Sherlock Holmes and the Red Maverick

Chapter 11- Withholding Evidence

We floated on the dingy until mid day until a Greek ship pulled us aboard. Wrapping our shoulders with blankets and comforting us. It was lucky that Sherlock knew so many languages and was able to communicate with the crew flawlessly. He explained part of our predicament and they allowed us to stay aboard the ship until they made port in France. It took us only a couple of days to reach it and the Captain forced us to earn our keep aboard the ship. While we carried out the tedious work we were charged with to pay for our passage over I found that I was along with my thoughts for long spans of time. 

I must confess that I sat for long periods of time attempting to use Sherlock's methods to solve my own mystery. The mystery that surrounded the newest letter from my old employer, written in my late cousin's hand. I thought over how they might have gotten a sample of his writing to fool me. But that would be impossible. He never wrote anything, he preferred type writing. And when he did write he then burned the evidence. He justified his reasoning behind it with the statement 'Leaving my hand writing around is as if leaving pieces of myself around. It would be akin to leaving an important part of me somewhere. Tell me, why would I do that?'. I had always understood though that he did not want his handwriting forged. He had a substantial checking account and harbored a constant fear of someone with a skill in the arts sketching out a replica to his signature on a check and taking all his "hard earned" money away from him. 

That information alone took away the possibility of forgery which left me to devise my theory. He had written this before he died and someone had seen fit to find me and give it to me. Although that left the bigger part of the mystery. He had no trusted contacts that he would leave a letter to me with as far as I knew. I was left at a dead end. Walled in by the impossibilities that surrounded the little note in my pocket that I had shoved deep inside so as to avoid Sherlock from catching a glimpse of it and prodding at me for information about it. 

I had kept it a secret because I did not know what the contents were. I was afraid to find out what the letter would hold. Perhaps news of my cousin being alive. But how could that be? I had held his cold hand all the way to the morgue. He was dead and there was no use pretending he wasnt. His death caused me to seek help from Sherlock. If he were alive you could easily argue that I had wasted Sherlock's time. And yet the events unfolding around us were undeniably important and I wondered if Sherlock would credit me with bringing such menial details to his attention. Then again, what detail is menial to the Great Sherlock Holmes?

I was startled out of my thought process when a hand touched my shoulder. I jumped and looked back at the intruder. Speaking of the devil, it was Sherlock. Attempting to pry me from my thoughts which I had been so deeply burrowed in over this journey back to land. The ship was making port in France, where we were now. 

Sherlock motioned for me to walk down the gang plank. I looked around at my surroundings, finding that my feet had carried me up onto the top deck and that the ship had pulled into port. I found that now, more often that not, I was too lost in my thoughts to really take much note of what was going on. I walked down the gang plank and we waved our thanks to the Greek crew aboard the ship that had rescued us. 

We all walked in silence for some time. It seemed that were all reflecting upon our thoughts. Sherlock peeled away from the group and went over to a newspaper stand as the Frenchman yelled out the headline. Watson lead me over with a hand on my wrist to stand beside Sherlock as he read down the front page in french. 

When he had finished reading he brought the paper down and away from his face with anger etched onto his features. He folded the paper sloppily and set it back on the stand, storming away. The Frenchman yelling at him to pay for what he had ruined. John and I followed after Sherlock until he found us a cafe to eat in. He slammed himself down in his chair and brooded for some time with his chin resting on his chest and his eye brows furrowed intensely. It wasnt until Watson cleared his throat that he looked up and his eyes bounced between us for a moment.