Gently French Read online

  She pouted prettily. ‘Perhaps, I said. Maybe I don’t know myself, exactly. That sometimes happens to one, huh?’

  ‘At least, you’re not grief-stricken.’

  ‘I am sad, oh yes. After all, we had been together three years. But grief-stricken, no. I have had one big grief, and after that—’ She gestured. ‘So say I am sad.’

  ‘Or even less than that?’

  Her eyes narrowed slightly. Then she thrust her bag at me.

  ‘Here – hold this! It is time I permitted myself a cigarette.’

  Which brought us closer: I sitting on the stile, Mimi extracting a cigarette from the bag I was holding. Then, strangely, she couldn’t find her matches, had to beg a light from me: and steady my hand. Fingers of character. Not anonymously feminine, but made to do something more than caress. And I caught that scent which Hanson had likened to honey, and which I immediately qualified: heather honey.

  ‘I am told you wish to go back to London.’

  ‘Oh, perhaps. It is not important.’

  ‘Some business was mentioned.’

  ‘Not true. Just some parties, a first night.’

  ‘Then you won’t mind staying here a little longer.’

  She blew me a tender stream of smoke. ‘No. It will not be so boring. It is the small men I find tiresome.’

  ‘After all, you seem able to amuse yourself.’

  ‘Aha. So you have noticed.’

  ‘Picking water-lilies. Where did you put them?’

  ‘They have horrible stems, my friend. No good.’

  ‘Yet you found them so intriguing that they made you miss lunch.’

  ‘Is that why my tummy feels empty?’

  ‘Did you miss lunch?’

  She blew smoke pettishly. ‘This is a foolish conversation.’

  ‘But did you miss it?’

  She took the bag. ‘I must have done. I am suddenly bored. So now I go straight back to have a meal. Au r’voir, my friend. Enjoy the daisies.’

  CHAPTER SIX

  SHE MOUNTED THE stile with quick grace and jumped down lightly into the meadow.

  ‘Wait,’ I said.

  ‘Why should I wait?’

  ‘I have some more questions to ask you.’

  She slitted her eyes. ‘And if I am not in the mood? If I do not choose to be pestered?’

  I shook my head. ‘You are too intelligent. You would never take up a foolish attitude.’

  ‘Foof!’ But her mouth twitched. ‘You know that you have no right to detain me. And I am not very pleased to be harassed like this, to be chased by a policeman when I stretch my legs.’

  ‘Is that what you were doing?’

  ‘Of course. Do you doubt it?’

  ‘I don’t doubt you could find a way to be more helpful.’

  ‘Huh-huh. And why should I?’

  ‘Because it would amuse you. And I make a change from the clientele at the Barge-House.’

  She drew herself up. ‘Monsieur, what vanity!’

  ‘Also, you’re not yet sure if I admire you.’

  She gave a throbbing chuckle. ‘I think you are a devil. What a good thing I find you unattractive.’

  We stared at each other. She was smiling now.

  ‘Okay, okay, we will play the game. I find I am not hungry after all. It must be the scent of so many flowers.’

  ‘Shall we go back to the launch?’

  ‘I prefer not. It will be more comfortable out of the sun.’ She glanced around casually. ‘Perhaps beneath that hawthorn. It seems unlikely that we shall be disturbed.’

  She stubbed her cigarette and made for the hawthorn. It was the most spreading of several that fringed the meadow; a handsome pyramid of milky blossom, throwing broken shade on the grass beneath. Mimi selected her spot and sat down; I selected mine, leaving turf between us. From there you saw a steely slice of the Broad with distant sails moving slowly upon it. Mimi plucked a stalk of plantain and chewed it appreciatively. She had turned towards me and was leaning on her elbow. Two harnessless breasts were moulding themselves sweetly, one drooping, one pouted by its neighbour.

  ‘Are you married, my friend?’

  ‘Not entirely.’

  ‘Hah. Such wisdom in two words. Is she so beautiful?’

  ‘I don’t carry her photograph.’

  ‘Then she is either very beautiful or very plain. I wonder which.’

  I let her wonder. ‘How did you come to take up with Quarles?’

  ‘Oh, I was unhappy. It was after my trouble. Two million Frenchmen wanted to marry me.’

  ‘And you didn’t want to marry?’

  She bit off some stalk. ‘I am rich too, that is the trouble. My late husband was an industrialist. If he had been poor there would have been no trial. La Famille. His poisonous mother. No doubt you are provided with the details. Afterwards, who cares about marrying Mimi? The bride is so many million francs.’

  ‘And Quarles was so different?’

  ‘Oh, but yes. I think you do not understand. Freddy also was rich, very rich. It is all tucked away in a little Swiss bank. So what did Freddy care about marrying rich girls? No, my friend, this was love. He picked me up one night in Montparnasse. He was a thief. I let him steal me.’

  ‘Did you know he was a thief?’

  ‘Not that first night. But he didn’t know I was a rich girl, either. Then it was too late. We make these grand discoveries when it would be disagreeable to let them interfere. So, we ignore them. He doesn’t want my money, nor do I wish to reform Freddy. After all, he is brilliant in his line. What chance has he ever given you to catch him?’

  ‘Somebody did catch him.’

  ‘Aha. But that somebody was not a policeman. In the end perhaps he catches himself. Or it is just that the little crooks grow envious.’

  ‘Which little crooks?’

  ‘Why not Rampant?’

  ‘It wasn’t Rampant who tipped the police.’

  ‘No, you are sure?’

  I popped the head of a daisy. ‘So if not Rampant, who would it be?’

  She drew her stalk through her teeth. ‘Well, it wasn’t me. I had no reason to shop Freddy. Was it a woman’s voice?’

  ‘That’s not important. It wouldn’t exclude a woman’s having been behind it.’

  ‘Ah, ah, it was a man, then. The rest is guessing. You are just trying it on, my friend. I think you had better stick to this little pig, Rampant. Because, after all, who is going to believe him?’

  She elevated a knee, and admired it. The action slid her hem down her thigh. She had a strong, distinctive leg that flowered from an athletic foot and ankle. She smiled and let the knee slowly unflex: leaving the hem where it was.

  ‘You think I was tired of Freddy, huh?’

  ‘Were you ever really in love with him?’

  She made a small mouth. ‘I think so, at first. Those first few weeks were formidable. It was like bubbles up my nose, I could scarcely get my breath. Better than my husband, oh yes. It is a shame to kill a man like Freddy.’

  ‘But you were through with him by Friday.’

  ‘You are right.’ She sighed. ‘So then it may not really have been love. I am swept off my feet, as you say. Freddy took me on the bounce. But still I am fond of him, huh? He was such an interesting man to live with. Such a wide acquaintance. They knew he was a crook, but it didn’t matter. He was always welcome.’

  ‘He was jealous of you.’

  She gave her gurgling chuckle. ‘All men are jealous, more or less.’

  ‘Perhaps you’d given him cause.’

  ‘But why not? We are only young for you once, my friend.’

  ‘Then he resented it.’

  ‘And I killed him?’

  ‘Well?’

  She rolled on her stomach and squirmed closer to me. ‘No.’ It was spoken as though to a child. ‘You are trying so hard, petit. So hard.’

  I thrummed another daisy-head at the meadow. Mimi picked daisies and thrummed one, too. Hers landed squarely on
my chin. She giggled and lined up another. Two bull’s-eyes. I shifted further off; Mimi squirmed after me like a seal. She rested her chin in her hands and stared up at me, her breasts pendant among the daisies.

  ‘Forget it,’ she said. ‘I didn’t kill him. Even though he was so stupidly jealous. Even though he threatened me with violence. There he was weak. And he knew I knew it.’

  ‘And you, of course, weren’t jealous of him.’

  ‘Shall I tell you the truth?’

  ‘If it isn’t being old-fashioned.’

  ‘Yes, I was jealous. Isn’t that strange? I couldn’t bear him eyeing another woman.’

  ‘Which sometimes he did?’

  She nodded. ‘Sometimes. And that made me so angry. Perhaps I am thinking I am much the most beautiful, so why does he insult me like that, huh?’

  ‘Was there any particular woman?’

  ‘Oh no. I would have left him on the spot.’

  ‘Please think carefully. It could be important.’

  ‘I tell you for certain. No particular woman.’

  ‘Just you.’

  ‘Wouldn’t you say I was enough? I never grew stale with poor Freddy. And I didn’t need to kill him, that’s certain too: if I had grown tired of him, I could have left.’ She let fly with a daisy. ‘So you had better believe me, instead of thinking up such useless questions.’

  ‘I believe anything I can prove.’

  ‘Oh, foof.’ She plucked and loaded a fresh daisy.

  I grabbed her firing-hand. She liked that, and let the daisy fall to the grass. The hand had a cool, consenting feel; it moved lazily under mine. But I dropped it. She lay still, leaving the hand where it fell.

  ‘Tell me about your stay here.’

  ‘Must you waste our time, my friend?’

  ‘Did you know that Freddy had come on a job?’

  She sighed expressively. ‘He didn’t tell me.’

  ‘But you knew?’

  ‘Okay, I knew. Freddy would not have come here just for pleasure. A bourgeois inn wasn’t his style. It isn’t my style, either.’

  ‘How did he propose it?’

  ‘Oh, very politely. He is thinking we would like a week out of town.’

  ‘It didn’t arise from some . . . earlier circumstance?’

  She stared. ‘Of course, he had the tip from Rampant.’

  ‘But nothing else?’

  ‘What should there be?’

  I shrugged. ‘The Bryanston job wasn’t a grand one. I would like to know why Freddy bothered with it. Whether there was something else in the wind.’

  She gazed for a while. ‘You are subtle,’ she said. ‘This is why they make you top man.’

  ‘Have you any suggestions?’

  ‘None, my friend. Unless it is that this Rampant misleads Freddy.’

  I shook my head. ‘Freddy was a specialist. He could cost a job like an accountant. He would have checked the size of the Bryanston labour-force and multiplied it by the average wage-rate. Add a percentage for over-time and N.H.I., deduct a percentage for the sick and absent. The result would give him a minimum figure, probably accurate within a few thousands.’

  ‘Freddy did all that?’

  ‘On his cuff. He’d know exactly what he was going for.’

  She giggled. ‘I think I’m proud of Freddy. I think he really was a clever man.’

  ‘Not so clever with this job, though.’

  ‘Perhaps he does it just to show his skill.’

  ‘You can’t help me.’

  ‘I am so sorry.’

  ‘Right. Now let’s talk about Peter Robinson.’

  Her eyes widened; were suddenly empty.

  ‘Why should we talk about a shop?’

  ‘Not the shop. A man. A man who was at Haughton Thursday evening.’

  ‘But I do not know any Peter Robinson.’

  ‘A man of about your own age. Five-foot-ten, fair hair with sideboards, comes from town, drives a blue Viva.’

  ‘But no, I don’t know him.’

  ‘He spent the night at the Three Tuns.’

  ‘I have never visited that place.’

  ‘He was out during the evening. Perhaps paying a call.’

  ‘I cannot help it – I didn’t see him!’

  I paused, holding her eyes. ‘Where were you Thursday evening?’

  Now she was sitting up straight in the grass. ‘In the hotel, of course – at first on the lawn—’

  ‘With Quarles?’

  ‘Yes! Why should I not say true?’

  ‘And after that?’

  ‘Then we go into dinner – and in the bar – and watch TV—’

  ‘Still with Quarles?’

  ‘Of course! With Freddy.’

  ‘Until you went to bed, never alone?’

  She drew quick breaths, her eyes glinting. Her hands were clasping her flexed knees. I had her going; but suddenly she realized it: suddenly let the tension go. She gave a breathless chuckle.

  ‘Ha-ha! You are trying to bulldoze me, huh?’

  ‘Were you alone?’

  ‘You are fierce, my friend. I adore a man with a touch of steel.’

  ‘Please answer the question.’

  ‘I grow so weak. A man like that can do what he wants with me. I melt for him, huh? A couple of times I go to the loo.’

  ‘Twice?’

  ‘It may be three times. Why do you bore me with such nonsense?’

  ‘Then you could have been available for a brief interview.’

  ‘I prefer the longer ones. All night.’

  I gave it up. She’d turned on her back, with a knee crooked and waving. Her arms were folded behind her head, her eyes thinned, lips parted. Venus inviting. And I couldn’t be certain if she was covering-up or not.

  ‘Have you been to this part of England before?’

  ‘I am a Parisienne, Monsieur.’

  ‘Meaning yes, or no?’

  ‘Would that be likely? I have not even heard of it before this time.’

  ‘Then you have no friends here?’

  ‘None.’

  ‘Nobody to speak to on the phone.’

  She hesitated. ‘Now you ask something different. It is not only to friends that one speaks on the phone.’

  ‘Then who was it on Friday?’

  She re-composed her legs; crooking both knees, letting them spread.

  ‘Don’t you want to answer?’

  ‘Just thinking, Monsieur. Let us say it was Friday when I phoned the theatre.’

  ‘The theatre!’

  ‘But yes. They have a theatre in the town. One day I feel desolate, think it will amuse me. Perhaps Friday, I do not know.’

  ‘Only, of course, there were no suitable seats.’

  Her lips twitched. ‘Monsieur knows.’

  ‘And you gave no name, so they wouldn’t remember you.’

  She released a hand to make a gesture.

  ‘And I am supposed to believe this.’

  She came coiling across to me. ‘Monsieur will believe what he likes, won’t he?’ She hung on my shoulder. ‘But it doesn’t matter. Because perhaps it was another day, after all.’

  ‘Though having no connection with Peter Robinson.’

  ‘Aha! I think that man makes you jealous. But there is no need, my fierce friend. I can truthfully say I have not met him.’

  ‘Not then or later.’

  ‘Not at all.’

  ‘Not, for example, today at lunch.’

  I felt her tense: the weight of flesh grew a little less on my arm.

  ‘Now I think you are teasing me.’

  ‘Really? How long has your launch been moored over there?’

  ‘One hour, two. How would I know? I am beginning to feel it is too long.’

  ‘Where does the lane lead?’

  ‘You must ask a map.’ She broke from me quickly and got to her feet. ‘This talk of lunch makes me hungry again, Monsieur. It is sad, but I fear our game is over.’

  I didn’t budge. ‘
Au r’voir, Madame.’

  She paused to give me a sharp stare. Then she tossed her hair with superb disdain and set off for the staithe. She didn’t look back.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  THE LAUNCH LEFT; I watched it make its turn and go creaming away up the Broad; then I sat beneath the hawthorn a few minutes longer, moodily sorting out my results.

  They were not encouraging.

  In the first place, I couldn’t link Peter Robinson to the crime. He had turned up a propos, giving a false name and address, but otherwise he wasn’t implicated. True, I had made a pass with him at Madame Deslauriers and seemed to have got a small bite; but it was a very small one, and the reaction may not have been due to Peter Robinson.

  Bringing me to the second place. If Madame Deslauriers had a secret, it didn’t necessarily link with the crime either. In fact it probably didn’t, because she had no motive: Quarles had been no obstruction to her. Her secret, if she had one, was probably a lover whom she felt it injudicious to produce at this moment: whether Peter Robinson or another villain who might come gratefully to our hand.

  All very semi-innocent. And yet . . .

  I rose and went back to stare at the lane.

  It was such an excessively discreet place for a rendezvous. You would almost say it would be wasted on a pair of lovers.

  I got over the stile and continued to the bend. Beyond it the lane entered a plantation; then it stretched away between ranks of wild parsley to meet a minor road a quarter of a mile distant. The surface was dried, rutted mud, and the straggling parsley suggested little use. But here and there a frond was broken, and the damaged leafage had not yet shrivelled. A car? A car must have turned. The only place for that would be the plantation. I checked back till I found a gap between trees, then the plain marks of wheels in grassed leaf-mould. I followed them. They entered the plantation; stopped and criss-crossed in a little clearing. Here the car had parked, out of sight from the lane, the precise spot shown by the deeper indentations. I prowled around. Cores, apple-peelings; screwed-up wrappings from chocolate biscuits. Fresh: the peel hadn’t browned, the wrappings had taken no damp from the ground. The car-tracks were unidentifiable, but the car had not been a large one, credibly a Viva. And along with the tracks were a number of footprints: these similarly unidentifiable.

  So what more had I now?

  A small matter of confirmation: that Mimi was in contact with a person unknown; and whom she wanted to keep unknown.