“Ribs aren’t quite healed up then, that’s a shame. I’ve got a line on an Irishman looking to book fighters. A bob each the pay would be.”
“Find somebody else and get your shilling that way. Being mauled by The Body Snatcher tends to put one off of going in the ring.”
“It’s not like you to turn down money, Tripner,” an unpleasant voice crowed from the back of the pub.
Jimmy winced. He looked at Dominick to ask if he wanted him to try and run Baz off, but Dominick just shook his head. No reason to get Jimmy on the Badger’s bad side. He tilted his head toward the kitchen, giving Jimmy his out. He didn’t blame the man for not wanting to tangle with Baz, he had a wife and four or five children to provide for after all. Besides, Dominick was pretty sure he didn’t want Jimmy to overhear whatever Baz was about to say.
“Funny running into you again, Baz. I’d say it’s a pleasure, but…”
“Likewise. I’ve been looking around for you, but no one seems to know where you’ve been. You think any more about that job I offered? I got word the work’s about to get serious. There’s good money in it. I’d even up your pay to four shillings a day.”
“The answer was ‘no’ the first time and it’s not going to change. You can keep your four shillings a day or give them to someone else. I wouldn’t work for you even if you offered four quid a day.”
“Is that so?” Baz smiled his sickly, black-toothed smile. “And what kind of service does four quid a day get from you, I wonder? Even Covent Garden whores don’t charge that much.”
Dominick reacted before he could think, grabbing Baz by the throat and slamming him against the side of the bar. He raised his fist, ready to silence his filthy mouth once and for all, when he felt a sharp prick in his side. He looked down. Baz had the point of one of his many daggers pressed just between two of his ribs. The razor-sharp blade had sliced through Dominick's shirt, and a thin line of blood was already beginning to seep down the metal. Baz adjusted his grip and angled the knife more sharply up. Even if Dominick killed him with a single blow, a knife entering at that angle would slice cleanly through his lung and straight into his heart. He’d be dead before he even finished his swing.
Dominick snarled, years of Baz’s torments finally coming to a head. He’d take the risk. He drew his arm back to end things between them once and for all, then paused. If he died today, Alfie would never know what happened to him.
The thought stopped him cold. He’d be lying there dead on the floor of The Barge and Alfie would never know. He’d sit in that big dining room all by himself, waiting for Dominick to arrive. At first maybe he’d just assume Dominick was late. He’d read his paper. When he finished that, he’d start to pace. When would he know that something was wrong? Would he worry, and as the hours ticked by, decide to come looking for him? He might be able to find Dominick's lodgings again, but by the time he did, the scavengers would have heard of his death and taken everything from the room. No one would talk to Alfie, and he’d go back home, never knowing what had happened.
Or would he just assume that Dominick had tired of his company? It wouldn’t be the first time they had parted ways without a chance to say goodbye.
Dominick pushed Baz away, sending the man skittering halfway across the pub. The blade never left his hand, and even in the dim light, Dominick could see his fingers itching for a second one tucked up his sleeve. It wasn’t a risk Dominick could take. He himself might not be worth much, but Alfie certainly was.
“I don’t want to hear from you again. I don’t want your wretched job and I don’t need your filthy money.” Dominick headed for the door.
“You might not today, with whatever mysterious job you have now. But tomorrow always comes, Tripner. And you’ve been spending like it won’t, haven’t you?”
Dominick froze in the doorway. There was no way Baz could know about Alfie and his lavish suits and fancy meals.
“That’s right. I hear things. I hear you bought two blankets at market last weekend. New ones too. And a bar of soap. Your landlady says she never had a single tenant buy so much coal for their fireplace either.”
Dominick left the pub without turning back. His blind anger carried him halfway to Alfie's house before he even stopped to think. His steps slowed as he actually considered what Baz had said.
He’d sworn years ago he’d never work for the pale, venomous little toad. He knew the man was just biding his time, childhood hurts only adding to years of adult grudges. Whatever this job he was trying to entice Dominick into, he wasn’t offering it out of the kindness of his heart. But the fact that he had noticed how much money Dominick was spending was worrying.
Flashing blunt around was a sure way to attract all sorts of attention, none of it good. All he needed was to round the wrong corner and have the last thing he see be a cosh coming down on his head. If he was lucky he’d wake up later, boots and purse missing. If not…
Dominick willed himself not to check the inner coat pocket where he kept his money. He hadn’t been paid a set wage yet, but he still had most of the original ten Alfie owed him, and every time Alfie gave him money to buy something, he told Dominick to keep the change. Dominick realised with a start that he must be carrying over fourteen quid. Fourteen pounds in his pocket, when he’d seen men’s throats slit for pennies.
He turned abruptly, startling a woman and her young son who had been walking behind him. He murmured a quick apology and headed back towards his lodgings. He had been a fool to carry so much on him at one time, and an even larger fool to be spending it the way he had. Not only was it likely to get him noticed, but he had no idea how long he would have to live off it after Alfie was done with him.
Fourteen pounds was enough to get him set up nicely somewhere, maybe even somewhere out of the great stink of London, but what would he do after that? He was still just a rough, uneducated piece of street trash whose only real skills lay in his fists or his mouth. And someday he’d be too old to get anyone to pay for either.
He climbed the stairs and unlocked the door to his lodgings. Better to go without those extra comforts and save his coin. The worst of the cold weather was past, so he could pawn one of the blankets he’d just bought, and he didn’t really need the coal. He did some calculations as he pulled up the floorboard and removed his tin box.
If he went back to living the way he had before he’d met Alfie again, he could stretch the money he had for a year or two if he was careful. Longer even, as long as he kept working when he could and only turned down the most repugnant jobs. Not spending it would keep from raising suspicions as well. Let everyone assume he had wasted whatever coin he’d earned and had nothing more worth stealing.
Decided, Dominick opened the box. Underneath a scattering of coins, Alfie's cravat still lay there, folded neatly and perfectly white, save for the ruddy brown stains of Dominick's dried blood.
But his ring was gone.
Chapter 15
Dominick sighed heavily as the coach pulled up in front of Alfie's club. Alfie shot him another worried look.
“We really don’t have to—”
“It’s fine.” Dominick snapped.
He’d spent over an hour scouring his rooms looking for his ring, but it was nowhere to be found. He knew that he had left it in the box—there was nowhere else safe enough for it—but if it wasn’t there, where else could it be?
The only option was that someone had broken into his lodgings and stolen it, but that didn’t make any sense either. Nothing else in his room had been touched, and the box itself was still beneath the floorboard. Any thief determined enough to search his rooms so thoroughly as to discover his secret hiding spot would have taken everything in the room. His spare clothes, his pitcher... Even the bent poker by the fireplace was worth just enough for a desperate thief. And even if a thief had somehow found the box’s hiding place, why leave the coins and just take the ring? Alfie's cravat was worth more than its few ounces of pewter if someone managed to rinse the blood
stains out.
Besides, Dominick had worn that ring since he was a child. It would be impossible to sell. Every pawnbroker and rag-and-bone man in the East End would recognize it as his. Even though he had lost to The Body Snatcher, Dominick still had enough of a reputation that none of them would risk crossing him just for the sake of a few pennies.
By the point he’d finally given up searching, it had been well past the hour for him to head over to Alfie’s house. He’d run nearly the whole way but even then, by the time he’d arrived Alfie had long since finished his breakfast and was pacing the length of the dining room. The relief in his eyes when he saw Dominick brought back that morning’s encounter with Baz, and how close Dominick had come to never showing up at all.
But there was no way he could explain any of that to Alfie. Especially not with how knowing Alfie had been worried about him, had actually cared if Dominick showed up or not, warmed something in Dominick that had been cold for years. To cut off any questions, he’d suggested it might be a good idea for them to spend what was left of the morning planning, then finally go to Alfie's club and see if anyone there seemed suspicious.
It was a thin excuse, but he knew Alfie had been trying to find a way to invite him back since the last time Dominick refused. And if the way Alfie's eyes lit up at the suggestion made Dominick feel guilty for keeping things from him, then that was Dominick's own problem to deal with.
“It’s fine, Alfie,” he said again.
His sour mood had only worsened as he’d changed into his dandy duds. So much money gone to waste and for what? A shirt that he would only get to wear another few weeks at most? A pile of cravats, each worth at least a week's rent? Enough stockings to wear a new pair every day for a fortnight, and yet not a one would stand up to a single day of hard labor.
Then the carriage driver sent over from the stables seemed to be the worst one yet, seemingly intent on hitting every single pothole between Bedford Square and St. James. By the time they finally arrived, Dominick's mood was as dark as the storm clouds that had begun to threaten overhead.
Still, there was no reason to take it out on Alfie. He glanced up at the worried look on his friend's face, and tried to put on a reassuring expression.
“Don’t mind me. I’m just worried about making a fool of myself is all. Now remind me, how do I remember which fork is for fish and which is for scratching my balls?”
Alfie's look of concern vanished in a burst of laughter. “The fish fork only has three tines,” he said with a grin. “The general rule is to work from the outside in.”
“Outside in, got it.”
They dashed out of the carriage through the first heavy drops of rain, to have the front door opened by a stone-faced doorman even before Alfie's fingers even brushed the knocker.
“Good afternoon, Lord Crawford,” the man said. His wig and knee length breeches were highly decorated, but several decades out of fashion. Dominick supposed this was not the sort of place where things changed very quickly, if at all.
He tried not to be overwhelmed as Alfie signed Mr. Dominick Trent in as his guest and they were led up a wide staircase into a dining room that could have held his lodgings fifty times over.
Christ. His eyes followed the tall mirrors and gilt-framed paintings up to an elaborately carved ceiling. It could probably fit the entire lodging house.
They had arrived towards the end of the luncheon rush and were seated at a small table near the edge of the room. The sight of so many nobles and wealthy men of business had Dominick itching to escape. He’d even thought he’d recognized one or two men from prints in the newspaper, and not from the crime section. The smell of leather and cigar smoke hung heavily in the air, mixing with the smells of roast potatoes and braised pork. His head began to spin.
He felt a swift kick against his shin and then a foot pressed against his, hidden by the long tablecloth.
“You don’t have to do this just because I wanted to,” Alfie said warmly. His hands betrayed the confidence in his tone, fluttering to straighten the already militarily aligned silverware. “I’d be just as happy sitting in a pub or eating pies from the back of a cart as long as it was with you, Dominick.”
Dominick's heart stuttered in his chest at the sincerity in Alfie's voice. Alfie smiled at him and he felt the fears that had been weighing on him all morning slide from his shoulders. This man. He really was too gorgeous and kind to be believed. Alfie could have anything he wanted and would deserve every bit of it, but all he wanted was to share a meal with Dominick.
“Even eels fresh from the Thames?”
“Even if we had to catch them with our teeth.” Alfie laughed, and in that moment, Dominick knew he was completely, irredeemably, and inescapably in love.
✽✽✽
The meal was one of the finest of Dominick's life, but later he would have been hard pressed to say whether he had the lamb or the pork, the fruit or the pudding. Afterwards, they sat sipping coffee and observing the other members and their guests, looking for suspects.
“What about that one by the window?” Dominick whispered, leaning in.
“Which one?”
“The one who looks like Old Harricutt the fishmonger, if you stuffed her into her grandson’s pants and shaved her bald.”
Alfie looked at him in horror.
“That’s Lord Wicksteed! He’s Deputy Speaker in the House of Lords!” he hissed.
“You knew who I meant though,” Dominick couldn’t help but tease. “Perhaps he really is Mrs. Harricutt in disguise. She knows you’re the one who stole her pickerels to feed the alley strays when she wasn’t looking and has been trying to destroy you ever since.”
“You’re being ridiculous.” Alfie rolled his eyes. He took a sip of coffee and scanned the room. “What about that one in the red waistcoat?”
Dominick surreptitiously looked in the direction Alfie indicated with a nod to see a man with skinny legs in a brown suit and a red waistcoat that distended over his potbelly. His face was flushed from too much wine in too warm a room. He appeared to be in the process of nodding off into his soup as his tablemate told some unending story, his head bobbing up each time before it hit the table. The overall effect reminded Dominick of a cheery little robin, hopping along and pecking at seeds.
He leaned in and motioned for Alfie to do the same. “You shouldn’t jest about such things. I recognize him. He’s a very dangerous man.”
Alfie's eyes went wide, darting over to the man in question then back to Dominick.
“He is?” Alfie whispered. His breath gusted over Dominick's lips as he spoke. They were close, almost too close for even the companionable atmosphere of a gentleman’s club, but Dominick couldn’t find it in himself to pull away. He nodded, face grim.
“One of the worst men in all of England, I’d wager. He was a captain under Nelson, but they say the admiral’s death drove him mad. He turned pirate, and has been the terror of the West Indies ever since. Stealing women and gold, and burning any ship that can’t provide him with both. Captain Crinkums, they call him.”
This close, Dominick could see Alfie's lips twitch suppressing a smile. “Oh dear, that does sound dreadful. But why is he after me?”
“You don’t remember?” Dominick shook his head sadly. “You were one of his pirate crew, but developed a conscience. In the middle of the night, it was you who slipped off in a rowboat and warned Kingston of the coming attack. You saved the entire colony, and the governor offered you the hands of both his daughters in marriage—it being the New World and him being the one to make the laws and all—but your one true love was the sea.
“So you left the weeping sisters behind you and sailed off. Never knowing that Captain Crinkums had not gone down with his ship, but survived, marooned on an island, kept alive by his desire for vengeance. And now he has returned to do battle with the man who destroyed him.”
Across the room there was a clatter as the man in the red waistcoat finally lost his battle with sleep, fa
lling face first into his soup bowl and knocking half the table to the floor as he spluttered awake.
Alfie chortled and Dominick nearly snorted out his coffee, but their laughter was lost in the raucous chaos that ensued. The man hardly had time to leave the dining room, puffed up with humiliation and bellowing drunkenly as a small army of the club’s staff trailed after him, sopping up the soup that still dripped from him as they went. They had gotten their laughter down to wheezing when a hand smacked Alfie in the middle of his back.
Dominick tensed immediately, hand reaching for the spot on the table where the knives had been, to come up with only a coffee spoon.
“Freddie boy! We haven’t seen you in ages! Weeks at least. How have you been?”
A flicker of dislike crossed Alfie's face before he rose and shook the hand of the man who had attacked him. Dominick rose too. The back slap may have been meant as a gesture of friendship, but he wasn’t letting his guard down. He ignored the twisting feeling in his gut that was too close to jealousy. Alfie was allowed to have friends other than Dominick. Just because he hadn’t spoken of any during their weeks together meant nothing.
“Lord Boyle, a pleasure as always. And I believe I see Mr. Stockton on his way over as well. How delightful it is to run into you both.”
The flatness of Alfie’s voice made it clear that it wasn’t.
“I say, is that Freddie?” A skinny man so pale he was almost blue joined them, shaking Alfie's hand before taking a spot next to his portly companion. Dominick thought immediately of the nursery rhyme about Jack Sprat and his wife.
“It’s been absolutely ages,” said the skeleton in a nasal whine that had Dominick’s hair standing on end. “Since that night we all went out together with Reggie wasn’t it? God, what a night that was! I remember almost none of it, but I woke up the next morning in Greenwich with an unsigned IOU in my pocket for a thousand pounds! It’s not yours, by any chance?”
A thousand pounds. Someone wagered and lost more money than Dominick could even imagine in a single night’s gambling and this Mr. Stockton didn’t seem to care if he collected on it one way or the other!
His Lordship's Secret Page 12