Ms. Stoliz glided past Holmes as though there had been a choreographed waltz for which neither of them had music. A slight breach of the decorum of societal protocol was the way in which Ms. Stoliz did not immediately assume her seat. Rather, she stood in the seating area near a chair-- which one assumed, as her hand rested on it, that her proximity suggested she was to be seated. Instead, she stood there in that posture, and waited for Holmes to take his gangling-long strides to convey himself to the seating area.
“If you please, Ms. Stoliz,” Holmes began as he indicated with an upturned palm that pointed toward the chair near her.
“Thank you, Mr. Holmes. It has been some time since I have been in a setting where women are seated first.”
“Whether you were a woman or not is of little relevance in this instance,” Holmes stated in a clipped way. “You are a guest, and whether you were man or woman, I would necessarily insist that my guests make themselves comfortable before myself within my own apartment.”
Ms. Stoliz took her seat deftly and crossed her ankles in a feminine way. This served two purposes. For one, it was more comfortable to her feet, but for two, it made sure that her ankles did not indiscreetly show. By this point in her life in her mid-thirties, she no longer had to think of these actions which had to be practiced routinely when she was maturing. Somewhere in the recesses of her memory, she could hear her mother telling her that a proper lady always took a seat with crossed ankles. When she forgot, she could still feel the sting of the long handle of the broom across her shins. She allowed one of her hands to occupy the armrest while with the other she rested on her thigh. When Holmes himself was finally seated--in what to her was a abnormal level of casual as he had stretched his long legs out in front of him and crossed them-- she would, as she began to speak of herself, move the hand which rested on her thigh to her chest with her fingers closed as if in a small circle. This struck Holmes, when he began to listen to her and notice this communication habit she had either consciously or unconsciously formed, as being similar to a flourish someone trained in rhetoric might use to make themselves more relatable. Indeed, Holmes surmised that though it was now apparently habit, it probably had been formed for this purpose at some juncture and that Ms. Stoliz had had training in how to be a sympathetic communicator--more than likely to audiences larger than the size of one.
“I suppose we should just get right down to it. As I have said, Mr. Holmes, (and here with the stress upon the “I” she had used that curious gesture described above) my name is Ms. Stoliz and I serve as a kind of public liaison to the Church of St. Marks. Specifically, Queen Victoria has taken an interest in the churches across London, and especially that of St. Marks since, as you are no doubt familiar, her family has taken a specific interest in that sanctuary. The Queen, in her capacity as “Defender of the Faith and Governor of the Church of England” has decided that a prime matter of importance concerns a restructuring of the Churches in terms of ecclesiastical reforms with the goal of preserving the core tenets of belief of the Churches of Scotland and England. She endeavors to do this in part through the Assembly and the Lord High Chancellor who represents her interests within that Synod. Of course, the Queen has many other ways of influencing these matters as her position dictates, but she does not wish to seem heavy-handed in a way that will incur the displeasure of the Greater Assembly and Prime Minister. “
“Allow me to interrupt you there,” said Holmes whose lack of tobacco by this point was making him irritable as usually for a story such as this he would have his hands occupied by his pipe. Instead, one hand had been stroking his chin intermittently in thought or perhaps of anticipation of where this conversation was going, or what its purpose was. The other hand drummed the fingers on the armrest at random intervals. “I am familiar with the intricacies of court, but I can assure you that the mechanisms of the Church are of no immediate interest to me at the present time. Most matters of faith, it seems to me, especially at the level of Monarchs, have less to do with faith and more to do with the power of the throne and political alliances. I therefore seldom concern myself with these matters, unless a case which I am working requires me to know more about them.”
“Mr. Holmes, am I to assume that you profess no belief in the Church?”
“I profess belief in what evidence ineluctably leads me to, which are conclusions. Indeed, it must be the case that you are sitting in front of me because some matter has arisen by which the mechanisms of belief alone are insufficient otherwise the answer would have been revealed to you or those you are representing of whatever problem set it is you are here giving me the outlines of. Therefore, you must, on some level, be hoping that I am the answer to a prayer. In that God is a being who may use whomever He wishes for His purposes, then it stands to reason that either I am aware of such a Being doing so, or I am not. If in the first case, the exercise is a matter of faith to which I will be applying logic, and if in the second it is a matter of exercising the faith and science of reason to elucidate the unknown. In either case, I shall be using the exact same set of tools, but as to the underlying reasons I am using them they are functionally irrelevant to all but myself and the Being under consideration. Therefore, you are not here to discuss my belief in God or lack of belief thereof, but are instead here to enlist my services for something which both troubles and eludes you, and those you represent. Now, if you please, I would prefer we get on with the main reason for your visit. Should I require more understanding of Victoria and her ambitions, I will, you can be sure, rely upon your keen understanding of the intricacies involved.”
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