Lord Foxbridge Butts In (16 page)

“Same as you, I expect,” she leaned back in her chair and propped her ankle on one knee in a terrifically cavalier pose, “Getting tiddly and looking for love.”

“Well, I’m
shocked
,” I shook my head and steadied myself with a sip of my medicine-tasting cocktail, “I didn’t know I still
could
be shocked. But I’m
actually
shocked.”

“Oh, come on, ducky,” she reproved, taking a langourous drag off the cigar and blowing smoke-rings, “You’ve been in Oxford for three years. The women’s colleges are crawling with my sort.”

“Oh, not
that
,” I dismissed the thought that I could be shocked by Lesbianism, “Just look at you! We’ve known each other since we were so high, and I’ve never seen you wear anything that wasn’t absolutely frothing with lace. You don’t even ride astride, for goodness sake.  But here you are looking even better than me in white tie and tails. I actually find you
attractive
! It’s simply shocking!”

“You’re sweet,” she reached over and pinched my cheek, “You’ll have to save me a dance later. But I don’t want to turn away your legitimate trade, so I’ll go back to the Girls’ Corner.”

“Wait, don’t go,” I grabbed her wrist to detain her, “I have too many questions.”

“You and your questions,” she smiled warmly, “You
are
rather like a fox, aren’t you? And not just your hair and your eyes, but how you’re always burrowing into things.”

“And then cruel coincidence gave me the name of Foxbridge,” I laughed at the timeworn joke I’d been laughing at since I was twelve years old.

“Okay,” she said in a not-very-convincing American accent, settling back into her cowboy-like attitude, “Shoot.

“What’s with the monocle? You’ve never worn glasses.”

“Diversion and disguise, ducky,” she popped the thing out of her eye and twirled it on its black ribbon, “My face is fairly recognizable in London, at least to anyone who reads the
Tatler
, so I find it prudent to divert the eyes of strangers from noticing my resemblance to a certain celebrated débutante. Is that all you wanted to know?”

“No, of course not. I want the name of your tailor. That tailcoat is
too
smashing.”

“I don’t go to a tailor, silly boy. Imagine
me
strolling about in Savile Row like this? No, there’s a costumier in Goodge Street who puts these things together for me. She’s utterly brilliant with draping, I fooled you into thinking I was a boy, didn’t I?”

“I’m going to ask you to marry me,” I declared, thrilled by her masculinity and her humour, “Not right now, naturally, but in due course. Season after next, say. Do you think you would be amenable?”

“I’ll have to think about it,” she looked at me appraisingly, her head to one side, “It’s an interesting idea. No more questions?”

“
Lots
more,” I smiled, “But I don’t want to impose on your kindness, so just one for now: do you know a molly-boy who goes by the name Angel Gabriel? I’m told he’s an habitué here.”

“Of course, everyone knows him. Sweet kid; not half so innocent as he looks, of course, but a lot nicer than most boys in his position. I didn’t figure you for the pretty cherub type, though.”

“What type did you figure me for?” I laughed.

“Big brawny lads fresh off the rugger field,” she said immediately, as if she could read the words on my forehead.

“Goodness, you
are
clever,” I was surprised by her understanding, “But I’m not looking for Gabriel to hire him, I’m negotiating the return of some stolen papers for a friend of mine.”

“You think Angel
stole
from a
punter
?” it was her turn to be shocked, “He wouldn’t!”

“I’m afraid he must have done,” I shrugged, “Nobody else could have.”

“Well, I never. He must be in some kind of trouble to do a thing like that.”

“That’s what I thought. Molly-boys can’t afford to be thieves, word gets around too fast. Is he here tonight? I’m commissioned not only to buy the papers back, but to offer any assistance if he’s in a jam. This friend of mine rather likes the lad.”

“I don’t see him,” she craned her neck to look around the room, “But it’s early yet. I’ll introduce you when he comes.”

“Thank you, La...Charley,” I reached out to shake her hand like a gentleman. She gave me a wink, replaced her monocle, and sauntered off in the direction of a bevy of young women at the other end of the room.

Not long after Lady Caroline left me, her place was taken by an older man who apparently didn’t like my conversation, and went off in a bit of a huff after exchanging a few pleasantries. Another man approached, sat for a moment to chat, and left quite soon — not so much in a
huff
, but definitely displaying a shade of dudgeon around the edges. This puzzled me, but I chalked it up to a new environment whose code I was unknowingly offending in some obscure way, and hoped that a more obliging chap would drop by and explain it to me.

“Care to dance, pretty?” a large ginger-headed bloke who looked exactly like what one expects a racing tout to look like, from the loud check suit and rather yellow boots to the garish horseshoe-patterned tie and immense walrus mustache, lumbered up to my table and executed a vague sort of bow in my direction.

“Charmed,” I responded, standing and putting out my hand in the usual manner.

“I’ll lead,
thank
you very much,” he winked at me and proffered his own hand in the same manner, and I had to stop and think a moment before turning my hand over and placing it in his, “My name’s Stan, what are you called?”

“Sebastian,” I said simply. Like most such establishments, the Green Parrot was not a place where surnames were bandied about.

He led me onto the small dance-floor, waiting patiently while I figured out where my hands were supposed to go, and then pulled me close as he began dancing a waltz, pushing me where I needed to be until I got the hang of it. I’d not danced in follow since I was a kid in school, and it was a little confusing trying to move backwards when my feet wanted to move forwards.

“New to this, are ye, Sebastian?” He smiled indulgently at me from under his mustache. He was a little bit shorter than me, and a trifle round-shouldered, but felt as solid as a wall pressed against me.

“I’ve not been here before, no,” I conceded.

“Never danced with a man before?” he looked at me oddly.

“Not since I was fourteen or so,” I wondered what had made him pull back just a little bit.

“Say that again, lad,” he squinted at me as if he was trying to see through a mist.

“Say what?” I was baffled.

“Anything, just say something, I want to hear your voice.”

“In Xanadu did Kubla Khan a stately pleasure dome decree,” I rattled off the first bit of poetry I could think of, “Where Alph, the sacred river, ran through caverns measureless to man down to a sunless sea.”

“Well, lor’lumme!” he grinned delightedly, “Yer a
real
toff, ain’t ye? It’s not a put-on!”

“I’m a toffee-nosed nob, to be precise. Or so I’m told,” I giggled.

“Well, ain’t that a hoot? I thought ye were a molly-boy!”

“Oh!” no wonder the other men had stalked off angrily, they’d been put off by my accent; but then I wondered, “I can’t be both?”

“Well, I guess you
could
, at that,” he considered the question for a moment, “But you’d be well out of my prices.”

“Really? A Mayfair accent would put up my price?” this was interesting indeed.

“Sure it would!” he pulled me close again and twirled me around a bit as the music came to a crescendo and segued into the next number, which was a foxtrot; he didn’t mind the time, though, and kept on waltzing, “You’d have access to them other toffs with all the money. Some fella here told me that our accents is what keeps the classes separate; I bet the toffs would pay good money to hear their own lingo spoke back at them from a molly-boy.”

“Well, that’s certainly something to keep in mind,” I didn’t think I
could
actually go broke, but it’s always nice to know there are other options, “Do you know a lot of molly-boys?”

“My fair share, I’d say,” he shrugged eloquently, “Only thing I can get, some nights. I ain’t exactly one of these here Adonises.”

“Nonsense,” I told him automatically, “You’re frightfully attractive.”

“‘Frightful’ is right, pretty,” he laughed at me, “We’re close enough right now I can tell
you
ain’t attracted.”

“Well, no,” I could tell that he
was
, and gave him a little bump in friendship, “But you’re just my friend Reggie’s type.”

“You know Reggie? The bloke over there at the bar?”

“Yes, we met down at Oxford,” I didn’t think I should say he was my employee, “Do you know him?”

“Met him a couple times,” Stan said, craning his head around to look at Pond, “Seems nice enough, but not my type.”

“What
is
your type?” I wondered, thinking that attraction was a funny thing.

“Can’t ye guess?” he grinned again and pressed his hips to mine, “
You’re
my type. Prettiest boy I’ve seen all week.”

“You saw someone prettier than me
last
week?” I teased.

“Yer pretty saucy for a toff,” he chuckled at me.

“Say, I wonder if you know a boy named Gabriel,” I’d nearly forgotten why I was there at the Green Parrot.

“Sure I do!” Stan boomed happily, “He’s damn near my favorite! Too bad, though.”

“What’s too bad?” I was suddenly afraid for the safety of a boy I’d never even met.

“His brother’s a bad lot,” he shook his head sadly, “Takes every penny that poor boy gets, and sends him out to get more.”

“His
brother
is his pimp?” I was scandalized. I’d never had a brother, but I knew a lot of fellows who did, and that struck me as not very fraternal.

“Since he got out of Newgate, he has been,” Stan lowered his voice confidentially, “Pretty little Angel was on his own and making a good name for hisself, when that no-good Mike Baker turned up and scared all the light out of him. He still smiles and laughs, but you can tell he’s afraid of that brute. It’s too bad.”

“Can I confide in you, Stan?” I asked, stopping the dance and moving away from the floor.

“Sure you can! ‘Say-No-More Stan,’ they calls me. What’s up?”

“A friend of mine is, well,
sweet
on Gabriel, and asked me to come down here and see if he needs any help. It sounds like he does, with this brother. How can we possibly get him out of that jam?”

“Short of killing Mike, or getting him sent back to Newgate?”

“Well, I’m
usually
averse to killing people, but Newgate might be arranged,” I wondered if Twister could manage that for me, getting this Mike Baker person hauled in for pandering; but he’d probably drag poor Gabriel with him, and that would never do.

“Is this friend of yours rich?” Stan wanted to know, “A toff, like you?”

“I don’t know how rich he is, but I expect he’s fairly comfortable,” the question started me down a line of thought that Stan had probably intended when he asked it: maybe the Baron could buy off the brother, or take Gabriel away some-where, “And he’s foreign.”

“Oh, you mean that round little chump with the pointy beard is your friend?” Stan laughed out loud.

“I don’t know if I’d call Gustaaf a ‘chump,’“ I laughed with him, catching myself before I referred to the Baron by his title, “It never occurred to me that he’d ever come down here.”

“Oh, it wasn’t
here
. It was at the Criterion, our Gabriel pinned the little round fella on his way home from the opera. I saw it happen,” Stan explained, which made more sense. The Baron would have mentioned the Green Parrot if he’d been here; and judging by his naïveté, he’d never have known where to find it in the first place. The Criterion Bar in Piccadilly Circus was a much more likely meeting-place for the two, standing as it does on the border of Soho and St. James’s, where the raffish and the regal rubbed elbows (or so one of the magazines says, I can’t remember which).

“Do you think you could help me find Gabriel, Stan?”

“Well, sure I could,” he smiled conspiratorially at me, “I know where he lives, if you want me to take you there. But that Mike Baker could be there, too.”

“I’m sure a big strong man like you,” I made seductive cow-eyes at him and toyed with his necktie, “wouldn’t be put off by some tuppeny-ha’penny thug.”

“You’d make a
fine
molly-boy, you would,” he grinned at me, “You sure know how to get around a man.”

“So you’ll take me to see Gabriel?”

“I can take you now, if you like.”

“That would be super! Just let me go say hello to Reggie before we leave, I don’t want him to think I’m high-hatting him now we’re in London.”