in the air between us. As a young man, Cavell had been so controlled by the man I now knew as Lawrence Blake, that he had flogged himself on command? I was stunned.
“But, that all happened seventeen years ago. He no longer has any power over me.”
“What happened? How did you break free?”
“I discovered what he was up to and came to my senses. I wanted no part in his occult games. After I escaped from him I left my studies and my father declared I was a disappointment and renounced me. I traveled to England and worked in music halls and theaters for a time, using skills I had learned on the streets of Paris.”
“And you never saw this Nathaniel Everett again, until you happened upon Blake at the Athenaeum?”
“No. To be frank, I hoped the rotter had perished.”
“It sounds as if Blake has found a replacement special boy,” I suggested. Sebastian hung his head.
“It is what I’ve feared since I saw him with the Leopold at your club.”
“What sort of business was he dealing in Paris?”
“Nathaniel Everett proclaimed himself as a prophet. He devised a scheme to gather rich, powerful men to his cause—men who shared his belief that having sex with boys gave them back their youth and virility. I was of legal age but I looked very young. Everett threw a party; he gathered a select group of men and plied them with drugs and alcohol. He offered me his special Absinthe and told me he was going to share me with the men and how they would love me. I’d never been buggered before, and that’s what he offered them—my virgin arse. He reassured me with silken words—told of how I would ascend my earthly body from the pleasure of it. I was terrified. I said I needed to go to the bathroom and escaped out of the tiny window!”
Bile rushed up to burn my throat. I took a sip of my now-cold tea to wash it down.
“What did they do to Leo?” Sebastian asked, his voice sounding fearful.
I explained as much as I could of what I had witnessed. As I made my telling I looked straight ahead, focusing on the flames dancing in the hearth. I was so ashamed I could not bear to look Sebastian in the eye and see his disappointment that I had not rescued Leopold. However, when I completed my tale Sebastian propped his pipe against his bedside lamp and said,
“Look at me”, I turned reluctantly expecting to see the eyes I was coming to adore glare at me with displeasure. But I was wrong; his look was of benevolent concern.
“I know you, Benedict. You believe you should have charged in like a bull and somehow removed Leopold from the clutches of the cabal.”
“I’m a damnable coward!” I insisted.
“You are far from it and much too hard on yourself. You would have placed yourself and the boy in far greater danger if you’d have attempted to single-handedly challenge Blake and six other men!”
I realized I was pouting, and conceded that this assertion was correct. I would never have been able to fight six men and drag a drugged young man to safety.
“We do not know the identity of those six acolytes. At a guess, Lord Spencer and the Tory, Cavendish are among them, which means we have four unidentified powerful men to discover—men who could be anyone from Robert Gascoyne-Cecil to Colonel Sir Edward Bradford.”
I gave a mirthless laugh.
“Whoever these men are, they would do much to prevent any from finding out their secrets. We are all aware of the risks we take in seeking our particular brand of companionship—“
“No!” I roared in outrage. “Don’t you dare equate what they did to what we share. Those men are not like US.” There was such angry vulnerability in my voice that for a second I thought I might become unmanned and cry. What Sebastian and I did together wasn’t even on the same planet as the acts of the cabal.
“They do not seek anything but to slake their lust and follow the prophecies of that snake-oil salesman, Blake.”
“I know,” Sebastian said in a soft voice. “But the point is, you would have been a fool to cross them, so do not berate yourself for leaving without the boy.”
We sat in silence for several minutes. I realized we must have raised our voices as I heard movement on the landing. I expected Wilkins or Troy to knock on my door at