Chapter 4
Explosion
at noted writer’s home, Chiara Noveau.
Breaking news story.
The
news bulletin floated through my muddled brain as I tried to concentrate on the
list of florists I was to be calling and had already called. I had turned on
the tele for background noise and the 6 o’clock news was on.
Where
could Sherlock be? I thought, it had been five hours since I had heard from
him. I had gone through 14 of the florist shops in Brixton. Two had been
closed, and only one had someone working there by the last name of Carlton. I
had decided to take a brief tour of the shop for something to do and to see if
it could possibly be the Timothy Carlton we were looking for. Upon stopping I
had asked for Carlton, and had been introduced to a lovely young lady by the
name of Christine Carlton. She had no recollection of a Timothy Carlton
whatsoever so I was back at the flat trying to decide which of the 12 remaining
florists on my list to call.
In a headlining story there was an explosion
this afternoon at the home of Chiara Noveau, where earlier today it was
reported that the noted actress and author had gone missing. Police are still
combing the evidence to try and find the source of the explosion, but it has
been confirmed that it was a remotely detonated bomb. Two people were killed
and several more are in the hospital. Police have confirmed…..
Suddenly the words made
sense. I bolted out of my chair and stared at the news story that was now
showing pictures of wreckage with ambulances carting bodies away.
Sherlock…
I
rang his cell, which went straight to voicemail. I tried again, same result. I
sent him a text that read. “Saw explosion, where r u? CALL ME.”
I
paced the living room for a moment, debating whether to go round to the
apartment or try the hospital, but then decided to call the police station.
They would have the most up-to-date knowledge and I could
I
was patched directly through to Lestrade, hanging around with Sherlock
occasionally had its benefits.
“Lestrade.”
The voice at the other end sounded tired.
“This
is John Watson, I just heard about the explosion. Was…”
Lestrade
interrupted me. “Sherlock was there, yes, but he wasn’t among the casualties.”
I breathed a sigh of relief.
“Right,
uh…thanks.”
“Has
he turned up back there yet?”
I
paused for a minute. “No, thought he was out at the crime scene, his phone
isn’t answering.”
“Right…”
Lestrade paused for a long moment. “He was out here going off about some papers
and how we needed to look at them. We found a ransom note and he was insistent
on getting it taken back to the lab to get it analyzed. I told Sherlock to slow
down and come back in a couple hours after we had time to process everything.
He didn’t like that very much and went to wait just outside the building.
That’s when I got a call from the station on some of my other cases and told my
team to pack it up. We were mostly out of the building when the explosion went
off. It was pretty contained but it damaged the surrounding apartments. We’ve
got teams over there combing the area and we’ve…picked up everyone in the
apartment.” He sighed and seemed even more tired after a moment. “You got
anything we might use?”
I
thought quickly, “Sherlock wants me to try and track down a Timothy Carlton.
Seems that he might be connected to Chiara Noveau and he was at the crime scene
this morning posing as one of your interns.”
Lestrade
swore in the other end of the phone. “And??”
“No
luck yet, but I’m working on it.” I went to the window and opened the curtain a
bit. There were a few people walking about in the street, but no one who stood
out. Sherlock definitely wasn’t out there.
There
were some indistinct noises in the background and Lestrade shouted indistinctly
to them. “I’ve got to get back to the case, keep us updated will you?”
“Right.”
“And
if Sherlock turns up, send him back over here. We need everything he’s got
right away. This is going to be a federal case now.”
The
phone clicked off. I held it loosely in my hand and sat down heavily on the
sofa. Had to think, Sherlock was at the crime scene when the explosion went
off. There was no sign of him, but that didn’t mean that something hadn’t
happened. I honestly had nothing to go on with this case, beyond the fact that
Chiara had been kidnapped, Sherlock was now missing, and I was unable to track
down my only lead.
*ding
– dong* The doorbell rang insistently. I glared at it for a moment, had to think,
not take in visitors. It rang again, so I got up and went down the stairs. I
noticed a pile of mail on the floor and regretfully realized that I had not
paid my half of the bills for the month yet. Mrs. Hudson was going to be rather
upset.
Upon
opening the door I found a young man who I hadn’t seen before. He was dressed
in jeans and a button-up blue plaid shirt, with a black peacoat on over
it. “Can I help you?”
“This
is 221B, right?” He had an American accent, although cultured and not as
foreign-sounding as some Americans.
“Yes,
what do you want?”
“And
you’re John Watson?”
“That’s
right.”
“Great,
I’m Daniel Cavendish. Sherlock Holmes sent me over to relay a message.”
I
looked up and down the street. There were a few people hurrying along but no
one suspicious. I looked at Daniel from the corner of my eye. “And what would
that be?”
He
had caught me looking and looked over his own shoulder now. “Can I come in for
a moment?”
I
shook my head. “No, that’s alright, I think we’d better do our talking out
here.”
He
seemed uncertain for a moment, then nodded his head. “Okay. Um, Sherlock told
me that he wants you looking into someone called Cort Ortega, and that he might
be affiliated with the money laundering business.”
“Hang
on, Sherlock wants me looking into someone else now?”
“That’s
right.”
“Why
didn’t he just ring me up and ask?” This wasn’t making sense to me.
Daniel
furrowed his brow. “Well, maybe I shouldn’t tell you this, but I had the same
question. See, I ran into Sherlock when I first moved to London and I know he
can be a bit of a funny character sometimes.”
I
laughed. “And that’s putting it nicely.”
“Well,
I was walking past Chiara Noveau’s building, it’s on my way to work see, and I
saw all the police tape. So, I stopped a minute to see what’s going on. Out
comes none other than Sherlock Holmes. I didn’t think he’d seen me because he
walked right into the crowd and went down the street. A few minutes later, he
comes up from the other direction though, pulls me aside, and tells me to give
you this message. Said it was urgent and that you’d know where to go once you
got the right information.”
“How
the bloody hell does he think I’ll even get the right information?”
“Don’t
you have police connections?” I glared at Daniel. “Sorry, yeah, anyway, I
thought that the message seemed a bit off and Sherlock wasn’t paying attention
to me. Seemed to be looking at some other guy in the crowd. So when he took off
I followed him. He went across the street there on Abbey way but I stayed on my
side. He went down an alley about two blocks from Chiara Noveau’s apartment and
then stopped. There was this really big guy that I think had been following
him, because he turned down the alley not a minute later. Sherlock seemed to be
just waiting for him. Anyway, they talked but I couldn’t hear because I was all
the way across the street. Then the big guy just took a swing at Sherlock and
he went down.” Here Daniel stopped and shifted, looking over his shoulder
again. “Mr. Watson, I think Sherlock’s been kidnapped too.”
I
had been listening to this story with a bit of disbelief, but this was too
much. I grabbed Daniel by his shirtfront and pulled him inside the door. “Right
punk, I’ve had enough of this.” I shut the door to the street and got in
Daniel’s face.
“Your
story doesn’t make any sense, why would Sherlock tell a random person, even if
he DID know you, to give me a message when he could ring me up?”
Daniel
tried to back up. “Look Mr. Watson, I’m just trying to say…”
“I
don’t know what your agenda is, but you’ve got the wrong bloke.” I was quite
mad at this point. Who did this kid think he was?
“So
maybe you’d better just take your story and scram.” At that moment the front
door opened and Mrs. Hudson walked in with her arms full of groceries. I
straightened up quickly. Daniel seemed to be a little shaken and kept his eye
on me.
Mrs.
Hudson saw us standing there and smiled brightly. “Hello! Got a visitor have
you?”
Daniel
stepped forward. “Daniel Cavendish, pleasure to meet you ma’am.”
“And
what nice manners too!” She looked at me still standing there. “Here John, take
these bags while I get your visitor a nice cuppa.
I
spoke, “I’m afraid he doesn’t have time for that...” at the exact same moment
Daniel said, “That would be very nice, thanks.”
Mrs.
Hudson looked at me a bit askance. “Where are your manners John? This young man
seems to have plenty.” She tipped the bags forward and I had to grab them or
risk Mrs. Hudson’s wrath.
“Now,
you just come with me Daniel, and we’ll get you all sorted.” She took his arm
and proceeded downstairs. “You can join us John after you put those away!” I
fumed for a moment in the stairwell and then took the bags to the fridge to get
them sorted. I could hear snatches of conversation from the living room where
Mrs. Hudson had planted Daniel.
“Now
don’t you mind John, he’s always had a bit of a temper. Shouted at me you know,
first time I met him”
“You
don’t say?”
“That’s
right. Anyway, so nice to meet a foreigner round here. Espcially one with such
nice manners such as you’ve got.”
Some
rustling sounds and clinking of glasses.
“Where
did you say you were from?” Mrs. Hudson was on a hospitality mission, I dumped
some sacks of vegetables into the crisper and hurried to stuff everything else
in wherever it would fit. Mrs. Hudson could sort it later.
“Well,
I’m most recently from Mississippi, but I’ve been living in London for the past
year now.”
“Oh,
how lovely. So glad you came round! John and Sherlock never get many visitors,
at least, ones that aren’t always on about particular cases and work and all
that. None of them ever have any time to talk.”
I
burst into the room and Mrs. Hudson looked at me brightly. “There you are John,
all sorted?” I nodded and stiffly sat down on the sofa.
“I’ve
made a cuppa for you too.”’
“Not
interested.” I wasn’t being very polite, I needed this young intruder to get
out of my house.
“Don’t
be rude, you could do with a little livening up, use your manners for once!” I
saw Daniel grinning into his cup of tea, the little git.
I
took my cup of tea and held it, pretending to sip a bit until Mrs. Hudson
seemed satisfied. “There, right yes, where were we?”
Daniel
set his cup of tea down. “I was just telling Mr. Watson here, that I saw
Sherlock today.”
“Did
you now? Oh, I hope he wasn’t rude to you. Sherlock never seems to know how to
be ncie these days.”
“That’s
Sherlock for you,” said Daniel. “Anyway, I saw him across the street and I
shouted to try and get his attention but I couldn’t get over there due to the
traffic. Once I got across the street he and the, um, man he’d been talking to
were gone, no where to be seen.” Daniel was obviously continuing the story.
“That’s
what you came round to tell me?”
“Oh
hush John,” said Mrs. Hudson. “You’ll have to go to your room if you can’t be
polite.”
Daniel
seemed to be quite enjoying Mrs. Hudson’s tea. “Right, anyway when I got over
there I found this.” Here Daniel pulled out a slim black object. He set it on
the table and I could see that it was a phone. Cracked right down the middle of
the screen with one crushed edge as if it had been stepped on. I picked up the
phone. There were no other identifying marks on it, except for the engraving on
the back which simply said…
“SH,”
said Daniel. “That’s how I figured out it was Sherlock’s and not that other
guys.”
“Well,
isn’t that lovely!” said Mrs. Hudson, beaming. She was quite proud about being
shown right by her visitor. “He just came round to return Sherlock’s phone. Not
many people would have done that. I tried to turn on the phone but it wouldn’t
light up. Daniel saw what I was trying.
“That’s
why you haven’t been able to get ahold of him all day, his phone’s been
missing.” He took another drink of his tea.
This
really was Sherlock’s phone, which meant Daniel had been telling the truth. I
stood up and pocketed the phone. “Come on,” I said to Daniel. “We’ve got to get
to the police station.” Daniel looked up in surprise.
“I’m
coming with you?”
“Yes,
finish your tea. We need to find Sherlock.” Mrs. Hudson stood up too.
“Oh
dear,” she worried, “Is he missing again?” I smiled at her.
“No
he’s, um, just been without a phone for awhile and I was supposed to, um, meet
him at the police station a while ago.” I hurried to put on my coat. “He’s
probably been waiting for ages now.”
“Well,
get going then,” said Mrs. Hudson. “I’ll do a bit of the cleaning up then,
although I really shouldn’t, not your housekeeper you know.”
I
smiled and nodded to Daniel, who had drained his tea and was on his feet.
“Right,
we’re off.”
Out
the door and into the street we went. I hailed for a cab.
“So,
what are we going to do?” Daniel seemed a little confused by the situation. A
cab pulled up and I opened the door.
“We’re
going to find Sherlock,” I said. And with that, we were off.
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