by Michael Bond
‘I thought he was making unusually good progress.’
‘Even so,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse, ‘surely a warning would have been sufficient?’
‘Not if you’re a policeman and the person you stop draws a gun on you,’ said Bonnard.
Monsieur Pamplemousse was late arriving at a meeting convened several days later in the Director’s office. Having tendered his apologies, he took stock of the others.
Monsieur Leclercq was there, as was only to be expected, along with Mr Pickering and Véronique. Also present, rather to his surprise, was Elsie, looking bronzed and fit, along with a tall, elegant figure standing with his back to the light, exuding the kind of diplomatic charm suggestive of time well spent at les Grands Corps de l’Etat in his younger days.
They were all dressed for the occasion, and he wished now he’d given Pommes Frites a bath before leaving home – he was still looking bedraggled after his journey in the laundry basket, but it had been at the Director’s insistence that he brought him along too.
‘Firstly,’ said the visitor, ‘I am instructed to convey congratulations all round. In doing so I must point out that this meeting is strictly sub judice and is not to be discussed outside these four walls, now, or at any time in the future. As far as the outside world is concerned the events you were a party to never took place.’
He turned to Elsie. ‘I shall be most grateful if you would pay my respects to your partner, along with our deep appreciation for the part he played, not only in the run up to the whole affair, but in regard to the vital information he subsequently passed on, which undoubtedly helped bring it to a happy conclusion.’
‘I still don’t understand how you came to be involved,’ said Monsieur Leclercq.
‘Ron sent me, din ’e,’ said Elsie. ‘There’s not much on the grapevine passes ’im by. Proper walking information service ’e is. As soon as ’e got wind of what was going on ’e sent me over to check up.
‘All it needed was a photo on the email to confirm what ’e already suspected. I don’t know the name of the one who was passing ’imself off as Mrs Beardmore, but according to Ron ’e’s as crooked as a corkscrew.’
‘We were on a state of high alert, by then,’ said the visitor. ‘There was a lot of information coming in. Almost too much.’
Monsieur Pamplemousse caught Mr Pickering’s eye.
‘Ron says ’e was born behind a roulette wheel and ’e’s been going round and round ever since.’
‘He was correct in many respects,’ agreed the visitor. ‘We have since learnt that he was born in Las Vegas. He began his working life as an electronics engineer cum spare time drag artist at one of the big casinos in the days when the Mafia ruled the roost. Having a foot in both camps, as it were, led him in the fullness of time to a job with the FBI. Always a cross-dresser, his activities came to the attention of J. Edgar Hoover and he received favourable reports, which stood him in good stead later on when he was taken on by the CIA. Unfortunately, he turned out to be the proverbial bad apple.’
‘Like Ron said,’ remarked Elsie, ‘’E was as crooked as a corkscrew.’
‘I have no doubt that the authorities will look kindly on your partner’s contribution,’ continued their visitor, ‘and perhaps even bring about a review of his present sentence. We intend to make suitable representations.’
‘’E won’t like that,’ said Elsie. ‘’E won’t like that at all. Ron’s very ’appy where ’e is, thank you very much. Rent free and all mod cons.’
‘Perhaps,’ murmured Mr Pickering, ‘he could have his sentence extended.’
If the speaker was at all fazed by the interruptions, he didn’t show it. He was already commending Véronique on the part she had played.
‘And now, Mesdemoiselles …’ an elegant bow indicated their presence was no longer required.
The Director, still basking in the reflected glory of those around him, rose to open the connecting door for them.
‘It has been a great pleasure, Elsie,’ he said, giving her a fond peck on both cheeks. ‘I must say you are looking extremely well.’
‘I’ve been playing boules, in I,’ said Elsie.
‘I reckon it’s something Ron could take up. It would do ’im good to get more exercise in between visiting days. Might put a bit of lead in ’is pencil.
‘You might not believe this,’ she gave Monsieur Pamplemousse a meaningful glance, ‘but I won my first ever game ’ands down and I ’aven’t looked back since.’
Having got to know Bonnard, Monsieur Pamplemousse guessed what was coming.
‘There’s this rule that says whoever is on the winning team gets their backside kissed by the losers.’
‘I always thought that was what you English call an old wives’ tale,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse.
‘More like an old French ’usband’s, if you ask me,’ said Elsie. ‘According to the other team they’ve mislaid the dummy they’re supposed to use, so they ’ad to make do with the real thing. They’ve all been at it. They’re worse than Pommes Frites. Some days it feels like I’ve been sitting in a puddle.’
Monsieur Leclercq looked aghast at the thought. ‘You don’t mean … don’t tell me, Elsie, you have been lowering your culottes in public …!’
‘That’s always assuming I ’ad any on,’ said Elsie darkly. ‘You’ll ’ave to come to the Luxembourg Gardens one day and find out, won’t you. I’ve been told it’s my best bit!’
Turning to Monsieur Pamplemousse, she handed him a large brown envelope.
‘Ron asked me to give you this. He says it’s very rare, but you might like to have it to put under your pillow at night.’
With that, and a final flourish of her ‘best bit’, Elsie followed on after Véronique. Monsieur Leclercq hastily closed the door behind her.
‘A one-off,’ he said, breaking the silence.
After a suitable pause the anonymous visitor took up the conversation again.
‘You could say our quarry was handed the whole thing on a plate while he was working on the Al-Qaeda problem. Violence begets violence. He happened to intercept a news item on the AZF bomb threats to French Rail and the idea came to him. Forget railways; why not strike at the very underbelly of France? Once the plan had been conceived, everything began to fall into place. A coded message to our security people set the ball rolling. Through his work, he already had his contacts in the milieu over here, and following 9/11, security forces the world over have been leaning over backwards not to put a foot wrong, so he was in business on both fronts as it were.
‘His passport allowed him special privileges when he was travelling, and since very few people on this side of the Atlantic knew what Claye Beardmore looked like, posing as her was something of a master-stroke. It enabled him to throw up the idea of creating a so-called “think tank”, partly as a smokescreen, but also as a means of providing him with a valuable source of information regarding the current thinking.’
The speaker directed his attention to Monsieur Pamplemousse. ‘Thanks to Pommes Frites’ and your own quick action, a major tragedy has been averted. Out of the one hundred boxes of chocolate that were sent out, a high percentage have been intercepted. The courier firm which, in all innocence, was employed to deliver them has provided us with valuable information and we are already homing in on others involved.
‘For your information the contents of the boxes have been analysed and each chocolate had been injected with a small quantity of Ricin. As I am sure you know all too well, Ricin is one of the most deadly of poisons. It is stable and unaffected by changes in temperature. Also, it is relatively easy to obtain and there is no known antidote.
‘Once again, injecting it into chocolates was a simple idea, but a good one. They not only look innocent; the vast majority of people find them irresistible.’
Monsieur Pamplemousse thought wryly of the way he had accepted one without so much as a second’s thought. It had been a demonstration of how easy it is to succumb to temptati
on. All unwittingly he had provided an expert’s opinion. He also remembered the medicine chest he had seen in the bathroom; fully equipped with syringes and all that was necessary to carry out the task.
The visitor turned to Pommes Frites.
‘In normal times he would receive the highest award, the animal equivalent of a croix de guerre perhaps, but these are far from being normal times. Instead,’ opening a dispatch box, he withdrew a parcel, ‘we have a small present for him.’
‘I think,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse, having seen the label on the side of the package, ‘it will be more to his liking than any medal.’
‘Finally …’ Before taking his leave, the visitor turned back to Monsieur Pamplemousse. ‘You may be interested to know that not all of the chocolates were injected with poison. One box was left untouched; the one which was sent to your home address. Make of that what you will.’
‘Perhaps he fancied you, Aristide,’ said Mr Pickering when they were alone.
‘I think it was more likely a thank you for my advice,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse. ‘After all, I did say what an excellent product they were.’
While he was talking he opened the unsealed envelope Elsie had given him and withdrew a faded photograph.
‘Don’t tell me …’ said Mr Pickering.
‘The genuine Mrs Beardmore,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse, holding it up for the other to see. ‘And it is signed! She looks rather nice, although I doubt if Doucette will appreciate my having her picture under my pillow. I am happy to say she is certainly nothing like her understudy.’
‘I can’t picture him drawing a gun like he did,’ said Mr Pickering. ‘Surely he could have talked his way out of trouble and got away with a warning?’
‘It just so happened,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse, ‘that a demonstration by a group known as the Union of Militant Midwives was taking place in the Place de l’Alma on the other side of the bridge.’
‘I wouldn’t have pictured midwives as being particularly militant,’ said Mr Pickering.
‘They aren’t normally,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse, ‘but would you argue with them? Believe me, they may be small in number, but get them together in a group and they can be very formidable.
‘In fact, there is only one thing more intimidating, and that is the CRS – the riot police; they are kept in reserve like a lot of caged wolves. There were vanloads round every corner, peering out of the windows, just waiting to be let loose … Seeing them all and feeling surrounded he must have panicked, and who could blame him?’
‘All that for a few midwives?’ said Mr Pickering. He looked sceptical.
In France,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse, ‘it is commonly accepted that the smaller the demonstration the more riot police there are in attendance. If it were not so, their Union would lodge an immediate complaint on the grounds that they were not being taken seriously.’
‘Ask a silly question,’ said Mr Pickering. ‘I was forgetting the power of French logic.’
While they were talking, Monsieur Leclercq returned and began casting an eye round his office, opening drawers and rearranging his bookshelf. ‘I still wonder how the information escaped,’ he said. ‘My only contact with the wretched person was the night we met up in the hotel.’
He began patting himself all over. ‘Surely, he – or perhaps I ought to say she – can’t have planted some device about my person while we were together?’
‘It depends what you were doing, Monsieur,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse.
Glancing round the room his gaze alighted on the Director’s desk and as it did so he had yet another attack of alors on a compris; the third in less than a week.
‘With respect, Monsieur, I take back what I said. I suspect he has been in constant contact with you from that very first evening.’
Picking up the book on North American Indians Monsieur Leclercq had been presented with, he flipped through the pages. Drawing a blank, he felt the back of the spine, and having wormed his index finger down inside it, began ripping the jacket apart.
‘What are you doing, Pamplemousse?’ boomed the Director in alarm. ‘Have you gone mad? I haven’t even started reading it yet!’
He broke off as a mass of wires and tiny components were revealed.
‘May I see it?’ asked Mr Pickering.
He held it up to the light. ‘Circa 1960, I would say. This kind of thing was all the rage when the Cold War was at its height; a marvel of miniaturisation at the time, but a bit of a museum piece by today’s digitalised standards.
‘Bugs,’ he said, handing it over to the Director, ‘are rather like jokes. The old ones are still the best.
‘A very satisfactory ending,’ he continued, as Monsieur Leclercq left the room to show it to Véronique. ‘I suppose now I shall have to return home and make out my report.’
‘What will you say?’ asked Monsieur Pamplemousse.
‘To those who ask what I have been up to, but have no good reason to know,’ said Mr Pickering, ‘I shall simply say MYOB.
‘In the written version, which will take rather longer to prepare and will remain a state secret for many years to come, I can really let myself go. I picture heading it: “A Little Knowledge is a Dangerous Thing”; perhaps followed by a subheading along the lines of “Every dog has his day”.
‘How about you?’
‘I picture an evening at home for a start,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse. ‘I have been away a little too much of late.’
He picked up Pommes Frites’ parcel and weighed it in his hand. It bore the imprint of Boucherie Lamartine, 172 Avenue Victor Hugo. ‘I think I can guess what is inside it,’ he said. ‘They are the finest butchers in all Paris. Par exemple, their beef is aged for a full twenty-one days.
‘Doucette will be pleased. She was wondering what we could have tonight.’
‘You couldn’t, could you?’ said Mr Pickering.
Monsieur Pamplemousse felt Pommes Frites’ eyes on him. It didn’t need a state-of-the-art electronic translator to read what was in his mind. Clearly, when it came to the important things in life, his faculties were still in good working order.
‘I was just testing,’ he said. ‘The answer is, of course, no, not in a million years. But, who knows? Both Doucette and I like it rare and there is such a thing as “chef’s perks”. He may well let us have a taste for old time’s sake.’
‘Talking of tastes,’ said Mr Pickering. ‘What do you think drew Pommes Frites to the chocolates? It can’t have been the smell of Ricin.’
‘Far from it,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse. ‘They simply happened to be extremely good. Superb, in fact; on a par with those from Robert Lynxe in the Fauberg St. Honorè. They don’t come any better.
‘It just so happens he is allergic to the smell of cocoa. It makes him sneeze. The darker it is, the more he sneezes.
‘Knowing Doucette’s fondness for chocolates, he couldn’t wait to show her where she could buy some locally.
‘But don’t tell the powers that be. They might ask for their steak back!’
Read on for an extract from
Monsieur Pamplemousse and the French Solution, the next book in Michael Bond’s
Pamplemousse and Pommes Frites series …
Monsieur Pamplemousse
and the French Solution
MICHAEL BOND
CHAPTER ONE
‘Merde!’
The moment Monsieur Pamplemousse placed his ID card against a brass plate set in the wall outside Le Guide’s headquarters and nothing happened, he knew it was going to be ‘one of those days’.
By rights, there should have been a discreet buzz, followed by a faint click as a small oak door let into one of a much larger pair swung open on its well-oiled hinges, thus allowing free passage to any member of staff wishing to enter the august premises on foot. Instead of which … what happened? Nothing!
He tried repeating the process, this time holding the card in place rather longer than before, but again
to no avail.
Looking, if possible, even more upset than his master, Pommes Frites lowered himself gently onto the cold pavement, stared at the offending piece of metal as though daring it to misbehave for a third time, then raised his head and gave vent to a loud howl.
To anyone close by, the mournful tone would have said it all, but it was lunchtime and the rue Fabert was deserted. That being so, and having decided knocking on the door would be a waste of both time and knuckles, Monsieur Pamplemousse applied a shoulder to it.
For all the effect it had, he might have been paying a surprise visit to Fort Knox with a view to enquiring how things were going with their gold reserves. There was what the powers that be might have called a negative response.
Nursing his right shoulder, the very same shoulder that had performed yeoman service whenever called upon to act as a battering ram during his years with the Paris Sûreté, he had to admit he found the situation extremely annoying.
He wouldn’t have minded quite so much had he not received a message from the Director summoning him back to headquarters tout de suite.
His first thought had been ‘Not again!’ followed in quick succession by ‘What is it this time?’ and ‘If it’s that important, why isn’t he using the word “Estragon”; Le Guide’s standard code word for use in an emergency?’
He had spent most of the journey turning it over in his mind. The last time he had received such a summons had been when they were called in to offer advice on a possible terrorist attack on the food chain. It had all been very Hush Hush.
Once again, no reason had been given, but by comparison, the latest message – DROP EVERYTHING. PLEASE RETURN TO BASE IMMEDIATELY – was positively verbose. Although it imparted a sense of urgency, the use of the word ‘Please’ – not a word that normally figured large in Monsieur Leclercq’s vocabulary – was unusual to say the least. It struck a personal note.
