221B.
Sherlock is standing at the fireplace again. The mirror is now almost completely covered because he has added several sheets of paper with various ciphers and pictograms on them. He has his head lowered and is consulting a book.
Vaness sat on John's couch while John was standing beside Sherlock. He's not in a bad mood because he didn't get caught. Vaness told him earlier what would have happened and they laughed it off.
"What do these cyphers mean Sherlock?" John asks tiredly.
"That's what we need to find out." There was a glint in his eyes, he's got an idea.
He turned to face John, "I need you to go to the police station, ask about the journalist."
"Okay, I'll go." John moved towards the door.
"Wait." Sherlock said, "bring Vaness with you so she can flirt with Dimmock, it would be faster that way." He said.
Vaness raised an eyebrow but didn't say anything. She stood up and walked towards John.
"Oh, Jesus!" John exclaimed. "Vaness, let's go before he stops us again." John said.
"His personal effects will have been impounded. Get hold of his diary, or something that will tell us his movements." Sherlock said grabbing his coat.
They go downstairs and out onto the street.
"Gonna go and see Van Coon's P.A. If we retrace their steps, somewhere they'll coincide." Sherlock walks off down the street.
John sees a taxi coming around the corner and hails it. As it pulls over to the kerb he sees an Oriental-looking woman with dark hair and wearing dark sunglasses standing on the other side of the road and taking a photograph. Her camera is aimed in his direction. He bends to the taxi driver's window.
"Scotland Yard." He said.
John gets into the back of the taxi and glances round to the other side of the road as he sits down. There is no sign of the woman.
"Did you see the woman?" John asked Vaness.
"No, but I knew she'd be there." She answered.
"Who is she? Was she taking a photograph of me?" John asked worriedly.
"I can't say John, I'm sorry. But she'll be following us around." She explained.
NEW SCOTLAND YARD.
Dimmock is standing at a desk and rummaging through a box of Brian Lukis' possessions. John and Vaness stands at the other side.
"Your friend..." Dimmock says.
"Listen: whatever you say, I'm behind you one hundred percent." John tells him.
"...he's an arrogant sod." Dimmock said.
"Well, that was mild! People say a lot worse than that." John looked at him surprised.
(Dimmock hands Vaness the diary.
"This is what you wanted, isn't it? The journalist's diary?" He asked them.
Vaness gave the diary to John and John takes the diary and flicks through it, opening it at a page which has been bookmarked with a boarding pass to Dalian DLC [Dalian Zhoushuizi International Airport] to London LHR [London Heathrow Airport] on Zhuang Airlines.
LONDON STREETS.
John and Vaness was in the streets as John looked at the diary. Vaness spotted Sherlock and pointed him to John.
"Look at him" Vaness said giggling.
John also chuckle as Sherlock has been spinning around as he walks.
Sherlock stopped when a hand tapped him in the shoulder. He was surprised to see John and Vaness but he quickly said, "Eddie Van Coon brought a package here the day he died - whatever was hidden inside that case. I've managed to piece together a picture using scraps of information..."
"Sherlock..." John says trying to stop him.
"...credit card bills, receipts. He flew back from China, then he came here." Sherlock continued.
"Sherlock..." Vaness called him.
"Somewhere in this street; somewhere near. I don't know where, but..." he said not listening.
"That shop over there." John said pointing at the other side of the road.
Sherlock looks at the shop, then looks back to John, frowning.
"How can you tell?" Sherlock asked as he looks back at John.
"Lukis' diary." He shows Sherlock the entry, "He was here too. He wrote down the address."
CHINATOWN.
They walk into a touristy shop which consists largely of decorative cats which are sitting up on their hind legs with one front paw raised. The paws on some of the cats are waving back and forth. John greets the female Chinese shop keeper politely.
They look around at all the items on display. The shop keeper lifts one of the cats from the desk.
"You want lucky cat?" The lady asked John.
"No, thanks. No." John said politely.
Sherlock looks round at him and smirks. Vaness tried to keep a straight face.
"Ten pound. Ten pound!" The lady insisted.
"No." John smiles awkwardly.
"I think your wife, she will like!" The lady pointed at Vaness.
"No thanks, and she's not my wife." John said.
"Sherlock is." Vaness muttered to herself.
John walks over to one of the tables which has small ceramic painted handle-less cups on it. He picks up one of the cups and turns it over to look at the price tag. His hand begins to tremble when he sees the Chinese symbol stuck on the underside. It's the same sort-of upside down eight with a line above it which was painted beside Sir William's portrait and on the library shelf.
"Sherlock, Vaness." He called them.
Sherlock, who has picked up one of the statues, puts it back on the shelf and comes over to him. Vaness just continued to look around smiling. She thinks John has some sort of luck in finding clues.
"The label there." John pointed.
"Yes, I see it." Sherlock said.
"Exactly the same as the cipher."Clearing his throat awkwardly, he puts the cup back.
Sherlock lifts his head as it all starts to make sense to him.
Shortly afterwards they have left the shop and are walking down the street.
"It's an ancient number system! Hangzhou." Sherlock exclaimed. "These days, only street traders use it. Those were numbers written on the wall at the bank and at the library."
He walks over to a greengrocer's which has some of its wares on display outside the shop. The various boxes have handwritten signs on them giving the names of the vegetables in both Chinese and English, and underneath is the cost of that particular item in both Hangzhou and English. He picks up various signs, checking the symbols.
"Numbers written in an ancient Chinese dialect." Sherlock said.
Vaness looked for the exact numbers and showed them. The upside down eight and slash above it, 15, and the single horizontal line, 1.
"It's a fifteen! What we thought was the artist's tag - it's a number fifteen." John said.
"And the blindfold - the horizontal line is the Chinese number one." Sherlock said.
"We've found it!" John said smiling af Vaness.
Sherlock turns and walks away. As John smiles and turns to follow him, he sees the same woman who was taking a photograph outside 221 standing nearby. Still wearing her dark sunglasses, she again has her camera raised and pointed towards him as she takes a picture.
Someone walks across her, obscuring his view of her for a moment, and by the time the person has passed, she has vanished. John frowns, Vaness grabbed him so they could follow Sherlock.
Shortly afterwards, sitting at a table in the window of the restaurant opposite the Lucky Cat shop, Sherlock is writing the two Hangzhou numbers and their English equivalents onto a paper napkin. John sits opposite him, also writing notes. And Vaness sat at the middle table.
"Two men travel back from China. Both head straight for the Lucky Cat emporium. What did they see?" John asks.
"It's not what they saw; it's what they both brought back in those suitcases." Sherlock said.
"And you don't mean duty free." John said.
A waitress brings over a plate of food and puts it down in front of John, and she place Vaness' 3 take out order in front of her.
"Thank you." John and Vaness thank the waitress.
"Think about what Sebastian told us; about Van Coon - about how he stayed afloat in the market." Sherlock told them.
"Lost five million ..." John recalled.
" ... made it back in a week." Sherlock said. "That's how he made such easy money."
"He was a smuggler. Mmm." He takes a mouthful of food.
"A guy like him - it would have been perfect." Sherlock said. "Business man, making frequent trips to Asia. And Lukis was the same, a journalist writing about China." Sherlock explained.
"Mmm." Was John's only reply as he ate.
Vaness opened one of the fried rice take out and ate.
"Both of them smuggled stuff out, and the Lucky Cat was their drop-off." Sherlock said.
"But why did they die? I mean, it doesn't make sense. If they both turn up at the shop and deliver the goods, why would someone threaten them and kill them after the event, after they'd finished the job?" John asked.
Sherlock sits back thoughtfully for a few seconds, then smiles as he realises the answer.
"What if one of them was light-fingered?" Sherlock asked John.
"How d'you mean?" John asked.
"Stole something; something from the hoard." Sherlock said.
"And the killer doesn't know which of them took it, so he threatens them both. Right." John nods to himself.
Sherlock looks out of the window towards the shop, then raises his eyes to the windows above it. Looking down to the ground floor level again, his gaze sharpens.
"Remind me, when was the last time that it rained?" He asked looking at the Yellow Pages on the other side of the road.
Without waiting for a reply, he stands up and leaves the restaurant. John, who has probably managed only two mouthfuls of his meal, sits back in exasperation but then dutifully gets up and follows. Vaness closed her take out food and followed both of them, carrying their food.
Over the road, Sherlock bends down to the Yellow Pages. The plastic wrapper still has drops of water on it, and the top of it has broken open a little. Sherlock runs his fingers over the top of the wet exposed pages of the directory.
"It's been here since Monday." Sherlock said.
He straightens up and presses Soo Lin's doorbell. He only waits a couple of seconds, then looks to his right and heads off in that direction. There's an alleyway beside the flat and the boys walk down the alley. Vaness stayed where she was, leaning on the wall.
John came back without Sherlock and rings on the doorbell.
Vaness walked towards the restaurant again, ordering some tea, it will be good for sore throat.
She was glad when yhe service was fast, as she head back to Soo Lin's door, she heard John shouting.
"No, I'm Sherlock Holmes and I always work alone because no-one else can compete with ..." He storms back to the letterbox, flips it open and angrily shouts through it, "... my MASSIVE INTELLECT!"
Vaness got the take out food for John and handed him it. She hates shouting.
"Just eat John. You look tired. We're all tired."
Upstairs, Sherlock is starting to lose consciousness. As his struggles become weaker and his hands fall clear of the scarf, the attacker releases his grip.
Downstairs, John looks at his watch in irritation and shakes his head, and ate the food Vaness gave him.
Upstairs, breathing a little better, Sherlock sits up on his heels, rummages in his coat pocket and pulls out a black origami paper flower. He looks at it for a moment, then stumbles to his feet, wobbling for a moment before pulling himself together and heading for the stairs.
A few moments later he opens the front door downstairs. John makes an exasperated sound and glares at him.
When Sherlock speaks, his voice is croaky.
"The, uh, milk's gone off and the washing's starting to smell. Somebody left here in a hurry three days ago." He said.
Vaness handed him the tea and Sherlock thanked her silently.
"Somebody?" John asked.
"Soo Lin Yao. We have to find her." Vaness answered for Sherlock.
She looks down and bends to pick something off the floor.
"But how, exactly?" John asked Vaness.
Vaness picks up a folded envelope. On the back of it is written:
SOO LIN
Please ring me
tell me you're
OK
Andy
She gave Sherlock the envelope an he unfolds the envelope and looks at the front of it. Printed in the bottom right hand corner is:
NATIONAL
ANTIQUITIES
MUSEUM
"We could start with that." Vaness said.
Sherlock walks out, closing the door behind him, and heads off down the road, John and Vaness following him.
"You've gone all croaky. Are you getting a cold?" John finally asked.
"I'm fine." Sherlock said, his voice better from the tea.
NATIONAL ANTIQUITIES MUSEUM.
Sherlock is pacing around a display area while he interviews Andy.
"When was the last time that you saw her?" Sherlock asked.
"Three days ago, um, here at the museum." Andy answered.
Sherlock focuses briefly on a glass case showing some of the clay teapots. Most of them are dull but one is shiny.
"This morning they told me she'd resigned just like that." Andy said. "Just left her work unfinished."
"What was the last thing that she did on her final afternoon?" Sherlock asked as he turned to look at Andy.
Andy has brought them to the basement archive, and now turns on the lights as he leads them in.
"She does this demonstration for the tourists - a-a tea ceremony. So she would have packed up her things and just put them in here." He said.
He leads them to the open stack and starts turning a handle at the end to widen the gap.
John goes to stand behind him and looks into the stack but Sherlock has noticed something more interesting in the shadows further along the room.
He walks closer to it. Vaness following him. On a stand is a life-sized sculpture of a nude woman ... and yellow paint has been spray painted across the front of it. An almost horizontal straight line goes across the eyes, and over the body has been sprayed the open upside down eight with the almost horizontal line above it. Andy and John turn and see what they found.
Outside the museum, night has fallen as Sherlock, Vaness and John come out.
"We have to get to Soo Lin Yao." Sherlock said.
"If she's still alive." John said.
"She is." Vaness said.
"Sherlock!" Someone called from behind them.
They turn as Raz runs over to join them.
"Found something you'll like." He said to Sherlock.
He trots off and Sherlock immediately follows. Vaness and John heads off after them a little more slowly.
Shortly afterwards the four of them are walking across Hungerford Bridge, heading towards the south side of the river.
SOUTH BANK SKATE PARK.
Raz leads the other two across the under-croft.
"If you want to hide a tree, then a forest is the best place to do it, wouldn't you say? People would just walk straight past, not knowing, unable to decipher the message." Sherlock said.
Raz points to a particular area on the heavily-graffitied walls.
"There. I spotted it earlier." Raz told Sherlock.
Amongst all the other paint there are slashes of the yellow paint forming Chinese symbols. Some of them are already partially painted over by other artists' tags and pictures.
"They have been in here." Sherlock turned to Raz, "And that's the exact same paint?" He asked.
"Yeah." He said.
"John, Vaness, if we're going to decipher this code, we're gonna need to look for more evidence."
The three of them split up and begin searching. Sherlock took Vaness with him and they walk along the end of a railway line and finds an abandoned spray can on the tracks.
Sherlock squat down to pick it up, he puts the end of his flashlight into his mouth and runs a thumb over the yellow paint on the nozzle, then sniffs the nozzle.
Sherlock and Vaness are now walking past a wall which has many posters glued to it. One of the posters attracts his attention and he tears off the bottom corner of it and takes it with him as they continue onwards.
Later John has finally tracked down Sherlock and Vaness, Sherlock was currently looking at the side of a parked rail freight container, and Vaness saw him immediately and said, "Finally! Let's go Sherlock." Vaness pulled Sherlock and John lead them.
Vaness didn't notice the look Sherlock had when she held his hand when she pulled him.
Back at the wall, John lead Sherlock and Vaness towards it, but his mouth drops open in surprise. The entire wall is now blank.
"It's been painted over!" He exclaimed.
Sherlock shines his flashlight around the area as John continues to stare at the wall in disbelief.
"Don't worry." Vaness said.
"I don't understand. It-it was here," he stumbles backwards, "ten minutes ago. I saw it. A whole load of graffiti!"
Vaness just shook her head when John didn't listen.
"Somebody doesn't want me to see it." Sherlock said.
'More like somebody only wanted Sherlock to see it.' Vaness thought to herself.
Sherlock turns and grabs the sides of John's head in both hands.
"Hey, Sherlock, what are you doing ...?" Jihn asked confused.
"Shh, John, concentrate. I need you to concentrate. Close your eyes." Sherlock said.
'Well this is romantic.' Vaness said to herself.
"No, what? Why? Why?" John asked.
Sherlock lowers his hands to hold John by the upper arms.
"What are you doing?!" John exclaimed.
Sherlock starts to spin them slowly around on the spot, staring intensely into John's eyes.
"I need you to maximise your visual memory. Try to picture what you saw. Can you picture it?" Sherlock asked.
"Yeah." John answered.
"Can you remember it?" Sherlock asked again.
"Yes, definitely." John answered confidently.
"Can you remember the pattern?" Sherlock asked again.
"Yes!" John said.
"How much can you remember it?" Sherlock asked again.
"Well, don't worry ... " John said.
"Because the average human memory on visual matters is only sixty-two percent accurate." Sherlock said.
By now, Vaness was both dizzy at watching them spin, and she thought it was cute, and funny.
"Yeah, well, don't worry - I remember all of it."
"Really?" Sherlock asked disbelievingly.
"Yeah, well at least I would ..." he pulls himself free, "if I can get to my pockets!"
He rummages in his jacket pocket.
"I took a photograph." John said.
Vaness laughed hysterically. "If only you two kissed that would have been perfect." She said after calming down.
Sherlock frowned at her but didn't say a word.
John takes out his phone and pulls up a flash photo he has taken of the wall which shows all the symbols clearly. He gives the phone to Sherlock, who takes it and looks embarrassed as John sighs and turns away.
221B.
The photograph has been blown up into small sections and then printed out and all the pictures are stuck on the mirror. The numerical value of each symbol has been written against it. Sherlock is standing at the fireplace looking at the pictures closely and has spotted a pattern.
"Always in pairs." Sherlock said.
Vaness and John is sitting at the dining table with his back to the fireplace, they were eating the take out that had gone cold.
Vaness finished hers first and took Sherlock's food out of the microwave.
"Numbers come with partners." Sherlock said.
John continued to eat, and was close to finishing his own food. He now feels sleepy.
Vaness tapped Sherlock on the shoulder. "Eat." She said.
"Why did he paint it so near the tracks?" Sherlock asked her.
"He wants information. He's trying to communicate with his people in the underworld. He wants the item back. Now eat." Vaness answered him.
Sherlock took three bites then he stood up.
He runs his finger over the symbols.
"We can't crack this without Soo Lin Yao."
John and Vaness followed him. 'Atleast he ate a little.' She said to herself. She was so tired.
NATIONAL ANTIQUITIES MUSEUM.
They are back with Andy in the same display room they met him in earlier.
"Two men who travelled back from China were murdered, and their killer left them messages in the Hangzhou numerals." Sherlock recounts.
"Soo Lin Yao's in danger. Now, that cipher - it was just the same pattern as the others. He means to kill her as well." John explains to Andy.
"Look, I've tried everywhere: um, friends, colleagues. I-I don't know where she's gone. I mean, she could be a thousand miles away." Andy said.
Sherlock has turned his head away in exasperation, but now his gaze focuses on the nearby glass case displaying the teapots.
"What are you looking at?" John asked.
"Tell me more about those teapots." Sherlock said pointing at the display.
"Th-the pots were her obsession. Um, they need urgent work. If-if they dry out, then the clay can start to crumble. Apparently you have to just keep making tea in them." Andy told Sherlock.
Sherlock bends down to look more closely at the shelf.
"Yesterday, only one of those pots was shining. Now there are two." Sherlock said.
Later, elsewhere in the museum, fingers reach through the gaps in a large grating at the bottom of a wall and carefully push the grating outwards. Moments after that, a shadow moves across the dimly lit display room, and a hand reaches into the glass case to take out one of the not-shiny teapots.
The shadow moves away again. Not long afterwards, Soo Lin is in an almost-dark restoration room, pouring tea into the teapot on the desk in front of her. She picks up the lid and carefully strokes it around the rim as, behind her, a very recognisable curly-headed silhouette appears on the other side of a window in the door.
Unaware of this, she picks up the teapot and pours some of the liquid into a pair of cups. Pouring more of the tea into the tray on which the cups are standing, she swills the teapot around to cover the outside with the drips.
A figure steps up beside her.
"Fancy a biscuit with that?" Sherlock asked.
Before he finishes the sentence she gasps in fright and turns towards him, the teapot dropping from her terrified fingers.
Sherlock reacts instantly and bends his knees to reach down and catch the teapot before it hits the floor. He looks up at her.
"Centuries old. Don't wanna break that." Sherlock said.
He slowly straightens up and hands the teapot back to her. As she takes it, he reaches out and flicks a switch on the desk, turning on the lights underneath the surface. He smiles slightly at her.
"Hello."
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