Chapter Sixteen An Unwanted Dinner Guest
It had been, by any measure, an entirely unremarkable Wednesday.
I had attended three meetings, two of which could have been emails and one of which was a conference call that ended when someone's dog started barking and couldn't be stopped.
I had reviewed a document that described itself as a 'strategic risk framework' and contained, in forty-seven pages, roughly four sentences of useful information, all of which were out of date.
I had eaten a sandwich from the place around the corner that does acceptable coffee and deeply disappointing sandwiches.
I had written, then deleted, then partially rewritten a response to an internal memo about hot-desking.
I had also, in the margins of the strategic risk framework, drafted a brief profile of the man sitting across from me in the waiting area of the third-floor meeting room.
Mid-forties. Well-dressed but with a slight tension in the shoulder of his jacket that suggested he'd put on weight since buying it.
Wedding ring, recently polished; anniversary or apology.
Eyes that moved to the door every ninety seconds. Not nervous exactly. Expecting.
This is not, strictly speaking, what I am paid to do in the waiting area of the third-floor meeting room. But old habits and they are old habits, deeply ingrained, are difficult to suppress. I notice things. I catalogue them. I do it the way other people breathe: without particularly deciding to.
The man was met by someone from Legal, exchanged a firm handshake and disappeared into a meeting room. Probably harmless. You can usually tell.
I went back to the hot-desking memo.
James rang at half six, just as I was putting my coat on, this was unusual as James preferred to communicate by text, voice note, or regularly by simply turning up unannounced at my flat with a bottle of wine and an expression that suggested he had either very good news or very bad news and wanted company while he processed it.
A phone call meant something was happening.
‘You’ll never guess,’ he said, before I’d finished saying hello.
‘You’ve bought another boat.’
‘No. Well, yes, actually, but that’s not the point. Anastasia has a brother.’
I let this land for a moment. Anastasia, who had told us she was alone in the world.
Anastasia, whose entire backstory consisted of: parents dead, left Ukraine, started a company, met James.
Anastasia, who had answered Granny’s question about family with a simplicity that had made the room go quiet.
‘A brother,’ I said.
‘A brother! Viktor. They lost touch during the war. It’s all terribly sad and dramatic and he’s been looking for her and he’s found her and he’s in London and he wants to meet me. Isn’t that wonderful?’
‘Is it?’
‘Of course it is! She has family, Henry. She’s not alone. And I know it’s complicated, families always are, you should hear what Freddie’s lot get up to at Christmas, but the point is she has someone. A connection. A person from before.’
James’s voice had that certain quality it got when he had decided something was good and was not interested in hearing arguments to the contrary. I had learned, over the years, that this quality was both his greatest strength and his most dangerous weakness.
‘How is Anastasia about all this?’ I asked.
A slight pause. ‘She’s… processing. I think there’s history there. Not all of it good. But she agreed to dinner, which I think is a positive sign. Thursday. Mayfair. Viktor’s choosing the restaurant, which tells you something about the man already.’
‘What does it tell me?’
‘That he has taste. Or at least wants us to think he does. Anyway, I want you there.’
‘James, this is a family reunion. You don’t need your best man at a family reunion.’
‘I absolutely need my best man at a family reunion. I need someone who isn’t going to fall for the first charming foreigner who buys an expensive bottle of wine. Anastasia warned me he’s very charming.’
‘And you think I’m immune to charm?’
‘I think you’re suspicious of it. Which is exactly what I need. Please, Henry. I want someone else’s eyes on this.’
It was an unusual request from James. He was not, as a rule, a man who sought second opinions.
He trusted people instinctively, completely and with a speed that occasionally left me breathless.
The fact that he wanted a witness suggested that some small part of him, some survival instinct buried deep beneath the optimism, had registered that a brother appearing from nowhere, weeks after the engagement, was perhaps worth a closer look.
Or perhaps he simply wanted moral support and I was reading too much into it.
‘Thursday,’ I said. ‘Fine. But you’re buying.’
‘Viktor’s buying, actually. He insisted. First sign of a good brother-in-law.’
I wasn’t sure it was the first sign of anything good. But I kept that to myself.
???
The restaurant was in a quiet street off Berkeley Square, the kind of place that didn’t have a sign outside because the people who needed to find it already knew where it was.
A members’ club that pretended to be a restaurant, or possibly a restaurant that pretended to be a members’ club.
Either way, someone had spent a great deal of money making it look like no money had been spent at all.
James and Anastasia were already there when I arrived. So was Viktor.
My first impression of Viktor Morozov was that he was the kind of man who made first impressions for a living.
He stood as I approached, which was either good manners or a territorial instinct.
Mid-forties, I guessed, though it was hard to tell.
Lean, well-dressed in a way that suggested European money rather than English; the suit was a shade too well-fitted, the shirt a shade too dark.
He had the kind of face that was handsome without being memorable, the kind of face you’d forget five minutes after meeting him unless you were paying very close attention.
I was paying very close attention.
‘Henry!’ James was on his feet, one hand on my shoulder, the other gesturing at Viktor with the enthusiasm of a man introducing two of his favourite people. ‘This is Viktor. Anastasia’s brother. Viktor, this is Henry Vaughn, my best man and the closest thing I have to a conscience.’
‘Henry.’ Viktor extended his hand. His grip was firm, brief, precisely calibrated. His eyes met mine and held them for a fraction longer than was necessary. ‘James speaks very highly of you.’
‘He speaks highly of everyone. It’s a character flaw.’
Viktor smiled. It was a good smile. Warm, self-deprecating, the kind of smile that invited you to like him. But there was something behind it; a watchfulness, a calculation that the smile was designed to conceal. I noticed it because I was looking for it.
Anastasia watched the two of us shake hands with an expression I couldn’t quite read. It might have been anxiety. It might have been something else entirely.
‘Sit, sit,’ Viktor said, waving a hand at the table, which already held a bottle of something that looked expensive and French. ‘I’ve taken the liberty of ordering wine. Anastasia tells me you’re a Burgundy man, Henry?’
Anastasia had told him nothing of the sort.
We had never discussed Burgundy, or wine in general, or anything that would allow her to report my preferences to a third party.
Which meant Viktor had done his own research.
Which meant Viktor had been preparing for this evening in ways that went beyond booking a restaurant.
‘I drink whatever’s put in front of me,’ I said. ‘But thank you.’
???
I will say this for Viktor Morozov: the man could work a table.
Over the next two hours, I watched him perform one of the most accomplished social operations I have ever witnessed.
He was charming without being sycophantic.
Attentive without being intrusive. He asked questions that prompted James to talk about himself, his family and his plans.
James, who needed no encouragement to talk about any of these things, was delighted to oblige.
‘The chateau’s been in the family forever,’ James was saying, halfway through the first course.
‘Well, not forever. Since the twenties. Great-grandfather made a surprising amount of money out of elastic somehow and decided to spend it on French property. Mummy hates it, says it’s draughty and the plumbing’s medieval. She’s not wrong about the plumbing.’
‘And the estate in the Cotswolds?’ Viktor asked. ‘Where the wedding will be?’
‘Uncle Peregrine’s. He’s not really my uncle, some sort of cousin, I think, or maybe a second cousin once removed. I’ve never understood the removed bit. Removed from what? Anyway, it’s a lovely old pile. Absolutely falling apart, but in a charming way. You’ll see it at the wedding.’
Viktor’s eyes flickered, just briefly, to Anastasia. ‘I’m invited to the wedding?’
‘Of course you’re invited! You’re family!
’ James looked genuinely surprised that this was even a question.
‘In fact and I hope I’m not overstepping, I was hoping you might come to the stag do.
Verbier, week after next. Skiing, drinking, general mayhem.
Freddie’s organising it, which either means it’ll be brilliant or we’ll all end up in a Swiss prison. Possibly both.’
I watched Anastasia’s face as James said this. She didn’t flinch, exactly. She was too controlled for that. But something shifted behind her eyes; a tightening, a withdrawal that was gone almost before I registered it.
‘James,’ she said. Her voice was perfectly even. ‘Viktor might have other plans.’
‘The stag do.’ Viktor’s smile was slow, considered. ‘I would be honoured.’
‘Brilliant! That’s settled then. I’ll have Henry add you to the list.’ James turned to me with the expression of a man who had just solved everyone’s problems simultaneously.