by Michael Bond
‘Excusez-moi, Monsieur. Un moment.’ Letting go of the receiver and regardless of his condition, Monsieur Pamplemousse jumped out of bed and rushed to the window, pulling the curtains to one side as he went. Almost as quickly he dropped them again. Clutching the window frame for support, he took a moment to regain his composure before trying again, this time through a much smaller gap.
But if he’d been hoping that like a mirage the view would have disappeared he was doomed to disappointment. Overnight a great change had come over the square. Gone were all the stalls and vans which had arrived for the fête. Their place had been taken by other vehicles, making it appear, if anything, even more crowded. In front of his room, pointing straight towards him from the top of some scaffolding, was a television camera. Even as he watched a red light came on and the operator pressed his face to the viewfinder as he took a firm grip of the panning handle. On the ground below another man wearing headphones was supervising while a man disgorged a small mountain of other equipment; two more cameras, tripods and lights. Cables snaked their way across the cobblestones towards a mobile control room. Men in jeans and checked shirts and girls with clip-boards added to the bustle. A mobile canteen had replaced the hot-dog stand. On the roof of the Sanisette, surrounded by empty beer cans, a man crouched holding a Nikon camera with an ultra-long-focus lens. By his side stood a battery of other lenses.
In the centre of the square, watched by a small knot of interested spectators, he recognised Miss Sparkling Saumur being interviewed in front of a second television camera. In direct contrast to her uniform for the parade, she was soberly dressed in a long black skirt, a white blouse done up to her neck and low-heeled shoes. Taking a handkerchief from her bag, she dabbed at her eyes as she turned to point with her other hand in the direction of the cellar steps. The floor manager stopped her for a moment, gave her a comforting pat, and then asked her to do it again using her other hand. Something to do with the light no doubt. A make-up girl stepped forward and dabbed at her forehead. The producer was obviously squeezing the most out of the situation.
Very slowly Monsieur Pamplemousse made his way back to his bed, climbed in and picked up the receiver again. He had to admit that anonymat was not the word he would have used to describe the scene outside.
‘I’m glad you agree with me for once, Pamplemousse. At least we have achieved some accord. I tell you, the press this morning does not make pleasant reading. It is like Bernard all over again only this time it is even worse. Do you know how many?’
‘I was not in a position to make an accurate count, Monsieur.’
‘Over forty.’ The Director sounded gloomy. ‘The youngest was six years old, the oldest was seventy-three. All victims of your uncontrollable lust.’
‘With respect, Monsieur. It was not they who were the victims, it was I.’
‘That is not what the journals are saying, nor the television.’
‘I have the scars to prove it, Monsieur. I can get a certificate from the doctor.’
‘I do not wish to hear about them, Pamplemousse. And who is Madame Toulemonde?’
Monsieur Pamplemousse racked his brains. The Director was in one of his darting moods.
‘She is selling her story to Ici Paris. They are advertising it already under their “coming attractions”. Soon the presses will be turning.’ There was a rustle of paper. ‘Blonde, thirty-nine year old Madame Justine Toulemonde. “How I Fought Like a Tigress to Retain My Honour.” She says she was attacked by you in her room two nights ago. You were like a man possessed. It was only her training with the Resistance Movement that saved her.’
‘A complete and utter fabrication, Monsieur. If I was possessed of anything it was an urgent desire to visit the toilet. I had a bad attack of the douleurs. If she was attacked in her room she must have kept her eyes closed for it was not I.’
‘She says you have a mole on your left knee. Do you have a mole on your left knee, Pamplemousse? I can easily check with your P.27.’
‘Oui, Monsieur, but I can explain. She must have seen it the first night I was here, when she was undressing me. I had been hit on the head by a baguette …’
Monsieur Pamplemousse held the receiver away from his head as a spluttering sound came from the earpiece. Pommes Frites watched sympathetically as his master gazed towards the ceiling waiting for the noise to subside.
‘That, Pamplemousse, is the most unlikely story I have ever heard. I knew there would be a woman at the bottom of it. I said to Chantal only last night, mark my words, always with Pamplemousse there is a woman at the bottom of things. Cherchez la femme.’
‘What did your wife say, Monsieur?’ asked Monsieur Pamplemousse uneasily.
‘Never trust a man with loose shoes.’ The Director sounded puzzled. ‘I can’t think what she meant.’
‘There is no reading the female mind, Monsieur. Women are beautiful creatures. They have qualities which in many ways make them superior to men, but I sometimes feel that when the good Lord created them he must have reached a point when he sat back, wondering if he had not been a little over-generous with his gifts, that perhaps enough was enough. It was at that point he must have decided to take away their sense of logic in order to help balance the scales. It makes them say strange things at times.
‘As for Madame Toulemonde, if she is as inaccurate with her forthcoming revelations as she is with her present pronouncements, then we have nothing to fear. She is neither a natural blonde – that I can state categorically – nor will she ever see thirty-nine again – a fact which does not require the use of an electronic calculator to verify. If she received her training in the Resistance Movement then even at forty-nine she would have needed to attend unarmed combat lessons in her pram.’
Taking advantage of the momentary silence at the other end, Monsieur Pamplemousse pressed home his advantage. ‘How are things chez vous, Monsieur?’ he ventured. ‘How is the young English mademoiselle? What was her name? Elsie?’
From the even longer silence that followed he knew he had scored a direct hit. A direct hit and a diversionary move at one and the same time.
‘Chez nous, things are not good, Pamplemousse. Chez nous, I would say things have never been worse. There have been ultimatums. Zero hour is approaching fast. What with that and Bernard, now this, I am beginning to wonder where it will all end.’
‘I am glad you rang, Monsieur,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse with a confidence he was far from feeling. ‘Despite all you may have read and heard, I have not been idle. Progress is being made. I do not wish to go into details at present, but I hope soon to be in a position to render a full report.’
‘I hope so, Aristide. I hope so.’ The Director’s voice sounded full of gloom. ‘If they are not then we will need to add a further “A” to our list. “A” for Adieu. In the meantime I will give you another.’
‘Monsieur?’
‘Allure. À toute allure. There is no time to be lost.’
Monsieur Pamplemousse replaced the receiver on its cradle and lay back for a moment. Talking to the Director had left him feeling quite exhausted. It often did. It was like playing squash with at least six opponents. Balls came at you from all directions. One moment reaching a high, then next moment down in the depths.
He climbed out of bed again and crossed to the window. As he made a tiny gap in the curtains and peered through he saw the red light come on over the lens of the camera opposite his window. Someone in the control room must be glued to the monitors. The technicians were probably on permanent standby, waiting to record any and every movement.
Making his way to the door, he opened it and tip-toed across the landing. He could hear voices below and as he peered over the bannisters he caught a glimpse of two men sitting on the bottom stair. One of them had a camera slung round his neck.
Back in his room he slipped the bolt and then slumped into the armchair. It was all very well for the Director to say make all possible speed, but how? He couldn’t have been m
ore heavily guarded if he’d been incarcerated in a top security prison. No doubt the back stairs were being watched as well. It was like being in a state of siege. For a moment he toyed with the idea of adopting some kind of disguise. The chances were they didn’t know what he looked like – apart from a general description, and from past experience he knew how widely they could vary. Clearly they didn’t have his name. The Director would have made a point of it if they did. Tante Louise must have hidden the register. He was tempted to telephone down and ask her to come up. She might have some ideas. Then he abandoned the thought. She was probably being watched as closely as he was, her every conversation listened to. Gun mikes would be trained on his window.
He wished he could reach outside and close the shutters. The heat was really getting intolerable. Although there was a stillness in the air, his pyjamas felt wringing wet; his bed looked uninvitingly dishevelled.
Stretched out on the rug, Pommes Frites resembled a late-night reveller who’d abandoned all hope of getting home and decided to doss down on his astrakhan coat instead. He envied him his ability to shut out the world, letting its problems take care of themselves. The biggest crisis in his dreams was probably a drama called ‘The Great Bone Robbery’.
Glancing round the room, he saw that someone had rescued his camera and bag of equipment. From where he was sitting it looked remarkably undamaged; a tribute to Leica. Perhaps when it was all over he would write to them. If Hasselblad could make capital out of their cameras being sent to the moon … His note pad was missing, but he’d hardly managed to write anything on it anyway.
He closed his eyes. There was no chance whatsoever of getting any sleep. He had far too much on his mind. But the rest would do him good. What was needed was some kind of diversion. A distraction of major importance. One which lasted long enough to take everyone’s mind off the job in hand so that he could make good his escape. One which …
It was dark when Monsieur Pamplemousse came to again. Forcing himself awake he climbed unsteadily to his feet, nearly tripped over the recumbent form of Pommes Frites, and made his way to the bedside table. Strange, but it was still only six o’clock by his watch. He crossed to the window and slowly parted the curtains. The sun was hidden behind a layer of haze. In the sky above there were banks of cumulus cloud. No red light came from the camera. Its operator was slumped over a book, his headphones round his neck. The scene in the square was less animated than it had been earlier. Boredom had set it. Now would be the time for action. Later on they would be on the alert again, expecting something to happen. Lights had been rigged up facing the hotel. They were probably ready to be switched on at a moment’s notice.
As he turned away from the window Pommes Frites rose slowly to his feet. It was a ritual awakening, performed in a time-honoured manner. First there was the stretching of the back legs, the lifting of the rump in the air, then came the stretching of the forelegs, outwards as far as they would go, usually followed by a rippling motion which started at the rear and made its way slowly but inexorably towards the front as muscles were brought back to life. Last of all came the pushing forward and slight raising of the head, coupled with the closing of the eyes; a prelude to a yawning return to normality.
On this particular occasion Pommes Frites’ head made momentary contact with its opposite number attached to the rug below, giving an effect in the darkened room not unlike a mirror image in a pool, and as it did so Monsieur Pamplemousse suddenly had one of his blinding flashes of inspiration.
It was a notion which was at once ridiculous and bizarre, eccentric and outlandish, and yet of such simplicity he had the feeling it might just work. It had to work. He would make it work. In all the accounts he had ever read of great escapes through the ages the common factor, the connecting link which ran through them all was the element of surprise. Surprise was the one great weapon the escapee possessed. Ennui and the fading light were on his side.
Never one to allow the iron to grow cool once it was in his hand, Monsieur Pamplemousse reached for his suitcase, his issue one from Le Guide. Removing the tray which normally carried his camera equipment, then the second which accommodated the emergency cooking apparatus – its contents a miracle of the folding-metal worker’s art, he reached into a compartment at the very bottom and withdrew a small leather sachet.
Pommes Frites watched with interest as Monsieur Pamplemousse laid the contents out in a neat row on the floor in front of him; a selection of needles, a hank of thread, a thimble, a tape measure and a pair of folding scissors. Undoubtedly his master was up to something – he recognised the signs, and the enthusiasm, determination and speed with which ideas were being translated into action communicated itself. He wagged his tail. Pommes Frites liked a bit of activity every now and then. He’d enjoyed a very good sleep, several very good sleeps in fact, now he was more than ready for action, and although cutting up his bed was not exactly what he would have chosen had he been asked to fill in a questionnaire, he was quite prepared to go along with whatever his master had in mind.
Despite the heat, ever anxious to please, he didn’t raise any objection when Monsieur Pamplemousse wrapped the lion skin round his body, and he happily lay back with his paws in the air while it was sewn into place. Nor did he demur unduly when the head was pulled over his own. Admittedly it made it hard to see where he was going and his growls took on a hollow, roaring sound, but if that was what was wanted, then so be it. Walking wasn’t easy; it was more a matter of progressing round the room in a series of leaps and bounds. However, this seemed to please his master out of all proportion to the effort it took. He basked momentarily in the words of praise and the encouraging pats his activities evoked.
‘Bonne chance.’ With his master’s words ringing in his ears he hurried out on to the landing. In the past he had tended to look down on dogs who wore any kind of clothes. There were quite a few of them about in Paris, not so much in the area where he lived, but he came across them occasionally while on excursions further afield. Dogs in coats, sometimes even in plastic boots and hats. He always treated them with the contempt he felt they deserved; not even worthy of a passing sniff. But suddenly, as he made his way down the stairs, he discovered the change the wearing of any kind of uniform brings about. It was a whole new world. The effect he had on others was electrifying. As he ambled out into the square in a kind of sideways lope people scattered right, left and centre. Women screamed. Men shouted. Somewhere a whistle blew. He broke into a trot, uttering growls of delight. It was all very satisfying. Quite the most enjoyable thing he’d done for a long time.
Upstairs in his room Monsieur Pamplemousse watched Pommes Frites disappear into the gathering gloom with an air of equal satisfaction. He let go of the curtains. Now he must quickly translate deeds into action on his own behalf. It wouldn’t be long before the makeshift disguise was penetrated. There wasn’t a moment to be lost. Dressing with all possible speed, he grabbed his case and made for the door, pulling himself up just in time as it began to open.
The back view of Tante Louise came into view. She was carrying a tray on which reposed a large jug and a glass.
‘I’ve brought this for you,’ she announced. ‘It’s iced tisane. I made far too much yesterday for the girls in the parade and it seems a shame to waste it.’
9
THE STORM BREAKS
In 1856, following a violent storm during the Crimean War which badly damaged the French fleet sheltering in the Black Sea outside Balaclava, Napoleon III charged Monsieur Antoine Lavoisier, a celebrated chemist of the time, to devise a system of weather forecasting which would ensure that such a thing never happened again.
Thus began a series of developments which some hundred and thirty years later led Monsieur Albert Forêt, an amateur weather enthusiast who lived in St. Georges-sur-Lie, to open the door of a slatted white-painted box set exactly two metres above the lawn in his back garden and note that the indicator on a mercury barometer within showed an alarming
fall in pressure.
Even as he entered the new reading on a pad, a gust of wind funnelled through the gap between his house and the garage, raising clouds of dust from the driveway on the far side. Simultaneously, a device inside his greenhouse closed the windows automatically.
All of which indicated that an enormous quantity of air was being sucked upwards to a great height, leaving behind a vacuum which, by the laws of nature, had to be filled.
Monsieur Forêt closed the door to his box, made sure the greenhouse was properly fastened, then hurried indoors calling out instructions to his wife to secure all the shutters while he telephoned a friend in the next village who owned a vineyard.
Half a kilometre or so away, Monsieur Pamplemousse took a quick glance out of the Hôtel du Paradis at the now deserted square and then looked up at the sky. The cumulus clouds which had begun to develop earlier had come together, forming one vast towering mass of cumulo-nimbus, the top layer of which had already taken on the ominous shape of an anvil.
‘I think we are in for a storm,’ he called.
Tante Louise shivered as she led the way down some stairs between the entrance to the dining-room and the kitchen. ‘I hope not. I hate thunder. It always makes me feel as if something awful is about to happen.’
‘In that case,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse comfortingly, ‘the cellar is probably the best place to be.’ As he spoke he wondered where Pommes Frites had got to. Perhaps success had gone to his head and even now he was sidling along a bank of the Lie suffering delusions of grandeur, King of the Jungle and all he surveyed. He hoped not. Pommes Frites didn’t like thunder either. At home in Paris he usually hid in a cupboard. Hiding in a doorway in St. Georges-sur-Lie would be bad for his image.
