Chapter Eleven #4
judge him too harshly. That kind of loyalty, even so badly
misplaced as this, is incredibly rare.”
“He’s still your father.”
That should be sacred.
Laurie closed his eyes. He didn’t know Sasha. He had no idea at all
of what it was like to be someone like that. To have inside him
that undying fire of love and duty that did not alter according to
its object’s worth. To be someone who would love you no matter what
you did. “I betrayed him,” he said suddenly, harshly, voice
cracking over the words. “Please, can I see him?”
“They won’t let you near him. And…he asked me to tell you not
to try. He has to go. Laurie, seeing you will only make it harder
for him.”
* *
*
Kucharski was right. The Dover immigration facility was a
sheer steel wall, impervious to Laurie’s attempts to get past it.
And he didn’t give up easily. He phoned and e-mailed, then got on
the coach from Victoria and went down to see for himself. He did
not want to meet with Sasha. He had taken him and Kucharski at
their word and would not inflict further harm on him. But he needed
to impress on someone in authority his own conviction that, if
Sasha were shipped back to Romania, his life would be worth no more
than the time it took Stefan Petrica or one of his hit men to find
him.
On a
bitter day between Christmas and New Year, he stood at a counter in
the Dover removals department and argued until his throat was sore
with the official behind the shielding glass barricade. He would
hire a lawyer for Sasha, he told her. Money no object—the best. In
promising this, he didn’t anticipate breaking his not-another-penny
rule. Lady Fitzroy had told him, tears in her eyes, that she would
spare no expense to help the boy she had come so close to
destroying. But the official shook her head and told him Alexandru
Petrica had been offered excellent legal counsel already, courtesy
of the Interpol agent who’d brought him in, and had refused it.
Further, there was little chance of intervention now. His
deportation order had gone through. A flight to Bucharest was
leaving in the morning.
So
Laurie went home. Not to Mayfair, where his mother was being tended
by Gibson and the private nursing staff Laurie had asked her to
bring in when Lady Fitzroy’s wild mood swings—from elation to
weeping despair—seemed to threaten her sanity, and where his father
still lay tucked away in the hospital morgue until someone found
the time to arrange his funeral. He went back to East Hill, to the
cold little flat, smiled at the meter where Sasha’s magical coin
was still bringing him light and warmth, and locked the door. He
felt very calm.
First he called Clara, who was still safe in her aunt’s
chateau, only now given the freedom of the grounds as well. She
still thought she was on her Christmas holidays and chattered away
to Laurie in the patchwork mix of English and French she always
acquired among her cousins, about the snow and Pere Noel and St. Sylvestre’s night.
Laurie responded in kind. There would be plenty of time to tell her
about the demolition ball that had swung through her family since
her departure—either that or no time at all, and either way there
was no point in disturbing her now. Elise, although bewildered and
not a little angry at the charade her sister had forced her
through, had promised to keep silence.
Then Laurie packed. It took him hardly any time at all, he
found, when he owned next to nothing. Everything he needed for a
trip of unknown duration to Eastern Europe fitted nicely into one
rucksack. With regard to tickets—well, those could fall under the
heading of the anything
Lady Fitzroy was prepared to pay to help Sasha,
couldn’t they? If Laurie could not protect him by law on English
soil, all that was left for him to do was fly to Bucharest and
intercept him there. He had no clear ideas about what he would do
if this mission succeeded. No helpful ones, anyway—just a single
thought of placing his own flesh and bone between Sasha and whoever
might come to hunt him down. Just that. That would be
enough.
He was
scanning through the battered Yellow Pages the last tenant had left
behind—having no Internet connection had knocked him back a couple
of decades when it came to travel arrangements—when his mobile
rang. He picked it up impatiently. John Kucharski was one of the
handful of people he would have picked up for at all at this
moment. “Yes?”
“All right, Laurence. Is he with you?”
Laurie
gave the question thought. Kucharski’s voice was an Interpol bark,
not the humane tone of their last conversation. Then the
implications hit him. Laurie leaned his back against the living
room wall and did not fight the desire to slide down it in relief.
“He got away.”
“Yes. He slipped his bloody leash between Dover and Gatwick.
Now, once more, son—and you should know that I am
not pissing about—is he
with you?”
“If he was, would you expect me to answer that honestly?”
Laurie felt himself smiling, heard the sound of it alter his voice,
and shut up. He liked Kucharski and had no desire to piss him off
either. He waited, holding his hand over the mouthpiece until the
agent stopped swearing and his own face was straight. “For the
record, he’s not. Send someone around to check if you
want.”
“Really? How very kind. His name is Anthony Ward, and I’m
surprised he’s not already there. Cooperate, Laurence, and he won’t
break your furniture.”
“I will. But you have to know, sir, if Sasha comes to me, I
won’t inform you. I’ll hide him if I can, or do any other thing he
wants me to do.”
“That’s great, Laurence. That’s really beautiful. Interpol is
grateful for your entire family’s cooperation, believe me. Ward is
there now. Don’t open up until you’re sure it’s him. One knock and
then three, for future reference. I’m bloody certain you’re going
to need it.”
* *
*
Laurie
stood aside and watched in silence while Agent Ward, who was built
like a brick shed but astoundingly quiet and subtle in his
movements, went patiently over his flat. It didn’t take long.
Laurie, arms folded, fought to maintain a solemn mask while Ward
looked in the few places a fugitive immigrant might hide, and then,
diligently, in the places where he could not—under the sofa, in the
kitchen cupboards. He checked the floorboards, glanced upward for
access to the building’s loft. Looked at the meter and said, with
apparent approval, “Ah, a magical coin, eh?” Then he picked up his
raincoat and left, assuring Laurie he was sorry for the
inconvenience.
Alone,
Laurie stood for a while, resting his palms on the stainless steel
draining board of his kitchen sink. It dawned on him that it was
pretty dirty. There were things he had not yet got around to doing
in this flat which he could see now needed to be done. He was very
spoiled, he knew. He’d tried not to be a messy kid growing up—aware
that, the more he chucked about, the more Gibson and her housemaids
would have to pick up after him—but nevertheless, the staff had
always been there. Basically he had no idea of what it took to keep
even the simplest living quarters clean. Letting them get into this
state was probably the best first lesson he could have.
It was
late. The shops were closed, even Sasha’s hardworking Indian
friend’s general store. Pulling open the kitchen cupboards, Laurie
saw that either the landlord or some departed tenant had left a
bottle of disinfectant and some steel-wool scrubbing pads in there.
A duster too. Under the building’s communal staircase, he found a
vacuum he assumed might be communal too, and dragged its monstrous
eighties bulk up the stairs, trying not to bump it off every riser
and wake the house.
He
worked until one in the morning. Not very efficiently, he thought,
but the place did look and smell a lot better when he was done. He
watered the plant. The electric fire was on, spreading such heat as
it could manage. For want of a change of bed linen, he stripped
what there was, shook it hard out of the window in the freezing
small hours air, and put it back, turning the duvet cover inside
out. Then, feeling that most of the flat’s dirt was now transferred
onto him, he padded down the corridor to the shared bathroom, where
the unsocial time of the morning ensured that, for once, he could
have a long bath uninterrupted.
Clean,
hollowed out, he put himself to bed.
No hopes or expectations, Sash. But I’m here. I’m
ready.