Chapter Text
The summer of 1889 was of the kind that melts the tarmacadam; that can render a fellow speechless, panting mute from its intensity. House windows thrown wide open, and with shirt-sleeves rolled as high as one might dare (buttons a bother), when one was private and away from public glare. But outside upon the street, of course, we men were trussed by decency in waistcoats, ties and jackets, our hats clamped damply to our perspiring heads.
One Tuesday morning at ten o'clock precisely, Holmes and I were sat side by side in revolving chairs at Smith & Curtin, the gentleman's barber shop on Lincoln Street. With white sheets wrapped around us to suffocate us even further, it was to some relief, still, as the snips of hair were shaken to the tile in triumphant coda.
“My goodness,” I said, “that feels so much better already.” I beamed up at Curtin, my man with the scissors. “So what news are you able to share with us, Mr. Curtin? Has your wife managed to find any relief from her symptoms of palsy?”
“Oh, yes, she is much better, Doctor, yes, thank you, after the course of treatment you recommended. We really cannot thank you enough. Elizabeth said to me – and yes, she truly did – 'That Dr. Watson, he is such a lovely man!'. And I said to my wife, well, I said to her: 'Yes, I quite agree with you, my dear, he really is!'”
I heard my friend yawn loudly, and rather pointedly, from his barber's chair beside me. I might have turned my head to frown if Mr. Curtin, at that precise moment in heat-slowed time, had not been attending to the hair above the arc of my right ear. I directed the frown instead to the mirror, where – naturally – it did not cast upon the irritant. For Holmes's eyes were closed, his attention span elsewhere; thin fingers tapping the chair arm in recollection, I had no doubt, of the concert at St. James's we had attended the night before.
Ten minutes later, and we were back out into the roil and brushing hair from our shirt collars.
“That feels so much better,” I said.
“Yes,” replied Holmes. “I believe you did say.” He wrinkled his nose in displeasure. “This brilliantine smells of flowers.”
He took me by the arm, and together we strolled the London streets as two old friends might do, who have no special place to be, nor any hurry to arrive there.
“Mr. Smith cut your hair extremely well on this occasion,” I told him quietly. “You look very handsome from it.”
Holmes bristled.
“And when do I not look– oh, just be quiet...”
(For I was now chuckling aloud at his petulant spat.)
“My ears itch,” he added then, still of the inclination to be wearisome.
“Someone must be talking about you,” I said. “I can only imagine their invective.”
That made him smile, a little. A corner of his lip quirked up, at any rate. He squeezed my arm.
The spring and early summer had proven fruitful for us both. The Spanish Embassy had seen Holmes engaged upon a confidential case, that held him occupied and absent for far longer than I might perhaps have wished. But his triumph in the affair had sealed his reputation far and wide, and only served to bolster his good spirits. For my own part, I had begun to take on some police surgeon work at Scotland Yard, and which found me in the evidence box of the courts on odd occasions. Such ventures never interfered with my participating in my friend's own work – and I was very glad of this, for I should have never heard the last of it if they had.
This fortnight past had been a tranquil one, however, with little of calling for the either of us. With this great heatwave, I may dare claim that to be a good thing.
Upon our arrival home, we were immediately struck by the oppressive air. One might have fried a perfect egg upon any of the surfaces. Holmes marched to the windows, which had been pulled and locked during our absence.
“Who closed the windows?” he demanded. “John, it is a furnace in here now.”
He pulled up all the sashes, fanning madly at his face with the morning's Times.
I removed my jacket and rolled my shirt-sleeves to the elbow. I sat at the breakfast table and reached to snatch the flapping newspaper in mid-wave. The front page was almost comical. “HEATWAVE!”, it proclaimed, proudly, in its first column. I began to read through the short article. The word reappeared a further dozen times.
Holmes was charging for the door, meanwhile. I looked up, alarmed.
“Where are you doing? Don't make a fuss. Billy saw that we were out and he did not think--”
“I am not going to make a fuss,” said he. “I am going to wash my hair. My ears still itch and I smell of flowers.”
He disappeared from view. After a moment, I heard sounds of splashing water from the bathroom. I took the opportunity to pad down to Mrs. Hudson to request a pot of tea. It arrived with us and was brewing when my friend at last emerged, his face yet pinker than before. En route he had shucked his garments to his trousers and his undervest. He patted his damp hair, smoothing it down, a sheen of black.
“Tea,” I said, pointing.
He smiled.
“Thank you, John. You always know exactly what I need.”
“You look delectable,” I told him.
“Well, I feel anything but,” said he, with the teapot in mid-air and pouring a cupful. “I pray to heaven we don't have a client while I'm in this state.”
I watched him as he sipped daintily at his tea. His hair, cut quite shorter, was drying already. A small, errant lock curled down on his forehead.
“The late morning mail,” said Holmes. “Where is it?”
“On the sideboard,” I replied. “And there is not so much of it. Two letters and an invoice, as best I can tell.”
My friend wrinkled his nose at the latter. His eyes strayed to the sideboard, all the same. For a letter might bring casework, a random intrigue or some small interest.
“John--” he began.
“I shall bring them across to you,” I said, and I did so.
“Hum,” said Sherlock Holmes. “The top letter is postmarked from Surrey. A gentleman's handwriting.”
He set it aside, and slit open the second with the blade of his pocket-knife. Scanning the contents, he let out a low chuckle.
“Three lines from Langdale Pike,” he said. He raised his eyebrows across the table. “In green ink, John.”
“Green ink!”
“Yes. Hmm hmm. Well, well.”
“What does the man have to say, then?”
“Nothing of import,” said my friend.
He slid the letter back into its envelope, stuffing it into his left trouser pocket.
The invoice was from Newton's, the furniture repair shop nearest to Baker Street. The owner was something of a charlatan, responsible for causing our occasional cabinet a fraction more turmoil than had been dealt it in the first place. Holmes passed a thoughtful moment casting complaint in sotto voce, before crumpling the sheet into a ball and overarming it away.
“You are not going to pay?” I asked him, amused.
It seemed that we spent many of our mornings in just this fashion, and the taller the mail pile then the richer the game. Holmes's moods would fluctuate from one missive to the next, and his reactions unpredictable. I thought perhaps it might be wise to retrieve the Newton invoice. Mahogany and hinges, and all of those things that must do good the damage, may well be expensive, but I had scant desire for my own face or for that of my friend's to land into sharp contact with Newton's right-hook.
“Newton was once a prize boxer,” I said.
“Well, damn it, so was I,” said he, with a sniff. “Before your time,” he added quickly.
“Your schooldays don't count,” I retorted. I lit a cigarette and leaned back in my chair. My eyelids began to droop from the warmth of the sun shining through the sash windows. I heard my friend rise from the table and commence to pad about the room. The roll of a drawer, the clink of a bottle, the pop of a cork. Some tinkering and then, a wafting familiar, faint eggy aroma. Holmes's latest chemical experiment.
“Hydrogen sulfide?”
“Yes.”
“Do be careful.”
I heard him tut.
The smell of rotting eggs is hardly a pleasant one, even with the windows open. With the lack of anything resembling a breeze to disperse the invasion, I flung open the sitting-room door.
“Mrs. Hudson!”
At extreme close quarters with our landlady, I took two steps back from the surprise. Her hand was raised, outstretched to make her rap upon the door; it froze there now as if debating what to do.
“Doctor!” said she. She retracted her hand. “I came to clear the tea-tray and to enquire as to what you both might care for your lunch.” The good woman sniffed and frowned, craning her neck into the room. “Whatever is that smell?”
“Eggs,” I said, not caring to elaborate.
It was to Mrs. Hudson's credit that she made no further comment. Neither did she exclaim loudly upon the partial undress of Mr. Holmes, who sat so nonchalantly at his mottled desk, a stub pencil scratching at his notebook. By some fine miracle these past eight years, he had yet to blow us all to smithereens, despite what seemed – upon occasion – as his very best intent to. Instead, his table bore the brunt of it, stained and woodsore, proudly stoic.
“Sandwiches would be lovely, thank you,” I said, as our landlady passed through. “Ham and mustard?”
She smiled and nodded.
The breakfast table now cleared, I glanced at the letter from Surrey still unopened upon it.
“Holmes,” I said.
“I am too hot for clothes, John.”
“Yes, I know, but it is not about that. You have not opened your letter from Surrey.”
“Well, am I an octopus? Must I do twenty things all at once?”
“The weather makes you impossible,” I told him fondly.
I stood close by the desk while he rearranged his test tubes into racks. His hair was fully dry now, if a little ruffed and wild. I stroked it gently. He leaned into the touch and rubbed his head against my palm.
“Let me just finish up here,” said he, “and then I shall come and rip open the letter.”
“Do not rush yourself on my account,” I said. “Read it next Christmas morning if you would prefer.”
I massaged his neck and shoulders, the taut sinew and muscle beneath the thin cotton of the garment. I leaned down to kiss his clavicle; butterfly pecks up to his nape. He shuddered.
“You are so beautiful,” I told him.
We remained that way, quite motionless, for a minute or even two, locked inside our quiet embrace. And then I stood back to release him that he might continue with his tidy.
It did not take him very long. Holmes rejoined me at the table and scooped up his correspondence. He gave the envelope close attention.
“I believe I recognise the handwriting,” he said. “Now, who do we know that lives in Surrey?”
He tore the letter open without waiting for my reply. A two sheet missive in neat, blue script, that he commenced to keenly read. He frowned and sighed and sucked air through his teeth at short intervals.
“It sounds an intriguing letter,” I said.
Holmes looked up at last from the signature scrawl.
“It is from Victor Burroughs,” said he. “I am afraid that it bears grave news, John.”