Chapter 15

East Harlem, New York

He groaned when he managed to get up from lying down on the pavement. The layers of fog, floating thick on the streets of New York that night, dimmed the light diffusing from the lamp posts giving an eerie edge in the atmosphere around him. He was ruffled up and probably he would be bruised by the next day but the shooting pulse of pain he felt coming from his left ankle when he stood up on his feet made him hiss and swear through his clenched teeth.

"Bugger!", he bended over and grabbed his left knee, staring at his pained ankle below.

He took a deep breath and relaxed for a few seconds before he straightened back up again. Conscious about his injury this time, he tried to put most of his weight on his right foot before he started limping on the pavement, hoping for a cab to show up. The streets around him were empty. He had a metallic salty taste in his mouth that made him pass his fingers over his lips. The sight of blood on them caused him to curse some more. He took a handkerchief out from his pocket to wipe the blood off while his eyes kept scanning for any passing car.

Luck at least was on his side. Ten minutes later, a pair of faint car lights were approaching through the fog. The "Taxi" sign on top of the car made him smile. He placed two fingers in his mouth, whistled as loud as he could and pulled his arm up. He was eager to leave the hell out of where he was. The pain on his ankle had turned into a constant throbbing one.

"Washington Square", he said to the taxi driver once he came in.

Robert would have a major surprise in front of his door in a little while and probably a heart attack but Terry could do nothing about it. He was certain that he would be subjected to a lot of angered frustration from his boss and the all necessary lecture about his ways but what was done was done. It wouldn't be a pleasurable experience but in the state he was he preferred Rob's anger over the hysterics from Eleonor if he chose to show up in front of his mother's door late at night.

"So Graham, what is your verdict?", Robert asked Dr. Lewis once he had finished his physical examination over Terry's injury, giving angry glances to him lying on the bed, resting his bandaged foot on a pillow, waiting to hear the same thing.

His old pal took his glasses out, wiping them with a cloth and turned for a brief moment his eyes to Terry.

"Hmm...let's see", he said with an authoritative voice, "He'll be bruised and in pain at places by tomorrow, that's for sure...a cut on his upper lip...and there is swelling and tenderness over the subcutaneous bones on his left ankle.", he continued his diagnosis while Robert was perspiring hearing the bad news.

"The injury on the ankle looks more likely to be a fracture, though I will need to confirm that with an X-Ray tomorrow at my practise", he added.

Terry left his head fall back, leaving a loud sigh in response to the doctor's last words. This was not what he wanted to hear. A disaster by all measures. He felt a headache coming and not only that but a complete rearrangement of the whole summer. London was getting nearer, and this stupid injury was the last thing he wanted right now. Not to mention, he would miss the last two weeks of this season's play. Rob would pull his hair out in frustration, Eleonor would find the opportunity to mother him incessantly, his fellow thespians would be disappointed to say the least with his sudden absence from the stage right at the end of the season. Anyway he looked at it, it was one lose-lose situation he had landed himself in and that made him groan impatiently on the bed. Robert gave a shooting glance that spelled trouble.

"No to worry Graham, I'll make sure he'll be at your practise first thing in the morning..."

"Yes...I'll need to place his foot in plaster cast if my diagnosis is correct...so I'm afraid it's no stage for you young man", he said, having turned his eyes back to Terry, putting his glasses back on his face.

"Thank you doctor", Terry said back to him through his teeth, looking at Rob behind him who had already hit the bottle of port once he realised he would have to make do without Terry as the protagonist for two weeks.

"Thank your lucky stars Terrence", the man answered back to him, "and please...next time, keep your nightly wanderings short and don't play heroics when you're pressed on the wall by muggers"

Terry chose not to respond. Sometimes saying nothing is better than saying something, especially in his situation where he couldn't afford to raise tempers more than they already were. Dr. Lewis was closing his bag, getting ready to leave.

"Young generation...", he said to Robert who quickly hid the small glass with the port behind his back to the sudden turn of the doctor towards himself. "All good looks and no brains...", he continued.

"You took the words right out of my mouth...", Robert said to him, placing discreetly his glass down.

Terry felt the blood ringing to his ears and bit his tongue not to throw something sarcastic back. Bloody everyone had an opinion for himself and now he was the stamp for his generation as well.

"Try to keep your leg still for the night Terrence", the doctor said to him.

"I don't see any other choice...", he mumbled with annoyance in his voice not being able to hold back any longer. Robert gave him a glaring stare signalling he would deal with him later the moment he spoke. He helped Dr. Lewis with his coat.

The man's eyes turned to the young actor. "Yes...there isn't any...", he said and smiled in his knowledge of Terry's mood. He wished goodnight to him and left. Robert came back to the guest's room where his protégée was after he escorted his friend to the door. He wasn't at all looking happy and Terry braced himself for a tirade of stern words from him.

"What the hell were you doing in East Harlem Terrence?", Robert asked him with a raised voice.

"I told you I wasn't paying attention where I was going", Terry replied once more repeating what he had said earlier to his boss.

"Were you blind?!", he continued ignoring his answer.

Terry put his hand over his eyes. His body was stiff. He was feeling like a load of bricks had fallen on him. He took a deep breath. Apparently the man opposite him who was to the point of fuming wanted nothing more than driving Terry out of his mind with his persistence to lecture him in the middle of the night. "How about a couple of those painkillers the doctor gave you and we call it a night, hey boss?", he turned and said to him with a look that spelled out he was reaching his limits.

Robert's eyes widened. He just couldn't believe this guy sometimes. He could turn a saint to a killer, he honestly could, he thought and opened his mouth to say something back. Terry's look didn't change. "Ohhh...alright alright", he said defeated and let a sigh, "I'll bring you a couple of painkillers, but don't think that you and I are finished", he continued mumbling, "I'll let you rest since you had a shock tonight".

He gave him the pills with a glass of water. While he watched him taking his medication he thought of this young man there, how he had the tendency to be drawn to unexpected situations. He pressed his lips with worry, hoping that nothing else would happen anytime soon even though he couldn't place his hand on the Bible where Terry was concerned. He wished him goodnight and left the room to let him rest.

"And don't forget to let Eleonor know tomorrow!", he heard Robert's voice yelling to him as he was getting further away from his room.

He imagined him smiling wickedly while he shouted that to him. He switched off the light next to him and lay there in the dark waiting for the painkillers to take effect, putting his hands behind his head staring towards the ceiling.

His mind went back to the surprise he had come across earlier in the day, experiencing the same deep sadness he was feeling before he was mugged. It was a thing he didn't expect to have in his hands, but there he was...bearing the effects of that particular find. And he wouldn't have found himself passing through East Harlem if his mind weren't so preoccupied from having stumbled upon and read from start to finish the journal his dead fiancee kept locked in a hidden compartment inside one of the bedroom's drawers. The truths inside hurt like hell. She might have been delusional in her love for him and that had cost him Candy...but he was also a bastard to her, denying her any sort of affection a man would show to the woman in his life. He had kept things at a strict friend's caring level and that was the best he could do under the circumstances.

What hurt him the most was, that he would have exactly the same attitude if he had to relive the years when he was considered a husband-to-be for the sick actress. There was no use trying to hide behind his finger. He had tried long and hard to fall in love with her but in the end there wasn't anything stirring in him when he was next to Susanna. For that inability from his part of loving her he was truly remorseful. He could have dealt matters better, with more maturity rather to take the "easy" option to devote himself to her in the name of duty. Duty hadn't brought love, nor had changed the façade the couple was living between the walls of their apartment. Anyone in their right minds would be able to see that duty had actually made matters worse for both of them for all the years she was alive...and Terry was the one to know of it first-hand...

30th April 1925

The Cock & Bull, London's East End

The Cock & Bull had been many a-times his meeting place with his "associate". Inside that small corner pub in East End London, Christian would always walk in, greet the pub lord, ask for his usual pint of dark ale and sit at the small table at the back of the pub. The loner's table as they'd call it. It could accommodate just two chairs where the punters would sit tight and they had better be firm friends with all that bumping of elbows, knees and what have you, since it was easier for a brawl to erupt in that pub that lighting a cigarette after a hard day's work.

That evening was nothing out of the ordinary. The place stunk of stale beer and cigarette smoke, crowed as ever. Particularly noisy too since Arsenal, the most successful London football team was coming second in the league table of the national championship.

A lot of comments spoken out loud would reach Christian's ears while he was nursing his pint waiting for Billy. Under other circumstances he would listen to that kind of conversations with interest, passing his time, even throw in his opinion too from time to time.

Right now he was preoccupied with other things though. He hadn't slept well the night before. He lit a cigarette and glanced at the beaten-up old leather satchel he carried with him, stuck between him and the wall. Its contents belonged to Billy and he was itching to give it away. Having it at home for two days now made him uncomfortable to say the least but...

Rose's unforeseen upheaval, the evening before, meant he had missed his meeting with him and as it was planned in situations like that, they did not phone each other. Instead, the person who had missed the meeting would arrive first, half an hour earlier and wait for the other.

The other reason that made him more than ever wanting to get rid of the contents of the satchel was Rose herself. He wanted to concentrate more with a clear mind on his relationship with her rather than on his hidden activities. He could not deny he was still wound up by her admittance of not loving him the way he loved her. To make matters worse, he insisted to find out the reason of her fear of a deeper love which extended over physical attraction.

He looked at the big clock hung on one of the walls opposite him. Billy would be there soon. He took a gulp of ale, a drag from his cigarette and glanced at the animated crowd still going on strong about football.

He had to hand it to her. Once he sat down and asked her about her past with a voice which did not leave her any alternative, she had obliged.

In short it was a story of heart ache. As a young girl several years ago, she had fallen in love with a rebel guy from St. Paul's college in London. They separated when he picked up all of a sudden and left to follow his dream as an actor in New York. Sometime later they hooked up again, in New York this time. Just when things turned serious between them, believing they found the love of their lives, looking forward for a future together, a major fateful tragic event took place which involved her future husband.

He asked her to tell him what that event was but it was too painful. Her voice broke up. Her eyes blurred. She pleaded with him not to ask her more than she could say. It was not easy for him forcing her to spill her hidden trauma out in the open just like that. He hated himself for what he was doing to her right then. He kept going only because he believed that secrets of this magnitude were better dragged out in the open, to be talked about, rather than leaving them festering like maggots feeding on a concealed albeit open wound under the surface. He had learned about that the hard way himself, when he considered the secrets his deceased parents were hiding when alive.

He behaved more like a callous piqued lover than a gentleman in front of her but at least she had made first steps, talking about what had happened in her past. The incidence which took place in the couple's life meant it was that man's honourable duty to stay by the side of another young woman. The nature of it was such that everything unravelled in the space of a day. Candy had woken up happy in the morning and ended up at night a hard broken shell of her former self.

Christian could not understand what was so dramatic about that event that it had made the man's "duty" to turn his attention and care to another woman so abruptly. Judging from his girlfriend's angrier than thou look on her face when he asked her if he had left the other woman pregnant, he realised how much she was still attached to that break-up and to that particular man as well, having vehemently defended him. "He wasn't that sort of a guy", she said on the spot with an absolute conviction in her voice fuelled by her anger to his question.

Her readiness to stand by him took Christian by surprise. A pretty disheartening surprise he might have added. A lot of years had passed since, but her reactions showed she had tender feelings for him. His dislike over Rose's old boyfriend grew, thinking he was a rival to someone unknown to him from her past. A lot of things made sense to him now as well as her fervent wish to live in the present throwing caution to the wind about what comes next.

Having reached this conclusion made his heart stir uncomfortably inside his chest. He was the perfect candidate for the lifestyle Candy had chosen for her. He did not have a steady job, he was independent, a man for himself. His life spent between his art and his crazy social engagements all together driven by his thirst for new experiences didn't really make him material for a long term relationship based on the commitment of true love. Problem was that she had counted on him not to fall in love with her and he had. His expectations shifted. With those he also felt determined to make her forget about her long lost once-upon-a-time boyfriend. Who knows...if he succeeded then he would also have a chance for her heart...

"'ello...'ello...". Billy's gruff voice took him out of his already at hand and a wide smile showcasing all his smoke stained crooked teeth, he slithered before Christian said anything, inside the tiny space between the chair and the table, and sat opposite him.

"Long time no see Billy mate", he smiled back at him.

"It is indeed...it is indeed...", he replied and took his tobacco pouch out for rolling him a cigarette.

"Wha' 'appened to you last night mate?", he asked him. "Nating serious I 'ope"

"Missus had problems Billy", Christian replied without wanting to talk about it much with him.

"Should 'ave figured it out...saw you...", he said, taking a drag from his cigarette, "and thought...geezer must 'ad been to a funeral", he continued, smoke coming out of his nostrils and started laughing out loud.

Christian couldn't do anything else but laughing together with him.

"At least mine doesn't chase me with the frying pan around East End!", he said back to him.

Billy stopped for a second and squeezed his fist on his chest, acting like a lovelorn man.

"Wifey's hand iz heavy but I love 'er", he said like he was on a break before starting to laugh again.

They both drank from their pints. His eyes fell on the satchel Christian was carrying with him.

"Is tha' it?", he asked with a lower tone, his eyes pointing to it.

"Yes!", Christian replied, "And we better get out of here...I want to get rid of it fast", he lowered his voice so only his mate could hear him.

"Faster than you can fly...", Billy replied, "Let's finish our pints an' we're off", he lifted his up and clinked it with Christian's.

"To black feathers an' sunny weathers", he proposed with a happy glint in his light green eyes.

"To black feathers an' sunny weathers mate", Christian replied and gulped the rest of his pint, banging the empty glass on the table with a smile.