Tony Richards - The Astonishing Adventures of Sherlock Holmes in the Twenty-First Century

While Sherlock Holmes’ gaze was travelling across these folk, a clap of thunder rang out from the heavens, so loud and so violent that the tiles under his feet appeared to shake.

The atmosphere in Narita immediately changed. Those who’d been behaving casually before looked off in the direction of the huge windows as well. Their movements slowed down, stiffening, their expressions turning noticeably more solemn. As for those who had been nervous in the first place … ah, they had a genuine reason for it now. Some of them went very pale, and one young girl looked almost sick with shock.

“Looks like we’re going to have a choppy flight,” said a calm female voice to Holmes’ left.

He turned to find himself being stared back at by a sparkling pair of blue-green eyes. Surrounding them was the handsome face of a middle-aged woman, apparently in her early forties, although Holmes could tell that she had elected for a few small touches of cosmetic surgery, and so was probably older than that. Her well coiffed hair was blonde, but had been dyed. She was remarkably smartly dressed, her suit classic Chanel, her accessories expensive and her white gold watch a Cartier.

And she was smiling broadly, yes, in spite of her remark. Holmes was not afraid of flying in bad weather and, apparently, neither was she.

She reached across from the adjacent table, extending a hand, which she expected him to shake.

“You’re Mr Sherlock Holmes, are you not? I recognised you from your pictures in the papers. I am very pleased indeed to come across you, sir. I’m—”

“Elizabeth Bradman,” Holmes said, “from Savannah, Georgia.”

Her eyes widened, but her smile … it did not leave the woman’s face. It simply transformed from a friendly smile to one tinged with amazement. Then a realisation seemed to strike her and she glanced down at the Louis Vuitton flight bag on her lap. It had a label on the handle that identified her by her name.

“Well spotted, Mr Holmes, although a rather elementary trick. But as to where I hail from …?”

“You have amply demonstrated how I knew that with your last two words,” Holmes told her with a gentle grin. “How many people, in this day and age, use such a term as ‘hail from’? Any fool could tell that you are from the southern states. But nowhere else in that whole region is that accent threaded through with such formality and grace as in the lovely city of Savannah.”

And, as often happens when two travellers find themselves with time to spare and little else to occupy their intellects, they began chatting as though they were a pair of long-term friends. Holmes told her some details of his recent adventures in the city they had left behind, and she listened with rapt attention.

Not without reason, as it turned out. For it proved to be the case, once she had begun explaining her own circumstances, that Lizzie – and she insisted on being called Lizzie – was an internationally best-selling author of fantasy novels. To prove it, she produced one such paperback item from her bag. It had a garish cover, depicting a dragon on a strange landscape of crystal, and was apparently set in an alternate world called ‘Nevergone’. There was an entire series of these books, Holmes discerned when he leafed through the first couple of pages. He had never heard of them, and did not read this kind of stuff, but Lizzie, it was obvious, had a vast number of fans.

She had been in Tokyo as the guest of honour at a fantasy convention, and it was scarcely the first time she’d found herself in such a role. He watched her studiedly while she explained the way she travelled constantly, the whole world’s width, attending at conventions, giving readings and interviews and talks and appearing on panels. Holmes was much impressed, but one thing was still bothering him.

“All of that is interesting, but does not entirely explain,” he put to her, “your equanimity when faced with flying in bad weather. Even frequent travellers will often draw the line at that. No, there is something else about you that makes you so very calm. Something in your background, perhaps?”

Lizzie’s smile was still in place, except that by this juncture it had become slightly mischievous and challenging. She waited for Holmes to come up with the most likely solution, and she did it with one eyebrow raised.

Holmes turned it over for a little while, then ventured, “Not now, but in earlier years, I believe that you were a reservist with the US Air Force.”

Lizzie’s face became a mask of sheer astonishment. “But how did you know that?” she cried.

“Sometimes, even a detective like myself must trust his instincts and take an inspired guess. I can detect no physical proof in the slightest that you were once what I’ve described. But there is something to your whole demeanour, the glint in your eye and the straightness of your back, the way that you seem to grow ever more casual in the face of an impending threat. It speaks of military experience, although not full time – your spirit is too independent for a lifetime spent like that.”

She took in what he’d said, then nodded slowly. Holmes, however, was not entirely done as yet.

“In fact,” he put in as a last remark, “I’ll wager you still like to pilot planes yourself, even to this very day.”

And Lizzie’s smile came flashing back. “I’ve just recently bought myself a brand-new Cessna,” she confirmed. “And I’ve always loved to skydive when I get the chance.”

And here she was, almost certainly in her late forties or even early fifties. A remarkable woman, then. Much about the world had changed for the worse since his day, but not this aspect of it. Holmes was for equality of opportunity in every shape and form, and so this new breed of emancipated, daring females was a social change that pleased him greatly.

He was trying to think of some way to put that without sounding patronising when the public address system chimed, and then a Japanese voice began blaring out. It was the Frankfurt flight that was being announced. Holmes glanced at his watch, and saw that they were being boarded fifteen minutes early.

Lizzie had noticed the same fact, but, experienced as she was, it did not seem to surprise her.

“They’re trying to get us up before the storm starts hitting hard,” she remarked, standing and arranging the strap of her bag across one shoulder.

Holmes, ever the gentleman, promptly rose up to his feet as well. Another even louder thunderclap shook the walls of Narita, accompanied by a flash of lightning this time, and several of the passengers around them let out gasps.

“It strikes me that they’ve left it far too late,” he said.

“Ladies and gentlemen, fasten your seatbelts …”

“… it’s going to be a bumpy night,” Holmes grinned, completing the quote, which he recognised.

They went side by side down the sterile, unappealing corridors that led them to their gate. And, as soon as they arrived there, they could see brightly uniformed attendants who were checking people’s tickets with uncommon haste and ushering them through in the direction of the final walkway. Lizzie Bradman yanked her own documentation from her bag, but then gave Holmes a sideways glance.

“I’m Club Class, Mr Holmes. Are you the same?”

Which made the great detective pull a mildly pensive face.

“I’m afraid not, dear lady. For the most part these days, you see, I work at the behest of the police. And they pay me for my efforts, certainly. But not so handsomely as some grand dowager or spendthrift baronet would do.”

“You’ve become a public employee, then?”

She said it without sounding mocking.

“Self-employed, but by the public, yes.” Holmes could only shrug, though he contrived to do it casually. “A sign of the times, I suppose. I am forced to go about in the same manner as the vast mass of the general population. It is very democratic, I am sure, but wearisome sometimes.”