A Letter of Mary - Laurie R. King [82]
"We've met."
"Yes?"
"Indeed. He may walk carefully around sweet young things for a while."
"Hello, hello, do I see a gleam in your eyes? Heaven protect me from an emancipated woman who can throw men over her shoulder."
"I should think you know me better than to accuse me of something as unsubtle as that."
"But no less painful, perhaps?"
"Well ..."
"Take care, Mary." He laughed, then went down the hall whistling something complicated and Mozartian.
EIGHTEEN
sigma
I expected the drive back to London to be something of an ordeal, but it was not. The colonel was, if anything, more relaxed and friendly, almost as if he were relieved to have some bothersome question out of the way. The clouds, actual rather than metaphorical, gathered again as we neared London, and it was raining lightly when Alex pulled up in front of Isabella's boardinghouse. The colonel moved to open his door, but I put out a hand to stop him.
"Colonel, I just would like to say thank you for such a nice day. It was perfect. All of it." I looked into his eyes for a moment, then leant forward to plant a daughterly kiss on his rough cheek. He seemed very pleased, so I let it go at that and got out when Alex opened my door.
Holmes was not there. Drat the man. I bathed, dressed, fidgeted, and at seven o'clock put a call through to Mycroft.
"Good evening, Michael," I said. "I was calling to see if by any chance you had news of a friend of mine? I was halfway expecting him to appear before this."
"No, I haven't heard from him." His voice was surprised but untroubled. "If he hasn't shown up by now, he will probably come directly here. There's no reason to let his absence spoil your dinner."
"I suppose you're right. I'll give him a few more minutes, then come on over."
I fidgeted for another eight minutes, then threw up my hands and went down to find a cab. I stood in the protected doorway and looked in disgust at the unceasing rain, wondering how long it was going to take me to find an unoccupied taxi on a wet Sunday night. Fortunately, my luck was in, for a shiny black taxi cab, empty but for the driver, came cruising down the street. I waved for it to stop, bent down under my umbrella, and climbed in without waiting for the driver to open the door for me. As I sat back in the seat, he clashed the gears irritably and growled at me through the speaking window.
"Damn it all, Russell, you had more sense when you were fifteen than you exhibit now. How many times have I told you— what are you laughing at, woman?" I was laughing, suddenly intoxicated with the sheer pleasure of being back in the presence of this ageing, supercilious, impossible man who was often the only thing in my life that made any sense.
"Oh, Holmes, I knew it was you the instant I saw the taxi start up. You know, if you wanted to make a truly dramatic entrance instead of something predictably unusual, you could astonish everyone by merely walking up the stairs, where and when you were expected. Oh, don't look so crestfallen. I'm glad to see you're having a good time." I caught his eye in the mirror and watched as he began reluctantly to match my grin. "Now tell me what you're doing in this cab. The last I heard, you were going to Bath. Did you finish with Mrs Rogers, then?"
He held up his left hand silently, and by the light of the streetlamps I could see the fading wounds of a lengthy battle with thorns and the extreme dryness of skin that comes from long hours of chafing and immersion in wet glue.
"Yes, I see. Did you do the entire house?"
"Two rooms. I told the good lady I would return Tuesday morning."
"And is she a good lady?"
A long pause followed, only in part due to a surge of traffic around a cinema house. When we had negotiated the tangle, Holmes spoke again, musingly.
"I do not know, Russell. There are a number of oddities about this case, and not the