Chapter Text
Love, that releases no beloved from loving,
took hold of me so strongly through his beauty
that, as you see, it has not left me yet.
(Inf. 5.103–105)
The night before they’re to return home John finds himself in that interstitial space between packing and leaving. There’s nothing left to do: the formalities have all been wrapped up, the goodbyes have all been said. Even John’s unauthorised firearm has been returned to the Deposito Bagagli at Termini, and in the morning, by the time they take the express train to the airport, it’ll be back to wherever hole or corner it came from.
Sherlock, looking ten years younger, is headed out for the evening for a conversation with Zanardi.
He bends to kiss Rosie, smiles and kisses John, says “don’t wait up,” and hands him a folded letter—handwritten, no envelope. The door closes behind him.
Now John’s weighing the letter, three heavy ivory pages filled with Sherlock’s spiky and strangely boyish script. Wondering if it’s going to be painful to read. Wondering if “don’t wait up” means something different when it’s Zanardi Sherlock’s meeting for the evening. Kicking himself for even thinking that.
Rosie’s looking at him, her worries written in her frown. Being Rosie, of course, she voices them: “Why is Ba writing you a letter?” Of course she’s seen the writing, the stationery. “Why are we not to wait up? Is something wrong?”
He hates that they’ve worried her. This whole “holiday” she’s been so positive, easy-going, bombproof—the Rosie they’ve marveled at throughout the years of her tranquil babyhood. And now she’s frightened that there’s something wrong between her fathers.
He shoves the pages into the pocket of his shorts and puts on his most serene Da voice. “It’s a love letter, Rose of the World. If you ask, he’ll write you one too. Now, what shall we do about dinner? Pizza out, or pasta in? If you’re worn out from our travels, we can make an early night of it.”
Rosie’s still weirdly immobile, her expression still dubious. —Of course. He’s dodged her question about not waiting up.
Slowly she says, “Let’s stay in. I want to sort my photos for Nana and Molly and Gran.”
He teases, “Why, don’t any of your male relatives like to see photos?”
“Not like Nana and Molly and Gran, no.” She’s both decided and guarded.
“Fine. Shower first?” Say yes, please Rosie, let me read this before I burst a blood vessel.
“Maybe I’ll wait until bedtime so I can go to bed all clean.”
“You’re so sticky, Rosie, shower now, and again before bed, yeah?” Is that tone convincingly light?
“Okay.” Hers isn’t, in any case.
But he’s grateful, nonetheless.
“Why does your reason wander
So far from its accustomed course?” ...
Or of what other things are you now thinking?”
(Inf. 11.76–78)
The letter begins in medias res, no salutation.
You’ve refused to return to the topic that upset you the other night in Marina del Cantone. That’s not like you. Admittedly, we don’t like to talk seriously—we don’t often have to—but surely the topic of whether I’ve sacrificed my vocation for our family life deserves some discussion?
John thinks of the first time they ran aground, when he took Sherlock back to Bologna; he thinks of their honeymoon in Venice, which they fled for Sicily. He thinks of the letters they exchanged in 2016, before they worked themselves out. How is it that their most honest conversations are somehow driven by Italy?
As if Sherlock were reading his mind: You wrote me once, in your first real letter, that we were never going back to our first eighteen months together: “We grew up,” you said. You were right then. That’s still right. But growing up isn’t the same as losing. Our lives—our life together—it’s all so much better than those first two years. Don’t you think?
Damn it, why is Rosie so quick in the shower? (At some point in her adolescent future, is he going to regret ever thinking these words?)
It’s all right. He’s got a sense of where the letter is going. There’s no radioactive material enclosed. And it’ll be fine to draw it out over the course of the evening. It might even be better than reading it in one go.
“Olive paste, or porcini and tartufo sauce? I don’t have a lot of inspiration to do much more than put pasta, olive oil, grated parm, and one of those two sauces into a bowl. It’s too hot for real cooking.”
Rosie’s very firm that tartufo is what she wants (thank the gods she’s an easy eater, if a selective one). She settles herself in at the table with her tablet while he sets the pasta water on to boil, and they potter about in companionable silence. Is it normal for a kid her age to be so easily quiet? Has she (horrible thought) got used to being without her fathers’ attention?
And to think he calls Sherlock the drama queen, when he’s making so very much ado about nothing. Leaving her for three weeks with other people, people who were teaching her Italian and entertaining her royally, hardly qualifies as parental abandonment.
She gives a little giggle as she hearts her newer photographs, from the sailboat and her Rome outings. Zanardi’s kids really have given her a generous amount of attention, making her feel like a little cousin rather than an uninvited guest. He catches glimpses of their tour: Rosie sitting behind Luca on his vintage Vespa; Rosie and Chiara sprouting out of the windows of a bright red Fiat Cinquecento. Sherlock holding Rosie high out of the water while she squeals in evident delight; Matteo in mid-hop up to adjust a sail; himself dozing in the hammock on the sailboat.
Sherlock said recently that “Watson improves everything. Well, almost everything,” giving John a frankly lewd wink that made him choke with laughter. It’s obviously true. She does improve everything, and it isn’t only her fond fathers who think so.
Does this mean he’ll have to interact with the Zanardis on a regular basis in future? Is that going to be uncomfortable?
On the whole, he doesn’t think it will, but it’s beside the point.
After their meal they retreat to the sofa and Rosie turns to sorting her treasures. The little bag of souvenirs that Helen and the Zanardi kids gave her when they said goodbye has her entire attention, so John takes out his letter again.
Our lives—our life together—it’s all so much better than those first two years. Don’t you think? And I can assure you it is indescribably better than the two plus years after I left you thinking that I was dead.
John winces. Classic Sherlock, monumentally tactless.
John. We aren’t as publicly demonstrative as we were at the beginning, perhaps. We don’t use pet names, never have; why would I, when there is no better sound than your name? We don’t toss around ‘I love you’ all day long, in my case at least because I dislike repeating the blindingly obvious.
He gives a slow smile. Sherlock’s exactly correct. Of course.
But it seems clear that it’s time for me to tell you something I didn’t think needed saying. You are quite right: I have sacrificed something for the family life we have.
At John’s sharp intake of breath Rosie looks up, then lowers her head again. He’ll have to reassure her later; this is urgent, it’s the heart of the matter, the words he’s been so afraid to hear that he hasn’t returned to the topic since that night.
It’s time I told you what I gave up. I gave up a loneliness that I disguised to myself as independence. Cocaine, which lost its appeal when it became an either/or: chemical stimulation, or you and Watson. I sacrificed boredom: I haven’t shot a wall since that first night in Bologna, have you noticed?
By now he’s grinning and his shoulders have relaxed. He sees from the corner of his eye that Rosie’s have, too.
I sacrificed celibacy, and good riddance to it.
He lets out a short bark of laughter. Good riddance to that, indeed.
I sacrificed an obsessive addiction to cases, and to emotional anaesthesia through the distraction of puzzle-solving. I even sacrificed an entirely counterproductive dislike of every member of my family and my wider (for a certain value of wider) acquaintance. Are you getting the picture?
Oh, he’s getting the picture, all right. And Rosie’s bright glance shows that she knows her Ba is the reason her Da is beaming.
I was eager to throw over our holiday for the case, not because of my massive ego (thank you very much, I know it remains massive, but it was not my principal motivation) and not because you and Watson have somehow deprived me of my true thrill-seeking vocation. Certainly not because of some unresolved affection for the man I left behind because I loved only you. I took the case because I wanted the Caravaggio back in its place. I wanted justice for countless Mafia victims. I wanted to help strike a blow it would take decades for organised crime cartels to recover from. And I knew I could do it, too.
But not without you. I’m not who I am, without you. I’m only half as effective, without you. Roberto’s involvement motivated me only insofar as I trust his intelligence and integrity, and could rely on his effectiveness in helping to protect Watson. That part, you will admit, has worked out brilliantly. You and I will be working on what went wrong.
With a start he hears the bells of Santa Maria Maggiore strike ten: he needs to get Rosie into bed. Before he can speak she’s rolling her eyes in a near-perfect imitation of Sherlock, and saying, “I know, Da.”
She doesn’t take another shower, in the event; he tucks her into the rollaway by the window, kisses her forehead and confiscates her phone and tablet. (She really is Sherlock’s daughter.) She makes no objection, already exhausted though unwilling to admit it. (Again: Sherlock’s daughter.)
John retreats to the lavishly oversized bed and settles in to reread his letter and reach the end.
It’s understandable, given how I abused your patience and your commitment during this case, that you should have reached an erroneous conclusion. (And I will make it up to you, by never making that mistake again—if you can forgive me for making it this time.)
You seem to think I gave up the life I wanted for the life we have. It’s the other way round. I gave up the life I had, for the life I wanted.
Will you do me the honour of believing me about this and letting me continue to live it, with you and Watson?
It will take time, and talking, and therapy, and we won’t like it—no, not even you. But you have to say yes, because you promised. I have your written vows to prove it.
Yours entirely, only, and always.
S
When Sherlock comes in—likely sweat-drenched, and surely not before midnight—John means to greet him at the door with an unusually emphatic kiss and an earnest “Yes.”
My guide and I came on that hidden road
to make our way back into the bright world;
and with no care for any rest, we climbed.
(Inf. 34.133–136)
I’ve asked Sherlock to meet me at the port of Fiumicino for an early dinner, 7 p.m.
I’m not nervous, as I was the first time I asked him to dinner all those years ago. Far from it, in fact. For almost the first time since that night, I feel calm at the prospect of being alone with him. Not relaxed, but calm. I finally feel in possession of all the facts, at least all the relevant ones.
John Watson knows about our dinner appointment, of course. He’s staying in with young Rosie, for that very reason. I’m grateful for his discretion, whereas once I’d have resented him no matter what he did.
I preferred not to pick Sherlock up in the city centre. Talking seriously in the car on the way would’ve been awkward, and filling time with small talk would’ve been agonising and then awkward, when we tried to shift to serious matters over dinner. So I asked him to meet me at Gianni’s, where they know to leave me alone when I meet up with anyone they don’t recognise. Sometimes it’s business, sometimes it isn’t; either way they give me privacy, no untimely interruptions about our satisfaction with the food, our choices for the next course, or other inanities.
In the event, he’s arrived before me. Nella’s seated him in a quiet corner outside, in one of those “temporary” extensions the lockdown provisions allowed which restaurants have refused to give up. So Sherlock must have specified whom he was meeting. He’s facing west, looking away from the other tables, and the evening sun paints his face with light.
How does he look? Beautiful, as always; a bit older, less impervious than the man I used to know. More still than he’s been for weeks. I’m relieved to find myself unmoved by these reflections, or by the blend of his eyes and his blue-green linen shirt. (I know that colour: from Sorrento, for certain.)
“Thanks for coming. I do appreciate it.” I leave it at that. Keep the atmosphere comfortable if not light.
“Of course. I’ve been meaning—wanting—to talk one-on-one.” His smile is restrained.
With this, I face the fact that we’ve not been alone by choice since he and John turned up that first day, when I’d finally given up trying to keep them out of the case at all. It stings a bit to acknowledge how thoroughly reluctant he’s been to be alone with me. But it’s a dulled sting, almost a force of habit. I understand him much better now. Can hardly blame him.
The waiter turns up with menus and sparkling water, so I don’t follow up on Sherlock’s reference to a private conversation. There’s no hurry; at last, we have time. I breathe in the air of the port—salt air, the tidal estuary. Fish. The sky’s a brilliant blue, with a single dense bank of cloud sitting far out over the water.
After the inevitable food consultation—Sherlock’s no more eager an eater than he ever was—I start off with the case. We both do, in fact, talking over each other before stopping with an embarrassed laugh.
“Congratulations on a—”
“I’d thought the London case—”
He gestures for me to continue, so I do. “I’d thought our London case was sprawling. I never dreamed we’d work on a case that would dwarf that one.”
The waiter has slipped a bottle of chilled Falanghina onto the table so discreetly I’m surprised to see Sherlock lifting a glass to his lips. No toast, though.
“I’m glad to have been in on it, if only at the end,” he says carefully. “Or perhaps the beginning of the end; it will take you time to sort it out.”
I lift my glass to him and he clinks mine. “Don’t be modest, Sherlock, it really doesn’t become you. You were the turning-point, the key. You and John.” (Well. That was for tact, but it was undeniably true.) “We’d still be fumbling in the dark if Alfieri hadn’t insisted on bringing you in.”
Sherlock looks wary. “He’s not allowed to acknowledge that we were brought in, mind. For all the reasons you know. Watson above all.”
While I respect his—their—stipulation, one thing still doesn’t sit well with me. “I don’t like taking credit I didn’t earn. There’s going to be a public ceremony—well, internal to the force—in full dress uniform, and I’m going to receive a commendation I don’t deserve for the return of the Caravaggio.”
Before I finish, he’s shaking his head vigorously. “But you do deserve it. You, and the others. You were open to a contrasting hypothesis and you came to agree, however sceptically at first. Despite my false steps and false starts, and the fact that we got practically everything wrong about the Vault and the Curator.”
And despite your maddeningly condescending interaction style that was so galling to my team, I think but don’t say. Again, I notice the waiter’s managed to deliver an antipasto without me even noticing, one I didn’t order. Gianni’s decided I need to impress this dinner companion.
“Well, but we weren’t getting anywhere. To ignore you would have fit that definition of insanity you quoted, doing the same thing over and over, expecting a different result.” And how long would I have kept at it, I wonder? Kept assuming the whole team was on my side and that we were on the right track, if in the slow lane? Worse: never suspecting the mole in our midst.
Sherlock does that thing again: pushing food around his plate as if to distract attention from the fact that he isn’t actually eating it. I wonder if it works with Watson. (Probably not. I doubt there’s much about Sherlock that escapes his husband.)
He looks up sharply and I remember something else about him: he usually sees what other people are thinking. I rearrange my expression to suit our case topic.
He says firmly, “Our investigation was successful because it was a joint operation. Two cultural contexts, one of them represented by deeply embedded investigators. It took local knowledge and goodwill and mental—flexibility—for it to work. You harnessed all of that and made it happen, despite taking far too much of the risk on your shoulders. You most certainly do deserve the commendation. And it will make your work with Rocca easier when it comes to recovering the rest of the art. I think she felt guilty about what happened to you.”
To my utter confusion I feel my face heating—am I blushing, at this age? Because a man I used to love has paid me a professional compliment? Am I never going to get over being disconcerted by Sherlock Holmes?
Fortunately the primo arrives. Spaghetti alle vongole for me, cacio e pepe for him. (“I’ve had too much seafood of late, to be honest,” and I remember that I never made any for him.)
As we eat, we canvass the case: the complexities, the near-misses, the dangers, and dear God, the final triumph out of near-disaster.
He cautions me; “It’s going to take a long time. You need to be prepared for that. She has all the cards in her hands, and will want to dictate too much to you. It will be tempting just to sit back and wait for her to identify when and how you can arrest anyone and recover a painting in the process. You might want to find a way to move the most valuable items into your safekeeping. Once you have a critical mass in your custody, you could move on all the remaining works in one coordinated world-wide exercise.”
It will take years of painstaking police work with the Curator to return the stolen art to the world. That sort of work with my team appeals to me, but Sherlock patently doesn’t envy me.
I find we can share this professional overview without awkwardness, without personal emotional undertones—my desperate desire, Sherlock’s desperate avoidance—and I’m glad to find this footing with him again, after so long.
He continues, “Are you alright? Any… aftereffects of what happened to you?” His solicitude is pitched in a way that makes it a matter of friendship.
I answer as truthfully as I can. “What, apart from acute embarrassment about my stupidity?” I mention how grateful I am that he never forwarded those letters I left behind. I have enough explaining to do to the recipients, without having to excuse the letters. He returned them to me, even his own; I’ll destroy them all.
I try to shrug it all off with a throwaway comment. “All’s well that ends well.”
The expression on his face says he isn’t buying it.
Chagrined, I add, “Yeah, well, I’d like to say I’ve learned my lesson. In some respects, now being chained to the Art Recovery Team and working it all through means I’m being given time to realise that work can be satisfying without having to constantly prove I’m a genius. Which Vally continues to remind me of on a daily basis.”
By silent consent we skip to dessert and coffee. Before it arrives I say, trying to sound matter-of-fact, “I hope we can keep the channels open. You might be needed again, after all.”
He fiddles a moment with his water glass, then says, “No and yes.”
Taking a sip from the water, he continues. “No, because for me the case is over for good. We’ve managed, just, to keep our involvement secret, to ensure that my family and I are safe from the Mafia. I won’t risk that again by being involved in any way. You’ll have your work cut out for you, but you don’t need me. —And yes, because I don’t see why we shouldn’t stay in touch. I’ve wanted to say something for some time—but I hate talking about things that matter. I’m rubbish at it.”
I look at him and wonder in what way I mattered, could still matter. But what I feel is curiosity, rather than hope. I raise my eyebrows, questioning.
“I am not he—not whom you think I am.”
(Inf. 19.61)
“It—it wasn’t your fault, Robe’, what went wrong between us. When I was with you in Rome, I was incapable of communicating anything real about myself to you. And when it came time to leave, I just bolted, not explaining anything. I am sorry I locked you out. I didn’t know how to keep up any communication with you that wouldn’t be misleading, dishonest. As well as for my life with John.”
I consider this. What I’d wanted back then was certainly counterproductive for his life with Watson and for that matter Rosie, there’s no denying it. But what he’d given me was less than nothing, and I have to be honest about that.
Without looking at him, I say carefully, “It felt like an eradication. As if something that meant everything to me, meant nothing to you.”
He’s quiet for a moment, then says in a low voice, “If it had meant nothing to me, I’d have been able to keep an open channel between us. I’m sorry. I was … target-fixated, on John, on Watson. On protecting our life in London. It made me cruel. I’m ashamed of that.”
He sounds so truly wretched that I take pity. “Well, I’m not proud of an obsession that outlasted common sense. I let it paralyse me.”
Worse. I let it drive me to the edge of madness. I can see that behind me, but I don’t yet see what’s ahead.
I listen, and as Sherlock talks I see a different image taking shape over the memory I’ve inscribed so deeply in my brain. So much of what he says is new to me, a version of our story that I’d have refuted if I’d heard it from anyone but him.
Who was he, this Sherlock finally revealing himself? A man who’d wanted to want me, but had not ultimately wanted me; who’d tried, but been unable, to let me in. The thought makes me see in sharp focus a parallel I’d barely intuited.
“When you left Rome—not right away, but after a while—I wanted to get past you. Tried to see other women, other men. But I locked them out, I suppose now in the same way you kept me out in that month we were together. I gave up dating, stopped trying to move on. Lived in the past, in that one … moment.”
With supremely bad timing his crème brulée arrives, along with my crostata—a bad choice, I hate crostata, why did I order it? Never mind, it gives us something to busy ourselves with over a moment that is uncomfortable, however necessary if may be.
After two bites of his dessert he looks up, almost smiling. “And in the process, you missed what was under your nose.”
Vally. He and Watson had seen that so much sooner than I had. Like the case in general, for that matter.
“I missed what was there right beside me,” I agree, wryly.
“She’s extraordinary. A good counter-balance. Professional, fast, a team player, fearless—someone who can challenge your risk-taking. She certainly gave me an earful about what I’d done to set you off on your own that way. Robe’, in that respect you and I are too similar. We both need someone like that. I have John.”
I can’t contradict Sherlock’s list of Vally’s merits, incomplete though it is—he hasn’t mentioned her energy, intelligence, independence, sheer beauty. The things that make her like him, not like Watson. But she’s her own person, not a cocktail of borrowed qualities. And she knows me, through and through. She’s loyal, though never blindly so. I’m not going to underestimate her again, that’s certain.
What might happen between us? Who knows? I have no way to predict the future. I just hope she’s still there as I make my way back once and for all.
As he’s putting too much sugar in his caffè (I shudder), I gesture to the waiter that I’ll pay Gianni next time. It’ll avoid the polite tussles over the bill that I hate, though Gianni will joke that a man in my line of work shouldn’t do things “irregularly.” He has no idea.
The sun’s setting over the water when I ask, “Walk to the end of the jetty? It’s beautiful, in the evening.”
“Yes, let’s walk. The dessert was irresistible, but rich.”
We walk along the estuary canal, down the long jetty that juts out into the Tyrrhenian sea. The long slow swell of the tide running in lifts the long fishing vessel Nonno Ciro, and her ropes creak loudly. She lies at anchor opposite the port facility of the Guardia di Finanza; both look imposing, but Sherlock’s looking at the glory of the rose- and orange-lit clouds on the horizon.
I say, with deliberate calm, “I hope we can keep the channels open.”
He smiles. “Watson’s so taken with the whole of the Zanardi family that we’ll have to.”
I hadn’t expected him to shift to Italian, but I know what it means that he does, and I appreciate it. To make sure he understands I’m at peace with how things have turned out, I continue, “I don’t mean, on the terms of before. I’m—over that. You can rest assured.”
He looks at me, gratitude in his expression. For what, though? That I’m over it? Or that I’ve been candid about it? I don’t ask. I ask something else instead.
“Do you remember the moonlight in the Pantheon?” I keep my voice neutral. It’s not a tug at his sleeve, just curiosity.
“I remember it all, now.”
What does that mean? It wasn’t that long ago. What had he forgotten?
He goes on. “One of the most impressive sights I’ve ever seen.”
So. There was that, at least. This far out on the jetty—almost at the end—the long swell is breaking into waves that crash and blow spray so high they mirror the white clouds from before, then hurry up the sea-lane between the two piers. We reach the end.
“Robe’, may I ask you something?”
I nod.
“If it had worked out with us—but I’d asked you to move to London—would you have done it?”
It came out of nowhere. I’d never thought of that, not even as a remote possibility. I’d thought of Sherlock staying with me in Rome, becoming part of my life. But me, move to London?
“I don’t think so, no,” I answer carefully. No, I couldn’t have done that. Not just for my family. Despite being part English I am not myself, in England.
Yet I’d expected Sherlock to re-invent himself in Italy. For me. I feel the pinch of shame. I’ve blamed him for a great many things, and given too little thought to my own selfishness. Perhaps because I’ve always had mamma to give thought to it for me. I smile.
“What makes you smile?” He doesn’t seem inclined to press the issue he’s raised—that I wasn’t really ready to give him everything, as I’d always imagined, always implied.
“I’m thinking about my mother.”
To my surprise, he bursts out laughing. “A redoubtable woman. She reminds me of my own mother, but with the velvet gloves off.”
I know nothing of Mater Holmes, but about Mamma Zanardi he’s certainly right: there’s absolutely nothing of the velvet glove about her. I laugh too, and say, “Did you ever consider that they might know each other? Not too many years apart, I think.”
He looks horrified at the thought. “I do hope not. They could gang up on us.”
I laugh again: we’re sons who know ourselves to be so fortunate in our mothers that we have to pretend otherwise.
Our conversation drifts toward our families, our children. He’s gratified that I’m fond of his daughter; I’m awed at his unforced regard for my mother, my (obviously admirable) children. We stand at the tip of the jetty long enough to see our long shadows fade out behind us, the darkness come in; the tide begins to slip out, the stars emerge to sparkle overhead
We talk about various things, none in depth; everything seems to have already been said. Eventually he turns to walk back up to the boardwalk, where the restaurants and gelaterie are full now, crowded with summer visitors, cheerful shouts and chatter. We pass silent fishermen still holding their poles over the terribly polluted water. Yet again I reflect that I’m all right, now: no pain, and very little regret. And he seems at ease as well.
To my surprise, he plans to walk a couple of miles and then take public transit back to Rome, to his family. I ask if he’s sure: away from the waterfront this isn’t the most pedestrian-friendly area.
“I am. Thank you, Robe’. Thank you for everything.”
I know what he means, I think, but I might be wrong, I’m no Sherlock Holmes. “Thank you. Stay in touch, you and John. Send Rosie to us whenever you want to go on holiday again, just the two of you.”
He laughs. “She’ll make sure we take you up on that. She’s attached to you all, you know, and she’s infatuated with Italy and Italian. She won’t forget you.”
“You don’t either, please.” We’re saying a proper goodbye, years too late. So I venture to say now what I never had: “We left each other without understanding each other.”
“But we do now, don’t we. Friends?” He sounds sincere, and I believe him.
I put out my hand to shake his. “Friends.”
He looks at my hand, then draws me in for a careful hug instead.
And I feel only—warmth. No intensity, no erotic enslavement; the claws of desire have withdrawn. I feel almost at peace.
“Friends,” I repeat. “Arrivederci.”
FINIS