“They will be in various stages of decomposition.”
“Yes, that is true. All the more reason to have at this chap. He is fresh.”
I cringed. Only Sherlock Holmes would describe a recently departed soul in such a way, yet I knew that he meant not to degrade and likely had no recognition of the fact that he had.
“I will do the toxicological work, but I want you to examine the body. For some reason, Lestrade refuses to rely upon the conclusions I reached upon my examination of it.”
For some reason, I thought. Of course, Sherlock would be incredulous. Why should anyone question deductive reasoning powers that were as sharp and sure as a surgeon’s scalpel?
Despite his lack of medical degree, despite his lack of any medical or scientific background other than some chemistry and biology courses, he would find it hard to understand how anyone could doubt him.
I started to say, “But I am just a woman. Lestrade will doubt me as well.” Refusing, however, to lend any credence to inequality of gender so far as intelligence, competence and medical background were concerned, I said instead, “I doubt that Detective Inspector Lestrade will trust a physician like me with so little experience in this arena.”
Sherlock put his hands on my shoulders, which sent the familiar shiver down my back, followed by a rush of warmth through my veins that made my entire body simmer. At these times, I barely recognized myself.
“Poppy, how can you belittle yourself when I have supreme confidence in you and your abilities? Now, put on these gloves and cover that elegant dress with this apron and get on with it.”
I opened the curtains, as I knew such an examination required daylight. Colour changes can be invisible in artificial light. I pulled on the gloves, then slid the apron over my head. He slipped behind me and tied it. I turned around to face Sherlock and our eyes met for a moment. Suddenly awash with memories of our one romantic evening in a cottage at Holme-Next-The-Sea - an emotional experience that he generally attributed to both of us having consumed too much wine - I felt my cheeks flush.
How right Sherlock was... not all body parts were created equal. The human heart was boundless, infinitely, and sometimes cruelly, inventive. A wound to the human heart could send madness and a bubble of rage to the brain. It could drape you in an aura of anger that darkened and eclipsed everything else. Forced into quietness and stillness, swathed in a bog, it could beat in a dull thump, nothing more than a feeble tremor, barely able to dispatch blood to your vessels. Or it could struggle against your breast, fight to smooth each recalcitrant nerve, make you feel drunk and giddy and littered with hope. When I thought of that night I’d spent with Sherlock, my heart flitted in a powerful frenzy, glittered with light, as though I had come out of a dull, grey shadow and stepped through a gateway to a meadow of rosy warmth and refreshing raindrops. I remembered how he had cupped my face with his palms. I remembered his touch, the scent of the sea, and the fragrance of the flowers he had left for me in the morning. I deliberately averted my gaze, walked toward the body and asked in what position it had been found.
“On the ground, face up,” he said. “Hands folded across his chest with the Buddha and the dead bird next to his head on the right.”
“Sherlock, is Detective Inspector Lestrade coming? Should we wait?”
“He was here earlier, but since you decided you had more important things to do, he left. He shall return soon; a page came with a message just moments before you arrived,” he said. “Lestrade told me to proceed without him.”
“Did you remove the man’s clothing?”
Sherlock nodded. “And before you ask, no, it was not soiled or stained with blood, there were no signs of a struggle, no torn fragments. There were no objects of any kind in the area except for the statue. I noted the absence of cadaveric rigidity and putrefactive changes.”
“Good,” I whispered as I examined the body for moles, tattoo-marks, abnormalities, and cicatrices, like keloid scarring or calluses.
“His hands were soft,” Sherlock said. “As I said, he worked in a bank so he earned his living in a profession that requires no manual labour. I took the liberty of taking measurements as well.” He looked at his notebook. “He is approximately 175 cm. and weighs 70 kg. Not very muscular. No violence to the genital organ, no foreign substances detected,” he added.
Sometimes I wondered if he said such things to get a reaction or if he simply forgot I was a woman. Despite the rude manner in which he sometimes addressed people, he was generally respectful of and genteel with women, so I thought this was his way of acknowledging my intellect and medical expertise despite my gender.
As I started to make my observations out loud, Sherlock took up pen and paper and began to scribble down everything I said, as if I were dictating a monograph. Then again, I felt certain that was exactly what he intended to do with his notes.
I had never done an autopsy per se, just some dissections in medical school, so I tried to channel the order and procedures I remembered from watching my uncle and reading the treatises of Virchow and others. “Male, Caucasian, appearing to be approximately forty years of age.” I lifted his limbs and manipulated his fingers. “Stage of lividity puts the time of death at approximately six to eight hours ago.”
I examined the body and saw no stab wounds, no evidence of a gunshot. I considered strangulation by some means that would not show marks
