Paid and Loving Eyes

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

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You never know with new people. You meet them, and form instantaneous judgements. Mine are always wrong. I’m truly gormless. If I met Rasputin I’d think him St Cuthbert and only clue in when the body count increased. Like my assistants, when finally they arrived. Nobody can be as wrong as me. They proved it.

Standing idly by the traffic lights, I wondered if Colonel Marimee was as militarily superefficient as all that. I mean, I was here, poised like a greyhound in the slips, ready for this phoney antiques scam, and where were my two assistants? Luckily, French drivers don’t let you cross, so I didn’t feel out of place waiting. I reasoned that ice-cold Marimee had planned this little interlude as a kind of initiative test. These military minds think straight lines. The last time I’d done one of these what-nexters they’d put me down in the Yorkshire moors in the deep midwinter so I’d die. I’d saved myself by kipping with some cows in a byre until daylight. The sergeant put me on jankers a fortnight for cheating. See what I mean? But here, lacking cows and initiative, I loitered, hoping my assistants would finally get fed up and come for me.

Their motor was a mundane thing. It passed, dithered, pulled in. Two roaring forties, him balding and specky; she smiley and talkative. They had a dozen maps out. I barely gave them a look, then a faint chime bonged deep in me. I bent down to peer inside their car. On the back seat was a very, very interesting chair, tall, thin, with six cross-struts for back support. Genuine Astley Cooper! I knocked on the window. I must say, they put on a good act.

“Yes?” the driver asked. His wife nudged him. “Owz?”

Scotch, thank God. Out of the declension jungle! “Hello,” I said. “Lovejoy.”

He glanced at his wife, probably checking that I was the right bloke. They probably had photographs of me in the glove compartment. Sensible to make sure, really. I could be anybody. “Could you please guide me to the Paris road?”

“We never get the maps right,” his missus said, smiling.

Good cover! Shrewd. I beamed. “I could show you,” I said loudly, to show the world this wasn’t prearranged. A really accidental encounter, tout le monde! “If you’d give me a lift.”

“I’m not sure…” he said, doubtful. I thought that was overdoing it, but the bird shoved him affectionately.

“Och, away, Gerald! Simplest thing to do!” He undid the rear door and I climbed in. “Mind that crofter’s chair, Lovejoy. It’s very valuable.”

“Lilian,” Gerald reproved as we pulled away. Why did he want her to be so circumspect? The antique was his signal, after all. Well, we all were treble secret I supposed.

“Och, he’s all right!” Lilian said of me, warm.

“Astley Cooper,” I said, smiling my thanks. She was bonny, as well as a superb judge of character. “Not a crofter’s chair. Not a farthingale chair.”

“It’s a Regency spinning chair,” Lilian said. She adjusted her vanity mirror to see my face.

“Nor that, love. Sir Astley Cooper was a surgeon, knighted for operating on the Prince Regent. He designed this chair to teach little children to sit upright.” They went silent. An odd pair, these, seeing we were on the same side. Had I missed some code word? “The other names are daft. Nice to see one of Astley Cooper’s chairs left plain. Goons nowadays decorate them with everything but Christmas lights.” I chuckled, but on my own.

The motor swerved violently. An open tourer shot close to us, horn blaring. A girl shook a fist at us, furious, blonde hair streaming. The young bloke with her was straight off some telly advert for South Seas surfing.

“Bloody idiot,” I muttered. The tourer’s lights were flashing. Both youngsters seemed angry, though Gerald was driving with a Briton’s usual guarded suspicion. “That was their fault.” Criticize other motorists, you’re in.

“I’m obeying the rule of the road,” Gerald said anxiously.

“Course you are,” Lilian said, her pride stung. “Always impatient. Same as at home.”

The tourer dwindled ahead. In newfound comradeship we relaxed into those where’re-you-from and heavens-my-auntie’s-from-there conversations that substitute for instant friendship.

“We’re looking at places,” Lilian said, too smooth by far as Gerald reasserted his motor’s rights. “For time-share holidays.” Aha. Their cover story.

“Good idea, time-share,” I said, thinking pretence the party line. Maybe the car was bugged? “I’m hitchhiking.”

The journey was pleasant, they eventually relaxed. Banter-time as we rolled —Gerald never raced—towards Paris. Luckily, I saw a Paris sign before they did, pointed it out as if I’d known all the time. They’d started up a small travel business. “Everything will be leisure, hen, in ten years.” Lilian was emphatic, but in a practised kind of way I couldn’t quite accept somehow. Still arguing about prices, the cost of renting a shop front in Glasgow…

“Dearer in East Anglia,” I challenged, to get her going. Women hate admitting that other people suffer more expense.

“You live there? And you think that’s dear? You come up to Clydebank, you wouldn’t know what’d hit you for prices! Gerald bought a…” The motor straightened after a small swerve, with this time no flashy youngsters cutting us up while overtaking. “… a share in a tour operator’s. It cost the earth…”

Gerald and Lilian Sweet, of Glasgow. Travel concessionaires. I listened, prattled, watched the scenery drift by. Marimee would have been proud of the three of us. Not a word passed our lips about the mission we were all on.

We stopped for nosh twenty kilometres short of the capital. I grinned, said I’d stretch my legs. As Gerald locked the motor with meticulous precision, Lilian took me in properly for the first time.

“Are you short, hen?”

“Had my stuff nicked, love. Pickpockets.” Stick to the pattern. Plenty of traffic about now, people have directional microphones these days. I could hear Marimee bark orders.

“We’ll stand you a bite, won’t we, Gerald?”

“Oh, aye.” He didn’t seem keen, though. Maybe Marimee checked their expenses. Lilian got her dander up and he surrendered. We went in this Disney-Gothic self-service for the loos. I was first out, and got collared by a flaxen-haired aggropath. He slammed me against the wall. My breath went shoosh! It was the sports-car maniac who’d bawled Gerald out on the road.

“What’s the game?” he said, through gritted teeth as they used to say in boys’ comics.

“Game?” I gasped, going puce. “Let me breathe for Christ’s sake! I wasn’t even driving!” Bog-eyed, I tried to point into the self-service. Let him throttle Gerald or Lilian. But not me.

“Drop your two friends. Wait by my Alfa. Thirty minutes!”

“Right! Right!” Quite mad.

“An’ if you don’t…” His eyes were so near, so pale, watery yet clear. The opposition hired madmen. You humour madmen, then scarper. I tried to nod, managed a weak smile.

“Kee!” The delectable blonde bird slipped up, nudged him.

And they were gone, into a murky-lit grotto place with slot machines and winking screens. I went jauntily towards my own couple, smiling at the prospect of grub looming. Henceforth, I would stick to the Sweets like glue. That Marimee should have told me there’d be dastardly foes on route. Typical. Always half a story. No wonder Gerald Sweet was ultra-cautious.

“Let’s see what sort of food they have, hen!” Lilian led the way in. “I hope they have a nice hot pasty!”

Love flooded my heart for the dear beautiful woman. A pasty! She knew my desperate need. I caught her eye in the mirrors. She coloured slightly, but it may only have been the steam from the cooking. Gerald was anxiously checking his pockets, craning to see his motor wasn’t stolen. Lilian laughed self-consciously.

“Gerald’s a real worrier, Lovejoy!” she told me. “Up all night phoning home to see the… the business hasn’t folded while we’re away!” Good. She was careful too.

I cleared my throat. “Really,” I said. Then as Gerald turned at my tone, “Nothing wrong with being careful, is there?”

“No, Lovejoy,” he agreed, and for half an hour gave me a lecture on how easy it was to get caught out in business. I noshed like a trooper, listening with half an ear. He was becoming more like Marimee every second. I promised to owe them the cost of the meal, got their phone number and address. They had it ready, to my surprise. Real pros, excellent cover.

As soon as we hit the road, I showed true military-style initiative. I deflected us down a road soon after leaving the service station. We shook off the two gorgeous loons in their Alfa Romeo. I was so thrilled.

The hotel was quite small, on the southern outskirts of Paris. I liked it, but maybe it was the relief of being back in a town, free of that terrible pretty countryside everywhere. There was a garden, a fountain thing, lights and tables outside. I’ve a theory that it’s the Continent’s weather that permits folk to be so laid back. In East Anglia you could never put awning umbrellas out, scatter romantic candlelit tables round an ornamental grove unless the weather gods freak out into a spell of sun. You’ve only to step outside for it to teem down.

They said I should stay for the evening meal. Then, as Gerald was about to start on his phone marathon, Lilian suggested they lend me some money. They were only sticking to the pattern laid down by Marimee but I felt really touched. I accepted, with great anxiety and swapping of bank-account guarantors, and got a small room in the garret. A lot cheaper than our own hotels, I was astonished to learn.

Supper, Gerald finally wedded himself to the phone, and I was left with Lilian. It was getting on for ten o’clock. It crossed my mind to tell her how I’d cunningly outwitted the opposition back at the pit stop but thought better of it. Was I expected to chat about everything that happened? Probably not.

“He’ll be telephoning now until midnight,” Lilian said.

She looked bonny. No specs now, earrings, a lace shawl that should have been Edwardian but was disappointingly repro. We were in the garden, looking down into the rock pool. Only three other couples remained, talking softly.

“He works hard,” I said. I meant it as praise.

“Och, nobody more than Gerald!”

Well, I suppose Marimee was giving orders for tomorrow. Was the silver lift to be done in Paris, then? Or was that tale now to be discarded, as the cover story it undoubtedly was? I felt things were imminent, brewing up to action. Maybe Gerald had better be warned about the two aggressive enemy.

“Look, love.” I glanced about. Any of these diners could be the opposition. “This is a bit public.”

“Public?” She seemed to colour slightly, but I couldn’t really tell in the low glim. “What…?”

“They’ll hear.” Through the lounge window Gerald was visible, nodding, reporting in, taking notes. “Even from inside the bar.”

She looked towards the hotel, seemed a little breathless. “It’s risky, Lovejoy. I’m not sure if I know what —”

“My room,” I suggested quietly. It was quite logical after all, the one place that had not been prearranged. They’d had difficulty finding me a nook.

“Oh, Lovejoy.” She was worried, glancing at the building, the other diners, two waiters. “I’ve never… I mean, what if Gerald—?”

Typical woman. A bloke’s got to take charge some time, hasn’t he? I had my arm through hers.

“We’ve got time before Gerald’s done, love. It’ll be safe.”

Which was how we entered my small single-bedded room together, in an ostentatiously non-clandestine way that probably announced skulduggery louder than a tannoy. Inside as I closed the door, she paused.

“Lovejoy.” She was all quiet. I bent my head to hear. Very sensible in the circumstances. In those spy pictures a transmitting bug’s small as a farthing. The hotel could be riddled.

“Yes, love?”

“I… I don’t do this sort of thing.”

What sort of thing? “I don’t either,” I whispered encouragingly. “We’re in this together, love. I’m discretion itself.” I decided to prove it. “I had a tussle with that blond motorist at the service station. I saw him off.” Well, it was nearly the way it happened.

“You did, hen?” Her eyes grew even larger. “Oh, that’s wonderful! Gerald isn’t really very… ” More colour. “Well, physical, Lovejoy.”

“Doesn’t matter.” I glowed in her admiration. Not much comes my way, so I have to glow where I can. “I can cope, love.”

“Lovejoy.” Quieter still. I was stooped over her now, both of us standing there. We hadn’t yet put on the light. “I’m not quite as young as I was. I’d hate to disappoint you.”

It’s one of my observations that women are more practical than us. But that only holds true for ninety-nine per cent of the time. Once in a hundred, their minds go aslant. They talk tangents. Here we were, spies doing our surreptitious best, and she starts on about age. Women’s tangents mostly concern numbers, I find. Years, hours, fractions of a penny for mandarin oranges, when little Aurora was actually born to the split second. Daft.

“It’s the way I want it, love,” I whispered, all reassuring. “You’re exactly right.”

“Oh, darling.” Her shawl fell as she put her arms round me. It’s not often my mouth gets taken by surprise, but this time it was startled. Her breast was beautiful, though I stabbed myself on a brooch that made me yelp. Just shows how thoughtless modern women are. Edwardian ladies had amber beads to cap the points of their brooch pins, so that marauding mitts of amorous gentlemen didn’t get transfixed in a ration of passion—cunning, this, because a dot of blood on a white-gloved finger when reentering the ballroom meant suicides in the regiment.

“Shhh!” she said, breathless still. I joined in the breathlessness as we made the bed and still I hadn’t managed to reveal my doubts about Colonel Marimee’s mission.

“Dwoorlink,” I managed, as nature started to decide the sequence of events.

“No, Lovejoy. Please. Say nothing…”

I did as I was told. It’s my usual way. Sometimes it works out for the best, as now. She was lovely. And it’s any port in a storm, isn’t it.

Love never comes without problems, but sometimes they come in a way that shows you’ve had no right to stay thinking. I mean,

I ought to have said how attractive she was, this lovely woman. Maybe, it seemed to me in the instant before ecstasy engulfed the universe, I should have admitted I wasn’t much, just a bum wondering what the hell everything was all about, give her the option to pull her dress on and light out leaving me, as it were, standing. But I obeyed, said nothing, learned nil, and managed only bliss. If anybody from the opposition was actually listening, we fooled them. She was superb.

An hour later I took her to her door, two floors down. She unlocked it. Gerald wasn’t in yet. She pulled me in, just far enough for a parting snog before shoving me gently away.

“Will I see you again, Lovejoy?”

“Eh?” Blank for a second, but she was right to stay in character. We were travellers with the hotel hots. “I couldn’t go on without that, love.” It was easier to say than usual. Her eyes filled. “It’s true, Lilian. You were magic.”

We whispered a few more phrases, enough to convince any eavesdropper, then I stepped reluctantly into the corridor as somebody came upstairs.

And I glimpsed something round Lilian’s neck that made my blood run cold. But I managed to keep smiling, nodding goodnight, as she put the door to and I went for a well-earned kip.

God knows how I’d failed to notice it. Heat of the moment, I suppose. Only a small gold medallion, with a monogram. Its initials, SAPAR, round the periphery, struck into my brain and set my two lonely nerve cells clanging like clappers in a bell. Stolen Art and Purloined Antiques Rescue.

But quite the most frightening was a single gold letter stencilled in the centre, larger than the others Letter H. Lying on my crumpled bed, I found myself shivering like in a malarial rigor, except this was much, much worse. I wondered for the first time who Lilian and Gerald really were. And the gorgeous golden maniacs in the posh racer. The world had unglued, to clatter all about me. Marimee would have me shot twice a day for a week. Paul, Almira, Troude, Monique, were on a dead loser. And me? I was in the worst-ever trouble of all.

H stands for Hunter.

Time to run.