Elementary season 3, episode 2, “The Five Orange Pipz,” just aired on CBS. Find out how five orange beads bring Watson, Holmes, and Winter together in our recap!

“They say that genius is an infinite capacity for taking pains. It’s a very bad definition. But it does apply to detective work.” Part of Sherlock’s closing line to Elementary season 3, episode 2, “The Five Orange Pipz,” sheds some light on the trajectory the episode follows. Sherlock, Joan, and Kitty are each taking different pains to cope with the rebalancing of the partnership.

Child’s play: Elias Openshaw, creator of the children’s plastic bead kits, known as Pipz, hides out as a fugitive in a home that would have done the Dursley’s well when fleeing from Hogwarts letters. But just as in Harry Potter, an envelope finds its way into his home with nothing more than five orange Pipz. The omen of the beads lead him to call his lawyer, Theo Fordham, but is met by the voice of Captain Thomas Gregson.

Standing over the dead body of Mr. Fordham, Gregson listens in as Mr. Openshaw is killed.

Holmes marches into Watson’s invisible shield around the case of the recently deceased victims. Respecting her as his equal, Holmes waits until she lowers it enough to let him examine the bodies and come onto the case as a co-consultant. He wastes no time stating the facts in his typical expository way, revealing that Elias Openshaw knowingly sold poisoned toys. The Pipz, were manufactured in India where corners were cut to save money resulting in the beads, when inevitably swallowed, metabolizes into GHB, a drug similiar to that found in date rape drugs. Of the nine children who swallowed beads, four did not recover.

The innocent criminal: Gabe Coleman, as Kitty discovers during her stint with Bell, is a resident of the area code the envelopes were sent from. He confesses to committing the crime even after Holmes deduces Coleman was framed. Mr. Coleman not only lost his son to the Pipz poison, but his wife, his job, and his feeling of self worth. Taking the fall for the crime would be a way to redeem himself and prove that he had a part in achieving justice for his son’s death.

Obstruction of reason: “I never guess,” Sherlock says to Kitty after she tries to commend his deduction. Kitty’s praise is not getting her any closer to gaining Sherlock’s bouncy attitude that he seems to reserve solely for Watson. The three of them, much to Kitty’s chagrin, await their meeting with the Assistant Attorney General, Angela White. As head of the investigation into Openshaw’s Pipz, White refuses to provide them access to the surveillance footage of the lawyer, Mr. Fordham. Kitty oversteps and test her luck on the wrong person, claiming that she and Sherlock can do work that no one else can. If White won’t share the tapes, she must be hiding something.

Cringing at the wrath of Sherlock, Kitty takes his criticism and tries to back out of a case that she sees no point in solving. Oddly enough, Sherlock picks up on the hint that this is more about her refusal to work with Watson than it is about bringing a man to justice. Typically clouded by snark and his expressionless mask that radiates disappointment, it can be hard to know when Sherlock is genuinely looking out for someone’s best interest. It took him nearly a year to hit his stride with Waston, Sherlock has to keep adjusting until he can find that ease between Joan and Kitty.

The trio reconvene at the station where a van driver claims to to have seen Openshaw and White together weeks before. White refutes the accusation, but bank transfers and a string of blackmail comes to light upon further investigation as her political career is at risk. Nothing, however, connects her to the actual murders. She recommends revisiting Agent Boden, who was took lead on Fordham’s surveillance team.

The trouble with Kitty is… Joan’s investigative flair, one that she learned her mentor, leads her to run a background check on Kitty. “Was there some question you simply couldn’t ask me?” is the response that she gets when she tries to bridge the subject with Sherlock. Did Joan really think that Sherlock would take someone off the street whose records disappear after five years? While Sherlock tries to figure out how to step between Kitty and Joan, Joan and Kitty continue to run at each other head on.

Joan and Sherlock take up their positions in front of the “wall of crazy” working through Boden’s assignment and subsequent disappearance. Sitting on the floor observing the tag team at work, Kitty becomes tired of playing the third wheel and steps into the frame. But her removal of a picture from the wall is the Sherlockian equivalent of stabbing his brain. Her tantrum leads to a few uncomfortable references to recreational drug use, before leaving the starry-eyed melding of minds. Her rant does spark something useful.

But first, Sherlock calls Joan to join him in his room where he reveals yet another secret hiding place and Kitty’s file. Kitty Winter, as she is now known, was the victim of a crime where a man took her. But her scars are not what she wishes to define her and Sherlock sees that potential of channeling her feelings into a productive skill set.

The creative kind: In light of Kitty’s jokes about poppin’ a few Pipz, Sherlock and Joan bridge the connection between Boden’s interest in helping Openshaw and then his plan to murder him. The Pipz were locked up by government as evidence, but once the case was closed, they were sent to a waste facility. Paying off one worker, Boden almost makes away with the stolen beads to sell as GHB on the street.

Joan offers Kitty the chance to take back the file with the knowledge that Joan never read what it contains. In this scene it is clear that Kitty and Joan both realize the effort Sherlock is making to bring the two of them to a plateau. If Kitty can get a better sense of Joan through observing, reading through their old work, Joan should have the chance to better understand the Kitty Winter before there was a Kitty Winter. Are you feeling the pain, yet?

Clyde Watch:

•Noticeably absent, but we did notice his mail is being forwarded from the brownstone.

Watch Elementary season 3, episode 3, “Just a Regular Irregular,” Thursday, November 13 at 10:00 p.m. ET on CBS.