Chapter 40

40. "I hope this won't cause you any discomfort"

I thought my request would stump Lucian.

After all, getting two more first-class tickets wasn't as simple as I'd made it sound. I'd also thought that even if Sherlock didn't want to go now, the power of the plot would push fate into arranging things. Surely the manga wouldn't use a flashback to silence its readers?

As it turned out, once Lucian was sure I was going, he easily arranged two more tickets for me and promised to give them to me when we met tomorrow. He hadn't brought them today.

I could hardly imagine whether Lucian was arranging this of his own free will, or whether the godlike hand of the plot was controlling his supply of tickets.

When Mrs. Hudson and Watson came home that evening, I told them Lucian had stopped by with the tickets.

Watson was pleasantly surprised and turned to Sherlock. "Looks like you took good care of him."

As soon as he said that, I realized Watson had asked Sherlock to receive Lucian today. It wasn't that Sherlock had discovered Lucian had a case. No wonder I'd felt things didn't quite add up, but then I'd quickly convinced myself otherwise and stopped worrying about it?

I also really wanted to tell Watson that after Sherlock arrived, he hadn't even given Lucian a glass of water.

But I couldn't say that, because once I saw Lucian had finished speaking, I'd told him to hurry up and leave. Thinking that we'd be boarding the ship the next day and that I'd lose a week afterward made my heart ache. All I wanted was to dry out all the walls quickly so I could put up the wallpaper. Otherwise, Christmas would be over by the time we came back.

I hadn't expected the trip on the Noah to include Christmas. Before, I hadn't known when it would start, so I'd assumed it would be Christmas by the time Sherlock and the others returned. After so many days had passed, I'd thought there must have been an accident midway through the trip and they'd come back early.

Now it looked like—

Before I could finish the thought, Mrs. Hudson covered her face and said, "Oh my, we get to spend Christmas on a cruise ship this year. Aren't we lucky?"

What I'd originally thought was no big deal became extraordinary because of that one remark from Mrs. Hudson. Even I couldn't help getting excited.

"Then we'll have to put the presents in our suitcases first. Oh my, this came so quickly. You should have told us earlier," Mrs. Hudson said, mildly reproaching Sherlock and me for not telling them in time. "Can we still go out and buy wrapping paper for the presents?"

Watson was happy too. "There should be a shopping center there, right? I might have to ask my boss for some last-minute time off. Starting tomorrow, we're going on a weeklong trip from Britain around Iceland."

I suddenly remembered that I'd also prepared a present for Watson's girlfriend, Sarah. "What should we do? Miss Sarah can't come over this Christmas. Can we go and give her the present first?"

"You prepared a present for her too?" After hearing that, Mrs. Hudson put down what she was doing, came over, and gave me a hug. "Lanny, you're such a sweet child."

Ever since we'd come home from the restaurant last time, I'd noticed Mrs. Hudson occasionally showing me affection. She linked arms with me when we walked, as if it were the most natural thing in the world. Sometimes she gave me a friendly pat on the shoulder, like a wordless gesture of encouragement. At other times, she put an arm around me affectionately like this, letting me feel her care.

These things made me feel like one of her

younger family members.

I didn't dislike that kind of contact.

Though it still depended mostly on who it was.

Watson spoke up beside us. "Let's give her the presents together when it's over. I still haven't decided what to buy. Lanny, what did you get her?"

"Tea." Whenever I thought of her, I thought of Chinese elements. And rather than recommending something, I preferred to give a present that showed something distinctive about me. "When she gets it, she'll know it's from me."

I'd chosen something with a more Western flavor, though. Easterners liked traditional teas, such as green tea, black tea, white tea, and oolong tea, while Westerners liked fruit teas, herbal teas, and floral teas. I'd chosen Lupicia's white peach oolong. When I sampled it in the shop, the fragrance of peach lingered in my mouth, while the tea itself had a very orthodox oolong flavor with a clean, sweet aftertaste. It didn't have the sweetness of peach juice mixed in, like a tea-flavored drink. The tea leaves smelled wonderful too.

Watson laughed beside me. "Now I'm suddenly curious what present I'll get. Did you prepare one for me too?"

I nodded quickly. "I prepared one for you, and one for Mrs. Hudson too..."

As I spoke, I looked over at Sherlock. I found that he'd gotten bored while I was discussing presents and gone off to read a book nearby. Just as I was about to mention him, Watson said, "I still haven't thought of what to get you. Have you already prepared everything so quickly? Is there anything you particularly want?"

There wasn't anything I particularly wanted at the moment, but if I really had to pick something, I wanted a medical textbook Watson had used and signed. I could show that off for the rest of my life. Or I could print out his blog and have him sign that instead.

Watson might not understand, but in the three-dimensional world, that would make every Holmes fan scream.

Seeing that we were going to keep chatting without end, Mrs. Hudson reminded us.

"You'd better hurry and pack. It's getting late. If we're going to catch the Noah leaving Southampton at eleven tomorrow morning, it would be best to take the six-thirty express. We can get there at eight-thirty, have breakfast, and take some time to rest. Otherwise, we can only take the seven-thirty train, but that won't get us there until ten. I don't know if getting to the Noah afterward would be too rushed?"

Mrs. Hudson urged everyone to pack and started clearing out the rubbish and leftover ingredients in the refrigerator so they wouldn't spoil and stink.

I didn't have much, so I could finish packing in less than ten minutes.

I spent the remaining time back in the room I'd been fixing up, making a list.

I'd originally thought I could put up the wallpaper once the walls were dry, but I discovered the surfaces were still uneven and needed filling, sanding, and a little cleaning. It was too late to do it now, so I could only make a list of work to do when I came back:

1. Repair the walls and put up the wallpaper.

2. Repair and repaint the windows, and replace the rusty locks.

3. Inspect the fireplace, including the flue, firebox, door, and chimney cap, and clean it.

4. Parts of the wooden floor were bubbling.

Once I'd finished writing it down, Mrs. Hudson urged me to go to bed early because we had to get up early tomorrow.

If we took the six-thirty express, we'd have to leave home by six at the latest.

Upstairs, Watson was still rushing to wash and dry his clothes. Sherlock, on the other hand, hadn't made a sound

. It felt as though he'd bring nothing but himself tomorrow, with no trace of ordinary human life about him.

Lying in bed, I suddenly thought that even if this was just a trip, it could still be something I'd remember for the rest of my life.

I felt a little uneasy just going to sleep.

So I rolled over and searched online for the ten most famous shipwrecks to prepare myself.

The next day, seeing how tired I looked, Mrs. Hudson couldn't help laughing. "Lanny really is a child. Were you that excited about going on a cruise?"

"..."

I didn't know how to answer.

We took the six-thirty express to the port city that morning without incident.

By the time we got close to the Noah, it was a little after nine. Even for the earliest boarding time of ten-thirty, we were very early. So we had breakfast at a café along the waterfront, where there were also a few people carrying luggage like us.

Mrs. Hudson had already started chatting with the people at the next table.

Watson was chatting with Miss Sarah, telling her what was happening today.

Sherlock drank black coffee and continued browsing the news on his tablet.

I sat to one side, thinking and looking through the manga. It still hadn't updated. As expected, I'd have to wait until the case was over to see the whole picture.

Because I felt I'd meet Professor Moriarty soon, I easily found myself thinking about all sorts of things related to him as I sat there.

For example, there was a pattern I'd recently noticed—a pattern in how the manga handled Sherlock's and Professor Moriarty's perspectives.

In Sherlock's domain, the story usually used the retrospective linear narrative of a traditional detective drama: after the detective discovered the crime scene, he collected clues and found the real culprit. Professor Moriarty's perspective used the opposite, an inverted narrative. From Moriarty's point of view, he first identified the killer, then used evidence, deduction, or a battle of wits to break through the other person's defenses and establish the culprit's identity.

The manga said the Noah was Moriarty the Patriot's domain, but judging by the preview's narrative style, it was actually Sherlock's.

For another thing, I doubted Professor Moriarty would handle this case the way the on-screen comments had suggested—

Using someone and manipulating them psychologically, setting the stage for a social experiment and having the target commit a crime, thereby exposing the crimes hidden behind the target and alerting the world to the darkness of the social system.

Because the social environment had changed enormously.

Moriarty the Patriot was set in the nineteenth century, and his actions were mainly in pursuit of fairness, justice, and social equality. The society of the time treated human lives as quite expendable. Now it was the twenty-first century, and unless Moriarty the Patriot truly took pleasure in pursuing crime, bloodshed, and violence, he ought to be more cautious about human lives.

In my view, the starting point for Professor Moriarty's actions could be explained by a line from Francis Fukuyama's Political Order and Political Decay: "Premature democracy without a strong bureaucratic state will indulge protected private interest groups."

In short, with the core pursuit of fairness, justice, and social equality unchanged, the twenty-first-century Professor Moriarty was quite likely to have shifted his target to "institutional corruption," using "crime" to advance the improvement of the rule of law and social reform.

If that really was how he thought, I would indeed

think Professor Moriarty wouldn't actively push others to commit crimes, but would be more inclined to expose them, thereby controlling crime and maintaining a certain kind of order.

I could even feel, from this imagining, that Professor Moriarty's plans were like drawing a geometric "straight line," full of order and symmetry, extending infinitely. He could treat everyone in society without distinction, punishing evil while also tolerating it, walking entirely on the gray edge.

Of course, I couldn't support that kind of action myself.

Following the rules and obeying the law were important to me.

Breaking the rules could naturally bring great rewards, and cheating always made it easier to win. But if everyone in the world was playing the prisoner's dilemma, all taking for granted a rule beneath the rules—that exploiting loopholes and breaking the rules was the best way to play—then the whole world would fall into irreparable chaos, with no order to speak of.

And there was something else: why couldn't the professor just be a professor?

I was actually quite looking forward to Asteroid Mechanics, the book Professor Moriarty had written.

For example, imagine it: at the boundary of a black hole, a star collapses, and space and time intertwine and warp. We stand on Earth and watch the star's light caught and bent by irresistible gravity, forming a huge, bright ring of high-energy particles and radiation—a halo.

Behind this halo are countless dark, curved paths.

Through the Island Rule or some other method of calculation, Professor Moriarty derives the mathematical formula and corresponding values for each path. It was easy to imagine how moving and awe-inspiring it would be to see him then, as if standing at the center of the universe, using a special language to name the stars in the vast galaxy one by one.

Wouldn't that be nice too...

My head was full of all these random thoughts.

Just then, Mrs. Hudson tapped my shoulder with a finger and asked, "What are you so absorbed in thinking about?"

"Nothing... just a character from a storybook."

Mrs. Hudson smiled. "It's almost time. Shall we go and line up at the cruise ship?"

I looked over at Sherlock and Watson again. They'd both left the café ages ago.

I hurriedly got up and followed them.

Before long, I saw a black Bentley parked not far away. A young woman in a white fur coat got out, while an elderly man over seventy emerged from the other side.

The moment he stepped out of the car and stood up, he caught my attention.

The old gentleman held the lady's expensive handbag in both hands, just as those gentlemen served beautiful ladies. Such courtesies were the manners and consideration ingrained in their bones.

The woman walked around the back of the car and supported him by the arm.

I remembered the subjects of the gossip Lucian had told me about—the wealthy Talbot and Maren Flynn. To an outsider, the way this old husband and young wife supported each other at the moment made their relationship look reasonably good, at least. The wealthy Talbot really was very old. Starting and stopping took him considerable effort, and he tended to lean forward, walking slowly with his back hunched.

I grew more and more absorbed in watching the two of them. Then I heard a familiar voice nearby. I instinctively looked toward it, and the sight of Professor Moriarty across from me, wearing a modest smile, made

my heart stop.

"..."

This was far too sudden.

I'd originally thought a nod of greeting would be the end of it, but Professor Moriarty walked over toward me. My scalp went numb in waves, and I felt as guilty as if I'd just spoken ill of him and been caught.

"I haven't seen you since the examinations began. Have you been well?"

Since all the lectures and discussion classes had stopped once exam month began, I really hadn't seen Professor Moriarty for more than half a month.

I stared at Professor Moriarty and blurted out without thinking, "Fihankyou. Andyou?"

Moriarty probably didn't know what was odd about that exchange. He said very seriously that he'd been quite busy lately, but everything was fine.

We'd barely exchanged a sentence or two before the landlady and residents of the 221B Apartment gathered around us. Mrs. Hudson and Watson had always been curious about my life at school. Once they learned that the young man before them was my professor, they both looked at Professor Moriarty expectantly, waiting for a chance to join the conversation.

Whether I was involved or merely watching from the sidelines, there was something indescribably strange about this scene to me.

Professor Moriarty clearly couldn't ignore their presence. Just as he was about to speak, Sherlock's voice rang out. "So, you're here too, Professor." His sharp gaze swept over Professor Moriarty's face, as though trying to discern his intentions, while Professor Moriarty maintained his faint smile.

"Yes." Professor Moriarty smiled at Sherlock. "I was invited. I hope this won't cause you any discomfort."

If there were on-screen comments right now, they'd probably be saying, [Fight! Fight!]

I'd bet fifty cents on it.

Sherlock made no comment and turned to me. "Lanny, don't forget what you said."

I... what did I say?

I couldn't make sense of it.

"We should go."

Sherlock strode ahead.

I assumed that "we" included me, Watson, and Mrs. Hudson. It was rare for Sherlock to do this, to have us all go along with what he wanted. I didn't know whether to call it mutual understanding, trust, or simply Sherlock's usual way, but we said nothing more and set off after him.

Before leaving, I gave Professor Moriarty a slight bow. The professor smiled too, waving as he watched me leave.

But I knew clearly that he was studying Sherlock.

He had come over deliberately.

The smoke of battle had already reached us...

It made me wonder: what kind of cooperation had the two of them reached to bring about that scene in the preview manga? Or had they been through something together?

I wondered whether it was something I'd get to see.

Curious, curious.

I was a little curious.!