Chapter 2

She led me past an impressive, curving staircase and deposited me in an ornate parlor—after relieving me of the fee, of course—to await the next scheduled tour. I glanced out the front window. My tag-along was nowhere in sight. The street rat had given up trailing me. Probably had just enough money for a bus fare back to whatever crappy apartment he shared with seven other hustlers. He’d have to hit the streets tonight and earn his bread and butter. For a moment, I imagined those cupid-bow lips wrapped around a thick cock. My mind automatically supplied the proper lighting for the scene: soft and dim, to suggest a smoky evening street corner. Perhaps a fog machine. A spot on the kid’s mouth, of course, just a bit on the blue side to play up his dark coloring.

I shook the daydream out of my head. The young hustler wouldn’t annoy me any further, and that was all I wanted. I circled the room, reading the placards mounted at strategic locations along the wall. I was lucky, I read, to be able to tour an authentic mansion in the process of being restored. My tour fee would help pay for reproduction wallpaper, perhaps, or repairs of the badly neglected roof. I wondered when they’d get around to re-plastering the outer walls.

I shrugged and peered out the door for another look at the great, curving staircase. Before and after photos would have been fine with me. I studied the old photos they did have mounted on the walls. I had to admit that the building in its prime was an impressive structure. This was like seeing a decrepit old lady standing before a painting of herself in the bloom of youth.

I did like the ornate sofa in the middle of the room. One of those round parlor seats that might have accommodated a good half dozen young men. I’d have to see about getting one of the things for a film. A veritable smorgasbord of flesh in the round, against red velvet. The scene would be amazing.

I peered out into the hall once more. The room across the way was less lavishly decorated than the parlor. I could see peeling wallpaper and a faded oriental rug. Dust sparkled in the sunlight streaming through the windows in that room. I checked my watch: still over half an hour until the next tour. I am not a patient man. Still, if I left the building now, I’d run into my young stalker, perhaps lurking behind the nearest oleander bush, a bright pink flower trapped in those long black locks. He might even now be scrambling up the crumbling brick wall, trying to peer into the windows.

I stepped into the hall, ready to duck back into the parlor if the little old lady spotted me. I saw no sign of her, nor did I hear the click of her sensible shoes on the hardwood floors. Perhaps she had a closet where she hid until the doorbell rang.

A battered, oddly slender door hid in the shadows behind the grand staircase. I stuck my head inside. There, hidden in the walls of the building, was the oddest set of stairs I’d ever seen. So steep they were practically a ladder, and so narrow that my shoulders nearly brushed the wall on either side. I had no idea what they might be for—thus, I had to find out where they led.

Once I pulled the narrow door shut behind myself, I truly appreciated electricity. Only a small window set a little above my head lit the stairway. Instead of the lemon polish redolent in the main part of the house, this space smelled stale, as if nobody had been here in years. The door fastened with a simple hook and eye, which I flipped shut. No sense risking my snooping being interrupted. I fumbled my way up the stairs, arriving in a sitting room on the third floor (which was the second, if viewed from the local perspective). I pulled out my camera for a few shots of the ornate Victorian sofa, envisioning finely dressed young men dallying before the marble fireplace. Again, soft lighting to suggest gaslights. Perhaps a real fire in the grate. I could get some period costumes from that costumer at the big studio across town. A frock coat pulled back to drape over the velvet sofa, spotlighting an erect cock. A cravat framing a pretty face eager for the taste of that organ.

I snapped back to the present and continued prowling the room. Huge windows ran from floor to ceiling, framing a balcony that ran the length of the room. I stepped closer to find that the panes slid upwards into the ceiling, creating a doorway onto that balcony. I took a step onto the creaky wood. I could, indeed, feel a cool breeze from the ocean—and catch a glimpse of the next room, where a small knot of tourists was headed for the stairs. That must be the previous tour. I ducked back into the sitting room.