The protagonist of this story is
Dorian, Earl of Red Gloria, a
beautiful and dashing aristocrat,
aesthete and international art
thief who operates under the code name
'Eroica'. Outrageously, openly gay, he is madly in love with Major Klaus von
dem Eberbach, a foul-tempered foul-mouthed painfully straight (in all senses of
the word) intelligence agent with NATO. Into their story (and series: From
Eroica with Love by Aoike Yasuko) comes the mysterious Sergei (from *his*
series, Papuwa Boy of the South by Shibata Ami.)
A Garden in Paris
1.
An invitation to dinner at the Savoy Hotel with the man of one's
dreams should be enough to make anyone happy, but not when one's beloved
behaves as perversely as Klaus was behaving now. Bad enough that he looked as
if Dorian had some pestilential disease that might be contagious, which from
Klaus' point of view he did: and if only, thought Dorian, gazing dreamily into
the sea-green eyes, Klaus would contract it. But worse, much worse, was being
made to look at other men's pictures: and such unattractive men at that.
"You know the
General, of course," Klaus said as if he doubted it, laying down a photo
of a blond sharp-featured man in his late forties.
"I don't believe
we've actually met," Dorian murmured, barely
giving it a glance.
"No of course you
haven't met," said Klaus testily. "As far as we
know, he's never left his native
Circassia: assuming of course, that it *is* his native Circassia. We can't be
sure of anything about his origins."
"Oh, in that case,
no, I don't know him. I've never been to
Circassia."
Klaus gave him a small
smile. "Why don't you go?" he suggested mildly.
Dorian looked confused.
"But isn't there a war on or something? Or am I thinking of somewhere
else? All those little countries get a touch muddled in my head..."
"It's not just
Slavic countries that get muddled, Lord Gloria, not in *your* head. And yes,
for your information, there is indeed a war on in Circassia and has been for
three years. A very bloody, bitter, sectarian religious war. There are two or
three major armies involved and as many more small ones, and between them
they've succeeded in tearing the country apart. All efforts to stabilize the
situation, or even to negotiate a cease fire, have met with failure."
Klaus sounded rather like a BBC newscaster. Since the BBC news was Dorian's
favourite cure for insomnia, he found himself giving a reflex yawn.
"Religious wars are
always so destructive," he sighed. "And so pointless. Rather like
religion, some people would say."
"No doubt they would,"
Klaus replied with distaste. "But not the kind of person I prefer to
associate with. In any case, the religious problem is minor compared to the
tribal and territorial issues involved. Back of this war there are centuries of
bad feeling, and because of it Circassia has been, until just recently, on the
verge of disintegrating into a number of armed camps and nothing more."
He tapped the photograph.
"But last year, one of the smaller armies began to have a series of
stunning successes. The General is a mercenary with no known religious ties.
Apparently he comes from one of the hill tribes. They've always fought among
themselves but generally held aloof from conflict down in the plains. Using his
own army of mercenaries, bolstered by defectors from other factions, he's taken
three of the major towns and held them against all odds. He's now in the
process of fighting for the capital. If he can take that, some kind of
stability may return to the country."
This was all vaguely
familiar. Dorian supposed he'd seen the face on the cover of magazines like The
Economist and Time. The thatch of sun-bleached blonde hair, the amazingly
bright blue eyes, the sharp features surrounded by a network of tiny, almost
invisible lines... It was a good photograph. And it made him feel a little
cold. The eyes were not quite sane, the mouth betrayed an ambition to be filled
at all costs, and the whole face conveyed a virility that Dorian found oddly-
very oddly- repulsive. Maybe if I were a woman, he thought abstractedly...
"I'm glad I don't
know him," he said without thinking.
Klaus gave him a peculiar
glance. "He's a dangerous and unprincipled man, with neither religion nor
morals. But he's the only hope for the country. NATO wants to keep him alive.
And unfortunately, someone else wants him dead."
"All the other
armies, surely?"
"Naturally,"
said Klaus dismissively. "But this assassination plot appears to have
originated outside the country, and to be connected to someone actually in the
general's camp. Unfortunately our informant was killed in the shelling of
Vbronsk. The details he managed to pass on to us are extremely scanty. The
centre of the plot seems to be in Paris. That being the case we're fairly safe
in assuming that the instigation comes from this man."
A second photograph was
laid beside the first. It showed a large man with a black moustache, in formal
dress, chatting animatedly with a woman in a ball gown and tiara. The face
displayed an almost exaggerated wellbeing and bonhomie, but the pale pursy
little eyes told another story.
"Taken at the Paris
Opera last year. The exiled President is a great supporter of the arts."
"Oh," said
Dorian. "Now this one I *do* know. He has- I mean, he had- quite a nice
Matisse..."
"Please," said
Klaus with distaste, "Spare me the details of your burglarious career. I
dislike thieves almost as much as I dislike perverts, and you happen to be
both."
"I don't think
you've met enough thieves *or* perverts to form a reasonable judgment, Major.
If you expanded your circle a little, you might change your mind."
"One is enough,
thank you. Kindly pay attention to what I'm saying. It's important that you
understand the background to this mission but I'd like to conclude this
interview as quickly as possible."
"Oh very well. But
politics make me thirsty; I hope you don't
mind if I send for reinforcements?
Dorian raised a finger
and a young Beardsley faun of a waiter
appeared at his side, ready with
adoring eyes to take his order.
"More wine,
Major?" Klaus made a stiff sign of refusal. "Ah well, in that case, a
half bottle of the Macon '75 please, dear."
He smiled winsomely at the young man
who trotted off on his errand with the expression of one who has been
vouchsafed a glimpse of the beatific vision.
"If I may
continue..." Klaus said repressively. "The civil war began after a
coup d'état which sent the President- and the fortune he amassed during his
term of office- off to a pleasant exile in Paris. In spite of the fact that
there's virtually nothing left of his native country worth going back to, he
seems desirous of returning. He's been trying to get his supporters in the
capital to arrange an amnesty. The General has said he'll personally castrate
him if he sets foot on Circassian soil. He probably means it."
"Fascinating,"
Dorian murmured, watching the Macon slide into his wine glass. "You're
sure you won't have some, Major? Dear, bring another wineglass. I'm sure he'll
change his mind in time."
Klaus ignored the
interruption. "Now we come to the area where you're involved. Are you
acquainted with the de Marquère family?"
Dorian was surprised.
"Why yes, of course. I've been to the
Baroness' salon several times. A
charming woman, even if she does collect only modern art of the
obstinately ugly school. Braques and Bacon and such. Her husband at least buys
eighteenth century prints: too pale for me, though the composition can be
charming enough..."
"Never mind their
artistic tastes. Our agent said that de Marquère was definitely involved in the
plot. We've been unable to turn up any connection between the de Marquères and
the President beyond the most superficial social contacts, which argues that
the conspirators are being very cautious. But we've discovered a Circassian
connection in the Baron's personal circle, who must be the link between him and
the conspiracy. It's possible that you know him as well."
Klaus laid the third
photograph in front of Dorian. It was an interior shot and the lighting was not
of the best. Madame la Baronne, small and vivacious, was standing next to the
short dapper Baron, her head turned to smile up at a tall pale man on her other
side. Beside the dark bird-like de Marquères, so vivid and alive even in a
photograph, the other's features seemed to lack both definition and expression.
His colouring looked washed out, almost albino, but that might have been the
fault of the photographer who had taken a spur of the moment picture with too
bright a flash.
"I don't think I do,
but then he doesn't seem the sort of person one would remember offhand. It's
hard to tell, with all this dirt on the negative." Dorian's finger
indicated the dark blob which obscured part of the unknown man's face."
"That's an eyepatch.
He lost an eye in the war. It makes him
easy to identify."
"And when he doesn't
have it on, does it make it hard?" Dorian was simply being facetious, but
Klaus stared at him as if he'd been struck in the face. Dorian grew alarmed.
"Major, dear, whatever is the matter? Did I say something I shouldn't
have?"
Klaus blinked and
swallowed hard. "No, no, not at all. I forget occasionally that you are
not always and necessarily a fool, Lord Gloria."
"Darling, you say
the sweetest things," Dorian burbled, covering Klaus' chagrin with
frivolity.
It worked. "Don't
call me darling," Klaus snapped with reflex irritation. "This friend
of the de Marquère's is called M.Serge. He seems to function without a last
name, unless of course that *is* his last name. He runs an antiquarian book and
print store somewhere back of the Boulevard St. Germain, with a number of
distinguished clients, the Baron among them. He's probably the source of those
prints you find so unsatisfactory. Claims to have studied in Berlin, has a
degree in fine arts from the Sorbonne. Travels regularly to Holland, Austria
and Germany, less often to Britain and Italy: always on business, attending
auctions. I'm surprised you don't know him."
"Prints,"
Dorian murmured deprecatingly. "So dull, so--
colourless. Give me a good oil painting
anytime."
"Or else, of course,
you'll take it. Acquaintances say M.Serge is polite and pleasant but not
forthcoming. Solitary, lives by himself, associates with his clients and other
dealers but appears to have no close friends. He travels on a French passport
which gives his irthplace as Circassia. With the present state of that country,
naturally, it's impossible to verify any other facts about him. Including, as
you've just pointed out, whether he really has one eye or two. He lives on the
second and third floors above his bookstore. We want you to break into his
house."
"Oh," said
Dorian, only half pretending surprise. "But... I
mean, what do you want found?"
"Anything that would
tie him to the President or a plot to kill the General. Anything at all
suspicious. Large, unaccounted-for sums of money, lists of names,
correspondence not related to business. Anything, in fact, that might shed
light on the man and his movements."
"But Major- this is
all so vague. If I know exactly what I'm
looking for, of course I can find it
without difficulty. But I'm a
thief, not an agent. How do I know what's
suspicious and what isn't? You know I love to be of use to you, Klaus, but
really, wouldn't one of your own men be better?"
"I've said all this
to the Chief already. He simply won't listen to reason. Tracing the source of
this plot is absolutely important and- though God alone knows why- he's
convinced only you have the background to uncover the truth about M.Serge. I
don't think you've got the knowledge or the common sense to find what we're
looking for, but I've received my orders." Klaus looked at him with an
intensification of the old dislike.
For once, Dorian was
almost inclined to agree with the Major's
assessment. This wasn't his kind of
thing at all. He hoped the stakes weren't too high. Klaus' next statement
immediately disillusioned him.
"NATO of course
informed the General that there was a plot against his life which might involve
some of the men around him, in the hopes that he'd take extra precautions. The
General, unfortunately, is a true hillsmen. His distrust of outsiders is
pathological. He refused to believe a word, demanded the proof we don't have,
accused us of trying to cause disruption in his faction and had our agent slung
out of his camp. If this plot is to be stopped and the country saved from ruin,
we- or rather, you- are going to have to do it alone." Klaus' bleak
expression left no doubt about how he estimated Dorian's chance of success.
"Here are your
tickets to Paris and your hotel reservation. You leave tomorrow morning. I have
to return to Bonn this evening; in fact-" glancing at his watch- "I
must leave for the airport at once."
"But darling- I ran
out and got us tickets for the opera as
soon as I heard you were coming.
Pavarotti is singing Calaf--"
"I don't care for
opera," Klaus said shortly. "Contact me at
this number tomorrow night when you've
completed your mission."
He laid all the papers on
the table. Dorian opened his mouth to protest, his instinctive dislike of the
proposal intensified by Klaus' treating him like some underling who could be
ordered about from here to breakfast. Realization dawned just in time. Of
course Klaus would always obey orders conscientiously and never knowingly
sabotage a mission; but unconsciously he was doing his best to make Dorian
refuse. How tiresome. There was no chance this time of wringing concessions
from the man he loved as the price of his co-operation. Klaus would only resist
adamantly, and report to his superiors that Eroica had refused to give his
services.
Klaus thought he would
fail. Well, that made it all the more imperative that he succeed. Not merely to
be of use to his beloved
but to have that beloved seriously in
his debt. Dorian's self-confidence bounced back from its momentary doubts like
a squash ball off the court wall.
"Of course, darling.
Anything you say. And you *will* drink a
toast to my success, won't you?"
He poured the last of the Macon into the other wineglass and handed it to von
dem Eberbach.
Klaus smiled grimly and
raised his glass. "To your success, Lord Gloria," he said, and drank
it down quickly. Dorian felt giddy with wine and exhilaration.
"How about a kiss
for luck?" he suggested.
"Absolutely not!"
the Major roared, and seizing his briefcase
he strode out of the dining room.
"Au'voir, mon
amour!" Dorian called to his fleeing back, and
sat smiling to himself for quite
fifteen minutes afterwards.
2.
Sitting next day in a
somewhat different restaurant, Eroica was feeling much less buoyant. It might
be spring elsewhere but in Paris the sky was grey and, even in a Fair Isle
jumper, Dorian was distinctly chilly. The dark asphalt streets, still wet with
the rain that was falling when he'd disembarked at Charles de Gaulle airport
this morning, breathed off a cold dispiriting dankness. He'd dropped by the
print store, a narrow three-storey building in the rue Galande, to see what he
could discover in daylight, only to find that M.Serge subscribed to the lunatic
French custom of closing on Wednesday afternoons. It was all very well for
sweet shops and iron mongers in small English villages to be closed on Wednesdays,
Dorian thought in cosmopolitan disgust, but one
expected something more of the City of
Lights.
So now he was sitting in
the Café de l'Odeon at the corner of the Rue St. Germain and the Boul'Mich,
while the thunderous Parisian traffic roared past him and the high-strung
Parisian inhabitants sat smoking all around him. Wet pavement, diesel exhaust
and Gauloises, that was the smell of Paris: and thanks to the latter two, the
air was blue and nearly unbreatheable.
In the right mood and
under the right circumstances Dorian rather liked the Parisians, but today he
found them merely wearing. All the people who passed him leaned forward as if
walking into a strong wind, and the slowest gait visible was a fast scuttle.
Strolling seemed unheard of. Wherever the crowds were going, they obviously
couldn't wait to get there. A little valium in the water supply, Dorian mused,
would do the Parisians absolutely no harm at all... All the young couples at the tables around him-- they were almost
all young, this being the university district, and almost all couples, the
French being hopelessly
heterosexual most of the time-- were
carrying on animated conversations, their hands and the inevitable cigarettes
held in them never stopping for a moment. Dorian felt surrounded by a forest of
fluttering little birds and was obsessively remembering the incomprehensible
punchline to a joke some small American child had once told him on a
trans-Atlantic liner: "Let your pages do the walking through the yellow
fingers." Fortunately the steak and frites he was eating were excellent,
and the pichet of red wine was superb, even for a vin ordinaire. Otherwise he
might almost- almost- have been tempted to forget the whole thing and go
home.
It was ridiculous, to
think of the de Marquères plotting the
death of a Circassian general. Such
nice people, in spite of their
unfortunate artistic tastes. It was, in
fact, owing to those tastes that Dorian's acquaintance with them had been able
to pass beyond a preliminary reconnoitre of the apartment. Surely it must be
someone else?: except that there were no other de Marquères. The present
Baron's grandfather's grandfather had been ennobled by Napoleon III for
efficient victualling of the Emperor's troops, and since that time the family
had produced one male offspring per generation and no more. Dorian had been
admiring a picture of the only son, a dark charmer whose fascination with the
mechanics of banking and the Bourse seemed almost to outstrip his own dear
James', when that piece of information had emerged. He and the Baron had then
commiserated with each other on the frailty of noble titles, always a
melancholy subject for Dorian. But young Jean-Claude, with his Place d'Etoile
friends, hardly seemed the
sort to get involved in assassination
plots of minor East European
generals. Even the Baron seemed more
likely.
Perhaps the de Marquères
were simply being used by this mysterious M.Serge. Dorian was a little vague on
how one went about passing secret information: his mind furnished the words
'cipher' and 'code' and mistily suggested something like a first edition of -
oh, A Rebours, perhaps - no, an antiquarian dealer: Michelangelo's
sonnets, then- with pinpricks under significant words... "My dear
Baroness, could you possibly give this to the President if you see him tonight
at the Opera? I meant to go myself but I have the most excruciating
migraine..." Well, it was not impossible. The clue would be inside
M.Serge's safe: and that
would have to wait another twelve hours
until the dead of night.
Meanwhile, on Wednesdays
the Baroness was 'at home'. The de
Marquère women had always been famous
for the brilliance of their salons. It was a Baronesse de Marquère who'd
charmed Proust out of his cork-lined room, in spite of his horror of parvenues,
and who had cheered Oscar Wilde's exile by inviting a succession of artistic
and charming young men on the afternoons when the Irishman was in attendance.
Another had borne with unruffled equanimity the aging Colette's cats, which
she'd insisted on bringing with her, the passes Garcia Lorca kept making at her
husband, and Alice B. Toklas' regular requests for the recipe of everything she
ate under the de Marquère roof. Only Ernest Hemingway had succeeded in making
her lose her sang froid: she had requested that his one, drunken, visit not be
repeated. The Baron's mother, an even more accommodating woman, had pretended
not to notice when Genet took the
spoons and salt cellars, and had
allowed Cocteau to decorate her
bathroom with a larger than life size
(in certain areas) nude drawing of Jean
Marais.
The rain was still
holding off, andit was a short pleasant walk to the apartment in the Rue de
Bièvre. Dorian was not, in fact, prepared for the gendarmes in the street when
he reached it, who stopped him and civilly inquired his business. They seemed
delighted to learn that he was an English lord and that he was off to visit a
French baron; especially as it transpired that they were presently guarding the
residence of the new Socialist president. Wondering just why the French
insisted on calling themselves republicans, Dorian at last found himself
entering the third floor 'appartement de grand standing', and being kissed on
both cheeks by Madame la Baronne in a cloud of Chanel perfume and a dress from
the same house.
"My dear Lord
Gloria, it's been an age, but simply an eternity, since I saw you last. Henri,
it's Dorian."
"Ah, mon vieux, how
are things going?" The Baron too kissed him twice. Though older than
Dorian cared for, he was still a handsome man, with the high cheekbones and
cat-like good looks common to many Parisians. It was as well that he also
possessed a shapely skull because, like so many of his countrymen, his hair had
started to recede when he was still in his thirties. All those hormones, thought
the Earl, had certain drawbacks. Aloud, he said, "Oh, very well, very
well, thank you. I came to catch the new exhibit at the Louvre. But my dear
Baron, I'm taking you from your guests."
"Oh, that's
alright." He looked down his thin nose with amusement and murmured, sotto
voce, "This lot can take care of themselves. They never stop talking long
enough to notice whether we're there or not. A new fad of Mathilde's. If you're
going to sit in on the conversation, by all means let Georges bring you a gin
and cassis. A double, Georges. And another one for me."
Dorian took his drink
with some hesitation and perched on a deep-gold brocade armchair. A number of
men and women were keeping up a lively conversation, finishing each other's
sentences and laughing uproariously.
"Well," one was
saying, "we no longer need to persevere, since the père sevère has traded
l'amour for la mort-"
"Achieved
closure," another chimed in.
"Taking his père
versions with him," a third laughed.
"He never cared for
mine. Said I kept inserting my Name of
the Father into inappropriate
lacuna-"
"Lacana-"
"Never that. All I
wanted was to bring signification to someone's manque, or some man's c- I won't
say it-"
"Another
repressed signifier?"
"Lack is expressed
by zero, the round hole, hence the signified must be the same above and below
and on both sides. After all, the woman doesn't exist..."
Eroica, who had thought
he understood French, was utterly adrift. "The stern Father?"
"Name of the Father?" It sounded like Christianity to him. Tentatively
he tapped the shoulder of the woman sitting on his right.
"Excuse me, are they
talking about religion?"
She looked at him in
surprise. "No of course not. Penises."
Dorian, who'd thought he
knew something about that subject too, was floored. He looked around for Henri
or Mathilde, hoping for enlightenment or at any rate sanity. But the Baron was
deep in discussion with a solid bull-dog of a man who had 'banker' written
all over him, while his hostess and a
pair of woman friends were
having a simultaneous three-way
conversation, their low voices swooping up and down like swallows and their
hands fluttering like butterflies' wings: "Mais c'est terrible, cette
pauvre fille..." "Bien qu'elle soit un peu complexée, quoi..."
"Mais c'est tout a fait dingue, comme disent les gosses..."
Over in the corner,
however, a single man stood leafing through one of the large folios that the
Baron kept out on the table. A curé of some sort, to judge by the black
cassock: although Dorian hadn't realized the Church had become so liberal in
the length it allowed its priests to wear their hair. This one's blonde
ponytail reached halfway down his back. Was that a soutaine he had on?
On closer view it looked more like some kind of cossack coat with a slightly
tailored waist, its severe black relieved only by a thin red piping on the
front between the high rounded collar and the hem. The skirt stopped just below
the calf,
showing black boots beneath. Something
about the whole ensemble suggested old photographs of Dostoevsky and Rasputin...
"Hello," he
said to the stranger. "Do allow me to introduce
myself. I'm..."
The other's head turned
and Dorian lost his breath. A pale, plain face- no, a pale beautiful face- no, not
pale... Even as he looked it changed almost out of recognition. It was like
watching someone peel the backing off a transfer, the bright colours suddenly
showing clearly where all had been undefined a moment before. Suddenly there
was life and a world of meaning in the wide carved mouth, the long oval face
with its high cheekbones, the upslanting brows, and the thick-lashed-- eye:
because the other one was covered by a black silk eye-patch.
Serge, he thought, but
remotely, while last night's opera sang gloriously in his head: o sognio, o
maraviglia, divina belleza... Their
eyes locked together. Serge's fingers, long and delicate, moved trance-like to
touch, ever so gently and briefly, the ravelled gold silk of Dorian's curls,
and a small spasm shook the slender black-clad frame.
"You are?" The
voice was light in timbre, barely above a murmur.
"Dorian." His
own hand reached undirected to place its first
two fingers on that beautiful mouth.
The warm lips moved as the other said his name, "Serge", making it
into a kiss.
"Shall we
leave?" Afterwards, he wasn't sure which of them had put words to the
thought that was in both their minds. Acting as if they had one consciousness,
they slipped out of the flat, Serge flipping a hand at the Baron over the
banker's head, Dorian kissing the back of Mathilde's neck in passing and murmuring
"A'voir, chérie. Des
affaires..".
Five minutes brought them
to the Rue Galande. Serge unlocked the narrow door and Dorian entered a green
and brown twilight, eyes barely taking in dark wooden bookshelves and display
tables in the dim light that came through the oilcloth blinds. As Serge turned
from locking the door again, Dorian threw both arms about his neck in blissful
anticipation. Oh. Oh, but--no...
"Oh, my dear,"
he said involuntarily to the look in back of the other's face. No; this was not,
after all, going to be one of those long, slow, friendly sessions he himself
liked so much. Not unless he insisted, and he didn't think he could. When you
offer a meal to a starving man you don't make him sit through cocktails and
canapes and an hour's chat beforehand. Serge's face in the darkened room was
like a panther's glimpsed in the forest, full of a desperate hunger. But he was
keeping himself rigidly in check, refusing, even now, to reach and grab for
what he most needed.
There was no time to debate
the whys and wherefores. Dorian
opened his arms wide, palms up. Take
me, I'm yours. The only line of Rabelais he knew came conveniently to mind to
make his meaning plain. "Fay ce que vouldras," he said, and gave his
sweetest smile.
An answering smile flashed
briefly across the pale features,
then Serge's arms were around him and
his face buried in the mass of Dorian's curls. Hot breath, warm lips and
blunted teeth stormed up and down the side of his neck, across his earlobes and
over his temples. Strong fingers grasped his hips and pressed their groins
tightly together. The Circassian knew what he wanted and Dorian had only to let
him do it. This was all for Serge; his own needs could wait until later. Still
he found himself longing for the moment when that exquisite mouth would come
down on his own. Perversely, it didn't. His eyebrows, his eyelids, the hollow
of his cheekbones, the back of his neck, all were subjected to a fierce and
passionate adoration, but Serge bypassed his lips as if they didn't exist.
A faint sense of
frustration tormented him but there were soon other, pleasanter torments to
think about. The circular motions of the other's thighs had begun a fire
between his legs that made the tight raw silk trousers he wore a hell of
confinement. He undid the buttons of his fly, giving himself some relief. Serge
pulled the bottom of his jumper free and slipped it up and over his head. The
sight of the Earl's naked torso seemed to excite him further: a new shower of
kisses fell on the bare shoulders and chest. Filament-fine strands of yellow
hair brushed
down Dorian's skin, starting small
shudders that had nothing to do with distaste. Long cool hands traced parallel
lines on either side of his spine and slipped at last into the back of his
trousers, moving down and ever down to the base of his body.
Dorian could only cling
tightly with his arms around the other's
neck, feeling himself begin to slide
away on a tide of pleasure. Serge steered them to the nearby desk. Loosing him
just long enough to strip off his coat, fold it to a double thickness and lay
it down as impromptu padding, he bent Dorian over the polished oak surface.
Dorian's face nestled against the smooth fine-woven wool that smelled faintly
of Sobranies and an indefinable odour that must be Serge's own, while his
forearms and hands rested on the smooth worn desk top. He breathed deeply to
relax the tension of anticipation, his finger tip idly tracing the shallow
grain of the wood, while Serge pulled out a drawer and rummaged in it briefly.
Behind him there was the quick snick of a zipper opening and a whisper of
cloth. Strong fingers took hold of the waistband of his own trousers and peeled
them down to his knees.
The mounded cream was
cold at first, but warmed as Serge rubbed it gently into the narrow declivity
and through the tight opening. A supple finger pushed itself in up to the
joint, checking his readiness; satisfied with his acquiescent openness, it
withdrew. Serge took hold of his hips, poised himself, and entered swiftly and
smoothly. The worst moment was over almost before he could feel it, and he
found himself once again in that happily ambiguous place where pain was
indistinguishable from pleasure and pleasure so intense as to be painful.
The familiar fire began
to run through his veins, from the centre of his body up to his forehead and
back down his spine and legs. Serge was perfect, neither too big nor too small,
filling him up beautifully. He adjusted his hips minutely to give the other the
most complete access, and in response that lovely fullness began to move out of
him, but slowly, so slowly, a centimetre at a time. Dorian knitted his brows in
puzzlement. Why? Is he afraid of hurting me...? With infinite care,
Serge withdrew almost completely, waited a long, long moment, and came back at
the same agonizingly deliberate pace. Dorian fretted, his fire
dampened and flagging. This is too
slow, he thought, I can't stand
it, but he willed himself to patience:
this one was for Serge.
Once more Serge quitted
him unhurriedly and then repaired back again in a leisurely fashion, apparently
with all the time in the world. Dorian could have cried with vexation. Where
was the violent ravishment promised a few moments before in that beautiful
animal-like face? Deep within him he felt again the minute movements of
withdrawal but this time there was a difference in his response. Subtle nervous
messages, usually drowned out by the rising clamour of lust, were coming across
loud and clear, tiny responses and unsuspected sensations producing a
cornucopia of unknown pleasures. He felt every millimetre of that careful
retreat and fought it each step of the way. The long instant when Serge stood
within the threshold of his body stoked the fire of
anticipation, and every atom in him
welcomed the loving, painstaking return.
Time as he usually
thought of it ceased to have meaning: awareness was all turned inward to the
exquisite minuet his heightened nerves were playing. Oh, he thought, but
joyfully this time, I can't stand it, I can't stand it. This had definitely
been worth waiting for.
He reared up on his
forearms, the better to receive the gentle thrusts, and Serge's arms came round
to encircle his belly and chest. His climax began mounting in him, slowly and
relentlessly, a heat so intense as to seem almost cold. His fingers clutched
convulsively at the material wadded beneath him. Serge's coat... A slight alarm
sounded in the back of his head. There were few things that Dorian rated higher
than sexual pleasure, but fine workmanship was one of them. For a hideous
instant the certainty of a world-shattering climax fought his
instinctive respect for a beautiful
object. Aesthetics, alas, won.
"Serge- love,"
he gasped, "Just a moment. Your coat..."
The deliberate movement
stopped, disconcerted. The body welded to his began to shake. Serge put his
head down on Dorian's shoulder and laughed silently but convulsively, so hard
that he slipped out from him entirely.
"I'm sorry,"
said Dorian, crestfallen in more ways than one.
Serge shook his head, the loosened hair
flying.
"It's- it's
alright," he gasped. "I shouldn't have laughed.
Shall we start again?"
Without waiting for an
answer he knelt and pulled Dorian's pants off completely, prising the shoes off
along with them. He was in no hurry to get up, seeming to feel a need first to
kiss and caress every inch of the sensitive skin on the back of Dorian's legs.
By the time he reached the swelling hills at the top, Dorian was in a fair way
to being in his previous condition. He pushed the coat to the far end of the
desk: a wise precaution, because Serge's mouth suddenly enveloped the sac
between his legs, causing a sprinkle of dew to fall on the desktop. He rocked a
little on his toes, wanting to have his partner inside him before his climax
came.
"Darling," he
gasped through the pounding in his blood, "Please- take me..."
Serge complied- but with
his tongue. Strong and pointed, it
darted between his cheeks, focussing
unerringly on what had become
the tight centre of Dorian's being. It
was more than he could bear. Fists clenched, mouth open, he succumbed so
fiercely to his orgasm that for a few moments it was as if he ceased to exist
entirely.
When he came back to
himself, Serge had him turned around and
was holding him against his chest.
Raising a flushed wet face, he
found the one grey eye regarding him
with both tender satisfaction
and the predatory sparklings of lust.
"Ready?" the
other murmured, and Dorian nodded. Serge laid
him on his back on the desk, legs
hooked over his shoulders.
Stretching out a hand for the cream he
renewed their lubrication, then entered him with the same easy mastery as
before. He repeated the slow deliberate stroke, a little faster this time, in
and out, then harder and harder. His long fine hair had slipped out of its band
and fell across the blind sweating face as he laboured within Dorian. When the
spasm began Sergei reached over and pulled him up by the shoulders; responding
to his cue, Dorian wrapped arms and legs around the heaving body and held him
through the violent upheaval of his climax.
Serge shook for several
moments afterwards, his face buried in the waves of golden hair and his breath
sobbing in Dorian's ear. Gradually he calmed, the muscles growing slack and
relaxed. At length he looked up. His face was streaked with sweat and tears,
and a painful red line showed across his forehead where the band of the
eyepatch had shifted a little, but his expression was composed.
"Thank you," he
said, simply.
"The pleasure's
mine," said Dorian. "You're a very patient lover."
"My partners are
patient. I'm just slow. I assure you I've
had complaints."
"The best things are
always worth waiting for," Dorian rejoined cheerfully, retrieving his
pants, "and that was definitely one of the best I've ever
had."
"You're very kind,"
Serge said with an odd formality. "May I
offer you a little hospitality? My
apartments are upstairs..."
"Thanks," said
Dorian. "I'd be glad to freshen up a bit. Lead
on, dear."
3.
Serge took him silently
up the cold stone stairway at the back of the building and unlocked a thick oak
door on the second floor. Pushing aside the moss green velvet curtain which
covered the entranceway on the inside, he let his guest into a parqueted foyer,
dim in the halflight. He flicked on the overhead chandelier and pressed another
button, hidden behind the curtain, which Dorian recognized as a security alert
attached probably to the nearest police station. The walls of the hallway were
papered in lozenged burgundy above dark wood panelling, and dotted here and
there with gilt mirrors and miniature oil paintings. Halfway along
the corridor Serge indicated a bathroom
to Dorian, and left him there to put himself to rights.
Fifteen minutes later,
feeling better for a little hot water, sandalwood soap, and a thick white towel,
he emerged and went in search of his host. Following an enticing smell of
coffee and the muted clink of china, he found him in a pale green and gold
livingroom, setting out small cups and saucers next to the large brass samovar.
"Do you drink
coffee?" Serge asked. "It's very black."
"The way I love
it," Dorian assured him, coming over and
hugging him from behind,
"Serge."
"Call me
Sergei," he said, crossing his arms over Dorian's.
"Is that your real
name?"
"What it turns into
in Russian. A bit closer to the original
than the French."
"French isn't much
good with foreign names, is it?" Dorian agreed, remembering how he tended
to turn into 'Milord Rei de Gloire' on hotel registers.
"And the dialect I
speak is one of the more difficult ones. My real name is virtually
unpronounceable by foreigners."
"Try me."
He did. The 's' was still
there, but the vowel had an unfamiliar roll, the r was flapped, the g was
somewhere between a v and an f, and the whole thing ended in a suppressed
sneeze.
"I suppose I shouldn't
ask about your last name," said Dorian, a little appalled.
"Better not,"
Sergei agreed serenely. "May I ask yours?"
"Red Gloria- but
it's my title, not my name. I'm an earl-- an
English nobleman," he explained,
remembering European insularity
about British noble orders.
Sergei turned his head,
amusement lighting his face. "I'm
honoured."
"Not at all. Earls
are fairly thick on the ground in England."
"My father was a
sheep farmer. His son has definitely come up
in the world."
The curving smile and mischievous
eye made Dorian's legs go
weak all over again. He'd never known
anyone with such a shifting clear-and-cloudy beauty as Sergei's: but when the
sun was shining, as it was now, he was irresistible. Dorian didn't even try. He
turned the pale face towards him and reached over to give it a kiss. Sergei
laid his hand gently but firmly over Dorian's mouth.
"I'm sorry," he
said, sounding it. "I can't."
"But darling, why
ever not?"
"It's a long
story." His finger stroked Dorian's lips tenderly but his expression
showed no sign of giving in. "Just accept that that's the way it is."
Dorian acquiesced
gracefully- for the moment. He knew he was lucky that his own nature led him to
have preferences rather than prejudices, and he tried to be patient with those
partners whose ideas of masculinity forbade them the enjoyment of certain
pleasures: patient, at least, until he could bring them round to a more
balanced view of the matter. Well, like Klaus... But not being able to kiss
Sergei's mouth was a definite deprivation: and, really, nothing else about him
suggested one of those he-men who think tenderness an effeminate intrusion on
manly sex. He was going to have to get to work very soon on this annoying
little quirk of Sergei's.
Meanwhile he picked up
his coffee cup and changed the subject.
"This is a lovely
room. Did you decorate it yourself?"
"Yes, mostly. A
pastoral theme."
It was easy to see what
he meant. On the pale-green toile de
Jouy wallpaper, 18th century shepherds
and sheperdesses cavorted
charmingly. The arm chairs and the
small sofa were covered in floral silks, and the gold-green rug was dotted with
small flowers. The furniture was light, cream-coloured Louis XV, court chairs
playing at being peasant furnishings. On one wall, a large tapestry showed a
group of women doing much the same thing, reclining gracefully under a tree
with their silken skirts arranged to good advantage, listening to a white
wigged shepherd reading verse from a book.
"It's based on
Watteau's Divertissements Champêtres," Dorian
said, recognizing the subject.
"Quite right. Do you
collect as well?"
"As much as I can.
Oils and porcelain, mostly." He smiled
mischievously at Sergei. "I find
prints depress me. So washed out.
And oil paintings are so glorious, so
warm..."
"And so expensive.
Especially in this period. The masterpieces are all in galleries. You can have
third rate artists at astronomical prices, or a simulacrum, like that." He
indicated the tapestry.
"I don't believe in
settling for second best," Dorian said firmly.
"I used to agree
with you. If I couldn't have the real thing it seemed more honest to have
nothing. Now I'm not so sure. There's a certain comfort in substitutes. They
remind you that the real thing exists, even if not for you."
"But why not
for you?" Dorian argued. "If you want a thing it
belongs to you already. Acquiring it is
just a formality."
Sergei was looking at him
with an odd tenderness. "If you want a thing, it probably is yours.
You're a very rare type. Most of us have to settle for what we can get- or what
we can keep." His hand went involuntarily to his right eye.
"You lost that in
the war?"
"Along with other
things," Sergei said, turning his head aside. "I suppose the Baron
told you?"
In fact, Dorian couldn't
immediately recall where he'd heard the story. He was more concerned that
Sergei was withdrawing from him and he sought for a topic to bring him back.
"Mm," he said.
"It was you who supplied de Marquère with most
of his collection?"
"A large amount.
Now, there's a man who actually prefers prints to oils. I think he finds them
more- rational, if you understand me. He said once that he thinks oil paintings
overdone. Mind you, we were talking about his wife's collection at the time, so
perhaps it's not the medium itself he objects to."
"They are
ugly, aren't they?"
"And she's such a
nice woman."
"And you? Which do
you prefer? You don't have any prints
here, I noticed."
"Books are my
passion and prints are merely business. That way I avoid the dealer's
temptation, to keep the best stock for oneself; and meanwhile the rent still
has to be paid. But as between paintings and prints- I don't know. Sometimes I
agree with the Baron. The world in the oil paintings- so sensual, so enticing,
so fraudulent. It's not true, any of it. But I love them. Watteau, Fragonard,
Boucher... That image of an Arcady: the perfect garden world where
shepherdesses wear silk and powdered wigs, and life is a picnic on a long
summer's afternoon."
His glance flicked over
at Dorian, as if wondering how much he would understand. "My country is
beautiful in a primitive way- the mountains at dawn, or the sunsets in winter;
but there's no... no grace, no delicacy," he said as if in explanation.
"The men are farmers, and like farmers everywhere concerned mostly with survival.
From time to time they get drunk and start fights with each other; that's their
idea of fun. I think they have feuds more to break the monotony of their lives
than to get a little more land. The women marry at fifteen and are
grandmothers- crones- twenty years later. When I look around me here, I can't
believe such a place exists. I don't know how anybody stands it. No books, no
paintings, no music to speak of; no scholars, no ideas, no
conversation..."
Sergei turned to him with
a smile that meant to be sardonic but which succeeded only in being rueful.
"I'm greedy, Lord
Gloria. I want it all. I want the beauty of my country, the simplicity of my
life there; and I want the pleasures and amenities of civilization. In short, I
want an Arcady, where the shepherds discuss the nature of love while they shear
their sheep."
Dorian remembered a
summer spent on his godfather's farm in
Shropshire. "Have you ever sheared
a sheep? They don't give you much chance for conversation."
Sergei laughed
delightedly. "No they don't. Sheep deserve all
their reputation for stupidity and then
some. But I'm surprised
you know."
"Landed gentry often
means just that. We're supposed to know
how to manage our farms. But the
flies-"
"And the green
shit-"
"And your hands get
so greasy-"
"Lanolin is
good for the skin."
"But it smells. I'll
take mine from a tube."
"A jar, actually.
It's what I keep in the desk."
Dorian blushed
beautifully at the memory.
"So you've created
an Arcady for yourself here. And the
shepherds?"
"There are enough of
them. Willing and agreeable young men; and being French, they certainly know
how to converse. It's more a question of getting them to shut up at critical
moments. They take ideas seriously and life- including romance- not at all.
Love comes and it's wonderful, and then it goes and it's sad, and then it comes
again. Very pleasant and bittersweet, like a Piaf song. But I'm rattling on.
Sorry. I'm usually what we call at home a no-mouth."
"Meaning?"
"Meaning I don't
talk much. More coffee?"
"Please."
Dorian handed over his cup.
"If you'll wait a
moment, there are some cakes from Printemps
as well." Sergei disappeared in
the direction of the kitchen leaving his guest, bemused, to consider the things
his host had left unsaid.
After all these months
besieging the barbed and barricaded citadel of Major Klaus von dem Eberbach, it
was a pleasure to be with someone as velvety smooth, as silkenly supple, as
Sergei. The same ideas, the same tastes, the same values: all welcoming and
easy, with no little frictions, no resistances. Sergei was like his own beloved
Arcadia, a civilized garden within walls made only for delight. One could
wander there at will, picking flowers and whiling away the time, with no
thought but of pleasure. A few years ago that would have been enough for
Dorian; and a few years ago he wouldn't have noticed anything more. It must
have been his experience with Klaus that had sharpened his vision: for now he
could see, clear as noonday, that in the centre of the garden was a tower, and
in that tower a man whom, he suspected, few if any of
his lovers knew existed. Poor Sergei.
That was the real hunger in him: not for sex, whatever he himself might think,
but for someone who would have the love and the patience to besiege his
isolation, demanding that he show himself as he truly was: someone who would do
for him what Dorian was doing for Klaus.
And poor Dorian, if it
came to that. Sergei knew himself better than the Major; he would be much more
appreciative of Eroica's efforts. Whereas Klaus- beautiful, delightful,
damnable Klaus- fought him at every turn, not giving an inch. But then again,
maybe not. Sergei was obviously a veteran in the wars of love, one who knew all
the tricks of strategy and sieges. It would be no easy matter to reduce his
defences. Whereas Klaus had only the one weapon at his disposal, an hysterical
denial of everything Dorian stood for; and when that was exhausted and his
native honesty asserted itself, the citadel would capitulate at once and
entirely. There was at least that advantage in loving a man with a
scrupulous conscience.
But how long would it be?
When would he be as comfortable with Klaus as he was with this man he'd met
less than two hours ago? He wanted the same friendliness, the same easy
intimacy, the same delight in Klaus' face when Klaus looked at him...
Sergei, behind him,
brushed a finger down the side of his cheek.
"Whoever he is,
can't you forget him for a little, now that
I'm here?"
Dorian smiled up. "I
will if you kiss me."
Sergei lifted the heavy
mass of golden curls with both hands
and leaned down to kiss the bare nape
of Dorian's neck.
"On the mouth,"
Dorian insisted, pouting. Sergei smiled a little sadly.
"I told you, I
can't."
"Not even for
me?"
"Not even for
you."
"This is
torture."
"I'm sorry. No-one
else has minded much."
"No-one else has my
aesthetic instincts. Everything beautiful in the world belongs to me by right.
And your mouth is extremely beautiful. Why are you keeping it from me?"
Sergei sat down beside
him.
"Try to understand.
In my country we are very conservative. Men like me-"
"Us."
"How easily you say
it. Men like us fear for their- our- lives. In my village, what we did
downstairs would get us stoned in the streets."
"This isn't your
village, it's Paris. Isn't it time you got
rid of your country attitudes?"
"That's not
it." Sergei sighed. "This is hard to explain. When
did you first fall in love?"
"When I was four.
The gardener's boy. I used to steal lump sugar from the tea-table and give it
to him in the potting shed."
Unexpectedly, Sergei laughed.
"I was a little older. After my
father was killed, my oldest brother
took over the family. I had brains- well, he thought I did; and he decided I
should go on to high school in the city down in the plains. I made a friend
there." His eye was distant, looking at a memory too private to bring a
change of expression to his face.
"We were
inseparable. Studied together, ate together, bathed
together, shared a bed at night- nobody
in my country sleeps alone; we don't have the space. You can imagine what it
would be like even here, a hundred adolescent boys cooped up together with no
women around at all. At home we see only our mothers and our sisters until they
get married; I seldom met even my brothers' wives. And in my country men touch
each other all the time, and kiss and embrace. The boys made jokes, of course.
There was a lot of smutty horseplay. Everybody seemed to know what men do
together. That was how I found out as well."
"And there were
romantic friendships. The literature of my country, what there is of it, is all
medieval sagas-- comrade warriors who use the same shield as a pillow, who
swear vows of eternal devotion the night before the battle and die in each
other's arms the next day. For him, I think, our friendship was like that. At
least I hope, now, that it was."
"He always had an
arm around my shoulder or my neck, and he would kiss me when he was happy or
excited, which was a lot of the time... We did everything but have sex
together. I wanted to, but I was afraid to ask; afraid he would look at me as
if I was a monster and begin to hate me; afraid that I would lose the happiness
I had, even if it wasn't perfect... I hope he wasn't thinking the same thing,
wanting me but afraid to say it."
Sergei fell silent.
Dorian put his arms around him. "What
happened?"
"There was a battle,
our first one. Battle: five hundred men
fighting over a few acres too barren to
do anything but graze goats on. I never thought twice about it at the time.
Everyone in my country is a soldier. You fight for your kinsmen and your
kinsmen's allies. It's what a man does." He paused. "We kissed each
other before the fighting started, like Turmis and Bayalim leaving the keep,
going out to face the Turks." There was another pause. "I've never
told anyone else about this. I don't know why--" He drew a deep breath,
then said without expression, "I was there when he died. I knew then that
he would be the last man I'd ever kiss like that. A little later I left home,
left my country, and began wandering. And that's the whole story."
He started to move away
but Dorian held him tightly.
"That's so
beautiful," he said, swallowing the lump in his throat, "and I'm so
sorry." He blinked away tears. "Are you angry that I made you tell
me?"
Sergei relaxed against
him. "No," he said eventually, "No,
I'm not." He turned in Dorian's
arms and took his face between his
hands as if it were a precious object.
Once again the sun shone through the clouds, lighting up the pale features from
within.
"Whoever he is, he's
a lucky man."
"He doesn't want
me."
"He will. How could
he resist?"
Dorian smiled, wobbly but
cheekily. "That's what I think. But
he does."
"Lord Gloria, you're
wonderful. You're like an August morning
after a week of Parisian rain. Come
upstairs. There's one more thing I should show you."
He took him to the stairs
leading to the third floor, talking
as he went.
"You must have had a
classic English education. I suppose you
read Vergil?"
"Endlessly. I
preferred Catullus.
"Some people do.
What Vergil? Just the Aeneid? Or did you
make it to the Eclogues?"
"Possibly. I forgot
it all as soon as I could."
"So you wouldn't
remember the second Eclogue? "'Formosum
pastor Corydon ardebat Alexim/ delicias
domini, nec quid speraret
habebat."'
"Oh, that one,"
said Dorian, enlightened. "'Corydon the
shepherd burned with love for his
master's favourite/ Handsome
Alexis, but saw little reason for
hope.' We used to pass it around
the dormitory at night. Poor old
Corydon. I always felt sorry for
him, turned down by a spoiled little
tart like that."
"A certain Frenchman
agreed with you, back in the eighteenth
century. He rewrote the story in heroic
couplets and gave it a happy ending." Sergei was leading him down the
length of the corridor, passing half opened doors on the way. Dorian had a
glimpse of a deep rose canopied bed with dark wooden posts in one room, and
ceiling high bookshelves with tobacco-coloured leather armchairs in another.
But the room they turned into, on the right near the end of the hall, was small
and nearly unfurnished, containing only a plain mahogany escritoire and chair,
several filing cabinets, and a conspicuous wall safe.
"I keep it locked in
here for security," Sergei said, and
confused Dorian by walking right past
the safe. At his noise of
surprise the Circassian stopped and
smiled.
"That?" he
asked, nodding at the large metal plate. "Window
dressing. Accounts and tax returns and
so on. The really valuable things are here." He stopped at a point halfway
along the opposite wall and ran his hands down the narrow rectangular molding.
The whole panel came out, revealing the door of a much smaller safe. His long
fingers spun the dial, opened the door and took out a canvas packet which he
brought over to the desk.
Carefully he unwrapped
the layers to reveal a quarto volume
bound in cream calfskin, with the name
printed on the spine in faded gold lettering: Les Amours d'Alexys et Corydon.
"No names, either of
the author or illustrator," Sergei noted. "Homosexuals were still
castrated and burned at the stake in eighteenth century France. That's why it
was published in Leiden. But the pictures speak for themselves. You can guess
whose work they are." He opened the book at random.
The elongated wavering
letters of eighteenth century typeface
covered the right hand page, but
Dorian's eye went at once to the left, where a ringletted young shepherd,
wearing buskins and nothing else, was depicted in a very friendly pose with a
slender dark-haired youth of classical mien. The tender pink flesh, the shining
golden hair, the rose red of the dark youth's mantle and the deep green
surrounding trees glowed richly in spite of age, causing Dorian's pulse to beat
more strongly.
"Watteau," he
murmured, almost absently, and turned to another page. Here the two young men were seen at the moment
of consummation, a tangle of arms and legs on the greensward: but the faces
showed a serene, unhurried happiness as they gazed tranquilly into each other's
eyes. Dorian made a little noise, almost of pain.
"Corydon is you to
the life," Sergei said. "I saw it at once." It was true, but he
barely noticed; for Alexis' face could have been drawn from Klaus'. A young
Klaus, one he had never known, no more than eighteen. He turned the pages
slowly, poised between delight and agony at the sight of himself and Klaus
indulging unstintingly in all those pleasures which the real Klaus would never
allow him. He couldn't bear to go on looking and he couldn't bear to stop. At
last he put both hands down on the table and closed his eyes, trying to still
his trembling.
"Sergei," he
said, using words he'd never thought to hear from his mouth, "What do you
want for it?"
He knew the answer before
the other spoke. "I'm sorry. It's
not for sale."
"Why not?" he
asked from the depths of his frustration, but
suddenly he knew that answer too.
"The same reason you won't kiss me?"
Sergei nodded. "Not
a close resemblance, but enough. It made
my heart stop the first time I saw
it." His forefinger briefly stroked the head of the dark figure as if it
caressed the hair of a living being. A pang of jealousy went through Dorian,
but he tried to calm it. It wasn't Klaus Sergei wanted, only someone long dead
who looked a little, just a little, like him. That was understandable. Taking
what comfort he could, Dorian put both arms around the other's neck and hugged
him hard. Sergei hugged him back. In the next room a clock played a short
minuet and struck five.
"Lord Gloria."
"Can't you call me
Dorian?"
"I'm a peasant. It
pleases me no end to have an aristocrat in
my arms. Dorian-- I have to go to Dijon
tonight on business. I return tomorrow evening. Will you still be in
Paris?"
"Yes. What time will
you get back?"
"Not before eight.
Can you come then?"
"Yes."
"If something comes
up, where shall I leave a message?"
"I always stay at
the Georges V. Can I reach you here?"
"Yes. I'm in the
book."
Serge escorted him down
the two flights of stairs. In the
store he kissed him on both cheeks.
"Until tomorrow."
"Until
tomorrow." Dorian waved his fingers, and walked out into the street.
4.
Dizzy with joy and
excitement and frustration, he walked unseeingly towards the Boul' Mich. What
luck, what a find, how beautiful... He wasn't entirely certain if he meant the
Watteau prints or Sergei or some combination of both. Those intimate glowing
pictures, mixed with the memories of the preceding love-making, contrived to
send him into a fever of desire. He wanted that book, he wanted Klaus, he
wanted Sergei; it-- he-- they belonged to him. And by some
incomprehensible quirk of a sadistic universe, at the moment he didn't have any
one of them. Patience, patience. Patience. He would have them all, soon
enough. What he needed now was some distraction to keep him
occupied until his meeting tomorrow
with Klaus. Well, of course, first of all he had to take care of Klaus' errand
itself. That assassination plot. He was supposed to break into--
It felt like walking into
a wall. For a moment his mind floundered in confusion, as if he'd just been
startled out of a deep sleep. It took several moments of concentration before
he could accept the plain fact, which somehow had simply not occurred to him
before. Incredible as it was, the M.Serge whom Klaus suspected of promoting an
assassination was the Sergei he'd just spent the afternoon with.
He put a hand to his
spinning head, and collapsed into a nearby café chair. How lucky that there
were always cafés in Paris. You never knew when you were going to have to sit
down in a hurry.
But it was ludicrous.
Sergei was no murderer. No-one with his
beautiful sensibilities could be involved
in anything of the sort.
Klaus was simply wrong: about him,
about the Marquères, about the
whole situation. He'd call him up and
tell him- that number was still in his wallet... And how would he convince his
dear obstinate Major of what he knew to be the truth? "You're saying he's
not a killer because you slept with him?!?" No, obviously that
approach wouldn't work.
Well, there was no help
for it. On principle he disliked the idea of breaking into an acquaintance's
house. It was, if nothing else, bad manners. But his motives were impeccably
disinterested: he wanted only to clear Sergei of this ridiculous suspicion.
When his safe proved to be empty of anything incriminating, Klaus would have to
turn his attention to finding the real plotters; and maybe someday Dorian would
tell Sergei how he'd burgled his house to prove that he wasn't an international
assassin.
Since the place was
empty, there was no need to wait til the
dead of night before making his entry.
Accordingly, after returning to his hotel for dinner and a change into black
clothes, Dorian was back in the Rue Galande well before eleven. The French
bourgeoisie- healthy, wealthy and wise as ever- went to bed at a ridiculous
hour, so the neighbouring apartments were mostly dark as he began his ascent up
the building and entered by an attic skylight. The low garret space barely gave
him room to stand up in and he ran quickly down the two flights to the front
hallway. Shutting off the alarm as he had seen Sergei do, he returned to the
small room on the third floor.
Ever cautious, he did his
reconnoitring by torchlight. Business before pleasure, he thought, and worked
at the larger wall safe for a minute or two before hearing the click of the
tumblers. As Sergei had said, there were accounts and tax files and records of
major orders; a boring mass of paper kept under lock only to preserve it from
possible fires. He closed the door with a sense of duty done and turned his
attention to the hidden safe. Sergei had been quick as he opened it, but Eroica's
practised eye had noted the combination automatically.
Heart beating wildly, he
took out the quarto. Just one look, he thought, unwrapping it and opening the
stiff covers. Yes, there it was, as beautiful as he remembered: himself and
Klaus disporting themselves in Arcadia. Klaus kissing him passionately, Klaus
lying on his back with raised legs, Klaus--hmm, what was Klaus doing in this
one? Or was it a question of what he was doing to Klaus? Either way, it didn't
look anatomically possible, although it might be fun to try. The Major didn't
have, as far as he knew, a particularly bad back, and a few pillows might
relieve the strain if one were to undertake it in an indoor setting...
With a superhuman effort,
Dorian closed the book. If he wanted the real Klaus, he'd better get on with
the business at hand. Now for the rest of Sergei's papers.
There were very few. A
thin notebook contained a list of
names and phone numbers. Michel,
Jean-Luc, Thierry, Menoud... There were no last names: Sergei's 'shepherds',
presumably. A bulky manila envelope held a large number of new Deutschmarks,
probably for buying trips in Europe; as good an international currency as any.
And in the wooden box...
They were handwritten,
five or six sheets of thin onionskin
paper, each with numbers at the top
that looked like dates. So they must be letters: but he couldn't read a word of
the foreign script. Letters from home, no doubt. No doubt in his mind.
But when Klaus asked him what was in the safe, and he answered-- a list of
names and phone numbers, a large amount of money, and letters in a foreign
language; well, it was easy to see how that could all be made to add up to a
suspicious total. Dorian considered his dilemma. It was no use thinking of
lying: the Major seemed to have a second sense for his prevarications and
dissimulations. But the only
alternative was to take the letters, and this occasioned a slight crisis of,
not so much conscience as aesthetics.
Eroica had stringent
principles when it came to his metier. He took what would make Dorian Red
Gloria happy and left the rest. Stealing someone else's letters was-- vulgar:
like a private detective tracking a straying husband. Dorian disliked having
the integrity of his romanticism compromised by mundane theft, but in a good cause
he could stoop to anything.
And this was unarguably a
good cause. It was necessary to clear Sergei of suspicion and necessary to
satisfy Klaus. And as satisfying Klaus was necessary to Dorian's own emotional
well-being, he concluded happily that the present situation in no way violated
his high standards of behaviour. The only problem was the slight possibility
that Sergei would discover that the letters were missing before he had a chance
to put them back. Well, and if he did, Dorian would simply have to tell him the
whole story. And being Sergei, he'd probably think it all very funny. Sergei
seemed to find him terribly amusing quite a lot of the time.
He slipped the thin
packet into his waistband under the black
windcheater. Why hadn't it occurred to
him that he might have to take something away with him? He'd have worn a jacket
with pockets. Silly of him. So now for Corydon and Alexis. He began another
ardent perusal of the pictures but stopped himself suddenly. Klaus- the real
Klaus- was expecting his call; it wouldn't do to keep the Major waiting. He
stole a last look at the frontispiece, where the two of them embraced smilingly
under a tree. Sergei was right: if only one could live in Arcadia. Quickly he
rewrapped the book in its canvas covering. He'd take it with
him, of course--
-- only there was no place to put it.
He gaped momentarily,
shocked beyond words that his unconscious mind could betray him so basely. Was
that why he'd worn an outfit with no pockets? But what on earth for? The book
was clearly his. Even Sergei had agreed that Dorian was entitled to whatever
Dorian wanted, and he knew Dorian wanted this. He wouldn't mind him taking it.
Well, he wouldn't mind much. Well... He was remembering, unwillingly, Sergei's
forefinger stroking the pictured youth's hair, gently and tenderly. For Dorian
and the love of his life there was a future and the promise of happiness to
come. For Sergei and his friend all was over. There was nothing but memories.
Yes, but... But how could
he leave the book here? Of course he was sorry for Sergei, but... It would be
like handing Klaus over to another man. The idea was unbearable.
He switched off the torch
as if darkness would somehow assist his thoughts. There was no problem with the
lack of pockets. He'd tuck his windcheater into his waistband and carry the
book inside that, and sucks to his unconscious. Well, good; he'd do that. But
still he sat unmoving, watching the reflection of the trees outside which the
streetlamp cast on the drawn curtains. Finally, without thought, he thrust the
book back into the safe and shut it. It was instinct. He couldn't explain it.
He'd have the book eventually, of that he was certain, but now- somehow...
Well, the best things were always worth waiting for; and meanwhile Sergei could
enjoy his treasure for a few days longer. His magnanimity
made him feel better. There was nothing
like a little selflessness from time to time, so long as it didn't get out of
hand.
His eyes were accustomed
now to the dark, and the muffled light from the street showed the outline of
furniture as he rose to go. The torch wouldn't be necessary until he got back
to the attic. He took two steps and was completely unprepared for the iron hand
that seized his arm and twisted it painfully up behind his back.
"Missing me?"
Sergei's light-timbred voice inquired gently. He tried to turn but the
unyielding grip on his wrist held him still. He'd never have thought Sergei was
so strong, as he was marched helplessly to the door where his captor switched on
the light.
"I thought you were
in Dijon," he stammered foolishly.
"Evidently. I doubt
you'd have broken into my house with me in it."
"Sergei, no. It's
not what it seems."
"And neither are
you. What's your name?"
"Dorian earl of
Re-" Pain streaked up his arm.
"Your real
name, thief."
Dorian drew himself up in
indignation. Sergei spoke the cherished title with all the scorn of a petit
bourgeois-- or a peasant. "That is my real name, M.Serge. I am
also-- Eroica."
The Circassian let his
arm go. "The art thief. But naturally. Very nicely done, M.Eroica. Though
of course you had the benefit of my full co-operation. I did everything but put
the book into your hands. An interesting modus operandi, yours. What do you do
with heterosexual dealers? Dress up as a woman?"
"As a matter of
fact, yes." Dorian was outraged. He'd come here with the best of
intentions- he'd meant only to help this idiot who didn't even realize the
trouble he was in- and now Sergei was looking at him as if he were something
that had crawled out from under a rock.
"I doubt if the
actual performance is as convincing as yours
was this afternoon, but men will
believe anything their gonads tell them. I congratulate you. Now return my
property."
"I don't have it.
It's in the safe."
Sergei gave a 'tchah' of
exasperation and ran his hands over
Dorian's body in a quick brutal search.
His face grew still."Go back and open the safe," he said quietly. The
tone was gentle as ever but there was a world of menace in the words.
Dorian did as he was
told, feeling sweat begin under his
armpits. Sergei had been in the room
for ages-- certainly long enough to see him with the book-- and he hadn't
sensed his presence even once. What kind of art dealer moved like a ninja and
was trained in unarmed combat? Why was he in Paris when he'd said he'd be in
Dijon? Those names, those Deutschmarks-- what if Dorian had been wrong all
along? Names of conspirators, money to buy arms; and the letters? Communiques
from the agent placed in the General's camp? At all costs he had to stop Sergei
from discovering that those letters were missing.
He took out the book,
unwrapped it and held it out.
"Put it back."
Dorian obeyed, keeping
his eyes averted as if in fear. He was
thinking fast, calculating
possibilities, and so was prepared when Sergei seized his shoulder and threw
him against the wall, pinioning him there with a hand around his neck. Those
long fingered hands looked so sensitive, he hadn't noticed how large they were.
This one spanned his throat easily and pressed uncomfortably on his windpipe.
Sergei's face was close
to his own, and the one grey eye
regarded him with no warmth at all.
"And now, Monsieur,
" he said, "you will tell me why you're
here and who sent you. "
Dorian opened blue eyes
wide and looked haughty.
"Sent me? No-one
sends Eroica anywhere. I'm my own agent, M.Serge. I thought you knew
that much about me, at least."
"What did you come
for?"
"The book, of
course. Only..." He dropped his eyes, and
blushed.
"Only?"
Sergei's voice was unyielding.
"Well, you were so
nice to me this afternoon. I felt- well,
you know- badly about taking it from
you... "
Sergei took his hand from
Dorian's throat and slapped him hard,
nearly knocking him over.
"That
trick won't work twice," he said calmly. "Try another."
Dorian looked up with an
injured expression, eyes welling.
"It's the truth," he said
unshakeably, since it was.
"Fine feelings from
a thief? Gratitude? Don't make me laugh."
"Well, why
not?" He didn't have to feign the note of exasperation that crept into his
voice. "Listen, M.Serge. I steal because I have fine feelings and
high ideals, not in spite of them. Who else can appreciate a beautiful object,
or a beautiful man, the way I can? Beauty only achieves its full potential when
I look at it. I'll admit I shouldn't have let those Watteau prints tempt me and
I shouldn't have come back here tonight when you were away. It was bad
behaviour. I apologize. But I did, and then I found I couldn't steal from you
after all. Not after what happened this afternoon." He gazed earnestly
into Sergei's face. "I don't know what you're going to do to me, and I
don't care; but at least
believe what I'm telling you. It's the
truth."
His voice broke on the
last sentence, and his eyes overflowed. Brilliant. Perhaps he should take his
seat in the House of Lords after all: he had so few opportunities to employ his
oratorical skills like this in everyday life.
Sergei was looking at him
expressionlessly.
"Get out," he
said.
"What?"
"M.Eroica. I could
kill you. You do realize that?"
Dorian nodded.
"I'm not going to.
But if I see you anywhere near my store
again, I will. Now get out."
5.
Dorian couldn't wait
until he got to the hotel to call Klaus,
though finding a public telephone that
wasn't broken proved, as always, a problem. He passed half a dozen with the disheartening "En
panne" notice attached before finding one that worked. Some wag had
written "Ça
marche!" on it, and a second had remarked "A Paris? C'est pas
possible!" Dorian was afraid it might prove so, but when he put his coins
in the dial tone came on and he got through to Klaus with no difficulty.
"You were right,
Major!" he announced triumphantly. "It was
all as you said. A list of names, a
large sum of money, and letters from Circassia. I brought the letters with me:
can you read Circassian?"
"Agent W can. I'll
bring him with me tomorrow morning. What
about the list of names?"
"Oh, I can go back
and get those any time. They were all French,"- well, some had been
Arabic, but no need to tell Klaus that- "it's just possible there's no
connection. But the man is definitely dangerous."
"How do you
know?"
"I dropped by the
Marquères this afternoon and met him there.
Pure coincidence. We didn't talk much:
there was something about
him ..."
"What?" Really,
Klaus was being more unbending than usual.
"Oh, maybe just my
fancy. He made my blood run cold. Icy, remote, unreasonable..."
"Unreasonable, Lord
Gloria? What do you mean?"
"Unreasonable means
unreasonable, Major. Like yourself. I'll see you tomorrow, at my hotel, at 10
o'clock for breakfast."
"Eight
o'clock," said Klaus shortly.
"Nine," Eroica
compromised. "Major, I'm tired, I've had a
tryi-- a busy day, and I'm going to
bed. Goodnight."
He was tired, and
for no good reason- after all, didn't he have a date with Klaus tomorrow
morning?- depressed. The pile of messages waiting for him at the front desk
didn't help. "6:00 M.Serge called en route to Dijon." "7:25
M.Serge called from Dijon- returning Paris this evening, please call after
11." "11:15 M.Serge called. Please call when you return." So
Sergei had gone to Dijon and- the conclusion was inescapable- had come
back simply in order to see him. Dorian swept the messages into the wastepaper
basket. Sergei was an agent and an assassin and he, Dorian, had had a close
call. The letters would prove it.
Agent W read through the
thin stack of paper with an increasingly puzzled expression.
"Well, Major,"
he said diffidently, "I'm not quite sure what
we have here. Unless it's an agreed
upon code of some sort..."
Klaus was looking
thunderous.
"What do they
say?" he demanded.
"Well, to all
appearances they seem to be about domestic matters-- Aah, this last one, it's
dated four months ago, it reads, unh"- he cleared his throat nervously,
"'Dear brother: We hope this letter reaches you and that you are in
health. Did you hear Ormansk has fallen? It seems the war may end this year,
God willing. Are you married yet? Your nephews send their love. The little one
is walking now. When are you coming back? Your loving brother, Halim.'"
"Any evidence of a
cipher?"
"I don't think so.
Perhaps something in the paper..." He
held it up to the light.
"We'll need further
analysis- laboratory tests and a full computer cipher scan. Lord Gloria- what's
the matter with you?"
Eroica wasn't listening. He drooped in his chair, eyes fixed on the ground. A tear ran down his cheek.
"Get a hold of
yourself, man. What's the matter?"
"Major," he
said, "You're wrong. There's no connection. Sergei isn't involved in
anything."
"Sergei?"
"That's what he
likes to be called."
"I thought you said
you didn't talk much. But if you're on such good terms with him, so much the
better. We need further information, starting with that list of names-"
"No,"
Dorian said vehemently. "Listen to me. You're looking in the wrong
place entirely. If you want to stop this plot against the General- and frankly,
I can't think why you do, because he's quite obviously a horrible man- then
you've got to start elsewhere."
"I'll be the judge
of that."
The beloved face was
looking angrily at him. Well, when had
it ever done anything else?
"If you won't
believe me, you'll have to operate without me.
I'm sorry, Major. I can't compromise my
principles even for you."
"Your principles?!"
Both Klaus' eyebrows disappeared into his
fringe. "What principles? You're
like a whore preaching chastity, Lord Gloria: slightly lacking in
believability."
Dorian said tiredly,
"I have my principles, Major, and I try
to abide by them. You don't have to
believe that if you don't want to. But I was wrong about Sergei, and I did him
an injustice. And now I intend to make it up to him."
He had the letters in his
hand and was halfway to the door before Klaus even knew what he was doing. As
he slipped through the entrance, he saw Klaus' pursuit being stopped by the
maitre'd and a burly waiter waving the bill. So far, so good.
He threw his toilet
necessities into a bag, took the service
elevator down, and was in a cab for
Charles de Gaulle within minutes. What he wanted was in London: in the Wallace
Collection, to be precise.
Next day, towards
nightfall, he walked slowly along the broad
expanse of the Rue St.Germain. A rose
sunset stained the cream walls of the Musée de Cluny a pale pink, and overhead
the first star had appeared, a white pinprick in the tender blue April sky. The
street lamps had just come on and under the budding trees the cafés were
beginning to fill with early dinner patrons. The sidewalk was crowded with
cheerful young Parisians finished with work and classes for the week and ready
for the small pleasures of the evening: supper, a bottle of wine, coffee, the
conversation of friends late into the night and a lover to sleep beside
afterwards.
In spite of himself
Dorian's heart was beating hard as he
turned into the Rue Galande. Sergei
should just be closing. The blinds were
indeed still up. Inside he could see faded brown and cream coloured volumes
standing upright on the dark bookshelves, the gilt lettering on their leather
spines sparkling here and there in the light from the overhead chandelier,
while below, large folios lay open on the glass covered tables. Sergei was at
the desk, a stray lock of blond hair hiding his face as he bent over the ledger
in which he was making notes.
Dorian swallowed hard and
opened the door.
"I came to
apologize," he said quickly, before Sergei's
expression had a chance to change.
"And to return your property." He held out the letters.
After a moment Sergei
came over and took the proffered bundle.
"These? These are
what you were after? I don't understand."
"Actually, besides
being a thief, I'm also an agent- a sort of agent. I work for NATO from time to
time. On a freelance basis, of course. There was a misunderstanding. They
thought you were involved in something you aren't. I was supposed to see if you
had anything suspicious in your possession. And these-- well, I couldn't read
them, so I had to take them with me. And I'm very sorry."
"They're just
letters from home."
"I know. How many
nephews do you have?"
"Three. I've never
even seen the youngest."
"Oh." There was
a pause. "Sergei. I wasn't instructed to meet
you. That really was an
accident."
"I see." Sergei
didn't seem particularly interested. His
expression remained cool and withdrawn.
"Don't be angry at
me, Sergei. I truly am sorry. I brought you a present." He held out the
leather tube. "Please. Let's be friends."
"What's this?"
He hesitated, then unscrewed the cap at the
end.
"It's something
specially for you. I hope you like it."
Sergei extracted the
canvas bundle and unrolled it on the desk. Dorian, watching, saw his face go white
with shock.
"The
Divertissements--" His lips moved, but he seemed incapable of making
another sound. After a minute he groped his way to the chair and sat down,
never taking his eyes for a moment from the glowing canvas on the desktop.
"This is in the Wallace
Collection in London," he said at
last, helplessly.
"It was in
the Wallace Collection. Now it's here. It's yours."
"No," he
whispered, shaking his head a little, "No." His gaze
devoured the delicate reclining
figures, the bosky darkness of the trees, and the luminous sunlight that
glinted on the shimmering silk costumes.
"I see," he
said at last, as if to himself, and put his head
in his hands. After a moment he looked
up at Dorian, like a man who watches a winter night sky, picking out the stars.
"Lord Gloria. You
know you'll have to put this back?"
"But I took it for
you. I know you want it."
"I do. Thank you
very much. But I can't accept it."
"Nonsense, Sergei.
If you want something..."
Sergei was shaking his
head, gazing down at the picture with
a strange, almost painful little smile,
his eye invisible under the long blond lashes.
"That man of yours-
I think I'm beginning to feel a bit sorry
for him." He looked at Dorian
again. "Wanting something doesn't make it mine. For you, yes; but not for
me. Not for most people, if it comes to that. We live in different worlds, Lord
Gloria, that's all. If you love me, take it back."
Disappointed, Dorian
rolled up his present and put it back in the tube. Behind him Sergei sighed
deeply as if some ordeal was over. Dorian's shoulders slumped.
"You're still angry
at me," he said sadly.
"Don't be
silly."
At the tone in his voice,
Dorian's heart leapt. He peeked over his shoulder and the expression on
Sergei's face made his groin tighten. He turned around.
"I missed you."
They both spoke at once, then smiled self-consciously, then smiled with no
self-consciousness at all.
"Well then- "
"Before dinner or
after?"
"Before and
after, why not?"
"Why not
indeed."
Dorian's eye went to the
desk.
"I think we can
manage something more comfortable this time.
My house has no secrets from you, after
all."
"Sergei,"
Dorian pleaded, and the other laughed softly. He
leaned over and nipped Dorian's
earlobe.
"A moment. I'll lock
up."
7.
They ran up the stairs to
the bedroom, eager as teenagers, hands already busy with buttons and snaps .
Dorian's Shetland jumper was abandoned on the second floor and his peach
coloured silk shirt fell by the doorway, while Sergei's coat barely made it on
to the chest of drawers. Dorian turned and caught Sergei in his arms, one hand
reaching for his behind. The next minute he found himself flying through the
air and landing on his back on the bed.
"Wha-? ! "
"Jujitsu,"
Sergei said, as if in explanation, pulling
Dorian's shoes off .
Dorian brought his legs
up, sending Sergei sprawling on top of him, with an arm all ready to flip him
over. Remembering his partner's economy from last time, he peeled off pants,
briefs, socks and shoes together in almost one movement.
"Like a
banana," said Sergei approvingly. What an odd simile,
Dorian thought, but Sergei's hands were
busy at his waistband and he had other things to think about. In a minute he
was naked as well, lying half on top of, half beside Sergei in a welter of rose
silk duvet and soft white sheets.
"More
comfortable?" Sergei inquired from two inches away.
"Much. Speaking of
comfortable, why don't you take that off?"
He nodded at the eyepatch.
"It's alright."
"No it's not. The
band digs into your skin."
"I have to keep it
fairly tight. Otherwise it shifts."
"You don't wear it
all the time, surely?"
"When I'm in
company. It's not a sight for civilized eyes, I
assure you."
"You're not in
company, Sergei, you're in your own bed, with me. You might as well be
comfy."
"Lord Gloria, let's
not discuss this."
It must have been the
faint remaining suspicion in the back of Dorian's mind that was responsible for
what he did next. Unthinkingly, his hand moved an inch and pulled the eyepatch
up and over Sergei's head. The Circassian snarled and Dorian's arm was caught
in a grip so fierce that he yelped in pain.
Sergei was staring at him
from an immobile white face. Where
his right eye should have been, there
was only a wide gaping hole,
with no eyelid or lashes. The
surrounding flesh had been scored deeply and healed in furrowing white scars.
No wonder he hadn't wanted Dorian to see.
It was his upbringing
that saved him. Iron nursery training
in ignoring the unseemly kept his face
perfectly calm.
"That must have
hurt," he said in what he was glad to hear was a completely natural voice.
He rubbed the red line across Sergei's forehead with his free hand. "You
really shouldn't wear this, you know. Your skin is so delicate, you'll mark it
for good."
Beneath him, Sergei
started shaking. He was laughing, but in
a painful, frightening way, and tears
ran from his left eye. He let go of Dorian, pushed him away, and turned over on
his side, laughing and crying into the arms that covered his face.
Alarmed, Dorian tried to
hold the shuddering body, kissing
whatever parts he could reach.
"Sergei- Sergei, love-
what is it? What's the matter?" He rubbed the rigid shoulders and kissed
the back of his neck, while Sergei's hysteric laughter turned gradually into
fullhearted weeping. At last even that ceased and he lay stiff and unresponsive,
his face burrowed protectively into his arms.
Dorian was appalled at
the effects of his thoughtlessness. He'd had no intention in the world of
hurting Sergei, but he seemed to have managed it quite efficiently nonetheless.
Desperately he cast about for a way of making amends. With great care he undid
the band that held Sergei's hair at the back, freeing the whole thick yellow
mass. It filled his hands like heavy silk, and he brought it forward to cover
Sergei's averted face, talking to him the while.
"If you don't want
people to see you, why don't you use this
instead? It's ever so much prettier.
One of my friends wears his
hair this way- it's really very
sweet."
Sergei stirred. One hand
came up and took hold of the bright
curtain, pulling it well across the
right side of his face. Unresisting, he let Dorian turn him half over onto his
back. His face was colourless and defeated, empty of all energy and beauty. He
lay looking at Dorian as if at something very very far away.
"I thought-,"
he said, in a dry husky voice, "I truly thought
nothing could frighten me anymore. But
you do. If there were two men like yourself I don't think Western civilization
would survive. You have as much decency and restraint as an avalanche."
"I don't
understand," Dorian said helplessly. "Truly, Sergei,
I only wanted-"
Sergei put a hand over
his mouth. "I know you don't understand. Who would ever have thought
innocence could be so terrifying?"
Dorian didn't bother to
protest that he was scarcely an innocent. Sergei was too upset to know what he
was saying. He stroked the gleaming hair and wiped the remaining tears from the
wet cheeks.
"When you want
something, Lord Gloria, you just take it, isn't that right?"
"Yes."
Sergei sighed deeply.
"Well, then," he said, and put up his mouth to be kissed.
Dorian blinked in
disbelief and joy, then swooped down to kiss him with all the skill and
tenderness at his command. A small sob caught in Sergei's chest, but after a
moment's hesitation he began to respond, tentatively at first, then more
passionately, as if remembering a long-unused skill. Lips moved across lips,
tongues twined, and their hips naturally found a way of fitting together that
pleasured them both. With small slow movements their bodies shifted against
each other, like snakes dancing. Fingers and hands began to travel in
exploration and excitement, and the tempo of the dance grew swifter. It was
Sergei who broke away first, gasping for breath.
"I'm a little out of
practice," he said.
"You're doing just
fine," Dorian encouraged him.
"Yes, but my lips
hurt. Can we give them a rest for a moment? There are other bits of me I'm sure
you'll like quite as much."
"Such as?"
"Find out for
yourself, lazy. I'm not giving hints."
Dorian tested the
cheekbones and the tender skin at the temples, moved over to nibble at the
fleshy edge of the ear, then dipped into the rounded shell of the ear itself.
Sergei, surprisingly, caught his breath, his hands suddenly tense on Dorian's
shoulders. Dorian probed further, his tongue tracing the inner whorls, and
Sergei writhed underneath him.
A hideous thought struck
him.
"I'm not tickling
you, am I?"
"No--no--"
Sergei was breathless. "Just- I never- It's amazing. Do it again." He
did, and Sergei moaned. His hands began to claw at Dorian's back and Dorian at
length had to pull away.
"Easy, darling, or
we'll be through too soon. I thought you
said you were slow."
Sergei's chest rose and
fell deeply. "I thought I was. It
hasn't been like this since I was a
teenager."
"Who did you do it
with then?"
"My brother. No, not
what you think. We were twins. Touching
him was like touching myself. I did
that too, of course."
"It must be nice,
having brothers. How many?"
"There were four of
us. One died in the war. Are you an only
child, then?"
"Sisters. We didn't
get along."
"It can be like that
with brothers too, you know. Don't be
too romantic about it."
"Mm. Have you cooled
off yet?"
"Yes, thank you. If you're gentle, you can even kiss me again."
The dance began once
more. Sergei was clearly trying to hold
back for Dorian's sake, but his control
seemed to have vanished.
The fire within him was burning far too
fiercely, no longer subject to his will.
"It's alright,"
Dorian assured him. "What do you want me to do?"
The gentle pressure on
his shoulder was hint enough. He slid
down in the bed and took Sergei into
his mouth. Not much was required of him: his partner was already teetering on
the edge of ecstasy, and the gentle windings of Dorian's tongue were enough to
push him over. He spasmed inside Dorian's throat, and almost at once pulled him
back up, probing his mouth with his tongue as if trying to find the flavour of
his own seed.
Sergei's wantonness
fanned his own flames into a bonfire.
"Any lanolin up
here?" he enquired of the Circassian's ear.
"Sorry. Petroleum
jelly. In the drawer," he nodded, "-your side."
Dorian sat up, groped,
and found the plastic jar. His eyes
consulted Sergei, who gave a ghost of
the old smile from his flushed and beautiful face.
"Are you up for
it?" he whispered.
"All the old
music hall jokes," Dorian groaned, and Sergei
laughed almost like his old self.
He raised his pelvis to
make it easier for Dorian's hand to find him, and Dorian slid his legs
underneath, resting the narrow hips on his thighs. He slipped a finger inside,
then a second to keep it company, and finally a third. He rotated them slowly,
leisurely, concentrating on the hot slippery sensations of inside-Sergei, while
the other breathed deeply, clenching his muscles tightly around Dorian's hand
as if to hold him there forever. Their eyes met, and his fingers stilled. What
was in Sergei's face, what was in his own, he didn't know, nor what message
they were sending each other, but for a moment time stopped while an
excitement so great he could barely
grasp it beat its wings about him. That huge undefined emotion narrowed,
focussed on his groin, and urged him on with its need. He pulled his hand free
and raised Sergei's legs.
"I like to be on my
face for this," Sergei said mildly.
"My turn,"
Dorian reminded him, and Sergei obediently braced his narrow feet against
Dorian's shoulders until Dorian was deep inside him.
"Come on up,
love." He pulled Sergei slowly into a sitting
position across his thighs, the other
gasping a little as the movement stretched him. Sergei put his arms around his
neck, with his ankles locked together against Dorian's buttocks and his head
drooping onto Dorian's shoulder. Like foam on water, the Englishman's golden
curls and the Circassian's yellow hair flowed together down their chests.
Dorian turned the averted
face to his and kissed it deeply,
savouring with immense satisfaction the
moment that marked his final possession of both Sergei's mouths. At last he let
him lean away and began rocking in and out, while Sergei braced his feet on the
bed and pulled against him, rider and ridden, posting up and down on Dorian's
thighs. Dorian closed his eyes, willing the timeless journey to continue
forever.
But his body began to
demand a fiercer satisfaction. He might
as well have pity on Sergei. With a
little difficulty, and thanks largely to the other's agility, he got him turned
around without having to withdraw from him. Sergei thrust a pillow beneath
himself and raised his hips, while Dorian did his best to be as slow as
possible. It was harder than he'd thought, reining in his body's urge for
speed. Finally, ruefully awarding Sergei the prize for technique, he abandoned
the fight and let his instincts do what they would. But he was aware that his
partner had to some extent recovered, and was caressing himself in rhythm with
Dorian's movements as he slid in and out of him. His climax
arrived suddenly, and he fell with a
voluptuous shudder onto the
already collapsing body of the
Circassian.
He lay with his face in
the sea of Sergei's hair, letting the afterglow fade. Reaching through the
veil, he kissed whatever bit of Sergei was under it, then rolled away to
flounder for his pants on the floor. Though he didn't usually care for
post-coital cigarettes, he was suddenly seized with a craving for the taste of
tobacco. He reached into his pocket, to discover nothing there but flat
crackling cellophane.
"Bother," he
said in consternation.
"Mmh? Something
wrong?" the other asked, in the honey tones
of drowned contentment.
"I smoked my last
cigarette before I came here."
"There's some in my
coat. Bring the lighter too?"
Dorian picked up the
beautiful garment- the nap of the fine wool was almost as delicious as its
owner's skin- and plunged his hands into various pockets. Keys, change, Cross
pen-- his fingers met only unwanted metal, all the wrong shape. The inside one?
There. He got hold of the lighter, but the cigarettes were blocked by something
thin and plastic, too big for a credit card, wedged across the inside. He
prised it out and gave it a glance as he retrieved the Sobranies. A photograph,
encased in vinyl, of three people: Sergei smiling down at a grinning
dark-haired teenager making a V-for-Victory sign, and next to them -- Dorian
blinked, but there was no mistake: the same blond mop of hair, piercing blue
eyes and determined features that he'd seen in Klaus'
photograph. But here the General's
expression was tender, almost
indulgent; he too was looking at the
dark-haired boy.
"Who's this?"
"In the photo? My
family. My brother and his oldest son."
"He's your brother?
The General?"
"Ah." Sergei
gave a small sigh. "You know him, of course."
"Well, he's rather
famous these days."
He replaced the
photograph. Climbing back into the welter of
sheets, he slid down beside Sergei's
warmth. Sergei raised himself
on one elbow and took a cigarette,
waiting for Dorian to light it.
"Now," he said,
"What did you want to ask me about my brother?"
"What makes you
think--"
"It's natural.
People always do, when they find out who I am.
Pass the ashtray, please."
Dorian put it on the
mattress between them, thinking what to
say. "Do you love your
brother?"
Sergei was quiet for a
moment. "What an odd man you are, Lord
Gloria. No-one's ever asked me that
before. The answer, I suppose, even now, is yes."
"Why don't you talk
about him?"
"I prefer not to.
For many reasons. This," he gestured at the
space between them, "is one, of
course. My brother is liberal for a Circassian- he wouldn't want me stoned to
death-- but he disapproves. He finds my desires incomprehensible and--
distasteful. I feel the same way about his." He drew deeply on his
cigarette. "I sleep with men. He kills them. We have little in
common."
"You were in his
army when-"
"Yes. Naturally.
Whose else?"
"You didn't learn
jujitsu there, by any chance?" The question
had been bothering him.
"No, of course not.
Just how to fire a gun." He smiled, a little sadly. "It was my friend
who taught me to fight. I was too bookish for it as a boy. After he died, I
wanted to go on thinking of myself as a fighter: it was the only thing I had
left of him. But I needed to learn to do it one-eyed, so eventually I began
studying the Eastern arts- tae kwon do, kung fu, jujitsu. Wherever I went, I
trained... Between whiles I'd go home, but nothing had changed there so I came
away again. After the last time-- I decided not to go back."
"Suppose,"
Dorian said carefully, "you knew your brother needed you?"
"I've wasted too
much of my life thinking my brother needed me," said Sergei flatly.
"He needs no-one; and if he did, he wouldn't admit it."
"And- your country?
If you could help there, would you--"
Sergei interrupted him
impatiently. "My country, Lord Gloria, isn't a country except in the minds
of people who don't live there. It's a collection of tribes, each sitting on
its own little piece of land. Circassia as a political entity simply doesn't
exist, a fact you Eurorpeans have never grasped. The only thing we understand
are personal loyalties, the tie between rulers and the men who fight for them.
The reason the ex-President was thrown out is not that he bled the country dry,
but that he didn't share enough with his men. There's no room for patriotism in
a place like that." He took a deep breath and spoke more calmly.
"Probably the best we can hope for is a strongman like my brother, someone
who will keep the various factions under control. He's always wanted a kingdom
and now it seems he may get one. It took him
twenty years to bring the hill tribes
together; the plains should
take him a year at most; and then...
But for me- my country is France. This is where I live. I'll go back for my
brother's coronation or inauguration or whatever it is he has, when he has it.
Maybe."
"Did he hurt you
that badly?"
Sergei rubbed a tired
hand over his face. "I was forgetting.
Lord Gloria, how do you survive in
polite society? You have the terrible candour of a child. Don't you know there
are things you can't say?"
"No," said
Dorian simply. "What I think, I say. What I want,
I take. How else can one live?"
"As I do," said
Sergei, stubbing out his cigarette and turning on his side, away from Dorian.
Dorian cuddled up to his
back. "Then learn to live another way. Stop settling for second best. What
is it you want, Sergei?"
"To be able to go
back to where it all went wrong and have it
different. To be given a second chance.
For us all to have been someone else in the first place. Or failing that,
simply to forget. I want a lot of things, Lord Gloria, and I can't have any of
them. Unless- if you would be so kind- I also want you to kiss me again."
Dorian did, feeling
immensely sorry for him. Let the General
go, he thought: it would only hurt
Sergei to get him involved. Only, having experienced some of the things love
can make a man do, he wondered why Sergei carried his brother's picture around
with him everywhere if he was really so indifferent to his fate. Would he in
fact not care if the General died? Somehow Dorian didn't believe it. This man
was the key to the success of Klaus' mission. Klaus had as good as said so. It
was just possible he might know something; Dorian should ask...
Sergei broke away from
him. "What is it? Has it made that much of a difference, finding out who I
am?"
Dorian blushed for his
incompetence. "Yes, sort of. Not the way you think. There's something I
should tell you. It's this thing NATO thought you were involved in..."
He related everything
that Klaus had told him. It wasn't much, boiled down to basic facts. Sergei
listened without expression.
"I don't know how de
Marquère can be involved," Dorian ended.
"All I can think is that the
information was mistaken."
"Or it could be
someone using his name, or one similar to it.
Your informant- did he definitely say
that this man de Marquère was in Paris?"
"I don't think so.
Just that there was a de Marquère involved. Oh- I see. Is there anyone called
that in your brother's camp?"
"I'm trying to
remember. Marquère," said Sergei, sounding the
syllables out. "Not that I know of
but I haven't been back in over three years. If he's there, he's probably only
recently arrived."
He stirred restlessly.
"How would you
pronounce it in Circassian?"
"Oh. How true.
Mahker. Mahka. Ma-- oh my god." He sat up,
looking shocked. "Maaqa. Maaqa.
He even looks..." He turned round and reached over Dorian for the
phone. "What time is it? They might still be in--" His fingers
pressed buttons impatiently. Dorian could hear the faint ringing at the other
end, and the "Allo, allo" as it was answered.
"Good evening,
Baron. It's Serge. You must excuse my appalling behaviour the other day,
running out on you and the Baroness like that." He smiled at whatever the
Baron was saying. "Yes, and talented. But spoken for, alas. Baron, I'm
about to compound my rudeness with insolence. I want to ask about your family-
a possible relation of yours. He's calling himself Marquère; I don't know his
first name. Young, maybe twenty-six or so by now, medium height, on the thin
side. Black hair and eyes. He looks a bit like Jean-Claude, same face and
cheekbones. Slightly tilted eyes, rather à
la Chinoise. Very intelligent, a little wild I would guess, and- pardon?"
"Not to be trusted?
Forgive me, Baron, but I would definitely
say so, yes." A pause. "Yes.
I see. Yes. No, at home. Three years ago. A chance meeting. Yes, I see. My
apologies, Baron. Mm? Yes indeed, I will. Au revoir." He hung up, and lit
another cigarette.
"The Baron sends his
regards." He sounded abstracted.
"He knows about
you?"
"He couldn't
not."
"What?"
"A man of liberal
ideas, the Baron, and quite attractive. Only once or twice, of course. He's
devoted to the Baroness."
"Sergei, he's old.
He must be--"
"Fifty-three."
"Well, there you
are. How could you--"
"How old do you
think I am?"
"Twenty-seven,
twenty-eight-"
"Forty next
year."
Dorian sat stunned. He
peered at Sergei, but there were no lines, no wrinkles, no roughening of the
skin.
"You're
joking," he decided, relieved.
"I'll show you my
passport sometime." Sergei put out his cigarette. "Will you call your
friend in NATO?" In spite of the
phrasing it wasn't a request. "I
want to speak to him as soon as possible. To-night for choice. Don't tell him
I'm the General's
brother; just say I have some
information that might be of help." He handed Dorian the phone with a
peremptoriness worthy of Klaus.
"Wait a minute. What
did the Baron say?"
"It's a nephew of his-
the oldest sister's second boy. Apparently something of a black sheep. Thrown
out of the Polytechnique, quarrelled with his father, took off for Africa, then
Iran. He comes home from time to time, won't tell his family where he's been or
what he's doing, and disappears again. His last visit was in March. He's
definitely your contact."
He spoke with barely
concealed impatience, eye on the telephone, and Dorian realized that the Earl
of Red Gloria was no longer the first thing on his mind. Pleased as he was at
being right about Sergei's feelings, and natural as they no doubt were, it was
still galling to find himself ranked below the General in his brother's
affections.
"How
interesting," he said, reaching for a cigarette and
lighting it slowly. He didn't really
want another, but he did want to tease Sergei. It was hard to resist,
when men got all hot and bothered about something other than himself. "I'm
sure the Major will be fascinated. But right now I could do with dinner. I'm
famished. Aren't you?"
Sergei turned a stern and
affronted glare on him, which Dorian, long inured to the same treatment from
Klaus, met with a provokingly innocent smile. Sergei's mouth suddenly softened
into tenderness, the like of which Klaus had never shown.
"I beg your pardon.
I was forgetting," he said, plucking the
cigarette from Dorian's hand and
putting it out in the ashtray. He
carried the hand to his lips and kissed
each fingertip in turn. "You're a child." Catching the other hand, he
kissed both palms, then leaned over to do the same to Dorian's eyes. That was
better. "And," Sergei murmured in his ear, "this is the
way I deal with wilful children."
He yanked both wrists
forward, and Dorian sprawled face down
across his legs. One large hand pinned
his arms, while the other moved to his behind.
"Sergei, you
wouldn't--" he said, between horror and delight.
"No, I wouldn't.
Another time maybe. But now..." His hand slipped between Dorian's legs,
into that very sensitive area between his groin and thigh, and began to tickle.
Dorian squealed and tried to clamp his legs together to still those devilish
fingers, but they moved onto the back of his thigh and down to the knee. He
howled and kicked, rolling half over, and they found his ribs and belly
instead. When he squirmed back onto his stomach, they moved up to his armpits.
"Sergei, stop- oh-
Sergei- not there, please-; no- stop- Sergei,- please," he gasped, his
face flushed and wet.
"NATO," Sergei
suggested. "A certain Major. On the telephone."
"Yes, yes,"
Dorian agreed.
"Now," said
Sergei, kissing the tears from the side of his face that lay uppermost.
"Now." Dorian
capitulated, and Sergei let him up. What a
persuasive man. If only he would give
Klaus some tips. If only Klaus would take them.
Klaus, in the event,
although making it unmistakably clear that he was still angry about the other
day, agreed to meet them at Les Deux Colombes on the Rue St.Germain in the
forty-five minutes it would take him to come across town.
"We'll be able to
get something to eat before he comes," said
Dorian, pulling on his black velvet
pants and ruffled peach silk shirt.
"They do a nice
Coquille St.Jacques," said Sergei, absently,
closing the multiple fastenings of his
coat. He reached for the eyepatch, then caught Dorian's glance. After a minute
he dropped it back on the bed. "I feel naked," he said, and turned to
look at himself in the mirror.
"I wish you were,
but it would distract the waiters too much.
You'll do as you are, love. If you're
worried--" Dorian picked up a tortoise shell brush and ran it through the
pale blond hair, arranging it in a smooth thick curtain across Sergei's face.
"There. Nothing shows. The only trouble is, you look twice as enticing as
before. You do remember that you promised me after dinner as well?"
8.
They had just finished
when von dem Eberbach strode into the
restaurant. Dorian effected the
introductions, ignoring Sergei's
small start of surprise when he saw
Klaus' face. Klaus sized Sergei up with an antagonism that was well-hidden but
apparent to Dorian's eye, and went as if by reflex onto the offensive.
"I believe, M.Serge,
you were in the army?"
"One of them, Major.
We have several," Sergei replied calmly.
"Your rank?"
"Meaningless in a
European context. Approximately lieutenant."
"Hmph. How much has
Lord Gloria told you about NATO's concerns with your country?"
"Merely that you've
been informed of a plot against the General's life which seems to originate
here and to involve a certain de Marquère, soi-disant."
"Ah- so you have
definite information about the man?"
"Yes, and I'll be
more than happy to give it to you. But in return I must ask for your word that
everything I tell you about myself will remain confidential."
"You're afraid of
the police?"
Sergei smiled at him like
an old friend and didn't answer. Klaus too sat calmly, prepared to outwait the
Circassian. There was a few minutes' silence, in which time the facts of the
situation became evident to everyone present: Klaus wanted information that
Sergei had no pressing need to deliver.
"Very well,"
said Klaus cutting his losses. "I withdraw that
remark. Why do you require
confidentiality?"
"You'll understand
that, Major, when you hear what I have to
say. But you may rest assured that
there's nothing illicit behind my request. You are doubtless aware that I have
somewhat less than happy memories of my country. At some cost, I've attained a
certain peace of mind and personal security here in France. Both would be
threatened if what I'm about to tell you were to become public knowledge."
The old world formality
of Sergei's speech appeared to have a
reassuring effect on the Major. Dorian
had often suspected that if
he himself spoke Whitehall Stuffed
Shirt rather than Mayfair camp,
Klaus would be an awful lot nicer to
him. A pity he didn't have
Sergei's facility with languages.
"Very well,"
said Klaus, unbending a little. "You have my
word."
Sergei took the
photograph from his pocket and handed it over. Klaus' eyebrows rose.
"I'm the General's
youngest brother. We're not on the best of
terms at the moment, but I have no
desire to see him assassinated. I'm willing to tell you what I know about this
man Marquère. I met him briefly the last time I was home, three years ago. His
name, incidentally, isn't Marquère but de Roussaye. He's the nephew of the
present Baron, using his mother's maiden name since he's been virtually
disowned by his father. It never occurred to me to connect him with the Baron,
since we pronounce the name in Circassian fashion, quite different from the
French. But now the family resemblance is obvious to me."
"What position does
he hold in your brother's army?"
"When I left, he was
attached to the elite commando team headed by my brother Halim- my other
brother, not the General. We like to keep things in the family." Sergei
smiled grimly. "He's undoubtedly still there, but in a higher position-
chief aide, would be my guess."
"And have you any
idea what his role in the conspiracy might be?"
"Fairly obviously,
he's the liaison between the President and
the head of the conspiracy in my brother's
camp."
"And who
is--oh." Enlightenment dawned in Klaus' eyes. Sergei
nodded, mouth crooked sardonically.
"Yes indeed. Everything
in the family, Major. Something of a
Circassian tradition, the fraternal
power struggle."
Klaus was thinking hard.
"This puts a new complexion on
matters, M.Serge. Have you proof of any
of this?"
"None in the world.
I know Halim, that's all. He's my twin. I
assure you there's no mistake. If I
might, I would suggest a word in the ex-President's ear: an intimation that
NATO knows all about young de Roussaye and his activities. The man is fond of
power, but he's also- well, prudent is perhaps the kindest word for it. He
won't risk his neck on anything that's not completely sure."
"We'll need to
secure the situation on both fronts. The
General must be informed as well. Are
you willing to tell him your
suspicions? He wouldn't believe us
without definite proof."
"I don't doubt it.
My brother distrusts Westerners. He thinks
they despise him." Sergei smiled
politely, as if deprecating the
General's folly. Klaus, to his credit
as a NATO operative, did not
blush. "I'm willing to return to
Circassia. I'll need transport as
far as Turkey. Can you pull strings in
Ankara, Major?"
"That's not
necessary. We'll fly you into the country."
"I'll fly myself in.
A helicopter. I'll be landing in the
mountains."
"M.Serge-"
"My pilot's licence
is still valid, Major," Sergei said
without emphasis.
They faced each other
down, Klaus imperious, Sergei calm.
Klaus opened his mouth to speak, but Sergei
cut in ahead of him.
"I'm not going to
tell the General unless it's absolutely
unavoidable. He would have to take
measures, measures that would be noticed and interpreted as a split in the
family. To keep the men's confidence and forestall other attempts, the command
must be seen as united. I'll confront Halim directly. When he knows I know,
he'll back off."
"He's willing to
kill your older brother. Why shouldn't he kill you?"
"He won't. He can't.
You won't understand this, Major. If we were capable of killing each other, we
would have done it long ago. "
"You're right,"
said Klaus. "I don't understand. Your plan isn't sufficiently secure, M.
Serge. I want the General informed directly."
"What makes you
think he'll believe me rather than Halim? You
forget, Major, that from his point of
view, I 'm a deserter. Brothers are supposed to stay at home and support the
head of the family."
"Everything I know
about the General suggests an astute man. I
imagine he already has his own ideas
about Halim's trustworthiness."
Sergei raised an amused
eyebrow, conceding Klaus points. "Nonetheless, I have no desire to meet
him face to face unless I absolutely must. Unfortunately, Major, if you want my
help, you must permit me to do it my way. Otherwise I will withdraw from the
business entirely, and you’ll be left exactly where you were before."
"If you do that, and
Halim's plot succeeds, you'll see your
country in ruins. Do you want that to
happen?"
"I don't care if it
does. I'm not a patriot, Major. Desole."
Dorian expected a sneer
from the Major, but Klaus was merely
looking at Sergei thoughtfully.
"You understand, M.
Serge, that I must prepare for a worst
case scenario. You go to Circassia, you
die, and we have
absolutely nothing that will
incriminate Halim. Would you be
willing to write a full statement of
what you know and suspect,
which we can show to the General if you
don't come back?"
"If you like."
Klaus sat back in his
chair. "Write it now." He took pen and
paper from his shoulder bag.
Sergei wrote quickly for
several minutes, the flowing Circassian characters twisting across the page. He
finished, folded the sheet in three, and handed it to Dorian.
"Lord Gloria, please
deliver this to Major von dem Eberbach if you don't hear from me by a certain
date. Otherwise, of course," he looked at Klaus unsmilingly, "I will
expect it to be returned to me." Dorian took the paper gingerly. Klaus'
mouth was stiff with anger. "Major. You don't understand my country and
you don't understand my family. With the best intentions in the world, you
could do incalculable harm."
They looked each other in
the eye for a long moment. Klaus
was far from pleased, but he was also a
realist.
"Very well, M.
Serge. Our hands are tied. We’ll do it your
way."
They went on to discuss
details, brisk and business-like.
Dorian felt like a child at a board
meeting, watching the adults
doing their incomprehensible thing, not
expected to take part.
"Very well,"
Klaus said. "The arrangements should be finished by Monday morning. You
can fly out then. Is that satisfactory?"
"Perfectly."
"We might as well
meet at the Georges V, at nine." He rose
to go, and Sergei also stood up.
"That's an
interesting hair style, M. Serge. A recent change?"
"Lord Gloria's
suggestion."
Klaus looked suspiciously
at Dorian. "You've missed your calling, Lord Gloria. You should have been
a hair dresser. A much more suitable profession. "
"Any time you want a
shampoo and blow j -, uh, dry, Major, I'm at your service."
"Thank you, no.
M.Serge, good evening. Until Monday." After an infinitisimal hesitation he
put out his hand and Sergei shook it gravely. Dorian, jealous, didn't miss the
trace of respect in Klaus' eye.
"Ouf," Sergei
said, sitting down heavily, "I need a drink."
He beckoned to the waiter. "The
Major is a very hard ticket. Remind me never to play chess with him. "
"They call him Iron
Klaus in the service, " said Dorian, chin
on hand, wistfully watching Klaus'
figure disappear down the
boulevard .
"He's the one? I was
afraid he might be. Oh dear, Dorian."
Dorian turned around,
smiling helplessly.
"It wasn’t my idea.
It just happened." The look almost of pity in Sergei's face annoyed him.
"You don’t think much of my chances."
"I think you have
your work cut out for you. The immovable
object and the irresistible force,
indeed. But I’ll drink to your
success." He lifted his wineglass.
"How about a kiss
for luck?"
"Certainly, "
said Sergei, and leant over and kissed his mouth.
9.
The weekend went by in a
sunny dream. Sergei and Dorian
strolled in the Bois de Boulogne, drank
coffee on the Avenue de
l'Opera, attended the Comedie
Francaise, and spent endless hours
in bed. After a Sunday evening passed
in the latter location,
Sergei sent him back to his hotel
early.
"I have
preparations, m'ami . I’ll see you in the morning."
"Sergei, it's only
nine. We have hours yet."
"Time, but not much
else. You're too charming, my dear. After
three days of your company, I’ll be
celibate for a month."
"You know that's not
true." Dorian tongue invaded his
ear, with the desired effect. It was ten thirty by the time he left, but leave
he did. Sergei was adamant.
Back in his hotel he
racked his brains for some sort of memento to give Sergei as a parting present.
Something to wear, perhaps? All that black was so somber, though he did
look good in it. Dorian cast a considering eye over his collection of scarves
and shirts. The pinks and mauves and golds and peacock blues-- no, he wanted
something Sergei would actually use. He was going off to the mountains-
in April... What had he brought in the way of warm clothes? Rummaging through
the closet he found, with no little dismay, the very thing. There was no doubt,
this was it, and he rarely wore it anymore himself. But- but- it had such
sentimental value- sentimental value that wasn't really connected with Klaus,
of course... It cost him a pang, but he wrapped it up anyway. Sergei was a
special person...
They met in the hotel
lobby next morning. Sergei, evidently a
light traveller, was carrying only a
shoulder bag. He looked keen
and alert, like someone leaving for a
long awaited holiday.
"Where will you be
on Thursday?" was the first thing he said.
Dorian had to think.
"At home, in Kent."
"Give me your phone
number there. I'll call or wire from Turkey. There's no point in relying on the
Circassian system to be operational."
"Sergei, this really
is dangerous, what you're doing." It hadn't quite registered before.
"What will I do if you don't come back?"
"Give that paper to
the Major, of course. But make him work
for it a little. You can tell him I
said to." Sergei smiled happily, obviously in the best of spirits.
"You're not enjoying
this, are you?"
"Yes, I think I am.
So many more things seem possible, all of a sudden. Maybe we all need the
occasional earthquake or avalanche to keep us on our toes: or an angel with a
fiery sword to drive us from our safe little gardens. At least I can always
come back to mine."
"Will you?"
"I'll definitely
try."
"I have a present
for you, a keepsake. No, it's not stolen,"
he said in annoyance at Sergei's raised
eyebrow. "It's all mine. I
thought you might need something to
keep you warm in the mountains." He took out the black velvet coat with
its fluffy white fur collar and the white fur at the cuffs. Sergei laughed
softly. "Sergei, why are you always laughing at me?"
"I'm sorry. I was
just wondering if you're the kind who likes
to make over his boyfriends. First the
hair, next the wardrobe..."
"It's nothing of the
sort. This is what I was wearing when I met the last man I fell in love with...
just before I met Klaus. His name was Caesar; you look a little like him. I
want you to have it."
Sergei put out a hand and
stroked the thick velvet, back and forth and then again, as if he couldn't
stop.
"Thank you," he
said, and taking the coat, slung it around his shoulders. "It's beautiful.
I'll think of you whenever I wear it."
Their eyes met, but
before they could say anything more, Klaus came sweeping in through the front
doors.
"Ah, good, M.Serge.
You're ready. The car is here; my agent will drive you to Charlie."
"Thank you, Major.
I'll be with you in a moment." He turned
back to Dorian. "I've closed the
shop for a week, and the concierge from next door will look in on my apartment
from time to time. But if you'd do me a favour--"
"Anything,
Sergei."
He reached into his bag.
"This is too valuable to be left in
an unattended house. I'd feel much
safer if you'd look after it for me for-- well, shall we say, a while?"
Dorian took the canvas
packet. He knew he was smiling uncontrollably, but he couldn't help it.
"Of course, Sergei.
I'll take good care of it."
"Thank you, Lord
Gloria. Au revoir. " He kissed him on both
cheeks, murmuring, "And don't
show it to the Major. He'd have a
heart attack."
"I won't,"
Dorian murmured back, and thought, "Maybe." With a
sudden rush of feeling, he put his free
arm around Sergei's neck
and kissed him hard on the mouth.
Sergei kissed him back, fully
and deeply. They let go of each other,
to find Klaus watching them
in white-faced shock, a sick
comprehension beginning in his eyes.
"I'm ready,
Major." Sergei smiled pleasantly at him, and
Klaus snapped, "W! " That
hapless agent escorted Sergei to the
waiting car. Dorian waved good-bye,
blowing kisses until they were
out of sight.
"I do hope he’ll be
alright, " he said to Klaus.
The Major seemed not to
hear.
"A homo. A damned
homo. Just like you. That's why the Chief-"
He was too angry to
continue.
"Well, it
worked," said Dorian matter-of-factly. "You're not
jealous, Klaus, surely? Because I was with another man?"
"Hardly. But to be
used as a- a pandar-" Klaus spat the word
out.
"Go-between, dear.
Or Cupid." There was a thought. Klaus with wings and a bow and nothing
else on- no, on second thought, better think about something else. Like the
book under his arm. Klaus with sandals and a rose mantle and nothing else on-
oh dear, everything seemed to lead to the same conclusion today. Sighing, he
slipped an arm around Klaus' waist, which the Major in his fury seemed not to
notice.
"Don't worry, Klaus.
You're the only man I'11 ever love."
"That's what I'm
afraid of," Klaus said, pushing him away impatiently. "Your kind-
they’re everywhere."
"Yes, aren’t
we?" Dorian agreed. "In the most unlikely place
too." Like your mirror, he
thought.
"I almost thought
well of that- that pervert," Klaus fumed.
"Really?"
Dorian feigned surprise . "I can't think why. Just because he's brave and
loyal and honourable and intelligent-" and got the best of you in a
confrontation- "surely that can’t be allowed to outweigh his sexual
tastes. Can it, Major? Come on, " he added without waiting for an answer,
"Let’s go have coffee somewhere. There's nothing more we can do until
Thursday."
They walked out into the
mild April sunshine, the great city
sparkling around them; and if the
Major, sunk in thoughtfulness,
was more silent than usual, Dorian for
once had no complaints.
MJJ