By: Alyona Kuznetsova

‘Good morning, Sir William!’ cheerfully said the butler while opening the curtains and allowing the overcast morning of London to enter the bedroom. A faint light fell over drowsy face of a middle-aged man. He opened his blue eyes, stretched himself languidly and brushed his rebel curly hair off his face. With ease that you do not expect from a man of his height, William left the bed. The butler gave him his terry dressing gown.

‘As usual, you are perfectly accurate, Johnson,’ William remarked approvingly, noticing that clock read exactly 7.00. The butler smiled respectfully and started making the bed whereas William went to bathroom to carry out his traditional fifteen-minute washing ritual. He went downstairs to dining room, sat down to the table where had already stood a bowl with white and red roses and lain a morning newspaper.

   ‘Your oatmeal, Sir,’ said the butler serving the breakfast.

   ‘Thank you, Johnson. What is the weather like today?’ William started traditional morning dialogue.

   ‘As usual, Sir: it is misty in the morning and it will be raining by the dinner.’

   ‘What a pleasure to have the constant weather!’

After breakfast William took a cup of coffee and started reading ‘The Times’. He glanced over crime report, opened sport news and felt frustrated as he found out that he hadn’t won a single pence at weekly horse-racing. At the same time, football news were quite pleasant: Manchester United had won another regular match. At last, William finished economic news, drank up cold coffee and went to get ready to go to work.

He put on the long black coat, took black umbrella and put on his favorite black hat. William said goodbye to Johnson and went out into the street where Mrs. Thompson, 50 years old widow, who owns 8 cats and adores Agatha Christie, had been already awaiting for him. As she noticed him, she instantly flew to William and started asking him her favorite questions about weather, politics and Queen Elizabeth II. Although Fisher was quite tired of monotonous questions, he was polite enough to continue the conversation. Absently listening to Mrs. Thompson, William came to the conclusion, that the mist was encouraging him for a walk, so he decided to leave his car at home. He told the annoying old lady that he was being late and then walked slowly along his way to work. As he was coming up to his office, William looked at his watches and saw that there were whole 10 minutes before the working day. So he decided not to waste his time and walked along the benches in the park. William was in his office at 9 o’clock precisely.

William Fisher was one of the shareholder of a stock exchange in London. He switched on the laptop in his office, checked his e-mail and skimmed through stock exchange bulletin. His old friend, Simon, phoned him to invite to the today’s evening birthday party of Simon’s niece of his second cousin of his cousin’s mother. As William hasn’t come out for quite a while, he accepted the invitation cheerfully.

The working day was long and boring. The documents were signed and folded neatly, diagrams were redrawn several times up until perfection. But the 5 o’clock has come. Fisher straightened his tie, switched off the laptop and headed to the nearest café. On his way there, William was caught by a new employee of the company. She was attractive, she was an excellent specialist in economic sphere and she has never worn a skirt above her knees. Young women smiled up at him charmingly and offered to take a cup of tea together. He had nothing but to accept. They sat down to a far table in the café and ordered traditional English tea with milk and gingery cakes. She was briskly talking something about work problems, something about one of the chief who was always coming to the office with his bulldog. Of course, she touched some political issues. But he wasn’t listening to her for quite a while. William was thinking about the new sofa he ordered in the furniture workshop. Then he realized, that it would be such a bad idea to play golf with his cousin, as he invited William long time ago. When she was talking about bosses, Fisher remembered, that he didn’t spend his vacation and that would be a great idea to fly to some island to fish. But he was distracted from his own thoughts by her question about the weather. He saw her attentive look and understood that she was waiting for answer.

‘What do you think, could we trust the information that it would be shining in London next week?’

‘For sure, it will be shining. But we will be unable to see the sun because of clouds.’

The rest of his working day Fisher spent in the conversations about economy, politics and the other boring things. He left the office at 18 o’clock precisely. It has just started raining, but he decided not to take his chances and headed to a bar by taxi. On his way there, he vainly tried to remember the lucky relative of Simon. This was of no use, because Fisher was mixing up even his own multiple relatives. Having entered the cozy place, he noticed his friend who was loudly telling barman about a bundle of a joy in his family. Fisher congratulated his friend. They both ordered a pint of Irish beer and sat down at a small table. Simon told in details about pregnancy of his sister, about emotional experiences of the relatives, he showed a bunch of photos of the newborn baby and its happy parents. William was nodding knowingly, smiling and laughing at Simon’s jokes. Fisher became quite curious after he saw a new model of Aston Martin at one of the photos, as it had become available for purchase recently. The conversation went smoothly to the discussion of specifications of the new car and its comparison with the other models, so friends ordered one more pint of beer to each.

This evening was surprisingly long as they left the bar about 20 o’clock. The rain has stopped and mist have covered the city again.

As he returned to home, Fisher sat in front of a flaming fireplace, smoked a cigar, opened a worn book of Conan Doyle and started rereading his favorite novel, ‘The Hound of the Baskervilles’. He didn’t noticed that he fell asleep and Johnson covered him with plaid. A soft cracking in the fireplace reminded sound of Sherlock slipping through bushes and, for some reason, searching stocks. And, strangely enough, he found them in the Buckingham Palace where Queen Elizabeth II with huge bulldog sleeping near her offered Sherlock to drink a cup of tea. As a true gentleman, he was unable to refuse though it was too early for 5 o’clock.

He was put out from the dream by his butler’s voice, ‘Your oatmeal, Sir.’ ‘But it’s too early for a breakfast!’ said Fisher with amused voice. ‘No, Sir, the oatmeal time is never too early neither too late,’ smiled the butler with all his 32 teeth, then his smile started stretching into Cheshire Cats grin. When the face of butler transformed out of the recognition, Fisher realized that he was still sleeping and he thought with content, ‘Well, it was good that today was misty, though. I have found a stain on my coat, which could be spotted easily with sunlight. In the morning I will certainly ask Johnson to deliver it to a laundry.’