Prelude to a Partnership

by Miss Roylott

  Prelude to a Partnership

  Miss Roylott

  Published: 2009

  Tag(s): "Sherlock Holmes" slash LGBT

  Prelude to a Partnership

  © 2009, 2010 Miss Roylott

  http://cress4.blogspot.com/

  Preface

  For anyone who did not read the description of this book, this is a tale of same-sex romance between Holmes and Watson. This is your last warning, so please do not claim to be shocked by the content of this book. I do not seek to offend anyone, and I only want willing readers.

  Also, since this pastiche takes place in an alternate universe where Holmes and Watson met before 1881, it need not disturb your own point of view about what "really" happened.

  * * *

  This novel-length story was originally published on my website in 2002 under the shorter title of Prelude, and I now reproduce it as an ebook. As it was published under my pseudonym of Miss Roylott, I retain that here, to avoid confusion. The title refers to the chance encounter that takes place in chapter 1, which influences the later behavior and relationship of the characters.

  In the years since I first wrote this, some of the websites that I originally cited in my footnotes no longer exist, so I have made some alterations where necessary. The footnote about the Code Napoleon is now based on Chapter 2 of Graham Robb's book Strangers: Homosexual Love in the Nineteenth Century. Beyond my amendments to the notes, I have made only minor changes to the text, mostly confined to chapter 4.

  In addition to the main romance, this book also attempts to explain certain odd problems in A Study in Scarlet, such as the issue of Mrs. Hudson's dead dog and Jefferson Hope's untreated injuries from breaking through the window. Such obscurities may only be noticeable if you compare the novels side by side. I hope you don't mind the footnotes, and can enjoy reading this unorthodox pastiche.

  Chapter 1

  The Episode of the Closet

  I have done it, I have succumbed to my dreadful weakness. What violent scandal there would be if my family knew! It was all so shameful, too—sordid, hurried, and dirty. I broke away from Bart's[1] for the weekend, so nerve-wracked and wretched with my carnal thoughts that I resolved finally to give up my resistance and just have a man. Any man. The barest modicum of restraint remaining within me warned that I must not be discovered by anyone who knew me; it would be the ruin of my career and my life. So I left London to relieve my unwholesome craving, taking only my old university gown with me, for I intended to use it as a sort of disguise.

  Riding in the railway carriage toward my destination, I almost felt as if I were journeying backward in time. I remembered well my early undergraduate years and the typical abandon with which we young scholars consecrated ourselves to exploring every nuance of life and love and ideas, whether they be ignoble or not. I remembered the intimate friendships that one formed in those ivory towers, and the illicit temptations that emerged within the shadows of those venerable colleges.

  More than that, I knew that it must be this same way at every such university, every academy brimming with impressionable young minds and hearts, year after year. Indeed, I also knew that now, at a university safely distant from my own, I could easily find one of those fresh young lads who would be receptive to my advances. It could not be that hard, after all, to seduce a young man; certainly not as hard as my faint-hearted charade these days of wooing varied women.

  Upon my arrival at the platform, I put on my gown over my street clothes before going into town. Like in some fairy story, my black gown would be my cloak of invisibility, to render me anonymous and unremarkable among all the other young men passing to and fro in their gowns. In any case, I have been told often enough that my face and figure are very commonplace, easily mistaken for other men's.

  So with feigned leisure, I strolled among the grand old edifices of the university and carefully devised my strategy for finding those students who would be likely candidates for my sinful purpose. I knew I could not just go hunting among the colleges,[2] for the eagle-eyed porters at the gates would likely take note of any strangers coming into the residences; I could not risk their suspicions. I determined instead to find an ongoing lecture or practicum, where I might discreetly drop in and pass unnoticed by the students and the dons. Then I could chat up a chap or two, and hopefully manage to coax someone's interest.

  Not knowing the schedule of the lectures here, I followed a cluster of students striding purposefully along. They entered an imposing, magnificent building evidently dedicated to philosophy, according to what I read of the Latin inscriptions on the façade. I swerved away from this building, knowing full well that I could not sit through a lecture on philosophy and risk someone questioning me about the subject. Therefore I sought out the subjects I had read in my own curriculum, so that I might reasonably pass myself off as a student.

  Soon I found the university's medical school and went inside. If I wandered in either egregiously late or early for a class, I would explain myself as being new to the university and muddled—which of course, I was. There were a number of both auditoriums and laboratories contained within, and I quietly passed by each room glimpsing inside for students. I wanted a crowd into which I might blend; attractive students would be nice too.

  I found a chemical laboratory moderately full of students and entered. They had naturally all hung up their black gowns in order to avoid chemical stains, as well the danger of the loose garments catching fire in the Bunsen burners. I removed my own gown too and approached one dashing, fun-looking fellow, asking him where the professor might be.

  "Which professor?" he asked me.

  Which?—Was no one here to supervise this lab?

  He chuckled a very pleasant chuckle. "Oh, well, this is independent research we are doing here. The lab is open for us to use without a professor."

  "Oh!" I looked embarrassed and apologised, explaining that I was new to the university and a bit muddled. I must be at the wrong place.

  "We all are, sometimes!" He shook my hand and introduced himself to me; I answered with an alias that I had chosen for the occasion, James Morris. Douglas was very friendly and continued to converse with me while he worked on his research. I questioned him about it and he invited me to assist him. We were getting on rather splendidly, and I sincerely hoped that he would not turn out to be revolted if and when I kissed him.

  Yet while we chattered on and worked together, I began to feel the hairs on the back of my neck standing on end. I felt as if someone were behind me, watching me, and when I turned around I indeed found a young man staring at me openly from across the room. He was a tall, thin, dark-haired fellow with a hawk-like face, perched there behind his own arrangement of instruments and flasks and pipes. His chemicals were certainly brewing with activity, but he did not pay attention to them at all, just standing there brazenly peering at me with his grey eyes. I scowled at him, but he would not shake his gaze.

  Douglas noticed my distraction and, seeing the over-inquisitive student, he looked sympathetically at me. "The cheek! Did his mother never teach him manners?" He kept his voice fairly low to avoid arousing the attention of all the other students in the room.

  Douglas began to ask me to keep an eye on his chemicals for a moment, no doubt intending to go over and have a word with the dark-haired young man. I however was seized with a sudden and terrible uneasiness about the whole situation, and, unable to withstand it any longer, I made scattered apologies to Douglas and left the laboratory. Douglas started to follow after me, asking me the name of my college, that he might see me later, but his chemicals called him back by disastrously bubbling over onto the tabletop. His experiment was too delicate to withstand his neglect for long; after cleaning up
the mess, he would probably have to start all over again.

  I withdrew down the passage and retreated to a lonely corner, too upset to think much about poor Douglas. I inwardly cursed that intrusive idiot for spoiling my chances, and I also cursed myself for my unexpected cowardice. Why did I let that wretched fellow shake my nerves so much? Why did I run away? He wasn't really a porter, after all; he just reminded me of one. I sank down to the floor with a sigh and wondered why my life should have to be so miserable. It was probably due to my perversion.

  I heard footsteps approaching me then and for a moment thought that Douglas had come looking for me after all, so I quickly got up to my feet. I soon saw to my disappointment that it was not he, but rather the dark-haired student, coming with a black gown draped over his arm. Why didn't his chemical research need him, damn it?

  "You left your gown behind," he said quietly to me. "Not a very wise move."

  I was incensed with him and snatched back my gown testily.

  He then had the audacity to try to apologise to me, in what I felt was a very insincere and placating voice. "I realise that my imprudent and concentrated stare has upset you, and I would like to explain, if I might—"

  His cool, collected manner only enraged me more. I dragged him by his coat-sleeve further away from the main corridor, to an isolated space well out of earshot and eyesight of any passers-by, and I had it out with him. "Listen here, you, I want to know who you are, and why I shouldn't thrash the hell out of you for your boorishness!"

  "I assure you that I meant no harm," he insisted in that eminently reasonable tone. "I watch people as a sort of hobby; I observe details about them as a mental exercise—"

  "Exercise for what? Offending people?!"

  "I apologise. I am usually never so blatant, but the details about you simply fascinated me so much. Such a wealth of things to analyse and deduce from."

  He bewildered me. "Are you some kind of crackpot?"

  "No, what I do is read your appearance, your things, for clues. Your gown, for instance, is similar to the gowns of students here, but it is subtly and distinctly different in ways that are suggestive—"

  I looked with horror to the gown on my arm and felt the meaning of his words sink in slowly. He somehow knew that I was not a student at this university, that I had come to this town only just today. The thought of what else he might know frightened and sickened me. As he kept talking, I wondered madly if I was being followed, watched. Had my family suspected my awful weakness and hired some spy to keep me in check? I dropped my gown on the floor, and he stopped talking long enough to glance at me.

  "Is something wrong?" he asked, stepping closer. "You look ill."

  I would not give him the satisfaction of watching me faint, so I fought back for control of myself. Launching myself at him, I grabbed him by the shoulders and pushed him back against the wall. "Who are you?" I demanded. "What business is it of yours what I do?!"

  "Calm down, man. Calm down." He tried to brush me off, and I only held onto him more roughly, hoping to bruise him.

  "Answer me!" I choked through my anger.

  He exhibited a surprising strength in fighting me, and my rage only deepened as he tried to restrain my violent temper with soothing words and his renewed stare. Fixed on me so sharply, his clear grey eyes seemed to be trying to mesmerise me and overpower me with their intensity.

  I stubbornly shoved at him, like a schoolyard bully used to having his way, and he matched my force with his own. Making no headway began to frustrate and exhaust me. "Just leave me alone," I growled in my distress and unhappiness. "I came all this way, and you just… I hate you, I hate you!"

  Then without knowing why, I kissed him furiously, violently. Just as inexplicably, he stood still and stopped fighting me.

  Without warning and without thought I found myself touching this young man, caressing his face and hair, devouring his soft mouth. As he sighed and closed his eyes, I pulled him with me toward a nearby closet. He was willing; he had a tendency. He responded to my hunger and drank in my kisses like one who is savouring a excellent vintage. Maybe this was really why he had stared at me with such absorbed interest. We shut ourselves inside the little closet and jammed the door so that we would not be disturbed. Then we took our guilty pleasure there in the darkness. It was wordless, shameless, heedless of all decency in that cramped space. I did not know nor care what his name was. All I wanted was his body, his touch.

  When I had at last satisfied my depraved appetite, I released him from my carnal embrace. We dressed hurriedly and then unjammed the door, exiting carefully so that no one would see us. From the look in his eyes he seemed to want to say something to me as we stood alone in that secluded nook, but I shook my head and he, being more mature than most of his peers, simply stood silent. He stooped to pick up my dropped gown from the floor and handed it back to me. Turning, I parted from him immediately and scurried to be away. I left the building and soon the town, too shocked at my actions to remain for the whole weekend, as I had originally intended.

  Since my return to London, I am of course unfit to do the work on my thesis[3] which I ought to have done this weekend. I am too distracted and restless with thinking of what I have done with that dark-haired, delicious student. I have probably thrown away all my righteous upbringing today, and by tomorrow the shame and regret will bear down on me, I'm sure. But it felt so damn good!

  Chapter 2

  The Whims of Fate

  Sherlock Holmes. That is his name. I never knew it until today, nor did I ever expect to see him again, but providence (or the Devil) seems to have a cruel sense of irony. It must be five years now since that evil weekend that I strayed from London and infiltrated a university for the sake of anonymous, unnatural fornication. After all this time, after my service in India and Afghanistan, after my wound and my illness, and after these listless and lonely weeks spent in London, my past finally comes back to shatter my complacence.

  I should have had a premonition of it when I ran into Stamford at the Criterion. He was a dresser under me at Bart's, around the same time as my encounter with Holmes. Yet who would ever think that two men from such disparate parts of my life would come to meet eventually, or that I should happen upon those same two men on the same fateful day?

  Over lunch at the Holborn, Stamford had suggested Holmes to me as someone with whom I might share affordable lodgings, and I had no reason of course to recognise the name. Stamford described the man's eccentric character and his puzzling studies as we made our way to the hospital, but he had never spoken of his appearance. I don't suppose I should have recognised Holmes by physical description, anyway, not after five years. So it came as a shock to me to suddenly see him there, flesh and blood, looking scarcely older than he had at our previous meeting.

  Stamford brought me down to the chemical laboratory where the fellow was working. From the view of his back, he looked to me like any diligent student bent over his retorts, test-tubes, and Bunsen lamps. So far, nothing disturbing about this Sherlock Holmes.

  As he heard our approach, however, he turned around to us, and now I caught my breath. There was no mistaking those grey eyes, that angular face, and those stained hands—he was the same student I had encountered in a different laboratory five years ago. I felt frozen and guilty, as if that episode in the closet had occurred only yesterday.

  Sherlock Holmes did not really see me at first, his attention focused solely upon the results of his chemical experiment. He sprang up from his seat and came toward Stamford, wielding a test-tube in his hand. "I've found it! I've found it!" he cried out with a boyish delight. "I have found a re-agent which is precipitated by haemoglobin, and by nothing else."

  Raising a restraining hand, Stamford stopped him from continuing with his excited announcement. "Dr. Watson, Mr. Sherlock Holmes," he introduced us.

  Now Holmes took a good look at me, glancing at me from head to toe, and by the change in his eyes, I saw that he recognised me too. He did not lo
ok as horrified as I felt.

  He extended his hand to me. "How—" But no, "how do you do?" was too cool a greeting for someone he knew intimately already. I could see the thought in his smile. "How are you?" he said instead. He shook my hand and watched my face for my reaction. "You have been in Afghanistan, I perceive."

  I was taken aback. "How on earth did you know that?" A horrifying idea struck me that he had followed me from his university back to London, that he had somehow been following me ever since.

  "Never mind," he said, chuckling softly. Holmes pointed out his test-tube again. "The question now is about haemoglobin. No doubt you see the significance of this discovery of mine?"

  I wrenched my mind onto the subject of his experiment, searching for merely conversational words to dispel my anxiety and distress. I shrugged. "It is interesting, chemically, no doubt, but practically—"

  He seemed put out, and insisted that I share his enthusiasm. "Why, man, it is the most practical medico-legal discovery for years. Don't you see that it gives us an infallible test for blood stains? Come over here now!" He seized me by the coat-sleeve and drew me over to the table at which he had been working, whereupon he put away his test-tube into a nearby rack and reached for a bodkin. "Let us have some fresh blood."

  At that remark, Stamford smiled and winked at me, as if to comment upon the difficulty in diverting Holmes, when once he had launched upon a subject that stimulated him. Stamford watched us with amusement, little knowing that my discomfort did not lie with Holmes's monopoly on the conversation.

  Holmes pricked one of his fingers and mixed a drop of the resulting blood into a litre of water. He then added various ingredients to the solution, all the while talking incessantly about his remarkable test for haemoglobin. The result was an instantaneous colour change, and the precipitation of a brownish dust to the bottom of the glass jar.