Steve had been seated alone in one of the double seats at the extreme front of the bus. Nadine hesitated, then took the place next to him.
Oh, oh, he thought. Another complaint. This was all he needed, somebody sore who’d send up a written complaint to John Brett-James in London. Steven Cogswell, his Riviera representative, was attempting to seduce the cash customers. Seduce, hell — she’d probably write that he’d attempted to rape her.
Steve directed the driver to head for the Ruhl Hotel in Nice, where they were to pick up the last contingent of tourists, and then settled back in his seat next to Nadine.
He began cautiously. “Miss Whiteley, I’m afraid that I was, uh, carried away last night. Probably too much celebrating. Particularly after you’d brought me so much luck. I’m afraid an apology — ”
“Oh, no,” she said. “Oh, please don’t.” Her voice was a whisper. In fact, there was almost a whimpering quality in it.
“But …”
“You’re the one who deserves the apology,” she said, her voice low and her eyes turned away from him.
He didn’t know what to say.
Nadine continued agonizingly, “I … I don’t know much about these things, but, well, I understand that it’s very difficult for a man … I mean …” She was blushing now. “I mean it’s very cruel to leave him under such circumstances.”
Steve stared at her in amazement. Far from being angry at him, the girl was apologizing for stirring him up and then leaving.
He said, “Look, don’t worry about that part of it. Let’s start all over again, eh? Friends?” He put a hand out to be shaken. “Well forget it all.”
She shook with him, her clasp tight. Now that she faced him, he could see the touch of tears in her eyes. Damn, but she’s pretty, he thought.
They picked up the balance of the tourists in Nice and headed down the coast. The trip was a long one, 290 kilometers, some 175 miles, but happily the roads were good. They passed through Cannes and twenty-two kilometers further on reached Saint Raphael where they turned inland.
There was a speaker system in the bus and a hand mike up front, and from time to time Steve brought the attention of the group to this or that sight they were passing. Tourists tended to get restless on these long treks.
Ordinarily, he didn’t run tours this far away from Nice, but the opportunity was too good to miss. Even after he’d paid for the bus and driver, for their lunch and for the bullfight tickets, he’d net well over a pound profit per tourist, more than a hundred dollars for the group.
They stopped briefly in Arles for an examination of the Roman and medieval ruins, and had a lunch based on bouillabaise at the Thévot, on the Rue du Forum.
Nadine and Steve had kept their conversation light and desultory thus far. There seemed to be an embarrassment — which both were conscious of and both attempting to shake off — between them.
He didn’t know how to bring up the matter of Silletoe, nor even if he should, but finally it came out, just before they reached Nîmes. He blurted, “Your fiancé dropped into the office this morning.”
Her face registered confusion. “Fiancé?”
“Mr. Silletoe.”
“Jerry Silletoe! He’s here? Why …”
It was his turn to be surprised “You didn’t know?”
“But, that’s impossible. He’s back in New York.” She looked at him strangely. “But why did you think he was my fiancé?”
Steve ran his hand along the side of his cheek, ruefully. “He let me know in a rather emphatic way.”
She was still astonished. “I had no idea Jerry was in France, but certainly there is nothing between us. We … well, we had a slight attachment at one time.”
“You don’t have to explain to me,” Steve said.
Nadine was slightly irritated. “I wasn’t explaining to you. I’m just amazed. First, that he’s here at all; second, that he claims to be engaged to me. Steve, I … I’d rather you didn’t tell him where I’m staying. That is, if you haven’t already.”
Steve said drily, “I’m afraid a man of his determination won’t have much trouble locating you.”
The bus driver turned to Steve and said, “Nous sommes ici, Monsieur Cogswell.”
They were entering Nîmes.
Steve came to his feet and took up the microphone to give a brief talk. He kept it light, grinning to take the sting out of some of his words. “Folks,” he said, “you’ll note there’s quite a crowd. Bullfights aren’t a common thing here in southern France and when a name fighter comes up from Spain, there’s usually a turnout.
“The corrida is held in what is probably the best-preserved Roman ruin in Europe. This arena is where gladiators once fought to the death, and you might keep in mind that the bullfight is a direct descendant of the Roman meets. In short, it can sometimes be a bit gruesome to those who are squeamishly inclined, the ladies in particular.
“In fact, some might become distressed and wish to leave. What I’m building up to is that there are thirty-seven of us and when the fight is over we’re going to have to get out quickly and start on the return trip. We can’t afford to separate. We’ll go as a group — all our seats are together — but if anyone leaves the group, be sure and note where we have parked the bus, and be there by the time the fights ends at about — ” he looked at his watch — “five-thirty.”
He grinned again. “With thirty-seven people, it’s almost certain that someone will get the idea of wandering off for a beer or to see some sight, or do some window shopping. Please don’t. We just don’t have the time. Okay, here we are. I’ve got the tickets. Just follow me.”
They filed out of the bus and Steve led them toward the ancient amphitheater. They’d hit it pretty well an the dot. He could hear the band inside playing a pasa doble.
Steve said out of the corner of his mouth, to Nadine, who was walking beside him, “In spite of that little talk, just watch. By the time we get back to the bus there’ll be anywhere from two to eight of them missing.”
She shot a look at him from the side of her eyes. “Then what happens?”
“I get a new ulcer trying to find them, but usually they’re in the nearest café, or on the nearest shopping street.” He added bitterly, “Tourists are like children. People who are probably perfectly normal in their own home town — responsible, respected citizens — go utterly vague as soon as they become tourists.”
In spite of herself she had to laugh at him. “Don’t forget, I’m one of your tourists,” she said.
“Hardly an ordinary one,” he said. Then, when she stiffened: “I didn’t mean it that way.”
• • •
Their seats were in the first tendidos. Steve made a point of rejecting barrera seats for the double reason of expense and avoidance of having his tourists too near the more gruesome aspects of a corrida. He’d once had a woman splattered with blood, and the howl that had gone up from London, when she demanded her dress be replaced, had taught Steve a lesson — particularly when he himself had wound up with the bill.
The first tendidos were near enough. By the time Steve’s party had arrived, several of their places had been appropriated by strangers who had evidently decided to move down from higher seats in the belief that these had remained unsold. Steve had to put pressure to bear through the ushers, to get all thirty-seven of his people into their reserved places.
There were few unsold seats that day. El Americano, all the rage down in Spain this year, was packing them in. The other two novilleros, one Spanish, one Mexican, Steve had never heard about, but the American boy had been getting a bit of publicity. Steve, who’d seen corridas in Spain, was anxious to see him fight.
They were coming in for the paseo now, all three of the matadors carrying their monteras in hand, an indication that this was their first fight in this ring this season. They and their caudrillas following them made a brave spectacle in their trajes de lucas. They faced the judge’s box.
One of the tourist wome
n hissed at Steve, “What are they doing now?”
“Saluting the judge,” Steve said. “The equivalent of the Roman gladiators saying, ‘Hail, Caesar. We who are about to die salute you!’”
“Good heavens,” the woman said. “You don’t really expect anybody to be hurt, do you? I thought … well, I read that here in France they have laws that prevent them from even killing the bull.”
Steve said drily, “That’s the trouble with laws, they’re so easily broken. In France they’re forbidden to kill the bulls and an impresario is fined a few hundred francs if he allows it to be done. However, that’s what the crowd wants, so every fight the bulls are killed and the impresario is fined, and everybody is happy.”
The paseo broke up, the ring servants, mules and picadors retreating back into the bowels of the arena and the toreros taking their places behind the barrera walls. A trumpet sounded.
A black bull exploded into the ring, dashed around for a moment, head high, searching for an enemy, his eyes unaccustomed to the glare of the afternoon sun. One of the colorfully clad peónes ran out, dragging his cape. The bull exploded after him.
Steve explained to the tourists seated in his immediate vicinity.
“The bull hooks at the cape, and the matador who is going to fight him, can see what horn he favors and other characteristics that might influence the later stages of the fight.”
The peón escaped behind a funk hole just as the bull crashed into it.
Now one of the matadors stepped out, cape in hand. He stamped his foot and his call could be heard throughout the arena. “Huh, toro!”
The bull spun and headed for him.
“It’s the American kid,” Steve said. “Now watch. What he’s doing now are called verónicas, one of the basic passes.”
El Americano held the cape with both hands, slowly swept it before the bull. From this distance and at this angle, the horns seemed to come unbelievably close.
Nadine, seated next to Steve Cogswell, said something in her throat and her hand clutched Steve’s thigh, unknowingly. He grinned. This wasn’t the first time he’d had this experience. There is a sexual connotation in the viewing of the danger inherent in the fiesta brava. In his time, Steve Cogswell had been with women frigid to begin with, who couldn’t wait for the end of the fight before wanting to return to the hotel — and to bed. It seemed to affect women in such wise even more than it did men.
The torero went through a series of passable verónicas, then did a media-verónica, swinging the cape around him and bringing the bull to a standstill, fixed. He turned his back and walked to the barrera.
The stands were roaring olés.
Steve shrugged. “He wasn’t that good.”
One of the tourists said to him, “Yeah? Well, I’d hate to be down there.”
“So would I,” Steve said mildly, “but I’m not a trained bullfighter.”
The other was argumentative. “Are you saying it’s not dangerous if you’re a trained bullfighter?”
It wasn’t Steve’s job to antagonize the cash customers. However, he said evenly, “It’s dangerous but not so much as they’d have you believe. It doesn’t begin to be as risky as, say, racing hot rods. I doubt if it’s as dangerous as prize fighting.”
The tourist, an irritating type, hooted his opinion of Steve’s statement.
Steve said, “A name matador hasn’t been killed since Manolete in 1947. How many men have died in automobile races since then? The Old Brickyard up in Indianapolis averages one man killed, each race each year; there isn’t a bull ring in the world that averages one dead torero a year. How many bulls does a matador finish off during his career? Two thousand or more. You figure that out percentage-wise and you see that in any given fight the chances against the bull are rather high.”
“I still wouldn’t want to be down there,” the other muttered.
The picadors were giving the animal a brutal working over to the point where the more knowledgeable in the audience set up a cry of protest. A horse was thrown back against the barrera wall, the picador unseated.
From the side of his mouth, Steve whispered to Nadine, “Along about here the exodus starts.”
“Exodus?” she said.
Two of the tourist contingency were on their feet. “I … I’m going to have to leave,” one said.
“Please return to the bus,” Steve called after them.
El Americano and his colleagues in the ring below were performing quites — making passes with their capes that brought the bull away from the horses, after each lancing. The bull’s back was pumping red blood where he had taken his wounds.
Two more of the tourists left, one holding her hand over her mouth.
Nadine said, “Does it get much worse than this?”
Steve said, “It always ends with the bull’s death. How clean a kill the matador makes is dependent on his skill. It can get on the grim side.”
The bugle blew and the horses withdrew to be replaced by the banderilleros.
“This is the part tyros usually like,” Steve explained. “The danger, and what is being done, is obvious. You don’t have to be an expert to understand what’s going on.”
A gaily clad banderillero dashed out, stood on tip-toe for a moment, citing the bull. It broke into a charge, and he ran toward it in a quarter-circle. Just before impact, he spun away, the two, yard-long darts which he’d held in his hands impacted in the bull’s shoulders.
The crowd yelled its olés and another banderillero dashed forth.
“I suppose that’s not dangerous?” Steve’s debating opponent said, argumentatively.
“I suppose it is,” Steve said, untruthfully. The danger of placing banderillas for a trained torero, he knew, was largely an optical illusion. However, he kept reminding himself, he wasn’t here to fight with tourists.
El Americano didn’t show up too well in the faena. The bull had been worn down by the picadors and banderilleros to a point where it was nearly dead on its feet. After two or three pase naturals, the matador dedicated the animal to a movie actress who was present, posed with the sword and then went in for the kill.
Either he didn’t know his business, or the bull was a paragon of gristle and bone. El Americano made six attempts before the bull went to his knees and was finally finished off with a puntilla dagger.
There were shouts of olé throughout the arena, but four more of Steve’s tourists were making their way to the exits, some of them talking disgustedly, one of them a bit green about the gills.
Steve said to Nadine, “Most of the rest will stick. You either rule out the fiesta brava the first time you ever see one, or you become a fan. Evidently this trip I’ve got about twenty-five fans. What do you think about it?”
Another bull was erupting into the ring below and a peón ran out to attract its attention.
“I don’t know,” Nadine said. “I think I’m fascinated more than anything else, but I don’t know if I’d ever come to another one.”
The bull nearly caught the running capeman, and she automatically clutched Steve’s thigh again.
• • •
It was dark by the time the tourist bus had returned to the Côte d’Azur. As predicted, two of the tourists had been absent when the rest returned to the vehicle following the fight. It took a full half-hour to locate them in the bar of one of the hotels. It was the couple who had first left the arena. By this time they were nicely plastered, and apologetic. They hadn’t known the fight was already over.
Nadine had sat next to Steve again on their way back to the Riviera. They had talked, in fits and starts, for a time, then as the weariness of the long day overcame her, she wound up with her head on his shoulder and deep in sleep.
Steve looked down at her. It occurred to him that he was finding her attractive all over again, in spite of the happenings of the night before and in spite of his farcical experience with Silletoe.
That brought Silletoe back to his mind and Steve scowled into the darkness. W
hat was the man’s game? Evidently he intended to brook no rivalry for the American girl’s affections. But from her account, Gerald Silletoe had no claims on her whatsoever. There was something here in the way of undercurrents. In spite of Steve Cogswell’s desire to remain unconcerned, it was attracting his curiosity.
He dropped the tourists off at their respective hotels, and Nadine at the Pavilion Budapest and made his way to his trailer for a quick shower and change.
No rest for the wicked, nor the tourist representative, he told himself sourly. He had another batch of people tonight who wanted the night club tour of the Côte d’Azur. It would take him well into the morning and after the long day’s drive, he was in no mood for it.
The night club tour was one of his most lucrative. He ran it every Sunday night, and usually had about forty of his people signed up. He’d visit three clubs, at each of which the group would have one free drink and see the floor show. He would then take them to Gordon Payant’s bar, where they got another free drink and where they could stay as late as they wished, returning to their own hotels by taxi.
Steve was able to get a good rate from the clubs, where he paid a flat amount for each customer, no matter what was drunk, which might run from Coca-Cola to Champagne. The clubs knew that although the first drink was free, the tourists often bought a few more before the show was over. Also, they might return the next night if they liked the place. Steve charged a flat three pounds per person and netted almost half of that, even after paying for the rental of limousines to get the group about.
Tonight was misery. He could hardly keep his eyes open, after the day’s grind. He tried to remember how much sleep he’d gotten in the past few nights. Precious little. He was going to have to crack down on himself, and particularly his night life and drinking. He wished that he’d let Elaine take over this tour, but then he’d wanted her to take the early morning group to Grasse, the perfume center, on the morrow.
Somehow, he managed to last until they reached Gordon Payant’s place. He got his people seated, then went over to where the Negro singer was having a cigarette between performances.
Episode on the Riviera Page 6