‘I’m afraid I haven’t been feeling very well the last couple of days,’ he said pitifully, whilst the women exchanged knowing looks over his head.
After the food had been cleared away, the manager of the hotel got a microphone from somewhere and called for quiet. The room fell silent whilst the man did a little speech about what an honour and a privilege it was, blah, blah, blah, to have all the players assembled at the hotel between rounds. Lex was pleased when Lorella stood up at the end of the speech and said that it was her pleasure to be there. She sat down and Jeremiah obviously then felt honour bound to say something as well for he stood up and? looking distinctly awkward at all the unfriendly looks people were shooting him? said that he, too, was pleased to be a guest at the Majestic. Once Jeremiah had retaken his seat, Lex got to his feet, being careful to look extremely reluctant to do so when he was, in reality, utterly delighted. A greater hush seemed to descend on the room when Lex stood up. All eyes were on him? which was just the way he liked it.
‘I’d like to echo what my fellow players have said. I’m truly honoured to be here. And I… I’d like to take the opportunity to..’ Lex trailed off, cleared his throat and continued in a stronger voice. ‘If you don’t mind, I would be very glad if you would all join me in a toast.’ Everyone in the room had their glasses in their hands so quickly that it was almost like magic. ‘I’d like to raise a glass to my fallen comrade,’ Lex went on, pleased to note out of the corner of his eye that Jeremiah seemed to have slid down even further in his chair and rather looked like he desired nothing more than for a hole to appear in the ground and swallow him up. ‘Jesse Layton,’ Lex went on, ‘was a good man and a true friend. He always put other people before himself. And I know that he gave his life gladly for Tess East and the last thing he would ever have wanted would be for anyone to feel resentful or angry about how the first round ended. That… That wasn’t his way. Jesse didn’t bear grudges and he wouldn’t want anyone else to, either. He knew what he was doing when he grabbed that octopus and he did it with no regrets.’
Lex paused, as if he was fighting to keep himself under control, and in that pause he distinctly heard the woman seated next to him whisper to her neighbour, ‘He’s an orphan, you know. They say the cowboy was like a father to him.’
Excellent idea, Lex thought to himself.
‘Some of you may know that my parents died when I was five,’ he went on. ‘My brother and I were orphaned. We barely remember our real father. But Jesse… Jesse was almost like a father to us-’ He broke off abruptly at the same time as he willed tears to appear in his eyes for the first time. The seconds dragged on in tense silence before he finally said, ‘I’m sorry, I… I can’t go on.’
And, with that, he sat down and covered his face with his hand. After another moment of silence, the entire room applauded warmly? which was nice. It is always gratifying to be rewarded for a performance. If Lex had been a less disciplined sort of fraud then he might have taken the opportunity to smirk behind his hand, especially as he alone knew precisely where Jesse really was? handcuffed to a bed upstairs. But he was far, far too professional for that. Smirking was for when? and only when? he was safely back in his room, securely away from prying eyes.
The women on either side of him put comforting arms around his shoulders and Lex spent the next half hour being thoroughly mollycoddled.
It was towards the end of the evening, when Lex was almost ready to make his excuses and go back to his room, that he became aware of Jeremiah standing up from his table and making his way towards him.
Everyone in the restaurant shot him evil glances as he went. They had all seen him hit the dying cowboy who’d heroically saved his sister’s life. Lex even heard a few muttered words along the lines of, ‘Disgraceful!’ ‘Outrageous!’ and ‘Surely he won’t have the audacity to actually speak to Lex Trent!’
Jeremiah stopped before the table. His head was high, his shoulders were back and he looked right at Lex and said, ‘Lex, I just want to say how… how terribly sorry I am. I realise there’s no excuse for what I did. My action was unforgivable. But I can assure you that I simply didn’t realise what had just happened when I… when I hit Jesse. I thought he was trying to hurt Tess. I love my sister and it’s my fault she got dragged into this Game in the first place. I’d give anything in the world now to shake Jesse’s hand and thank him myself. I… tried to give up the win for the first round. I told Kala I shouldn’t have won in the first place, but it was too late.’ He lowered his voice and went on more quietly. ‘I understand that you and Jesse were friends for a long time so I’ll understand if you never speak to me again. I just want you to know how heartily sorry I am. If I could swap places with him, I would, in a heartbeat.’
Lex could have throttled him! Jeremiah East was acting like a decent human being, blast him! Already Lex could feel the others thawing? their icy hatred melting away to be replaced with cautious sympathy. Jeremiah certainly seemed genuine, for he hadn’t even brought Tess over with him, but had left her back at the table instead. If Lex had been in his place, he would have dragged the kid over for the apology because it was much harder to remain stony-faced when the dear, sweet, angelic-looking child whose life had been saved was gazing at you with big eyes.
As it was, Lex would have loved nothing better than to snap, ‘Your apologies be damned! Jesse is still dead and nothing you can say will bring him back, so piss off!’
But that would never do at all, for then he would lose sympathy. He therefore had no choice but to exercise some damage control. He sat motionless for a moment, as if thinking about what the nobleman had said. Then he slowly rose to his feet, very aware of his own table, and several others nearby, looking at him with baited breath as he turned to Jeremiah and said graciously, ‘I believe you, Jeremiah. And I forgive you. I hope we can put this behind us.’
Then he held his hand out to Jeremiah, who looked rather stunned. After a moment, the nobleman gripped Lex’s hand firmly and shook it vigorously. Several people actually clapped. Jeremiah then leaned closer and muttered in Lex’s ear, ‘If there’s ever anything I can do for you? anything at all? please don’t hesitate to let me know.’
Lex pulled a face inside his head. A sap? that was what Jeremiah really was. Underneath all the arrogance and the bravado and the conceit he was just another silly, gutless sap who could be manipulated so easily that it wasn’t even funny.
Playing his part flawlessly, Lex thanked Jeremiah quietly before releasing his hand and looking away. ‘If you’ll excuse me,’ he said quietly, ‘I’m very tired. I think I’ll call it a night.’
Lex slipped out of the restaurant and swiftly made his way upstairs. He was rather tired and looking forward to his bed. But first he had some diamonds to pinch, and he was looking forward to that even more than he was looking forward to going to bed.
How you carried out a theft depended on where you were thieving from. The different locations all had their own set of advantages and disadvantages. Lex had never stolen anything from a hotel before. Most of the things he’d pinched had been from museums and the like. Museums were harder to get into but, once you had gained entrance, you were unlikely to be disturbed provided you didn’t trip off any alarm systems. Hotel rooms, on the other hand, would be easier to get into than a museum and wouldn’t have alarm systems, but the major problem was that you could never be entirely sure when someone was going to come back to their room. You therefore had to work under the constant threat of being suddenly interrupted at any moment. That meant one thing and one thing only: a damned good disguise.
Lex had picked his victim in the dining room downstairs. There had been a big fat woman sat at his table who insisted upon being called Margie and was wearing so much jewellery over her lacy white dress that she positively sparkled like a frosted vanilla cupcake. She had spent much of the evening talking loudly to anyone who would listen about Murray? her ‘dear departed ’usband.’ She was quite perfect because she was rich and she was lonely. Therefore, she was likely to spend a lot of time down in the bar that evening, chattering away. That should give Lex more time to sneak through her room. He had slipped the room key out of her bag whilst pretending to pick his napkin up from underneath the table.