2 AT FOUR YARDS

"Can you ask, my Dear Watson," Holmes said blithely. "Do you imagine that I have no respect for your medical talents? Could I fancy that your astute medical judgment would pass a dying man, however weak, who had no rise of pulse or temperature? At four yards I could deceive you. If I failed to do so who would bring my Smith within my grasp? No, Watson, I would not touch that box…"

My outstretched hand froze in mid-reach as I remembered Holmes' reaction when I had previously lifted that little box.

"You can just see if you looks sideways," Holmes explained, "where the sharp spring like a viper's tooth emerges as you open it. I dare say it was by some such device that poor Savage, who stood between this monster and a reversion, was done to death. My correspondence however is, as you know, a varied one, and I am somewhat upon my guard against any packages that reach me. It was clear to me however that by pretending that he had really succeeded in his design I might surprise a confession. That pretense I have carried out with the thoroughness of the true artist. Thank you, Watson, you must help me on with my coat. When we have finished at the police-station I think that something nutritious at Simpson's would not be out of place."

"We should not need you until the morning," Inspector Morton interjected from the doorway.

He looked at me helping Holmes with his overcoat and the usual disdain was etched on his face, does placing a pebble next to a diamond make the a diamond look brighter? The reverse is just as true, I think.

"Simpson's then," Holmes proclaimed.

He proceeded down the stairs with a clatter leaving Morton and I to follow in his wake. Sarah would be expecting me by now, and although she tried not to worry when I was delayed she was too good of a wife to accomplish such equanimity. The fact that she never nagged at me about it made me all the more careful to get home promptly.

Morton alighted upon a police wagon, which rumbled off down the street.

"Holmes…" I ventured.

Holmes flagged a passing hansom. "Hurry up, Watson," Holmes chided.

It just seemed easier to follow along behind him. Holmes was pleased with himself. He watched the darkened street slide past through a grimy pane of glass. He smiled openly and paid me little heed. I ruminated as we went, upon the events of the last few hours. I did not come upon my conclusions with alacrity, and I did not share them.

I followed Holmes up the stairs to Simpson's, I allowed him to choose the table and take his seat. He ordered a meal full of the kind of seasoning and sauces that were unlikely to be wise for a man breaking a long fast, as well as water, coffee and a large measure of brandy. Finally he turned to me.

"Well, Watson, you look very resolute. When are you planning on telling me how appallingly I have behaved?"

In truth his behavior was fairly predictable, although circumstances rarely drove it to this extreme. It was my own behavior that was more on my mind.

"So long as you eat something before you finish that drink, you will be fine without me in attendance."

I began to stand but his hand upon my sleeve made me pause. He downed his drink in one.

"Now you will have to stay," he said smugly. "Besides, someone has to share the triumph, after all it would have been impossible without you."

"A little more difficult, perhaps."

"Come along," Holmes said. He patted my arm. "Where would I be without you? You cannot be so cruel as to leave me to leave my to celebrate alone."

I have always understood and indulged Holmes in his small vainglories and his secretive machinations, perhaps that was my greatest mistake.

"If you require a helpmate, perhaps you should take the trouble of cultivating one. I have a home to return to." My words seemed petty and terse even to my own ears, but in the absence of glib words, honest ones would have to do.

"My dear Watson, have I been neglecting you?"

I sat down again with a sigh. "You included me in your little plan, so certain of my reactions. But I am the center of my own life, if you depend upon me in such a manner you will find, one day that I may not answer. I tell you this for your own safety as much as out of my own pride."

Holmes smiled condescendingly. "What have I done to offend you?" he said.

"I understand that you are presumptuous, secretive, and often single-minded, Holmes," I said, pushing all my usual instincts for courtesy aside. "I am no longer inclined to indulge you."

My heart was thumping, I dare say I would be feeling calmer if I was preparing to amputate my own finger without anesthetic. Holmes, for his part, seemed finally to be taking me seriously.

"Watson, I do wish you had chosen a different time to raise this grievance, when I was more hale and able to placate you and the venue was a little more private. I know you have always tended to look upon me in a way…"

I stood and walked away from the table. Yes, Holmes had always known how I felt, and always made his own inability to reciprocate quite clear. It was not a matter that required further discussion, not a wound I wished to reopen. I had found love of a different kind, indeed a kinder kind, elsewhere – time I returned to it.

The street outside was quiet; I headed for the corner where cabs would be more likely to pass. I was surprised to hear footsteps behind me and find that Holmes had pursued me. I rarely found a chink in Holmes's self-involved indifference, but he was in earnest now.

"Watson, please, I can see you are upset. Come back and we will talk."

His face was pale and creased, I felt badly to have put this strain on him but I was not interested in listening to him further. No doubt he could argue me around, as he always had before.

"We have talked enough."

I walked away, schooling myself not to look back. At the corner my resolve failed and I turned. Holmes stood leaning heavily upon the outside wall of the club. As I watched his knees buckled and he folded quite slowly, falling to the damp footpath.

Cursing, I rushed back to his side. The doorman ran to help me and together he helped Holmes to sit upon the stone step.

"You should go back inside," he said as gently as I could. "You shouldn't be exerting yourself.

I dare say I shouldn't have been giving him cause, but it was surely no coincidence that I found the strength to speak when he had too little to object.

"I'll go back to Baker Street", he said.

The doorman ran to flag a hansom cab. I steadied Holmes with a firm hand, but did not meet his eyes, as we waited. The cabbie and the doorman were most solicitous, and I could hardly leave him to return home unattended.

Thinking Holmes was dying had roused a most abject terror in me, and I was not untouched by his weakness now, but it was the very strength of these reactions that was the essence of the problem. I returned that the familiar door of 22 Baker Street.

Rather than use the key I still retained I rang the bell. Mrs Hudson answered.

"Lord 'ave mercy," she said, seeing Holmes leaning limply upon my arm.

Typically, it occurred only belatedly to me that he might well be feigning his condition. He would not hesitate to do so if it served his purpose and I could normally be depended upon to fall for it. I did my best to pass him into Mrs. Hudson's care….

"Do you think that you might come up with something for Holmes's sustenance, it seems he was a little ambitious in going out in this state.

"The things you do to yourself, Mr Holmes," she scolded. She took herself down to the kitchen muttering. "--and to the rest of us."

The stairs are narrow and Holmes preceded me. I stood in a hallway that was empty but for two retreating backs. Every instinct as a doctor and a man suggested that I should follow Holmes. Of course these were the very instincts that lead me to be an intermittent physician who spend a great deal on locums, an indifferent husband and a man who was most widely known as a bumbling sidekick to a more brilliant companion. My meanness of spirit had been a long time coming, but my Sarah and my patients would be the better for it.

I placed my spare keys upon the hallstand, and closed the door behind me as I left. I may not be a good man, or a wise one – but I had finally decided that my beloved Sarah was mine, to have and to hold. Strange that Holmes himself has allowed me to see it with his pretense of Vaseline and belladonna. With Holmes four yards might just as well be four miles and anything else was an illusion.