The Roar of the Coward
Whispers, whistles, and the sound of horses' hooves mingled together, creating a blurred background noise.
But to Rose, the world was deathly silent.
Only the thumping of the heart.
Eaton's blond hair was stained with mud and blood, and the lieutenant's medal on his chest was askew.
The sash that had once skillfully trimmed her skirt and provided her with brief support and warmth now lay loosely draped over the cold stones, soaked by dirty puddles, and trampled by the crowd of onlookers.
Everything around me became unreal and surreal; the faces of the crowd were blurred, and their voices sounded otherworldly.
Rose felt her knees buckle, and the ground seemed to be spinning and collapsing.
Just as she was about to collapse, a strong arm suddenly caught her, and then a familiar black trench coat with a faint chemical smell was draped over her trembling shoulders.
Sherlock has arrived.
Unlike usual, the great detective didn't immediately pounce on the corpse like a hunting dog, dissect the scene with his sharp eyes, or throw out astonishing deductions at lightning speed.
He didn't even glance at Eaton on the ground for more than a few seconds; all his attention, all his almost clumsy concern, was focused on Rose.
Police officers are collecting the body, preparing to hand it over to the forensic doctor.
Sherlock held Rose tightly, embracing her chilled body in his arms and wrapping her in his trench coat, trying to block out the biting cold and the cruel reality before him.
He placed his hand on the back of her head, burying her face in his shoulder to shield her from Eaton's gruesome death.
"Don't look," he whispered.
Rose's tears finally broke free, not with a loud wail, but with a silent, torrent that soaked the fabric of Sherlock's clothes.
The warm, dampness seemed to carry a scorching heat, making Sherlock's heart clench.
He tightened his grip on her arm, his chin gently resting on the top of her head: "I will definitely, absolutely find the real culprit and bring him to justice."
"I don't need you! I know who the real culprit is!"
A series of hurried and unsteady footsteps approached, and Owen pushed through the crowd and rushed in.
He was yelling and screaming, acting like a madman, completely unlike his usual self.
The old Owen gave the impression of being introverted, even somewhat timid. He had a very good temper, and would only smile when others mocked his German-accented English. He was also submissive to the fact that his wife had changed fiancées, like a gentle lamb.
He never seems to lose his temper, and no one can imagine what he would look like when he does.
But at this moment, his lips trembled uncontrollably, and his eyes, which usually carried a hint of melancholy and evasiveness, now burned with a frenzied flame: "It's your brother! It's Mycroft Holmes, it must be him!"
The crowd erupted. "Shut up!" Sherlock stood up and grabbed Owen by the collar. "I'll let it slide this time, you're just overwhelmed with grief over losing a friend, but don't let me hear you slander anyone again! You said it was Mycroft, do you have any proof?"
Now Owen was not only furious, but also laughed—a sympathetic laugh, a compassionate, manic laugh.
He didn't answer Sherlock's question, but instead struggled to break free, then suddenly turned around and ran wildly in one direction like a mad bull.
The end of this direction is very familiar to Sherlock; it's Holmes Manor.
“Owen! Where are you going!” Sherlock tried to stop him, but Owen ignored him.
A strong sense of unease gripped Sherlock. What would Owen, in this state, completely out of his mind, do? He glanced at Rose, who was sluggish with grief in his arms, then at Eaton's body, which the officer had carefully preserved. Without hesitation, he half-supported, half-carried Rose, flagged down another carriage, and urgently told the driver, "Follow that madman up ahead!"
The carriage sped through the night, its wheels churning over the damp pavement with a dull, rapid sound.
Rose leaned on Sherlock's shoulder, her eyes vacant, not yet fully awake.
Sherlock pursed his lips, watching the London lights flow by outside the carriage curtain. His usually sharp mind seemed tangled in threads, unable to unravel the mystery.
The manor’s gilded, towering gates remained closed in the night, just as they had been countless times before.
"Let me in! I want to see Mycroft Holmes! Now! Immediately!" Owen roared, struggling against the growing number of servants who rushed in.
“Sir, please calm down! You may already be resting at this hour, we cannot let you in.” The servants held him firmly in place.
"Rest? How could he possibly rest?! He just killed someone! He killed Eaton Smith!"
"Let him in." Sherlock arrived, glanced at the servants, and gave the order.
The servants hesitated, wondering whether to let go.
“I’m just moving out. Mycroft hasn’t said he’s going to remove me from the family tree yet, has he?” he said coldly.
The servants exchanged a glance, then released Owen.
Owen shot up the stairs like a bullet, with Sherlock supporting Rose as they followed behind.
In the portraits on the corridor walls, the indifferent gazes of Holmes' ancestors seemed to sweep over everyone.
The door to the "heart" was not locked, and Owen pushed open the heavy, carved wooden door.
Mycroft was standing in front of the fireplace in the center of the room, with his back to the door.
He was still dressed in a crisp suit, his posture upright, as if he were merely admiring the flickering flames in the fireplace rather than plotting or witnessing a murder. He even held a glass of amber brandy in his hand, his demeanor elegant and composed.
His gaze swept over the seemingly insane Owen, over the pale-faced, broken-eyed Rose, and finally settled on the furrowed brow of Sherlock.
“A visit so late at night, and such a fuss…” Mycroft’s tone was as flat as if he were commenting on the weather. “I hope you have a convincing reason.”
"Reason? You're asking me for a reason?" Owen's words were laced with anguish, his voice distorted by extreme rage. "Eaton Smith! He's dead! You did it! It must have been you!"
Mycroft raised an eyebrow slightly. "The loss of an officer is regrettable. But Mr. Owen, accusations require evidence. I have never met this Lieutenant Smith before; what motive would I have?"
"Motive? Ha! Motive? Your motive is all too clear, it's just that nobody knows it!" Owen laughed wildly, his laughter filled with grief and despair. He suddenly pointed at Rose, who was being protected by Sherlock, "Because of her! Because you fell in love with your own sister!"
“Owen! You’re insane! What nonsense are you spouting?” Sherlock interrupted him sharply, trying to stop the absurd accusation. Rose also seemed to come to her senses, her eyes widening in shock.
“I’m not crazy! He’s the one who’s crazy! It’s your twisted family!” Owen’s voice was like a sob, and he turned to Sherlock, his eyes filled with pity and a kind of triumphant despair. “You don’t know, do you? You’ve been living in a huge lie all along!”
He stared intently at Sherlock, each word like the sharpest dagger, stabbing again and again at the fragile balance that had been maintained for so many years:
"Rose Holmes, hahahahaha, she's not a Holmes girl at all! She's just a fake your mother found somewhere! Eurus is your real sister, and she's my fiancée! Everyone's lying to you!"
A thunderbolt struck Rose and Sherlock's minds.
Rose's face instantly lost all color, and her body swayed precariously, only managing to stay upright thanks to Sherlock's support.
She didn't even dare lean on Sherlock anymore, not knowing if that support would be gone the next second.
The secret she had kept buried deep in her heart, the one she feared day and night, was torn open in such a crazy way, in her most vulnerable moment.
As for Sherlock, his intricate mental palace seemed to have been struck by a magnitude 9 earthquake.
All the details flashed through his mind like a fleeting glimpse—Mycroft's words upon first meeting her, "Blood ties are a poor adhesive," the occasional "Eurus" he heard at dinner, Rose's occasional unspoken expression... Countless clues that he had deliberately ignored or forcibly rationalized because of his emotions converged into an irresistible torrent at this moment, shattering the facts he had always firmly believed in.
“No, this can’t be, no,” Sherlock muttered, his deep blue eyes filled with confusion and struggle. He looked at Rose, then at Mycroft, and even around the “heart,” but all he saw was blankness, an absurd blankness. “Mycroft, Mycroft, he’s lying, isn’t he?”
"Hahahaha, see if your brother dares to answer you?" Owen pointed at Mycroft again, his voice filled with a vengeful pleasure.
"And you! Mycroft Holmes! You hypocrite! Murderer! You knew all along that she wasn't your sister! You loved her! You were madly infatuated with her!"
"For her, you even gave up mathematics, which you valued more than your life! You traded your freedom to negotiate with your mother! You abandoned your beloved mathematics just to ruin her engagement with me!"
"Because you were siblings for eighteen years, you dared not admit this love! You neglected her, pushed her away, and were extremely cruel to her! Until you saw her leaving with someone else, you couldn't take it anymore! So you killed Eaton! You cold-blooded, deformed monster!"
Rose stared blankly at Mycroft.
Those subtle acts of protection, those moments of losing control, those incomprehensible harshness... Could it be that what lies behind them is such shocking and unacceptable emotion?
Eurus's statement back then, "How desperate it is to be loved by a monster like Mycroft," wasn't a lie.
Sherlock was completely stunned. He looked at Rose, who was pale as a ghost, and then at his brother, who was standing in front of the fireplace, still expressionless, but whose knuckles were gripping the wine glass so tightly that the water level was slightly swaying.
If what Owen said is true... then Mycroft's unusual concern for Rose, his tacit approval of Rose's departure from the manor yet his imprisonment of Rose, and even his mother's sudden death, all have an absurd and terrifying explanation.
So the person who killed their mother was not him, but their brother.
"Ah—" he groaned as his head throbbed with pain, and his mental palace burned, collapsed, and seemed to turn to ashes.
Mycroft stood there quietly, facing Owen's vehement accusations and the shocked, broken gazes of his younger siblings.
A tiny crack finally appeared on the usual, slightly weary, calm mask on his face.
Deep within those grey eyes, ice was cracking, revealing a surging, dark undercurrent beneath.
When Mycroft was closing the case on Eaton's murder, he had considered Owen as an unstable factor.
There are only five people in the world who know that Rose is not Eurus: his mother, himself, Rose, Eurus himself, and her childhood sweetheart, Eurus.
But at the time he was absolutely certain that after Eaton’s death, Owen would never reveal that Rose was not Eurus.
Firstly, although Owen was cowardly, he was actually a smart man. He knew that revealing this matter would not bring any benefits, but would instead cause endless trouble.
Secondly, the Owen family's shipping business has been completely revived thanks to the Holmes family's efforts, and in recent years they have become deeply intertwined with it.
Thirdly, Owen had no reason to suspect him, an older brother who was always indifferent to his younger siblings and always argued with them whenever they met.
However, no one would have expected that his mother would tell Owen about how he had given up mathematics to pursue politics in order to break off his engagement with Rose.
The seemingly unbreakable conclusion collapsed because the underlying logic had changed: Owen knew of his secret love for Rose, a love that even Rose herself was unaware of.
So when Eaton was murdered, Owen immediately suspected him and was quite certain of it.
Years of accumulated resentment and hatred—the resentment of having one's childhood sweetheart replaced, the hatred of being manipulated in continuing the marriage contract, and the hatred of having one's close friend's body exposed in the street—all converged in this instant.
On this night, the timid and gentle Owen, who had always been cowardly, let out a sharp roar, a deafening cry from the silent one.
My mother was brilliant, truly brilliant.
Indeed, there is much evidence suggesting that a child's intelligence largely comes from their mother. The woman who gave birth to him, Sherlock, and Eurus—three monsters—shouldn't possibly be an ordinary person.
The hidden threads she had laid out long ago, threads that could affect everything, finally began to unleash their full force at this moment, burning everything away.
This is her complete response to herself.
It's not just about crossing the line and falling into eternal darkness.
Furthermore, years of kinship have turned to ashes, and deeply buried love has been uprooted.
Furthermore, everything he cared about was completely destroyed. Everything he had tried to avoid was now deeply entangled in. His beloved younger brother suffered a mental breakdown. The woman he deeply loved turned against him.
So when faced with Owen's hysteria, Mycroft neither admitted nor denied it.
He merely raised his chin slightly, breaking the suffocating silence with an almost cruel tone:
"I never imagined my mother would tell you even this. So this is what she meant by something that had been planted all along, something that would ignite everything."
Mycroft even applauded: "You've done a perfect job. I think she'll be very pleased to see you in the other world."
"Are you finished, Mr. Owen?"
His voice wasn't loud, but it was like an ice pick, piercing through Owen's frantic outburst and also piercing through Rose and Sherlock's last shred of hope.
“If this is your dying confession,” Mycroft looked at Owen, “then you can rest in peace.”
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