“I’ve…seen UK border agents come down here in all shapes andsizes.Police too.Sometimes they’re women.One came once dressedas a nun to round up a runaway Catholic.But I’ve never seen onequite like you.”
Lauriesnorted.He spread his hands.“Are you kidding?”he asked.“Did youever see a border agent’s dad come along and haul him off by thescruff?”
Sashasmiled.To Laurie it was like an undiscovered type of sunlight; hetook a helpless step toward it.
“All right.I’m sorry.Street people get suspicious.I thoughtperhaps you were their latest secret weapon.”
Theycontinued along the riverside promenade.Sasha had not replaced hisarm around Laurie’s shoulders.They made a conspicuous enough pairas it was—the skinny down-and-out and his elegant, glossy-hairedcompanion, two sides of the same coin if you knew how to look.Laurie said, not much caring for the answer—he could have walkedlike this at Sasha’s side forever, as if in a dream, on and ondownriver until the Thames spread wide into the sea—“Where are wegoing, then?”
“I’m going to take you to lunch,” Sasha told him serenely.WhenLaurie’s eyebrows went up, he reached into one of the parka’s deepinner pockets and produced a twenty-pound note.“I couldn’t usethis.The police check the shelters, and I’m not supposed to behere.”
Theystopped outside an elegant little café on the Embankment.Headingautomatically for the door, Laurie noticed Sasha had remainedbehind him, rooted to the spot.Laurie saw fear in his eyes.“What’s the matter?Don’t you want to go in?”
“Love to.If you want the embarrassment of having them ask meto leave, or calling the police to make sure I do.”
“Sasha, for God’s sake.You can go anywhere you want whenyou’re—”
“When I’m with you?”
Laurielooked away.“I…didn’t mean that.”
“No.I know you didn’t.Street people aren’t welcome anywherebut the street, that’s all, and nine times out of ten, not there.Here.”Smiling, letting him off the hook, Sasha held out thetwenty.“Go and get us something.I’ll wait for you on the fountainsteps in the gardens.”
Laurieemerged a few minutes later with long beef-and-mustard sandwichesand two extra-large coffees clutched to his chest.It occurred tohim belatedly, sitting down at Sasha’s side the whispering shadowof the fountain, that he should have asked him what he wanted, butSasha only shook his head when he expressed the concern.
He tookthe sandwich carefully from Laurie’s hands, shot him a quick,half-apologetic glance.“Wait a moment, please.”
Lauriewatched, half in amusement, half in sympathy, while he demolishedhis meal.Wherever he came from, he hadn’t left his manners behindhim there.The process was not messy, but it was thorough, andLaurie guessed it was an urgent priority, certainly over smalltalk.Once he had finished, Laurie offered Sasha the remaining halfof his own sandwich, which he accepted with a shamefacedgrin.
“I was worried you might be vegetarian or”—Laurie cast aboutfor his limited knowledge of dietary restrictions—“or Muslimor…”
“Nn-nn.”Heaving a deep breath, Sasha patted his mouth with thepaper napkin.“As it happens, neither.But if I had been…well, Iwouldn’t be anymore.Not down here.Thank you.Now we cantalk.”
Laurie’sthroat promptly went dry.The brown eyes on his were withoutexpectation, but so steady and calm that they unsettled him.“Howstupid,” he said, faintly.“Now you put it like that, I don’t knowwhere to start.”
Sashareached for the coffee, wrapping both hands around it.They werestrong-looking hands, though wasted and chapped with cold,expressive even in their grasp on the polystyrene cup.“Well, youcan start by telling me how you found me.Nothing personal, butit’s not good news for me that you did.It would help if Iknew.”
“Don’t worry.It was mostly luck.I turned right instead ofleft outside of the Tube station, and I asked an old guy on theplaza, that’s all.”
“By the statue?”Laurie nodded.“Gyorgy told you where Iwas?”
“Not exactly.He just did this.”Laurie reproduced the oldman’s vague directing gesture.“Don’t be angry withhim.”
“I’m not.I’m just surprised.He’s one of us.”Sasha smiled atLaurie over the rim of the coffee cup.“He must have liked yourface.All right.I’m glad he did.I’m glad your luck brought youhere.But you have to promise me you’ll never do itagain.”
Laurietensed.He fought not to betray a sharp sting of disappointment.Stupidly, he had not considered that his arrival might bring moreevil than good to Sasha.That this might be a last time, not abeginning.“I’m sorry.I didn’t mean to make trouble foryou.”
“No, stupid.Trouble foryou.The likes of Len will eat youalive.It’s no place forgaje.”
“Gaje?”Laurie echoed.“Is that what I am?”
“Just one of you, sogajo.Oh, everyone’s got their ownname for them—the people who live on the topside.Gaje’s a Romaword—in Romania, anyway.You’d call us gypsies.”
Laurie couldn’t help it; a thrill went through him.Childishof him, he knew, but the word conjured for him stories his motherhad read to him of a people whose lives were so free, so differentto his own narrow existence that he could scarcely believe in them.Frightening figures too, or they became so after his father hadchased a group of them off their grounds in Suffolk.Horse thieves,child snatchers, ghosts who silently unlatched windows and doors torob the cradle.He felt a blush rise, as if Sasha could read theseparanoid gaje thoughts.“Gypsies…” He thought for a moment, thenremembered an article he’d read in theGuardian—because it certainly wasn’tthe kind of political awareness he’d ever been taught at Eton—andsaid, “But the right word’sRomany, isn’t it?”
Sashaturned to him.The chatter of the people on the esplanade, thepaths that wound through the winter-bare park, seemed to fade outto Laurie, replaced by the thump of his own heart.He watched,motionless, while Sasha put out a hand and, just for an instant,touched his face.His palm was warm from the coffee cup, soft assuede.He said, “You’re…very sweet, aren’t you?”
Lauriefrowned.He wanted to protest that he was not.He might not live onthe streets or earn his keep giving blowjobs under bridges—mightnot carry a knife, but he wasn’t naive.Not a child.
