by David Linzee
Renata was performing on a bare platform, before a roughly painted backdrop of a forest, to the accompaniment of solo piano. The lights in the auditorium were as bright as onstage, so the guards could keep an eye on the audience. This was the refectory of Her Majesty’s Prison Wayland, in Norfolk.
Some of the denim-clad men seated on rows of benches were talking to each other. Others were asleep. Many, though, seemed to be enjoying the performance, none more than a man near the back who was smiling and wagging his head in time to the beat. Don’s blond hair was cut short and his skin was sallow. He had put on weight. But he was still a good-looking man.
Or so his sister thought. She had spotted him the moment she stepped on stage but had not smiled at him, because her professional standards were the same in one of HM’s prisons as at Covent Garden. They would have a chance to talk after the performance, while the costumes and props were being searched prior to being packed in the lorry. The staff of the Fidelio Foundation, the troupe Maestro Vladimir Grinevich had organized to tour prisons and young offender institutions, had worked long and hard to arrange the appointment, because it was taking place outside regular visiting hours.
The visiting room was thus empty when the Radleighs met a couple of hours later. It was a large, windowless room, with well-worn tables and chairs, and the Christmas decorations only pointed up its bleakness. Still, there were no barriers between prisoners and visitors. When the guard brought Don in, they were permitted a hug.
“I’ve been polling the audience,” he said as they took chairs on either side of a small bare table. “Rave notices all round for the opera. But there were complaints about you.”
“Were there?”
“One bloke summed up the prevailing sentiment. He said, we hardly ever get to see a beautiful woman in here, and when we do, she’s dressed up as a boy.”
Renata laughed, mostly with surprise. She wasn’t used to receiving compliments from Don. They exchanged season’s greetings, then sat smiling at each other in strained silence, until he said, “Heard anything from DI McAllister?”
The siblings had always had an awkward time getting a conversation rolling, and often resorted to shop talk. When Don had worked for the Saint Louis Opera, it had been the classical music business. Now it was the Mavalankar litigation.
“McAllister’s as slow and dogged as ever. Still trying to connect Mavalankar to the goondahs who killed Neal Marsh, and the ones who chased me along the canal. Apparently, if you pay someone to attempt a murder, you can be charged with any other murders he commits along the way.”
“So they’re hoping to charge Mavalankar for the man who got shot in the canal? What a splendid law. Good luck to them. Heard any good outrage out of India lately?”
Renata did have some good outrage, which she had picked up from the website of a Delhi newspaper. The Indian politicians whom Mavalankar had bought never tired of denouncing his British and American prosecutors as politically motivated, racist, and imperialist. The politicians he had not bought wanted him extradited to India to face numerous charges. Nonetheless, he remained locked up in a high security prison in South London.
Don was in a low security prison, because he had pled guilty to minor charges like entering the UK on a forged passport. He was being rewarded for his cooperation in the prosecution of Mavalankar for conspiring to defraud Philip Reeve and Adams University. Now he explained to Renata that the case was being delayed by a jurisdictional wrangle between St. Louis and London prosecutors. “Wherever they end up holding the trial,” he went on, “I hope my testimony can do ex-Chancellor Reeve some good. It was jolly decent of him to help wrest me from Mavalankar’s clutches after what I’d done to him. I owe him one.”
Don turned to face the wall. “And you, of course. More than one.”
Renata faced the other wall. The siblings shared a quintessentially English moment of paralyzed embarrassment. She appreciated his expressions of gratitude but had no idea what to say to them. To her relief, he grinned and said, “Did you know Geoff Archer was bunged up in here for a while?”
“You mean the corrupt Tory politician and hack writer?”
“None of your Labourite nonsense. I mean Lord Archer, peer of the realm and bestselling novelist. He wrote a book in here, they tell me. I may follow suit if I can find the time.”
“Your schedule still as busy as ever?”
“Lord, yes. I can hardly squeeze in the ordinary police anymore. It was MI5 last week. And before that the FBI and Interpol. My favorite interrogator, though, is Geraldine.”
“Who’s she with?”
“Circuit attorney’s office in St. Louis. She’s trying to build a case against Mavalankar for Hannah’s murder.”
“Oh,” said Renata.
“Geraldine has a lot of problems. Not with my testimony, of course. But she can’t get anyone to testify to Mavalankar’s involvement. Even if she can charge him, there will be problems with extraditing him. Britain shouldn’t extradite people to jurisdictions that have the death penalty, and Missouri does. That’s what the nambie-pambies will say anyway. Can’t say I see their point.”
“How are you bearing up otherwise?”
He folded his hands on the table and looked down at them. “It’s an odd sort of life. You go into a room and the recorder is switched on and you run through your crimes and follies yet again. I’m all right, as long as I’m in the room with the interrogators. But when I’m back in my cell ….”
He gazed at his hands for a long moment, then said, “I think of Hannah a lot.”
They tumbled into another well of silence. It lasted until Renata noticed that the guard, standing by the door, was looking at his watch. He would call time soon and she couldn’t leave Don like this.
“My calendar’s filled up nicely,” she said.
“Has it indeed?”
“I’ll hit the road in the new year. Lyon, Cologne, Hamburg. Rather small parts, but it’s a living.”
“Saint Louis will want you back.”
“Possibly.”
“Tell your agent to make sure they don’t skimp on the per diem. They’re bad about that.”
It always cheered him to give her professional advice, and he talked on happily until the guard broke in, telling them time was up. They hugged again. Then the guard took him away, and a moment later another guard appeared to lead her to the car park.
They were finishing loading the lorry, and the singers were dispersing to their cars. They exchanged waves as Renata walked to her hired Vauxhall. She opened the door and said, “Want me to drive?”
“No,” Peter replied. “I want to get used to this lefty routine.”
He started the engine as she fastened her belt. As they drove across the wide lot, he asked how Don was doing.
“Bearing up, I suppose. He didn’t ask about you, which was just as well. I feel so guilty not telling him you’re here.”
“You would have felt guiltier if you had told him. You’d be imagining him in here imagining us sipping egg nog under the mistletoe.”
“True.”
They stopped at the gates, presented their identification for the last time that day, and drove off across the Norfolk countryside, which was, Peter told her, flatter than the Midwest. She said, “You still haven’t told me how you can afford to pop over to London for Christmas.”
“No. I haven’t.”
“I’ve guessed.”
“I was afraid you would. Let fly.”
“You’re back at Adams PR.”
“Yes. I’m ashamed of myself, but it’s nice being solvent again.”
“I’m happy for you. You’ll be able to move to an apartment like the one you used to have.”
“I’m not rushing that. I’ll wait until something becomes available in Parkdale.”
She turned to look at him.
“No, really,” he said. “It’s a much-envied perk of being employed by Adams U to live in Parkdale, which gets more beautiful by the day. You’ll
see, come May.”
“Saint Louis hasn’t offered me a part yet.”
“They will.”
“Don says so, too.”
“We’re optimistic on your behalf. I’ll go so far as to predict the next time you’re involved in murder and treachery, it will be onstage only.”
“Amen to that,” said Renata.
* * *
David Linzee was born in St. Louis, where he and his wife currently reside. Earlier in life he lived near New York, where he sold several stories and published mystery novels from the ’70s through the ’90s: Final Seconds (as David August), Housebreaker, Belgravia, Discretion, and Death in Connecticut.
Moving back to St. Louis, Linzee turned to other forms of writing, selling articles to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and other publications and teaching composition at the University of Missouri-St. Louis.
Retired from teaching, Linzee has continued to write more than ever. He also serves on the boards of various community organizations and has been a supernumerary at the Opera Theatre of Saint Louis.
Linzee is a former marathon runner (two in New York, one in St. Louis). He prefers to cycle rather than drive, and also enjoys scuba diving. Eager travelers, he and his wife have been to Ecuador, India, and Israel, but his favorite destination is London, explaining why English characters keep popping up in his novels.
For more information, go to www.davidlinzee.com.