‘I’ll bear it in mind,’ I said, and wondered if there was some personal history there, maybe a shared background. I tried to picture Dunckley in military uniform, something I’d never considered before, and suddenly it wasn’t so hard to imagine. ‘Does the fact that I didn’t say much go against me?’
‘Not at all. The reverse, in fact. I trust you’ll be just as discreet about me. Discretion is a commodity I value highly. I couldn’t do business otherwise. Now, I need a trial run.’ He slid the envelope across the desk. ‘That’s got to get to Paris by tonight, eight on the dot. If you give it to anyone but the person whose name is on the envelope, don’t bother coming back.’
The change from ex-public-school geniality to cold menace was as scary as it was sudden, and I made a mental note to ask Hugo why Charles had been called ‘Red’ at school. Maybe it was the colour of the mist which came down over his eyes when he was given a questionable ‘out’ decision in cricket.
‘What if anyone asks what’s in it?’
‘Like who?’
‘Customs.’
‘Tell them. Papers. If you’re pushed you’ll have to open it for inspection, although I’d rather you didn’t, frankly. If you do, don’t read them.’
‘Why?’
‘Because then I might have to kill you.’ The nearly-smile he gave wasn’t even remotely warm enough to convince me he was joking.
As I picked up the envelope he handed me a smaller one which crinkled with a familiar feel. ‘Your fee. Call it a goodwill gesture. Do this right and I’ll have other deliveries for you. Ring me when you get back. Have a safe trip.’ He was sounding almost bored, and I guessed he was already focussing on something else. Now I was on board and had taken his money, anything further was a distraction.
I stood up and made my way to the door. When I turned and looked, he was watching me, a sharp glitter in his eyes. I shivered and went out.
I met Hugo at lunchtime in the pub near his place and told him about the meeting with Charles ‘Red’ Clayton.
‘Good,’ he nodded. ‘Glad he found you something.’ He turned to plant himself between me and the landlady who was lurking nearby with a damp cloth, and lowered his voice. ‘Just one thing, old boy. You will be careful, won’t you? I mean, I suggested Charles because I knew he could give you something to tide you over. But it wasn’t meant to be anything long term. He moves in some pretty mysterious channels.’
‘Mysterious? You mean like HP&P mysterious?’
‘Yes.’ He saw the expression on my face and raised a hand. ‘Oh, nothing illegal, I promise. Well, as far as I know, anyway.’ He grinned weakly, and I felt the little worm of concern I’d first experienced at Clayton’s place growing more assertive.
‘As far as you know.’ I sipped my drink and waited for Hugo to say something else, but he seemed more concerned with catching the landlady’s attention. I tapped him on the shoulder until he looked at me. ‘Why do they call him “Red”?’
‘No idea, old boy,’ he murmured. Then, when I stared at him he continued, ‘Really, I don’t know. Someone once said it was because his father was friendly with the Russians back in the Fifties – made a lot of money in Moscow, apparently: import-export and so on. Not that he was a commie – far from it. He lost it all when Her Majesty’s Government took a dim view of consorting with the enemy and made his life a bit difficult with trade barriers and exchange controls. Charles joined the army and he’s managed to do all right for himself since.’
‘Doing what? He mentioned security.’
‘That sort of thing.’ Hugo shrugged. ‘He probably got into it via the army, being a familiar line of business, only with a whole new line of customers. I understand it pays rather well.’
I sighed. The old school tie: even the whiff of something faintly unpatriotic wasn’t enough to break the connections. Still, if it helped me out of my current dilemma and earned me some money along the way, I wasn’t about to complain.
‘You sounded awful when we spoke this morning,’ Hugo observed, partly, I thought, to change the subject. ‘Been up to anything you shouldn’t have?’
I looked at him and wondered if his antennae had picked up something or whether he was just fishing. Juliette wasn’t the only incorrigible old gossip in the Palmerston household, and I could hazard a pretty good guess that Juliette would try and wrangle any information she could out of Hugo to help Susan.
‘Just a headache,’ I said.
‘You, too?’
‘Pardon?’
He grinned wolfishly. ‘You said Marcus was hungover, too. Were you two out on the razz together, by any chance?’ He snapped his fingers. ‘Good God – you went to a party! Marcus took pity on his poor old brother and took him out on the town.’ He almost smacked his lips, he was so excited, the question of Charles Clayton and his ethics suddenly tossed into the long grass. ‘Come on, Jake – lowdown, you old dog. Did you score?’
‘No. I didn’t,’ I snapped, and discovered that, after all these years, I still couldn’t prevent a blush from burning my cheeks at a critical moment. Hugo spotted it and pounced like a tiger.
‘You did – you took my advice!’ he crowed, attracting the landlady’s attention and the ear of more than one of the other drinkers present. What sad lives they must lead.
I gave Hugo a very potted version of what had transpired, leaving out the enjoyable details in the upstairs guest room. I also told him of the subsequent revelation by Marcus that someone – no guesses as to who – had been an unwitting party to adultery with the wife of a serial psychopath.
‘You ever breathe a word,’ I said heavily, staring him in the eye, ‘especially to Marcus, or anyone who even remotely knows Susan – and when I’m found off Beachy Head with a hundredweight of scrap iron tied to my ankles, I’ll bloody come back and haunt you and your whole brood.’
‘Scout’s honour,’ said Hugo, holding up two fingers. He’d obviously never been in the Scouts. His family would have been more into prep school and summer camp with the Combined Cadet Forces, but I took it as a sign of faith. ‘Won’t say a word, I promise.’ He smirked. ‘Now we’re even-Stephens, right?’
‘We’re nothing of the sort,’ I muttered. ‘You played hide the sausage with Lorraine – what was it… three times? And while you were happily married. My wife has left me and has already slept with another man. There’s no comparison.’
‘Oh, really?’ He snorted. ‘For heaven’s sake, Jake, don’t be so bloody precious. You’ve done what thousands of other marrieds are doing every day… every minute of every day. In fact, I bet there’s someone upstairs in this place bouncing around on the bedsprings even as we speak.’
We both looked at the landlady and tried to imagine it, but there are things the human brain can’t cope with, and we sank some more alcohol instead.
‘Thanks, Hugo. You make it sound almost mundane. If it’s so casual, explain to me why I didn’t indulge much earlier.’
‘Beats me, old son.’ He finished his drink. ‘Maybe Susan was right – you could always be counted on to be faithful. Ever thought that could be boring, too?’
I stared down into my glass and wondered how Hugo could have known what Susan had said to me in the tapas bar. I know I hadn’t told him; there are only so many things you tell a friend – if you’re a bloke, anyway. And being looked on by one’s other half as two points above a faithful old Basset hound isn’t one of them.
No doubt Susan had been on to Juliette, exchanging the latest gory details of our sunken relationship, and she in turn had told Hugo, probably with some relish.
‘Don’t you feel… I don’t know, depressed about any of this?’ asked Hugo.
‘I don’t have time. I’m too busy dodging the fickle fist of fate which is doing its level best to flatten me. First the job, then the house, then Susan. Now I’m guilty of shtupping another man’s wife.’
‘Shtupping?’ Hugo looked puzzled, proof that I was at least a step ahead of him in current parlance.
He opened his mouth as if to say something, then closed it.
‘What?’ I said.
‘Nothing. Just… be careful with him, that’s all. Dunckley, I mean.’
‘Clayton said the same thing. What is it with Dunckley? I thought it was HP&P or their new owners who’d have me skinned and pinned on an ant hill if I talked out of turn.’ It was certainly the impression Dunckley had given me.
Hugo looked puzzled. ‘I don’t know about that. But I do know Dunckley’s not a man to cross.’ He held up a hand. ‘Don’t ask for details because I don’t know any for sure. There’ve been whisperings that he’s got interests outside of HP&P – and that’s all I’m saying. Oh, and I suggest you try and make some kind of peace with Susan, if only to save me from an ear-bashing every time I go home.’
It was only as I was walking away down the street that I realised with a considerable degree of confusion that during the entire passionate episode with the lovely Jane, I hadn’t given Susan a single thought.
SIXTEEN
I grabbed a seat on the Eurostar and arrived in Paris just before six.
It felt odd after all these years to find myself cut adrift from the twin clutches of work and relationship. I was a bit like a long-term prisoner released from some easy-going institution, now at the mercy of whatever fate decided to hurl at him. Even though I’d been fairly independent with HP&P, there had always been deadlines and targets to be met, which meant I was always under some kind of mental hammer, one way or another. Now all I was under was the basilisk stare of Charles ‘Red’ Clayton and his requirement that his little envelope be delivered on time, unopened and to the correct recipient. Otherwise find a deep hole somewhere and pull it in over my head. On the surface the job should have been laughably easy; get to the destination, take a bus or taxi, knock on a door at the appointed time, and bingo. What could be simpler?
Only I knew from long experience that something which looks simple on the surface is likely to be booby-trapped with nasty surprises for the unwary. The main one being that nothing this simple could be entirely legal. Clayton’s dismissal of established courier services was probably reasonable, but plainly not the whole story. Even I knew that for a fee, a reliable courier service could be hired with little or no delay and delivery guaranteed.
Which meant that whatever I was carrying had an element of risk – evidenced by the generous fee Clayton was prepared to hand over for my services. In fact, money for this one trip was very nearly the equivalent of what I had earned each week with HP&P. Two trips a week and I would be laughing all the way to the bank – albeit not the bank which Susan had so casually frozen me out of.
Feeling like a character in a Tarantino movie – hopefully minus the blood and gore – I checked the envelope and took the Métro to Mairie d’Ivry in the south of the city. The address was in a broad, tree-lined street and looked solid, respectable and about as expensive as you’d want to get in Paris. Evidently Charles Clayton didn’t do business with shifty men in greasy vests under railway arches. At least not this time.
At five minutes before eight I found the number and pressed a bell push alongside an entry-phone. There was no identifying name but I hoped I would find the name on the envelope. I took it out and checked it: M. P. Philipet.
‘Oui?’ A man’s voice came through the grill, accompanied by a growl from what sounded like a large dog. I stepped back. Small dogs were okay; big ones not so much.
‘A delivery for Monsieur Philipet,’ I replied.
‘Who wants him?’
The response was aggressive enough to curdle milk. I explained that I had a package for M. Philipet and could only leave it with him. The reply to that was a bleep from the entry-phone and the click of the door opening.
Inside was a passageway, running past a cubbyhole containing a man behind a glass screen. A camera hung from the wall, its unblinking eye staring down at me. I heard another growl and stopped moving, but the man beckoned me forward. He looked hard-faced and tanned, with hands like grabs. The giant Alsatian alongside him looked even less friendly and eyed me with interest. I noticed there was a large flap in the door to the cubbyhole which looked disconcertingly Alsatian-sized. One wrong move and I figured the pooch would be out and all over me like a rat on a dung heap.
‘Passport?’
I held my passport against the glass and he scrutinised it carefully.
‘Give me the package,’ he said, once he was satisfied. ‘I will pass it on.’
‘Sorry. No can do. My instructions are that this has to be handed by me to M. Philipet himself, no exceptions.’
He showed me his teeth, which were yellow with nicotine. ‘Tant pis. This is as far as you go.’
‘Fine. Explain it to your boss. Then it’ll be tant pis for you – and your dog.’ I turned back towards the outer gate. When it comes to games of bluff I have some experience born of years of dealing with petty functionaries.
He must have watched me on the camera feed because I was almost out of the door before he shouted, ‘Wait.’ When I got back to his cubbyhole he pressed a button and motioned me to go down the passageway towards a door at the end. ‘He will meet you in the yard.’ He smiled as he said it, and I wondered if this had been some kind of test.
I walked through the door and into an open yard and garden. It was cool and quiet and contained a man standing by a doorway into the building behind.
He was tall and elegant, dressed in a plain, blue suit and white shirt. I guessed he was about fifty, but it was difficult to be certain. He had glossy, white hair and grey eyes behind frameless glasses, which gave him the appearance of an academic.
‘My apologies for the precautions,’ he said, holding out his hand. ‘But we live in uncertain times.’
I wondered what kind of trade he worked in if this kind of precaution was necessary, and decided not to ask.
‘Do you have some identification?’ I asked politely. ‘Only, my instructions were to give this to M. Philipet and nobody else.’ It felt pedantic, but I’d done this too many times before to be embarrassed. Losing the envelope to the wrong person would be the end of my new-found career and would make me an enemy in Clayton that I didn’t need.
He smiled and produced a wallet, out of which he took a business card. It was printed with his name in embossed script. M.P. Philipet. Nothing else.
I handed him the envelope and he turned and walked back inside the building. Transaction over. ‘Please find your own way out,’ he said, as he disappeared.
I went back out past the guard and his dog, reflecting that for the money I’d been paid, people could be as abrupt or as cautious as they liked. And if future deliveries went as smoothly, I wasn’t going to complain.
It was already too late to go back to London, so I decided to enjoy the delights of Paris and indulge in a spot of relaxez-vous. First, though, I needed to make contact with someone who would be able to show me the ropes.
I checked my address book and dialled the number of an Australian I hadn’t seen in a while, but had shared airport lounges with on many occasions. John Crane worked for a Singapore-based engineering conglomerate and had lived in Paris for twenty years. He was loud, opinionated, very often drunk and not the sort of person to take home to meet your mother. Which made him just the sort of company I needed.
‘Stone the crows, mate,’ John blurted forty minutes later, splashing a jug of red wine into two very large glasses. ‘Thank Christ you rang me when you did. I was going stir-crazy.’ He gulped down half his glass and slapped his thigh with a meaty hand. ‘This bloody thing’s really pissing me off. Nicole reckons I should be chained to a bed until it heals, but bugger that for a game.’
Nicole was his French wife, an endlessly tolerant woman with a heart of gold, and the ‘thing’ in question was a broken leg, encased in plaster from the thigh
down. I noticed he had a knitting needle poking out of the top, no doubt for use when itchiness became intolerable.
‘Skiing accident,’ he explained. ‘Took a black run by mistake and hit one of them – what d’ya call em – moguls. Went up in the air like a rocket and landed like a sack of shit. Poles one way, skis the other, head up my arse. They had to bring me down on one of them stretcher things with ropes. Bounced me around like a bastard all the way down. Never felt a thing, though.’
‘The shock?’
‘Nah. Pissed as a rat. Only way to ski, in my opinion… saves all that keepin’ the legs bent thing they always go on about. Drink enough and it comes natural as breathing. So, how ya doin’, Jake? I heard you got dumped by the shaggin’ badgers.’
I started off by giving John the abridged version, until the wine began doing away with my natural reticence and I told him about Susan as well. They had met once or twice when he was in London, but he was way too blunt for Susan’s sensibilities and they’d never really hit it off. I think she’d found him oafish and obscene. Even so, he was genuinely sorry.
‘Jeez, mate, that’s a shame. So what are you doing over here – making up for lost time?’ He grinned dirtily and jiggled his eyebrows.
‘Working, as a matter of fact.’ I told him about my temporary assignment, which caused his eyebrows to knit together. ‘It’ll do until I can find something more permanent.’
Smart Moves Page 11
