Welcome to Baker Street

117. Not good at goodbyes

"Then how was he killed and by whom? We need to give Jim a name. Someone among the suspects must have killed him," John affirms.

"What if nobody killed him?" Giulia suggests, earning another condescending look from Sherlock.

"Again, stating the obvious here: there's always a killer involved in a murder."

For a second, she is tempted to slap him down off his high horse. Yet she knows he is going through a lot and has had a devastating breakdown, so she swaps violence for a more diplomatic and (despite Sherlock's remonstrance) entirely plausible theory.

"But what if this wasn't a murder? What if it was an accident?"

"The forensic team established he died from a blow to the head. How can that be accidental?" Sherlock counters.

"By falling and hitting the head, perhaps? We assumed it was murder based on the lethal wound, which, given the depth, indicated either a heavy object or a strong blow. What if it was both but the other way around? What if he fell and smashed his head hard on something with all his weight and the added force of gravity? Wouldn't it be possible?"

"Surely, but against what? That's why the incident option was never taken into account: there aren't any blood-stained blunt edges in his bedroom that would support your theory. His body was at the centre of the room, at the foot of his bed. If we assume he fell and hit his head, what did he fall against? There weren't any obstacles in his fall that would have smashed his head in. And there wasn't blood spatter on anything except the carpet and the dog's pawn prints."

"The dog!" Giulia exclaims. "What if the dog took away the object that killed him? He went by his side to look over his owner's body but maybe got distracted by an object, took it as a toy, brought it to the garden and buried it. That would explain why the police haven't found the 'murder weapon'—provided that we can still call it that way."

"It's a possibility," Sherlock confirms. "Especially considering the breed: Jack Russell Terriers have a high tendency to dig."

"How do you know?" John blurts out.

"I've always had a thing for dogs. Can we focus on the dead man's fate now?"

John brings his attention back to the case and skims through the copy of Dimmock's notes.

"Then how would the dog get to the garden if, as Dimmock noted down and Moriarty repeated, Rebecca Lockett found the bedroom door closed?"

"Through the dog flap," Giulia promptly replies, pointing at the French door to the garden in one of the bedroom's pictures.

"Fine. We'll get on board with your theory of the fall, then. So Mr Portland fell and smashed his head against something, like what?" John asks.

Sherlock's eyes glimmer at that question. "Like one of his tools, such as the hammer. Look at his toolbox. Where's the hammer? There's always a hammer in a toolbox."

John studies the pictures. "Okay good. We're getting closer." His tone harbours a bit more confidence, contrasting with the detective's gloomy expression. Something is still eluding him.

"Yeah, but falling down like that makes no sense. How did it happen? What was he doing?" Sherlock wonders. His eyes flit to the countdown: 15 minutes to go.

"Does it matter?"

"It does if we want to be absolutely certain of our answer," Sherlock retorts, stealing one more glance at the dark red curtain. They can't leave any stone unturned, not with his brother's life on the line.

He shifts his gaze to John. "We need to reconstruct what happened seconds before he died. So far, we can tell he went to bed and lay down for a while after taking the Xanax. Then he stood up for whatever reason. But why and how did he fall?"