wonderfully. You’ll get to meet her tonight. The whole Thompson family will be eating dinner there, and we hope that you can join us.”
“Thanks, I’d love to,” Irene replied, dazed by her host’s voluble friendliness.
“I called Rebecka Schyttelius last night. She had just come home from the hospital. She agreed to see us today, late morning,” Thompson continued.
They surged forward in the heavy morning traffic, the green surfaces of Hyde Park behind the tall fence on one side, and beautiful stone houses with expensive facades on the other.
Glen Thompson turned in on a cross street. The contrast was striking. The road was relatively narrow, with little traffic. The houses were faced with brick or stucco, tall, but not as impressive as those lining the more magnificent streets. Small shops and restaurants with exotic names were squeezed onto the ground level. Irene also noted the striking number of hotel entrances.
“There are plenty of hotels around here,” she noted.
“Yes. Some are really posh, but most of them are small family-owned ones.”
They turned onto an even smaller street and stopped. A few steps led up to a heavy door with lead-framed windows. Two columns supported a portico. Under the roof, there was a frieze with “Thompson Hotel” written in elegant gold letters. Through large windows on each side of the entrance, the reception area was visible. The facades of the neighboring houses adjoined each window. The tall, narrow property appeared to be newly renovated. The stucco shone white, freshly painted, and the window frames were newly trimmed in a soft light blue. Irene immediately liked the little hotel.
Glen Thompson held the door open for her and insisted on carrying her bag. Irene entered the bright lobby and was met by a smiling woman who, she realized, must be Glen’s sister. When she smiled, Irene saw the family resemblance. She was a head shorter than her brother and had a somewhat lighter complexion. She appeared to be about the same age as Irene.
“Welcome to the Thompson Hotel. My name is Estelle.”
She held out her hand to greet Irene, automatically brushing the other hand over her neck to smooth her chignon. Her golden brown short-sleeved dress matched her eyes. Irene realized that the woman in front of her had been a stunning beauty in her youth; she was still very attractive.
“Hello, Estelle,” said Glen. “You can treat me to a cup while Irene gets settled in the room.” He asked Irene, “Is fifteen minutes enough time?”
“Absolutely.”
“Good. I’ll be waiting on the couch.”
HER ROOM was located on the top floor. For the first time in her life, she encountered a one-person elevator. It wouldn’t have been possible to get anyone else inside the tiny cage unless they were tenderly entwined and didn’t have any luggage. When the small elevator had safely rattled its way to the fourth floor and opened its doors, Irene decided that she would have to use the stairs from now on.
The room was surprisingly large, decorated in emerald green and golden tan. Everything was bright and new, from the carpet on the floor to the tiled bathroom. A graphic print with a theme from the Carnaval in Rio adorned the wall.
Irene hung up the few clothes she had brought in the closet and took the opportunity to use the toilet. Then she walked down the stairs to the lobby.
“SHOULD WE walk? It’s only about half a mile from here,” Glen Thompson said.
“I’d love to walk,” Irene agreed.
The sun was shining, but it was still quite cold in the wind.
A surprising number of houses had scaffolding on the outside and several were already restored. Irene realized that Bayswater was a part of the city which was regaining its old character. As if he could read her thoughts, Glen said, “Quite a few immigrants live here in Bayswater but at the same time, we have an influx of English people who want to live in central London. Of course, other areas of the city are more fashionable, like Mayfair or Holland Park, but the houses there are terribly expensive. Yet even if Bayswater has become trendy, it’s nothing compared to Notting Hill. That’s where Rebecka Schyttelius lives. I don’t know if you’ve seen the movie with Julia Roberts and Hugh Grant. .?”
“No.”
“The movie had an amazing impact, and now it’s fashionable to live in Notting Hill.”
Irene noticed that they were headed west. Pretty soon, the houses became dirtier and more decayed. There was also a lot of scaffolding here, but the houses that were undergoing renovation hadn’t originally been as beautiful as the ones in Bayswater.
“Notting Hill is a old blue-collar neighborhood. But there are a few really nice houses, like the one up there.”
Glen pointed at a large white four-story house with a beautifully ornamented facade. The first floors had narrow balconies running along the whole width of the house, where flowers in boxes and pots were already blooming. The balconies faced a thickly wooded park surrounded by a high iron fence. The general public could only peer through the bars at the greenery, because a sign hanging on the gate told them that it was private.
They walked past a large Tudor-style red brick house, continued to the next cross street, and found themselves on Ossington Street. A pub was located at the corner which, according to the black sign with an ornate golden text, was called “Shakespeare.” The building that housed the pub looked considerably older than the surrounding structures. It was low with small, lead-paned mullioned windows, painted a dull greenish-brown color.
Even here on Ossington Street, scaffolding dominated, particularly on one side. Most of the houses on the other side seemed to have been restored already. Glen Thompson stopped in front of a white stucco house with a bright red door. Two brass plates shone on the door, but the distance was too great for Irene to be able to read them.
“Here it is,” Glen announced after checking the address on a piece of paper.
Irene noted that the next house and Rebecka’s house looked identical, aside from the fact that the neighbor’s door was bright blue. There were even two matching brass plates on the blue door.
A high stone stoop led up to the red door. “Datacons. Lefevre amp; St. Clair” read the larger sign. “Rebecka Schyttelius” had been engraved on the smaller one. So Rebecka lived at her place of work.
Glen Thompson pushed the shiny new brass-surrounded doorbell. There was a faint dingdong from inside the house. After a few seconds, they heard quick steps and the door opened.
For the second time in a few hours’ time, Irene’s jaw dropped when confronted by a man who didn’t look at all like she had expected. Because, as far as Irene knew, this one had been dead for almost twenty years. His murder had been featured on the front pages of newspapers all over the world and on news programs around the globe. Now he stood before her, peering at Irene with brown eyes behind round-framed eyeglasses. His thick shoulder-length dark-brown hair was parted in the middle. A white cotton shirt with rolled-up sleeves was open at the neck and hung outside his faded jeans. On his otherwise bare feet were a pair of sandals.
His name was John Lennon.
But when he held out his hand and introduced himself, he claimed that his name was Christian Lefevre.
He smiled when he became aware of Irene’s surprise. In a friendly way, he said, “I’ve won some look-alike contests. People are usually startled when they see me. It’s actually become a fun thing. Especially since the Beatles are my idols, although I was too young during their golden years.”
Christian Lefevre stepped aside to let them in. They took off their coats in the narrow vestibule and were shown into an airy room with a high ceiling. Sunlight entered through tall curtainless windows, filtered through the leaves of the large green plants. Colorful and expensive framed posters of various computers hung on the walls. The Beatles’ “Yesterday” flowed into the room from concealed speakers.
Irene counted three laptop and four desktop computers, standing on wooden desks that had been covered with clear varnish in order to show off the grain of the wood. The thin metal rectangles, the laptops, were closed and rested together on a separate table. Only two of the computers were on.
“Unfortunately, Rebecka couldn’t handle the tension before this meeting. I had to drive her to see Dr. Fischer this morning.”
