‘Are you interested in society goings-on?’
‘Not particularly, monsieur,’ I mumbled.
He held out his hand.
‘Jean Murraille!’
I got to me feet and made a show of being surprised.
‘So, you’re the editor of . . .’
‘The very same.’
‘Delighted to meet you!’ I said, off the top of my head. Then, with an effort – ‘I like your magazine very much.’
‘Really?’
He was smiling. I said:
‘It’s cool.’
He seemed surprised by this slangy term I had deliberately used to establish a complicity between us.
‘Your magazine, it’s cool,’ I repeated pensively.
‘Are you in the trade?’
‘No.’
He waited for me to elaborate, but I said nothing.
‘Cigarette?’
He took a platinum lighter from his pocket and opened it with a curt flick. His cigarette drooped from the corner of his mouth, as it droops there for all eternity.
Hesitantly:
‘You read Gerbère’s editorial? Perhaps you don’t agree with the . . . political . . . views of the magazine?’
‘Politics are not my game,’ I replied.
‘I ask . . .’ he smiled ‘ . . .because I would be curious to know the opinion of a young man . . .’
‘Thank you.’
‘I had no difficulty in finding contributors . . . we work as a close team. Journalists came running from all sides . . . Lestandi, Jo-Germain, Alin-Laubreaux, Gerbère, Georges-Anquetil . . . I don’t much care for politics myself. They’re a bore!’ A quick laugh. ‘What the public wants is gossip and topical pieces. And photographs! Particularly photographs! I chose a formula that would be . . . joyful!’
‘People need to loosen up “in these troubled times”,’ I said.
‘Absolutely!’
I took a deep breath. In a clipped voice:
‘What I like best in your magazine, is Lestandi’s “Rumour & Innuendo” column. Excellent! Very acerbic!’
‘Lestandi is a remarkable fellow. We worked together in the past, on Dubarry’s
La Volontei.
An excellent training ground! What do you do?’
The question caught me off guard. He stared at me
with
his pale blue eyes and I understood that I had to answer quickly to avoid an unbearably awkward moment for us both.
‘Me? Believe it or not I’m a novelist in my spare time.’
The ease with which the phrase came startled me.
‘That’s very, very interesting! Published?’
‘Two stories in a Belgian magazine, last year.’
‘Are you on holiday here?’
He asked the question abruptly, as if suddenly suspicious.
‘Yes.’
I was about to add that we had already seen each other in the bar and in the dining-room.
‘Quiet, isn’t it?’ He pulled nervously on his cigarette. ‘I’ve bought a house on the edge of the forest. Do you live in Paris?’
‘Yes.’
‘So, apart from your literary activities . . .’ he stressed the word ‘literary’, and I detected a note of irony – ‘ . . .do you have a regular job?’
‘No. It’s a little difficult just now.’
‘Strange times. I wonder how it will all end. What do you think?’
‘We must make the most of life while we can.’
This remark pleased him. He roared with laughter.
‘
Make hay while the sun shines!’ He patted me on the shoulder, ‘Look here, you must have dinner with me tonight!’
We had walked a little way into the garden. To keep the conversation going, I remarked that it had been very mild these last few afternoons, and that I had one of the pleasantest rooms in the inn, one of the ones that opened directly on to the veranda.
I mentioned that the Clos-Foucré reminded me of my childhood, that I often went there with my father. I asked him if he liked his house. He would have liked to spend more time here, but the magazine monopolized his time. But he liked to keep at it. And Paris could be very pleasant too. With these fascinating remarks, we sat down at one of the tables. Seen from the garden, the inn had a rustic, opulent air, and I didn’t miss the opportunity of telling him so. The manageress (he called her Maud) was a very old friend, he told me. It was she who advised him to buy the house. I would have liked to ask more about her, but I was afraid my curiosity might arouse his suspicion.
For some time now I had been thinking of various ways I might get in touch with them. First I thought of the red-haired woman. Our eyes had met more than once. It would have been easy to get into conversation
with
Marcheret by sitting next to him at the bar; conversely, impossible to confront my father directly because of his mistrustful nature. And Murraille scared me. How to approach him tactfully? Now he solved the problem himself, after all. An idea occurred to me. Suppose he had made the first move to find out what I was up to? Perhaps he’d noticed the keen interest I had taken in his little group these past three weeks, the way I was intent on their every movement, on every word they spoke in the bar or the dining-room? I remembered the derisive way I’d been told, when I wanted to become a policeman: ‘You’ll never make a good cop, son. Whenever you’re watching or eavesdropping, you give yourself away. You’re a complete innocent.’
Grève steered a trolley loaded with aperitifs towards us. We drank vermouth. Murraille told me that I could read a ‘sensational’ article by Alin-Laubreaux in his magazine the following week. His voice took on a confidential tone, as if he had known me ages. Twilight was drawing in. We both agreed that this was the most pleasant time of the day.
The hulking form of Marcheret’s back. Standing behind the bar, Maud Gallas waved to Murraille as we came in. Marcheret turned.
‘
How are things, Jean-Jean?’
‘Good,’ Murraille answered. ‘I brought a guest. Actually . . .’ he looked at me, frowning ‘ . . . I don’t even know your name.’
‘Serge Alexandre.’
This was the name I had signed in the hotel register.
‘Well, Monsieur . . . Alexandre,’ Marcheret announced in a drawling voice, ‘I suggest you have a porto-flip.’
‘I don’t really drink’ – the vermouth we had had was making me feel queasy.
‘That’s a mistake,’ Marcheret said.
‘This is a friend of mine,’ Murraille said. ‘Guy de Marcheret.’
‘Comte Guy de Marcheret d’Eu,’ corrected the other. Then he turned to me: ‘He has a horror of aristocratic titles! Monsieur likes to think he’s a republican!’
‘And you? A journalist?’
‘No,’ said Murraille, ‘he’s a novelist.’
‘Are you indeed! I should have guessed. With a name like yours! Alexandre . . . Alexandre Dumas! But you look miserable, I’m sure a little drink would do you good!’
He held out his glass, almost pushing it under my nose, laughing for no apparent reason.
‘Have no fear,’ Murraille said. ‘Guy is always the life and soul of the party.’
‘
Is Monsieur Alexandre dining with us? I’ll tell him stories he can put in his novels. Maud, tell our young friend about the stir I created when I walked into the Beaulieu in my uniform. A very dashing entrance, don’t you think, Maud?’
She didn’t answer. He glared at her sourly, but she didn’t look away. He snorted:
‘Oh well, that’s all in the past, eh, Jean-Jean? Are we eating up at the villa?’
‘Yes,’ Murraille said curtly.
‘With the Fat Man?’
‘With the Fat Man.’
So this is what they called my father?
Marcheret got up. To Maud Gallas: ‘If you feel like a drink later on up at the house,
ma chère
, don’t hesitate.’
She smiled and shot me a brief glance. We were still very much at the politeness stage. Once I managed to get her alone, I wanted to ask her about Murraille, about Marcheret, about my father. Start by chatting to her about the weather. Then gradually inch towards the true heart of the matter. But I was worried about seeming too obvious. Had she noticed me prowling round them? In the dining-room, I always chose the table next to theirs. Whenever they were in the bar, I would sit in one of the leather armchairs and pretend to be asleep. I kept my back
to
them so as not to attract their attention, but, after a minute or two, I worried they were pointing at me.
‘Goodnight, Maud,’ Murraille said.
I gave her a deep bow, and said:
‘Goodnight, madame.’
My heart begins to pound as we reach the main road. It’s deserted.
‘I do hope you will like the “Villa Mektoub”,’ Murraille says to me.
‘It’s the finest historic building in the area,’ pronounces Marcheret. ‘We got it dirt cheap.’
They stroll at a leisurely pace. I have the sudden feeling that I am walking into a trap. There is still time to run, to shake them off. I keep my eyes fixed on the trees at the edge of the forest, a hundred yards ahead. If I make a dash for it I can reach them.
‘After you,’ Murraille says, half-ironic, half-obsequious.
I glimpse of a familiar figure standing in the middle of the veranda.
‘Well, well!’ says Marcheret. ‘The Fat Man is here already.’
He was leaning idly against the balustrade. She, lounging in one of the whitewashed wooden chairs, was wearing jodhpurs.
Murraille
introduced us.
‘Madame Sylviane Quimphe . . . Serge Alexandre . . . Baron Deyckecaire.’
He offered me a limp hand and I looked him straight in the eye. No, he didn’t recognize me.
She told us she had just been for a long ride in the forest and hadn’t had the energy to change for dinner.
‘No matter, my dear,’ said Marcheret. ‘I find women much more attractive in riding gear!’
The conversation immediately turned to horse riding. She couldn’t speak too highly of the local stable master, a former jockey named Dédé Wildmer.
I’d already met the man at the bar of the Clos-Foucré; bulldog face, crimson complexion, checked cap, suede jacket and an evident fondness for Dubonnet.
‘We must invite him to dinner. Remind me, Sylviane,’ Murraille said.
Turning to me:
‘You should meet him, he’s a real character!’
‘Yes, a real character,’ my father repeated nervously.
She talked about her horse. She had put it through some jumps on her afternoon ride, something she had found ‘an eye-opener’.
‘You mustn’t go easy on him,’ Marcheret said, with
the
air of an expert. ‘A horse only responds to the whip and the spurs!’
He reminisced about his childhood: an elderly Basque uncle had forced him to ride in the rain for seven hours at a stretch. ‘If you fall,’ he had said, ‘you’ll get nothing to eat for three days!’
‘And I didn’t fall.’ His voice was grave suddenly ‘. . .That’s how you train a horseman!’
My father let out a little whistle of admiration. The conversation returned to Dédé Wildmer.
‘I don’t understand how that little runt has such success with women,’ Marcheret said.
‘Oh I do,’ Sylviane Quimphe smirked, ‘I find him
very
attractive!’
‘I could tell you a thing or two,’ Marcheret replied nastily. ‘It appears Wildmer’s developed a taste for “coke” . . .’
A banal conversation. Wasted words. Lifeless characters. Yet there I stood with my ghosts, and, if I closed my eyes, I can still picture the old woman in a white apron who came to tell us that dinner was served.
‘Why don’t we eat out on the veranda,’ suggested Sylviane Quimphe. ‘It’s such a lovely evening . . .’
Marcheret would have preferred to dine by candlelight, himself, but eventually accepted that ‘the purple
glow
of twilight has its charm’. Murraille poured the drinks. I gathered it was a distinguished vintage.
‘First-rate!’ exclaimed Marcheret, smacking his lips, a gesture my father echoed.
I had been seated between Murraille and Sylviane Quimphe, who asked whether I was on holiday.
‘I’ve seen you at the Clos-Foucré.’
‘I’ve seen you there, too.’
‘In fact I think we have adjoining rooms.’
And she gave me a curious look.
‘M. Alexandre is very impressed by my magazine,’ Murraille said.
‘You don’t say!’ Marcheret was amazed. ‘Well, you’re the only one. If you saw the anonymous letters Jean-Jean gets . . . The most recent one accuses him of being a pornographer and gangster!’
‘I don’t give a damn,’ said Murraille. ‘You know,’ he went on, lowering his voice, ‘the press have slandered me. I was even accused of taking bribes, before the war! Small men have always been jealous of me!’
He snarled the words, his face turning puce. Dessert was being served.
‘And what do you do with yourself?’ Sylviane Quimphe asked.
‘Novelist,’ I said briefly.
I
was regretting introducing myself to Murraille in this curious guise.
‘You write novels?’
‘You write novels?’ echoed my father.
It was the first time he had spoken to me since we sat down to dinner.
‘Yes. So what do you do?’
He stared at me wide-eyed.
‘Me?’
‘Are you here . . .on holiday?’ I asked politely.
He looked at me like a hunted animal.
‘Monsieur Deyckecaire,’ Murraille said, wagging a finger at my father, ‘lives in a charming property close by. It’s called “The Priory”.’
‘Yes . . . “The Priory”,’ said my father.
‘Much more imposing than the “Villa Mektoub”. Can you believe, there’s even a chapel in the grounds?’
‘Chalva is a god-fearing man!’ Marcheret said.
My father spluttered with laughter.
‘Isn’t that so, Chalva?’ Marcheret insisted. ‘When are we going to see you in a cassock?’
‘Unfortunately,’ Murraille told me, ‘our friend Deyckecaire is like us. His business keeps him in Paris.’
‘What line of business?’ I ventured.
‘Nothing of interest,’ said my father.
‘
Come, come!’ said Marcheret, ‘I’m sure M. Alexandre would love to hear all about your shady financial dealings! Did you know that Chalva . . .’ his tone was mocking now ‘ . . . is a really sharp operator. He could teach Sir Basil Zaharoff a thing or two!’
‘Don’t believe a word he says,’ muttered my father.
‘I find you too,
too
mysterious, Chalva,’ said Sylviane Quimphe, clapping her hands together.