‘My word,’ said Byrd, ‘what with your salary from the travel agency and writing pieces for magazines you must be minting it. Absolutely minting it, eh?’
‘I do all right,’ I admitted.
‘All right, I should think you do. I don’t know where you stack it all if you are not declaring it for tax. What do you do, hide it under your bed?’
‘To tell you the truth,’ I said, ‘I’ve sewn it into the seat of my armchair.’
Byrd laughed. ‘Old Tastevin will be after you, tearing his furniture.’
‘It was his idea,’ I joked, and Byrd laughed again, for Tastevin had a reputation for being a skinflint.
‘Get you in there with a camera,’ mused Byrd. ‘Be a wonderful story. What’s more it would be a public service. Paris is rotten to the core you see. It’s time it was given a shaking up.’
‘It’s an idea,’ I agreed.
‘Would a thousand quid be too much?’ he asked.
‘Much too much,’ I said.
Byrd nodded. ‘I thought it might be. A hundred more like it eh?’
‘If it’s a good story with pictures I could get five hundred pounds out of it. I’d pay fifty for an introduction and guided tour with co-operation, but the last time I was there I was persona non grata.’
‘Precisely, old chap,’ said Byrd. ‘You were manhandled, I gather, by that fellow Datt. All a mistake, wasn’t it?’
‘It was from my point of view,’ I said. ‘I don’t know how Monsieur Datt feels about it.’
‘He probably feels désolé,’ said Byrd. I smiled at the idea.
‘But really,’ said Byrd, ‘Jean-Paul knows all about it. He could arrange for you to do your story, but meanwhile mum’s the word, eh? Say nothing to anyone about any aspect. Are we of one mind?’
‘Are you kidding me?’ I said. ‘Why would Datt agree to expose his own activities?’
‘You don’t understand the French, my boy.’
‘So everyone keeps telling me.’
‘But really. This house is owned and controlled by the Ministry of the Interior. They use it as a check and control on foreigners – especially diplomats – blackmail you might almost say. Bad business, shocking people, eh? Well they are. Some other French johnnies in government service – Loiseau is one – would like to see it closed down. Now do you see, my dear chap, now do you see?’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘But what’s in it for you?’
‘Don’t be offensive, old boy,’ said Byrd. ‘You asked me about the house. Jean-Paul is in urgent need of the ready; ergo, I arrange for you to make a mutually beneficial pact.’ He nodded. ‘Suppose we say fifty on account, and another thirty if it gets into print?’
A huge tourist bus crawled along the boulevard, the neon light flashing and dribbling down its glasswork. Inside, the tourists sat still and anxious, crouching close to their loudspeakers and staring at the wicked city.
‘Okay,’ I said. I was amazed that he was such an efficient bargain-maker.
‘In any magazine anywhere,’ Byrd continued. ‘With ten per cent of any subsequent syndication.’
I smiled. Byrd said, ‘Ah, you didn’t expect me to be adept at bargaining, did you?’
‘No,’ I said.
‘You’ve a lot to learn about me. Waiter,’ he called. ‘Four kirs.’ He turned to Jean-Paul and Maria. ‘We have concluded an agreement. A small celebration is now indicated.’
The white wine and cassis came. ‘You will pay,’ Byrd said to me, ‘and take it out of our down payment.’
‘Will we have a contract?’ asked Jean-Paul.
‘Certainly not,’ said Byrd. ‘An Englishman’s word is his bond. Surely you know that, Jean-Paul. The whole essence of a contract is that it’s mutually beneficial. If it isn’t, no paper in the world will save you. Besides,’ he whispered to me in English, ‘give him a piece of paper like that and he’ll be showing everyone; he’s like that. And that’s the last thing you want, eh?’
‘That’s right,’ I said. That’s right, I thought. My employment on a German magazine was a piece of fiction that the office in London had invented for the rare times when they had to instruct me by mail. No one could have known about it unless they had been reading my mail. If Loiseau had said it, I wouldn’t have been surprised, but Byrd …!
Byrd began to explain the theory of pigment to Jean-Paul in the shrill voice that he adopted whenever he talked art. I bought them another kir before Maria and I left to walk back to her place.
We picked our way through the dense traffic on the boulevard.
‘I don’t know how you can be so patient with them,’ Maria said. ‘That pompous Englishman Byrd and Jean-Paul holding his handkerchief to protect his suit from wine stains.’
‘I don’t know them well enough to dislike them,’ I explained.
‘Then don’t believe a word they say,’ said Maria.
‘Men were deceivers ever.’
‘You are a fool,’ said Maria. ‘I’m not talking about amours, I’m talking about the house on Avenue Foch; Byrd and Jean-Paul are two of Datt’s closest friends. Thick as thieves.’
‘Are they?’ I said. From the far side of the boulevard I looked back. The wiry little Byrd – as volatile as when we’d joined him – was still explaining the theory of pigment to Jean-Paul.
‘Comédiens,’ Maria pronounced. The word for ‘actor’ also means a phoney or impostor. I stood there a few minutes, looking. The big Café Blanc was the only brightly lit place on the whole tree-lined boulevard. The white coats of the waiters gleamed as they danced among the tables laden with coffee pots, citron pressé and soda siphons. The customers were also active, they waved their hands, nodded heads, called to waiters and to each other. They waved ten-franc notes and jangled coins. At least four of them kissed. It was as though the wide dark boulevard was a hushed auditorium, respecting and attentive, watching the drama unfold on the stage-like terrasse of the Café Blanc. Byrd leaned close to Jean-Paul. Jean-Paul laughed.
11
We walked and talked and forgot the time. ‘Your place,’ I said finally to Maria. ‘You have central heating, the sink is firmly fixed to the wall, you don’t share the w.c. with eight other people and there are gramophone records I haven’t even read the labels on yet. Let’s go to your place.’
‘Very well,’ she said, ‘since you are so flattering about its advantages.’ I kissed her ear gently. She said, ‘But suppose the landlord throws you out?’
‘Are you having an affair with your landlord?’
She smiled and gave me a forceful blow that many French women conveniently believe is a sign of affection.
‘I’m not washing any more shirts,’ she said. ‘We’ll take a cab to your place and pick up some linen.’
We bargained with three taxi-drivers, exchanging their directional preferences with ours; finally one of them weakened and agreed to take us to the Petit Légionnaire.
I let myself into my room with Maria just behind me. Joey chirped politely when I switched on the light.
‘My God,’ said Maria, ‘someone’s turned you over.’
I picked up a heap