Chapter Sixteen #3
He has a deceptively firm handshake, and while he continues to grin broadly, I nod my appreciation. By the time I leave, midday has just passed, and I decide to grab a coffee and a sandwich before starting my search for somewhere to live.
Finding a place to rent—a task I thought would be easy—turns out to be problematic.
The first agency I approach informs me they have nothing available for two months, so I turn around and head out.
In the afternoon, similar stories are given four more times.
There are other options. Before I met Albert, I knew a couple of private landlords around King’s Cross station who rented shared rooms by the week.
I don’t like approaching them as Gabriel’s friend, but I will not rule out the idea.
I am ready to throw in the towel for today and head back to the hotel, grateful I had not checked out yet, when, as a final resort, I decide to try the agency my new boss recommended.
When I enter into an arrangement of empty desks and find the shop deserted, I am about to turn and leave when a frowning goth girl appears from the back with a cup of soup noodles in one hand.
After thumping the carton down, she orders me to sit.
Although she doesn’t appear particularly keen to help, she pulls out a map and shows me the location of three properties on their books.
One available immediately is perfect, with not more than a fifteen- to twenty-minute walk to the hospital.
Twisting around her computer screen, she shows me photos of a room with an adjoining bathroom then runs through the terms. I agree to a monthly arrangement, paying a month’s rent and a month’s deposit upfront.
I could argue the extortionate downpayment, but I am guessing she would not be the one to negotiate with, and besides, I need this place.
When I confirm payment in Euros, she calls up someone who I assume is the landlord, who agrees to let me have the keys immediately.
By eight o’clock that night, I have parted with the equivalent of two thousand pounds in cash, checked out of the hotel and moved my bag into the tiny one-bed box room. The space is smaller than my walk-in wardrobe in Eagle House, but the location and anonymity are priceless.
That evening, Romano sends me the attachment with a hint at the password.
ALPP#.
He does not have Albert’s imagination. The clue is a reference to Aksel Larsen’s passport number.
I lie back on the bed and begin looking the file over. The information is not much help, detailing Leblanc’s impressive academic record and brilliant medical career. I skip past long documents written entirely in French that I’m unable to decipher until stumbling upon a few that pique my interest.
A typewritten police report in French from the turn of the century accompanies a scanned newspaper clipping about protests in the heart of Paris.
From the clashes with police, I assume the gatherings were illegal.
One clipping shows protestors carrying banners with phrases like ‘avortement est un droit fondamental’ and ‘mon corps, mon choix’, which I assume to be pro-abortion.
A young and angry Sylvie—circled in red on the clipping—is caught front and centre angrily pushing away a policeman twice her size.
In another, she is in London protesting European participation in the invasion of Afghanistan.
All public displays of dissent point to her time in medical school, as there are no further police reports.
After that, there are letters of praise from charitable organisations for her voluntary work.
I toss my phone onto the bed and stifle a yawn. Last night’s operation for Romano had kept me awake, and today has been hectic. I know I should sleep, except the room feels unusually cold. When I reach for the room’s radiator beside the bed, the cast-iron casing is freezing.
After a steaming shower in the cramped, plastic cubicle, I dry off completely, throw on sleeping sweats and climb into bed.
Staring at the ceiling, I feel something still out of place.
Red and blue neon light from a store sign on street level bleeds past the slats of the room’s white blind.
Closing my eyes, I press the heel of each hand into my eye sockets to block out any light.
Lorenzo’s face floats into view, laughing at something I said or did.
I consider sending him a message. Until I remember Romano’s caution.
But the reality hits me hard how much I miss Lorenzo, his shared body warmth, and proximity.
I miss Lorenzo’s heat more than I miss the Tuscan sun.
Gabriel would never let his emotions distract him from anything, but Gabriel did not spend the past weeknights in Lorenzo’s bed, allowing himself to be lost to lovemaking.
I take a deep breath and tell myself that the sooner I find out what Sylvie Leblanc knows—if she can talk at all—the sooner I can return to Monticiano and, more importantly, to Lorenzo.
With that plan crystallising in my mind, sleep finally comes.