Mission London

19

The cook had had a bad day. When he had finished his culinary duties, he was effectively free and could mess about as much as he liked. Which obviously annoyed the Ambassador. Varadin ordered him to paint the bathroom and the toilet at the residence. The cook was deeply displeased by this unusual task, but had little say in the matter. From time to time he found some excuse to go to the Embassy to check on the freezer. The battered old chest rumbled deeply in the depths of the kitchen, its lone red eye flickering. Having verified that all was well, the cook would then lock up the kitchen and return to his brush. He tried to phone Chavdar in the evening, but got no answer. And his mobile was switched off. The evil bastard’s hiding! He knew that when things slow down, they often head for disaster. The whole business with those ducks had looked dodgy to him from the very start, which was why he had wanted his share up front. They had duped him. Now he had a load of ducks but not a single penny in his pocket. His salary had run out two days previously. They were living off the remains of the last reception and the small savings that Norka managed to squirrel away.

Chavdar Tolomanov called the following day, in the afternoon. It was evident from his voice that he was not doing so of his own volition, but because some extreme circumstance forced him to. He was against the wall. He sounded frightened. “We have to meet up straight away!” he said quickly.

“What’s up?” asked Kosta, all his awful premonitions crowding round.

“I’ll explain, come over! I’m in the bar of the Consort, you know where it is, right?”

He knew. The Consort hotel was directly opposite the Embassy. It was owned by a Serb, for whom Chavdar had worked for ages, until they had eventually become friends. The hotel looked no different from the other well-maintained facades on that side of the street. It was equally unremarkable on the inside, although well kept; it was patronised by middle-of-the-road tourists, and Balkan citizens who foundthemselves in London fora varietyof reasons. It was reputed to be a nest of spies, and the diplomats avoided it as a rule. But that was not the case for the staff. In the Consort one could find work on the sly, trade in various small items, and on the whole it was a priceless source of supplementary income.

“Your health, Simich!” Kosta waved to the barman, who was mixing some cocktail behind the enormous bar.

“Good day,” Simich nodded.

He was a strong, blue-eyed, horse-faced Serb. He was wearing a short-sleeved shirt, with a black bowtie and played with his cocktail-shaker as though it were a hand-grenade. It was rumoured that Simich was wanted for crimes he had committed in Bosnia, but that did not stop the cook from providing him with cheap cigarettes from the Embassy. Simich always paid cash. Chavdar was sat at a small tablenearthewindow.Thebarwashalf-empty. Thecookapproached like a black thundercloud. His hands were spotted with paint.

“Have you got the cash?” he asked.

“Sit down,” Chavdar nodded.

The cook sat down unwillingly, the question still in his eyes. The actor looked worried and pale. He looked around and said in a low voice, “They nailed Batushka!”

“What?!” the cook’s eyes popped out of their sockets.

“They nailed him,” Chavdar repeated.

“How do you know?”

“Here, look at this!” Chavdar pulled out a paper and opened it before the cook’s eyes.

“Hmmm,” he mumbled; the headlines meant nothing to him. Chavdar pointed to a picture in the top right-hand corner, and read the following text, ‘Crime Wave strikes the West after Fall of Berlin Wall. Yesterday, at 6.30 pm, whilst leaving the Vodka restaurant, Azis Nikolayevich Asadurov, a citizen of the former USSR, was shot. Asadurov owed money to the Russian mafia, and had been hiding in the UK, according to police sources.’

The face in the picture bore a striking resemblance to their mutual acquaintance. But Kosta was not convinced, “Are you sure it’s him?”

“Hundred percent!” the actor was agitated. “I haven’t been able to contact him for the last two days. He’s disappeared off the face of the Earth. I knew there was something about him. He was so secretive.”

That was the actual truth of the matter. The personal life of Batushka was hidden in murky fog. Chavdar had no idea where he lived, nor even what his real name was. They had met in the Russian restaurant. Mobiles had been the only link between them.

As they were hiding in the Botanical Gardens, he had regarded his accomplice’s angular face and asked himself why he was getting involved in such chicken-feed deals when he was obviously destined for much greater ones. But then, as they gathered the drugged ducks from the ground and stuffed them into the bags, he realised that Batushka saw no difference between the robbing of the Bank of England, the hijacking of the Trans-Siberian Express, and poaching in the public park. He had known the wasteland outside the law, and nothing else interested him.

“What are we going to do now?!” cried the cook.

Chavdar rustled the paper and showed him another headline, “It’s on about us here!”

“What does it say?” asked the cook worriedly.

“BARBARIC ATTACK IN RICHMOND PARK”

“Shhh…”

“Don’t worry! It says here, ‘the investigation is bogged down.”

“Well, I’m not so sure,” Kosta was gloomy. “We’re done for. Did you bring the money?”

“What money?!” exploded Chavdar. “Batushka promised to get a deposit from the Chinese. But what we planned and what actually happened…”

“Get it yourself!”

“I don’t know them. They were his people.”

The cook clenched his fists instinctively. He wanted to smash Chavdar’s face in. “And what the fuck are we supposed to do with these ducks now?! And your mother!!” he hissed maliciously. “You got us into this mess!”

“How come I’m to blame?” retorted the actor indignantly. “They’re in no danger of going off, are they?”

“They can’t stay there forever!” Kosta shouted.

“We’ll shift them, mate!” Chavdar reassured him. “Bit by bit, here and there.”

“Won’t the Serb buy them?”

“I’ll talk to him,” said Chavdar, nodding. “You ask at our restaurant.”

“Well, at least we’re not going to starve,” moaned Kosta, his voice laced with a hidden threat.

Chavdar threw him a frightened glance. “Hey, pal, we’re still partners aren’t we?!”

The cook said nothing. He suddenly felt a surge of power. He was in control of the situation. He had both the ducks and the knife. Fucking actors!