It was hell of a size, the stage having two royal boxes, all gilt, gold leaf and yellow and white and red decoration around the “fourth wall”, as actors all call the proscenium arch opening.
“This practice scenery is for students from ballet and acting schools for rehearsals,” Natasha yelled. “Of course, to be thrown away when the actual performances begin later this week. A minister of culture will attend!”
She paused. We looked at her. Did she expect applause? She resumed.
“This theatre is restored in every particular. It is an example of Russian skill, and is admired by everyone from overseas.”
“It looks great, Miss Natasha,” I chipped in.
“Yes!” she said evenly.
“Is that it?” somebody grumbled in the seats behind me. I think Tour B2 expected some sort of show, perhaps the Bolshoi to come on doing Swan Lake.
“How long did it take?” I asked, trying to look calm and interested. My head was already pounding. I felt the theatre swimming round me. Giddiness started, but I stuck to my resolution. Sweat trickled, and the terrible muscle ache began. Gamely I started an enthusiastic beam.
“Four years, three months and two days,” Natasha said. “Now we have admired the expertise of restoring skills, we move to the lovely courtyard where a glass of Russian champagne which is better than that of France is offered to you our kind guests, with St Petersburg cake which is tastier than that of the Dutch…”
“That’s more like it,” said Josh Bannerman.
I could hardly move. My hands were clammy but I forced myself to stretch and yawn as our courier led the way to the exit.
“Come on, Lovejoy,” Lady Vee groused. “We’ll miss everything.”
“Go on, then,” I said, giving myself time to get moving. “I’ll race you.”
“He’s a case,” Lady Vee said, less than happy at my tardiness.
I wasn’t the last to leave, but nearly. I saw how I’d been hoodwinked, and why I was so necessary for the scam. I also saw what the scam was. I’d known all along, just been too thick to see. I must have the brains of a pot dog. I’d been mesmerised by the wine, women, shows, manipulated every single minute of the voyage. I’ve always known I’m stupid. This was my dimmest achievement.
“I do scenery like that for our village,” I said, grinning and looking full of enjoyment, trundling Lady Vee into the garden. I should have said, “The robbery is nothing to do with the Impressionists, is it? Nothing even to do with the Hermitage, either.” Except I didn’t. I was too scared, still waiting for somebody to come and arrest me.
The gardens were so perfect they were distressingly neat. Not a blade of grass out of place, not a plant on show but was blooming vigorously. People exclaimed, while they got their mouths round the cake and gulped the champagne.
I could see the lake, the small artificial islands studded with blossom. It was a glimpse of paradise. Natasha boomed information about this garden designer, that architect.
“Marvellous, wasn’t it, Lovejoy?”
“No,” I answered Kevin. “A bit dull, after the Hermitage.” Billy offered me a glass of the wine.
“We thought it superbissimo, didn’t we, Billy?” Kevin insisted.
“I do better scenery than that in our village.” I could hardly breathe, let alone swallow, but I forced a mouthful of the crumbly cake down and had a swig of the champagne. “They were obviously done in a hurry. Only students, though, Natasha told us. I use poster paints. Emulsion colours are a pig on canvas. It cracks like hell under stage lights.”
“You weren’t impressed?” Kevin looked alarmed and about to cry.
“Oh, the restoration was brilliant! I told Natasha that.” I laughed heartily, I’d show the bastards. “I thought you meant the tatty stage scenery! Even Lady Vee could do better!”
“I’ll have you know I once acted in a Strindberg’s Miss Julie in the Liverpool Playhouse!” Lady Vee chirped up.
“That the one where she says she can’t act?” I said, laughing.
“Don’t be rude!”
“Any more of that cake?” I looked about. “I’m famished.”
Billy and Kevin were looking at each other. Ivy and Victor came over to speak to Lady Vee, Ivy bringing her another glass of champagne. You’d think everybody hadn’t seen food or drink for a fortnight.
“I was extremely good,” her ladyship was telling anybody who would listen. “I was always applauded. They said my Ophelia was second to none in Oldham.”
“Ophelia only floats on the river,” I argued loudly. “Any actress can do that.”
My throat wouldn’t work and my breath was hard to shove in and out after the experience in the theatre. No wonder Henry Semper had wanted a bigger room for his fake antiques. I could practically hear my muscles screeching as I moved.
“Much you know!” Lady Vee shot back, scathing. “Lovejoy daubs a few pieces of canvas on amateur-drama sets and thinks he’s Olivier.”
“Never met a dud thespian who isn’t the world’s greatest,” I said, chuckling. I was almost falling, but I kept going so the swine wouldn’t have the satisfaction. “Did you hear Les Renown’s joke about actors? Why does an actor not open the curtains in the morning? Answer: To give himself something to do in the afternoon!”
And I laughed and laughed. I deserved a medal for my performance.
Natasha started rounding us up on the terrace to take us to the tourist shops. I looked around casually for the loos and handed the wheelchair over to Delia. I strolled off, idly thanking the ladies who’d provided us with the nosh, and slowly followed the M and WC sign. I heard the voices recede. I stood for a count of ten, then eeled into the bushes.
Move slow, stand and look, take a few even slower paces as if your attention is caught by something, then take a few more paces. Make sure you follow the direction you originally planned, minimise the sight lines from the house, and keep obstacles – bushes, trees, sheds and shade if any – between possible viewers and you.
Then move fast, once you’re unseen. Astonished, I stepped out into the street a few minutes later. I wore my tat with a swagger, like the rest of the blokes, trying to look cool – or is that slang obsolete? Once among people walking to the market, I went slower, hands in pockets, conscious I had no real plan.
The thing was to stay away from the ship, where I’d be done for. After, I wasn’t really sure of who, only how and what. The only chance seemed to try for the airport or a later ship. The Line had shore agents in each port visited, but I couldn’t trust those, and Mangot and his mob might have people waiting for me.
I entered the market near the large square, and strolled in among the stalls away from the main street. Our Coach B2 would soon be roaring past, passengers at every window. I roamed among the barrows. I was still shaking, but recovering. I’d done brilliantly, showed them all that the Yusupov Palace and its theatre hadn’t affected me one bit. I’d looked completely unaffected. I proved to the bastards that I knew nothing, that their exquisite Wonder of the World might actually be dud. And I’d escaped. I offered a prayer of thanks to Henry Semper and his death-bed warning.
For one American dollar I bought some tea and unlimited sugar. Looking cocky and know-all, I stood and sipped. Some thirty minutes later I saw our coaches roll by, and felt the world had finally got back on its orbit.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
The next couple of hours I loitered, as only a lowly antiques dealer can loiter in a pretty average market. I grew sick of Russian grandma dolls – one inside the other inside the other. I strolled among the crowd, saw one or two cackhanded pickpockets hard at it. They worked in threes, like in the Middle East. In London they go in pairs, more efficient I suppose. I felt sorry for a German couple who got done, as we say, the lady’s handbag being lifted. (The strap was sliced by scissors – new technique to me; usually it’s a knife – by No.1, the bag grabbed by No.2 and cast to the third accomplice, who legged it. Pretty slick.)
The shoppers were mo
stly Russian. Tourists, identifiable by coloured stickers, drifted in baffled groups. I ditched my own B2 sticker. I saw more roubles here than I’d seen anywhere so far, visitors using dollars. A flock of children trailed foreigners, importuning and sometimes tempted to do a little subtle-mongering of their own. I tried to look bored. I judged time by the daylight, having no watch.
It doesn’t take long to spot local customs. From the safety of the market I kept an eye on the traffic. I recognised taxis, with their chequerboard stripe and peridot-green windscreen light, but intending passengers seemed to have to dialogue his way in, but they sometimes gave up and walked away.
There seemed another technique to collar a motor: Stand with your arm doing a slow flapping motion, as if patting a non-existent child on the head. A car stops. Usually they’re those noisy sewing-machine Lada things. The driver converses, you argue back, and the Lada drives off in disgust. Or, praise be, the driver raises a hand, still disgusted, and you get in. I had no way of knowing, but supposed they were fixing a price. Since I couldn’t name my destination, I was immobile.
Another local custom seemed to be highly skilled spitting. Men were adept, hawking up and expectorating with accuracy. I wished I could do it. I saw one bloke spit at, and hit, a flowering weed from a distance of several paces. I took warning from this: don’t duel in St Petersburg. Pushkin should have heeded. They also did a certain amount of expelling nasal mucus by pressing one nostril … I’ll not go on.
The thought occurred that I should leave the market, get some distance between me and the locality where I’d hoofed it. I decided against it. Police might pick me up and demand what I, a gungy stranger, was doing roaming near elegant houses of the rich. I’d be for it, or, at worst, put back on the Melissa. I had no illusions, now I knew what the scam was and what part I was to have played in its finale.
For what seemed hours I drifted, avoiding butchers’ stalls because they make me queasy. As I went, trying to look unemployed, I did that truculent look most Russian blokes my age seemed to adopt. One or two came up and, holding up a droopy fag, muttered in Russian, presumably for a match. I moved off as if annoyed; I wasn’t to be bothered by riff-raff. One bloke even tried to pick my pocket. I harrumphed as if to say what a pillock he was, trying it on with me and nodding amiably at where I knew his accomplices would be. He raised a hand in mute apology and edged away, probably assuming I was just another subtle-monger.
When I was faint from hunger – must have been well into the afternoon by then – I scented familiar fried food. I was too scared to try any of the small stand-up nosh bars in case I gave myself away, but was getting close to despair. At the northern edge of the market, where the Metro station was and the Moskovsky prospekt ran into the big open place, I saw a sign familiar the globe over, instantly recognisable. No cutlery, but the fastest food on the planet. I hadn’t known they had them in Russia too. My heart warmed.
If possible I avoid meat. These days they say chips must be a foot thick or they kill you with saturated fat. Thin chips are death. Worse, quick nosh corrupts and is infected and stifles Planet Earth. What choice had I, though? I forgot all the health warnings. Here was a grub place I might understand. International cuisine, however badly it is talked down by posh chefs, became my instant hero. It had saved my life once before, in the USA late at night when there was simply nowhere else to eat. I’d had a long journey, and was starving, just like now.
A queue snaked onto the pavement. I was willing to wait. I saw a few tourist-looking people inside, and heard American accents. Some looked non-Russian, meaning they didn’t wear the same sombre colours as I, and one or two exhibited coloured lapel stickers. Refugees from some coach mob, I supposed, off cruise ships – there were two others in the harbour. I’d had them pointed out. I wondered about talking to them, perhaps claim I too was a true-blue tourist. I was saved this risk by seeing some Russian youth, in similar drossy gear as I, try his luck engaging Americans in conversation. They shucked him off sharpish, even though he’d acquired a sticker. Maybe their couriers warned them?
My turn. The menu was in English and Russian. I asked for a load of everything, paid in dollars, and sat and gorged myself on chips with everything. The tomato sauce was bliss. Reckless with the salt, I wakened taste buds dormant for decades. I love bread, and had everything in a bap. Tea-logged from the market, I couldn’t face yet more Russian tea, and thoughts of coffee were too daunting. I settled for cola and milk shakes. A long time afterwards, I went to the loo and then went round the nosh a second time.
It was pretty crowded. Time had gone faster than I’d supposed. When did Melissa sail? I was unsure, too het up to remember mundanities. If she cast her mooring in, what, eight hours, Mangot and his mob would somehow have to invade the Yusupov place, remove all that scenery, and somehow transport it to the wharves and load it into the ship’s hold, all with the approval of the captain and port authorities.
Except, port authorities would be compliant, because of the bribery hereabouts. And the captain might control the ship, but what went on aboard her was in the hands of others. Like, the Cruise Director ruled show-business and entertainment. The Hotel Manager controlled catering and nosh. The Purser and Executive Purser ran the money, and money was paramount. So if they shipped some cargo, it would be done without question as long as it was legal and the right papers were signed.
Especially if the stuff looked like innocent designs for some manky stage production, and the sections were properly crated. Easy to handle. If, I guessed roughly, there were forty or fifty crates, so what? A ship of 75,000 tons could accept that without a wobble. She took on 2,000 passengers in three hours without batting an eyelid, and another 700 crew. What was a box or two?
Weakening, I went to the counter to justify my staying there. They’d given me change in roubles, and that went on fluid. The late afternoon sky lost its edge, the weather turning cold. A smattering of rain speckled the window panes, and still the St Petersburg folk crowded in. Odd, seeing their own nosh stands were brilliant from what I’d seen, but maybe this nosh was in fashion.
With wistfulness, I saw the last of the Americans leave, calling out to each other that their ship sailed at seven, or the hotel coaches would be leaving soon from the Bolshoi Theatre. Evidently an anti-culture brigade.
My choices were two. I could get a taxi to the airport, mill about there pretending I was early, or late, for some flight somewhere if anybody asked. Or I could loiter until dawn, then go to the Embassy … but then what, claim political asylum? Or was that the other way round, what strangers did if they wanted to stay forever in a country? Or, probably safest of all, turn up at the Embassy and say I’d lost my way (this was it) and strayed from my coach. Then, what, fell asleep somewhere? Or say I’d been mugged, been unable to find my way back to the quaysides knowing no Russian? Not bad. I’d only to lurk in the shadows. With luck, I could stay safe until the morning.
Watching the sky turn grey, then dusk, then night with the lights of St Petersburg coming slowly on here and there, I felt a certain magic.
Cruelly the nosh bar closed. It was down to me and Russia’s old capital city. Survival of the fittest.
* * *
If I’d got Melissa’s midnight departure right, Mangot’s thieves would have only a few hours of darkness to lift the stage scenery from the Yusupov Palace theatre. That meant they couldn’t simply pack it into some boxes then lorry it across the city, crane it aboard and batten it down or whatever they did to cargo before setting sail, at least not until the city slept. Say, nine o’clock to midnight? Three hours.
So they’d be too busy to search for me, once they realised I’d gone missing. Still, they could blacken my name. I’d just not be there to get arrested for whatever they’d frame me for. Easy enough. I’d done similar things.
I reminisced in the dying market, thinking how to bubble Purser Mangot. Bubbling is our word for landing somebody in trouble while you look innocent. This is an example of a classic bu
bble: A lass called Devvie stole money from a children’s hospice, a place for sick children. It was the usual fraud. Devvie was a bonny antiques dealer in Crouch Street, facing the Capitol cinema. She bought some worthless drinking glasses and had them engraved with grapes and vines, less than a penny a glass, and sold them “In Aid Of The Children’s Hospice” for a fortune. She did other scams. Of course, her pure motives touched our hearts.
Devvie’s Fund Raisers became a feature of the landscape, because people dig deep for ailing babbies. Her antiques shop burgeoned. Such a charitable lady, you see. She began to live the life of Riley, holidays, toured Europe, bought a pad in the Costa Brava, got one of those long cars that are all engine and nowhere to sit.
Then one day a genuine hospice collector – standing in the Arcade selling paper flags at fivepence a time – asked for help. A ward would have to close, see, if money couldn’t be found. The government, so pure were they, told the Hospice to get stuffed. He asked me if I would sell a few nick-nacks. I said sure, and asked should I combine it with Devvie’s next sale. He asked a terrible question. “Who is Devvie?”
“That antiques dealer in Crouch Street who supports your hospice,” I said, gormless.
He thought. “There’s a gypsy in Rowhedge who helps us with bric-a-brac. Don’t you mean him?”
No, I didn’t. The penny dropped. Devvie had kept the entire proceeds. We’d simply helped the bitch feather her own nest. She’d taken us all for idiots, me most of all because I’d divvied multo things and brought the money in. That year had been one long headache. She simply made away with the gelt. She had to be bubbled.
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