Chapter Eight
Laurie
drove Sasha to the Guidance Council offices next morning. The
ten-minute journey took half an hour in crawling traffic, and the
congestion-charge cameras glimmered hungrily at the sight of this
new, unregistered licence plate, but the trip had only been an
experiment. Outside the offices, they laughingly declared it a
failure, kissed passionately over the handbrake, and Sasha ran off
to try the entirely new sensation of being late for
work.
Laurie
watched until the security desk had passed him safely through. He
now knew he'd done a bloody stupid thing in buying this car. He
couldn't quite remember the leaps and throbs that had taken place
in his brain yesterday to make him think it was okay. He'd been
forgiven, but maybe part of that had been due to Sasha's
exhaustion. Well, all they had to do was get through their
respective Fridays. Then Laurie would use the Merc like the most
expensive hire job in the world, run them about for a carefree
weekend, and put it up for sale on Monday.
He might
as well enjoy it until then. The salesman had thrown in a satnav to
sweeten the deal. The gadget looked ashamed of itself,
sucker-footed onto the sleek 1970s glass, but the route to Gunari's
postcode showed Laurie a nice straight run down Brixton Hill.
Rehearsals didn't start till two. Probably there were fifty
enterprising restaurateurs named Gunari in London right now. Still,
there was no harm in taking a look.
He
leaned to start her up, and noticed his mobile—also looking alien
against the vintage dash—flashing an email message. He read it
idly, one eye on the traffic warden threading the parked cars ahead
of him.
He thought it was spam at first, or a joke. Not like Sir
Ralf's communications, where you could turn over a sheet of creamy
A4 in your hand to test their authenticity. Ivory Gate Studios,
their UK division. Douglas Brett, producer of the
Blood Moon trilogy, had
seen Laurie in performance at the Queen's, and been impressed by
his ability to convey the latent terror in the All's Well production. Casting for
the next sequence of Blood Moon
movies would begin on Wednesday at IG UK, Ealing.
Brett couldn't make any guarantees, of course, but needless to say
the success of the franchise was such that Laurie would certainly
find any association with it worth his while.
Laurie shook his head. He tossed the mobile into the Merc's
glove box, and looked up just in time to see the traffic warden
bearing down on him. He flashed her a smile, revved the engine and
pulled out. Blood Moon? What had Arnie said—over my undead
body? That was pretty funny in retrospect,
though Laurie had been too distracted to get it at the time. Arnie
would stamp up and down making the glassware rattle, denounce the
brain-drain Hollywood machine that lured good stage actors from
British shores.
But Arnie was gone. If Laurie wished to be lured or drained,
he could do so unhindered. The traffic was clearing a little now:
he edged the Merc through a hairsbreadth gap between two taxis and
borrowed the bus lane as he sailed past Westminster Abbey, enjoying
the sudden free movement. He didn't wish, of course. He had just
landed the theatrical role of the decade, and the
Blood Moon films were
idiotic, the kind of thing Clara would have adored and made him sit
through with her until his hair and teeth fell out from the toxic
effects of it. Still, it was nice to be asked. To be noticed from
the far side of the planet by one of its wealthiest production
companies... He'd reply later, he decided, sailing out across
Lambeth Bridge. The answer would be no, but if he was going to be
his own agent from now on, he had to make sure such approaches met
with a civilised response, better than a form note from Hamlin
still looked as though he should be
heading up a neo-Nazi march, his tight leather waistcoat helping
the impression along. He was unshaven, blond stubble glinting
metallically in the sun, and dragging on a cigarette as if his life
depended on it. What had happened to him after the raid on the
Birchwood camp? John Kucharski had told Laurie that none of the
Roma travellers had been detained. Laurie didn’t even know if
Gunari associated him with Mama Luna’s death.
It was too late to worry about it now. After glaring blankly
past him up the street, Gunari was starting to focus. He shaded his
eyes, and Laurie lifted a hand in an attempt at a casual greeting.
He didn’t feel casual. Not like a top-flight young actor just
summoned to Hollywood fame, that was for sure. His spine was still
sweat-damped from the stress of getting lost in a redbrick maze of
terraces just like this one—yes, he knew Streatham Green, but not
its hinterland dormitory suburb—and trying to park a bright-red
sports car inconspicuously by the treeless, wasteland kerb. A group
of kids had been eyeing her up before he’d even got the roof
properly shut, not a problem he’d have had if he’d come here on the
Tooting Bec Tube. Well, she was insured, and in the hands of the
car gods now. Laurie had his own problems. “Latcho, Gunari,” he called. “Not sure
if you’ll remember me, but—”
Something small and muscular shot out of the hallway behind
Gunari. It passed him at knee height and cannoned out into the
road. A near-miss with a speeding taxi didn’t even slow it up. It
launched itself at Laurie, gargoyle face contorted in a
snarl.
The best way to take such a hit was to roll with it. Zaga
didn’t leave him much choice. Age hadn’t mellowed her, and Laurie
went down hard on the tarmac, shielding his face with one arm.
“Zaga,” he gasped. “Latcho, Zaga. Good girl, good
girl.”
The
bulldog switched tactics. She quit trying to chew his face off and
began to lick it frantically instead, her breath enough to strip
his skin from the bone. A shadow fell across Laurie, who paused in
his defensive manoeuvres long enough to look up.
“Dog remembers.”
Gunari
was grinning almost as widely as Zaga. He stood in the road, hands
planted on his hips, clearly enjoying the scene. “Uh-huh,” Laurie
managed hoarsely. “Don’t suppose you’d get her off me, would
you?”
“Maybe. Dog has good memory for faces, once eaten. Me, I need a
hint.”
“Birchwood camp, two years ago. I came to you when—”
Gunari grunted. Then he let loose a great roaring laugh. “You!
Little Sandru Petrica’s polone!”
Laurie
knew what that meant now. The last person to use the name had been
holding a knife to his throat, and he found he didn’t mind it from
Gunari. All a matter of perspective, he supposed. He nodded.
Gunari, still chuckling, gave Zaga a poke in the haunch with one
steel-toed boot, and the dog went placidly to sit beside him. “Poor
little rich boy. I remember. Your pa didn’t kill you,
then?”
“No. He died.” Laurie watched Gunari’s face cautiously, waiting
for the links to form. But to his surprise, the grinning mask
softened. Shock? Sympathy? Laurie couldn't read him. He took the
hand Gunari held out and got up, dusting grit out of his clothes.
“It's okay,” he said. “He wasn't any loss. Did you have to close
your restaurant?”
“Close?”
“It's all boarded up.”
“Boards are because of stupid kids and riots. At night, boards
down. Kenna Gunari does grand trade.”
“Oh. Good.” Laurie found himself stuck for conversation. He
couldn't introduce his mission out here in the street, and Gunari
showed no signs of inviting him in. Zaga was still panting and
drooling on his foot. Glancing at the restaurant's unpromising
frontage, Laurie noticed an orchid in a bowl in the first-floor
window, and an unexpectedly fashionable set of curtains. “Do you
live here? In the flat above the shop?”
Gunari released another of his short, startling roars of
laughter. “In flat? Dark, cramped, like hen in coop? No, I rent
flat to stupid gaje who like to tell friends they live with gypsy. Who think
fashionable to live here on shitty street with no trees. No, you
come with Gunari. I show you where I live. I show you.”
Laurie
followed him. He had little choice, since Zaga was herding him,
nudging his ankles with her bony brow. Gunari led him through a
dark hallway, whose peeling paint and fusty smell did not prepare
him for the gleaming kitchen that opened off from it. Laurie had a
glimpse of copper pans hanging from ceiling racks and an array of
formidable-looking meat cleavers and knives. Then he was stumbling
out into the light again, Gunari striding proudly in front of him.
“Here,” he said. “Like Mama Luna. Not like gypsy—like Roma
travelling man.”
The grim
little terrace backed onto a sweep of waste ground. The rows behind
had been demolished for some project never brought to fruition, and
beyond their rubble lay the Clapham railway lines, a chaos of
parallels gleaming in the sun. Here, within the limits of the
tumbledown barbed-wire fence that informally marked off one
property from the next, Gunari had set up camp.