Family Deductions

"Sylvia's my other sister," Adam explained as they headed to the door, Sherlock watching him closely. "And Eddie's my brother. When they said my brother was here, that's who I was expecting to see. Not you two."

"How many of you are there?" Sherlock asked with a small chuckle.
"There's myself, Carole, Eddie, Sylvia and Amanda."
"Amanda's dead, she doesn't count," Sherlock replied rather harshly as he walked swiftly down the corridor leading the way back to the morgue.

He burst through the doors where Molly was making some notes on the uninteresting heart attack victim. "Can you wheel out the Jane Doe from the Thames for us Molly?" Sherlock asked politely, giving her a charming smile.

"Um...yeah, sure," she smiled back and went to the lock up, wheeling out the body of the girl. Adam staggered back in horror and shock, his hand going to his mouth.

"Is this Carole Waugh?" Sherlock asked.
"No," Adam replied. "This is my other sister...Sylvia..."

The detective's assistant thought as the three of them walked down the corridor to the morgue and Jackson spoke of his family members that the list of suspects was growing at an alarming rate.

In the morgue John nodded to Molly, she gave him a terse 'now what?' look. He quickly got out his notebook, leaned on the desk, and took down the details of Adam Jackson's family while Sherlock carried on with the interview.

John was aware that Jackson hadn't replied to his question about a jewellery buyer and jotted that down although he knew Sherlock would already have stored that fact in his head.

He waited for a lull in the exchange “Sorry to ask, but what's Carole's husband called please, his first name, are they still a couple?” John requested.

Adam seemed a little weak at the knees. He clearly hadn't been expecting to find his sister dead, or at least not this particular sister. Sherlock placed his hand on the man's shoulder to stop him falling over and led him quickly to a chair, with help from Molly.

He smiled at John's question, impressed, and nodded at Adam that he should answer it. "His name's Peter. They're not together anymore. Split up last year, just waiting for the divorce to go through."

"Tell us about the necklace," Sherlock pushed, standing quite close in Adam's personal space. "It was found on Sylvia's body, loose in the pocket of her coat, yet we have a receipt to show it was bought by Carole, your other sister. Why was she looking to sell it? She only bought it three weeks ago."

Adam bit his bottom lip, unwilling to talk. After a pause he muttered, "Don't know." Sherlock laughed quite heartily and slapped him on the back.

"Mister Jackson," he smiled. "I already know you murdered Amanda with an injection of botulinum because she was having an affair with your wife Laura, so saying 'I don't know' just isn't going to cut it I'm afraid."
Adam paled significantly at Sherlock's words, looking like he'd seen a ghost.
"How...the...hell..."

John noted that their suspect looked very shaken to discover that his sister Sylvia was dead and had suddenly refused to answer another question before saying he didn't know the answer. Sherlock must be sure that he was hiding something or lying. He made ready if the man attempted to bolt in desperation.

The doctor also had another question suddenly as he looked at his notes in the inheritance of ear patterning in families.

“Mr Jackson,” John piped up, “Mr Holmes can tell you which side of the bed you sleep on. There aren't any twins in you family.” he phrased it as a challenge rather than a question. It might be a poor question but it was to throw the suspect further off balance.

Sherlock chuckled lightly to himself. He always found it amusing when people were flabberghasted by his deductions.

Adam Jackson looked between one man and the other, then finally sighed and hung his head in his hands, realising his situation was desperate.

"What you're saying is quite...quite right," he admitted. "Although how you managed to guess all that I've - "

"I didn't guess, I deduced." Sherlock interupted sharply. "Now, the ring. You bought it as a gift for your wife but told Carole to sell it when you found out she was cheating. Correct?"

Adam looked amazed again. "Yes...but how - "

"Not many people can afford Cartier jewelery, Mr Jackson. And selling it less than a month after you bought it is...suggestive. Yet Carole's name is also on the receipt so...what...you gave her the money to buy it?"

Adam nodded. "I was at work."

John heard Sherlock chuckle to himself and his face, he knew, probably registered almost as much amazement at his partner's deductions as Jackson's was doing. Putting his head back down to his case note-making John muttered “Fantastic” quietly in admiration of the elegance of the deduction and carried on writing.

When John looked up again at Jackson, who had let out an agonised sigh, the man looked more sheepish. John knew what Sherlock's instant, and probably sharp, reply would be to an accusation of dabbling in guesswork. People, with great frequency, thought the detective's skills and abilities were guesswork or some kind of magic act or clever stage trickery. It was though, none of the latter, and it inevitably caught them off guard.

Sherlock glanced quickly at John, pleased to see he was getting all of this down. Always important to have a good reliable witness and a record of any confession. And it seemed Adam Jackson was in the mood for confessing right now.

"My parnter Doctor Watson asked you earlier about the potential buyer for the necklace," Sherlock continued, speaking quickly and smoothly. "You avoided the question. Why so? Got something to hide?"

Adam wrung his hands and looked at the ground. "It seems you already know all my secrets, Mr Holmes," he mumbled quietly. "Yes, I murdered Amanda, but I swear to you, I know nothing about how Sylvia died."

"Do you know why she was carrying the necklace? You told Carole to take Sylvia and Eddie with her to meet this mystery buyer. Obviously you didn't trust him for some reason. Perhaps she took your advice, perhaps they were all on their way to meet the buyer when Sylvia came to this unfortunate end, perhaps we have further reason to be concerned as to the whereabouts of Carole and Eddie, perhaps - "

"Mr Holmes!" Adam interupted, almost shouting, holding his hand to his head as if Sherlock's incessant talking was giving him some kind of headache. Sherlock simply smiled. He often had this effect on people, he was quite used to it.

John squirmed, scribbling furiously. It was difficult to keep up when Sherlock went into his fast speaking mode.

“Mr Jackson, It'll be easier for you if you just answer the questions.” John interjected in a slow, clear voice as the pathologist began to go to pieces in front of his eyes.

It was a tricky double act sometimes to obtain information. John hoped that he judged the pace right to ease off or apply pressure, working in tandem with his partner, but he knew that Sherlock was never truly displeased as long as he had tried.

The doctor's pen paused and hovered over the notebook, he glanced up at Jackson whose blood pressure was very clearly high still going by the colour of his face but the man had remembered to breathe again.

“Something happened for the jewellery to be in Sylvia's pockets. Where should Carole be at the moment?” John asked gently.

"I've no idea where Carole is," Adam replied, throwing his arms in the air exasperated. "Honestly, I don't. They must have gone to see the buyer. Together."

Sherlock took a step closer to Adam, invading his personal space, trying to push him for the answers he needed.

"The buyer, Mr Jackson," he insisted, glancing at John to give him an approving nod at his questions and comments. "You're still being purposely evasive."

Sherlock looked him up and down with one of his prying deductive glances, then smirked to himself. "This is to do with your brother's gambling habits isn't it? He was in debt and needed the money. When you weren't giving the necklace to your wife, you told Sylvia to return it and get you your money back. Sylvia persuaded you to let her sell it privately to help out Eddie."

"How could you possibly know all that?" Adam asked, totally flabbergasted.

John looked up when he heard Sherlock persisting in questioning Adam about the buyer and gave him a little nod back in agreement with the line his partner was pursuing.

It was still niggling John if the other sister Carole was alright but he was busy with the dead who deserved justice and who's best hope for that was firmly in the hands of Sherlock Holmes. Sherlock who prided himself on being logical and if it happened to be both coldly, unemotionally, logical and a warmly, emotionally, caring action he still wouldn't think of himself as being at all heroic.

“He doesn't, he observes and deduces” John murmured, without thinking, quite loudly.

John tried not to smirk and failed dismally. This was an investigation into the untimely deaths of two young women, sisters, both murdered. It was not polite to smirk.

The doctor's face creased though because he knew that Sherlock would be able to tell Mr Jackson why, and how, down to the last tiny vital detail, he could work out what had happened. And if there weren't tiny vital details, then Sherlock had a special way of extracting information.

Sherlock smirked, amused at the effect his deductions were having on their suspect and looking forward to his favourite part – explaining himself. He looked at John and gave him a warm smile and an approving nod at his description of the detective’s skills. “He’s right,” he remarked, turning back to Adam and giving a small shrug.

“So…how then?” Adam asked, quite confused. Sherlock cleared his throat and took a deep breath, before launching into his explanation, speaking quickly and smoothly.

“When we arrived earlier, I didn’t even know you had a brother. If the receptionist hadn’t responded favourably, I would have explored some other way of getting to speak to you. As it happened, I struck lucky and she barely even blinked as she called for you. You came out almost immediately, and it struck me that you didn’t seem the least bit surprised that your brother was here to see you, which told me that either you were expecting to see him or that he came here regularly unannounced. It would be extremely lucky and coincidental on the part of John and myself to have arrived and posed as your brother right at the exact moment of a previously arranged appointment. Happy accidents such as those happen rarely so second option it is. The only question left then is why? Why does your brother come and see you at work? And why didn’t the receptionist recognise me as not being him? A quick glance at her badge gave me the answer to that – ‘in training’ – a new staff member, obviously not met your brother before, although clearly aware of his existence and aware of his little visits. When you came out to greet us your hand was in your pocket, your fingers clasped around something, about to bring it out. I caught a glimpse of something brown but I couldn’t work out what it was. Now I’ve taken a second glance at you up close, and I can see it still sticking out of your pocket.”

Sherlock reached out his hand to Adam’s left pocket and brought out a thick wallet. “Your wallet, which you promptly left in your pocket when you realised that it wasn’t brother Eddie come to see you. Now why would you be getting out your wallet? To lend him money. He turns up unannounced at…” and at this point Sherlock glanced at his watch. “Half past three in the morning, and you get out your wallet without batting an eyelid. That tells me he comes here regularly to borrow money off you, often in the middle of the night. He stays up late, therefore unlikely he has a job to get up for in the morning, at least not a nine to five. He’s borrowing money off his brother, so he’s clearly in some kind of financial trouble which you frequently bail him out of. Gambling seems the most likely. And it explains why Sylvia wanted to sell the necklace and give the money to him. Not to fund his gambling, to help with his debts. He owes someone a serious amount of money. Someone dangerous. Someone you don’t want to mess with. Am I wrong?”

For a moment Adam just sat there open mouthed. Then he slowly shook his head. “No…you’re right. You’re completely right. That was…incredible.”

“Simple observations. Anyone can do it,” Sherlock shrugged his shoulders modestly, before continuing. “Now who is it?”

John looked up expectantly, waiting for Sherlock to be astounding, and felt the warmth of his partner's smile as a glow in his heart. He could only glimpse Sherlock as he wrote at top speed recording the dazzling exposition. John only had time to look up again as Jackson stuttered his reaction.

Simple my foot. John thought chuckling inwardly.

“Eddie plays cards, and the greyhounds, horses...” Jackson began and seeing the detective would not give up asking he summoned up some desperate courage “Moron is what he calls him. Sebastian's his name, I don't know what his first name is, you aren't going to tell him I said so, are you?” the man's lip trembled with fear. “I don't know any more than that, you've got to believe me!”

John was familiar with this, there was always more that people knew than they thought they did, they overlooked things that they didn't consider to be important. “Do you know where he plays cards?”

“Parties, private parties, a casino or two.” Adam answered the doctor's unexpectedly easy question.

“Thank you.” John replied with the relief he felt evident in his voice.

Sometimes it was like digging a ton of earth to get a minute particle of gold. Mycroft could instruct the Home Office to release bank records but if cash was withdrawn no names would be thrown up. Eddie Jackson was undoubtedly overdrawn to the hilt anyway. “Anyone else he owes money to?”

Jackson frowned and looked pensive, his bottom lip still fluttering “A bookie, he has an account with one...Fitz..something.”

“Very helpful, thank you.” the doctor smiled.

The pathologist's head bobbed in a spasm of short jerks and he looked back to the unnerving detective, his face pleading for lenience. He had been helpful, he had.

((You read my mind!))


Sherlock nodded and listened to Adam's torrent of information about his brother, his heart skipping a beat as he put two and two together. Eddie had referred to one of his fellow gamblers as Moron. And his first name was Sebastian. With a slight change of letters that would make Sebastian Moran. Well known gambler, Moriarty's best sniper and still the second most dangerous man in London. The man who had managed to evade them on several occasions over the years much to Sherlock's general frustration and annoyance, but he knew a time would come when Moran would slip up again and he'd get the chance to have another go at capturing him and putting him behind bars where he truly belonged, although it wouldn't exactly break Sherlock's heart to see him six feet under.

Sherlock glanced over at John, to see if he'd picked up on the name and made the connection. He didn't seem to look particularly enlightened, concerned or excited, so the detective wandered over and leant close to his partner's ear. "Sebastian Moran, John...it fits. That's why Moriarty led us to this case. Because it was something to do with him." He leant in even closer, stealing a quick look at Adam as he whispered, "We need to be prepared for the worst here. I'm not holding out much hope for Carole and Eddie. But this strangulation isn't Moran's style. So it means someone else was involved."

He stood up straight and cleared his throat, walking back over to address Adam. "You have indeed been very helpful," he agreed, granting to give the man a small smile. "That doesn't change the fact that you're a killer, and whilst I sympathise with your plight, you made the wrong decision by choosing to murder your sister. A decision which will likely result in a lengthy prison sentence which will be for the courts to decide but you do realise, however, that I can't just let you walk out of here, I'm going to have to call this in to my friend at Scotland Yard."

Adam nodded meekly. "I understand. I'll make a full confession when they get here."
"Excellent, thank you," Sherlock replied, patting him on the back before taking out his phone and sending off a quick text to Hopkins whilst addressing John at the same time. "Now then John...this bookmakers...Fitz something...sounds like Fitzdares to me. Private bookies, I've dealt with them before. They've got an office on Warwick Street. There's someone there 24 hours, we should probably pay them a visit."

John smiled. “Yes, yes. Talk about this outside!” he whispered quickly pulling his partner closer meaning to talk to Sherlock as soon as they left the Path lab. He finished his note-taking and stowed it away in his jacket pocket then straightened up and stretched to ease his aches from being stooped over scribbling for so long.

A pair of uniformed police officer's quickly arrived and without much ado other than to acknowledge Sherlock's part in apprehending a suspect informed the forlorn and penitent Adam Jackson of his rights in the form of the standard caution. John was already itching to get away and his urgency was matched by the detective's who lost no time in leaving the building.

“I tried not to give anything away when Adam mentioned Moran,” John explained to Sherlock on the way out of the hospital. “He got his name wrong so I don't think he knew who Moran was, do you?”

The two men had to walk to the main road to find a taxi and John turned to his partner as they walked “Moran's just not a strangler, so would it be hired muscle or one of Moran's friends?"

There was a big advantage to being the statuesque height that Sherlock was, he could generally be seen very quickly by cabbies looking out for a fare, particularly at gone 4am before the nightclubs turfed out the last of the night's revellers. A cab rolled up and as the two men got in John leaned over to the driver, “Warwick Street, please.”

The route took them back down Shaftesbury Avenue and around Piccadilly Circus again heading for just a few blocks away from the Cartier shop in Old Bond Street. John didn't have an encyclopaedic knowledge of London's streets like Sherlock but he knew some of the streets off the main W1 roads. He wondered if where they were going was entirely by coincidence and mentioned it to Sherlock.

Just as soon as the police arrived, Sherlock headed straight out the door, eager to get away, listening to John talking quietly by his side. "No, I doubt he knows him," he agreed, "probably just heard his name mentioned a couple of times."

They got outside and began walking at a swift pace to the main road. "Exactly right John," he nodded enthusiastically. "Moran didn't do the killing himself. I think they were on the way to meeting this buyer when she was killed, which is why I suspect the other two probably came to no good either. You notice he was completely reluctant to talk about the buyer despite repeated questioning? It means there's definitely someone else involved, and some other level to this we're missing. Because if this was simply a gambling debt, yes, I can understand why someone like Moran would have them killed, he is after all, something of a psychopath, but wouldn't they have taken the necklace as well?"

Sherlock waved his arm in the air for a cab. Luckily there was one passing and the streets were relatively quiet. The taxi screeched to a halt in front of them and Sherlock opened the door, jumping inside, John following. He sat back in his seat with a sigh, and gazed out of the window at the route they were taking. "Hm yes, that Cartier branch is only round the corner," he remarked. "Could be a coincidence, but we'll see."

It was only a ten minute journey at this time of night, and pretty soon they were pulling up outside the bookies. Sherlock gave the driver a tenner and got out, glancing around them. There was a notice on the front door instructing that "after midnight, use the side entrance."

“No, it's like the motive was malice, or the value of the jewellery was nothing to them or if they were hired to kill Sylvia it was to do that and do nothing else, or the killer might have planned robbery, if she screamed grabbed her to shut her up and seeing they'd killed her fled.” John ran through the possibilities that he could think of, mystified.

“Can't have got as far as Sylvia meeting the buyer or they'd have taken the jewellery.” Despite laying out what might have happened it didn't help John at all.

“Or a gruesome warning to 'back off' to somebody, on the Thames foreshore, they made sure the body was found. And you know who has left a body on that for you before today!” John added very quietly and looking directly at Sherlock as they walked down the gap between an office building and the bookmaker's office.

The bookies office wasn't quite the dingy, little dive on a back street that John had been half-expecting. It looked quite prosperous and respectable as he took a look up and down Warwick Street. Fronts though were designed to mislead he thought to himself as he pressed the brightly lit up doorbell.


((I googled Warwick Street ))

Sherlock led the way round the back where there was a small street and a side entrance to the bookmakers. He checked his watch as John pushed the bell, just to see how they were doing for time. After around thirty seconds, the buzzer sounded and the door unlocked.

Sherlock pushed it open and walked through into a darkened hall room. Once inside there was another door on their left. He had been there before, many years ago, before he had even met John, but he still remembered the layout and knew the door led through to the office. He turned the handle and walked through.

Inside was quite a large room with four desks all opposite each other, and chairs opposite the desks for customers to sit. The decor was lavish, expensive wallpaper and leather swingy chairs on wheels, the latest models of computer on each desk. There was only one person in the room, sat at the desk in the far corner working on his computer - a middle aged man in his late forties, smart suit, balding, slightly overweight, forgot to shave this morning, married but uses prostitutes. Sherlock looked the man up and down and made a mental note of the details before anyone had opened their mouth to speak.

"Evening gents, how can I help?" the man asked, standing up from his desk and indicating to the two chairs opposite. Sherlock strode straight over, ignored the chair, and took out one of the IDs he'd stolen from Hopkins, flashing it in front of the man's face. "We need some information on some of your clients, first of all a man named Eddie Jackson."

The man frowned. "Client information is confidential, sir."
Sherlock smiled sweetly. "I am aware of that, but this is a murder investigation Mr...?" And he held out his hand asking for a proper introduction.
"Milverton," the man replied. Sherlock frowned. The name sounded familiar but he couldn't place it. He'd have to do a mind palace search when he got the chance. He was 90% sure he'd heard it before on another case some time ago.
"Sherlock Holmes," he answered, shaking the man's hand. "And this is my partner and colleague Doctor John Watson." He indicated John with his arm.

Milverton's eyes flickered slightly, and despite what were probably his best efforts to hide it, Sherlock could tell instantly that the man recognised their names, that he knew who they were. What he couldn't tell was whether that was a bad thing or a good thing right now. "Does Mr Grunberg still work here?" the detective asked, suddenly remembering the man he'd dealt with the last time he'd been there.

"Mr Grunberg died some years ago," Milverton replied. "he left the business to me."
"That's sad," Sherlock replied, glancing around the room and taking in some of the details. "He was a nice man."
"You didn't come here to talk about Grunberg, Mr Holmes," Milverton sighed a little impatiently.
"Didn't I? How do you know?" Sherlock counteracted. "What if I told you we were investigating his murder?"
"He died of a heart attack," scoffed Milverton. "Check the autopsy reports if you don't believe me."
"Why would I not believe you?" Sherlock's eyes narrowed. "Are you not trustworthy?" There was something about the man he didn't like, and he wanted to see what buttons he could press.

John nodded neutrally at Mr Milverton but felt disinclined to step forward to offer to shake the man's hand. Sherlock, for all his politeness, didn't appear to have formed a good opinion of the man and he had never known Sherlock to be too far wrong.

The doctor was arriving at the opinion that the proprietor was hostile, if not bordering on aggressive for some reason. John decided to create a little distraction to give Sherlock something more to work with and moved, apparently aimlessly, towards the computer desks.

“Sorry,” John piped up in an inoffensive little voice, feigning puzzlement “You are Mr Milverton and the previous owner was Mr Grunberg, Why is your, um, called Fitzdare's?”

Sherlock could tell Milverton was getting impatient with his barrage of strange and probing questions, and John's contribution only served to flare the man's temper even further, something the detective was rather pleased about.

"What does all this have to do with anything?!" Milverton snapped angrily, his voice rising considerably. Sherlock cast a quick triumphant glance to John, and a small nod to let him know he'd done a good job. The bookie, meanwhile, had quickly realised what he had done and lowered his tone, calming down slightly.

"I apologise gentlemen," he muttered, adjusting his tie and trying to appear as if all was normal, although in reality, the damage by his outburst had already been done. Any semblance of trust or believability had vanished out of the window and all of Sherlock's keen senses were on full alert. "But I fail to see the relevance of your current line of questioning. You said you came to ask me about some clients of ours? In relation to a murder enquiry?"

Sherlock smiled politely and cleared his throat. "That's correct." He dug his hands into his pocket and brought out his leather bound note pad, flipping it over and reading off the page. A page that was, in fact, blank. "Um...the names are...Eddie Jackson and Sebastian Moran."

Milverton blinked rapidly and played with one of his cufflinks. "Yes, they're both clients here."
"Long standing clients?" Sherlock pressed. "Respectable? Reliable?"
"Colonel Moran...ex of the British Army. He's been with us for many years now. One of our most valued clients."
"And Jackson?"
"A couple of months. And quite frankly, not the type of client we are interested in."
"Oh?" Sherlock frowned. "Why would that be?"
"Mr Holmes. This is not your standard back street bookmakers. We deal with a particular class of client. Our stakes are high and we only deal in...shall we say...larger sums of money. Eddie Jackson simply could not afford to invest his money here."

John tried not to do anything but look apologetic and mouse-like when Milverton turned and rounded on him and found it difficult while his partner used the moment that the bookie's back was turned to communicate with him.

Knowing that Milverton was facing Sherlock, busily trying to reverse the damage he had just done to his credibility and couldn't see him, John stood with his hands in his jeans pockets looking at the carpet, boyishly and pretending to whistle innocently for a moment.
The doctor listened to the answers Milverton was giving. He was interested in knowing what sums the bookie was talking about and thought his partner would like to know too.

“More front of a back street, with a side entrance down an alley and Eddie Jackson couldn't afford just a few hundred quid?" John remarked in an incredulous disparaging tone of voice trying to get more from Milverton whom he had decided was as trustworthy as a hungry boa constrictor.

"Look, we're not just talking a few hundred quid, OK?" Milverton replied, his eyes lighting up suddenly. Sherlock was pleased to see him opening up as a result of John's line of questioning, and couldn't help a small smirk darting over his lips before disappearing just as quickly as it appeared. "Everything we do here is big, on a grand scale. We're talking thousands."

Sherlock got out his pen and pretended to be making notes of something. "And how did Mr Jackson become involved here, if he clealy couldn't afford the stakes?" Milverton hesitated and bit his lip, but the detective just stared at him with a cold unreadable expression, unwavering. He'd continue staring until he got his answer.

"That other man you mentioned," he continued, "Moran. I believe him and Jackson met in a casino. They had some kind of personal bet, and Jackson lost. Quite a bit of money from what I hear. Moran said he could win it back by coming here."
"But he didn't of course, he only made it worse," Sherlock finished off the story with a sigh, then perked up with, "Mr Milverton, how much did he owe you?"
"Eight thousand."
"And did he ever try to pay you...not with money?"
Milverton laughed, then scoffed, "what the bloody hell was he gonna pay me with then, bloody M n M's?"
Sherlock smiled and shrugged his shoulders apologetically, as if he'd just asked a stupid question.

The detective snapped his notebook away with an air of finality and slipped it back into his pocket. "Thank you Mr Milverton, you've been enlightening."
"I have?" Milverton asked, a little confused.
"Oh, just before we go...the addresses for Moran and Jackson. Could I have them please?" And he held out his hand expectantly.
Milverton shook his head. "Like I said Mr Holmes, this is a discreet service, we don't even keep addresses." As he spoke his hands were movin over his desk and reaching for a sticky note and pen, then he flicked through the pages of a large thick leather bound note book.
"I can give you their phone numbers, that's it."
"Wonderful," Sherlock responded with a sweet smile, then glanced at John, giving him a small secretive nod.

John hid a smile as he saw Sherlock smirking briefly. He had done right and his partner was happy and Sherlock's delight was always a good sign in such circumstances. He paid attention to Milverton's discomfort and noted his short temper as the balding bookie boasted of the scale of operations he headed up.

Sherlock's magic stare had an effect before too long however and John managed to merely purse his lips in a silent whistle as the bookie spoke of Jackson owing a debt of eight grand. John wondered how much Moran and Jackson's bet had been originally.

The doctor wondered how far Milverton was going just to get Sherlock off his back by coming up with phone numbers for Eddie Jackson and Sebastian Moran. He didn't think it'd be last they saw of him somehow. Sherlock would be able to do something now that he had Moran's phone number and he looked forward with enthusiasm to seeing what his partner would do with it.

Milverton handed over the post it note with the two phone numbers on, and the men's names next to them so they could be easily identified. Sherlock glanced at it for a second then slipped it in his pocket and offered out his hand to the bookmaker.

"Thank you Mr Milverton," he smiled as warmly as he could muster. "You've been most helpful." Milverton took the proffered hand and shook it.
"You sure you won't place a bet with us before you go?" he asked with a small sneer.
"I doubt I'd be able to afford the stakes," Sherlock quipped before adding, "Good night Mr Milverton" and breezing out of the room with a quick "come onf John" to his partner, grabbing onto his arm and leading the doctor towards the door with him.

Once they were outside and back round the front of the building, Sherlock stood on the edge of the pavement so he could keep an eye out for passing cabs and took out the two phone numbers to look at them again. "These are probably fakes," he remarked, taking out his mobile and typing the first number in - Eddie Jackson.

"What did you make of our friend Milverton?" Sherlock asked with a small smirk, interested to see what kind of impression he had made on John, and whether they'd feel and think the same. They normally did.

John wasn't sorry to leave Milverton to his empire when Sherlock led the way out of the bookie's office.

Back on Warwick Street Sherlock wanted to know what John thought of Milverton. “Not a lot,” John scoffed, “Materialistic, greedy, short-tempered, aggressive and as trustworthy as a hungry boa constrictor. A predator preying on the weak.” he was surprised at the ease he found to instantly list what he didn't like about Milverton. He thought Sherlock would agree, and, of course, being a keen observer of detail, would be able to tell him a lot more about the man.

“Have to hope Eddie Jackson is alive if they are fakes.” John frowned as he looked down Warwick Street and stuck his arm out for a cab that had just turned right into the street.

Having spotted customers the taxi driver pulled in to the kerb. “It would be a neat scam for Moran to send an unsuspecting loser to Milverton and take a commission for introducing new clients.” John remarked quietly opening the door for Sherlock.

John followed Sherlock into the taxi pulling the door shut behind himself.


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Sherlock's lips curled into a little half smile as he heard John's thoughts on Milverton. "Very descriptive John, remember those words for your blog. And I would tend to agree with you whole heartedly. He didn't exactly fill me with good vibes," he smirked, then added. "Besides which, he's a very bad liar and clearly hiding something. Did you see the look he gave when we first mentioned the names of Jackson and Moran. You saw the amount of names in that thick black book, John, they have a big client list and no one would be able to remember the names of every single person, yet he knew who we were talking about instantly."

He cast John an appraising look at his ability to grab them a taxi, and he continued speaking as they got in. "His reaction told gave us several pieces of information, his general untrustworthiness being only the first on the list, but we now know for certain that Moran is a well established, highly esteemed client of the company, and quite possibly a lot more involved in the running of the business and its affairs than they would have us believe. It also tells us that Moran is most certainly linked with Eddie Jackson and corroborates Milverton's story, which I do believe to be true."

Sherlock leant forward and gave the cabbie their home address. Until they had another lead there was nowhere else for them to go. If something came up in the meantime they could always turn around and go to another location. "Your theory seems a likely one John, and quite sound," the detective complimented his partner then hit the call button, pressing the phone to his ear. It began to ring. "Well, it's ringing at least."

After a few minutes it clicked onto an answering machine and a voice came on. "This is Eddie. I'm not here right now so please leave a message and i'll get right back to you." Sherlock hung up and turned to John excitedly. "It's the right number John," he hurriedly opened up a text message and began typing. "I'll send the details through to Hopkins. With a name and a phone number he should be able to get us an address. Then we can pay Mr Jackson a visit."