The Buddha of Brewer Street (23 page)

He was on his knees, tidying the papers, a half-empty bottle by his side, when there was a knock at the door. He turned. It was Elizabeth.

He swore.

‘And greetings to you, too, Tom.’

‘Sorry. Not quite the candle-lit welcome I’d planned,’ he apologized. ‘Been bloody burgled.’

‘Have you called the police?’

‘Doesn’t seem a lot of point. I’m not sure anything’s missing. And they didn’t break in, the lock’s not damaged.’

‘A professional job, then?’

‘Not very professional if they chose me as a target!’

‘Unless they knew who you were, that it was you.’

‘Of course they did.’ Sod it.

That was why he couldn’t call the police. He was a target, too, and there would be too many clumsy enquiries – about god-kings, about the Chinese connection, about Kunga. He couldn’t tell them about Kunga; it might end up killing him. So he wouldn’t tell them anything at all. Oh, but why tonight of all nights, when the only thing he wanted to dwell upon was Elizabeth? He looked across the room, she was all ankle and thigh and – oh, bugger the burglary. It was time to get shot of this Tibetan tangle. He had no time for all this. OK, so the Tibetans were decent, but also chaotic, and Tibet was a million miles away. What did it matter to him? Not as much as Elizabeth. He’d done enough – no, too much! Time to wash his hands. He was about to tell her of his decision and put his life back on course when he was interrupted by a persistent, almost violent ringing of the bell downstairs. It hesitated, but started up again almost immediately. Then, through the night, came a wretched cry of despair.

‘Daddy …!’

Goodfellowe found himself flying down the stairs three at a time, almost tumbling in his haste. Sam was kneeling on the step, Edwina standing behind her. There were tears on her face, and blood splashed on her blouse. Her clothes were dishevelled, she seemed to have vomited and her hair … Her hair was grotesque, like the Medusa, and for a moment he could not move. Then, with all the tenderness he could find, he gathered her in his arms and guided her up the stairs.

Sam stood trembling and speechless in the middle of the room. Edwina sobbed quietly. Goodfellowe was in turmoil. Then Elizabeth was beside him, taking control. This is woman’s work,’ she instructed, ushering him aside and leading the girls in the direction of his small bathroom.

‘It’s all right, Daddy,’ Sam whispered over her shoulder, trying to find a brave smile. ‘I haven’t been raped, nothing like that.’

He closed his eyes and felt sick inside. ‘I’ll call the police.’

‘No, Daddy! Please, we’re all right. No questions.’ Not about why they had come to London or where they had been. So for a change both father and daughter found themselves of one mind – no police. But it was with great reluctance and more than a little doubt that he allowed the phone to fall.

It hurt, how it hurt. He was her father. This shouldn’t have happened, not to his daughter, not on his doorstep. Somehow he had let her down. Again.

Yet perhaps in all this there was something to hold on to. Sam, in trouble, had come running to him. That made him feel a little better inside. And she appeared to have accepted Elizabeth’s presence without qualm or question. That might yet prove to be the brightest blessing of all. Later, after the women had re-emerged and Sam and Edwina were reliving and only modestly reinventing their ordeal for him, Elizabeth busied herself with making coffee, finding tissues, being an unobtrusive comfort.

It was also Elizabeth who voiced the fear that had been lurking in Goodfellowe’s mind. ‘A burglary and an attack. All in a few hours. You’re going to tell me it’s coincidence, Tom?’

‘Tell me again, Sam, what he said at the end. The leader. As he attacked the one who …’

‘Who pawed me? He called him a little banana. What did he mean, Daddy?’

‘Banana? A Chinese insult. Yellow on the outside, white on the inside. And bent.’

‘Then he said, that’s not what they had come here for.’

‘Oh, Buddha,’ he moaned. ‘Do you understand what this means?’

‘That it wasn’t an accident. They knew who I was. That I was your daughter.’

‘My fault. All my fault.’ Remorse flooded his voice.

‘Don’t be silly, Daddy.’

‘I’ve been helping save Tibetans. It’s caused a lot of trouble. I was going to give it up. I shall have to stop now.’

‘Not bloody likely,’ retorted Sam.

‘What?’

‘Give up? Because of this?’

‘Of course because of this.’

‘You want them to win?’

‘No, but I can’t have you—’

‘Daddy, you think it’s the first time I’ve been felt up in a dark alley?’

The veins in his neck bulged in alarm.

‘Although normally I don’t take on six guys at once,’ she continued. Edwina managed to muster a giggle. Not much of a joke, but in the circumstances any joke was better than tears.

Was this what he paid thousands of precious pounds for every term? he wondered. But there was also pride. She was a fighter.

‘Honestly, Daddy, you can’t stop just because of this; it’s all the more reason to carry on. And somehow it helps to know that it was for a purpose, for you. Much better than having been chosen at random.’ She put her arms around him and squeezed, like she used to when she was half her age. ‘Look, no harm done.’

He looked down upon his daughter’s hacked and savaged hair. ‘Can you forgive me?’

‘On one condition, perhaps.’ She buried her head in his chest.

‘What condition?’

She looked up, her eyes sparkling through tears. ‘That you pay for my hair extensions.’

She was laughing at him, the laughter running like spring water and washing away their pain.

‘The girls have missed their last train, Tom,’ Elizabeth reminded him, practical as ever.

‘They can stay on the sofa.’

‘Then you’d better call Edwina’s mother and explain.’

As he helped the girls prepare the sofabed, he kept turning the events in his mind, examining them from all sides. There were no coincidences, only connections. He had no doubt that the burglary and the attack were intended to be a warning to him to stay out of the Dalai Lama matter. They wanted him to know that next time, perhaps, Sam might lose more than her hair. But how did they know about him and what he was up to? He had no public connection at all with Tibet. Yet, as always, the Chinese seemed to be one step ahead, to know everything that was going on.

He telephoned Edwina’s mother, explained simply that they had missed the last train, nothing to worry about, that he would make sure Edwina ate something other than chocolate for breakfast – ‘Thank you, Mr Goodfellowe, preferably fresh grapefruit and a little Earl Grey with lemon; she’s so casual about her diet.’ – then turned to find the girls already clambering unselfconsciously and exhaustedly into their bed. He, too, felt as though he had been folded a hundred times. And the papers were still scattered everywhere. He swept them up in his arms and threw them into a pile for the morning.

Wearily he finished off the last glass of wine and put away the unlit candles. They would have to do for another day. He looked round for Elizabeth. As he did so the last of his energy drained through the soles of his shoes.

She was at the door. Coat on. A mournful smile that seemed to twist her full red lips in sorrow, an expression of both disappointment and determination in her eyes that brooked no argument. She stood only across the room but might have been a million miles away. And growing more distant. Then, without a word, she was gone.

Goodfellowe was not a man long on patience and neither was he a creature of the morning. By the time he had got the two girls roused, restored and off to their train, he was already grinding his teeth and in need of a little pampering. So he wandered down Gerrard Street to Chou’s place for some tea. Like Goodfellowe, Chinatown woke slowly. The mid-hours of the morning were still sleepy, almost gentle. Goodfellowe sat himself down with a newspaper and a pot of tea while he watched Chinatown stir itself and come slowly to life.

Chou’s restaurant could best be described as rudimentary, dressed in an assortment of cheap veneers and gaudily coloured lights, and frequented largely by Chinese who used it as something of a social club. Far more business was conducted across the tables by his customers than by Chou himself, but this caused him no great concern. It gave him contacts, enabled him to keep many friends and, in the margins of their friendship, to maintain a sound investment portfolio. And the modest surroundings helped keep the tax man off his back.

Not that everything was harmony. At the rear of the restaurant, full-scale hostilities had broken out in guttural dialect between Chou’s wife and the fishmonger who was trying to get her to accept the day’s delivery of fish. Chou was keeping well out of the way; he preferred the quiet life. Which was why any Westerners who came through his door with push chairs were told the place was full up – ‘No room! No room!’ he would gesticulate, shooing them off – while he allowed in any number of Chinese children. They knew how to behave themselves. Unlike Western kids. Or his wife. He lit a cigarette and drew deeply, filling his lungs and getting the kick-start to the day that would see him through until the small hours. He smiled encouragingly at Goodfellowe. Chou was an inveterate chatterer. He always had something to say. Goodfellowe waved him to a seat.

‘Trouble?’ Goodfellowe enquired, nodding in the direction of the battle.

‘My wife say prawns look …’ – he struggled for the word – ‘unhappy. It happen every day.’

‘Then why not fire the fishmonger?’

‘No, no, Mr Minister! He my best friend. Come from same village in Hunan.’ Chou smiled broadly through crooked teeth. ‘Prawns always very good. Frozen very fresh.’

‘So why the row?’

‘Just business. My wife want to make sure prawns are also frozen fresh tomorrow.’ He shrugged philosophically. ‘Marriage is business, too.’ Chou had no intention of intervening; the fishmonger would have to earn his money the hard way.

‘Everything is business in Chinatown, Mr Chou.’ Goodfellowe chuckled.

Chou nodded enthusiastically, and a thought began to rattle around in the back of Goodfellowe’s head.

‘Tell me, if I had lost something very precious, or even someone, a person, and I wanted help looking for him, could I get any help? Around Chinatown?’

‘Sure-sure.’

‘How?’

‘Chinatown like a big notice board, Mr Minister. You want something. Somebody find it for you. For a price.’

‘And if I wanted a lot of help. In a hurry?’

‘Sure thing, Mr Minister. Bigger hurry, bigger price. You want something, you let me know. I put word around for you. I good at putting word around.’ He beamed. Being a gossip of gargantuan proportions was part of his trade, and he was a master at it.

Goodfellowe studied his cup. ‘And what if I wanted something a little unorthodox? No questions asked. If I had made a bad friend, for instance? Wanted him to feel … uncomfortable?’

Chou nodded thoughtfully, his head grown heavy, along with the price. ‘Then more money. Up front.’

‘And if I had made a very bad friend …?’

Chou drew once more on his cigarette, enveloping himself in a cloud of blue haze. At last he reappeared, smiling, with a mouth full of broken and badly stained teeth. ‘Very bad friend, very good business.’

‘You could help me, Mr Chou?’

Chou’s smile suddenly shrivelled. This sounded all too much like a leading question. ‘No, not with very bad friend. For that you go elsewhere. Four or five places in Chinatown for such very good business. Clubs. Families. You know?’

‘You mean gangs. Triads.’

‘Perhaps.’ Chou thought he had already said too much but did not wish to give offence. ‘But no good for you, Mr Minister. You not Chinese. Sorry.’

‘That makes a difference?’

‘Don’t mix with Chinese bad boys, Mr Minister. Look, Chinaman want to screw Chinese girl, you go ask barber and he give you address in Queensway. Westerner want to screw a Chinese girl and price double. Then she take him to hotel where she says she has a room. But front desk suspicious, she explain. So she get him to wait outside back door while she go round front to open it. You know what? He still waiting at Christmas.’ Chou began to laugh, hoping that the tale had diverted Goodfellowe’s enquiries. ‘Anyway, she probably not Chinese but Filipino. So don’t mix with bad boys, Mr Minister. Or bad girls!’

Goodfellowe nodded indulgently. ‘I shall accept your advice in everything, Mr Chou. Including the prawns.’ Chou looked relieved. ‘But if I were Chinese, with bad friends, I could get help in Chinatown?’

‘Maybe.’

‘A lot of help? An entire army, perhaps?’

The answer dribbled out slowly. ‘May-be.’

Oh, no, concluded Goodfellowe, no maybe about it. For sure. And someone had done it. Got themselves an entire private army roaming the country looking for one small boy.

‘I hadn’t realized there were so many – how can I put it? – possibilities in Chinatown.’

‘Two hundred thousand Chinese in Britain. Plenty possibilities, Mr Minister.’

Two hundred thousand, thought Goodfellowe. And barely two hundred Tibetans. A thousand to one. He hadn’t realized the odds were so immense. Or that it might be so easy to get someone burgled, battered or even burnt out.

You could do anything in Chinatown with money. Buy a woman, a man, a life.

Or a child.

Mickey arrived carrying a pile of mail, behind which were lurking two new shirts. She had a habit of bringing him items of clothing – shirts, sometimes a sweater, and since he’d begun to trim up in the gym even some exotic underwear. She had a cousin in the trade, she told him, which was true, who gave her samples, which was only half the truth. The items were inexpensive, for what they were, but not free. Her treat. And, for the sake of his male pride, her little secret.

Goodfellowe was a challenge. It wasn’t that he enjoyed being unkempt, more that he had mislaid the art of looking at himself critically. With a wife in a nursing home and a daughter at private school, the end of most months left him with little to look at other than bank charges. His own needs came so low down his list of priorities that all too often they simply dropped out of sight. So Mickey helped. In little ways. And usually without Goodfellowe knowing. Getting deals on office equipment. Making sure he claimed all his allowable expenses – and, it had to be admitted, occasionally some that might not have been technically allowable. Finding a dry-cleaners that didn’t kick the stuffing out of his suits. And, of course, fresh shirts and ties. His life was a mess, but he didn’t have to look it. Not all the time, at least. Not until his next bike ride in the rain.