Inside it’s cooler and even more quiet than it was outside. He tears around the back and pulls open the door. “John!” he shouts when he nears the gatehouse. The grass under his feet reaches as high as the top of his shoes and the big pond is covered with a thick layer of duckweed. Looking about him as he runs, he spies the half-hearted attempts at keeping up appearances but on the whole the borders and copses look eerily unkempt. Yesterday he was so intent on seeing John that he had no eye for the evidence of neglect sprawled all over the park. Sherlock feels his back ripple with unease. A few tits scurry in the undergrowth, pecking listlessly at the earth. The trees and shrubs stand motionless in the sweltering heat. After no more than two hundred metres sweat trickles in rivulets down his spine and over his ribs. Though it’s still early the morning is already unseasonably warm and with each slap of his feet against the ground, the clammy blanket of sultry air he’s pushing against is wrapped a little tighter around him. Straight after breakfast, Sherlock runs to the gatehouse. And you can deduce to your heart’s content for I’ve seen them all twice, so I already know who did it anyway.” I know you’re not one for watching telly but it’s a murder mystery so that will make you happy. “There’s a rerun of Miss Marple this afternoon. “I’ll make you a nice cuppa first,” she continues, unaware she has narrowly escaped falling victim to a collision with a fast-flying object. The cushion sails over her and lands safely in Sherlock’s chair. Snarling, he hurls it across the room, missing Mrs Hudson, who has just bent to pick up some of the stray papers in the middle of the carpet, by a narrow margin. With the object of burying his head beneath it he reaches for the nearest cushion at hand, only to find it is John’s Union Jack cushion, which he has curled around in search of comfort earlier. The inane chatter does nothing for Sherlock’s headache. A true friend would be happy for John making a go of it at last. Then she has the audacity to pat him on the shoulder. “At least it looks like the weather will be holding out for them,” she chirps. Mrs Hudson, in blissful oblivion, prattles on, rearranging the papers strewn over the coffee table. The headache that has been hovering just behind his eyes since John left has by now fully manifested itself and sits throbbing painfully and insistently. To keep himself from jumping from the sofa and physically bundling her out of the flat – for he would never do that, never mind that the prospect looks most tempting just now – he braces his feet against the armrest and groans in his most theatrical manner. He isn’t going to be pleased about that, you know.” Resolutely ignoring his demands to remove herself from the flat, she walks over to the nearest window and yanks open the curtains, allowing the bright glare of a convivial summer afternoon to sparkle on the white crests rising from the sea of papers that has overrun every flat surface in the living room. “John’s only been gone half a day and look at the mess you’ve made already. “Go away,” he growls, pulling his dressing gown even tighter around his shoulders and launching himself onto his other side, to present his back like a bulwark against the inquisitive sniffing of falsely gay landladies. Rather, Sherlock couldn’t be bothered to push it shut before collapsing onto the sofa. The fact that the door isn’t closed doesn’t mean she’s welcome, however. “Yoohoo, Sherlock?” Complying with some ridiculous notion of privacy, Mrs Hudson raps her knuckles perfunctorily against the frame of the door that is standing open wide before entering the flat.
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