Page 13 of Across Space and Time

“Maybe early afternoon? A lot of time had passed, at least.” Anthony chewed on his thumb nail again. “I don’t remember what happened to me, but I probably don’t want to. Cause I was pretty banged up.”

“What do you mean?” Hugh asked.

Anthony gave a vague wave in the vicinity of his abdomen. “Pretty achy. I know a few of the boys were unable to do ass work for a few days.”

“Do you remember anything else about that night?” Hugh asked, trying not to think too hard about what might have happened that would cause that kind of pain for the young men.

“No, sir,” Anthony said. “Except… Victoria disappeared that night.”

“Victoria?”

“Oh, um… His real name was Alexander. He was one of the boys that worked with us. It seems like he didn’t come back with us, because no one saw him. Mr. Galloway said that one of the people at the party took him.”

“Took him?”

“Yes, sir. Sometimes a client really likes one of us, and he’ll pay to keep us for himself.”

A private whore, probably not with the boys’ permission, and definitely without any rights. Hugh felt his stomach surge at that. Anthony actually sounded slightly excited by the prospect. Perhaps that was what they hoped would happen; someone would take them away from their life of anonymous sex with strangers to live specifically with one man and satisfy his personal desires. He wasn’t sure if that was any better, considering that anyone rich enough to afford their own personal prostitute wouldn’t necessarily take good care of them. But what did he really know about it? Perhaps there were some good men out there who treated their boys with respect and kindness.

“Did you ever hear from Alexander again?”

“No, sir. But we usually don’t once they go live with some fancy toff.”

“Did anyone else go missing that night?”

“Not from here,” Anthony said, thoughtfully. “But I ain’t sure about the ladies either.”

“How often do these kinds of events happen?”

“There’s other sorts of parties all the time,” Anthony said thoughtfully. “At fancy houses, or pubs, or them fancy clubs that the rich folks go to. Have one of those every week or two. But the one like this, I think it only happens once a month? I’ve gone to the last two? Three? Something like that.”

“Do you know how long they’ve been going on?”

Anthony shook his head. “Mr. Galloway keeps pretty shut up about them. Concerns about privacy, I guess.”

“But the one where Alexander disappeared was the most recent?”

Anthony nodded. “Yeah. And that was the one where things got all fuzzy.”

“That’s not a common occurrence?” Hugh asked, wondering how often Mr. Galloway drugged his boys.

Anthony shook his head. “No, sir. Just when we go to this particular place. Usually, we can find out some information about it, but this particular event was really hush-hush.”

“And how long ago was this?”

“Hmm. Two-ish weeks ago?” Anthony said thoughtfully.

Hugh nodded. “Thank you for answering my questions, Anthony. I really hope I can figure out what is happening to keep you and your friends safe.”

“Will you look for Alexander?” Anthony asked hopefully. “I know Mr. Galloway said that he got taken away, but it just don’t feel right.”

“I’ll see what I can do,” Hugh said. He suspected that finding a single prostitute in London, especially one that might be under private engagement, would be difficult, but he had to at least try. His mind flitted back to the boy in the morgue. “Does Alexander have red hair?”

Anthony shook his head. “No, he’s got dark brown.”

“Do you know of any other young male prostitutes with red hair that might be missing right now?”

Anthony’s face screwed up thoughtfully. “Not that I know of,” he said finally. “There’s a couple here, but I seen them all tonight.”

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