Gregg Loomis - The Pegasus Secret

London, Piccadilly

The door at the top of Nellie's stairs opened into what could have been the lobby of a tourist-class hotel: unmatched chairs scattered in view of a cheap television set, a certain worn quality to the few end tables, magazines carelessly tossed about. The girls were the ones who relaxed here. Customers rarely saw the room.

Had the place been done in antiques, the furniture still wouldn't have gotten Lang's first attention. Young women, most in their teens or early twenties, lounged. Every skin color the world had to offer was on display with a minimum of cover. Most wore short pajamas or bra and panties. A few were done up in more exotic garb such as embroidered kimonos or shifts in vibrant African colors. Nellie's inventory reflected the ethnic diversity London embraced.

None of them gave Lang more than a bored glance.

Nothing like being ignored by a roomful of partially dressed women to shrink the old ego.

Nellie emerged from a hallway opposite from him, squinting at Herr Schneller's moustache and jowls. They inspected each other as warily as a couple of dogs meeting on the street. Lang was surprised she looked pretty much the same as he remembered. Not a thread of silver streaked the blue-black hair that seemed to sparkle with green and amber like a crow's wing in the sun. Her face was smooth, devoid of the little wrinkles years try to sneak by. Her chin was sharp, unblunted by the wattles of age. Her only concession to the passage of time was a dress that reached her knees, instead of the microskirts Lang remembered. Even so, her calves were slender, well-turned and without the mapping of varicose veins.

Her important parts had defied gravity as well as old age.

Lang took her gently in his arms and planted a wet one on her cheek. "You're still a young girl, Nellie."

She displayed teeth that must have put at least one orthodontist's kids through university. "You compliment both me and my unbelievably expensive plastic surgeon."

There was still a trace of the Balkans in her voice. She cocked her head, leaned back and regarded him like a specimen in a jar. "But you… you don't look the same."

"Not all of us age as well as you."

Her rich, thick hair had always been her best feature or at least of those Lang could see. She shook her head, the silky strands caressing her shoulders. "That's not what I mean, luv."

Lang touched the moustache and padded cheeks. "Let's just say you're the only person in London I want to recognize me."

A smile twitched the corners of a sensuous mouth. "I thought you had left your position with…"

He let her go and managed to drag his eyes off her long enough to make sure there wasn't anybody there who didn't belong. A little late. If Pegasus had been waiting for him, he'd be dead. He'd been far too interested in the scenery to notice potential danger. Death by carnal desire.

Lang stepped back and shut the door. "I did. It's the cops I'm dodging."

She treated him to those teeth again. "The police, is it, luv? You've come to the right place."

"That's what I hoped you'd say."

A second look around the room and he didn't see any familiar faces, faces from the past. Attrition was fierce in Nellie's line of work.

"I'd like to spend the night," Lang said. "Make a telephone call if I could."

She raised manicured eyebrows. "Make a call and spend the night, would you?" She swept a hand in an arc. "Are my girls so ugly you need to call in talent?"

Lang grinned sheepishly. "No, no. I need to speak with a friend in the States, a priest, actually."…

Nellie laughed, a blunt coughing sound. "A priest? We know about priests, what they do. No wonder you never wanted any of my girls."

She said it loud enough to get the attention of several of the young women nearby. If he hadn't been so occupied with Pegasus, Lang might have blushed.

She took him by the hand to lead him into the hall she had come out of. It was lined with doors like a corridor in a hotel, except there were no numbers. They stopped in front of one while Nellie fished around in her blouse. Lang was about to make the obvious crude comment when she produced a key and unlocked the door.

"Sue Lee's room," she explained. "She's on the coast of Spain with a client."

She wrinkled her nose at a faint odor Lang couldn't identify. "Been cooking in here on her wok. Vietnamese, Japanese, something like that. You'll get used to the smell."

She ushered him inside. "Sure you don't want company, luv?"

The room looked like one in a girls' dorm. A vanity with light-studded mirror was built into one wall. A plain wooden chair, a metal chest of drawers and a single bed completed the furnishings. It wasn't exactly the place Lang would have imagined a high-price hooker spending her off time.

Nellie had been following his appraising look around. "The girls don't entertain in their rooms. The traffic would make it hard for the coppers to look the other way. They use hotel rooms or have their own flats. She pointed to a door on the other side of the vanity. "The loo. Connects with the next room. Mind that unless you want a surprise. Help yourself to the telephone."

"Thanks."

She started to close the door and stopped. "Sure there's nothing I can get you?"

Lang smiled. "Thanks, but no."

She looked at him as though seeing him for the first time. "On the run from the law, bet you haven't eaten. Some of the girls always get fish and chips, Chinese, some sort of take-away. No trouble to get something for you."

The mention of food reminded him he hadn't eaten since… since Rachel's gut-cramping Indian fare the night before. He must have fully recovered because he was suddenly hungry enough to risk another had it been available. Fortunately, it wasn't.

"You talked me into it," he said, pulling some bills out of his pocket. "Surprise me."

Finally alone, Lang reached for the telephone, one of those cutesy ivory-and-gold ones that is supposed to look like an antique. He picked it up, happy to hear a very contemporary dial tone. He dialed 00, international, 1 for North America, and 404, one of Atlanta's area codes, and then information. Never before had he paid particular notice to the toneless voice of the computerized information service. It had an American accent.

After a series of astral clicks and whirs, a familiar voice was on the line, words so clear they might have been spoken from across the room rather than across the Atlantic. "Lang?"

"It's me, Francis, your favorite heretic."

Francis's chuckle was audible an ocean away. "Glad to hear from you, although I've been reading some pretty disturbing things in the local fish-wrapper."

Lang was thankful the phone's cord extended to the bed. He stretched out. This was going to take awhile. "Forno volat, Frances, rumor travels fast. Besides, you know the media: accused on page one-A, acquitted somewhere in the obituaries."

"I suppose," the priest said, a rueful note clearly detectable. "They publish accusations but not the rebuttal." "If it bleeds, it leads," Lang said. "Gotta pump the ratings for the six o'clock news and sell advertising for the paper."

"Somehow, I don't think you had your secretary have me wait for your call just so you could tell me you didn't do it."

Lang took a deep breath and exhaled. "No, you're right as usual." "You've recognized your feet are set upon the road to hell and you want me to hear your confession."

Even the fatigue that was beginning to fog Lang's mind couldn't suppress a chuckle. "You don't have enough time left on this earth to hear my full confession."

"Then it's my pastoral skill and brilliant intellect you seek."

"Don't you guys take some sort of vow of humility? But, yeah, sort of. First, listen to what I have to tell you. Pay attention. There'll be a test later."