By the time the war came, and with it conscription, Donald had already suffered two separate knife wounds to his left thigh and had begun to walk with a limp. He avoided military service but other men of his age did not. Donald worked this to his advantage. His influence spread. So did his reputation. It was around this time that his first wife left him, and with her went his second daughter. He’s changed, she said. He’s changed, everyone said.
After the war, Donald bought property in central London. Prices had slumped and much of it was in disrepair through wartime poverty or outright bomb damage. It was going cheap. A few years previously, Donald Howard had gone to see a motion picture in full technicolor at the Leicester Square Trocadero. Its name was Gone with the Wind. Land, it’s the only thing that matters, Mr. O’Hara had said to his daughter. Donald had taken these words to heart. He bought and he bought. All the money he earned from his illicit activities was poured into property in Soho. He ran more brothels, and strip clubs, and underground gay bars, and he became achingly, blindingly rich. Another wife. This one was significantly more glamorous than the last: she had aspirations in musical theater and smoked cigarettes using a long, red cigarette holder. Three more daughters, five in total. He and his glamorous wife named these daughters after London landmarks: Angel, Chelsea and Victoria.
By the time Donald met Agatha’s mother, Anastasia, he was already old. Donsky, darling, it’s a boy. I know it’s a boy. The young and beautiful Anastasia told him this again and again. Donald wanted desperately to believe her, and in the last months of his life, which he spent with his Russian wife, he changed his will, so the estate would be left to his youngest child, as yet unborn. Donald Howard died shortly afterwards. When the baby arrived, she was a girl.
Agatha has scheduled a day of meetings. She is looking forward to none of them. She enjoys the parts of the business that involve designing and building, working with architects and engineers, and taking a derelict, useless wreck and turning it into something beautiful and productive, but lately, so many of her plans have been stymied by the situation at the brothel, and the ongoing legal disputes with her sisters. Her first meeting is with a police officer, who she hopes can deal with the former issue, and the second meeting is with her lawyer, who has news regarding the latter.
She spots another dog and its owner coming in their direction. The dog is very small, and as it gets closer she makes out the face and features of a Yorkshire terrier, a pink ribbon tied into a bow between its ears. The dog’s owner is a man of about 5 foot 5 with strong arms, a round belly and a shaved head. His face is round and reddish.
Fedor is still off lead but close by. He hasn’t noticed the other dog.
Agatha and Roster continue to walk and so does the man with his Yorkshire terrier. They are now perhaps ten meters apart. The approaching man begins to smile at them. He looks as though he is going to speak. Neither Agatha nor Roster returns his smile and his face begins to fall.
Fedor catches the scent. He stands to attention. His ears are pricked; his eyes are wide; his lips are closed but ready, quivering. The man has not noticed the sighthound’s stance; neither has Roster. Agatha has noticed Fedor’s posture but thinks little of it.
The Yorkshire terrier lets out a short, high-pitched bark. Triggered by the frequency, the borzoi lurches forwards. His hind legs are released like the arm of a catapult. He is immediately upon the small creature.
Nobody understands what has happened. All three of the humans look, Agatha frowning slightly, Roster a couple of steps behind. The man who owns the Yorkshire terrier continues to hold the end of the lead, the other end of which is attached to the small dog, which is in the mouth of the large dog.
Even the little terrier hasn’t realized what is happening. She hangs limply, and makes no sound.
Then the Yorkshire terrier’s owner panics, and he begins to shout. He has a thick accent from a part of the country Agatha hasn’t visited, and she can’t make out what he is saying. She has never been shouted at by a complete stranger before. She has very little interaction with what she would call “members of the public,” and she has still less experience of this manner of incident. She recoils a little but is otherwise immobile.
The large dog is still holding the smaller dog in its jaws. The smaller dog is now quivering and making a high-pitched whimpering noise. Roster is trying to explain to the shouting man that this is only making matters worse; that the borzoi is simply responding to his very sensitive prey drive; that the borzoi believes the Yorkshire terrier to be a rabbit or some other traditional prey animal.
It takes nearly ten minutes for Fedor to be persuaded to drop the other dog. By this point, the man is in tears.
Happy Go Lucky
Lorenzo begins the day with an audition for a role in a new television series. He’s doing it for Glenda, he tells himself, but also he could do with the money. The production company is American though filming will be done in the north of England with a largely British cast. This is to give the program an “Old World” feel. Though set in a fantasy land, it’s supposed to be a kind of medieval fantasy, and it’s felt British accents will be more authentic.
Lorenzo’s agent put him forward for one role but the production company came back and
