The Beekeeper's Apprentice - Laurie R. King [68]
Jessica hugged me, hard. I dropped down to her level and gave her the doll.
“Can you write yet, Jessie?”
“A little.”
“Well, perhaps your mother might help you write me a letter some-times. I’d love to hear from you. And remember to stay happy with your anger. Good-bye, sister Jessie.”
“Good-bye, sister Mary.” She whispered it so her mother shouldn’t hear, and giggled.
e took our leave of an uncomfortable Chief Inspector Connor, who arranged a car to Bristol so we might catch an earlier train and be off his turf all the sooner. Again we had a com-partment to ourselves, though we were no longer more disreputable than our bags. Bristol turned to fields outside our window, and Holmes reached for his pipe and tobacco pouch. Normality tugged at me, be-coming more firm with each accelerating clack of the iron wheels, but there was something to be set aright between Holmes and myself be-fore we went further.
“Holmes, you did not wish to let me join you in this case,” I said. He grunted in agreement. “Do you now regret that you did so?” He knew immediately what I was talking about and did not pretend oth-erwise. However, he did not look at me, but took his pipe out of his mouth and examined the bowl closely, retrieved his little tool, and fussed with the tobacco for a moment before answering.
“I was indeed filled with a singular lack of enthusiasm at the prospect. I admit that. However, I hope you understand that this was not due to any doubts concerning your abilities. I work alone. I always have. Even when Watson was with me, he functioned purely as an-other pair of hands, not in anything resembling true partnership. You, however—I have seen for some time that you are not the type to be content to follow directions. My hesitation was not out of fear that you might put a foot disastrously wrong, but that I might cause you to do so by misdirection and my longstanding disinclination to work in harness with another. As it happened, by hesitating to give you even the responsibility for creating the necessary diversion, I paradoxically presented you with an opportunity for independently solving the case.”
“I’m sorry, Holmes, but as I was—”
“For God’s sake, Russell,” he interrupted impatiently, “don’t apolo-gise. I know the circumstances; you made the correct decision. You should have been quite wrong, in fact, had you let the opportunity slip through your fingers. I admit that I was severely taken aback when I saw you running down the road with the child on your back. It was something Watson could never have done, even discounting his bad leg. Watson’s great strength has always been his utter, dogged depend-ability. His attempts at independent action tend to blow up in my face, so I have never encouraged them, but I allowed you to come in with me on this case because the step had to be taken at some time, and it was best done while I was immediately to hand at every moment. Or so I thought, not knowing that the first time I let you out of my sight you would take it into your head to perform an appallingly dangerous stunt like—” He stopped and turned again to his pipe, which seemed to be giving him considerable difficulty. When it was finally belching smoke to his satisfaction, he looked at me, and in his eye was what I can only describe as a rueful twinkle. “It was, in fact, precisely what I myself might have done, given the circumstances.”
In an instant twenty pounds were lifted from my shoulders and five years added to my posture. Although the compliment was distinctly backhanded, I felt ridiculously pleased, though I hid the satisfied smile on my lips by looking out the window. After a few dozen telegraph posts my thoughts turned back to other concerns, to the child in the hotel and the struggle she faced. Holmes read my mind.
“What did you say to the child, to cheer her so? She seemed a dif-ferent person when we left.”
“Did she? Good.” The poles flipped rhythmically past, and the steady beat of the wheels called hypnotically, and because he was