good luck.” She walked away from him, in the opposite direction of Sherlock’s room, and Greg sighed and tucked the rip into his suit pocket and went to Sherlock’s room.
The door was closed, and Greg knocked and didn’t receive an answer. He thought for a second, then sidestepped to John Watson’s door and knocked on it sharply. There was a long pregnant moment, and then Sherlock opened the door a crack and said, immediately, “Damn.”
“Hello,” Greg said to him.
Sherlock looked displeased. “I thought there was a slight chance you might be John, having forgotten his key.”
“Sorry,” said Greg. “No. Are you supposed to be in John’s room without him?”
“John doesn’t mind,” insisted Sherlock.
Greg made a skeptical noise but decided that was the least of his problems. “Come into your room. I’m not having this conversation in someone else’s bedroom.”
“We don’t have to have a conversation,” said Sherlock.
“About the rip? Of course we do. It’s college rules.”
“You can just say we had a conversation about it and then…go.” Sherlock looked hopeful about this.
Greg tipped his head at him. “Is that what your former tutor used to do?”
“No, but that would have been nice.”
“Get out here and into your own room,” said Greg, firmly, and Sherlock sighed but obeyed. As slowly as possible. Greg rolled his eyes, especially when Sherlock flopped onto his bed. Sherlock should be enrolled in drama, thought Greg. Greg leaned against the wall opposite Sherlock’s bed and crossed his arms and said, “Why are you even taking chemistry if it doesn’t interest you?”
“Because I had to fill my schedule. They wouldn’t let me take nothing, they said it wasn’t allowed.”
“You could have taken a science you don’t know as much about,” Greg pointed out. “Astronomy, maybe.”
“Why do you appear to have memorized my file?” Sherlock asked, looking at him suspiciously.
“Because you are by far the most problematic student in this entire college.”
Sherlock looked pleased at this. “Am I? Excellent.”
Greg sighed and hoped that Sherlock wouldn’t think that Greg thought he was at all amusing, even though Greg thought he was actually a little bit amusing. Greg thought the problem with Sherlock was obvious, and he didn’t understand how no one before him had seen it immediately: Sherlock was bored. He was more than bored. He was beyond bored. All indications were that he was cleverer than could be quite grasped, and there was no school nearly challenging enough for him on the schedule. “I’m going to talk to your chemistry master,” he said.
Sherlock made a face. “Please don’t. She’s a horrible cow.”
“You’re no prince either,” Greg replied, and Sherlock made an offended squeak. “Luckily for you, though, I’m quite charming.”
Sherlock looked dubious. “Oh, are you? And why is that lucky for me?”
“Because I’m going to persuade the chemistry master to give you credit for the school based on my assessment of your progress in private chemistry lessons with me.”
Sherlock gave him a truly epic eye roll. “That is worse,” he proclaimed.
“You should hear me out.”
“Why?” said Sherlock, sullenly.
“Taman Shud,” Greg told him. “Do you know what that is?”
Sherlock eyed him. “Another language, clearly.”
“What about The Rubaiyat? Do you know what that is?”
“Is this some sort of quiz on literature?” Sherlock complained. “Because—”
“On December 1, 1948, an unidentified man was found dead on Somerton Beach in Adelaide, Australia. In his pocket was a tiny piece of paper, two words cut from a copy of The Rubaiyat, which is a collection of Persian poems.”
“Taman Shud,” said Sherlock. “Those two words.”
Sherlock had turned fully toward him on the bed, his unusual eyes close on him, sharp with thought. Greg had his interest, which was more than he had hoped to have, really. “Yes. Those two words.”
“What do they mean?”
“You should find out. And also find out who the man was.”
Sherlock hesitated, looking torn between expressing his interest in the puzzle and giving Greg any sort of satisfaction at all. Greg saw him decide to go with indifference. “Fine,” he said, negligently, and waved his hand about. “When shall I get back to you about it?”
“Your timetable,” Greg told him, and straightened from the wall. “I’ll see you in biology. And be nice to John. I’m fairly sure he could kick your arse if you’re not.”
***
John’s first day at Eton was one of the stranger days of his life. And lately he’d had some pretty strange days. But the surrealism of being at Eton was unsurpassed. Truthfully, the news that his father had died had not been surreal. John had realized the moment it was said to him that he’d been unconsciously waiting for just that thing to happen. The rest of it had been a much different story. The news that the car accident hadn’t been his father’s fault had been more surprising than the news of the death itself. The outcome that there would be a sizeable legal settlement had been more surprising still. The fact that the guilt-stricken driver of the vehicle in question had had enough contacts at Eton to pull strings to get John to sit for an entrance exam for his final year, which Eton never did, had been, frankly, astonishing. But none of it had seemed entirely real until John finished his first day at Eton and realized that there were many more to come.
He met with his tutor, who seemed to be nice enough but was dreadfully concerned over John having switched in his last year. “That never happens; how are we supposed to predict your A level results; this is just appalling; but ah, well, we’ll figure it out.” John had a strict schedule by which he was supposed to be settled on which courses he wished to apply to and have drafted his personal statement. It was all a bit overwhelming, frankly.
He sat at supper with the rest of his year and looked around him, at the casual sumptuousness that everyone else seemed to be taking for granted, and promised himself never to find anything about this life routine.
His classmates seemed nice enough. He had almost nothing in common with any of them, but that was to be expected. Actually, he admitted that he rather missed Sherlock. Sherlock was completely mad, of course, but Sherlock didn’t ask many questions. He seemed to already know everything about John, and seemed confident of his ability to eventually learn everything he didn’t already know, and there was a relief to not having to dodge the questions about his past. Where he was from, what school he’d transferred from, how he’d managed a transfer in his final year, what his parents did. John knew these were all normal questions for people to ask him, but he dreaded answering them, and he would rather have had Sherlock at supper with him, talking to him about ways to kill people. John thought that maybe he should have accepted the therapy his solicitor had suggested together with the settlement money.
Sherlock was not at supper, however. John had not seen Sherlock since he had been unceremoniously thrown out of chemistry div earlier that day. John had half-expected to find him in his room when he’d stopped there before supper, but the room had been deserted, and John had realized then that he’d really been looking forward to Sherlock’s company. John wasn’t used to space, to aloneness. He wondered if that was partly why he hadn’t fought Sherlock harder on the impromptu laboratory. He was vaguely homesick, he thought, walking back to his room from supper. Maybe he should phone Harry.
His room was still empty when he entered, and John pushed away the frisson of disappointment and decided to go and telephone Harry. She had started a new school as well, and she was bubbling over with enthusiasm about it, and she also wanted to hear all about how Eton was. John told her all about the divs but left out Sherlock entirely. He wasn’t sure he could explain Sherlock in a way that wouldn’t make one or both of them sound insane.
When he was done talking to Harry, he hung up the phone and considered his room, the strange, unfamiliar contours of it, the sounds he wasn’t used to all around him, the quiet of the countryside and the faint murmurs of people in other rooms, the creaks of an old building settling. He’d slept poorly the night before, restless with nerves, and he felt exhausted suddenly. Maybe he would sleep better tonight, now that one day was out of the way, now that the bed was a bed he’d slept in once before.
He shut off the light and tucked himself into bed and was just on the verge of falling asleep when his door was flung open and the light was unceremoniously turned back on.
John jumped, his heart leaping with adrenaline, but it was, of course, only Sherlock, sweeping into the room and crouching down immediately to start rooting through one of the piles.
“Sherlock,” John protested.
“I’m looking for something,” Sherlock said, as if that were an answer, and began literally throwing things out of his way.
“And I’m trying to sleep,” John pointed out.
Sherlock turned to him, dropping onto the foot of his bed. He was still fully dressed in his uniform, tie-less and a bit disheveled, and his hair was a mess, and his eyes were very bright. “Lestrade has given me an unsolved murder,” he announced, looking gleeful about this. He even bounced a bit on the bed, shaking the mattress.
John gave up on the idea of sleeping, because Sherlock clearly wasn’t going to leave the room until he was ready to leave. “What does that mean?”
Sherlock looked irritated. “It means a murder where the culprit is still unknown.”
John sighed. “I know what an unsolved murder is. What do you mean Lestrade gave you one?”
“He said, instead of chemistry, that I could work on this puzzle.”
“Yeah, speaking of chemistry, was that little performance you gave this morning really necessary?”
Sherlock waved his hand dismissively. “Chemistry was a waste of my time, John.”
“Are you going to get yourself thrown out of every div? Because it was nice to have a friend in them with me.”
Sherlock gave him the oddest look, as if he’d suddenly started speaking in tongues, and John had a moment of panic.
“That is what you lot call them, isn’t it? ‘Divs’?” He’d thought he’d picked up the jargon, but everything at Eton had a different word; it was dizzying.
“Yes,” said Sherlock, slowly. “They’re divs.” Sherlock cleared his throat suddenly and settled himself more solidly on the foot of the bed. “On December 1, 1948, a man was found dead on Somerton Beach in Adelaide, Australia.”
“This is the case Lestrade gave you?” John guessed.
Sherlock didn’t even bother to confirm it. “He had a number of things in his pockets: a used bus ticket, an unused rail ticket, chewing gum, a comb, cigarettes, matches, and, at the very, very bottom of his pocket, a piece of paper with two words written on it: Taman Shud.”
“What’s that mean?”
“Finished. Ended.”
“Why did he have that in his pocket?”
“No one knows. No one even knows who the man is. Forty-four years and no one has even identified the victim, never mind the murderer. This case is like Christmas.”
“If you say so,” said John, and he couldn’t help being amused by how excited Sherlock clearly was over an unsolved mystery nearly half a century old.
“I’m going to solve it,” announced Sherlock, confidently.
“You’re going to solve a forty-four-year-old Australian murder from your bedroom at Eton College?”
“No,” said Sherlock, and grinned at him, looking irrepressible. “From your bedroom.”
John rolled his eyes. “Get out so I can go to sleep,” he said, but he wasn’t even sure he really meant it. “You’re not supposed to be barging in and out of here at night.”
“Not much,” said Sherlock. “I’m not supposed to be barging in and out of here at night much.”
“That isn’t what we agreed.”
“Yes, it is. We agreed to it this afternoon.”
“I wasn’t here this afternoon.”
“It’s hardly my fault you weren’t paying attention.”
John sighed. Sherlock was impossible. “Seriously. Go away.”
“I’m looking for something,” Sherlock told him, hopping off his bed and going back over to his piles of stuff. “I know I did an experiment on cigarettes and tobacco, I wanted to check something against the evidence from the case. Don’t mind me. Go back to sleep.” Sherlock resumed throwing things around the room in a pell-mell manner.
John wanted to point out that no one could possibly fall asleep with Sherlock making the racket he was making. Except that then John actually did fall asleep.
Next Chapter
