Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

“Third one this week,” said Mycroft Holmes, skewering the roast pork on his plate with relish. “National embarrassment; the number of Lords unable to enter the House of Commons, all because some sad man* is going around London, stealing wigs.”

 “Well, what is being done about it?” asked his mother primly, cutting her own serving with precision. 

“We know his methods, so I’m sure it is only a matter of time before -”

The clang of cutlery against china interrupted him; Sherlock announcing his excitement. “How? How is he doing it?” Sherlock cried.

“Sherlock!” their mother hissed. “Sit down at once.” She directed the servants to the spilt dishes with a click.

“It’s quite simple, actually.” Mycroft said. “He’s been riding on the back of carriages, cutting holes in the hoods and taking the wigs straight off the MP’s heads.”

Sherlock’s snort earned himself another glare. His mother glanced pointedly at his chair, tipping her head for emphasis.

He was sitting too far back from the table.

With a look of aggravation only an eleven-year-old could summon, Sherlock jerked his chair forward, drawing out the loud scrape of its legs as they screeched satisfactorily in protest. He bent over his dinner again, only to be checked by a pointedly whispered, “No elbows on the table!”

Sherlock stabbed a potato viciously, and making sure his mother was watching, brought it to his face and gave it a long, deep sniff.

“Sherlock!” She snapped, the large vein near her temple throbbing bulbously. Sherlock laughed to see it, but when he caught his brother’s disapproving gaze the joy dissipated abruptly.

“If it’s quite simple, then why haven’t the police got him yet?” Sherlock said after a few minute’s terse silence.

“Why do you think, little brother?”

“They’re sumphs**?”

“Well,” Mycroft sighed as the plates were cleared, “That’s one way of putting it.”

“I’m going to catch him,” Sherlock declared and motioned to stand up, but his mother cut across him.

“You will do no such thing.”

“But, Mother-“

“No, Sherlock. For once you will conduct yourself as a reasonable member of society. You will not engage in such activities that will cause our family ridicule. You will model your behaviour after that of your brother.”

With this final denouncement, Lady Holmes excused herself from the table, leaving the newly created wake of abject horror to fester in her absence.

-----

In the late afternoon of the next day, a muddy and wet Sherlock Holmes was hiding outside the large warehouse door of the London Carriage Rental’s store room. He was waiting impatiently for Mr Wildershins to turn his back. 

Tracking down exactly which MPs had had their wigs stolen (local newspaper), their place of residence (sneaking into Mycroft’s study and combing through his files) and their usual route to the House of Commons (map of London; he really ought to have it memorised by now) had been more complicated than anticipated, but he had triumphed – of course – and if Mr Wildershins would just leave he could –

Now!

Sherlock ducked through the door, holding it with one hand to stop the threatening creak, then sprinted through the warehouse and hid behind the gleaming wheels of an enormous hansom.

His target carriage was within sight. 

Mr Wildershins whistled an aggravating tune, flipping a dirty cloth over his shoulder as he rummaged for wood polish in the storage drawers on the far wall.  With delicate, exact footsteps, Sherlock darted over to the next carriage, breathing as quietly as he could, despite the heavy beating of his heart.

A loud clutter made him jump, knocking his elbow painfully on the carriage’s panels. Biting back a wince, Sherlock risked a glance at the worker.  He’d dropped the polish. Sherlock watched it careen away from its owner, making a desperate bid for escape out the door, and Mr Wildershins followed like a hound.

Sherlock darted through the room, glorifying in his solitude, and inspected his prize.

The thief had stood on the mudguard when cutting the hole; that was immediately obvious. Less clear was how he’d climbed up.  The arrival of his weight would certainly have tilted the carriage and alerted its occupants. He couldn’t have hidden on the roof as the driver would have spotted him.

The entire rear quarter of the coach came under close scrutiny.

There! On the elliptic spring.  A small patch of dried mud, unremarkable to most, but clearly forming a small shoe print.

So the thief was his age, or younger. A tiger***? No - posing as a tiger, to fool pass-byers?

After carefully memorising the print’s shape, Sherlock replicated the thief’s actions and swung himself up into position on the carriage.  The fabric had been cut – not slashed – quite a degree of dexterity and confidence had been used.  The knife was serrated, and well used by its owner.  Two cuts; one down – the largest, cut with the fabric’s grain; quicker and quieter – and one across –

“HEY! What the devil do you think you’re doing?”

Sherlock spun around to see the bristles of Mr Wildershin’s moustache sparking with rage, and swung himself neatly off the carriage.

“Come here, boy!” the man roared, bearing down on him, bear-like hands reaching forwards. With a smirk of defiance, but regretting he had been unable to collect all the evidence, Sherlock ducked under the carriage and sprinted out the door.

----

It took an atrociously long time before Sherlock had narrowed his search enough that he was reasonably confident he’d have caught the wig-stealer within a day.  Long enough that his mother had commented approvingly on his spending time quietly and respectably in the house, oblivious to the turmoil that had characterised his mind for the past week.

But now the game was afoot!

He stood pressed against the outside of a church, using it as much for shelter against the monotonous London rain as a hiding place.  The suspected thief was due to round the corner any moment now, and a small matchstick-factory boy had promised for a coin that this was his getaway route.

Sherlock had found some ridiculous hat in the depths of Mycroft’s room, and he jammed it on his head to conceal his face.  The likelihood of the MP in the carriage pursuing the sad man was low, but the last thing a future detective needed was public knowledge of his identity.  It was difficult enough with Mycroft elevating the family name even closer to royalty.

He shifted where he stood, debating whether to button his coat, when an enormous coach pulled by two snorting horses, grey coats gleaming in the downpour, stopped in the traffic. And more by chance than skill, Sherlock saw a flash of yellow vanish from behind it.

Tripping on the wet cobblestones, he ran out onto the road, the rain immediately slicking his hair to his face.  Sherlock pushed it away, and – there!

The boy’s yellow coat was a rare beacon in the grey haze and bullets of raindrops, and a blob of white in his hand confirmed his identity; Sherlock dove through London’s smog and straight into his goal.

The impact of the pavement threw them apart, Sherlock’s knees burning as the gravel raked across his skin.  But he held the boy’s waistcoat tightly, and when he tried to stand up, Sherlock yanked him back down.

“I’ve got you,” he crowed.

The boy punched him in the face.

Reeling, and wiping a steady stream from his nose that he wasn’t certain was blood or rain, Sherlock staggered after him.  He had hunted this boy too hard to let him go now. The boy was shorter than him; he could catch him.

But luck favoured Sherlock, as a huge hansom burst out of the traffic right before the thief, the horse’s hooves whipping out in front of it, slowing the boy enough for Sherlock to reach him. Grabbing his wrists, he threw the scruffy kid against a shop wall and pinned him there. The wig fell from the boy’s forcibly slackened grip to bathe in the city’s grit.

“I’ve caught you, wig-stealer,” Sherlock breathed. “You’re mine.”

The boy glared at him filthily and tried to kick him, but Sherlock had been ready and sidestepped the move.

“You were a good puzzle,” Sherlock continued. “The best so far.  Took days to find you, but I did. I won.”

“Let me go now and I won’t kill you,” the boy said, eyes dark with menace. 

Sherlock laughed. “I really don’t think you’re in the position to make those kinds of deals.”

“If you turn me in, I’ll be hanged. Do you actually think I'll stop fighting, you posh git?”

Sherlock paused.  He studied the struggling boy before him, observing him. Cataloguing him.  He had been a worthy opponent; and there was a quickness to his dark blue eyes. “I don’t want you hanged,” he said eventually.

“Then why the hell –“

“To solve the puzzle! To show I could!”

“Oh, well then,” said the boy, every syllable dripping with sarcasm, “I’m so glad I’ll die for the noble cause of your ego.”

Sherlock suddenly found he had much less sympathy for his prize.  The rain had soaked through his coat, pooling in his shoes, and patience was running thin.

“I know you’re from a working trade family, recently moved to London on the hopes of better job prospects, unfortunately for you several million other people had that same idea.  Given your financial state school is not an option, and with your injured shoulder the factories don’t want you either.  You’ve got a sister who’s worried about you, but you continue your thievery because it puts food on the table, and you don’t approve of her anyway. Most likely because of the drinking.  That’s enough, don’t you think, to consider my ego warranted?”

“How long have you been following me for!?” the boy bellowed, struggling renewed.

“I have never seen you before today.”

"You're a filthy liar!"

"I am not. But I will give you to the police and they will reward me with cases."

The boy was almost snarling, turning animalistic with his rage, and when he began to fully realise the potency of the searing hatred directed at him Sherlock felt a tremor of unease race down his spine.

Sherlock was so focused on his struggling captive that when the boy glanced down, he did too.  He had only just registered there was something on the boy's foot when a white hairy thing was flung up into him. The coarse and dirty wig drove into his face, stinging his eyes and forcing him to reel backwards.  There was a sickening crack and pain exploded across Sherlock's skull, and he clutched his forehead as the blur that was his trophy ran off, disappearing into the turmoil of London's streets.

Sherlock leant heavily against the wall, trying to force clarity into his vision, but he knew it was too late. The limp, befouled wig lay where he flung it, marinating in the gutter.  It was worse than useless to present it to Mycroft without its thief; everyone would be assumed he stole it. A stupid boy so desperate for attention that he mimicked a criminal to pretend he’d solved a case. Mycroft would be embarrassed to be associated with him.

Eventually, and now thoroughly soaked, Sherlock turned to walk for home, furiously ignoring the fact that not all the water on his face was rain.