Chapter Twenty
The Captain returned from his shower wearing a black silk robe and a pair of riding boots. There were red dragons embroidered on the robe, crawling upward toward the massive slabs of his pectorals. It was a rather feminine sort of garment for a man off his background, something he had probably acquired while stationed in Asia. It would have looked absurd on a lesser man, but it was long enough to spare the world any view of his heavily furred legs above the knee-high boots. I was oddly reminded of a Cossack, a comparison inspired by his bristling moustache. He carried a lit cigar in one hand and a glass of brandy in the other. He had been gone awhile, and his face was a bit flushed. The brandy was likely a refill.
I had been waiting for his return as I had been when he lef
