West London Fix

Colonel Ivanov is placing his reflection carefully in the river at Albert Bridge. Someone has brought him back and he has no idea who or why. One minute he was sleeping, perhaps dead, in a quiet place near Kiev, the next he was smoking a cigar and bracing himself against London's October rain. Sweet, forlorn Mandy still sings in his memory. Mr. Stephen is painting canvasses, fending off and ignoring the inevitable conclusion of his pecadilloes - arrest, charge, imprisonment. The mews are quieter now than they were twenty years ago.
Funny thing - Ivanov realises he hasn't aged.
Blessed, lucky. Is Uncle Joe watching over him? Everything, they say, is to be continued.
This is Ivanov's chance then to be seduced by the city once again.
The common glow of gold on the Thames. The careening - what's that? - green parakeets in the treetops. They weren't here before, not then, not in the view from the Rolls or the hired Bentley.
And the short, rumbling regeneration of the rails.
To be continued then . . .