“Ytzak, darling.” Varnish flashed at the tips of his fingers. “One celery snap, an absinthe on fire, and a d-d-double rye and soda.”
“Make it a single,” said Cyril. “Nice try.”
When Ytzak’s back was turned, Aristide took something from the pocket of his dressing gown and slid it across the bar beneath the pads of his fingers. Light skimmed over monogrammed silver.
“You left this,” said Aristide. “I thought about smoking them, but frankly, d-d-darling, you’ve got abysmal taste in tobacco. I can b-b-barely stand to k-k-kiss you sometimes.”
Well that was a lie. Cyril palmed the cigarette case. “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome, I’m sure. Now. What is the reason for all this … subterfuge?” He drew the word out with central city sibilance, feigning interest in his nails as he spoke, one hand spread in front of him like a decorative fan. Cyril couldn’t tell if he was just playing along with the intrigue, or if he was genuinely offended. It didn’t matter, anyway.
“Listen,” said Cyril, without preamble. “I have to stop seeing you.”
“What?” The whites of Aristide’s eyes flashed as he cut his gaze toward Cyril.
“We’re done. I just … we’re done.”
There was a long pause. When Aristide did speak, he had damped down his sparkling affectation. “Something happened in Nuesklend.”
“I can’t talk about it.”
“Of course you can’t.”
“Ari, don’t be sour—”
“Who’s the boy?”
The question brought him up short. It was not what he had been expecting. “A colleague. An excuse. I owed him a drink. I couldn’t be seen coming to the Bee on my own. Not now.”
“I won’t ask why not.” Aristide pushed away from the bar. His words were clipped. “Because I know: You can’t talk about it.”
“Don’t—” But Ari was gone. Cyril slumped against the bar, angry with himself for breaking character. Had he thought Aristide would just nod and smile? He should have been ready for what he got. He wanted, desperately, to explain. To tell Ari that the deception was for his own benefit. That the ends would justify it. But Van der Joost’s hesitancy made him hold back. No good promising what he couldn’t deliver.
“Your order, sir.” Ytzak set the tray of glasses down. “Should I put it on Mr. Makricosta’s account?”
“No, no.” Cyril took his money clip from the pocket of his jacket and put down a bill. “Keep the rest,” he said, and Ytzak nodded his thanks.
By the time he got back to their table, the sugar cube over Aristide’s absinthe was burning low and poisonously blue, dripping molten threads through the slots of the silver spoon. Aristide had drawn his chair close to Finn’s, and was flirting like a Princes Road harlot. Well, Finn couldn’t possibly be suspicious now. He wouldn’t remember his own name by the time Ari was through with him. Cyril set the glasses down.
Aristide barely acknowledged him, which was childish, but deserved. There were probably better ways to have done this. But Cyril had panicked, and taken the first route that presented itself. Bad technique. Culpepper would have switched him raw. But Culpepper would never know he’d thrown Ari over, would she? Or if she found out, he hoped she wouldn’t pin the reason.
He caught Finn’s gaze over the top of his drink. The accountant’s eyes were wide, blissful and disbelieving. In that moment, Cyril hated Aristide more than he had ever hated anyone.
Then, with excruciating elegance, Aristide upended a shot glass of cold water over the last embers of his sugar cube. Like alchemy, the liquid in the absinthe bulb turned milky green. Aristide touched the tip of his tongue to the intricate twists of the flat absinthe spoon, though it still must have been hot, tracing and tasting the remnants of burnt sugar.
It was an ostentatious metaphor for spite, but Cyril could not look away. The house lights dimmed and rose, then dimmed again, signaling the end of the interval. Aristide turned away from Finn, at last, and lifted his glass to Cyril.
“Thank you for the d-d-drink, and a d-d-divine introduction.” He was curling his words against the roof of his mouth again, his speech peppered with that false, delicious stutter. “Mr. Lourdes is quite the charmer.”
“My pleasure,” said Cyril, matching his toast and his empty smile.
Aristide tilted back his head and drained the last of the absinthe. The edges of his white greasepaint were blurred where they met his brown skin; brown as the burnt sugar on the spoon. And, Cyril knew from experience, as scorched and sweet.
The whiskey, when he drank it, tasted like nothing at all.
CHAPTER
TEN
After the last curtain call, Aristide went straight to his dressing room, ignoring Cordelia’s snappish “Well you assed that one bad enough, didn’t you?” The striptease had been a disaster, but by the end of the second half, the audience was inevitably drunk, and as long as they saw flesh, they didn’t care how.
He showed most of what he had to stage right, which snarled the choreography and put Cordelia in a snit. But Cyril’s machinations had cost Aristide a pleasant chat with an influential heiress, and then—without any explanation—the man had dropped him like a burned-down cigarette. Now Aristide was seething mad, and revenge was worth a little improvisation onstage.
During the interval, Aristide hadn’t slipped Finn a card, or made any lewd suggestions. If he couldn’t find the boy right after the show, still stuck to Cyril’s side, there’d be no point in picking him up. So Aristide had to hurry.
Peeling off what little was left of his costume, he replaced it with the tight black jersey he wore during rehearsals. The buttons of his dress shirt and waistcoat were too much hassle. His hair was already down—most of the pins came out while Stella and Garlande did their contortion act, so that during the striptease, Cordelia could pull the few that were left and let loose his curls.
He tore his false eyelashes away and slashed cold cream across his face. A quick dash of plum lipstick, and he was out the stage door with his coat still unbuttoned. A few admirers waited with programs and flowers, but he slipped between them, turning up his collar before they realized who he was.
His anger had cooled by the time he made the front of the theatre. Taxis queued against the curb, ready for the audience streaming across the pavement; their doors popped open and slammed shut. Aristide briefly considered blending in with the punters and going home to a book and a stiff drink. Then again, Central had been known to pick up people of interest in cabs, and Aristide didn’t want to risk that, thank you. Rumor had it you couldn’t bribe the Foxhole cabbies if you shat solid gold.
Still, there was always the trolley, or a hack if he could find one. Maybe it was better to leave things lie. But then he spotted Cyril and Finn coming through the gilded doors, and he made his choice.
They headed for the trolley stop at the end of the block. Aristide followed. The northbound would be along in—he checked his watch—two minutes, headed for the transfer at Heynsgate. The transfer that Cyril would take to get back to Armament. Who knew where Finn was headed? Unless they were going out. Or Cyril was taking him home. Or … oh, none of it mattered, because Aristide was about to dash whatever plans they had.
Cyril cracked his cigarette case and put a straight between his lips. When he offered the case to Finn, the younger man fumbled and dropped it. Drunk? Good. Aristide took three quick steps, knelt, and offered the case to Finn.
“Yours?” he purred, though the monogrammed DP was clearly visible to both of them.
“No, sorry.” Then, Finn recognized him. “Oh my.”
“That would be mine.” Cyril’s hand closed on the case. “Thank you.”
Aristide stood and leaned against the trolley schedule, taking a cigarette from his own cache. He made a great show of searching for matches. “I d-d-don’t suppose you’ve got a light?” he asked, looking at Finn.
“I don’t smoke,” said Finn, helpless.
“Ah! Never mind.”
Aristide “found” his matchbook and struck one, drawing deep as he lit up. “D-D-Don’t smoke? You’re a rare gemstone, Mr. Lourdes. A veritable cabochon of virtue.”
Cyril made a small sound that might have been a snort. Aristide ignored it. He could see the light of the trolley coming up Temple Street. “Come here,” he said to Finn, curling the hand that held his cigarette.
Finn looked back at Cyril, who gave a nearly imperceptible shrug.
Aristide reached for the lapel of Finn’s greatcoat and tugged him forward. “You’re a grown man, Mr. Lourdes. You d-d-don’t need a chaperone.”
The trolley bell rang out, and the car slid to a stop on its cables. Outbound passengers poured onto the Temple Street footpath. Aristide took another drag, and the flare of his straight lit Finn’s face crimson. He wrapped a hand around the back of Finn’s neck—soft-prickly with the stubble of an old haircut—and kissed him. Rich, dark tobacco smoke twisted between their mouths.
Over Finn’s shoulder, Aristide saw Cyril look back, once, as he boarded the northbound trolley. Under the brim of his hat, his face was blank. The trolley began to pull away. Finn broke the kiss.
“I’ll miss the tram,” he said, putting a protesting hand against Aristide’s chest.
“But I’ll hire a cab.” He could call a hack from the theatre.
“A cab?” Finn’s heavy eyebrows drew together. “But how will I—oh.” Then, as Aristide pushed a knee between his thighs and slipped a hand beneath his coat, he said it again, like another breath of smoke. “Oh.”
* * *
Sleep didn’t come. An hour passed, and then another, and then Aristide’s bad back wouldn’t let him lie still anymore and he had to get up. Finn stirred. His bright, shaggy hair flopped across his forehead as he turned in his sleep. Unthinking, Aristide reached out and brushed it back, then cringed away lest Finn wake. But he didn’t.
The bedside clock read quarter to four. Aristide wrapped himself in a dressing gown and padded to the front parlor. He poured a schooner of port and stood in front of the tall windows, watching a few determined revelers weave across the footpath below. Thin clouds blurred the moon, hanging over the river.
Something was wrong with Cyril. Now that his fury had abated, Aristide could acknowledge that. If it had just been Culpepper forcing Cyril to break it off, none of tonight’s chicanery would have been necessary. Then, there was the election to consider. The unexpected result stirred things up for many Amberlinians—Aristide had spent the afternoon reassuring contacts, delaying or expediting certain clandestine shipments, speculating in back rooms, variously calming hysterical tempers and leveling stern warnings at anyone who didn’t take the upheaval seriously. Everyone knew the outcome had been thrown. It was the only way to explain an Ospie victory in Nuesklend. And Cyril had been there, sent on Central’s bidding.
Or had it been official, after all? Cyril had never said “Culpepper’s sending me.” Only, “I have to go.”
Aristide set down his drink and put his palms together, pressing his index fingers against his lips. After a moment of contemplation, he slipped back to the bedroom.
He dressed quickly, trying not to make noise. Finn slept like a sated child. At least he wasn’t a snorer. Oh, plague take it, he was all right, in his own meek way. Aristide felt almost guilty about using him as an instrument of revenge. Almost, but not enough to stay by his side through the night.
He wrapped his hair into a knot and pulled a broad-brimmed felt hat low over his face, checking the picks secreted in the band. In a plain, dark overcoat with a scarf across his face, he was unidentifiable. If Cyril couldn’t be seen with him, he would disappear.
Amberlough’s trolleys ran all night, so Aristide took the eastbound Baldwin line. Without a press of bodies around him, the wind was bitter. At Armament, he transferred south and rode to Blossom Street, where he disembarked and walked back along the high iron fence of Loendler Park. Strange quiet, the hush of a concert hall, filled the street. Aristide was used to the constant clamor of life in the southwest quarter, and it was rare for business or pleasure to bring him east of Talbert Row.
Cyril’s block of flats was dark. All respectable Amberlinians, gone to bed early. Or, still out on the town. Aristide crossed the street, glad his memory had served him. He hadn’t been sure he’d know the building when he saw it. To avoid the lift attendant, he slipped up two flights of stairs. At Cyril’s door, he knocked but got no answer. Five minutes later, the lock sprang under the ministrations of his pick and wrench, and the door swung open with a long, low creak.
Clever, that. Oil the hinges and anyone could sneak in.
The entryway was dark. Aristide paused on the threshold. He had only rarely come to Cyril’s flat—unwise to bring an enemy home. Unlike his own rooms on Baldwin Street, here, Cyril was very much Central’s fox and Aristide his adversary. The few times Aristide had visited, he’d never gone further than the entranceway. Cyril had ushered him out too quickly to take stock. He didn’t pretend he could navigate it in the dark.
But when he stepped out of the tiled alcove, a stripe of light crossed his path. He traced its length across the parquet, to a slice of window visible between the heavy curtains of the drawing room. Cyril had pulled an armchair close to the sash. A lamp in the street below shone through the crack in the curtains, illuminating the sharp line of his jaw.
“Evening,” he said, and lifted a glass. The streetlight glanced off dark liquor as it moved. Cyril drank and lowered the glass, but did not turn.
“I thought you’d be in bed,” said Aristide, though he hadn’t.
“I slept a little. Not very well.”
Aristide snorted. “I wonder why.”
“Damnation, Ari. Don’t go all jilted lover on me.” His words were slurred. He bent his head. Aristide heard the bite of glass on glass, and the three liquid pulses as Cyril poured.
“How much have you had?”
A short, hoarse laugh. “Too much.”
“Well, share the burden then.” Aristide took a few steps, but Cyril flinched, and he stopped. He settled one hip onto the back of the sofa and unwrapped his scarf from his face. “Cyril,” he said, but Cyril didn’t look at him. “Why don’t you tell me what happened in Nuesklend.”
“Where’d the stutter go, Ari? I always liked the stutter. Thought it was ch-ch-charming.”
Cyril only picked at Aristide’s dictional affectations when he was angry, or trying to avoid whatever serious conversation had occasioned their disappearance. “Nuesklend, Cyril.”
“I really can’t say, Ari. Not a word.”
“And if I guess?”
“I won’t tell you if you’re right or wrong.” He moved in the armchair, and Aristide could see enough to know he had a blanket wrapped around his shoulders, and was drawing it closer. It was cold in the drawing room—the radiators must have gone off hours ago.
“You went on orders from the Ospies.” He made it half a question.
There was a sharp silence, a pause that said too much, and then Cyril threw his head back and laughed. He shook with it, splashing liquor on his lap. “Oh, Ari,” he gasped. “You’re giving me too much credit.”
Relief washed down the muscles of Aristide’s back. But Cyril’s pause had been significant. “Then what?” he asked. “Why now?” It couldn’t be coincidence, his coming back and breaking things off right away.
“What does it matter?” The words came out between his teeth, harsh and poisonous. “You can’t be jealous, not the way you snatched up the first pretty thing that stumbled across your path.”
“Me, jealous? You can turn that one around.” A Kipler’s Mew expression, one he’d picked up bickering with Cordelia. Arrogant, vain, jealous: You can turn that one right around.
It made Cyril smile. “You sound like a blush boy out of Eel Town.” He reached back, his hand unsteady, and offered his glass to Aristide, who did not take it. “Honestly, I don’t blame you. Lourdes is just your type.”
“G
overnment employee?” He meant it to sound flirtatious, but it came out snide.
Cyril missed the jab and shook his head. “Blue eyes. Bright hair. Young and pale.” He jerked his chin at the mirror hung opposite the gramophone, where their two dark reflections were visible only as slight movements. “Sober dresser, and a little bit … conservative. You like a foil, Ari.” He hiccupped. “I should know.”
Though the mirror was useless in the gloom, Aristide could see them in his mind’s eye. A striking couple: himself, tall and dark and not quite handsome; Cyril smaller, trim and golden-haired, with leading-man good looks. “You’re not exactly fresh with morning dew, Cyril. Not like Mr. Lourdes.”
“No,” said Cyril. “But the best vintages age superbly.” He looked around, like he expected Aristide to have brought his guest along. “Where is Finn, anyhow?”
“Sleeping, at mine. I wore him out.”
“Very trusting,” said Cyril, letting his head loll against the back of the chair. “But I suppose he’s just an accountant.” He closed his eyes, and for a long moment, didn’t say anything. Then, sounding on the verge of tears, “Oh, Ari, where’s the thrill in that?”
“It’s not obvious?” But revenge felt hollow, now that he was here. He closed the distance between them and sat on the arm of Cyril’s chair. “What happened?” he asked again.
Cyril shook his head, finished his drink. The bottle of rye at his feet was two-thirds empty. Aristide wondered how much of that had gone in the last few hours. When he looked back up, Cyril was still shaking his head—a hypnotized movement, like a snake watching a piper. “I’m so sorry,” he said. “I’m so, so sorry. I’ve ruined everything.”
“For queen’s sake, Cyril, don’t … oh, perdition.” Tears spiked Cyril’s lashes. “You’re being maudlin.”
“I just…” Cyril’s face crumpled. “Ari, I’m all tied up this time.”
Aristide put his hand on the back of Cyril’s neck, pushing his fingers into the fine short hair at the base of his skull. “Good,” he said. “That’s how I like you.”
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