"Where are the snows of yesterday" - Villon
"Well, let me ask you, Sir" Pettigrew beamed. "Take a good look at me: what to you notice that sticks out the most?!"
He leaned against the soft back of the chair. "You want an honest answer?"
To tell the truth, the question took Worcester back a little, yet intrigued him, too. Did he want some bland anodyne platitude from the, frankly, heart-meltingly gorgeous looking man or... what?
There was a threat in the question: that there might be some terrible insult in the answer, and yet: yet it would be something real from the hidden heart of Mr Brendan Connolly. God knew, Pettigrew thought, there was enough to criticise about him: what would the horse whisperer choose? His heart was palpitating somewhat as he answered the question:
"Sir, I value nothing more highly in another man than honesty!" It sounded brave and noble and strong, but secretly Worcester, sad old, over the hill, ugly, fat, cream-puff, sissy Worcester was pleading in his head and heart... 'Please don't hurt me.'
Well. If Pettigrew valued honesty so highly, Brendan wanted to be sure he was really being honest. He peered at Pettigrew again, eyes still drawn to the bulge of his waistcoat. Aha. His waistcoat. The corset and clothing maker was one of the best-dressed men Brendan had ever seen. Almost dandy-like in its decadence, his clothing marked him as a man of expensive taste.
And now that he'd looked again, that was what stuck out the most.
"Your clothes," he said simply, then took another gulp of whiskey in hopes it would help him elaborate. "Your clothes. They're fit for...for a president." Not that former soldier President Grant would ever wear anything quite so...striking.
"You make this yourself?" Unable to rein in his curiosity, he reached out and touched the beautiful brocade waistcoat Pettigrew wore. Poor socially-bumbling Brendan had no idea of Pettigrew's inner struggle, or how his touch might arouse the other man. All he knew was that they were talking about clothes, and although men normally didn't touch each other, Pettigrew had been all over him moments ago while taking his measurements. Surely it was all right.
"Where are the snows of yesterday" - Villon
"Your clothes," he said simply, then took another gulp of whiskey in hopes it would help him elaborate.
"Say what now?!" frowned Mr Pettigrew, not having expected this answer amongst the possible flattering and much more numerious unflattering options.
"Your clothes. They're fit for...for a president." Not that former soldier President Grant would ever wear anything quite so...striking.
"Oh! Well! It was hardly my sartorial elegance to which I referred but that is very nice of you to say so Mr Connolly!" the balding old lard-ass beamed at hearing such a compliment from the good looking young butcher's assistant.
"You make this yourself?" Unable to rein in his curiosity, he reached out and touched the beautiful brocade waistcoat Pettigrew wore.
Worcester suppressed a gasp as saw that big strong hand, that had so recently been weighing out sausages and wielding a heavy chopper, reach toward his midriff: and a combination of relief and disappointment when it caressed his vest. He could feel his heart thumping in his chest and was almost fearful that he was about to have the sort of coronary attack that had killed that fellow Crabbe.
"Oh well, as a matter of fact yes!" he beamed proudly "Would you like me to make you one?" he blurted "Perhaps in more muted tones to suit your more Mediterranean skin tone." Unable to bear the sweet torture of Brendan's touch and further, he stood "Er... may I offer you a cigar, Mr Connelly. And then I will reveal all. I mean.. the real reason I am honour bound to help you and the lovely Miss Monahan achieve your fated conjugal bliss!" He walked shakily to the bureau and brought back a large box full of cigars and offered one to Bren before sitting down again.
(The box should have been a little fuller, he reflected, and wondered if Miss Wigfall had been smoking his prize Havanas again)
He fished out a lucifer and offered it toward Brendan with palsied hand to light his stogie.
Brendan wondered what Mr. Pettigrew had been referring to, if not to his clothes. Maybe his stomach after all, or his wispy gingery hair the same color as Bridget's?
He grinned at the idea of dressing up in a fancy vest like Mr. Pettigrew's. "As fine as it'd be, me wearing one of them vests would be like tryin' to pass a coyote off as a lapdog." He ignored the bit about his Mediterranean skin tone because he didn't know what that meant.
After selecting a cigar from the box, he held it out for Pettigrew to light it. A few draws later and the cigar was burning nicely. The whole evening so far had made him feel like someone, someone who was respected and looked up to instead of looked down on and frankly, after the events of the past month or so, viewed with suspicion still. If he used his imagination, he could envision what his life would have been like if he'd been born to cigars and drinks in a parlor and tailored clothes.
But this was the real world, not the land of make believe--even as much as this felt like it.
"So," he said, drawing on the cigar again and letting the smoke permeate his palate before exhaling, "what's the real reason?" It was always better to come at a thing head on instead of dancing around it, so he forged ahead.
"Where are the snows of yesterday" - Villon
"So," he said, drawing on the cigar again and letting the smoke permeate his palate before exhaling, "what's the real reason?" It was always better to come at a thing head on instead of dancing around it, so he forged ahead.
"It is not the only reason, you understand, Mister Connolly, but I must own: the first time I met your dear little Miss Monahan, I was struck most forcibly by the magnificence of her head of fiery ginger hair! A bonnet that burns as fiery as my own could not but be remarked upon and admired. Only, I think, poor Mister Wigfall has anything like a colour to match Miss Monahan and myself, and his stores of the wonderful strands are sadly diminished these days, I am afraid." he said sadly. Considering that he was married to Mrs Wigfall, and his(?) kids were Hector and Jemima Wigfall, the man's baldness was probably the least of his worries.
"So you see, Mister Connolly, just like you I had an interest that young lady the first time I ever met her that transcended those little flaws that others seem to find so all consuming: to me she was and always will be, first and foremost, a member of that Red Headed League: those who have and always will 'stay wide awake - and look out for each other'" he said grandiosely.
"She is a wonderful, beautiful young woman, and you are a wonderful, handsome young man, and I... I Mister Connolly... am just a big, fat old romantic: how could I fail to want to do all in my power to help the two of you find that... why that bower of contentment in loving partnership that I myself have been denied..." he looked a little sad for a second, sitting there in his sumptuous, but ultimately lonely bachelor apartments.
Mr Wigfall - his store of ginger hair was sadly diminished
Apparently Pettigrew was one of those people who didn't mind beating around the bush, or at least taking a little time to say what he really meant. Brendan tried to keep track of the way Pettigrew's monologue was headed.
Some parts of it stood out, like Pettigrew's referring to Bridget as Brendan's "dear Miss Monaghan" and when he admitted to an interest in Bridget. Brendan's eyes narrowed at that. What sort of interest? But it turned out he didn't have to worry. It was all about Bridget's hair.
Brendan had made some good progress on his cigar, and he slowly lowered it from his lips when Pettigrew finished.
"You're tellin' me...the reason you're doin' this is because of Bridget's hair?" Pettigrew had said it wasn't the only reason, but it was the only reason he'd given so far.
Whatever a bower of contentment was, it was sure kind of Pettigrew to want to help him find it. Did he mean a certain part of Bridget's female anatomy? Brendan had already found that. But he pitied Pettigrew if he never had. Certainly the man was somewhat pitiable in his dog-like eagerness to please.
"Where are the snows of yesterday" - Villon
"You're tellin' me...the reason you're doin' this is because of Bridget's hair?" Pettigrew had said it wasn't the only reason, but it was the only reason he'd given so far.
"Mister Connolly... I am doing this because I like Miss Monahan and, if I may be permitted to say so, I like you, even by dint of a brief acquaintance. It would please me, in other words, to be a willing and active part of your, what shall we call it, rapprochement." in his eagerness to prove is totally innocent and avuncular contribution to Brendan's upcoming visit to the Wentworths' house, he was probably just confusing poor Brendan all the more.
"How about another drink?" he said, enjoying the company of the beautiful looking young man and wanting it to last for as long as possible before he was left all on his lonesome, rattling around the place.
"I just hope that they are letting her wear her corset, the one I made specially for her. You know, once I got her clothes off, I could see there was a lot to keep my hands busy. It looks a little gruesome, I know. I blush to ask if you have seen it yourself, Suh, but I constructed it along quite scientific lines with advice from Doctor Danforth. Without it she will have to spend all her days confined to her room or move about only with great pain after a short while. You must ask them about that when you go. If you want me to furnish any evidence that it is a necessary garment for her to wear, please call on me at anytime, day or night." he offered.
He wasn't just trying to think up excuses to see Brendan again after this evening and the final suit fitting tomorrow, he really did have concerns about Bridget's body frame support.
"Mister Connolly... I am doing this because I like Miss Monahan and, if I may be permitted to say so, I like you, even by dint of a brief acquaintance."
Brendan raised his cigar in a toast at Pettigrew's words. He rather liked the tailor, even if the man used words that were too big to understand. "Another drink sounds just about right."
After his glass had been refilled, he took a generous mouthful and almost choked when Pettigrew talked about getting Bridget's clothes off. It was a perfectly innocent thing he referred to, Brendan realized a moment later, similar to the undressing he'd done for Pettigrew to take his measurements.
Well, Pettigrew may have blushed to ask it, but Brendan didn't blush to answer. "I've seen it. Made things...interesting." He grinned a little bit. There was no need to tread carefully when it came to the subject of his relationship with Bridget. He figured everyone knew what had happened the night of Crabbe's death by now. And even if Pettigrew somehow hadn't, he was a man. Men talked about their encounters with women. It was just the way things worked.
Pettigrew's description of how important Bridget's corset was brought a question soaring to the front of Brendan's mind. "That means that if I took it off her 'cause I wanted to be...close to her...I'd be hurtin' her more?" Although he'd discussed other women with other men before, often in cruder terms, Bridget was different because he cared about her. And because he'd never had to put such thought into how he made love to anyone else before.
"Where are the snows of yesterday" - Villon
Well, Pettigrew may have blushed to ask it, but Brendan didn't blush to answer. "I've seen it. Made things...interesting." He grinned a little bit. There was no need to tread carefully when it came to the subject of his relationship with Bridget.
While he might normally have been appalled at Brendan's apparently flippant summation of Miss Monahan's grotesque physical deformities, Worcester had a blind spot as far as the beautiful man was concerned and overlooked it.
"I am pleased to hear that you, Mr Connolly, are one who is not trammeled by the dictates of society upon the aesthetics of the human form; if one man finds beauty in the stale repeated fashion plates of accepted feminine charms, fine; but if another finds beauty in the fragile broken wing of a pretty dove, that is equally acceptable to me; or even, forgive my flight of fancy, if one man happens to find the naked form of another man who exemplifies the perfection of human form, to be the ideal of his dreams, well, let him, I say, let him, No matter how ludicrous it may seem to us normal fellows, eh?" Wus blathered, mopping his brow suddenly with his handkerchief.
He took a breath, trying to get a grip on himself.
Pettigrew's description of how important Bridget's corset was brought a question soaring to the front of Brendan's mind. "That means that if I took it off her 'cause I wanted to be...close to her...I'd be hurtin' her more?"
"Oh no no no..." Pettigrew cooed soothingly "The corset is only designed to support and shape Miss Monahan's frame when she is about her perambulations. Around the house or... er, lying down, she may dispense with it entirely." Wus informed his new friend. He liked to think of Brendan as his friend.
"May I ask you a question, Sir, man to man? Have you and Miss Monahan, to put it bluntly... well, if it is not too crude a phrase... partaken of carnal knowlege?!"
Brendan's head began to swim a little bit. It might have been the whiskey or maybe just the flood of words from Pettigrew. Listening to the red-headed man was like listening to Clara, but Pettigrew was even more verbose. What was he even trying to say? It all came down to one thing, he figured finally: he and Pettigrew were normal, whatever that meant.
"Sure," he agreed cautiously. Whatever that business with a naked man was, he wanted no part of it. "I mean, I may not be that normal. Fallin' for a girl like Bridget ain't normal." Although abnormal as it was, it felt right.
He breathed a sigh of relief at the knowledge that Bridget wasn't stuck in the corset all the time. Just when she was up and about. Even though it was meant to help her, it couldn't be comfortable to lounge around in or do whatever Bridget did all day. Playing with dolls?
"May I ask you a question, Sir, man to man? Have you and Miss Monahan, to put it bluntly... well, if it is not too crude a phrase... partaken of carnal knowlege?!"
Brendan tilted his head to one side. If whatever Pettigrew meant by "carnal knowledge" was what he thought it meant, how could he use a less crude term to cater to the man's sensitivity? After giving it some thought, he replied, "We did have a roll in the blankets, if that's what you're askin'. Why?"