Free Death of a Showgirl by Tobias Jones Page A

that name mean anything to you?’
    He suddenly turned to me as if I had woken him up. He shook his head conclusively, quickly. ‘Nothing.’
    ‘You’ve never heard her name before?’
    He shook his head again, raising his palms as if to apologise for his ignorance.
    I stood up and thanked him for the coffee. He walked me to the door and held it open as the dogs reappeared and snarled. He stared at them angrily, picking up an umbrella from behind the door like it was the only way to let out all his frustration. They yelped pitifully as they retreated. He clicked open the gate for me and I exchanged his cold, perfect house for the hot chaos of the capital.
    I walked along the pavement above the Tiber, looking down at the light brown river and the oblique steps descending down to the banks. There were a few boats moored up there, rocking left and right in the breeze. I watched a few squawking gulls as they tried to snatch crumbs from the deck of a pleasure boat. One of the birds got what it wanted and soared up to the rooftops to enjoy its takings. I saw it alight on the top of one of the blocks of flats, disappearing amidst the forest of aerials and satellite dishes.
    I stood there, staring at the ugly receivers. Strange that they were the means by which synthetic dreams were captured, that it was those metallic tangles that brought the tinny laughter and forced applause into people’s lives. Next to them the white dishes were all facing upwards to the sky as if in admiration of a orbiting god. There was something beseeching about their angle, about that recipient, passive pose, like the viewers themselves, with their gaze cast up to the passing stars.

  
     
     
    Back in the city I checked into a hotel near Piazza del Popolo. It was an old-fashioned place, full of dark wood, antiquarian maps and quiet staff. I went up to my room in a slow lift and made some calls. It didn’t take long to discover that Gianni Esposito worked on a magazine called Desire . I called the publication and they told me that Esposito was in.
    I wrote down the address and went round there. It was a short walk outside the centre, where the streets became boulevards and the shops, rather than selling designer outfits, sold discount underwear and cheap suitcases. There were fading posters from some recent political campaign, the politicians’ large faces smiling at pedestrians. There were trite slogans written underneath, many of which had been doctored or defaced.
    I wondered to myself why I was chasing a story from twenty years ago instead of the current one. I had to follow any leads I found, and if I had none on Simona, then I would chase loose ends from back in the 1990s. I wasn’t sure if history was repeating itself, but I knew that as names came up I had to confront them, see what they could tell me about the past and what that might say about the present.
    The magazine’s offices were in a large block housing various other titles. The ground-floor reception had lime-green sofas and copies of the covers of various magazines from years gone by. There were photographs of couples on snowy mountains, smiling outrageously at something as they stared into the far distance; there were pictures of fashionably dressed children running along the beach holding hands, their feet splashing in the water. I looked for a cover of Desire and saw a woman on her hands and knees, showing her cleavage. It was someone I recognised from the TV, but I couldn’t place the programme. She looked young and seductive. The cat with nine lives , read the headline.
    The whole place exuded fantasy. This was what people aspired to: the laughter, the glamour of snowy peaks, feet splashing in a transparent sea, a beautiful wife with perfect teeth and voluptuous curves. On the far wall, in large letters, it said Sogni Group .
    The woman on the front desk, though, looked like a sourpuss. She was the wrong side of plump, her face was barely symmetrical and her short black