Title: Washing Day
Fandom: Sherlock Holmes (ACD)
Rating: G
Length: 666
Summary: Mouselet reports on washing day at 221B Baker Street

Yesterday was washing day.   I knew this even before I peeked out, for I could hear Mrs Hudson complaining to Mr Holmes.

“Really, Mr Holmes.  I cannot imagine how your shirt sleeves end up in this state.  I presume these are grass stains, and mud, which should not be coming indoors.  This I think is blood, and as for this, I am not sure I want to know.  I expect the occasional fluid stain on the doctor’s shirts, and he always makes a point of apologising, but I cannot see why you need to have anything similar.”

She had almost departed when she added, “And don’t think I’ve missed the bicycle grease stain on the front of the shirt either.  How I am going to get rid of that I don’t know.”

One would almost have thought Mr Holmes was deaf from the way he did not react to this at all.  However he seemed perfectly happy to continue his conversation with Dr Watson as soon as Mrs Hudson had left, so I conclude he did not have a hearing impairment after all.

Later that morning, once the two gentlemen had gone out, Mrs Hudson and Esme came up to clean the rooms.  They were partway through when Mrs Hudson suddenly said, “It’s starting to rain.  Come on we must get the washing in again.”

Esme said, “But it’s only a shower and the washing has just gone out.  My mother never worries about the rain until the washing is nearly dry.”

“But that’s in the country, dear, where the rain water is clean.  Here it will leave grey streaks on all the clean clothes.  Not that Mr Holmes would notice.  But it’s the principle.”

So Mrs Hudson and Esme went to get the principle in, and then a little later when it had stopped raining, they put it out again.

The next thing I heard about the washing was in the afternoon, when my beloved inspector arrived and offered to bring the basket of clean bed linen and clothing upstairs.  Mrs Hudson thanked him and said she would bring the tea up in a few minutes.

While they waited, Mr Holmes was describing a crustacean [O/N: our best guess is this was a credulous client and not a crab] who believed in ghosts and who had been terrorised by a relative who had pretended to be a ghost.  In order to demonstrate, Mr Holmes had taken one of the clean sheets which he used to cover himself.

Unfortunately he leapt out making ghostly noises just at the point at which Mrs Hudson came into the room carrying the tea tray.  Not surprisingly, this made her jump, for she was, as she explained later, expecting three gentlemen to be sitting quietly in arm chairs, and not two gentlemen in arm chairs and one lunatic hiding behind the door and making noises.  The Sloth tells me he is not allowed to print the word Mrs Hudson used to describe the noises.

Anyway, the teapot slipped off the tray and landed right in the middle of the clean washing.  I don’t think I have ever seen Dr Watson and Inspector Hopkins depart so rapidly.

In fact my inspector left so quickly he forgot his hat.  It was a few hours later when the two gentlemen crept back in.  The dear man said he would take his hat and go, but then they both started to giggle and he had to sit down.

I was somewhat mystified as to what could have happened to them, but before I could worry about it Esme came in, put down a tray with some cold supper on it, and said, “Mrs Hudson said this is all you’re getting.  She also said she presumes you’ve been hiding in the Red Lion and you are not to disturb her when you leave.”

I had a look at the supper, but it wasn’t very exciting, so I contented myself with watching my dearest man eat.