by KJ Charles
“They paid out three hundred and fifty quid to save a total stranger as a favour to a friend?”
“If you knew them, it would make sense. They get things done, whatever way seems best.”
“But should they not have checked before spending your money?”
“It wasn’t my money,” Stan said patiently. “Temp wouldn’t let me pay them back. Said it was a birthday present.”
“He said that to me too.”
“Happy birthday to us. They can afford it, in case you’re wondering.”
“I expect they can,” Morrow said. “Did you say Lilywhites? The Lilywhite Boys? Are you telling me those were the Lilywhite Boys? Oh Jesus Christ!” He looked like he was going to cry.
“It’s just Temp and Jerry,” Stan said, kicking himself. “Honestly, you’re not going to have any trouble. People talk a lot of rubbish about them.”
“You literally just said—”
Bugger. “Yeah, well, you don’t want to cross them, but they’re fair dealers. Don’t worry about them.”
“And what about you?”
“Me? I’m nobody.”
“But you sent the Lilywhite Boys to save my life. And he, Templeton, said it was because you’re an admirer. Of me.”
Oh God, oh God. Stan writhed internally. “I’m not—I don’t—well, I do admire you because you’re really good. I’ve seen you a few times.”
“It’s more than a few. I recognise you. You’re a regular. Twice a week, sometimes.”
He hadn’t realised it was possible to be this embarrassed and not die. “I like your singing,” he tried hopelessly.
“You like my singing,” Morrow repeated. “Wonderful. Anything else you like about me?”
“I—”
“Because your friend the Lilywhite Boy made a point of telling me I didn’t have to fuck you as an expression of my gratitude. But, as you pointed out, that sort of remark really is not as comforting as it might be.”
“It’s not, but you don’t,” Stan said. “Not my thing.”
“What isn’t?” That was sharp. “Fucking men? Because you clearly can’t wait to get away now, but what I’m wondering is what happens when next you see me with my skirts on. I have quite a few male admirers who can’t get enough of Miss Christiana. That’s exactly what Grizzard wanted me for. Men who like a woman with a cock.” He said it brutally. Stan couldn’t help a flinch. “And to be clear, Stan, I’m not a fancy piece no matter what I wear, or a freak, or anyone’s fantasy, so—”
“Hold on, hold on, hold your horses!” Stan felt compelled to get in before Morrow’s voice rose any higher. “I don’t make people do things they don’t want to, all right? I’m not Kammy, and I’m not trying to get into your trousers or under your skirts.”
“Well, that’s good, because I’m not available. Not dressed like this, not in skirts, never. Don’t do it, didn’t do it for Kammy fucking Grizzard, won’t do it for you. Clear?”
“Crystal,” Stan said. “Can I just point out, I’ve not bloody asked you to.”
Morrow paused on that a second. “No,” he agreed. “You haven’t. But you did bring flowers.”
“Yeah, well, you bring flowers to dressing rooms. Everyone knows that.”
“To ladies’ dressing rooms.”
Stan jerked a thumb. “That’s a lady’s dress, this is a lady’s dressing room. I came here to tell you not to worry about owing anyone anything, because you don’t. Now I’ve told you and I’ll go.”
“No, wait.” Morrow’s lips parted and moved slightly, as though he were trying out a thought. “Are you serious? Did you actually come here to reassure me? Nothing else?”
“Yes!”
“Although your friend made a point of your admiration?”
Stan felt himself redden. “He’s an arse. I dare say you get bothered a lot in your line of work, but I mind my own business.”
“I’m beginning to get that impression,” Morrow said. “I do unquestionably owe you something, though.”
“No, you don’t.”
“I was under Kammy Grizzard’s thumb for the five most miserable months of my life, which is saying something. Your friends arrived like a pair of very badly cast fairy godmothers and pulled my feet out of the fire on your behalf. Don’t you think I owe you some sort of thanks?”
Stan wanted to say something smooth about how she could thank him by keeping on singing and making the world a brighter place. If only he was a smooth sort of man. “Forget it. Buy me a pint some day.”
“Not, say, a private performance as Miss Christiana? Just for you?”
He sounded like he was making like a totally sincere offer, even with a little inviting smile. Stan didn’t trust that for a second, and anyway, that wasn’t how music hall should be. Rich men asked for ‘private performances’. Stan liked the performers on stage where they belonged.
“Nah. You’re all right.”
Morrow looked at him a moment longer, then smiled. It was an actual, real smile and it made Stan’s heart thump in his chest. “So are you, I think, against all the odds. Have you got time for that pint now?”
THEY WENT TO THE BLUE Posts. Morrow went to the bar, and Stan found a table, and looked over at a back view in close-fitting trousers that he couldn’t fault, artistically speaking.
Morrow returned with two pints. They clinked glasses. Stan sipped the beer and drank in his companion.
“So how long have you been on the stage?” he asked, for the sake of conversation.
“Oh, since I was fifteen or so.”
“You like it? Doing stuff in front of a crowd?”
“Love it.” Morrow’s smile touched his eyes, lighting them up. “There’s nothing like working an audience. Making them listen, making them applaud, or gasp, or cry. It’s glorious. Have you ever tried?”
“Gawd, no, I couldn’t get on a stage.”
“Why not?”
Stan shrugged. “I’d rather keep myself to myself. I’m just not, you know, special. I mind my own business—mostly,” he added with a shrug, to which Morrow gave an acknowledging lift of his pint. “I don’t much like being looked at.”
“I suppose yours is not a line of work that welcomes observation.”
“No, it ain’t. That a problem?”
Morrow made a face. “I try to stay away from trouble. It’s bad enough being”—he paused fractionally—“in my line of work without mixing with desperate characters.”
“I’m not that desperate.”
Morrow gave him a look that was Miss Christiana all the way. Stan choked on his pint. “Not what I meant.”
“I know, but if you set them up like that, you really should expect me to knock them down.” He smiled again. He had a glorious smile.
“I meant, I try to stay out of trouble too.”
“You’re in the wrong job for that, aren’t you?” Morrow frowned. “Or I assume you are. What do you do?”
“I’ve got a repair shop. And I buy and sell stuff.”
“Stuff your friends acquire?”
“Sort of thing.”
“I see.” Morrow did not look approving, but he didn’t walk out either. “Why? I mean, if you don’t like trouble...”
“I don’t, but...well, I need the money. Big family. I’m the second oldest of nine and it’s not good back home.”
Morrow took that in. “Where’s home?”
“Poland. East.”
“Really? You don’t sound it.”
“Stanislav Kamarzyn,” Stan said. “My old man brought me and my brother over when I was eight. Left us with a couple of relatives to learn trades, have a bit more of a chance.”
“So you send them money?”
“It’s not like they aren’t working,” Stan said, feeling a little defensive. “Two of my brothers are studying in France, and I’ve got two sisters learning with the, uh, they call it the flying university? The Russians have rules about what Poles can study, so there’s a sort of secret arrangement where
they have classes at night.”
“A secret university? Really?”
“Honest. Polish language and history, and sciences. It’s against the law and they’ll get in a lot of trouble if they’re caught, but people want to learn, and the girls can’t go to a proper university. We’ll send them to France as well, once the older boys are bringing money in. And my brother here’s doing well, works in a bank, only he’s got his own family to support now. Everyone’s doing their best, is what I mean. Sorry, I’m going on.”
“No, you’re not. I’m fascinated. So your family put you to your trade?”
“Not on purpose. What happened was, my brother Mateusz—Matthew, rather, he’s the clever one, so he went to a cousin who worked in a bank, and I went to this family friend, Uncle Jacob, who’s a locksmith. Respectable trade. Only, turns out he had a sideline.”
“Ah.”
“My father didn’t know, but I found out pretty quick, and there you go, really. It’s a better way to make a pile than anything else I could do.”
“But didn’t you want an education too?” Morrow asked. “If all your siblings are going to universities—”
“I’m not the book-learning sort, and there’s a lot of mouths to feed. Anyway his pal, I call him Uncle Louis, he used to be a teacher back in the day before he left France. He made sure I could read and write, which was a bit of a struggle, and taught me my numbers. I haven’t been hard done by.”
“It sounds a bit like you have,” Morrow said. “Unless this is what you always wanted to do.”
“I wanted to help my family and I’ve done it my way. That’s what matters. Is it so odd?”
“Sorry?”
“You look gobsmacked.”
“I’ve got an older brother and sister, and neither of them has spoken to me since my father threw me out when he caught me dressing up in my sister’s clothes.” Morrow said that far too unemotionally for Stan’s liking. “It didn’t cross my mind to ask them for help when Grizzard was leaning on me. I wouldn’t have got it.”
Stan wanted to put a hand over his, just a comforting touch. He wished he could. “Sorry, mate. That’s no good.”
“No. Well. You can’t expect other people to look out for you in this world, can you?”
“Yes, you can, or you should. That’s the point. I look out for my family—”
“And what would they say if you were nabbed?”
“I was, once. Got six months. Mat told our mother I’d been arrested at a political protest, so she was all right with that. And Uncle Louis and Uncle Jacob have always looked after me.”
“And you went out of your way to help a complete stranger when we hadn’t even met,” Morrow said. “Good grief, Stan. Stanislav, was it?”
“You said it right,” Stan observed, stupidly pleased. “Stan’s fine.”
Morrow hesitated, then said, “Chris.” He held out his glass. Stan raised his own. They clinked and drank.
“So if it’s not too personal, how did you get in hock to Kammy?” Stan enquired.
“I didn’t, as such. I made some stupid decisions when I came to London, trusted a few people I shouldn’t have and took some bad advice. I was a hundred and seventy pounds in the hole, but I was getting steady work in the halls and making a plan to sort myself out. Then Kammy bought the debt. I’ve never been so scared in my life. The people I owed before weren’t very nice but they were reasonable. Kammy...was not.” He stared into his pint. “He wanted—do you know what he wanted?”
“I can probably guess.”
“He wanted to whore me out to the sort of men who like my sort of pretty women. Rich men who want a special thrill. I was supposed to let them do whatever they wanted and then rob them.” His throat worked. “And if I got caught I’d be on my own. I couldn’t go to gaol, Stan. Or be arrested, even, or tried. That doesn’t go well for people like me. The papers— But Kammy didn’t care about that, and he didn’t care that I didn’t want to do it. He told me he’d find a handsome fellow for my first, and laughed.”
“The son of a bitch.”
“And I tried. Because by then my debt was somehow two hundred and fifty, with interest, and I really did think perhaps I should just do it because I couldn’t see another way out, but this man— He wasn’t even awful. He was perfectly nice. Obviously I was just there for him to use, but he was very polite about it, which almost made it worse because he was playing at being a gentleman to a lady. And I flirted with him and did everything I was supposed to do, but when it came down to brass tacks and he started touching me, I couldn’t. I thought I was going to be sick. And I ran. I just ran away and he didn’t try to stop me, but it had taken weeks for Kammy to set it up, and he wasn’t pleased. And then Kammy’s man, his nephew, came to tell me what I’d have to do now to work off my debt, and he was vile so I threw a perfume bottle at his head and gave him a nasty cut.”
“Good for you.”
“I’m braver when I’m Christiana. And it was stupid, because it’s why Kammy decided to make an example of me, and that’s where you came in.” He took a deep, shuddering breath. “Goodness. Sorry. Dramatic monologue. I didn’t mean to spill all that on you.”
“It sounds really bad.” Stan had never been an object of anyone’s desire, which suited him very well indeed, but he was pretty sure he’d be sick under similar circumstances.
“It was horrible, all of it. Every night for the last week I’ve woken up in a cold sweat, panicking about it.” Chris looked up at him with an expression in his big brown eyes that stopped Stan’s heart. “And then I’ve remembered that I’m all right. Thank you for saving me.”
“I didn’t do anything.”
“You did. I won’t keep on embarrassing you, but you really did.” He pointed at Stan’s glass. “Another?”
“My round.”
It was almost a relief to go to the bar, to stop looking at Christiana-in-Chris, the way his mouth moved on the rim of the tankard, the shape of his slim fingers. Chris saluted him when he returned. “So what will you do when you retire from this game? Is there a plan?”
“Set up shop somewhere a bit nicer.”
“Selling?”
“Clocks,” Stan said, feeling a bit breathless at the admission. This wasn’t something he talked about much. “Clocks, watches, general timepieces. Antique and modern.”
“You’re an expert?”
“I know a bit. I like the way they work, the mechanisms. I like new ones as well, the way the art’s advancing, and I enjoy repairing them. That must sound dull as ditchwater to someone who likes singing on stage.”
“I wouldn’t say dull,” Chris said thoughtfully. “Not if it’s interesting to you.”
“It is.”
“How?”
“Solving puzzles?” Stan tried. “Getting things working right. Precision. Having a thing do its job as it should. Clockwork’s satisfying. And it’s—I don’t know the right word. You might say predictable, I suppose, but that’s not exactly...”
“There are rules, and you know them,” Chris suggested. “Guiding principles. If not certainties, then at least a pattern you can trust.”
“All that. I like knowing where I stand, that’s the thing. I know where I stand with clocks.”
“Right. I see.”
“You do think it’s dull.”
“No, I don’t. Actually I’d love to know where I stood. I’d love something solid. Do you know Keats’ epitaph?”
“Whose?”
“John Keats. The poet. No?”
“Not really my sort of thing,” Stan said, with some understatement.
“It reads, Here lies one whose name was writ in water. He was complaining about not being as famous as he should have been for his poetry. And we do remember his name—except you, obviously—but really, that’s life for most of us, isn’t it? Names writ in water, here and gone. I’ve got a handful of people who know my name, or a variation on it, and that’s all I’ll have.”
“And there
’s nobody knows my name at all, and if they do they say it wrong,” Stan said. “Do you need other people knowing your name? I mean, I’ll personally count it a success if I never see myself in the papers.”
“Especially not on the trial reports pages. No, not really. That is, we’d all like to be Marie Lloyd, wouldn’t we? It could have been me, the Queen of the Music Hall.” He said that in a campish way, fluttering his long dark lashes with hand to heart, and dropped the pose at once, but not before something inside Stan had squirmed. “No. I don’t think fame brings a great deal of happiness in the end, unless your idea of happiness is gentleman admirers. But I do feel writ in water, and I understand wanting something real, that you’re sure of, and striving for it. I think that’s marvellous, actually.”
“It’s not much of a dream though, is it? I mean, compared to being as famous as Marie Lloyd. I only want to run a clock shop.”
“Just because your dream isn’t like someone else’s dream, that doesn’t make it wrong,” Chris said. “Imagine fitting your own dreams to someone else’s head. You carry on being Stan, you’re good at it.”
He smiled. Stan smiled back, and then, because he had to know, he said, “Are you good at being two people, then?”
Chris’s smile faded a little. “How do you mean?”
“Well, you said you were braver as Christiana. And you move different, talk different. So are you different then? Or is that wrong?”
“It’s not...Ugh. That’s not really it, but it’s hard to explain.”
“You don’t have to,” Stan said hastily. “I’m fine with however you are, it’s none of my business. I just don’t want to think about it wrong when I see you again, that’s all. I mean, on the stage. If it’s all right for me to keep coming to the performances. If you don’t mind.”
“I would love you to come and see me again,” Chris said. “I’ll be upset if you don’t.”
“Really?” Stan said, brightness growing in his chest. “You really don’t mind?”
“I’d really be upset. Please come.” He bit his lip, a tiny movement. “Since you ask...if you call me by what I’m wearing, that makes sense. You know. Easiest for everyone, doesn’t attract attention in the pub.”