‘You don’t work.’
The annoying one narrowed his eyes conspiratorially and tapped the side of his nose.
‘Nice shorts, by the way. Very revealing.’
He ignored this. It seemed the wisest course. The idiot had begun to walk back to the house, and sensing he’d been distracted from something he wasn’t supposed to have noticed, a skill he was more than capable of recognising in another man, he had little choice but to follow. A single hammer blow seemed a little mocking as he caught up with the swift pacing.
‘She’s distracted—that godly lass of Diesel’s. Wedding being in a couple of months, an’ all.’
He nodded. He had worked this out for himself. Molly was a handful. She needed more care than Sarah could be expected to provide, even without the distraction of her imminent wedding. Hearing this from someone else, even this idiot, however, made him extremely uncomfortable, wearing as he was his tennis whites from the game he’d been enjoying, entirely unaware of a strange man engaging Molly in an even stranger conversation. He knew damn well that Ben would be thinking exactly the same thing.
‘She okay then—Squirt?’
‘I left her stuffing her face with mince pies. It was hard to tell.’
‘Huh, like father like daughter. So, you any further on with getting a new Mary Poppins?’
‘No.’ At some silent but perceived criticism, he added, ‘It’s complicated.’
‘Oh, it’s something. I’ll give you that. It’s something.’ After a moment of uncharacteristic thought, the moron added, ‘The old woman might ‘ave to get himself one of those. If he goes ahead with this stupid fucking plan he’s got.’
Aleksey, who was only listening with his habitual not actually hearing anything level of concentration, made no reply. Then the words sank in, and he straightened and flicked the other man a swift, puzzled glance. He was about to enquire more when the moron suddenly swung away and announced cheerily, ‘I’ll ring Sunshine; tell her what’s happened. Then I’m gonna run home. If I see any invisible people I don’t recognise on the way, I’ll kill ‘em for you.’ With that helpful promise, he was gone.
***
Chapter Two
They were colouring together at the table while Ben was cooking supper. He’d suggested it, and Molly, apparently shocked thatPapahad volunteered to do something normal with her, had immediately run off to fetch her box of crayons. He pushed his finished artwork across to her. Molly knelt up on her chair and began to scrutinise it, possibly with a view to making a few suggestions for improvement.
‘What is it?’
Annoyed, he pointed. ‘That’s you. Those are flowers. That’s a gravestone.’
‘Oh. Who’s that? Is that you?’
‘No. That’s the man who spoke to you today. He’s behind the wall, see?’
‘Oh.’ She picked up her brown pencil. ‘He didn’t look anything like that.’
He smiled inwardly. ‘Make him better then.’
She began to colour over the figure’s hair, turning it from yellow to brown. Aleksey was slightly relieved that the mysterious man hadn’t resembled him. Non-scarred but otherwise extremely similar. He occasionally allowed the thought to cross his mind that Nikolas had somehow survived the fall to the pavement in Moscow, and that he might, therefore, turn up one day to renew their…acquaintance. He wouldn’t put it past the gods of chaos and chance, who seemed to take such delight in fucking up his life, to actually have this little twist already plotted out: Nikolas swinging into an open window beneath the balcony, and another body being pushed out to splatter on the concrete below. Worse, it did occasionally pop into his mind that he wasn’t Aleksey at all—that he was actually Nikolas, and that in killing his twin, he, Nikolas, had taken on Aleksey’s persona in a kind of psychotic overlay which would one day peel away to reveal the far less interesting truth beneath. ‘Papa!’ He jerked back to the demands of the baby tyrant who was pushing the picture on him. He glanced down at the paper. She had added lots of new little stick figures. They appeared to be holding hands and dancing around one of the graves. She stroked her fingers over the children.
‘We play Ring-a-Ring o’ Roses together, but I’m not allowed to do the falling down bit at the end yet.’
He put his head down on the table and gave up, defeated. He felt Ben folding his arms on his shoulders and resting his chin on his hair.
‘I said Molly could stay here tonight.’
‘Can I sleep in your bed?’
‘No, but you can start off there if you want. But if you start in your room, you’ll be able to hear us talking out here.’
‘Will you be saying interesting things?’
‘I don’t think Papa will, no. I think Papa might be having an early night. He’s had a very stressful day.’ Ben patted his head.
‘I’m going to get my things.’
