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holmesticeTitle: The Prince-Detective and the Several Types of Beans
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swissmarg
Author:snarryfool / ancientreader
Characters/Pairings: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson; two other characters from BBC Sherlock, under assumed names
Rating: G, or maybe a hair more than G
Warnings: None
Length: about 5700 words
Summary: One rainy night, a mysterious stranger appears dripping on Prince John's doorstep. He says he's a prince, as well -- but how can John know for sure?
A retelling of Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Princess and the Pea,” which may be read here.
Also on AO3: "The Prince-Detective and the Several Types of Beans"
Prince John had a twinkle in his eye and a reputation for leaving his female companions sleepy and satisfied; indeed, they gave a general impression of having just licked sweet cream out of the corners of their lips.1 As lagniappe, there was a castle, complete with enchanted mirror — admittedly rather a small and rundown castle, with a paucity of servants and retainers, but still. That the Prince had a couple of war wounds, one of which was psychosomatic, didn’t diminish his appeal in the slightest: wounded soldiers are glamorous, we’re told.
And maybe wounded soldiers are glamorous; but also, they are frustrated and tamped down. They shy at odd noises. Many wounded soldiers are of irascible temper. Pretty much all wounded soldiers are lonely, and they are sad. Prince John had much to offer even apart from the sex-god feature — he was brave and generous and loyal — but as he was also frustrated, tamped down, skittish, irascible, lonely, and sad, his numerous attempts to court an appropriate princess came to nothing. (Or, anyway, that’s part of the reason his courtships came to nothing.2) The Prince tried to be polite and interested, but invariably he fell asleep during one too many romantic suppers or turned up late for indispensable conferences concerning the allocation of political power after the marriage. Sometimes he even managed to notice that he wasn’t as smitten as he ought to be with someone he meant to wed, and would end the courtship in a less passive-aggressive way, for example by apologizing and stumping out by himself for a pint.
The problem, I hasten to clarify, was not really with the princesses, who would have shown themselves more interesting had Prince John been genuinely interested in them. Princess Mary, for example, collected taxidermied household pets and wasn’t unnecessarily rigid about waiting for them to die of natural causes. This might not have increased her appeal as a life partner, but you certainly couldn’t call it boring. — No, the trouble was that Prince John sincerely believed he was looking for a quiet life, and that, being a bit stodgy in certain of his notions, he thought a quiet life was what women, universally, provided, and consequently when a woman of his acquaintance manifested traits incompatible with a quiet life . . . well, as someone he was about to get to know remarked of him, Prince John saw, but he did not observe.
After half a dozen failed attempts, or pseudo-attempts, to find himself a wife, Prince John gave it up as a bad job and went home to his small, rundown castle, with its continuing shortage of servants and retainers. Whenever another brick crumbled or the roof sprang a leak, he looked about the place and thought, I ought to do something about this, immediately after which he thought, But why? He always did — eventually, and grumbling — patch the leaks, but his energies seemed to extend no further. A bit of ivy in the upstairs loo only added charm, he told himself. Every so often he consulted his enchanted mirror; alas, despite his late mother's promises that it would advise him well when most needed, it never spoke, and all his looking showed him only himself, a man who, when Prince John was feeling unkind, struck him as faded.
*
It was fortunate that the Prince was not in such dismal spirits as to ignore a leaky roof, because after he had been paddling around at the bottom of the well of loneliness3 for several months, it began to rain. Also, on the next day, it rained. And on the day after that, it rained again. Of course there had been rainy days in previous months, but this was rain of unnatural intensity and duration, rain of the sort that appears as a portent in a fairytale.
On the evening of the fourth day of torrential rain there came a banging on the castle’s back door. As the almost nonexistent servants had gone to bed and Prince John was sitting up late in the warm kitchen the better to contemplate his dull existence, it was the Prince himself who responded, cursing his limp all the way down the long hall. He flung open the door so that it would bang against the inner stone wall, and to the very tall, very wet male person standing under his eave, he said: “What?”
“It’s pouring rain and I’m soaked to the skin. As you are the lord of this castle, it behooves you to welcome me and provide me with dry clothing and a bed for the night. A hot drink wouldn’t go amiss, either. That’s ‘what.’”
“How do you know I’m the lord of this castle?”
“You’re insufficiently obsequious to be anything else.”
“What makes you think my servants are obsequious? Nobody’s ever obsequious around here. — Fine,” said Prince John. “Follow me to the kitchen. And close the door behind you, it’s perishing out there.”
“I’m aware.”
The very tall, very wet male person removed his cloak and took a position in front of the kitchen fire, where he presently began to give off steam. The visual effect was mysterious and perhaps even otherworldly, but John was able immediately to dismiss these fanciful thoughts on the ground that supernatural beings are unlikely to be subject to the vagaries of weather. Another fact suggestive of the tall wet male person’s human origins was his petulance: for he huffed and tsked and ugh’d continually as he turned and turned, warming different bits of himself and wringing out his cloak into the fire, making it spit.
“None of my trousers will be long enough for you,” said Prince John.
“Obviously,” said the tall, now somewhat less wet male person, bending to remove his shoes and socks and displaying a rump whose contours were emphasized by the way in which his trousers clung. The shoes were of a soft black leather completely inappropriate for travel, John noted, fixing his gaze on the floor. “A dressing gown and your warmest socks will do for now.” The person wrung out another section of his cloak and then, noticing that John had not left, turned on him a pale, puzzled gaze. “I realize that I’m by far the most interesting thing to happen in this castle for months, so it must be difficult to tear yourself away even for a moment, but if I die of hypothermia while you stand there gawping at me you’ll have only yourself to blame when your future existence proves as drab as your present.”
Prince John stomped out of the kitchen and up the stairs to his bedroom. He fetched a pair of warm leggings, a knitted overshirt, a dressing gown, and the only pair of wool socks he owned that were devoid of holes in the toes. He stomped back down, making plenty of noise so as to inform his visitor of exactly how angry he was. “Who says my existence is drab?” he said. Averting his gaze, for apparently the tall male person had found it appropriate to become a naked tall male person in John’s absence, he tossed the bundle of clothing in his visitor’s general direction.
The visitor caught the bundle neatly. “I say it. Look at you, hanging about the kitchen all alone on a rainy night. You’re so glad of the diversion I provide, you’ve forgotten to limp. You practically galloped up and down those stairs.” He smirked.
Prince John began to think he could pass what remained of the evening in an attempt to discover whether there was any limit to the man's offensiveness. As there was no sending him out into the weather tonight, the project could easily be continued in the morning. He pointed out to himself that this was a dismal prospect. “You'd better tell me your name if you're going to hang about wearing my clothing and insulting me,” he said.
“Why is it insulting you to state the obvious? — I am Prince Sherlock of Holmes.”
“John of Watson. Prince of this castle and so on. Aren't you cold?”
“Oh!” Appearing to realize that he was still holding the bundle of clothing, Prince Sherlock began to dress himself. He certainly took his sweet time; meanwhile, the firelight played with irritating randomness against his skin.
There was really no good reason, John thought, for his own poor success in entering into an engagement with a princess. He would have to return to the project as soon as he managed to send this unexpected visitor along his way. Finding it expedient to occupy his hands, he put the kettle on for tea. “What were you doing out in this weather, anyway?”
Prince Sherlock looked down. It was a bit difficult to tell in the flickering dim light, but he might have been blushing. “I had to leave the inn where I was staying.”
“Any special reason?”
“Some of the other guests may have taken exception to a few remarks I may have made.”
“You must be joking. What remarks?”
Haughtily: “Deductions.”
“Ah. Like the ones you made about me?”
“Yes. No! No, you're not engaged in any criminal activity. You're only languishing in your crumbling castle waiting for something to happen.”
Prince John considered being offended by this, but (1) it was in its essence what Prince Sherlock had already said, and (2) it was true and therefore difficult to argue with. Besides:
“What criminal activity?”
Prince Sherlock waved his hand. “Cattle theft, forgery, that sort of thing. Not worth my time.”
“Hang on — ”
“Oh, don't get your smalls in a twist: I left a message at the Sheriff's station on my way past.”
“What, the Sheriff does your bidding, does he?”
“Naturally. He's accustomed to my doing his work for him; when I present him with evidence, he acts on it.”
“Oh.” Prince John wondered how long this collaboration had been in place without his knowing. There was no getting around the fact that he'd been letting his princely duties slide; he must buck up and take a better grip, he told himself.
“You loathe administrative tasks, and people hardly need you to govern them — they're well able to do the job for themselves, even considering what idiots most of them are. You may as well leave them to it.”
“How do you know I loathe administrative tasks?” Prince John said. “And thanks for making me feel bloody useless, by the way.”
“If you didn't loathe them, you would do them. And you're not useless, you're wasting yourself. It's not at all the same thing.”
“Right,” said Prince John. “Right. Drink your tea and meanwhile I'll make up the guest room.” For it was quite a small castle, not one of your sprawling edifices with a thousand rooms; and, as has been mentioned, the servants were all asleep. “I'll make myself useful.” And back upstairs he stomped (affording a strict lack of attention to the fact that he was still not limping), only this time he really was angry. Also, his feelings were hurt, although this was not something he cared to admit. He didn't look back, so he didn't see Prince Sherlock looking after him, and being somewhat obtuse at times he would not have recognized the expression on Prince Sherlock's face anyway.
*
Prince John had reached the second landing when an unfamiliar voice addressed him: “Stop right there, young man,” it said, catching him between one angry step and the next.
“Now you decide to talk to me?”
For of course the voice had emerged from his mother's enchanted mirror. When John looked at it he saw not his own face, nor (no surprise, the voice not being hers) the face of his mother, but rather a woman of mature years, standing with her arms folded and regarding him sternly.
“Don't be rude, young fellow. I know your mother told you I would speak to you when you most needed me, and here I am. Do you want to hear what I have to say to you, or not?”
“Er . . . yes?”
The woman in the mirror sniffed. “Try to be a bit more definite, there's a dear. That's your first bit of advice. Now, this visitor you've got. Says he's a prince, I think?”
“Yes,” said Prince John, in some consternation. “Prince Sherlock of Holmes. What, is he not?”
“There's only one way to find out. You go right back down to that kitchen and fetch a dried pea. Put it under his mattress. If he's a real prince, it'll keep him awake all night, tossing and turning. There you go, there's your answer.” With that, the Woman of Mature Years vanished, leaving only John's reflection staring open-mouthed back at him.
In a moment, soldierly sangfroid reasserted itself. John closed his mouth and went back downstairs, wondering how he might explain to his possibly prince-impersonating visitor why he felt a sudden late-night need to investigate his supply of dried legumes. Fortunately, the kitchen was empty, and from behind the closed door of the water closet a telltale sound was audible. The Prince thrust a handful of dried peas into the pocket of his tunic and trotted back upstairs to make the bed. Possibly he had forgotten how annoyed he was.
*
In the absence of Prince John, the kitchen offered few points of interest, or none. No doubt it would be rude simply to head upstairs without waiting for his host to guide him; therefore, Sherlock did exactly that. He had reached the second landing when —
“Yoo-hoo!” the mirror said.
*
The next day, Prince John awoke refreshed, to birdsong and blue skies. Good, he told himself: the weather being fair, his unwelcome castleguest would soon be on his way, meanwhile (surely) having been unmasked as a fraud. Which would be not at all disappointing and only what served Sherlock right. If Sherlock was even the man's name, of course, Prince John thought self-righteously. He dressed as quickly as he could and trotted down the hall to the guest room. Still not limping, a voice in his mind's ear said, sounding very much like the Woman of Mature Years. Oh, shut up, said his own Sensible Prince John voice. You're the one who told me to put the dried pea under his mattress. Pick a bloody side, will you?
Sherlock was sat on the bed, holding something in one closed hand and looking peevish. “I lay awake all night,” he announced, the instant John appeared; “I don't know how your other guests have borne it, assuming of course that you have other guests, you probably don't or you would have done something about the dreadful conditions in which you expect one to sleep. Look at this object. Look at it. How do you expect anyone to derive even a moment's rest when something like this is under the mattress?” And he opened the closed hand and brandished before John the dried pea.
John looked at the pea. He looked at the mattress, which was a good eight inches thick. He looked at the pea again. “That kept you up,” he said. It seemed improbable, Woman of Mature Years in the Mirror, or no Woman of Mature Years in the Mirror.
“It dug,,” (Prince) Sherlock proclaimed, “into the space between two of my lumbar vertebrae.” And he glared at John.
John thought: Wait. So I know he’s really a prince, anyway I do if I believe the woman in the mirror, but now what?
“You are wondering,” Sherlock said, “about the implications.”
“Of your being a prince?”
“What? What has my being a prince to do with anything? I’m speaking of the implications of my experience with this — this thing.”
“It’s a pea,” John said, helplessly.
“A legume, or pulse. I’m well aware of its botanical classification, John. My point is that the horrific experience to which I have been subjected affords me the opportunity to increase my store of useful knowledge. — Have you others?”
“Other dried peas? — Wait, what useful knowledge?”
“Not only dried peas! Peas, kidney beans, garbanzos, cattle beans, scarlet runner beans, black beans, lima beans, mung beans, rattlesnake beans, lentils French, green, black, and orange, though it’s difficult to describe a plausible mechanism of action by which their color could affect the result — ”
“Oh, my God,” said Prince John.
“ — navy beans, tepary beans, cranberry beans, flageolets, turtle beans, pinto beans, black-eyed peas, European soldier beans — ”
As Prince Sherlock gave no indication of running out of either breath or beans, John seized him and covered his mouth. “Yes! I have several kinds of beans!” He could not help but notice that Prince Sherlock offered no resistance to handling, except that it took several seconds for his mouth to stop. Prince John then released him instantly.
Almost instantly.
“What are you going to do with my beans?” John said.4 Strangely, the pressure of Prince Sherlock’s moving lips appeared to linger on his palm.
Sherlock clapped his hands, letting fly the pea, which rolled into a corner of the guest room because the floor sloped northward on account of settling. “I’ll conduct experiments, of course! We’ll make a chart, with data on each kind of pulse or legume available in your kitchen — however paltry the number of varieties compared with those to be found elsewhere in the world, here we have a convenient starting point for a preliminary study of the relative insomnia-inducing effects of the dried seeds of several species of leguminous plants, when placed under a mattress. How many kinds of legumes did you say you have available?”
“I didn’t,” Prince John replied, in stupefaction.
“Tsk! That won’t do at all. You must maintain an inventory of your experimental materials, else your lab is no sort of lab at all.”
*
Prince John would have sworn that his pantry held only peas, kidney beans, and garbanzos, unless the cook had used all of the latter the last time there was hummus for lunch, but it transpired that he could supply a sample of every variety Prince Sherlock had named and some he hadn’t. Evidently the guest room was in for a long siege.
Among the psychological sequelae of John’s military service was an unusually high degree of suspiciousness — though of course, at this point almost anyone would have started to think he ought to have a word with the Woman of Mature Years in the Mirror. Whilst Prince Sherlock was occupied in taking inventory, Prince John ran up to the second landing and demanded to speak with her. Alas, he got nothing for his trouble but his own reflection and the sound of her voice saying “Sorry, I’m terribly busy now, dear! And I can’t help but notice you took those stairs two at a time. Isn’t it wonderful?”
*
When Prince John returned from shouting at the mirror, he found that Sherlock had finished designing his bean-related-insomnia data sheet. In addition to the obvious category Variety of Bean, it comprised Widest Circumference of Bean, Relative Sphericity of Bean, and Weight of Bean, as well as Location of Bean with Respect to Investigator’s Location on Mattress, and Time Spent Lying Awake (with subcategories “Lying Very Still” and “Tossing and Turning”).
“Should any of the test samples not induce insomnia with a single bean,” Sherlock explained, “I can repeat the experiment with additional exemplars of the type.” He beamed at John.
“But when will you sleep, if you’re up all night on account of a bean?”
“Oh, I never sleep when I’m working on an experiment.”
John thought: And yet you whinged like a champion at missing a single night. And then he thought: But maybe you are a supernatural being, after all. Prince Sherlock’s clothing had dried overnight; it well suited a rich earthly lord, but then there was the way his black curls drank the light, and when he smiled down at John, tiny crinkles appeared at the corners of his eyes, and against the palm of John’s hand, Sherlock’s lips seemed to move even though John wasn’t touching any part of him at all.
It must be some nefarious form of magic.
“What about the rest of the day, then?”
“Murder, John! Murder!”
John folded his arms. “I know you aren’t killing people to pass the time.”
“John!” Prince Sherlock placed his hand against his bosom in the classic pose of the Tragically Misunderstood. “How has it not occurred to you to inquire what I was doing at that inn in the first place?”
“Oh — so there was a murder, and you’re involved somehow, and you were staying at the inn because . . . I give up.”
“Yes. Well.” Sherlock cleared his throat. “There hadn’t actually been a murder, no. But. Ah. It seemed likelier to happen in those environs than at home. Home is frightfully well regulated — Mummy — you see — At any rate, there’s an unpardonable lack of murder-facilitating activity. Drinking, roistering, cheating at cards. Swiving. That sort of thing. Common at inns. Well, more common than at home, that is. And then, when the murder happened, I would be in a position to investigate it. I should. Er. Take samples, and so forth. And study them.”
“Swiving,” said Prince John, feeling that he had been rather left behind.
“Copulation, John.”
Sherlock blushed dusty pink, John noted. I wonder whether he turns that color when he’s actually —
John really would have to see about a wife soon. “See, here’s the problem, though: I dunno about the inn, but things are pretty quiet around the castle. I don’t think you’re likely to run across a murder here.”
Sherlock sniffed, at once crestfallen and defiant, as if, perhaps, someone present might think it unreasonable of him to wait alertly for a murder to occur so that he could alleviate his boredom. “And I imagine you have some alternative activity to propose?”
“Yeah, sure,” John lied. In fact he had no idea what to suggest that Sherlock might find worth his while; so he just kept talking, in the hope that some appropriate verb or noun would show up by the time he arrived at the end of the sentence: “What do you say we” — a panicky nanosecond of absolute blank — “go on a picnic?”
*
A strange paralysis must have taken over Sherlock, for he found himself unable to voice even the mildest objection to John’s proposal. Instead he followed as the Prince assembled bread and cheese and ale and wrapped these provisions in an old blanket and led the way across a meadow (extravagant with tiny blue-and-white flowers suggestive, Sherlock thought, curling his lip, of romance) to a — a —
— a peach orchard. In full fruit. The ripe sweet fragrant juice dripped down Prince John’s chin in a disturbing manner; John wiped it off with the back of his hand, and then licked his hand, also in a disturbing manner; and then John licked his lips with unnecessary, and even more disturbing, thoroughness. “Lovely spot, isn’t it?” he said.
“Soil samples,” Sherlock replied. “I’ve got to — the microbial life — How can anyone be expected to have a coherent thought around all this nectar?” He wasn’t fleeing! He was in urgent pursuit of data. It made perfect sense to take random samples of the leaves/insects/bird droppings and then bring them all back to where Prince John had arranged their lunch on the blanket, and of course after all that research Sherlock was exhausted, so what could he do but lie down with his face in the shade and a hand thrown over his eyes and thus pass the afternoon?
*
With a kidney bean under the mattress, sleep eluded Sherlock that night. More peculiar — perhaps an instance of what physicists call spooky action at a distance — was the fact that John found himself also subject to insomnia, although upon inspection there was no bean, kidney or otherwise, to be found.
Most likely, John reflected, his sleeplessness was an effect of sheer annoyance. Not only had he never met anyone as ridiculous as Prince Sherlock — imagine wandering about the countryside in hopes of happening upon mayhem, and being unable to sleep on the perfectly good mattress John provided — but also everything about Sherlock was irritating, from his dramatic gestures to his endless lectures on subjects of no conceivable interest to anyone but himself to the way he always seemed first to stand too close to John and then to shy away as though he didn’t like being that close —
Ugh. It was enough to drive a Prince completely off his nut. Or his legume, John thought, sourly.
*
On the second day, Prince John and Prince Sherlock went for a stroll along the banks of a clear, cool stream, where dragonflies hung in the air and then shot away too fast for the eye to follow, and where swallows swooped and frogs sang, and where Sherlock grew impatient because he had spied a solitary bird, tall and long-beaked, almost invisible among reeds, and no matter how he directed Prince John’s gaze, John persisted in being unable to see it until Prince Sherlock laid his palm along John’s cheek to turn it to just the correct angle and they all three stood there, bird, Prince, and Prince, suspended, until the solitary bird extended quiet wings and flew.
*
Lima bean: insomnia.
No bean of any kind: insomnia.
*
On the third day, Sherlock insisted on going to the village where, he had learned, one might, for a limited time only, consult James the Meritorious, a traveling apothecary of great renown. Broadsheets had been pasted on every corner, extolling his prowess not only as a concocter of sovereign remedies for all manner of ill but also as a reader of fortunes and an adviser to those in difficulty. Though James himself was nowhere to be seen, the village was crisscrossed by men vending gaily colored pamphlets that told of this or that triumph, one or another illness cured or financial difficulty overcome. Prince Sherlock bought and read each of these, exclaiming admiringly over them. His cheeks grew pink and his voice exuberant. He waved his arms in the air and declared his intention to confer at length with James, who alone of all the world was clearly as brilliant as himself.
Prince John, having had little sleep in the two nights just past, was weary and much vexed, for any but the blindest eye could see that this James, so far from being Meritorious, was a low rascal, and how Prince Sherlock could fancy himself clever when he was plainly being taken in by a mountebank was beyond him, meaning John, and furthermore, the sooner Prince Sherlock concluded his stupid experiments and never again darkened the door of Prince John’s castle, the better.
Having delivered himself of several remarks to the above effect, Prince John stomped off toward the tavern — but he never arrived, for as he made his way along the narrow passage that led from the village square to the congenial, inexpensive, and comfortably grubby establishment where he meant to render himself insensible with drink, two men seized him from behind, forced a sleeping draught down his throat, and bore him away he knew not where.
*
In the mirror, the Woman of Mature Years shook her head. “Rose,” she said to John’s mother, “Sherlock’s people raised one silly goose, and you and your Peter raised another.” But, being dead, the Lady Rose could not hear the WMY, which is perhaps just as well, for she had something of a temper, like her son, and would have taken umbrage even though the WMY was absolutely right.
As always.
*
Prince Sherlock, after detailing to his own satisfaction Prince John’s many personal and mental deficiencies (He is pigheaded! He is self-righteous! He is short and he smiles far too often! He’ll let himself be seduced by the barmaid and then he won’t come home tonight but who cares, because he would only listen open-mouthed to my report of James the Meritorious’s brilliance!), stalked off to the village’s other inn, the clean one with expensive wine.
As was only fitting for one of his eminence, James the Meritorious had taken the finest rooms: overlooking the square but above the noise, and hung with rich tapestries of the chase. The carven oak staircase led right up to the door, so that, as they sought admittance, the Meritorious’s clients must stand below his guards, gazing up in all humility.
It would never occur to John to mark his high position in this way, Prince Sherlock thought.
But that’s because he’s a simpleton, Sherlock said to himself, as he climbed the stairs.
The aforementioned guards stood there like oxen, side by side, but unlike oxen they went masked. Also unlike oxen, of course, they were armed, with both sword and mace. They breathed hollowly, reminding Sherlock of a traveler’s description he had read of that stupendous machine the Automaton: it seemed animate, but was not so.
*
Sherlock was admitted almost at once. To his surprise, the Meritorious received him warmly, as if he had been expected; a fine meal was laid before him, the quail and coney so cleverly prepared that they appeared to live. “I have long been aware of your researches,” the apothecary said, “and finding myself in want of a collaborator, I would welcome you into my work.” He listened intently as Sherlock described his longing to fully understand great events, to study the passions that drove men’s and women’s hearts. How weary Sherlock must be, James the Meritorious said sympathetically, of the dullness of his present circumstances — of being surrounded by people who could not appreciate his brilliant work. The boredom must be enough to incline him to do murder himself.
Prince Sherlock was much pleased at these compliments, and felt that now the whole world lay before him!
James the Meritorious began to discourse upon the many potions and remedies he had invented and the effects they wrought. He could make men feel as though they were flying or sustain a woman’s pleasure over minutes, even hours —
“What was that?” Sherlock asked. For he had heard a thump, but could not tell whence it came.
“Oh, that’s nothing,” said James the Meritorious. And he went on talking, of how one potion might increase the agony of a broken limb, or ease it, depending on whether it was given chilled or warmed; of how —
“What was that?” Sherlock asked. For he had heard another thump.
“It’s nothing,” said James the Meritorious. “Now, are you listening to me, or not?”
And it seemed to Sherlock that there was something wicked in his look; but this could not be, for James the Meritorious was an apothecary of wide renown, who had invited the Prince to join him in his work, and together they could —
Thump. Thumpthumpthump. “Sherlock, run!” came a muffled voice — but now Prince Sherlock could tell its source, an immense trunk at the room’s far end, draped in cloth with gold embroidered, and Prince Sherlock knew that voice!
At once he saw James the Meritorious for what he was; he stood, setting the table with all its dainties flying, and with one mighty blow he felled the villain. Out of James the Meritorious a thousand thousand beetles flew, their beetle-wings clattering; they were his evil magic leaving him, and as they flew they vanished. The guards stormed in, but Prince Sherlock was stronger, for their powers had been given by their master, who would never rise again. They were indeed automata, as they had at first seemed, and now they dropped to the floor insensible.
With the axe he had seized from one of them, Prince Sherlock chopped the lock from off the heavy chest; he lifted the lid from above, and Prince John pushed it up from below, and they clasped each other and uttered many imprecations each against the other, such as “Fool” and “Idiot” and “Nitwit” and “Great booby.” And then they confessed their love, although one might have thought that redundant what with the saving each other from mortal peril, and the imprecations, and the clasping, but it seemed necessary to them anyway, and who am I to argue?
At that moment, the Sheriff and his men burst in — none too soon, as their arrival prevented the Princes from attempting to enact their love in a room containing a corpse and two inactivated automata, to say nothing of the difficulty that Prince John was, when one came down to it, standing in a box.
It was soon discovered that James the Not At All Meritorious had intended to kill Prince John and incorporate his bones into certain highly specialized potions that, although no more effective than earlier remedies and producing many more varied and dangerous effects, could be sold at steeply higher prices owing to their novelty. Truly, many were James’s wicked deeds, both consummated and in the early planning stages, and Sherlock and John were acclaimed as heroes.
*
“John,” said Sherlock when they had finally returned to the castle, “it has occurred to me to wonder whether the number of sleepers in a bed has any effect on the insomnia-producing effects of dried legumes.”
So they tossed handfuls of beans onto the bedstead and then set the mattress back on top. After which they kissed each other fervently and removed all their clothes, alternating between these activities as seemed most convenient; and, each having attained a joyful conclusion, they slept all night like babes, with nothing to disturb them.
They lived happily ever after, quarreling constantly. From time to time, the Woman of Mature Years would offer them advice, but she always refused to do their housekeeping5; and though Sherlock never did admit that it was she who told him to feign sleeplessness and blame the bean, John knew.
Very Important Scholarly Notes
1 I said cream, and cream is what I meant. Cream. From cows. Jesus, but you have a filthy mind.
2 Children, that sentence was an example of the literary device known as foreshadowing.
3 See what I did there?
4 Notice that the form of John’s question assumes he has already acceded to Sherlock’s plan, even without knowing what it is.
5 Even had the expectation not been offensively sexist, the Woman of Mature Years found herself occupied with the concurrent affairs she was enjoying with several other enchanted mirrors in the vicinity. Getting the Princes together had taken up quite enough of her time, thank you very much.
Recipient:
swissmargAuthor:
snarryfool / ancientreaderCharacters/Pairings: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson; two other characters from BBC Sherlock, under assumed names
Rating: G, or maybe a hair more than G
Warnings: None
Length: about 5700 words
Summary: One rainy night, a mysterious stranger appears dripping on Prince John's doorstep. He says he's a prince, as well -- but how can John know for sure?
A retelling of Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Princess and the Pea,” which may be read here.
Also on AO3: "The Prince-Detective and the Several Types of Beans"
Prince John had a twinkle in his eye and a reputation for leaving his female companions sleepy and satisfied; indeed, they gave a general impression of having just licked sweet cream out of the corners of their lips.1 As lagniappe, there was a castle, complete with enchanted mirror — admittedly rather a small and rundown castle, with a paucity of servants and retainers, but still. That the Prince had a couple of war wounds, one of which was psychosomatic, didn’t diminish his appeal in the slightest: wounded soldiers are glamorous, we’re told.
And maybe wounded soldiers are glamorous; but also, they are frustrated and tamped down. They shy at odd noises. Many wounded soldiers are of irascible temper. Pretty much all wounded soldiers are lonely, and they are sad. Prince John had much to offer even apart from the sex-god feature — he was brave and generous and loyal — but as he was also frustrated, tamped down, skittish, irascible, lonely, and sad, his numerous attempts to court an appropriate princess came to nothing. (Or, anyway, that’s part of the reason his courtships came to nothing.2) The Prince tried to be polite and interested, but invariably he fell asleep during one too many romantic suppers or turned up late for indispensable conferences concerning the allocation of political power after the marriage. Sometimes he even managed to notice that he wasn’t as smitten as he ought to be with someone he meant to wed, and would end the courtship in a less passive-aggressive way, for example by apologizing and stumping out by himself for a pint.
The problem, I hasten to clarify, was not really with the princesses, who would have shown themselves more interesting had Prince John been genuinely interested in them. Princess Mary, for example, collected taxidermied household pets and wasn’t unnecessarily rigid about waiting for them to die of natural causes. This might not have increased her appeal as a life partner, but you certainly couldn’t call it boring. — No, the trouble was that Prince John sincerely believed he was looking for a quiet life, and that, being a bit stodgy in certain of his notions, he thought a quiet life was what women, universally, provided, and consequently when a woman of his acquaintance manifested traits incompatible with a quiet life . . . well, as someone he was about to get to know remarked of him, Prince John saw, but he did not observe.
After half a dozen failed attempts, or pseudo-attempts, to find himself a wife, Prince John gave it up as a bad job and went home to his small, rundown castle, with its continuing shortage of servants and retainers. Whenever another brick crumbled or the roof sprang a leak, he looked about the place and thought, I ought to do something about this, immediately after which he thought, But why? He always did — eventually, and grumbling — patch the leaks, but his energies seemed to extend no further. A bit of ivy in the upstairs loo only added charm, he told himself. Every so often he consulted his enchanted mirror; alas, despite his late mother's promises that it would advise him well when most needed, it never spoke, and all his looking showed him only himself, a man who, when Prince John was feeling unkind, struck him as faded.
*
It was fortunate that the Prince was not in such dismal spirits as to ignore a leaky roof, because after he had been paddling around at the bottom of the well of loneliness3 for several months, it began to rain. Also, on the next day, it rained. And on the day after that, it rained again. Of course there had been rainy days in previous months, but this was rain of unnatural intensity and duration, rain of the sort that appears as a portent in a fairytale.
On the evening of the fourth day of torrential rain there came a banging on the castle’s back door. As the almost nonexistent servants had gone to bed and Prince John was sitting up late in the warm kitchen the better to contemplate his dull existence, it was the Prince himself who responded, cursing his limp all the way down the long hall. He flung open the door so that it would bang against the inner stone wall, and to the very tall, very wet male person standing under his eave, he said: “What?”
“It’s pouring rain and I’m soaked to the skin. As you are the lord of this castle, it behooves you to welcome me and provide me with dry clothing and a bed for the night. A hot drink wouldn’t go amiss, either. That’s ‘what.’”
“How do you know I’m the lord of this castle?”
“You’re insufficiently obsequious to be anything else.”
“What makes you think my servants are obsequious? Nobody’s ever obsequious around here. — Fine,” said Prince John. “Follow me to the kitchen. And close the door behind you, it’s perishing out there.”
“I’m aware.”
The very tall, very wet male person removed his cloak and took a position in front of the kitchen fire, where he presently began to give off steam. The visual effect was mysterious and perhaps even otherworldly, but John was able immediately to dismiss these fanciful thoughts on the ground that supernatural beings are unlikely to be subject to the vagaries of weather. Another fact suggestive of the tall wet male person’s human origins was his petulance: for he huffed and tsked and ugh’d continually as he turned and turned, warming different bits of himself and wringing out his cloak into the fire, making it spit.
“None of my trousers will be long enough for you,” said Prince John.
“Obviously,” said the tall, now somewhat less wet male person, bending to remove his shoes and socks and displaying a rump whose contours were emphasized by the way in which his trousers clung. The shoes were of a soft black leather completely inappropriate for travel, John noted, fixing his gaze on the floor. “A dressing gown and your warmest socks will do for now.” The person wrung out another section of his cloak and then, noticing that John had not left, turned on him a pale, puzzled gaze. “I realize that I’m by far the most interesting thing to happen in this castle for months, so it must be difficult to tear yourself away even for a moment, but if I die of hypothermia while you stand there gawping at me you’ll have only yourself to blame when your future existence proves as drab as your present.”
Prince John stomped out of the kitchen and up the stairs to his bedroom. He fetched a pair of warm leggings, a knitted overshirt, a dressing gown, and the only pair of wool socks he owned that were devoid of holes in the toes. He stomped back down, making plenty of noise so as to inform his visitor of exactly how angry he was. “Who says my existence is drab?” he said. Averting his gaze, for apparently the tall male person had found it appropriate to become a naked tall male person in John’s absence, he tossed the bundle of clothing in his visitor’s general direction.
The visitor caught the bundle neatly. “I say it. Look at you, hanging about the kitchen all alone on a rainy night. You’re so glad of the diversion I provide, you’ve forgotten to limp. You practically galloped up and down those stairs.” He smirked.
Prince John began to think he could pass what remained of the evening in an attempt to discover whether there was any limit to the man's offensiveness. As there was no sending him out into the weather tonight, the project could easily be continued in the morning. He pointed out to himself that this was a dismal prospect. “You'd better tell me your name if you're going to hang about wearing my clothing and insulting me,” he said.
“Why is it insulting you to state the obvious? — I am Prince Sherlock of Holmes.”
“John of Watson. Prince of this castle and so on. Aren't you cold?”
“Oh!” Appearing to realize that he was still holding the bundle of clothing, Prince Sherlock began to dress himself. He certainly took his sweet time; meanwhile, the firelight played with irritating randomness against his skin.
There was really no good reason, John thought, for his own poor success in entering into an engagement with a princess. He would have to return to the project as soon as he managed to send this unexpected visitor along his way. Finding it expedient to occupy his hands, he put the kettle on for tea. “What were you doing out in this weather, anyway?”
Prince Sherlock looked down. It was a bit difficult to tell in the flickering dim light, but he might have been blushing. “I had to leave the inn where I was staying.”
“Any special reason?”
“Some of the other guests may have taken exception to a few remarks I may have made.”
“You must be joking. What remarks?”
Haughtily: “Deductions.”
“Ah. Like the ones you made about me?”
“Yes. No! No, you're not engaged in any criminal activity. You're only languishing in your crumbling castle waiting for something to happen.”
Prince John considered being offended by this, but (1) it was in its essence what Prince Sherlock had already said, and (2) it was true and therefore difficult to argue with. Besides:
“What criminal activity?”
Prince Sherlock waved his hand. “Cattle theft, forgery, that sort of thing. Not worth my time.”
“Hang on — ”
“Oh, don't get your smalls in a twist: I left a message at the Sheriff's station on my way past.”
“What, the Sheriff does your bidding, does he?”
“Naturally. He's accustomed to my doing his work for him; when I present him with evidence, he acts on it.”
“Oh.” Prince John wondered how long this collaboration had been in place without his knowing. There was no getting around the fact that he'd been letting his princely duties slide; he must buck up and take a better grip, he told himself.
“You loathe administrative tasks, and people hardly need you to govern them — they're well able to do the job for themselves, even considering what idiots most of them are. You may as well leave them to it.”
“How do you know I loathe administrative tasks?” Prince John said. “And thanks for making me feel bloody useless, by the way.”
“If you didn't loathe them, you would do them. And you're not useless, you're wasting yourself. It's not at all the same thing.”
“Right,” said Prince John. “Right. Drink your tea and meanwhile I'll make up the guest room.” For it was quite a small castle, not one of your sprawling edifices with a thousand rooms; and, as has been mentioned, the servants were all asleep. “I'll make myself useful.” And back upstairs he stomped (affording a strict lack of attention to the fact that he was still not limping), only this time he really was angry. Also, his feelings were hurt, although this was not something he cared to admit. He didn't look back, so he didn't see Prince Sherlock looking after him, and being somewhat obtuse at times he would not have recognized the expression on Prince Sherlock's face anyway.
*
Prince John had reached the second landing when an unfamiliar voice addressed him: “Stop right there, young man,” it said, catching him between one angry step and the next.
“Now you decide to talk to me?”
For of course the voice had emerged from his mother's enchanted mirror. When John looked at it he saw not his own face, nor (no surprise, the voice not being hers) the face of his mother, but rather a woman of mature years, standing with her arms folded and regarding him sternly.
“Don't be rude, young fellow. I know your mother told you I would speak to you when you most needed me, and here I am. Do you want to hear what I have to say to you, or not?”
“Er . . . yes?”
The woman in the mirror sniffed. “Try to be a bit more definite, there's a dear. That's your first bit of advice. Now, this visitor you've got. Says he's a prince, I think?”
“Yes,” said Prince John, in some consternation. “Prince Sherlock of Holmes. What, is he not?”
“There's only one way to find out. You go right back down to that kitchen and fetch a dried pea. Put it under his mattress. If he's a real prince, it'll keep him awake all night, tossing and turning. There you go, there's your answer.” With that, the Woman of Mature Years vanished, leaving only John's reflection staring open-mouthed back at him.
In a moment, soldierly sangfroid reasserted itself. John closed his mouth and went back downstairs, wondering how he might explain to his possibly prince-impersonating visitor why he felt a sudden late-night need to investigate his supply of dried legumes. Fortunately, the kitchen was empty, and from behind the closed door of the water closet a telltale sound was audible. The Prince thrust a handful of dried peas into the pocket of his tunic and trotted back upstairs to make the bed. Possibly he had forgotten how annoyed he was.
*
In the absence of Prince John, the kitchen offered few points of interest, or none. No doubt it would be rude simply to head upstairs without waiting for his host to guide him; therefore, Sherlock did exactly that. He had reached the second landing when —
“Yoo-hoo!” the mirror said.
*
The next day, Prince John awoke refreshed, to birdsong and blue skies. Good, he told himself: the weather being fair, his unwelcome castleguest would soon be on his way, meanwhile (surely) having been unmasked as a fraud. Which would be not at all disappointing and only what served Sherlock right. If Sherlock was even the man's name, of course, Prince John thought self-righteously. He dressed as quickly as he could and trotted down the hall to the guest room. Still not limping, a voice in his mind's ear said, sounding very much like the Woman of Mature Years. Oh, shut up, said his own Sensible Prince John voice. You're the one who told me to put the dried pea under his mattress. Pick a bloody side, will you?
Sherlock was sat on the bed, holding something in one closed hand and looking peevish. “I lay awake all night,” he announced, the instant John appeared; “I don't know how your other guests have borne it, assuming of course that you have other guests, you probably don't or you would have done something about the dreadful conditions in which you expect one to sleep. Look at this object. Look at it. How do you expect anyone to derive even a moment's rest when something like this is under the mattress?” And he opened the closed hand and brandished before John the dried pea.
John looked at the pea. He looked at the mattress, which was a good eight inches thick. He looked at the pea again. “That kept you up,” he said. It seemed improbable, Woman of Mature Years in the Mirror, or no Woman of Mature Years in the Mirror.
“It dug,,” (Prince) Sherlock proclaimed, “into the space between two of my lumbar vertebrae.” And he glared at John.
John thought: Wait. So I know he’s really a prince, anyway I do if I believe the woman in the mirror, but now what?
“You are wondering,” Sherlock said, “about the implications.”
“Of your being a prince?”
“What? What has my being a prince to do with anything? I’m speaking of the implications of my experience with this — this thing.”
“It’s a pea,” John said, helplessly.
“A legume, or pulse. I’m well aware of its botanical classification, John. My point is that the horrific experience to which I have been subjected affords me the opportunity to increase my store of useful knowledge. — Have you others?”
“Other dried peas? — Wait, what useful knowledge?”
“Not only dried peas! Peas, kidney beans, garbanzos, cattle beans, scarlet runner beans, black beans, lima beans, mung beans, rattlesnake beans, lentils French, green, black, and orange, though it’s difficult to describe a plausible mechanism of action by which their color could affect the result — ”
“Oh, my God,” said Prince John.
“ — navy beans, tepary beans, cranberry beans, flageolets, turtle beans, pinto beans, black-eyed peas, European soldier beans — ”
As Prince Sherlock gave no indication of running out of either breath or beans, John seized him and covered his mouth. “Yes! I have several kinds of beans!” He could not help but notice that Prince Sherlock offered no resistance to handling, except that it took several seconds for his mouth to stop. Prince John then released him instantly.
Almost instantly.
“What are you going to do with my beans?” John said.4 Strangely, the pressure of Prince Sherlock’s moving lips appeared to linger on his palm.
Sherlock clapped his hands, letting fly the pea, which rolled into a corner of the guest room because the floor sloped northward on account of settling. “I’ll conduct experiments, of course! We’ll make a chart, with data on each kind of pulse or legume available in your kitchen — however paltry the number of varieties compared with those to be found elsewhere in the world, here we have a convenient starting point for a preliminary study of the relative insomnia-inducing effects of the dried seeds of several species of leguminous plants, when placed under a mattress. How many kinds of legumes did you say you have available?”
“I didn’t,” Prince John replied, in stupefaction.
“Tsk! That won’t do at all. You must maintain an inventory of your experimental materials, else your lab is no sort of lab at all.”
*
Prince John would have sworn that his pantry held only peas, kidney beans, and garbanzos, unless the cook had used all of the latter the last time there was hummus for lunch, but it transpired that he could supply a sample of every variety Prince Sherlock had named and some he hadn’t. Evidently the guest room was in for a long siege.
Among the psychological sequelae of John’s military service was an unusually high degree of suspiciousness — though of course, at this point almost anyone would have started to think he ought to have a word with the Woman of Mature Years in the Mirror. Whilst Prince Sherlock was occupied in taking inventory, Prince John ran up to the second landing and demanded to speak with her. Alas, he got nothing for his trouble but his own reflection and the sound of her voice saying “Sorry, I’m terribly busy now, dear! And I can’t help but notice you took those stairs two at a time. Isn’t it wonderful?”
*
When Prince John returned from shouting at the mirror, he found that Sherlock had finished designing his bean-related-insomnia data sheet. In addition to the obvious category Variety of Bean, it comprised Widest Circumference of Bean, Relative Sphericity of Bean, and Weight of Bean, as well as Location of Bean with Respect to Investigator’s Location on Mattress, and Time Spent Lying Awake (with subcategories “Lying Very Still” and “Tossing and Turning”).
“Should any of the test samples not induce insomnia with a single bean,” Sherlock explained, “I can repeat the experiment with additional exemplars of the type.” He beamed at John.
“But when will you sleep, if you’re up all night on account of a bean?”
“Oh, I never sleep when I’m working on an experiment.”
John thought: And yet you whinged like a champion at missing a single night. And then he thought: But maybe you are a supernatural being, after all. Prince Sherlock’s clothing had dried overnight; it well suited a rich earthly lord, but then there was the way his black curls drank the light, and when he smiled down at John, tiny crinkles appeared at the corners of his eyes, and against the palm of John’s hand, Sherlock’s lips seemed to move even though John wasn’t touching any part of him at all.
It must be some nefarious form of magic.
“What about the rest of the day, then?”
“Murder, John! Murder!”
John folded his arms. “I know you aren’t killing people to pass the time.”
“John!” Prince Sherlock placed his hand against his bosom in the classic pose of the Tragically Misunderstood. “How has it not occurred to you to inquire what I was doing at that inn in the first place?”
“Oh — so there was a murder, and you’re involved somehow, and you were staying at the inn because . . . I give up.”
“Yes. Well.” Sherlock cleared his throat. “There hadn’t actually been a murder, no. But. Ah. It seemed likelier to happen in those environs than at home. Home is frightfully well regulated — Mummy — you see — At any rate, there’s an unpardonable lack of murder-facilitating activity. Drinking, roistering, cheating at cards. Swiving. That sort of thing. Common at inns. Well, more common than at home, that is. And then, when the murder happened, I would be in a position to investigate it. I should. Er. Take samples, and so forth. And study them.”
“Swiving,” said Prince John, feeling that he had been rather left behind.
“Copulation, John.”
Sherlock blushed dusty pink, John noted. I wonder whether he turns that color when he’s actually —
John really would have to see about a wife soon. “See, here’s the problem, though: I dunno about the inn, but things are pretty quiet around the castle. I don’t think you’re likely to run across a murder here.”
Sherlock sniffed, at once crestfallen and defiant, as if, perhaps, someone present might think it unreasonable of him to wait alertly for a murder to occur so that he could alleviate his boredom. “And I imagine you have some alternative activity to propose?”
“Yeah, sure,” John lied. In fact he had no idea what to suggest that Sherlock might find worth his while; so he just kept talking, in the hope that some appropriate verb or noun would show up by the time he arrived at the end of the sentence: “What do you say we” — a panicky nanosecond of absolute blank — “go on a picnic?”
*
A strange paralysis must have taken over Sherlock, for he found himself unable to voice even the mildest objection to John’s proposal. Instead he followed as the Prince assembled bread and cheese and ale and wrapped these provisions in an old blanket and led the way across a meadow (extravagant with tiny blue-and-white flowers suggestive, Sherlock thought, curling his lip, of romance) to a — a —
— a peach orchard. In full fruit. The ripe sweet fragrant juice dripped down Prince John’s chin in a disturbing manner; John wiped it off with the back of his hand, and then licked his hand, also in a disturbing manner; and then John licked his lips with unnecessary, and even more disturbing, thoroughness. “Lovely spot, isn’t it?” he said.
“Soil samples,” Sherlock replied. “I’ve got to — the microbial life — How can anyone be expected to have a coherent thought around all this nectar?” He wasn’t fleeing! He was in urgent pursuit of data. It made perfect sense to take random samples of the leaves/insects/bird droppings and then bring them all back to where Prince John had arranged their lunch on the blanket, and of course after all that research Sherlock was exhausted, so what could he do but lie down with his face in the shade and a hand thrown over his eyes and thus pass the afternoon?
*
With a kidney bean under the mattress, sleep eluded Sherlock that night. More peculiar — perhaps an instance of what physicists call spooky action at a distance — was the fact that John found himself also subject to insomnia, although upon inspection there was no bean, kidney or otherwise, to be found.
Most likely, John reflected, his sleeplessness was an effect of sheer annoyance. Not only had he never met anyone as ridiculous as Prince Sherlock — imagine wandering about the countryside in hopes of happening upon mayhem, and being unable to sleep on the perfectly good mattress John provided — but also everything about Sherlock was irritating, from his dramatic gestures to his endless lectures on subjects of no conceivable interest to anyone but himself to the way he always seemed first to stand too close to John and then to shy away as though he didn’t like being that close —
Ugh. It was enough to drive a Prince completely off his nut. Or his legume, John thought, sourly.
*
On the second day, Prince John and Prince Sherlock went for a stroll along the banks of a clear, cool stream, where dragonflies hung in the air and then shot away too fast for the eye to follow, and where swallows swooped and frogs sang, and where Sherlock grew impatient because he had spied a solitary bird, tall and long-beaked, almost invisible among reeds, and no matter how he directed Prince John’s gaze, John persisted in being unable to see it until Prince Sherlock laid his palm along John’s cheek to turn it to just the correct angle and they all three stood there, bird, Prince, and Prince, suspended, until the solitary bird extended quiet wings and flew.
*
Lima bean: insomnia.
No bean of any kind: insomnia.
*
On the third day, Sherlock insisted on going to the village where, he had learned, one might, for a limited time only, consult James the Meritorious, a traveling apothecary of great renown. Broadsheets had been pasted on every corner, extolling his prowess not only as a concocter of sovereign remedies for all manner of ill but also as a reader of fortunes and an adviser to those in difficulty. Though James himself was nowhere to be seen, the village was crisscrossed by men vending gaily colored pamphlets that told of this or that triumph, one or another illness cured or financial difficulty overcome. Prince Sherlock bought and read each of these, exclaiming admiringly over them. His cheeks grew pink and his voice exuberant. He waved his arms in the air and declared his intention to confer at length with James, who alone of all the world was clearly as brilliant as himself.
Prince John, having had little sleep in the two nights just past, was weary and much vexed, for any but the blindest eye could see that this James, so far from being Meritorious, was a low rascal, and how Prince Sherlock could fancy himself clever when he was plainly being taken in by a mountebank was beyond him, meaning John, and furthermore, the sooner Prince Sherlock concluded his stupid experiments and never again darkened the door of Prince John’s castle, the better.
Having delivered himself of several remarks to the above effect, Prince John stomped off toward the tavern — but he never arrived, for as he made his way along the narrow passage that led from the village square to the congenial, inexpensive, and comfortably grubby establishment where he meant to render himself insensible with drink, two men seized him from behind, forced a sleeping draught down his throat, and bore him away he knew not where.
*
In the mirror, the Woman of Mature Years shook her head. “Rose,” she said to John’s mother, “Sherlock’s people raised one silly goose, and you and your Peter raised another.” But, being dead, the Lady Rose could not hear the WMY, which is perhaps just as well, for she had something of a temper, like her son, and would have taken umbrage even though the WMY was absolutely right.
As always.
*
Prince Sherlock, after detailing to his own satisfaction Prince John’s many personal and mental deficiencies (He is pigheaded! He is self-righteous! He is short and he smiles far too often! He’ll let himself be seduced by the barmaid and then he won’t come home tonight but who cares, because he would only listen open-mouthed to my report of James the Meritorious’s brilliance!), stalked off to the village’s other inn, the clean one with expensive wine.
As was only fitting for one of his eminence, James the Meritorious had taken the finest rooms: overlooking the square but above the noise, and hung with rich tapestries of the chase. The carven oak staircase led right up to the door, so that, as they sought admittance, the Meritorious’s clients must stand below his guards, gazing up in all humility.
It would never occur to John to mark his high position in this way, Prince Sherlock thought.
But that’s because he’s a simpleton, Sherlock said to himself, as he climbed the stairs.
The aforementioned guards stood there like oxen, side by side, but unlike oxen they went masked. Also unlike oxen, of course, they were armed, with both sword and mace. They breathed hollowly, reminding Sherlock of a traveler’s description he had read of that stupendous machine the Automaton: it seemed animate, but was not so.
*
Sherlock was admitted almost at once. To his surprise, the Meritorious received him warmly, as if he had been expected; a fine meal was laid before him, the quail and coney so cleverly prepared that they appeared to live. “I have long been aware of your researches,” the apothecary said, “and finding myself in want of a collaborator, I would welcome you into my work.” He listened intently as Sherlock described his longing to fully understand great events, to study the passions that drove men’s and women’s hearts. How weary Sherlock must be, James the Meritorious said sympathetically, of the dullness of his present circumstances — of being surrounded by people who could not appreciate his brilliant work. The boredom must be enough to incline him to do murder himself.
Prince Sherlock was much pleased at these compliments, and felt that now the whole world lay before him!
James the Meritorious began to discourse upon the many potions and remedies he had invented and the effects they wrought. He could make men feel as though they were flying or sustain a woman’s pleasure over minutes, even hours —
“What was that?” Sherlock asked. For he had heard a thump, but could not tell whence it came.
“Oh, that’s nothing,” said James the Meritorious. And he went on talking, of how one potion might increase the agony of a broken limb, or ease it, depending on whether it was given chilled or warmed; of how —
“What was that?” Sherlock asked. For he had heard another thump.
“It’s nothing,” said James the Meritorious. “Now, are you listening to me, or not?”
And it seemed to Sherlock that there was something wicked in his look; but this could not be, for James the Meritorious was an apothecary of wide renown, who had invited the Prince to join him in his work, and together they could —
Thump. Thumpthumpthump. “Sherlock, run!” came a muffled voice — but now Prince Sherlock could tell its source, an immense trunk at the room’s far end, draped in cloth with gold embroidered, and Prince Sherlock knew that voice!
At once he saw James the Meritorious for what he was; he stood, setting the table with all its dainties flying, and with one mighty blow he felled the villain. Out of James the Meritorious a thousand thousand beetles flew, their beetle-wings clattering; they were his evil magic leaving him, and as they flew they vanished. The guards stormed in, but Prince Sherlock was stronger, for their powers had been given by their master, who would never rise again. They were indeed automata, as they had at first seemed, and now they dropped to the floor insensible.
With the axe he had seized from one of them, Prince Sherlock chopped the lock from off the heavy chest; he lifted the lid from above, and Prince John pushed it up from below, and they clasped each other and uttered many imprecations each against the other, such as “Fool” and “Idiot” and “Nitwit” and “Great booby.” And then they confessed their love, although one might have thought that redundant what with the saving each other from mortal peril, and the imprecations, and the clasping, but it seemed necessary to them anyway, and who am I to argue?
At that moment, the Sheriff and his men burst in — none too soon, as their arrival prevented the Princes from attempting to enact their love in a room containing a corpse and two inactivated automata, to say nothing of the difficulty that Prince John was, when one came down to it, standing in a box.
It was soon discovered that James the Not At All Meritorious had intended to kill Prince John and incorporate his bones into certain highly specialized potions that, although no more effective than earlier remedies and producing many more varied and dangerous effects, could be sold at steeply higher prices owing to their novelty. Truly, many were James’s wicked deeds, both consummated and in the early planning stages, and Sherlock and John were acclaimed as heroes.
*
“John,” said Sherlock when they had finally returned to the castle, “it has occurred to me to wonder whether the number of sleepers in a bed has any effect on the insomnia-producing effects of dried legumes.”
So they tossed handfuls of beans onto the bedstead and then set the mattress back on top. After which they kissed each other fervently and removed all their clothes, alternating between these activities as seemed most convenient; and, each having attained a joyful conclusion, they slept all night like babes, with nothing to disturb them.
They lived happily ever after, quarreling constantly. From time to time, the Woman of Mature Years would offer them advice, but she always refused to do their housekeeping5; and though Sherlock never did admit that it was she who told him to feign sleeplessness and blame the bean, John knew.
Very Important Scholarly Notes
1 I said cream, and cream is what I meant. Cream. From cows. Jesus, but you have a filthy mind.
2 Children, that sentence was an example of the literary device known as foreshadowing.
3 See what I did there?
4 Notice that the form of John’s question assumes he has already acceded to Sherlock’s plan, even without knowing what it is.
5 Even had the expectation not been offensively sexist, the Woman of Mature Years found herself occupied with the concurrent affairs she was enjoying with several other enchanted mirrors in the vicinity. Getting the Princes together had taken up quite enough of her time, thank you very much.
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Date: 2016-06-02 08:32 pm (UTC)Perfection.
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Date: 2016-06-20 05:49 pm (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2016-06-02 09:38 pm (UTC)Thank you for this!! :-D
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Date: 2016-06-20 05:51 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-06-20 07:10 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-06-20 10:07 pm (UTC)I have to tell you that when I realized how neatly "Meritorious" fitted "Moriarty," I *squealed* with self-satisfied glee.
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Date: 2016-06-21 12:34 am (UTC)The sleep issues!
I'm picturing a small, 'deleted' scene from a fly-on-the-wall (or ceiling) perspective or a peep-hole through the lattice-work, key hole, as you like, that John's just using to check up on his odd guest, with Sherlock tossing and turning, throwing the covers off, pulling his dressing gown tight around himself and curling up, then turning over and undoing the sash and flinging his limbs out to the four corners of the bed, huffing in exasperation. All because of this pea, of course.
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Date: 2016-06-21 12:36 am (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2016-06-02 09:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-06-20 05:51 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-06-02 10:35 pm (UTC)the way his black curls drank the light
Sherlock blushed dusty pink, John noted. I wonder whether he turns that color when he’s actually —
John really would have to see about a wife soon.
This was delightful! Thank you so much for sharing it. It's winning and sweet and very funny. :D
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Date: 2016-06-20 05:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-06-02 10:49 pm (UTC)UTTERLY DELICIOUS.
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Date: 2016-06-20 05:53 pm (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2016-06-02 11:31 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-06-20 05:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-06-03 06:38 am (UTC)Now if you don't mind, I have to go take a pea.
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Date: 2016-06-20 05:54 pm (UTC)(Thank you! Glad you liked it!)
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Date: 2016-06-03 06:54 am (UTC)WoMY!Hudson is the best. Concurrent affairs ftw! I love the twist about her telling Sherlock what to say about the bean. The footnotes are a scream, and yes I did see what you did there!
Also: Sherlock's spreadsheet, Mary's taxidermy (nice!), the romantic picnics, hanging out hoping for a murder, psychological sequelae, the oxen/Automata, the thousand beetles (wow what a powerful image!), attaining a joyful conclusion, and this little perfect nugget which deserves its own room in the mind palace: Prince Sherlock laid his palm along John’s cheek to turn it to just the correct angle and they all three stood there, bird, Prince, and Prince, suspended, until the solitary bird extended quiet wings and flew. *melts*
May they live long enough to try out every bean variety in every position. ;)
Thank you so much for this joyous, inventive story. It has really touched my heart. <3
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Date: 2016-06-20 05:59 pm (UTC)(tl;dr: Thank you, you're welcome, Happy Holmestice, and many happy returns! I am sure John and Sherlock will enjoy all the dried-legume experiments in the world!)
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Date: 2016-06-20 06:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-06-05 05:12 am (UTC)FWIW, I have also just been reading Seanan McGuire's Indexing, a novel involving the secret government agency that exists purely to keep fairy-tale narratives from taking over all reality. This story and that one are playing with some of the same conventions, though with distinctly different approaches and somewhat different tones, and the writing here is every bit as clever as that in McGuire's book.
Bravo!
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Date: 2016-06-20 06:00 pm (UTC)