Читать книгу The Dave Bliss Quintet - James Hawkins - Страница 9

Three days of heightened awareness since his first meeting with Marcia has got Bliss no further forward, other than confirming his suspicion that he is a very small fish in a very large cesspool. Still jumpy at the sight of anyone vaguely resembling Edwards, he wanders the jetties and quays of the port with a warm baguette under his arm, journal in hand, and his thoughts on the ranks of flashy yachts, trying to calculate how many mainline junkies it takes to keep each afloat.

With his eye on two especially well-appointed craft, each bristling with a helicopter, a deck load of expensive marine toys, and enough communications hardware to out-manoeuvre an average frigate, he drops onto a convenient bench and watches the frenzy of activity as deckhands and day-workers scrub and polish the already immaculate vessels.

A flotilla of drab harbour ducks, a drake and his harem, spot Bliss taking a meditative bite from his bread, quickly leap the quay wall, and mob him noisily for titbits. The crumbly French loaf showers flakes onto the quayside, which are swooped on by the male, leaving his wives squabbling over thin air. After three failed attempts to reach the smaller birds, Bliss christens the aggressive drake “Edwards” and decides he might as well let him pig out until he is stuffed.

Ten minutes later, with half the baguette inside him, Edwards’s head suddenly flops to one side, and he waddles to the edge of the quay, his gut scuffing the ground. With an ungainly belly flop the large drake drops with a noisy “plop” into the harbour and promptly sinks.

“Bloody hell,” utters Bliss, rushing to the edge, but other than a thin trail of bubbles there is no trace of the bird. The words “serves you right” die on Bliss’s lips and he slouches away from the rest of the family, head down, facing yet another restless day.

In an effort to clear his mind he isolates himself at the end of a jetty and opens his journal for another serious start.

I am an author writing about a man who sits alone on a jetty gazing at the ocean. Who am I? Why am I here? What do I think? What am I waiting for?

Like the breathing of a somnolent giant, the gentle swish of the tide rises and falls under the jetty with such power I feel my spirit being carried away across the ocean to some distant paradise where all is revealed.

Footsteps on the wooden planking bring his head up as a young woman throws out a towel suggestively close to him, then does a striptease with her dress, revealing a bikini thong that offers virtually no protection against the elements.

“Look at me!” screams the tiny triangle of strategically arranged material.

“What are you looking at?” says her face as she catches him, “and what are you writing about?”

Paradise is not all it’s cracked up to be, he writes, sensing that the woman is somehow annoyed that he may be writing about her. That, like the naked indigènes of other less civilized cultures, she is concerned his writing will steal her soul, or will expose her to her enemies.

Feeling the weight of her stare he keeps his head down, writing gobbledegook, and debates whether or not she wants him to pay her attention. Should I approach her? he wonders. Let her know I’m not a nutter. But what to say — flattery? I am writing about a beautiful woman …

What does she expect? he questions, trying to read her expressions and feel her vibes as she swings from inquisitiveness through interest to concern, then annoyance, and eventually outright fury, as she snatches up her towel and storms off along the jetty, the naked cheeks of her bottom clenched in fierce anger.

What did I do wrong? he wonders, feeling even more dejected as he puts away his pen and turns his thoughts to the malignancy of Superintendent Edwards. The possibility that an old rattan beach mat would solve his dilemmas does not occur to him as he sits on the jetty and winds himself up with worry.

Watching as the beach quickly fills with the day’s visitors, his eye is caught by a noticeable void in the carefully arranged mosaic of basking flesh. A frayed beach mat lies abandoned on the sand, like an empty raft amid a sea of floating bodies, yet is accorded more reverence than any sun worshipper.

“Mind the mat!” shout worried parents, as playing children blindly rush across the sand in pursuit of balls, kites, and each other, and newcomers give the space a wide berth as they scout for a vacant spot. Near-naked sun seekers, shining with oil, can fend for themselves, but the unoccupied mat obviously demands protection from all.

“Gosh — did that swimsuit shrink?” muses Bliss, spotting a V-shaped man whose skinny legs seem incapable of supporting his pumped torso. His chest still bears the breadth of an active youth, but the rest of his body is retreating into old age as he spends his days patrolling the shoreline with the arrogance of an elephant seal beachmaster. The sunbathing beauties instinctively know the trophy he seeks, and at his approach they quickly turn onto their stomachs or grab a towel.

The beach prowler takes on the question of the vacated mat, standing overly close as he scours the beach, hoping his intrusion on the mat’s personal space will induce the owner to claim possession — hoping the owner may turn into a trophy.

“See. I was guarding your mat for you,” he will insist, but only if she is worthy; otherwise he will snort loudly and grumble about the inconsiderateness of people leaving unattended mats.

After five minutes of posturing, the pariah becomes restless at his lack of magnetism and draws upon the strength of surrounding bodies, gathering a small group to infringe upon the mat with him as he leads a deliberation on its fate.

“I zhink we should move it,” he suggests, taking command. “Ça vous défrise?” he enquires — any objections?

The crowd backs away from the edge. “It is nearly midday,” one quickly explains. “He could be having an early lunch.”

“He?” the beach-master queries, with more than a trace of disappointment.

“Mais oui,” says the other, “it seems most logical to me. Regarde — zhere is no bag, no towel, no dress, and no sunscreen. What woman would go to zhe beach without sunscreen?”

The realization hits the old beach bum like a cold shower. His chest deflates as he loses interest and wanders off.

Then the French veneration for lunch — déjeuner — from midday until mid-afternoon, wins the rattan mat a breathing space. The halyards and shrouds of yachts sing in the early afternoon breeze like a giant musical extravaganza, then the vent de midi picks up a notch and sends parasols, plastic chairs, and small children on skateboards skidding along the harbour wall. The rattan mat lies unruffled until three o’clock, precisely when an inquest is convened by a holidaying Berliner.

“Is zhis beach mat kaput?” sniggers Bliss to himself from his vantage point on the jetty as the German gathers a small group to surround the antisocial item.

“It has been here since zhis morning,” explains one in English.

“Yes — but precisely when?” the German demands to know.

“Does that matter?”

“Certainly. It is essential.”

“But why would anyone abandon such a beautiful mat?” asks another in French, leaving the German out of the loop.

“Beau?” questions another native. “It is crevé — dead. See, it is limp — not even rigor mortis.”

“But we must know if it was here before nine this morning,” insists the German, attempting to restore his authority by precision. “Then we might assume it is abandoned.”

“Why?”

Because, though nobody will express it, the early morning bathers are a breed apart. Misfits, misshapes, and those burdened with an unruly metabolic system who take the waters before the high achievers arrive in the spotlight of the sun and further batter their bruised egos.

The momentary awkwardness is broken by a young Englishman, with a beer bottle in each hand and a couple of illuminated plastic ducks on his head, making a fool of himself by dancing around the mat, turning the funeral into a wake.

“Get away,” they shout, maddened by his apparent irreverence. Then one utters the unthinkable. “Maybe we should just move it.”

No one will take the risk, so search parties form to scour the beach, and a swimming team volunteers to check the sea. “But what are we to look for?” asks one.

“Un homme, of course. A man.”

“Why not une femme?” pipes up a woman, thrusting her bronzed chest forward, unwilling to allow her gender to be so lightly dismissed simply because of the lack of sunscreen.

“OK. Half will keep a look out for a man, and half will search for a woman,” decides the German, and the meeting breaks as constituents return to their sunbathing with an eye to every potential aberrant mat owner.

Bliss’s amusement is suddenly dimmed with the thought that recently drowned bodies usually float just below the surface, and he worriedly scans the bay for a few minutes, but the bright sun clouds his vision. He considers calling the authorities. But what would he say? Officer — someone’s left a mat on the beach!

The weary sun starts to fade, heading lower towards the craggy red peaks of L’Esterel in the west, and dinner beckons the beach lovers — but they spare a respectful moment as they pass the rattan mat, and take one final look around for its soul mate. Finally, picking up a cue from the mountains, the sun blushes as it sets. The beach is completely deserted and the cerulean sea is perfectly clear. With no possibility of a claimant challenging him, Bliss gathers up the mat and bundles it under his arm, thinking he has had such an enjoyable interlude he might bring it back one day, and on his way home to the apartment he laughs inwardly at the thought that everybody has spent the day searching for someone who had simply discarded an old mat. Then he stops with the realization that the situation offers an ideal solution to his dilemma.

What if he, like the mat’s owner, were to disappear, buying a yacht and simply sailing away? But where to? That might be tricky, he admits, realizing his only previous nautical experience involved a rowing boat on the Serpentine in Hyde Park. But he wouldn’t need to sail anywhere, that is the crux of the plan — just like the rattan mat, the yacht would be crewless — a modern-day Mary Celeste.

However, by the time he reaches the apartment he has all but given up on the idea, having realized both the limitations and complications, and, wineglass in hand, he leans over the balcony to watch the moon rising from the sea at the start of yet another spotless evening.

The lemon, catching the first rays of moonlight, is still there, still sitting on the grass, ownerless and neglected just like the rattan mat. But — Bliss brightens as his germ of an idea undergoes a resurgence of growth — there is a crucial difference: everyone on the beach saw the mat, but, as far as he is aware, no one but him knows the lemon is there. And if no one knows it’s there — does it exist?

I don’t need a yacht, he tells himself, seeing his plan beginning to blossom. I only need certain people to believe I have a yacht — a yacht that, like me, has disappeared.

The logic of the plan is so simple that he questions its viability. “What a stir it’ll cause,” he muses, envisioning Commander Richards and Chief Superintendent Edwards scrambling to find him and his yacht before Richards is forced to lay out some sort of explanation to the commissioner and the press. And in the meantime he can quietly continue his enquiries into Morgan Johnson.

The plan seems flawless as he runs and reruns it in his mind. If this doesn’t flush out the bad guys nothing will, he realizes, judging his disappearance cannot be entirely ignored — even convalescent leave has its limitations. But, in order for it to have any effect, he will need to draw attention to his apparent disappearance. No one has contacted him during his first two weeks — but isn’t that their plan? Out of sight …

What if he closes his bank account so his monthly transfer is returned to the admin office? he thinks, then shakes his head. No, they’ll assume it’s an error and contact Commander Richards. He will assure them there is no problem. It could be months before someone starts asking questions and demanding answers — unless Samantha were to warm them up by putting a worried call in to the administration department. “I haven’t been able to get hold of my dad since he told me he was going sailing,” she can say, with all the innocence of a defence lawyer asking a deviously loaded question in a major trial. And someone in admin will be on the phone to Richards wanting to know what’s going on. “According to our records this man’s off sick. How come his daughter doesn’t know? And what’s this about a yacht?”

That would work, he thinks, but what’s the downside? An international search and rescue operation, perhaps. It’ll be a good training exercise for someone, he reasons, then seriously considers the possible repercussions such an escapade could have on his career.

There are two possible scenarios, and both see him coming out ahead. If the Morgan Johnson case turns out to be genuine, he pops up and says, “What’s all the fuss about? Of course you couldn’t find me, I was working undercover — what did you expect?” But if the malfeasance of Morgan Johnson is a put-up job, then he surfaces and drops everyone in the shit — Edwards, Richards, and anyone else he can put the finger on.

But what about Commander Richards? Knowing the truth, what possible recourse could he have?

“You specifically ordered me not to tell anyone where I was, Guv,” Bliss can say, like butter wouldn’t melt, and watch Richards seethe as he realizes he’s been end-run.

With the perfection of the plan exposed, Bliss spends a few moments considering the possibility of taking it one stage further, and seriously contemplates actually disappearing completely, opening a bistro or a bar on some remote Aegean island à la Shirley Valentine, but stops himself — I’m not going down that road again — the quaint English pub scenario. The only difference would be the climate and the prices. “How much?” they’d screech in disbelief, though it wouldn’t stop them from getting plastered.

Marcia is waiting for Bliss at the bar L’Escale and can barely conceal her excitement.

“He’s back,” she whispers as he sits.

“Where?” he asks, his eyes roving the harbour and not finding the large yacht.

“No, he’s not here,” she explains. “He sailed into Cannes this afternoon. I couldn’t find you. I looked everywhere.”

“I was dealing with a death on the beach.” He laughs, but doesn’t elaborate. But what now?

All his plans have been thrown into turmoil. With Johnson uncovered he can go home — as soon as he is sure the Morgan Johnson on the yacht is the Morgan Johnson in the photograph. But what then? Case closed. Bon voyage, Monsieur Burbeck. But the detective in him wants more — wants answers. If this isn’t a put-up job, then who wants Johnson, and what for? What about the information Samantha has gleaned regarding the huge investments? And where is Edwards in all this?

Maybe it is time to disappear after all, he decides, as he plans to visit Cannes the following morning. “Richards has no way of knowing I’ve tracked Johnson down so quickly,” he mutters, “so he can wait for a few days while I dig a little deeper.”

Hugh and Mavis seem a little out of sorts as they sit alone staring silently out over the harbour as Marcia leaves.

“So,” says Bliss, going over and taking a seat. “How was the beach today?”

“Never made it, old boy,” says Hugh, clearly prepared for the enquiry. “Surprised you even asked after what happened.”

“Sorry,” Bliss says, concerned that his dalliance with an old mat has caused him to miss news of a global catastrophe. “What’s happened?”

“Storms, of course. Didn’t you watch the news?”

“I try not to.”

“Don’t know what you’re missing.”

“Storms, apparently.”

“Half of France got washed away last night,” says Hugh, with a disaster-monger’s delight. “Thunder and lightning like you wouldn’t believe — dozens dead and missing.”

Bliss casually inspects their surroundings. “Seems to have missed us though,” he says, heavy with sarcasm.

“Luck if you ask me, dear boy. Mavis was petrified, weren’t you dear?”

Mavis nods on cue. “Petrified.”

“Wouldn’t risk the beach today, would you, old dear?”

“Not likely — not with all those storms about. But there’s always tomorrow.”

Hugh shakes his head solemnly. “Not tomorrow, dear — you’re getting your hair done.”

But what of Jennifer and John? Bliss looks along the promenade. “Are you expecting the others?”

“Wouldn’t know,” says Mavis, with unconcealed chagrin. “They can do what they want. They don’t have to ask us. Do they, Hugh?”

“Of course not, dear.”

I guess they went to the beach, then, Bliss figures, but sees no point in asking.

Jacques is also conspicuous by his absence, just like his wind — la tramontane. What a day, thinks Bliss, wondering if any other relationships have been destroyed by contrary meteorological conditions, and he sets off along the promenade, determined to extract some information from Marcia’s husband in the first stage of his plan to uncover the truth — the whole truth.

The evening’s breeze dies, and the moon — another full moon — picks its way across the harbour, highlighting the masts of yachts while perfectly mirroring the vessels in the still water. Bliss sits in a comfortable canvas chair opposite L’Offshore Club readying himself to ambush Greg the potter when he has finished his work for the day.

Midnight on the quayside and the families start thinning, leaving little gangs of girls flaunting their sexuality like gaudy fluorescent signs while fending off those attracted with a nasty glare. The body allures — face repels. This is the game — this is not a game — this is war. If you don’t know the rules of engagement — you’re dead.

Will I ever learn the rules? wonders Bliss, his mind returning to the sensual woman on the jetty.

The crowds may be winding down, but the pots keep coming; Greg is having a heavy night. How can you not be busy when you have nothing to sell? thinks Bliss, realizing the prospect of receiving something for nothing, even something as useless as a wet clay pot, turns almost everyone into a child.

The menfolk, standing back, or wandering to a nearby bar, scowl at the delicate pots won by their womenfolk, and laugh, mockingly. “And just how much did you pay for that?”

“Absolutely nothing — the nice man just gave it to me.”

“Yeah. Right.”

“Well, I did tip him a few euros,” they admit under continued scorn.

“A few euros’ tip for two cents worth of cheap clay — une merde!”

“But you don’t understand ...” they complain, and they’re right.

“Want a beer?” asks Bliss, apparently catching Greg’s eye by chance. “Burbeck,” he adds, holding out a hand at the passing man. “Dave Burbeck.”

“Greg Grimes,” the potter replies, but waves off the handshake, his hands still caked in clay.

Promenaders still toting their pots nudge each other as if they’ve spotted a film star as they pass. “That’s him — that’s the potter,” they whisper, just loud enough for him to hear.

“You’re something of a celebrity around here,” says Bliss, grateful for an opening gambit.

But celebrity is not on the potter’s mind as he mocks the stupidity of gullible foreigners. “There are a thousand potters better than me up there,” he says, giving a nod to the wooded hillsides shrouded in darkness above the port. “Picasso himself lived up there — did you know that?”

“I saw a sign,” admits Bliss, “but I thought he was a painter, not a potter.”

“He was an artist,” screams Grimes, his hands clenched in passion. “Painters slap whitewash on walls — artists create masterpieces.”

Bliss drops the temptation to say he’d visited the Picasso exhibition in Antibes at which he personally thought whitewash slapped on walls would have been an improvement.

“Picasso was a master in ceramic art,” continues Grimes, winding down. “He lived and worked up there in the hills after the first war.”

“Oh …”

“And did you know,” he goes on with reverence, “that he used to eat just over there — in Le Bistro?”

“Imagine that,” replies Bliss, turning to seem interested as he tries to come up with a way of levering the man away from the Master.

Playing him along until he can throw in the hard questions, while fearing Marcia might show up any minute and put a spoke in his wheel, Bliss chats of England, beer, football, and the monarchy, without comment or dissent from Grimes, although the mention of marriage clouds his face, and the question of children only makes things worse. “I used to have a daughter,” he grieves, staring out over the harbour to the distant bay.

“Odd reply,” suggests Bliss, knowing it isn’t at all odd, considering the plight of so many parents whose children’s lives have been stolen by drugs, but Grimes catches him unawares with his response.

“Yeah.... She ran off with an asshole.”

That’s interesting, thinks Bliss, as he takes a few seconds over his drink and notices that the wayward Jacques has been blown off course and is having a nightcap in the next bar. The fisherman looks away as Bliss tries to connect; too embarrassed, assumes Bliss, and he turns back to the potter, wondering why he’d not mentioned the heroin. “Asshole?” he queries, opening a chink, and Grimes heads for it full throttle.

“Morgan fuckin’ Johnson,” he spits, asking, “Have you heard of him?”

“No.” Bliss lies, but Grimes isn’t listening as he rants.

“Big-shot fuckin’ bastard. He’d pinch the scum off a cesspit if he thought he could make it smell sweet enough to flog.”

So what about this Johnson? Who is he? What is he? Where is he? Bliss desperately wants to ask, but doesn’t dare for fear of alerting Grimes to his mission. When Marcia told him she’d lost her daughter to Johnson, he assumed she meant through drugs, not physically. Now he has to string her husband along for the rest of the information. “So — how old?” he asks, showing a glimmer of interest.

“Eighteen.”

“No — Johnson.”

“Buggered if I know. Fifty-something, probably — slimebag.”

“I can see why you’d be upset,” sympathizes Bliss, but it backfires as Grimes lets off a broadside.

“You have absolutely no idea. You don’t know the half of it — not a fraction of it.” Then he clams up.

“What about you — what are you doing?” Grimes asks when he’s calmed.

“Holiday,” says Bliss, adding, “I write a bit.” It is a shot in the dark — based on what Samantha told him — but he carries on: “Actually, I’m researching for a book about expatriate villains who rip off British investors and bunk off to Shangri-la.”

Grimes’s face lights up knowingly. “You’ve come to the right place then,” he says. “This joint is full of them.”

“You think so?” asks Bliss, then he enquires with the innocence of an incognizant, “And Johnson — is he one of them?”

The potter’s watchful stare probes Bliss’s eyes inquisitively as the mind behind them seeks to connect — telling him what? Bliss wonders, maintaining the stare. An opportunity to get something out in the open, perhaps? Marcia had that same look, leaving Bliss with the feeling that both husband and wife were ready to explode with information, but for some reason were keeping it in.

“You’d have to ask him yourself,” says Grimes, as the moment is lost.

It’s two o’clock in the morning by the time Bliss leaves L’Offshore Club. Finally fed up with “Guantanamera” and his lack of progress with Grimes, he puts on his CD player and listens to Brubeck’s “Look for the Silver Lining” as he strolls the deserted quayside, thinking that he may as well positively confirm Johnson’s identity, and whereabouts, before he puts his disappearing act into gear. He will take the train to Cannes in the morning. The yacht, the Sea-Quester, according to Marcia, should be easy enough to spot.

With the apartment in sight, and Johnson virtually in the bag, Bliss decides the time is ripe to pick up the fallen lemon, and, with the full moon to light his path, he creeps around the back of the building and sneaks up on the tree. With one eye on the door to the ground floor, he bends and picks up the fruit, but a faint glow from the apartment window draws him like a magnet as he goes to pocket the lemon. Nothing could have prepared him for what he sees, and he drops his prize as he inches closer and peers into the apartment’s kitchen. The long-haired young man is there, naked, together with his dog, curled as one in sleep, in a large steel cage in the corner of the room.