A Study in Pink prt 1

I first met Sherlock Holmes on the serial suicides case. I was a new detective on the force, having only recently transferred from America.

Everyone warned me about him, of course, particularly Anderson and Donovan. There seemed to be some bad blood there, although I wasn't sure why at the time.

We met at the crime scene of the fourth suicide. I had just walked out of the building to see him and John Watson walk up to Anderson.

"Ah, Anderson," Sherlock said. "Here we are again."

"It's a crime scene. I don't want it contaminated," was Anderson's response. " Are we clear on that?"

"Quite clear." He took a deep breath. "And is your wife away for long?"

"Oh, don't pretend you worked that out. Somebody told you that."

"Your deodorant told me."

"My deodorant?"

Sherlock made a quirky face. "It's for men," he said.

"Well, of course it's for men," Anderson exclaimed indignantly. "I'm wearing it!"

The detective gestured to Donovan, who was standing near me. "So's Sergeant Donovan," he said.

Anderson turned to look back at Donovan, shock written all over his face. Sherlock sniffed pointedly.

"Ooh, and I think it just vaporised," he said. "May I go in?"

Anderson turned back to Sherlock. "Now look: whatever you're trying to imply…"

"I'm not implying anything," he interrupted, walking past Donovan to the doorway where I stood. "I'm sure Sally came round for a nice little chat, and just happened to stay over." He stopped and turned toward them. "And I assume she scrubbed your floors, going by the state of her knees."

I started laughing as the two of them stared at him in horror. He had a smug look on his face as he turned toward me.

"And who might you be?" He asked me.

"Oh sorry," I said, holding out my hand. "Julia Lee. I'm a new detective on the force. Came here from…"

"America, yes," he interrupted, taking my hand and shaking it. "Sherlock Holmes."

"I suppose the accent is a dead giveaway," I replied. "Yes, I know who you are, Mr Holmes. I was warned about you, but who is this? No one mentioned anything about a friend."

"Yes. Call me Sherlock, please." He gestured to John. "This is a colleague of mine, Doctor Watson."

"Hello, Doctor Watson." I shook his hand before leading them into a room where Detective Inspector Lestrade was waiting, putting on coveralls.

Sherlock pointed to a pile of similar items. "You need to wear one of these," he said to John.

"Who's this?" Lestrade asked.

"He's with me," he responded, taking off his gloves.

"But who is he?"

"I said he's with me."

John took off his jacket and began putting on a coverall, and I did the same. Sherlock just put on a pair of latex gloves.

"Aren't you gonna put one on?" John asked him, motioning to the coveralls. He gave the doctor a stern look, but said nothing.

"So where are we?" Sherlock asked Lestrade.

The detective inspector picked up another pair of latest gloves. "Upstairs."

I followed the three of them up the stairs.

"I can give you two minutes," Lestrade said to Sherlock.

"May need longer," he responded casually.

"Her name's Jennifer Wilson according to her credit cards. We're running them now for contact details. Hasn't been here long. Some kids found her."

We entered the room where the body of the woman lay. She was wearing a pink overcoat and heels.

Sherlock stepped into the room and stopped near the corpse, studying it. We stood in silence for a few seconds before he turned to Lestrade.

"Shut up," he said.

"I didn't say anything." He looked startled.

"You were thinking. It's annoying."

I grinned and Lestrade and John gave each other surprised looks as Sherlock stepped closer to the body and began to examine it. I took a step closer myself, curious.

After about a minute of examining Sherlock sat back, giving a satisfied smile.

"Got anything?" Lestrade asked.

"Not much," he replied nonchalantly. He took off his gloves and pulled out his phone.

She's German," Anderson said from the doorway behind me. "'Rache': it's German for 'revenge.' She could be trying to tell us something…"

Sherlock walked over to the door. "Yes, thank you for your input," he said sarcastically, shutting it in his face before walking back into the room.

"So she's German?" Lestrade asked.

"Of course she's not," the detective replied, still on his phone. "She's from out of town, though. Intended to stay in London for one night before returning home to Cardiff." He smiled smugly, putting his phone back in his pocket. "So far, so obvious."

"Sorry, obvious?" Asked the doctor.

"What about the message, though?" Lestrade asked.

"It wasn't German," I piped up. Everyone turned to look at me.

"Tell me, detective Lee," said Sherlock, "what do you think the message was?"

"She was writing Rachel," I responded, "wasn't she? And please, call me Julia."

"Yes, she was." Sherlock gave me an intrigued look before turning to John. "Doctor Watson, what do you think?" He asked him.

"Of the message?"

"Of the body. You're a medical man."

"Wait, no," Lestrade cut in. "We have a whole team right outside."

"They won't work with me," Sherlock responded.

"I'm breaking every rule letting you in here."

"Yes, because you need me."

Lestrade was silent for a few seconds. "Yes, I do," he said finally, looking down. "God help me."

Sherlock turned back to John. "Dr Watson?"

John looked between the body, Sherlock, me, and inspector Lestrade.

"Oh, do as he says," he said techily to the doctor. "Help yourself."

He left the room, yelling for Anderson to keep everyone out. I stayed put, watching the two hold a whispered conversation on the floor over the body. Lestrade came back in, standing just inside the doorway as John quickly examined the body. After a minute he sat up and looked to Sherlock.

"Yeah ... Asphyxiation, probably," he said. "Passed out, choked on her own vomit. Can't smell any alcohol on her. It could have been a seizure; possibly drugs."

"You know what it was. You've read the papers," the detective said.

"What, she's one of the suicides? The fourth …?"

"Sherlock – two minutes, I said," Lestrade interrupted. "I need anything you've got."

He spoke very rapid fire as he stood. "Victim is in her late thirties. Professional person, going by her clothes; I'm guessing something in the media, going by the frankly alarming shade of pink. Travelled from Cardiff today, intending to stay in London for one night. It's obvious from the size of her suitcase."

"Suitcase?"

"Suitcase, yes. She's been married at least ten years, but not happily. She's had a string of lovers but none of them knew she was married."

"Oh, for God's sake, if you're just making this up…"

He pointed to her left hand. "Her wedding ring. Ten years old at least. The rest of her jewellery has been regularly cleaned, but not her wedding ring. State of her marriage right there. The inside of the ring is shinier than the outside – that means it's regularly removed. The only polishing it gets is when she works it off her finger. It's not for work; look at her nails. She doesn't work with her hands, so what or rather who does she remove her rings for? Clearly not one lover; she'd never sustain the fiction of being single over that amount of time, so more likely a string of them. Simple."

"I nodded. "Makes sense," I said. "Amazing."

"That's brilliant," John said admiringly. Sherlock shot us a look.

"Sorry," the doctor said.

"Cardiff?" Lestrade asked.

"It's obvious, isn't it?"

"It's not obvious to me," John said.

Sherlock looked at the two of them. "Dear God, what is it like in your funny little brains? It must be so boring," he said. "Her coat: it's slightly damp. She's been in heavy rain in the last few hours. No rain anywhere in London in that time. Under her coat collar is damp, too. She's turned it up against the wind. She's got an umbrella in her left-hand pocket but it's dry and unused: not just wind, strong wind – too strong to use her umbrella. We know from her suitcase that she was intending to stay overnight, so she must have come a decent distance but she can't have travelled more than two or three hours because her coat still hasn't dried. So, where has there been heavy rain and strong wind within the radius of that travel time?" He pulled out his phone and showed us what he had been looking at earlier: a weather map. "Cardiff."

"That's fantastic!" John exclaimed.

"D'you know you do that out loud?" Sherlock asked in a low voice.

"Sorry I'll shut up."

"No, it's… fine."

"Why d'you keep saying suitcase?" Lestrade cut in. Sherlock turned around in a circle.

"Yes, where is it? She must have had a phone or an organiser. Find out who Rachel is."

"So she actually was writing Rachel?"

"No, she was leaving an angry note in German," he replied sarcastically. "Of course she was writing Rachel; no other word it can be. Question is: why did she wait until she was dying to write it? And how did you come to that conclusion?" He added, turning to me.

"Well it's obvious, isn't it?" I said. Lestrade and John shook their heads.

"There's no reason for her to write out revenge in another language," I explained. "It would be a meaningless and painful waste of valuable time. So she'd write something that had meaning, something important. And since she wasn't writing Rache it had to be an unfinished word, so Rachel it is. The only question is: why Rachel?"

"Well done, detective," Sherlock said approvingly. "Looks like there is hope for Scotland Yard yet."

"Thank you."

"Okay, so she was writing Rachel," Lestrade said. " But how d'you know she had a suitcase?"

Sherlock pointed to her right leg. I looked closely at it as he spoke. "Back of the right leg: tiny splash marks on the heel and calf, not present on the left. She was dragging a wheeled suitcase behind her with her right hand. Don't get that splash pattern any other way. Smallish case, going by the spread. Case that size, woman this clothes-conscious: could only be an overnight bag, so we know she was staying one night." He squatted by her body and examined her legs. "Now, where is it? What have you done with it?"

"There wasn't a case."

Sherlock looked slowly up at the inspector with a frown. "Say that again."

"There wasn't a case. There was never any suitcase."

He got to his feet and ran out of the room, calling out as he raced down the stairs. "Suitcase! Did anyone find a suitcase? Was there a suitcase in this house?"

We followed him out of the room, stopping on the landing. "Sherlock, there was no case!" Lestrade called out to him.

Sherlock slowed down a bit. "They take the poison themselves; they chew, swallow the pills themselves. There are clear signs. Even you lot couldn't miss them."

"Right, yeah, thanks. And?"

"It's murder, all of them. I don't know how, but they're not suicides, they're killings – serial killings." He held up his hands in front of himself with delight. "We've got ourselves a serial killer. I love those. There's always something to look forward to."

"Oh, fun," I said, grinning. The others gave me a weird look. "What?" I asked.

"Why are you saying that?" Lestrade asked Sherlock, not answering me.

"Her case! Come on, where is her case? Did she eat it? Someone else was here, and they took her case." He spoke more quietly. "So the killer must have driven her here; forgot the case was in the car."

"She could have checked into a hotel, left her case there," John said. Sherlock looked back up at us.

"No, she never got to the hotel. Look at her hair. She colour-coordinates her lipstick and her shoes. She'd never have left any hotel with her hair still looking…" He stopped talking suddenly, then his face lit up. "Oh. Oh!" He clapped his hands together.

"Sherlock?" John asked.

"What is it, what?" Said Lestrade.

Sherlock smiled cheerfully to himself. "Serial killers are always hard," he said. "You have to wait for them to make a mistake."

"We can't just wait!"

"Oh, we're done waiting!" He hurried back down the stairs. "Look at her, really look! Houston, we have a mistake. Get on to Cardiff: find out who Jennifer Wilson's family and friends were. Find Rachel!" He reached the bottom of the stairs and disappeared from view.

"Of course, yeah – but what mistake?!" Lestrade called after him. He came back and ran up a few steps before stopping and yelling up at us, "PINK!"

And he was off.