Chapter 18
Guntram de Lisle's diary
January 19th, 2016
London
On Monday I arrived at London airport at 11 a.m. Just my luck, St. Claude's secretary was waiting for me and she drove me to the bank for a meeting I wasn't expecting or informed about.
The London office, or what is left of it, was quite a mess of unhappy people. I wasted four hours speaking with St. Claude and trying to find a way to sort out some of his mess. This bloody thing, Marvin, makes us feel like useless idiots as it has taken over almost all of the business. How can you be a banker if the thing creates the companies for you? In a way Konrad was right. Humans are not ready for it.
We have old sharks sitting at their desks, furious because there's no meat in the water and we also have... little “Dories” in two thousand pounds suits sitting at their desks trying to look useful.
Bloody upcoming Brexit. We have to push the fusion of the London Stock Exchange with Frankfurt.
I was supposed to be here to meet Altair and in the blink of an eye, I found myself playing Konrad up to 7 p.m.
On the way back to the house, I stopped by Harvey Nichols to buy the candies, macarons and biscuits. I hope he chokes on them.
The truth is I didn't want to pass by Constantin's former house. It brought me so many memories back. I didn't also want to walk by Holland Park but Altair lives in St. Edwards Square, so that's unavoidable.
After showering and changing I walked towards his house because I needed to think without anyone hovering around me. The view of the tall trees soothed me. I arrived at 9 p.m. Altair was still in meetings. So I was led by one of his aides -I don't even know their names- to what used to be the music room. Maybe his staff was a bit surprised that I would be walking alone in the streets.
I tried to wait peacefully, but my mobile phone didn't give me a minute's rest because it was vibrating permanently with messages and e-mails. Note to self: We should create a Whatsapp group and collectively whine there.
