- Holmes and Watson consult on a case in which a man suspected of murdering his wife years ago receives a ransom demand for her safe return. Meanwhile, Lestrade overstays his welcome at the brownstone and seems unwilling to leave.
- "Elementary"- "Ears to You" - March 6, 2014
A man rides in the back of cab and notices the driver is checking him out in the rearview mirror. He confirms for the cabbie that he is indeed the man he's been seeing on the news. The driver asks, "Did you do it?" The man asks to be let out. He heads to his home and notices a box with his name on it behind a gate. (His name is Gordon.) He opens the box and in it are two, bloody human ears.
Over at the brownstone, Joan is working at her desk, Sherlock is working on defusing a makeshift bomb made by a friend to help him keep up his skills, and LeStrade is screaming for help because one of the roosters is sitting on the remote. Sherlock notes to Joan that he has been in their home for 19 days. Apparently, he is mulling several offers to work with large companies as an investigator but hasn't picked one yet.
Joan and Sherlock go to meet with Gregson about Gordon and his ears. He was accused of killing his wife Sarah, who was an alcoholic, in 2010 and was a big media circus but no body meant no conviction. The box he got had a note in it that said they were his wife's ears and demanding $2 million for her return. It's not the first time he's claimed to have been contacted. He says a year after her disappearance he gave the guy a $1 million and never got his wife back and then went to the cops.
They chat with him about the ears and he thinks it means she's alive. He brought pictures of his wife to compare the ears. Gordon worries Gregson still thinks he's the killer. He admits he made a mistake the last time and didn't want to take any chances since his wife says he sounded terrified. He says he's always been honest. He admits he fell out of love with his wife long before she disappeared because of her drinking and says he doesn't want her back because he misses her but because he's tired of being looked at as a murderer.
Sherlock and Joan compare the ears to the pictures and agree they look similar and Sherlock thinks Gordon was being earnest but so have other murderers. Joan says if he's telling the truth than she feels sorry for him.
LeStrade locks himself out of the house and Joan goes to let him in and discovers he's been drinking and is livid since one condition of him staying was no substances him in the house. He notes he has a little stash of whiskey in the back. He breaks down and confesses he's been drinking because he's been looking at all the offers and realized Sherlock is right, he is not a good detective and these major companies want someone like Sherlock not someone like him. She says he's overthinking. He says that's easy for her to say since she's with Sherlock now and is the one that gets to be special and tells her to enjoy it while it lasts.
The next morning Sherlock works on another bomb. He tells Joan that the ears are Sarah's who is likely alive and Gordon and the NYPD are going to meet the ransom demand. They commiserate about LeStrade. He shows files Bell dropped off about recent muggings since LeStrade claims he was mugged the night before.
Gordon makes the drop in the subway to a guy in a knit cap and hoodie. Gordon shows him the money. The guy says he will call in an hour when he knows he's clear and he will give him Sarah's location. He then flees into the subway tunnel with the money and Gregson says the police shouldn't pursue. Gregson starts to freak that he's going to get away. Gregson says there's a tracer in the bag and they will get him in the exit. Gordon runs after him on the tracks. Gregson says to cut the power to the tracks. The cops go after him. They find Cushing who says he was just trying to stop the guy and he hit him in the head with a pipe and killed him.
They bring him back into the precinct. He said it happened fast. The man had no ID and his prints and DNA had no matches in the system and have not heard from any partners he may have had. He claims to be worried that if he was working alone there is no one to bring Sarah food and water. He tearfully says for 4 years he tried to convince people he didn't kill her and now he might have by killing the kidnapper. Gregson is not happy. Two severed ears, one dead body, no leads.
Sherlock heads to the morgue to look at the body while Joan talks to LeStrade, who she has invited there. In part to tell him he has until the weekend to get out of the brownstone. And also to point out that Sherlock went through 7 detectives while Bell was hurt and none were good enough. He went through many at Scotland Yard as well until he met LeStrade and stuck with him. She shows him the case files she got on recent muggings that matched the MO of the guy who mugged him and says so to go find him and get his money, self-respect, and confidence as a detective back.
Sherlock and Bell look over the body of the kidnapper at the morgue. Sherlock determines the guy was a roofer and probably a recent parolee. They think he was probably an errand boy for the actual kidnapper. They notice tattoos they are AA/NA sobriety chip tattoos. They go to meetings where the guy lived to try to ID him. Even though it is something of a violation of AA. Joan meets him and Sherlock says it may be a mistake on Joan's part to have LeStrade working on the case. Sherlock isn't trying to let him bottom out and implode so he can find his own way out of his crisis of confidence. Sherlock notices a woman enter the meeting and it's Sarah, alive and with ears, and looking like she's had some plastic surgery but not enough to obscure her identity.
After the meeting they talk to her. She admits it. She goes by the name Alison Drake now and says what Gordon said was true, she packed her bags and left. They ask why they never reached out to the police and she says she was afraid that Gordon might hurt her. She says she's made a new life, got sober and married a doctor. They show her the dead man's picture. She said she met him in a meeting and he blackmailed her for awhile. She can explain the ears. She says Gordon was seeing another woman, who left her brush behind at Gordon's house. The police mistook it for hers and used hair strands as a DNA comparison so she figures it is this other woman who must be dead.
LeStrade tries to run down the mugger. One of the victims emails him a video file that proves unhelpful. The other one is also unhelpful and hits on him. He does remember a yellow bicycle chained to a tree. LeStrade goes back to the video from the first victim and the bicycle there.
Sherlock and Joan go to Gordon, he says it was a "professional" engagement and claims now that this woman, "Kendra," also disappeared. He claims it must've been her on the phone during that first ransom demand and that she's been in on it.
They wait for Bell to find the hooker and then Sherlock decides to start working on it himself. She asks if he's heard from LeStrade, he has not. Bell calls and found "Kendra," who died in a car wreck and was cremated so they weren't her ears.
They go back to wondering whose ears they are. She reiterates that they should be helping LeStrade and not just wait for him to bottom out.
LeStrade IDs the mugger and goes to his house and busts him thanks to his ugly bike. He got his wallet back. He says he doesn't even want to turn him in, he just wants his money back. The guy pulls a bat and LeStrade knocks him out. He's disappointed it was all so easy. He then notices a feather on the ground.
They realize, she married a plastic surgeon, she sent her own ears to Gordon, that's why the DNA matched. They bring her in and bust her and her fake ears. Bizarrely enough, she grew them out of her own back, just like that crazy mouse in the '90s, her husband has done this kind of work before. She made the dead guy her accomplice.
LeStrade tell Sherlock and Joan he caught the mugger but he realized, after seeing the feather, that Joan handed the mugger to him by spoon feeding the clues to him and doctoring the files and then pretending to be the other victims on the phone and helping him-- and hitting on him. He thinks Sherlock "set the table" for him to give him a shot in the arm. He says he's accepted an offer with the Irish National Police. He gives Sherlock a chance to come clean and Sherlock shakes his hand and says "well-played." LeStrade says she shouldn't feel bad about being "left in the dark" about Sherlock's devious plan. Joan asks Sherlock, Sherlock says he had no idea what LeStrade was talking about and the feather obviously fell off his own clothes. LeStrade closed the case himself. Joan asks why he let him believe that he was involved. Sherlock says she was right and sometimes there are other ways to help friends.
He goes back to work on another bomb. He had said earlier that the devices were rigged to spay paint or water. She asks what happens with this one if it doesn't work. He says it explodes. He asked his friend for more of a challenge. She continues to make her salad. He asks if she's staying. She says she has faith.
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