Chapter 1: Cut and Dry

Mycroft Holmes seldom called his brother regarding personal matters. Their family simply wasn't like that. Sentimental, that is. Personal matters were private matters, and therefore not to be shared, asked after, or remarked upon. Fortunately, one could categorise affairs of the family estate under business, which made the following interaction a tolerable one:

'Barnaby has died.'

On the other end of the phone, he heard the sigh of a put-upon young man, and Mycroft knew what would follow: some extraneous question to demonstrate a degree of interest in the tragedy (there wasn't any), a cliché platitude to showcase some feeling of remorse (entirely fabricated), and finally, an adequate but undemanding social response (well rehearsed). Sherlock knew how to play a role.

The extraneous question: 'Was he ill?'

'Pneumonia. Two weeks in hospice care. But the man was eighty-seven. At that age, it's mostly about making them comfortable, isn't it?'

Sherlock grunted.

The platitude: 'A damn shame. He'll be missed.'

Mycroft couldn't stop himself from calling Sherlock out on this little bluff. 'Brother mine, when was the last time you even saw Barnaby?'

'Christmas,' said Sherlock defensively.

'Of what year?'

Sherlock ignored him, moving straight to the final checkbox.

'I'll arrange for the disposal of the corpse. And flowers.'

Of course, his tact could use a little work.

'Cremation provisions are already well in hand,' Mycroft said, sparing him. He was the magnanimous big brother, after all. 'You needn't lift a finger but to sign off on the paperwork. It'll arrive by courier.'

'Is that all then?'

'All but the matter of Barnaby's replacement.'

Again, the bedevilled sigh.

'I know, I know, it's so taxing on your time. But unfortunately, Sherlock, this is one civic duty you cannot shunt aside. We all must play our part.'

'I was thinking of applying for exemption.'

Mycroft snorted. 'Based on what!'

'Hazardous environment.'

The only plausible response was to scoff. 'You live as a bachelor in a cosy two-bedroom flat in Central London—'

'The upstairs is a laboratory, not a bedroom.'

'—and enjoy the doting of an old housekeeper who feeds you up and serves you daily tea with biscuits. Hazardous environment indeed!'

'She's my landlady,' he countered, as if that explained it. But he was bristling. 'My work invites all sorts of unsavoury clientele to the flat, some highly dangerous, and there's no telling when another explosion will rock the kitchen. I cannot be bothered hosting!'

'Sherlock, if I cannot apply for exemption, as a prominent and dedicated servant of the British government, your tinkering in the kitchen sink and playing detective on weekends is hardly going to qualify.' He paused, waiting for a reply. None came. 'Don't mope. I can hear you moping even from here.'

'I'm not moping,' Sherlock moped.

'Once the expiry paperwork goes through, you'll have thirty days to submit the registration for a new ward. You know the law. Failure to do so will result in a very hefty fine, and I'll not loan you any more funds.'

'I don't need your funds.'

'I would, however, be willing to assist in the purchase of the new ward. The good ones are getting pricier, and lord knows you can't handle one of the bad ones.'

If the sound of rolling eyes could pass through a mobile phone, Mycroft Holmes would have claimed just then to have heard it. 'I shan't need to prove you wrong on that count,' said Sherlock, 'seeing as how my exemption will be approved before thirty days is out.'

'So sure about that, are you?'

'Are we done?'

'For now. Happy Christmas, Sherlock.'

The line went dead, and Mycroft sighed out his exasperation. Just once he'd like to end a phone call to his little brother on a civil note. Well. No. That wasn't entirely true. He did so enjoy the jabs.

Within seconds of ending the call, Sherlock had put Mycroft and the matter of acquiring a new ward out of his head entirely. It was a problem for another day.

He pulled out his laptop and checked the inbox. Empty. Next, he went to his website, The Science of Deduction, to see whether anyone had commented on his last post regarding logical alphabets as a handy tool for novices of deductive reasoning. Nothing. What's more, his hit counter was low, in the teens. He didn't understand. He had taken special care to dumb it down so that even a simpleton could understand and successfully employ his methods. It was fascinating subject matter! Why was there not more traffic?

With a sigh, he turned to his phone.

I need a case.
Get me one.

He waited.

While he waited, he brewed himself a pot of tea, reorganised his bookshelves by publication date, and played half of Elgar's Violin Concerto in B minor. He was just climbing a particularly challenging scale when his phone dinged on the coffee table. He abandoned the concerto and pounced on the phone.

Nothing on right
now, I'm afraid.

He glared at the screen. Nothing? In all of London?

A cold case, then.

He wasn't one for begging. Demanding on the other hand . . .

The phone rang.

'You know, Sherlock,' said Detective Inspector Lestrade, 'I can't just drop everything and go scrounging around to find you a distraction.'

'If you have something to drop, you have something to give. What are you working on?'

'Nothing that requires the refined observational skills of an outside consultant. All run of the mill. Open and shut. You'd be terribly bored.'

Sherlock was already terribly bored. Why else would he be calling? Idiot. 'I'll take it.'

'You don't even know what—'

'I'll take it. Bring me on. What is it? I'm getting my coat. Are you at the Yard or in the field?'

'Jesus Christ, Sherlock, do I need to get you a packet of Marlboros for Christmas this year?'

'Not my brand. And no, I'm nine months clean. It's finally getting exciting, staying away.'

They said the first thirty days were the hardest. Not so. Every day since just became more and more challenging not to go crashing into a tobacco shop, throw a handful of banknotes at the cashier, and demand the lot. He needed a superior distraction.

On the other end of the line, Lestrade sighed mightily. 'Ten minutes. I'll pick you up.'

'That's more like it.'

It turned out to be fifteen. By the time Lestrade pulled to the kerb, Sherlock—awaiting him impatiently, tapping foot and all—was in a dour mood.

'London's criminal class needs to step up its game,' he griped, fighting with the seatbelt Lestrade insisted on.

'Well, aren't you in a strop,' Lestrade said amiably. 'Maybe we coppers are just doing a damn fine job of maintaining order.'

Sherlock laughed, a jab at the effectiveness of those practising Lestrade's chosen profession.

'What's the matter?' Lestrade sparred back. 'Not enough traction on the old website?'

His laughter stopped.

They arrived at a flat in Southwark, just beside the railroad tracks, where a small convoy of police cars and an ambulance had drawn the attention of the neighbourhood. Before stepping out of the car, Sherlock refitted his gloves and scarf and pulled the collar of his coat up to his ears. It wasn't just that he had an image to maintain in front of Lestrade's people; it was also damn cold.

'What've we got?' Lestrade said by way of greeting, as they approached the police tape.

The other police officers eyed Sherlock with a modicum of resentment. He was used to this by now. He was good, and they knew he was good; they just didn't like being bested at their own jobs.

A police sergeant on the scene began to list the details.

'The vic's name is Lucy Harrison, aged twenty-three. Suspected cause of death is blunt-force head trauma from falling down these brick stairs here. You can see where the blood is pooled around her head.'

Sherlock did see. There was also blood on the edge of the bottommost step, along with strands of blond hair frozen to it. From the way the body lay, and if her skull had met with that final step, it appeared she had gone down head over heels and not slipped, which meant she had been pushed. Foul play, almost certainly.

'Who called it in?' asked Lestrade.

'Neighbour, just across the way there. We've got two boys interviewing her right now. Told 999 operators that she saw it happen. The girl was pushed.'

'Who pushed her?'

'Neighbour says it was the brother, Joseph Harrison. They'd been fighting, she says, and he pushed her, then fled. Left her cold on the ground.'

'Fled on foot?'

'Bike.'

'Any other witnesses?' Lestrade indicated the open front door. 'Anyone else at home who can tell us what the argument was all about?'

The sergeant shook his head no. 'Just the ward. They call him Westie. WSC has already removed him. Seems a pretty cut-and-dry case of domestic assault turned homicide, sir. Not sure what need we have of'—he gestured vaguely in Sherlock's direction—'additional resources.'

Another officer, holding her com unit to her ear, came jogging up. 'Just spotted him, boss. Right outside Bermondsey Station. Units are bringing him in.'

Lestrade turned to Sherlock and gave something of a shrug, half apologetic. 'Well, that's kind of it, then, isn't it? We know the how, just picked up the who, and we're about to learn the why. In a few hours, Mr Harrison will be the concern of the courts. I'm afraid there's not much more to do here.'

Sherlock felt the bitter sting of disappointment. It was just so ordinary. Not even a proper murder, just a sibling dispute turned violent. He could almost sympathise with that. But he couldn't lose face, not in front of these coppers, who would just love to see him turn tail and slink away, having deduced nothing. He couldn't even admit his disinterest to Lestrade, not with his pitying frown and there-there eyes.

'I want to interrogate Harrison,' he said.

Lestrade shook his head. 'Not your job.'

'Then I want to listen in.'

'Jesus, Sherlock, you can't possibly be interested in this anymore.'

'Lestrade.' God, he didn't want to beg, and he was right on the cusp of begging. He finished pathetically, 'You might miss something.'

Lestrade sighed. 'You're sure you don't want to spend more time with the body?' he asked, as if offering a treat to a petulant child.

'She fell down the steps and cracked her skull,' Sherlock said peevishly, walking back to the car. 'Next.'

Joe Harrison was a lanky, twitchy white man and bike courier. When he met Sherlock, he said sullenly (having just been arrested), 'Sherlock Holmes of Baker Street? I have a delivery for you.'

'It's a small London after all,' Sherlock said drily.

'Start from the beginning, Mr Harrison,' said Lestrade, leaning back into his chair and folding his arms. He had adopted a sudden tone of impatience, and Sherlock realised he wanted to play bad cop. He wasn't terribly good at it. And in this situation, it wasn't exactly called for. Joe Harrison was deeply ashamed, and deeply ashamed people didn't play hard ball.

Still, they lied. In that seat, under the hot lamp of accusation for a terrible crime, everybody lied.

'I just come home from a run,' Harrison said, talking to his hands, which rested on the table top, joined together by silver bracelets. 'And I seen Lucy and Westie together on the sofa.' He sniffed angrily, and his hands balled into fists. 'They was . . . they was . . .'

'What, Mr Harrison?'

'Westie was two-dij-up-mij, that's what,' he spat.

'What?' Lestrade and Sherlock asked together.

Harrison sighed and rolled his head. 'You know.' He stuck two fingers into the air and made a rude, plunging gesture.

'Oh,' the detectives said.

'Yeah. That, and, and, and his mouth were all over her Bristols.' His own mouth twisted into an ugly line. 'If I shoulda stoved in anyone's head, it woulda been his. He's a cas, but that don't stop wards like him. He was raping her, know what I'm saying? It was violation.' He sniffed again and rubbed a shaky hand under his nose.

Sherlock lifted his chin a little, quirking an eyebrow. 'Are you sure?'

Harrison froze in the act of rubbing, and his eyes went wide, scandalised. 'Eh?'

'Are you sure she wasn't enjoying herself?'

'You mother fucker, you prick!' Harrison made an aborted movement, trying to get to his feet, but the restraints kept him in the chair.

'Sherlock,' Lestrade said as warning, the bad-cop routine dissolving. He'd forgotten who he was playing with.

'I mean, was she struggling? Trying to get him to stop?'

'Shut him up!' Harrison cried. 'Ain't no way Lucy would fuck a ward!'

'Of course not,' said Sherlock smoothly, 'because that would mean she raped him.'

That was the law, after all. A ward could not legally give consent, not to anyone, and certainly not to a host. Any host who elicited sex was abusing his or her power. But it happened. Sherlock had seen cases like these—they didn't always end in murder—a hundred times before. There was an entire division devoted to host-ward sexual abuse cases at the Yard. But hosts almost never, ever admitted to coercion. What happened instead was a shift in blame. Suddenly, a ward with no history of violence or misbehaviour was a violent, sexual deviant. 'She attacked my son,' the sobbing host claimed, or 'He came into my room. I was helpless.' Ward detention centres were filled with such inexplicable deviants.

'She weren't no slag!' Harrison protested.

'Then the question, I guess,' Sherlock continued, unperturbed by his outbursts, 'is why she was the one who wound up dead, and not the ward. Your sister wasn't fighting the ward, was she? She was fighting you.'

'No.'

'You walked in on her getting off with the ward—'

'It weren't like that.'

'—and she screamed at you to get out—'

'It were all his fault.'

'—and then what did she say, Joe? That she was in love with him? Is that what really set you off?'

Harrison flinched.

'Mr Harrison,' said Lestrade, shooting Sherlock a look to tell him that he was about to take over, so don't test him. It was the official detective's job, after all. Damn, and it was just getting fun. 'Was Westie your ward, or your sister's?'

'Family ward. Both our names is on the registration.'

'So you and Lucy shared a residence.'

'Yes.'

'And when did you acquire him?'

'Lucy and me inherited when Mum and Dad reached exemption age, four years ago. But he's been in the family since I was five, Lucy three.' He sniffed, long and hard. 'Westie was my age. Supposed to be a playmate for me. Mum even let me name him. But he was rubbish, I never liked him. Always thought there was something wrong about him.'

'But let me guess,' said Sherlock, unable to shut up. 'Lucy took to him just fine.'

Harrison glowered.

'Tell me about what happened, after you found Lucy and Westie together,' said Lestrade.

'I shouted,' said Harrison. 'Told him to get the fuck offa her. And . . . Lucy'd always had a soft spot for him, said it weren't his fault, what he done to her, but I knew better. I knew. Then we was fighting—arguing—and I'm trying to get her away from him, see, and next I know we's at the front door, and . . . It was an accident. She slipped. It was an accident.'

'She slipped,' repeated Lestrade. 'Could you tell she was hurt?'

Harrison's eyes were downcast. Tears spilt onto his cheeks. 'Yeah.'

'But you didn't call an ambulance?'

'I dunno. I was in shock, wasn't it? I thought it weren't so bad.'

'Mr Harrison, her skull was cracked open.'

'I didn't see . . .'

'Right there, at the bottom of your steps, where you pushed her.'

'No . . .'

'There was a lot of blood.'

'I didn't . . . It was Westie what hurt her.'

'And you just hopped on your bike and headed for the tube? With your sister lying dead? Where were you going?'

'It was Westie. All Westie. It was the ward.'

At that, Joe Harrison broke down into sobs, and they could get no more out of him.

They left him in the interrogation room with a glass of water and a constable well known for calming down hysterical murderers, and stepped out into the hallway. Lestrade's hands burrowed into his front trouser pockets and he rocked a little on his heels. 'Well damn,' he said. 'This means a trip to the pound.'

'He's clearly lying,' said Sherlock. 'He wasn't breaking up an assault. Not on Westie's part, anyway. And if he believes he was, that's just the cocaine talking.'

'Cocaine?'

'Run a drug test, inspector. The sniffing, the dilated pupils, faint traces of white powder on his trouser knee. He's a user. He was high when he came home, and in a state of paranoia, delusions, and poor judgement, whatever he saw or imagines he saw led him to become aggressive and murder his own sister. Cut and dry, like you said.'

'We'll still need the ward's testimony.'

'Those never hold up in court.'

'Doesn't mean I don't want to hear it. Are you coming? Or has this case finally bored you?'

Sherlock drew himself up proudly, offended at the suggestion he would skive off now. 'I'm coming. Though I don't fancy a trip to the pound any more than you do.'

Lestrade sighed and shook his head. 'No one does.'