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After the inquest on the Armstrong case was over, Curtis was summoned to his uncle’s office. He left bearing the address of a man he hadn’t thought he’d see much of again.

The door opened after three knocks. “Captain,” said Daniel da Silva, looking surprised to see him. His mouth twisted as if to hide a smile. Curtis noticed that he was still dressed flamboyantly, despite not being in company. It was a welcome consistency. “This is more than a pleasure.”

Curtis cleared his throat. Da Silva, whilst not exactly his friend, was a man he respected very much after what they’d gone through together at the Armstrongs’ house party. And despite his proclivities, he thought him a very fine fellow.

“Good afternoon,” he said. “I have a business matter to discuss with you. May I come in?”

He was welcomed into da Silva’s little flat. Two paintings, one a still life of fruits and the other something unsettling with sharp angles, hung on opposite walls. It smelt like smoke and baked goods. Curtis sat down on the chaise-lounge and said, “My uncle has a proposition for us.”

Da Silva leaned back on his little wooden chair. “How intriguing. Not related to the Armstrong case, I hope?”

Curtis waved his hand. “No, thank God, that’s all blown over now. No one knew you were involved. What my uncle has proposed…” he took a deep breath, unsure of how da Silva would react. “He has suggested we work for the Bureau together. As partners. You would do the same work as you already do, but I would deal with the more unpleasant side of affairs. I gave him my agreement: I need something to do, and I think we worked pretty well together at the Armstrongs’. Now I am here to persuade you.”

There was a silence as da Silva took in this idea.

“You have no training,” he said.

“I was in the army for a great many years.”

“I shan’t consent to you being your uncle’s little bird.”

“Neither should I.”

In the end, da Silva had to agree. And so Curtis became a secret agent for the Foreign Office Private Bureau.

*

Six months later

Curtis had written da Silva yesterday to remind him of this meeting, and still da Silva had failed to show. Sir Maurice, looking implacable from behind his desk, had asked Curtis where his charmer of a partner was this time. Curtis had responded that he did not know, but he would fetch him immediately. Sir Maurice said his patience was wearing thin, and that he would expect them in his office before the next hour. 

This was the most recent in a long line of da Silva’s misdemeanours. During their last mission, an almost-bungled thing involving the Prussian Ambassador, thirty barrels of beer and a single blood diamond, da Silva had got drunk at the elaborate gala where they’d planned to have the showdown. Sir Maurice had chewed him out and then Curtis for good measure during their post-mission briefing, but their perfect success meant he couldn’t really say much. Curtis had suggested a celebratory pint afterwards, and da Silva had declined.

Da Silva had been prickly and almost condescending when they’d first partnered up, but for the last month or so Curtis had the feeling that da Silva was intentionally avoiding him. He knew that da Silva’s previous partnerships had all ended in failure, but the reasons for those had at least been mutual. Curtis suspected that da Silva had never had a partner longer than a month, and here they were approaching six months of working together. Perhaps da Silva was growing tired of Curtis as a partner and it was making him act like a prick.

Well, Curtis wasn’t having it. He was going to ask da Silva what the hell was going on, and if da Silva wished to part ways then Curtis would attend the meeting alone.

His knock was met without a reply, and then softly, the sound of fabric rustling. Curtis put his ear to the door and made out whispers from inside.

“Da Silva!” he called through the keyhole. “It’s me. Curtis.”

Another silence. Then: “I bloody well know it’s you, Curtis. Who else would rouse me from my bed on a Tuesday morning?”

Curtis said, “Open the door. You’re late for our meeting.”

“Shit!” came da Silva’s voice, and then more rustling. So da Silva was still in bed, and it was almost twelve. What would keep a man in bed until midday? Curtis was about to knock again, when the door was wrenched open and da Silva emerged, looking as if he’d dressed himself in seconds. He closed the door very quickly behind him.

“Terribly sorry, Captain,” said da Silva, flashing him a grin. His shoes were on the wrong feet. “I’m afraid I completely forgot. Shall we?”

“Hold on a minute,” said Curtis. “I want to have a word with you.” He glanced towards the closed door.

Da Silva did not take the hint. “Then have it.”

“Inside,” said Curtis irritably. “We have time before Sir Maurice expects us.”

Da Silva said, louder than he needed to be, “You want to go back inside? To talk?”

“Yes,” said Curtis, wondering if he was quite all right. “Is that a problem?”

“Not at all, Captain.” He cleared his throat. “If inside you wish to come, then who am I to prevent it?”

He opened the door. It finally became clear why da Silva had wished them to speedily go on their way.

Curtis said, stutteringly, “I was—was unaware you, er, had a visitor.”

The other gentleman in the room had light brown hair and a strong, memorable face. He was in the act of dressing, though thankfully he had completed the preliminaries and was onto his waistcoat. Curtis completely forgot his manners and stared at the man with open horror. The man seemed unbothered by his audience as he finished his toilette, adjusting his tie in the little mirror by the chaise.

Da Silva sighed. “I hope we can all be gentlemen about this. Curtis, this is Freddie Merrill. Freddie, my colleague, Archie Curtis. He’s a perfectly safe pair of eyes.”

Curtis felt he deserved rather more than ‘colleague’ but saved that complaint for later. Freddie Merrill came forward and held out his hand. “A pleasure, Captain Curtis. I am a great admirer of your uncle.”

“Mr Curtis,” he corrected. “I don’t go by Captain any longer.”

Freddie frowned. “My apologies. Daniel always speaks of you as ‘Captain’, and I—”

“Yes, well, I shouldn’t say he enjoys me calling him that,” said da Silva hastily. “Freddie, would you excuse how awfully crass I’m being, and do me a kindness? My Captain and I must discuss a business matter and he’s rather tetchy about audiences.”

“Oh, indeed,” said Freddie, who apparently delighted in proving himself an amiable sort of fellow. Curtis nodded at him stiffly. Freddie straightened the collar of his coat and made a bow. “I shall leave you gentlemen to it.”

He gave Curtis an amused look and da Silva a faintly amorous one as he left. Da Silva turned to Curtis and said, “So, you see, all that rigmarole at the door was me trying to save you from an awkward interaction.”

There was a tug in Curtis’s belly that felt rather worse than awkward. He ignored it and said dryly, “I’ve survived worse,” and lightly motioned to his scarred hand.

Da Silva mercifully refrained from making any comments about love being a war and gestured for him to sit. “So, what is so urgent that we braved a run-in with my lover to discuss it?”

The word lover thundered through Curtis’s head even as he tried to push it out. He cleared his throat. “I have noticed of late that your behaviour has been odd. I don’t think we can let it go by any more.”

“Am I to be scolded like a schoolboy?” said da Silva, raising an eyebrow in anticipation. His mouth took on a smirk and he relaxed his posture. “Should I expect the birch rod?”

Curtis turned red. “Don’t—that’s not—this is a serious matter, da Silva.”

Da Silva inclined his head. Curtis sought for a delicate manner in which to approach this.

“You’ve been behaving strangely,” he blurted out. “It’s bothering me and I can’t make out why you’re doing it.”

“Behaving strangely? My dear fellow, you’ll have to elaborate.” 

He might have known that da Silva wouldn’t make this easy. “Yes,” he said. “Come on, da Silva, you can’t be doing it unknowingly. You were drunk at the Marstons’ ball during the Prussian affair—completely unprofessional, you know. You have constantly been late to meetings, such as this one. You turned down my invitation to dinner with Sir Henry and Captain Good; you left dinner with Miss Carruth and Miss Merton before the final course. Miss Carruth was so worried, she almost sent a footman after you.”

Curtis breathed a sigh and continued, ignoring da Silva’s rising eyebrows. “I know when we started working together you were somewhat reluctant, on account of your lack of success with previous partners, but I like to think you and I have done pretty well together, you know, we’ve cracked a good many cases, and no one’s been seriously injured thus far. But if you prefer working alone, if you don’t want me as a partner any more, then do me the favour of telling me upfront. Because, da Silva, I can’t imagine what else it is. I’m no good with hints and implications and behaviour. As you know.”

Da Silva frowned. “Good God, Curtis,” he said. “I had no idea you were carrying all that around.”

“Well, I am,” said Curtis, willing his courage not to wane. “So? Is my assumption correct?”

Da Silva looked at him as if he had quite lost his mind.

“I do wish you had just said this,” he said, “before it festered in your head and you began to draw outlandish conclusions. Of course I do not wish to stop working together. I am not ashamed to admit I work better with you as a partner.” He smiled ironically. “And whatever preference one might have for being a lone wolf… one must always forfeit to the good of King and Country.”

Curtis said, “If it’s a great nuisance, having me around, I don’t wish for you to bear the burden for the sake of a few cases.”

“How very unpatriotic of you, Captain,” said da Silva. “One might expect that of a dago Jew, but not of an English hero. To think this was the man who fought so bravely for this sceptred isle.”

When da Silva began to mock him, Curtis could relax. They could go on as before.

“Then why have you been behaving strangely?” said Curtis.

Da Silva raised an eyebrow and began to recount. “In turn: that port was from 1884 and tasted like the tears of angels. I was unable to visit your uncle and his companion because it fell on Yom Kippur, and whilst I am not devout, my mother does insist I show up for the Day of Atonement.” Curtis felt a flush of embarrassment at this and told himself that he really ought to do better.

“Finally, I truly did feel unwell at dinner with Miss Carruth and Miss Merton, and I suspect it was to do with the dodgy shellfish I ate at lunch. Does that satisfy you, Captain?”

Curtis felt rather sheepish.

“I, er, apologise profusely for the invitation. It was wrong of me not to know.”

“Not really,” said da Silva. “I don’t know when Yom Kippur is either. I rely entirely on my mother’s letters.”

“Still,” mumbled Curtis. “It is something I should have been sensitive to.”

Da Silva shrugged.

Curtis wanted it confirmed. “So, you really don’t wish to change our working arrangements? You don’t want to stop being partners?”

“Assuredly not,” said da Silva. “I never do anything I don’t want to do. Of course, the same cannot be said of the reverse.” He flashed his grin at Curtis again, one which Curtis suspected numerous men, lately Mr Merrill, were receivers of. “I find myself being reined in more often than not.”

Curtis cleared his throat. “Well,” he said, satisfied and relieved by the conclusion of their talk. “Sir Maurice expects us before the hour. We ought to get going.”

Da Silva snorted. “If you think I’m happy going out like this, you’re sorely mistaken.” He pushed himself up from his chair and gestured to his person. “Last night’s clothes, and hair like a bird’s nest.” He shrugged off his overcoat and jacket and discarded them onto the chair.

Curtis surveyed him neutrally. “I think you look fine. More rumpled than usual, but you do overdo it with the brilliantine. I prefer your hair like that.”

Da Silva blinked at him, hands still where they were wrestling with his knotted tie. “Excuse me?”

Curtis felt he had made a misstep of some sort, because his heart was in his throat. “I didn’t—nothing,” he said. “I only mean you put too much stuff in your hair. Makes you look like an oil spill.”

Da Silva’s face shifted into amusement. “How poetic,” he said, wrenching off the tie. “Now the speaker need only express a wish to run his hands through my hair, and we have ourselves a sonnet.”

There were times where Curtis simply did not understand what da Silva was getting at. He asked politely, “Is Mr Merrill a poet?”

The smile on da Silva’s face dropped and Curtis felt his mistake even as he could not understand it, and he thought to himself how unfair that was. “Yes,” he said shortly. “Isn’t that fortunate?” 

He went into the little bedroom at the back of the flat to dress and Curtis waited on the chaise. He’d been in da Silva’s flat several times, but sitting here now felt like a new experience. He cast his eyes around and spotted a beige scarf on the floor. He remembered da Silva had once lamented the existence of beige as a colour and quick as a flash, Curtis realised who the scarf belonged to. He didn’t want to look at it.

One didn’t simply take off one’s scarf and drop it to the ground. Most likely, it had been thrown there, and then Curtis’s limited imagination began to envision what had happened last night…

Thankfully da Silva came out, dressed in fresh clothes, before Curtis’s thoughts could go any further. He noticed that his hair was brilliantined within an inch of its life as if throwing down a gauntlet. They went out and took a cab to Sir Maurice’s office on King Charles Street. Sir Maurice greeted them with resolute stares when they filed in.

“Good afternoon,” said da Silva, sauntering in. “Lovely day. One could write odes to the sky.”

“One shouldn’t,” said Sir Maurice, from behind his great oak desk. “Mr da Silva, you are testing my patience. Archie has had to drag you here today, as if he were a long-suffering nursemaid. I distinctly remember your distaste for that dynamic in your partnership when I first paired you together.”

“Tastes change,” said da Silva lightly. “Or so people tell me.”

Curtis, standing next to da Silva, sent up his regular prayer when witness to conversations between his partner and his uncle. Sir Maurice stared hard at da Silva but did not say anything.

“You have a new assignment.” He handed over two identical files. “We suspect a not insignificant government figure to be profiting unduly from his position. We’ve been informed that two months ago, in the small hours during a party in Vienna, a certain German noble was heard to boast of making a great deal of money over the Nora Point Bridge project. Perhaps you have heard of it?”

Curtis and da Silva both read the papers. “The Government recently backed a project to build the first ever bridge across the Amazon,” said Curtis. “It’s said to cost two hundred thousand pounds. It only came out last week.”

“Indeed,” said Sir Maurice. “When delicately pressed, the German noble confessed to being tipped off by a member of His Majesty’s Cabinet. Sir Roland Cheswick, the Undersecretary of Foreign Affairs.”

Da Silva folded his arms. “My, my,” he said, and on cue Curtis’s blood pressure rose. “I wouldn’t have thought he could do it.”

Sir Maurice’s left eye twitched. “And why, Mr da Silva, is that?”

Da Silva shrugged. “Sir Roland appears a dreadful bore. Wealthy enough, isn’t he? His wife’s rich, I know. All in all, I’m rather pleased there’s more to him.”

Curtis fixed his eyes on the wall. “I am glad,” said Sir Maurice stiffly, staring da Silva down, “that the personal failings of members of our Cabinet provide some entertainment for you, Mr da Silva.”

Da Silva shrugged. “One of the few benefits of not being English. I don’t take these crises so personally.”

Curtis hurriedly stepped in, lest Sir Maurice chose not to let that comment fly. “Sir Roland? Truly?”

When he’d started at the Private Bureau, Curtis had been shocked at how many scandals of influential men he’d had to investigate. He was accustomed to it now, but Sir Roland Cheswick, selling state secrets? Curtis had met him once, at a small party. He remembered him as a mild-mannered, fair-minded, decent man. He was one of the last people Curtis would suspect of doing such a thing.

Sir Maurice raised a brow. “The investigation against him still has to be conducted. That is, I believe, your job. Investigate Sir Roland, verify the rumour. One Teuton’s drunken boast does not conclusive proof make. The Prime Minister will not get rid of Sir Roland on flimsy evidence, especially when, as Mr da Silva has so sensitively articulated, Sir Roland does not seem the sort for insider trading. And if not Sir Roland, then who? Someone has sold this Government out. Moreover, this matter needs to be handled discreetly, lest the papers get hold of it. I am sure I do not need to remind you that a scandal would be most unwelcome indeed.”

Da Silva nodded in agreement. “One cannot have traitors in the government,” he said genially, “but one would rather still be in government, than be rid of traitors and be the Opposition.”

Sir Maurice allowed the silence to stretch out. Curtis’s pulse hammered wildly.

“Thank you, Mr da Silva,” he said archly. “I am sure you do not need to be advised on the delicacy of this mission. Sir Roland has no reason to suspect anyone knows his alleged secret, and startling him into fleeing the country is not the result I would like to achieve. I hope you have no questions.”

Curtis did not dare to contradict; da Silva probably didn’t care to ask.

“Dismissed.”

He and da Silva usually read through case files together. Curtis’s townhouse was nearer, but da Silva’s flat was more discreet. His chest tightened at the prospect of seeing Merrill’s beige scarf on the floor again, but he could hardly tell da Silva that. They took a cab back and went up to da Silva’s rooms. Curtis sat down on the chaise-lounge. Da Silva went to prepare tea.

“My mother came by and scolded me for not eating well,” said da Silva from the little kitchen. “She unloaded a barrage of almond and rosewater cake on me. Would you care to try some?”

At the earliest stage of their acquaintance, they had dined together, and Curtis had recommended to da Silva the pork. It was a mark of their improved friendship that now they laughed about it, and da Silva freely unloaded onto Curtis foods that his terribly English upbringing had not exposed him to.

“Please,” said Curtis to the cake, and da Silva emerged from the kitchen with practically a full tea set. Curtis raised his eyebrow.

“I am not uncivilised,” da Silva said defensively, setting the silver tray down on the little table. He poured and added: a splash of milk for Curtis, a great deal of milk and sugar for himself. Then he cut two slices of cake.

Curtis could not help commenting on the picture before him. “I recall you saying once even if you were a woman, you would not be a lady.”

“Geishas pour tea,” snapped da Silva. “I channel their spirit.”

Curtis ate some cake and opened his copy of the files with his good hand. “This is… brief,” he said, scanning the page. “For an undersecretary, Sir Roland has not led a very notable life.” He hummed and skimmed the page. “He is young, only forty. Married for ten years. Lady Cheswick is very respectable.”

Da Silva snorted. “Forty, young?”

“For an undersecretary, yes.”

“I believe you, Curtis, are fast approaching forty?”

“I am thirty-five,” said Curtis indignantly. 

“The very prime of life,” said da Silva. He sipped his tea. “Continue?”

“They have no children…” Curtis trailed off, staring at the page. “Ahem. There is speculation that, perhaps…”

Da Silva had his own copy but preferred to read off Curtis’s, which he did, brushing his hair against Curtis’s neck as he leaned over. “Lady Cheswick’s infertile?” he said. “What pervert conducted the research to make that conclusion?”

Curtis was a gentleman, and dash it all, he did not feel they should be talking of such things. “It doesn’t matter,” he said, pushing through the embarrassment. “All that matters is most likely, Sir Roland’s wealth will be left to his nephew, a Mr Acton Rivenhall, who resides with them.” He flicked through the pages. “We have a profile on him as well.”

“Excellent,” said da Silva. “We’ll get to that later.”

“This cake is marvellous, by the way,” said Curtis. “Convey my regards to Mrs da Silva.”

Da Silva thanked him but said it was a slippery slope from expressing appreciation to being overwhelmed with baked goods, and Curtis was not ready for the onslaught. He bade Curtis continue with the report.

“Someone friendly to the Bureau tipped us off about the comments of one Baron von Schlegel… lots of information on him, though it won’t do us good as he’s in Germany. It is suspected that Sir Roland divulged private Cabinet information relating to British intentions that guided investment opportunities… yes, we know. Must be impressed upon agents the great delicacy of the matter… hmm.” He paused.

Da Silva said, “As ever, our investigation must be conducted with discretion, lest the press catch hold of it and dear old Balfour looks the worse for having a foreigner-colluding undersecretary under his nose.”

“It would appear that way. Sir Roland is playing a dangerous game.”

Da Silva nodded. “I hope he has good taste. I should hate to think of that blood money being wasted on something gaudy or chintzy.” His shudder was more to do with gaudy expenses than the blood money used to acquire them. “The easiest way to investigate Cheswick would be to get into his house. Might we procure an invitation to some dreary soirée and sniff around once we’re in?”

Curtis frowned. “I met him at a party once, but it was so long ago he’s probably forgotten me. But between us, someone must know someone who knows either him or his wife, who might get us in.”

“I’m sure I wouldn’t,” said da Silva, looking offended. “This is a fool’s errand anyhow. Corruption abounds among these people. Cheswick might not get away with it, but plenty of others have and will. Espionage won’t stop anything. And what about other sins the rich commit, which are perfectly legal and no less immoral?”

“I didn’t know you were such a Bolshevik, da Silva.”

“I’m working class, aren’ I?”

Curtis hid his smile. “Yet you dress like you’re in the court of the Sun King.”

Da Silva ignored him. Curtis returned to the matter at hand. “Well, I am due to luncheon with Mr Herbert Wyfflington soon. He knows most of Westminster. I shall telephone and hope he is free.”

“Oh, that old gossip? What a helpful friend he is.”

“Yes,” said Curtis. Sometimes he felt a woman would be much better at his job, which mostly consisted of talking to people and listening for clues dropped in conversation. Curtis was not a great talker and was known to nod off at parties. But Wyfflington was a decent sort, bombastic and well acquainted with Sir Henry. Curtis looked forward to lunch.

Da Silva said, “I suppose I am left with the woman. What do we know of her?”

“Only until we have further leads,” said Curtis soothingly. He flicked to her pages. “Geraldine, Lady Cheswick. Politically active. Runs about a thousand societies and circles.”

“Splendid,” said da Silva. “I shall become a suffragist. And what of Mr Rivenhall?”

Curtis found the half-page on the nephew. “Mr Rivenhall is… twenty-six, unengaged, and interested in horses. Frequents the Blue Square.”

“Lord preserve me.”

“He was expelled,” said Curtis, in a tone of surprise. “From Trinity, for…” He stopped and looked up at his partner, concerned that he’d brought back unpleasant memories.

Da Silva rolled his eyes. “It was over ten years ago, Curtis, I’ve quite recovered. What was Rivenhall kicked out for?”

Curtis cleared his throat and kept his eyes on the page. “Indecent behaviour.”

“I feel a sort of kinship,” said da Silva. “Also: the penny drops.” Curtis’s expression did not concur, so da Silva explained: “Why your uncle assigned us—or shall I say me—this case.”

Curtis still looked confused. Da Silva sighed and said, “The plan is clear. I shall seduce Rivenhall, and he shall tell me all the Cheswick secrets. Or we will find them out ourselves through prowling about their townhouse—which I will get us into.”

“You shall do what?”

Da Silva looked amused. “Seduction, Captain. One of the mainstays of our profession.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” said Curtis. He was starting to feel a bit sick at the thought. “You cannot seduce our target’s nephew. It’s unprofessional. I’m sure my uncle didn’t even think of it.”

Da Silva left the last sentence uncontested. “My dear fellow, you needn’t worry. I shall leave it off the record.”

“Yes, but I shall know about it,” said Curtis. Another thought struck him. “What of Mr Merrill? Will he understand the business with Rivenhall?” He frowned at his partner. “He doesn’t know what we do, does he?”

Da Silva looked mortally offended. “Of course not. And I had no idea you were such a custodian of my arrangement with Freddie. Anyway, he was only in London for a week. He lives in Hong Kong. I doubt I shall see him again.”

“Oh,” said Curtis. Oddly, the fact that Freddie Merrill’s presence in da Silva’s life was a short-lived thing consoled him somewhat. Then he asked, “Arrangement?”

Da Silva rolled his eyes. “Sometimes, my dear, I forget how proper you are. Fucking a chap and being in a relationship are two very different things.”

Curtis tried not to look as if he would rather be anywhere else right now. The fissure in his belly had opened up again. He chided himself on his discomfort: there was nothing wrong with what da Silva did. Curtis himself did some of that stuff—had done that stuff, before George Fisher’s death. It was his old prejudices coming back and Curtis did not care for them. He would give himself a stern talking-to and he would get over this revulsion to the thought of da Silva sleeping with other men.

He cleared his throat. “Let us return to the point. Da Silva, I really do not feel it is necessary for you to, er, charm Mr Rivenhall in such a way. One may get secrets out of a friend.”

“Your uncle told us this was highly time-sensitive,” said da Silva. “A whirlwind romance is the perfect way in.”

“We became friends after a week,” said Curtis. “No seduction necessary.”

Da Silva waved his hand. “Yes, but those were exceptional circumstances. I can seduce and earn the confidence of a man within even an ordinary week.” He smiled catlike at Curtis. “As long as he knows what he wants.”

Curtis hesitated to bring up the possibility that Rivenhall might not fancy da Silva, or might not fancy men at all. Inside, he was hoping to God that either was the case. The idea that da Silva might sleep with someone to help them with a case felt dirty and wrong.

“I cannot allow you to do this,” said Curtis, with authority.

“You cannot allow me? Do I ask you to allow me to do anything?”

“I cannot allow you,” Curtis repeated. “It is wrong.”

“Is it? Pray tell me why.”

“Because—because this young man is wholly innocent in this. It isn’t right, da Silva, that you should—you should do this seduction business with him, to use him for your job.”

Da Silva said, “Is that all?”

“Isn’t that enough? What would you have me say?”

Da Silva smiled, Sphinx-like. “I’m sure I wouldn’t know.”

But he did not press the point further, and thus it was decided. Curtis would arrange a meeting with his civil servant friend as soon as possible, and hopefully he would be great friends with Sir Roland, or know someone who was. Da Silva would begin looking into Lady Cheswick, and failing that, Mr Rivenhall. The intention was to procure, through one of these three routes, an invitation to the Cheswick residence. They would meet to discuss their findings in three days’ time at the latest.

Curtis met Herbert Wyfflington for dinner the following day. They dined at a place near Whitehall. Wyfflington insisted that Sir Roland was quite the most upstanding fellow in Westminster, in his personal life as well as his political. He had even accompanied Lady Cheswick to Scotland for the week, as she visited her ailing sister. As a couple, they entertained regularly enough, and Wyfflington was quite sure he could get Curtis an invitation to the next do. Their champagne was average but their fish was divine. They were hosting quite a grand fundraiser in a month’s time—would that do?

A month was not ideal, but it would have to do if they had nothing else. He thanked Wyfflington for a pleasant evening and went home. He dispatched a note to da Silva on the way and they met the next day in Regent’s Park. 

“I met with my friend,” said Curtis, as they strolled along. “Sir Roland and Lady Cheswick are currently in Scotland visiting her sister, but they will be back within the week. They are having a fundraiser next month. Wyfflington is sure he can put us in touch, and if Sir Maurice will allow us a month, then we have until that night.”

They passed a lady with her maid and dog; Curtis waited until they were out of earshot before continuing.

“He also passed on some tales about Mr Rivenhall. He seems to be causing Sir Roland some trouble. Mr Rivenhall’s parents are dead, and Sir Roland is his guardian. Mr Rivenhall is not, I think, the sort of man Sir Roland would wish to be his legacy. His friends are a dissolute, unmarried, gambling crowd.”

Da Silva nodded. “How long did it take you to get this information?”

Curtis admitted he’d stayed out until one, as Wyfflington had regaled Curtis with long anecdotes about his days as Deputy Director of the Civil Service.

Da Silva said, “I had it yesterday within two hours.”

Curtis begged knowledge how. Da Silva said, “I slept with him, of course.”

Suddenly it was enormously painful inside Curtis’s belly. He carried on walking, but he felt more than slightly unwell, and wished desperately he was anywhere but here, next to a dashingly attired da Silva who did not know the effect of his words. Or indeed, actions.

“You look rather pale,” observed da Silva. “Perhaps the winter air disagrees with you. We should have discussed this at my flat, which is quite wonderfully insulated.”

Curtis said, “How did you even—I told you specifically I did not think it was right for you to—to seduce Mr Rivenhall.”

“He seduced me,” said da Silva.

“Is there a difference?”

Da Silva looked offended that Curtis had even asked. “My philistine, no smaller than the difference between kissing and being kissed.”

Curtis swallowed. “I don’t see a great difference there either.”

“Dear God. That means no one has taught you, which is an even greater tragedy.”

“I have no need for teachers,” said Curtis faintly. They were getting away from the point. “You were explaining the way by which you bedded Rivenhall.”

“Oh, if you insist,” said da Silva lazily. “He had this rather interesting toy—”

The sensation in his belly was not going away. “I don’t wish to hear that,” he said. In his mind he furiously ran through his thoughts. He had told da Silva not to sleep with Rivenhall. Da Silva had gone and done it. Betrayal—that was it. That was what hurt. Curtis felt betrayed by his partner, and it was horrible.

“I did some rather excellent tailing,” said da Silva. “Followed him to a tavern, then strolled in half an hour later and proceeded to—”

Curtis put up his hand. Da Silva stopped, mercifully, and Curtis tried to articulate himself. “You must see how this is for me,” he said steadily. “Our partnership suffers if one of us does something the other doesn’t agree to.”

Da Silva said, “You shoot people. I object to guns on principle.”

“I have to shoot people, or they will likely shoot us,” said Curtis. “I believe you would rather I shoot than be shot.”

Da Silva shrugged. A pigeon landed two feet away from them and continued its progress in their direction on foot. “Kindly piss off,” said da Silva to the pigeon, who stared at him with his beady eyes, but obeyed.

Curtis said, as simply as he could, “I do not wish for you to… repeat your acquaintance.”

“Why?” said da Silva. “Because he is entangled in a case of bribery and corruption at the heart of government?”

“Yes,” said Curtis. “It is unethical, da Silva.”

“I see,” said da Silva. He toyed with the frayed ends of his scarf. “So if I were to resume fucking Rivenhall after the case is finished, you would find that acceptable?”

Curtis said judicially, “It is hardly my business who you involve yourself with, outside the parameters of a mission.”

“Mm,” said da Silva. “Well, I agree. But if, my dear Captain, you were less intolerably English about your feelings, what would they be if, as I said, Rivenhall and I fucked after the mission is completed? He does have rather austere cheekbones.”

Curtis was usually unsuccessful at hypothetical experiments. Being gifted with little imagination and a strong notion of practicality, he found them difficult and largely pointless exercises. Nevertheless, he knew instantly how he felt at the prospect da Silva laid out before him: awful.

But he couldn’t reason it to himself, so he discarded the feeling. “Your personal activities are your own business, da Silva,” said Curtis steadily. “It’s hardly my place to comment on what you get up to.”

Da Silva looked at him for a long time and said, “I see,” very slowly. Then he shifted incrementally away so they no longer had a chance of brushing sleeves and adjusted the collar of his overcoat.

“In that case,” said da Silva after a silence, “I fail to see any reason why I shouldn’t fuck Rivenhall tomorrow. If it is merely a matter of the mission, then I shall endeavour to keep from him that we are investigating his uncle. Besides, it will become an advantage if and when we eventually go to the Cheswick townhouse.” He raised a brow. “And so far, it is the best progress we have made.”

Curtis couldn’t understand himself. Da Silva was laying it out perfectly reasonably, professing himself willing to do the thing. And Curtis could not pretend he was so ethical that the thought of using Rivenhall for a case was making him feel physically sick. Weakly he acquiesced and tried to put the thought out of his mind. 

Da Silva rolled his eyes. “How gracious of you. I also learned that Sir Roland and his lady are expected to return on Tuesday. Thus, I have until Monday to persuade Rivenhall into his residence for the night, and from there we will have our way in.”

Getting into the townhouse was essential. Curtis knew by now that evidence was never all destroyed, especially if money was involved. One always wanted a keepsake, since one never knew what might happen. Account books, calendars, diaries or letters might reveal a secret one wished to keep quiet.

Usually, making the acquaintance of the subject, or someone close to them, was the strategy. But blatant seduction was also an option.

If only da Silva had stuck to Sir Roland’s wife. “What of Lady Cheswick?” Curtis asked. “Did you get anything on her?”

Da Silva shrugged. “Committees, committees and more committees. All ladies’, so unless you fancy getting Shakespearean, we will not have an in there. But I do not think she is impermeable, and she might know something useful. Perhaps, Curtis, you should take her, while I concentrate my energies on young Rivenhall.”

“Perhaps I will,” said Curtis, not without heat. It was not likely to yield much, but he was not going to idly sit around feeling sick to his stomach at the thought of da Silva with Rivenhall. “I wonder if Miss Carruth and Miss Merton are acquainted with her.”

*

Later that week he discovered that they were not, but Curtis had wanted an excuse to see his friends anyway. Miss Carruth had greeted him with her usual enthusiasm, exclaiming: “How lovely to see you!” and jumping up from her position on the sofa. She kissed Curtis’s cheek and said to Miss Merton, “Look who it is, Pat!” Turning back to Curtis, she asked, “Have you brought Mr da Silva with you? I do wish he had stayed for dinner longer last time.”

“Fen, dear, you may have overwhelmed him,” said the much calmer Miss Merton, who had remained seated. “It is a pleasure to see you, Mr Curtis. I hope you are well?”

“Very well, thank you,” said Curtis, as Miss Carruth pushed him into an armchair and rang for tea. “I’m afraid da Silva is otherwise occupied, though he sends his apologies for that dinner. He proposes we have another to make up for it.”

“Oh, that would be wonderful,” said Miss Carruth. “I shall begin work on the menu tonight.”

A tea-tray arrived, laden with biscuits and sandwiches. Curtis was famished, having last eaten three hours ago. Miss Carruth poured tea and pushed food onto Curtis’s plate, which he accepted gratefully.

“I do wish you had brought Mr da Silva,” said Miss Carruth again. Miss Merton shot her a look but she ignored it, steering ahead. “You would say if he was not well, wouldn’t you?”

Curtis coughed. “He is perfectly well,” he said. “Only…”

Miss Carruth was looking at him expectantly, and even Miss Merton looked interested in what he was about to say.

Sod it. If he couldn’t tell these two women, there was no one he could tell.

“Only, there is a bit of a, er, delicate matter.” 

Miss Carruth’s eyebrows rose gracefully. “Well, we are very good at secrets.”

“Fen, please,” said Miss Merton, but Curtis saw them exchange a smile. “What can we help you with, Mr Curtis?”

Curtis gathered up his courage and cleared his throat. “Well, I wanted to talk to you about da Silva. He’s been rather… no, that’s going about it in the wrong way.” He smiled rather awkwardly at his friends, who sat very patiently waiting for him to finish his sentence. “Oh, bugger,” he said, then blushed red because he’d sworn in front of ladies, and though he knew Miss Carruth and Miss Merton were hardly delicate, they were still ladies.

“Don’t worry,” said Miss Carruth brightly. “Pat swears all the time. I am quite impervious to any shocking effects.”

Curtis smiled ruefully. “I am making a mess of this. The thing is, it’s not da Silva at all. It’s me. I’ve been feeling rather… off, lately. Particularly—well, almost always—when he, er, makes reference to certain activities he participates in.”

This was as far as Curtis’s courage could propel him, but Miss Carruth and Miss Merton seemed to have understood him perfectly. “Aha,” said Miss Carruth. “I quite see why you came to us.”

“I can’t understand it,” said Curtis. “I never—well, of course, there was the initial prejudice, but once I got past that silly stuff, I never held it against da Silva that he had certain… proclivities. And when I realised that my, er, relationship with my lieutenant had been something of a similar colour, I certainly didn’t feel disgust. I think it’s quite natural. Some men desire men, and as far as I can make out we’ve always been around. Why, there’s plenty of poetry about it, and it’s even in Plato, so…” he trailed off, conscious that he had strayed quite far from his point. He reoriented himself. “But as I say this, I’ve found, recently, that I do feel—” the word stuck in his throat— “disgust, when da Silva talks about himself and some bloke. I’m ashamed of it and I know I should be better. But I can’t seem to talk myself out of it.”

By the time he’d finished, he’d realised the acute insensitivity of coming to Miss Carruth and Miss Merton about his unexplainable disgust for people who enjoyed people of the same sex, and he was prepared for not a few sharp words levelled in his direction. But Miss Merton was giving Curtis an inspecting look, not a sharp one, and Miss Carruth looked almost bemused.

“Hmm,” said Miss Merton, her intelligent eyes still trained on his face. “Are you sure the emotion is disgust?”

Curtis frowned. “Yes,” he said. He brought to mind da Silva with Rivenhall and felt it confirmed. “I feel immeasurably sick at the thought.”

“And you haven’t spoken to Mr da Silva about this?”

“No,” said Curtis, and quickly played out that scenario in his mind. It was sure to go badly. Da Silva would throw something at him, and ignore his pleading explanations, and Curtis would very possibly lose his friend for good.

Miss Merton sighed very deeply, and Curtis waited for her to say something profound, but all she said was: “I see.”

Curtis frowned. “I really don’t think it would be wise to tell him. He would not take it well. And he doesn’t need to know. The fault is mine. I’m sorry,” said Curtis in a rush. “I’ve come here and bothered you both with my unkind notions, thoughts that I was almost too ashamed to voice, but I was beginning to grow quite mad, and really the answer is quite simple…”

“Yes!” Miss Carruth burst out. Curtis turned to her inquisitively.

“Miss Carruth?”

She looked at him brightly. “You see, I might feel unpleasant feelings at the thought of Pat—”

“Fen,” said Miss Merton, almost sharply. Then, in a lower tone, “It isn’t our place.”

Curtis didn’t hear that last bit. He watched as an apparently silent conversation took place between his hostesses. Then Miss Merton said, “I really think you ought to talk to Mr da Silva about this. He might be able to help you understand things that we can’t.”

Curtis frowned, but cared not to unpick that obscure comment. “Miss Merton, I’m not sure…”

“Really, Mr Curtis,” said Miss Carruth, leaning forwards impulsively. “I am quite sure it would be best as well.”

Curtis stayed for a few more excellent biscuits and left before sunset. He walked home, puzzled by their advice, and still more puzzled by the Cheswick case. Their plan still rested on da Silva’s success regarding Mr Rivenhall. Talking to Miss Carruth and Miss Merton had not aided him in that matter, so he focused on the mission. If they could get into Sir Roland’s residence as soon as possible, that would very likely find them the evidence they needed. He thought with impatience of the month-away Cheswick party. Perhaps they ought to attempt a break in? Frankly, Curtis wanted this case put behind them, and he was not above bending the law to do so.

He presented this suggestion to da Silva when they met for dinner at a very dirty but very discreet tavern. Over beef and potatoes, Curtis explained how he’d examined the exteriors of Cheswick’s house, and how breaking in would not be easy, but not impossible. Or perhaps one of them could dress as a footman, and with Sir Roland and Lady Cheswick away, it might go undetected…

Da Silva was drinking wine with an unimpressed look on his face.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” he said. “I am about to ask Acton to bring me there. I believe I will be able to bring it up at our next rendezvous without gaining suspicion.”

Curtis’s fork stopped on the way to his mouth from the plate. “Acton?” The rest of the tavern carried on in the silence, but Curtis did not register it.

“Rivenhall,” said da Silva unhelpfully. There was that feeling again in the pit of Curtis’s stomach. “We have grown more intimate.”

Curtis muttered, “If that’s even possible,” which da Silva heard clearly and said, “I assure you, my dear Captain. It’s possible.”

Curtis thought about what Miss Carruth and Miss Merton had insisted, and decided he had to tell da Silva what he was feeling. “Must you—I don’t want to hear those things,” he said, plaintively. “I find it unpleasant.”

Da Silva raised one of his perfect eyebrows and Curtis knew what he must think he was saying. “Not like that—you know I don’t think nasty things of men like…” us was the word he wanted to say, but of course that was not quite right. Curtis’s tendencies were just that: tendencies. Da Silva’s were a marked preference, and besides, he loved men as well as merely fucking them. Not that Curtis had ever, technically, done that. “Like you,” he finished. “But I think there must be some middle ground between not minding what you get up to, and hearing all about it.”

“I see,” said da Silva. “So it’s the hearing about it that irks you.”

Curtis did not comprehend what da Silva was digging at, but he knew da Silva and knew that the blasted man was digging at something. “It’s a reasonable request,” he said, feeling uncomfortable that he was pushed to such a point. He cut off another morsel of beef.

Da Silva did not seem to think so. “I suggest, Captain,” he said, with more ice in his voice than he usually directed at Curtis, “that you examine why the mentioning of my lovers is so disturbing to you. Perhaps you will find the results enlightening.” He took a long drink of his wine-cup. “In the meantime, I will resume my report. Acton and I have plans to meet on Monday. When the night wanes, I shall simply propose we sojourn to the townhouse he shares with his uncle and aunt. There, I shall wait until he is asleep, then search the place.”

“It seems rather risky,” said Curtis. Especially as it meant da Silva would be on his own. He had a lax sense of danger for which Curtis often had to compensate. “What if he wakes up? What if you fall asleep? What if he does not wish to go to his townhouse?”

“I have been doing this quite a bit longer than you,” said da Silva, but his tone wasn’t condescending. “I assure you none of those things will happen.”

“Before me, you nearly died every other mission,” said Curtis. “So, what is my role in this?” He frowned. “Really, wouldn’t it be better if I came? I mean—”

“My dear Captain, it is rather early in the arrangement to think of introducing a third.”

Curtis went as red as the middle of his beef. “I am serious,” he muttered. “Mightn’t it be safer if you and Rivenhall go to a tavern, and coincidentally there I am, and we all go back to the townhouse? One of us distracts whilst the other searches. Or, if we’re lucky, Rivenhall’s drunk so much he falls asleep at once, and we are free to search through the house.”

“My, my,” said da Silva, arching an eyebrow. “Where are your ethics now?”

“Certainly it isn’t as unethical as—as stringing the fellow along.”

“I never said that,” said da Silva. “In fact, I rather like the chap. Knows what he wants. Foolish, in a way that inspires affection.”

Curtis did not want to hear about da Silva’s affection for another man, and his earlier comment about examining why was slowly ticking in Curtis’s brain. “Apart from ethics,” said Curtis, “what are your objections?”

Da Silva sighed. “I suppose it would be safer to have two of us.”

The next evening found Curtis waiting outside the Gilded Lily, bloody cold from the evening chill and bloody impatient too. He and da Silva had agreed he’d show up at eleven: enough time that he and Rivenhall could get sufficiently drunk. It was currently ten-thirty.

Curtis forced himself to wait. He went across the street and made himself take a looping detour, then returned. He checked his pocket-watch. Ten to eleven.

Close enough. Curtis blustered through the door of the establishment and spotted da Silva with Rivenhall near the back, sitting in a booth. From this angle, Curtis could get a good look at Rivenhall. He was broad-shouldered and blond, blonder than Curtis. Da Silva’s head was bent back in laughter. Watching him gave Curtis a queer feeling, and he quickly composed himself.

“Great Scott!” he boomed, channelling his sexagenarian uncle Sir Henry as he approached them in their booth. He narrowly missed spilling his beer over a passing barmaid. “Daniel da Silva, is that you?”

Da Silva’s eyebrows shot up in comical surprise. “Archie Curtis!” he declared. “Delighted, I’m sure. Acton, darling, this is Captain Curtis. His uncle is Sir Henry Curtis, the great explorer.”

Acton Rivenhall shook Curtis’s hand robustly. “Very fine to meet you, Captain Curtis.” To Curtis’s eye Acton Rivenhall looked barely drunk, which made that time da Silva had spent alone with him completely unnecessary.

Curtis clearly wasn’t going to get an invitation, so he seated himself on da Silva’s other side without waiting for one. “It’s a dashed fine thing to meet such a dear friend by chance. And in a place like this!” Da Silva’s elbow drove itself into Curtis’s side and he understood the message: laying it on a bit thick, Captain. “Any friend of da Silva’s is a friend of mine. Delighted to meet you, Mr …”

“Rivenhall,” said Rivenhall. Politely: “How do you know Daniel?”

Curtis fumbled at a hurdle he really should have seen in advance. “How do I—”

“We are mutual acquaintances,” said da Silva smoothly. “Captain Curtis and I met some months ago. It’s rather an interesting story.”

Curtis shot da Silva a look. “No, it isn’t,” he said hastily. He nursed his pint. “Mr Rivenhall. Do you box?”

Rivenhall did not. Curtis, out of conversational ideas, deferred to da Silva. Da Silva went on a long spiel about a boxing match he once witnessed as a child and lingered over the blond Adonis’s rippling muscles in a way that left his preferences unmistakable.

Rivenhall stood up. “If you’ll ‘scuse me, gentlemen,” he said. “Need to take a piss.”

Curtis turned to da Silva the second Rivenhall was gone. “What have you been doing? The fellow’s not even tipsy!”

Da Silva raised an eyebrow. “We have all night to get drunk.”

“The plan,” said Curtis with gritted teeth, “was for you to get Rivenhall drunk, just in time for me to sweep in and us to take him home to sleep it off.”

“I am aware of the plan,” said da Silva. “You are rather tense. Perhaps you ought to have something stronger than beer.”

“I would not be tense if you had done what we agreed,” said Curtis. A new thought crept into his mind. “You haven’t—haven’t developed a liking for Rivenhall, have you? Is that why you are reluctant to take advantage of him?”

Da Silva huffed. “On the contrary. I greatly enjoy taking advantage of him.”

Curtis scowled as da Silva maintained his ineffable ease. Rivenhall returned and Curtis prepared to watch their plan for this night go absolutely tits up.

However, da Silva came through. He manoeuvred the conversation to hunting, and Curtis dutifully went along, recounting tales of house parties and hounds. Rivenhall loved hunting, and Curtis listened patiently as he enthused on his greatest encounters with creatures of the woods. He watched da Silva, who was listening with what appeared to be interest. Curtis felt this interest to be disingenuous; da Silva abhorred violence, and he was sure hunting was not a passion of his. It made Rivenhall a completely unsuitable companion for him.

While Curtis was pondering that, da Silva said innocuously: “Acton, is this exquisite fox pelt with you in London? I would love to see it.”

Curtis concurred. Rivenhall, bless him, said stumblingly, “How ‘bout—I mean, no time like the present! It’s a reg’lar stone’s throw away.”

“I am enthralled by fox pelts,” said Curtis dispiritedly. “That is, if it will not be an intrusion?”

Rivenhall slapped his shoulder. “No intrusion, my good man! A jolly good thing we met this ev’ning, when my uncle and aunt are still—” he hiccupped— “away.” He started talking about Scotland and Curtis stopped listening. Da Silva threw his arm around Rivenhall when they left the pub and Curtis trailed behind them, completely lost as to what was happening. Da Silva couldn’t, in seriousness, like this man. A greater bore Curtis had never encountered. He spent the whole walk in a mood, wishing that they were never assigned this mission in the first place, and growing ever more irritated by the fact that da Silva was hanging onto Rivenhall like some limpet.

The manservant was dismissed when they got in, and in less than half an hour Rivenhall was sleeping soundly. Curtis and da Silva, having put him to bed, tiptoed out of his room.

“And now,” said da Silva, “we search.”

It was thankfully not a large house. They decided Sir Roland’s study would be the most efficient place to start. It was locked, but da Silva took care of that soon enough and in they went. Curtis wouldn’t let da Silva light any candles lest they somehow gave away their presence, so they had to rely on Curtis’s flashlight while they searched the room. The desk too was locked, but it opened easily.

“Not to worry,” said da Silva merrily, when they returned the documents to the desk after a thorough search. “It would be too easy if he kept the evidence of his crimes in his desk. What’s next?”

There was nothing incriminating on the bookshelves, cabinet, nor mantlepiece. Curtis poked his head into the fireplace, but that too was empty of any paper.

“Nothing at all?” said da Silva.

“No,” said Curtis. He frowned. “Well, I suppose the library is our next best bet.”

They tiptoed out and found the library, which was not locked.

“Oh,” said Curtis, staring at a bookshelf. “Er.”

“What?”

“Nothing,” he began, but da Silva was already behind him. Curtis sighed and gestured with his bad hand. “Your poems are here.”

Da Silva paused. “So they are.”

Da Silva did not move. He was very close behind him, closer than he needed to be. Curtis could feel his breathing against his face. Da Silva was maybe an inch or two shorter than himself, he thought.

His hair had gradually lost its gelled stiffness over the course of the evening, and now it was almost disordered. Curtis found himself liking the sight. Da Silva reached around him and plucked his book off the shelf, and sat back against the armchair. He opened it and started flicking through.

“We are on a mission,” hissed Curtis, shining the flashlight away so it was impossible to read. “You can read your own poetry any other time.”

“I am looking for intelligent annotations,” said da Silva airily, snatching the flashlight away from Curtis. “Acton said he read poetry, but never mentioned he’d read mine. I will be quite besotted if he has read it closely.”

“I’ve read your poetry,” said Curtis impatiently. “And yet you are not besotted with me.”

“Indeed?” said da Silva. But he put the book back on the shelf and continued their search of the library. He set to work picking the cabinet’s lock whilst Curtis peered at the rest of the books. He’d just got it open when he heard a distinct gasp from Curtis.

“What is it?” said da Silva, already by his side. Curtis had a letter in his hand.

“It’s from a Baron von Schlegel,” said Curtis, as da Silva scanned the page. “Thanking Sir Roland for his service. Dated to two months ago.” His voice was blank, but he was shocked at the proof he was holding in his hand. Naïve as he was, he had truly not thought Sir Roland capable of this. “Who would hide this in a book?” he wondered.

Da Silva folded it up when he was done. “It’s certainly written by someone who speaks German,” he said. “The prepositions are all wrong in the expected places and the cursive is passable. I suppose it’s not detailed enough to send one immediately to the gallows, but it’s not something you want a bookish guest stumbling upon.” He paused. “Or your nephew’s nosy lover.”

Curtis shied away from the sting that word caused. “It was in a volume of Johnson,” he said. “I only noticed it because the surrounding volumes were all covered in dust.”

“Excellent work, Captain,” said da Silva. “It’s the proof we need that Sir Roland Cheswick is a dirty, thieving scoundrel. To your uncle this goes. In a week’s time I suppose we shall hear of Sir Roland’s resignation.”

“But why hide it in a book?” Curtis repeated, not really listening to da Silva. “The volume was sticking out next to its neighbours too. Almost as if someone wanted us to find it.”

“Curtis,” said da Silva, not impatiently. “What are you getting at?”

“I don’t know,” he admitted. “But something about this feels wrong.”

“Well,” said da Silva, “I don’t think Acton is waking up any time soon, but we ought to get back in case there are servants around.”

Curtis agreed and they crept back up the stairs. At the door, da Silva said—

“Perhaps I should go in alone.”

Curtis blinked.

“It will look strange tomorrow morning if we are both in his house. Far more reasonable that you came to see the fox pelt and went home after our host blacked out.”

“And you?” said Curtis. He felt bewildered, confused.

“Well, it is perfectly understandable that I might have stayed,” da Silva said, shrugging. “And if he asks questions, I shall simply distract him.”

“Right,” said Curtis. Of course da Silva would want to be alone with his lover when he woke up. It would be tremendously awkward if Curtis was there too.

“Terribly sorry,” said da Silva, sounding as insincere as Curtis had ever heard him. “But you do understand.”

“Of course,” said Curtis, polite to the end. “I will get a cab. Perhaps I should take the letter?”

Da Silva handed it to him wordlessly.

“Good night,” said Curtis awkwardly. “Should we meet at the park tomorrow to discuss this? How is ten o’clock?”

Da Silva made a face. “So early. I might as well go home with you.”

Curtis realised the implications of the sentence long after he replied: “Eleven, then. Since we are on the brink of solving a matter of national importance.”

“Oh, all right then,” said da Silva. “Eleven.”

Curtis walked home, too restless to wait for a cab. The letter was in his pocket but instead of thinking about the crucial evidence he had just found, he found himself thinking about da Silva instead. He had to do something about this—this terrible feeling that gathered in his stomach whenever da Silva mentioned a lover. He had never reacted like this before, not even when he first met da Silva. He had not predicted that prejudice would grow on him; in his months knowing da Silva, he thought he had grown more accepting. But apparently not.

He thought about what da Silva said at the tavern before Rivenhall came back. About Curtis examining why the mention of his lovers was so disturbing to him. Curtis could think of nothing else but the loathsome, shameful truth. He was just as bad as the rest of them, colleagues of theirs, who gave da Silva dirty looks and refused to shake his hand. He might have told himself he didn’t care, but his physical response suggested something very different. It was revulsion in his stomach when he thought about da Silva spending the night with Rivenhall; it had been revulsion when he saw Freddie Merrill’s scarf on the floor of da Silva’s flat.

But it was worse—if that was even possible—to suspect, as he did, that da Silva really liked Rivenhall. It was obvious that they were perfectly wrong for each other. Curtis was quite bewildered by the concept of matchmaking, but this was too blatant. Rivenhall was a brash, indelicate, conceited sort of fellow, who refused to work even when he had no money, preferring to remain as a grown man living with his guardian. Da Silva on the other hand was brilliant, witty, sensitive and deserving of more, much more, than that. Curtis knew about da Silva’s fixation with aristocratic fops, the kind of men he himself had grown up with. Made inane by familiarity, Curtis didn’t think they were all that much, but he could imagine they were attractive by what they embodied. But what the hell did da Silva see in Rivenhall?

Anyone was better than Rivenhall. Even Curtis was better for da Silva—

The idle thought planted itself in his mind and waited to sprout.

*

In the morning, Curtis read the letter three times over and made a copy. It still struck him as odd that Sir Roland would hide it in a book in his library. He scoured old gossip sheets and found that a Baron Nicholas von Schlegel, wealthy owner of a shipbuilding firm, had indeed recently departed London. Everything about this letter made sense. He would have liked for it to make sense, and they could put the whole affair behind them. And yet Curtis was definitively unsure.

He was at the park ten minutes before eleven. The minutes passed, and still da Silva did not show. Curtis began to feel aggrieved. He was here, trying to prevent a government scandal committed by someone who apparently did not care for the sanctity he owed to his position, and da Silva was off enjoying the company of his nephew.

Curtis walked around the park only to return to an empty bench. Da Silva finally made his appearance almost an hour late.

“I thought we had agreed to meet at eleven,” said Curtis. “What delayed you?”

Da Silva shrugged. “The comfort of a warm bed, if you must know.”

Curtis blanched, then immediately felt terrible for doing so. He cleared his throat. “Listen, da Silva. I have a strange feeling about this. I don’t think this letter is the full story. Someone put that there to be found—I’m sure of it.”

Da Silva sighed. “Really, Curtis? You couldn’t have expressed these doubts before I dragged myself across town to sit and freeze here with you?”

Curtis continued. “I don’t know why, I don’t have any proof… look, did Rivenhall say anything this morning?”

“Nothing I’d repeat to you,” said da Silva sharply. “Why?”

“I am telling you I simply do not feel certain, or even beyond any reasonable doubt, that Sir Roland is guilty—”

Da Silva raised an eyebrow. “Have you even read the letter?”

“That’s just it,” said Curtis. “I have, over and over, and I can’t shake the feeling that we’re missing something. Here—” he brought it out. “You have the original. I made myself a copy.”

Da Silva took it gingerly. “What a welcome change it is to receive.”

Curtis was beginning to find his patience wearing thin. He said, “Will you at least try to take this seriously? A man’s reputation is on the line, and all you can do is make comments about… receiving!”

“My my, Captain, I’m shocked at your insinuation.”

“It was your insinuation first,” said Curtis, feeling very childish.

“All the same, I am quite impressed that you picked up on it. You have matured rather in the time I’ve known you.”

“Thank you,” said Curtis stiffly. “As I was saying, this mission is far from resolved. I’m quite sure we’re missing something.”

“Fine,” said da Silva, looking as if he could not possibly give less of a shit. “What do you suggest our next move is, Captain?”

“I don’t know,” said Curtis.

“How helpful,” said da Silva. “You object to finishing this matter, but propose no alternatives.”

Da Silva was in one of his moods again. Usually Curtis paid them no heed, but the last few days had been emotionally taxing for him as well, and he did not feel like being the whipping boy for da Silva’s crotchety mood when Curtis had quite enough to deal with on his own.

“I don’t see you offering any ideas,” said Curtis. “You had an ideal opportunity this morning—”

“So that’s what this is about.”

“What?”

Da Silva scoffed. “You think it’s Acton.”

“I never said that. I said that I think it is unwise to be involved with a suspect—”

“I was not aware we had agreed he was that.”

Curtis was beginning to feel real anger. “Damn it, da Silva, I don’t want to quarrel with you.”

“Well, what if I want to quarrel with you?”

“I apologise if I’ve done something to offend—”

“Oh, stop being so bloody reasonable. You’re always so bloody reasonable, so logical. Some things aren’t logical, Curtis! So have some fucking sympathy for the rest of us, who are at the mercy of illogical feelings!”

If they had been indoors, da Silva would have stormed out. Being as they were in a park, he stormed off instead. Curtis, never at home with emotional outbursts, stood frozen as this happened.

Gradually comprehension of what had happened trickled through his brain, until it hit him that da Silva was obviously talking about Rivenhall, about illogical feelings that were complicated and immensely difficult, and Curtis began to feel truly awful.

He set off in the direction da Silva had gone and caught up with him in minutes. “Da Silva!” Da Silva was not stopping. “Da Silva! For goodness’s sake, won’t you look at me?”

Da Silva turned around. “What now?” he snapped.

Curtis took a deep breath. He had been so caught up in himself that he’d completely forgotten about da Silva’s own feelings. Da Silva was an emotional man, prone to melancholy, jealousy, brooding and lovesickness. It was not at all surprising that he had fallen in love with Rivenhall, a man who was at best a scapegrace and at worst a traitor. Here Curtis was lecturing him on taking this seriously, when da Silva presumably knew full well the hazards of the situation even better than Curtis.

“I’m sorry,” said Curtis. “I have been ungenerous in my assumptions.”

“Indeed,” said da Silva testily.

“It is not my intention to hurt you—”

“I’m sure.”

Curtis knew that a public park was the worst place to have this conversation, but as always with da Silva he found himself unreasonably angry and unable to control his words. “What is going on, da Silva? I’m trying my best to understand, but whatever I say manages to offend you. Is this about Rivenhall? Because I—”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, Curtis!” He started to storm off again. When he was a few feet away he turned around and yelled, “And don’t follow me!”

*

A few days passed, and then one afternoon when Curtis was sitting at home with the paper, there was a loud knock at the door.

“I hate this place,” said da Silva, swanning in. Curtis closed the door behind him. Da Silva was waving the letter and he had a book tucked under his arm. “Your landlady is a right pill, do you know that? And those curtains are awful.” He sat down on his usual chair and crossed his legs.

“Da Silva!” said Curtis, still registering the fact that he was here. He’d thought their fight had driven him away, possibly for good. And then he had been terrified again by another thought that came to him. “What are—what are you doing here?”

“You were right,” said da Silva.

Curtis really didn’t think he was. “I was?”

“About Rivenhall,” said da Silva grimly. He put the letter—Sir Roland’s incriminating letter—on the coffee table, and then opened up the book, poems by Walt Whitman. So this was a professional, not personal call.

Da Silva was talking. “The idea came to me when I remembered finding my poems in the library. I borrowed a few books and the marginal handwriting seemed familiar, and then I realised it was the handwriting of the letter.”

“Sent by the Baron?” said Curtis, baffled.

“Yes,” said da Silva. “Or so its real writer would have us believe. I wouldn’t have found it if you didn’t give me the original letter, you know. Anyway, then I remembered what you said about the letter’s convenient placement, and also the fact that Rivenhall was barely hungover the morning after that night. I slipped into Rivenhall’s room and found the real letter from Baron von Schlegel, which Rivenhall had copied out with his uncle’s name, and put in the library for us to find. It seems he suspected who we were and was framing Sir Roland.”

Curtis took this in.

“So,” he said. “Rivenhall is guilty? Sir Roland is innocent?”

“Yes,” said da Silva. “Go on, bask in it. I will allow you one minute before we must leave to apprehend him. Knowing Rivenhall, he is likely still asleep and an earthquake couldn’t wake him.”

“I don’t want to bask,” said Curtis.

“That’s very noble, Captain, but you needn’t pretend with me. Forty seconds–”

“No,” said Curtis oddly. “I don’t think I do.”

There was a long pause. Curtis swallowed. “Da Silva, I...”

“Well then,” said da Silva abruptly and loudly, “if you are going to squander this opportunity then we can leave right now. We can’t have Rivenhall getting away after we’ve done all the hard work of finding him out. I refuse to be beaten by an inferior intellect.”

“Da Silva, are you sure you are quite prepared—”

“My dear Captain,” said da Silva, his smile almost brittle. “Perhaps we ought to act now and talk later.” 

Curtis swallowed his protests. There would be time afterwards for da Silva to process this, that his duty compelled him to arrest his lover. It was hard enough for da Silva as it was; it would be worse with Curtis questioning a decision it was doubtlessly painful to make.

“Yes,” he said. “My gun is loaded; I will fetch it.”

*

Acton Rivenhall was indeed asleep when Curtis and da Silva got to his townhouse. Sir Roland and Lady Cheswick had arrived home yesterday, and it was a terrible thing having to arrest their nephew in front of them. Curtis led Rivenhall away as da Silva took on Sir Roland’s rambling confusion and Lady Cheswick’s helpless protests. “We are confident of your own innocence,” da Silva was saying to the couple, even as he knew protocol meant they too would be interviewed and suspected for as long as Sir Maurice saw fit. “Please, Lady Cheswick, do not be distressed. Your nephew will not be mistreated. Sir Roland, be assured we will be as discreet as possible. You need not fear a leak to the papers.”

“Oh, hang the papers,” said Sir Roland. “You really think—my own nephew…”

“The evidence is persuasive,” said da Silva, not unkindly.

“But why?” said Lady Cheswick. Her voice was frail, so unlike the woman who made speeches to rapt audiences every week.

“I suspect it was money,” said da Silva. “The Baron paid handsomely for such confidential information.” Then he followed Curtis out of the townhouse and into the car.

*

It was a silent trip to the Bureau, Rivenhall having decided to neither protest his innocence or plead for sympathy. Sir Maurice was at a meeting in Whitehall, but he would be back soon. Meanwhile Rivenhall was carted off to a quiet place, and Curtis and da Silva were offered tea as they waited for Sir Maurice’s return. Da Silva sipped it languidly, which Curtis watched with growing alarm. Da Silva had just arrested his own lover, caused him and his family immense personal shame, with many worse things probably to come.

“I’m sorry,” said Curtis, the words rushing out of him. He spoke quietly. “This—I can’t imagine it’s easy for you.” If he’d stopped here he would’ve noticed the confused look on da Silva’s face, but having started now it was much easier to go on. “Having to arrest your—your friend. I know I’m the last person you want to talk to because of how I’ve been acting, but I want you to know I don’t blame you in the slightest. You’re a romantic; it was always a risk. But it was the right thing to arrest him.”

“Curtis,” said da Silva very slowly. “What on earth are you talking about?”

Curtis looked confused. “Are you not—isn’t Rivenhall guilty?”

“Yes,” said da Silva. “But what would you be blaming me for?”

Curtis was beginning to turn a little red, but he carried on. “I mean, I wouldn’t. It can’t be easy seeing a man you have—er, have feelings for—guilty of a terrible crime.”

“My dear fellow,” said da Silva. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

Curtis began to panic. “Have I said something awful? I’m so sorry, da Silva, really. I’m trying to be supportive—”

“Stop apologising,” said da Silva, not nearly as irritable as he was a few days ago. “I must clarify. Do you think I am in love with Acton Rivenhall?”

Curtis, poor thing, could only manage a weak, “Aren’t you?”

“Good God, do you think I have no taste at all?” This was practically a shout.

Curtis slowly translated this outraged question into the denial it was. “You aren’t?”

“Bloody hell. In love, yes, but with Acton Rivenhall…”

“Keep your voice down,” Curtis hissed. “Look, how was I to know? You told me about that duke’s son in Cambridge, and the man I met before the meeting—I thought you had a preference for flippant aristocrats. Like Rivenhall. Besides,” he added, more strongly, “you’ve slept with him! It’s hardly an outlandish thought.”

Da Silva suddenly looked uncomfortable. “Ah. Yes. Well. About that.” He cleared his throat. “I may have misled you on that point.”

Curtis sat down. “What?”

Da Silva sighed. “I didn’t sleep with him. You must think me a terrible prude.”

“You didn’t sleep with Rivenhall? Then how—”

“Well, we almost did, the precursors, if you know what I mean, but then we didn’t. Anyway, he’s quite lonely, so I listened to his complaints, made him tea, forced him to sleep. It was rather like being his nursemaid, only it didn’t pay. It was torturous work, really, I can’t imagine doing it for anything less than a hundred pounds a week, and it’s shuddering to think that working mothers do it for free—”

“Why did you tell me you slept with him?”

Da Silva paused. “Did I? Well, perhaps. I didn’t think you’d care.”

“I felt horrible!” said Curtis. He looked shocked at his own outburst. “I’ve been tearing myself apart these last few weeks, thinking I was some sort of—intolerant person, because the thought of you with Rivenhall virtually made me sick, and I…”

Another pause; Curtis’s face took on that shocked look again and da Silva hurried to stop it. His own heart had begun to flutter dangerously and he was afraid of what was going to happen if Curtis continued to realise things. “No harm done,” he said. “I quite forgive you. Don’t look so tortured, my dear captain. I do hate it when you take inconsequential things to heart. You have a talent for it, you know. I wish you thought better of yourself. I know I do—which makes it so disconcerting when you don’t, since I am an exceptional judge of character and yours is quite one of the—”

Someone opened the door.

“One of the what?” said Curtis. His silly, adorable mouth was open and da Silva was half-tempted to slam that door and answer Curtis’s question.

“Am I interrupting something?” said Sir Maurice.

*

Curtis stumbled through the post-mission briefing like he was a schoolboy being examined on his Latin. Sir Maurice listened to his agents give blustering accounts of the events that led to the discovery and subsequent arrest of Acton Rivenhall. After a few cursory questions, he let them go.

They walked out together. Curtis asked the operator for the ground floor. In the elevator they stood in silence, during which da Silva dared not to look at Curtis, lest he saw…

“So,” said Curtis, when they were finally outside the building. “You are not in love with Rivenhall.”

“No,” said da Silva. It was cold and he wanted to be indoors, somewhere warm. His own flat was half an hour away, but in the same direction as Curtis’s, which was much closer. They had already started walking.

“That makes things easier,” said Curtis.

“What?” said da Silva. “Oh, with the case and the paperwork and all that. Yes, emotions are quite messy, aren’t they? I’m quite glad we were able to keep them out of this.”

“Stop talking about paperwork,” said Curtis. “I’m trying to talk to you about something.”

Da Silva’s heart, which he had previously thought dusty and out-of-use, started beating wildly again. “I do hope it isn’t important,” he said. “That scene at the Cheswick townhouse was quite enough for one day. I’m not sure I can manage another serious conversation for at least a week. Would your uncle accept a request of compassionate leave?”

“I’m not sure,” said Curtis, but his mouth was tugging into a smile. “Listen, I—”

Da Silva’s heart responded in kind. “In addition,” he said loudly, “I’m starved, and my mother’s rosewater cake is at least twenty minutes away.”

“I have food in my flat,” said Curtis. “We’re almost there. Will you come up?”

Da Silva thought about what he was afraid to say, then forgot it altogether. His mistake was to look at Curtis. At his expression, one of absolute tenderness, he could say nothing but yes.

“Good,” said Curtis, rapping at the door. He nodded politely at the porter who let them in. His rooms were only on the second floor. Inside, it was fairly sparse and horribly tidy, except for a few papers on the table and, shockingly, a thin book opened face down.

“Please sit,” said Curtis, gesturing to an armchair in front of the fire. “Tea?”

Da Silva shook his head. “Curtis, what is going on?”

“I want you to be comfortable,” said Curtis earnestly. “And I want you to know that if I’m wrong about this, then there’s really no harm done, and we can forget the whole matter.”

“This is awfully vague,” said da Silva, who was feeling a mixture of absolute terror and traitorous hope.

“Is it me?” said Curtis suddenly. “Am I the reason you’ve been so difficult lately?”

Da Silva blinked. “Pardon?”

“I phrased that poorly,” said Curtis. He looked nervous, tapping his foot and blushing adorably. “You don’t have to answer that. It’s just—how can I explain it? Da Silva—no, that’s not right. May I call you Daniel?”

“If it would help,” he said, trying to sound sardonic. He was afraid it came out as pleading.

“Daniel,” said Curtis, and he wanted to melt. “This case has been very difficult for me. At first I was horrified at myself, but finally I realised what it was, and then I thought a similar thing might be going on with you, and needless to say I really hope it is, but if it isn’t I can accept it. Daniel, we have worked together for six months now. I don’t know at what point it started, but I’ve been terribly slow on the uptake and I’m sorry for that.”

“Curtis, what on earth is going on?”

“I was jealous!” said Curtis. “I was jealous of all of them: of Rivenhall, of Freddie Merrill, of every man you cared for who wasn’t me.”

Da Silva said nothing.

“And I thought—or at least I wondered, and hoped—that the reason why you were being so difficult, and maybe why you lied about Rivenhall, was that you wanted me to care. And I do. I realised it today. Daniel, I care for you, like I’ve never cared about anyone before. If I’ve read this wrong then please tell me. Or if I’ve said something wrong. The last thing I want to do is make things difficult.”

“Difficult?” he echoed. He choked on a laugh. “I don’t believe this.”

Curtis’s face flooded with disappointment. “Please, I didn’t mean to—”

“No!” said da Silva. “No, that’s not—Curtis—Archie, listen. You’re right. I was trying to make you jealous. I thought it was hopeless, but there we are.”

They stared at each other, and then suddenly they were very close together. Daniel’s mouth was on his, warm and hungry, and Curtis was responding with equal insistence. Why hadn’t he realised all this earlier? They could’ve been doing this months ago. He’d missed things—hints dropped during that week at the Armstrongs’, looks and remarks and insinuations, which he’d finally put together now.

So new was the realisation, that he needed assurance. He broke their kiss. “Do you really mean it?” he said breathlessly. “You care for me, as I…”

“Yes,” said Daniel. “Do you?”

“Yes.”

They moved to each other and fell back on the sofa together. Daniel pushed him down and they were face to face again. Curtis felt like laughing—it all seemed so silly, the fretting and worrying and doom-laden imaginings—until Daniel kissed him again, and lust settled warmly over his body.

Daniel was going slowly for Curtis’s sake. Curtis realised this when he felt the insistent bulge in his trousers. It was rather gratifying, but the thought of what might happen next allowed caution to etch its way into his mind. He managed to say, somewhat dazedly: “Please don’t think—this is wonderful—but the Dunstables are next door, and I don’t think—”

Daniel stopped immediately and shifted so he was no longer straddling him. “My flat,” he said decisively. “It’s much more discreet.”

“Would you mind?” said Curtis. Having said it, he was beginning to regret the suggestion. Now a walk in the cold stood in the way of lying on a couch with Daniel.

“I’ve waited six months,” said Daniel. “I can wait another twenty minutes.”

He pressed a final kiss to Curtis’s mouth. Then he sat up and adjusted his appearance. Curtis tried to do the same, rebuttoning his jacket. He stopped when he felt Daniel’s eyes on him.

“You look delicious,” said Daniel.

Curtis blushed fiercely. “I thought you said you could wait.”

“Oh, I can,” said Daniel. “I’m just evening the score. You have only had to wait—what, a day?”

Curtis looked anguished then playful. “If only you’d said something! It was always going to take me some time to realise. I’m not—I’m quite slow on these things.”

“I know,” said Daniel. He couldn’t repress the fondness in his tone. “I don’t mind it.”

Curtis nodded. “And—we can still work together? I want to.”

“I don’t see why not. Only, perhaps your uncle can be left to his own conclusions, along with the rest of the Bureau.”

“Oh,” said Curtis. He blinked, and Daniel knew that he was remembering the dozens of cruel remarks Curtis had easily ignored in the past, which would now be unwittingly true. “Of course.”

“But not everyone,” said Daniel, softly. “There are people who might be told. Miss Carruth and Miss Merton, for example.”

“Yes,” said Curtis. He started to smile. “And perhaps, I might finally be introduced to some of your friends?”

“Perhaps,” said Daniel. “If I’m feeling nice.”

“I’ll do my best to ensure that.”

“I’m sure you will,” said Daniel, desire and affection swimming together in his eyes. Then his face turned more critical. “Your collar,” he said, reaching out to tidy it himself. “Now you look perfectly respectable.”

“Little do they know,” said Curtis. He held out his arm, ridiculously, and Daniel took it for the few seconds he could. “At least your flat isn’t far. We can talk and, well, do other things…”

“Indeed,” said Daniel. “Whichever you prefer. Or both.”

“I think both,” said Curtis. They kissed, again, then he opened the door.