Where All Paths Meet, page 33
part #3 of The Adventures of Holloway Holmes Series
It looked the same as ever—it hadn’t burned down to a smoldering ruin, and there wasn’t any visible sign of stormtroopers, and if any ghosts were haunting it, they weren’t working the day shift. The windows glinted in the late morning light, and the only sound was the truck’s tires rumbling up the driveway.
When I knocked, no one came to the door. I tried the bell. Nothing. That thing about being crazy applied here, too; the door opened easily, and I stepped inside. The smell of smoke met me—foul, clinging, making my gorge rise. It wasn’t the smell of a campfire or a grill; this was half-burned textiles and blistered paint and man-made chemicals heated until they vaporized. But the house itself looked the same as always: the white walls, the dark timbers, the inverted ship’s hull of the tall ceilings. The shape of it now made a cavity in my mind, and I thought, instead of a ship’s hull, of the curve of a skull. Nothing looked like it had been touched by flame, but as I moved deeper into the house, the reek followed me.
I ended up in the living room where Holmes had brought me on that first visit, and I stopped and stared. All the furniture had been pushed to the edges of the room: the sofa, the chair, the occasional tables, the sculptures and the mixed-media pieces of art.
In their place, someone had laid shards of glass. Hundreds of them. The shape was roughly circular, and most of the glass was smoked and dark, so that at the right angle, it looked black and opaque. Around the rim of the circle, though, was a thin ring of fragments of glass that had been stained gold. I stared at the arrangement for a while. I moved around it. The sun was at the wrong angle to come in from the windows, but I imagined what the installation would look like when light hit it, when you could watch the beams rake their way across it over the course of a day. Like a star being born, maybe. Or the sun collapsing in on itself.
“Do you like it?” Cecilia Holmes stepped into the room. She had her blond hair up in a complicated braid, and she was wearing a brown skirt and a man’s chambray shirt, and it looked simultaneously chic and wholesome, like she’d just stepped in from milking the cows. “Hello, Jack.”
“What is it?”
She cocked her head. “That’s a dangerous question to ask an artist.” When she reached the circle of shattered glass, she stopped and trailed a finger over one of the golden pieces. “Among other things, these are infused with honey from the ancestral estates on the Sussex Downs; there are a few aunts and uncles who still keep the hives there.” She flipped over one of the smoked pieces. “For these, I used ash. There was a photo I was ready to let go.” Standing, she offered me an unreadable smile. “When that wasn’t enough, I burned my husband’s study.”
My laugh was more startled than amused, but Cecilia didn’t smile, and I swallowed the rest of the noise.
“Would you like to sit?” she asked.
“I want to see H.”
She nodded.
“Where is he?”
“Sit down, Jack.”
“Fine. I’ll find him myself.”
“He’s not here, you stubborn boy. Now sit down.”
I sat on a chair pushed into the corner. Cecilia brought another chair over and sat, looking at me. Outside, a cloud moved in front of the sun, and the whole valley dimmed like it was on a switch.
“I’m not going to apologize,” I said. “I hope he stays in prison the rest of his life. I hope he dies there.”
Her hazel eyes were steady on me. “I did not expect an apology from you, Jack. Allow me to apologize, though, for his actions. It is not enough to tell you I am sorry for your mother’s death; she was an interesting, impressive, and challenging woman. The world is less without her.”
“You let him do it.”
She touched the placket of her shirt, flattened it against her belly.
“Why didn’t he kill me that night? He could have found me; it wouldn’t have been hard.”
“Because he wanted you alive. Because he is a Holmes, and although he is fully capable of going against his nature, there is still a part of him that…values the Watsons.”
I wiped my eyes; I hadn’t felt the tears until then. “Until they become a problem. Until they’re inconvenient.”
“Yes.”
“That’s why he tried to kill me once he knew I was involved with H. And that’s why the attacks stopped once H was gone. Because I wasn’t a problem.”
For a moment, I thought I saw compassion in her face. But it might have been the light. Or it might have been a shadow.
“Is H ok?” I asked.
I wasn’t sure what changed in her face; nothing I could put my finger on. But it softened a little, and she said, “Of course not.”
“Where is he? He needs me. I don’t understand how nobody gets that.” Another moment passed, and she didn’t even seem to be breathing, so I shifted to the edge of my seat. “I don’t know what you want. You tell me to sit, and then you don’t say anything, and H is hurting really bad right now. If you won’t tell me where he is, I’ll find him myself.”
Her face was like deep snow.
“You know what I don’t get,” I said. “I don’t get how you could let it happen.”
“If you’re referring to recent events, I was otherwise occupied freeing my daughter. A paramilitary organization. Something to do with her government work, I believe. It was all quite…patriotic.”
“No, I know about that. Enough, anyway. I know it was Blackfriar. I know that’s how he got both of you out of the way. I’m talking about all of it. All these years of it. H was a child, and you let Blackfriar do that to him. You knew what it was, you knew it wasn’t training. You knew it was all of Blackfriar’s rage, that he hated H because H wasn’t his son, that he was punishing him for being who he was, and that it wasn’t H’s fault. And you let it happen. You’re as bad as he.”
She nodded slowly. “And yet, my son is alive. And he is strong. And I am alive, Jack. And while it may not seem like an important thing to you, to me, it matters a great deal. I learned early in our marriage what my husband was capable of. I could either give my children a mother, with whatever small influence I still held. Or I could be the sacrificial lamb.”
“Why didn’t he kill H?” I asked. “If he knew the truth, why did he keep him alive, hurting him like that, spending all those years trying to break him?”
She cocked her head, as though looking for the trick in the question. “Because he enjoyed it, of course.”
I couldn’t say anything to that.
The clouds moved on. The lights in the valley went back up. There’d been an accident on I-15, a bad one, and the cars were piling up and sparking like quartz, and greasy black smoke plumed up into the sky.
“You know what I’ve been thinking about?” I asked. “I’ve been thinking about the fact that somebody framed Blackfriar with Lynnissa Baca’s jewelry. I was at her condo after he killed her. I saw that jewelry; it was still there. So, somebody went to her condo, picked up a few distinctive pieces, and put them in the Bentley. And I don’t think it was Maggie; she was too busy trying to find the safe.”
“My daughter has always had a sense of humor.”
I nodded. “And somebody had to send me that invitation, telling me to come to the Zodiac anniversary party.”
“I thought you might help my son. As you told me once, the Holmeses are better with a Watson.”
“But then you tried to pay me off. You tried to scare me into leaving.”
“Goodness, Jack.” She laughed softly. “You should have seen yourself: the outraged dignity, the sheer stubbornness.”
“Yeah, it worked. After that, I wouldn’t have walked away from H for anything. That was smart. Reverse psychology; I bet it works on the Watsons every time.” I sat back and ran a hand through my hair. “You know what I don’t get? I still don’t know why Sarah sent that stuff to H. And I don’t know why she made it so that I’d have to open the safe. But the thing I keep coming back to is that somebody had to give Sarah what was in that safe: the hair samples, the video of the accident, the necklace.”
For a long time, Cecilia said nothing, and I thought she wouldn’t say anything, and her pulse fluttered in her throat. When she did speak, the sound startled me, spiking my pulse. “Who says Sarah Watson sent anyone anything?”
“But—” I began. And then I stopped. What had been in the package that Holmes had received? A printed family tree of the Watsons. The safe. Instructions. Had they been in Sarah’s handwriting? Had she signed anything? Holmes might have investigated the return address, found the lawyer, drawn the conclusion that Sarah had left the package as a backup or a contingency. But that was an inference. An abduction. And lawyers could be paid.
Cecilia’s eyes were cool and deep, and they made me think of trackless forests and earth that never saw the sun.
“What was on the other flash drive?” I finally managed to ask. “One of them had the accident, but what about the second one?”
“I don’t know, Jack. But you have an active imagination; I’m sure you can guess what my husband feared Sarah had.”
I didn’t need to imagine or guess; I knew, because Blackfriar had told me. He’d thought Sarah had evidence. Videos. Proof of Blackfriar trying to break Holmes, trying to turn him into a sociopath. Like what I’d seen of Holmes’s training. Worse.
Nodding, I said, “You know what else I keep coming back to? That video, the one of the accident. I keep coming back to the coincidence that someone happened to be standing there, at that moment, taking a video on a random stretch of highway.”
“A tourist, perhaps.”
“In the middle of the night.”
Her lips parted with amusement. “A tourist with insomnia.”
“That’s a pretty big coincidence.”
“Life, Jack, is full of coincidences.”
I thought about that. And I thought about this woman who made art out of Dr. Watson’s diaries and out of the deerstalker cap and out of Sherlock Holmes’s cocaine bottle. Who made art out of honey and ash. I saw her moving the pieces around the way she had laid out the glass on the living room floor. She was, after all, Holmes’s mother.
“Did Blackfriar know about the video?”
“He knew. He believed he had the only copy.” She seemed to weigh her next words, and then she said, “He enjoyed watching it.”
It took me a moment to get my voice under control before I asked, “What’s going to happen to him?”
“We shall see. I imagine he will go to prison; even my husband is not untouchable. After that…” She gave a one-shouldered shrug. “A great many things could happen.”
“What about Tom?”
“I understand he’s arranging some kind of deal with the prosecutor. Regardless, he is no longer welcome at the Grange.” Cecilia’s smile was white, a bright sickle. “This family already has a Watson.”
“And H?”
“My son is not well, Jack. I understand that you are attached to him, but he needs time to come to terms with what he has learned.”
“He should stay at Walker.”
“I don’t think that would be good for anyone.”
“You have to let him stay. If you don’t, I’ll—I’ll tell everybody what I know. About this family. About you. About what you did, all of this, how you made it happen.”
“Jack,” she said, and she leaned forward slightly. In spite of my best efforts, I moved backward in the chair. She didn’t raise her voice. It remained cool and untouched and clear, like winter sunlight. “You’re forgetting: I’m the victim.”
From what seemed like a long way off, I thought I could hear honking. Or maybe it was all in my head, that noise, the distant blaring sound.
“Come,” Cecilia said. “I’ll walk you out.”
At the door, I looked her in the face and said, “Was it Fairfax?” I could see him in my mind’s eye, the way he’d been in the photograph in Blackfriar’s study: the silver eyes, the exact same hair. “Is he H’s real father?”
Cecilia smiled. “Be safe, Jack.”
And then another thought came to me, and it was so impossible, so ridiculous, that I wanted to laugh. But it ran through me like ice water in my veins. “It wasn’t—was it Leopold? Was it Leopold Moriarty?”
“What an interesting question,” she said as she shut the door. “You’ll have to tell me, one day, what you did with Maggie’s body.”
Chapter 36
Elementary
The days dragged by with no sign of Holmes. Walker’s campus emptied as students left, all but the few who stayed for the summer program. Rowe and Emma and Glo insisted that I come visit them over the summer, which was nice of them to say. But it turned out they weren’t just saying it; the day after they left, plane tickets popped up in my inbox. A gift from the three of us, the note said. See you in July.
Dad and I were busier than ever, which was partly because we finally had free run of the campus, and there were always a million things to fix, and partly because I thought Dad was trying to work me into the ground again, the way he had in December. I thought maybe I should tell him that this time was different. It hurt, having Holmes disappear again. Hurt didn’t begin to describe it. But it was easier, in some ways, knowing it was my fault. And easier, too, knowing that Holmes was safe now, that he was free of Blackfriar. If the cost was that I had to lose him, well, that was ok. I could live with that. Some days, I could even tell myself it was better this way.
And then, on a hot day at the end of May, I walked into the maintenance garage, and he was standing there. He looked like he always did: the oxford, the chinos, the immaculate chukkas. His only concessions to the heat were that he had cuffed his sleeves and undone the top button of his oxford. In his good hand, he carried the black doctor’s bag that Tom had been toting around. I, on the other hand, was a red-faced, sweaty, filthy mess, who had spent the last four hours moving mulch by hand. And Jesus Christ, I thought with a high-pitched note I recognized as panic, my hair.
Dad was there too, a shop rag in one hand, head bent as he listened to Holmes. He’d been working on the bike, I figured—he’d pulled it out from where we kept it stored, and he’d taken off the chain. For a moment, neither Dad nor Holmes seemed to have noticed me.
Holmes was saying, “—cannot ask him to forgive me. You will understand, though. You will explain it to him and give him Dr. Watson’s bag.” He seemed to struggle for a moment before saying, “Please, tell him—”
Then he stopped, and he turned his head and looked at me.
I wanted to run to him. I wanted to touch his face, make sure it was really him. I wanted to hear his breathing, for Christ’s sake. But my legs stayed locked, and I realized I had my hand in my hair, still trying to fix it. I pulled my hand free, and some mulch came with it, and somebody in charge of my voice said, “Um, hi.”
So, that was it. That was officially how I died.
Amusement and compassion flickered across Dad’s face—definitely more of one than the other—and he said, “Finish up here, buddy. I’m going to talk to Holloway for a minute.”
Holmes threw him a questioning look, but Dad only nodded and tossed me the rag.
“But I—” I said. My legs still weren’t working. “Shouldn’t I—”
“Get the chain back on,” Dad said as he herded Holmes toward the side door—a move, part of me noted in the background, designed to keep Holmes and me from crossing paths. “We’ll be back in a few.”
The door clicked shut behind them.
I did not get the chain back on. I went to the door, shouldered it open, and watched them walk up the canyon. The blue grama was getting tall, the seed heads bobbing in their wake. The air was hot and dry, and the pine trees seemed to shimmer with it.
“I said get that chain back on, son,” Dad said. He didn’t even have the courtesy to look back.
I let the door close. Then I opened it again, more quietly this time. They were still walking up the canyon, the blue grama brushing their calves. I could see the decision being made in Dad’s body, and then his hand came up to rest on Holmes’s nape, and after a moment, he slid his arm around Holmes’s shoulders. Holmes, of course, immediately lost every shred of grace, and he walked like someone had replaced his joints with machine bolts. They stopped where a line of aspens grew, and the shade was plentiful, and the air was sweet. Dad kept his arm around Holmes, and he was talking in a low voice, and Holmes was perfectly still and listening. Dad glanced up, and I flinched and let the door fall shut.
The bike.
I had a hell of a time getting the chain back on. And then I realized that’s because I was doing it backwards. So, I had to take it off again, and by the time I got it on—the right way, this time—my hands were a mess. I checked the tire pressure, which was stupid, because my eyes weren’t working right and I couldn’t read the gauge. I made sure the wheel was true and not pulling to either side. The panic hit me like a wave, coming out of nowhere. My face was hot, and I was sweating all over again, and I dropped the bike so hard that it bounced once. I ran to the door and threw it open. Because what if he was gone?
But he wasn’t. He was standing there, and Dad was hugging him, and I knew what I was seeing because I’d gotten a few hundred of them, give or take, in my lifetime: Holmes was getting a dad hug. I figured he’d never had one before. Holmes didn’t look stiff anymore; he was falling apart against Dad, crying into his chest, loud enough that I could hear the worst of the sobs that wracked him, even at that distance.
I tried to wipe down the bike. I couldn’t even do that. I stood there with a bucket and a clean rag, and I stared at the water dripping from my hand. And finally, when I’d decided I didn’t care what Dad did, didn’t care if he told me to work on the bike, didn’t care if he grounded me, didn’t care if he decided I’d totally lost my shit and locked me up in a home, didn’t care about any of it, the door opened, and Holmes and Dad stepped back into the garage.
