One Step to Danger

by John Gubert

  They told me to dress. I was allowed into a washroom and splashed cold water over my face. I thought I would be sick. But I wasn’t. I was seething. I couldn’t believe it was Jacqui’s father. He would not have risked it while we had the tapes. I also didn’t think that he would have done it. After all Jacqui could end up in prison. I ran through the options. Who could it have been?

  It needed to be someone who knew where we were. It had to be someone who did not know about the tapes. And it would be somebody who hated us.

  The only people I could think of were Yussef and Di Maglio’s messenger of the previous night. And I thought Yussef was too stupid to manage such a stunt.

  I would have liked to discuss the matter with Jacqui but we were kept apart. I told the customs and police that I refused to answer their questions and they decided not to waste their time. So, with a police guard, I sat alone. I was left with my thoughts of what we should do.

  It was a quarter past one in the morning when the senior customs official, the one who had been surveying us at the luggage console, returned. He looked worried. My heart missed a beat.

  He said, “We have analysed the substance. And it is not an illegal one. It is a normal household product. I have to apologise for any inconvenience or distress we caused. We acted on a tip off which we had good reason to believe was reliable. We acted, as you may be aware, within our rights and according to the guidelines we are given. I am able to make a copy of them available to you if you need them.”

  I asked for Jacqui and our luggage. He directed me to the next room for Jacqui and said that a trolley was being sought for our luggage.

  I walked into the room. Jacqui sat there with a woman officer. She did not see me enter. She sat there hunched up. Her fists were clenched. Her breathing was heavy. I walked over and sat beside her.

  I took her gently into my arms. Her eyes were brimming over with tears. She kept on repeating, “Oh no, no.”

  “I’ll look after you,” I said. “Let’s get going out of this place. I doubt the car is waiting. We’ll get a taxi. Let’s get some air.”

  She walked like a robot. Her face ashen and framed by a wild mass of black slightly curly hair. She still swallowed from time to time as she tried to keep her tears back. I pushed the trolley and could not offer her an arm as we walked out of customs again and into the crowd around the terminal exit.

  There was no sign of the Ritz driver. He must have assumed we were a no show. We walked out of the airport buildings into a cold, drizzly London night.

  There was no queue at that time of night and we soon were in a taxi, heading for London. I held my arm round Jacqui now and felt her tears on my chest as they soaked through my shirt. The horror had been too much for her. This was an indignity for which she was not prepared.

  “Darling,” I said, “You have to give me a minute for a couple of calls. It’s important to make them.”

  The first was to the Ritz. I told them we had been delayed and asked them to have the room ready and to check us into the hotel in the room. I did not think that Jacqui would want to be hanging around the lobby, even at that late stage of the night.

  I then called her father’s number. I now knew it off by heart. I thought I recognised the voice at the other end. “Is that Aldo? This is De Roche. I think I saved your life the other night.”

  It was indeed Aldo and I continued, “I don’t want to talk to Di Maglio. But you have an informer in your circle. Someone who is known to the police and who tips them off regularly. I don’t know your business well enough, so it’s possible he does that with your agreement. But today he went too far.

  “Someone planted white powder in our luggage and informed the British customs of the fact. You might be able to narrow down who it was. Sometime today he was in the Carlton. He knew our room and spent a good deal of time planting the stuff in our luggage. It was a professional job. It may have been the person who put a bug on our cases, one that I got rid of before we hit Nice Airport.

  “That person must have tracked our flight details. Perhaps he has access to airport computers. He knew we were going to London. But I only ticketed Nice to Orly. I picked up the other tickets at Roissy.

  “He also hates us. He got them to strip search me and Jacqui.”

  I heard a sharp intake of breath from Aldo. “And he also asked them to do a cavity search,” I added.

  At that point Aldo swore.

  I added, “Kill him for us, and do it quickly.” With that I put down the phone.

  Jacqui looked at me through tear-filled eyes. She nodded and sobbed, “And they should do it slowly and painfully, whoever the bastard was.”

  We did not exchange another word. Her breathing became calmer as we approached the hotel. Her mascara was smudged. She had hardly any lipstick on. Her face still looked ashen. She kept on nervously pulling her hands through her hair.

  As we reached the hotel, she pulled her jacket around her and waited for me as I paid off the cab.

  We walked over to the lobby. A porter carried our luggage. We were whisked up to our room. The expert eye of the receptionist saw something was wrong. Jacqui was evidently distraught. And I suppose I was visibly still in a cold rage.

  Alone, I turned to Jacqui. She said, “I need a bath. Get me a nightdress. There’s one in the case.” With that she disappeared into the bathroom. I soon heard the running water and the sound of brushing teeth.

  Opening our cases, I took out her nightdress. I left everything else packed. There is one thing you can say about the customs, they actually repacked the cases well. I was now certain that we wanted to get out of England as soon as possible. I wanted to change our plans. I had to ensure that we were not tailed.

  I walked into the bathroom with the nightdress. Jacqui was lying in foam filled, steaming bath. Her eyes were shut. Her face was troubled. I thought back to the day before and the sadness I had noted. I knew we had to go away. Jacqui was no slouch when it came to handling herself. She could cope with most things. But anybody would be stressed out after the trials and tribulations we had been through.

  I also knew that I had pushed myself to the extreme. I was lucky she did not depend too much on me at such times, or perhaps I would have been the first to crack. I stripped off; suddenly feeling soiled by the intrusion of the custom search. I walked over to the shower in the corner of the room. Turning it on full blast, first cold and then hot, I tried to wash away even the thought of this evening’s events.

  I washed and washed myself from top to toe. I pushed the events at the airport out of my mind, although I doubt I could push them out of my memory. I focussed on the hot water splashing me from top to toe. I felt myself slowly gain control of my feelings. I almost returned to the person that I used to be.

  The glass door of the shower opened and I turned to see Jacqui.

  She had got out of the bath and had dried herself. She was wearing the nightdress. It was a long black slinky number, one she had worn the other night.

  “Let’s get to bed,” she said, “it’s almost two in the morning and you need to be up for a meeting at seven.”

  I looked at her again. The distress was still in her eyes. It was not as pronounced as earlier. It was not the same as before when she talked of her family. But I wanted to banish it forever. Once again the lonely mountain village or the idyllic beach beckoned as the way to escape. Once again, though, it was clear to me that such an option was not the real solution.

  I stood there under the hot water, and looked at Jacqui. I smiled and she smiled back. A quiet, sad smile and it flickered across her face. A smile that touched her eyes and then fled in fear of her sadness. I took her arm in my wet hand and drew her close to me. She walked into the shower, and the rush of water soaked her hair.

  It attacked the light, flimsy, silky material of her nightdress. The water splashed off her and me onto the floor of the bathroom. I pulled the door shut behind her and took her into my arms. We kissed not a passionate or sensual kiss. It wa
s a comforting, healing kiss. A kiss that recognised the trauma we had both felt. A kiss that cleansed us more than the water ever could.

  I moved away from her. By now the night-dress was soaked. The material clung to her body. I saw the curves of her breasts, the contours of her waist and the sliminess of her hips. I looked at the slender legs and envied the freedom of the warm, wet, clinging fabric to touch every part of her body.

  We switched off the shower and dried ourselves on the same towel. We rubbed it across our cleansed bodies. We wrapped it around both of us as we moved closer together. Then we allowed it to drop on the floor, before moving to the bed.

  The memory of the evening was banished but had not gone. We had exorcised it from our minds, but not from our senses. We clung to each other and fell asleep, but we knew that we needed to be far away from England before we could expurgate the thought of that evening’s pain.

  I woke a few hours later to realise that it was dawn. I looked at the clock and saw that it was already past six. I remembered that I had a business meeting with the man from Banque Fucquet at seven. I quietly got out of bed and washed and shaved. I looked in the mirror. I looked haggard. I was tired. I knew I needed to get away. Unless Jacqui felt different I swore that we would. And we would do it that day.

  Just before seven, I was at reception. Jacqui had been in a deep sleep in our room. As I had expected, at seven an impeccably dressed man, without a hair out of place or a part of his smooth rotund face missed by the attentions of his razor, asked for me at reception. As I approached him, the sweet smell of an eau de cologne wafted over. His trousers were pressed like a knife-edge. His jacket meanwhile had seen no unwanted crease. His club tie was perfectly knotted over his crisp cotton shirt. And an army sergeant would have been proud of his shiny shoes. If you added to those the solid gold ingot cufflinks, the large gold and onyx signet ring and the mother of pearl tie pin, you had to have a Swiss private banker. This was the manager of Fucquet’s representative office in London. Born into nobility and trained in servility, he made the perfect private banker.

  As we had breakfast, I read the agreement. As usual it was penal for us and liberal for them. I really didn’t care for our aim was to get the maximum cash possible. As I signed the papers with a flourish, I knew that, as long as we won our first and second plays, we would really be in the multi billion dollar plays. That could even be enough to achieve my father’s dream objectives of bringing about a crisis in Asia. If the first play went well, we would be able to mobilise without suspicion, under the guise of more funds for investment from our wealthy backers, the eight hundred million we held in different banks throughout the world. And through such a crisis and with that sort of money, we would become billionaires.

  The papers signed, I left my Swiss friend, pleased to have done his day’s work before eight in then morning. I knew Jacqui would still be asleep and decided to go for a walk.

  I turned left out of the Ritz. The streets were still fairly quiet at that time of the morning. I turned left again into St James’ Park and walked down towards the Serpentine. I found a bench and, despite the coolness of a damp English morning, sat there and watched the few passers by.

  There were a few joggers, some in shorts and headbands, and others in lurid jogging suits. Some ran briskly along the paths, relaxed and calm as they breathed in the semi polluted air just a few feet away from the growing morning traffic. Some seemed to run in a slow walk, puffing at the exertion of their pedestrian pace. Some walked, having perhaps jogged to the corner of their street, and then out of view preferring a more comfortable speed.

  There were people walking dogs. The dogs and their owners often looked remarkably similar, either waddling in unison or alternatively mimicking each other’s hairstyles. The poodle owner had frizzy hair. A bushy mane accompanied the Old English sheepdog. A plump little old lady led the podgy Pekinese. While the Afghan hound led its kaftan clad ageing hippie owner through their daily exertions.

  I saw the office workers joining this group. They were mainly male, completing some interminable commute from the London suburbs. A few smart suited locals appeared in this group, walking from the mews of Belgravia to the chic of St James.

  Not all my fellow companions fitted into these stereotypes. I saw the occasional young girl, still clad in the light clothes of summer, and walking, proud of her new found maturity, through the green. Then there was the odd nanny, sometimes still in uniform, pushing a sleepy child banished from the early morning routines of their busy parents. And finally I saw the old tramps; a few bundles thrust into a pram or hijacked supermarket trolley, walking aimlessly towards some warm vent or perhaps a prime location for begging.

  As the crowds increased, the people merged into anonymity. They distracted from the beauty of the grass, still green in the early days of autumn. They irritated the trees, turning russet as they prepared to bare their branches for the winter. And they banished the birds flying around to find a fresh fast food snack from nature, only to replace them with arrogant pigeons looking for a casual hamburger.

  I no longer felt at ease and walked back to the hotel, mingling with the crowd and yet totally removed from them. I nodded at the doormen as I entered the proud lobby of my famous temporary residence, and headed back to the few square yards that had been lent me for the night.

  Jacqui was still sleeping when I quietly walked in. I picked up the newspaper, left discreetly on the doorknob outside and settled into an armchair. There was no news of murder or robbery, at least none that I recognised. Our friends in Asia had apparently decided that they could put their recent tempestuous markets behind them. They, and all the carpetbaggers they attracted, were signalling their desire to act as irrationally after the crisis they created as they had done both before and during it. Markets were moving ever more crazily higher. That was good. I knew though that this behaviour was playing into our hands and every day was bringing closer the moment when we would need to strike.

  Jacqui woke up with a start. She smiled when I went over. “I forgot where we were for as moment,” she said. “You look as if you had been up for ages.”

  “Yes I’ve sorted everything out with Fucquet. I had breakfast with their London man. And I also went for a short stroll in the park. We should head out to the airport some time. Would you like breakfast? Anything you want to do?”

  “Let’s talk while I get ready,” she said. “I’ll skip breakfast I’m in favour of elevenses in Fortnum’s. I’d like a coffee though.”

  I ordered it. “I wanted to go to Boston, but I’d rather cut out as much travel as possible after last night. If you agree, let’s head straight over to New York. I think we should get over there by the evening flight. It leaves around half six I think. That would mean that we get there in good time for dinner.”

  “I agree,” said Jacqui. “That means we can go shopping here. I want to head up to Bond Street and get some new cases. And I am going to pack them myself this time. I also need some new clothes. You have a habit of getting me into fixes where I ruin what I am wearing.”

  “Hey” I said, “what do you mean?”

  “I ruined one outfit when we got caught in the storm at Remantuelle. You didn’t exactly improve my nightie yesterday when you pulled me into the shower. And I’ve wrecked a pile of tights. Oh, and I lost half my make up last night at customs,” she said. A frown passed over her brow.

  And then she added, “I bet it was Marco. He was pissed off with what you did to him. And he may have felt that my approach was pretty final, although God knows he’s fairly thick skinned.”

  “Are you going to find it hard to get over?” I asked.

  “Well, it was hardly a pleasure being held on suspicion. And I can tell you that I am no great fan of having a hand in plastic gloves pushing its way around my insides. But I’ll be OK.” She smiled, “Nothing that retribution and a bit of shopping won’t cure.”

  We walked out of the hotel, arm in arm, then crossed the road and wandered
through the side streets to Bond Street. I guessed that Jacqui would find all she needed there.

  “Why don’t you do your shopping and then we can buy cases. We may need an extra one if you excel yourself,” I said.

  “Hold on, you need some casual clothes as well. Most of yours are formal. They’re much too formal for the US and Rio. You’ll need to go into some shops. But I still want those late elevenses in Fortnum’s. So let’s walk up to Oxford Street and then spend our way down Bond Street.”

  “Is your credit card able to bear this strain?” I asked.

  “Sure, the bill gets sent to my bank and they pay it. My father gives me an annual allowance and so the account is pretty flush still. It could get a bit tight towards the end of the year. But, by then, you’ll be so rich that you won’t mind buying me a hamburger.”

  We did as she said and soon stopped at several shops. We seemed to go into a variety of dress shops for clothes.

  She went into Versace. It had just opened. And she squealed with delight as she found some casual clothes she adored. She stopped in the White House for a couple of nightdresses and got a fit of the giggles when the assistant asked if it was for her honeymoon trousseau.

  She pulled me into a man’s shop for some slacks and polo shirts, and insisted that I bought a blouson that was more her taste than mine. She stopped for make up, even though I pointed out to her that we would be able to stop in duty free at Heathrow.

  “Too crowded, darling, and the selection is lousy when it comes to make up rather than perfume.”

  At Louis Vuitton, she enthused over luggage. “We must get rid of that assortment of un-matching things. We look shoddy.” And she bought us a set of matching luggage. There were three smart leather cases that luckily fitted one inside of the other, together with a matching vanity case and, from sheer extravagance, a briefcase for me. “Darling, the other one looks as if it has been used as a skateboard.”