A Study in Charlotte

“Hi,” I said. “I hope you don’t mind that I came.”

She shook her head no, though I wasn’t sure if it was No, I don’t mind, or No, actually, leave.

“May I sit down?”

A nod.

“How long until you get your voice back?” I asked. When Detective Shepard said that Elizabeth had been unable to speak to the police, I hadn’t thought he meant it literally.

Slowly, achingly, she pulled a marker out from the folds of her blanket and scrawled something down on the board. I peered over at what she was writing. Don’t know, it said.

I didn’t mean to interrogate her. That wasn’t why I’d come. Besides, Shepard had told us that Elizabeth’s parents had asked the police for a few days’ grace for their daughter. They said that she had been through enough without being forced to relive it all.

“I’m sorry,” I told Elizabeth, looking down at my hands. I’d come to apologize. It was why I hadn’t brought Holmes. Apologizing was the kind of thing that made her break out in hives.

A scribbling sound. For what?

“For what happened to you. You didn’t deserve this. Any of it. I’m sorry.”

I don’t remember all of it. But the detective told me you found me and got help. Thank you. Her exhausted eyes met mine. Exhausted, and gentle. I didn’t deserve that gentleness.

“I hope you feel better soon,” I said, standing to leave.

Scribbling again. Detective said “blue carbuncle” to my parents. He thought I was asleep. Explanation?

I sat back down. “Do you know the story?”

A headshake. She scrubbed her board blank with her hospital gown and wrote Talk fast. My parents went to get takeout. They won’t tell me anything but I need to know. She furiously underlined the last four words.

I understood what it was like, being kept in the dark.

“It’s a Sherlock Holmes story,” I began, “about a rare missing diamond. A blue carbuncle. One that a policeman finds in the throat of a dead Christmas goose on the street. Holmes and Watson trace the goose back to its breeder, and from there, to the breeder’s brother. He’d stolen the gem from a countess and hidden it in a goose’s craw.”

It was the quick and dirty version, the boring one—all facts, no flair. It left out all the details that made the story something I loved. But Sherlock Holmes’s strategies and Dr. Watson’s observations didn’t have a place in this guarded hospital room.

Even so, Elizabeth listened avidly. When I’d finished, she held up her whiteboard. So I guess I’m the goose.

I hesitated, and she lifted her eyebrows in a challenge. “Guess so,” I said.

Fucked up.

“Yeah.” It was, impossibly so. “How much do you remember about that night?”

Not much. Seeing you. Making out with Randall. They showed me the thing that was in my throat.

“Did you recognize it?”

No. Her eyes were imploring. Do you know anything about it?

“The police are trying to solve this as fast as they can.” I took a deep breath. “Did Randall do this to you? Do you remember?”

She shook her head, blushing a little. I don’t remember his face, but I DO remember what the guy said. “Give my regards to Charlotte Holmes.” I don’t think Randall would say that.

There was a commotion outside the door. “Who did you let in to see my daughter? A friend? What’s his name?” I didn’t hear the police officer’s reply. Hastily, Elizabeth rubbed her board clean and then started writing something else.

Elizabeth’s mother barged into the room, her arms full of Chinese food. “Don’t tell me,” she said in a dangerous voice. “You’re Jamie Watson. You’re the one that found her.”

She might have said found her, but it was clear what she meant was attacked her. Elizabeth’s eyes seized on mine.

“No,” I said, extending a hand. “I’m Gary. Gary Snyder.” He was a poet we were reading in Mr. Wheatley’s class, one I vigorously hated.

“And what exactly are you doing here, Gary Snyder?”

Elizabeth tugged on her mother’s sleeve. She held up her whiteboard: a half-completed tic-tac-toe game.

Charlotte Holmes would have been proud.

Her mother deflated. “We’ve just been so worried, sweetie,” she said, and burst into tears over her daughter’s bed.

I took that as my cue to leave. I think I have some leads, I texted Holmes in the elevator.

Somehow, I wasn’t surprised to find Detective Shepard waiting for me on the sofa in Sciences 442.

“So, next time, tell me when you’re planning on pulling something,” I said, hanging up my jacket. “Her parents were conveniently gone? Oh, Elizabeth couldn’t talk to the detective, but she could easily talk to me. What, did you wait until I stepped out the door and then had the hospital cafeteria closed?” The last was directed at Holmes.

Across the room, she poked at her vulture skeleton until it spun in circles. “For the record, I merely waited until you left and then had Emperor Kitchen offer free takeout to all the families in the ICU. I’ll make Milo pay for it. I told you he’d go either today or tomorrow,” she said to Shepard. “You should trust me more often, you know. I am the world’s foremost Jamie Watson scholar.”

“Look, I’m happy to question her, but next time, I want to be in the loop. Otherwise I’m just going to build my own chessboard and let you move me around it.”