Laurie King - The Beekeeper's Apprentice

"And Mr. Holmes. I am happy to greet you more civilly than the last time we met." (Mycroft's expression of jovial bonhomie seemed faintly menacing.)

"Please, Miss Russell, I hardly think that formality is necessary or even appropriate, what with being welcomed into your boudoir and all." The fat face smiled down at me, and I felt so tired. What were they doing here?

"Brother Mycroft, then. And Holmes. You have had a rest since the morning, I think. You look not so strained."

"I have. There is a vacant room next to yours, and I have made use of it. How are you feeling, Russell?"

"I am feeling as though a large piece of lead passed through me and took a considerable quantity of myself with it. How do the white-coats say I am?" (Why didn't they go?

Perhaps it is the painkillers, dulling my interest.)

Watson cleared his throat.

"The bullet passed through the back of your neck, missing the spinal column by — by enough. It did go through your collarbone and nick various blood vessels before leaving the front of your shoulder and continuing on, to lodge finally in Miss Donleavy's heart. The surgeons have pieced together the clavicle, though there is considerable damage to the muscles in that area. And," his face prepared me for a feeble attempt at a joke to cheer the patient, "I fear you will never care to dress in anything other than high-necked clothing. Though I think you had already resigned yourself to that. Where on earth did you pick up all that scar tissue?"

"Watson, I think — " Holmes began.

"No, Holmes, it's all right." I was so utterly weary, and Watson was peering down into my face with what I supposed was loving concern, so I closed my eyes against the brightness. "It was an accident some years ago, Uncle John. Ask Holmes to tell you the story. I think I'll sleep for a while now, if you don't mind."

They filed out, but I did not sleep. I lay and felt the fingers of my unresponsive right hand, and thought about the walls of Jerusalem, and what my mathematics tutor had taken from me.

I was in that hospital for many days, and a degree of movement gradually returned to my arm and neck. I could not abide the thought of my aunt, and indeed after I was conscious I refused to have her in my room. After some discussionit was arranged that I go home to the spare room in Holmes' cottage, to the great delight of Mrs. Hudson and the concern of the hospital authorities, who disliked the distance, the remoteness, and the poor road I should have to travel. I told Holmes I wished to go with him, and let him fight it out for me.

Once there I ate obediently, slept, sat in the sun with a book, and worked at restoring strength to my hand, but it was an emptiness. I did not dream, though often during the day I would find that I had been staring off into the distance unblinking for great chunks of time. When I had been in the cottage for two weeks I went to the laboratory and stood looking at the clean floor and the restored shelves. I touched the two bullet holes in the walls, and felt nothing but a vague unease; I could only think how bare and cold the tile looked.

Summer wore on, and my body gained strength, but there were no suggestions that I move back to my ownfarm. Holmes and I began to talk, short, tentative discussions about Oxford and my reading. He was away a great deal, but I did not ask why, and he did not tell me.

One day I came into the sitting room and saw the chess set laid out on a side table. Holmes was working at his desk and looked up to see me standing there with what must have been an expression of extreme loathing on my face as I stared at those thirty carved figures, the salt cellar, and the nut-and-bolt king on their teak and birch squares. I turned on him.

"For God's sake, Holmes, haven't you had enough chess for one lifetime? Put it away, get rid of it. If you wish me to leave your house I will, but don't ask me to look at that thing." I slammed out of the room. Later in the afternoon I came back through to see its box and board sitting closed up but still on the table. I said nothing but avoided that part of the room. They remained on the table. I remained in the cottage.

I began to find Holmes more and more irritating. The smell of his pipe and the odours from his laboratory plucked at raw nerves, and I retreated outside or behind the closed bedroom door. His violin sent me on walks into the downs that left me trembling with exhaustion, but I did not go back to my house. I began snapping irritably at him, but his response was invariably reasonable and patient, which only made me worse. Rage began to stir but lacked the consummation of open battle, for Holmes would not respond. In the last week of July I made up my mind to leave the cottage, gather my belongings, and return to Oxford. Next week.

Into this state of mind fell a letter. I was outside, on a hilltop away from the cottage, a forgotten book in my lap as I stared out across the Channel. I did not hear Holmes come up behind me, but suddenly there he was, his tobacco smell and his gently sardonic face. He held out the envelope between two long fingers, and I took it.

It was from little Jessica, addressed in her childish printing. I had a quick image of her bent over the envelope with a pencil in her small hand, laboriously copying my name. I smiled, and it felt strange on my lips. I took out the single sheet of stationery and read the child's words aloud.

Dear sister Mary,

How are you? My Mama told me a bad lady hurt your arm. I hope it's all right now. I am fine. Yesterday a strange man came to the house but I held Mama's hand and I was brave and strong like you. I have bad dreams sometimes and even cry but when I think of you carrying me down the tree like a mama monkey I laugh and go back to sleep.

Will you come to see me when you are better?

Say hello to Mr. Holmes for me. I love you.

Jessica Simpson

"Brave and strong, like me," I whispered, and started to laugh, a sour, bitter sound that tore my throat and sent pain shooting through my shoulder, and then it turned to tears and I cried, and when I was empty I fell asleep in the simple sunshine as Holmes stroked my hair with his gentle, clever hands.

When I awoke the sun was lower in the sky and Holmes had not moved. I turned awkwardly onto my back to ease my shoulder and looked up at the bowl of the sky.

Holmes reached for his pipe and broke the silence.

"I need to go to France and Italy for six weeks. I shall be back before your term begins. Would you care to come with me?"

I lay watching his fingers fill the pipe, tamp down the black shreds of leaf, strike a flame, draw it down into the bowl. The sweet smell of burning tobacco drifted across the hillside. I smiled to myself.

"I believe I shall take up smoking a pipe, Holmes, for the sheer eloquence of the thing."

He looked at me sharply, and then his face began to relax into the old attitude of humour and intelligence. He nodded, once, as if I had given an answer, and we sat watching the sun change the colour of the sea and sky until the wind came up. Holmes knocked his pipe out against the sole of his shoe, stood up, and reached down to help me rise.

"Let me know when you're ready for a game of chess, Russell."

Twenty minutes later we came to his hives, and he went down the row to check them while I stood and watched the last workers come home with their loads of pollen. Holmes came back and we turned toward the cottage.

"I'll even spot you a piece, Russell."

"But not a queen?"

"Oh, no, never again. You're far too good a player for that."

"We'll start equal, then."

"I shall beat you if we do."

"I don't think so, Holmes. I really don't think you will."

The cottage was warm and filled with light, and smelt of tobacco and sulphur and the food that awaited us.