Under the heaviness of low gray skies, against the backdrop of the immense blue-black Atlantic, beneath perilous and steep hanging earthen cliffs, Holmes eyes appear almost turquoise. Anna stumbles on her thoughts as they get caught up with rampant emotions.
“You refer to Lady Banks?” She stalls to collect her thoughts. She can’t help but wonder how it is that Sherlock knows her motives better than she.
She mutters, “In a word, No. For example, in the discussion of the initiator’s bag of tricks. You never talked about the main ploy.”
Holmes knows her meaning but asks her to explain herself, “And that is?”
Anna speaks frankly, “Sex!”
Sherlock says simply, “Go on.”
Anna does, “Lady Banks purpose is to give the illusions of a monogamous heterosexual union. Thus I assume that the main agenda is priming Lady Banks for this task. In other words bagging Lady Banks involves bedding Lady Banks. And I assume this affair compromises her.”
“Indeed,” Holmes says and adds, “Remember Watson, ‘the devil is in the details.’”
She picks up on Sherlock’s point, “Speaking of the devil, where do we start with Lord Banks?”
Sandpipers dig frantically for clams in the surf’s wake. “I’m a steam roller baby, guaranteed to blow your mind,” is all Holmes says.
Anna struggles with the sand, the wind. He extends his hand for her to catch up. Anna looks at Holmes closely to see if he jests. She is struck by his quick recall of pop American culture. She quips back, “Somehow I don’t think that James Taylor had Lord Banks in mind when he wrote that lyric, did he?”
The stiff north wind bullies them as they face it head on. Holmes decides to retreat, “Let’s walk back along the water’s edge.”
Anna takes one last look around. The surf is picking up a punch. The seagulls frolic in the wind’s squalls. The fog advances. Observing the mad rush of sand crabs to secure a land hold, her thought returns to Lady Banks. She asks quite casually, “Holmes is every Lady Banks story sordid in its details?”
“Are you asking me if Lord Banks and Lady Banks live happily ever after?”
“Oh damn I am. Holmes, you must think I’m possessed.”
Sherlock stops. He turns towards her. With bone cold hands he lifts her chin upwards. His aquamarine eyes find Anna’s troubled brown pelican eyes, “It’s a story of possession.”
Anna holds her tongue knowing the truth when she hears it.
Mycroft and Dodd are perched precariously upon the pub’s railing overlooking the steep cliff’s side. Dodd in his wool cap, slightly tattered oatmeal sweater, and salt and pepper stubble strikes a pose off the cover of ‘Shipping News.’ However, his green snake skin cowboy boots give it all away. He is West End London all the way.
Mycroft’s pose is equally smart. The North Wind brushes his cheeks raw and ruddy. His wool cap sits askew his flame colored hair. Surely now, he was born within the hole of a schooner. Anna dubs them the Smith Brothers from the cough drop dynasty.
Mycroft calls out to them, “Find any dinosaurs today?”
Anna answers, “Just this one!” She takes hold of Sherlock’s hand.
The brisk walk back to the depot reinvigorates the musketeers. On board they make themselves comfortable in the club car. The guys order Guinness on tap. Anna passes. No need to pressure her bladder. On the train ride back to Bishop Ledyards, conversation starts off with the news on the explosive happenings in London.
Mycroft relates, “In old London town, it is business as usual. All around arrests are imminent.”
Anna ignites a hot subject with a simple question; “Is Islam about to bring down Western Civilization?”
Mycroft jumps on it first, “Not as I see it, mate. Terrorism is not about Islam. As I see it we are stuck in the mother of all bloody traffic jams.”
Anna doesn’t know if he is serious or dismissing the matter. She presses him, “A ‘round about’ cock up, as you say here?”
Mycroft smiles politely at Anna’s pitiful attempt at East End slang. He expands, “I think of it more as a twelve lane speedway merging into one lane. It’s rush hour on the globe. Everyone is rushing to squeeze through the hourglass of time, to pass from the old world into the new. If you’ll excuse a switch in metaphors.”
His audience of three urges him to go on. He needs no encouragement. The force is with him. He is animated. He is back in his tutor’s room at Cambridge. He picks up speed, as does the locomotive as it weaves through the small idyllic villages that pepper the carefully sculpted landscape of green upon green. He lets fly his red hair from its ponytail confines. He shakes loose his tresses as if to free up his thoughts. Guzzling a gulp of Guinness he wets his gullet and goes on,
“Today the population explosion is off the grid. Families cannot feed, house, clothe, educate, or simply insure a livelihood for their own. Likewise, villages, towns, cities, nations, whole continents are pushed to break point with the scale of people demanding all of the above. With breakdown, breakout happens. It’s a stampede of millions decimating borders.”
He pauses to empty his glass. He picks up the pace, “As I see it, a New Millennium Mind Set is absolutely necessary. Its principle must be ‘accommodate and integrate.’ If anything is to derail the course of Western Civilization, it is this, the mass movement of millions of people from the poorer, less established centers into the more affluent established regions. The nature of such an ominous crush of people is destabilization on a scale that we cannot fathom.
There is, if I may borrow the familiar phrase, a clash of cultures. The twelfth century meets the twenty-first. The new world threatens the old world mind-set. Islam is one example. This fear expresses itself as a reactionary standoff. And the world is a sadder place.
I don’t see that fundamental Islam is flexible enough or expansive enough to become a viable mind set for the new millennium. But it is a blip in the massive wave of disruption that faces the world today. If Islam turns the world away from reality than it is a secondary factor in the decline of Western Civilization. But the primary concern is people, people and more people.
Anna peers over her glasses at Mycroft and asks “And terrorism where does that fit into your landscape of things?”
Mycroft’s passion rises, “As I said, Western Civilization’s paradigm construct is obsolete. There are no super powers. A power vacuum exists, despite the ranting of your cowboy president. Bravado aside, the hard fact is that a band of renegades has him on the run.
Terrorists exploit the power vacuum. Hordes of hoodlums are loose upon the landscape. In the New Millennium, Outlaws rule.”
Anna turns to Dodd, “What do you say? Is Islam just a voice crying out from the drowning masses?”
Dodd unfolds his ladder legs. He scratches the stubble on his chin. He expresses his version, “I agree with Crofty on this. However, my shifting paradigm would include markets. The shifting sphere of influence away from the West to the East creates enormous waves of unrest and rising insecurities. No one wants to be left behind.”
Anna is eager to see wherein Sherlock enters the debate. “Well, Mr. Sherlock Holmes, is it Malthus or markets?”
Sherlock is sitting opposite Anna. His eyes move upwards from their pensive downward gaze. His green stare finds hers. He attempts to enlighten the troupe. “The paradigm shift is bigger than Islam, emerging and declining populations and markets. In my humble opinion, I think that the current state of unrest results from the shift in the magnetic poles. My cosmologist friends point to shifts occurring in the outer limits. I am an earthbound scholar so I rest my case on the historic and disturbing rise in the temperature of the earth.”
Dodd tosses his watch cap at Sherlock, “Really, Holmes, are you suggesting that the earth has fever?”
Sherlock anticipating the action catches the cap in mid-air. He answers without hesitation, “Spot on! Consider the symptoms of fever. It throws you for a loop. Likewise, the earth, it is a living, breathing organism
. Its fever results in a rash of famines, a run of floods, bowel-breaking earthquakes. Islam and for that matter fundamental evangelic Christianity are the sinking lifeboats to which the victims who fear change cling.”
Back in the Rover, Anna relishes this refreshing and expansive exchange of ideas. She realizes that she misses the company of thinking souls. Dodd, at the wheel, steers the conversation back to the graces of the passing countryside. “Very near here you will find the Hester Combe Gardens. They have it all; a lake, a waterfall and a witch house.”
Anna takes in the landscape. She comments, “You see right out here is a telling difference between the British and American mind set.”
Mycroft turns around to see what has Anna’s attention. Dodd peers at her through the rear view mirror. Sherlock looks ahead at the two in front and merely shrugs his shoulders to show that he hasn’t a clue either.
Anna oblivious to their antics goes on to explain. “The fences… your fences are one with the landscape be they crumbling, weathered beaten stonewalls, dense copse of mulberries, or lush, thick heritage hedges. They embrace design, function and history. Now consider American fences. They are invariably made of cold menacing barb wire.”
Dodd adds, “Don’t fence me in!”
Mycroft expands and entertains the troupe with a round of “Give me land lots of land where…”
The foursome enjoys an evening of pure distraction from the perils of living. Bach Night at the Pub is just what the over talked, over analyzed troupe needed. As Anna and Sherlock walk quietly back to their respective cottages, she hears Sherlock singing,
“Black Birds singing in the dead of night. All your life you were waiting for this moment to arrive. Take these sunken eyes and see.”
Once again, much to her chagrin, Anna wakes abruptly to the pitter-patter of Mary’s little lambs as they file by her window.
“Why can’t they leave those poor little lambs in the meadow at night? The blasted sun sleeps yet. The damn mutton can’t even see!”
Anna punches the pillow, fluffs the comforter, hoping to find sleep yet in her bed. She hides her head under the pillow. After a time, she abandons the wish for more sleep. She showers. Dressed, packed and bed stripped, Anna exits the genuinely cozy cottage, knowing that she will ever enjoy its comforts again.
Mycroft steps out at the same time with bag in tow. The two walk side by side. Mycroft remarks, “I always find it hard to leave this place.”
Anna agrees “Hmm.
Mycroft throws his knapsack into the rear seat of his very used, modest to the max, Escort. He scans the surroundings. He shakes his head, shrugs his shoulders and concludes: “The flowers in the garden mark your absence. And rejoice the day of your return.’”
Anna knows the lyric, she replies, “‘Sueno,’ this place is truly an old Italian love song. I will miss it.”
Mycroft quickly recovers from his moment of reflection. He changes directions and remarks, “But! I can tell you this. I never miss for one moment those awful foul smelling wooly creatures. Why can’t they sleep in when I am here? Really, what do they have to do that is so important and so damn pressing that they have to start before sun up? All they ever do is meander aimlessly around the same pasture again and again.”
Sherlock joins them, “Top of the morning, Anna, dear brother.”
Anna watches to see where Sherlock will stow his faded blue rut sack. Without a missed step, without a moment’s hesitation, he opens the door to the mini minor and throws it alongside Anna’s things. He then asks after Dodd, “Is the lord of the manor about?”
Just then Dodd joins them. He is packed and ready to hit the road too. “Did I hear my name?”
He hands Anna and Sherlock a thermos of hot Blue Mountain coffee. He takes Anna aside. He hands her a key ring with a Celtic cross and two keys.
“This is for the front door to the main house. The other is for your cottage. You have your own keys now. So come and go as you please.”
He enfolds the keys into her hand. From his inside jacket pocket, he retrieves a slip of blue paper. “This is my cell #, anytime, day or night. But this is not adieu. You are coming with us to Paris. You must advise me on the flat.” He gives her a big hug and gets into his car.
Mycroft waves goodbye as he joins Dodd for the trip back to London. “Dinner at eight, Baker Street...Sherlock?”
“If we are not there by eight, do start without us,” Sherlock yells back as they drive off, gravel flying in their wake.
Anna maneuvers the mini out onto the main road, Sherlock offers, “I say Watson, as the navigator, I suggest that we take the scenic route.”
Anna smirks and says only, “Have mini, will travel Holmes.”
“Hmmm…indeed” Holmes mutters under his breath.
His itinerary passes through miles of wooded glens. He directs Anna to detour down a one-lane dirt passage in order to spy upon the private botanical and architectural showcases reserved for the privileged few. He waxes eloquently on the flora and fauna of the ancient tree line carriageways. He insists that Anna stop upon an historic bridge dating back to Roman times.
“Is this a legal stop? Are we trespassing?” Anna asks as she steps from the car.
Sherlock overrides her worry and just points her eye to the landscape before them.
“Wow! So this is the home of Constable’s muse.”
For a moment her worries about trespassing dissipate as she takes in the beauty of the old gravel road grown over with wild grasses and graced on either side with ancient trees with serpentine trunks.
Sherlock adds, “A Constable sky indeed, cumulous clouds topped in pristine white with the soft gray base. Watson, observe how the clouds merge, a sure sign of a change in the weather. Walk on with me.”
With her head out of the clouds now, Anna returns to the matter at hand, “But the car? We can’t leave it here. What if someone wants to pass?”
Sherlock walks ahead, “Have you seen any cars in the last hour, Watson?”
As Anna assumes her position at his side, Holmes asks her, “Got a penny?”
Anna checks her pockets and wonders what is next could it be a science experiment. Or perhaps he is asking what is on her mind. She discounts an inquiry to her thoughts, as he most certainly knows that her thought is the rental car parked in the middle of the road. The mystery of the penny resolves itself as they come upon a deserted old well.
“A wishing well… ”
Holmes remains perfectly still. He allows the magic of the place to free Anna’s imagination. She leans precariously over the well’s crumbling stonewall to look within. He thinks to caution her. But he draws back, lest the moment be diminished by any sound of fear. And besides, the very action of searching into the abyss should engage her daring. He feels that a bit more imagination and daring will serve her well.
Anna speaks directly into the hollow. The well’s echo adds a dash of bravado.
“At university my favorite period of study was the Romantic Age. We exchanged heady discussions on the relationship between the Romantics and their love of nature. I was sure that I grasped its mystic. However, only now do I feel the connection. In this place I can hear the hills breath. I can feel the grass growing under my feet. ”
Sherlock lowers his eyes, a trace of a soft smile curls his furry lip, and he adds, “Local lore claims that this is a holy well Supposedly, Joseph of Aramethea passed this way.”
Anna asks eagerly, “Was Jesus with him?”
“The story changes from person to person and from century to century. Though the locals, here about swear that Magdalene and Jesus drank the water therein.”
Anna jumps ahead of Holmes, “What do you believe?”
Sherlock says, “The story is appealing, but it is a bit out of their way.”
Anna asks “Shall we find the road again?”
Sherlock motions her to follow him. “I want you to see something. It’s quite apropos, Watson.”
Anna is curious, “What?”
She is beginning to suspect that any time he calls her Watson that then he is back to the Lady Banks agenda.
Sherlock makes his way over a broken wooden fence. He calls to Anna, “Here, is still here and it is in bloom.”
Anna anxious to see what has captures this erudite man’s attention scurries. Before her is a delicious butter yellow rose bush. Anna doesn’t know what to make of it.
“A rose bush…?”
Not wanting to keep her guessing, Sherlock answers, “The name of this rose is Lady Banks. You only find them now in ancient rose gardens.”
“Really…? I assume there is a story behind the name?”
Sherlock asks her, “Take a close look.”
He takes hold of a stem, “It is a thorn less rose propagated by Lord Banks at Kew Gardens in the eighteenth century presumably he named it after his wife.”
Anna takes a closer look. But as she takes stem in hand she pricks her thumb. She lets out a small cry, “Damn…”
Holmes can’t believe that she is bleeding. He grabs hold of her hand and gently wraps it in his handkerchief.
“Sorry Watson, I should have said almost thorn less rose. Legend says however that the rose pricks only those who belong to the sacred heart.”
Anna draws back and with grave doubt she says only, “God Holmes…!”
Holmes points her in the direction of the car.
Anna jumps back, “So what’s your point here that your Lady Banks shares the same name because she is defenseless as well? Without thorns…?”
Sherlock likes her spunk and quick association. “Also Kew Gardens was known back then as spy central. And it was the place of choice for secret assignations of the gay community.”
The Christmas Pudding Lie Page 14
