The Tropical Issue: Dolly and the Bird of Paradise

by Dorothy Dunnett

  Make-up is my business, as Johnson said. And I had seen van Diemen’s arm only twice, in the dimness of the Mercedes, and through a window in Barbados when he was speaking to Natalie.

  But these tracks, when they are real, stay and can’t be disguised. If I was being lied to, I wanted to know it.

  I said, ‘Show me your arm.’

  Today, no one was going to refuse me anything. Without speaking, van Diemen took off his jacket. Under, he had a formal shirt with long sleeves and fine cuffs. He prepared to unbutton them. ‘Which?’ he said.

  I couldn’t have told. Johnson said, ‘Show her both arms.’

  Head bent, my one-time attacker undid both sets of buttons and began to roll the sleeves up.

  I watched him. Because he had been stupid, as he said, it was right that he should pay for it, but only as much as was due.

  I had thought of him over many months as the killer of Kim-Jim, and hounded him. He was not, and I shouldn’t forget it.

  I hoped that he hadn’t been lying. For if he had, it would be Johnson’s lie too.

  The arms were bare, and he held them palm upwards and looked at me.

  There were no tracks. Instead there were the pale pink, wrinkled blotches of recent burns. I had them myself, all over my body.

  I looked at Johnson, and he in his turn looked, smiling a little at van Diemen, who drew his arms back.

  This time, neither of them helped me, and I had to ask. ‘The man with the megaphone?’

  The man who, long familiar with every inch of the banana islands, had stood still at the lip of the caldera, ignoring the flurries of steam. The man who, with his hands upraised to his hailer, had steered me, patiently and clearly, out of that boiling mud in St Lucia.

  To me and Away from me.

  ‘It was the least I could do,’ said Roger van Diemen.

  Revenge and jealousy. It isn’t often that they unravel so easily, or that the punishment is so light.

  We had lunch, the three of us, and talked about nothing serious, at which Johnson was very good; and Roger van Diemen did his best. I was rather glad when it ended.

  After the coffee, van Diemen left. I have never seen him since. He owed me a debt, and Johnson let him pay it.

  Half an hour after that, I left myself, to let him rest.

  Alone, he had talked to me of a lot of things. About my work, and my mother.

  I didn’t think Robina would live long.

  When I said so, he said, ‘Another cat. Do you know, Rita, that that’s how I traced you? Marguerite Geddes, born to Robina Curtis, or Souter, of Kirkcaldy. Your nice yellow cats with their flowery coats are Kirkcaldy cats. Not from Ayrshire at all.’

  ‘I shall have two more,’ I said. ‘Three, when Robina dies. You wouldn’t like one?’

  We were still sitting at table. He took off and put down his glasses, and then looked up.

  He said, ‘I should be honoured. A woman with the courage and determination of Genghis Khan. Look it up, and don’t be annoyed: it’s a compliment.

  ‘You don’t need any help from us now. You’re on your way. But if you would like it, Raymond could add a little seamanship to your accomplishments, once Dolly is herself again. Racing is a game for you.’

  He broke off and was quiet for a bit, fingering his spectacles. I didn’t interrupt.

  Then he said, ‘Rita? What do you really feel about it all? It was your decision, to come out of your safe hole and look for your family.

  ‘It wasn’t your fault what hit them after that. It would have happened anyway. It was our fault, though, that you had such a rotten time. You were in a lot of danger. We might well have killed you amongst us all . . .

  ‘You’ve got such a bloody heart that it mayn’t have occurred to you to hate us for it, but you may very well wish you had never left home. Do you?’

  ‘And that’s a silly question,’ I said.

  He laughed.

  ‘I hoped it was,’ he said. ‘And I’m really very glad. And so is Roger, whom you were kind to as well.’

  He put his hand on the table and got up, to come with me to the door of the room. He was wearing the bifocals again.

  Standing there, saying goodbye, he said, ‘Tell me. Will you change your hair? Maggie has.’

  I smiled. ‘I saw,’ I said. ‘I don’t know. Should I?’

  He said, ‘I liked it when it was orange. If you want a life of battle, go ahead. You’re in the illusions business. You know the dangers to keep clear of. And I’m all for reminding people that there’s a lot of illusion about, and that it’s quite a good idea now and then to have a look under the paint.

  ‘You don’t need to keep in touch with us. Raymond will keep in touch with you,’ he said. ‘More often than you want, I shouldn’t wonder.’

  Which was as nice a way of parting as I had ever heard of.

  Connie took me to get my coat.

  That was where I saw the photograph. In fact a lot of photographs, that had never been there before, but one that struck me particularly, because I’d first seen it in Lady Emerson’s house.

  The picture of this pretty, open-faced girl. Smiling, and good-looking enough to be in pictures.

  Connie saw me looking at it. She said, ‘It’s nice that he’s got it out. And the things from the house. It was a great worry, for a while.’

  I said, ‘Who is she?’

  She didn’t answer, just looked taken aback. Then she said, ‘He hasn’t told you?’

  I felt cold. I said, ‘What?’

  Connie Margate said, ‘But that’s his wife. Judith. Judith Ballantyne, daughter of the judge.

  ‘She’s dead. She died when . . . he was the only survivor.’

  ‘Of the plane crash,’ I said.

  She didn’t answer. Then, ‘Of the plane crash,’ she agreed.

  I don’t remember leaving 17b, or taking the lift, or walking out into the bright streets of Mayfair, and looking for a taxi to take me the few paces I had to go.

  I was thinking of Johnson, and of 17b, and of all those terrible letters.

  ‘You’ve been a great help,’ Lady Emerson had said.

  She’d taken a bloody great risk in sending me to 17b. I understood Raymond’s fury.

  It nearly hadn’t worked, either. Johnson had resented Natalie and Ferdy and being forced to think of Roger van Diemen. What had made him change his mind, you couldn’t tell.

  But I could see that, in a way, I had been of use, and not just because of the quiche, and the dog. Even the jazz and the phone calls and things must have dragged him out of himself a bit, anyhow.

  I was glad I had helped him.

  I gave Cohn to Celia, though. I’m told he’s now breeding in Jersey.

  That’s fine.

  I don’t mind bifocals a bit. But I find parrots are asthma.

  Synopses of ‘Johnson Johnson’ Titles

  Published by House of Stratus

  Ibiza Surprise

  Life in Ibiza can be glorious and fast, especially for those who have money. Sarah Cassells is an intelligent girl and has many admirers. Having completed her training as a chef, she hears of her father’s violent death on the island, and refuses to believe it when told it was suicide. She becomes involved with a series of people who might be able to shed some light on events, including her brother who is an engineer for a Dutch firm from whom a secret piece of machinery has been stolen. As Ibiza prepares to celebrate an annual religious festival events become more convoluted and macabre. Sarah has choices to make; none are simple, but fortunately Johnson Johnson, the enigmatic portrait painter and master of mystery sails in on his yacht ‘Dolly’. Together they may get at the truth, but with murder, espionage and theft all entwined within the tale, there are constant surprises for the reader - and for Sarah!

  Moroccan Traffic

  The Chairman of Kingsley Conglomerates is conducting negotiations, which are both difficult and somewhat dubious, in Morocco. He is accompanied by executive secretary Wendy Helmann. However,
there are soon distractions when unorthodox Rita Geddes appears on the scene. Wendy discovers that there is much more at stake than the supposed negotiations, and finds herself at the centre of kidnappings, murder, and industrial espionage. Explosions, a car chase across the High Atlas out of Marrakesh and much more follows. Of course, the prior arrival of portrait painter Johnson Johnson is in many ways fortuitous, but he has some ghosts of his own to lay.

  Operation Nassau

  Dr. B. McRannoch is in the Bahamas with her father who has moved there from Scotland because of asthma. She is a savvy and tough young lady who shows much independence of mind and spirit. However, when Sir Bart Edgecombe, a British agent who has been poisoned with arsenic falls ill on his way back from New York, she becomes involved in a series of events beyond her wildest imagination. Drawn into an espionage plot where there are multiple suspects and characters, it is only the inevitable presence of Johnson Johnson that saves the day. As with all of the Johnson series, nothing is quite as straightforward as it at first seems, and there are many complicating factors to grip the reader as well as the added bonus of another exotic location.

  Roman Nights

  Ruth Russell, an astronomer working at the Maurice Frazer Observatory, is enjoying herself in Rome – that is, until her lover, Charles Digham, a fashion photographer and writer of obituary verses, has his camera stolen. The thief ends up as a headless corpse in the zoo park tolleta. Johnson Johnson, enigmatic portrait painter, spy and sleuth, is in Rome to paint a portrait of the Pope and is therefore on hand to investigate in one of Dunnett’s usual thrilling and convoluted plots that grips the reader from cover to cover. There is something far more deadly at stake than just the secrets of a couture house …

  Rum Affair

  This mystery is told from the point of view of the ‘Bird’; Tina Rossi, a famous coloratura soprano who arrives to sing at the Edinburgh Festival, only to find a murder victim in a cupboard, whilst at the same time her lover, top scientist Kenneth Homes, has gone missing. Saved from the long arm of the law by Johnson Johnson, a world renowned portrait painter and enigmatic solver of mysteries, Tina joins him on a yacht race to the Hebrides - there are connections anyway as Homes was conducting top secret research in the area. Here, though, there is yet more trouble and the mystery deepens as Johnson’s yacht ‘Dolly’ nears the island of Rum, where it turns into a race for life rather than prize money. This is the first title in the Johnson Johnson series and in common with the remainder involves an intricate plot and solution which is far from immediately obvious.

  Split Code

  Joanna Emerson, a trained nursery nurse, is hired as a nanny, albeit reluctantly, to the infant heir of a cosmetics fortune. She then becomes caught up in a complex kidnap plot. She is also an expert in codes and her purpose is to gain an insight into the opposition plan? But how does kidnapping further anyone’s interests? Commencing in Winnipeg, Manitoba, the story moves quickly through locations, as with many of Dunnett’s stories. On this occasion Joanna ends up on a crippled yacht off the coast of Yugoslavia. As always, both behind and aside from the plot and it’s inevitable conclusion is enigmatic portrait painter, yachtsman and former spy, Johnson Johnson. Bullets are flying, most of them in Joanna’s direction. Just how can this end?

  Tropical Issue

  Rita Geddes is a dyslexic makeup artist whose appearance seems to change with the weather. She is called to Johnson Johnson’s apartment, which he has let to a friend who wishes to use his studio, to fix the makeup of the famous Natalie Sheridan. However, Johnson, who is seemingly recovering from an accident, which turns out to be a murder attempt, is also present - as is it seems a mysterious figure seen by security outside of the apartment. What follows is murder, mystery and mayhem, with Johnson and his yacht Dolly, as always, at the centre. The reader will not be involved in second guessing a simple plot, however, as it is as intricate as fast moving, and far from a straightforward ‘whodunit’. The journey through this gripping story also moves from London to Madeira and the West Indies with equal pace.

  www.houseofstratus.com