Two Hundred and Twenty-One Baker Streets (17 page)

Not that the memory of Holmes was exactly sacrosanct. His predilection for drugs was well known, cocaine in particular, but that seemed to be his only vice. There were no stories of affairs; indeed, no mention of women at all, which naturally led most commentators to assume he had been gay and circumspect, common enough at the time.

“When did those problems become more than you could handle?” I asked, hoping I was phrasing the question with suitable diplomacy.

“In 1984,” he said.“I could tolerate everything up until then. Not
like
it, tolerate it. I grew to dislike him, yes. Tiring of his constant bloody attitude. But hate him? Really, utterly, loathe him?1984.”

“When he died?”

Watson smiled.

Hadn’t I said that once he’d shown a glimpse of good humour, I’d consider getting my book out for him to sign? Not a chance. That smile didn’t relax me. If anything, it made me even more uncomfortable.

“The third series,” he said, returning precisely to where we had been before our digression.“That was good. Excellent, in fact. I sound as arrogant as Holmes, but it was. Ray was just what we needed. He took Holmes’ wilder ideas and my love of word play and built a bridge between them. We weren’t a double act, not at our best. We were a trio, the silent partner tapping away behind the drapes. Those five years saw us at our best.

EFFECTS
: The sound of a champagne cork being popped, the champagne being poured into a glass.

HOLMES
: Ah... Champagne and petit fours. Could it get any better?

WATSON
: Yes. It could be us out there, enjoying it.

EFFECTS
: Watson rattles on the bar of his cell.

WATSON
: Damn you, John Clay! You can’t keep us locked up forever!

CLAY
: [Drinks] True. But I can certainly keep you in there until I’ve finished my dinner. Yours is on the floor.

EFFECTS
: Watson kicks the tray of gruel.

WATSON
: You expect us to eat this slop?I’ve just seen a fly die after landing on it.

CLAY
: I know how it feels; the canapes are positively heavenly.

“R
AY STAYED WITH
you until series seven,” I said,“then there was a falling out?”

“Holmes again. He finally got one of the higher-ups to agree that we could write the show on our own. Ray was fired. Couldn’t believe it. I tried to reverse the decision, begged Ray to come back, but he’d had enough of Holmes by then. He wasn’t going to carry on under sufferance. Horrible. I lost a good friend,didn’t talk to him again for years. It was Mary that built the bridges between us again, she’d worked with him on his sitcom,
The Scowerers
.
¹²
Told him that I’d love to see him again. We met up for dinner, but it wasn’t the same, too much time, too many regrets. Good of Mary, though. Course, he got some revenge; the eighth radio series was the last. People didn’t like it as much. Too silly.”

EFFECTS
: A rushing sound, the roar of a rocket.

WATSON
: [Shouting] I can see the sea from up here.

HOLMES
: [Shouting] Splendid. If I can’t defuse the warhead you’ll be able to sprinkle yourself over it.

S
ERIES EIGHT HAD
seen Holmes and Watson fighting the Nazis. While British comedy—particularly
The Goon Show
—had obsessed over the war during the’fifties, by the’sixties the idea seemed dated and absurd. Listeners had turned off in their droves.

“Was that part of the reason you cancelled the radio series?”

“For sure. Holmes never could stand criticism, and I was bored of the characters, happy to try something new. Much good it did us; eight years of floundering and then we were back.”

“The TV series was a huge success,” I said.“Was that a surprise? After so long off the air, did you worry that people wouldn’t be interested in the characters anymore?”

“It was all people kept banging on about. Those that had liked it before came back, and we added a new audience, a younger one. I was bored with them, but nobody else seemed to be.”

“And of course, that was when you met Mary.”

Watson nodded.“She’d been a production unit manager for a few years, hopping from one show to another. She’d been pushing for a producer’s job, and they gave her to us, I think they thought she’d quit after a few weeks working with Holmes—I’m damn sure nobody else wanted the job—but she always was made of sterner stuff. She would weather his moods. Eventually he grew to respect her.‘The Woman,’ he called her. It started off as an insult, but eventually it was a compliment. To him she was the definite article. The Woman. To me, too, of course.”

“You married in1976.”

Watson looked at the picture of Mary on his desk and finally I sensed warmth in him.

“We’d been a couple for a year or so. Kept it as quiet as possible, but that didn’t last, people talk. You never can keep a secret on a set. We’d been on location for the Christmas special.”

“‘The Hounds of the Baskervilles’?”

“That’s right. 1975. Buggering about on Dartmoor, freezing to the bone. Holmes was in a sour mood because Christopher Lee was the guest star and was getting all the attention. Second fiddle again, he never could stand it. He’d flounced off halfway through shooting and Mary was beside herself. She’d come to me, hoping I might be able to calm him down but nobody even knew where he’d gone. We shot around him as much as possible, and that night Mary and I had got drunk in the hotel, taking it in turns to moan about him. We ended up in bed and that was that. I suppose it was Holmes that brought us together, in his own strange way. Just as he would later tear us apart.”

If Watson saw my surprised look at that, he ignored it, continuing:

“Of course, he re-appeared the next morning, acting as if nothing had happened, and we managed to get back on track.”

INT. BASKERVILLE HALL

SIR HENRY
: How dare you, sir! I am a peer of the realm!

What gives you the right to treat me in such a manner?

HOLMES
: The fact that I’m the only man who can protect you from the lumbering great mastiff that wants to chew on your kidneys.

“Y
OU WERE MARRIED
to Mary for eight years,” I said.

I’d thought about asking Watson to clarify what he had meant when he’d said that Holmes had torn he and Mary apart, but we’d get there soon enough. I imagined he’d be more open if I let him tell his story in his own time.

He seemed distracted now, that sharp, staccato manner of his having softened into genuine reminiscence. It was clear that Mary was the one thing that broke through his cold exterior.

“Eight wonderful years,” he agreed,“happiest time of my life. We bought this place, our seaside retreat. She’d always wanted to live by the sea. Never went in it, just loved to hear the noise of the tide. In the winter, when all the tourists are gone, you have the place to yourself. Wonderful. An empty beach, haunted by summers.”

The softness that had begun to creep into his tone when discussing Mary was more noticeable.

“It’s a beautiful town,” I said.“I used to come here when I was a child.”

He nodded, though I’m not entirely sure he was paying attention to me. He was lost in memories of his own.

“I made her happy,” he said.“At least, I think I did.”

“I’m sure she was,” I said.“I’ve read a lot of interviews with people who knew her and they always remark on how happy she was, how full of life.” That last comment might have been tactless. I hadn’t intended it to be, but once out of my mouth, the words worried me.

He turned to look at me.“I know she was happy,” he said, with a slight trace of anger.“That wasn’t my point.”

“Sorry.” I wasn’t altogether sure what I was apologising for. I only knew that the gentle, reminiscent Watson showed signs of slipping away again. “It’s obvious you would have done anything for her,” I said, desperate to bring him back.

His eyes turned to the window again.“I did,” he said, his meaning far from clear.

I felt like I was losing control of the interview, and I tried to think of ways to bring it back on track. Before I could say anything, though, he carried on talking.

“It was no way to go,” he said,“unfair. Cramps, swelling, blurred vision. Headaches. Reading about that stupid woman in the papers, the American singer, whole thing presented as if it were a noble battle. Posh doctors running around. Her fans filling the Internet with insubstantial prayers. Whole thing played out like a soap opera. Rubbish. Nothing noble about it.”

He looked at me and the anger was still there, a cold, dangerous thing that I realised was not directed at me, but at the world in general.

“I only hope you never see someone you love go through that sort of pain,” he said.“That perfect, glittering presence, reduced to a thing of screaming, sweat and death.”

He picked up the picture of her on the desk and stared it.

“I try and remember her like this. Not the corpse he reduced her to. I got rid of most of her things. Didn’t want them cluttering the house. Reminding me. This is all I need.”

He put the picture down and got up.“More coffee. I need a break.”

Without waiting for my answer—and, in truth, I didn’t really know what to say—he picked up my mug and the cafetiere and walked out of the study. I was left on my own, staring at the posters on the wall and trying to make sense of what I’d just heard.

Mary Watson had died of a seizure. That’s all that I had known—my knowledge of John Watson and his life was embarrassingly encyclopaedic; it was all
most
people had known. From what Watson had just said, it sounded though the cause of that seizure had been pregnancy. The American singer he was referring to could only be Miko Clash
¹³
who had recently, publicly, suffered from pre-eclampsia giving birth to twins. But if Mary had died during pregnancy, why had the fact been hidden? The obvious reason was because John Watson, sterile thanks to TB,couldn’t be the father.

I stared at the dictaphone on the desk and wondered what I had stumbled upon.

If Watson wasn’t the father, then who was? My mind kept returning to the news clipping on the wall. Holmes and Watson on Blackpool front, the seeds of murder just a column-inch away. Was that possible? When I had asked Watson when he had truly begun to hate Holmes, he had said 1984, avoiding my attempts to force a specific answer.“When he died?” I had asked. Watson had just smiled.

It was absurd. I was jumping to conclusions, reading too far between the lines. My obsession for crime fiction—fostered by the comedic work of the man I was interviewing—was colouring my judgement. There was no way my suspicions could be correct. Was there?

HOLMES
: How many times must I tell you, Watson? It’s always a mistake to theorise before you’re in full possession of the facts.

WATSON
: Like the time you burst into the Coco Club claiming Mimi DeVaux must be the Brixton Strangler? An assertion based only on the size of her biceps and the speed with which she could knock up a reef knot?

HOLMES
: How was I suppose to guess at the services Madame Mimi offered her clients? Unbelievable. I’ll never see the like again. Like a Sunday roast being trussed up for the pot. The man must have been mad.

WATSON
: Him and the rest of the cabinet.

T
HE DOOR OPENED
and John Watson returned, carrying a tray of drinks.

I jumped up to help him, but he waved me away.

“More than capable,” he said.

He put the tray down on the desk and poured two cups of coffee. He passed me one and took the other. For a moment we just sat there, an awkward silence hanging between us. I took a sip of the coffee. It was far too strong, but I continued to work at it; better that than sit there doing nothing.

“I’ve probably said too much,” he said, after a couple of minutes.“Know I have. Stupid. Shouldn’t have let you come. Missed it. That’s the truth of it. Stupid profession, putting people in the spotlight, turning them into stars, making them need the attention. Adoration. Pathetic, really. Agent told me you were doing a book, and I felt the old thrill. To be important.”

“You’re very important to me,” I admitted, slightly embarrassed at the turn of the conversation.“I’ve been a fan since I was akid.” I considered for a moment, then reached down to my bag and pulled out the book, handing it over to him. “I bought that when I was eleven. Always loved crime stories, and I thought it was a serious book.”

He smiled, and for the first time there was a kindness to it. “Serious book? Arguably,it’s neither.”

“But I loved it. Read it over and over again until I could recite the comics by heart. Then I found the radio series on cassette. Then the TV show when they finally released it on video. Holmes and Watson were my heroes. Friends, almost. Well, Watson at least,
you
; Holmes was too cold, too remote. He was funny, but you didn’t like him. Not in the same way. The doctor felt like someone you wanted to know, the warm, faithful, kind man who would be the best friend you could have. I think I loved him a little.”

Now it was me that had said too much. He didn’t look concerned, though; in fact, he was in agreement.

“So many did.” He stroked the cover of the book.“All the letters. The autographs. It never affected Sherlock. Probably because he’d
always
believed he was special. Me? I could never refuse it. The social events, the women. So many women. Sherlock could resist those as well, of course. All except one. Mine.”

He looked at me and the anger had gone, to be replaced with a gentle, almost fatalistic, look of comfort.

“That’s what I always assumed. That Sherlock wanted Mary because she was mine. Because finally I had someone else I needed in my life. Someone I needed more than him.”

“Second fiddle,” I said.

“Exactly that. So he charmed her. And he could be charming, when he really tried. Mary and I were having a rough couple of weeks. My fault. I’d been unfaithful and careless about it. Holmes saw his opportunity and struck. Talk about careless. He got her pregnant.