Vermin

[capt_facepalm]

Title: Vermin
Author: capt_facepalm
Rating: PG
Fandom: Sherlock Holmes (Gaslight ACD)
Characters: Dr John Watson, Mr Sherlock Holmes, Irregulars
Summary: Call for the doctor
Warnings: (none)
Word Count: 100
Author's Notes: July 7th 2016 prompt: Epidemic

.oOOo.

Holmes forced the door open and dim light fell upon two figures.

‘That one is Wiggins,’ said Dr Watson indicating the motionless one on an old mattress. The other one lay panting on the floor.

‘Freddy Euston,’ said Holmes, stooping to examine him whilst Watson felt for Wiggins pulse. Both boys had been sick and there was blood in Wiggins' vomit.

‘Typhoid, Doctor?’

‘No,’ Watson replied in exasperation.

Wiggins could not be roused but Freddy moaned.

‘Fred, it’s important. What have you eaten?’ asked Holmes.

‘…scraps from Margate’s,’ the child groaned.

‘When?’

‘…suppertime.’

‘Holmes, it’s not disease. They’ve been poisoned.’

.oOOo.

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Comments

[donutsweeper.livejournal.com]

No!!! No poisoning Wiggins!!!

[capt-facepalm.livejournal.com]

Thanks! Oh yes, they are definitely poisoned. Good thing Holmes arrived in time and brought a competent medico with him.

[gardnerhill.livejournal.com]

It used to be the custom to douse bits of stale bread or rotten meat with arsenic and leave them in corners of warehouses to use as rat poison. Ravenous pauper children would easily succumb.

[capt-facepalm.livejournal.com]

Thanks! Unfortunately, that is exactly what the proprietors of Margate's Restaurant had in mind.

[pompey01.livejournal.com]

O.O

Aww, crap! They're just a couple of little kids! Kids that would just as soon rob you blind but still.

[capt-facepalm.livejournal.com]

Thanks! Street urchins were regarded as vermin in this time setting. They were dirty and desperate and vicious; definitely not "Angels with Dirty Faces". I love that ACD made Holmes a man that saw their value even if he exploited them for his own purposes.

[hagstrom]

Well I guess that'll teach them, but poor kids!

[capt-facepalm.livejournal.com]

Holmes talks the Irregulars out of burning down the restaurant.
Thanks!

[caffienekitty]

Oh no! I suspect that Margate's might be receiving an unexpected reckoning in the near future.

[capt-facepalm.livejournal.com]

A brief truce is struck between The Irregulars and Simon, the ratcatcher's boy, resulting in the brief closure of the restaurant?
Something like that, perhaps?
Thanks!

[med_cat]

This begs for a sequel...

[capt-facepalm.livejournal.com]

Maybe some day...
Thanks!