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Chapter Text

It began, as many of our more heart-twinging interludes did, with Jeeves standing by the window and not saying anything.

I was at the breakfast table, poking half-heartedly at a bowl of strawberries and thinking about the economic consequences of the Riviera being overrun by one’s acquaintances. Jeeves cleared his throat.

I looked up. He had that particular posture of his—shoulders set, eyes mild, hands folded loosely behind the back—that signaled something Important was about to be broached. Possibly involving cufflinks, but more likely involving moral peril.

“Yes, Jeeves?”

“If I might be permitted a suggestion regarding your summer itinerary, Bertram?”

“Oh!” I perked. “Yes, absolutely. I was just saying to myself it’s high time we decamped somewhere. Somewhere with fountains and waiters and absolutely no sheep.”

There was a pause. Then, with the quiet gravity of a man placing his entire heart in the teacup saucer, Jeeves said: “I should like to accompany you. On holiday.”

I blinked.

“You—you mean, with me?”

“If it is agreeable.”

“Together.”

“Yes, my dear.”

“Oh!” I said again, but in a completely different register this time. “Yes, gosh, absolutely. Rather! I mean, why not? Perfectly topping idea. Are you sure you want—? I mean, don’t you usually go to Nice and do... whatever you do in Nice?”

Jeeves looked at the carpet. “This year, I find I have no inclination to travel alone.”

He did not fidget. Jeeves never fidgets. But there was a quietness to him, a gentleness in the air, that seemed to glow faintly at the edges. A softness that made me want to wrap him in a picnic blanket and tell him he was cherished.

“Well,” I said, flapping the newspaper closed, “the world’s our oyster. France? Spain? Portofino?”

Jeeves hesitated. “Might I suggest Brussels.”

I blinked again. “Belgium?”

“Yes.”

I ran through the mental stack of cards: lace, mussels, Poirot. “I say—why?”

“I thought it might suit. The weather is mild. The art museums are well-regarded. The architecture is of some renown. And one is less likely to encounter society acquaintances, as they generally favour Paris or the Mediterranean.”

“Well, yes, I suppose. But wouldn’t it be a bit—? I mean, no beach. No cabanas. No bronze young people bringing drinks with umbrellas.”

Jeeves gave me a look of such serenity that I felt like a man being invited to step into a church.

“The Arnolfini Portrait is currently on loan,” he said. “There is a temporary Van Eyck exhibition. I have always wished to see it with the other Early Netherlanders.”

Something in his voice—the softness again, almost yearning—made up my mind for me.

“Right-o,” I said. “Brussels it is. Museums, mussels, and mediaeval people in hats. Let's pack the cream suits.”

Our lodgings turned out to be not a hotel but what Jeeves described as “a short-term leased private flat, acquired via correspondence with the proprietress.” Bertie-speak: a very convincing young woman had written to him in enthusiastic Franglais and convinced him it would be cheaper and more authentic than a hotel.

It was a tall, narrow building with pale shutters and ironwork balconies, halfway between quaint and slightly falling apart. The front door was opened by a blur of patterned linen and ambition.

“You are the Englishmen!” she exclaimed in a flurry of red lipstick and bangles. “Parfait. You are just on time. I have washed the linens, arranged the flowers, and prepared all the instructions in a little book. You will love it. It is like being in a home—but not your home. No responsibilities! No noise from the neighbours unless you count the accordion.”

“Er,” I said.

“My idea is to take the hotel model and completely subvert it,” she declared. “Not just a chambre, but an experience. A temporary domestic life. A curated immersion. C’est génial, non?”

“Very much so,” I said, as one might to a lioness with a clipboard.

Jeeves stepped in with his usual diplomatic grace, exchanging pleasantries in French and accepting the enormous iron key and the rulebook. We were then waved upstairs, advised that if the hot water failed we should bang the radiator with a shoe, and left to our own devices.

The flat itself was modest but charming. You could still smell the ghost of lavender sachets and furniture polish. There were doilies on everything and a photo of a solemn mustachioed man on the dresser who I suspected had once wielded tremendous power over breakfast toast. The wallpaper was floral. The bedspread crocheted. The atmosphere distinctly grandmotherish.

“I like it,” I said, flopping onto the divan. “Feels like one ought to be offered barley sugar at any moment.”

“I believe,” said Jeeves, opening the wardrobe and inspecting the hangers, “that it will suit us admirably.”

Jeeves did not want to wait to see the portrait on loan. It was as if he was worried His Majesty’s long arm would reach out and snatch the picture back before he got to see it in Brussels. And so, that very afternoon, we visited the museum. 

Jeeves paused before a printed placard and gave the faintest lift of the brow—his version of a cheer. “Ah,” he said. “Here it is.”

“Oh?” I said, peering at the text. “I thought they didn’t let those old masterpieces out of England without chaining them to a bobby.”

“It is a rare exception, sir. A gesture of cultural goodwill, I believe. The opportunity to see it alongside the Van Eycks held here is… rather special.”

I looked over. His eyes were lit in that Jeevesian way—quiet, focused, gleaming ever so faintly with joy. The same look he got at antique book fairs and when he had gotten me into respectable, well-pressed evening formalwear.

“Well, then,” I said. “Lead on to the matrimonial masterpiece, old thing. Let’s see what all the fuss is about.”

The gallery was all marble and hush, the sort of place that inspires a fellow to speak in whispers and walk on tiptoe, even if his shoes are already the softest suede and he hasn’t done anything criminal. Not recently, anyhow.

I trailed behind Jeeves as he studied a painting of some ruddy-faced chap being visited by angels. Or possibly heavenly tax auditors—it was hard to tell. The angels looked rather grim about the whole business.

Jeeves, naturally, was glowing.

Not in the luminescent sense—more the quiet, inward sort. He had that look he gets when surrounded by oil paint, Gregorian silence, and nothing in need of ironing. His hands were folded neatly behind his back, and there was a distinct upward quirk to the corner of his mouth. If Jeeves were a lesser man, you might call it a smile.

I leaned in.

“Would you say that’s Saint Jerome or someone more local?” I asked, squinting.

Jeeves’s voice was reverent. “Saint Jerome, sir. The lion in the background is a common motif.”

“Oh yes,” I said. “Splendid lion. Bit underwhelmed, if you ask me.”

“I believe the lion is intended to express humility.”

“Well, he’s certainly not expressing bite.”

Jeeves gave the faintest of huffs. I counted it as a win.

We moved on. Room after room—more saints, more knights, a couple of ethereal ladies looking either very holy or very annoyed, it was hard to tell. Every few paintings, I glanced sideways. And every time, Jeeves looked a little more at ease. Not outwardly. Jeeves never changes outwardly. But his posture took on something lighter—like a man unfolding, quietly, from a long-held tension. He walked more slowly. He looked, truly looked, at every painting. And every now and then, when he thought I wasn’t watching, he allowed the smallest smile to ghost across his face.

Eventually, we paused before a pale, delicate portrait of a young man in a soft hat, painted with such aching gentleness it almost made me groan.

Jeeves said, very softly, “There is a serenity in Flemish brushwork unmatched elsewhere.”

I looked at him.

He was staring not at the painting, but at the light falling across the floor. Thinking. Feeling something, deep in the Jeevesian soul.

“I thought you might like this,” I said.

His eyes flicked to me, startled.

“I—” he began. Then, with careful precision, “It is most restorative, sir.”

And I swear to you, reader, he reached out—very subtly—and touched my wrist.

No one saw. Or if they did, they had the good sense to mind their own business.

We stopped in front of a serene Madonna with a window behind her and a table of fruit to one side. “Campin,” he murmured. “Note the clarity of the light. The domestic tranquility.”

I peered. “The baby looks rather smug.”

“The Christ Child is frequently depicted with precocious wisdom.”

“I suppose being divine does that to a fellow.”

Jeeves exhaled—possibly a laugh, possibly a prayer for strength.

After room six, I began to suspect a plot.

Not a sinister plot—nothing with poison or daggers—but something far subtler, like a plot to drown a fellow in robes and halos. Everywhere I looked: saints in wimples, saints with lambs, saints with what looked suspiciously like very large soup spoons. And babies. So many babies. Cherubic types, mostly in someone’s lap or being presented to a bishop with great ceremony. I counted no fewer than a dozen baby Jesuses in one room alone.

“Was there a discount on halos in the 1400s?” I muttered.

Jeeves, maddeningly serene, gave a small smile. “It was a popular devotional motif, sir.”

“Oh, I see. And here I thought the medieval set were simply running a very enthusiastic crèche.”

He didn’t dignify that with an answer, which I felt was both uncharitable and predictable.

We passed yet another painting featuring a Madonna giving a side-eye to a poor fellow in a doublet, and I leaned close.

“Do they all look like that, or is this particular saint just deeply unimpressed?”

Jeeves considered. “That would be Saint Anne, sir. She is often portrayed with a stern aspect.”

“Well, she looks like she’s about to ban someone from the village fête.”

I trailed behind him into the next gallery, quietly marveling at how many men in medieval Brussels appeared to have owned golden robes and opinions about chastity and godliness. I’d been hoping for something a little more splashy, maybe a reclining odalisque or two, but instead, it was all divine infants and wintery scenes in perspective.

Still. Jeeves looked happy. Peaceful, even.

So I carried on, hands clasped behind my back in what I hoped was a museum-appropriate stance, waiting for inspiration—or at least a reclining odalisque—to strike.

We came to the Arnolfini Portrait, on loan from London, resplendent in a softly lit frame, its colours rich as old wine. The room was quiet, reverent, as though even the parquet knew not to creak. 

I hung back a bit, arms loosely folded. It was a calm enough picture, as medieval portraits went—none of the usual martyrdoms or scowls. A man and a woman, holding hands in a finely furnished room. She in green, he in a big old hat, both of them solemn as bishops at a bake sale.

Jeeves stepped forward with the air of a man beholding a holy relic. “It is a rare opportunity, sir,” he said, voice low. “To see it here, among the other Belgian masterpieces. The conversation between them—across centuries, across canvas—is extraordinary.”

I squinted. “Well, it’s certainly a domestic sort of setup. Carpet, dog, hats. They look like they’re halfway through promising to buy each other a new kettle.”

Jeeves did not laugh, but I could see the corners of his mouth waver dangerously.

“The atmosphere,” he said, “is one of serenity. Mutual regard. There is no ostentation here—only assurance. The joining of hands is not merely symbolic—it speaks of trust. Of two people agreeing, without pomp, to share the mundane as much as the divine.”

I tilted my head. “They do look rather like they’ve just decided what to have for supper.”

“Yes,” he said, still watching the painting. “It is domestic. Intentionally so. That is what makes it revolutionary. The idea that a private bond—a quiet one—might be worthy of grandeur. That a love expressed not in poetry or spectacle, but in small gestures and shared rooms, can be art.”

I stared at the painting.

The man wasn’t particularly handsome. Nor the woman. But there was something about the way their fingers met—lightly, calmly. Like it had always been obvious they’d end up there. Like holding hands was simply the correct thing to do, because anything else would be unthinkable.

I blinked.

Then looked at him.

He was still speaking, softly: “Some scholars argue that it is a document of affection not in its ardour, but in its settledness. In the sense of safety it conveys. To be known, and to know, without spectacle. There is no performance here. Merely presence. Holding hands in a room they both inhabit. Knowing each other. Knowing it is enough.”

He turned slightly toward me. And something in his expression—

“Oh,” I said.

His eyes met mine.

And suddenly, standing there in the hush of the gallery, with sunlight filtering through lace curtains and a dozen saints silently judging us from the walls—I understood him.

“That is,” I said, fumbling slightly, “I mean, it’s a lovely shade of green, that dress.”

A pause. Then his voice, even softer: “Yes, sir.”

I stepped closer, quietly. “Do you suppose,” I said, “they picked out the dog together? Or was it more of a spontaneous thing—‘darling, look what followed me home’?”

Jeeves smiled.

Not the usual polite flicker, but a real smile. Deep and warm, blooming across his face like sunlight on polished wood.

“I believe it was a mutual decision, sir.”

We stood there a long time. The gallery was hushed around us, but the painting was full of conversation.

Chapter Text

The sun was doing its level best to charm the cobblestones, the coffee had a certain kick that suggested it might be halfway to sentience, and Jeeves—immaculate even in linen—was perusing a small guidebook titled Brussels: Art and Elegance in Eighty-Four Steps.

I stirred my coffee and tilted my chair just far enough back to pretend I was Continental.

“That one,” I said, pointing vaguely at a building across the square. “That’s got nice arches. Very arched.”

“Yes, sir,” said Jeeves. “The Galeries Royales Saint-Hubert. Designed by Cluysenaar in 1846.”

I grinned. “I was going to say that. Right after I finished admiring my croissant.” He didn’t correct me. Just turned another page, gaze serene, the faintest smile threatening the corner of his mouth. Not his professional smile. The real one. The one I was beginning to know rather well.

I had just resumed croissant duty when I noticed two familiar figures crossing the square—one compact and precise, the other tall and sunlit, practically bouncing along.

I blinked. “Well, I’ll be—Jeeves. Isn’t that—?”

Jeeves looked up. “Monsieur Poirot and Captain Hastings, sir.”

They spotted us at almost the same moment. Poirot paused. Hastings lit up.

“Bertie!” Hastings called. “And Jeeves!”

We stood as they crossed to our table.

“What are you doing here?” I asked, delighted.

Poirot gave one of his elegant little nods. “Interpol, monsieur. A request—délicat, you understand. I could not refuse.”

“Nothing dangerous,” Hastings added quickly. “Just a bit of background work. I was thrilled to come along.”

Poirot gave him a look of fond exasperation. “You were thrilled to pack three pairs of binoculars, mon cher capitaine.”

“They were on sale.”

Jeeves inclined his head. “We are on holiday, sir. Mr. Wooster kindly accompanied me.”

Poirot’s gaze slid from one of us to the other, just for a beat. His expression shifted—just slightly. Something quieter. Gentler. He saw something. I saw him see it. Jeeves saw him see it. And no one said a word.

“How very civilisé,” he murmured. “May we join you?”

We all sat down, cups refilled, pastries ordered with what I can only describe as brio. I passed Hastings the last sugared twist, and he passed it onwards, insisting Poirot liked them better.

Poirot sipped his hot chocolate delicately. “Mon Dieu, these Interpol people. They barely let us out long enough for a small lunch break.”

“Working you hard, what?” I said.

“Trop de paperasse,” Poirot sighed. “Always the forms. Always the clarifications and stamps. Tsk!”

Hastings leaned in. “We were just saying—once Poirot’s case is settled, or during the lulls, we’d love to do some sightseeing. He knows the city like the back of his hand.”

Poirot lifted an eyebrow. “Not entirely like the back of my hand. I have never, par exemple, seen the back of my hand covered in scaffolding.”

I brightened. “Still! You’d be willing to play tour guide?”

Poirot gave a small shrug. “It is my homeland, monsieur. If one must walk the streets of memory, it is better to do so with friends, n’est-ce pas?”

“I should like that very much,” said Jeeves.

I nodded. “Same here. We’re very see-the-sights types, these days.” 

Poirot inclined his head. “Bon! Then it is settled. I shall be your cicerone. Architecture, cuisine, and—naturellement—anything requiring binoculars.”

Hastings beamed. “I knew bringing the binoculars was a good omen.”

Poirot sighed. “Mon ami, they are for birds.”

“Well, so are rooftops,” said Hastings, unbothered.

Across the table, Jeeves reached for his teacup. Our hands brushed.

I didn’t pull away.

Neither did he.

There was no need for grand pronouncements. Just a quiet sense of things having settled into their proper shape. The faint warmth still lingered, like afternoon sun on old stone—not insistent, but comfortably there.

Hastings resumed describing some elaborate migratory pattern involving storks, canal rooftops, and what he referred to as “excellent perching opportunities.”

Poirot rearranged the cutlery in concentric order, his hands moving with idle precision.

And I leaned back, feeling—well. Content.

Like we’d slipped into the sort of moment you don’t plan for, but recognize when you’re lucky enough to find yourself inside one.

Some time later, Poirot and Hastings were summoned back by Interpol for some "additional clarifications." Poirot described it with a faint grimace, as one might describe being asked to re-alphabetize a filing cabinet one has already alphabetized perfectly. Hastings, ever obliging, went along in case "a bit of heavy lifting" was needed, though precisely what lifting Interpol required from him remained unclear.

We agreed to meet again for dinner once they’d been liberated from the clutches of bureaucracy. In the meantime, Jeeves and I wandered without purpose through a few quiet streets, pausing now and then before shop windows, or watching children chase each other beneath the linden trees. The city hummed gently, full but not crowded, and blessedly free of aunts or acquaintances with awkward questions and engagement plots.

By the time we reunited that evening, the light had softened to gold and the air had cooled just enough to warrant jackets. Poirot looked faintly weary but otherwise composed, while Hastings beamed with the cheer of a man who had spent several hours not being strictly useful and felt rather proud of the effort.

We strolled as one, unhurried. Hastings was cheerfully scanning the façades, binoculars swinging from his neck. Jeeves walked beside me with the pleasant air of a man happily cataloguing every architectural feature. Poirot led, cane in hand, taking corners by memory rather than map.

“This used to be a bakery,” Poirot said, pausing at a bright little boutique. “Madame Brissot—she made the most exquisite mirlitons. Gone, of course. Her niece married a dentist and moved to Bruges.”

We turned a corner into a lively street near the Grand Place, where lanterns were beginning to flicker on and music filtered from a café with open doors. The scent of beer and buttered leeks drifted out, and people leaned into each other over small tables, laughing in several languages.

It was beautiful. But Poirot stood on the edge of it like a man on the threshold of a party he wasn’t quite certain he’d been invited to.

I frowned a little, not because it was alarming—he was perfectly poised, as always—but because it was so uncharacteristic. Poirot was not a man given to uncertainty. And yet here, walking the streets of his own city, there was a shadow to him. A kind of quiet hesitation, as though every doorway might contain something he wasn’t entirely prepared to greet.

I’d seen that look before—briefly, back at Brinkley Court, on those moments when he’d pretended not to watch Hastings quite so closely. That same muted softness. That same air of a man carrying something he didn’t quite dare put down.

Before I could dwell on it, Hastings spotted a promising bistro across the way and waved us toward it. We claimed a table beneath a striped awning, the kind where the chairs wobbled slightly on the cobblestones and the waiter raised one eyebrow to determine whether we were tourists or simply British.

Menus arrived, orders were placed, wine was poured.

Poirot sighed as he set down his glass. “Ah là là. The Interpol. They summon me, they consult me, and then they bury me in their paperwork like so many bureaucrats with a fondness for endless clarifications.”

“You’d almost think,” I said, “that you were here to work, not rest.”

Poirot spread his hands with a faint smile. “I would prefer a proper holiday, monsieur. Sunshine, leisure, perhaps a pleasant afternoon with nothing more pressing than which café to frequent next.”

“Well,” I said, grinning, “if you were actually on holiday, you’d run directly into an international jewel thief, find a murder victim in the hotel kitchen, and end up solving the case while juggling the local police and Interpol both.”

Hastings chuckled. “He’s not wrong, you know.”

Poirot gave a long-suffering sigh and shook his head. “It is possible, I concede, that my holidays do have a certain… pattern.”

“Dashed consistent, anyway,” I said, reaching for the breadbasket. “But at least you’d have excellent company.”

That earned a quiet smile from him. A little real, a little weary, but grateful.

Jeeves poured more wine with his usual efficiency, though I noticed his eyes flick toward Poirot’s face with that same careful attentiveness he’d worn for days now.

We ate as the lamplight thickened around us and the hum of the city deepened, full of music and old stones and conversations in half a dozen languages.

Shop windows glowed softly in the falling dusk, and the streets were full of voices—French, Flemish, laughter, bells. A waiter called “à demain!” to a regular across the way. Somewhere a street violinist played a slow melody.

The night had the sort of softness that made you want to speak in italics and verse. The air was warm, not sticky; the stars obligingly twinkled; and the streets of Brussels—even the quieter ones—had the air of having just been swept for guests.

We’d parted from Poirot and Hastings just outside their hotel, where the lamps gave a rather golden glow and the two of them had a sort of hush about them that didn’t want interrupting.

So Jeeves and I let them go without fuss.

Our own borrowed flat—modest, grandmotherly, not without a certain lace-curtained charm—was just a few streets over. We let ourselves in quietly. The windows were cracked to let in air. The furniture gave faint floral sighs. Somewhere outside, a tram hummed past.

Jeeves moved about the sitting room with his usual grace, but there was something a little different to the way he loosened his tie. Less mechanical. More… domestic. He looked around the room like it belonged to us for longer than a fortnight.

He paused by the window, watching the light ripple on the glass.

“I am not, as you know, much given to personal holidays,” he said quietly. “When I have taken time in the past, it has been… compartmentalised. Restful, yes. But solitary. Or at least—without continuity.”

I blinked. “You mean, not shared.”

“Yes.” A pause. “Not affectionate.”

He turned toward me. There was that flicker again—that faint, almost shy pleasure I’d seen back at the museum, when he’d looked almost as if someone had just handed him a key to a room he hadn’t known he was allowed in.

“I had not expected,” he said softly, “that something as simple as walking through a city—eating trout and listening to violins—could feel like… a privilege.”

“Well,” I said, “it is a privilege. Being with you.”

Something in him softened at that.

Jeeves drew the curtains shut. A gentle rustle of fabric, a flick of the wrist.

And then—he pounced.

I barely had time to blink before I was backed against the settee, kissed with the sort of intensity usually reserved for Victorian novels and natural disasters. His hands were everywhere at once—undoing buttons with scandalous precision, tugging at sleeves, sliding under collars.

It was, frankly, a feat of coordination I’m not entirely convinced was legal.

“How,” I gasped between kisses, “are you doing that—”

Jeeves didn’t answer. He merely removed my waistcoat with the kind of elegant violence that suggested this had been on his mind since the Arnolfini.

I stopped asking questions, but I did make a mental note to take Jeeves to fine art museums more often.

We hadn’t found any reclining odalisques, but what followed would’ve made the Greeks blush—and possibly take notes.

Chapter Text

The days fell into a kind of rhythm—gentle and sunlit at first, full of the best sort of holiday promise. Mornings spent lingering over coffee, afternoons drifting through quiet streets, evenings of delicious dinners beneath striped awnings. Brussels offered herself politely—all lace and chocolate and dignified façades—and we let her.

Poirot led, of course. A perfect host on familiar ground, though he always insisted it was simply efficient. He knew every turn of every narrow street, and could summon a history lesson from the most unassuming chimney-pot.

“That was once the Galerie Dubois,” he said one afternoon, gesturing toward a tall stone building with elegant iron balconies. “A jeweller’s, most reputable. In 1911, they displayed a necklace so magnificent the guards were issued sabres.”

“Sabres!” I said. “Egad.”

Poirot allowed a faint smile. “More for show than utility, but impressive nonetheless.”

“Did you grow up near here?” I asked, squinting upward at the ornate windows.

He did not pause in his walk. “Ah, Brussels was always dear to me, monsieur. Always familiar. But the city changes, as cities do.”

We crossed a narrow footbridge, and Poirot gestured left. “And here, before the war, there was a bookshop. Run by a woman everyone, regardless of age or status, called Tante Claire. She had a limp and an encyclopedic knowledge of Verlaine. I once chased a jewel thief straight through her front room.”

“Did you catch him?” I asked.

“Non,” said Poirot with a laugh. “He had a bicycle.”

We crossed quiet squares where plane trees cast wide nets of shade, and Poirot pointed out each landmark with the air of a man gently reintroducing himself to old acquaintances. It seemed like there was neither a statue nor a fountain that hadn't featured in at least one of his early cases.

He recalled restaurants long vanished, scandalous barbershop feuds, and a florist whose shop cat once ruined a police sting by leaping into a suspect’s lap mid-interrogation.

“Poor Commissaire Delacroix,” Poirot said, shaking his head fondly. “The allergies, you understand. The sneeze quite disrupted his dramatic accusation.”

“Ah,” I nodded. “One never factors in the feline element.”

Jeeves, by my side, murmured politely, “Quite, sir.”

“There,” he said, gesturing with his cane toward a modest stone façade with wrought iron balconies, “that used to be the offices of Monsieur Vandermoot—the finest tobacconist in the Quartier Royal. In 1912, he was poisoned with his own pipe. A most ironic death.”

I blinked. “Good heavens.”

Poirot’s moustache twitched. “The assailant was his apprentice. A jealous young man with dreams of monopoly and a fondness for herbs. He grew the aconite and belladonna himself.”

“Good Lord!” Hastings exclaimed.

“Oui, mon cher capitaine, it was a case most shocking. Naturellement, I solved it with order and method and the little grey cells.”

But as the days progressed, Poirot grew… quieter.

Not withdrawn. Not cold. But there was a kind of soft thinning to his cheer, as though the lightness required more and more effort. Sometimes he would pause a beat longer before answering. Sometimes his eyes would fix, for just a moment, on an empty shop front or a rebuilt corner before he carried on with the story.

One afternoon, we crossed a small bridge overlooking the canal. A barge drifted slowly beneath us, the water catching the light.

“That quay,” Poirot said softly, “was once lined with warehouses. I investigated a smuggling ring there in 1907. The ringleader was betrayed by a button. A pearl button, from his mistress’s glove.”

“Details always get one in the end, don’t they?” I said brightly.

Poirot’s smile was thin. “Oui.”

He said nothing further for several minutes.

The city itself bore its own witness.

Old buildings stood alongside new ones, bright stone against darker scars. Here and there, gaps where something once stood — now patched with modern façades or quiet squares with neat benches.

Poirot rarely mentioned those.

Hastings, for his part, said nothing. But I saw him watching Poirot more often as the days passed — with that soft look of his. Not intrusive. Just… gently vigilant. As if listening to a tune played slightly off-key.

In the evenings, we dined together—always somewhere intimate, always somewhere known to him.

“The Hôtel du Cardinal was once here,” he said softly one night. “A charming little place. They made moules mariniere with a certain white wine produced in Northern France, by the cousins of the head chef...”

He sipped his wine and stared at the empty lot across the street where nothing now stood.

Hastings tried to fill the quiet. “You’ve known every corner of this city, Poirot. You must feel quite at home.”

Poirot smiled politely. “Brussels is very dear to me, mon ami. But familiarity and comfort—they are not always the same.”

He deflected smoothly. We let him.

By the fourth day, even I, cheerful and oblivious as ever, began to suspect something was seriously off.

He had grown more subdued. Not unhappy, exactly, but distracted. His silences lengthened. His anecdotes arrived a little slower. Occasionally, he would watch a family pass—a father hoisting a child onto his shoulders, a woman adjusting a toddler’s cap—with an expression I couldn’t quite place.

When asked, he only shook his head.

“It is the Interpol case,” he said lightly. “Tiresome bureaucracy. Petty crime, inflated egos. It wears on the nerves.”

“And here I thought you were the master of bureaucracy,” I said, trying to make him smile.

He did smile. But not all the way. “Even the most patient man, monsieur, may grow weary of tangled papers.”

“Oh, mais regardez! I had my first official case in that alley,” Poirot added, gesturing towards an alley of exposed brick and walls covered in advertising posters. “A brutal one. A butcher’s boy. He had a talent for drawing maps in chalk. I remember thinking—mon Dieu, what a terrible waste of a cartographer.”

“Well—er—at least he had promise?” I offered.

Poirot sighed and shook his head. “Quel gachis.”

At the next corner, Poirot paused again. “Here I once waited for a suspect. It was winter. I remember my breath on the window. The man never arrived—he had taken poison the night before.”

Silence fell for a moment, the kind one walks through rather than breaks.

I glanced at Jeeves. He was watching Poirot carefully.

Poirot adjusted his gloves. “I am boring you.”

“Not at all,” said Jeeves gently.

“I find I have fewer light stories here than I had remembered,” Poirot said. “It is a fine city. But memory plays cruel tricks. And I—j'étais policier.”

Hastings touched his arm. “Still, it’s better shared.”

Poirot looked up at him. A long pause. Then he smiled faintly.

“Yes,” he said. “Yes, it is.”

I smiled at him. “Dash it all, Poirot, who else can recall a case for every cobblestone? If anything, it makes one feel terribly young and uninformed.”

Poirot gave a low laugh. “That is your gift, monsieur Wooster. You remind the old to feel young, without shame.”

A moment later, Hastings pointed across the road. “That place looks decent—what do you think? Mussels and frites?”

Poirot glanced over. “They have not changed their menu since 1897.”

I perked up. “Oho! A survivor.”

Poirot nodded. “Then we must go in. It is good to see something that has stayed the same.”

The place smelled of garlic butter, sea air, and heritage.

A cheerful man in his fifties approached the table with a practiced bow. “Bonsoir, messieurs! Bienvenue Chez Bineaux.”

Poirot’s face lit up. “ Ah! Monsieur Bineaux. Votre famille entretient toujours la flamme, à ce que je vois. ”

The man beamed. “Vous avez connu mon grand-père, monsieur?”

“Mais oui. J’ai eu le plaisir de dîner ici pour la première fois en 1909,” Poirot said, with quiet pride. “Votre grand-père était un véritable maître de l’harmonie culinaire — sa bouillabaisse avait une structure remarquable.”

The man looked delighted. “Mon père est désormais aux fourneaux. Quant à moi, je veille à la salle. Nous suivons toujours les notes de Grand-Père, bien sûr.”

Poirot nodded. “Il m’avait confié un jour que le secret d’une sauce réussie, c’était la justesse... et le thym frais.”

“Ça reste vrai,” said the younger Bineaux, laying out the menus. “On n’a presque rien changé depuis qu’il a ouvert, en 1877.”

“Then we are in safe hands,” said Jeeves.

As I listened to them, I couldn’t help noticing how different this was. No jewel thieves, no poisoned tobacconists, no bitter winter stakeouts. Just good food, warm memories, and a restaurant still standing where it ought to stand.

He sounded... lighter. Almost pleased, for once, rather than carefully polite. As though here, at least, was a small corner of Brussels that hadn’t shifted beneath his feet.

I looked around the dining room—half wood, half mirror, all charm—and sighed happily. “Now this is how you holiday.”

Poirot’s hand rested briefly on the tablecloth. “Oui,” he said. “It is.”

Chapter Text

It was a sunny sort of luncheon spot—brick courtyard, striped awnings, and waiters who looked like they’d once played Hamlet and were still emotionally recovering. Poirot had been summoned for some pressing Interpol business (“urgent but delicate,” Hastings said vaguely), so the three of us luncheoned without him.

I was halfway through a very decent tomato tart when I noticed Hastings hadn’t really touched his croquettes.

He was stirring his glass of water as if hoping to find answers at the bottom.

Jeeves noticed too, of course. “You appear pensive, Captain Hastings.”

Hastings gave a distracted smile. “He’s just—well. He’s not himself. I mean, Poirot. He’s quiet. Not in the usual clever-calculating way, but… grey, if that makes sense.”

“Quite,” Jeeves said gently.

“He’s been to Brussels before,” Hastings added. “After the war, with Japp. Didn’t bother him then. But now—now he wakes up tired.”

“Well,” I said, and they both looked at me, which is always alarming. “I was just thinking—maybe it’s his soul.”

Hastings frowned. “What do you mean?”

Hastings blinked. “His soul ?”

“Yes,” I said. “It’s rumpled.”

“Rumpled,” repeated Jeeves, with polite caution.

“You know. Like a coat that’s been sat on. Not torn. Not ruined. Just not quite right.”

Hastings stared at me a moment longer, then—bless him—nodded. “Yes. Yes, actually.”

“Maybe it’s something about being here ,” I went on. “I mean, does he have people to see? An aunt he’s studiously avoiding? A cousin who sells American chocolate?”

Jeeves’s brow furrowed slightly. Hastings leaned back.

“No,” Hastings said slowly. “He hasn’t mentioned anyone. And that’s odd, isn’t it? I mean—he must have known people. He grew up here…”

He trailed off.

I looked at Jeeves.

Jeeves looked at Hastings.

And the pair of them shared the sort of glance normally reserved for locating murder weapons.

“He’s been avoiding it,” Hastings said softly. “The personal places. The streets he walked as a boy.”

“Quite,” Jeeves murmured. “He may be retracing the geography of his past—but not the memory of it.”

I tapped my fork thoughtfully. “So what he needs is not mousse or waffles.”

Hastings tilted his head. “Then what?”

“He needs,” I said, “a gentle emotional ambush.”

Jeeves inclined his head. “If we are to act discreetly, sir, promptness would be advisable. The municipal archives close at five.”

The decision was made with the speed of a rash engagement, only far more promising.

“Now?” said Hastings, blinking. “Don’t we need—forms? Permission? A moral compass?”

“Well, Poirot’s still off wrangling Interpol,” I said, tossing some francs on the table. “It’s the perfect time to do a bit of light digging.”

Hastings sputtered the entire walk there, flapping about like a man who’s just realized his waistcoat is too tight for espionage. “We don’t even know how Belgian records are organized!”

“Don’t worry,” I said. “We have Jeeves. I know some French. We’ll be fine.”

We reached the archives—a grand sort of building, all stone and silence, like a library that had decided it was too good for books and gone straight into government service. There was a formidable woman at the desk, her expression suggesting she had eaten two undergraduates before noon and was eyeing Hastings as a possible third.

I stepped up, hat in hand, and smiled in my very best we’re-all-Europeans-today fashion.

“Bonjour, madame,” I said, crisp and clear. “Nous cherchons des documents concernant la famille d’un ami—des registres de décès ou de naissance, vers 1915. C’est un projet personnel, mais très respectueux. Rien de presse, seulement une recherche familiale.” To make a good impression, I slid her one of the gag business cards we’d created for the Drones Funny Business Card Competition held on April Fool’s Day. It broke my heart a little to part with the BWW, Esq. Vice-President, Society for the Prevention of Work card, but it was for a good cause.

To her credit, she did not blink. Just gave me a long, appraising look, then glanced at Jeeves.

Jeeves gave her the kind of nod that starts international diplomacy and said, in French, “C’est également une question de succession. Il pourrait y avoir des implications juridiques, vous comprenez. Bien entendu, c’est strictement confidentiel.”

She gave a little “ah!” of bureaucratic interest, reached under the counter, and handed over a clipboard. Within three minutes, we were being led down a corridor lined with the sort of wood paneling that smells like old money and powdered ink.

“Succession?” Hastings hissed, the moment the clerk was out of earshot. “Jeeves, was that a—was that a lie ?”

“Only in the strictest legal sense, Captain.”

“You said we were investigating inheritance!”

“There may well be an emotional inheritance involved,” Jeeves murmured. “Of memory, of identity—”

“Oh, good Lord,” Hastings said faintly.

I patted him on the back. “This is nothing, old sport. Barely even fraud. Just a friendly nudge to history. What’s a little crime in service of truth and love?”

Hastings gave me a look that said he would not be writing this part up in any memoirs.

Jeeves's lips quirked upwards in quiet satisfaction. Like I’d just correctly guessed a wine pairing with a late Renaissance massacre.

The municipal archives of Brussels, for those unacquainted, are roughly what you’d get if you crossed a law library with a crypt. Cool, echoey, and full of shelves that looked like they hadn’t been dusted since Napoleon last dropped by.

We were shown to a long wooden table, handed a stack of indexes the size of small tombstones, and left to our own devices. Jeeves rolled up his sleeves with the sort of reverence usually reserved for mass, and Hastings—poor fellow—looked deeply unsure whether he was being noble or terribly rude.

“I still don’t know about this,” Hastings muttered, turning pages as though they might scream. “What if he doesn’t want us to know?”

I shrugged. “Then you don’t tell him. But maybe you find something that makes things make more sense.”

Hastings frowned. “You think that’s what this is? A mystery to be solved?”

“No,” I said, flipping through a registry titled DÉCÈS, 1914 . “I think it’s something that got left unfinished. And that sort of thing can get under a chap’s skin if he doesn’t know it’s there.”

A pause.

“My father died around Easter ’11,” I said. “Mother a few days after that. Pneumonia, then stroke. Telegrams came at school. I did go home—headmaster made a fuss of it, packed me off with a prefect for the train.”

Hastings looked up, startled.

“I remember the funeral,” I said. “Wet day. Someone played Abide with Me badly on the church organ. Afterwards, Aunt Dahlia gave me a handkerchief and said I was being very brave. I wasn’t. I cried so hard I threw up on the undertaker.”

Jeeves didn’t say anything, but I felt his hand press gently on my knee under the table. Just once. Just enough.

“I suppose what I’m saying is—if I hadn’t gone, I’d always have wondered. You don’t realise how heavy wondering is until you stop.”

I cleared my throat. “I suppose I always told myself it didn’t matter. But sometimes I still think—well, maybe, I’d have been different. Bit more… anchored. Bit less inclined to run off to New York in a straw hat.”

There was a quiet beat. Jeeves’s fingers smoothed the fabric on my knee lightly.

“Anyway,” I said quickly, “this place does good work with municipal paper. Lovely cardstock. Shall we?”

We searched. Hastings more methodical than I, Jeeves divinely efficient, me attempting to interpret French cursive without dissolving into tears.

We meant to look for just the one.

One name. One record. One neat column of grief.

But once Jeeves had the rhythm of the registrar’s ink and Hastings got past the emotional flustering, the pages started to give.

“Here,” said Jeeves again, tapping another entry. “Agathe Poirot. Died 1916. Same district.”

I leaned in. “Relation?”

Hastings skimmed the form. “It doesn’t say. Likely another civilian casualty.”

Another silence. Then another record.

“Marguerite Poirot,” Hastings read aloud. “1914. Pneumonia. Listed as a domestic servant.”

Then one more.

“Rosalie Poirot. 1914. Shellfire. Age—”

He stopped.

“Age fourteen.”

No one said anything for a while.

We found one name after another. Bombing. Pneumonia. Typhoid.

Jeeves gently turned a page. “It is not an uncommon surname, sir,” he said quietly. “But within the same four blocks…”

I nodded, throat dry. “Family.”

Hastings leaned back in the chair, eyes unfocused. “He lost them all .”

We sat in the quiet of the archives, surrounded by crumbling paper and ink the colour of dried violets, and tried to picture it. One year after another. One funeral after another. All the women in a man’s life gone, one by one, in a city turned upside-down by war. I presumed all the men had been sent, and lost to, the war.

No wonder he hadn’t come back. No wonder he couldn’t walk those streets without falling silent.

I reached out, almost without thinking, and set my hand lightly on the table beside Hastings’s.

“I suppose,” I said slowly, “that a man can only take so many farewells.”

We came out quiet.

No one said it, but we didn’t need to. The weight of it clung to us like dust from the old ledgers—cloying, fine-grained, impossible to shake.

Outside, the air had cooled a little. The sun was still out, dappling the cobbles, but the sky had turned the pale blue of pressed flowers.

Hastings looked like he’d aged a year inside. He wasn’t blinking as much. Just walking straight ahead, hands in his coat pockets, jaw tight.

Jeeves had that expression he sometimes gets in post-opera silence—a sort of sacred reverence, like something grand and sad has played itself out and it would be impolite to speak first.

And me? Well, I’m not built for tragedy, but even I could feel the thing settle in my chest, slow and serious.

At the next corner, we paused.

“He ought to go,” I said. “To the cemetery, I mean. It might help.”

Hastings looked up.

“You think?”

I nodded. “He’s spent this whole trip walking around his ghosts. Maybe it’s time he faced them.”

Hastings was silent a moment, then said, “I’ll take him.”

There was no bravado in it. No grand announcement. Just a promise. Quiet and true.

We stood like that for a moment—three men on a Brussels street, one freshly full of grief that wasn’t his, one solemnly cataloguing the practical next steps, and one a little out of his depth, trying not to cry at the thought of someone else's lonely funeral twenty years ago.

“Right,” I said at last. “Let’s go get a tea or something, before we do anything saintly.”

Hastings let out a breath—almost a laugh—and Jeeves gave me a glance so full of quiet pride it nearly knocked the wind out of me.

Chapter Text

Poirot returned to our hotel just after five, looking rather tired and a touch irritable in that contained way he has—like a man who has mentally corrected fourteen grammatical crimes before tea.

He set his cane by the door and removed his hat with a sigh.

“Interpol,” he said simply. “They send for Hercule Poirot, oui, but they forget they are summoning also his patience.”

I smiled faintly, rising out of the chair where I’d been pretending not to wait for him.

“Long day?”

He gave a little shrug, more impatient than usual. “C’est la bureaucratie. Endless forms. Endless ‘small clarifications.’ The case itself is trivial, but it will be inflated for months by men who believe themselves brilliant.”

He was trying to be sharp, but I could see the fatigue at the edges. The weariness behind the moustache. The sort that doesn’t come from papers and pen-pushers.

“I was wondering,” I said, “if you’d let me take you somewhere.”

He looked up. “Where?”

“Nowhere formal,” I said. “Just… a walk. Just the two of us. I think it’ll do some good.”

He tilted his head at me.

I could see the part of him that wanted to deflect. To say he was tired. To mutter something about needing to double check a file.

But instead, after a moment, he simply asked, “Do I need to wear a tie?”

I grinned. “Only if you want to impress the pigeons.”

He made a little noise—half disdain, half amusement—and moved to retrieve his jacket again.

“As you say, mon ami. Lead on.”

We didn’t speak much as we walked.

Poirot took the lead at first, his cane tapping a gentle rhythm beside us, the spring light catching on the silver of the handle. I kept just half a step behind, matching him.

We weren’t heading anywhere in particular, I’d said.

That was a lie, of course.

But a soft one. One that waited to be understood rather than revealed.

We passed shuttered bakeries and iron railings, flower stalls, a small park I thought I saw him glance at twice.

And then the street changed.

Subtly. The way you know the shape of somewhere from inside your body, before your brain catches up. The curve of the road, the slope of the pavement. Poirot slowed just slightly, though I don’t think he meant to.

I said nothing. Only touched his hand on my arm.

He looked up at a row of narrow houses with carved lintels and remembered balconies. Windows with starched curtains and painted shutters.

He exhaled slowly.

“This is Cureghem,” he said.

I nodded.

He gave a short, almost-laugh. “I did not think I remembered it so well.”

He kept walking.

And then, more quietly, “Rue de la Clinique.”

He said it not as a question, but as confirmation.

I nodded.

“I lived here,” he said, voice soft. “Not just me. All of us.”

We’d passed the place where the streets turned too familiar, where the curve of the pavement and the smell of coal smoke began to press on something in Poirot’s chest. He didn’t say anything, but I saw his hand curl a little tighter on the cane. Not pain—exactly. But pressure.

At the corner of the Rue de l’Instruction, I stopped.

“There’s a tram,” I said. “It’ll be quicker.”

He nodded. Not eager, but not resisting.

We waited at the stop in silence. A woman with shopping bags joined us, humming tunelessly to herself. Somewhere behind us, a child laughed and a dog barked. Ordinary life, rolling on.

Poirot’s gaze drifted upward. “There used to be a tannery here,” he said. “The smell—mon dieu. My uncle refused to walk this street on warm days.”

“Gone now,” I said gently.

He didn’t respond.

The tram clattered into view—a green and cream affair, all boxy edges and practical windows. It gave a sharp bell clang as it slowed.

We boarded and took seats near the middle, just across from a tired-looking man in work boots and a girl with ink-stained cuffs. Poirot sat by the window, watching the streets pass.

As the tram pulled away, I saw his reflection in the glass: motionless, composed, but not at ease. His fingers were tight on the curved edge of the windowframe, knuckles pale.

“Is it all right?” I asked.

He was silent a moment. Then: “Yes. Non. I do not know. It is… strange.”

“How so?”

“These streets—they are both smaller and larger than I remembered.”

The tram jolted slightly over a join in the track. He steadied himself and went on.

“When I left Belgium, I believed I would return in victory. With stories. With triumph. Instead—” He gestured faintly. “I returned older. With silence. And a cane.”

I didn’t answer. Just sat beside him as the city slid past, modern and oblivious. We passed schools, cafés, shops with gleaming glass. Then the buildings gave way to quieter roads, stone walls, and finally: our stop.

The gates of the cemetery rose up ahead—tall, iron, old. The kind that do not creak, but remember.

Poirot froze. He turned and looked at me. There was no anger in his face. No alarm. Just something quiet. Something like surrender.

He nodded once.

“Merci, mon cher Hastings,” he said.

And stepped through the gate.

The light had softened, casting long shadows across the rows of stone. The cemetery was nearly empty—just birdsong, the faint rattle of leaves, and the quiet crunch of gravel beneath our feet.

Poirot walked beside me, a little slower than usual. Not from pain, I thought—but from weight. The sort you carry inside the ribs.

“I looked it up while we were at the city archives,” I said gently. “I was hoping… you’d show me.”

He didn’t speak. But after a moment, he adjusted the grip on his cane and turned down a narrower path. I followed.

It was a plain stone. Tall, pale, edged with ivy. In Memoriam: Aux Victimes Civiles de la Guerre. Dozens of names followed. Some carefully engraved. Some weathered to shadow.

He stopped before it and folded his hands atop the cane.

“ Maman died in a bombing,” he said. “Not in the trenches. In the market nearby. I had planned to return, to sit with her. But I was injured. Hospitalised near the Somme.”

“She was in poor health,” he said quietly. “And alone. The occupation… By the time the letter reached me... she was already gone.”

I stood beside him.

“There was no funeral,” he said. “Not because it was forbidden, but because there was no one left to give her one. The priest had died. The neighbours and family had fled or starved or... It was winter. She… the bombardment...”

He swallowed hard. “For a devout woman, to pass in silence, without rites... it is not what she deserved.”

His voice thinned slightly. “I could not come back. I fled to England. A refugee, like so many others. I knew little of what happened here for years.”

He exhaled. “My aunts, my cousins… scattered. Some escaped, disappeared. Some did not. The war came to the women, mon ami. And I was not here to protect them.”

He shook his head faintly. “All that was left were records. And this list of the disappeared.”

I didn’t speak. Just stood with him.

“I could not even pray for her properly,” he murmured. “Not then. I tried.”

His voice broke, just slightly.

“Had it not been for the young soldier beside me in the hospital,” he went on, “I do not know what I would have done. He played chess badly, but often. He made me horrible tea and drank it with me. He talked until I remembered I was a man, not just burns and a shrapnel wound. He taught me patience. He showed me... that the world had not ended. Not entirely.”

I turned to him.

“You kept me alive,” he said simply. “When I had nothing.”

“And now you have me,” I said.

He closed his eyes.

“Yes,” he whispered. “Now I do.”

“I wish I could have met her,” I said softly. “And tell her what a wonderful man she raised.”

His breath caught. He made a sound, almost a laugh, but twisted, aching. Then came the tears. Something in him broke—so softly I almost missed it. His shoulders shifted, barely perceptible, like a breath held too long finally exhaled.

I reached for him. He let me. I said nothing, just wrapped an arm around his shoulders. To an onlooker, we looked like a pair of friends grieving in front of a memorial.

He leaned his face against my shoulder. His breath, when it reached my neck, was shallow and warm.

He trembled.

I slid a handkerchief from my pocket. After a moment, he took it without speaking.

And we stayed like that—two men, a marker and names, and all the years in between. We stood in silence as the evening shadows lengthened, and the city softened around us.

Poirot straightened, slowly, with the kind of care only a man his age knows—elegant and understated, but still stiff in the joints. He dabbed his eyes once more, folded the handkerchief precisely, and pressed it back into my palm without looking at me.

“Merci, mon cher capitaine,” he said.

We started down the gravel path. The green branches rustled overhead. Poirot held onto my arm, and we walked slowly, shoulder to shoulder.

After a few dozen steps, he spoke again, very quietly. “If anything ever happens,” he said, “if it ever becomes too difficult in England—politically, or personally—I will bring you here.”

I glanced at him.

“To Belgium?” I asked gently.

He nodded. “There are places I could arrange. Not this city—no, Brussels is a museum of ghosts—but perhaps Ghent. Or Namur. Or one of the quiet towns with lace shops and good bread. They are kind to old men, in those towns.”

He looked ahead. “But my home,” he added, even softer, “is now in England. In a flat with a stubborn Briton who insists on doing the shopping himself.”

I smiled. “Poirot—”

“I mean it, Hastings. I was born here. I was raised here. But it is not mine anymore. It cannot be. The world that knew me is gone.”

There was a long pause. Then I said, “I understand.”

He looked over, surprised.

“Argentina didn’t feel like home either,” I said. “Not really. I kept thinking it would, if I just… stayed long enough. But it was always too new. Or perhaps I was always too English.”

We walked in silence for a few moments more, the city pressing in soft and warm around us—sunlight on stone, the clink of coffee cups from a distant terrace, the sweet dusty smell of summer brick. He held onto my arm, fingers softly curving on my sleeve.

“And now?” he asked.

“Now,” I said, “I can picture the sound of your slippers in the hallway and the smell of coffee from the kitchen and the rattle of the Times at seven-fifteen sharp. And it feels—well. Like we belong there. In your flat.”

“ Notre flat,” he said.

I turned to look at him.

He didn’t elaborate. Just: “I have made arrangements. Justement au cas où. I could not bear the thought of you being thrown out if—” His voice faltered. “If something were to happen.”

I stopped walking.

“You—”

He nodded once, briskly. “My solicitor has the documents. Quietly done. It is not just a matter of inheritance. It is a matter of residence. Continuity. You belong there.”

I stared at him. My throat tightened.

He glanced over. “You never corrected me, you know. When I said ‘my home is in England.’ You did not say ‘ours.’”

“I didn’t think I could,” I said. “I mean—I don’t own anything, not really. Just a little rental studio in St. John’s Wood to keep up appearances. I don’t even sleep there. The car’s mine, but—well. Most of it went to Dulcie.”

Poirot’s gaze softened. “You gave it freely.”

“Yes,” I said. “To make things easier. She deserved that, at least.”

We stood there, in the middle of a quiet Brussels street. “You belong with me,” he said.

I nodded.

And we walked on.

Chapter Text

The café was one of those tucked-away affairs you’d never find on a map—linen tablecloths, dusty hydrangeas in cut-glass jars, and a menu that made no mention of anything so vulgar as prices. Jeeves had picked it, naturally. I’d merely expressed a vague desire for coffee and somewhere to sit and ruminate, and five minutes later we were seated beneath a trellis of ivy, the clink of teaspoons and soft French murmurs all around.

I was still thinking about the painting.

Not in a deep, aesthetic sort of way—well, not just that—but in the way one does when something’s gone and opened a new door in one’s brain. The hands. The stillness. The feeling of being understood so completely that nothing need be said aloud. I sipped my coffee and peeked at Jeeves, who was buttering a roll with quiet precision, looking—well, content.

It was quite something, seeing him like that. Like a man who’d stepped into his own frame.

The whole city, really, had begun to feel like that painting in miniature—full of quiet corners where people knew how to sit still together, how to simply exist without fuss. And I found I rather liked it.

I caught Jeeves’s eye again. There was even—though I hardly dared believe it—a trace of softness in his expression, a glint behind the calm that suggested not just contentment, but pleasure.

Not the polite, professional contentment of knowing the guest towels were properly starched, but something smaller and far more dangerous. A kind of quiet delight. Almost—as shocking as it sounds—affection.

His mouth curved, not into his usual faint professional smile, but into something else. Warmer. And there was a sparkle too—a little gleam in his eyes, like someone who had briefly, mischievously, pulled back the Valet a fraction and let Bertram's Darling out for a stroll, and rather enjoyed the fresh air.

It made me brave.

“I say, Jeeves,” I said, attempting casualness but likely vibrating with glee, “there’s a spot just off the Grand Place—Le Hibou Bleu. Apparently they do a bit of jazz in the evenings. Local talent. Saxophones and so on.”

Jeeves stirred his drink thoughtfully. “Indeed, sir?”

“They say it’s quite the thing,” I added. “Terribly modern. But not the wrong kind of modern. Brass, but not brass band. You understand.”

He regarded me for a moment, then inclined his head. “If it would please you, sir, I should be very glad to accompany you.”

He let his mouth quirk a fraction more into a smile. “I believe you would enjoy the atmosphere.”

I could have kissed him in public. (I did not. But it was a near thing.)

“Well,” I said, trying to contain myself, “in that case, I shall find us a good table and prepare to be scandalously moved by a trumpet solo.”

“Very good, sir.”

He took another sip of his drink. His expression was calm, but I detected the faintest glint of amusement in his eyes.

Across the table, I beamed.

Two weeks in Brussels. Jazz. Art. Architecture. Jeeves.

Not an aunt in sight.

I was, as the poets say, the luckiest sap alive.

I was still mulling this over when Poirot and Hastings arrived.

“Ah,” said Poirot, with a nod so subtle it barely disturbed his hat. “Mes amis.”

We rose for the brief flurry of greetings. Hastings gave me a warm grin—one of those broad, honest chaps who always looks pleased to see you, even when you’ve done nothing worth being pleased about.

They sat.

Something was different.

Not in a dramatic, scarlet-letter way—but Poirot’s usual spark had dimmed slightly. Still elegant, still poised, but subdued. A little frayed at the edges, like a silk ribbon that had been ironed one too many times.

Hastings, by contrast, was gentleness itself. He poured the coffee for both of them, handed over the sugar without being asked, and leaned just slightly too close when he spoke to Poirot, as though worried he might flicker and disappear if left untended. I noticed, too, how his hand hovered briefly near Poirot’s arm whenever the waiter passed or the table shifted—steadying without actually touching, as if offering an anchor he wouldn’t presume to grab.

No one said anything for a moment. The air between them was warm, but quiet. Not strained, precisely—but something had been turned inward.

I had a very strong suspicion where they'd gone earlier that afternoon. The sort of outing one doesn’t ask about. At least not if one has an ounce of decency and a shred of self-preservation.

Jeeves, of course, noticed as well. He caught my eye for a flicker of a second, then returned to his roll as if nothing were amiss.

“How was your day?” I asked, aiming for lightness.

“Reflective,” said Poirot. “And yours?”

“Divine,” I said.  “Jeeves has compiled a list of local ecclesiastic landmarks with the quiet zeal of a man preparing for battle. I merely followed and marvelled.”

Poirot reached for his cup, and I saw Hastings’s hand move again—just slightly—as if to steady it, then think better of it.

It wasn’t awkward, exactly. But it was tender in a way that made me ache, just a bit. Whatever the afternoon had brought them, it had left something behind. And though they sat here now, side by side, you could feel the weight of it—quiet, old, and full of love.

Poirot gave a small sigh and waved one hand vaguely. “The Interpol, they have left for me at the hotel a folder. A thick one. Very thick. Full of addenda. They are determined, you see, to make me continue answering their questions by way of footnotes.”

“Dashed inconsiderate of them,” I said.

“They insist upon perfection,” he said, sipping his coffee. “Even when perfection is already achieved.”

Hastings chuckled softly. “They’re afraid to argue with you directly, so they hide behind paperwork.”

“Exactly so,” said Poirot, making a face. “It is most tiresome.”

“Would you like me to have a look at the file, old chap?” Hastings offered, already half-rising as though ready to march to the hotel at once.

Poirot reached out, resting his hand lightly on Hastings’s sleeve for the briefest moment. “No, mon ami. Thank you. Not tonight.”

The way he said it was quiet, but final. Not weary—just… enough.

I glanced at Jeeves.

He caught my look, tilted his head a fraction, and gave the smallest, most knowing smile I have ever seen.

I nodded back.

Chapter Text

The place was a dream—tiny tables, crisp white tablecloths, walls painted midnight blue and hung with oil portraits of owls wearing monocles. Bertram was absolutely enchanted before a note had even played.

“This,” he whispered to me as we were seated near the front, “is absolutely the ticket.”

He ordered champagne. Of course he did.

When the band started—a lazy swing into something tender and sly—he all but levitated. Eyes shining, foot tapping, head tilted toward the stage as though every note was a secret being told only to him.

And I watched him.

Not for the first time. But perhaps, as I would later realize, with new clarity.

His expression—unguarded, luminous—was the same he’d worn earlier, in front of the Arnolfini portrait, when he asked whether I thought the couple had mutually decided to acquire a pet dog .

He glowed.

The bass and drums were steady beneath it all, a low, insistent thrum, like the pulse beneath the skin, the quiet machinery that holds a body upright and breathing.

But the trumpet—ah, the trumpet was something else entirely. That was the breath itself. The spirit. The golden divine spark animating flesh and form.

And Bertram, too, was that trumpet: bright and daring, leaping where the melody dared not predict, making beauty out of flight.

And something in me—well-oiled, orderly, perpetually composed—shifted. There, in a jazz bar in a foreign city, with an owl painting winking above us and the trumpet spinning gold into the air, I understood.

This was his version of the Van Eycks. Not solemnity but joy. Not oil paint, but brass. Not reverence, but rhythm. And it was just as beautiful. The notes spun upwards like birds in twilight—"light-winged Dryad of the trees." And Bertram, too, seemed to rise with them, face alight, head tilted to the stage. For all my fondness for order, I thought, there was none here save for the heartbeat of the bass and the drums—only flight, and gold, and joy.

I had long understood Goethe’s wish: “Linger awhile, thou art so fair.”

And watching Bertram now—face alight, fingers tapping gently in time, eyes half-closed with the sheer, unstudied joy of it—I felt the ache of that wish in full.

If only, I thought, there were some mechanism, some quiet device of the soul, by which one could press a moment like a flower between the pages of one’s memory. Flatten it gently, preserve its colors against time, and carry it forward.

So that on some distant evening, when the world grew heavier, I might draw it out again. This moment. This gleaming, golden room. The owls winking on the walls. And Bertram: beloved, entirely himself.

He caught me looking, and flashed his open, radiant, beautiful smile at me. Held out a hand under the table.

I took it.

And that was, as they say, that.

The walk home was quieter. Not in silence, but in something more settled. As though the world had taken a breath and let it out slowly.

Bertram’s arm brushed mine occasionally. Not deliberately, but often enough to make my chest ache in the pleasant way it sometimes did when he laughed too brightly or called me darling in that half-shy way he hadn’t yet realized was utterly disarming.

We returned to the flat—our borrowed sanctuary with its wallpaper of faded roses and its sofa that sighed when you sat down, as if pleased to have company again.

There was no gramophone.

But through the open window came a thread of accordion music, played somewhere out in the night. A slow, meandering tune, soft as the streetlamps. Beneath it, the distant clatter of a tram. A dog barked once. A couple laughed down the street. Brussels spoke in its sleep.

I turned to him.

“I believe,” I said slowly, “I understand jazz now.”

Bertram, halfway through removing his cufflinks, blinked at me. “Eh?”

“I have always admired structure,” I said, searching for the words. “Harmony. Repetition with variation. Basslines. Drums. Order.”

He tilted his head, watching me.

“You, my dear,” I said, stepping closer, “are the trumpet. Wild and bright. Full of improvisation and feeling. You soar. You don’t need the sheet music to know where the music ought to go. You make it.”

There was a pause.

Then his whole face lit up. “Jeeves.”

“Yes, Bertram?”

“You romantic devil.”

He took my hand.

And then—he pulled me close.

“Dance with me.”

“There’s no music,” I said automatically, already lying.

“There’s enough music,” he said, swaying us gently. “And besides. You’re the beat. I’ll follow you.”

We moved slowly across the carpet—no grand ballrooms, no polished parquet, just threadbare rug and the smell of lavender. He leaned his head against my shoulder. I held him like I’d never quite understood how before.

It was awkward, at first. My hand didn’t know where to rest. My feet—trained to poise, not romance—stepped too carefully. But he didn’t mind. He just hummed along with the accordion, guiding me like he always had: fearlessly, without map or sheet music, into joy.

I had never, ever slow danced like that.

And I think—if you’d asked—I would have told you it was the finest performance of my life.

Outside, the city’s lights glimmered against wet cobblestones. Inside, it was just us. We had changed into pajamas—mine folded crisply as always, his slightly rumpled but endearing — and completed the small rituals of the evening. The brushing of teeth, the tidying of the sitting room, the brief negotiations over whether the window ought to remain cracked open or closed for the night.

Bertram looked up at me, his hair slightly disheveled, eyes wide and fond.

“You know, Jeeves,” he said softly, “I don’t think I shall ever tire of this.”

“Of dancing?” I asked, though I already understood.

“Of us, ” he murmured, his voice catching just faintly.

I felt my chest tighten, my hand tightening slightly around his.

“Nor I, my dear.”

There were two bedrooms in the flat. We had booked them without discussion, out of habit more than necessity. But every evening had ended in one—the slightly bigger one, with a slightly wider bed.

Tonight was no exception.

We moved together almost without words—I guiding him gently by the waist, he following with quiet trust—until we reached the bed. The lamp cast a warm honeyed glow across the pale sheets, the room already turned down as I had prepared earlier.

And now we stood before the bed.

Or rather—the bed.

There was a smaller bedroom, of course, one designed for a servant.

But this, this was the master bedroom.

The bed itself was a charming, rose-quilted and crocheted feature of the flat, or as the landlady had described it when handing over the keys, “A chic, space-savvy sanctuary.”

It was perhaps one and a half persons wide, at best.

I suspected the intention had not been practicality but, rather, discretion: an architectural nudge meant to discourage visiting gentlemen from entertaining ladies of the night.

Bertram was already smiling as he pulled back the coverlet, wholly unbothered by the limited square footage. "We’ve fit before," he said cheerfully, already tugging back the coverlet. "Bit snug, but I rather like it."

"Yes, dear," I replied softly, watching him climb in first.

The narrow width left no room for formal arrangement. By the time I slipped in beside him, we were immediately entangled—my arm beneath his shoulders, his leg draped over mine, our bodies naturally aligned simply because they had no other choice.

He gave a small, satisfied hum as he tucked himself fully against me.

"Perfect," he murmured into my shoulder.

I let my hand settle on his back, fingers tracing slow, absent patterns.

In truth, we had both perhaps imagined that tonight might carry a more... physical conclusion. There had been long glances across dinner, soft laughter as we danced, little touches exchanged while brushing teeth.

But now, after days of wandering the streets of Brussels—museums, galleries, winding cobblestone alleys and endless little cafés—exhaustion wrapped around us like a second blanket.

And this, we both silently agreed, was more than enough.

"Jeeves?"

"Yes, Bertram?"

"I rather think I’ve never been happier."

The words landed with a weight he did not seem to fully grasp, but I did. My chest tightened, not unpleasantly.

"Nor I," I said softly.

He shifted slightly, craning his head up just enough to meet my gaze. His hair was still faintly mussed from the earlier dancing, his eyes warm, half-lidded with comfort and affection.

"Shall we stay like this for a bit?"

"As long as you wish, my dear."

And so we did.

The bed was small. The world outside foreign. But the space between us was exactly right.

Two men. One impossibly narrow bed. And not an inch wasted.

I lay still for a long moment, simply feeling the weight of him, breathing him in. The poets spoke of lovers as restless seekers, drawn forward by distance and desire. But in this narrow bed, I found no distance left to cross. Here in this small bed our hearts beat together, now—no longer seeking, no longer doubting. Two shapes, yes; but only one rhythm between them. And in the hush between breaths, I understood fully what it was to belong.

“Jeeves?” he whispered after a while.

“Yes, my dear?”

“Is this what you thought it might feel like? When we were still… waiting to say things aloud?”

I turned slightly, pressing my lips to his hair.

“No, Bertram. Far better.”

His breath hitched faintly, and I felt him smile against my chest.

“Good.”

The lamp flickered softly as the wind rattled gently against the windowpanes.

And there, in a borrowed bed in a foreign city, we settled deeper into each other, not chasing anything, not proving anything. Simply existing, quietly, as two men who had crossed every distance and at last found home in the same place.

Chapter Text

Poirot lay on his side beneath the soft light of the bedside lamp. Awake, but quiet. Not working. Just… still.

I closed the door behind me gently and crossed the room without a word.

He didn’t turn, but his fingers moved—just slightly—toward the empty half of the bed.

I slipped under the coverlet and crawled in close. My hand found his. He let it.

“You’re not sleeping,” I said quietly.

“Non,” he murmured.

Another pause.

Then, with a soft breath: “The leg feels worse today. As if it resents this city.”

I kissed the back of his neck. “You’ve been walking more than usual. And grieving.”

He didn’t reply. But when I let my hand slip lower, over his waist and across the familiar pattern of scar tissue, he didn’t flinch.

We knew each other now.

I knew how to touch him there—carefully, without pressure, with intention. I’d learned how to map the sensitivity from the numbness. How to avoid the deep ache and find the places that still wanted.

My fingers drifted in slow, patient circles over the shrapnel-starred skin at his hip; each edge familiar now, each curve known. It didn’t look catastrophic. But the muscle and bone underneath had gone wrong. Nerve damage. Loss of control. Pain, when it chose to flare.

He sighed, quiet and open.

“You are always gentle,” he whispered.

“You taught me how.”

“Others did not wish to learn.”

“Their loss,” I said, and pressed a kiss to his neck.

He rolled on his back. His eyes searched mine—not with uncertainty, but something quieter. A kind of wonder that hadn’t worn off.

“Seven months,” he said softly. “And still I find myself surprised.”

I smiled. “That I finally stopped being so blind?”

“Ça aussi.”

I didn’t reply. Just kissed him. Poirot’s breath was slow, controlled, but his eyes were shining in the lamplight.

Then, very quietly, he said, “What you make me feel… is something I thought I had lost. After the injury. I believed—” He hesitated. Then, his voice dropping further:“Je croyais que je ne pourrais plus jamais connaître ce plaisir.”

I let my fingers rest, not pressing, just there. Steady.

“You never said,” I murmured.

He smiled faintly. “It is not something one says at dinner.”

“No,” I agreed. “But it’s something worth saying in bed.”

His smile twitched a little higher. I leaned in, brushing my nose against his.

“You know,” I said, “you and I—between us, we’re practically experts in romance.”

That earned a soft laugh. Real. Warm.

Poirot cupped the side of my face with his hand, gentle and sure.

“Mon cher capitaine,” he whispered.

And he kissed me. Deeply. Deliberately. With every part of himself that still remembered pleasure and joy and how to choose it, even when the world said no more.

We curled into each other, limbs tangled.

It started as it always did — quietly.

We were wrapped in that soft kind of intimacy that feels more like breathing than thinking. His body beneath mine, warm and willing, our hands clasped together as we moved.

But then his breath caught. I froze instantly. I felt it almost at once; the faint tension in his breath, the way his hips shifted awkwardly beneath me, muscles tightening as though trying to find a position that didn’t exist. I felt his hands shift abruptly, tightening hard around my arms—grounding himself, trying to ride through it.

“The leg?”

He nodded tightly, breath already ragged. I shifted off him at once, careful but firm, one hand bracing his chest, the other cupping his cheek.

“It will stop,” he whispered. “Just a moment.”

But it didn’t.

“ Merde... toujours cette maudite jambe. Ce maudit nerf, ” he hissed, the flash of anger sharp and immediate. “Every time—” My chest ached watching him fight himself. His pride. His fury. “Always like this. Like a fool I hoped tonight it would behave—that I could—but it only grows worse.” He looked away, unable to meet my gaze. The words fell out sharp, bitter.  “You must sometimes regret it, Arthur. Trading your beautiful wife for—this.” He gestured faintly, his voice dropping hoarse and harsh. “An invalid .”

That stopped me cold.

For a second, something burned hot in my chest. Not pity. Not heartbreak. Something harder. Something sharper.

I grabbed his chin, forcing his eyes back to mine, I saw it: that faint glassy shine, the frustration weighing heavy behind them. Not tears, not quite, but so near.

“For God’s sake, Hercule—stop.”

He blinked, startled. 

“You listen to me.” My voice was low but firm, sharp and sure.  “I don’t give a damn if one night doesn’t work out. We have all the other nights. All the mornings, too. All the years ahead.”

He tried to look away again, but I held him steady.

“You’re my man, Hercule. You hear me?”

“Arthur—” His voice broke, quieter now.

“No bloody pity. I didn’t sign up for perfection . ” I gathered him close, pulling him hard against my chest, one hand cradling his head as he buried his face against my shoulder.

“You daft man,” I whispered fiercely. “You have me. I’m yours. That’s all that matters.”

And then—I felt his hand slide softly along my chest. A slow brush of fingers across my ribs. He didn’t say anything. He didn’t need to.

I caught his hand gently in mine before he could reach any further, holding it softly but firmly.

“Don’t be silly, love.”  He was trying, I knew, to offer something. To give. To make himself useful. To not feel like a burden. And God help me, I loved him for it. But I wasn’t going to let him play that card tonight. Not when he was exhausted like this.

He blinked again, surprised. He swallowed faintly, lips pressing together, and I saw that flicker of protest rising again.

“No.” I tipped his chin up gently, forcing his tired eyes to meet mine again. My tone softened just a hair, but only just, with enough edge of command in my voice to cut through the last of his pride: “Right now you’re going to rest. And I’m going to rub your leg so you can sleep. And I won’t hear a word otherwise. Is that understood?”

There was a flash of something in his face—startled, faintly amused, and somewhere underneath it: relief. He exhaled, voice barely above a whisper. “Oui, mon capitaine.” His head sank back into my chest as he let go of the need to do anything except be held.

I smiled faintly, pressing my lips to his temple.

“Good man.”

I shifted carefully, drawing the blanket over us a little tighter as I gently began massaging the tight muscles of his thigh, working slow circles with my thumb along the places I knew best—where the nerves flared most often, where the old injuries settled when they were cross.

He sighed heavily as the pain began to loosen its grip, muttering French complaints under his breath, but there was no sharpness to them now, only the exhausted grumbling of a man finally giving in.

“ Ah, ce corps misérable... toujours ainsi... Et pauvre moi, je n’ai même pas le droit à mon bien-aimé ce soir... ”

I kept working, slow and careful, feeling the knots loosen bit by bit under my hands as his body softened into me, the edge of the pain finally ebbing away.

His head sank deeper into the crook of my shoulder, breath warm against my skin, fingers curling loosely against my ribs.

Within minutes, he was half-asleep — the tension draining from him as the weight of the past week’s emotions, the pain, the frustration, all bled out into the quiet. I held him close, cradling him gently. My hand kept moving idly over his hip, but my mind drifted elsewhere, smiling to myself in the dark.

I hadn’t expected it, I admitted silently. Hadn’t expected that when I stood my ground, when I snapped him out of his spiraling nonsense—that he’d yield so quickly. Apparently, my brilliant Poirot has something of a weakness for Captain Hastings of the Military Sternness.

I chuckled quietly to myself, not wanting to wake him.

Good to know.

Poirot sighed once—soft, content—and nestled in closer, his head resting against my shoulder. His breath, a little uneven at first, slowed.

I stared at the ceiling and swallowed hard.

My own injury had ended my military career. A few cracked ribs and a broken shin, a shoulder that didn’t quite lift the same way—but nothing like this. Nothing that haunted touch, or pleasure. Nothing that made me believe I couldn’t be loved.  And yet, even a year ago—Lord!—Poirot had been ready to live that way. Had resigned himself to quiet, to solitude, to… less.

Not bitter. Just accepting.

Like so many wounded men I’d known.

I looked down at him, still sleeping, still breathing against me.

I curled my arm more tightly around his shoulders. Kissed the crown of his head.

And after a moment, as my hand traced slow, absent circles against his back, I smiled faintly to myself.

He does exaggerate, when he's frustrated. In truth, it’s often quite the opposite—more times than not, we find each other just fine. But when the pain flares, or his pride stings, everything feels larger to him. Unfixable. Final.

I held him a little closer.

“You have me,” I whispered.

He didn’t stir.

But his hand shifted, just slightly, to rest over my heart.

And we stayed like that, safe in the hush of Brussels, until sleep found me too.

Chapter Text

Somewhere in that soft, silvery hour just before dawn, I stirred. The room was quiet, but not entirely dark anymore. Pale shafts of early light slipped in through the small gap between the curtains, streaking across the bed, gently catching the edges of his hair and the soft folds of the blanket. 

I blinked against the dim glow, aware first of the warmth beside me, then of his steady breath against my shoulder. 

Poirot.

Still tucked close against me, head resting just beneath my chin, one arm loosely draped over my waist. 

For a moment I simply lay there, breathing him in, feeling the rise and fall of his chest against mine—calm now, steady, safe.

But then—I felt it. 

The unmistakable press of him against my thigh. He shifted slightly in his sleep, his body nudging closer. A faint hum escaped him—something halfway between a sigh and a pleased little exhale. And then, slowly, I felt his hand move, sliding over my stomach, fingers brushing lightly, absentmindedly, but not without purpose.

I smiled to myself. Well. Good morning indeed.

I shifted a little, letting my own body respond—already half-awake, and entirely willing—and pressed a kiss to his temple.

“Feeling better, love?” I whispered. He let out a faint, sleepy chuckle, voice low and warm with the roughness of first light.

“Mmm… considerably, mon cher.” The hand at my waist tightened just slightly.

“The leg?” I asked, half-whispered. 

“No pain.” He smiled against my skin. 

“Pas maintenant.”

“Excellent.” We lay there for another breath, but already the air between us had shifted, the warmth rising, the quiet urgency building in both of us. He lifted his head just slightly then, and our eyes met. The soft gold light from the early sun caught his face, illuminating the warm forest green of his eyes—eyes that today, for once, held nothing but ease and quiet joy. 

God, he looked happy. 

The tight lines of worry that so often lingered were gone, at least for this moment—replaced by something tender, something deeply at peace.

“Arthur…” he murmured softly, voice a little more awake now.

“Yes, love?”

“Profitons de ce moment, mon cœur.” I felt his fingers slide lower as well, and this time, I let them. 

I reached for him, slipping my hand beneath the blanket; his breath caught against my collarbone. I watched him closely, barely an inch between our faces, letting my eyes trace every faint flicker of his expression. His dark lashes fluttered against flushed cheeks. His mouth parted slightly, soft breaths escaping in shaky little bursts. 

And I thought: This is mine to give him. 

This peace. 

This surrender. 

This quiet, blushing pleasure that no one else had ever been allowed to see. 

His hand faltered slightly, trembling with the effort of control, and then I felt his lips press to my neck—not a kiss exactly, more like the first bite of a man barely holding himself together.

Lord help me, it was beautiful.  I bit my own lip to stay quiet.

His fingers flexed against my shoulder, I could feel him trying to hold onto composure, and yet trusting me enough to let it slip. The growing waves pulled at both of us now—breathless, trembling, deeply safe in each other’s arms. 

There was something oddly thrilling—something sweetly electric—in knowing that I was the only one who could give him this. Not because I was perfect, but because I was me. Because I was his . To this man—this man who had spent his life behind carefully composed dignity—I was someone special. 

And that was breathtaking. 

Slowly, as the waves eased, I whispered against his temple: “There now.”

The smell of coffee and fresh rolls drifted lazily through the hotel restaurant. Outside, the city stirred—trams clanging, carts rattling down cobblestone, pigeons debating philosophy in the gutter.

We took a table by the window. Poirot sat with his back to the wall, as always. I rose again almost immediately.

“What would you like?” I asked, already halfway to standing.

He raised a brow. “They have waiters.”

“I know,” I said breezily, already moving toward the buffet. “Just let me, all right?”

When I returned with a plate of soft eggs, fresh fruit, cheese, a single perfectly symmetrical round bread, and his preferred cup of cafe au lait, he smiled.

It wasn’t a teasing smile. It was… warm. Private.

“You are being gallant,” he said as I placed everything just so. “Quite deliberately.”

I didn’t deny it.

He chuckled softly, unfolding his napkin. “Mon cher capitaine, you needn’t prove anything.”

“I know,” I said. “But I like doing it anyway.”

He looked down at his plate, then back up at me—eyes warm, dark, and very alive. Like a forest on a summer day.

“Tiens, tiens,” he murmured, “it is always pleasant to be reminded that one’s judgment was correct.”

I reached across the table and tapped his fingers lightly with mine.

“Breakfast is the most important meal of the day,” I said.

He laughed—quiet, real, and full of sunlight.

And we ate, content in a silence made not of things unsaid, but of things completely understood.

Chapter Text

The station had the usual air of mild chaos one associates with European travel—porters darting like well-trained waterfowl, small children shrieking with the uncontainable energy of pre-boarding excitement, and a number of hats being worn at what I would generously call experimental angles.

Poirot and Hastings stood near the platform, luggage neatly arranged, tickets already folded and organized with military precision.

The Interpol business was finally wrapped, their case concluded. They were heading back to London, while Jeeves and I would linger a few days longer, ostensibly for cultural enrichment but, in truth, simply because it was rather pleasant.

What struck me, though, was Poirot himself. The heaviness that had hovered around him when we first arrived—that faint shadow just behind the eyes—was gone now. Not absent, perhaps, but quiet. Like storm clouds that had rumbled, poured, and finally drifted off, leaving the wet streets gleaming.

He looked at Hastings then, and in that look was something I could only describe as sunlight . Clean, bright, like the weather after summer rain.

Hastings, for his part, returned the glance with one of those open, uncomplicated smiles of his—as though it had never occurred to him to hold anything back.

“Do ring once we’re back, old bean,” I said, shaking Hastings’s hand. “We’ll have to compare museum notes sometime.”

“Absolutely, Bertie,” Hastings said, beaming. “Plenty left to see.”

Poirot gave a slight bow—one of those exquisitely economical gestures of his, somehow managing to convey both respect and warm affection without wasting a syllable. “And you, monsieur Wooster—always a pleasure. You bring lightness where it is needed.”

“Well,” I said, a bit sheepish, “I do my best.”

Poirot turned to Jeeves. His expression softened, and for a moment, his voice lowered into something quieter—private, but perfectly audible.

“Monsieur Jeeves,” he said. “You are fortunate to have such kindness at your side. Continue, if you would, to take very good care of him.”

Jeeves inclined his head, that small flicker of warmth reaching his eyes. “I shall do my utmost, monsieur.”

The train gave a short whistle. An impatient porter waved.

Hastings stepped aboard first, turning back to steady Poirot’s arm as he climbed. And just before they disappeared into the compartment, Poirot looked back one last time—not at the station, or the city, but at us—and smiled.

Not the little courteous smile. The real one.

The one that said: It is all right, now.

The doors closed with a soft thunk, and the train slipped away down the shining tracks.

We stood for a moment longer, watching it go.

And then Jeeves, quietly at my side, said, “Shall we, sir?”

“Yes,” I said. “Let’s.”

I came back from the chocolatier in a mood of triumph. Triumph, and mild stomachache.

“Jeeves,” I declared, kicking the door shut with the heel of my shoe, “you are about to behold an artistic achievement in ganache the likes of which has not graced this household before.”

No reply.

I poked my head into the sitting room.

There he was—at the little desk by the window, light golden on the carpet, head bowed just slightly over a postcard. Not reading, not fussing—writing. Carefully. Slowly. With that particular air of Jeevesian gravity usually reserved for cufflink emergencies or diplomatic scandal.

I padded closer, curious.

It was a postcard. Watercolor sketch of the Galeries Royales. The kind of card tourists never send but keep wedged in books for decades.

He finished writing. Paused. Then slid the card gently into the middle of a rather elegant hardback— The Renaissance in the Low Countries —and closed it like it was something sacred.

I lingered.

He looked up. Caught me looking.

“Did you find what you were looking for?”

“Chocolates,” I said, holding up the bag. “Possibly life-altering. May require fanfare.”

He smiled. “Excellent.”

I hesitated. “What’s that you were writing, if you don’t mind my asking?”

He glanced at the book. Then, after a second, opened it again. The card lay flat between the pages. He turned it toward me.

Just a few lines. No address. Just:

To: Myself
You were happy here. Remember that.
In the light, in the quiet, beside him.
Remember what it felt like to belong.

Something caught in my throat.

I looked at him.

He didn’t seem embarrassed. Just… open. Like it mattered that I’d seen it.

I swallowed. “May I—could I add something?”

He smiled—small, amused, and entirely sincere.

“Of course.”

He handed me the pen.

I bent over the bottom corner, heart thumping for some reason I couldn’t quite name, and added: Never forget Arnolfini and jazz – B.

I handed it back.

He read it. And then—very gently—slipped it back into the book.

“Perfect,” he said.

The flat was just as we’d left it, only slightly dustier, and feeling—somehow—smaller than Brussels. Or perhaps we’d expanded.

I stood in the doorway for a second, letting the quiet settle. No lace curtains or marble façades. Just our clock ticking, our lamp in its usual slightly-crooked position, and our home.

Jeeves, precise as ever, immediately carried the suitcase into the laundry room.

I followed.

He opened it. Began to fold things. Brushed a fleck of lint from a cream jacket. Paused to examine a collar with quiet judgment.

And I—well, I hovered.

Normally, I wouldn’t dare interrupt The Process. Jeeves had a whole philosophy about suitcases—creased linen being a moral failing, and so on. But something about the quiet made me want to help.

“I say,” I offered, reaching for a stack of shirts. “Shall I—?”

Jeeves blinked. Surprised, but not displeased.

“If you wish, my dear.”

So I stood beside him, and tried very hard not to ruin the crease line of a sleeve.

We worked like that for a moment. In sync, sort of. He folded with mathematical grace. I mimicked with vague enthusiasm.

Then we both reached for the same shirt.

Our hands touched.

I hesitated.

Then—quite deliberately—I let go of the shirt and curled my fingers around his instead.

He looked at me.

I didn’t say anything. Didn’t need to.

We were two men, in an admittedly nice flat, at the end of a summer vacation. No trumpets. No saints. Just shirts, and sunlight, and a suitcase half-unpacked.

Jeeves didn’t move his hand away.

After a pause, he interlaced our fingers.

And I thought: This is it. This is the portrait.