Julian, or A Meeting at the Diogenes Club

by Andrea Johnson

"So, Sherlock," said my brother Mycroft in his deceptively mild fashion, his gray eyes sparking with an anticipatory thrill. "Have you given more thought to my little proposal?"

I chewed on the stem of my pipe as I am wont to do when in deep thought.

It was true that after more than a year of enforced inactivity I itched for something to do. Mycroft's proposal that Russell and I engage in this fact-finding mission in Berlin held a certain appeal. I did wish to work again with my partner and wife. Some of our greatest successes, and often our greatest enjoyments, have come from the investigation of the criminal element.

Also, Russell and I had read the news reports coming out of Germany with growing concern. The Jews of Germany, including a handful of my wife's distant cousins, had reason to fear the rise to power of the virulently anti-Semitic National Socialist Party and its leader, Adolf Hitler. Neither Russell or I moved in the highest circles of British aristocracy but we could not help but be aware of the prejudicial sentiment against 'Hebrews' among their numbers. I was sorry to count some members of the Royal Family in this last group.

The citizens of the United Kingdom were weary of war by 1933 and eager to believe the problems in Germany would have no impact upon them. I knew better.

"You and Mary are in a unique position to learn much about the activities of Herr Hitler and his associates in Germany," Mycroft said.

He watched me inscrutably, rather like a cat at a mouse hole. I maintained an impassive expression. It was true that Russell and I could uncover information in Berlin that would prove vital when our country was again forced into war. Still, I hesitated. There were other considerations here, considerations I would not have made in years past.

I rose from my chair and walked to the fireplace to knock my pipe out against its stones. I paced over the Tree of Life design on the Turkish carpet and back again. The Strangers Room of the Diogenes Club was luxuriously well appointed. The Greek philosopher Diogenes the Cynic would have disapproved.

"Such a mission would be of as much benefit to Mary as to yourself, Sherlock," Mycroft said.

"Do you think so?" I said. "Need I remind you that my wife is a Jew, Mycroft? Should that be discovered in Berlin, we would be confronted with quite a pretty problem."

"All the more reason for her to undertake this mission," Mycroft declared. "She will be of help in protecting others of her religion. She would not thank you for protecting her in this matter, Sherlock."

I knew full well that I would be treated to the sharp side of Russell's tongue should she hear of this conversation. She objects to what she refers to as my "chivalrous impulses." Yet I also knew my wife was sometimes in need of my protection, whether she wished to acknowledge that fact or not. She nearly died in giving birth to our son. He was a most precious gift, as was his sister, but I would not have traded their mother's life or health even for these well-loved children.

I felt as though we waged war against an enemy more insidious than Moriarty or his daughter in the aftermath of Jack's birth. Depression followed infection followed the agony of labor and a breech birth. The enemy that seized my wife, that sapped energy from her long limbs and interest from her eyes, was a gray, shadowy figure I could see only out of the corner of my eye. I could not touch it. I could only touch my wife and pray (oh, yes, I prayed, to the Lord God of Israel, to the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost, to Buddha, to any other God I felt might answer.) When at last she smiled at me, with her whole heart in her sky-blue eyes and the son she risked so much for in her arms, I felt as though I had somehow snatched her back from the jaws of death.

"Your country has need of you both, Sherlock," Mycroft reminded me.

My wife and children need me, I thought.

It is not that I doubt Russell in any way. Her bravery, cool intelligence, and tremendous competence as a partner continue to be my bedrock. I know she felt shamed by her depression following Jack's birth and feared that I was angry with her, but I was not. I was angry with myself for believing Russell immune to serious illness or death because she is so young. I have had proof enough to the contrary. Still, I have at times taken her for granted. I have told myself that surely I will die first, that I will never know the agony of losing her and our children will be there to comfort her in my absence.

Russell, who understood the inevitability of death far too young, always knew better than to take anything for granted. Watching her carry two children, give birth and mother them has convinced this former misogynist that womankind is the stronger half of the race.

I had every intention of continuing to investigate cases with her and knew that I would doubtless continue to irritate her by pulling her from her Wisdom book. The nature of our partnership does not give me the option of wrapping her in cotton wool. Yet, however selfish it might be, I did not wish to risk my wife so soon in a country where people would do her harm because she is Jewish. Somewhat to my chagrin, I realized that I was unwilling to risk the happiness and future security of my wife, my son and my daughter even for the well-being of my country. Judith and Jack had a septegenarian father and a mother with no close or trustworthy living relatives. What would become of them if we died on this mission?

So, old man, I thought ruefully. A family has given you reason to be cautious. Watson would never have thought it.

At this point, one of these blessings of my old age interrupted our conversation with her learned discourse.

"Your club isn't named after a Greek god?" Judith inquired loudly of a tall, dark and handsome gentleman whose acquaintance I had not yet made. She looked disappointed, as her current all-consuming passion was the study of Greek mythology. "But then who was Diogenes?"

"Diogenes, my dear Miss Judith, was a Greek philosopher who practiced self-control and a most rigid abstinence," proclaimed the shaky-looking octagenarian who stood to the right of the red leather chair that doubled as my daughter's throne. I knew this august personage to hold a position of some importance in the Naval Office.

"He exposed himself to the utmost extremes of heat and cold and lived upon the most simple diet, casually supplied by the hand of charity," interjected the rotund Welshman in his late sixties, who stood to her left. Mr. Llewellyn was (conveniently for Mycroft) placed as an attache to the ambassador to Germany.

Judith shook her head in dismay.

"How horrible for him," she said innocently. "He does not sound very much like my Uncle Mycroft."

The dark, twenty-something man behind her chair glanced in Mycroft's direction and smirked in a manner that seemed somehow familiar to me. I wondered where I had seen him before. My daughter's other admirers were more successful in hiding their smiles, but Mycroft flushed to the roots of his thinning hairline.

"Such impertinence," said her uncle, who was still fond of his creature comforts. He had lost a considerable amount of weight whilst still dining on red meat and fine wines.

"Her mother would call it chutzpah," I murmured, looking at my Jewish child. Hitler's thugs would not treat her with gentleness.

Visitors to the Strangers Room are permitted to speak, though elsewhere in the Diogenes Club an almost monastic silence is maintained. Still, the walls of the Strangers Room are lined with dark wood paneling and bookshelves filled with books, magazines and newspapers in several languages. The hushed atmosphere of a library prevails even here.

Since most of the members of my brother's club are misogynists with a horror (more likely a terror) of women, the presence of even female children is frowned upon. Therefore, the tableaux enfolding in the southwest corner of the room was highly piquant. My little daughter was certainly the only female creature to walk these floors since her mother's last visit here some months ago.

Judith accompanied her uncle and I to the Diogenes Club due to unforeseen circumstances. I would not have caused discomfort to the members of London's most unsociable social club without good reason.

Both Judith's nanny Mrs. Carmichael and my brother's man Theodore were suffering from severe colds which manifested themselves within hours of our arrival at Mycroft's flat. Russell was renewing her studies at Oxford that week. She rang me Tuesday night and spoke with first Judith and then myself. The enthusiasm in her voice reassured me that she was back in top form. For Russell, I know the life of the mind is as essential as her partnership with me and our family life. For her part, Mrs. Hudson was delighted at the opportunity to have our son, Jack, all to herself. She was showing off her surrogate grandson to her nephew's family in a nearby town.

With wife, housekeeper and nanny otherwise occupied, I seized the opportunity to introduce my eldest child to the city that Russell jokingly refers to as "Holmes' first wife." First we visited my old haunts on Baker Street, where Judith asked a great many insightful questions. She was most interested in the Baker Street Irregulars, the boys not much older than herself who assisted me in many of my early cases. She met Billy, a one-time Irregular who has grown into a most sensible individual. She played with Billy's nieces, nephews and cousins and made new friends. She also learned the cultural differences between her country upbringing in Sussex and that of children of the East End of London.

Then I began her instruction in the geography of the great cesspool. At the end of the outing we celebrated her introduction to London at the restaurant owned by Mr. Edwards, a failed safecracker (but most successful chef.) We dined on baked pear and Stilton, followed by Russell's favorite onion soup with garlic and grated cheese. The menu was perhaps my way of including her absent mother in our day's excursion. I found that I missed Russell after more than a year of being constantly in her company.

As we returned home in a taxi, Judith called out the names of streets and alleys as we passed them. She showed such acuity of memory that I can safely say my second apprentice shows as much promise as the first.

Upon our arrival at Mycroft's rooms, we learned the illness that had befallen the House of Holmes had not abated. Mycroft suggested we adjourn to the club across the street to escape the sounds and scents of illness.

Judith promised solemnly to remain completely silent while her uncle and I conducted our business and so she had, until now.

"Was Diogenes a special philosopher?" Judith asked her courtiers.

"Well, Diogenes was a very practical man, little lass," said the octogenarian Mr. Abercrombie. "And so are we all - even your Uncle Mycroft, though he doesn't always look it."

He slanted a look at Mycroft, enjoying his gentle jab. Mycroft harrumphed and pretended not to hear him.

"I don't think it is very practical to choose to be uncomfortable," Judith said sensibly. Her comment was also loud enough that Mycroft could not help but overhear it. I noted that Judith stole a look at him to make certain he was listening. "Are all of you like Diogenes?"

The dark-haired man grinned.

"That depends on how you define 'likeness,'" he said. "We're like the philosopher because we don't always do what society expects us to do."

"Oh," Judith said, putting a hand to her chin. "Like talk to female persons? But you're talking to me, aren't you?"

Mr. Abercrombie, Mr. Llewellyn and the dark man all laughed.

"Perhaps we wanted to talk to you," Llewellyn said.

"I like talking to you too," Judith said. She then knelt on the floor and picked up the miniature bisque dolls she had been playing with. Mr. Abercrombie and Mr. Llewellyn began to admire them, sounding more like seasoned grandfathers than fusty old bachelors. The third man glanced at me. When he lifted his head, a certain slant of light turned his eyes to near silver.

"At times she reminds me of Mary; at others she is quite like Grandmother," Mycroft commented. "She has Grandmother's way of managing men. Have I told you, Sherlock, that I approve of your decision to give your daughter Grandmother's name as her second appellation?"

On our family tree there is a bouquet of Violets: our mother, grandmother, great-grandmother, a sister who died in early childhood and the first cousin who became our eldest brother's wife. But of course Mycroft understood without my telling him that my daughter is named in honor of the grandmother who influenced us both.

"Yes, Mycroft, you have," I said cordially. "Judith Violet indeed suits her. But you are trying to distract me. Who is the young man with Llewellyn and Abercrombie and why have you brought him here?"

Mycroft raised an eyebrow.

"You don't recognize him?" he said.

"I should not have asked if I did," I said irritably.

"That is Monsieur Julian Vernet," Mycroft said, savoring my defeat. "He is quite a gifted photographer. I thought perhaps you might wish to engage him, particularly since the photographer Mary found in Oxford proved so unsatisfactory."

"Do not be disingenuous, Mycroft," I said in annoyance. "He is Sherrinford's grandson."

"It took you so long to make the deduction?" Mycroft said. "You are slipping, Sherlock."

I scowled at him. Mycroft continued to look pleased with himself.

"He is a British subject raised largely in Vienna and Cannes and, therefore, in a perfect position to help you regarding this matter in Berlin. He has volunteered his services to the Foreign Office. I had planned to introduce you this afternoon, but it seems Judith has already done the honors."

He sat back in his chair and pushed his lips in and out, as he is wont to do when deep in thought.

"He doesn't care to discuss that other business, Sherlock," Mycroft assured me. "There will be no unpleasantness."

"The other business" still haunts both of us. The harm our parents first did to the name of Holmes was completed by our eldest brother Sherrinford in the 1890s. Involvement in a criminal occult group destroyed Sherrinford's reputation and caused his son so much shame that he changed his surname to that of our ancestors. Sherrinford gambled away his money, indulged in opiates, lost the family estate our father Siger passed down to him largely intact, and turned to the occult in hope of regaining the power and prestige he had lost. Instead, he lost what remained to him. I extricated him from the group and paid his debts, but his shame left him in a weakened condition. He died of typhoid fever a short time later.

Neither Mycroft or I tried to stop Sherrinford's widow from fleeing to the continent with their son and beginning anew. I was vaguely aware that she had remarried and that my nephew had himself sired a son. But neither this nephew or his offspring chose to contact us as the years passed. I thought perhaps he found the name of Vernet easier to bear than that of Holmes.

Now my brother's grandson appeared before me like a ghost, with much of Sherrinford in the nervous movement of his hands and the expression in his gray eyes. There was perhaps something of my own younger self in his arrogant carriage.

I also would not have hesitated to travel to Germany in my youth, I thought. I would have viewed it as a grand adventure.

Judith gave a delighted peal of laughter in response to something Julian Vernet had said. The sunlight from the window painted her long braids a molten red-gold. There are other adventures remaining to me, I thought. There are other puzzles closer to home for my wife and I to explore, other contributions we could make to the safety of this green England.

"I will not go to Germany," I told Mycroft, making the decision all at once. "Take me to task for that if you wish, but a husband and father, particularly one of my age, has other responsibilities that take precedence."

A shadow passed across Mycroft's face and I cursed myself. How could I have been so thoughtless, particularly with the direction my thoughts had taken this afternoon? I remembered Mycroft's long ago marriage in Montenegro and the tragic loss of his wife and young son. If he lived, that fine strapping lad would be old enough to be a grandfather himself, but his father has not forgotten him. No more could I forget my own lost son.

Mycroft has always blamed himself for failing to be with them at the end. If he had been in Montenegro instead of in England helping me to extricate Sherrinford from his self-made traps, perhaps he could have saved them both. At least he might have saved young Nero. But that is more of the unpleasantness of the past we do not discuss. There is nothing we can do to change it, after all.

"We will do what we can to train the others who undertake this assignment," I added quietly, giving him an apologetic look. Mycroft nodded in acknowledgement.

"Perhaps you are right after all, Sherlock," he said, looking towards my giggling daughter. His expression was almost wistful.

"Judith holds you in the highest esteem, you know," I told my brother. "I believe that last comment about the impracticality of Diogenes was in the way of an apology. Neither of us would..."

"Never mind, old man," Mycroft said gruffly. "I understand perfectly."

We both looked towards young Vernet. I rose to my feet and walked over to my daughter and her companions.

"I am Sherlock Holmes," I told the photographer and aspiring spy.

"The great detective featured in the 'Strand,'" said Abercrombie helpfully. I winced inwardly at this description.

"I am Julian Vernet the photographer," said the young man sardonically.

I felt Judith slip her hand into mine and move closer to my side. My daughter sensed undercurrents here which she could not yet understand.

"Father, you should hear what else Diogenes used to do," she told me.

"In a moment, child," I told her and squeezed her hand reassuringly. "Perhaps I may be of some help to you?" I asked Julian Vernet.

Julian Vernet arched a sarcastic brow and looked meaningfully at the leaded window pane. I saw that he stood in my shadow.

"Yes," he said. "You can move out of my light."

For a moment I was irritated by this insolent young man. Then I recognized the reference and laughed.

When Diogenes the philosopher met Alexander the Great, Alexander asked the philosopher if he wished for a boon. Diogenes replied, "Yes, you can move out of my light."

My daughter and I stepped out of the beam of sunlight so that Sherrinford's proud, arrogant grandson could bathe in its radiance.

"If I had not been Sherlock Holmes, I should have liked to be a Vernet," I told Julian Vernet, paraphrasing Alexander's answer to the impertinence of Diogenes. "Art in the blood takes the strangest forms."

Julian Vernet shot us a grin.

"I've heard that one before," he said. "It certainly has with us, hasn't it? But I would hope I am not quite so bad-mannered as Diogenes."

Judith giggled. I suspected that Monseiur Vernet had told her of Diogenes' more uncouth habits. The philosopher was known to scratch himself like a dog in a public square.

"I should greatly like to photograph your daughter," he told me. "She would make a capital model."

I warmed further to the man at this praise of my daughter's charms. Her delicate, mobile features and the contrast of her strawberry blonde braids against her blue woolen frock did make her look quite picturesque. She was rather bijou, in fact: a priceless, elegant jewel of exquisite worksmanship. I give most of the credit to her mother.

"You may photograph Judith on the condition that you also photograph the rest of my family," I said quickly.

Russell wished to have our family photographed earlier but the Oxford photographer she selected did not please any of us. This great-nephew of mine showed promise, regardless of his artistic ability. Best of all, he also came with an interesting case.

"I shall do both on the condition that all of you shall help me, in other ways besides stepping out of my light," said Vernet.

His face sobered as he looked from Mycroft to Abercrombie to Llewellyn, those practical men who were the founding members of the Diogenes Club.

"I believe I shall have need of it if I am to help save our country," he said.

"Any help we can offer will be yours," I said.