The Devil's Advocate

April 23, 1924. Wednesday.

The dazzlingly brilliant performances on Broadway’s theater district had just ended, deep in the night.

High-end motorcars lined up in front of the ordinary townhouse tucked into the alley behind them. Gentlemen in top hats and ladies in flamboyant evening gowns spilled out.

They lined up in front of the rear door as if serving as servants, carefully knocking on the door. It was a small window the size of a palm that allowed a view outside.

After exchanging a short code with the doorman, the door slowly opened.

After a while, the door opened a crack even though no one was knocking. A man with a long scar across his face peeked inside, looked around warily, then flung the door wide open.

A towering gentleman wearing a deep-felt fedora strode out without looking back.

Behind the back of Carlyle de Rocheret, the Baron de Rocheret, the door to the infamous speakeasy in Manhattan, El Dorado, closed firmly once more.

In the driver’s seat, his knight and bodyguard Massimo, half-asleep, jumped at the sharp whistle.

“You startled me….”

He blinked his startled eyes and looked around. Carlyle stood in front of the townhouse and whistled at him again. The sound sounded somehow uneasy. The golden wolf carving on the handle of the cane flashed viciously in the streetlamp light.

“You came out earlier than usual today.”

Massimo, turning the ignition, slowly turned the steering wheel. The rundown Ford Model T, which didn’t match his expensive attire, was the motorcar Carlyle used when he wanted to avoid the eyes of the world.

But before Massimo could stop the car, Carlyle slammed into the side of the road and pounded on the driver’s window. Massimo, pressed by the fierce momentum, looked up through the glass with a dazed face.

“Get out.”

“…Yes?”

The cold gaze from his sharp eyes looked down at him. The back of his knee suddenly went numb. Had he been driving too slowly?

“Don’t say it twice. Get out.”

As Massimo hesitated, Carlyle flung open the driver’s door and grabbed his collar, pulling him out.

Before he could understand what was happening, Carlyle took the driver’s seat while Massimo stumbled. Sensing the danger instinctively, Massimo hurriedly ran over and opened the passenger door. At that moment, with the roar of the engine, the motorcar shot forward.

“Ouch!”

Massimo, hanging on the door and running, threw his heavy body into the passenger seat. He barely squeezed his leg in by dodging the honking taxi cabs, then urgently pulled the door shut.

Massimo, panting, checked Carlyle’s expression. This was the first time he had seen him take the wheel himself. With two big men occupying the driver and passenger seats, the air was thick.

With a stiff face, Carlyle looked straight ahead, then roughly pushed the hand-brake lever down and lifted his foot from the left pedal. He meant to speed forward at full throttle.

Right in front of him, the iron wheels of the streetcar screeched to a halt on the tracks. Sharp noise accompanied sparks of bright blue flames.

Carlyle didn’t hesitate; he twisted the wheel to overtake the streetcar. Ignoring the policeman signaling at the traffic tower installed in the middle of the road, he passed through the intersection without stopping. Loud horn sounds trailed far behind.

Like the black night, the motorcar trailed engine roar and gasoline fumes behind it, zigzagging on the asphalt, heading toward uptown.

Holding onto the ceiling and shaking this way and that, Massimo carefully felt the holster on his waist. He felt the weight of the Colt pistol. He should have packed more ammunition.

Anyway, uptown….

“I heard the West Side gang has recently expanded its territory to Harlem. Did something happen?”

“…….”

Carlyle, driving the car with madman-like intensity, blue eyes flashing like they would spark, answered nothing.

Avoiding the slow-moving bus, Carlyle twisted the steering wheel roughly and let out a dry laugh.

He was on his way to pick up his wife. To be precise, he was going to grab his ‘temporary wife’ who had attended the ‘petting party’.

“That’s exactly right. A necking party is only from the neck up, a petting party goes all the way down there. Young men and women swap partners, kiss, and do more. The world has changed quite a lot, hasn’t it? I find such parties boring, but apparently they’re quite popular among the flappers these days.”

Kansas’s voice rang clearly in his ear. But that was a remark about what kind of woman his wife was.

Cornelia Mabel de Rocheret, acclaimed debutante of the year in New York’s high society, was a naïve and modest lady. She had never heard of a petting party.

Carlyle recalled his first night, when Mabel had cried and trembled with fear. After he promised to wait until her body and mind were ready, she had looked relieved as if she had been brought back from the dead. There was no way she would have voluntarily attended the petting party.

Unless someone had tricked her and taken her.

That damn Leslie Winthrop. The son of Dr. Winthrop, who was like an elder brother to Mabel.

He must have known the nature of the party.

Carlyle ground his teeth.

He could make him into a neckless cadaver and toss him into the anatomy dissection lab of Columbia University.

He gripped the steering wheel until his knuckles ached and loosened the stiff muscles in his neck. Mabel might have already gone home.

Once she heard it was a petting party, she would have panicked and run away from there. Now, she might be grumbling while drinking warmed milk because she can’t sleep in her room.

Carlyle let out a long sigh.

Mabel was nothing more than a hostage. When the matter was settled smoothly, he had decided to release her without touching even a single hair on her head. So until the divorce, he had the duty to protect her safely from every other man, including himself.

He had once considered Leslie Winthrop as Mabel’s next husband. But after this incident, he had permanently excluded him from the candidate list.

How could he trust a wicked man who would bring a woman like Mabel to such a vulgar petting party?

“You’re kidding, right?”

Massimo snorted and laughed.

Carlyle turned his stiff head and glared at him. Had I spoken out loud?

“Those West Side bastards have been really annoying lately.”

“…….”

At the corner of 113th Street on Riverside Drive, Carlyle turned sharply.

Massimo’s head banged hard against the window. Carlyle, satisfied with the satisfied grunt he swallowed, discovered Mabel’s town car and swallowed a string of filthy curses.

His bodyguard Ferguson was patrolling in front of the townhouse window. She seemed to still be inside.

Carlyle slammed on the brake and stopped the car, then stepped out of the driver’s seat. Ferguson turned around and smiled.

“Welcome. I didn’t let that idiot go who was hanging around Mrs. the Baron at the teahouse in front of the school last time. You said not to intervene in private matters, so I just watched. But he’s been clinging to Mrs. since earlier and whispering in her ear. Whoa, look at that!”

Carlyle’s sharp gaze followed Ferguson’s and went beyond the window.

Under the chandelier light, a young man and woman in their early twenties were dancing Charleston, legs kicking alertly, chests shaking. Lively jazz melodies and wild laughter spilled out the window.

On the shadowed edge bench, a pair of men and women were engaging in a passionate act. The man had his hands on the woman’s back and was covering her completely.

Through the man’s fingers, familiar caramel-colored hair flowed down like syrup.

Mabel.

Carlyle’s heart skipped a beat.

He leaped up the eight steps to the front door in just two strides. The doorman who was guarding the entrance scanned him and blocked his way.

“Who invited you?”

“Open it.”

“Without an invitation, you can’t… Eek!”

Carlyle grabbed his collar and threw him down. The doorman rolled down the stairs, and Ferguson immediately grabbed his neck, dragging him away toward Riverside Drive.

As Carlyle kicked the door open and entered, Massimo jumped up and blocked the front.

Inside the party hall, cheap liquor from the bathtub, cigarette smoke, and jazz melodies were mixed in a mess. He immediately headed for the bench.

“During the discussion of the divorce as grounds for annulment….”

The man lifted his upper body and rattled on to Mabel. Before he could finish speaking, Carlyle grabbed the nape of his neck and slammed him to the floor.

“Gah!”

Noise broke out behind his back, but he didn’t turn around.

“M-Master Baron? How is it here….”

Mabel hurriedly stood up and looked up at Carlyle. Guilt flashed in her purple eyes.

It was shocking.

‘Did you really come here knowing what kind of party it was…?’

The heart that had burned in the abyss was crushed like a stone that would shatter ice.

Carlyle swept her with his gaze, her face flushed. Because she had spilled her drink, the front of her dress was wet and the curves of her breasts were exposed nakedly.

While chewing a vicious curse inside his mouth, he unbuttoned his jacket and draped his own clothes over her shoulders.

“The matter was resolved earlier than I thought, so I came to pick you up.”

He glanced at Leslie, who was adjusting his body with a bewildered face.

“It seems you are… enjoying your time.”

Mabel’s gaze lingered briefly on Leslie, then returned to him.

Carlyle smiled coldly and taunted, “Would you like me to give you more time to have fun?”

The blush on her adorably lovely face vanished instantly.