[Shen Xia] Britannia Rose

"Oh, John, are you coming to the circus too?" Isabella met Watson with his girlfriend at the gate of the circus. It should be his female colleague, and it is obvious that Watson has a little interest in this lady.

"Isabella, and Jasmine, why are you here... Could it be..." Watson suddenly felt that today's circus performance might not be that simple.

"I think this is just an ordinary performance." Isabella saw his worries, so she smiled and comforted Watson, who was about to be overwhelmed by Sherlock, "Why don't you introduce me?"

"Oh!" Watson hurriedly introduced, "Sarah, my...friend. These two are Isabella and Jasmine."

"Hello?" Sarah tentatively greeted.

"Hello, uh, I think we'd better go first, the show is about to start," Molly said.

"Yes, yes." Watson nodded in agreement.

"Then let's go in first? You can go get the reserved tickets first." Isabella said.

"Okay," said Watson.

After saying goodbye to Mr. Military Doctor briefly, Isabella and Jasmine wandered around the theater casually. The theater was not particularly big, and there were very few people who came to watch the performance.

"What is this? It looks very beautiful!" Jasmine looked at the lanterns hanging on both sides and exclaimed, "I saw this kind of lights hanging in many places along the way."

"If I'm not wrong, this should be one of the Chinese traditions. They hang this kind of lamp in front of the door and on the street during the New Year or the Lantern Festival. It's called a lantern. It's a beautiful meaning." Isabella explained.

"denglong?" Jasmine repeated that awkward Chinese word, "It's amazing! What is painted on it? Chinese characters, or some kind of picture?"

"It's a Chinese character, read this word..." Isabella was about to say it, but suddenly stopped. She remembered that in the car, Mycroft told her that those yellow spray paints were actually an ancient Chinese symbol called Suzhou Mazi, and now they came to a circus run by a Chinese, is this a coincidence?

"what?"

"Fu, fu, means happiness and happiness." Isabella said the following words.

"Hey, Sherlock, why are you here?" Jasmine looked at the man striding into the theater in surprise.

"Jasmine?" Sherlock frowned, but looked at Isabella and asked her, "Why are you here?"

"The ticket was given by Jasmine's friend." Isabella's bad premonition came true, "So, the case you are investigating is related to the Golden Dragon Circus?"

"A killer who can jump over the roof and wall kills two people."

"Then do you know what those strange symbols mean?"

"Suzhou Mazi. But I still need to find a decoding book."

Jasmine saw that the two who started to communicate in a low voice were completely unable to get in the conversation. She opened her mouth and looked at Sherlock, "Is it related to those two corpses?"

"Oh, yes." He waved to Watson, "John—"

Watson, who brought his girl on a date, said that he didn't want to talk to him very much.

"You said the circus, this is not a circus... look at this little group of people, Sherlock, this is art." Watson whispered with his back to Sherlock.

"It's not their job." Sherlock reminded in a low voice.

"Sorry, I forgot, they are not a circus but an international smuggling gang."

"Smuggling?" Isabella also came over to discuss in a low voice.

"Oh, yes, someone stole their goods, and it was priceless, so those strange symbols are messages left by these smugglers, only for their people to see." Watson explained.

While they were talking, a Chinese woman in opera costume appeared on the stage. Her face was painted with thick makeup, and her exact age was unclear. She pulled out the hairpin from her head and gently placed it on the tray. , the mechanism □□□□□□ nailed into the opposite wooden stake like a broken bamboo.

A man wearing a grimace mask was tied behind his back and fixed on a wooden stake. He had to escape before the hourglass leaked out, otherwise, he would be nailed to the wooden stake by a sharp dagger.

The tight drumbeat intensified the tense atmosphere, and Sarah couldn't help reaching out to wrap Watson's arm, as if this would relieve the fear in her heart.

"call out--"

The man finally managed to get out of trouble a second before the hourglass was finished, and the sharp arrow shot through the air.

"My God!" Sarah exclaimed.

"Ladies and gentlemen, from the moonlit shores of the Yangtze River far away, we have the honor to present you the deadly Chinese flying spider."

As the woman spoke poor English, a small man wrapped in red silk descended from the sky. He flexibly used his body to make various dangerous movements in the air, which surprised the audience and applauded, but only Isabella noticed. Then, Sherlock sneaked into the backstage of the stage.

"Did you see it?" Watson exclaimed, "It's incredible!"

"Oh my God, how did he do that? Flying around in the air?" Sarah exclaimed.

The little man flying up and down in the air nimbly soared up along the red silk, and Isabella suddenly thought of the killer that Sherlock said could fly over the wall.

"Ah! Sherlock!" Jasmine turned pale with shock.

Sherlock, who was supposed to be in the audience, rolled over and tore open the red curtain in the backstage. The man in the horror mask chased after him and chopped at him with a knife.

Watson rushed forward with a stride. He pushed the masked man away, but was kicked away by the other party. It was Sarah who bravely picked up the wooden stick on the ground and hit the man's head violently a few times, which made Sherlock out of trouble.

Seeing this, the "Aerial Spider-Man" who was supposed to perform also jumped up and ran behind Sherlock.

"Stand there and don't move."

Isabella held a small Glock 43 pistol in her hand, and the muzzle of the gun was pointed directly between the eyebrows of the little man.

"Well done, Isabella, let's go!"

Sherlock took off the cloth shoes of the strange masked man, revealing a strange black lotus at the heel.

"What is that?" Isabella followed the crowd and escaped from the theater. "By the way, I drove here, but I can only bring one person."

"It's the Black Lotus Society, that smuggling gang," Sherlock said, waving for the next taxi, "Taxi—"

"Uh, you and Jasmine can go first, leave the rest to Sherlock, he must know how to do it." Watson smiled wryly, and turned his head to comfort the shocked female companion beside him.

……

"Come here, thank you, Isabella."

The screeching sound of the brakes of the red sports car, which was so eye-catching, made one's teeth sore. Isabella sent her to Jasmine's house according to her address. Although this sports car was the same color as the previous one, from the appearance, it was the same. It is obviously the latest model that Ferrari only released this year.

"I hope you are not scared tonight." Isabella said helplessly.

"No, I was the one who suggested going to the circus performance, I'm sorry..." Jasmine felt extremely guilty.

"I don't think so. When we meet Sherlock, the show is destined not to end smoothly, isn't it?" Isabella said slightly jokingly, she wanted to alleviate some of Jasmine's self-blame.

"Uh, yes, Sherlock..." Jasmine didn't know what to say, so she had to take a few steps back, her lips pulled into a smile, her eyes fell on the sports car, "This car is great! It's beautiful, the speed Also fantastic."

"Thanks, I thought it was great too, good night, Molly."

"Good night, Isabella."

After Jasmine turned around and entered the building, Isabella started the engine and drove away when the lights in her home came on. It was more than nine o'clock in the evening, and she didn't want to go back to Pall Mall so early.

Maybe she should go to 221B and discuss the case with Sherlock.

The car drove slowly into Baker Street, and Isabella saw the restaurant waiters standing upright on the side of the street, and lamented in her heart, after knowing that he changed all his people to midnight duty, he ordered all the staff on Baker Street All the agents were transferred away, and then a group of new recruits came over.

These strange faces in front of him seemed to be a new batch of unlucky ones.

"Damnit!"

Isabella slammed on the brakes, and the person rushing out from the dark corner of the street made her startled. If she didn't have a seat belt, she almost flew out of the car.

The man in the black windbreaker flying to stop the car turned over and jumped into the co-pilot of the sports car. He shouted anxiously: "Quick! Tramway! John is in danger!"

"Sherlock?!" Isabella covered her head, looked at the person who hijacked the car in disbelief, and swallowed the curse she had prepared, "Damn it! Can you obey the traffic rules?"

"Stop talking nonsense! Quick, run!"

Sherlock's voice was so loud that it exploded in her ears, and Isabella's ears were almost deaf.

Not much to say, the superior performance of the sports car makes it accelerate to 80 miles in just a few seconds, and it is like a ship dexterously shuttling through the streets of London at night.

Isabella slammed the steering wheel, the car twisted around to avoid the pedestrians around, Sherlock was dizzy from her shaking, and couldn't help complaining: "You must be an avid racing fan—"

"Of course! I am!" Isabella stepped on the accelerator, "We used to play drifting on the winding mountain road back then!"

……

"I'm single."

"We tried to kill you and your companion three times, Mr. Holmes. What does it mean that the killer didn't hit the mark?"

"This shows that they didn't really want to kill you. If we really wanted to kill you, it would have been done by now. We just wanted to arouse your curiosity. Have you got it?"

Only a small cluster of flames danced faintly in the dark abandoned tramway, emitting a faint fire.

John was confused by the words of Gang Leader Shan. The other party seemed to think that he was Sherlock, and shouted Mr. Holmes one by one, making him unable to explain.

"What did I get?"

"treasure."

"I do not know what you're talking about."

"I want to make sure that everything has a price in the West, and the price of her life is information," Shan Gangzhu signaled his subordinates to move Sarah to the front of the organ, "the queen's hairpin worth 900 million, it is in Where? We had a Western buyer, but then one of ours got so greedy that he took it and took it to London, and you, Mr. Holmes, have been looking for..."

"I'm not Sherlock Holmes!"

"I do not believe you……"

"You should believe that Sherlock Holmes is nothing like him. How would you describe me, John?" The towering figure who appeared at the entrance of the subway said loudly. Measurement?"

"Late?" John breathed a sigh of relief.

"It's semi-automatic. If you fire it, the bullet will travel at over 1000 meters per second. The radius of curvature of these walls is close to four meters. If you miss it, the bullet will bounce, and it can hit anyone. It may even bounce. Come back and shoot yourself."

Sherlock's elusive figure knocked down one of Gang Leader Shan's subordinates with a punch, and then took the opportunity to approach Sarah who was tied up in the dark, and hastily untied her.

And the little man who performed trapeze appeared from behind Sherlock like a ghost, and he strangled Sherlock's neck tightly with a silk cloth.

As the sand in the sandbag leaked more and more, the gangster who was ready to go was ready to move, and Sarah's life was in danger at any time.

At the moment of crisis, a gunshot sounded very clearly in the empty underground tunnel.

John was gasping for breath, he didn't dare to confirm who was shot, after all, the only person with a gun here could be the leader of the Shan gang.

"Sherlock, your suggestion is correct, but I can hit it, so naturally I don't need this suggestion."

The muzzle of the Glock gun in Isabella's hand was still smoking, she said calmly, until Sherlock, who was freed, brought Sarah down on the chair, and the gun was finally activated, piercing through the chest with a bang The little man who got shot.

"It's all right." Sherlock quickly untied Sarah.

"Don't worry, the next date will definitely not be like this." Watson tried to comfort.

And there was a strange noise coming from the depths of the tunnel, and Isabella raised her gun vigilantly.

"She's gone," Sherlock said.

"Maybe it won't be far." Isabella said coldly.

"You notified the fat man?"

"Do you still need me to notify?" She said speechlessly, "He has more agents by my side than there are tourists in Buckingham Palace."

Before the words fell, the sound of a police siren came from the entrance of the tunnel.The leading detective was not the familiar Lestrade, but another man whom he had never met.

"Let's go first, don't mention us in the report." Sherlock said.

"Mr. Holmes..."

"I expect a lot from you, Inspector, bright future."

"I'll hit where you point." Inspector Dimock said flatteringly.

"Sherlock," Isabella saw an inconspicuous little black car behind the police car, she pursed her lips and quickly followed Sherlock, "the key."

Sherlock took her car keys, glanced around, and twitched his lips when he saw the small black car dedicated to someone, and said, "It doesn't matter if you stop here, anyway, the fat man will definitely Get someone to drive it back for you."

Isabella ignored him, but walked quickly to the little black car and opened the door.

The man sitting in the car didn't speak, and first looked her up and down with extremely sharp eyes, until Isabella felt trembling at the sight of him.

"What's wrong?" she asked.

"..." Mycroft looked away, and his tone was indifferent, unable to detect emotion, "It is less than three days before Prince Harry's wedding."

"I know."

"So you want the whole world to know that Isabella Mountbatten-Windsor was shot three days ago by unknown people?" When Mycroft called her full name, he paused word by word, and his face became extremely pale. cold.

Now Isabella could see that Mycroft was probably full of anger because he followed Sherlock deep into the black lotus and would risk his life.

"..."

"Her Royal Highness even fired a shot."

"They don't know who I am." She defended in a low voice.

"Isabella!" Mycroft was about to laugh angrily. He knew that Isabella and Sherlock couldn't be put together, otherwise the troubles caused by these two people would be enough to make his tooth hurt for three days.

When he received the news from the agent, he was in a meeting. No one knew that the person standing behind the Black Lotus Club was Moriarty. He was the only one who hurriedly called off the meeting when he heard the news. The brain discards those complicated meeting documents and national policies, and everything is behind Isabella and Sherlock.

He ordered the agents stationed on Baker Street to take pictures of the yellow signs inside 221B and the London subway map on Sherlock's desk. Soon, Mycroft's brain was running at a high speed, and he got the addresses left by the smugglers like a cocoon. He left the ministers in the conference room looking at each other, and walked out the door with a stern face. Those politicians thought it was a sudden terrorist attack, and they were so nervous that they dared not even speak.

"Sorry, Myc..." Isabella finally came back to her senses. Although the journey went incredibly smoothly, she still felt scared after thinking about it, not to mention the frightened Mycoff.

"..." He didn't speak, but still released low air pressure.

Anthea on the co-pilot boldly asked, "Sir, are you going to Pall Mall?"

"Go to Whitehall first." Mycroft said coldly.

Seeing that he still didn't say a word, Isabella closed her mouth resentfully and focused on the scenery outside the window.