Death Becomes Them

Chapter 2: Unraveling the Threads

Molly was struck first and foremost at how beautiful Alice Turner was. Even in an unassuming jacket, wellies, and jeans, with her hair messily swept up away from her face, she was undeniably striking. Her cheeks were flushed, partly from the cold, but partly, Molly suspected, from agitation. She was drumming her fingers rapidly on the table when they found her, and her toe was tapping just as insistently on the floor.

"Mr. Holmes." She stood as soon as she spotted them. "Sorry, and she is...?" She glanced over at Molly uncertainly.

"Dr. Hooper. My associate. She'll be helping me on the case."

"Ah, I see." Alice shook her hand. As all of them took a seat, Alice began to speak again, hurriedly, in a low tone. "Thank you again for coming, Mr. Holmes. I just wouldn't be able to stand it if – look, the police have all got it the wrong way round, James didn't do it, you know. I know he didn't. We've known each other since we were kids, he would absolutely never –"

"No point in rehashing the contents of your email, Ms. Turner. I would like you to recount to me, as succinctly as possible, the relevant events of last night and this early morning, leading up to the precise moment you contacted me."

Alice's knuckles were white around the glass she was gripping. For a second, Molly thought that Sherlock's harsh tone would tip her over into tears, but instead she took a deep, steadying breath and let it out in a long exhale. When she spoke again, her voice was calmer, each of her words pronounced carefully.

"Well, last night James – James McCarthy, that is," she added as she glanced over to Molly, "arrived to visit from Uni; he was staying out at his dad's, Charles'. I ran into him at the pub; we chatted a bit – catching up, you know, that sort of thing. Nothing too personal, it was only – "

"Skipping ahead," Sherlock interrupted brusquely.

Alice's eyes widened in surprise for a moment, and Molly tried sending her a sympathetic glance but didn't think that she'd seen it. Alice's hand came up to rub over a brooch pinned over her jacket, the only piece of jewelry she wore, in what seemed like an unconscious gesture.

"Right." Alice sucked in a breath, lowering her hand, closing her eyes for a moment, and then opening them again. "Sorry, it's just been all so unexpected. And Charles was a friend of my father's – James and I practically grew up together." She had been staring at the table as she spoke, but now she looked up at Molly with a pleading look, as if she had decided she was the more sympathetic listener of the two of them. "Look, you might as well hear it from me. James never got on with his father; but in his defense, Charles McCarthy wasn't a particularly nice man. My father was really one of his only friends, and that was only because of the time they spent in the military together. Bonds people, I suppose."

Molly smiled at her encouragingly, if only to compensate for the very evident look of impatience Sherlock was currently wearing. "Last night?" she prompted gently.

"Right, right, of course. James phoned me. It was – almost exactly five in the morning or so. I was awake; day starts rather early on the farm. I was just setting the kettle for breakfast. I picked up, and I could tell something was wrong right away, he was panicking. He told me that he'd just found his father dead by Boscombe pond. He said he'd called the police already, but he was panicking, because there was blood all over him, and he'd argued with him earlier that night."

"Patience Moran says she saw a physical altercation," Sherlock interceded.

"No, she said she saw that James was about to hit him," Alice corrected sharply, frowning. "And I suspect – I think know why they were arguing. I – there's one time where his father – where he came on to me; stopped by our farm one night, completely drunk, you know, spewing filthy things at me, trying to play it rough with me. I put a stop to it before anything happened, of course, but – James found out about it somehow; we were arguing about it last night, too, about me not telling him, and why I didn't go to the police. I assume that was the argument he was having with Charles, but I'm telling you, James didn't lay a finger on him."