Mission London

14

“Your Excellency!” Robert Ziebling exclaimed, from the very threshold of the office, “I cannot begin to express how delighted I was to receive this invitation.”

The Managing Director of ‘Famous Connections™’ seized the Ambassador’s hand and proceeded to shake it fiercely. He was of average height, slightly over forty, with thick, unruly ginger hair. A pair of fashionably thin glasses, with yellow lenses, were wrapped around his face. He was wearing a severely cut, single-breasted jacket, buttoned to the neck, which gave him a military air.

“Please, have a seat,” Varadin responded woodenly, nodding to the heavy leather suite that graced the forward half of his office.

He waited for Tania Vandova to serve the tea for his guest, and began warily, “I received an excellent recommendation for your agency from Dean Carver.”

“Oh, yes!” Ziebling nodded energetically. “He is one of our regularclients. Avery original man. Such a tireless imagination…!”

Varadin blinked bewildered. “Mr Carver let me know that your agency has connections at the highest possible levels…” He continued hesitantly, “I won’t hide from you the fact that that is precisely what interests me. As you can see, my own connections are purely official, which imposes certain restrictions…you understand, of course.”

“Of course….” Ziebling began to nod.

“The possibility of less formal ways of communicating has always interested me,” the Ambassador added. “Sometimes such connections can turn out to be far more fruitful than official ones.”

“That’s usually how it happens,” Ziebling agreed, and asked slyly, “And in which sphere do your interests lie exactly?”

“Excuse me?”

“Our network of connections is tremendously wide,” explained Ziebling. “That’s why they are grouped into different categories. For example, Show-biz stars: Spice Girls, Elton John, Boy George, Mr Bean, Benny Hill…”

“Wait a moment!” cut in Varadin. “I thought Benny Hill was dead?”

Ziebling stared at him shocked, “So what if he is?”

“Excuse me?” Varadin was confused.

“Aristocrats are, of course, in another broad category,” continued Ziebling unperturbed. “As are the politicians, Lady Thatcher, Gorby. We also have some very effective contacts in the Catholic line of things.”

“You have connections with Lady Thatcher?!” Varadin was awash with respect.

“All the time!” proclaimed Ziebling. “Did you know that she is an extremely sought-after lady. Such style! Such an iron hand!”

“I don’t doubt it,” muttered Varadin.

“She is fully booked. Naturally, one can always find a slot, but, usually she has ongoing engagements.”

“I assume that is not cheap?” Varadin narrowed his eyes, amazed at his own audacity.

“Good investments are never cheap,” Ziebling, shook his head sagely. “Let’s be serious, these things last a lifetime!”

“That’s true,” Varadin nodded timidly.“ All the same, how much?”

“My dear, we are not talking lettuce in the supermarket here!” Ziebling warned him playfully. “It all depends on the character of the engagement. As well as its duration: one hour, two, the whole evening. Who the client is, of course, is not without importance either. To sum up, every offer is treated individually.”

“I understand,” the Ambassador nodded.

“You see, we do not wish to profit from chaotic, short-term contacts!” Ziebling was on a roll. “When we create a particular connection, we look at it in a larger perspective. For that reason, connections made with our help are usually stable and last a long time, often for years.”

“Most impressive!” whispered Varadin.

“And so, Lady Thatcher…?”

“Actually, no…It concerns the Palace.”

“Ahhh, the Palace,” Ziebling nodded again, then continued, “Well, why not? We often work with them.”

“We are organising a charity concert,” Varadin began timidly, “and we would like Her Majesty to grace us with her presence.”

“Her Majesty?” Ziebling raised his eyebrows.

“Exactly!”

“An interesting choice,” Ziebling clasped his hands together thoughtfully. “Audacious. Of course we can arrange it. I don’t see any problem with that. However, this concert concerns me a little. What exactly did you have in mind?”

“Well, a charity concert, you understand,” replied the Ambassador, confused once more. “For Bulgarian orphans.”

“Orphans?” Ziebling sounded worried. “Do you mean minors…?”

“Mmm, yes. At least I assume that they are under eighteen….”

“I cannot allow them to participate in the entertainment!” Ziebling’s tone brooked no argument.

“Of course, they won’t participate,” agreed the Ambassador. “They’re in Bulgaria, aren’t they? You see, they are merely the reason for the event…We want to gather together the most select audience. High Society, as such.”

“Uh-huh,” nodded Ziebling, relieved. “Fine. We have plenty of experience with similar undertakings. It’s beginning to look like a very ambitious project.”

“That’s exactly what it is.”

“We will have to work out a preliminary scenario,” continued Ziebling. “We have a specialist who deals with just that. He’ll get in touch with you in the next couple of days. His name is Thomas Munroe.”

That’s what I call a business-like approach to things, Varadin thought. Maybe Carver would turn out to be right.

Robert Ziebling left the office in high spirits. He even shared a joke with Tania Vandova, who seemed a little worried.

Varadin decided that he should take advantage of this brief moment of partial satisfaction (the satisfaction was never complete and never lasted long), to sort out some family matters that had been left to one side in the haste of his departure. He ought to call his wife. This was something that he had been carefully avoiding ever since he set foot on British soil. There was no way to erase it from his mind, and in fact he had no intention of doing so. He looked at his watch: it must be almost 10 am in Sofia now. A good time, he decided, dialled the number and waited. Would she still be in bed? When had she gone to bed? What had she been doing until so late?

“Hello?” a confident male voice answered.

Varadin stood open mouthed in shock, but did not say anything. Nor did he put the phone down.

‘Hello…?’ repeated the voice, suspiciously this time.

Varadin listened carefully, straining to hear better. The man at the other end started to do the same, so the only thing to be heard for several seconds was the hiss and crackle of the line. Then both of them put the phone down almost simultaneously.

“Wrong number,” Varadin told himself, less than convinced.

He dialled again. This time a sleepy female voice answered.

“Hello, Nadya, did I wake you?” he asked, relieved.

“Hello, yeah, pretty much. Are you calling from London?”

“What do you think?”

“From London, or else it would have been the doorbell ringing, I know you. Why are you calling?”

“I want you to come,” his voice brooked no denial. “I need you. I hope you’ve thought it over.”

“Yes, I’ve been thinking quite a bit.”

There followed a short pause.

“So you’ll come?”

“No, of course, I won’t.”

“We are talking about London, in case you happen to have forgotten.”

“We are talking about the London Bulgarian Embassy,” she put a special emphasis on those last two words. “There is an important difference.”

“What’s this load of rubbish?” he hissed.

“You heard!” snapped Nadya. “I don’t like the environment and that’s that; I still feel sick when I think of your last mandate. Not to mention the previous one! All those holes stink as badly as each other, no matter where they are. It was that way before and nothing has changed, nor will it because this half-arsed country hasn’t changed a bit!! D’you get what I’m saying here?”

“Nadya, Nadya!”

“Ahh, so you don’t get it then?! You think you’ve got God by the beard, but in reality he’s got you. And you know where? By the balls, the nuts, the privates. And he’s slowly crushing them. Squish, squeeze for fifteen years now. You’re not the man I married all those years ago. Now you’re like someone who’s had a steam-roller go between his legs. You all get that way after you spend a few years in that mill! I, on the other hand, don’t intend to be a part of all that. I’m not going to be one of those misanthropic little women, who accompany their husbands for cocktails, and spend the rest of their time at female get-togethers and organising charity events. Finita la commedia!”

“You’d rather rot over there then!”

“YOU are not telling ME where to rot!” she yelled. “I’m going to the UAE.”

“Where?”

“You’re the diplomat, you should know: the United Arab Emirates.”

“What are you going to do there?” Varadin felt stung.

“I found myself a job in a clinic.”

“You’re going to work as a doctor?”

“Exactly, that is what I’m trained for. I’m leaving in two months. You’ll have to send me some money.”

“Forget it!”

“Then I’ll just have to send your old Communist Party Membership Card to certain department chiefs….”

“My old Communist Party Membership Card? There’s no such thing.”

“You wish! I fished it out of the trash. I can courier it to you, if you send me five hundred pounds. I’ll need them for my lawyer.”

“Bitch!”

“Don’t piss me off, small fry! You go calling me at some ridiculous hour of the morning, wake up my boyfriend, then wake me up as well, and to top it all you then talk shit down the phone. I told you, it’s over. What more do you want?”

“Bitch!!!” Varadin repeated helplessly.

Hearty laughter gushed from the other end of the line. “You woke me up nicely; Ciao for now!”

The line went dead. Varadin shook the phone as though he wanted to shake all the negative energy out of it, then put down the receiver. First privatized Embassy was what percolated through his mind. But all he could vocalise was the number 100.

“100!-100!-100!”

Doctor Pepolen did not allow for numbers outside the framework of 1 to 100 — that was the iron rule. However, there existed no categorical statement that numbers could not be repeated, and thus Varadin often bent the rule by pouring out his spiritual turmoil in small packages of 100, fired off like a machine-gun, until he emptied the well of his anxiety. Dr Pepolen was unaware of this little innovation, otherwise he might have banned it.