Tipper asked.
‘Well. Strictly speaking it’s frowned on,’ the Fish reluctantly admitted. ‘But it’s all innocent fun. It’s fine as long as everyone keeps a lid on it. Know what I mean!’
Sam knew exactly what he meant. And he saw an opening for his talented cousin.
‘Do they have a man in Sinclair’s yard, Johnny?’
‘Well as it happens they don’t.’
‘Well, maybe we have the right man here?’ Sam suggested pointing his left finger obviously at Tipper.
‘Jesus, hang on a minute, Sam. I’m not sure I should be getting involved with that,’ Tipper protested.
‘Well, there could be an opening for you, young Tipper,’ Johnny persisted. ‘No harm in it.’
‘You’ll have great craic, boy. And you’ll get to know a few people. That won’t do you any harm,’ Sam pointed out.
‘Jesus, boys. I’m not so sure.’
‘How long have you been in London?’ Shalakov asked the prostitute sitting nervously on his sofa.
Like all tycoons General Stanislav Shalakov had many calls on his time. With economic interests ranging from Albanian artichokes to Zambian zinc, he travelled continually. His private pleasures didn’t receive as much of his attention as he would like. But he tried to devote one Saturday night every fortnight to their indulgence, usually in London, usually in the penthouse apartment he owned in Cadogan Square.
He never had the same girl twice. He quoted a peasant proverb from his youth: you only peel a potato once. By the time a girl had spent the night with Shalakov, she had invariably lost, in his eyes, the fresh bloom, the trembling aura of innocence that had made her attractive to him in the first place.
The shyness, the innocent aura, were all too likely to be a pose anyway, a carefully worked illusion. Most of the girls were in reality more-or-less hardened young hookers handpicked by his security chief, Harrison, for their ability to sham that precious commodity of innocence. Depending on Shalakov’s mood, they came in drafts of one, two or three at a time, and they had to be Russian speakers. He insisted on that. Shalakov’s English had been passable ever since the Red Army put him and his fellow officers through an intensive language course in the 1950s—part of the Soviet Union’s preparation for war with America. But he found it impossible to talk dirty in any language other than his own. And, in any case, he needed clarity, the knowledge that his particular requirements were precisely communicated and understood.
Ana had never intended to leave Moscow. But her mother had been made a very good offer by an agency for Ana to work in London as a secretary. And her mother needed the money to buy kidney dialysis treatment. Ana had nervously gone along with it. For the sake of her mother.
Not surprisingly, she seemed to Shalakov a good deal less calloused by her profession than many of the others.
‘How long have you been in London?’
He didn’t hear her murmured reply.
‘Speak up, girl!’
Ana had been given two options by the men who controlled her when she arrived in London. This or a beating. She was now feeling sick as she contemplated what was in store for her. And she was terrified it would show that she’d never done it before. Little did she know the Russian General would have been thrilled if he’d known the extent of her innocence.
Ana was still wet from the shower. Shalakov always insisted the girls take a shower as soon as they entered the apartment. So now she wore a robe of white towelling, and her dark hair was wet. She was sipping a Bacardi and coke. She’d already refused Shalakov’s offer of a line of marching powder.
‘I have been in London almost two weeks, Mr Shalakov.’
‘I am Comrade-General Shalakov.’
‘Yes, Comrade-General.’
She spoke in the low, submissive way that, as she’d been told, he particularly liked.
‘You’re a pretty girl. That’s good. You’re young. That’s good too. You have chosen a very simple and childish drink. That amuses me. So where do you come from back home?’
‘Kazakhstan, Comrade-General. I mean, originally. We moved to Moscow when I was fourteen. We are a Russian family, of course.’
Shalakov wasn’t really interested in all this. He was impatient to get on to spelling out the scenario he had in mind for this evening. But these preliminary civilities had to be observed for at least five more minutes, purely to satisfy his own personal superstition. He had formed the belief that, if he didn’t make some token effort to ‘get to know’ the girls whom Harrison fired at him, then their evenings together would go badly. He might even—banish the thought—be impotent with them. There was no excitement or pleasure in dominating someone you didn’t know—at least a bit.
‘Oh yes?’ he said idly. ‘So, did you like the move?’
‘No, Comrade-General.’
Ana bowed her head, studying the pattern on the Persian rug that lay under the coffee table between them.
‘Why not?’
‘I had to leave my horses. In Kazakhstan my uncle had a livery stable and I spent all my spare time there. Horses were my main interest in life, Comrade-General, my passion actually. But I was not able to ride in Moscow.’
Listening to this speech, Shalakov perked up.
‘A horse lover!’ he crowed. ‘Good, very good. I like horses too.’
He started boasting to Ana about his activities with horses: the Moscow racing and equestrian centre, his running horses with the trainer David Sinclair, and the stud farm near Newmarket.
‘It’s not doing as well as it can, or should. This is disappointing. It’s taking longer than necessary to come to fruition, because Stanislav Shalakov is a man with much else to think about. But one day I personally will rule the world of horses. Just wait and see.’
He lit a smoke from the gold cigarette case, which lay before him on the coffee table, and looked at his watch.
‘But enough of that, we must get on.’
He stood up and began pacing around.
‘I shall explain what I have in mind for this evening—’
Shalakov’s personal phone, which lay on the table beside the cigarette case, suddenly emitted an electronic melody. The number was known to just a handful of his closest associates, and the phone chirped only when something important had to be discussed. Impatiently he snatched it up and growled a greeting.
‘Daddy, it’s Nadia.’
Shalakov cursed inwardly, but the tetchiness drained from his voice. Nadia was his daughter.
