Current location:	paradise
Current mood:	refreshed
Current music:	Ella and Franky
Entry tags:	holmes/watson

A pennance drabble
Instead of a drabble, I am posting a little teaser of a little PWP I'm working on.  Suggestions, comments, criticisms  are all  welcome.  I actually did research for this! But if my billiards terms are wonky, let me know.

Billiards

I suppose it is a requirement of every bachelor estate that there should be a smoking room equipped with a sturdy, serviceable billiard table.  The enormous gothic monstrosity that passed for Lord Delaney’s estate was no exception.  The lord of the manor had engaged Holmes to discover the whereabouts of his most recent manservant, and so we were both compelled to travel to his holdings in Cornwall.  The case proved to be a relatively simple one, uninteresting and unworthy of Holmes’ extensive abilities, but the mansion itself was entertaining enough to compensate for the lackluster mystery.  

The case had been completed to Holmes’ satisfaction in just under a week, but we remained at Lord Delaney’s manor house over the weekend at his behest.  He was a pleasant host, and we both enjoyed his company, but even above his surprisingly interesting conversation we relished the expensively luxurious billiard table.  That billiard table, with its perfectly polished mahogany legs and brilliant green wool cover was the pride and joy of Lord Delaney’s collection of “gentlemen’s entertainment.”  It stood in a prominent corner of the gaming room, surrounded by racks of the highest quality cues made of all sorts of exotic woods, some of which boasted beautiful inlay patterns.  I discovered over the course of the investigation that Holmes loved billiards and was a terrific player, even to the point where Lord Delaney, who was himself quite accomplished, refused to play against him.  I have never minded basking in Holmes’ shadow and losing to him at billiards was the easiest thing in the world.  It allowed me, with perfect decorum, to admire his lean figure and long, delicate hands for hours on end.  In return, Holmes passed many contented hours without sparing a thought to the cocaine needle that seemed to always loom above the end of a less than satisfactory investigation.

It had become our practice to retire to the gaming room instead of the smoking room after dinner for conversation and, of course, to put the magnificent billiard table through its paces.  To this end, Holmes and I remained awake after Lord Delaney retired the night before we planned to go back to London, intending to play billiards by the low gaslight.  So it happened that on our final night in Cornwall we found ourselves engaged in a long, emotional goodbye not to our host, who had retired quite early, but to his magnificent billiard table. 

Holmes was in the process of racking the balls, a thin cigar balanced daintily between his teeth.  He maneuvered around the table with an admirable economy of movement, his penchant for perfection requiring he check the racked balls from every angle before breaking them.  From the first moment his cue hit the porcelain I knew the game would be a short one.  I fervently hoped another would follow it, not out of any particular love for billiards, though I did enjoy the game.  Rather, I shamelessly hoped that my observation of Holmes’ stunning figure would not be interrupted by something so inconvenient as the end of a short game.

Holmes is not a classically attractive man.  His body is far too lean and his face far too angular to be considered beautiful, but by the warm gaslight that seemed to rest like a human presence in the air of the wood-paneled room, the shadows made him seem dark and mysterious.  His eyes glinted like mirrors, made bright by his intense concentration.  All in all, the effect was astonishingly stunning.