“Vill you tell me vatt you did?”
“Nope, I’d much rather acquaint myself with you.” I tried to put my arm around her and was rewarded with a slap - Oh, it was love alright, perhaps enough so to convince me to give up wenching for good.
She straightened her gown, covering up what little ankle she displayed. “You, Captain Strapper, are terrible. Do you know nossing of how to court?”
“Of how to what?”
“I ssort not.” She shook her head and sneered. “One vould hope a mann of your stature vould know better by now, but you are zery crass, Captain.”
And the more I conversed with her, the more I understood the reasons I went wenching. One moment she was all for old Strappy and the next she was insulting and making strange faces. Holding out her hand for me to kiss one minute and then the next moving away, slapping or throwing a few more insults into the bargain, right before returning to being pleasant again. It was so much easier paying for a woman’s favours because that way there were never any misunderstandings and I considered applying my litmus test, which never failed, of feeling her tits and seeing how she reacted, because a woman who liked a man would never object to being groped, but then I was distracted because she shouted a new instruction to the coachman, telling him to drive to Soho, so this uncouth and unrefined English barbarian could be dropped off at his hotel.
“Zat you vould live in Soho says so much about you.”
“And to think you gave up a prince for me, you daft bat.”
“And who says he vouldn’t come back running if I asked?”
“You’d have to offer a lot more than your bare ankle. Really, you’re not worth it.”
“You ignorant English animal, I hass nezer been spoken to in such a vay.” But she didn’t again slap me and neither did she turn away. On the contrary, she now leaned into me, her knee just barely grazing my own. It was most confusing because her actions and mannerisms did not match her words and my head was spinning with confusion as well as something else I just couldn’t explain.
Of course I’d been kicked and scratched and whipped by women before and a lot worse besides, but on every occasion I’d either stipulated that was what I wanted or had not given three flying figs for the mistreatment anyway. But now - Every slander, in English or German, was like a sabre cut to the heart.
I just had to have the sour Kraut! And the worst thing - I doubted my purse was heavy enough to buy but one stick that projected from her head. She was like nothing I’d ever seen, big green eyes on a symmetrical face, quite unlike the wenches with lopsided noses and black eyes taken from the abuse of clients which I was accustomed. No, nobody had ever laid an angry hand on this girl and the thought of anybody ever doing so enraged me and that troubled me yet further because I’d never before cared a dickens for any wench.
The carriage stopped outside Hazlitt’s, my upmarket hotel in Soho, but even that was unlikely to impress her.
“Won’t you come inside?” I asked, trying not to sound too pathetic. “We could talk about Germany, or wherever…I have tea and I promise to protect you from the dead.”
She smiled. “I already know all zer iss to know about Germany, vee hass tea aplenty at zee palace and zer are guards too, just in case zee dead should come, vhich zey von’t.” She pulled the door closed as I stood in the gutter, losing the feeling in my body and then the carriage started down Frith Street. Finally, she poked her head out the opened window. “I had fun, Captain Strapper.”
And with that she was out of my life.
An Introduction To Society
I lay wallowing in bed most of the next day. Well, it was a fine hotel, one of the best in all of London and my room had a view overlooking the whores in the square below as they went about enticing men into the various establishments for a massage or legal advice.
But at this time whoring was the last thing on my mind. None of them, not even the two Frenchies were fit to pull out Gertrude’s sticks and the very thought of boarding another woman interested me far less than the day before.
I turned and sweated, tossed and even purged my belly but nothing vanquished the odd sensation. I didn’t like it one bit, this love or whatever it was because I had no control over it and the coward I was liked to be in control, to know I was safe, physically and emotionally.
Her lovely image was always in my head, no matter if I tried distracting my mind with a solo card game or by throwing the contents of my piss pan over the tramps squatting in the gutter below. Finally I decided to fill my belly in the hotel bar, if only to furnish my guts with something new to purge.
I needn’t have been so distracted because when passing the front desk I was handed a card, left for me by a young lady’s attendant earlier in the day. It was an invite to attend the Drury Lane Theatre that very evening, signed personally by a Fräulein Gertrude of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. I was so jovial I very nearly skipped dinner to take my physical recompense out on the two French wenches but I’d spent so long lolling about in my room there was very little time to do that, or anything else, before the evening show, whatever that was, not that it mattered.
It was all too good to be true and when her carriage arrived outside Hazlitt’s, I half expected Prince Albert, the mummy’s boy, to be with her. As it transpired, Gertrude and I were not alone.
“Captain, I’d like you to meet Herr Hermann Brunch.” She introduced the man as I took position opposite.
I held out a reluctant hand but his chubby mitt was not forthcoming.
“Captain, you may refer to me ass Herr Brunch.”
What in the blazes? Who was he?
Brunch, whose thighs resembled two over filled bratwurst stockings, sat slumped beside my woman, panting, perspiring, filling the confines with a stinging odour, single handedly occupying the majority of the carriage interior and I felt for the poor beasts pulling the thing, and the poor devils within. And I didn’t wish to be gawking at him right now but one couldn’t help it, the man was that fat in his oversized tweed overcoat, top hat and cane that rested most threateningly over his ample lap. Oh, I had the measure of this chap alright, the attendant, on hand to ensure Strappy took no unwelcome liberties with his charge.
And I was randy for that charge and cursed Brunch’s company, especially after entering the theatre and it was made immediately clear his overbearing presence would not be leaving me with a minute’s opportunity to apply my litmus test, or anything else.
The lobby thronged with some of society’s best, the sort of people I was born to be amongst, the sort I’d successfully mingled with and impressed in Ireland and I envisaged the charming Strappy would have few problems making the smooth transition to the English upper crust - The son of a Rochefort, I was born into it after all.
Within ten seconds, Gertrude was accosted by an English lady in prom dress and after much hoo-haa’ing they toddled off together in the direction of the ladies room, leaving me alone with Brunch who wasted no time in stating the law.
“Don’t ssink I don’t know you English menn, Herr Strapper, I know you all zery vell. Now you listen to me, ya…zer vill be no inappropriate touching, no talking unless I am zer to hear zee vords. You may link armss like so, but no more and you vill refer to herr ass Fräulein. Ve vatch ze spectacular and zen ve go for beer and sausages, ya, or vhatever iss zee English equivalent. You break veze rules and you vill have zee forces of Deutschland after you.” All I could do was nod, terror stricken, as his garlic breath washed over my face. “And vhat iss vrong vitt your leg, Herr Strapper?”
I was so distracted by the authoritative, borderline hostile tone of the German voice with the strategic tapping of cane against leg, just to emphasise his words, that I was temporarily tongue tied.
“Perhaps you did not undersstand me, Herr Strapper?”
“Huh? Oh, I hurt it, that’s all.”
“Ist das so?”
Mercifully, Fräulein Gertrude returned and I linked my arm in hers like my life depended on it whilst her
protector took position at my other side, turning inwards most awkwardly.
I’d wanted to steer the conversation around to the potential for an after show frolic back at my hotel, but under the circumstances thought better of it. “Fräulein, tell me exactly the reason you’re here in England? Why, it’d be far safer back in Germany, surely?”
She squeezed my arm in the crack of her elbow, giving me quite a thrill. “Captain, you already know I vas betrothed, but now zats over vitt all I have now are my Ancient Greek, Latin and music lessons.” She hesitated, casting a sideward glance over me to the fat man. “Unless something else more thrilling should happen to come my vay?” She said suggestively, giving me quite an overt tug into her at the same time.
I’m no fool as everybody knows, and can spot an invitation when it comes my way, but how in the blazes could I possibly act on such a thing with a six and a half foot sausage monster gurning down on me, analysing my every word for possible innuendo?
“Music aye? I tried the trumpet once, but didn’t much take to it.”
“You ver probably blowing it vrong, Captain. Perhaps you require proper instruction.”
My loins throbbed - And this lady was no better behaved than a common tramp. Oh, I wanted her, and the fact I couldn’t have her made me want her even more.
She looked so sweet and innocent with blonde hair tied up, her clear skin without slap, punch, bite or whip mark and her tits looked ripe enough through her prom dress, not that I could tell for sure. No - She was different to most others and it drove me half insane with lust.
It was my first time at the theatre and I wasn’t to know a large part of the experience was loitering in the lobby prior to the show, meeting and discussing affairs and the state of Britannia with fellow members from the cream of society. How many of them were discussing the latest scandal that the Prince of Wales’ beloved was now courting the nation’s greatest soldier since Wellington? - Full of it, you may think me, but my own words they most certainly weren’t. And the reporter from The Telegraph, who first attributed that tag to me, was also present, mingling with high society whilst here to write an expose on the opening night of Charles Kean’s The Corsican Brothers. Upon seeing me, he came henceforth to finally meet his hero, towing along a bearded chap with a sharp face and a young girl who wasn’t the man’s wife.
“Captain Strapper, it’s a pleasure to finally meet you,” he embraced me presently, driving out the air from my lungs, “and may I congratulate you properly on your Ireland heroics. My breaking that story did more than a nice turn for my career too, what? So I must thank you, old boy.”
He fawned over me and I let him. It never harms to allow your lady to see how well loved and respected you are amongst your peers and I noticed how her grip on my arm progressively tightened with every introduction, particularly when it was a young lady finding any excuse to make my acquaintance.
“Captain, allow me to introduce Mr Charles Dickens.”
The man with the young girl bounded forward and vigorously pumped my arm whilst my lady, for whatever reason I had no idea, crowed with delight. “My word, such a pleasure it is, I should write my next novel about you, my boy. I’m presently half way through some tosh going by the name of Great Expectations, but I’ll gladly shelve that rot to instead beat the drum for you, for it’s sure to be a best seller the world around and back.”
Well, I was happy for him to continue along this line of course, whoever he was, and even Herr Brunch looked impressed, not that he gave me an inch extra leeway.
“Captain, awfully sorry about switching over to interrogation mode and all that business, but we journalists just can’t help it, you see,” my fan from The Telegraph began, “but I have to ask…when will you be taking a lead fighting the dead? The nation needs you now more than ever, no?”
A half dozen nearby conversations muted as I found myself in a circle of people peering at me and a German almost princess crushing her tit into my arm in expectation. My heart told me to announce I’d be marching north just as soon as the order came, to see how Gertrude would react, for if there was one thing I’d learned since supposedly joining the army, it was the ladies love a dashing cavalry captain presently engaged in fighting a common enemy. But I didn’t listen to my heart and instead gave a typical Strappy answer.
“Well sir, you know I’d love nothing more than to engage the enemy and drive the dead forever from Britannia, but,” and here I touched my peg, wincing just a little for effect, “it’s the old ham, you see, plays the devil with me every time I sit on Lucky…she’s my horse, see…and for a cavalryman, not being able to mount the old steed is a bit of a hindrance…I’m sure you understand. Now don’t get me wrong sir, there’s nobody in this building more vexed and frustrated about it than I, it’s just that, and I never disobey doctor’s orders, but I wouldn’t be much good fighting whilst crippled, would I?” I clenched my fist several times and tried to look broken. “It’s damn Britannia, she needs me…if only my damned leg would heal dammit.”
There were murmurs of disappointment and sympathy all around and Gertrude’s head, for a second at least, came to rest upon my shoulder.
But it was all in the way they looked at me. They were safe in London, for the time being at least. But behind the eyes they each possessed a little something else, that they knew what was coming eventually, even if all they could do was show their typical stiff upper lipped Britishness, going to the theatre and getting on with things whilst their countrymen elsewhere were being devoured by the dead hordes. And there was something else present too, besides the fear; that because I was here, they knew everything would somehow be ok and I’d recently learned a nice way of milking like a Jersey cow their admiration, respect and, dare I say it, even love.
“But I do believe, ladies and gents, that you’re all placing too much hype on a mere captain, and one recovering from injury at that. There’s only so much one man can do against the multitudes of hell.”
That did it alright and it never ceased to amaze me how playing down your own role, when they all thought they knew better, only served to deepen, thicken and widen the image of your heroics to their tiny minds. But then that’s the British - World conquerors and all too modest about it and it never harms to know the mentality and temperament of one’s countrymen, so one can later use it against them, if only to enhance one’s own personal safety. Either way, my man from The Telegraph almost wept whilst straining his quill in shorthand, recording my every word for his over trusting readers.
I’d recently taken to reading The Telegraph myself because it was always handy to know where the dead were and how they progressed rampaging their way through the country, getting ever closer to London by the day. The logic was simple enough - Know where they were so I could avoid them. And I’d no doubt the cleverer among the English were doing the same. According to the tabloid they’d taken much of the western reaches of the country already, devoured the inhabitants of every hamlet, village and town all the way from the coast to the whitewashed buildings of Cheltenham, with only those strongholds whose ancestors had bothered building big stone walls remaining. Naturally Wales was gone, Cornwall too. The rub was, the dead hardly seemed to be following any logical pattern, which made them hard to predict and after apparently getting lost somewhere in the midlands, I suspected the Black Country Forest, they only recently re-emerged, to head aimlessly northwards, angry and hungry. Some reports suggested they were already in the north and that Scotland was now under possible threat. Of course, this was only taking into account one great swarm, which was apparently being watched at all times, though one could never tell when and where more would pop up next, new swarms small and large - People roamed the nation after all, on business and pleasure and it only took one careless individual to turn and before anything could be done, the whole region would be afflicted. Not me though, and I endeavoured to remain safe here, in London, which was about as far away as one could possibly hope to get whilst remaining on Britannia�
�s mainland and I aimed to keep it that way.
For the next twenty minutes they continued to insist on meeting me and it was such that an orderly line had even formed. There were authors, poets, politicians, royalty, aristocrats, war heroes, some very powerful men, and even one or two who announced themselves as actors in the approaching spectacle, which very much impressed Gertrude. It was most entertaining, even if many times I had to deflect the same question about fighting bloody zombies. Evading it was easy enough, however there was one thing that distracted me the entire time.
Five minutes prior to being seated in the auditorium, and assuming I’d now met everybody in the lobby, at least briefly, my eyes wandered lazily about the Victorian splendour, the grand piano, hanging chandeliers, Afghan carpets, marble busts and the rest. That was when I spotted the one solitary individual of whom I’d not been introduced, a brigadier complete with sherry glass, stupidly long moustache and monocle. At first I didn’t think much of the old eccentric, as he stood ramrod straight in a clearing at the foot of the staircase. But after five, ten, fifteen and then twenty minutes, every time of my looking, he glaring continuously my way, I must admit, it ruffled me a little - He was a military man, after all, and military men usually tried roping me into some insane cause, like fighting.
I forgot him, when finally we were permitted entrance and showed to our seats in a box by an overly dressed primp with mannerisms most impeccable. Our view overlooked the entire auditorium, quite wonderful, but then I saw the three seats, Gertrude taking the one on the left, which meant I was sandwiched in next to the minder whose bratwursts pressed against me. He again rested his cane over his bulging lap, just to act as a friendly reminder, quite.
Not Dead Yet: A Zombie Apocalypse Series - Books 1 - 2 Page 19