The Janeites

by Nicolas Freeling

  It is very good to feel grateful for a network of solidarity. There you were; big-chief Hawkeye. But of a sudden – lost, in the middle of a desert. But you’ve got your modern-day convenience – your mobile phone, your credit cards, your little briefcase with the magic microchips. Except that you haven’t: nightmare. How are you to be rescued? The helicopter appears. It’s a big Deputy with a belly and expensive sunglasses, who bawls at you. ‘What the hell are you doing here? This is a forbidden area; this whole desert is radioactive; stand here over five minutes you’ve lost your balls. Papers! No papers? I’m putting handcuffs on you boy. Do your explaining to the Sheriff in Las Vegas; feel grateful if he doesn’t slam you in the drunk tank.’

  Shuddering Raymond opened his eyes, and there was Paul, placidly smoking a cigar and using a coffee-cup as an ashtray. Mate, if Angèle comes in here she’ll have your balls.

  “Needed, Paul, is a good Act of Contrition, is what we need.”

  Because of course Angèle did come in, and made a tirade, about Grown Men, being Fucking Irresponsible. Not, to be sure, the first time the Society has been expelled from the kingdom. Viper in the bosom of Marianne, or a Russian spy in Nevada, you’ll get it in the neck. Well – sighing deeply and being very original – God moves in imponderable fashion. Why should anyone take the pains to break the bridge of his nose, in such an unpleasantly precise and spiteful fashion. What is the message? It sounds like ‘Boy, straighten up or something worse will happen.’ Who is it addressed to? A doctor, a Jesuit, a Russian spy? Is it Do something? Or Stop doing something? On the whole it would be nicer to know.

  The day of his discharge he took a look in the glass. Feels still like it’s going to be Elephant Man with a trunk or something. And of course it’s perfectly normal. Perhaps just a touch more aquiline, but that’s a Sign of Distinction. Very good piece of cosmetic surgery.

  “Smashing,” agreed his angel, in not, perhaps, the happiest choice of phrase. “The slight werewolf look is terrifically sexy.” He went out and bought her expensive chocolates.

  As soon as Doctor Valdez (Silvia, to be honest) had got his affair in order he drove out to see William, to whom he had sent no message. It was anyhow a fine sunny morning.

  The house seemed empty; no answer to his ring: garage door down, couldn’t tell whether the Porsche was there asleep. Around the side the garden wall was too high to see over without a ladder. Hm, French privacy. All that work (and a great deal of money) to build a fortress, and ‘what for?’ There was a door in this wall. Bolted. Looking down to the corner, vines came right up to the level of the garden William had done nothing with, but there was a path, and in the centre of the lower wall a grille, but one would still see nothing, even without the sun in his eyes; the architect had planned that you shouldn’t. Terraces had been built to the exact edge of the sightline and the house itself invisible from here. Cunning; one would admire if it wasn’t all such a waste.

  Oh well, he’d try again before giving up. There must have been a camera in the front porch because William’s voice said, “Oh it’s you,” and the door opened at once. William met him in the hall. He had a gun in his hand. Unnecessary melodrama I’m making there: it was a small rifle, tucked in the crook of his arm.

  “Sight for sore eyes. I thought you’d lost interest.”

  “No. I was unavoidably detained. To make the story short I was in hospital.” William put the gun down. “Make the story long.”

  “I had an accident,” said Raymond apologetically. “My nose got broken. I was out of action while they put it together again.”

  “There is now you mention it something funny about your eyes.” Ho: the werewolf look.

  “Some bones got remodelled.”

  “Then that was some broken nose.”

  “Somebody broke it for me.” He didn’t know why he said this. Was it because – an idea ridiculously remote – the attack had some obscure link to the man he was talking to? The life of a security guard could include people with exotic tastes. Now William looked at him with a sharp focus, an intensity.

  “Come on out to the terrace. Nice morning. I want to hear more about this,” picking up his gun.

  “What you doing with that?”

  “It’s a Walther twenty-two. Pretty good with quality ammo.” Strolling out to the corner. “How far would you make it to the bottom wall there?”

  “Hard to say, with the slope. Fifty surely?”

  “Nearer a hundred. Easy for me since I knew already. See the crow?” He threw up the rifle, sighted, there was a dry hard slap, the bird fell off the wall.

  “As though shot,” faking surprise.

  “You try. Backsight’s at seventy-five, allow a scrap for wind from left to right.”

  “No, I’m a Janeite, violence in any form. You shouldn’t shoot birds.”

  “Songbirds I wouldn’t. Not many left around here, the local people shoot them, eat the grapes they say. Swarms of cats too. Shoot them if I catch them. I’m violent of a sudden? No, I’m a countryman. And an ex-cop. So now I want to hear what happened to you.”

  Raymond told the story, bald. Not laughing, the audience; no, but smiling broadly.

  “You think this had something to do with me?” Shrewd – and unexpected.

  “I can’t for the life of me bring it home to anything.”

  “Then we’ll have to find out.” Abrupt. “Coffee? No. Drink?”

  “Yes, if it’s long and pretty unalcoholic.”

  “Sit,” handing him the gun. “S’all right, there’s nothing in the magazine. Harmless as a stick,” walking off.

  This top terrace was flagged. You could shade it when the sun got too hot. There was rattan garden furniture. The terraces below stretched out abandoned, weed-grown; and what a pity. The sunny wall would be perfect for espaliered fruit.

  “Lots of lovely things planned,” thought Raymond aloud, “and never carried out.”

  “Just so,” coming back with the drinks, “but one thing at a time.”

  What a fine thing is youth! This was straight back to his time as a student in Cracow. Well, you’d expect Poland to be full of Jesuits, wouldn’t you. ‘Apple-pie’ is the student drink. The Szarlotka is two-thirds cold apple juice and the rest is buffalo-grass vodka: even then he’d been better at medicine than he was at theology But ‘can’t remember the name’.

  “Zubrówka,” said William, pleased.

  “These vines yours too?”

  “Mr Baron Geoffrey de Sainte-Anne, who lives in the château over there, made a deal with his sister, with rather bad grace, to let her have this corner. Wedding present for me, that was supposed to be. Since the Baron is also the local mayor, and on excellent terms with every local authority, I was looking forward to a life of leisure and a rosy future. I’ve neither. It seemed a bit rough when I heard about that, but as an ex-cop I don’t believe in justice much. Thought I was stepping into a pretty grand world when I married Joséphine. Marky giggled a good deal about that. For him of course these local notables were so many jokes. I go on getting wine from Geoffrey. He’s not a bad chap; bit of an old woman. Tight-fisted crowd, viewed as a whole – nothing stingier than the upper classes.”

  “Tell me about your own family.”

  “That’s quickly done because there’s none of it left. My father was still quite young when he caught his hand in a machine. Septicaemia. My mother, not very long after, had the windows tight shut on a cold winter’s night. Carbon monoxide. My brother and myself, big strong boys, thought of serving the Fatherland. Army, and police. He got into a little local difficulty out in Africa, got a posthumous medal for his pains. On the whole – you might say – we seem to have been an unlucky crowd.”

  “Perhaps,” said Raymond, “we’ll reverse this string of fatalities. I begin to see it better; you saw your luck turning good. Only then it didn’t.”

  “They’ve rather an elegant pad in Paris,” as though talking to himself. “We lived there while this place was building; I was
still with the Marquis. Only one fine day I found I wasn’t married any more; it had all been a mistake. I’d do quite well I suppose out of a divorce settlement; she’s generous, you know. I haven’t done anything about it – and then when I got ill… One could sell all this – get rid of that pissy Porsche. Only I keep wondering, what’s the point.”

  William would be a candidate all right, for the select company of Janeites.

  “Things are following me round,” he went on. “You turn up, and what’s more it’s Marky who sends you. It’s like these damn stupid books – mystery, suspense, call them all sorts of names. Queer things happening. You come here – and somebody mugs you in the alley. I wonder whether I can find out more about that. Sort of job I know how to do. I’d be interested.”

  “And you’re short of things to interest you. You might not be wrong. All right, I’ve got this chore in Paris, and when I get back we’ll be in touch, talk a bit more about matters… It’s a pity about this garden.”

  “Yes,” said William ‘making an aphorism’, “never raining when you want it and always when you don’t.”

  William Barton.

  People live in little compartments. In the words of the old joke – les Vicomtes se rencontrent, ils se racontent des histoires de Vicomte. I’ve seen a good deal of this.

  People who live in a world of privilege, meaning power, wealth, influence, they lose touch with reality.

  We were there to protect power. Sort of an in-joke among us. There were those who knew they were vulnerable, depended on us. And those who wanted to pretend we weren’t there. Got highly irritable. But mostly they came round, started to understand. Power can leak away, sudden. Had to come to terms with their fear.

  These worlds don’t intersect all that much. They touch, at big pompous entertainments like an Elysée garden party, a fashionable occasion for some big culture-thing. They rub together in the showy restaurants, on the golf course, at exhibitions (the times we’ve cursed Roland-Garros or the Courson flower show.) A few overlap to some degree, like when bankers and the finance groups are licking there at a fine new honeypot. Come to rub noses at the watering holes, our daily bread and butter all that.

  Some types are more Seldom-seen. Not exactly laggards in the money, nor the power-race. Not behindhand in the megalomania ratings either. Narrower frame of reference, lawcourts or the cardiology clinic. The doctors are like that. Do them justice, they often work hard. Great lords in their own shop, and just as far removed from the wear-and-tear. Insulated from servitudes by the string of aides and secretaries whose job is to smooth the path and strew the flower petals. No thought about getting the sack and not keeping up with the mortgage payments, nor even for missing the train, being late for work; boss is looking at his watch, don’t let it happen again, Jimmy.

  I’ve never come across anyone like Ray Valdez. Close up, that is. Marky used experts in any branch where he’d got interested. An antiques dealer was just like the international-law specialist; if he wanted a water-diviner he’d tell Patricia to ring up the best.

  You can see, straight off, that Raymond is good at his job; intelligent and sensitive, a quality of sympathy and a lot of humour. Be no good as a cop – far too much imagination. Not a bit interested in the chase after money and power, of which I’ve seen so much. He’s more like an artist.

  This is a word gets slung about over-lavish and I don’t mean pissing in the snow, making casts of the holes. The Marquis is an artist like the juggler in the circus, or a good jockey. I mean the one who sees things we don’t. I was trained myself to see a lot others don’t, and am no good at defining this. Occasionally though, along the corridors-of-power, I’ve seen a musician or a painter who was right off the map. I don’t understand ‘imagination’ but they know things which aren’t there, not in our world.

  You have to have the gift. Some people can tame lions, whisper to horses. I’ve come to like Ray and I’ve noticed a few things about him. He doesn’t have technical manual skills – but that’s another trick word. A skilled touch and he says that’s a lot of practice. And discipline; a mass of fears but won’t let himself get jumpy.

  This attack – he didn’t imagine that! Can’t think what it’s all about, ‘he says’. But now he’s looking round at every corner and wondering when it’s going to hit him next, and I can see he suffers – sure, he laughs that off, and the more credit to him – but if you think you’re going to get kneecapped it’ll be as painful as the real thing: a doctor, he can see inside his own knee!

  Dogged does it; I haven’t got beyond the two simple scenarios a cop thinks of. (1) A fellow’s got something you want, so you intimidate him into giving it to you. (2) The fellow might do or say something you don’t want: intimidate him into thinking better of it. But Raymond says that neither or these applies.

  Sweet-reason means nothing to a lot of people; the fanatics, the monomaniacs, they’ve wheels missing. Not loony in any legal sense. Familiar problem; not a lot you can do but be ready; they’re apt to be sudden.

  An ex-professional respects the professional approach. A government guard sees to it that he’s on a good footing with the local marechaussée, and where possible that he has also informal contact within. William is quite recently-ex, and these channels are not altogether silted. A place like Strasbourg, Chiefs-of-State, important ministers (and a ruck of attendant politicians) are forever in and out of, and William knows a man in the PJ. The police-judiciaire service is largish here, and important. He does not know the boss; Le Patron is ambitious, on the way up, and intent on a good job in Paris. But he does know the chief of staff for that is a man whose local knowledge is valuable and impressive, and tends to stay where he is for several years. Xavier Picarlat is a middle-grade commissaire of much experience and doesn’t miss much of what happens in his territory.

  “Sure there was a complaint. Proc did nothing with it because it doesn’t amount to anything, so there’s no instruction, there ain’t no witnesses neither. Nothing in that bloody alleyway of course, people are up and down there all day. Fella probably had a goodish idea when your Doctor Valdez would be coming home, wouldn’t want to hang around much. Darkish anyhow, rush-hour, nobody saw a thing. So we did a neighbourhood inquiry, likewise zilch, yer-man is well liked, keeps himself to hisself, all correct with his bills and his taxes, not known as heavy drinker or better: or touchy, inclined to argue, unpopular with local teenagers.

  “Not thus a local brawl. Where do we go from there?”

  “A Funny, maybe? – little boys? No sign of it. Why’s he living in a place like that?”

  “Artist.”

  “No law against it, I know of. Brief, couldn’t see anything to interest us, meaning it stays on the file but dead in the water. Try the neighbours.” He means the political police, interested in Turkish conspirators, Iranian subversives, Albanian Banditry.

  “Keep as a rule the grievous-bodily-harm within the Brotherhood.”

  “True. Well, remember to wash your feet, keeping company with the likes of us.”

  William has plenty of professional relationships, also a friend or two, and after a fruitless day he went to see Albert, who was gardening; one reason why William feels little enthusiasm for this pursuit, because Albert is so damned meticulous, and his quite large suburban garden is always fiercely impeccable. Albert says things like ‘Look before you leap’ or ‘Fast bind fast find’, means them quite literally (little twists of string stowed in his pocket) and William’s real friend is Mrs Martin who is a judge of instruction. But he likes and respects Albert who is a good man, devotes much time and money to the poor, is a municipal councillor in Geoffrey de Sainte-Anne’s territory (which was how William first met him), is an accountant by profession, but isn’t only the soul of integrity; has very good judgment and an unfailing kindness.

  “There,” taking due pride in his compost-heap, “lovely out, perhaps we’ll have a beer when I’m ready. Bernadette might be late in that office, she so often is.” He took his
gloves off to get the phone out of his pocket. “Good… she’s on her way. You can stay for supper? Splendid.” He suspects rather that William living alone is ‘not properly nourished’.

  It’s an orderly household. Rather a ceremony of cleaning and polishing tools. Bernadette, the picture of exactitude in the office, is almost sloppy in her kitchen; a quick-moving energetic woman with grey hair, good legs, something of a bosom, she has also good judgment: between them, William thinks he’ll get good advice, and he’s quite right.

  “Why on earth attack this man? Violent, and looks premeditated, certainly a waylay. Liked, around there: most of them don’t even know he’s a doctor, hardly any that he’s a Jesuit. That makes no sense. His professional frequentations, just as preposterous. Intellectual jealousy? – he’s getting the credit for my work – utter bullshit.” Albert doesn’t believe in ‘bad language’ and would never say even ‘bullshit’. Bernadette hears much worse in the Palais de Justice, had been called a motherfucker that morning (unlikely though this seems) said, “This sounds like a fanatic.”

  “I’d agree there, but on what grounds? Some private belief of his own? Somebody unbalanced about Jesuits? Or about doctors?” Albert wiped his mouth, said “Maybe both. Where does Doctor Valdez stand, for example, on the subject of abortions?”

  “Legal termination of unwanted pregnancy,” corrected Bernadette. “A tricky subject, and people get very heated indeed.”

  “You may have got something there.”

  “Opens up a number of hypotheses. There is for example euthanasia. Or the move to legalize cannabis in certain therapies. Within the deontology there are several grey areas. We might for instance assume that Doctor Valdez would have unrestricted access to morphia. Which is very far from any supposition that he has made any illegal or even irresponsible use of medicaments.”