Portobello (14 page)

But when he had gone she thought, as Eugene had thought
before her, that it was silly and verging on the paranoid to suspect
every stranger of nefarious behaviour. He was just a poor boy who
needed to supplement his probably low income.

It was Saturday evening when Gemma arrived, the very time of
all times when Lance calculated she couldn't possibly come.
But there she was on the doorstep, looking more beautiful than
ever in a diaphanous maxi-dress with low neck and puff sleeves,
her long blonde hair piled on top of her head and a rose tucked
among the curls.

Lance was struck dumb with joy and longing. He could only
gaze.

'Aren't you going to ask me in?' She stepped briskly over the
threshold without waiting for him to answer. 'My God, what a
pong. You've not taken up smoking, have you?'

Lance found his voice. 'It's Uncle Gib. He gets through fags like
there's no tomorrow.'

'Probably isn't, for him,' said Gemma. 'Where is he, anyway?'

'Gone to a senior citizens' social. They're mostly seniors at his
church.'

Gemma wasn't interested. 'Where's your room, then?'

An hour later, sitting up in Lance's bed, they started on the
bottle of Cava Gemma had brought with her. It wasn't until this
point that Lance came round sufficiently from his state of bliss to
enquire who was minding the baby.

'Fize is. He's really taken to Abelard, says he's like his own son.'

This, to Lance, was like a jet of cold water in his face and
enough to wake him thoroughly from his euphoria. Sympathetically,
Gemma poured him more wine. 'You're going to give him the boot,
though, aren't you?' said Lance. 'Get rid of him and have me back?'

'Ooh, I don't know, lover. Maybe one day. It'd be like awkward
right now.'

'But you said . . .'

'My idea's much better. We'll have an
affair
, you and me. I'll
come round here in
secret.
Won't that be great?' She looked around
the room, curling her lip. 'I'll get this place cleaned up a bit. It's
disgusting.'

'It'll have to be Sunday mornings when Uncle Gib's at church.'

'What's wrong with that? Mum'll have Abelard. She don't work
Sundays.' Gemma brought her mouth to his in a long deep kiss.
'I've never had an affair,' she whispered. 'It's always been relationships
everyone's like known about. Boring, really. This way'll be
romantic.
'

Another hour later Lance heard Uncle Gib come in. They'd have
to be very quiet getting Gemma down the stairs. Faintly he heard
Uncle Gib singing 'Jesus Wants me for a Sunbeam' and then the
television started. Gemma got up and slipped on her dress and
shoes with remarkable speed. Her hair had come down and she
left it to stream over her shoulders. It amazed Lance that a girl
could get up to what they'd just got up to – three times too – and
emerge looking like she was ready for a photo-shoot.

Footsteps sounded on the stairs as they put their heads out but
it was only Dorian Lupescu on his way to the top floor. He nodded
to Lance and Lance nodded to him but they didn't speak.

'Who's that?'

'Guy who lives upstairs.'

'Hot,' said Gemma, casting Lance back into the depths.

Ella was looking for the key to the side gate. She had checked
the hooks in the garage where various keys hung and glanced
into the shed at the end of the garden. Keys were also kept
in a drawer in the kitchen but it wasn't among them. She asked
Eugene.

'In the lock on the gate.'

'No, it isn't. And it's not in the garage or the shed, or with the
other keys in the kitchen.'

'It doesn't matter, does it? The gate's always bolted on the inside.'

'Yes, but I don't like the idea of that burglar having it and I'm
sure that's who's got it.'

She wasn't quite sure. For a man with so many valuable possessions,
Eugene was very careless about security. She hadn't been
aware of this before she became engaged to him. It wasn't a character
trait that affected their relationship. In the future she would
see to the safety side of their living arrangements, so that was all
right, but meanwhile where was that key? When she came to think
of it, what was the point of the burglar keeping the key? He would
know the gate would in future be kept bolted and expect bars to be
put on the windows at the back of the house. Whatever Eugene
might say, he had probably put the key in some unsuitable place in
the house.

If she couldn't find it, she'd have the lock changed. That was
only prudent. With no surgery that morning, she waited till Eugene
went off to the gallery and began to search the kitchen. That was
where it very likely might be, dropped into one of the many drawers
by an absent-minded man who wouldn't think twice about getting
it mixed up with cutlery or microwave operating instructions or
teacloths. But it wasn't among the knives and forks or lying on
top of an oven glove. Ella did a good deal of tidying-up as she
searched, always conscious of the fact, and very happy to be
conscious of it, that in a few weeks' time this would be her home
as much as it was Eugene's. She folded the cloths more neatly,
put the cooking implements in a different section from the forks
and spoons, and the knives in the empty knife block. Squatting
down to search the unlikeliest of places, the area at the base of
the oven where baking and roasting tins were kept, she took hold
of a kind of flange to hoist herself up – really, she would have to
join a gym; being stiff in the joints at her age was a disgrace –
but found herself pulling open a drawer. A secret drawer – who
would have thought it?

It was empty but for two small orange-and-brown packets
containing sugar-free sweets. Chocorange, they were called. Ella
took a sweet out of the already opened packet and put it into her
mouth. Rather nice. Probably left behind by Carli the cleaner, she
thought. Carli was always on the lookout for things to satisfy her
appetite but help her lose weight. Ella finished searching the kitchen
but the key still eluded her. It looked as if changing the lock was
inevitable.

Eugene had sold two John Hugons bronzes, lovely things he
was almost sorry to part with. They would have looked beautiful
in his drawing room and Ella would have liked them. Leaving
Dorinda in charge, he went off to have lunch with a woman artist,
an exhibition of whose work, tiny paintings rich in gold, silver and
copper lacquer, he was going to mount in the gallery. Lunch was
to be at a restaurant in Knightsbridge and on his way he called in
at Elixir and bought three packs of Chocorange.

His intention had been to resist temptation. His intention was
always
to resist temptation, although the phrase 'phasing out' he
had abandoned. Lately, he had been seriously cutting down, largely
the result of having Ella with him most of the time. Saturday and
Sunday had passed without a single sugar-free sweet but on Monday
he had eaten several on his way to the gallery and three more while
Dorinda was out at lunch, almost returning to his usual pattern.
Just one pack remained in the secret drawer, four in the spare
bathroom cabinet and two in the drawing room. The cache behind
the E. M. Forsters must stay there untouched. He envisaged a
time when he was over this, when it was all behind him and he
could, with ritualistic pleasure, take that bagful and drop it in the
waste bin on the corner of Pembridge Road.

But that time wasn't yet. The craving had been very sharp this
morning. He was also hungry. The breakfast he had eaten was
inadequate to satisfy him until lunchtime but if he ate twice as
much, which he would have liked, he'd start putting on weight
again. Chocoranges were a substitute for real food. He had brought
a full pack out with him, eaten two sweets on the way, two more
surreptitiously, telling Dorinda he had a sore throat, and now three
more on his walk to Elixir. He knew that if he didn't replenish his
by now meagre kitchen, bathroom and drawing-room stocks he
wouldn't be able to resist breaking into the store in the plastic bag
behind the books. And somehow doing this seemed to him to
signify the beginning of the end. What he meant by 'the end' he
wouldn't have been able to say, but it included such concepts as
'downfall', 'crack-up' and total abandonment to a loved, yet hated,
habit. The Chocorange sweets in that bag were sacrosanct, never
to be touched. So he could persuade himself that buying three
more packs in Elixir was a prudent measure, postponing or avoiding
altogether the final weakness. And now he had the three in his
briefcase, he need not be careful to restrain his consumption of
the sweets in the pack he had brought out with him. In spite of the
one he had put into his mouth before entering Elixir still remaining
there as a sliver between the side of his tongue and his back teeth,
he helped himself to another whose rich creamy taste was so much
stronger and more delectable than the fragment that had once been
as delicious as the newcomer. Philosophising as he often did on
the nature and constituents of his addiction, Eugene considered
what makes a habit and what a dependency and, concluding that
in his case the former had finally become the latter, entered the
restaurant where he ordered a sherry to take away the taste and
the smell of chocolate. It was a reversal of the accepted order of
things. Instead of chewing a sweet to disguise the smell of alcohol
when he opened his mouth, he was drinking alcohol to hide the
smell of a sweet on his breath.

The house opposite the one with the bamboo was up for sale.
The owners had moved out, removing curtains and blinds from
the windows. Lance sneaked round to the back where he tried the
handles of the back door and a glass door, which opened out of a
living room. Both were locked but he had known they would be.
Telling himself that no one cares much if you break a window
in an empty house that's going to be sold, he picked up a large
flint which, with a hundred like it, formed the border of a circular
flower bed. He took off his jacket, wrapped it round the flint
and slung the wrapped stone against a glass pane in the back
door. After that, he pushed his hand through the gap he had
made, unlocked the door and let himself in. He made very little
noise and what he had made had apparently gone unheard by
neighbours.

Inside, all was empty and forlorn. A large wooden crate served
him as a seat by the front-room window. From there he could
watch the house opposite. It was only then that he asked himself
precisely what he was looking for. The old woman to go out?
Suppose she was out already? The house had no garage and there
was no car on the short driveway. But she was about a hundred
years old and people of that age often didn't have cars. Lance had
been on the watch for no more than five minutes when the rain
began. It started as a drizzle, then became torrential, creating a
sort of fog through which nothing on the other side of the street
was discernible.

Like most summer rain – of which there had been a great deal
lately – the shower lasted no more than ten minutes. It cleared
and the sun came out, blazing on the wet pavements. That made
him think of Gemma who'd been complaining that this weather
she couldn't get her washing dry. Fize had promised to buy her a
tumble dryer but so far he hadn't done anything about it and meanwhile
it was always bloody raining. She had come round twice
more to visit Lance in Blagrove Road, though the first time there
had been very little time for the affair aspect of things as she'd
spent two hours cleaning his room, taking down the curtains to
get them washed and changing the sheets. But the second time . . .
The only alloy in Lance's happiness had been another encounter
with Dorian Lupescu on the stairs. Gemma had made no comment
on his appearance but Lance hadn't liked the look on the Romanian's
face, his eyes rolling and his lips pursed up as if for a silent whistle.

While he was thinking of ways to get rid of, or make Uncle Gib
get rid of, the upstairs tenant, but keeping his eyes on the house
opposite, the old woman came out of her front door, carrying an
umbrella and pushing a shopping trolley. Heading for the Portobello
probably, Lance thought. You wouldn't go up to Westbourne Grove
unless you wanted to buy clothes or CDs or make-up and this
woman was too old for any of that. He watched her go off in the
direction he had predicted. For someone of her age she walked
very fast.

That meant she wouldn't be long. Still, he wasn't planning on
anything major today. All he wanted was to get a good look at the
place; from the back, in daylight. No one would do anything about
the window he'd broken for days, maybe weeks. Lance locked the
back door on the inside and let himself out of the front door,
pulling it closed behind him. The old woman's side gate wasn't
locked, couldn't
be
locked, he saw when he was on the other side
of it. No keyhole, no bolts. The back door, however, was locked
but a window was open. She must be losing her marbles if she
thought there was any point in locking that door when she was
leaving other easy means of access. He soon saw that she wasn't
all that foolish, had calculated that no human being was thin enough
to squeeze between the casement and its frame.

Lance was very thin, he had a narrow concave chest and no
hips worth speaking of. He took off his jacket and then his T-shirt.
Still, his shoulders got stuck and he had a moment of panic when
he thought she might come back and find him trapped there, she
might have to send for paramedics or, worse, the police. But by
wriggling and contracting his upper arms, folding them across his
still tender ribs, he got himself through, his shoulders scraped and
burning. His poor hand wasn't right yet and now it had begun to
ache – but no pain, no gain, he said to himself, quoting Gemma
in another context. He found himself in a sort of laundry room
from which a doorway led into the kitchen, a large place equipped
with all sorts of ultra-modern stuff, quite surprising in a woman
of that age.

What wasn't surprising was the glass jar full of money he found
in a cabinet. That was the kind of thing these geriatrics did, kept
the housekeeping in a jar or tin. Knowing that she was behaving,
in one aspect at least, the way old people should behave brought
him a sort of comfort. The money wasn't all small change. There
were fivers and tenners mixed up with the coins. Lance stuffed
most of it into his jeans pockets, leaving only two- and five-pence
pieces. With that and what he'd been saving out of his takings
from the fat woman's handbag he might have nearly enough to buy
Gemma a tumble dryer himself. That would be one in the eye for
Fize . . . Nearly a quarter of an hour had passed since he had seen
the old woman go out and ten minutes since he got through the
window. He ought to be out of there within half an hour of her
departure. Old people didn't eat much and she might only be
buying a chop for her supper and a packet of biscuits. Thinking
of food made him realise he was ravenous. Saving up for Gemma's
present had made him cut his rations and he'd been relying on the
meagre pickings provided by Uncle Gib. He opened the fridge. A
large frosted chocolate cake had pride of place in the front of the
middle shelf. Saliva flowing, Lance cut himself a slice with one of
her kitchen knives, stuffed it into his mouth with both hands and
cut another. Uncle Gib had once told him that it was usual for
burglars on breaking and entering to eat the food they found. He
found himself wanting to be like other burglars, to be a professional
and do it right.

He cut a third piece, carrying it with him into a huge lavishly
furnished living room and leaving a trail of sticky brown crumbs.
He made for a desk, lifted up the rolltop and contemplated the
contents. No money was to be seen but there were two credit
cards right in the front and a chequebook. Better not touch them
now. Twenty minutes had gone by and Lance thought that if he
turned the cake round so that the side he'd cut slices off faced
the other way, she might not know he'd been there. After all, he
had entered but not broken in. Half-starved for the past week,
he felt a little sick. Put the small change back into the jar and just
keep the notes. A change of plan with regard to the cake would
be to take what remained of it with him. He found a carrier bag
and dropped it in. She wouldn't notice now. Old people had terrible
memories, lots of them halfway to Alzheimer's, and she'd think
she'd eaten the cake or, more likely, never made it.

From the living-room window, peering out between the
festoons of lace and velvet curtains, he looked up and down
the empty street. No reason why he shouldn't let himself out
of the front door. When he came to think of it, nothing else was
possible; if he went by way of the back door there was no way
he could lock it and leave the key in place on the inside.
Cautiously, he emerged into the front garden, toting his carrier
bag full of cake. His nausea was passing. At first he had thought
of dumping the cake in the nearest bin but a little foresight told
him that next day he would be hungry again and a slice of it
would be very welcome as dessert after one of Uncle Gib's first
courses of black pudding and fried egg.