His routine was invariable. He arrived at the office at eight and spent precisely seven hours on his allocated work. Since he brought a sandwich with him and ate it at his desk, he was through his work by four, when he turned with eager anticipation to whatever was his current out-of-hours project.
Conroy ran a tight ship and required his staff to run past him not just the tax returns with which they were struggling, but those they had approved. This process not only provided quality control but also occasionally threw up an unexpected and interesting fact that provided the basis for an informal investigation. Conroy didn’t just work at the office: if he felt he was venturing into worlds he didn’t want to explore on his computer, he would follow up at home, often with the help of a well-placed phone call to an old comrade. And he also believed in occasional on-the-spot spying.
He had first become interested in Oleg Sarkovsky when the approved tax return of his butler, Joseph Taylor, landed in the in-tray. Conroy’s latest project had just come to a satisfactory end when he was able to tip-off the Border Agency that a Clapham restaurant—which claimed to have three employees—was operating mostly on the labour of illegal immigrants.
Conroy noticed that Taylor lived in the most expensive part of Kensington, but had a very modest salary, and he wondered why. A check on the electoral roll showed him living there alone, so Conroy spent some time finding the name of its owner, which proved to be a company registered in the British Virgin Islands which had not disclosed the names of the directors.
It took only a couple of hours to identify the owner and occasional resident as Oleg Sarkovsky. Conroy didn’t like what he learned from an ex-comrade who was well-informed about Russian oligarchs, so he set himself to find out everything he could about him. By now, he thought he almost had him nailed.
***
Hortense was in animated and distressed conversation with Fortune and Pringle on their sofa when Gavin Truss arrived, wearing jeans and a t-shirt with the legend: ‘
That which is cannot be true—
Herbert Marcuse.
’
He took one look at the baroness and screeched like a banshee who was having a particularly bad night. Fortune, Pringle, and Hortense wrapped themselves around him and bore him off to their enclave. By now they had glasses and a couple of bottles standing at the ready on Trixie, so there was no reason for the baroness to proffer drinks. She shrugged, fetched herself another bottle, and a hopeful empty glass, and returned to Joleen and tried to think positive thoughts.
When Jake Thorogood arrived, his torn dressing gown failing to cover his bare shins, she was encouraged that she didn’t recognise him, but their exchange of names brought neither of them comfort and he was borne off so fast by Fortune and Pringle that there was no time even for a cursory nod. By now the anti-baroness faction had spread over two sofas, so the occupants had to converse across Trixie. She could hear occasional words like ‘bitch,’ ‘rude,’ and ‘Neanderthal’ which she assumed meant she was under discussion.
She was momentarily cheered when the next entrant was also someone she didn’t recognise. He was a dapper man in his fifties, whose expensive haircut, well-fitting tuxedo, and red satin waistcoat seemed to have weathered recent challenges better than the clothes of his fellow captives.
He saw her first, walked over and held out his hand. ‘Hey, I’m Chester Herblock.’
‘Jack Troutbeck,’ she said. But before their handshake was naturally concluded, Fortune and Pringle had swooped once again and hustled him away. Pringle made an attempt to move one of Joleen’s sofas, but it proved to be rooted to the floor, so the sofa containing Fortune became full to overflowing.
The next arrival failed to get the door open, and the baroness, being nearest to it, obligingly tugged at the door-handle and revealed a stick-insect in a sable coat over a long, crumpled, dirty, white silk dress and tottering on six-inch gold sandals. Herblock was already there to gather her in his arms, crying, ‘Marilyn, darling. We’re re-united at last,’ and support her back to his group. She was so thin, noted the baroness sourly, that even with her coat on, she made almost no demand on space. Her face was as unlined as that of a fifteen-year-old; the baroness guessed she was in her sixties.
When no one seemed to recognise the dark young man in a pin-stripe suit, pink shirt, matching tie, and Fedora when he tumbled through the door, the baroness hoped she might be in luck, but within seconds Pringle had called ‘Charlie’ loudly, and identified him to the others as ‘a dear friend and the purchaser of a darling Fontana’; he had been clasped to their corporate bosom. Herblock gave him his seat and perched elegantly on Trixie’s glass top.
By now the baroness was feeling positively lonely in her splendid isolation, but she was not yet ready to do anything about it. She eavesdropped on the whines about food and the smell and the vying for sympathy, but while she snarled to herself about their having the instincts of a herd of sheep, she had some sneaking sympathy for them. She, at least, was not starving: her last secret meal before leaving her cell had been full of carbohydrates. When, occasionally, someone looked over at her with an expression of mingled disbelief and loathing, she raised her glass in a gesture of good fellowship. And when they looked away again, she put a brave face on it and tried not to think about the immediate future. When there was another commotion at the door, she groaned inwardly. All I need now, she thought, to add to the gaiety of nations, is Sir Nicholas Serota himself.
It proved to be instead an attractive rangy blonde, in skin-tight red jeans, snake-skin boots, and a black top with a neckline that revealed most of her chest. She cast her eye around the room and said: ‘Jeez, I don’t know about you drongos, but I’m as mad as a cut snake.’
Entranced by the appearance and demeanour of the newcomer, who identified herself as Anastasia Holliday, the baroness decided instantly to make her a friend and ally. After Fortune and Pringle had fallen upon Anastasia with shrieks of joy, and there had been a few minutes for the sharing of recent experiences, the baroness took her by the elbow, detached her from the
melée
and said, ‘I’m Jack, Anastasia. And I like Australians. There is only champagne, but here’s a glass of it. Come and sit beside me and tell me about yourself.’
To her relief, Anastasia put up no resistance. ‘This is a right crockload of shit and no mistake, Jack. I suppose it’s a relief that I’m not alone. I’ve been like a bandicoot on a burned ridge.’ She lowered her voice. ‘But it’s not good news to be locked up with those dipsticks? If I have to be in an asylum, I don’t want to be with star fuckers.’
‘Aren’t some of them your friends?’
‘Might have said so few days ago, but I’ve had plenty of time to think. Being hungry makes you sharper. One think I thunk was that the arty-farties I’ve been hanging with—some of them are over there—were pseuds and fuckwits and as dry as a dead dingo’s donger.’
The baroness raised an eyebrow. ‘Weren’t some of them instrumental in making you rich and famous?’
‘Oh, sure. But just because you’ve got a good pimp doesn’t make you a happy hooker. I’m over being a show pony.’
Everyone jumped as Sarkovsky’s voice announced: ‘You all here. Now you listen. I Beeg Brother.’
‘You Oleg Sarkovsky,’ said the baroness.
‘Shuddup you. You talk about me, you die. I Beeg Brother. This Beeg Brother house.’
‘What’s he talking about?’ whimpered Fortune.
‘I don’t know,’ said Herbloch.
‘Strewth,’ said Anastasia. ‘Where’ve you been? Everyone knows about Big Brother. Biggest TV show all over the world.’
‘You explain them,’ came the instruction.
Crisply, Anastasia explained how people volunteered to shack up together, be spied on around the clock, and win a lot of money.
‘You say them eviction consequence of task,’ prodded the voice.
‘What’s the prize?’ asked Thorogood hopefully.
‘No prize,’ said the voice.
‘This is illogical,’ said the baroness. ‘What’s our incentive to do these tasks if we all want to be evicted?’
‘You evicted, you killed,’ said the voice helpfully.
‘You cannot be serious,’ said Jason Pringle. ‘Oh, Bubbles,’ he shrieked, throwing himself on Henry Fortune’s ample breast.
‘I’m sure he’s not,’ said the baroness gruffly. ‘He’s just trying to frighten us.’
‘It is truth. Now, feeeeerst task. Laidee Troutbeck eat hamburger.’
The baroness’ scowl cleared. ‘I don’t mind that,’ she said, ‘as long, of course, as it’s made of Aberdeen Angus beef. Rump is a possibility, though sirloin is usually preferable. It must have been well-hung. And mind you make sure there’s enough fat. And that it’s coarsely ground. And, of course, rare. Now with it, I want…’
Though oblivious to the incredulous expressions on the faces surrounding her, she registered the menace in the ‘Shuddup and follow instruction’ that boomed from the speakers. ‘The hamburger McDonald’s.
Surf Turf. Weeth processed cheese.’ He laughed merrily. ‘From y
esterday.’
‘It doesn’t matter if it’s last year’s,’ said the baroness bitterly. ‘Not being food, it doesn’t decompose.’
‘And with chocolate meeelkshake. Beeg, beeg, super-size.’
‘You cannot be serious, Oleg,’ she cried piteously. ‘Why would you do that to me?’
‘I say you, you name me Oleg, you die. I Beeg Brother. I very serious man. I hear all you say. Anyone talk about Oleg Sarkovsky, Albanians kill him. Hamburger hatch. Kitchen. Eat. Drink.’
‘I’m certainly not going to consume such muck,’ said the baroness haughtily, grateful that—unlike the others—she wasn’t starving. ‘I’d rather die.’
‘OK. No problem. I happy help.’
‘Stuff and nonsense, Ol…Big Brother. You’re losing your marbles. You can’t bully me.’
‘He can kill you,’ whispered Pringle, whose normally supercilious expression had long since been replaced by one of abject terror.
‘Rubbish,’ said the baroness. ‘He’s having a lark. There’s nothing to be worried about.’
‘You not eat. No food in house. Never. All very hungry and die.’
‘He’s bluffing,’ said the baroness. She looked at her companions for reassurance and found none.
‘Please eat it,’ sobbed Pringle.
The baroness looked uncertainly at her companions and saw that Marilyn had begun to cry. Then Anastasia leaned over, clapped her on the thigh and said, ‘Think bush-tucker trial.’
‘Think what?’
‘It’s something people do on reality shows to prove they’re tough.’ The baroness obviously wavered. ‘Look, Jack, if I was you I’d stop grizzling and get on with it. We’re in the shit and no mistake. Would you rather eat the Macca’s or cark it?’
‘Cark it?’
‘Like he said. Die.’ Anastasia made a cutting motion across her throat.
‘I’m not sure.’
‘It wouldn’t be just you,’ said Pringle. ‘It’d be all of us. We could end up cannibals.’
The baroness ruminated for a moment, turned her head towards the skeletal Pringle and sighed. ‘I suppose if you put it that way, there are worse things than a revolting hamburger. None of you looks edible—except possibly Anastasia.’
She heaved herself up and surveyed her companions. ‘I want to do this alone.’ And assuming an expression so agonised that Marie Antoinette might have considered it over-the-top as she mounted the steps to the guillotine, the baroness gazed neither to right nor left as she marched into the kitchen and opened the hatch.
As there was no door to the kitchen, the nine starving people could not but hear the baroness’ loud curses as she chomped and slurped her way through her test. There was little sympathy for her when she emerged from the kitchen complaining that she had never had such a disgusting meal in her life. She marched over to the most visible camera and said, ‘I’ve done it. Now what about food for the others?’
‘Feerst you go in Diary Room.’
‘What?’
‘Red door.’
Had the baroness ever seen Big Brother, she would have been less surprised to find a tiny room furnished only with an enormous purple armchair. ‘Seet.’
As she sat down, her eyes flickered over to the door opposite the one through which she’d come.
‘You crazy if you think escape. Albanians has machine guns.’
‘Nothing could have been further from my thoughts.’
‘Now. Orders.’
‘For food, do you mean?’
‘Shuddup. Orders from me. For you. I give food. Drink. Then you start argument.’
‘About what?’
‘Art. I want argument. Beeg argument. You make them crazy.’
‘Is this just for fun, or is there a deeper reason?’
‘You discover, maybe. Now you follow instruction. And not say from me. Go in now, say food here in short time.’
‘We’re all filthy. Any chance of a change of clothes? And toothbrushes and razors and that kind of thing?’
‘Maybe. If I like argument.’
Discretion, concluded the baroness uncharacteristically, was undoubtedly now to be embraced rather than valour. ‘OK,’ she said. ‘Thank you.’
***
Akim Zeka had been looking at his watch all afternoon, waiting for the moment when he could stop watching those boring people and get away to Edona. The boss had been very reluctant to let him leave even for a short time, but he needed Akim to be ready to direct proceedings later on, and he had known Akim long enough to know that sexual frustration made him erratic. Sarkovsky wished that this operation could be run by someone calm and effortlessly competent like Taylor, but the butler had made it clear that what he did was to run Sarkovsky’s UK establishments and that he wanted no involvement in anything that might be less than respectable. ‘I realise that with your business interests you need tough people to protect you, sir,’ he told his boss. ‘But I want nothing to do with those uncouth Albanians.’