London has long been one of my absolute favorite cities to visit. As an investment banker out of Zurich in the early 1990's, I would count the days until my trips across the channel to the "English-speaking" world. I would spend hours at my desk plotting how I might time my trips to Blighty to coincide with long weekends and establishing a precise itinerary once I got there. When in Paris, Hemingway used to meticulously plan out his days and weeks to get the most out of what the city had to offer. I felt (and still do!) the same way about London. (See: Memories of London)
I arrived in London on a bright sunny Sunday afternoon. Heathrow has never been one of my favorite airports and as I entered the immigrations hall and spied the crowd of 400 new arrivals standing in line ahead of me I remembered why. My flight had the misfortune of landing several minutes after not one...but two... inbound planes from Pakistan. Resignedly, I walked down the stairs and chose between the two lines. There was a family with three squirming infants on the one side and two prosperous looking Pakistani gentlemen in formal Shalwar Kameezes in the other. Which do you think I chose? Correct, the gentlemen. Big mistake! Neither of these two upstanding citizens had showered in the last two weeks. That combined with a fifteen hour flight from southwest Asia produced a ripeness that has to be experienced to be believed. Standing there, inching forward step by step, I kept flashing back to that scene in Silence of the Lambs where Scott Glenn smears Vick's Vapo rub under his nose and says to Clarice Starling: "You'll get used to the smell it in two minutes." Needless to say, I did not have any Vaporub! The line was as crowded as the Matterhorn on a busy day. The wait was two hours. Pleasant memories!
Freed at last, I bypassed the Tube and went directly to the Taxi station. The sixty-pound fare to my hotel in Mayfair was worth every pence. I stopped long enough to put down my bags and wash up, then headed out. I had three days in London and there was no time to waste. My first stop. The Dorchester Hotel.
The Dorchester is one of England's great hotels. It's a living landmark located on Park Lane adjacent to Hyde Park. I'm a big WWII buff and all the great writers and journalists passed through the Dorchester on their way to Europe: Hemingway, Irwin Shaw, Robert Capa, Martha Gellhorn, and many more. Anyway, I saddled up to the bar and ordered a Gin and Tonic. What else? The bar itself has recently been re-done and is full of velvet and mirrors. It's also full of elegant Russian ladies and not so elegant men right out of a Guy Ritchie movie.
Rules of Vengeance opens with my hero, Jonathan Ransom, arriving in London from a refugee camp in Africa to speak at a medical conference. Doctors being doctors, the conference is located at the Dorchester. Unfortunately, I did not set any scenes in the bar, so I limited myself to one cocktail. There were other more important dimensions of the hotel I needed to observe and photograph, but I can't really talk about them for fear of giving away the story. I will say, however, that Jonathan Ransom puts his climbing skills to good use.
The real reason I had come to London, however, was not to visit the Dorchester. It was to meet with several colleagues at Scotland Yard and at a "to-remain-unnamed Political Risk Consulting Firm."
Monday morning, I presented myself at the entry to New Scotland Yard. British police are nothing if not punctual. At eleven on the dot, Detective Superintendent Charlie McMurdie came downstairs to greet me. Charlie is a twenty-year veteran of the force. In that time, she has seen and done it all, from fraud to murder to the famed "Flying Squad," better known as "the Sweenie," (you can find out why in the book), the undercover unit charged with stopping robberies in flagrante. These days, she is standing up the country's cybercrime division. I had met Charlie eighteen month earlier when she was with the murder squad and it was on this subject that she offered her expertise. Here's some advice to the bad guys in Londontown: Don't try anything. Charlie will catch you. It's a done deal! She's just plain smarter than you.
But murder isn't the primary crime in Rules of Vengeance. It isn't even the secondary one. The action opens with a very large, very nasty car bombing directed against a diplomatic motorcade passing along Victoria Street in the heart of Westminster. Due to the proximity to Whitehall, the seat of the UK government offices, such an attack would be viewed as an attack on the government itself. The investigation would fall to the Counterterror squad of the London Metropolitan Police.
Later that Monday, I was privileged to spend a few hours with Chris Nolan, one of the Met's senior CT officers. Chris is a tall, broad-shouldered man with a quiet and imposing authority. He was one of the lead investigators in the 7/7 bombings three years ago and was largely responsible for identifying the culprits. Step by step, he walked me through the comprehensive response to such a car bombing from securing the crime scene, to evidence collection, all the way through to the Cabinet Office's probable actions. The hours I spent in Chris's company were an eye-opening lesson in modern policing. He is a consummate professional, which is my highest compliment.
I'm happy to report that my professional obligations ended there for the day. Dropping my papers off at my hotel, not the Dorchester, alas, but the very pleasant Mayfair Hotel, I walked along Green Park to Piccadilly Circus, and continued up Shaftesbury Avenue to the Coach and Horse Pub where I met my former editor, Bill Massey, for a pint of lager. Bill was with me for The First Billion, Devils Banker and Patriots Club, but has since returned to his native land where he works for Orion, as director of trade fiction. It was Bill who introduced me to his home football team, West Ham, and convinced me to become a fan. I try and overlook that each time we meet.
The next morning found me ringing the bell of a discreet office just off New Bond Street, where by hook and crook, I'd managed to track down a recently retired member of MI5, Britain's domestic security service. The former officer, who shall go by the name, "Rex," was the very picture of an undercover operative. Tall, slim, and looking a good ten years younger than his stated 65 years, he reminded me of James Bond, a few years after retirement. It was Rex who helped me shape the character of Charles Graves, also an MI5 officer, who is charged with pursuing and apprehending Jonathan Ransom.
I have to stop here to let all of you know how much I enjoy this part of writing a novel. Having the opportunity to travel to far flung corners of the earth and speak to men and women who are expert in fields absolutely foreign to me, is a real kick in the pants. Over the years, I've shared strudel with a former German SS officer, eaten midnight dinner at the Café Pushkin in Moscow with an avowed former hit man (and now very successful businessman), toured the headquarters of the United States Secret Service and even stuck my head into the presidential limousine.
My latest adventure will see me embedding with the United States Marine Corps this summer in Afghanistan to research an article for Parade Magazine about our nation's efforts to drive the Taliban out of the southern part of that country. I recently received my packing list. The first two items on the list were Kevlar vest and helmet. Gulp! I've come a long way from manning that old wooden desk inside a Swiss bank on the Bahnhofstrasse.
There is another part about writing novels that I love and that involves lunching with my editors and publishers. We've all read about how the tight economy is forcing publishers to rub their nickels and dimes together. The whole "wining and dining thing" is on hiatus for now. Forget about the three-martini-lunch. These days you're lucky to get three olives and the toothpick. I'm happy to say that my English publisher, Oliver Johnson, will have none of it. He's old school and so am I. There's only one way to properly prepare a battle plan for publishing a new novel and that's over a decent lunch with some decent wine. Oliver kindly invited me to the Tate Gallery, where we were joined by my English agent, Peter Robinson. It was fall so we ordered the game - pheasant or lamb, I think. We also ordered a few bottles of wine. White and red. Don't you dare ask me to recall the vineyard! Afterwards, we repaired to the Gallery and spent a few minutes admiring the amazing collection of Turners. Interestingly, drinking a full bottle of wine actually makes the pictures become clearer. I'll have to try that trick the next time I go to the Jeu de Paume in Paris and stare at all those Monets!
I walked the entire three or four miles back to my hotel, and
arrived once again clear of head.
Sadly, my stay in London was over.
I had only that night to write up my notes and pack. The next morning at five a car came to
collect me for the airport. My
next destination was Rome.
Memories of London
Back in the day, my trips would follow
a similar rhythm. The first and
most important step was to be free and clear of the office no later than 5pm
Friday afternoon. This was no easy
task and required an expert and shameless degree of shirking. Before you get any ideas, let me say
that I am a hard worker. When I
arrive at my office at 7 AM, I do not fiddle faddle about, browse the papers,
study the NBA box scores, clip my nails, check out the last episode of Lost on
my iPod, or count the number of synthetic fibers in the carpet. I get to work.
But I also believe in working
efficiently. There is only so much an intelligent, focused human being can get
done in a day.
To quote Chuck Connors, investment bankers are "a different breed of cat." And I don't mean, "Thrillseekers."
Quite the opposite. Too
often, I-bankers confuse quantity with quality. Why take five hours to get a job done perfectly when
you can take fifteen? Bottom
line: if you don't watch out, you can be in the office until nine every night,
studying balance sheets, revising spreadsheets, or worst of all, putting in dreaded
"face time." All too often,
I can remember leaving at seven PM after a twelve-hour day and my colleagues
calling after me, "So Herr Reich, you are verking only half-day? Was
ist das
I circumvented this in any number of ways.
The best, of course, was the off site client visit. Back then without cell phones and Blackberries, once clear of the office you were your own man. Another ploy called for parents, siblings, or loved ones to (coincidentally) be visiting London at the same time. The Swiss are pious in their love of family. Only the
coldest-hearted of bosses could refuse a loyal son a visit with his beloved
mother or father. Finally,
there was the disappearing act.
This one calls for leaving a light on in your office, a spare jacket draped
over your chair, and a few cryptic messages lo colleagues about your various,
all-important chores, while you slip downstairs and run like hell once you hit
the pavement.
I am proud to
say that I have successfully used all three.
Anyway, once clear of the office, I would take the tube to Covent Garden and visit a few of my favorite pubs. The Coach and Horses on Greek Street
off Shaftesbury Avenue remains my favorite. After a few pints, it would be back to the hotel to shower and change. I am a lifelong theater lover. At least one night
of the weekend would be devoted to seeing a show on the West End, hopefully a
comedy, hopefully something by Noel Coward. I remember seeing Tom Conti in Blithe Spirit or was it Design for Living?
Whatever! Leaving the
theatre, I was holding my ribs in pain from having laughed so hard. Afterwards it was off to a late supper
and then to bed. Good memories.
My other favorite haunt was (and still is) Trader Vics located in the basement of the London Hilton on Park Lane. I grew up going to the Trader Vics in the Beverly Hilton. My first real taste of alcohol was stealing a sip from my father's Fogcutter. I think it was enough to make me tipsy!! The Trader Vics in London is the real deal as far as Polynesian haunts go. Dark rooms, pufferfish and
outrigger canoes hanging from the ceiling, polished teak wood tables. You cannot go wrong with a
Fogcutter, Queens Park Swizzle, or my all-time favorite, the Old Style Navy
Grog. Add a few "Pupu platters"
and you are in business! No matter
what you do for the rest of the night it will be fun. Now that I think about it...we never ever left Vics once we
got there!
Weekends in London demand sightseeing. Either a walk down the Embankment, a visit to the Tower, or an hour or two at the Tate Gallery. It's all good!) Here are some other favorites in London: Tsars Vodka bar in the Langham Hilton on Portman Place, Bibendum Restaurant, Mr. Chow, Harrods, Harvey Nichols, Claridges, Maxwells for hamburgers, the original Hard Rock café, and of course, Annabels for clubbing it.
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