Читать книгу The President's Hat - Antoine Laurain - Страница 14

The secretary brought croissants and eggs which looked as if they were wearing woolly winter hats. Daniel supposed the crocheted accessories were there to keep the eggs at the right temperature. I’ll have to tell Véronique, he thought. Jean-Bernard Desmoine sat opposite him. Both men were installed in large white leather armchairs near a window on the eighteenth floor of the SOGETEC building, overlooking Paris. Having such an elevated office must surely give its occupant a feeling of superiority.

‘Tuck in,’ said Desmoine, snatching the knitted hat off his egg. ‘I’m very particular about how my eggs are cooked,’ he added, smiling.

So that was it, thought Daniel, remembering at the same time that the correct way to break the top of a soft-boiled egg was with the back of a spoon, not a knife, as he did at home. He lifted the hat from his egg and rapped the top of the shell.

‘Daniel, I won’t beat about the bush. I was very impressed by your analysis of the plans for the finance department.’

Daniel embarked on a suitably humble reply, but was interrupted before he could finish.

‘No need to say anything,’ said Desmoine. ‘No false modesty, please. I’m not one for false compliments. Coffee?’

The director poured him a cup. If someone had told Daniel, just a few days before, that Desmoine himself would be serving him coffee, he, Daniel, the man who stood in line at the seventh-floor coffee machine, waiting for his plastic cup to drop …

Desmoine dipped the tip of a croissant in his coffee and chewed, at the same time proceeding to outline Daniel’s future with wondrous precision and clarity: ‘You see, I know a thing or two about people,’ he announced with the confidence of those who have their own offices on the upper floors of tall buildings. ‘People and business,’ he mused. ‘You don’t get many surprises in our line of work. People are judged on their first year in the post; after that, they either develop or they don’t. But no surprises. Do you get my drift?’

Daniel nodded, his mouth full of croissant, indicating that he did indeed get Desmoine’s drift.

Desmoine took it upon himself to pour Daniel another cup of coffee. ‘Important to drink coffee,’ he added. ‘Balzac drank litres of the stuff. You’ve read Balzac, of course.’

‘Of course,’ Daniel confirmed, never having read Balzac in his life.

‘You really are a resourceful fellow. Why hasn’t SOGETEC got you in a more important post? You should have a position better suited to a man of your quality.’

‘A position …’ muttered Daniel. ‘You mean …’

‘Maltard’s a complete arse,’ interrupted Desmoine. ‘Anyone can see that. But for reasons that are no concern of yours and which give me very little pleasure, I can assure you, I am obliged to keep him where he is. On the other hand, I want to promote you to director.’

Daniel stared at him, his croissant suspended over his cup.

‘Daniel, I’m offering to make you director of one of SOGETEC’s regional finance departments. I know you’re based in Paris, but it’s all I can offer you. Pierre Marcoussi heads the Rouen department, but he’s leaving for health reasons. It’s not official for the moment. You’ll start in January.’

The hat. It was the hat that was responsible for the events that had turned Daniel’s existence on its head in the last few days. He was convinced of that. Since he had taken to wearing it, the hat had conferred on him a kind of immunity to the torments of everyday life just by being there. Better still, it sharpened his mind and spurred him to take vitally important decisions. Without it, he would never have dared speak to Maltard as he had at the meeting. He would never have found himself on the eighteenth floor sharing a breakfast of soft-boiled eggs with Desmoine. In a strange way, he felt that something of the President was there in the hat. Something intangible. Some microscopic particle perhaps. But whatever it was, it had the power of destiny.

‘Thank you,’ Daniel muttered, addressing the hat as much as his superior.

‘So you accept?’ asked Desmoine, swallowing his last mouthful of croissant.

‘I accept,’ said Daniel, looking him straight in the eye.

‘We’ll be seeing each other again then,’ said Desmoine, holding out his hand before bending over a third, hatless egg. ‘This one’s for me.’ He smiled. Desmoine tapped the top with the handle of his teaspoon, making a small hole, then did the same at the other end, and threw his head back to swallow it down in one.

‘Every morning. A raw egg. My little treat,’ said Jean-Bernard Desmoine apologetically.