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stonepicnicking_okapi) wrote2025-06-25 02:47 pm
stonepicnicking_okapi) wrote2025-06-25 02:47 pm
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Yahtzee Roll #6: Fill 5: Clearing the air
Title: Clearing the air
Fandom: BBC Sherlock
Pairing: Stella Hopkins/Sally Donovan
Rating: Gen
Length: 400
Prompt: camphoric
Summary: A riddle turns into a case.
The camphoric perfume cloyed.
Sally fought for breath, then the air cleared, and she gasped.
“Stella!”
“It’s over, Sally.” Then Stella turned her head and whispered, “She’s awake.”
“Ah, welcome back. Hello, Detective Inspector Donovan.”
Sally blinked. The faces of two old ladies came into focus.
“I’m Dolly Bantry and this is my friend Jane Marple.”
Jane Marple was the old lady I had seen in the head scarf. “I’m so glad you got my message with the clocks. Yes, of course, it was murder, but it seemed cruel to put Heather through an interrogation when she’d just lost her sister, so I just took her place. One old lady looks very much like another, don’t you think? And I was careful not to show too much of my face.”
“I told Stella that the Badcock sisters were peculiar but not senile,” said Dolly. “There have been murders, and the proof was in that diary. You were only a few minutes quicker than Stella was to arrive. And you had the key, the key Jane knew was somewhere.”
“It was an old-fashioned system, but sometimes the old-fashioned things are best, don’t you think?” purred Jane Marple. “Or maybe you don’t. So modern, these young women.”
The book in the old lady’s hand had two rings.
“Mariana would put her lock on, then leave it for Heather. Then Heather would put her lock on and leave it for Mariana. Mariana couldn’t open it. She didn’t know what Heather had put inside. Then Mariana would remove her lock and give it back, then Heather could remove her lock and ensure her secret was safe. That is, until it wasn’t.”
“A finger.” said Sally. “The bones of a finger with a ring on it.” That was what she had seen in the box when she’d opened it. That was the last thing she’d seen.
“What a wicked girl, Ms. Zielinksy!”
“I could never countenance calling her ‘Miss Ellie,’” said Dolly with a harrumph.
“Getting residents to sign over their money, then dispatching them if they were houseflies and saying their families collected them or they were transferred to another home.”
“But she said there wasn’t a basement,” argued Sally.
“There isn’t. But there are plenty of loose floorboards.”
“A team is here,” said Stella. “It seems we have a case whenever you’re ready, Detective Inspector Donovan.”
“Ready when you are, Detective Inspector Hopkins.”
Fandom: BBC Sherlock
Pairing: Stella Hopkins/Sally Donovan
Rating: Gen
Length: 400
Prompt: camphoric
Summary: A riddle turns into a case.
The camphoric perfume cloyed.
Sally fought for breath, then the air cleared, and she gasped.
“Stella!”
“It’s over, Sally.” Then Stella turned her head and whispered, “She’s awake.”
“Ah, welcome back. Hello, Detective Inspector Donovan.”
Sally blinked. The faces of two old ladies came into focus.
“I’m Dolly Bantry and this is my friend Jane Marple.”
Jane Marple was the old lady I had seen in the head scarf. “I’m so glad you got my message with the clocks. Yes, of course, it was murder, but it seemed cruel to put Heather through an interrogation when she’d just lost her sister, so I just took her place. One old lady looks very much like another, don’t you think? And I was careful not to show too much of my face.”
“I told Stella that the Badcock sisters were peculiar but not senile,” said Dolly. “There have been murders, and the proof was in that diary. You were only a few minutes quicker than Stella was to arrive. And you had the key, the key Jane knew was somewhere.”
“It was an old-fashioned system, but sometimes the old-fashioned things are best, don’t you think?” purred Jane Marple. “Or maybe you don’t. So modern, these young women.”
The book in the old lady’s hand had two rings.
“Mariana would put her lock on, then leave it for Heather. Then Heather would put her lock on and leave it for Mariana. Mariana couldn’t open it. She didn’t know what Heather had put inside. Then Mariana would remove her lock and give it back, then Heather could remove her lock and ensure her secret was safe. That is, until it wasn’t.”
“A finger.” said Sally. “The bones of a finger with a ring on it.” That was what she had seen in the box when she’d opened it. That was the last thing she’d seen.
“What a wicked girl, Ms. Zielinksy!”
“I could never countenance calling her ‘Miss Ellie,’” said Dolly with a harrumph.
“Getting residents to sign over their money, then dispatching them if they were houseflies and saying their families collected them or they were transferred to another home.”
“But she said there wasn’t a basement,” argued Sally.
“There isn’t. But there are plenty of loose floorboards.”
“A team is here,” said Stella. “It seems we have a case whenever you’re ready, Detective Inspector Donovan.”
“Ready when you are, Detective Inspector Hopkins.”
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