[Sherlock Holmes] The Legend of the Nightingale

(God's perspective)

Near midnight.A carriage was parked on the street in the eastern suburbs.The coachman sat in front of the carriage and lit a cigarette, but didn't put it in his mouth immediately, watching the smoke rising and spreading in the night with a dejected expression.

"We were really tricked this time, Justin." He said after a long silence.

"Really." Someone in the carriage replied.

The coachman gently turned his cigarette, and the faint light of the fire illuminated a corner of his clothes.Anyone would be surprised to see the driver of an ordinary carriage in the slums sitting here like a tramp, dressed like an uptown gentleman.

"Do you believe it? For the first time in ten years, I got fake news from a professor."

"Trust me. Get in the car, it's too cold outside."

"I'd rather be cold and sober. Stay in the conservatory too long and I'm almost an idiot."

The companion in the car stopped talking.

"Should have known that Moriarty couldn't have been so smart to keep so many backs outside Porlock," continued the driver, "that he has only one secret base that we don't know about. He knows he's doomed and must immediately Running away, not even thinking about revenge, made up this lie on the spot to make us feel at ease. I never dreamed that the address was fake."

"It's not smart to figure it out now." Justin said calmly.

"He put us in this place on purpose. He knew Scotland Yard would have surrounded the hotel by the time we found out, and they'd long since lost track of which little house in Yorkshire they were warming up."

"That's too soon, Vincent."

"In short, no one will be loyal to anyone forever." Vincent said bitterly. "When things come to an end, we will be left here without a fight. London is still so big, there is no room for us."

"Vincent, do you really believe that Holmes called the police?" Justin suddenly poked his head out of the car window, "No, not at all."

"What do you mean?" Vincent turned to look at him.

"If the detective got to the police station as soon as he escaped, they would have been there long ago. You think we'd have time to clean up the hotel like it hasn't been lived in months, and do a good job. Maybe the professor and Moran can fly away in time, there is no room for us to escape. Scotland Yard found this place by itself. It is said that they now have an American detective to help, and the doctor, who has never been discouraged The professor knows Holmes well, and he knows that the more this guy suffers, the more he refuses to ask the police for help, otherwise the bad treatment Scotland Yard received before would be enough. Holmes will be worried about it for the rest of his life."

"what do you want to say in the end?"

"Holmes did not return to the city at all after he escaped from the hotel. He must have temporarily put the papers in some place which was absolutely safe, and even if he could not go back to retrieve them, they could be found by Scotland Yard, and then returned."

"Back to where?"

"Anywhere is possible. Find this Miss Nightingale," Justin pointed behind him, "and don't hesitate to kill someone. Fortunately, I don't think he has time to get a gun. His gun was taken by us, and now At the professor's."

"Can't we really find a hotel to stay?"

"Is there anything more suspicious than two men carrying an unconscious young woman?"

"We're not in the city."

"Vincent, Scotland Yard is frantically searching every place where people can live in the eastern suburbs. We are free outside, and it will be over if we are suddenly besieged in a hotel. I know this is the way of no return, but at least I don't want to let It came too fast."

Vincent finally took a drag on his half-lighted cigarette.

"I don't understand why you don't care at all."

"What's the use! I can't leave London. Baldwin's gang hunted me all the way from Virginia to the English Channel, and I didn't survive until the professors in London provided protection. They're still out. One step out of London and I'm alive." But 24 hours. Even if they are not caught by Scotland Yard in the short term, they will soon know the news of the professor's downfall, and they will still come to kill me. I am already dead. If I remember correctly, Vincent , you and I are in the same situation, otherwise we wouldn’t be stuck here in a dilemma.”

"Then we have reached a consensus," Vincent said with a sneer. "No one will die for the professor because he is loyal to him, but because he will die if he leaves."

"You didn't believe that this morning, did you?"

"You don't believe it either."

A moment of silence.

"What should this woman do?" Justin opened the mouth first, "I don't seem to have controlled the dosage properly, she is still not awake yet."

"What good will she do us if she wakes up?"

"No. But she's not doing us any good."

"Justin, you know very well that even if the two of us don't go through a court trial, there is nothing wrong with going directly to the gallows ten times."

Another moment of silence.

"Vincent, if we hand her over to Scotland Yard intact, won't we win any hope?"

"Don't be kidding, Justin. If I need to kill people now, I can feel at ease."

The tone of this sentence was so gloomy that Justin was unwilling to answer.He wasn't as careless as he appeared in his heart, so Vincent's last ruthless words not only failed to inspire him, but had the opposite effect, causing Justin to sit sullenly in the carriage for a while without speaking.

"Vincent, if we..."

Justin suddenly shut up, maybe because he suddenly found that the smoke that had been wafting outside the window was gone.He wasn't too far from confusing cigarettes with vaping.Almost at the same time, the sound of fighting came from outside, mixed with screams, and within ten seconds, a person fell to the ground.Then there is nothing.

Justin took the knife out of his pocket and held it in his hand, leaning down so he wouldn't be seen from the car window.He dragged Nightingale to block him, and slowly opened the door of the carriage.At this moment, the carriage door was suddenly pulled open by an external force, and he almost fell out.The decision to use Nightingale as a shield saved him, because the opponent was about to punch her, but when he saw Nightingale falling from the seat first, he raised his hand reflexively to help her.Justin took this opportunity to crawl out, got up and glanced at Vincent.The temporary coachman fell to the ground motionless, not knowing whether he was alive or dead.

Justin saw the gray, pale and thin man beside the carriage trying to help Nightingale back into the carriage, then stood up and looked at him.Justin suddenly had an illusion, that gray gaze piercing through the enveloping fog, through himself, pinning him in place unable to move because of shock and fear.He once thought that the most shrewd gaze in the world wasn't even visually perceptible, it was the breath of a poisonous snake, something fatal to all creatures.He has never seen the gaze of an eagle, calm and decisive, and will kill any creature that stands in his way without hesitation, but God, it is still so clean, unbelievably clean!He has shed other people's blood, he and the professor are the same person, but now they are very different.

Maybe it was because of Holmes' complete despair, maybe because he was no longer able to continue the doomed escape, or maybe it was because of the collapse of faith to some extent after seeing the man who had escaped from the professor's clutches finally won, Justin did. made a near-suicidal decision.Two steps forward he made a direct attack on the detective, without defense or skill, and Holmes seized him by the wrist and knocked him down with a blow.

Moriarty's Justin can finally stop being nervous.

Holmes confirmed that Justin had indeed lost consciousness before going back to pull Nightingale in the carriage.At this time he hesitated a little.They sedated her and she still hasn't woken up, hopefully not life-threatening.It will take some time to wait for Scotland Yard to come here, and if the two wake up during the period, it will be another trouble.Better to take her in the car and leave.Seeing Nightingale's hazy face, the detective frowned slightly.In the past two years, he has been obsessed, as long as he only needs to get back the round he lost in a daze, but now he has an illusion, as if she was washing test tubes at the workbench in 221B yesterday, and she has been missing for less than six hours. .

It was too late when Holmes noticed the sound. He couldn't move his hands, but he still did what he could, blocking the direction of the sound with his whole body.Feeling a chill in his right rib, the detective's pale gray eyes glanced to the right.The well-dressed temporary coachman touched Holmes for some reason, his facial features were distorted, and he looked very embarrassed. The dagger in his hand was inserted under Holmes' right rib, all the way to the handle.Because of the constant need to avoid gunshots, Moriarty's men carried knives with them and knew how to use them effectively, such as now.Holmes judged correctly that the knife was aimed at Nightingale.

"No guns, Mr. Detective," Vincent whispered. "Now we have to fight."

Holmes said nothing.The weary killer suddenly became alarmed by the detective's overly calm reaction, and Holmes' indifference in which nothing was beyond his control frightened him.The instinctive reaction under the control of fear is either to stand still and let others be slaughtered, or to attack frantically, cutting the opponent into pieces and blood with eyes closed.Moriarty's Vincent falls into the latter category.He pulled out the knife and stabbed it straight at the heart.Because he was too panicked, Vincent did not see Holmes' eyes suddenly change from eagle-like calmness to eagle-like murderous intent.He first heard a very close gunshot against the rules of nature, and then realized that the knife in his hand hit an obstacle and stopped halfway.

The killer with a pierced heart stared dumbfounded at the blood-sprayed detective.Holmes held a revolver in his right hand, the muzzle of the gun was almost pressed against Vincent's chest, and the dagger was blocked by his left arm across his chest.Seeing the stunned question in his opponent's eyes clearly, Holmes gave a weary but gloomy smile:

"I don't have a gun. But she does."

Perhaps he died without hearing the last words.As you may remember, it was the professor's first Christmas present to Nightingale, a .[-] bullet.He said she would come in handy sooner or later.So far, Angela Nightingale has never fired a single shot with Irene's revolver.

The dagger was very thin, and for a while Holmes only felt the heat oozing from the wound, but felt no pain.He frowned, and glanced at Nightingale lying flat on the ground beside him.She was thin and haggard, the makeup on her face was messed up after the bumpy journey, and her expression was peaceful, as if she was in a deep sleep.Black hair fell out over her forehead and neck.

Holmes put down the gun, did a little physical hemostasis, and leaned over to prop her up against him.Blood was on her clothes.Holmes hung his head so that his chin touched her black hair, and the cold sweat stood on his brow.

"They know we're around here, and Scotland Yard can't find two people in this place."

……

"Can you please stop stealing my gun like this in the future, Nightingale?"

……

Scotland Yard officers found Holmes and Nightingale after dragging away two of Moriarty's men (one unconscious and one dead).Both were in a coma, Nightingale was injected with drugs, and Holmes lost a lot of blood from trauma.There were signs of a fight at the scene.The deceased was shot in the heart at close range and died on the spot.The two detectives looked so peaceful, if it wasn't covered in blood, it would look as if nothing had happened.

"As long as he has anything to do with Miss Nightingale, Holmes will be in bad luck. It's simply evil." After picking up the two wounded, Lestrade said to the non-insiders present.The "non-insiders" here refer to Dr. Watson, McMurdo and Iris Adler, who collectively referred to Scotland Yard as the greatest disaster of the 19th century during this period.

"It's better to say that he will be unlucky when he meets Moriarty," replied the American detective.He came to England originally with the pleasure of traveling for a long time, but as a result, he got involved in the chores of Scotland Yard one after another, confronted a professor he had never heard of in his life, was ridiculed by the local detectives incidentally, and fell into the hands of a capricious man. In the palm of the femme fatale, the mood is extremely chaotic now.

"This is the gun." Lestrade watched the police officers seal up the blood-stained revolver as evidence. "It doesn't belong to Holmes."

"It belongs to Nightingale," Watson said with certainty.Iris smiled beside him without saying a word.

"Interesting, officer. Why did she have a gun when she came out of Moriarty's? They couldn't have given it to her."

"That's not surprising—it's not surprising that there must be something strange about Holmes' pupils."

"These two men are mad enough to frighten me," sighed McMurdo. "In every sense."

The author has something to say: I just found out that there are already 100 chapters.It's really a milestone turning point.