Free You Buy Bones by Marcia Wilson

were.”
    â€œI assure you, you’ll get no more than a few shillings.” That eyebrow went up again as that voice dropped to the dry note Lestrade remembered. “And I’m afraid it won’t look too well for you the next time you go to the clinic, Mr. Woods.”
    â€œWe’ll just have to live with that, won’t we?”
    Lestrade was stamping out just as Watson’s cane touched the first man’s sternum. He barely seemed to tap, but the bruiser stopped dead in his tracks just as he was closing his hand over the doctor’s shoulder.
    As soon as his fingers touched him there, something flitted across Watson’s face like black lightning. He rose up, weight favouring his better leg, and his opposing arm lifted. Lestrade saw the flash of gnashed white teeth in a white face with dark eyes and a terrific impact sent the would-be assailant on a short journey through the air. The standing man backed away, kneeling down to his comrade’s side in a show of loyalty - his only admirable action.
    â€œI’m not sure you need me, doctor.”
    Watson whirled, his face open to Lestrade’s and for a moment it was a terrible thing, like a violent wave cresting. Just before it could crash, the look was smoothed over and replaced by tired regret.
    â€œI know them.” He said softly. “When the hunger for their drug comes, they’d commit whatever crime is required.”
    â€œYes, I recognise the breed.” Lestrade agreed. A single glare was enough to freeze the would-be thieves. “You aren’t going to go anywhere, are you? Thought not.” He pulled out his police whistle and blew; Watson flinched at each blast but held himself in check very well. “You might as well sit down, doctor. It can wait for the Bobbies. This is Holder’s beat; he won’t be long.”
    â€œHolder,” Watson breathed out slowly, collecting his nerve. “Didn’t he play cricket at one time?”
    â€œW-well, why, the very same.” Lestrade blinked. “Do you play cricket?”
    â€œAt one time I did.” Watson passed a gallows-grin to the smaller man. “But I gave it all up for rugby.”
    Lestrade forced his embarrassment down his throat. If Watson was looking for pity he would have done so in better ways. As it was, Lestrade sensed the doctor was just stating a fact because he was trying to face a bitter truth about himself.
    And at that moment, the puzzle pieces that were Watson jigsawed together with a sharp click in Lestrade’s mind.
    Watson wrote about himself in a distant voice in the details of his past. He ironically seemed more alive pre-London than he did in it. In the present he was showing himself as struggling and failing to understand the genius of his fellow lodger. He concentrated on his failure to comprehend that mind - a struggle everyone at the Yard could sympathize with. Watson might describe others in unflatteringly honest lights, but those were outside observations, notes on how people were behaving, talking, and how they projected themselves. When it came to the inward rationale, he kept the frustrations, the inadequacies, and the incomprehension in his own viewpoint... and thus, was hardest on himself.
    â€˜ The campaign brought honours and promotion to many, but for me it had nothing but misfortune and disaster.’
    Watson was in transit between the young man who had been in the prime of his life and fortune, and the shattered, useless soldier who somehow survived Maiwand. Instead of serving the Crown he was now dependent on Her benefice. The two ill-matched facets had not yet melded. It all fit on him like a shoe that hadn’t been broken in. He was a stranger to himself.
    â€˜I had neither kith nor kin in England...’ ‘ ... be it remembered how objectless was my life...’ ‘...My health forbade me from venturing out unless the weather was exceptionally genial, and I had no friends who