Page 40 of Peril in Piccadilly
I nudged Christopher, who nudged Tom, who started up the staircase to the street. Behind us, the music and voices became louder for a second as I assumed the doorman opened the door to the nightclub to start evacuating the guests.
ChapterNine
Partof me half expected to walk through the door into Heddon Street and come face to face with a police cordon. That wasn’t likely to have happened in the time we had been in the cellar, of course, not when Heddon Street had been deserted when we went inside. But my guilty conscience, or whatever you want to call it, nonetheless conjured an imaginary battalion of police officers ready to arrest Christopher and myself, and subject Tom to the law enforcement equivalent of a court martial, as soon as we walked out.
None of that happened. Heddon was just as peaceful and quiet as when we had left it. There was the faint sound of music from below, and the buzz of traffic from Regent Street and Piccadilly, but other than that, everything was silent.
Not that that seemed to calm Tom at all. He gave a quick but comprehensive look around the deserted street before heading for Regent at a good clip. “Come along. Move it.”
This was addressed to Christopher, who traipsed behind, tethered to Tom by the latter’s fingers wrapped around his wrist. As I had seen for myself earlier, the cobbles were uneven and a person was likely to court a twisted ankle if he or she wasn’t careful. Christopher kept up, but he also kept swearing under his breath about the treatment he was receiving.
“Slow down, dammit. I can’t walk as fast as you can in these shoes.”
“Should have thought of that before you came here,” Tom told him, although he did slow down a little. The only reason I noticed was because it made it a little easier for me to navigate the cobblestones, too.
“If I had realized that I’d be required to run for my life,” Christopher said tartly, “perhaps I wouldn’t have done.”
Tom shot him a look over his shoulder. “Don’t you think you ought to have prepared yourself for that, Kit? After the last raid, and the raid before that, and?—”
“He’s got you there, Christopher,” I said, as I minced along behind the two of them.
Christopher sniffed. “I’m well aware, Pippa.” He gave an exaggerated shudder, and added, “Wouldn’t even let me pick up my evening wrap. Now I shall probably get a cold on top of everything else. Not to mention that I shall have to spend the money for a new one.”
Tom muttered something, but by then we were out of the alley and standing on the pavement on Regent Street.
“I can go back for it,” I offered, but Tom shook his head.
“Under no circumstances will either of you set foot in that place again. I’ll buy you a new wrap myself if I have to, Kit.”
The Crossley Tender was parked a few yards away, and Tom tugged Christopher towards it. I followed. Before Tom opened the passenger door, however, he shrugged out of his tweed coat and draped it over Christopher’s bare shoulders. “There.”
Christopher blinked. “Well,” he said after a moment, “it isn’t velvet and ermine, but I suppose it’ll do.”
“Glad to hear it. You’d best go into the back where you’re less visible.”
Tom pulled the door open and moved the front seat forward. Christopher made a moue—I’m sure he would prefer to sit next to Tom—but he didn’t complain, just made his way into the rear of the motorcar.
I ambled over and, as soon as Christopher was situated in the back, fitted myself into the front passenger seat. Tom made certain my skirt had made it all the way into the motorcar and made to close the door. And just as he did, a gentleman in evening kit—one I had noticed out of the corner of my eye, but to whom I had paid no attention beyond that—slowed to a stop as he reached us. “Philippa? Is that you,mein Schatz?”
“Wolfgang.” I smiled brightly, even as I felt Christopher’s consternation from behind me. “What are you doing here?”
He was dressed for an evening out, in a handsome, black overcoat and topper, with a silk scarf around his neck, so the question was mostly rhetorical. He was on his way to a restaurant, or the theatre, or somewhere like that. Perhaps he had a date.
He smiled. “That should be my question, should it not?”
Should it? While I contemplated that, and also how I felt about him possibly going on a date with someone who wasn’t me—was this evening what the note had been about?—Wolfgang nodded to Tom. “Detective Sergeant Gardiner.” He flicked a glance into the back of the motorcar. “And… Lady Laetitia? How lovely to see you again.”
He clicked his heels together and inclined his head. Christopher muttered something non-committal in a breathy, higher-pitched voice than usual, and shrank as far back into the dark of the backseat as he could. His voice sounded nothing like Laetitia’s, and I could see Wolfgang’s eyebrows begin to draw together. Tom must have seen it, too, because he jumped into the fray. “Grafvon Natterdorff. Out on the town?”
Wolfgang took his eyes off Christopher to focus on Tom. “I’m on my way to Piccadilly.”
“I’d offer you a lift,” Tom said, “but as you can see, we’re going in the opposite direction.”
He indicated the nose of the Tender, which was, indeed, facing away from Piccadilly.
Not that I wanted Wolfgang to get into the Tender with us. He didn’t know about Christopher’s habits—or if he had picked up on the fact that Christopher was queer, he didn’t know that my cousin had a penchant for women’s frocks and drag balls—and it was probably best that he didn’t find out. The fewer people who knew about that, the better.
And yes, I do recognize the hypocrisy. Considering that Wolfgang was someone I contemplated marrying. I shouldn’t be keeping secrets from him, even if they were Christopher’s secrets and not my own.
