Sherlock Holmes and the Adventure of the Seventh Safeguard

Chapter 17 ~ A Retrospection

It was the first of September, and the sun had sunk below the horizon. Baker Street had fallen into deep evening twilight. Sherlock Holmes, perched in his customary armchair, was reading and rereading a long letter. I was sitting and looking out the window, wrapped in contemplation. My thoughts were with the Hogwarts train, as it wound its way through the highlands to the castle by the loch. Harry Potter had told me that it usually arrived shortly after dark had fallen. He would be aboard it now, as would Ron and Hermione, for their last year in school. I thought of all the eleven-year-olds, newly apprised of their wizardry, who were now safely embarked on their schooling, and nearly at Hogwarts. I was almost envious. It would be a fine thing to go to school in a great stone castle in the highlands, to learn to fly, and to see dragons. But mostly, I thought of the fact that Mary Watson, the unschooled wizardess whose overseas birth to muggle agents of the British Embassy in India had led to her being overlooked for decades, was downstairs, having tea with Shirley and Mrs. Hudson, instead of being on that train.

When Mycroft had asked Mary to follow us and watch for Death Eater reinforcements coming, Mary had gone to Ginny Weasley, and asked for her help as a guide. Ginny, and Luna Lovegood, her friend, the Ravenclaw girl who Sherlock and Hermione had gone to for advice, were under-age members of Dumbledore's Army. They had been delighted to be asked to help in a non-combat role. Luna dressed Mary in robes which had belonged to her late mother so that she could try to pass as a wizard if she was seen. And together they led her to an old house outside of Hogsmeade Village and showed her a secret passageway – one of the seven on the Marauder's Map. There, Mary had insisted that they stay behind, and had gone on, through a tunnel and into the grounds of Hogwarts. She had waited in the grounds, hidden in some fashion, until she saw the cloud of dementors, and knew that someone inside the castle was summoning unsavoury reinforcements. She set off her flare, sent her beautiful patronus, and then entered the castle. I believe, though I am not sure, that she levitated onto the battlements.

The robes now hung in her closet, and her Hogwart's letter lay on her bureau. The discovery of an entire world of people with her abilities had enlarged her area of study, and brought her in touch with persons like herself. We had interesting friends calling at Queen Anne's Street. Ginny Weasley and Mrs. Lupin had called only yesterday. But she had not chosen the new world over the old. She had broadened her horizons, but not transplanted herself. She had not gone where I could not come as well. She had stayed in my world, with me and our daughter.

Sherlock rolled up his letter; rolled, not folded. It was written on a parchment scroll instead of notepaper.

"So who's your other Wizarding correspondent?" I asked.

"Oh, very good, John." he said. "It occurred to you that a muggle-born wizard would use either the internet or the muggle post office to correspond with a muggle while she's staying with her muggle parents?"

"And it's a little too early for Hermione to be writing from school."

"Just a little. It's Severus Snape."

"He's somewhere in the Andes right now, isn't he?"

"Yes. I think he's studying the potioneering techniques of some fringe society of Peruvian warlocks."

"Why is he writing to you? You're a muggle."

"I seem to be his source of British news." replied Sherlock. "And he repays me by sending back enlightening commentaries on it from an inside perspective."

"And why not write to a wizard?"

"Who would he write to? The vast majority of British Wizarding society thinks he should be locked away at the very least."