After The Reichenbach Fall

CHAPTER 44

Mary is walking along a road towards Leinster Gardens. It is an expensive-looking area, with a long terrace of four-storey white-plastered Edwardian buildings lining the road.

A homeless person is squatting with his back to the wall at the corner of the road. He has the hood of his jacket pulled over his head, a blanket wrapped around him, and a white plastic tub is on the ground in front of him. "Spare any change, love?" He said as Mary walk past in front of him.

"No." Mary said, not stopping from walking.

"Oh, come on, love. Don’t be like all the rest."

She stops and turned back to him, then takes a handful of loose change from her coat pocket and bends down and drops the coins into the tub. Before she can fully straighten up or withdraw her hand, he takes hold of her wrist and looks up at her.

It’s Bill Wiggins. "Rule One of looking for Sherlock ’olmes and (your full name) ..." He puts a phone and a headset into her hand. "... they find you." He stands and picked up his tub.

"You’re working for them now." She said.

"Keeps me off the streets, dunnit?"

"Well ... no." She shrugs at him. The phone in her hand starts to ring. As she puts the headset into her ear, she answers the phone. "Where are you two?" She said as she walks along.

"Can’t you see us?" Sherlock said, over the phone.

"Well, what am I looking for?"

"The lie – the lie of Leinster Gardens – hidden in plain sight. Hardly anyone notices. People live here for years and never see it, but if you are what we think you are, it’ll take you less than a minute. The houses, Mary. Look at the houses."

"How did you two know I’d come here?"

"(y/n) knew you’d talk to the people no-one else would bother with."

"I thought I was being clever." She said, laughing briefly.

"You’re always clever, Mary. We were relying on that. We planted the information for you to find."

She slows down, looking at a couple of adjoining houses in the middle of the terrace. "Ohh." She said as if she's impressed. She stops walking and turns to face the two houses which have caught her attention. Although there is no light shining from any of the windows, unlike the others on either side, the houses otherwise look similar to the rest of the terrace.

"Thirty seconds." He said.

"What am I looking at?"

"No door knobs, no letter box ... painted windows. Twenty-three and twenty-four Leinster Gardens the empty houses. They were demolished years ago to make way for the London Underground, a vent for the old steam trains. Only the very front section of the house remains. It’s just a façade. Remind you of anyone, Mary? A façade."

At that moment a picture is projected onto the front of the two houses. Three storeys high, stretching from the first floor to the third, it is a photograph of Mary. The picture, obviously taken on her wedding day, is a head shot only and shows her wearing her headdress with the white veil surrounding her head as she smiles happily at the camera. Mary turns and looks behind her, trying to see where the picture is being projected from. "Sorry. I never could resist a touch of drama." You spoke for the first time, over the phone. "Do come in. It’s a little cramped."

Mary starts to walk towards the houses, "Do you own this place?"

"Mmm. Me and (y/n) won it in a card game with the Clarence House Cannibal. Nearly cost us my kidneys, but fortunately (y/n) had a straight flush." Sherlock said.