The Dust and the Heat

by Michael Gilbert

  “It sounds like a second-feature film,” said Philippa.

  Oliver locked the car and they started to walk back the way they had come. A hundred yards short of the factory they turned left down a side road and right again when they reached the canal. They were now on the track which led behind a row of shops and houses, finishing up at their own car park.

  Oliver slowed his pace and motioned Philippa into the shadow of the wall. They were moving now along the narrow strip between the factory itself and the canal. Above her head she could see a fan of light, milky in the mist, and located it as the window of the experimental laboratory. Beyond the row of windows in the north wall of the packing department there was a small iron gate, a back entrance to the car park. It was usually kept locked. Oliver put his hand on it and pushed. The hinges must have been oiled, because it swung open without a sound.

  Oliver put his mouth close to Philippa’s ear and said, “Now we wait.”

  For the next thirty interminable minutes which dragged past, every separate minute ten minutes long, nothing happened at all. Philippa was a long way past simply being cold. She had lost all feeling in her feet. The mist made her want to sneeze, and in an effort to stop it she bit her lip until the tears ran down her frozen cheeks. Then the muscles in her right leg started to twitch with cramp, and when she put a hand on the gatepost to steady herself, she found that all feeling had gone from her hands as well.

  Oliver saw her moving and put out his own hand to steady her. Then she saw that he was pointing.

  A figure had materialized in the car park behind Bernard Lewin’s car. He was carrying something in his right hand which made a metallic “chink” when he put it down.

  Philippa suddenly forgot the cold and discomfort. After the long wait in the dark her night sight was now excellent, and although the only light was a street lamp outside the far gate, she could make out well enough what was happening.

  The newcomer was carrying a heavy army knapsack. That was what had made the “chink” when he put it down. Now he was unstrapping it and taking out a tin. It looked as if it might be paint. It must be paint because he was now taking out a brush as well.

  There were other people there too. Two or three of them closing in on the car. Then all the car-park lights came on.

  Philippa started forward, but Oliver’s hand closed on her arm.

  “We’ll keep out of this,” he said.

  The man with the paintbrush she recognized. He had a mop of greying hair, an old-young face and dragged one leg when he walked. She had seen him in the despatch department. Bolus was behind him and with Bolus were three of the lorry drivers. Palmer was one of them. She didn’t know the other two.

  “Doing a little overtime, Jarvis?” said Bolus. “Touching up Mr Lewin’s car for him? I don’t know that I’d have chosen just that colour myself.”

  He took the brush from Jarvis’ hand, dipped it in the open paint pot and drew it out, thickly covered in red paint.

  “I wasn’t doing anything wrong,” said Jarvis. The panic in his voice made it run up into a squeak.

  “You didn’t do anything wrong because we happened to be here in time to stop you,” said Bolus. “Pity to waste good paint, though. Grab his arms, you two.”

  Jarvis saw what was coming, twisted round and tried to run. It was a futile gesture. Two of the drivers had him by the arms. Palmer had one hand on his collar and the other in his hair.

  “Let’s try our hand at a spot of home decorating,” said Bolus. So saying, he drew the full brush of thick red paint over Jarvis’ face and down the front of his coat. Jarvis said feebly, “Lay off, will you. A joke’s a joke.”

  “You’re talking too much,” said Bolus. He had another brush full now and a lot of this went into Jarvis’ mouth.

  “Never leave a job half done,” said Bolus. He dipped the brush into the pot once more and slapped it vigorously over the squirming captive.

  Jarvis started to scream. It was a horrible blubbering noise, thick with pain and outrage.

  “He looks a right mess,” said Palmer. “What do you say we give him a wash down?”

  “Good idea,” said Bolus.

  “Suppose he can’t swim?”

  “Everyone ought to be able to swim. Up he goes. One, two and away.”

  A flailing of arms, a splash and Jarvis disappeared under the murky waters of the canal. When he reappeared the men started to laugh. The canal was so shallow at that point that the water only came up to Jarvis’ waist. He plodded across, feet squelching in the mud, and dragged himself slowly up the bank.

  “Don’t bother to come back for your cards,” said Bolus.

  Philippa was shaking.

  “Come on,” said Oliver. “Run. It’ll warm you up.” He led the way back to the car. “What you want’s a stiff drink. I know just the place.”

  The saloon bar of the Connemara Arms out on the Watford bypass had a roaring fire in the grate. Oliver bought two large whiskies and carried them over to a table by the fire. Philippa’s teeth had stopped chattering, but she still looked a bit white round the lips.

  “Put that down the hatch,” said Oliver. “You asked to come, you know.”

  “It was horrible,” she said. “Four of them and that silly little man.”

  “That’s the sort of thing that happens to spies when they’re caught.”

  “Spies?”

  “Jarvis was carrying out orders. He’ll get adequate compensation from his employers, I don’t doubt.”

  “What are you talking about? What orders?”

  “We happen to have the best analytical chemist in the market. Bernard Lewin’s a genius. Absolutely the strongest card in our pack. If our rivals can trump him, it’s an important trick to them. Bernard’s a bit eccentric, like most geniuses. And he’s a Jew. So they put someone in to pester him. It’s been going on for some time now. Someone sewed a yellow patch on the back of his overcoat in the cloakroom. Not very pretty. One of the men spotted it and reported it to Bolus, who had it off before Lewin saw it. There was that scribbling on his car. We got that off too. Tonight’s little effort was intended to be something permanent. Something that couldn’t be rubbed off.”

  “But why?”

  “Don’t be a cuckoo,” said Oliver. “It’s perfectly obvious. If he’s unhappy here he puts himself back on the market. And guess who’d give him his next job?”

  “Mallinsons, I suppose.”

  “It’s a fair bet.”

  “I think it’s horrible,” said Philippa. “Do you think I could have another drink?”

  “That’s the girl,” said Oliver.

  By the time he brought the second one back, Philippa was looking more her normal self again. She said, “Do you think you’ll be able to prove it was Mallinson?”

  “We shan’t even try. There’ll be no direct link. There’s a firm in the West End of London. It operates as a genuine employment agency, but if you’ve got the proper introductions and see the right partner, you can hire industrial spies and saboteurs as easily as you can get–”

  “Secretaries?”

  “If any secretary of mine tried to double-cross me,” said Oliver, “I’d give her such a beating she wouldn’t be able to sit down for a week.”

  “I believe you would, too,” said Philippa.

  They drove back in the car towards Elsfield Wood in a warm and companionable silence. Philippa was thinking, when we get to the station I know exactly what’s going to happen. It’s sort of inevitable. The whole evening has been leading up to it. He’ll park his car at the far end, away from the lights, he’ll switch off the engine, he’ll say, “We’ve got ten minutes before the train comes. Why waste it?” and he’ll put his left arm under the middle of my back, which I’ll lift up just slightly from the seat to show him I’m not fighting and he’ll put his right arm on my left shoulder and pull me towards him, and he’ll kiss me very thoroughly. I don’t think he’ll start undressing me, because he isn’t the sort of man who undr
esses a girl in the front seat of a motor car in a station yard. If he wanted to do that there’d be another time and another place altogether.

  Oliver swung the car into the station yard, drove it up to the far end away from the lights, switched the engine off, and said, “By the way. I’m going to France on Saturday. It’s about this lawsuit. I thought I’d take the car and we’d take it easy.”

  “We?”

  “I’ll need my secretary, naturally. I thought I’d warn you so that you could get any clothes you needed for the trip. As it’s business the firm will pay, of course. And here’s your train.”

  8

  The Silver City biplane tilted its wings, circled round the salt marsh and sand dunes which border Le Touquet’s golf course, skimmed the roofs of Etaples and touched down on the runway.

  “I’ve never done that before,” said Philippa. “It was fun.”

  “Best way of crossing the Channel,” said Oliver.

  “Until they build that tunnel,” said the girl in the seat behind them.

  There were seven of them in the tiny cabin and they had talked to each other in the offhand, friendly way that English people sometimes do when they are thrown together. Philippa had gathered that the middle-aged couple were coming over to pick up a daughter who had been staying with a French family in Rouen, and the young man and girl were starting their first-ever touring holiday in France. The older man with the grey moustache and briefcase, who looked like a retired army officer, had said good morning pleasantly enough, but had not told them anything about himself.

  When Oliver had told the young couple that he and Philippa were also motoring in France (“business and pleasure, fifty-fifty”), the girl had glanced at Philippa’s ringless left hand and then looked quickly away. Oliver had noticed it and decided that it was something he had better attend to.

  They had lunch on the terrace of the Escale restaurant and sat over their coffee watching the shuttle service of little silver planes drop out of the sky, taxi round, deposit their cargo of two or three motor cars apiece, pick up a new load and take off again. The two couples had driven on.

  The military gentleman was sitting by himself in the far corner drinking Campari. He waved genially to them as they left. After he had watched them drive away through the pine trees towards Etaples, he strolled down to the telephone booth in the reception hall and dialled a number at Montreuil, which is oddly called “sur mer” although it stands ten miles from the sea. All southbound traffic from Le Touquet passes through Montreuil.

  Oliver never found it possible to dawdle when he was driving a car, but on that afternoon he was in no hurry. They dipped down the long, winding hill into Rouen as the clocks sounded four, crossed the river, and ambled through the area of docks, factories and oil refineries on the south of the river. As the road swung up, past the castle of Robert the Devil, they were suddenly in deep countryside, running between woods of oak and chestnut and lime.

  It was after seven, and the kilometre stones to Alençon were running out of numbers, when they turned off the main road, twisted through a tangle of byroads and came suddenly on the village of St Pierre-sur-Orcq and the Hôtel Grâce Dieu.

  “But it isn’t a hotel at all,” said Philippa. “It’s a château.”

  “And so it was not so very long ago,” said Oliver. “It’s a hotel now, and unless it’s changed hands since I was here last, it’s a good one. For some reason or other it’s not in the Michelin Guide, so it doesn’t get overrun with tourists.”

  As they drove into the paved yard, Oliver ran an eye over the cars already parked there. Five with French numberplates, one from Germany, one from the Netherlands.

  He parked alongside, jumped out, lifted his own suitcase and Philippa’s quickly from the boot, and handed them to the man who had appeared. The man said something in French. Oliver nodded and gave him a five-franc piece. The man stumped off.

  “Come and have an aperitif. You can wash afterwards.”

  “They know you here?”

  “I’ve been here once or twice before. I telephoned for the rooms from the airport. I usually do that for the first night in France. When you’re within driving distance of the Channel, the hotels tend to get booked up. Later on I take a chance on it. Dubonnet, Byrrh, Campari-Soda or something with gin in it?”

  By the time they had finished their second drink it was eight o’clock and the waiter was hovering over them with a menu. Oliver chose the meal for both of them with loving care.

  “Your first meal in France,” he said, “is more than a feast. It’s a festival. Do you know why the French are so good at food? It’s because they hold to the tradition of eating out on Sunday. Whilst the English family huddles around its unchanging weekend joint, the French family departs, en bloc, to its favourite restaurant. That means that every restaurant, however small, however casual its weekday trade, must cook and serve at least one large, first-class meal a week. This keeps the chef on his toes and makes the whole thing an economic possibility.”

  They were in the dining-room by now. Philippa noticed that the idea of going up to their rooms for a wash and brush-up seemed to have been dropped.

  “It would be a mistake to rush things,” said Oliver. Philippa looked up sharply. She thought she detected a gleam of amusement in his dark brown eyes. “I was talking about food,” he said. “In a day or two your stomach will have acquired a French appetite.”

  He ordered quenelles de brochet, deciding regretfully against the lobster sauce as being too rich, and Guinea fowl à la belle mamma with a salad of watercress. “After that, we shall pause for breath,” he said, “and see if we can manage something ambitious to finish up with, or perhaps just a sorbet.”

  “You’re in love with food,” said Philippa.

  “It’s a mutual affection,” said Oliver. “Food and I love and respect each other. Perish the man who eats only enough to replace the energy he expends. Is food petrol? I eat much more than I need, and year by year I acquire additional layers of fat, each a memento of some enjoyable engorgement.”

  “Like an oak tree. One more ring each year.”

  “An apt and charming simile. Sommelier!”

  He chose a Sancerre to go with the Quenelles and a Chambertin for the Guinea fowl. Philippa did some mathematics.

  “You’ve ordered two bottles of wine just for us?”

  “Correct.”

  “But that’ll mean we’ve got to drink a bottle each.”

  “It’s a mistake to make actuarial calculations about wine. We shall drink exactly as much of each bottle as we feel we need.”

  The dining-room was filling up and most of the tables were now occupied. One car at least had arrived after them. Its driver, obviously an Englishman and less obviously a commercial traveller, was demanding saumon fumé in the loud clear tones which English people use when dealing with foreigners who don’t understand their own language.

  As the waiters bustled from table to table, as the spirit lamps flickered under the chafing dishes and the brandy flared, as the wine sank in the bottles and the blessed smell of good coffee permeated the room, the atmosphere seemed to warm and thicken. Philippa leaned back in her chair. She was as happy as any cat given a cushion in front of the fire and a dish of cream.

  She turned her head to look at Oliver. He seemed relaxed and contented, but there was a hint of wariness in his eyes. In just such a way, thought Philippa, and at just such a moment, having dined and wined a business acquaintance, would he introduce casually, lightly, almost as an afterthought, the proposition which had been the raison d’être of the whole meal.

  She said, “When you spoke of one’s first meal in France you meant your first meal on each visit, I take it. Or did you mean your first meal ever?”

  “I wasn’t sure,” said Oliver. “You haven’t told me a lot about yourself yet. Have you been to France before?”

  “I lived here from the age of four to the age of fourteen. I had holidays in England with my father but
I went to French schools – a kindergarten in Paris and then the Lycée at Fontainebleau.”

  “I see,” said Oliver. The wary look was back in his eyes again. “Then I imagine you speak French pretty well.”

  “Of course. I understand it too. When that man took our bags he said, ‘Room twenty, as on the previous occasions’.”

  “Naturally,” said Oliver. “I booked us in as Mr and Mrs Nugent. I thought it would save a lot of explanations and embarrassment.”

  “D’accord,” said Philippa, demurely.

  Never was fortress more charmingly surrendered.

  The next three days were spent in demonstrating how long you can take, if you give your mind to it, to get from Alençon to Lyon. On the first day they got no farther than the Loire, and spent a long, hot afternoon bathing in it. On the second day they followed the Loire almost to its source and spent the night in a tiny, chalet-like hotel at Le Monastier. On the third day, for no better reason than that Oliver knew of an excellent restaurant at Talloires which served fish called ‘ombles’, they made a long diversion to the Lake of Annecy.

  It was whilst they were sitting over lunch here that Oliver said, “As you will have guessed, this legal business at Dijon is partly an excuse. I have to go there, it’s true. Twenty-four hours would have covered the trip. But I came to the conclusion that I had earned a holiday.”

  “I’m not complaining,” said Philippa. She was watching the sails of the little boats tacking up the lake into a fresh breeze off the foothills of the Alps.

  “I worked the whole thing out with my usual skill. We get to Lyon tomorrow – that’s Wednesday. I shall have settled my business with the lawyers by Thursday evening. We motor back on Friday and Saturday, fly across on Sunday and are back at our desks by Monday morning. That gives us exactly eight working weeks before D-day.”

  “D-day?”

  “When we loose Tendresse on an appreciative Upper Middle Class.”