Alex Bell - Fighting with fire

Just to be on the safe side, anyway, Lex opened the door on the side of the ship that faced away from the teashop. From there he was able to jump on to the tourist boat docked alongside and walk off its gangplank on to the harbour. If anyone saw him alighting from the boat they would merely think he was a young lord who had been taking a nap and no one had bothered to wake him up when they arrived. He plastered a miffed expression onto his face and then stalked on to the veranda, immediately adapting his Trent Lexington walk and mannerisms, head held so loftily high that he was practically viewing the scene through his nostrils. It had taken him a fair amount of practice to walk like that without losing his hat, for it had a tendency to topple off his head when he stuck his nose in the air, but he had mastered the knack eventually.

‘Ai simply can’t believe that you didn’t wake me up, Mama!’ Lex exclaimed in a loud, snotty voice to no one in particular as he walked through the veranda, thus creating the distinct impression that he was part of some unfortunate family there. Then he opened the door into the tearoom, walked in and said loudly to the room in general, ‘Ai say! Are you still serving elevenses or aren’t you?’

‘We are, sir-’ the server began but Lex cut him off.

‘Well, what does a fellow have to do to get some crumpets around heyah? Do you think this is acceptable?’

‘If you’d just place your order with me, sir, I will gladly-’

‘Oh, very well, very well,’ Lex said irritably, as if placing his order was a great inconvenience to him. ‘Ai want a pot of tea. And ai want crumpets.’

‘Butter or jam with the crumpets, sir?’

Lex turned his head, looked directly at the server? who was not much older than he was? and affected an expression of utter horror. ‘Do people really eat jam with crumpets nowadays?’ he asked as if it was the most disgusting thing he’d ever heard of. ‘My heavens, you’ll be asking me if I want ham with crumpets next, I shouldn’t wonder. Butter, boy! I want butter, naturally.’

‘I’m very sorry, sir,’ the server replied, completely unaffected by Lex’s tantrum, thus proving that he must have worked at the Sea Volcanoes teashop a while now and so was accustomed to rudeness. ‘Would you like milk with your tea, sir?’

‘Yaas, naturally.’

‘I’ll bring it right out to you as soon as it’s ready.’

‘Very well.’

Lex turned and walked back to the door, managing to collide with someone who was coming through it from the other side. It was a woman with a silly hat and an expression that indicated she’d just been drinking cups of vinegar outside rather than tea. She also looked rather like she might have been crying in the not-too-distant past.

‘Watch where you’re going, young man, really!’ she said huffily.

‘Ai’m very sorry, madam,’ Lex apologised in his best sulky voice. As he walked out to the veranda he could hear the woman berating the server for the fact that there hadn’t been enough butter on her crumpets. He grinned inwardly at the heavy weight of her purse, now stowed away inside his pocket.

He’d wanted to come to the teashop partly because it seemed rather a shame to come all the way to the Sea Volcanoes and not sample crumpets at its famous teashop (even if he did have to wait until he was back on the ship with Jesse before he could enjoy them), but mostly he’d wanted to come for a little sport. Lex had moved on from petty pickpocketing. His crimes were more sophisticated than that now. But he still liked to keep his hand in every once in a while, just to reassure himself that he hadn’t forgotten how. Of course, this was hardly a sensible time for thieving right when the Game was about to begin and he’d been in prison and threatened with disqualification once already. But a teashop just stuffed full of toffs like this… Well, expecting Lex not to try to rob them would be like expecting a wolf not to go after a paddock full of fat, stupid sheep who were all bleating at it in a distinctly taunting sort of way.

The veranda commanded a spectacular view of the Sea Volcanoes rising up out of the water and there were twisting black rails all the way around the perimeter to stop rich fools from walking straight into the sea. The tables were placed at a spacious distance from one another and covered in crisp, spotless white tablecloths on which stood silver teapots and plates of scones and crumpets.

Lex surreptitiously eyed the tables, chose a likely looking one with only two men already seated, walked up to it and sat down before saying, ‘Do you mind if ai sit here? Ai’m waiting for my elevenses but ai’m afraid ai’ve just had the most devilishly trying time of it with that fool server in there.’

‘It’s like I was just saying, isn’t it, Forsythe?’ boomed the man to Lex’s right. ‘You can’t get the staff these days.’

‘You’re quite right, Easty, quite right.’

‘Easty?’ Lex blurted, looking up sharply. ‘Are you, by any chance-?’

‘That’s right. Humphrey East. My boy, Jeremiah is playing in the Game,’ the man said, practically swelling with pride where he sat.

Lex had to force himself not to goggle at him in sheer disbelief. Now that he looked at him more closely, he could see that there was a slight resemblance. They both had the same dark hair and haughty look, although Jeremiah’s father was getting on for being a bit on the rotund side? too many hours spent lounging in fine armchairs, enjoying expensive brandy, had ruined what had probably once been an impressive figure. Lex supposed it made sense that Jeremiah’s father would be here at the commencement of the first round. After all, the Easts obviously had more money than sense and so could easily afford to shell out for this little tea party in order to gloat over the first-born son. And if Lex couldn’t find some way to turn this to his advantage, then he wasn’t half the talented cheat he thought he was.

‘Mey name is Trent Lexington III? of the Galswick Lexingtons, you know? ai was at the Academy with your son.’

‘Really?’ Humphrey East said, grasping Lex’s hand and shaking it emphatically. ‘Glad to know you, my boy. Glad to know you. Although I can’t say I remember Jeremiah writing home about you.’

‘Ah… well,’ Lex looked uncomfortable as he drew back his hand. ‘I don’t expect he used mey real name. They used to call me Old Squiffy.’

It had been an educated guess on Lex’s part but, from what little he understood of private schools, it seemed that there was always one unfortunate boy who got landed with the nickname ‘Old Squiffy’. Whether or not Jeremiah had ever had such a friend, Lex couldn’t tell, but it seemed to go down well enough with his father, who threw back his head and laughed. ‘I say, Forsythe, do you remember the Old Squiffy from our school days?’

The two men had a good chuckle and Lex let them have it. He’d experienced a momentary flicker of concern that they might work out the Trent Lexington thing. After all, they must have known that one of the other players in this Game was called Lex Trent. But that was toffs for you. Money had made them stupid. Lex could have announced himself as Tex Lent and they still wouldn’t have put the pieces together. In fact, that wasn’t a bad idea, Lex thought. He rather fancied calling himself Tex. He would have to think up an alter ego for Tex Lent at some point when the circumstances were right… But not now, when Trent Lexington suited the situation so perfectly.

A waiter appeared at that moment with Lex’s tea and crumpets, closely followed by the woman in the daft hat that Lex had knocked into on the way out in order to pick her pocket. He almost choked on his first mouthful of tea when, instead of walking past their table as he’d expected, she pulled up a chair and sat down instead.