The Ayatollah's Money

  Chapter 9 – Getting Friendly

  Hanging out with the Junes wasn’t cheap. First there was the 820 pounds per day to stay at The Savoy, and then there were the restaurant bills. Drinking $300 bottles of Burgundy, Bordeaux, and Champagne twice a day added up. Hadn’t she read somewhere, sometime, something about a connection between the human liver and alcohol? Oh well, not to worry, she trusted Gwen and Roger. If they could do it, she could do it.

  And the reality was she was a lot richer than the Junes. She was a lot richer than almost everyone. The Junes were well off, but not exactly rich. If they were truly rich, they may not have gotten involved in all the shady deals they had over the years, most of which were connected, in one way or another, with artworks and antiques. Some of the artwork and some of the antiques were bona fide, and some weren’t. Some were fake. Whether they were real or fake, their connection to the Junes usually produced a tidy little income, which went out as fast as it came it, being exchanged for all the expensive bottles of wine that also were connected to the Junes. Then again, even if the Junes truly were rich, they still might have gotten involved in the shady capers, just for the fun of it, because the Junes like excitement.

  They weren’t involved in any shady deal right now, though, sitting in the lobby of The Savoy, deciding whether to go to Covent Garden to see the ballet or stay in their suite and watch a DVD starring William Powell and Myrna Loy. Gwen said, “We’ve been burning the candle at both ends for a week now, since we met Laleh. Maybe we should stay in and watch the movie.”

  Roger knew enough not to argue, so they put the DVD in the player and settled in to watch their favorite movie couple. The craziness started immediately, with Myrna Loy trying to egg William Powell into a new detective venture, and him trying to avoid getting involved because he knew it would get in the way of his martini drinking. During a slow part in the movie, Gwen said, “How long are we staying in London?”

  “As long as we want.”

  “How long is that?”

  “Until we want to go home and see the dog.”

  “I miss him. He saved our asses that time.” Gwen referred to the time the Russian woman came into their house at 3am, armed with a Walther PPK handgun, with malice aforethought. The dog heard her downstairs and woke up his owners, each of whom got out of bed with a gun in their hand, and waited, hidden, at the top of the stairs, for the woman to come up. Which she did, and they got the drop on her, and that started one of their wilder adventures. How she got into the house, past their alarm system and deadbolts, they never figured out. What they knew was that she didn’t get past their dog, and from that day on they loved the dog twice as much as they did before, which was a lot.

  Roger said, “Do you want to go home soon?”

  “No. London is beautiful. Maybe in a week or so. And Laleh is interesting. We know nothing about her, and she’s still interesting.”

  “It’s odd, isn’t it, not knowing anything about someone after spending most of a week with them? I don’t even know what it is I find interesting about her, but it’s something. You know what it is?”

  Gwen said, “Shhh, this is a great scene.” The great scene in the movie, one of the great scenes, had William Powell holding court in a fancy bar, teaching the bartender and everyone else who would listen how to mix the perfect martini. The bartender would mix one, and Powell would drink it, and say, “Not bad, but not perfect.” And he would do some more instructing, and the bartender would mix another one, and he would drink it, and say, “Better. But not perfect.” Then one of the customers would try his hand at mixing, with the same result. After Powell has drunk seven of the imperfect drinks, Myrna comes into the bar, dressed like a million bucks and knocking out all the guys. She says to the bartender, “How many has he had?”

  “Seven.”

  She says, “Ok, line ‘em up for me. All seven.”

  The bartender looks at William Powell for confirmation, but Powell looks away across the room, so the bartender proceeds to mix seven less than perfect martinis and lines them up on the bar in front of her. The director of the movie doesn’t show her drinking them, but cuts to the next morning, in their bedroom, to her waking up with a hangover. She looks at Powell and says, “Well, was it worth this hangover?”

  And he says, “My dear, we have twenty-five new friends now, all of whom told me that if we ever need to go to war, all we have to do is ask, and they will follow us.” He pauses. “Yes, I would say it was worth it.”

  After Powell said that line, Gwen turned down the volume again and said, “I don’t know what's interesting about her, but I know what you find interesting.”

  “What?”

  “Her smile.”

  “A person’s smile is enough to want to hang around them for a week, eating lunch and dinner every day?”

  “Her smile is worth it, for a simple mind like yours.”

  Roger never resented statements like that coming from Gwen. He said, “For the moment, let’s say that’s true - all I care about is her smile. What makes you want to be with her as much as we have? What intrigues your noble and more complex intellect so much?”

  “It's not my intellect that’s intrigued. Something else.”

  “What?”

  “Intuition.”

  “What’s it tell you?”

  “That we want her in our lives.”

  Roger thought about that for a moment, and said, “Ok.”