A Coldblooded Scoundrel Read online

  But Devlin was curious to hear the rest. "Please - go on."

  Phoebe took a long drag on her cigarette, exhaled smoke with a practised air. "You're a lovely man, Inspector," she said softly, "but you have the loneliest eyes I've ever seen." She shook her head, crushed the cigarette under the heel of her dancing slipper. "You're scared to death to let someone close to you - you think you'd be compromising yourself if you did. Losing that keen edge of yours." She grinned. "Oh yes, I've heard all about you, Inspector."

  Devlin was silent for a long moment. "I wish there was something else to drink besides that awful punch," he blurted, and could have bitten off his tongue. In a trice, Phoebe reached into her reticule and handed him a silver flask.

  "Brandy," she explained. "Mother makes the punch and I can't stand the bloody stuff. I've been tippling ever since this damned thing started."

  Devlin couldn't remember when he'd been this drunk - whatever Phoebe Alcock had put into her little flask, it bloody well wasn't brandy, or at least, it wasn't any brandy that he had ever had. "They're going to wonder where we are, inside the house," he slurred. For some long moments he had been discoursing with Phoebe on the nature of humanity, and whether it was possible for anyone to be entirely good. Phoebe told him that she had absolutely no desire to be good - that it was better to be interesting.

  "How long have we been out here?" Devlin wondered if Phoebe even had a watch.

  She did. "It's nearly midnight," she said. "We've been out here the whole time." She laughed, rolled back on the gazebo seat and tossed her stockinged feet into the air - she had long since discarded her shoes.

  "Your father is going to kill me..." Devlin rested his head in his hands and closed his eyes. The gazebo seemed to be mounted on wheels and was spinning about him like Mr. Ferris's famous carnival ride. He opened his eyes to the touch of Phoebe's nose against his own. "He'll think I'm presuming on your virtue."

  "Presume all you bloody well want," Phoebe cackled. "I'm past the age of marriage and damned well past the age of consent." She gazed at him thoughtfully. "Do you know that Freddie Lewis is in love with you?"

  "He kissed me, you know. Twice." A saner Devlin would never have told her this, but the brandy - or whatever it was - was whirling in his head.

  "Did you like it?" Phoebe reached out, laid her palm against his cheek. He was such a dear thing - lonely and unutterably sad, and so bloody fragile in his own way.

  "Oh, yes." Devlin nodded with the weighty sagacity of the thoroughly drunk. "I don't get kissed very much - " The rest of it died in his throat, unspoken, as she reached for him and kissed him tenderly, a tenderness that was curiously without passion.

  She slipped away from him, moving through the darkness towards the house.

  "Sir...?" Freddie Lewis's face filled the whole of Devlin's vision. "Are you - " He drew back in astonishment, then began to laugh. "You're drunk!"

  "Sh -shut it." Devlin tried to loop an arm around Lewis's neck and thus steady himself, but was unable to make his limbs obey him. "No need to tell - " He waved expansively at the house, including the grounds and all the occupants. " - everyone."

  "Are you alright?" Freddie wrapped his arm around Devlin's slim waist, steadying him. "I think I ought to take you home, Inspector." He walked Devlin carefully down the gazebo steps and into the cool night air. "You're in no condition - "

  "What if Whittaker comes back?" Devlin fought to make his eyes focus.

  "Whittaker?" Freddie felt the hot flush of anger in his face and fought it back. "I'll thrash him from here to Kingdom Come!" He moved Devlin the short distance down the gravel drive to where a four-wheeler was waiting, handed the inspector inside and got in beside him. "I won't let Whittaker anywhere near you." He wondered when he'd become so voluble in his devotion.

  "Phoebe said - " But Devlin thought better of it. He closed his eyes and seemed asleep in moments.

  Freddie Lewis reached across the dark confines of the carriage, and took Devlin into his arms.

  Devlin awoke groaning, in an unfamiliar bed and an unfamiliar set of circumstances. His head felt at least as large as Sir Neville's belly, but not nearly so soft or padded. And he wasn't alone - through weighted eyes he peered at the blond head on the pillow next to his. Freddie bloody Lewis! Devlin reached out gingerly and rapped his knuckles against the constable's forehead. "Wake up!" he snapped, and regretted it instantly. The volume seemed to be causing the insides of his head to slosh about in a most disagreeable manner, and his stomach seemed to be rising to meet the unfortunate condition of his brains. He fairly bolted from the bed and was halfway to the Closet of Ease when it occurred to him that he was absolutely mother-naked - this was the last coherent thought he was to have for some long moments, for all his energies were spent in expelling the contents of his stomach.

  Dimly, he heard Freddie speaking behind him, and reached out an arm to wave him away. It was all bloody bad enough - here his thoughts were curtailed by another wave of vomiting - bloody bad enough to be upchucking into Freddie Lewis's facilities, but even worse to be doing it without a shred of dignity. How in God's name could he explain himself, or even look the constable squarely in the eye?

  He sat back on his heels, his ribs and abdomen sore from this most recent bout. A hand appeared within his field of vision and passed him a cold cloth, which Devlin took gratefully and applied to his sweating forehead. "What...?" The taste of bile had backed up into his throat and he pressed his eyes closed against another rising wave of nausea. "Where is this?"

  "Let me get you sorted, guv'nor - " Freddie reached out to help him to his feet, but Devlin struck out savagely. "Oi! There's no call for that - sir."

  But Devlin, his mind elsewhere, didn't bother to reply. His hand had found a towel on the rack nearby and he wrapped it around his middle in the manner of a Polynesian warlord.

  "Oh, that suits you right down to the ground, does that." Truth be told, Freddie was in a unique position to appreciate Devlin's unusual attire, seeing as how he was still kneeling on the floor. Nice arse, he thought - nice legs, stomach flat enough to iron bedsheets on...

  "Get up!" Devlin staggered against the washbasin and nearly fell. "This is not the time to be commenting on my attire, Constable!" He ground his teeth together in frustration and pain; it felt as if his eyeballs were going to pop out. "Where are my clothes?"

  "I hung 'em up for you - keep the wrinkles out." Freddie indicated the wardrobe just beyond, its door standing open, Devlin's clothing clearly visible. Devlin pushed past the younger officer and seized his trousers, yanked them on over the towel.

  "Haven't got time for this," Freddie heard him say, "Bloody tea dance at bloody Brassie's house then bloody drinking with his bloody daughter and her bloody brandy - "

  "I think it were gin, sir." Freddie coughed apologetically. "Old Br - I mean, Sir Neville's missus said young Phoebe brews the stuff herself."

  Devlin levelled an evil glance at Freddie. "Just my bloody luck!" he hissed. He rammed his feet into his shoes and cast about the room for his hat and overcoat. "And what use were you last night, eh? Left me on my own with that spinster and her witches' brew - rubbing elbows with the toffs, were you?"

  This was unfair, and both Freddie and Devlin knew it. From another man, Freddie Lewis would never countenance such an attack, and on a reasonable day, he wouldn't countenance it from Devlin, either. But he knew Devlin was horribly hungover and doubtless feeling as if he were even now in the claws of Death. Perhaps he would bring it up to Devlin another time, when the inspector wasn't feeling as if he'd been crushed under the wheels of a costermonger's cart.

  "I'm going," Devlin said savagely, "and don't follow me!" The door slammed shut behind him, and Freddie was all alone. He allowed himself a philosophic gesture, in the form of screwing his eyes shut and twitching at his lower lip violently with his index finger. He sighed gustily once or twice, and went into the lavatory, stared at himself in the mirror. "You're a bloody idiot, you." His mouth compressed its
elf into a line underneath the neat moustache. "Stripping all his clothes off - did you think he weren't going to notice?"

  By the time Devlin got into his office, early Monday morning, the whole city of London was humming with the news of a possible Ripper repeat. Devlin wondered sourly who the hell had let it leak to the papers, but then realised it could have been anyone, not necessarily someone inside the Force. This made him feel slightly better. His hangover had gone completely, although he wasn't quite sure what to do with Freddie Lewis's bath towel, now that it had served its appointed function as concealment for his nether parts. He'd given it to his landlady to wash and tried to ignore her pointed questions about its origin, and her never- ending lament that she'd never seen it before, and who knew where it had come from, and what was Inspector doing, bringing home strange towels for her to launder? She dinned his ears with this continually, night and morning, until Devlin wished he'd never seen the bloody thing.

  He'd arisen early this morning, and treated himself to a shave and haircut at Windigger's barbershop. Normally he shaved himself, but the events of the past few days, and the reappearance of Whittaker, had convinced him that he deserved a little treat, even if Windigger's rates were exorbitant and Devlin could hardly afford it on a policeman's salary. He would be the last man to think of himself as being niggardly over money, but his colleagues at the Yard made a point of routinely inspecting the seat of his trousers to ascertain the degree of wear.

  He slipped into the chair and submitted himself to Windigger's tender ministrations, and was massaged, clipped, pummelled, soaped, scraped, and had his cheeks pinched into what, for Devlin, passed for glowing health. At the end, the stray hairs were brushed from his waistcoat and he presented Windigger with the cost of his ordeal, and what was rather a minuscule tip.

  Make no mistake: Devlin hadn't yet found a barber to surpass or even equal Windigger, an elderly Dutchman with a surfeit of nose and ear hair, and the halitosis of a week-dead corpse. "I heard that Ripper fellow is raising havoc again, yes?" He dropped this into one of Devlin's ears as his scissors did their work.

  "I've no idea where you got that idea, Mr. Windigger." Devlin felt a knot of anger growing underneath his breastbone: what was the world coming to, he wondered, when one's barber bruited official police business about the streets? "Never heard such silliness in my life."

  "But they say that even now - "

  "Rubbish." Devlin bit back a sigh. "Look, how much longer is this going to take? I've to be at the Yard in half an hour."

  Windigger took his scissors away and twirled Devlin's chair - and Devlin himself - like a carousel. "There. You are handsome, Inspector."

  "Humph." Devlin grumbled at his own reflection in the mirror opposite, wondered when he'd achieved those dark rings underneath his eyes.

  "But a little tired-looking, if I might say."

  "Mind your own business!" Devlin snapped - and anyway, Windigger's breath could peel the skin off your eyeballs. He slipped into his coat and gathered his gloves; the October morning was sunny and bright, but held that unmistakable breath of winter. "And thank you."

  He decided to walk the moderate distance to the Yard, to get some fresh air and also to delay the inevitable meeting with Freddie Lewis. Just this once, Devlin wished that Freddie could be elsewhere, for he was still curiously amnesiac about events immediately following Old Brassie's tea dance, and embarrassed that he had evidently turned up in the bed of his subordinate completely au naturel. Of course, Freddie's reasoning in the matter had been perfectly sound: Devlin would have been considerably put out if he had awakened to find he'd slept in his clothing. Still, that didn't warrant being stripped to the skin and deposited into bed beside a man who was in a similar state of undress. Perhaps Freddie merely thought he was doing Devlin a favour, and meant nothing by it. What was it Phoebe Alcock had said? "He'd be on you in a minute." Here Devlin grumbled again, stepped neatly around a steaming pile of horse turds and onto the pavement opposite. Freddie hadn't - as far as Devlin could tell - so much as laid a finger on him. Freddie had been absolutely circumspect. In every regard.

  This made Devlin incredibly depressed.

  Devlin reached his desk a little after nine, having successfully dodged Sir Neville Alcock, who was deep in heated conversation with three sergeants near the desk. He wondered how much - if anything - Phoebe had said to her father about Devlin's questionable conduct at the dance. He hoped to God she was intelligent enough to understand that even an intimation of inappropriate behaviour would be sufficient to ensure that Devlin's stones became a permanent fixture in Sir Neville's office, alongside the elephant foot rubbish bin and the monkey paw ashtray. He shuddered to think of his bollix floating in ether at Sir Neville's meaty elbow.

  There was a cup of tea waiting for him, and Freddie Lewis appeared, all graciousness and good intentions, to take Devlin's coat and hat. If the constable was still upset about Devlin's screaming at him on Sunday, he made no mention of it now - but Devlin thought he could detect the pungent stench of hurt feelings. Freddie was particularly obsequious this morning, which immediately put Devlin on the defensive: every time Devlin so much as looked at Freddie, the constable flinched, until Devlin believed himself capable of any number of heinous acts.

  "See here, Constable - "

  "There's a telegram for you as well, sir, and shall I freshen up your tea?" Freddie's gaze rested somewhere around the knot of Devlin's tie and moved no higher.

  "Freddie - "

  "I expect you ought to open the telegram as soon as possible, sir. It might be something important." Here the constable bit his bottom lip and fell into a grievous brown study that rendered him very nearly catatonic. So intent was he upon his private mourning that he completely missed Devlin's immediate directive.

  "Sir?"

  "I said, shut the bloody door!" Devlin got up from his desk but Freddie was quicker, and closed the door of Devlin's office with a punctilious 'click' that would not have been out of place at the Prussian royal court. He then adopted an attitude of profound humility, and stared at the floor between Devlin's feet.

  "Out with it." Devlin leaned against his desk and crossed his arms on his chest. "Come on. Let's get this bloody air cleared before we both smother."

  The constable raised his eyes and looked Devlin full in the face. "I wanted to tell you...that is...well, see here, sir - " At this point words failed him, and he appealed to Devlin mutely, his warm brown eyes overbrimmed with misery.

  Devlin sighed - there was no way in God's name that he could even think to broach a subject as delicate as this, with Freddie looking like Devlin had just murdered his kitten. "Saturday night," he said finally. He'd had it all planned out, what he'd been going to say, even down to his facial expressions and the placement of his feet. Right now, his feet were betraying the rest of him by creeping ever so slowly towards Freddie Lewis, until finally Devlin was gazing into the constable's eyes. "Thank you for taking care of me." He laughed self-consciously and rubbed a thumb across his eyebrow. "Made a bloody fool of myself, I did." Devlin straightened his shoulders and tried to look authoritative, even though his stomach was attempting just then to invert itself entirely, and come out his windpipe. "And that scene on Sunday morning - "

  Freddie smiled gently. "I see you've been to the barber this morning," he said.

  "What?"

  "Windigger, isn't it?"

  Devlin blinked at him like a startled animal. "Yes - yes, I always go to Windigger."

  "And he always nicks you in the very same spot."

  "Nicks me?"

  "When he shaves you - he always gets you right there."

  Devlin's hand explored the contours of his naked face. "Where?"

  Freddie swayed forward and captured Devlin's mouth with his own, sucking the inspector's bottom lip gently, while his eager tongue flickered and nibbled, teasing. Devlin heard himself groaning, as if from a great distance away, and his body moved of its own volition, into the constable's embrace. Hi
s fingertips pressed against the clean white linen of Freddie's shirt, exploring every contour of the young man's back, memorising the texture of barely covered flesh. When Freddie at last released him, Devlin was gasping as if he'd been dragged along the Strand behind an omnibus.

  "Oh God, Freddie - " Was that his voice - his voice, so ragged and so pleading? " - we can't do this - someone will walk in and then - "

  Freddie pressed his thumb against Devlin's mouth. "I know," he whispered, leaning in to kiss the inspector gently, cherishing the touch of his mouth. Devlin looked absolutely bloody wonderful when he'd been thoroughly kissed; Freddie wondered what he'd look like if he were given a damned good tumble.

  "Who's the telegram from?" Devlin whispered, going weak in the knees as Freddie leaned in and pressed his opened mouth against Devlin's neck.

  "Reginald Harker."

  NOTHING UNUSUAL STOP VARIETY OF SUBSTANCES USED STOP NO PRECISE CONCLUSIONS STOP