The Beekeeper's Apprentice - Laurie R. King [26]
“Have you never used a broom before?”
“Well, not often.”
“Perhaps you should carry firewood, then.”
I hauled barrow-cart after barrow-cart of split logs up to the house, saw that we needed kindling as well, and had just started using the double-bitted axe to split some logs on a big stone next to the back door when Patrick ran up and prevented me from cutting off my hand. He showed me the cutting block and the proper little hand axe and carefully demonstrated how not to use them. Two hours after I had walked down the hill I had a small pile of wood and a very trembly set of muscles to show for my work.
The road to Holmes’ cottage seemed to have lengthened since last I rode that way, or perhaps it was only the odd sensation of nervous-ness in the pit of my stomach. It was the same, but I was different, and I wondered for the first time if I was going to be able to carry it off, if I could join these two utterly disparate sides of my life. I pushed the bi-cycle harder than my out-of-condition legs cared for, but when I came over the last rise and saw the familiar cottage across the fields, faint smoke rising from the kitchen chimney, I began to relax, and when I opened the door and breathed in the essence of the place, I was home, safe.
“Mrs. Hudson?” I called, but the kitchen was empty. Market day, I thought, so I went to the stairs and started upwards. “Holmes?”
“That you, Russell?” he said, sounding mildly surprised, though I had written the week before to say what day I would be home. “Good. I was just glancing through those experiments on blood typology we were doing before you left in January. I believe I’ve discovered what the problem was. Here: Look at your notes. Now look at the slide I’ve put in the microscope....”
Good old Holmes, as effusive and demonstrative as ever. Obedi-ently, I sat before the eyepieces of his machine, and it was as if I’d never been away. Life slid back into place, and I did not doubt again.
On the third week of my holiday I went to the cottage on a Wednesday, Mrs. Hudson’s usual day in town. Holmes and I had planned a rather smelly chemical reaction for that day, but as I let my-self in the kitchen door I heard voices from the sitting room.
“Russell?” his voice called.
“Yes, Holmes.” I walked to the door and was surprised to see Holmes at the fire beside an elegantly dressed woman with a vaguely fa-miliar face. I automatically began to reconstruct mentally the surround-ings where I had seen her, but Holmes interrupted the process.
“Do come in, Russell. We were waiting for you. This is Mrs. Barker. You will remember, she and her husband live in the manor house. They bought it the year before you came here. Mrs. Barker, this is the young lady I was mentioning—yes, she is a young lady inside that cos-tume. Now that she is here, would you please review the problem for us? Russell, pour yourself a cup of tea and sit down.”
It was the partnership’s first case.
Mistress of the Hounds
At the smell of the smoke, they imagine that this is not the attack of an enemy...but that it is a force or a natural catastrophe whereto they do well to submit.
t was, i suppose, inevitable that Holmes and I would collaborate eventually on one of his cases. Although ostensibly retired, he would, as I said, occasionally show all the signs of his former life: strange visitors, erratic hours, a refusal to eat, long periods at the pipe, and endless hours producing peculiar noises from his violin. Twice I had come to the cottage unannounced and found him gone. I did not enquire into his affairs, as I knew that he accepted only the most un-usual or delicate of cases these days, leaving the investigation of more conventional crimes to the various police agencies (who had come to adopt his methods over the years).
I was immediately curious as to what Holmes might see in this case. Although Mrs. Barker was a neighbour, and a wealthy one, that would hardly keep him from referring