DOWNTON ABBEY 1926.

EPISODE 3. Chapter 3.

Downstairs Gossip

Downstairs was all abuzz with the footmen's accounts of what had happened at dinner. It was a small but enjoyable perquisite of being a footman that one was privy to upstairs "scenes." There had been some memorable ones in the Crawley dining room, but for the most part these were few and far between. Spats between Lady Mary and Lady Edith - the ordinary fare - were hardly fuel for a bonfire of gossip. Hence the satisfaction with which Andrew and Molesley, the latter slightly unsettled by the presence of Miss Baxter in the downstairs audience, related the goings on upstairs.

"You could've heard a pin drop," Molesley said breathlessly. "We were all, all of us," he indicated Andy and himself, and included, by implication, Mr. Barrow who had not yet come down, "standing there as though we'd been petrified."

"And then what happened?' Daisy's words came in hushed tones befitting the shocking nature of Molesley's tale.

"His Lordship and Her Ladyship, they went frosty. Not impolite. Just ... cold. Lady Mary didn't even try to conceal her anger..."

"She hadn't been trying all evening," Andy broke in. "And then His Lordship asked in this ... cutting voice... what being Jewish had to do with anything, and..."

"And didn't the fool go on to answer, as though it had been a real question!" Molesley finished. "'They're widely held responsible for the collapse of the Reichsmark,' he says! 'They're not very popular in my country.'"

"That will have enraged His Lordship," Bates observed. He wasn't one to pay attention to gossip for the most part, but things that concerned His Lordship usually concerned Bates.

"Then the other one got into it," Andy went on, "and tried to explain that Herr Ribbentwerp hadn't really meant what he said, and no one believed him. And then the first one cottoned on, for a minute anyway, and told Lady Grantham that of course he didn't feel that way..."

"Unbelievable!" Molesley declared.

"Didn't anyone call them out on this?" Daisy said. Why, she wondered, did posh people always put up with rudeness from other posh people, but never hesitate to trounce a servant who got out of line?

"Mr. Branson did. He said that kind of thinking had no place at Downton."

"And then they just...carried on?" demanded Mrs. Patmore, as enthralled as anyone else with this tale of social horror.

"Lady Mary didn't. She got up and left the room."

"I think she would rather have stayed and taken him apart limb from limb," Molesley said reflectively. It was clear he thought Lady Mary up to the task. "But she didn't want to embarrass Mr. Talbot."

"I felt sorry for him," Andy said, with feeling. "This von Ribbentwerp person wasn't his friend. He just came with Herr Morden. Mr. Talbot couldn't have known this would happen."

There were footsteps in the passage and Mr. Barrow strode in.

"What's going on here?" he demanded, looking round at them all.

"What do you think?" Mrs. Patmore said belligerently.

Thomas hesitated. It was a difficult moment. Mr. Carson would have scattered them all with a sharp reproof about gossiping. But Thomas had been as astonished as the footmen at the conversation in the dining room and would have liked to talk about it. This was, however, no longer as easy as it had once been. He had to set an example.

"Is dinner ready, Mrs. Patmore?"

She scowled at him and she and Daisy slipped away. This left Molesley standing uncomfortably beside Miss Baxter without the comforting shield of something else to talk about. Thomas offered him some relief by turning to Mr. Bates and Miss Baxter.

"His Lordship and Her Ladyship retired immediately after dinner. They said to have your dinner and them come up directly."

In the moment of diversion, Molesley slipped into the passage, muttering some feeble explanation as he went. Thomas looked after him with exasperation. He wasn't going to get away that easily.

"And not a word about any of this over our dinner," Thomas said loudly, hoping his voice reached into the kitchen and down the passage. "We've got company of our own."

Molesley and Baxter

Of course, he should have just gone home when they came down from dinner. He could have done. There was no reason for him to stop here except that he was hungry. And it was just a habit of some years' duration. It was extremely awkward being here with Miss Baxter - somehow he ended up next to her at the table - when he'd spent the last three weeks avoiding her. But what else did he expect, accepting Mr. Barrow's appeal?

And then, having come, he couldn't just slip away after dinner. She had to go up and attend to Her Ladyship, so he had the opportunity to do so. But the barrier of distance that he had so scrupulously maintained lately had been shattered. It couldn't have gone on much longer anyway. He was here now. And he would have to explain. So he sat in the now-deserted servants' hall and waited.

"How are you, Mr. Molesley?"

He'd been so deep in thought about her that he hadn't heard her return. Scrambling to his feet, he banged his knee. He winced at the pain, and then his eyes fell on her face and he forgot about his knee.

It was a perfunctory question, but behind it, in the mirror of her eyes was all the hurt and hesitation that his cowardice of the past few weeks had sown there.

"Fine. Good. I've been... I'm well." He always said too much.

They stood together, uncomfortably close and yet just out of each other's reach. Not that they'd have reached for each other anyway. They hadn't gotten there yet. If they ever would.

"Shall we...?" He indicated the table and they sat down, she in her usual place and he in Mr. Barrow's chair, so that they did not have to bridge the expanse of the table along with everything else.

"How've you been?" He didn't really need to ask. She looked wretched in spirit, crumpled. He'd seen that look in her before, when she'd talked about other hurts in her life. Only this time he was the cause of it and that knowledge twisted like a knife in his gut.

"All right," she said, and gave him the shadow of a smile.

"Miss Baxter." He faltered again, but saw in her eyes, beyond the hurt there, a willingness to trust. To trust him. Still. He could not fail her.

"I want ... first ... to apologize. I've been ... avoiding you, and that was ... wrong. It was hurtful, though I never meant it to be. There is something about me. Not you. It has nothing to do with you, except that...I should have told you. And I'm ashamed I didn't because ..." This was agonizing. "Well. I did something shameful once." And then he halted again, shook his head. "No. Not did something. I didn't do something, and that was shameful."

There was a look of alarm on her face. She had some acquaintance with shameful things. "What is it?" she said, almost in a whisper.

Her question was so direct. As if he could just blurt it out!

"It's ... not easy for me to say. It's easier for me not to say. Ever. And to stay right away. From you. And I've tried that, only...that doesn't really help." He looked resigned. "I suppose I always knew that."

These words only increased her concern. "Are you all right, Mr. Molesley?"

He saw her whole frame trembling with the weight of his turmoil. She was the most empathetic person he knew. Unthinkingly, he placed a calming hand over hers. And then withdrew it again in haste.

"I'm fine. There's nothing wrong with me. Not in that way."

"Then...what is it?" For all the gentleness of her manner, there was an insistence in her voice that he knew he must answer. He owed it to her.

He swallowed hard. "I hesitate because... I don't like the idea of your thinking ill of me," he said. "I don't just not like it. I'm ... afraid of it. I'm terrified, really, to lose your good opinion. There aren't that many people who've had a good opinion," he added, lapsing as he sometimes did into a reflective self-pity, but then abruptly shook himself out of it. That had no place here. "And your consideration," he said with some gravity, "is... well, more important than most."

"You know my past," she said earnestly, her eyes fixed on his. "I can't judge. I don't judge."

But he could not meet her gaze in return and his eyes kept darting away. "I've done worse," he said almost inaudibly.

Her eyebrows arched in disbelief. "Not you."

"Yes! Me!" He'd always been so modest, all his life. Well, this was a thing in which modesty had no place. It had to be named honestly, boldly. "I've got this ... weight... on my conscience, and it's...a grand one."

"What is it?" she asked again.

He closed his eyes for a long moment. He'd successfully suppressed his shame for so long and then, for the past few weeks, been unable to think of almost anything else, unless it was to imagine how Miss Baxter might react to it. And he'd never considered anything but revulsion on her part.

From his childhood he had imbibed the lesson that no problem was ever solved by running away. It was a lesson that came hard to him, as it had often seemed to him that getting right away from something was better than standing and fighting. But he'd embraced it all the same, and taken his lumps for it usually. But during the war, he had run, in a manner of speaking. And it was only slowly dawning on him that there was another side to this truism that no one had every explained. When you stood and fought, you might be beaten - or killed, in this instance - but then it was over. When you ran away, however, it never let you go.

"It was during the war," he said at last, his voice leaden. He couldn't look at her, so he looked near her. "It was what I did during the war."

In his peripheral vision, he saw her face wrinkle in bewilderment. "I thought you didn't do anything during the war," she said. She was, of course, thinking of the conventional crimes of war, of sins of commission. No one went naturally to sins of omission in such a context.

"That's right," he said, and his voice caught a little. "I did nothing."

"But ... you couldn't," she said, still confused. "Your lungs."

There it was. His lie. He'd told her, then. He'd forgotten about that. Still he did not raise his eyes to meet hers.

"There was nothing wrong with my lungs," he said.

"What do you mean?"

Did she truly not understand? Or was there a note of indignation there? What do you mean there was nothing wrong with your lungs!

He look a deep breath and then did look at her directly, though he could hardly see her through the blur of tears in his eyes. "There was nothing wrong with my lungs," he repeated. "It was a lie that Her Ladyship, the Dowager, made up to keep me from being conscripted. And when it was found out, I took it up and persuaded ... well, I'd already been rejected on false information. So I made out that it wasn't false."

She had that look of distress on her face, the one she wore when she saw or felt pain. He wasn't sure which it was. But he wasn't finished yet.

"I was a coward," he said abruptly, and more firmly than he'd thought possible. "A coward. I didn't want to fight for my country. I was afraid, as so many other men were, but I got out of it. I lied my way out of it."

He collapsed into his chair, exhaling heavily and closing eyes wet with tears of shame. There. He'd told her. That was one part of the burden he'd never have to bear again, even if the price was the loss of her good opinion of him.

But she said nothing, did nothing. And at length, he opened his eyes again.

She looked miserable, but she was still looking at him.

"I would understand if you..." His voice trailed off. If she would not say it, then he would.

"What?"

"If you despised me," he said wretchedly. "If you never wanted to see or speak to me again. ... If..."

"Why would I want to do any of those things?"

He was confused, and cautious. "Don't you?"

She did not respond immediately. And then finally, she said, "This is your sorrow, not mine. I can't judge you for it. Nor more than you did me for mine."

He shifted a little uneasily at that, for he had struggled a little with her confession of theft and imprisonment, although his heart had brought him through it in the end.

"And I don't despise you," she added, "although I think you may despise yourself."

"Oh, yes." How could he not? He who read history and celebrated the heroic figures of the past had failed the test of honour and courage when it came to him.

"The thing is," he said softly, "I can't fix it. I can't ... undo the past. And, as it turns out, one lie does lead to another. I told it to you." And then he told her about his class and how an offhand question had precipitated this crisis. "There I am - lying to children!" He wanted to shed this shell of disgrace, discard it and never have to own it again. He buried his head in his hands.

He hardly felt the tentative fingers on his wrist. Her touch was firmer when her hand came up to stroke the side of his head. It was a tender gesture that might, in other circumstances, have awakened another kind of longing in him. In this moment, however, he almost recoiled from it.

"Why are you still here?" he wondered.

He missed her gentle smile. "Because I want to be."

He put his hand up to cover hers, holding it against his cheek. He wanted to turn his head and to press his lips to the palm of her hand, but dared not.

"I don't know what to do," he said.

She seemed to understand what he was saying. "Maybe there isn't anything you can do. Sometimes you can't fix things. You have to accept them."

His shoulders heaved. "I can't forget it."

"No. Accepting is different. Perhaps," and her tone was slightly emboldened, "I can help you there."

He lifted his head then and in her eyes saw the honesty of her words. She did not despise him, as much as he deserved it. And words that she had once spoken to him, words that were carved on his heart for the startling novelty of the sentiment therein expressed, came to his lips. "Your strength makes me stronger," he said.

She smiled, remembering. "Talking helps," she said. "Perhaps we could talk again. Soon."

He nodded. He couldn't quite muster a smile, so he only tightened his hand over hers instead.

Robert and Cora

Robert and Cora had restrained themselves. No matter what the provocation, they adhered to the principle that saying nothing and withdrawing into cold distance was the civilized way to deal with rudeness. With that in mind, Robert had declined to join the younger men in after dinner brandy and cigars, and he and Cora had gone up. They maintained a cordial silence until they reached their bedroom and then, with the door firmly closed behind them, gave way to the sentiments that had seized them at the dinner table.

"What on earth was that?!" Robert demanded.

Cora only folded herself in his arms and for a long moment they held tightly to each other. Then she carefully disengaged and swept across the room to her dressing table. "I don't know what it was," she said, glancing over her shoulder at him. "But I'm hoping it never happens again."

"That made the dinner with the Drumgooles seem pleasant!" he said.

This gave Cora a moment's pause. She had to think about that.

"It made me nostalgic for the days of Miss Bunting!" Robert went on.

Cora knew then that he was exaggerating. She started to laugh, and he did, too. He came over to stand behind her, reaching out to massage her shoulders. She leaned into him.

"I'm so glad Mama begged off," Cora said, eliciting a snort from Robert. "What would she have made of that!"

"I don't know," Robert mused. "She specializes in pithy and cutting putdowns the sort of which I can only dream about. I felt a bit of a fool, really, sitting there dumbfounded while Tom put the man in his place." He shook his head. "What was Henry thinking?"

"To be fair, Robert, it wasn't Henry's fault."

"No, I suppose not. I rather hope Henry and Tom don't make any business alliances with Herr Morden, even if hewas reasonable."

"Was he?"

Cora's question puzzled her husband. "Wasn't he? He apologized for von Ribbentrop's remarks. And he was clear that they won't be back tomorrow night. The prospect of breakfast with the man..." Robert could only shake his head.

"I'm going to have breakfast in bed, just in case." Cora seldom let exasperation get the better of her, but she'd found the exchange at dinner taxing. "Imagine blaming Jewish bankers for the collapse of the German Army." She sat up a little straighter and turned around in her chair. "The thing is, Robert, I think Herr Morden agreed with most of what his friend said. He didn't wade into it until he realized he'd gotten the wrong end of the stick as far as we were concerned."

"I thought Mary was going to skewer the man with her knife," Robert said, and looked as though he half-regretted her self-control. "We should make it a house rule not to discuss politics at the dinner table."

"It is a house rule, darling," Cora said drily. "But I guess we're going to have to start enforcing it. You're the usual culprit." She gave him a mischievous smile.

He ignored this allegation of culpability and moved on smoothly. "I don't think the vacuous champagne salesman had anything else to talk about."

"Tom was wonderful."

"Yes, Tom was wonderful." Robert sank into a chair beside the dressing table and sighed. "What are we going to do about Tom, Cora?"

She refrained from rolling her eyes at this. "Support him in his choices, visit him and Sybbie in their new home, and have them to Downton often. He's not going very far, Robert. And he needs to live his own life."

"Why can't he live it here? It's a big house."

Cora shook her head. This was an old argument between them. "Living with your in-laws, no matter how big the house, is a difficult proposition. As I well know... Robert, haven't you noticed that Tom has never entertained any of his relatives here?"

Robert stared at her. "Isn't that a good thing? And there was his brother."

"All right. His brother. That once."

"Once was quite enough."

"And you wonder why he'd like to live on his own!"

Robert looked contrite. "All right, all right. But then there's this Catholic business again, too. It's good for Sybbie to attend church on Sunday with the family. It makes her part of us." He flicked a hand impatiently. "I thought he'd got over that."

"Robert!" Cora's amused indulgence of her husband's cultural narrowness was fading. "Tom is a Catholic. That's not something one gets over. It's who he is. And whether you like it or not, it's who Sybbie is, too. I respect that. And," she added airily, "it won't make a whit of different what they are, because we're going to ban discussion of religion at the table, too." She laughed. "I'm afraid that's going to leave us with banal subjects like fox-hunting and fashion. Or maybe architecture!"

But Robert remained disgruntled. "I don't think it's right, Cora."

She looked at him in a kindly way, but without much sympathy. "It's going to happen anyway, darling. You'll just have to get used to it."

She turned to her dressing table and her eyes fell on the items arrayed there, prompting her to look over at her husband once more, this time with a somewhat incredulous look on her face. "Did you look closely at that valet at dinner, Robert? I'm not sure, but I think he was wearing make-up!"

Henry and Mary

Henry had been looking forward to this evening for weeks. Seeing Reinhard again, talking about cars - he'd been excited. He hadn't realized how much he'd missed Reinhard's friendship until they were re-living their Oxford days over tea. And now they shared a passion for cars, too, and there were not enough aficionados of the machine - or the sport - in the world for Henry. But for all that, Henry loved Mary Crawley even more, so he made his excuses and left Tom to the pleasure of an evening of intense conversation about engines and auto bodies and racing.

Tom was a godsend, in more ways than one. He'd put von Ribbentrop in his place and then firmly steered the conversation into more comfortable waters. Mary could not be won over and left, not even bothering with an excuse. Robert and Cora allowed themselves to be drawn in by Tom's light chatter and Reinhard had risen to the occasion, too, staying clear of controversy. Von Ribbentrop had fallen silent, but did not appear nearly as uncomfortable as he should have done. He consumed a lot of wine, but looked to be enjoying it rather than drowning his sorrows. What a debacle.

When Robert and Cora declined further society after dinner, Reinhard had followed them into the Great Hall and offered profuse apologies. Alone for the moment with von Ribbentrop, Henry and Tom were nonplussed with the man's nonchalance. He seemed oblivious to the disruption he had caused at dinner and entered upon a disquisition on the virtues of German champagne. Fortunately, car talk bored him and he went upstairs shortly after Reinhard rejoined them.

"Do you think we should leave him unguarded?" Tom asked.

Henry wasn't entirely sure Tom was joking. He was of two minds about this himself. But his concern had shifted from his duties as a host to thoughts of his wife, and so he left soon thereafter. Mary was not in their room. She was probably in the nursery. He hoped she was in the nursery and had not de-camped entirely, blaming him for this mess. He sat on the bed, not changing his clothes, waiting.

When she came in half an hour later, Mary was wearing a dressing gown and had her evening gown folded over her arm.

"Nanny helped me out of it," she said, answering his confused look.

Of course. Evening gowns did not lend themselves to attending to babies.

"I did wonder whether I ought to be wandering the gallery my dressing gown with that creature in the house," she went on.

"How is Stephen?" Henry asked, his heart lifting at the thought of his son. The boy was truly magnificent. And mention of him never failed to bring a smile to Mary's face.

"He's a little charmer," she said warmly, allowing herself the distraction.

He went to her and when she had laid the dress over the back of a chair, he took her in his arms. "I'm sorry, my darling." But she did not unbend at his touch.

"Did you know nothing of this boor before tonight?" she demanded impatiently.

Henry shrugged and relaxed his arms. "Reinhard's met him several times, but he had no idea about his political views. Or his lack of tact." Henry had been shaken, too. He'd met crass men before, but this one had taken him by surprise. "Reinhard will apologize to your parents again in the morning. Tom and I will take them to York immediately after breakfast. They'll leave from there. We won't see von Ribbentrop again. I don't know that we'll see Reinhard any time soon. He was very embarrassed."

"I don't know why you let them in the house," Mary said forcefully, moving off.

This puzzled Henry. "I beg your pardon?"

She tossed her head impatiently. "You know what I mean. Germans." Her tone was brittle. "After that war."

"You can't ... hate ... a people, Mary," he said easily. "And certainly not forever. In a war feelings are deliberately stirred up to pit men against each other, but most of it is rot."

She stared at him. "Your friend is a pleasant man. And he is certainly a gentleman. But he believes that nonsense about the war, too, Henry. Germany wasn't losing. What rubbish!"

Henry went to stand by the window, drawing the curtain aside a little and staring out into the night. "You're right. Reinhard didn't deny that. But they've been hurting since the war. They lost their king. And the great estates, like the one in Reinhard's family, were destroyed. And they were humiliated at the peace."

"I don't care," Mary said bluntly. "It is supreme arrogance to come to England, to Downton - where men went away to fight and never returned, or did and ... - and to spout such nonsense and expect us to swallow it."

"I know. I was there, Mary," he said earnestly, looking back at her. "I was at Amiens on August 8. We drove them back four miles, the Australians seven, the Canadians eight. They were throwing down their guns, running away from us. They collapsed on the field, not in Berlin." He didn't talk about the war much. It was the kind of thing you wanted to put behind you.

"Then why didn't you say so?" Mary demanded. "You were the only one who could legitimately have put that appalling man in his place, but you let him babble on. And your Herr Morden, nodding approvingly, until he began to worry we'd toss them out on their ear in another minute!"

"Perhaps I ought to have done," Henry said heavily. "But it's just ... nonsense. Harmless folderol. They've got to save face somehow."

"Well, let them save it somewhere else.". Tossing her dressing gown on the chair over her dress, she climbed into bed.

Henry cocked his head to one side and looked at her. "Are you really angry about the war and von Ribbentrop's stupidity about the Jews? Or is it something else?"

She glared at him. "Haven't you been listening?"

He had. And that was the problem. He believed she was angry with their guests and accepted her reasons for being so. He'd known few such disagreeable dinners in his life. But he sensed there was something more going on here, that the Germans were tonight's excuse for a coolness between them.

"I would do anything for you, darling. Anything."

The expression on her face softened. "I know. You already have."

But her acknowledgment of that didn't seem to improve things. Henry was stymied. The Mary with whom he had fallen in love wasn't a woman of secrets or hidden guilt. She wasn't afraid of her weaknesses and shortcomings. But she was holding back here and he didn't know why. If he didn't know what the problem was, how could he combat it?

"Can't you tell me what's going on, Mary?"

But she only shook her head and turned away.

He sighed and retreated to his dressing room.

Thomas and the Valet

Thomas had left Molesley and Miss Baxter to it, and with her the responsibility to lock up after Molesley left. He hoped they made it up. The dark clouds of discontent that followed her through the Abbey made for a dismal atmosphere. Thomas checked all the doors and windows on the lower and main floors and then headed up the servants' staircase to bed.

What a night! It hadn't been the worst evening he had seen in the dining room. Larry Grey, Lord Merton's elder son, was a match for the champagne salesman any day, and had proven it on two occasions. His Lordship had shown remarkable restraint tonight, perhaps because he had lost his temper so thoroughly that time with Miss Sarah Bunting, the radical schoolteacher. And nothing really compared to that moment, last year, when His Lordship's ulcer had burst and drenched the dining room and the honoured guest - Minister for Health Neville Chamberlain - in blood. But the "German fiasco" was still one for the books, if only because that Ribbentrop fellow didn't know when to quit. Or perhaps he did know and just didn't care. Cheeky.

It wasn't the butler's place to have an opinion, at the dinner table anyway, although Mr. Carson had sometimes voiced one - such was his stature with the family. But if Thomas had spoken up during the evening, he would have stood firmly in support of Lady Mary, who, he thought, had taken von Ribbentrop's measure right from the start. The temerity of the man! claiming that the German Army had not been beaten! We should have gone to Berlin, Thomas thought grimly.

He'd reached the men's quarters and realized that the most interesting aspect of this whole visit had somehow slipped his mind for a few minutes. Erich Miller had joined the staff for dinner and, in accordance with Thomas's directive, no one had raised the subject of the social disaster upstairs. Not in words, anyway.

Erich Miller. He was so beautiful. Thomas had never met anyone like him. And now it looked like he wouldn't have much opportunity to deepen the acquaintance, as the party was surely going to be off in the morning. Erich worked for Herr Morden who had not disgraced himself and therefore might be invited back, but Thomas suspected it would be in the more distant future, time being the only remedy to the animosity stirred this evening. Time was, therefore, something Thomas did not have. He wondered if he might...

But he was wary. A lifetime's yearning was not the same as a lifetime's experience. He'd made mistakes before and there had been serious repercussions, and not only for himself. Surely in this instance he was not mistaken. Only he dare not take the chance.

He was the butler of Downton Abbey now and that had implications of its own. He felt the burden of responsibility of which Mr. Carson had spoken, a burden he had not been able to appreciate until he had shouldered it himself. Mr. Carson, of course, had never even had a thought that rattled the boundaries of respectability, so he had hardly tested their strength. Why was it that when Thomas had finally gotten to where he wanted to be that things seemed more restrictive than liberating? Wasn't power supposed to bring freedom?

The door to the valet's room was ajar. Thomas knew it even as he approached it, seeing the angle of the door's shadow in the dimly lit passage.

He paused. There were only three of them up here now - Thomas, the valet, and Andy - and Andy would be fast asleep. He'd come up directly after dinner and his light was out. And he slept readily and was a heavy sleeper. They'd discussed sleeping habits once, when Thomas confessed to his midnight rambles. But the valet ... his door was ajar and there was a light within.

His heart was pounding in his chest from ... anticipation? excitement? ... the thrill of adventure? of not knowing? It was an invitation. It must be an invitation. He had a moment of doubt. Perhaps the invitation wasn't meant for him. But ... no. The valet had been staring at him, not Andy. And it was an invitation Andy would never even recognize, let alone accept.

He tapped lightly on the door. It feathered open.

Erich Miller sat at the writing desk on the other side of the room, his back to Thomas. He was bent over a small mirror.

"Hello," Thomas said, thinking that sounded a bit stupid, but what else was there to say? It surprised him that his voice seemed so normal. And why shouldn't it? You're thirty-six, not seventeen! "Are you comfortable,... Erich? Is there anything you need?"

Erich had gotten to his feet and turned around before Thomas had finished speaking. Thus far, Thomas had only seen the man in formal attire - the flawlessly fitting tails or the livery with which he had been provided to serve at dinner. He had shed the jacket now and the crisp white shirt that had been buttoned up to his throat was completely open, the ends hanging raggedly over his waistband. He wore no undershirt. Thomas couldn't help but stare. It had been a while since he'd seen so much of another man and been allowed to appreciate the view. And what a chest. Like the beautiful face above it, the chest was magnificent. And bare. The novelty of a hairless chest was gratifyingly seductive.

Still Thomas hesitated. Surely these were signs, but he'd been burned before. "Well," he said, not sure where to go from here.

"Mr. Barrow."

The valet's tone was abrupt, almost business-like. Thomas was perplexed.

But then Erich strode across the room until he was standing right in front of Thomas, so close that the butler could feel the other man's breath on his face. There was a minty aroma to it that prompted Thomas to an unexpected smile. He liked mint. Erich reached around him, batting the door gently so that it silently closed over.

As he did this, Erich leaned in more closely to Thomas, the heat of his body radiating even through the folds of Thomas's livery, those sculpted lips lingering by Thomas's ear.

"You are in hell, Mr. Barrow. And I am here to rescue you." And then he pressed his mouth to the taut muscle in Thomas's neck, evoking a gasp of pleasure, relief, exhilaration. "If you're interested," Erich added softly, and then chuckled.

Then those compelling arms were encircling him and, with a sigh that spoke of a hunger too long suppressed, Thomas relaxed into the embrace.

Author's Note: Things will lighten up - a little - in Chapter 4.