The warmth of Finn’s exhalation against his collarbone was welcome in the cool, damp night. “Yes, I suppose I do. It’s why I came.”
“And are you feeling better?”
“Mightily.”
“What’s your p-p-pleasure? Another show? A quiet drink? Or would you rather just … head home?”
He could’ve scraped Finn’s blush from his cheeks and used it for rouge. But before the boy could answer, someone in the crowd checked his shoulder, and he stumbled.
“Pardon me.” The accidental assailant reached out to steady Finn, but Aristide had already caught him. Highly polished spectacles flashed in the golden light of the marquee. Aristide froze, assuming an expression of polite disdain.
“D-D-Deputy Commissioner Müller,” he said, extending a languid hand. “So p-p-pleased to see you. And how is Maxine? It was d-d-divine running into her at the baroness’s little party.” Müller’s grip was lackluster, and he drew away quickly. Aristide was accustomed to having his hand kissed, pressed to cheeks, wrung enthusiastically; he was underwhelmed by the deputy commissioner’s performance. “T-T-Tell me, did you enjoy the show?”
From Müller’s expression, he hadn’t been impressed with Aristide’s performance either. Still, he said, “It was all right,” and nodded, once.
“Mr. Makricosta,” said Cyril, drawing Aristide’s attention from Müller’s narrow, sunken eyes. He realized Cyril had been watching him this entire time, and wondered if he’d seen Müller take his collision course, seen where it would lead them, and hadn’t stopped it. “I didn’t realize you and the deputy commissioner were acquainted.”
Aristide knew when he was being mocked. But he also knew when he was being given a warning. And Cyril, hang him, had managed both at once.
“Only by reputation,” said Aristide. “His, of course, not mine.”
“I’m sure I’ve heard your name before,” said Müller.
Aristide graced him with a smile like a rabid dog’s.
“Mr. Lourdes,” said Cyril, defusing the situation. “I don’t believe you’ve met Alex Müller.”
“A pleasure, sir.” Finn’s earnestness was refreshing.
“Mr. Lourdes and I are coworkers,” Cyril explained.
Müller gave Finn an appraising look. “Are you—?”
“Oh no. Office of the Bursar.”
Müller let his hand be shaken. “It’s always a pleasure to meet another civil servant, Mr. Lourdes.”
There was an awkward pause, as conversation scrabbled to find a crack through which it could enter. Aristide looked at Cyril again, and caught him with his guard down. He was searching the crowd with shifting eyes, looking hunted.
Finn saved things by yawning enormously and putting his weight on Aristide’s arm. “I’m so sorry,” he said, “but I’m utterly bashed. Been traveling.”
“You’d better let Mr. Makricosta take you home,” said Cyril.
Tastelessly blatant innuendo. Aristide did not engage. “Indeed. Time to put your feet up and have a t-t-toddy.” He nodded to Cyril, and to Müller. “Gentlemen.”
Even after the crowd had separated them, Aristide felt two pairs of eyes on his back. He pulled the ribbon from his hair and let his curls tumble down, trying to cut the intensity of imagined scrutiny. Finn caught one of the ringlets and wound it around his finger.
“Are you really so t-t-tired?” Aristide tipped his head to the side, tugging his hair free of Finn’s grasp.
“Yes,” said Finn, leaning his head on Aristide’s shoulder. “But I’d rather not go to sleep just yet, if it’s all the same to you.”
“It’s t-t-two quite d-d-different things, in fact, and we’re in full agreement. Ah, but we might not be able to slip away just yet.” Because he was taller than most of the people on the footpath, Aristide could see a plume of peacock feathers swaying like glamorous semaphore over the crowd. Zelda Peronides had spotted him and was waving her hat to catch his attention. “There’s a friend I need to speak with, before I go.”
“Ari,” said Zelda, as she hove through the press of people. “Oh darling, this is the first I’ve seen of the new show. It’s simply marvelous. Even Mab thought so. Didn’t you, Mab?”
Zelda’s companion, a leather-faced woman in country clothes, laid a hand on Aristide’s free arm. “Pleased to meet you, and it certainly was.” Her pursed, immobile lips, the way her words crowded behind her teeth … Even more than Finn’s soft lilt, her dialect was intensely familiar to Aristide. This woman was mountain-born: the Currin Pass, or somewhere nearby. Her dark skin and darker curls said she was at least part Chuli, too.
“I didn’t get the chance to introduce you two during the interval,” said Zelda. “But Mab’s got a little bit of a problem I hope you might sort out for her. Mab, this is Aristide Makricosta. Ari, meet Mab Cattayim.”
“If you sort my problem,” said Aristide, shaking Mab’s hand but speaking to Zelda, “I would be more than delighted to sort hers.” They hadn’t got the details of the ivory worked out in the short minutes he’d spent at her table. Zelda’s fee was exorbitant, and Aristide was a ferocious haggler by nature. “B-B-By the way, this is Finn Lourdes. You didn’t get to meet him at the interval either. Because the silly thing actually waits in the q-q-queue for the washroom.”
Zelda shook her head, laughing. Her long earrings jangled against her neck. “Darling,” she said, kissing each of Finn’s cheeks. “That’s what the mime is in the show for. So you have a tidy five minutes to piss and you won’t miss anything good.”
“I’ll bear it in mind,” said Finn.
“Now, Ari.” Pixie-sized Zelda had to cock her head back to meet his eyes. “When can we have our little sit-down? I suppose a pretty thing like you has all manner of dinner engagements after a show of that caliber. I hear you’re dabbling with one of Culpepper’s foxes these days.” Finn stirred at Aristide’s side, but Zelda went on. “Rumor has it he’s a roto print of poor old Solomon Flyte.”
At that, Finn froze—he knew she wasn’t talking about him.
“D-D-Dabbling?” Aristide assembled his strongest quelling glance and aimed it down at Zelda. “I wouldn’t say that. Not anymore.”
“Oh dear. It always stings to be thrown over. You must be shattered. Do let us take you out. It would be such a treat.”
“I’m afraid I’m t-t-tied up,” he said. “Might we have a bite of lunch tomorrow? And let’s keep it strictly business, please. I prefer not to air my d-d-delicates in public.” He squeezed Finn close. The accountant’s spine held stiff against his embrace.
“Mab?” Zelda looked at her friend.
“I’ll be free.” She smiled at Ari like she expected something of him.
“Perfect.” Aristide caught Zelda’s hand and kissed her knuckles. “Ring me up in the morning, Zelly. But not t-t-too early, understand?”
* * *
“Makricosta, Makricosta … why do I know that name?” Müller chewed his lower lip. “Damned familiar.”
“The smugglers on the southern wharves owe him most of their success.” Cyril lit a cigarette and offered one to Müller, who took it but made no motion to light up. His eyebrows were drawn down against the thin frames of his spectacles, and he watched Aristide with the intensity of a hungry raptor.
“Of course,” he said, at last. “Makricosta’s his stage name. He goes by a different handle when he’s bringing in ships.”
“I know.”
“Isn’t that Zelda Peronides he’s talking to?”
Cyril finally let himself look at Aristide, instead of watching Müller look at him. He still had Finn tucked under one arm, and the accountant was suffering himself to be kissed on the face by a slip of a woman in an outrageously feathered hat. “Looks like it.”
“The two of them can’t be up to any good.”
“Relax, Alex. You’re off the clock. You can’t spend all your time chasing criminals.”
“That’s the kind of attitude that’s got the ACPD into such a shameful state,” said M
üller, finally lighting his straight. “They don’t want to spend any time cleaning the place up. They’d rather play in the filth.”
“Well, then it’s good I’m not an officer.” With relief, he spotted Cordelia coming toward them. He held out an arm to her as she sidled between people queuing for the trolley. “Ms. Lehane! So kind of you to join us.”
She dipped gracefully into the circle of his arm. “Had a beast of a time gettin’ out,” she said. “You wouldn’t believe the kind of stuff that goes on behind that curtain.”
“Try me,” said Cyril, and kissed her. She tasted like fresh lipstick, and kissed back.
“You put on a sterling show,” said Müller. “That last part especially. I’ve never seen somebody get out of a girdle with such panache.”
Cyril felt Cordelia smile against his mouth. She broke away, and gave Müller a once-over. “Glad you enjoyed it. It’s for the punters, after all.”
“Surely you enjoy it, too. Or you wouldn’t be doing it.”
“Damn right I wouldn’t. Pay’s piss-poor.”
“And all those bits of paper pushed into your garters at the interval?” Müller’s flirtation made him grin, showing sharp teeth stained with nicotine. “What were those? Telephone exchanges?”
“You’d be surprised.”
“No.” He flicked ash into the gutter. “No, I don’t think I would. But I’d hope they were written on some hefty bills.”
“All right, you two.” Cyril pressed the heel of his palm to his mouth, checking for lipstick stains. “I’ll just head home now. You seem like you’re getting along fine.”
“DePaul!” Müller laughed, and Cyril felt a bit of tension ease from his shoulders. He’d been worried Müller would stay stiff all night. “I didn’t have you pegged as the jealous type.”
“Not jealous,” he said. “Sensitive to the needs of my friends. For instance: Next round is on me. Where should we head?”
“You a port drinker?” asked Müller. Cyril wasn’t, but nodded anyhow. “The Kelly Club, then.”
It was on the other side of town, the northeast quarter, not far from Cyril’s flat. However well Müller liked Cordelia, he didn’t seem enamored of the theatre district. “I’ll get us a cab,” said Cyril, and left the two of them together.
Leaning against a streetlight with his arm out—the first rush after curtain had taken most of the nearby taxis—he watched Cordelia work on Müller. She was a sharp one—she’d figured out first thing, at the interval, that Cyril was using her for something, and started laying it on thick. Her flirtation was a seamlessly choreographed dance: She tossed her hair; touched Müller’s arms, the back of his hand; threw her face to the sky in exaggerated laughter. All so smoothly it seemed natural. Like he was brilliant and special and must think the same thing about her.
No wonder she couldn’t stand Aristide. There was barely room for both their egos on the Bee’s broad stage, let alone in conversation. Their clashing tempers and over-the-top personalities were what made that striptease so sizzling.
In the backseat of the cab, he would put her in the middle. Let his weight fall on her in the curves, so she’d fall into Müller in turn. If only he could pass his pocket flask around. But Müller was the deputy police commissioner, and he’d proved himself vigilant even out of uniform.
Headlights made him squint. A black cab drew up beside him, and he waved to Müller and Cordelia. Müller went around to the street side. Cyril stopped Cordelia with a hand on her wrist.
“You’re perfect,” he told her. It would pass for an endearment, if Müller overheard them, but from the look in her eye, she knew it wasn’t flattery; it was fact.
Car doors fluttered along the curb, opening and shutting like the shells of beetles. Before Cyril followed Cordelia and snapped his own door closed, he looked down the taxi rank and saw Aristide arm-in-arm with Finn. Aristide noticed him staring and their eyes locked. Cyril caught his breath and looked away.
* * *
“You know Cyril,” said Finn, as Aristide ushered him into the back of an illegal hack.
“What’s that?” Aristide climbed in and gave the driver his address, hoping his feigned inattentiveness would put Finn off. He wasn’t so fortunate.
“You know Cyril DePaul, somehow. The first time he brought me round, I kenned it. Too much frizzing in the air.”
“Frizzing?” Aristide pretended incredulity, though he knew the northern slang.
“You know.” Finn wiggled his fingers. “Electricity. Even just now, and you two hardly said a word. Still, zap!”
Aristide snorted. “Silly boy. C-C-Come here. I’ll show you electricity.” He lifted his arm and Finn hesitated. “Oh, Finn, p-p-please. We all have p-p-pasts.”
Finn relented and slipped across the leather seat into the curve of Aristide’s body. “He’s an old spark, isn’t he? Why was he so keen on introducing us?”
“What Mr. DePaul once was to me is now irrelevant.” To prove it to himself, Aristide tipped Finn’s face up to his own. The accountant’s mouth tasted like gin and tea tree chewing gum. “I’m sure he has his own c-c-curious motives, but in general I try not to question them. He’s a very useful friend to me sometimes, and he may be useful to you someday as well. Don’t put him off over a t-t-trifling little thing like jealousy.”
“It’s not that,” Finn started, but Aristide stopped him—utterly.
CHAPTER
SEVENTEEN
The Kelly Club was a set of second-story rooms on Orchard Street, just off Ionidous Avenue. The avenue was distinct from the arch; cocooned in the fashionable central city, Loendler Park boasted the patronage of wealth and beauty. Ionidous Avenue ran straight through the heart of the financial district. The Kelly Club had wealth, but lacked elegance.
The club was within walking distance—strenuous walking distance—of Cyril’s flat, and he’d gone there a few times in years past. He hadn’t been recently. They’d done the place up, polished the brass, et cetera, but Cyril still caught a whiff of old cigar smoke. Probably the same stale stuff he’d wrinkled his nose at the last time he came around.
There was a pack of razors at the bar, talking textile futures. They ignored Müller’s entrance, but when Cyril helped Cordelia out of her coat, they roused a chorus of wolf whistles. Cordelia flicked her skirt at the offenders, and chased it with a vixen’s smile.
The high ceilings bounced sound, but the tables were nearly filled. So many people were murmuring to one another, the effect of the echo was more obscuring than revealing.
“Table in the rear,” Cyril told the maitre d’, and she took them to a booth in the corner. He stood back and let Cordelia slip in. Müller settled beside her—not too close, Cyril noted, but close enough their feet could be doing who knew what under the table.
“What are we having?” Cyril asked, hanging Cordelia’s coat from one of the booth’s hooks, and hanging his own over it. He topped the column with his trilby, at a jaunty angle.
“They serve a good Maleno vintage,” said Müller.
“Hang it,” said Cordelia, “I don’t know port from nothing. They got gin back there?”
“A dry white’ll do for the lady,” said Müller.
Cyril, who was inclined to agree with “the lady,” resolved to have the same. At the bar, he squeezed past a hefty razor in her shirtsleeves and a backless waistcoat. She cased him and growled appreciatively.
“Sorry,” he told her. “I’m here with company.”
She cast her eyes whence he had come. “The old eagle or the pretty young jay?”
“And if I said both?”
“You’d put me in a twist,” she said. “I couldn’t straight envy you, but I wouldn’t give you any pity either.”
He propped a foot up on the bar rail. “What’s good here?”
“Not a port drinker?”
“I prefer whiskey,” he said.
“Are you a rye man, or do you like barley?”
“Rye, when I have a choice.”
She slid her schooner down the bar. “Try that beauty. Babe turned me on to it.” One of her companions saluted. “Thirty-year tawny. You’re gonna think it’s sweet, but give it a chance.”
He lifted it to his nose and barely smelled it, then took a sip to be polite. It was too sweet, but he could see where she was coming from. The butterscotch and nutmeg notes were reminiscent of a good, dark rye.
“All right,” he said. Then, to the bartender, “One of those. And the Maleno. And … oh, whichever dry white you like.”
The bartender went to work. By the time Cyril brought their port to the table, Müller was lighting Cordelia’s cigarette from his own, their heads bent close. Cyril doled out the glasses.
“Cheers.” Müller lifted his and looked at Cordelia. “To pretty things.”
She rolled her eyes, but let him drink to her.
Cyril did his best not to taste the syrupy stuff he’d ordered. Conversation wandered. When Müller was distracted by some detail of his story, trying to recall a name or place, Cordelia caught Cyril’s gaze and angled her head out of the booth. Presumably toward the washrooms, or the bar. He nodded, barely. When Müller finished up his punchline, she laughed, told him he was a lying show-off, and then excused herself for the toilet.
“Stuff’s gone right through me,” she said, tapping her nail against the streaky glass. “Ah, don’t look so shocked, Mr. DePaul. You know you love a little plain speaking.”
He caught her hand as she rose and pulled her down for a kiss—a wordless thank you. The dry port lingered on her lips, bright with citrus and a hint of nuts.
When he let her free, she fetched a tube of lipstick from her coat pocket. “Better take a minute and repaint the pucker too, if you’re going to keep on like that.”
“Hurry back, pigeon pie.” Müller’s smile was indulgent. “He’s going to make me talk business, I’ll wager. And I’d rather talk with you.”
Cordelia snorted and turned away. As she crossed the room, her hips rolled like a buoy in choppy water. Heads turned, including Müller’s.
“You’re awful, Alex.” Cyril shook his head. “What would Maxine say?”
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