Page 38 of Peril in Piccadilly
“I knew the passwords, yes. Those are common knowledge, at least at the office. I don’t think I know the place in Spitalfields.”
“How about the one in Marylebone?”
“Not that one either,” Tom said. “I suppose I shall have to ask Lord St George for elucidation.”
He turned his attention to the rest of the club and the reason we were here. “Do you see him?”
The old Cave of the Golden Calf was an oppressively low-ceilinged room with brightly-colored but faded murals along three walls. As best I could see through the heavy layer of cigarette smoke, they depicted oceans and jungles and other types of landscapes, in quite a primitive style. One wall showed an array of what were surely natives—naked and brown—frolicking with… were they horses? In some sort of mud-puddle, it seemed, or perhaps just dirty water. There were bare behinds on display—on the wall, I mean, not on the dancefloor—although the figures facing the room were at least decently covered, by what looked like palm fronds or the horses’ heads.
A few divans sat along the walls, and an array of tables had been moved aside to make an open area for dancing in the middle of the floor. What looked like perhaps seventy to a hundred people moved to the sounds of the jazz band playing on the small stage.
Just like the last time I had crashed one of Christopher’s drag balls, it took a moment or two to realize that most of the dancers, even the ones with the high heels in the sparkling gowns, were men. And of course I knew that already, having watched Christopher put on his face and wig and pink frock in front of my makeup mirror a few hours ago. But it was one thing to know it intellectually, and another thing for my eyes to see it. We see what we expect to see, what we’re used to seeing, and at first glance, I saw men dancing with women, the way they do all over London. It was only after the first second that my brain caught up with what I was actually looking at, which were men dancing with other men.
“There,” I said, pointing. Christopher’s petal pink dress was fairly easy to pick out among all the evening suits and darker gowns. “Dancing with the bloke with the carnation in his lapel. Next to the redhead in the seafoam green.”
The red bob was certainly a wig, just like the person in the seafoam was of the male persuasion. It was quite a nice frock he had on, however.
Tom nodded. He started forward, and I grabbed him by the sleeve. “You can’t just grab him and haul him off.”
“I’ve done it before,” Tom said, eyes on Christopher and his jaw tight.
“He’s not doing anything to him.” The bloke with the carnation wasn’t doing anything to Christopher, was what I meant. No one was doing anything to Christopher. He was here of his own free will, and seemed to be enjoying it. His poppy-red lips were curved in a smile, and his eyes sparkled.
And perhaps that was exactly what Tom objected to.
“Why don’t we simply dance our way over there?” I suggested. “Christopher will see us, he’ll understand why we’re here, and he’ll come quietly. There’s no need to cause a scene.”
“There’s every need,” Tom growled. “That… that…chapis feeling him up.”
The emphasis he put on the word made it clear that the word he would prefer to use was one altogether less restrained.
“He’s not.”
Admittedly, the gentleman’s hand was roving over Christopher’s back in a way more suitable to a secluded alcove than the middle of a dancefloor, but it looked no different than what was going on all over the rest of the club.
“Any lower,” Tom said, “and that hand palms Kit’s arse.”
That was rather a crude assessment, if entirely accurate, and for a moment I couldn’t get my voice to cooperate. Tom, meanwhile, didn’t take his eyes off the pair, and I could feel the tension build up around him, like Mount Vesuvius about to blow.
“Let’s dance,” I said brightly when I had my breath back, and held my hands out. Tom’s eyes lingered on the dancefloor for a second before he transferred his attention to me. It was another second before he processed my position and what he was expected to do. Then he nodded sharply, took my hand in his, snaked his other arm around my waist, and pulled me into a quickstep.
I sincerely hoped he did a better job of subterfuge if he ever had to go undercover during work, because there was none here. No slow circling of the floor, to make us look like we belonged. No attention on his dance partner—me—at all. Just a straight line into the middle of the floor, where we ended up next to Christopher and the latter’s dance partner. I elbowed Christopher discreetly in the ribs, and he moved out of the way, courteously, without looking at me.
“Cut in,” I told Tom, and he gave me a look.
“Do you want me to dance with Kit or the other bloke?”
“Christopher,” I said, “of course.”
“And how does the other bloke react to losing Kit and ending up with you?”
I didn’t know, but now that he mentioned it, perhaps I didn’t want to find out. I couldn’t imagine that the other bloke would be happy. I wouldn’t at all be what he wanted.
But needs must. I took my hand off Tom’s shoulder to poke a finger into the bare skin of Christopher’s upper arm.
“Ow!”
He jerked and turned towards me, mouth already open to remonstrate, and then his eyes widened with recognition. “Pippa? What are you doing here? And…” His eyes moved left, or right for him. “Tom? What’s wrong?”
