Warning: ...how shall I phrase this...how about, 'oblique sexual innuendo'? That oughta cover it. It gets itself over with pretty early, if you're squeamish. =^_~= I say it's oblique because it's highly nonspecific, because I want each of you to fill in the gaps with something appropriate to your own sensibilities. You'll see what I mean...
Disclaimer: In a town called Perfect where there's a Walgreen's on every street corner, every author and authoress has their own set of Gundam pilots to love and to squeeze and to show off to all their friends. But we don't live anywhere near Perfect. *realizes she just ripped off a commercial to explain that she's not ripping off a tv show* Dangit.
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Episode Forty-Five: Windfall "Gambling: The sure way of getting nothing for something." ~Wilson MiznerApril 29th, 1902 Based on new information provided by Mr. Marlowe, the select group at Bridlewood who knew the terrible truth about Lord Peacecraft's death, or as Duo had dubbed them, the Regents Park Irregulars, instituted a new policy of watching Treize at all hours of the day, and following him wherever he went. Heero was hoping that they might catch him in the act of doing something suspicious that may have led to clues about young Captain Peacecraft's whereabouts, dead or alive. Today, the Count remarked to his niece that he was going out for the day, and invited her to come along, but she politely declined; in the next room, ear pressed to the door, one of the Regents Park Irregulars silently accepted the invitation in her stead. It was Duo's turn to watch Treize that day, and once he received word that the Count would be slipping out soon, he went up to his and Heero's room to swap the chef's uniform for his black suit and frock coat. He was just re-braiding his hair for tidiness' sake when there was a gentle knock at the door. "Enter at your own risk!" Duo called out, transfixed by his own image in the full-length mirror and hunting for errors to correct ahead of time. The door opened, and Quatre nudged his head an inch or two inside. "Hi...have you got a minute?" "As many minutes as Count Iron Drawers gives me," Duo said, fluffing up his bangs a bit. "I'm supposed to be following him into town, so I've gotta look sharp." Quatre smiled and walked the rest of the way in, shutting the door firmly but quietly behind him. "I'll try not to take up too much of your time, it's just getting harder and harder to be by myself lately, and I thought I'd grab the opportunity to come and talk to you." Duo straightened the black string tie he'd bought to replace the priest's collar which originally came with the outfit, and turned around with a grin. "What's on your mind?" Quatre licked his lips and fidgeted uneasily. "Well....." Unfortunately, 'Well' was as far as he got, for he had no idea how to gracefully approach the subject he wanted to discuss. A reddish tinge quickly filled in his pale cheekbones. "Uh...you and.....you and Heero........" The longer the pauses became, the higher Duo's eyebrows sat on his forehead, and eventually they dissolved into his bangs altogether. "Right...me and Heero...good nouns, but could I trouble you for a verb or two?" "You know you can talk to me about anything, don't you?" Duo shrugged. "Sure, but right now, I think you're the one who needs practice talking." Quatre's blush worsened, and he stepped closer, lowering his voice. "You and Heero...you're very.....close...aren't you?" Duo lowered his own voice to the same level. "Why do you ask?" "I just...was curious, that's all," the blond boy stammered. "If, let's say, I knew two people...two boys, who were.....more than friends...I'd just be curious to know...what it was like." They looked at each other with dazed stares, and it really didn't click in Duo's mind, what Quatre was so bashfully agitated about, until his sea green eyes darted from Duo's face to the bed, and back again. Duo followed the path of the furtive glance, got a hideously clear flash of insight, and backed away sharply from both Quatre and the bed, tugging at his collar and turning an interesting shade of crimson himself. "Oh, nooo. No no no. No. We're not...I mean, we don't...no, we're just...whew! Is it getting warm in here?" Since he was at the window anyway by that point, he jerked up the sash and stuck his head outside, and was lucky not to dislodge Heero's Arabian Jasmine plant from the windowsill. Poor Quatre became beet red, mortified at his mistake and yet unable to figure out how it happened. After all, he was only basing the assumption on the kinds of auras he picked up on when Duo and Heero were together, and his sixth sense had never steered him wrong before. He backed away towards the door, head lowered. "I'm so sorry! I never meant to cause offense! ...I'll just go." Duo pulled his head back in the room. "Now wait, wait...nobody said anything about offense," he said with a mediator's tone. "Let's talk about this, calmly and rationally, okay?" He pointed Quatre to the old walnut chest at the foot of the bed, and the gardener quickly sat down and stared at his shoes. Duo paced next to the bed, back and forth about eight times, then dragged a pillow over to the chest and sat down next to Quatre. He propped the pillow up on his lap and slumped down into it with a slouching hug, sinking his chin into the feathery bundle of fluff and studying his own shoes with equal interest. "Just to make sure we're on the same page," Duo said slowly, "when you talk about me and Heero being close...you mean, like the stuff you heard at the trial, right?" The false testimony of Treize's lackeys. It had burned the ears of everyone in the courtroom for hours, detailing the sort of physical behaviour two men could be tarred and feathered for in less civilized societies, and yet nobody present could tear themselves away. What they heard was scandalous, forbidden, compelling, and strangely exotic all at once, and their sense of revulsion was only slightly overpowered by their curiosity and thirst for cheap titillation. Quatre swallowed. "Yeah." "Yeah." Duo straightened up a bit and took a deep breath. "I'll level with ya...I'll be the first one to admit that a lot of that stuff sounded extremely gross...but a few things...I dunno...when I attach Heero's name to them in my head, somehow they don't seem that bad." Quatre looked up at him, wide-eyed. "Really?" "Sure, like, I can't stand to even think about doing that sort of thing with a stranger, it just turns my stomach! But then I look at Heero, and I want to hold him...and be held by him...and then I don't know what's supposed to happen next because I never get that far, but I want to know. Sometimes I sit and daydream, going down the list of everything they accused me of at the trial, and think, 'What if we did this?' or 'What if we did that? What would it feel like? What would Heero do if I even suggested it?'" He hugged the pillow a little tighter, reliving some of the vivid thoughts he had secretly pursued as recently as the previous night, then relaxed again. "Which, of course, doesn't mean to say that I'd do everything on the list...some of it was too gross even for me. It's revolting, when you think about it! How could you kiss somebody after knowing where their mouth had just been!?" Both boys shuddered violently and made 'Yuck!' faces at the wall. "I didn't honestly believe you'd lower yourself that far," Quatre said, pulling himself together at last. "Hell no. Neither would Heero, I hope. It'd sure take the taste away of whatever I cooked for dinner that night." Duo exhaled slowly and flopped on his back, bouncing lightly against the mattress and hugging his pillow a little tighter, with a dreamy look on his face. "I bet he's got great hands, though. That's what I think about the most. I wouldn't push him into doing anything really weird, but...I'm a reasonably normal, healthy, red-blooded kid, and it's only natural that I'm going to get a little hungry, y'know? I'd just...kinda like to know what's on the menu." The trans-dimensional space around Duo warmed itself considerably as he drifted into the innermost rings of his imagination, and Quatre felt it. From his perspective, looking down at the blissful chef, the warmth and joy he exuded expanded to fill the entire room; it was something like a soothing spiritual sauna made up of soft ocean waves and warm sunbeams, all emanating from the relatively tiny body of the braided boy next to him. He smiled. "You love him, don't you?" With his eyes softly closed and his lips only barely parted, Duo nodded, serene and trancelike. "Does he love you?" Duo opened his eyes, and at the same time, the sunbeams dimmed. "I don't know," he whispered. "I'm not even sure he knows what it means, and I'm way too chicken to come out and ask him." Quatre sighed. "That's too bad." "Yeah." They thought about it for a short time, while simultaneously acting as if it was the farthest thing from their minds, until sudden footsteps came rollicking up to the door a scant three seconds before it opened. Duo sat up, saw Heero in the doorway and smiled. The warm sunbeams returned, glistening with twice as much life and beauty as before. "Hey!" Heero noticed Quatre was there, but wasn't terribly concerned, to the suddenly nervous gardener's relief; he had bigger fish to fry. "Treize is ready to leave. There's a carriage outside." Duo tossed the pillow back to its usual place and leapt off the bed, tucking his braid down the back of his frock coat with a wink. "That's my cue, then. Showtime!" He headed out the door, followed by Heero, who gave a polite nod to Quatre, indicating, in Quatre's mind at least, that he really didn't give a flip if he was alone with Duo in their bedroom or not. At least he's not the jealous type, Quatre thought. He tried very hard to get a glimpse of what Heero was feeling, but at the brief moment before they both left, Duo's sunbeams were overpowering everything else in the room. Before Quatre left the sacred spot as well, and fled back to his familiar surroundings in the back garden, he promised himself that sooner or later, he was going to take a peek inside Heero's soul and find out if he cared for Duo or not. **********Dorothy found the practice of tracking Quatre's movements to be very irritating, because he was constantly flitting about the estate like a rabid chipmunk, and she never knew exactly when he was going to pop out from behind the hedge or shoot out from the nearest doorway. It was highly detrimental to her mission, which was to sneak a look at whatever, or whoever, was in Quatre's room. At least Trowa had the good sense to spend the bulk of his time with the horses. Good old, predictable Trowa, able to store up human contact like a camel stores water. Part of Dorothy's plan involved swiping a few matches from somewhere in the house, which was fairly easy. Remembering well what happened the last time she tried to light a match unassisted, she had been practising lighting a fireplace every night for the past week. Confident in her new skill, she took the tapered matches out back and looked around cautiously. He's got some nerve, locking his bedroom door all the time! It's like he doesn't trust me or something! She strolled casually past the kitchen window, towards the north end of the house. Well, I'll show him that he can't keep secrets from the likes of-- The servants' door to the kitchen opened. Dorothy instinctively ducked down behind the nearest potted spruce and started formulating excuses rapidly. It was Heero; he walked straight past the back terrace without any sideways glance and continued on, past the hedge maze and out of sight. Dorothy stood slowly, her heart racing, counted her blessings and dashed over to her target, Quatre's bedroom window. The curtain was still there when she crouched down to the sunken window pane. What she needed was a crack in the woodwork between the bricks and the glass large enough for a matchstick to fit through, and she soon found it. Shame...such pretty curtains...but they are dead common, so they deserve to burn. With a devilish smile, Dorothy lit a match on the very first try and delicately poked it through the hole, just far enough to catch a few fibres of the flowered curtain and set it alight. That done, she jumped up, taking the match with her and blowing it out, then ran to within an inch of the kitchen window, knowing that the kitchen was probably the nearest source of running water in the basement. Dorothy held her breath, peering in the window while keeping herself carefully concealed, and sure enough, someone took the bait. Two short, feminine creatures with veils, one dressed in reds and golds, the other in blues and greens, came tearing into the kitchen from the left-hand side and made a beeline for the washbasin. They each filled a fruit bowl with water and ran back the way they came. Success! Dorothy smirked. She didn't need to go back to Quatre's window for a second look; the curtain had probably already been replaced with an emergency reserve curtain of some sort. Besides, she found out what she wanted to know anyway. There were girls hiding there. Foreign-looking girls. Sisters perhaps. Feeling the giddiness of knowing something she wasn't supposed to know, Dorothy walked up the concrete steps to the main level, triumphant. **********When Heero knocked on the door to Arthur's cottage, he was surprised to be shouted in by an angry young voice. Inside, he found Arthur and Wufei sitting opposite each other in front of the fireplace, staring down at the coffee table. On it was a cribbage board with red and black pegs, and each of the gentlemen held a small hand of cards. Even at a distance, Heero could tell that the reg pegs were much farther ahead; judging by the sour look on Wufei's face, it appeared he was in charge of the black pegs. The butler attempted to say something but was quickly hushed by a waving hand attached to a white-suited arm attached to a very desperate Chinese warrior. Arthur and Wufei each counted up the points for their cards that hand; Wufei was able to move his black pegs ahead an impressive twelve notches, but it wasn't nearly enough. Arthur's hand counted for eighteen, and it put his red pegs at the finish line with a few spaces to spare. Wufei gurgled angrily. "It's impossible to win so many times in a row! How are you doing this!?" Arthur sat back and smiled good-naturedly. "Ah can't 'elp it if yer'e no expert at these sort'ah games." "Well, cribbage just isn't my best game, that's all!" Wufei shouted. "If we'd been playing backgammon, I would have mopped the floor with you!" "Oh, aye?" Arthur leaned forward. "I've go' a backgammon set in th' storage cupboard." Wufei leaned forward as well. "Bring it on." Arthur got up and toddled off to the other room, while Heero raised an eyebrow at the entire exchange. Less than a year ago, Arthur and Wufei were eyeing each other suspiciously across eighty feet of grass and cobblestones, and wouldn't have stood in the same room together, let alone sit at the same table, yet here they were, trying to humiliate each other at card games. He thought perhaps Duo would have found something hysterically funny about it all, but Heero couldn't imagine exactly what. "So...you two are getting along?" "I must beat him at something!" Wufei growled at the table, cracking his knuckles. "It's not just about winning anymore! My honour is at stake!" When he stopped to think, Heero found it strange that a young man who seemed to match him in cunning, intelligence, and fighting ability couldn't manage to beat an elderly man at a board game. It seemed...unbefitting an agent. He blinked the problem away to the back of his mind, to be dealt with another time. There was serious business to be taken care of first. "Have you been to see Jeffrhyss lately?" The anger drained from Wufei's face, replaced by apprehension. He wasn't ready to admit it out loud, but seeing what the man did to Heero had spooked him badly, making him realize just how deeply entrenched he was in something he basically wanted no part of. "Not since...no, I haven't." He lifted his chin bravely, but his eyes were on the floor. "Have you?" "I promised Duo I'd have no contact with him until it was safe," Heero said, "that's why I've come to you instead." The Chinese boy couldn't help but be intrigued. "What do you need?" "I'm trying to find out if Relena's brother is really dead, but to do that, I could use the help of any operatives or agents on assignment in South Africa. I used to know the movements of dozens of operatives, but that was over a year ago. A lot could have changed since then." "And you need me to ask Jeffrhyss who's in the area," Wufei finished for him. Both of Heero's eyebrows twitched, and he tilted his head to the side. "Don't you already know? All agents in the field are supposed to know each other's movements, so we don't shoot each other by accident." Wufei fidgeted. "Maybe...maybe I just wasn't paying attention when I was told. I tend to do that when I'm being force-fed tedious details about people and places that are of no consequence to my life. Though he didn't let on outwardly, Heero thought that was very strange. The hierarchy of the organization from oneself downwards was one of the first things an agent was drilled on before being released into the world, and Wufei's total ignorance on the subject was just one more thing about the boy that didn't add up. Either he was much lower on the ladder of power than he originally let on, or there was something more sinister behind it all. Still, it wasn't the time to make him irked and defensive, at least not until Heero got what he wanted out of him. "I wouldn't ordinarily ask you to ferry any more messages for me, but if there's any possibility we can catch Treize in an act of fraud, or murder..." Wufei nodded at the idea. He'd been talked out of slitting the Count's throat some time previous, since the number of crimes they could pin on him had grown considerably, and if they all worked together to prove his guilt, they had the power to inflict much greater suffering on him. "I do know someone in Brighton who could relay a telegram to the base. We might get a reply by this evening, if we're lucky." Heero looked relieved that he wouldn't have to speak to his Lordship personally. "I'd appreciate that." "One game of backgammon, and then I'll go," Wufei declared, a moment before Arthur returned with the game in question. Heero left them to it, and retraced his steps back to the house, but he couldn't get the nagging inconsistencies about Agent Chang Wufei out of his mind. When they met, Heero should have known of him, as he would anyone belonging to Jeffrhyss who was below him in rank, but he had never heard the boy's name or seen his face before his arrival at Bridlewood. Wufei knew some key secrets about Jeffrhyss, however, things only a high-ranking operative in his Lordship's company could know, so he wasn't lying about his involvement...but he was still a cause for mild suspicion. As soon as the business with Treize was sorted out, Heero decided, he would devote more of his energy into discovering what it was about Wufei that unnerved him so. **********Duo had to admit, he'd had more exciting afternoons. Even after swearing off his old habit of thrill-seeking, the night he and his best friend nearly got killed by an oncoming freight train, he was seriously considering going back to his daredevil ways, if only to fend off dying of boredom. Right after leaving the manor in a hired carriage, one that Duo followed easily by sprinting down side streets and alleyways, and also by relying on heavy traffic downtown, Treize went straight to Lady Une's mansion. She appeared to be expecting him, and sailed out her front door in a lemon chiffon sundress and matching wide-brimmed hat, eager to join him on his planned adventure. Duo followed them to the shops, through the park, and up west, where he subsisted on a meagre lunch of fish and chips while the Count and his fair Lady dined at a gourmet restaurant. It was all quite tedious, but Heero had asked him very nicely to watch Treize, and watch him he would. After lunch, the aristocrats went to the racetrack, where the new sporting season's fastest fillies and most sturdy stallions were charging around in dirt-covered circles before an audience of thousands. Treize and Lady Une each placed a few bets, just for fun, and took their seats in the executive gallery with the striped sunshade, amongst the rest of London's rich and famous, and had the best view of just about everything to be seen. Duo sat way in the back of the grandstands, on a hard wooden bleacher as opposed to the socialites' high-back upholstered deck chairs, and struggled for a long time to get comfortable enough to concentrate on observing his target. At the far left-hand side of the race track, a bell clanged, the retaining gates at the starting post opened, and eight jockeyed horses sprang out at full speed, clomping and jostling as they made their way around the sun-drenched oval for the crowd's amusement. Duo found nothing spectacular about it. Whee. Horseys go round in circle. This is better than sleeping pills. Three races later, the Count hadn't moved, preferring to keep close to his companion and the bottle of champagne they shared. They look like they're celebrating, Duo thought. Probably dreaming up a thousand and one ways to spend Relena's money, once they get their grubby paws on it. No one had thought of the possibility that Lady Une was assisting Treize in his larcenous campaign, but now Duo was starting to wonder. The extra thought this required made him hungry again, and since his target hadn't moved in the past half hour or more, he felt safe enough to nip back to the concession stands in search of anything remotely resembling a Coney Island hot dog. He got up and squeezed through the lower-class crowd without any trouble, but when he got to the aisle, where the cheap seats met the stairs, his foot caught on something, and he halted, looking down. Stuck between two slats of poorly-maintained wood, but nosing out just far enough to nab Duo by the toe of his shoe, was a small brown leather pouch. He picked it up, turned it over a few times, and gave it a squeeze. It sounded and felt like there were folded papers inside. Duo looked around furtively, but saw no one scanning the stairs for lost items, nor did he see anyone looking at him in a way they shouldn't have been. Nonchalantly, he slipped the pouch into his pocket and exited the grandstands in the opposite direction from Treize. Once safely at ground level, Duo picked out a covert spot behind a hedge and took out the leather pouch to give it a closer inspection. With the best and purest of intentions, he opened it, and nearly choked at what he found. Inside was a roll of bank notes, altogether totalling thirty-five pounds. He realized, both excitedly and foolishly, that with a sum equalling a year's salary in his pocket, he could sit in front of Treize and Lady Une, with champagne, smoked salmon and a strolling violinist, and still have enough to buy a whole new wardrobe on the way back home. Just in time, guilt slapped him in the face and told him to knock it off. The best thing to do, he reasoned, would be to turn the money in to the lost property office, and let them deal with it. Unfortunately, he searched the entire racing complex three times over, and couldn't find the lost property office. Failing that, he went to the nearest unoccupied ticket wicket, where a trio of bookies were on their coffee break with the 'Next Window Please' sign clearly displayed. "Excuse me," he said, tapping politely on the window. "Next window, please," one of the three rough-edged tellers yawned, without looking up from his racing form. Duo looked at the other windows, and they all had long lines in front of them. He preferred to unload the cash as soon as possible, before it was unlawfully picked from his own pocket by a more experienced thief. "But I need some help now, not an hour from now. Can't you guys spare two minutes?" The second teller, a gruff-looking bearded bloke with an eye patch, bit down on his cigar and snarled at the boy. "Oi! Cawn't you read!? It says we ain't open, so clear off!" Duo faked looking hurt and humble. "Ohhh, I'm sorry, I just hoped there was someone who could tell me what to do with the big fat wad of money I just found!" As his voice hardened towards the end, heads turned, and the three tellers all looked shiftily at each other. To their disappointment, all three had heard the boy quite clearly, so none of them could offer to look after the money and pocket it without the other two knowing. At occasions like this, Duo was glad that he understood the criminal mind. "Ain't there nobody at the lost property office?" the first man said, putting down his coffee with a slosh. He appeared to be in charge of that particular window, had dark, thinning hair, spectacles, and heavy jowls hanging off his face with three days' worth of stubble. "Maybe there would be, if I could find it," Duo explained, "but half the people in line over there know I'm walking around with a small fortune, and if I go looking for the place now, and someone follows me, smacks me over the head and steals it, it'll be your fault for not helping me! I'll sue!" "Awlright! Awlright!" the man whined with his hands in the air. "But you cawn't jus' dump a load o' money on us...if you wanna leave it 'ere, you'll 'ave to place a bet." Duo looked down and to either side, gnawing on his lower lip and thinking. He couldn't give the money away in case the owner was still looking for the pouch, and he certainly couldn't gamble with something that didn't belong to him...but if the owner was never found, gambling it and losing it was spiritually better than keeping it. He took a deep breath and huffed it out in exasperation, removing the leather pouch from his pocket and shoving it through the open portion of the window. "Okay, if that's the only way to get rid of it." He started walking away, but the man called out and stopped him. "...'ang on, you've gotta pick an 'orse first!" Duo spun around and sighed, looking up at the odds posted for the next race. He picked the horse with the worst chance of winning, hoping never to see the money again. "Alright, the...the blue one, up there. Whatever." He pointed at his choice, the turned to leave again. "Gillingham Bluebell to win at five-to-one," the man muttered as he filled out the paperwork. "Oi! Son! You forgot your betting slip!" Again Duo stopped and groaned. Every moment he delayed getting back to his seat was a moment in which he could lose the Count's trail. He stalked back to the window, snatched the piece of paper confirming his wager, and practically ran to the grandstands and up the stairs to his spot. Thankfully, Treize hadn't moved. Duo found the entire trackside experience rather boring; horses just weren't fast enough for a decent race, in his opinion. Too bad Professor Giorgenson didn't soup up a couple dozen jalopies just like Winifred. Then we'd have a race. The chef was pretty much zoned out when the next race began, but slowly became aware of the droning announcer's voice, piped to the audience by a man in a straw hat and striped waistcoat, pouring a speedy commentary into a metal speaking trumpet. "...ahead by two lengths, falling back is Pardon My Garden, and it's Razzamatazz, Hershey Bar, and Chiquita Margarita coming down the back stretch, followed by Twenty-Three Skidoo, Gillingham Bluebell, and Pardon My Garden. Into the third corner now, Chiquita Margarita inches ahead, Razzamatazz still strong on the inside, and coming up on the outside is Gillingham Bluebell. Gillingham Bluebell closing fast on Chiquita Margarita as they come out of the fourth corner, and it's Razzamatazz and Gillingham Bluebell, Razzamatazz losing ground as they head to the post, and at the finish, it's Gillingham Bluebell by half a length, followed by..." There were disappointed groans peppering the grandstands, and a few grateful cheers from the few that took the same long shot that Duo took. The chef blinked. Hold on a sec...I won, didn't I? Frantically, he tore the betting slip out of his pocket and read it twice. Gillingham Bluebell to win at five-to-one odds. Duo swallowed. But...I can't win with someone else's money! I've got to straighten this out! In a flash, he dashed back down the stairs, forgetting his mission, and ran straight for the window with the three Cockney clerks in it. Only the man in charge with the heavy face and the thinning hair remained, as the other two had gone back to their own wickets, and the window that had been 'closed' was now open for business, complete with a long line. Duo stood at the end of it and fidgeted, tugging at the scruff of his neck where his hidden braid was scrubbing an itchy patch into his skin. When he finally got up to the man, he slapped the paper down with a wild and desperate look in his eyes. "You've gotta take the bet back!" Duo shouted. The man looked at the slip and whistled appreciatively. "No can do, my son. You are now the proud h'owner of one 'undred and seventy-five quid." "What!?" "Plus your stakes money back. That makes two 'undred and ten." The clerk opened his cash drawer and started counting out twenty pound notes. Duo gurgled with fright at the prospect of semi-stealing such a large sum and smacked both hands against the glass. "No no no no! I can not take this money! It's not mine!" "It is now, sunshine." "Look, I don't want it!" the boy insisted. "Can't you just stick it under the counter and hope one of your goony friends makes off with it after closing time!?" "See 'ere, we may be a bit shifty, but we h'ain't unethical!" The clerk rubbed his stubbly chin and thought about it. "Tell you what, though...if you're really dead keen on losin' it, you could always place a tougher bet." "Nuh uh, no way! I'm through gambling! I like to restrict my crimes to public lewdness, petty theft, and occasionally using my sleeping best friend as a decorative display pedestal for my cat! This is out of my league!" "Not if we make it easier to lose!" the clerk said, taking out the day's racing form and spreading it on the counter at an angle from which they could both read it. "...'ere we go, race after next, the one with the worst odds is Sweet Adeline at ten-to-one. Suppose you put your winnin's on that 'orse, and it loses, then you can just keep the original thirty-five quid, since you came by it honestly. Howzat?" Duo looked doubtful. "Well..." "And in the remote 'appenstance that Sweet Adeline wins, you can put the winnin's of that race on the worst runner of the next race, which would be.....Harlequin's Gallop at fifteen-to-one." Duo blinked and looked up. He'd heard that name before... "Then only one 'orse has to lose, and you've lost the lot. It's what we in the trade call a 'double'. What d'you reckon?" Harlequin's Gallop... The words echoed in Duo's mind over and over, but he couldn't figure out why they mesmerized him so. He would have given it more consideration, but the gentlemen behind him in line were getting antsy, grumbling and prodding him in the back, telling him to get a move on. "Okay...okay, I'll do it, but put everything on the line. I don't want to walk out of here with a single penny more than I came in with." The clerk filled out the paperwork and handed Duo a new betting slip, which he hastily shoved in his pocket before squeezing out of the line and running back to the grandstand, but before he even made it back to his seat, he could tell he'd spent far too much time trying to get rid of his ill-gotten gains. Treize and Lady Une were gone. Duo panicked. He ran down to the upper-class gallery where he'd seen them last, but the attendant wouldn't let the pathetic lower-class boy in, even to have a look around. He dashed out of the complex and ran all around the perimeter looking for the pair, but couldn't find them anywhere, then dashed back inside, searching the wickets, the gardens, and the concession stands. All the while, there was the tinny voice of the man with the speaking trumpet in the background, barking out the results of the latest race. "...into the fourth corner, Percy's Paddleboat falling back behind Aces Wild, and it's Mother of Pearl, Sweet Adeline and Aces Wild. Aces Wild coming up strong on the outside, and down the front stretch, it's Mother of Pearl and Aces Wild, but Sweet Adeline's making a strong comeback! Half a length back, quarter length, and at the post, it's Sweet Adeline by a nose!" Duo was only barely listening. Oh man, oh man, oh man...Heero only asked me to do one thing and I messed up bad! He's never gonna trust me with any more spy work as long as I live! Desperate for a clue, he started asking people at random if they had noticed a tall, distinguished-looking gentleman with a glamorous brunette on his arm. Most people said yes, dozens of them, which was no help at all. By now, Duo was sweating from the exertion and couldn't fight the need to sit down and pull his braid out from under his jacket before it could tickle any worse. Despondently, he sank his head into his hands and sighed. To his left, the man with the speaking trumpet was calling the most important race of all. "...down the back stretch, it's Wings of Fire leading Grim Reaper by a nose, half a length back is Cannonball, Desert Sand and Lonely Dragon, and three lengths back, posing no threat, is Harlequin's Gallop..." Duo dragged his head up to watch what he had already decided would be his last horse race ever. On the whole, gambling had not been a positive experience. He propped his chin up on one arm and stared at the broad dirt oval, vacant'-eyed and wondering how he could show his face at home that evening. "...but hold on a moment! Harlequin's Gallop is rallying! Past Lonely Dragon, past Desert Sand, and closing fast on Cannonball!" The crowd drew in a collective breath, and Duo's eyes ballooned. "Cannonball holding steady against Harlequin's Gallop coming out of the second turn, but down the back stretch it's Harlequin's Gallop going for the pass! Harlequin's Gallop ahead by half a length, and now a length going into the third corner!" Suddenly, a fragment of Duo's memory that had been lurking in shadow leapt out into plain view, and he knew where he'd heard the name 'Harlequin's Gallop' before. ...when I was talking to Heero on the telephone! He said Relena walked in, and he made out like he was placing a bet so she wouldn't catch on, and that's the horse he picked! He told me he made that name up...but it's real! It's real and it's fast! At worst, it was a coincidence; at best, a sign from above. "...gaining on Grim Reaper, and it's Wings of Fire, Grim Reaper and Harlequin's Gallop! Harlequin's Gallop taking them both on in the fourth corner, squeezing them to the inside, and coming down the front stretch, Harlequin's Gallop takes the lead!" Several spectators jumped to their feet, Duo included. "Wings of Fire and Grim Reaper, unable to fight back! Harlequin's Gallop leads by a length, now two lengths! An amazing turn of events! At the post, with a commanding lead, it's Harlequin's Gallop! Harlequin's Gallop wins it all!" The grandstands erupted into a combination of cheers and moans, and Duo might have heard them if not for the strong ringing in his ears. He swayed a bit from side to side, eyes wide and double-glazed, and finally had to grab the nearest metal railing to keep from toppling over. The next coherent thought that formed between his ears told him to go as fast as he could to the gruff clerk's wicket, and to have it out with the man who all but promised him a fine losing streak. He went, stumbling and lurching, numb from the neck down, to the very same window which was displaying the 'Next Wicket Please' sign once again. Impatiently, he rapped on the window. "What the heck did you do!?" he yelled. The clerk looked up, saw who it was, snatched off his spectacles and tossed the sign over his shoulder. "You wanna watch your manners, my son! I've just done you a whopping big favour!" "Favour!? I was supposed to lose everything! Now my problems are ten times bigger than they were before!" "Oh no," the clerk said with a smile born of avarice, "first they got ten times bigger, then they got fifteen times bigger on top o' that!" He grabbed pencil and paper, scribbled out some quick calculations, and put his spectacles back on to make his grand announcement. "Since both 'orses done come up, your winnnin's, stakes an' all, comes to thirty-four thousand, six 'undred and eighty-five quid. My 'eartfelt congratulations to ya." Duo's eyes bulged. "Thirty.....thirty-four........thousand?" "I cawn't authorize that big a payout meself," the clerk said. "I'll 'ave to fetch the manager." As soon as the man left his window and ducked into the inner recesses of the trackside office space, Duo's legs gave out. He crumpled into a seated position, turning around as he fell so that he was leaning up against the counter facing away from the window. For some strange reason, he felt extremely dizzy. The people around him hadn't heard the clerk's words; they were still milling about, attending to their own petty business, betting a shilling and occasionally collecting a pound or two, totally oblivious to the fortune that had fallen on Duo's shoulders. As visions of little money bags danced around Duo's woozy head, he started to like the idea of being rich. He could buy a house with Heero somewhere and never have to lift a finger. He could open a chain of homeless shelters across Europe. He could hire Relena to shine his shoes. The clerk came back with his superior in tow, and blinked rapidly when he saw the lucky boy was missing. He drew up close to the window and just barely saw two feet sticking out from under the counter, and banged on the wooden surface sharply. "Get up, you plonker!" Duo got up a little too fast and whacked his head on the underside of the countertop, yelping and clutching at his sore scalp as he half-straightened up to look at what the clerk had brought with him. The manager standing behind the clerk was clean-shaven and snooty-looking, with substantially better clothes and a classier haircut that his scruffy subordinate. He looked Duo up and down, studied his face, and leaned slightly closer to the window with a scrutinizing glare. "How old are you, young man?" he asked with a terribly snooty accent. "Wha...I don't know," Duo stammered, "sixteen, seventeen, somewhere around there. What difference does it make?" The snooty manager stood back and put his hands in his pockets, looking down his nose at the smarmy juvenile. "It makes quite a lot of difference when the ownership of such a large sum of money is in question," he said. "Unless you can prove that you are legally an adult, I'm afraid I cannot release this money into your possession." "But how am I supposed to do that!? I'm an orphan, for cryin' out loud! And who are you to say who's an adult and who isn't!? What about mental maturity, huh!? Doesn't sixteen or seventeen years of being a reasonably good citizen put me ahead of some of these other degenerates who can't even find this place without having a drink first!?" Duo waved an arm violently at the growing crowd of spectators listening to his frantic speech, some of whom were admittedly winos trying to double their money before taking it to the liquor store. Two of them nodded, clinked their bottles in brown paper bags together, and drank a toast to lethargy. The manager was unmoved, and seemed to get even snootier after the boy slagged off his regular customers. "I'm sorry, sir, but these are house rules." Either that, or he was trying to bilk the boy out of his rightful winnings, no one would know. In a rare display of temper, Duo kicked the front of the counter below the window. "Well, it's a stupid rule! That money's mine and I'm not leaving without it!" "I thought you dinnint want it!" the clerk whined. Duo grabbed the edge of the counter and ducked down to the hole in the window to shout at the troublesome man. "I changed my mind, okay!?" "Sir," the manager said tiredly, "all this is immaterial. Until you can prove that you are legally responsible for your winnings," he said, elegantly taking the betting slip from the counter top and placing it in a drawer, which he subsequently locked shut, "this stays here." Duo gaped as he saw his dreams of wealth fly away on gilded wings. Behind him, the crowd reacted to the decision with a mixture of sympathetic moans and condescending giggles. With an ear-bending sound that cut a wide swath through the mess, two people began laughing rich, sophisticated laughs, and they sounded unpleasantly familiar. Duo turned around and was dismayed to see Treize and Lady Une observing the scene and having a nice little chuckle at his expense. He glared at them, but they wouldn't stop. Finally ready for a good long gloat, Treize sauntered over and smirked wickedly at the boy. "Having a bit of trouble with the establishment, are we? Serves you right, I say! Yet another divine confirmation that some of us are destined to be poor." "I don't need this from you," Duo growled. "I'm being taken advantage of here! This whole system is seriously screwed up!" The Count's smirk sharpened, and his eyebrows arched in superiority. "Well, that's what happens when you play big boys' games, isn't it?" He smacked the side of Duo's face lightly with one gloved hand, and Duo shrank uncomfortably away from it, looking beaten and hurt. The poor chef watched the pair stroll away, still laughing up a storm, then turned back around and leaned heavily against the ticket window, head bowed in defeat. Only a few feet away, a newspaper reporter wasn't missing a single detail of the action. He recognized Duo from the time he covered the boy's trial, and knew this would be a thrilling continuation of the unfortunate waif's story. Without being noticed by anyone, he finished off his notes and prepared to swoop on Duo for an exclusive interview, but the boy had slipped away to mourn his misfortune in solitude. With a small shrug, the reporter decided he could complete the story without the interview anyway, and rushed home to his typewriter without delay. **********Grateful for even five minutes' rest from his suddenly backbreaking manual labour, a very tired butler slumped into one of the parlour's plush sofas and kicked his feet up on the coffee table. Heero understood that Relena might have been just a little disappointed at finding out that he wasn't a marrying man, but he never expected her to take it out on his hide. Only recently, and especially since Marcus had been coming over more frequently, she had been giving Heero more work than anyone else on the staff, and even took difficult duties away from the housemaids and dumped them on the boy, perhaps as a form of subconscious retribution for leading her on and then turning into a grouch. Many debates could be held on the subject of whether or not he deserved it, but he did the work without complaining, and had a few precious moments to spare before dinner was served. In the absence of Duo, who was running rather late, he decided to curl up with the evening paper and relax. Ahhh, the late edition, full of mind-numbing drivel. What bliss. He flipped languidly through the society pages, not really caring what he read as long as it had nothing to do with housework. Before long, something bizarre beyond belief caught his attention, and as he read the short piece in the middle of page seven, he tightened his grip on the paper with both hands, crinkling the delicate leaves in white-knuckled fury. Perhaps fatigue was making him more irritable than usual, but from what the article said, these were far from usual circumstances. Just then, there was a mousy tapping at the parlour doorway directly in front of him, behind the paper. Duo was peeking into the room and partially-shielding himself from harm with the door jamb, still wondering how to tell Heero what had happened. "Hi!" he chirped. Slowly, Heero's tightly knotted hands folded down the top half of the paper without moving. He was already glaring an intense glare that seemed to say, 'Have you lost your mind!?' Duo cleared his throat. "Um...you've done one or two things in your life that you're not proud of...right?" With a flashy jerking motion, Heero shook out the paper to straighten it, and read from the spot he'd left off at. "Headline. 'Plucky Chef Out Of Luck. High society cook Duo Maxwell, age unknown, made famous last year by the seedy scandal of gross indecency at Bridlewood Manor, had a bad run of luck at the track today, when--'" "It wasn't my fault! It was an accident!" "How does a person win thirty-five thousand pounds by accident!?" "I don't know!" Duo slumped pathetically next to Heero on the sofa and buried his face in his hands. "It's not like I was trying to goof off instead of watching Treize like you asked me to, I really stuck to him until we got to the racetrack! I found someone's wallet on the ground and I started out wanting to give it to the lost-and-found, but then every time I tried to get back to my work, they just kept throwing more money at me!" He lifted his head and made wild throwing gestures to accompany the last phrase, then fell back against the red plush and let his head loll wherever it wanted. "I tried to do my job today, I really did." Heero tossed the paper aside and pinched the bridge of his nose, counting to ten in as many languages as it took to calm down. "This wasn't what I had in mind when I told you to keep a low profile. In fact, if you can keep your name out of the papers for the next year, I'll buy you your weight in chocolate. That should be encouragement enough." Duo whimpered, sat up, and leaned his head on Heero's right shoulder, looking as meek as he ever had in life. "I'm sorry I lost track of Treize. Actually, he wasn't out of my sight for that long...he showed up just in time to laugh at me, the jerk. So...now he knows we're watching him more closely. I screwed up and I'm sorry." "I'm sorry you couldn't keep the money. I can't think of anyone more deserving of a little good luck." Softened as he always was by Duo's very presence, Heero loosened up and wrapped a comforting arm around him, and Duo repositioned himself snugly against Heero's shoulder, with an arm around his waist at the back. "I suppose you'll just have to mooch off me for a little while longer," he said with a hint of a grin in his voice. "I knew it'd be wrong to keep it right from the start," Duo said, "but the more I pushed the money away from me, the more of it there was...and eventually, I really did want to keep it. That money could have done so much for my old orphanage, and maybe every other orphanage in London, too. I could have helped a lot of people, but I blew it because I don't know who I am." He straightened up and looked Heero in the eye, while they still had a comfortable grip on each other. "I was thinking about this on the way home. We don't know who we are, Heero...neither one of us. We don't know our families, or the places we came from...we don't even know our own birthdays." Heero looked down. It was the gospel truth; there was a randomly-chosen birthdate printed on his fake passport, the one that said his name was Harvey Young, but that was as close as he had ever come to knowing how old he was. Over the years, he'd made some rough approximations for his own interest, but in the real world, it was hardly sufficient. "We still have all those things, even if we're not aware of them," he said. "It doesn't diminish us." Duo pondered, then brightened up. "I know what we should do! We'll give ourselves new birthdays! You pick one for me, and I'll pick one for you, and then we'll always have them starting this year. Any excuse for a party in the hedge maze. How 'bout it?" The idea actually made Heero smile, totally disarmed by Duo's charming childishness. "Deal." They shared a comfy moment and didn't really feel like getting up, but it was almost dinnertime, and there was work to be done. Before they could return to their duties, however, they were stopped at the parlour door by Wufei, who looked at Duo and wondered whether he should save his news for another time. Heero spotted the telegram in his hand and saved him the trouble. "You've had a reply?" "Quicker than I expected," Wufei said, ignoring Duo's slightly puzzled look. He hesitated for a moment, his face drawn. "It wasn't the news you were hoping for. I explained to Jeffrhyss why you needed a contact person in South Africa, but he says he won't do any business with you unless it's face-to-face." Heero glared. "Not likely." Not very mindful of Wufei's presence, Duo clutched Heero's arm closely. Now he understood what it was all about, but it still worried him. "He's not coming to get you, is he?" the chef asked nervously. "He wouldn't dare," Heero said firmly, "not while I'm armed and unresponsive to his brainwashing techniques. It would be suicide." On the inside, Duo shuddered. He could tell by the boy's voice that he meant every word. "And you won't go to see him, promise?" Heero looked at him with sympathy for his worries. "I already promised, remember?" Duo smirked grimly. "Just makin' sure." Having gotten absolutely nowhere that day, the three of them were ready to write off the rest of the evening and try again tomorrow. Wufei went back to Arthur's cottage, still displaying a puzzling reluctance to leave the old man's company, while Duo and Heero shuffled downstairs to check on dinner. Perhaps they had lost a few hours surveillance on Treize, but they had gained several days' worth of material to talk about between them and them alone. Curiously enough, most of it entailed fanciful speculation about what each of them would do with thirty-five thousand pounds...theoretically, of course. **********9:54 pm, Telegraph Office As he did every night he could, a part-time cub reporter by the name of Eddie Brooks was wading through a small ocean of overseas telegrams filled with tidbits of news from around the world. Every now and then, when things got slow in his small corner of a New York newspaper, bottom left corner of page 23, to be exact, the editor let him choose an intriguing piece of fluff from another country to print as a quirky interest piece. Tomorrow's outlook for the bottom left corner of page 23 was looking very grim indeed, so Eddie was screening every possible story that his chums in other nations were sending him for the gem that could promote him to the top left corner of page 23, or even better, page 22. Right between reading about the reputed two-headed alligator in Mexico and the boy who could eat metal in India, there was a knock at the door to the small telegraph office, and the visitor barged right in before Eddie could officially invite him. It was a friendly acquaintance of the clean-cut young man, one he was rarely unhappy to see. "Eddie, Eddie, Eddie!" the visitor chirped cheerily. It was a middle-aged man who, for lack of any better term known to the King's English, was pointy. His beard was pointy, his moustache was pointy, and even the ring of gray hair encircling his bald spot was pointy. Besides those outstanding features, he wore round dark spectacles and an obscenely colourful shirt that suggested a dozen scarlet macaw parrots and a handful of peacocks had walked past him and blown up all at once, splashing their brilliant hues all over the man's clothes. He was well-known for all these things, but most of all for his laid-back personality and his ability to sell anyone anything. He was also carrying something smallish in a brown paper sack. "Eddie baby, have I got a deal for you." "Hiya, Howard," the young reporter said, looking up from his papers with a smile. "If it's another 'factory seconds' trench coat, thanks but no thanks. The sleeves fell off the last one you sold me." "Aw, sorry to hear that kid," the pointy man said. "Trust me, this time I've got something you can really use!" With that, he hefted the paper sack onto Eddie's desk, on top of the mountain of papers, and extracted from it a pocket-size folding camera. At the click of a button, the front panel dropped down, and the accordion-like red bellows unfurled itself and held the lens out a few inches from the back panel. "Eastman Kodak, only three years old, fell off the back of a camera truck, so to speak. I've got six rolls of number two film with it, worth a good fifteen cents apiece, but I'll throw them all in for only a quarter. As for the final price...eh, since you've been such a good customer, we can negotiate. Whaddaya say?" Eddie smirked. "I know what you're like when I've just gotten paid for the week. You should've brought that thing here while I was broke, then you'd be easier to deal with." He looked at the camera; it was awfully tempting, he had to admit, and having his own photographic equipment could bump him up in the newspaper hierarchy. "How much?" "For you? A dollar." "I could get it new for a dollar!" "But not with film included!" Howard propped himself up on the desk with both arms and leaned forward. "Ninety cents." "Seventy-five." "Eighty cents and I leave your office in tears, dooming you to a life of guilt and self-recrimination for having gotten such a good deal out of me." Eddie reached out and shook Howard's hand. "Done." He fished out some coins and completed the transaction, shaking his head. "I'll have to spend the rest of this on developing chemicals now. Every time I talk to you, I end up further in debt." Howard gratefully accepted the money and squirrelled it away in his pocket with a grin. "It's a beautiful friendship, isn't it? So, whatcha workin' on?" "Oh, sorting through some news stories, looking for something juicy," Eddie said tiredly. "You'd think there'd be something of importance after the amount of time I spend here, but it's all the same trash...'Man bites dog and gives it chicken pox'...'Woman gives birth to albino triplets'...'American waif robbed of fortune in London gambling scandal'..." Howard's eyebrows leapt up above the top edge of his specs. "Are you serious? Redcoats picking on a Yank? They got to keep Canada, wasn't that enough? Lemmie see that last one." Eddie handed him the news item about the peculiar boy who lost big time at the track because of his age, or official lack thereof, and watched Howard's reaction with great curiosity. "Hey...I think I know this kid. Long braided hair, skinny as a beanpole...yeah, that's him. Well, I'll be damned." Eddie waited in vain for an explanation. "What?" "I met this kid last year in Buffalo," Howard said with a sense of wonder in his voice. "I didn't even know his name...but they describe him perfectly in this article, so it's gotta be him!" "Well...what's he doing over there?" Eddie asked, befuddled. "What's he doing? Gettin' shafted by the Brits, that's what he's doin'." Howard handed back the paper with a raised eyebrow. "You want my advice? Print that one." Eddie read it over a second time, and it seemed just a little bit more interesting if he read it with the mindset that an American citizen was being taken advantage of by a legal loophole, thousands of miles from home. That made it a human interest story. "You know...you could be right." He thought about it some more, and nodded emphatically. "In fact, you are right. This is the one. Thanks!" "Anytime, kid," the pointy man said as he headed for the door. "And, um...there's a chance I might be getting some authentic Tennessee whiskey next week. There should be some falling off the back of a whiskey truck around Wednesday. How many bottles can I put you down for?" Eddie went back to his work with a grin. "Goodnight, Howard." Howard shrugged, and left. His philosophy, as always, was 'Nothing ventured, nothing gained,' and the occasional minor setback on the path to becoming a millionaire was of little concern. He went back to his horse and cart full of odd things collected from odd places, some of it legally, and rode off into the night, looking for the next likely customer to unload his salvage collection onto. Eddie put the chosen news item in his attaché case, put away the rest of the papers, and locked up the office for the night. Anything else that was coming over the wire, he could afford to leave until the morning. For now, he had a stunning little story that a large portion of New York city would be reading the next day, and he had a boy named Duo Maxwell to thank for it. |
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Next, in Episode Forty-Six: Someone at Bridlewood welcomes a mystery visitor who just happened to be in the neighbourhood, and the reunion seems almost too good to be true. Dorothy discusses her findings with Lady Une and is given a suggestion even she isn't comfortable with, and Trowa divulges his true feelings about Quatre's family.
Dun dun DUNNNN! Oh well, easy come, easy go, right? =^_~= We'll find out, I guess...now, um...I had the next six episodes plotted out, time-wise, on a little piece of paper. Well, guess what. I haven't done my taxes yet, I've got less than 36 hours in which to do them, and there are DOZENS of little pieces of paper all over my room. I'm pretty sure Episode 46 will be posted in the middle of next week, but until I finish my civic duty, I can't be exactly sure. Just stay tuned to my website and I'll let you know the second I find it, kay? =D Gosh, you're all so understanding, I could smooch you.