Exit wound

Five days later, I was home again – just in time for the christening of Red Ken’s granddaughter. At a break in the proceedings, I gave his widow her gold ring and told her I’d opened an account for her with five hundred grand in it. She knew better than to ask where the money had come from. The code was the code, and she knew that he was gone for ever even before I told her. His seat was occupied by a large, framed picture of him in uniform. I liked to think Red Ken would have done the same for me, but maybe I was getting soft in my old age. I must have been, because Tenny’s widow had got the same amount.

Cinza? I have a feeling she’s already made other arrangements, but she got the biggest bottle of Amouage Homage I could find to help her on her way.

After that I’d decided I’d had enough of The Secret Millionaire routine and headed for the Porsche showroom. Well, it was about time I had the odd mouthful of steak as well.

I’d never been much good at keeping score. Did it go some way towards compensating for Dex and Red Ken getting zapped? Julian reckoned it did – but then he always was a big softy.

Not only did he pull strings for Ali. During the Iranian election riots, there’d been a low-key news story that a certain Bradley Capland, banged up in the UAE as a bad debtor, had been allowed to go back to spend his final days in Canada with his beloved wife Sherry by his side. Several commentators expressed their surprise at the UAE authorities – not known for their touchy-feely side – letting him go. The story was a welcome antidote to the bad news that had been flooding out of the Gulf state as the Dubai dream continued to turn sour.

Julian wanted me to work for him and I told him I might. But not just yet – I had some things to do.

It took me ten minutes to reach the basement car park of my docklands apartment block – a glass-and-steel monolith that had had its final lick of paint, the estate agent told me, the day Lehman Brothers went to rat shit. Their crunch had been my gain. If you’ve got cash in your back pocket, recessions are a great time to clean up, the experts say. Since in every other recession I’d ever lived through I’d been penniless, I was only just beginning to find out.

My biggest problem was not really knowing what furniture I needed for the penthouse two hundred feet above my head. But help was at hand. Anna was arriving tomorrow and staying over – as long as she only ever smoked on the balcony.

I had two outings planned: a trip to IKEA, followed by a night out at Mamma Mia. She was a smart girl, but I doubted that even she would get the connection.