Title: The Cleverness of Women
Author: LizBee
Summary: Russell receives an invitation from Irene Adler, who makes an offer she can't refuse and brings certain issues to light.
Rated: PG-13
Warnings: Um.  
Fandom: Mary Russell
Spoilers: BEEK, MREG, LOCK.
Disclaimer: Not mine. No profit. Now read on.
Notes: This, too, is related to my other Russell fics.  Thanks as always to Branwyn for her support and beta-reading, and to Professor Pangaea for reading an early draft and pointing out that it had no focus, purpose or point.  
Email: elizabeth_barr @ yahoo.com.au


The Cleverness of Women
by LizBee



What with one thing or another, it was almost three months before we finally left America.  An interesting case arose in San Jose, followed by an imperious invitation from my great-aunt in Boston.  It was late summer before we arrived in New York.  We were to stay two nights; nothing, I swore to myself, would keep me from boarding that ship, even if I had to leave Holmes behind, either in the hands of villains or investigating some curious bit of evidence.  I was looking forward to being home, with my own desk and my own work.

I said as much to him early the next morning, and he chuckled into my hair.

"I thought you showed remarkable restraint when your uncle asked when you intended to give up 'that career nonsense'."

I snorted into my pillow.  "It isn't done to stab one's relatives with a salad fork."

"It is an inefficient murder weapon," he agreed.  I nodded, closed my eyes and dozed while Holmes dressed.

He had gone out and returned by the time I woke again.  He greeted me with an inscrutable look and a cup of coffee.  I had the impression that he was on the verge of finding my heavy sleeping as irritating as the insomnia of earlier months.

But all he said was, "You have a letter."

"What?  From whom?"  I sat up, groped for my spectacles and reached for the coffee, which did little to settle my stomach, but revived me considerably.  Thus fortified, I found the envelope he'd left on the bedside table.  

It was addressed, in the hand of a woman who had lived many years in Europe, to Mrs Mary Russell Holmes.  The sender identified herself as I. A. Norton.  There was no postmark; it must have been delivered by hand.

The letter read, Dear Mrs Holmes,
I heard through a friend that you were stopping briefly in New York.  I would be most obliged if you could call on me at your earliest convenience.

There was a tremble of ink, as if the hand holding the pen had hesitated, and she added, I have thought of you often over the last few years.
Irene. A. Norton

Burning with curiosity, I climbed out of bed and went to dress.  I paused for a quick, bland breakfast of toast and tea, and presented myself two hours later to the doorman of an exclusive apartment building.  

I was, he said, expected.

The distinctive scent of Mrs Norton's perfume hit me as I entered her apartment; it was neither strong nor unpleasant, but it made my stomach turn over, and my step faltered for a moment.  It took me back to 1919, Paris and that unpleasant stage of my life after Patricia Donleavy's bullet had ripped me apart, and for all that I liked Mrs Norton, I didn't care to be reminded of that period.

Mrs Norton had changed little in the intervening five years: she seemed smaller, and her hair was fully grey, but her eyes were still bright and knowing.  Her gaze took in my hair, my dress and the gold band on my right ring finger, and no doubt many other things besides.  She smiled and leaned up to kiss my cheek.

"You look remarkably well," she said, "if rather pale.  Are you all right?" 

I told her I was fine, merely tired from our long travels, and she nodded in understanding, with a faint reminisicent smile. "Do you prefer his name these days, or is it still Miss Russell?"

"Russell, usually," I said, allowing her to direct me to a small table in a tastefully decorated breakfast room, "but please, call me Mary.  I hadn't realised you were living in New York."

"For the last two years, now.  I have family in New Jersey.  They wanted to keep me near."  Her lips quirked in a wicked little smile.  "I'm afraid this is as close as I intend to get.  How did you find Boston?"

"Lovely, although I had trouble persuading my eldest uncle that his patriarchal powers don't extend to me."  I sipped the excellent tea her maid had provided and said, "Who was it that told you when I'd be in New York?"

"An old friend in Boston with an inordinate taste for gossip.  But I must confess that I've been following your time in America with some interest.  Do you find it tedious, having murders and violence follow you wherever you go?"

"Only when I've got a manuscript at home, waiting for a final edit."  I glanced  over the books on her shelves.  "I must admit that your invitation took me by surprise."

"I surprised myself.  When we parted in 1919, I never expected to see you again."

I would have understood if she'd said, I never wanted to see you again.

"Why am I here?" I asked softly.

She leaned back and regarded me with a stern eye that reminded me of some of my more exacting tutors.

"Several reasons, I suppose.  One being the indulgence of my own indecent curiosity.  I wanted to see what kind of husband Sherlock made."

I raised my eyebrows.  "You'd have been better off inviting him if that's what you wanted to know, and I doubt he'd reveal much anyway."

"No, I suppose not.  But you look happy and healthy, and that tells me a great deal."

"Yes.  Perhaps it does."

There were no souvenirs from her career in this room, but on the shelf behind her was a sepia photograph of her late husband.  I had only known Godfrey Norton briefly, in the very last days of his life, but he had struck me as that rare beast, a truly decent man.  He'd survived the influenza epidemic of 1918, only to have the disease linger and turn into pneumonia, finally carrying him off in the summer of 1919.  

In his photograph, he was still a relatively young man, with all the pride and honour of an educated and comfortable Englishman.  His pose was stiff, but there was a hint of a smile in his otherwise serious face.  He was handsome and confident, and one could almost be persuaded that he resembled the figure whose photo was half-concealed behind a plant: a thin young man of surprising beauty, wearing the uniform of an junior officer of the British army.  

Adrian Norton.

It was with great difficulty that I pulled my attention away from my husband's son, to make polite conversation as if thirty years of history had never happened.

Her maid served a light lunch, which Irene hardly touched.  I nibbled around the edges, trying to settle my stomach, and we spoke of inconsequential things: my work at Oxford, the years she had spent teaching music in France and Italy.  Neither of us, I thought, had her mind on the conversation at hand.  I was think about the immense courage Godfrey Norton had shown, in raising Adrian as his own.

I didn't envy the Nortons their choices.  In the hospital, after the accident, the doctor had told me (in hushed, sympathetic tones) that the internal injuries I'd suffered would make it unlikely that I would ever be able to have a child.

He'd paused, waiting for hysterics.  With all the dignity I could summon from my broken body, I'd told him it was the only piece of good news I'd received since I regained consciousness.  Nothing in the intervening ten years had served to change my mind.

So we pushed food around our plates, and spoke of inconsequentialities until there was no longer any point in pretending to eat.  The plates were taken away, and Mrs  Norton climbed to her feet, stiff despite the short time we'd been sitting.  She was several years older than Holmes, and age was just beginning to take its toll.  He still carried the coin she had given him on his watch-chain, and the sound of metal scraping against metal was as comforting to me as the memory of my mother's voice.  Strange, to think that in the minds of millions of Watson's readers, she would forever be the daintiest thing under a bonnet, an adventuress and a deceiver, and all the things that a Victorian woman was not supposed to be.  Not for the first time, I was grateful that I had escaped Doyle's 'literary' attentions, and that Uncle John knew better than to allude to my existence in any way.

Her fingers, unadorned except for an old fashioned mourning ring, were moving nervously, plucking at nonexistent loose threads in her sleeves.  I watched her for a minute, and when it became clear that she was unable to speak, I said, "I presume that the second reason for my presence here is your son."

She gave me a look of mingled gratitude and regret.

"I had wondered if you knew where he was.  If you'd had any contact with him."

"No.  There's been no trace of him."  Although as far as I knew, Holmes had not asked Mycroft to look too closely.  In answer to the unspoken question in her eyes, I added, "If Holmes knows any differently, he's said nothing to me."

"I shall try not to regard that as a reflection on your marriage."  She paced slowly.  "I know he's alive.  Every quarter, my lawyer deposits a certain sum of money in his accounts.  It's certainly being spent."

That, I reflected grimly, was no guarantee that Adrian himself was spending it, but I merely said, "We didn't know.  We thought there was … little chance of his being alive."

But we didn't speak of Adrian often, Holmes and I, and Mrs Norton seemed to know it as she looked at me.  Adrian combined a talent for manipulation with a desperate need for -- love or approval or something else, we never knew.  I never knew.  I had liked him, briefly and intensely, because he was Holmes's son, and lovely in his own right.  But Adrian had a talent for self-destruction, and when everything fell apart, he lacked the courage to face us afterwards. 

He'd had a bad war.  It was a familiar story.

"Well," she said, rallying.  "I should like to see him again, before I get too much older.  If my messages reach him, there's no sign, but if you see him, in your travels…"

I couldn't imagine that Adrian would seek us out; even if our paths had crossed, we'd parted on bad terms.  But there was something pitiful in the request, and I could hardly refuse.

"There is one final thing," she said.  "Follow me, please."

I reflected, as I obeyed, that if Mrs Norton had learnt one thing in her time with Holmes, it was the art of being unbearably inscrutable.

She led me through her apartment, which was as large as some of our neighbours' houses in Sussex, into an anteroom that I judged was near her bedroom.  It had obviously been prepared for our visit: sitting on the small, pristine desk was a large lacquered box with a freshly oiled lock, and a leather folder.  

The folder held a sheaf of papers, some handwritten, some typed.  I recognised Holmes's distinctive scrawl before I'd read even a single word.  Beginnings of monographs; carbon copies of letters, none signed in his own name; what looked like an attempt to write his memoirs; and the original draft of a letter to Uncle John, much blotted and crossed out.

Every word seemed to bleed onto the page.

Irene spoke quietly.  "He left very little behind when … after.  Only the papers.  And ....  I never liked to throw them out, but my family is beginning to show an interest in my estate.  And they would come to light eventually.  I must admit that I wouldn't mind leaving my family to deal with a posthumous scandal, but it hardly seems fair to you.  Or Sherlock, come to that."  She drew a key from her pocket and opened the lacquered box.  "For the same reason, against the wishes of my lawyer, and in defiance of good taste, I'm also giving you these."

The box held jewellery.  Diamonds, for the most part, and sapphires; I could easily imagine them shimmering against the young Irene Adler's pale skin and dark hair.  Heavy, ornate Victorian jewellery, kin to the emerald necklace I had inherited from my mother.

I found my voice and said, "I can't accept these."

She chuckled.  "I'm afraid I am going to insist, and if you refuse to take them now, I shall simply entrust them to a courier and have them follow you to England.  Best to avoid the embarrassment, really."  She picked up a sapphire pendant and held it up to the light.  "This is the only one your husband gave me.  I think he rather scorned jewellery.  Feminine clichés."

"But they're all from men whose names are best kept quiet," I said.

"Precisely."  She returned the pendant to the box, locked it and pressed it into my hands.  "Keep them, wear them if you wish – you'd make a pretty picture, although I'm having trouble imagining it – sell them if you must, although I'd prefer you waited until my death.  Pass them on to your child, if you like.  I don't mind what you do, as long as they're out of my hands."

Dumbfounded, I followed her back into the main rooms on suddenly shaky legs, and sank into a chair with relief.  The box and folder sat heavily in my hands.  I wondered if Holmes would welcome the return of these papers, or throw them all into the fire.  I wondered what I was to do with the small fortune I was carrying.  

I wondered what I was going to do next.

"I suppose there are rewards," Mrs Norton said.  "To having children, I mean.  I don't think I did a particularly good job with my son, but then … I had no choice.  Or very few choices, anyway, none of them good."

"I can't say I relish my present options."  My voice was low and unexpectedly harsh.  

"I suppose not."  

“What,” my voice failed, and I tried again, “what made you ... realise?”  When even I was uncertain, and Holmes suspected nothing.

She gave me a disarming smile and said, “It was a lucky guess.”

I looked away, and said nothing.

She let me go after that, whispering a thank you as she kissed me goodbye.  Her driver returned me to the hotel and ensured that I, and my packages, got inside safely.

Holmes was out when I got back to our rooms.  I locked the jewellery up with my other valuables and left the folder on a table where he would find it.  That accomplished, I found myself restless and craving activity.  I exchanged my dress for  a blouse and trousers, and went for a walk.

Central Park was full of tourists, automobiles and nurses with small children.  I walked quickly, paying no attention to the afternoon traffic, meditating on the problem of taking a marriage between two independent individuals and adding a child.

I'd never wanted motherhood. I never wanted this decision.  

I stayed out until the sun began to set.  Holmes was still gone when I returned, so I peeled off my clothes, crawled into bed and fell into an uneasy sleep.

It was dark when Holmes woke me.  The light of the bedside lamp hurt my eyes, but even without looking at him, I could sense his concern.  His only comment was, "I am glad we aren't facing a repetition of our experiences in San Francisco."

"No.  Not precisely."  I stretched, feeling heavy from the long sleep.  "Did you find the folder?"

"Of course."   He sat down on the bed and squeezed my hand.  "I presume that's what she wanted you for?  To give you the papers?"

"And some jewellery."  I shifted.  "She wanted to know if we knew anything of Adrian's whereabouts.  I couldn't help her, of course."

"Of course."

"She believes he's alive, though."  I told him about the bank account.  "I didn't like to point out the obvious."

"No.  But I shall ask Mycroft keep an eye on that account."

I wondered, irrelevantly, what would happen if Holmes were ever unable to commandeer the Empire's information sources for his own personal use.

"Holmes?" I said.  

"Russell?"

"I believe I'm pregnant."

His fingers, which had been drumming an uneven pattern on my inner wrist, fell still.

"Are you certain?" he asked eventually.

"It would explain a great deal."

"Yes.  It would."

"I don't know what to do."  It sounded far more pitiful than I'd intended, and felt like an admission of failure.

Holmes said nothing.

"I've suspected for some days now," I continued.  Holmes's finger traced the tendons that ran from my hand into my arm.  "Mrs Norton … guessed."

He snorted.  "She was always a very acute observer of women.  But not, I fear, a particularly good judge of male character.  Her son is a shining example of that.  Unless you believe his defects are entirely my contribution, in which case this trepidation about your child is quite appropriate."

“That's not what I'm concerned about,” I snapped.  “As you should very well know.”

"Do you think you'll be all right?"  

His tone was almost neutral but for an edge of concern.

"I suppose that depends on your definition, really."  I gave him a thoughtful look.  "Are you implying that I'm – delicate?"

"Of course not.  I merely wonder, with your history, if you think--"

"I can carry to term?"

"Yes," he said, a faint, regretful note of apology in his voice.

I had the distinct impression that he was talking about more than the physical trauma of pregnancy and childbirth.  I pulled my arm away from his hand, sat up and said, "I shall see a specialist when we get home.  Possibly several."  

I saw a gynaecologist before I married, to reassure myself that my doctor in California had been right, that I would never have children.  Instead, I was told that the situation might be more ambiguous.  I resolved to be careful – a wealthy woman always had more options than a poor one – and still felt relief, that I could move through life unfettered.

And now this.

"I'll manage," I said grimly.

Holmes smiled.  "I expect you will."

He sounded, if not convinced, then ready to let the matter lie.  I stood up and stretched, feeling heavy and lethargic.  And this was the early stage.  Christ.

"Holmes," I said, switching on the main light, "I'll be perfectly fine."  Provided that the doctors didn't recommend nine (eight? – seven?) months of bed-rest, in which case I would not be held responsible for my actions.  "Right now, I need to eat.  And I need to go home."

"I heard of an interesting case out near--"

"Holmes.  No."  He gave me an innocent look, which did not fool me in the least.  I found a frock suitable for dining in the wardrobe and said, "If you wish to stay in New York and investigate whatever nonsense has caught your attention, you're certainly welcome to do so.  However," I pulled the gown over my head and smoothed the fabric, "I am going home.  To pay a visit to Harley Street, and to see Mrs Hudson for the first time since the new year.  And to edit my book.  At last."

Holmes rose to his feet and helped me with the intricate buttons of my frock.  

I was trying not to think of Adrian, and his remarkable skill at vanishing from the lives of everyone who cared about him. I wondered if Mycroft would be able to trace his activities, and if his peculiar brand of avuncular attention would ever be turned towards my own child.  Morbid curiosity compelled me to ask, "Does Mycroft know who Adrian Norton is?"

"I've never spelt it out in precise terms.  He might have his own sources."  He closed the final button and reached past me to my jewellery box.  "Why do you ask?"

"I simply wonder if Irene will ever see him again."  Holmes closed the clasp of my necklace with a snap.  "It's unfair.  That she should be so alone."

Holmes's face, in the mirror, was unreadable.

"She deserves better," he agreed.  "It may not be in my power to give it to her."

I wanted to say that we owed her something, for all the damage we had caused, but there was no simple restitution to offer.

Holmes went to change his own clothes.  I made my way out into the sitting room.  The leather folder lay on the table where I had left it, but the papers, when I looked, were out of order.

The man who had written them was not the man I'd married. I couldn't imagine how Irene Adler had lived in proximity to that great intensity; it would have left me exhausted and empty.  Perhaps, in the end, it had done the same to her, and all she'd had left was her son and her curious, complicated marriage.

I put the folder down.

I rose to my feet when he emerged, and allowed him to tuck my hand into his arm.

"Mrs Hudson, at least, will be overjoyed," I said.

"And Watson."

"And Mycroft?"

"I can't say I've ever pictured him in the avuncular role."

I snorted.  "I'm sure he'll adjust."

"Admirably, I'm sure," Holmes agreed.  "I look forward to breaking the news."

"Nonsense, he probably knows all ready."

He laughed, and we made our way down to the restaurant.  I felt queasy and hungry all at once, and the prospect of a sea voyage in this state was not a happy one.  But soon, I promised myself, I would be at home; the journey would only be a temporary discomfort.




end