Page 5 of Peril in Piccadilly
I groaned. “If it’s St George, please don’t let him up. I don’t want to have to deal with him on top of everything else. I’m in enough pain already.”
“Crispin?” Christopher scooted towards the front of the sofa. “Why would it be Crispin?”
I made a face. “We saw him at the Criterion Restaurant after the theatre. Him and Laetitia.”
“Did you really? You didn’t mention that.”
“We had other things to talk about,” I said, indicating my knees and hands. I hadn’t told him about the ring I had turned down either, and that was a much bigger deal than Crispin’s presence in the West End.
Christopher pushed to his feet as the bell from downstairs pealed again. “Sadly, I don’t think he’ll be put off, Pippa. But perhaps you’ll get lucky and it won’t be him.”
Perhaps. Although if it wasn’t Crispin, it was likely to be Wolfgang, and I wanted to see him even less. “I’ve changed my mind. If it’s St George, you can let him up.” Although it probably wasn’t. Laetitia was no doubt keeping him busy. “If it’s Wolfgang, lie and tell him I haven’t gotten home yet.”
“You’ll be explaining that to me later,” Christopher said, but he strode away from me as the buzzer sounded angrily for a third time. “Hold your horses, I’m coming. Hello?”
There was a faint quacking from the other end of the line, recognizable as the dulcet tones of Evans the doorman, ringing up from the lobby downstairs.
“Yes,” Christopher said, “of course, Evans. Send him up.”
He replaced the receiver and turned to me across the parquet floor of the foyer. “You were right. It’s Crispin.”
As if my evening hadn’t been traumatic enough. “Listen, Christopher. Before he gets up here, there are a few things you ought to know…”
Christopher sighed. “Tell me later. I doubt he’ll stay long.”
“I have no idea why he’d be here at all,” I said disagreeably. “We conversed at the restaurant. There is nothing left to say. He has been instructed to address me as Philippa, for your information. Just so you’re prepared.”
“He won’t be doing that here,” Christopher answered, and unlocked the door. “In front of Laetitia, I’m sure he’ll try. In front of you and me, there’s no point.”
He pulled the door open. From down the hall, I could hear the rattling of the lift, and then the sound of the door gliding open followed by the skitter of the grille being drawn back from the opening. Then Crispin’s footsteps. And his voice.
“Evening, Kit.”
“Crispin.”
Neither of them said anything more until Crispin had passed across the threshold into the flat and Christopher had divested him of his topper, gloves, and cane. “Tea?”
“If that’s what you’re having.”
We were having tea, as it happened, although there was also a little something else in it, to help with the pain. I was getting nicely woozy and ready to sleep.
“Hello again, Darling,” Crispin added as he walked into the sitting room, and then he stopped, dead in his tracks, when he got a look at me. “Dear me. Too much time on your knees worshipping Wolfie?”
“Don’t be crude, Crispin,” Christopher told him, with a shoulder check as he walked past on his way towards the kitchenette for another cup and saucer. “Pippa fell down the stairs to the tube.”
“You took the tube home?” He perched on the chair across the table from me, hands in his lap. “At this time of night?”
“I was in a hurry,” I said. “Not that it’s any of your concern.”
He gave my knees and hands one more intent look before moving his attention up to my face. “Yes, I saw you tearing out of the restaurant leaving Wolfie with the bill. What happened?”
“Wolfie—” I grimaced and corrected myself, “Wolfgang was always going to end up with the bill. He invited me.”
“That’s not what I’m asking, Darling, and you know it.”
“Philippa,” I said. “Remember your fiancée.”
“I haven’t forgotten. She isn’t here, so I’ll call you what I want. Focus, Darling.” He snapped his fingers in my face. I scowled, and he added, “What happened with Wolfie?”
