In the Kitchen (51 page)

Nobody spoke. An extractor hood gasped and wheezed. A big slug of vodka, thought Gabriel, was exactly what he needed, hell, it was what he deserved. He took a swig. Water. He pressed the glass into Oona's hand.

'The boy having a few troubles,' said Oona. 'Few troubles at home. Got him a bitta counselling and ...'

But Gabe wasn't listening. He was watching Ivan staring down Victor and miming slitting his neck.

'Come with me,' called Gabriel, motioning to Victor. 'Yes, you, it's your lucky day. Come on. Jump to it.'

He stayed so hard on Victor's heels he almost pushed him down the stairs. 'In there. No, no, there. And yes, I'm closing the door.'

They stood in the meat locker. Victor's head was positioned between the two hanging halves of a suckling pig.

'This time,' said Gabriel, picking up a big beef shank and swinging it like a truncheon, 'I'm getting some answers. I'm getting some answers from you.'

'Tough guy,' said Victor, his right leg vibrating anxiously. 'Think you scare me?'

'We'll see,' said Gabriel. It was Victor who would tell him what was going on with Ivan and Gleeson. Victor knew. He hadn't fallen out with Ivan just over some girl.

'Man,' said Victor. 'This is bullshit.'

'What is it with you and Ivan? Did he cut you out of some deal? Some sordid little thing you had going with Gleeson?' Gabriel knew when a steak was done.

He didn't need to work it out. He didn't time it. He just knew.

'You gonna hit me with that bone?' Victor sniggered.

'Maybe,' said Gabriel, whacking it hard against a metal surface.

Victor squealed something about harassment and lawsuits.

'Still watching all those cop movies?' said Gabe. He moved in close to Victor, close enough to see the pimples nesting in his eyebrows.

'Man ...' said Victor.

Victor was the weak link. He was the one who would talk. That was why Ivan kept threatening him. Gabriel threw the shank aside. 'You think Ivan's your worst nightmare? I can protect you from Ivan. But who's going to protect you from me?'

'In Moldova ...' began Victor.

'Fuck Moldova.' Time to cut the steak. 'You're in London now.' Gabe seized the sides of suckling pig and swung them against Victor's head. He squeezed the halves together with his forearms, crunching them on to Victor's cheekbones.

Only his nose poked out. The nose went red, then purple. It pitted with white.

Victor reenacted the animal's last, piteous sounds.

'Are you going to talk?' said Gabriel. He was dizzy from squeezing so long, all the air pressed out of him.

A muffled yes escaped from the pig. Gabriel let go. Victor crumpled to the ground as if Gabriel had been dangling him by his head. Gabe squatted next to him. 'Go on.'

Victor rubbed his face with his sleeves. He spat and rubbed his mouth.

'Stinks.'

'What else can I do to encourage you?'

Victor sat up, propped against a shelf of vacuum-packed duck breasts. 'Ivan, that motherfucker,' he said. He dug in his pocket and pulled out a small bottle of cologne. He sniffed it like smelling salts.

'What did he do?'

'He gets girls from the hotel. He gets them and sells them on.'

'Yes,' said Gabriel. 'Girls from the hotel.'

'Cleaners. The maids. New ones coming in, so no one knows them, no one misses them.' Victor touched his cheeks. 'Have you marked me? Did you mark my face?'

Gabriel shook his head.

'The restaurant manager,' said Victor, 'he shows them photos. He says, you can earn more money there, working in this bar as a waitress or a dancer, whatever the story is. If they want to dance he shows them photos of dancers. If they want to sing he shows them, look, you can sing like her. I got that job for this girl.'

Yes, thought Gabriel, that would appeal to Gleeson, to use Charlie's photograph like that. It would give him a kick. When had he started to use it?

Right away after the staff night out? Or later, when they had begun their slide into warfare?

'And then?' he said. 'What happens?' He knew how this story would go now, but he wanted to hear Victor tell it.

'In his smart suit, telling lies.'

'Yes, Gleeson, a good frontman, they'd believe him. They'd be scared of Ivan.

And then?'

'That woman who's in charge of housekeeping? I don't know her name ...'

'Branka.'

'Looks like one mean dude. If you saw her in a movie it'd be when they'd just checked into a hostel and the receptionist comes through the wall with a chainsaw. She'd be the receptionist, yeah.'

'Yeah,' said Gabe. 'Go on.'

'She brings them in. Selects them nice and fresh. Knows who's legal and illegal, who's desperate for money, who's got friends here who'd give a shit if they go AWOL, you checking me?'

'Yeah, yeah,' said Gabe. 'And then what? What happens next?'

'I'm not scared of that motherfucker,' said Victor, jutting his chin. 'I'll tell the whole fucking world.'

'Start with me,' said Gabe.

'Ivan, like, introduces them to the club, the bar, the whatever, that's the line. He takes them, he sells them like meat, man, two dollars a kilo.'

'He pimps them himself or he sells them to a pimp?'

Victor picked up his hat, stood and straightened himself. He ran a hand through his hair to make it stand up in cocky rows. 'How should I know? I told you what I know.'

'Well, you seem to know a lot,' said Gabriel. 'Were you in on it? Were you?'

Gabriel sprang to his feet. He punched a beef loin that lolled on a hook.

'Fuck you, man.'

'What makes you so sure, then?'

'They picked the wrong girl. My friend from back home, but she didn't tell no one she knew me. Two days before, one of the other maids told her she was taking this new job, waitressing, Ivan arranged it and the money was very good. Then they brought my friend and talked to her early in the morning, they said look at this great opportunity but you have to go now, today.'

'So she didn't have time to think.'

'Yeah, but my friend she came and talked to me and I said, no, let me check it out first. I went to this place, this club, and – guess what – they weren't hiring, they didn't know Gleeson or Ivan.'

'And the first girl? The one who took the job?'

Victor clicked his fingers. 'Gone. Like that.'

'What about your friend? Is she here? Can I talk to her? Would she talk to me?'

'You think she hung around here? Jeez.' Victor had recovered his self-esteem.

He measured up his reflection in a glass case, coming on to himself.

'It's all speculation,' said Gabriel, drifting between carcasses. 'We don't know anything.'

'Think about it,' said Victor. 'It's a beautiful system. You've got a ready-made supply of girls. None of that business about getting them away from home, smuggling them, all that shit. Less hassle, less expense, feed them through, get paid. Who's gonna care?'

'But there's no proof,' said Gabriel, shivering, finally feeling how cold it was.

Victor opened the door of the walk-in. 'Like I told you before. First time you brought me in for interrogation.'

'What?'

'You're better off not knowing. So why'd you even ask?'

He hunted Gleeson down to a meeting room in the marketing suite. He told the others to get out.

'Oh dear,' said Gleeson, smirking, 'have we forgotten our medication today?'

Gabriel kicked Pierre's chair. 'Go on. Clear off.' The bar manager stood up and clenched his fists.

The marketing executives drew breath audibly.

Gleeson, smiling tightly, said, 'I think the sentiment that Chef is trying to express is, would you excuse us, please?'

When they were alone, Gabriel prowled the length of the table and back again.

'Well,' said Gleeson, adjusting his cuffs, 'I don't mean to pry, but what is all this about?'

'I know,' said Gabe.

Gleeson cocked his head. 'Know?'

'I know everything,' said Gabe fervently, extending his fingertips to the ceiling.

'And might I enquire as to the nature of this enlightenment? Is it Damascene?'

'I know about the photographs. I know what you do with them.'

Gleeson straightened his papers. 'Much as I'd love to play this parlour game ...'

He was about to get to his feet but in a bound Gabriel reached him and pushed him back into his chair. Gabriel swung the chair round and held the arms, trapping Gleeson, staring into his pale blue eyes.

'Do you deny it?' said Gabriel. 'Do you?'

'I neither confirm nor deny. I have no idea what you're talking about.

Neither, I suspect, do you.'

Gabriel could see nothing in Gleeson's eyes except the sparkle of self-righteousness. It flowed through the iris like a cleaning fluid, scouring out everything else.

'I know about the girls. I've seen you. Branka brings them. For fuck's sake, I've seen.'

Gleeson began to hiss. 'You are in my personal space.'

Gabriel leaned in closer. He smelt fabric conditioner, hair dye and fear. 'I know what Ivan does with them. I know where you're spending the next ten years.'

Gleeson raised his foot and kicked Gabriel's knee so that the chair went spinning back on its wheels. He slithered out of his seat. 'I've had enough of this.'

'But it's you, you evil fuck, you persuade them to go with him.'

'If you ever, ever ...' Gleeson sprayed the words like poison over the room.

He stopped, pulled back his top lip in a sneer and shook his head. 'You are, quite clearly, mad.' He laughed. 'Oh dear, oh dear.'

'I'm going to ...'

'Do go on. You're going to what?'

Gabriel's jaw became locked.

'You don't know anything,' said Gleeson, coolly. 'Perhaps you've been hallucinating, it's quite possible.'

'I'm going to ... I'm going to ...' Gabriel's arm jerked. He struck the table again and again. His other arm flew up to the back of his head. His whole body trembled and bucked with exertion, trying to halt his flailing arms.

'As I was saying,' said Gleeson, blowing a speck of dust from his sleeve, 'I've had quite enough of your insane insinuations. And while the substance of your allegations remains, it must be said, somewhat hazy, they are, of course, entirely slanderous. Should you take it upon yourself to repeat them, I shall be forced to complain most vociferously to the management, although I will naturally cite the mitigating circumstances of your deteriorating mental health.'

Gabriel finally wrenched his arms out of their contortions and immediately held tightly on to one with the other so that he was more or less hugging himself.

Gleeson flicked his tongue around his lips. 'Since you don't seem to know, Chef, what it is that you're going to do, permit me to make a suggestion. Take some time off, have a little break, check yourself into a clinic. You may not have noticed, but you appear to be having some sort of ghastly nervous breakdown.'

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

BACK IN HIS OFFICE, WITH THE DOOR CLOSED AND THE BLIND STILL lowered, Gabriel skimmed from corner to corner, failing to find purchase anywhere.

Gleeson thought he was so clever, trying to turn the tables like that, threatening him with ... with something which was no longer clear in Gabriel's mind, and which seemed, in consequence, all the more terrible. Gabriel raged silently.

Yes, he was furious. Who in their right mind wouldn't be? It was an outrage, the situation with the air-conditioning. Why hadn't it been fixed? He was under enough stress as it was. He would not blame Lena, although of course she ... He took off his chef 's coat and slung it on the chair. He missed Charlie so much, their relationship was dead and he'd had no time to grieve. But it was Gleeson, that bastard, don't get distracted, Gleeson was the one. Gleeson would get what was coming to him. It was much too hot. He stripped off his T-shirt. Gleeson could threaten whatever he liked. Gabriel did not even care.

He floated above it all because he was leaving this place soon.

He'd promised Rolly a revised spreadsheet now that the final building costs were in. There was a fuck of a lot to do and he'd get down to it right away.

Was it Wednesday today? The PanCont charity gala was on Saturday night and he'd barely begun to make plans. He took his trousers off and sat down.

Now he was ready to work. He opened up the spreadsheet. His mobile rang. He saw from the screen it was Jenny but he would have to call her back later or he'd never get anything done.

Lightfoot's would be the place to go. He'd have his own place, finally.

Nothing better than making a place your own, chef patron, stamp your own personality, just like Fairweather said.

He whittled at the figures. That was realistic. Or maybe not. Who knew? Who could tell? What was his personality, anyway? And if he didn't know what it was, how could he stamp it anywhere?

But he was wasting time. He jumped up, away from his desk, almost falling over in his haste. He had to get to the pastry kitchen, had to see Chef Albert and brief him about the gala now, this instant, straight away.

'Bienvenu,' said Chef Albert, wrapping an arm around Gabriel's shoulders. 'No formalities – bravo! We are all friends, n'est-ce pas?'

'Listen,' said Gabriel, urgently. It appeared to be bedlam in here. He might have to sort it out himself. He picked up a tray of choux pastry puffs and began tipping them into the bin.

'Sit down,' said Chef Albert, positioning a stool and pushing Gabriel down on to it. 'Sit down, my friend. You are tired, no?'

Gabriel admitted as much with a sigh.

'Energy drink,' said Chef Albert, handing Gabe a can. He opened another for himself. 'Gives you wings, like zis.' He flapped his elbows and ran around in a tight circle. 'Heh, heh, don't drink more than three. Four at the most. If you are very sleepy have another one or two.'

Albert's assistant giggled behind his hand.

Chef Albert brandished a rolling pin. 'In ze anus,' he promised gleefully.

The assistant retreated behind a barricade of ciabatta rolls and sourdough baguettes.

Chef Albert pulled up another stool and sat with Gabriel at the marble counter. 'I too feel zis exhaustion,' he declared. 'My new girlfriend, she is thirty years old. Mon dieu!'