Little Black Book

Dev walked down the street, kicking at tin that stubbornly refused to move out of his way. He felt the frustration of the day, the week, the year, building up inside him and he almost screamed. The jewellers was going under, he’d wagered its future on a big summer of sales that had never come and now no bank would loan him the money to continue. He didn’t blame them. He was a loser, and he had lost.

With an almighty kick, he sent the can sailing off the kerb where it hit a lamppost and ricocheted crazily down an alley. Dev turned to watch it go, feeling a vindictive fury pulsing through him before it drained out of him as he remembered everything was his fault. He didn’t want to go home, tell Adrian that they would have to try to sell the business. He’d be so nice about it. It would be unbearable.

But Dev knew it was time to face the music. He’d tried, he really had. If only that was enough.

He turned to leave the entrance to the alley, when a glint by the bins caught his eye. Probably that bloody can, laughing at him. Dev walked over, deciding he’d crush it, take it home, put in the recycling, along with his life, when he realised the glint wasn’t a can.

Stepping closer, he saw a matching shine just to the right of the first. They looked like eyes shining in the darkening light, just above the floor. A creature ready to pounce? Dev’s blood ran cold.

Then a car drove past on the road, its lights illuminating the monster and something stranger emerged. A black briefcase, its two brass clasps glinting in the dark. He had thought they were eyes.

Dev crouched down and examined the briefcase, shining a light from his phone. No markings anywhere on the briefcase, nothing to indicate it was anything unusual. But it was fancy leather, and the clasps that seemed like there were brass from a distance Dev immediately recognised as gold. High quality gold at that. The more he looked at this object, the more he knew it was expensive.

Dev looked down the alley and behind him, searching for anyone who might have dropped it. Another few cars roared by as a light rain started to fall. Nothing.

Dev moved to a squat, haunches bent like he’d seen of him on family holidays to the beach, hunched over a rock pool fishing for crabs. He took the briefcase in both hands. It was clean, untouched. Just a little damp from the rain.

His thumbs moved over the golden clasps. There was no combination. Dev clicked the first latch back, feeling the cold gold on the tips of his thumb. It clicked open with a satisfying clunk. Then the next. Footsteps walked past him on the main road. Sirens blared somewhere. Dev didn’t turn.

Both clasps open, Dev lifted the lid. The briefcase was resting on his knees, and even then Dev nearly dropped it, his mouth gaping. Inside was one piece of paper, and beneath that, a sea of £50 notes. It was, even to the most cursory of glances, a lot of money.

Dev rocked back in his squat, turning to the wall to keep himself upright, before sliding down onto his ass, his legs out in front of him, like he was working on his laptop at home. The backs of his thighs grew damp from the wet ground. Dev didn’t move. He stared at the money, his jaw slack. He read the note:

To whoever finds this briefcase,

You are very lucky. Inside here is £20,000.

This is not a scam. These are not counterfeit. They are yours.

I ask only one thing: do something good.

You will never meet me, and I will never meet you, so there is no way of me knowing what you will do. That’s between you and your god.

I hope it brings you happiness.

A friend.

Dev read the note 3 more times before folding it up and putting it in his pocket. His heart was pounding. His mouth was dry. He immediately became very aware of his position in a dark alley. He was holding a briefcase full of money, and he wasn’t white; this was a precarious position to be in when it came to law enforcement. Dev slipped one note out of one neat bundle of 20, bound by a paper sleeve, and held it up to the light. As if to lend a hand, the moon slipped out from behind a cloud and its light shone down on the note. Dev had never been so happy to see the Queen’s face peering through the material. This was real alright. A lifetime working in Hatton Garden had given him a very keen eye for fake money. This was kosher as a Brick Lane beigel.

Dev slipped the £50 into his pocket next to the note, and clicked the briefcase clasps shut. His heart was pounding, but by the time he got to his feet, sliding his back up the brick wall, feeling the rubbing against his shoulders, he felt an eerie sense of calm.

He took one deep breath, and then walked out of the alley way back onto the main road, heading south towards the river and his small flat with Adrian. The briefcase hung at his side, feeling incredibly heavy and lighter than air all at once. Dev’s arms felt strange as they swung back and forth, and he had the irrepressible urge to sing. He knew he shouldn’t bring attention to himself, given he was carrying a small, very stealable fortune on his person, but suddenly the world felt magical and alive and like all things were possible. A strange benefactor leaving £20,000 in cash on the street? It was too strange to be true. And yet.

Dev skipped through the rain and leaped onto a lamppost, swinging around with one arm, the other stretched into the air, briefcase hanging as a balancing counterweight. Dev hummed the notes of the song, the only song that you could think of when you’re happy and rain was falling down, and he danced down the street, through the flickering lights of the streetlamps, his feet lighter than air.

** *

Grigor Yanechkin watched as the man danced down the street, and allowed himself a smile. This had been a good one. It would have been better if the man had an umbrella but really Grigor was being picky at this point. It had been an almost perfect reaction.

Grigor removed a small black book from his coat pocket and wrote down a description of the man, along with the time and date. Under the column “reactions”, he wrote nothing. That would come with time. He would think about that. Grigor’s mind worked slowly and methodically, like a large clockwork soldier, and Grigor knew when to give it the space to slowly clunk its way forwards towards an answer.

Grigor opened his black umbrella, the rain pattering down above his head now, and Grigor closed his eyes. It reminded him of being back home in Russia, the reassuring round of rain on a tin roof. Things were so different now, he was so much more comfortable, but he missed the wild closeness of those days. Still, he was in England now, he had a master and a friend who gave him interesting work, and most importantly, he was alive. In this moment Grigor felt so profoundly, throbbingly grateful for that.

Grigor felt so good in fact, that he decided to walk. He was in East London now, where the young rich artists live, and his home was all the way in the west, where the old money was. There were still artists there, Grigor had seen them, but they were older and had connections and had the kind of money that could have bought Grigor’s entire village. Rich artists! What a world. It was strange, how so many people wanted to live in London but you had to be so rich to live here. Why not go somewhere else and have a nice life? Still, it was not Grigor’s to question why. Maybe other people had a very rich friend like he did. Grigor did not know this country.

Grigor felt the comforting rhythm of feet on concrete and rain overhead as he walked west. He knew it was west, because of where the moon was in the sky. He knew these streets, he had had work here over the years, of so many different types, but today, he navigated by the moon. It connected him with home. The same moon, viewed from such a different perspective. That was all his job was, really. A series of different perspectives.

As he made his way through the city, through the finance district and then onto the jewellers in Hatton Garden and even, unbeknownst to Grigor, almost directly past Dev’s shop, and onwards, he fell in love with the quiet thrumming energy of the place all over again. This always happened to Grigor when he walked these streets; the sheer number of people trying to survive. How did they all do it? Grigor was aware enough of his situation to know the comfort he had access to couldn’t be something everyone had, so how did they all get through the day? His mind gently boggled, swimming with the magnificent painful industry of it all.

Grigor walked along Holborn Road, into the centre of London, cars swooping by as the rain fell down. He felt a great sense of peace within him as the thought of all this life around him. He had helped. This one person, he had helped. He had seen the man’s reaction. He would do something good with that money. Grigor knew it.

Grigor cut north off the main road to walk past the British Museum. All these stolen treasures, put in one place so British people and tourists could see them. Precious items from the world over, hardly anyone complained that they were all here. What a place.

Grigor walked along Bond Street, past the immense shops full of clothing made by small children from poor countries, through the crowds and into Hyde Park. The greenery and the opulence made him think of Mary Poppins, and Paddington, and London at its best. Welcoming and friendly and so very very British.

The rain on his umbrella teleported his mind to Russia, but now he was safe and warm, wrapped up in an expensive coat. He felt cosy as the darkness deepened around him. He was inside London’s embrace. It would protect him.

Eventually he emerged in Kensington, with all its embassies and museums and so many rich people. This is where his master’s house stood, huge and imposing and modern and ancient and everything all at once. Grigor pressed the hidden button by the gate, the one no one else knew about, and it opened for him to enter.

Inside the huge hall, he hung his coat up and placed his wet umbrella in the basket.

He looked up the huge marble staircase for a moment, before walking left into his area of the house. It was opulent, compared to what he was used to. But nothing compared to what he imagined upstairs.

He sat on his single bed, and opened up the black book. He thought for a long time about what to write under “reactions”. It was an important decision.

After an indeterminate amount of time, he wrote down “Definitely good” in a neat, simple hand, then he placed it in the dumbwaiter and sent it upstairs. By the morning, it would be back down.

And he would have another briefcase to hide.

Grigor undressed, and got into bed.

He slept soundly.