Angel Hunt by Mike Ripley

name. From the first moment I’d seen Inverness Doogie and his Welsh wife, Miranda, I’d had them down as a sort of suicidal Sonny and Cher.
    Doogie was Scottish – well, he would be; nobody would admit to coming from Inverness if they weren’t – and had absolutely no sense of humour. It was almost as if it had been surgically removed along with his appendix when he was a kid. On our first meeting, he had thought I was a removal man working for Frank and Salome who had gone on to higher things (mainly higher rates, mortgage repayments, so fourth, so fifth). Things had got worse after that, when I’d met Miranda: as dark and austere as a Welsh mining valley and as much fun as chapel on Sunday. It was she who’d told me that Doogie was a commis chef at one of the better Park Lane hotels (and I’d said I hadn’t realised his politics were important and she’d just looked at me) and that she was a journalist with one of the North London suburban weeklies. I’m sure she wrote everything from the ‘What’s On in Stoke Newington’ column to the reports of the Council’s planning committee meetings with equal sincerity, convinced she was helping to change the world. If she didn’t change it, I suppose Doogie could always poison it.
    Many a time I had wished that Frank and Salome were not so upwardly mobile and were back slumming it in Stuart Street. But short of a stock market crash, a hundred percent divorce rate and the legal profession starting to work for free, I couldn’t see it. Frank had designs on being the first black High Court judge, and Salome actually enjoyed her job in the City, as well as prospered from it. The other factor against a return was that I reckoned it only a matter of time before they stopped being Dinks (double income, no kids) and became Whannies (‘We have a nanny’).
    An early morning call from Doogie and Miranda left a lot to be desired, especially as it was not yet nine o’clock. I fought off the duvet and padded to the door, grabbing a towel from the bathroom to wrap around my waist and avoiding a cunning ankle-tap trip-and-throw move from Springsteen. He’d been practising it while I’d been away.
    Doogie’s idea of knocking on a door was to impersonate a heavy machine-gun, and I’d never heard him run out of ammunition. The only way to stop him was to open it.
    â€˜Good morning, sir,’ I said cheerfully. ‘Do you mind if I ask you something? Do you actually read your Bible? Do you know that the answer to all your questions, all your
problems, is actually contained within its glorious covers? There you can find hope. There –’
    Doogie held up a finger.
    â€˜Ahm knocking on your door,’ he said slowly.
    I hit my forehead with the heel of my hand.
    â€˜So you are. I’m sorry. Force of habit.’
    Behind him, the dark and diminutive Miranda rolled her dark eyes to the ceiling and shook her head.
    â€˜Just give him the message,’ she said wearily.
    â€˜A friend of yours called Bunny rang last night and told you not to forget that you’re playing at Christopher’s place this morning,’ said Doogie, then nodded to himself, pleased
that he’d remembered his lines.
    â€˜Thanks. I hadn’t forgotten.’
    I had, but I had no intention of giving Miranda the impression I was disorganised. I grabbed at my towel just before it slipped.
    â€˜C’mon, Doogie, let’s get to work,’ she said, starting down the stairs. ‘Before he starts rehearsal.’
    Doogie raised his eyebrows, then his shoulders and then the corners of his mouth, and set off after her.
    â€˜Rehearsal?’ I shouted after them. ‘Don’t know the meaning of the word.’
    But as soon as I had the door shut, I began to ransack the flat for the sheet music I keep for special occasions such as Christmas, bar mitzvahs, weddings and so on.
    In the bottom of the