India Black (2 page)

I was gratified to see that Mrs. Drinkwater had completed her duties in my study before wading into the liquor supply. A sea-coal fire burned in the grate, the lamps had been lighted and their wicks freshly trimmed, and last night’s empty glasses had been removed. I lit a taper from the fire and used it to ignite a saucer of incense. The scent of sandalwood filled the air, eliminating the faint odor of smoke that clung to the cushions. Mrs. Drinkwater had placed the morning papers in a neat pile in the center of my desk, and I glanced through them idly while I waited for my tea.

The headlines were depressingly familiar: The Russians were rattling sabres, backing their lapdogs, the Serbs, in their fight against the crumbling, decadent Ottoman Empire, and threatening to march on Constantinople. Dizzy, the novelist turned present prime minister, had dusted off a rusty rapier himself and was waving it rabidly, uttering dire warnings that Constantinople was the key to India and England must do whatever necessary to prevent the Russian Bear from occupying the city. Gladstone, the former prime minister turned evangelist, was on the sidelines, scrawling religious screeds against the Mussulman massacres of Christians (ignoring the tit-for-tat massacres of Mussulmans by the Christians), and sniffing around No. 10 Downing Street like a lion smelling zebra on the African breeze, waiting for Dizzy to make the fatal misstep of backing the bloody Turks (Mussulmans, by God) against the Russians (nominally Christians, but not really our type).

Bloody politics and politicians. I had very few rules here at Lotus House, but one of them was that gentleman were forbidden to flog their favorite horses while they were under my roof. Discussions inevitably led to arguments, which usually led to two portly gents with red faces and bristling whiskers glaring balefully at each other as they circled the room, while the other customers lined the wall and cheered them on, the girls squealed with excitement, and I calculated the loss of revenue with a sinking heart.

I tossed the papers in a heap on the floor and crossed the room to the Chinese screen in the corner, which hid from view a heavy iron safe. I’d just extracted the bag of gold coins when I heard the clatter of crockery as Mrs. Drinkwater lurched into the room, her pink face (“Heat,” she says; “Drink,” I reply) screwed tight and her lips pursed in concentration as she strained to balance the tea tray. She’s rather unsteady on her pins (“Age,” she says; “Drink,” I reply), and the china rattled ominously as she weaved her way across the room. She deposited the tray on the desk with a thump, huffing like a dray horse released from the harness. I winced as the Limoges bounced.

“Here’s your tea, then,” she announced breathlessly. “Will you be wanting anything else?”

“Lunch?”

Mrs. Drinkwater released the agonized sigh of a martyred saint. “You’ll be dining in, then?”

“Yes.”

“Will there be any guests?”

“I’ll be dining alone.”

I was treated to another wheezing bellow of affliction.

“That will be all, Mrs. Drinkwater,” I said.

She gave a half bow that threatened to send her arse-over-heels, and then tacked unsteadily out of my study. I poured a cup of tea and pondered, not for the first time, why I employed such a drunken, ill-bred creature. I know the reason, of course. Lotus House, as fine an establishment as it is, is still a brothel, after all, and it’s damned hard to find a cook who’s willing to work among a gaggle of half-naked women and drunken roisterers. Mrs. Drinkwater, occasionally surly and inevitably intoxicated, was the best of a bad lot.

I poured a cup of tea, hefted one of the cook’s scones, debated its relative worth as paperweight or weapon, and returned it to the plate untouched. The bag of coins jingled merrily as I picked it up. There’s no sound I like better in the world than that of sovereigns cascading onto the leather blotter on my desk. I raked my fingers through the gold pieces and contemplated them with pleasure. Last night had been exceptionally lucrative. A troop of cavalry officers, home from India a fortnight before they’d been scheduled to dock, had descended on Lotus House like a plague of locusts. They’d drunk the house dry in under an hour and I’d had to send Mrs. Drinkwater to knock up the owner of the nearest wine shop to replenish my stores, but it had been worth it.

I stacked the coins in a row of small golden towers and settled myself at my desk to review the month’s expenses. Casks of sherry, cases of whisky, Madeira and brandy, gallons of porter, ale and rum. A quarter of beef and two of mutton; bushels of potatoes, wheels of cheddar, slabs of butter; dozens of loaves of bread; not to mention sugar, coffee and tea. Those damned whores were eating (and drinking) me out of house and home. I could of course stop feeding them and let them fend for themselves on their earnings, but they’d be thin, ragged and diseased in a fortnight. It was better to keep them here, where I could keep an eye on them, and see that they stayed fresh and plump for the customers. My plan worked admirably, but at the rate my trollops were going through supplies, I’d have to raise rates again this year, and how the gentlemen would grumble, until I fetched a young filly in her petticoats to sit upon their knee and tickle their chins, and then no price was too dear.

I was totting up the charges and wincing at the image of my pile of golden sovereigns disappearing into the pockets of the greedy tradesmen when my roving eye detected an entry that made me look twice, then roar for Mrs. Drinkwater to fetch me Clara.

I read the entry again, just to be sure I wasn’t imagining it. Two pounds for pineapples.
Pineapples?

Clara Swansdown, formerly Bridget Brodie of Ballykelly, all flaming red hair, pale skin and freckles, came bustling in, eyes still filmy with sleep, fumbling for the sash of her dressing gown. “God’s truth, that old crone give me such a fright I nearly wet meself. Whatever’s the matter? The Queen ain’t dead, is she?”

I brandished my pen at her accusingly. “Pineapples?” I asked.

She scratched her bum through her dressing gown and looked abashed. “Oh. I reckon I should have told you about that ’fore I sent out for’em. Tubby Farquhar asked for’em special.”

“Got a thing for fruit, does he?”

Clara nodded vigorously. “He do indeed. He was stationed in Montevideo for a spell and he got right fond of’em.”

“I see. No doubt pineapples are quite common in Montevideo. Probably lying about all over the place. Have to hire a gang of little brown boys to remove the damned things from the polo field so as not to cripple the ponies.”

Clara looked doubtful. “I don’t think Tubby plays polo.”

“Nor do I suppose he’s ever bought his own pineapples. They may be thick on the ground in Montevideo, but they’re a luxury in London. I expect Tubby sends out the servants to do that sort of thing and has no more idea what a pineapple costs than why fleas fart.”

“Fleas fart?”

I could see that Clara was losing the thread of the conversation. “Do
you
have any idea how much a pineapple costs in London?”

“No, ma’am.”

I consulted my records. “Two quid.”

Clara’s mouth fell open. “Blimey. That’s robbery.”

“Indeed. I don’t mind making allowances for some of our oldest customers. I’ll even go so far as to cut my profit margin a bit for them and indulge some of their little fancies at my expense. But Tubby Farquhar is hardly a valued customer, at least not yet. If he wants pineapples ...”

“Oh, he does. He was stationed in ...”

“Yes, I know. Montevideo. As I was saying, if he wants pineapples, he shall have them. But he must pay for them. Do you understand?”

Clara nodded. “Yes, ma’am. I’ll get the two pounds from him when he comes in on Tuesday.”

I shook my head. “Clara, my dear, there’s a lot you must learn. Tell Tubby the pineapples cost two and six. Keep a shilling for yourself, and bring the rest to me.”

Clara’s eyes were the size of my tea saucer. “Oh, ma’am, that’s genius, that is.”

You can see why I’m the abbess and Clara’s the bint. She’s a nice girl, Clara, but as thick as two planks, which is one of the reasons I employ her.

“That’s all, Clara. You may go now.” She was at the door when my curiosity got the better of me. “A moment, Clara.” She turned back into the room. “What exactly do you and Tubby Farquar do with those pineapples?”

“Well, ma’am, it’s like this ...”

I never did hear what Tubby and Clara were up to with the tropical fruit, because at that moment the door burst open and a garish figure reeled in, squealing like a stuck pig, and hurled itself into my arms. The casual observer might have thought the Prince of Wales, undergoing an unfortunate experiment with his mustache and dressed in a confusing array of corsets and trousers, had finally succumbed to venereal disease and gone barking mad, had wandered into the Lotus House and was now running amuck through the halls. But I recognized the face of Arabella Cloud, one of my newest employees, and the favorite of Bowser, my regular Sunday afternoon customer.

“Good God, Arabella. What’s happened?”

Tears streaked her face and slid down into the wispy mustache pasted to her upper lip. “It’s Bowser, ma’am. He’s dead.”

B
owser was indeed deceased, though it took some minutes to ascertain that fact, as I had to paw through a lace ruff the size of a barrel hoop to get at the pulse of the corpulent gentleman who lay sprawled across the four-poster in Arabella’s room.

I pressed my fingers into Bowser’s fleshy wattle, all the while issuing helpful advice like, “Breathe, you bloody bastard,” and, “Don’t die here, you thumping great whale,” but my admonitions had no effect. Bowser remained dead.

Bowser was a regular customer; a stout, tweedy old cove with a blue-veined nose who worked in the War Office. I called him Bowser because he panted a great deal, had the mournful eyes of a spaniel chastised for soiling the carpet and had a distressing tendency to hump the leg of any available female. He always arrived on Sunday afternoon, dressed in a sober dark suit and a top hat, and carrying under his arm the black leather case that signified the senior British civil servant. Come straight from the office, he’d told me years ago. It was the only time he could get any work done, without the ceaseless interruptions he had to endure Monday through Friday. Lotus House was his bit of fun. Bowser would settle in the salon with a drink and a cheroot, and Arabella would come tripping downstairs with a rakish air, brandishing a fake mustache and whiskers and bleating, “Hello, Mama, dear.” After a few draughts of brandy and soda, and a few minutes winking at Arabella and addressing her as “Dear boy,” Bowser would toddle up the stairs and down the hall to Arabella’s room, where he’d shed his suit and combinations, dress up as Queen Victoria in her mourning clothes (did she ever wear anything else?) and stimulate himself while he flogged Arabella and castigated her for her wanton ways and losses at the gaming tables. In this game, I’ve seen and done most everything (although every whore has at least one thing she won’t do), but even I found Bowser’s penchant for dressing up as our sovereign while a tart masqueraded as the wicked Prince Bertie a tad peculiar. However, he paid handsomely for the privilege, and who am I to judge my fellow man? What the prince consort would have thought of this little pantomime, I shudder to think, though I’m of the opinion it’s a good thing Albert died when he did; otherwise, he’d be remembered (despite Vicky’s attempts at beatification) as a pious prig with a thick accent. But I digress.

I closed the protruding brown eyes (not out of respect, but because their bulbous stare looked vaguely accusing), gently disengaged the riding crop from the spastic grip of the corpse, and said: “Tell me what happened, Arabella.”

Arabella was sniffling in the corner. She had Slavic cheekbones and breasts like the Caucasus, and as she had a flair for accents, excelled at playing Polish émigrés and impoverished Russian princesses. She wore a nifty set of trousers, too, and had become a favorite of Bowser’s shortly after she’d arrived on the steps of Lotus House six months ago.

Arabella’s great white bosom heaved. One side of her mustache had begun to droop. “Lord, I don’t know. One minute, he was shaming me for losing a hundred pounds at vingt-et-un and rogering Nellie Clifden on the grounds of Kensington Palace, and the next he was flat on the floor, flailing around like a dying goose and shouting for Mabel.”

“Mabel?”

“Mrs. Bowser, I reckon.”

The mention of the wife made me blanch. It was bad enough that a government bureaucrat had kicked the bucket in my establishment, which meant God knows what by way of interference and investigation into my affairs, but the poor sod also had a wife who’d have to hear the news somehow. Luckily, that was no concern of mine. For that matter, neither was the government’s loss. My only concern was getting Bowser out of the house.

“Listen to me, Arabella. If word of this gets out, I’ll be ruined.”

Arabella swiped at a tear that was trickling through the powder on her cheek and nodded dumbly.

“You don’t want to have to find another house, do you?”

“No, ma’am.”

“Good. Then see that you keep quiet and don’t say a word to any of the girls.” Bints are prone to gossip, and I knew that if one word escaped Arabella’s lips, the news that India Black had lost a customer would be all over London by teatime. It wouldn’t take long for some enterprising competitor of mine to whisper a word into the ear of the nearest peeler, and I’d have a serious problem. I needed to get Bowser (God rest his soul—somewhere else, of course) out of here as quickly as possible.

“Dry your eyes, Arabella, and fetch Mrs. Drinkwater.”

By the time Arabella had returned with the cook in tow, I’d succeeded in stripping the heavy black bombazine gown from the old codger and was removing a petticoat the size of a schooner’s sail from the limp body. Mrs. Drinkwater teetered over to help, and between us we peeled off the rest of Bowser’s costume until he lay stark naked on the carpet, then dressed him again in his own clothes. It was a bit like playing with a large, albeit cold and clammy, doll. Mrs. Drinkwater proved to be of considerable assistance in the matter, perhaps because she was oblivious to the indecency of the occasion, being blind drunk, though she wheezed and huffed like a bellows, all the while moaning about “the sort of work a respectable woman is required to do in this establishment.”