Paul nods and starts to leave, but the young woman screams, and quickly puts herself between him and the door. The old woman walks over to the door and locks it with a big iron key. She says ‘Mr Morton,’ and points to a chair in the corner. The woman opens the window and throws the key far out into the garden. Then she blows out all nine candles with a single blow. Paul struggles to suppress the urge to vomit.
The younger woman now motions for Paul to sit by the fire. Gives him a chunk of dark bread and a small glass of hot, sweet tea from a massive urn standing on the table.
The younger woman starts chopping the vegetables and salts the meat. She boils the beetroot, and the potato, making a soup. Then heats a griddle iron while she sets the table for four. Then there’s a sound of a key in the door. When he sees the big white shape on the threshold, a wave of nausea washes over him.
‘Paul,’ Mr Morton says, ‘nice to see you.’
‘Pleasure’s all mine,’ Paul manages to say.
‘Are you feeling peaky? You’re green in the face.’
‘No, I’m fine.’
‘Will you join us for dinner? Please. You must.’
‘Thank you, but I was hoping to get going. Have a couple of things, deliveries actually, I’d like to get through tonight.’
‘You will join us for dinner. Besides, I know you don’t have any other engagements. I’ve made sure of it.’
The old woman sets steaming hot food on the table. Mr Morton invites everyone to sit. Then he commands them to close their eyes and bow their heads over interlaced fingers. He prays a long, convoluted and flowery prayer to Saint Christopher. When he’s finished, he looks up at them. ‘That’s it. Your souls are now saved.’
The woman serves Mr Morton the steak along with a potato gratin, and on a side plate she cuts up the apple and the cheese for him. Then she pours him a large glass of foamy beer, and he commences to eat.
For herself, the old woman and Paul, she fills a bowl with watery soup called borscht.
Between mouthfuls Mr Morton tells Paul why he’s here. The Russian maître d’ has turned up, and he swears that the note with Ilya’s fateful numbers were different from how they usually look. This both incriminates him, as he shouldn’t know what the notes usually look like, and is probably the truth, as it was the second to last sentence in his life. Mr Morton tells Paul all this, in the same tone as if he was talking about the price of wheat or how to burn a brick. Non-committal, aloof.
The two women either don’t understand English. Or at least they pretend they don’t. All Paul can see of their reaction to Mr Morton being there, apart from fear and servitude, is the way they eye his sirloin steak.
‘Now, Paul,’ says Mr Morton, ‘I’m not convinced about this, but it doesn’t really matter. The last sentence this man said out loud was an accusation. A pretty serious one at that. I can’t know for sure he’s right, as the note itself has been destroyed, but I know from experience that I run a tight ship and that incidents like these are always down to the human element. And never to me.’
Mr Morton chews with his mouth open wide, then continues, ‘I’ve decided that even though you might not be entirely guilty, you are not entirely innocent. So, what I want you to do, which I think is quite reasonable, is to go halves with me on the money that Ilya lost me. That you lost me.’
‘I don’t know anything about this. And either way I have no money, none at all,’ Paul blurts out.
‘I know. So I’m going to lend you some, which you will then bet on yourself in a race, with rigged odds of course, and once you win, you can repay the little debt first, and then see the rest as a first payment towards the larger sum.’
‘Can I think about this? You see I’m not a betting man. Not since my father lost us our home several times over.’
‘You’re a funny man. Of course you can’t think about this. It’s been decided, this is just me being courteous enough to inform you ahead of time. I’m killing two birds with one stone.’
‘How? Is there more to come?’
‘Not for you. But you see the younger woman? She is Ilya’s second widow. I now own her and I’m taking her with me to have her installed in a place over in Ireland. She’s going to be very popular with the customers I think. Look at her bone structure.’
‘Please don’t.’
‘Do you know her?’ Mr Morton asks, looking straight at Paul, as if for clues.
‘Never seen her before.’
‘Then shut up.’
Mr Morton pushes his plate away from him, dries his chin on the tablecloth and stands up.
‘Paul I’m also a bit upset with you for other reasons.’
‘I didn’t do anything. The man must have made this whole thing up.’
‘Don’t worry your head about that. I’ve decided how it’s going to play out and I never go back on a plan.’ Mr Morton’s gaze sweeps the room. He looks satisfied in the knowledge he’s had the last word. ‘Now, I’ve got a niggling feeling you’re maybe getting to know one of my employees too well.’
‘Who? I just pick up messages and deliver them.’
‘Think hard before you speak again.’ Mr Morton looks straight at Paul.
‘You mean Silas?’ Paul says, beads of sweat running down his back. ‘I spent New Year’s Eve with him, quite drunk, if that’s what you mean?’
‘Don’t make me more upset with you than I already am.’
‘I honestly…’
‘I’m leaving now and I’m taking the woman with me, but I’m going to deal with you and this other situation once I get back from Dublin. Think hard about which race you want to win, and how much you need to bet to meet the targets.’
‘How much is it?’
‘Just win as much as you can, then I’ll let you know how far off you are. Either way I have to speak to Silas first, he’s your handler after all. I’m going to let the widow pack while I eat cheese and apple, might even get a cup of tea, then we’re off. Now run along, Paul.’
Chapter 35
Mr Morton tells me I need to make the boy more profitable. That he has transferred some of the Russian’s debt to Paul. That there will be a race in the near future I will have to place a special bet on. While I try to get my head around what this means he starts talking about medicine.
Then he mentions that he knows a doctor who’s come up with some miraculous new mixtures. A doctor who’s not afraid to experiment. I nod and say yes. I think about the strongbox in his office above the pub. I know it hasn’t been emptied between last week and now, and the Carousel has been very busy with drinkers.
He talks about side effects and necessary sacrifices. About injections and slowly upping the dosage. I nod. Say yes. Think about the coarse twine string holding up the crucifix in his white office upstairs. Fantasize about choking Mr Morton with it.
This can’t possibly continue. It has to stop. For my sake. For Paul’s sake. Mr Morton talks about opiates and some of the things he has heard that they did in the war to make soldiers more alert.
I wasn’t meant to notice it I’m sure, but between the cross, on the twine, next to the dull gleam of the nail driven into the wall, was another brighter speck of metal. A key.
Mr Morton tells me he might arrange for an associate of Doctor Heinrich Dreser to come over to England and run some tests on Paul in the near future.
I make myself reach over and shake his hand, tell him it’s about time we took the boy to the next level. This earns me a cigar and another hour in his company.
When I finally get away from the Carousel, I sit in another pub, where I’m unlikely to bump into anyone I know. I think about things. I think about the future. I try to make a plan and try to work out the odds of me succeeding. It doesn’t look good. But then again, things can’t stay the same. I have to go for broke. I celebrate with a bourbon, something I never do, but it’s time to embrace the spirit of the Americas.
I decide to tell Paul about my idea for the upcoming race, the day after tomorrow. I kno
w where he’ll be racing after all, always do.
I travel back to my house and have a bath. Think things over. Then I walk over to Portobello. Mr Morton’s revelations weighing heavily on me. I need to ignore it to deal with it. I know where I will end up and it’s a good destination. I’m angry and hungry enough to eat an honest portion of food.
I usually make a point of letting one of the little grubby boys that hang around either outside my own house, the Carousel or the house on Copenhagen Street, know where I’m going. Not that it’s their business, but Mr Morton likes to be able to get hold of me. Sometimes it’s been good to be able to say to people less than eager to give up their possessions that Mr Morton knows exactly where I am. That if I don’t report back by a pre-arranged time, things will get even more complicated.
This time though, I’ve snuck out the back. Suppose I could have told the boy a lie, but despite everything I don’t particularly enjoy a straight lie. Missing someone, being away for a little while. That’s just what happens in life. Lying about my destination and my intents to Mr Morton would quickly render me unable to walk.
I’m taking my time, enjoying my relative freedom. Allowing myself to think back, to dream ahead. I know the food will bring memories, it’s more than half the reason I go there. Some days I emerge back out into the drab Englishness a jubilant and proud strong Greek. All of antiquity on my shoulders, modern society created by me and the generations who stride in my shadow.
Sometimes the smells, the language, the sound of the bouzouki – however badly played – make my eyes water. I measure myself and my life’s progress against a different set of blueprints from most people. I am not them. I am not of this place. I might have mastered it – and if so therein lies my intelligence – but I am not of England. I like it here. Some days I even love it, but I am fundamentally torn between the two countries, always will be.
Ambling down Portobello Road, looking at things I don’t need, or want, just enjoying being on my own. It’s busy, but not dense, people are out on errands but not rushing around heedlessly. It’s something I enjoy about the British, this determination and diligence. I pet a dog, look at a cloud of pigeons settling on a roof, consider a new pair of gloves in a very expensive shop and decide to buy them before I change my mind. Kidskin, I’ve never owned a pair before but now I understand why people like them. Putting them on, I walk past a Wine & Spirit dealer, a China Merchant, an Engraver & Printer, a Hat Manufacturer, and a Slater. All jolly good at what they do I’m sure. All jolly stuck.
I try to catalogue these shopfronts in my mind. Some of them look a bit run down, maybe I should come back here and ask them if they would be interested in a business loan: Very reasonable rates of interest; Two percent per annum knocked off if you decide today; I’ll come back in a little while; Let you mull it over. That whole spiel. I know it like actors know their Tempest.
At a shop called Henderson’s Antiques, I look at prams and tea sets, inspect the welding beads of a chair made from the wing of an aeroplane, playfully try a klaxon. The man running the shop comes over all haughty. He explains I’ve just touched one of the klaxons he was commissioned to send to America. ‘The composer Gershwin if you must know,’ he says. I can tell he’s told the story before, and that he will tell it again until his grandchildren are tired of it.
‘An American in Paris, his new big piece, uses four taxi horns, made here, in this very workshop. You must have heard of it,’ he says. ‘They just came back from touring the world.’
When I politely shake my head and go to put the instrument down on the bit of felt he keeps it on, he snatches it from my hands and swats me out of his shop like I was a horsefly. I batter my way back inside and buy the damned thing. For the asking price. In cash. Then I move on, making an extra note to myself to make sure he needs a business loan in the near future.
Intriguing, though, that America keeps coming up in conversation and in my thoughts. If I was more like my mother with her streak of clairvoyance – not the showy Cranbourn Street Hippodrome kind, but the real, useful kind – I could probably make sense of some of these premonitions. As it is I stagger along blindly. An understudy stumbling over the lines of my own life, re-enacting myself.
Outside the Greek restaurant I’ve been aiming for and avoiding most of the afternoon, a small, dark man in a beret sits smoking. When he sees me he gets up and walks off, I chase off after him, thrust the klaxon at him. He takes it, as surprised as I am. He is the old man I could have become but never will. I turn back and look at a group of sweaty white men puking up ale in the gutters, then kissing prostitutes on the mouth.
The passageway down to the restaurant is daubed in white, and it smells of lamb, thyme, honey, baklava and the coffee that I will have after the food – already making my head spin a little.
My veal arrives, and it smells like a cloud in heaven. I grab fork and knife, my mouth already filling with saliva, when a boy with soot on his face and hands, hat in hand, hair in clumps, runs up to the table. He tells me I’m to go to the Carousel immediately.
I almost lash out and smack the boy in the face.
Instead I put my napkin to the side of my plate, leave a huge tip, and wave for my waiter.
‘I’ve been called away,’ I say, and here I look skyward, as if someone close to me had died. The waiter notices the money tucked under the plate, and smiles a smile that tells me he’d be fine with any explanation.
When I get to the club I am told Mr Morton is too busy to see me.
Outside in the street I hail a taxi. Once seated and alone again in the blur of people going places, I hide my face in my hands and cry.
***
Paul is surprised when I pick him up from his race in Peckham the following evening. I just tell him we have some things to celebrate, and some things to discuss. Tell him to leave the bike and get into the taxi I’ve got waiting for us.
I get us a booth at the Strand. It could have been a very nice evening. If it wasn’t for the things he tells me Mr Morton has told him. If it wasn’t for what I have to tell him, the limb I have to get out on. If he wasn’t so attractive. If I wasn’t such an old, lonely owl. After lobster and champagne for me and beef and water for him, and chocolate mousse for both of us, I lean back and try to gather my thoughts. It won’t work. My thoughts and heartbeats are like mice scurrying after crumbs of sponge cake. On the deck of a ship in a storm.
He’s visibly shaken by Mr Morton’s forced proposal. I am too. I tell him about my plan. Tell him it could be our plan. That in fact it will only work if it’s our plan. What I don’t tell him is that I want to take him with me wherever I go. That I desperately want him to see me for who I am. Someone more than a lowly moneylender, game fixer, bent landlord, debt collector.
Instead I order more champagne. Insist that I am the one to open it instead of the po-faced sommelier. Once the white foam has run down my hand, I pour Paul a glass. I know he doesn’t drink or gamble, but I think since he’s being forced to gamble maybe he will start to drink. Either way I like the symmetry of glass, glass, bottle.
I can’t tell if he’s scared, drunk or lying when he says it’s a good idea. Possibly all three. It doesn’t matter. He has agreed, and now I’m about to set something in motion. Finally I’m doing something. Finally we are doing something.
‘Let’s go, Paul,’ I say, once we’re finished. ‘I know a good doctor who can fix you up.’
After a short taxi journey we get to Doctor Sanderson, an old friend of mine. I apologise for waking him up, and explain our predicament in vague terms. The doctor just nods and heads inside to start mixing up what he needs.
Once he comes back he places Paul on his back on the floor, with his legs up on a chair. For the blood to leave his lower body and to enter his abdomen and brain.
Doctor Sanderson and I start. I use a pair of scissors to cut off his right trouser leg. Then we plaster his left ankle and shin, almost all the way up to his knee. We’re making it look like he’s been
in a horrible accident. Once we’re done I smile to the doctor and thank him. He goes to get a pair of crutches and I sit on the floor and look at Paul’s legs. Only the doctor and myself know what the two little lumps in the otherwise very smooth plasterwork are. A cyanide pill each for Paul and me. Just in case.
I take Paul to my flat. He enjoys the crutches Sanderson dug out for him, doing little tricks all the way up the stairs. I tell him to come up with a good story and to look more sorry. I tuck him in, breaking my promise to myself never to take him to my flat again. It seems like it’s been a night for breaking promises.
***
In the morning I ply him with coffee and he laughs as we come up with a plausible accident for him to have been in. If we treat it like a game, it’s actually quite funny. I ask him what he needs, tells him he’s more than welcome to stay on in my apartment.
‘I don’t want to see you,’ he says and I’m taken aback, surprised.
‘That’s not very nice,’ I blurt out. ‘Why not?’
‘Firstly, because I don’t want people to think we have anything more in common than being manager and cyclist. Secondly, because I was doing well before. I hate the house where I live. No disrespect, the new room is miles better than the old one, but I sleep badly. I’m cold, and angry at my circumstances. This fuels my desire to change things, to win. It keeps me in shape. I don’t eat too much, relax or gain weight.’
‘I see.’
‘I mean, your apartment is too nice. Too comfortable.’
All I can do is laugh at him. The gall of turning down hot meals and hot baths. Thick duvets and monogrammed slippers.
‘I’d love to one day get used to luxury like this,’ he continues.
‘And if you stayed here you wouldn’t be able to see a certain someone?’
He looks up at me, alarmed. His fear frightens me. If I’m right he’s dead. Parts of him will be strewn into the Thames.
Devil Take the Hindmost Page 25