Vladimir Popov:I want to hear all the gossip about you and Ludo.
Vladimir Popov:The kettle will be on.
I had to kill this off right here and now. It was getting out of hand.
Sunny:NOTHING IS HAPPENING! I will NEVER get romantically involved with a colleague.
Vladimir Popov:Oh, that’s a shame. I said to my wife just last night, Ludo is such an adorable helpless puppy of a fellow and you’re such a strong and assertive type on the outside, yet such a bleeding heart on the inside. You’d be absolutely perfect together.
This knobber needed to stop reading Mills & Boon.
Sunny:Is a Cabinet reshuffle imminent?
Vladimir Popov:See you10am Friday.
Vladimir Popov:The kettle. Will. Be. On.
The man must really like tea.
Sunny:Fine. But I’m putting the boot into Wynn-Jones in tomorrow morning’s paper. See you Friday.
With that, I followed the rest of the press pack into the oil rig’s canteen to write my stories.
* * *
The canteen smelt like someone had dropped a bottle of cod liver oil and decided to clean it up using a mop soaked in human sweat. I looked around the room for Ludo but couldn’t see him. I found a spare table, set up my laptop, logged in to the Viking XI’s Wi-Fi, and started tinkering with the opening paragraph of my lead story. A few minutes later, someone tapped on my shoulder. I turned to see Ludo standing beside me, face flushed crimson. He looked adorably flustered. He pushed his glasses onto his nose and ran his fingers through his hair.
“Would you mind sharing your audio from the press conference?” he asked. “I appear to have dropped my Dictaphone into the North Sea.”
Chapter18
Ludo
Freshly showered and pyjamaed back at the Otter’s Den, I decided to video-call Uncle Ben. We messaged every day, but sometimes I just needed to hear my godfather’s voice and see his face. I’d kept him up to date onthesituation with Sunny. (Uncle Ben had put the emphasis on the definite article as soon as I told him about our fight at Maxime’s.) His advice had been to play nicely. After all, Sunny was a tabloid reporter and could very easily turn our fracas into a juicy titbit for theBulletin.
“How are you fairing up in the fair isles, dear boy? Have you run off with a swarthy fisherman yet?”
“Yes, I am calling you from atop my widow’s walk. I am waiting for my lover to return from the sea.”
Uncle Ben laughed, coughed, and cleared his throat. In fact, I was calling from my bed, which he could clearly see. Uncle Ben was wearing his silk dressing gown and sitting in his wingback armchair in his drawing room in his Connaught Square flat. Piano music tinkled softly in the background. It was like having a Zoom call with Noël Coward. It was a carefully cultivated image of decadence, which I jolly well envied and made a mental note to emulate in my senior years.
“Did you get the picture of me with the puffins?” I asked.
“I did, dear boy. They looked like good eating.”
“You can’t eat them, Uncle Ben. They’re a vulnerable species. We just photographed them.”
“Shame, they’re a good size for the oven. I bet they roast up beautifully.” Uncle Ben was in a silly mood. I adored him when he was like this. “How isthesituation? Have you flung Sunny Miller bodily into the North Sea?”
“No, I saved that honour for my Dictaphone,” I said.
“What have you done now?”
“We were on an oil rig this afternoon, and I tripped over a cable while running away from what I suspect was an actual albatross.”
“Why were you running away from an albatross?”
“It was chasing me. Anyway, when I hit the deck, the Dictaphone slipped out of my hand and skittered over the edge. The albatross went flying off after it. So, I expect it’s either swimming with the fishes or it’s currently giving an enormous seabird a bout of constipation it’s unlikely to forget.”
