by John Pirillo
Watson laughed. "You two are driving this poor young man mad with fantasies now. Come, Constable, you're already doing the work; why not take the title?"
"And the salary," his father explained. "One day you'll be finding a bride..."
Constable Evans threw his hands up in the air. "Stop! Everyone please. I haven't even started the new job and I'm already getting married?"
They all broke into laughter.
But Constable Evans didn't laugh. He began to realize that they were all in earnest and he had longed for such a day for many months now. Here it was now, banging him across the knees and he was crying "ouch," when it was exactly what he wanted.
And there was that lovely young woman he had met on one of the cases with Holmes. "I'll take it."
Holmes and Watson pounded him on the back as they congratulated him.
They stepped back and his father came around his desk and gave him a big bear hug. "Word of advice, son," he whispered in his ear.
"What?"
"Don't get cocky!"
Chapter Seven: Delicacy
A small crowd had gathered about the area where the Yard's forensics team was carefully gathering evidence. The bobs of plumed hats with colorful feathers told where the shorter women were hidden behind the muscled shoulders of working men, who had taken some time off away from their lunches for the spectacle, as they saw of it, of a dead man. Small children hid behind the legs of parents who just had to take a look, even though they feared the worse, totally forgetting about the nightmares their children would likely have now for having seen the horror.
"Sight seeing," Watson sighed as he, Constable Evans and Holmes came to the crime scene. "What is it about human nature that has such a perverse attraction to the pain of others, but fears its own death and destruction?"
Holmes looked at Constable Evans, who answered for him. "Curiosity. Some to see how it would have looked had they been the victim; for others morbidity, the excitement of living on the edge."
"Quite astute observation," Holmes complimented Constable Evans.
"Thank you, sir, but I feel it to be more of a complaint like Watson's here, than a true observation of human nature."
Holmes smiled. "I doubt that any one of us can know exactly why each has been attracted to this carousel of death and destruction. And it certainly is not our duty to judge what others think and do."
"Unless they choose to break the law, of course," Constable Evans added.
Watson shrugged. "No matter what the choice, let's get busy, why don't we?"
"Excellent suggestion, Watson."
Holmes and Constable Evans spread out on the periphery of the crime investigation, while Watson went to the body.
"May I?" Watson asked Myron, the forensics expert near the body. He knew the man quite well. Studied at Oxford. Early thirties. Thick mustache that covered his upper lip entirely with a spread of brown and gold. Wore the latest flannel pants with the leveraged cuffs that were becoming the rage of London. Even wore a watch on his wrist. One of the new fangled ones. Watson hated them because he always snagged them on something and cut himself on the metal bands they used. Why couldn't they use something like leather?
"Certainly, Doctor Watson," the man said. "Not much to look at, but be my guest."
Myron waved at the body. His eyes sparkled with a kind of dark humor, his lower lip curling in amusement. He knew Watson well enough to know he felt no more a guest at such occasions than he. He felt an aversion to humans overall instead, who could be so coldly brutal.
Watson frowned. "Is this one like the last, Myron?"
"I've seen four of these now."
"Four!" Watson exclaimed. "I thought this was only the second. My God man, why has this been kept so quiet?"
"Two were the Queen's men."
Watson immediately felt a rush of anger. "She would never order such a thing."
The forensics expert shook his head. "No, she wouldn't, but her Head of Security might."
"Oh," Watson acknowledged. "Well, let's at it then. Would you mind assisting me? I'd hate to pull you away from anything meaningful you're engaged in."
"Not at all. The sight of a bloody corpse is more soothing than this crowd of vampires about us," the man complained.
Watson smiled. "Don't be too harsh on them, Myron; they are probably too scared to death to do anything else."
"Mayhaps, Doctor, but one man was so interested that he was taking pictures."
Watson perked up. "Pictures? How would he manage that? The devices are so large."
"Oh, not that kind of taking, with a pencil and pad."
"Oh, I see. Well then. Reporters are getting more ambitious these days, are they not?"
Watson dropped to a knee beside the tarp covering the corpse. Myron took the other side, and they gently peeled it back.
The crowd who were the closest gasped in horror. Some even screamed.
The neck was eaten away and the spine severed.
Myron peeled further along with Watson and revealed the torso of the man.
"Do we know who this is yet?" Watson asked.
Myron picked up his pad he had made notes on and read a name, "Freddy Hampton." He looked up. "Says here that he was an unusually obese man, though you wouldn't know it from looking at this."
Freddy's shirt and jacket had been completely ripped open. Blood soaked the remains and his entire left side was open to the air.
"He's missing his heart, lungs, liver and kidneys."
"You've already examined his body then?"
Myron nodded. "It fits the same MO as the others. Open body cavity. Missing organs. Severed spine at the neck. Identical in every way."
Watson nodded, jotting notes in his own note pad. He pulled his black medical bag next to him, opened it and took out a soft bag of swabs, each wrapped in thin clinically clean paper. He popped one open, took a swab and dipped it into the neck area. He pulled it forth and looked at Myron. "Could you give me one of the vials in my bag please, Myron?"
"Be happy too, Doctor," Myron replied.
He handed Watson the vial without its top. Watson stuck the swab into it, then took the top from Myron and stoppered the vial again. He put it into his bag.
"When would you estimate the time of death?" Myron asked.
"I would say, judging by the coagulation of the blood nearest the surface, and its state inside the body cavity, the nature of the removal of the organs. More or less twenty hours."
"That would put the time of death about nine this last night?"
"Yes, I believe so, Myron. But then you're an expert at this as well."
"I agree with your approximation," Myron said with a nod.
"But we won't know for certain until we get this body to the morgue as soon as possible," Watson added.
"Here, give me some of the swabs and we'll finish this up so we can transport the body back to the station and examine it more closely," Myron advised.
"Excellent idea," Watson agreed.
The two men worked quickly and effectively, taking samples and sticking them in vials.
"How's the wife and kids?" Watson asked as he peeled back the flesh from the left side of the rib cage.
"Well enough. My oldest is getting ready to go to trade school."
"Not interested in his father's work, I take it?"
"No, Doctor, I took him with me to work several times and he heaved his insides out both times."
"Mmmm. Maybe not a good idea."
"I want him to do something that doesn't expose his sensitive soul to such brutality."
Watson looked up at Myron. "You know, my fiancée and I were discussing that very same thing the other night."
"And?"
Watson shrugged. "The child must make up its own mind."
Myron nodded, but Watson could tell he didn't agree. He smiled. Didn't matter. What in the world was Holmes up to anyway?
"Watson, come here I need you!" Holmes voice thundered over the hush of the crowd a
s if the man had heard Watson's thoughts.
Watson looked to Myron.
"I'll finish the sampling for you, Doctor."
Watson nodded his gratitude, and hurried to meet Holmes, who was standing about twenty yards away, he and the Constable looking at something peculiar behind a spread of bushes.
"See here, Watson, what do you make of this? Constable Evans has given me a proper description, but I want your input as well."
Watson was taken aback at what he saw.
Spread on a very lovely piece of fancy tablecloth was a huge platter, four smaller plates and one large one with a knife, a fork and a spoon beside it. All were bloody. The cloth was spotted with blood about the utensils and plates.
"A bloody dinner!" Watson exclaimed.
"And what do you make of this?" Holmes asked.
He pointed to a neat row of bones laid to the right of the large plate, and then to several gobbets of fat to the right of those.
"Why, it reminds me of a gourmet meal," Watson declared, stunned at what he saw. "What kind of insanity are we talking here, Holmes?"
"But Watson, you have missed the most important thing about this," Holmes pointed out.
Watson, who was weary from the work done so far and the loss of sleep for the last days, had to force himself not to yawn. "I had a friend once who ate like this. He was a gourmet cook. Everything had to be perfect, even the way the food was served..."
"...And eaten," Holmes finished for him.
Watson looked at Holmes, then at Constable Evans, who he at last noticed was looking sickly.
"Our killer is a gourmet cook?" Watson asked in horror.
"No," Holmes agreed. "It was a gourmet dinner for a man who eats the flesh of humans. Not a cook at all. But a gourmet..."
Constable Evans was the first to say the dreaded word. "...Werewolf," he said in a low and trembling voice.
"A gourmet werewolf?" Watson asked. "You mean to say we're dealing with an overweight, picky flesh eater?"
Holmes smiled. "That remains to be seen, Watson. But what I am saying is that if he sees humans as gourmet food, then he would be quite choosy in his choices and..."
"...Likely to strike in the most unusual of places," Watson finished for Holmes.
"But there has to be a pattern, Watson, and your examination of the corpse, I suspect, will help to discover that."
Watson nodded, but by the way Holmes was staring at the corpse, he suspected his partner already knew exactly what the pattern was.
Chapter Eight: The Morgue
Watson and Myron labored side by side on the body of Freddy Hampton, laying out his body parts neatly into a series of silver pans, filled with a preservative fluid.
"Your first observations were correct, Myron. He is missing his heart, liver, lungs and kidneys. But he is missing one other very important thing."
Myron gave Watson a blank look.
Watson uncovered the body below the waist, revealing the pubic area.
"He has no testicles!" Myron exclaimed.
"You wouldn't have seen that because of the position he had fallen to."
Watson began sliding his gloves off and flipped them into a tray for burning.
"But why would any creature eat a man's testicles, that's insane!" Myron exclaimed.
"Challenger tells me that in some of the indigenous cultures of Fairie that the men believe if you eat the most precious part of a man you gain his strength and power."
Myron laughed. "What nonsense! No man's testicles are the most powerful part of him."
"I agree, Myron, but consider this," Watson began, pausing to gather his thoughts. "What part of the body do most men dread the most being harmed?"
Myron had no reply for that; he knew as well as Watson what it was.
Watson slid into his coat and hat and turned to eye the corpse. A simple ring was on one of the fingers of the left hand.
"Your prognosis, Myron?"
"Death caused by extreme trauma to the neck and spine."
"And by what?"
Myron hesitated.
Watson waited.
"Teeth, Doctor."
Watson nodded. "Very large and sharp teeth. I would say a wolf about the size of a small elephant, wouldn't you?"
"But that's impossible, isn't it, Doctor?"
Watson shrugged. "What's impossible anymore, Myron?"
Myron frowned. He didn't want to go there. So instead he pulled the cloth over the body and prepared to put it into the cooler.
"Have a good night, Doctor."
"You too, Myron."
Watson left the room.
Watson got no further than the main hallway from the morgue, then remembered he had left his street gloves. It was getting cold outside, so he went back to the morgue. The door was locked. Unusual.
He knocked hard.
"Myron!" He demanded.
The door opened after a series of latches were heard to be opened.
Myron peered out. "I'm sorry, I thought you were gone. I just locked up for the night."
He nodded. "Just after my gloves is all."
Watson stared at Myron hard for a moment. Then he shook his head, must be a mistake he thought to himself. That couldn't have been blood at the corner of Myron's lips, could it? Had he harmed himself somehow?
Myron shut the door, then came back with the gloves and handed them through the crack. "Anything else?"
"Not at all. Good-night!"
Watson paused one moment, eyeing Myron's face, but the blood spots were gone. Maybe he had been imagining it.
"Something wrong, Doctor?" Myron asked in an innocent voice.
"No, just thinking about how we're going to solve this one," Watson said, though those were not his thoughts at all.
"Goodnight, Doctor."
The door was shut, almost slammed in his face. The sound of the latches shutting the door were heard and then footsteps moving away from the door.
Watson frowned.
Chapter Nine: 221B
Mrs. Hudson sat at the table with Holmes and Watson, handing over a large bowl of stew, which each took a portion of into their smaller bowls, then passed to the next. When the bowl returned to her, she set it aside, and then accepted a plate of rolls from Watson, took one and passed the plate to Holmes, who set it down without taking any.
"So it was very strange what your friend at the morgue did, Watson?"
"I don't know that he did...do anything," Watson admitted.
"Oh?"
"I just find it strange that he locked it up. He never did that before. And he most certainly wouldn't have missed the testicle that had been eaten."
Mrs. Hudson held a hand up.
Both men looked at her.
"Can we at least pretend we're having a normal dinner, gentlemen?"
Watson gave her an apologetic look. "I'm sorry, my dear, shop talk."
"Well, talk shop later, after I've eaten and can keep my food down," she complained.
Watson smiled, took her right hand and pressed it to his lips. She smiled into his face.
"You're forgiven, my grouchy bear," she told him, the hint of amusement in her voice, as he let go and grimaced.
"I am not..."
She put a finger to his lips. "I'm teasing, John."
Holmes smiled. "You two are more amusement than the William Blake play at the Globe Theater."
Mrs. Hudson looked at Holmes. "You've been to it?"
"I have."
"When? You're always in your room or working?" She pointed out.
"Rehearsals."
"Ah," She said softly. "Your..."
"Morning constitutions," Holmes finished for her. "Yes, sometimes I use that time to amuse myself, or to do further research."
"I hardly call seeing a William Blake play research, Holmes. The man has a very nasty sense of humor when it comes to anything of God."
Holmes gave Watson an indulgent smile. "Perhaps he knows something we don't."
Watson smirked.
"After all we've been through?" Watson snorted. "I doubt that heartily."
Holmes didn't respond. Instead he played with the remainder of his egg, twirling it on his dish, and then arranging a part here and a part there. Next, he took some bread and broke it into pieces and arranged that as well.
Both Watson and Mrs. Hudson watched him, uncertain what was going on, but not wanting to ruin his train of thought.
Holmes finished his arrangement by taking several of the utensils, and lining them up as well. He spread his napkin before them.
"Perhaps you were right earlier, Watson."
Watson was relieved to finally get a word in. "About what?"
Holmes looked up. "That our werewolf, or murderer, whichever it is, was a cook."
Watson began to beam.
Homes held a hand up. Watson lost his smile.
"However, a good cook always cleans up afterwards. They don't leave a mess."
"I'll vouch for that," Mrs. Hudson joined in.
She looked at Watson, who hurriedly looked at his plate and fiddled with his bread nervously. "I wouldn't know about that."
Then he looked over at the coat rack. His eyes widened as his thoughts came together more clearly.
Watson looked up suddenly. "You've spoken to the Queen, haven't you, Holmes?"
"How in the world could you ever tell, Watson?"
"First, your top hat is on the coat rack, and you never wear it except to proper occasions such as a visit to the palace."
"And two?" Holmes asked with interest.
"Two, when you came back from your morning constitution you smelled like roses. Her Majesty always keeps her room abundantly filled with the fragrance of roses."
"And?" Holmes asked.
"Your boots."
"My boots?"
"Yes, I moved them to make better room for my own shoes and I noticed rose stains on the heels and flat of them."
Watson leaned forward and pointed his fork at Holmes accusingly. "She walked with you through her rose garden. She never does that unless she's quite worried."
"Excellent, Watson, but how do you know I haven't just been to a nursery instead?"
Watson stood up, went to the fireplace mantle, and picked up a message laying there. He returned and laid it on the table. It had the impress of the Queen's mark on the wax sealing it.