by Xavier Mayne
“That’s a question I asked myself frequently during those first few years at school. I was completely alone there. My classmates had families that, at the very least, felt socially obligated to acknowledge their offspring with the odd letter and to collect them on the half terms and school holidays. I spent the first few such occasions hoping he would appear to take me home with him, but even a child can recognize when he’s not wanted. Eventually an older couple, caretakers of the school gardens, began taking me in when everyone else jetted off for vacations in exotic locales.”
“That sounds awful. I am so sorry.”
“We do seem to be apologizing for the machinations of a cruel world, don’t we?” Imre asked wistfully. “But the truth is, in time I began to appreciate what he had given me—the chance to rise. I was the only son of a poor miner and his long-suffering wife, orphaned by a cruel twist of fate, and in just a few years I found myself graduating from one of the most exclusive schools in the world, with universities seeking me out. What he gave me was opportunity, not love.”
Donnelly shook his head sadly. “Not sure what the former is worth without the latter.”
Imre looked a little startled, then chuckled softly. “It took me many years to see that, and you say it casually as if it’s been clear to you all along.” He shook his head. “Where have you been all my life, Gabriel Donnelly?”
“Well, I haven’t been lurking in elite Swiss boarding schools, that’s for sure.” He looked up to smile his gratitude to the waiter for bringing another round of drinks.
“That’s a shame,” Imre said, lifting the glass to his lips. “I wouldn’t have had to waste my time on all of those rich, arrogant boys.”
“All of those boys?” Donnelly asked, eyebrow lifted.
Imre smiled, a devilish twinkle in his eye. “A dormitory full of boys, half of them already as power-hungry as their fathers and grandfathers, and the other half of a decidedly artistic bent? You can do the math on that one. It’s a wonder we found time to study, what with all the buggery going on.”
“What a charming British term for it,” Donnelly said, struck again by how different his upbringing had been—rural, uncultured, straight. “Though one imagines many of them grew out of it?”
“Most, but not all, and not all of them are open about it even to this day. I’m always amused at reunions by the many ways some of them find to explain away what happened between all of us. Last winter, at Gstaad, one of the more… experienced… of my schoolmates actually claimed that he’d graduated a virgin. A virgin! I reminded him of that star-filled night in the depths of winter when I’d bent him over the footboard of his four-poster bed and pounded away until the wee hours.”
“How’d he react to that little trip down memory lane?”
“Not well. But then again, neither did his fiancée, who was standing just behind him and to whom he had neglected to introduce me.”
“Oh, that must have been awkward.”
“You have no idea. Though it turned out all right—she’s nobility, something like twelfth in line for some long-forgotten Prussian baronetcy, so she doesn’t expect anyone to reach adulthood without having been railed whilst in boarding school. Plus, his family’s money was needed to plug the holes in the roof of her family’s castle. Win-win.”
“I do love a happy ending,” Donnelly said, laughing.
“I have a massage therapist to introduce you to.”
Their laughter was perhaps more boisterous than the Queen’s Grill was accustomed to.
Right, Donnelly thought, back to work.
“You said your grandfather went to the same school?” he asked.
Imre nodded. “And his before him and on into the mists of time.”
“My grandfather was a widower the whole time I knew him,” Donnelly said. “And he never so much as dated anyone after my grandmother died. Growing up I figured that people of his generation only had sex to make a family. It must be strange to think of your grandfather getting up to shenanigans at school.”
Imre looked down at the tablecloth as if suddenly cast into somber thought. He was silent for a long moment. “My grandfather,” he said, “was—”
He was interrupted by the appearance of the waiter, and the two men put aside their conversation and ordered dinner. When the waiter had retreated, Donnelly pondered the sad and musing face of the man across from him. He was trying to figure out how to get the conversation back on track when Imre took a deep breath.
“My grandfather never really left school,” he began, his eyes fixed on the ice cubes in his glass. “At least in terms of his sexuality. I think his entire life has been a demented struggle to recapture those days of adolescent discovery.”
“But he must have put it aside at some point to marry your grandmother, didn’t he?”
Imre shook his head. “My grandmother was never his wife, and as far as I know, she was the only woman with whom he’s ever had sex.”
Donnelly layered his voice with a veneer of scandalized surprise. “I don’t… I don’t understand.” This was going better than he’d dared hope.
“My grandfather, having spent his youth buggering schoolboys, seems to have decided to continue the practice into adulthood and finally senescence.” Imre, for the first time since the conversation took a serious turn, looked up and met Donnelly’s eyes with his own—bloodshot and desolate. “My grandfather, the man who gave me every chance in life,” Imre said softly, barely above a whisper, “is a pedophile.”
“What?” Donnelly didn’t need to fake surprise this time, nor did he have to bother with arranging his face in an attitude of shock. The shock was real. How could someone state such a horrifying, monstrous thing as a simple fact? Imre’s voice had been as devoid of emotion as if he’d said his grandfather was a plumber, not a rapist.
Imre’s eyes filled with tears, and his hands began to rattle the ice in his glass. “I’ve never said that out loud,” he whispered miserably. “It sounds just as awful as it has in my head since I found out.”
“That’s… horrifying,” Donnelly managed, his voice rough and tinged with more anger than he’d tried to show.
“I don’t think I’ve had a decent night’s sleep since I discovered it.” He reached, gratefully, for the third gin and tonic handed to him by the waiter. He seemed to Donnelly to be quite used to drinking heavily when he thought of his grandfather.
“When did you find out?” Donnelly asked, setting his third drink next to his second, which was still mostly full.
“There’d been talk for many years among the diplomatic gossip grapevine,” Imre replied. Donnelly felt sure he had met one of the primary cultivators of that particular vine. “I was slow to believe it, given how much he had helped me.”
“But you said he hadn’t even seen you since your parents were killed.”
Imre nodded. “I don’t mean he helped me directly. He certainly never did that. But his reputation among the diplomatic service, the prominence of his name, those things did help me a great deal. He opened doors for me, even if it was ultimately up to me to walk through them. I owed him a tremendous debt, and it kept me from seeing the truth about him while I could still do something about it.”
Imre sighed and rubbed his eyes, suddenly seeming exhausted and ten years older. “I found out too late to save any of them. By the time I knew what was going on, he’d stopped.”
“How do you know he’s stopped? Imre, kids could be in danger.” Donnelly could no longer hold back the fury he felt rising in his chest. “You have to do something.”
The upbraiding hit home: Imre sagged even further. “I wish I could have done something to help them, Gabriel, I really do. But by the time I finally came to see the truth, cancer had taken both his willingness and his ability to cause any more pain. He’s in hospice now and not expected to last another month.”
“When you reported this, what happened? Did they bring charges?”
Imre frowned. He studied the remains of his thi
rd drink as he swirled it in the heavy crystal glass, then downed it in one go. “I had no evidence they could use. I had pieced together enough to be certain—beyond certain—but I had nothing that would stand up in court. It seemed better to let it go.”
“Better? Does it feel better to you? Really?” Donnelly’s voice had an edge in it that he struggled to soften, but he wasn’t entirely successful. “Are you certain he wasn’t part of a ring of some kind? Your grandfather may not be able to hurt anyone now, but there may be others who still can. If you have any evidence at all, you need to get it to the police or constable or whoever it is that watches over you diplomatic types.”
Imre stared silently at the table. Their soup arrived, and still he stared blankly, apparently unaware that he was expected to actually dine in the dining room.
“What if I told you I was trying to do exactly that?” he finally murmured.
“Trying to do what?” Donnelly leaned closer.
This last question, delivered in Donnelly’s “hostile witness” voice, set Imre back in his chair. He shook his head slightly as if clearing it of the will to confess, and picked up his soup spoon. “Forgive me,” he said, his voice back to its prior smoothness. “I’ve become a little morose. I must be hungry.”
Stupid! Donnelly berated himself through most of the soup course for pushing too hard, all the while keeping up his side of the small-talky conversation. Imre seemed to be bucking himself up as he regaled Donnelly with some anecdotes from the glamorous life of a cultural attaché.
As the table was cleared in preparation for the arrival of the main course, Donnelly eased back into his questioning.
“So, you were going to tell me about something you’d done. About your grandfather…,” he said with a carefully crafted nonchalance.
“Ah, yes. I suppose I did mention something about that.” Imre looked around the room. “I probably shouldn’t say anything. I wouldn’t want to involve you in… an incident of any kind.”
“Sounds intriguing.” Donnelly took a deep breath. “But we’ve only known each other since teatime, so if you don’t feel like you can trust me, I understand.” He gave Imre a look that he hoped conveyed equal parts disappointed humility and Boy Scout trustworthiness.
“It’s not that, not at all,” Imre replied. “It’s just that what I’ve done might not be considered ethical by all observers.”
Donnelly spoke seriously, and he spoke the truth. “If you did anything that might help prevent more children from being victimized, the ethics are definitely on your side.” He could see Imre starting to soften, so he pushed a little further. “Plus, if you’re worried I might tell someone about it, you can rest easy. I don’t know anyone on this ship—pretty much kept to myself since New York. You’re the only person I’ve exchanged more than elevator small talk with.” A flattered grin began to appear. Time to lighten the mood and get the disclosures going. Donnelly craned around the room like a summer-stock Poirot, then whispered loudly, “Your secret is safe with me.” He winked to seal the deal.
Imre chuckled, and Donnelly knew he was home free.
“It would be nice to tell someone, and since I can’t tell anyone I work with, it’ll be nice to tell a friend.” He laid particular emphasis on this last word. “But not here. Maybe we can have a drink after dinner? We could go to my cabin.”
“I’d like that,” Donnelly said, as an alien feeling of shame crept up the back of his neck. He had never been invited by a man back to “his place” before and had never intended to be.
“It’s a date,” Imre said, in a voice suddenly laced with a smoky warmth that hadn’t been there before. It gave Donnelly a chill, but as he willed a pleased expression onto his face, he realized there was a part of him that was thrilled to have seduced a man. The purpose was to get his information, not his dick, but still. His head spun a bit with the power he felt.
Their main courses arrived, and again the conversation veered into less intense topics, which seemed like a relief to both of them.
THEY HAD lingered over dinner for hours, Imre talking as if he could finally unburden himself to a friend who knew most of his secrets—and would know the rest soon. Donnelly realized over dessert that he had been dragging things out a bit, not wanting to rush toward the moment that he would find himself alone with Imre in his cabin.
Now they were there.
“I was surprised at how small the cabins are,” Imre said as he shut the door behind them. “I figured it would be like a hotel room, but this is like a hotel room in Tokyo.”
Donnelly looked about. Imre’s entire cabin would fit into the bathroom of his suite. “But the view is much nicer, I’d imagine,” he said, looking out at the pitch-black night. “When the sun’s up, I mean.”
Imre smiled. “This room has never looked as nice as it does at this moment,” he said suavely, pouring deep amber bourbon into two heavy crystal tumblers. He handed one to Donnelly. “You really dress up the place.”
Fuck, fuck, fuck. Donnelly took a deep breath and reminded himself that he had a job to do. Pretend he’s Ethan. He tucked a half smile into the corner of his mouth and raised an eyebrow. “That’s a pretty smooth tongue you’ve got there,” he said slyly. “It must get you into trouble.”
“It has on occasion,” Imre said with the same smoky heat in his voice that had panicked Donnelly so badly at dinner. “I hope it will tonight.”
“We’ll see,” Donnelly replied, then took a steadying sip of the bourbon. He needed a way to slow this down. “How about some fresh air?” He stepped across the length of the cabin—about three strides—and opened the balcony door. A whoosh of chilly night air swept into the cabin, and he walked gratefully into it. He leaned his elbows on the railing and looked down to where the hull slashed the ocean into glowing white ridges. He took a deep breath of sea air, but before he’d had a chance to let it out, Imre was next to him, leaning on the railing, their shoulders touching. They stared out at the sea for a long moment.
“This ship is so grand, and yet one steps out here and sees how small it is against the entire ocean,” Imre said. “It gives one a certain perspective. Out here we are simply a tiny artifice of man, surrounded by miles and miles and hundreds of miles of dark ocean under stars infinitely more vast.”
“We are small, aren’t we?” Donnelly replied, looking up at the twinkling stars. He took a drink and then played his hand. “It would be easy to realize how very small we are in the grand scheme of things and figure what we do with our lives doesn’t really matter.” He looked at Imre. “I think what we do matters. We may not understand the effect it has on other people, on the world, on all of this”—he gestured out into the endless dark—“but I think what we do matters, and we should always try to do the best we can for the people in our lives.”
“I have tried,” Imre said. He stared down at the surging splash where hull met ocean. “Do you want to know what I’ve done?”
“If it would help to tell someone, I’d be honored to hear it.” He hoped Imre would respond to this light touch.
“I don’t know how to….” Imre lifted his gaze from the churning water and looked deeply into Donnelly’s eyes. “A kiss for good luck?”
Donnelly tried not to let the shock show on his face, to suppress the panic he felt in that moment. He took a deep breath and repeated his mantra—you’re a cop, you’re doing a job—and he leaned in. He closed his eyes, and on the deck of a mighty ship surging through the night sea, he touched his lips to those of the second man he’d ever kissed.
He closed his eyes and thought of Ethan.
When the kiss ended, Imre stepped back slightly, smiling in the glow cast by the lights in the cabin, his hair whipped back and forth in a brisk wind. “Oh my,” he said softly.
“That bad?” Donnelly asked teasingly.
“Breathtaking, that was.”
“Can’t take credit. The waves, the stars, the bourbon….” Donnelly smiled modestly. Now spill it, buddy.
&nb
sp; “So. Let’s see.” Imre took a drink, swallowing awkwardly as if the liquid burned him on the way down. “When a diplomat wants to send something secret to another diplomat, he uses what’s called a diplomatic pouch. Once it’s sealed, it can only be opened by the recipient—no country would allow another country’s pouch to be opened in transit across their territory because they wouldn’t want theirs to be opened.”
Donnelly nodded as if he were learning about the Vienna Convention for the first time.
“So the fact that I stole one yesterday is likely to cause an incident.”
“You… what?” Donnelly didn’t have to fake disbelief at hearing Imre’s confession—he had certainly not anticipated it coming out so quickly.
“Well, strictly speaking I didn’t steal it, but rather arranged for someone who knows the ship well—and who could evade the security cameras—to steal it for me. I convinced him he was helping me sort out a domestic dispute straight out of a telenovela, so the poor boy had no idea he was actually stealing. But I think the finer points would be lost on a panel of inquest. They tend to be rather grim about their duty.”
“Does this have something to do with your grandfather?”
“The pouch was from him. It’s been nearly a decade since he was in active service, but he used his last measure of strength to arrange for one final pouch. And the courier who was dispatched to carry it is on this very ship.”
“Well, that was quite a coincidence.”
Imre chuckled and rolled his eyes. “Not exactly. The plan had to be made quickly, as I only found out that the pouch existed when the courier was sent. That volcano threw a bit of a spanner into the works, but in the end it was easier to steal it from a safe in a cruise-ship cabin than in an airport or while actually on a plane. I know the courier—he’s far too good to let a pouch out of his possession under normal circumstances. When I found out he’d managed to get on board, I got here as soon as I could. There were so many diplomats who wanted to get on this sailing that I had to pull a few well-placed strings to get passage myself. He is a tremendously resourceful courier.”