“I’ve been a fool, Watson. It has been before my nose all along. Literally! The stench is so distinctive. But, you see, I’ve seen Him before as well, if only briefly. You recall the case of the Devil’s Foot, which you so expertly set down?”
Good Lord, I thought to myself, is Holmes making some kind of veiled reference? Surely we were not facing the Fallen One himself; such a thing would have been even more preposterous than Holmes’ theory about demonic possession. As it transpired, our foe was much more terrifying. I nodded, remembering the case well.
“It happened when I subjected us to the burning powder that was used to induce both madness and … death.”
“Are you saying a similar poison has been employed here to drive people to such acts?”
He shook his head. “No, no, Watson. The Radix pedis diaboli has nothing to do with this affair, save for the fact that the one we must stop was present during that investigation also.”
“I do not follow you.”
“I have never spoken about what I witnessed under the influence of that powder, nor have I asked you what you saw.”
“My dose appeared to be notably smaller than yours,” I told him, remembering how I shook Holmes out of his hallucinogenic trance.
“Indeed…” He looked again at the headstone before him, then cast his eye over the entire graveyard. “Consequently, I saw our enemy, Watson. A brief … suggestion, you might call it. But nevertheless it was Him, of that I am certain.” Was my friend speaking of prophecy now? “It was a state I have been attempting to recreate during my absence from Baker Street.”
“And were you successful in your endeavours?” asked I, when all I really wanted to do was voice my concern; the state Holmes was talking about almost cost him his sanity, if not his life.
“I was indeed. I saw that which I was seeking, and more besides. I finally know what I must do … actually what you must do, Watson.” I still wasn’t following his line of reasoning and I told him so. He placed a hand on my shoulder. “At this moment I have more need of your skills as a physician than a detective. Do you trust me, old friend?”
“Of course, Holmes.”
“Then I would ask you to visit your surgery, with the express intention of collecting the items we shall require for our task, and meet me back here tomorrow at sundown.”
“Task, Holmes?” said I, still puzzled.
“Yes.” He fixed me with a stare that I have never forgotten and then he said, more serious than I have ever heard him, “Watson, tomorrow evening I would ask that you kill me.”
The logistics of Holmes’ plan will soon become apparent, but you can appreciate my asking him to elaborate on his statement. However, he would not, merely indicating that the following night he would require me to end his life by stopping his heart.
“I simply refuse,” I told him.
“Then more innocent people will die before this is all over,” Holmes said to me. “The killer has a taste for this now. From what I can ascertain he is using more and more direct and personal methods. He is taking pleasure in the tactile aspect of ending lives. If you will not do this for me, Watson, then do it for the victims yet to be claimed.”
Reluctantly, I agreed, returning to my surgery to gather what I would require. The safest way I could think of to stop Holmes’ heart temporarily was by way of administering an injection; a lethal concoction of my own devising, for which I also had the antidote. Holmes had explained that he only required me to impede the beating of his heart muscle for a short amount of time. “Just long enough to lure our prey out into the open,” Holmes informed me.
Quite how ‘killing’ my friend would achieve this, I did not know, apart from the obvious parallel it had with friends and loved ones suddenly doing the same thing across our city. Did he wish to recreate the madness of extinguishing a life in such a way? If so, he could scarcely have chosen a more apt person to perform this action; Holmes has always been and will forever remain, my best friend…
The wait of a day passed slowly, as I contemplated what I was about to do. In a few hours I would achieve what every single one of Holmes’ adversaries had failed to do. Even Moriarty. I would murder the great detective, and he had asked me to do the very deed! The thought of it boggles the mind.
Nevertheless, at the appointed time, I found myself once more travelling back to that cemetery as another thick fog descended upon London. The sky was darkening and the overall effect chilled me to the bone. As I walked through that graveyard, knowing full well that the people contained therein could not harm me, I still found myself shivering. When Holmes stepped out from the depths of a bank of fog and tapped me on the shoulder, it was very nearly I who found my heart stopping that night.
“You gave me an awful fright, Holmes,” I told him.
“My dear Watson, please forgive me…” In spite of the circumstances, and by the light of the lamp he was holding, I detected the hint of a smile playing on his lips. “Did you bring the required items?”
I nodded, showing him my medical bag.
“Splendid, then we shall begin.” Holmes took me over to a flat slab of stone, a place for him to rest as I carried out his request. He placed the lamp beside him so that I could see.
“Holmes, are you quite sure about this…? I still do not understand why—”
He silenced me with a raised finger. “Please proceed. I know that I am in the most capable hands.”
Sighing, I took out a hypodermic and a vial, siphoning off a massive dose of my concoction. Holmes, for his part, rolled up his sleeve. I saw the cost of his experimentations; red welts on his arm, dotting the lines of his veins. I frowned, but said nothing, instead taking up his arm to give him the injection: quite possibly the last I might ever administer to him.
As the needle sank into his flesh, Holmes reached over and patted my hand gently. Neither of us said a thing as he shut his eyes and waited for the drug to take effect. I sat there and noted the look of complete peace on Holmes’ face; it was the first and only time I have seen him look so content.
I took his wrist and felt for a pulse. It was still there, but faint.
“I never got the chance to tell you this before, Holmes…” I whispered, still keeping hold of his wrist as the beats slowed. “But thank you. Thank you for everything…”
And, suddenly, the beating ended.
I bowed my head, choking back the wave of emotion I felt at seeing my companion as dead as those corpses I had examined after the murders. Then I felt it, a sudden jolt — so fierce I almost let go of Holmes’ wrist. I wonder now if I would have seen what followed had I done so, for I firmly believe it was the physical connection to Holmes, at the moment his spirit departed his body, that allowed me to bear witness to what transpired. Yes, that is correct — you did not read wrongly. I can finally unburden myself of the knowledge of what happened in those ensuing seconds. It is an unspoken memory I have carried with me now for so very long…
A shape began to coalesce beside the slab, indistinct at first and shimmering — but as I blinked, refocusing on it, a familiarity began to reveal itself. A head, then shoulders, arms, legs … it was a body, transparent but glowing white. Eventually it took its true form. It turned to look at me, and it was then that I saw the unmistakable visage of none other than Holmes himself. He mouthed something upon seeing me, but I could not hear him at that point and was too much in shock to reply anyway. I wondered whether Holmes had somehow infected me with his madness, for this must surely be what it felt like to experience insanity.
The fog parted, close by, and began swirling round, taking on a form itself. It was difficult to separate the darkness beyond our lamp and the glow of Holmes’ spirit from that which was bending the mist to its will. I soon realized my mistake, however, because again this was not a thing of our world. It was nebulous in appearance, mist-like though not of the mist enveloping us. The only reason I could see it at all was because of my physical connection to Holmes.