The Girl at the Bus-Stop by Sam Aubigny

across Southwark Bridge. He wandered the quiet streets for an hour, before buying himself a coffee from a café near the Thames.
     
    He could see across the river to the apartment block, and he sighed. Hating himself for being middle-aged, he finished his drink and walked back with his head down. In the reception area of the apartment block, an athletic young man in a track-suit was talking to the porter. As Rudge waited for the lift, he strolled over to him.
     
    ‘It’s Mr Rudge isn’t it?’ he said with a warm smile.
     
    ‘Yes, I’m Rudge.’
     
    ‘I’m Frankie Gibb, Mr Rudge. I’m the personal trainer of Mr Granger, the owner of your apartment. Or rather, I was his personal trainer but he’s not been here for months.’
     
    ‘I see, so what can I do for you, Mr Gibb?’
     
    ‘Frankie, please,’ he replied with a warm smile, ‘and it’s more a case of what I can do for you, Mr Rudge. I was wondering if you’d care to try the facilities in the basement?   I can take you through everything in the gym, show you how the equipment works. If you want I can put together an exercise programme for you and recommend a healthy diet.’  
     
    As the lift door opened, Rudge stood quietly for a few moments before stepping in. He turned around to face Gibb and smiled.  
     

    ‘You know something, Frankie, I think you might just have found yourself a new customer. I’ll see you down there in ten minutes.’

Chapter 8 - Sympathy for the Diva
     
      Becky waited on the stone steps of Gale Buckingham’s elegant four-storey Georgian ‘crash pad’ in Eton Place. Having pressed the highly polished brass bell switch twice, she still hadn’t heard it ring and wondered if it was broken. She was just about to try the huge door-knocker with the angry-looking gargoyle motif, when the huge black door slowly opened. A young lady dressed in a tight-fitting pink and black hooped tee-shirt with matching tights peered around the side of it, the expression on her face about as welcoming as the gargoyle’s.
     
    ‘Yes,’ she said snootily, eying Becky up and down with suspicion.
     
    ‘I’m here to see Gale Buckingham.’ announced Becky nervously. ‘She’s invited me for afternoon tea.’
     
    ‘Oh, of course,’ the young woman replied, and a warm smile instantly melted away her initial frosty look. ‘You must be Raspberry Caine, please come in.’
     
    She led Becky through a vast hall with its busy mosaic tiled floor, antique furniture, exotic ornaments and offered to take her coat.
     
    ‘Gale’s in the drawing room,’ the young woman informed her, her voice echoing upwards towards the ridiculously high ornate ceiling. ‘I’ll just hang this up and take you through.’
     
    ‘Ms Caine,’ greeted Gale, ‘I’m so terribly pleased you could make it.’
     
    Rising from the Art Deco teardrop-sided turquoise leather sofa, Gale outstretched her arms and gave Becky a theatrical embrace, kissing the air three inches from either cheek.
     
    ‘I was pleased to have been asked, Gale. What a beautiful place, it’s like a palace.’
     
    ‘It’s been in my family since the turn of the century, twentieth that is,’ she said proudly. ‘My great-grandfather took it in lieu of a gambling debt owed to him. I think some wayward Lord or Duke lost heavily at cards and couldn’t cough-up the necessary readies.’
     
    ‘Goodness,’ replied Becky, ‘lucky old great-grandfather.’
     
    Gale led Becky over to the sofa, and beckoned her to sit down, before pouring out two large Sherries into crystal schooners and handing one to her.
     
    ‘Yes, he was a banker and used the place when he was up in Town. He was quite a character, and apart from his love of gambling he kept a string of mistresses living here. To the casual observer they were his domestic staff, but behind closed doors they must have got up to all sorts of mischief.’
     
    ‘I didn’t think that sort of thing went on in those days.’
     
    ‘You’d