by Ann Bridge
‘That’s what those beastly people engaged the poor little wretch for,’ Julia said, moving on towards the taxi. Jean-Pierre caught her arm and halted her.
‘But how could they find her? This is so strange.’
‘Oh, she’s a model-girl, or whatever they call it; she sits to be photographed for advertisements—in her case mostly her feet and ankles, to display shoes. All they had to do was to ruffle through the files in all the advertising agencies till they came on someone reasonably like Aglaia. In fact this girl, June Phillips, really has brown hair; they had it bleached for this job.’
‘This is horrible,’ Jean-Pierre said, slowly walking forward again.
‘Of course. The modern world is horrible, beyond belief; personally, I regard the atom bomb as one of its more respectable features.’
Jean-Pierre’s loud laughter at this observation was still filling the small quiet street as he approached the taxi, and this produced a slightly reassuring effect on June when he went up and opened the door.
‘Good-morning, Miss Phillips,’ he said, shaking her hand. ‘I am so glad that you are coming to pay us a visit, and so is my wife. All our daughters are married, and we miss them; we shall enjoy having a young girl about the house again.’ He told the taxi-man to cross over and pull up behind the Frégate to simplify moving the luggage from one car to the other; the man did so. June had made no reply to his welcoming words; when Julia went to help her out she saw that tears were pouring down the pretty foolish little face.
‘June, dear, what is the matter? Do stop crying, and come into the other car. You’ve got to drive quite a long way, you know.’
‘He’s too good and too kind!’ June sobbed out. ‘I can’t understand it. I don’t deserve it.’
‘Which of us deserves all the kindness we get? I know I don’t,’ Julia said. ‘The only thing we can do is to give as little trouble as possible to the people who are being kind to us. Come on—hop out.’
During this interchange the Pastor and the taxi-driver had been switching June’s luggage from the cab to the car; when the girl got out and hobbled along to the Frégate Jean-Pierre looked at her with concern.
‘But she is lame!’ he said to Julia, when June had been bestowed in the front seat.
‘Yes, she sprained her ankle the other day, up on the Niederhorn. I wanted to tell you about that—Dr. Hertz has been treating her here, but a good doctor ought to see it from time to time, and say what she may and mayn’t do. Her feet and ankles are her bread and butter. Hertz said she was to use it a little every day, and she can get up and down stairs all right; but I’m afraid she won’t be mobile enough to be much help to Germaine. I am sorry—I ought to have told you about this before, but I was concentrating on getting her away.’
‘That aspect is quite unimportant,’ he said, brushing aside any possible inconvenience from having a female criminal who was also lame foisted on his household. ‘As to her foot, it can easily be seen to; I often have to go to Lausanne, where the doctors are hors concours’. He paused.
‘I’ll get all that paid, of course,’ Julia said, thinking that in view of June’s information about the bus tour the Secret Service, in the shape of Colin or Antrobus, might well pay for the child’s medical expenses.
‘Another aspect of no importance,’ Jean-Pierre said, quickly though smilingly. ‘Many of our doctors do half their work for love, as I believe yours do also.’
‘I daresay they did before the Welfare State came in,’ Julia replied rather acidly. ‘Now I think the National Health Service has spoiled the old easy comfortable family-doctor business, and the all-for-free treatment of the poor. For one thing there are no poor now.’
‘So? That is very sad. But I am thinking—should not Dr. Hertz perhaps see her before she leaves? Here we are precisely at his Clinic.’
Julia looked at her watch; it was exactly half past twelve.
‘No. There’s not time enough to be safe; without an appointment one may have to wait ages. Anyhow he saw her yesterday. No,’ she said again—‘I’d rather you cleared off at once. Goodbye. I can’t thank you enough for doing this. My love to Germaine.’ She went and leant in at the door of the Frégate.
‘Goodbye, June dear. I shall be coming to pick you up very soon, and meantime the Pastor will get a doctor to keep an eye on your ankle.’
‘The what?’ June asked—the word ‘Pastor’ had caught her ear. ‘Is the gentleman a minister? Dad was Presbyterian.’
‘Really? Yes, I think it’s all more or less the same,’ Julia said, trying vainly to remember how much Calvin and John Knox had had in common. ‘You can ask him. Goodbye. Thank you very much for what you told me just now; that may be quite a help.’
Once again the little Londoner startled Julia.
‘You won’t go after them on this bus trip, will you? Oh don’t, please! They both carry revolvers!—and Mr. B., he’d stick at nothing.’
‘No, I’m sure I shan’t. Don’t worry, June dear—bless you.’ She gave the girl a quick kiss, and turned and bade Jean-Pierre goodbye. With the utmost satisfaction she watched him manœuvre his car round at the end of the street and drive back past her, waving as he went. Anyhow June was sorted—one job cleared up, and a main one.
The taxi-man was patiently waiting. ‘Das Fräulein desires to return to the Bear?’ he asked.
‘No, not to the Bear.’ Where should she go to try to put a call through to Antrobus? She had his number. ‘To Schuhs’ she said, getting in. Surely a big place like Schuhs would have a telephone-box?—and please God with a door that shut! Like all English visitors to Switzerland she glanced anxiously at the meter as they drove off; to her surprise it registered only the minimum price. Julia spoke through the front window.
‘You have been paid to the Clinic?’
‘Ja. Der Herr paid me, while das Fräulein was consoling das Mädchen’.
Julia laughed rather wryly to herself. Switzerland might be the oldest democracy in the world, but even among its taxi-drivers social nuances were recognised: she was ‘The Small Lady,’ poor June only ‘the Girl’. As the taxi passed along the main street towards Schuhs she caught sight of two men, one tall and graceful, the other rather stocky and bearded, turning down the little side street that led towards the Cantonal-Platz—Wright and Borovali, both looking as sour as vinegar. What would they say when they found their wretched captive gone? Poor Frau Göttinger! But she was well able to defend herself. At the sight of the two discomfited crooks Julia laughed again, this time with full-hearted pleasure.
Chapter 12
The Passes
There was a telephone-box at Schuhs, and Julia got Antrobus at once. ‘I have a little news-item,’ she told him.
‘Where are you speaking from?’
‘Schuhs.’
‘Have you had lunch?’
‘Goodness no!—I’ve only just finished off-loading the little party.’
‘Then why not come and eat something with me? Where we lunched yesterday? Was that all right?’
‘Yes, lovely. I shall have Brienzerli again. When?’
‘Now. It’s not two minutes from where you are.’
‘All right. Only oughtn’t I to have an ice or something for the good of the house, after telephoning? No, I know— I’ll buy some cakes for Mrs. H.’
She bought her cakes, and then wandered along the walk beside the Hohe Matte, lingering to smell the newlymown hay and to gaze up the valley at the Jungfrau; when she turned into the garden she saw, with a small throb of delight, Antrobus already seated at a table, two misty glasses of iced Cinzano before him. He got up.
‘Darling, you’ve taken rather a time. What have you been doing?’
‘Looking at the Jungfrau,’ Julia said, sitting down and putting the parcel of cakes under her chair.
‘Quite a good excuse, as they go. Now take your drink —has it got hot? No? Well half-way through it I hope you will feel strong enough to pass on your news.’
Julia did thi
s after a couple of sips—she was boiling over with her information.
‘On the Drei Pässe tour!’ Antrobus exclaimed. ‘How ingenious!’
‘Why?’
‘Because on that trip the bus makes five halts: on the top of the Grimsel, on the top of the Furka; a long stop at Andermatt for lunch, a pause again on the top of the Süsten-Pass, and finally all the more energetic passengers get out at the upper end of the Aares-Schlucht, to walk through it and be picked up again at the bottom—after having coffee and buying picture post-cards. So there’s a vast choice of places for a brief-case to change hands in.’
‘What’s the Aares-Schlucht? And why should one walk through it?’
‘Oh, it’s a “sight”. In fact it is rather spectacular. The Aar runs through a very narrow gorge between vertical or even overhanging limestone cliffs three hundred feet high or more, and the water races along between them frighteningly fast—in fact everything about it is rather frightening, especially those unclimbable walls.’
‘How does one walk, then? Is there a beach?’ Julia asked, with her usual practicality.
‘No, there’s no beach. To exploit the place the ingenious Swiss have built a little sort of gallery-path all through it, fastened to the rock on steel brackets, thirty feet or so above the water; it’s barely a yard wide—no place for people who easily get giddy.’
‘I think it sounds horrible. Let’s hope the other side have bad heads for heights! Not that that would worry Colin—he was always one for peering over the edges of towers, and climbing cliffs.’
The waitress came to take their order; when she had gone Antrobus said—‘I must get hold of Colin and pass this on. Your little creature has done us quite a good turn this time.’
‘Did he find you all right this morning?’
‘Oh yes. But he was fairly sour.’
‘Why?’
‘That’s what I was going to ask you. Is he in love with you?’
Julia laughed out so loudly that heads turned in their direction.
‘Don’t make so much noise!’ Antrobus said, with a hint of irritation. ‘What’s the joke?’
‘Only that he’s engaged to Aglaia Armitage! I’m sorry, John—but he really can’t be “J.” about you and me.’
‘Was he never in love with you? That seems unlikely.’
‘Yes, I suppose a bit, when he was finishing with Eton and I was a pre-deb. But it was much more that we were tremendous muckers, and did everything together, as we had ever since we were small children. Anyhow all that is as dead as mutton,’ the girl said airily. She paused, thinking. ‘Listen; June said another thing—that B. and W. always carry revolvers. Has Colin got one?’
‘I shouldn’t think so—no. They’re such a nuisance at the Customs; draw attention, and all that.’
‘Well when he goes along on this tour I think he ought to have one. Can you supply?’
‘Not myself—I don’t carry one either. It isn’t done, normally. But I can get him one from Berne, I expect.’
‘In time? Do you know when this bus starts?’
‘Yes. 7.30 a.m. from the Fluss, and then it wanders round the other hotels, picking up passengers. I shouldn’t think it would bother with anything as small as the Bear; I expect B. and K. will board it at one of the big places like the Victoria.’
‘Then he ought to have it tonight,’ Julia said anxiously. ‘He’ll have to come down to sleep here anyhow, to be in time. Can you fix that?’
‘Yes. If you’ll excuse me for a moment I’ll go and telephone at once—then it should be here by tea-time.’
While he was doing this the Brienzerli arrived, and Julia began on them—no sense in letting them get cold. When Antrobus returned and started on his cold trout he said—‘You do fuss about Colin, don’t you? Are you still in love with him?’
‘Oh don’t be such a clot, John. That was practically in our infancy! And would anyone of my age stay in love with someone who wasn’t in love with them?’ She said this with complete sincerity, but even as she spoke a little pang of anxiety struck at her heart. If Antrobus wasn’t in love with her, and she couldn’t be sure, would she be able to stop falling more and more in love with him?
His answer was not altogether reassuring.
‘It’s been known to happen,’ he said, with his rather twisted smile. ‘Look at the wretched Baron de Charlus and Odette.’ Julia nodded—she remembered that agonising infatuation. ‘Anyhow I don’t know what your age is.’
‘Do you want to guess? No, I hate any rubbish about one’s age. I’m 28.’
‘You’re so posée, and have so much expertise that I should have given you 30. But clearly you’ll be quite as beautiful at 45 as you are now; you have bones and eyes, which don’t change, as well as your fantastic colouring.’
This was in a way more open than anything he had said yet, and Julia’s colouring promptly showed one of those modifications which so exasperated her. She changed the subject abruptly.
‘Couldn’t we go too?’
‘Where? On the bus-tour?’
‘Well not in the bus. In your car, I thought—just follow on and be there at all these halts. You might ring Berne up again and indent for two more revolvers—“One for me, one for Moses, and one for Elias”!’ she said irreverently. ‘I’d adore to go over those passes—I’ve read about them in Baedeker, and they sound too lovely.’
‘They are—I want very much to take you over them some time. But I’m not sure that tomorrow is quite the moment—we couldn’t concentrate on the view and the flowers if we are keeping lynx eyes on B. and W. all the time.’
‘Oh.’ Her dove’s eyes mourned at him. ‘Oh, John, couldn’t we do some of it?’
‘You beguiler! Yes, I think we might do a short run, anyhow; but I shall have to check with Berne and make sure that they don’t want me to be here.’
‘Oh do do that.’ Then another idea struck her. ‘How do you think B. and W. will react to June’s having flitted? I saw them coming back from the police-station, and they looked frightfully soured—but of course they didn’t know about June then. Do you suppose it will make them alter their plans?’
‘They can hardly do that at this stage. In their place I should be only too thankful to be relieved of such a liability as that little nitwit! She’s served their turn, and ever since she can only have been an embarrassment, even before she started turning King’s Evidence to you. But I daresay it will bother Mr. Borovali quite a bit. Did the hotel know that it was you who took her away?’
‘But of course. I even offered to pay her bill, because I didn’t want her to lose all those frocks that were the main bribe; but Frau Göttinger wouldn’t hear of it. She said “Herr de Ritter” had booked the rooms, and he could foot the bill.’
Antrobus laughed.
‘Good for her! How do you come to know her name?’
‘Oh, der Chrigl, the Beatenberg bus-driver, is her nephew—he told me.’
‘There you go again! You really ought to be employed whole-time. Why don’t you apply?’
‘I don’t need money except abroad, and I get quite a good business allowance for my papers, when I remember to put in for it. I was in too much of a hurry this time, racing out to take Watkins to Mrs. H.’
‘Watkins being the lady’s-maid you mentioned at Geneva?’
‘Yes.’ Julia was pleased that he should remember this detail from the conversation at the Palais des Nations. ‘But here is something else, while I think of it.’
‘More information?’
‘No.’ She paused, considering how to present what she had to say. ‘Did you tell Berne about the bus-tour?’ she asked.
‘Yes.’ He looked a little surprised.
‘Were they pleased?’
‘Delighted. I was congratulated warmly on my “local sources”!’ he said, smiling at her.
‘Fine. However, as you very well know, your local source is not me, but June Phillips,’ Julia said, in a rather cassant tone.
; ‘My dear, so what? What’s biting you?’ he said, leaning across the table towards her, plainly upset by her sudden change of manner.
‘Money,’ Julia said firmly. ‘I know your people pay their local sources for “hard” information, and often for information that isn’t hard at all—soft as putty, half the time. What is this rather crucial information about the bus-tour worth to Berne? What would they have paid a genuine “local source” for it?’
He stared at her in surprise, his expression slowly stiffening.
‘I have no idea,’ he said, rather coldly.
‘Oh nonsense! Of course it’s your business to have a very good idea,’ Julia replied brusquely. ‘You are such a bad liar, John! Anyhow I want three hundred francs for it. Probably miles below the real tariff, but I think that should be enough for my need.’
‘May I know what your need is?’ he asked, a little less coldly. ‘If you are really short of cash of course we can help you out; you have done a great deal for us. Merligen, and the Bear, and now this.’
‘And the photograph the police used,’ Julia reminded him. ‘Personally I think three thousand francs would be much nearer the mark!’
‘I don’t disagree. In fact it is hardly possible to put a cash value on what you have done in the last few weeks. Only I didn’t realise that you wished it to be on this basis.’ His tone was very cold indeed.
‘I shall slap you on both sides of your face if you make any more remarks like that,’ Julia told him, in her slowest tones. ‘I hadn’t realised that being offensive was in your repertoire at all.’
He blushed.
‘I do apologise. Pray forgive me. If I was offensive— and I see that I must have sounded so—it was because I am so taken by surprise at your raising the question of money.’
‘That’s simply because you never use your imagination. Look—June Phillips, to whom the unutterable British Secret Service owes most of the information on which they have been, and tomorrow will be, acting, has injured her ankle, which is her livelihood. She has got to see doctors, and they will have to be paid. I’ve paid Hertz’s bill here —quite small—myself. But now she’s gone to the de Ritters, who are as poor as the traditional Church mice, and I want three hundred francs—damn it, it’s only twenty-five pounds!—to cover her medical expenses while she’s with them. Isn’t what she’s given you worth that?’