I sat up with him while Androssoff went to eat at the self-service. Then he sat with him while I ate a salade composée in the cafeteria. The ship was rolling a bit by then, but I had got my sea legs years ago.
We docked at seven in the morning and drove straight back to the country house B&B, passing a group of festival goers with pop-up tents strapped to their backs like the wings of beetles. Stasia was in the kitchen, talking to a double-bassist who was taking part in the Dartington summer school five miles away. There was plenty more porridge on the stove but Androssoff said we’d get something on the road. He told his sister he was working on Monday and had a lot to sort out before he went back to the hospital.
Nicky looked disappointed. ‘Can’t we sleep in the tent again, dad?’
‘Your mother’s going to take you to Madame Tussaud’s. You’re going back to Switzerland on Tuesday.’
‘I am so glad I don’t live in London anymore,’ the double-bassist said to no one in particular.
‘Where do you live?’ I asked her.
‘Solihull, now. Much, much cheaper. Lovely countryside and no crowds. I studied at The Royal Academy of Music. Marylebone Road was a nightmare, so much traffic.’
‘Yes, but the park is just behind. You could go in the park, it’s lovely. I used to live near there.’
‘Come on Nick,’ Androssoff said. ‘London calling.’
21
A house had gone on sale in Chalcot Crescent. It had been let for years by the Council to a crazy artist, known locally as Cardboard Kit. I used to see him at the market picking up the rotten veg from out of the gutter. He also collected cardboard boxes, and it was rumoured that he used them for his paintings. He was legendary for his attacks on well-meaning neighbours and social workers, barricading himself inside the house and throwing rotten tomatoes and eggs at them from an upstairs window. The police were always round there, but they never arrested him. He was a local character, like Kingsley Amis and his cronies who used to drink at The Queens. They were all gone now.
‘He must have died,’ I said. ‘Or gone into a home.’
Androssoff wasn’t interested in Cardboard Kit. He had spotted an opportunity. He got straight on the phone and arranged a viewing. I said I’d go along. I wanted to monitor his expectations.
All the other houses in the crescent were painted candy colours of pink and blue and primrose yellow. The house we were viewing stuck out like a weed in a neat floral planter; its stucco still begrimed from the coal fires that had killed many Londoners before the Clean Air Act was enforced.
The agent was waiting for us on the pavement. She was a sharp-faced young woman in a good suit. She looked at Nicky and me as though we had just come up from the country which, strictly speaking, we had.
‘Dr Androssoff?’ They shook hands.
She unlocked the front door and pushed it open onto a carpet of flyers and free sheets, slushy with damp. The artist had daubed concentric circles on the wall in shades of magenta and red – similar to Rothko’s Seagram paintings, and just as gloomy. The whole place reeked of tobacco and some other pungent smell. I didn’t care to look inside the old man’s bedroom.
‘It has the original floorboards,’ the agent boasted, although most of them had been painted black. The kitchen tiles were yellow and pink, covered by a greasy veneer of filth. The lino was cracked and looked as though it harboured cockroaches. Nicky clutched my hand tight as we looked round.
‘There’s plenty of room for a family. There’s a garden out at the back and you’d qualify for residents’ parking on-street. Properties in this location can only appreciate. I can take your offer today but I won’t be able to put it to the Council until Monday.’
‘What happened to the old man?’ I asked.
She looked blank.
‘Why don’t they turn it into flats and move other tenants in?’ I insisted. ‘Three families could easily live in this house.’
‘They need to raise money for new-builds, I suppose.’ She shrugged. ‘There have been a lot of cuts, and with the Council Tax being capped ...’
Androssoff looked down. ‘What do you think, Nick? You can see the Hill at the end of the street.’
‘It’s spooky.’
‘It just needs a bit of paint, that’s all.’
‘Just a bit,’ I said.
‘Why don’t you take him for a milk-shake, Louise, while I talk to this lady?’
‘Do you think you might fill me in first? I didn’t know you were moving.’
‘You know I want a bigger property. You know why. I’ll offer four hundred thousand,’ he told the agent. It’ll cost at least another fifty thousand to do up.’
‘Come on, Nicky,’ I said. ‘Your daddy’s lost his marbles.’
At the Polish cafe in Regent’s Park Road, I sipped green tea and thought of my former homes in London while Nicky played with his Game-Boy. I had lived for years in a rented flat in Camden Town until August Stockyard bequeathed me a life-interest in an almshouse he owned in Marylebone. That house had caused a lot of problems for Androssoff and me because he hated August and rightly saw that his gift would bring me nothing but grief. Giving it up and going to New Zealand was my commitment to Chas. It had been make or break then, and it looked as though it might be make or break now.
I glanced round at the locals: resting actors, freelance producers et al, all sipping their skinny lattes and braying with self-importance. I tried to place myself in this community. Primrose Hill had been a decaying corner of North West London when Chas bought his flat here in 1981. Even a decade or so later, when I got together with him and started sleeping over, the village still had an ironmonger’s shop, a butcher, greengrocer, fishmonger, and chippy. The book shop was still here and the post office, but all the other useful outlets had been turned into quirky boutiques peddling decorative objects and designer clothes that would be out of fashion next season. On the plus side, there was plenty of greenery. I wasn’t keen on the Hill itself – it reminded me of a slag heap that had sprouted grass, but I could never think about Regent’s Park without a pang of homesickness. It was my salvation in London, a green lung.
Androssoff came into the cafe, chin up, head held high. He got himself a coffee and disrupted a group of media folk at the adjacent table as he borrowed one of their chairs and squeezed into the corner beside me and Nicky.
‘It’s feasible,’ he said. ‘The equity in the flat is worth nearly five hundred K. With the sale of the Devon flat, I’ll have it covered. In fact, I could comfortably go up to nine hundred K, but I don’t want to take on another mortgage if I can avoid it. There’d be a lot of renovation work to factor in. Horse is coming to view the house for me this afternoon. He can give us an idea about the costs. The agent doesn’t know he’s acting for me.’
‘Who or what is Horse?’
‘He’s a jack-of-all-trades – builder, surveyor, interior designer. We were at medical school together but he dropped out before the end of the first year. He’s done very well for himself in property development. He’s used to doing up places like this. He’ll give me mates-rates.’
‘You can’t sell the flat in Devon. What about Stasia?’
‘I only invested in the first place to help her set up the B&B. She’s doing a roaring trade now, especially with the festivals. She’s got the woodland burials, the winter fair, and the solstice events. We’ve not used that flat for seven years and I doubt we’d use it much again.’
‘But Stasia might not like the idea of new owners on the property. It might be awkward for her.’
‘She could use it as staff accommodation. She needs more staff on the premises. They could pay rent out of their earnings if she needed to take out a loan. Anyway, she won’t need to do that because it’s sure to be snapped up by one of her regulars.’
‘You’re very good at organising other people’s lives.’
Nicky was humming to himself while we were talking over him. We were attracting some disapproving looks, although
we wouldn’t be the only self-absorbed couple in that quarter of London.
‘And you say I’m nuts.’
‘You won’t say I’m nuts next year, Louise, when we’re living in a newly-renovated little gem. There are properties in Chalcot Square worth over two million.’
‘We live in Geneva. Are you hungry, Nicky?’ I asked him. ‘It’ll be lunchtime soon.’
‘Best get back,’ Androssoff said. ‘Horse is coming round to talk strategy.’ He scraped his chair. ‘I’m kind of hemmed in here, Louise, can you move so I can get out?’
We squeezed past the gawpers and walked towards Primrose Hill Road.
‘After all you’ve said about speculation, you sound as though you’re running a hedge-fund.’ I had never seen him so excited about anything, except the Harley-D. He had been quite laconic at Nicky’s birth. I followed him up to the flat, Nicky trailing behind me. He was very quiet. He went straight to his den.
‘Don’t shut the door,’ I called.
A smell of roasting chicken permeated the open kitchen-living room. That was all there was to the flat, apart from the good-sized bedroom and the bathroom with its lingering scent of Eau Sauvage. The living space was big though, with minimalist decor. The house had high ceilings and large sash windows overlooking the Hill.
‘How much did you pay for this place?’
‘They put it on for fifty K but I offered low and got it for forty.’
‘And it’s worth five hundred thousand now?’
‘About that. The agent said I’d have no problem selling. There’s a waiting list for flats like these. Prices round here have gone through the roof. That’s why we’ve got to act fast before some developer spots a bargain in Chalcot Cres.’
The vegetables wanted steaming, then I would take the chicken out to stand while I made the gravy. Androssoff was opening a bottle of wine when the doorbell rang.
‘That’ll be Horse. I’ll just ask him up to say hello. He won’t stay long, he’s going to view the house and then he’s going off to finish a job.’
Nicky appeared and clambered onto one of the high stools under the kitchen counter. ‘Are we going to live in London, Mummy?’
‘Not at the moment, no. We’ve got our home in Geneva.’
‘I don’t like that spooky house. Why can’t Daddy live all the time with us?’
‘He has his work here at the hospital.’
‘Why can’t he work at the hospital I went to when I fell off the trampoline?’
‘I don’t know, sweetheart. You should ask him.’
‘Ask me what?’ Androssoff said. I hadn’t heard him come back in. He was accompanied by a tall, bald man with an ear-ring and a goatee beard.
‘This is Louise,’ Androssoff said. ‘And this is the lad.’
Horse didn’t come forward to shake my hand. Nicky got down from his stool and ran back to his den.
‘You’ve scared him off,’ Androssoff laughed. ‘It must be the beard. Have we got time for a drink before lunch?’
‘Not really,’ I said. ‘It’s ready now.’
Horse grimaced at me and turned to Androssoff: ‘I’ll be in touch when I’ve made my calculations.’
‘I wouldn’t like to meet him on a dark night,’ I called as I heard the door closing. ‘You know some funny people, Chas.’
‘He’s a shit-hot builder.’
‘Please just leave me out of it,’ I said. ‘I can’t see us living in that house. I don’t want to live in London.’
‘But you’ll consider it, wont you?’ He put his arms around my waist. ‘Consider, consider.’
‘Be careful. This gravy is scalding.’
‘Nick,’ he called. ‘Go and wash your hands. Your mother has cooked up a feast here.’
22
Androssoff called the hospital on Monday morning to inform them he would be in later. Taking extra time off work to wait for an estate agent’s negotiations convinced me how serious he was about the house in Chalcot Crescent. She rang at eleven o’clock to say the Council had rejected his offer of four hundred thousand.
‘Call them back. I’ll go up to five hundred K.’
‘Mummy, when are we going to Madam Tissods?’
It was our last day in London. Androssoff could have spent it with us after all, or at least the morning.
He let the phone ring five times before he picked it up again: ‘Right. See if they’ll come down to five hundred and fifty for a quick cash sale.’
‘Get your parka, Nicky,’ I said. ‘I think it might rain this afternoon. We can walk through the park and catch a bus. Where would you like to go first, Madame Tussaud’s or The Planetarium? They’re next door to each other.’
Five more rings on the phone.
‘Any joy?’ I asked.
‘They don’t want to move from five hundred and fifty. I’ll need a bridging loan before the flat in Devon sells, unless I can get it all from this place.’
‘And move to Chalcot Crescent before Horse has fixed it up? Rather you than me.’
I was seeing a new side to Androssoff. He was covetous. He had never been like this before. He had never wanted another mortgage. The flat was paid off, but he had seen what the equity was worth and now he wanted to speculate. He used to say speculation should be criminalised, like it was under the Soviets.
‘Daddy, are you coming too?’
‘I’ve got to go to work soon. We’ve been out enough times together this holiday, Nick. Give me a break.’
As we were passing Chalcot Crescent, Nicky said: ‘I don’t like that house.’
‘You don’t have to live there,’ I said. ‘We live in Geneva. Anyway, I don’t think your daddy will get it. They want too much money.’
We walked up towards Regent’s Park, pausing on the canal bridge. ‘Look,’ I said. ‘There’s the aviary. It’s part of the zoo. It was designed by a man who was married to a princess, she was the sister of the queen.’
He didn’t look up.
‘We’ll be going past the wolf enclosure in a minute. Look out for the wolves. There, look, there’s one, look there.’ I pointed to the railings. ‘It’s going to that piece of meat. They must have just fed them.’
Nicky gave the wolf a quick appraisal, then looked down at his feet again.
‘I used to love this walk,’ I said. ‘It’s called the Broadwalk. It goes right through the park into the heart of London. Soon we’ll pass a statue and a fountain. It’s a mermaid and a big sea monster. Can you look out for it?’
‘I don’t want to. I want an ice-cream.’
‘You’ll have to look out for one then. I think there might be one at the toadstool cafe.’
‘What’s that?’
‘You keep your eyes peeled and you’ll soon find out.’
The cafe sold pre-packaged iced cream cones with red goo on top that attracted the wasps when the paper lids were pulled off. I said we might wait till we found another ice-cream place but Nicky said he wanted one of these. He tore off the paper and licked the frozen syrup. It seemed to buck him up.
‘Why is it called the toadstool cafe?’
‘I’ve always called it that because of these tables. See, they’re just like toadstools springing up in the grass.’
He walked on. He didn’t want to stand in the queue outside Madame Tussaud’s. The queue for the Planetarium was a little shorter. I bought two tickets and we went inside. It was dark in the auditorium. A piped recording of Holst’s Planets Suite played in a loop.
‘Look up,’ I told Nicky. ‘See the stars?’
A sonorous voice started reeling off the constellations in counterpoint to The Planets.
‘Isn’t that amazing?’
Nicky didn’t answer. He was dozing off.
When we got back to the flat, Androssoff was jubilant. ‘I got it,’ he said. ‘I got them down to five hundred and forty five K. They’ve agreed to take it off the market.’
‘Someone could still come in and offer the asking price.’
&n
bsp; ‘Don’t rain on my parade, Louise. What’s up with him?’
Nicky had gone to his den.
‘He’s tired after all that walking. I am too. It all seems busier and there’s way too much litter about, all those plastic coffee cups and burger wrappers – you don’t know where to put your feet. We couldn’t get in to Madame Tussaud’s. Are you still coming with us to the airport before you go to work, or have you more important things to do like exchanging contracts?’
‘We won’t be exchanging contracts for a bit yet.
‘I was being satirical.’
‘I think we can push it through quickly. The Council needs the cash. I spoke to Horse – there’s no structural work needed. I guess the Council kept an eye on that, health and safety checks. He said he could get the renovation done in a month if he prioritised the job. You know, we’re really lucky to get it. If a developer had seen it, I couldn’t have competed.’
‘You haven’t got it yet.’
‘They’ve accepted my offer, Louise. Lighten up, will you? I’m doing this for the three of us.’
‘Two of us live in Geneva.’
‘In a rented apartment. It’s a waste of money.’
‘It’s Buz’s money. He left the legacy so Nicky could go to school in Switzerland.’
‘You know that’s completely meaningless. This is London, for Christ’s sake, think of all the culture, the schools, the opportunities for Nick and you.’
‘What about the quality of life?’
‘There’s outstanding quality of life in Primrose Hill. Even you have to admit that.’
‘And the humanitarian ideal – not much of that in the City, is there? It’s all about profit and greed.’
‘It’s about investing in our future as a family.’
‘I like Geneva. Anyway, the house won’t be ready for months yet, assuming you get it.’
‘I’ve got it,’ he said. ‘It’s a done deal.’
23
In the morning, Nicky started playing up. He didn’t want to leave his den in case it wasn’t there when we came back. He didn’t want to live in the spooky house.
Fatal Choices Page 11
