Box 88 : A Novel (2020), стр. 76

‘It’s just all this’ – Kite gestured at the shops and the girls, the street life of the Marais – ‘my first time in Paris. Taking it all in.’

Peele had taught him never to embellish a lie. To make it short and sweet and get out fast. If a person rambled on without cease, giving answers to questions that had never been asked, it was a sure sign of guilt.

‘You were weird this morning, too.’

Kite shrugged and apologised, wondering what to say.

‘Maybe it’s Mum. Killantringan. She’s basically bankrupt after paying off her loans. I don’t have anywhere to live when I get home, not sure if I’ve done OK in my A levels. It’s just been a weird summer.’

‘Well, you can relax now.’ Xavier patted him on the back. ‘You can take it easy.’ A breathtakingly pretty girl with a Godard bob walked past their table and smiled. ‘Mon Dieu,’ he whispered. ‘Do you think that will ever stop?’

‘Girls?’ Kite replied.

Xavier nodded.

‘Probably not.’

‘We’ll go out in the south,’ Xavier said. ‘Antibes. Cannes. You’re bound to get lucky.’

‘You, not me,’ Kite replied. Xavier had the advantage of his father’s saturnine looks, expensive clothes and a certain enigmatic magnetism, at once feral and poetic, which too many girls – as far as Kite was concerned – found irresistible.

‘We should get back,’ Xavier announced, throwing a few francs on the table. ‘Mum wants to take Maria out to dinner at La Coupole. It’s her fortieth.’

Kite was embarrassed not to have had the opportunity to buy Maria a present. Xavier took him to Shakespeare & Co on the way home, finding the owner closing up but happy to let two young students browse quickly inside. Xavier knew the history of the bookshop and encouraged Kite to buy something by Hemingway or F. Scott Fitzgerald. The owner recommended The Beautiful and Damned (‘much better than Gatsby’) and Kite asked that it be wrapped up. Later, as the family were presenting Maria with presents at dinner, she cried when she saw that he had bought her a book, as if nobody had ever thought to credit her with greater intelligence than the ability to make scrambled eggs or to turn perfect hospital corners on a king-size bed.

‘Gracias, Master Lockie,’ she said, pulling him in for a kiss. She had put on a dress for the occasion and did not look out of place among the glamorous denizens of La Coupole. ‘I will treasure this. I will read it slowly.’

Kite had never experienced a restaurant quite like it. The ripple of Left Bank conversation, the music of cutlery and cut-glass, waiters in black tie gliding from table to table as though they had been on the same shift since the liberation of Paris. It was a world away from the chaos of the Killantringan dining room where prawn cocktails and defrosted lasagne had been the order of the day. Kite had been practising his French with Peele almost every day for three weeks but still didn’t recognise half the dishes on the menu. Luc announced that he had been coming to La Coupole with his family since childhood and always reserved the same table, nestled between pillars within touching distance of an extraordinary stained-glass dome in the centre of the room. Compelled by Luc to experiment, Kite willingly played the wide-eyed tourist and asked for snails as a starter. Xavier tried to make him order Andouillette as a main course until his mother interjected and told Kite that it was a ‘revolting’ sausage made primarily from offal which ‘tastes like a loo brush’. Xavier cursed her affectionately for spoiling the joke and went to the bathroom.

While he was gone, Luc turned to Kite.

‘Lockie, there’s something I need to talk to you about.’

His eyes had a way of going dead in moments of seriousness. Kite’s stomach caved in on itself.

‘Of course,’ he said.

‘My friend Ali is arriving tomorrow. Xav’s told you that he’s an Iranian businessman. Is that correct?’

Kite leaned on his training. Don’t talk unless you have to. Keep your answers short. Nobody expects you to be anything but a dozy teenager.

‘Yeah.’ He nodded. ‘Said he was some kind of godfather?’

Luc smiled. ‘A Muslim godfather, yes. Ali and I were good friends in Paris when Xavier was living here as a child. He has close links to the new president. We’ve been trying to have a holiday together for years and we’re finally making it happen – despite all the changes going on in Iran at the moment.’

‘What changes?’ Kite asked. He wondered why Luc was bothering to tell him so much about his relationship with Eskandarian. It was almost as if he was trying to conceal something.

‘Oh, you know.’ He gestured towards the street. ‘The death of the ayatollah. And there was an election last week. We thought maybe that would prevent Ali from coming, but thankfully he is flying out tomorrow.’

Again, Kite wondered why Luc felt obliged to explain the situation to him. It was more than just politeness. Was Xavier’s father trying to persuade him into thinking about Eskandarian in a particular way?

‘That’s great,’ he replied. ‘You’ll be happy to see him.’

‘I will.’ Luc took a sip of wine. ‘I don’t want you to worry, but there is a certain threat to Iranian public figures when they travel overseas. Ali will be coming with a bodyguard. The chances of anything happening are zero. It’s only for show.’

‘OK,’ Kite replied.

Strawson had suggested that Eskandarian would travel with protection; this merely confirmed it.

‘I just thought I would say something in case you were surprised when he turns up. Various people may come to the house this week to meet him, but more likely he will go off and do whatever he has to do during the days. My hope is that we can all have a nice holiday together.’

‘Mine too,’ Kite replied.

He thought about MOIS sweeping the house and considered the scale and complexity of BOX 88’s interest in Eskandarian. Kite wondered