Through the sound of rain, a strangely familiar voice sounded. It didn't fit the cold, rainy night at all; rather, it felt more like an old friend greeting her after a long absence.
So utterly infuriating.
Mary hesitated for just a moment, but quickly regained her composure. She stayed silent, unmoving, just standing there as the cold rain hit her face. In her blue eyes, the uninvited guest in a white mask was reflected; her head felt foggy from the chill, but her mind was clearer than ever.
Her body, cold just moments before, quickly grew warm with anger at the sight of this man.
"If you leave your window open on a rainy night, aren't you afraid of catching a cold?" Russell asked with concern.
Mary responded only with a cold, rhetorical question: "What are you doing here?"
There was distance and aversion in her voice.
"This is not a place where you're welcome. You'd better disappear before I call the police or shout for help."
"Don't say that. You sound really angry. Who made you this upset?"
Russell's tone was nonchalant.
"What do you think?" Mary's voice grew colder.
[Mary Morstan is irritated by your mockery. Hostility and annoyance rise—Malice +50.]
"Eh? What did I do?" Russell spread his eyes wide behind the mask. "I've only been outside a minute, and you already hate me? Wasn't that last time just a mild bit of sarcasm? Isn't this a little dull?"
"Um… calm down, Mary—"
"Don't call me by my name," Mary interrupted sharply. "We're not that close yet."
"Fine, fine, Miss Morstan, please calm down." Russell raised his hands in reluctant surrender. "Honestly, I didn't come here to taunt you."
"Oh? Planning to steal my lipstick again?"
"No, not at all… actually, this time I didn't come to steal anything." Russell reached into his pocket.
Mary instinctively stepped back, hand moving toward her cane, watching Russell warily.
[Mary Morstan is now openly hostile. Malice +20.]
"What do you want?"
"I… want to give you a present."
Under Mary's glare, Russell pulled out a stack of documents from his pocket.
"A present?" Mary's brow creased. "I'm afraid your belongings are rather filthy."
"You really should take a look."
Russell smiled. "Besides, who said these are mine?"
Hearing this, Mary's frown deepened. She stared at the mask's unreadable face, then slowly let her eyes drift to his outstretched hand.
By the moonlight, she made out a few words written on the top page.
The name "Morstan" stabbed her eyes like a needle.
"This is…"
Her voice trembled a little.
She glanced at Russell, who did not react; then, slowly, she reached out and accepted the documents.
The pile in her hands was incredibly important.
She let go of her cane and cradled the documents in both arms, staring at the words in disbelief. For a moment, the whole scene felt unreal: a sense of complete absurdity, where the approach and the process had been utterly wrong, but the outcome was somehow exactly right.
"But how…?" she murmured, all hostility and suspicion gone from her voice. "Why do you have these, and why are you giving them to me…?"
Her blue eyes stared intently at the masked face before her, searching for even the faintest hint of sincerity beneath the pale disguise.
"Oh… that's a long story." Russell scratched his head, looking unsure of where to begin. "Simply put, I was at Lloyds Bank last night intending to steal something, but ended up running into a bunch of incompetent thieves. I mean, sure, I've broken into houses before—but I've always been a nice guy about it."
"So, as a good citizen, I saved Scotland Yard a bit of trouble." Russell shrugged, as if this was all very casual. "Afterwards, I just picked this up from the vault. You know me—whatever I steal, I always return. This time's no exception. Honestly, I didn't even know it was stolen from your family until now. Funny how fate works, isn't it?"
Fate.
Mary turned that word over silently—it tasted distinctly ironic.
Her mind raced, trying to force some logical explanation onto the inexplicable scene before her. Was this a new trap? Had he seen through her plans and used this just to humiliate her? Or did some deeper scheme, spun by Mycroft, lie beneath?
No.
None of those.
There was no arrogance or deceit in Russell's tone, and his little gestures made his mood clear. No conspiracy, no mockery, no plot—just a pure, infuriating carelessness.
The chessboard had been flipped, the pawns sent flying, and the king thrown into the mud—utter defeat. Yet now, the hand that upended the board picked up the most important piece, brushed the mud away, and set it back in her hand.
He didn't even know why the chess piece mattered.
Mary fell silent.
And suddenly—she wanted to laugh.
Not the polite, reserved smile she'd wear as Miss Morstan, but a real, genuine laugh: anger, disbelief, relief at surviving disaster, all mixed together. But she held it back. She wouldn't show such rudeness before a stranger.
She looked up at the thief and, curiously, found him not so bad as she'd thought.
Still infuriating, though.
"By the way, you look pretty shocked," Russell said as Mary stayed quiet. "Didn't you even know your own property was stolen?"
"My father called to check as soon as the paper came out." Mary, much improved in spirit, became more talkative. "Lloyds Bank insisted the vault was untouched and nothing was stolen. They even thanked us."
Russell snorted in his heart. If they really wanted to thank me, maybe they wouldn't be urging Lestrade to catch me right away.
"And," Mary continued, after a pause, "with no reports of theft in The Times, we believed their story."
"But obviously, both the bank and the paper were lying." And with those words, she fell silent, something sharp and calculating flaring in her blue eyes.
She'd had a new idea.
If Lloyds wants to be disingenuous, then giving them a little trouble wouldn't hurt at all.
A dangerously cunning smile flashed across Mary's face.
"Miss Morstan, your smile is terrifying!"
"!" Mary snapped her head up, startled to remember Russell was still outside the window.
"Ahem," she coughed twice, restoring her expression to normal. "Sorry, could you move back just a little?"
Sorry?
Russell arched an eyebrow beneath the mask. Looks like you have no intention of kicking me out.
"The Morstan family doesn't mistreat those who've helped them," Mary said gently and made her way toward the door.
"Wait a moment—"