The Dave Bliss Quintet (17 page)

Pulling out his manuscript, he decides to use the failing light to advantage and writes of his protagonist, Frederick Chapel, alias harpsichordist François Couperin, wandering the beach of St-Juan, day after day, with his eyes on the island's fortress across the bay, and his mind on his seemingly impossible task.

He must have dreamed of simply running away, Bliss decides, as he constructs his character and delves into his mind, envisioning him escaping to some paradise
island with sweeping white sand beaches and distant horizons — but the plot compels him to continue his mission. Fear, sense of duty, loyalty to his homeland, or, perhaps more plausibly, a simple refusal to be defeated, appear to be valid motives. Chapel is a man, Bliss notes, with the strength of character to stand up and be counted, a man who refuses to be bowed by a bully. Here was someone who would expose the identity of the man in the iron mask whatever it took. And if he failed, whether he offered his neck perpendicularly or horizontally, his spine would remain upright.

The practical difficulty of a lone seventeenth-century buccaneer storming the
castel
is a problem that concerns Bliss in his desire for authenticity, especially as Frederick Chapel is clearly more a pressed man than a hard-bitten swashbuckler of his time. What, then, if Chapel were to assault the island by stealth? But sailing under cover of night would be risky, with uncertain winds and uncharted shoals, and the noise of oars from a heavy wooden rowboat would draw the guard's attention — and fire.

The sun settling over the Mediterranean hovers briefly on the surface, as if reluctant to end another picture-perfect day, and Bliss stops writing to watch the celestial firework slowly fizzle out. Then, in the twilight he continues his story, writing:

Frederick Chapel sat on the beach at St-Juan as Angélique risked her pretty neck in a race with a mounted
légionnaire,
delivered him his customary
gobelet,
surveyed his dishevelled appearance and demanded, “Hey Engleesh. Where you sleep?”

With only a modest settlement from his patron he had precious little for lodgings, and had slept under a tree in an olive grove since his arrival.

“I 'ave zhe friend,” went on Angélique with a lecherous wink. And, for a humble fee, Dorothée provided him a straw
paillasse
and all the comforts of home in a converted pigsty.

With little prospect of stealthily fetching up on the island by boat, Chapel decided to swim the reach on a moonless night, though the remainder of his escapade was yet to be resolved. In preparation for the swim, he took to the sea each daybreak, along with the disabled and disfigured who bathed their wounds in the salt water, and he strengthened his stroke until he judged he was ready.

The execution of the principal part of his plan required him to identify a suitable departure point, and, as he sat in his usual place one eve, he turned with innocent casualness to Jean le pêcheur and enquired, “What is afoot on the spit of land extending into the bay over there?”

Jean turned to glance, then scoffed, “Zhey are building zhe château.”

“Whose château?” asked Chapel, puzzled by Jean's apparent scorn.

“Merde!” exclaimed the wily fisherman. “I know not. But zhey are crazy to build a château here.” Then he spat, “Zhis place stinks of goat shit —
c'est de la crotte de bique.
Zhe sand is bleached under a sun zhat scorches from morn to night. Zhe plainness of zhe sea and sky will offend your eyes, and zhe plainness of zhe food, your gut. And zhe women here zhink only of sex.”

“Ah … the food is poor,” agreed Chapel, surviving chiefly on the oysters, lobsters, olives, and figs bought from scavengers, but he persisted in his enquiry about the château, whose grounds seemingly extended to the beach.

“I have heard it is a
panier de crabes,”
said Jean, pulling Chapel towards him with a conspirator's tone.

“It is rumoured zhat zhe watchguards have zhe orders to shoot trespassers on sight. Indeed, I know of three such men personally, and two others who have been savaged to death by zhe guard's dogs.”

Chapel sat back with a skeptical eye. He had known Jean for only a short while, but, in one or two other matters, had found him a trifle wanting.

A snorting sound brings Bliss's head up, and he is surprised to find he's been so engrossed in his work that the light has gone completely. Switching on the Jeep's headlamps he jumps. He is surrounded by a herd of longsnouted, lean-bodied wild pigs warily inching towards him. What would Frederick Chapel have done? he wonders, and considers posing the problem to his fictional character at some point, though now, as the animals edge closer, he jokingly muses, “Dinner at last,” and lightheartedly considers leaping out with a tire iron and hammering one to death. But as they become bolder, snuffling and snorting right up to the car, he realizes the shoe is on the other foot, and he turns on the ignition. Whatever possessed me to hire an open-topped vehicle? he is thinking, as one or two of the animals buffet the big car. How vicious are they? he worries, and what would happen if they ganged up and attacked, taking a chunk out of one of the tires — or out of me? How high can they jump — or scramble?

Dropping the Jeep into gear, he gently nudges a few of the big animals aside and hits the road at a run.

The lights of the small fishing port glow on the coast beneath him, but otherwise there is no sign of life. No one knows I'm here, he realizes, as he heads back to civilization,
deciding that even the fierce-faced locals are less threatening than wild boars. But what would have happened had the pigs got me? he ponders. The unidentified body of John Smith of no fixed abode, with only a fraudulently obtained credit card in his possession, would be buried in an unmarked Corsican grave, and David Anthony Bliss, Police Inspector of London, England, would become a missing person without even trying — just like the rattan beach mat's owner.

But he has to go back — now wants to go back. He has a novel to finish and the riddle of the Château Roger to solve. It is certainly strange, he thinks, that people who'd lived in St-Juan-sur-Mer for years, maybe even for life, either never noticed it or, like Daisy, clammed up at its mention.

Concentrating fiercely on the twisting mountain road, fearful that one of the many untethered goats or cows he'd seen on the narrow rocky verge earlier will leap out and force him over the precipice, he makes his way to the small port to wait for the filling station to open in the morning.

A boat launch ramp leading to the beach makes an ideal parking spot, and he drifts to sleep in the moonlight, listening to the gentle sigh of waves on sand in the warm Mediterranean air, smiling to himself in childhood memory of Brighton beach and the stout little donkeys with gaily ribboned tack that had trotted him past the winning post of The Derby on so many occasions.

Bliss's second day on Corsica starts early. His stomach wakes him at dawn to a strawberry and champagne world, with feathery pink sky and gently fizzing surf. In the soft, calm Sunday air, he eyes the ranks of medieval terraces crowded around the little stone-walled harbour with a feeling of guilt that he and his snorting monster have intruded into a historical montage.

What if I've been spun back three centuries? he momentarily ponders, and pictures the locals awakening in awe to a fair-skinned Jeep driver on the harbour's boat ramp. For a few seconds he imagines the intrigue of some, the terror of others, and the certain condemnation of the parish priest — or would the cleric be theologically astute enough to turn it to his advantage and quickly pronounce the second coming? He could then gleefully anticipate the pontiff decreeing his sainthood and the elevation of his
measly church to the second holiest place in the world — surely the dream of every priest.

“
Allez, ouste!
” shouts an arm-waving fisherman, wanting to launch his three-hundred-horsepower supercharged sardine hunter down the ramp occupied by Bliss.

So much for historical quaintness and ecclesiastical musings, Bliss thinks, startled from his reverie.

Fortunately Bliss has enough cash for fuel and the filling station in the small port opens early this Sunday morning to service the fishermen's thirsty machines. With sufficient fuel in the tank to take him back to Calvi, he is pleasantly surprised to find some money left for food. A few freshly made sandwiches lie baited at the garage for late-rising fishermen, and Bliss checks them out carefully. One whiff of the cheese confirms his suspicion. “
Brebis
,” he snorts, already acquainted with the black sheep of the cheese world and its ability to decapitate an unwary eater, so he plumps for the meat.

“
Bon
— is good?” he asks.

“
Si
,” replies the old man enthusiastically. “It is
la spécialité de la Corse
.”

Ah — ah! The Corsican speciality, he thinks. Why not?

Having poked a snotty note, together with the Jeep's ignition key, through the rental car office letterbox, he catches the first ferry, grateful he bought a return ticket, and treats himself to a coffee with his last few coins. With dinner at La Scala in her sights, he correctly guesses Daisy will happily take his collect call and meet him in Nice.

He tries phoning Richards the moment he arrives back at the apartment, muttering, “Bugger security. I'm not going to Antibes to use a public pay phone. I'm on my way out of here.”

“It's Sunday,” the duty officer at Scotland Yard stresses in a puzzled tone when he asks for Commander Richards.

“Sorry. Should have thought ...” he says, putting down the phone and looking over the balcony. The decaying lemon, dissolving slowly into the ground, bitterly accuses him of neglecting the boy in the cage, but the château has also dissolved, and he picks up his binoculars and stares in disbelief. Was it a mirage after all? he wonders, then chastises himself. You saw it from the ferryboat. It has to be there.

It is a trick of the light — the green copper roofs and creeper-entwined stonework are so deeply ingrained in the landscape that it is almost as if the building were a natural feature. Probably the reason the locals don't even acknowledge its existence, he reasons, finally getting it in focus. I really have to have a good look in there before I leave, he resolves, knowing how critical the château is to the solution of the masked man case.

The suddenness of the street lights going out at ten o'clock has Bliss musing, “Power cut,” and raising himself inquisitively. Then all the remaining lights follow suit and he sits back, his suspicion confirmed, when
bang!
a violent explosion cracks the air with such force that the moment is held and seems incapable of moving forward. Then the second and third explosions hit with equal power, rocketing across the bay, sending seagulls and small children running for cover. With the blasts still reverberating around the hillsides, a mega-speaker rocks to life with a pop version of the national anthem,
“La Marseillaise.” Bliss gives himself a shake and leans across the restaurant table to Daisy. “What the hell …?”

“It's Bastille Day,” she explodes. “Did you not know?”

He'd forgotten.

“
Mesdames et messieurs
; ladies and gentlemen,” booms a giant voice from the water, “welcome to the Bastille Day festival of fireworks of Cannes.”

“
Youpi!
” the crowd exclaims, as three luminescent balloons burst overhead and expand in a giant tricolour of patriotism. Then the sky fills with friendly fire as starbursts, grenades, and mortars explode in joyful release. Eye-blinking flashes, choreographed to a musical maelstrom, light the sky with a billion flashbulbs. A flotilla of ships, yachts, and ferries ringing the bay are lit in the sun-bright burst of radiance, and half a million uplifted faces on the promenade, quays, and jetties are warmed in the glow.

Above the jostle, from his perch on the balcony of La Scala restaurant, Bliss watches, mesmerized, as the sky is repeatedly shredded by exuberant colour and pierced by lightning-bright flashes. The floating city ahead of him, poured from every port along the coast, is picked out in the brilliance like the D-Day armada, the vessels seemingly so numerous and close that, from shore, he imagines being able to clamber across the bay, dry-footed.

“This is amazing,” he exclaims, as rockets and shells of all kinds rip repeatedly into the sky in perfect rhythm and the deafening blasts rock in time to the music.

Daisy's face is alight with joy as she grasps his hand over the table and says, “You like — no?”

“I like.” He smiles and feels that this is a fitting end to a perfect — well, almost perfect — weekend, but at least he is now free.

“Look at zhat,” Daisy cries, as multicoloured fireballs explode one after another, pushing out balls of iridescent starlets that grow to fill the entire sky over the bay of Cannes.

“You didn't tell me about the fireworks,” he exclaims, his face lit in delight.

Her mischievous smirk says she'd deliberately kept him in the dark to add to the moment. “You like —
Daavid
?” she questions, pronouncing his name with the long “aah,” like the Welsh, while squeezing his hand.

“Yes. I like,” he replies, and realizes that after three weeks on tenterhooks, this is the first time he's been able to relax with a clear mind. With Johnson in the bag, all he needs to do is call Commander Richards first thing Monday, then he'll be on his way.

Not so fast, he thinks. There are a couple of loose ends, including sorting out the mix-up with the Corsican car hire company over the credit card. Plus, the caged boy situation still has to be resolved.

“
Daavid — Daavid
!” Daisy calls through his musings. “Are you all right?”