Night Without Stars (33 page)

I think it was in one of the worst moods of dizziness that I finally slipped, and I clung like a fly and felt the rock moving up slowly under my fingers. The sky was circling round. I jerked my right foot out and found the rocky ledge at last. It wasn't any use because I was already falling with the cliff. The whole cliff side was toppling into the valley. I slid another inch or two as it swayed and I moved my right hand, then my left, pulling into the shelter of the other side. Left foot was numbed and slow to move. It dragged behind. I hurt my knee. Then I fell forward into the safety of the bushes.

Sometimes when you go through an ordeal and come out of it all right you feel uplifted and thankful. That was the way when my eyesight came back. Other times the processes work differently. This was one of the other times.

There was no one about and I sat by the road for ages, tying my shoes—which wouldn't be spiders' nests after all—vaguely straightening shirt and tie and trousers. They were in a pretty bad state, but it was instinctive to do something about them. Dizziness was better away from the heights, but a headache remained and I was chiefly worried about that, afraid it was something to do with my eyes. No one passed, not a car or a bicycle or a walker. The sun had left the valley and the wind was dropping.

It would be nice to recall that sitting there out of reach of the cliffs brought me at least relief or satisfaction. I don't remember it. Everything tasted too bitter. The anger had gone and left this.

It seemed to me then that I'd failed in the one thing that mattered, indeed that I'd never had the least chance of bringing it off. Realising that was the one outcome of the attempt on my life: now I knew where I was. I'd failed where Alix was concerned, and because of that I'd somehow failed towards myself. All that remained was to tidy up the loose ends and go.

I began to walk up the road towards the Villa Lavandou. It didn't occur to me that there might be any further danger there. For a time the things I did were as if worked out and decided by someone else. It was all gone through by a stranger.

Not many yards on I found a rivulet trickling down the rocks, and I drank some of this and washed the blood and dirt off my hands. After sitting there for a good time I began to feel better.

As the villa came in sight I saw there were two cars outside, but neither was the Studebaker. There was an old chap working in the lavender fields, and he gave me a glance but no more. I was surprised at that. Either he took no interest in an unusual sight, or I was less unusual than I thought.

The sun had set now, and the first twilight was fading. There were two or three lights in the villa, one being in the long Renaissance room. I was pretty clumsy and reckless, but I did have a twinge of caution at this point, and made across the lavender beds towards this light, hoping to look in without attracting attention.

As I got near I saw there were about half a dozen people in the room, and the first one I made out was Alix in a chair. She didn't look as if she was enjoying herself. Armand Delaisse, sulky and flushed, was beside her, and Charles stood by the mantelpiece. They seemed to be arguing with a man who had his back to me. As I moved nearer someone tapped me on the shoulder.…

I jerked round: a man had come up behind me: a policeman.

We stared at each other. “Your business, please.”

“My name—Gordon. I came to see M. Bénat.”

“May I see your passport?”

I showed it him. He said: “Will you come with me.”

As we passed across the window I think Charles saw me. This development was a shock and I couldn't make sense of it.

The policeman opened the door of the house, led me into the hall, told me to wait, while he went off towards the living-room. Bénat's usual servant put his head out of another room, his eyes scared and curious and faintly greedy, but he nipped back as soon as he saw me. Then another policeman came out of Bénat's office.

The first policeman came back.

“This way, if you please.”

Down the familiar corridor. There were six in the room. A stranger just inside the door, the three I'd seen, another man with his back to me. In the corner was the lorry driver who'd put me over the edge.

Alix said: “Giles …”
The dog began to bark, great hostile gulps that filled the room.
“Quiet Grutli,” Charles said.
The other man turned his head. “Come in, M. Gordon.” It was

Deffand. I'd forgotten his existence. I made sense of it all now.
Alix said with a sort of pain in her eyes: “ What is it? What's

happened to you, Giles? Are you hurt?”
Armand Delaisse had hardly moved. I could see my coming had

shaken up all three of them. Charles's clever sallow face.… The

lorry driver had gone a bit green. But it was Alix I was looking

at.
She said again: “What is it, Giles? Why are you—like that?
Tell

me
.”
I heard myself saying: “Sorry to be—late.”
She glanced at Charles and I think she jumped at once to the

fact that he was somehow accountable. Her face changed, the last

roundness went out of it; she looked like her brother.
Deffand said: “ You've hurt your hands. Have you been in an

accident?”
“Well, yes.”
“Have you come by car?”
“I
came
by car.”
Charles moved to a cupboard, poured a glass of brandy. Deffand's

eyes followed him. Charles brought the glass over to me. “Sit down,

Giles. You must be quite tired after your long drive.”
We looked closely at each other. His lip had a derisive, defiant

droop. My coming had finished it. The game was up—and he didn't

care a damn.… It was part of the hazard, part of an expected

malevolence in fate, part of his theory, fitting somehow into the

pattern he'd made for himself. He almost welcomed it, as a masochist

welcomes pain. I found myself suddenly hating him for the first

time. I could hardly keep my hands off his face.
Deffand said: “No doubt you'd like some attention.”
Charles turned away and the moment was gone.
“I'm all right.” My knees were weak and I sat down. Alix didn't

move; she was still staring at me. The quiet man by the door turned over a page in his notebook.

“Why did you come up here this evening?”

“Has anybody a cigarette? I smoked my last—on the way.”

Deffand passed me one and held his lighter, taking in my broken finger-nails and shaky hands. I wanted time to think. A quick decision now which would affect everything else. It was almost too much; my brain was tired and slow.

“I came to see M. Bénat. Invited for six o'clock—things delayed me.”

“My God!” said Alix. “My God!” And put her face in her hands.

Deffand glanced at her with a narrow preoccupied frown. “ What happened?”

I stared at the end of the cigarette.

Charles said: “Well, go on, Gordon, tell us what delayed you.”

I looked across at him, thinking it out. “I should have hurried if I'd known there was going to be a party.”

“I thought you'd be sure to know that.”

“I'm damned sure you thought nothing of the kind.”

Grutli began to growl again at my tone. I gulped at the brandy, felt it go warmly down. A policeman came in and spoke in Deffand's ear. He waved an impatient finger and the man went. Alix wasn't looking at me any longer.

Deffand said: “As you'll guess, M. Gordon, I'm here in a professional capacity. I explained my mission to you earlier this week.”

“Yes.”

“Perhaps you know I have taken certain steps since then.”

“I saw something in the paper this afternoon.”

“You may remember I asked you to help me then, and you refused. Your help would have been valuable, but you see we got along without it.”

Nobody spoke. Deffand lit a cigarette himself and began to blow smoke through his nose. “I'll be quite frank with you. M. Bénat and his friends are under suspicion for the same sort of offense. Their connection with the Café des Fourmis has been suspected for a long time. A search is at present being made of this house and its contents. It may succeed or it may fail.…”

“It has already failed,” said Bénat indifferently. “The sergeant has just told you.”

Deffand squinted at the end of his cigarette. “Perhaps you have had too long an experience to commit much to writing, Bénat.”

“During the war it was almost all word of mouth. No doubt fighting the Germans from across the Channel was a different matter.”

Deffand said: “The point is, M. Gordon, that I could arrest these people at once if I chose— but generally speaking time and trouble are saved by moving only on concrete evidence. So we again invite your help. I shall in any case make a clean sweep in the end. Evidence from you now would be largely a matter of saving time and trouble.”

There was a minute's silence. Armand Delaisse was staring at me in a queer way.

I said: “ You're mistaken in expecting me to be able to help you.”

There was a faint stirring in the room. Bénat bent to stroke the dog.

Deffand said: “You know these people well.”

“I've been up here twice this year.”

“But you knew them last year also.”

“I was blind then.”

“You have spent several days with Mme. Delaisse this week.”

“We were out for pleasure. Nothing more.”

Charles laughed. His face had that dark look, as if it were in shadow.

Deffand said: “ I should like you to understand that it need not necessarily be a charge dealing with the things we've spoken of. What I want is evidence against M. Bénat which will give me greater freedom to act as I should like.”

“How graciously you put it,” Charles said.

Deffand ignored him. “Let me express this a little differently, M. Gordon. I understand your interest in Mme. Delaisse. You must be anxious about her position at the moment, and her future.”

“Possibly.”

“Then let me put a suggestion to you. If I get suitable evidence against M. Bénat now I will give you my guarantee that Mme. Delaisse will not be molested at all. She'll be free to leave France or to go on living here if she chooses. She will cease to exist so far as I am concerned.”

I didn't speak.

“On the other hand, if I have to follow these inquiries to the end, it will be my duty to charge everyone implicated. So it would be in her interest to speak now.” Deffand looked at me dryly. “ If you fear further intimidation I can grant you a safe conduct.”

I said: “ I never have feared intimidation.”

For the second time Armand Delaisse glanced at me. He looked very puzzled.

Deffand blew another spiral. “ Well?”

I met Charles's gaze. Under the irony was a relentless pride. “I don't like this situation any better than you, M. Deffand. But I've nothing to say that will help you in the case.”

There was a short silence. “I'm sorry you take this attitude.”

“I'm sorry I can't help you.”

“A foreign visitor to this country is entitled to expect special consideration. But it would be a mistake to think himself above the law.”

“I've never felt that.”

“Just what do you feel then?”

“I think it would take too long to tell you.”

“I am here to listen.”

“Sometimes,” I said, “private wars get out of hand, take precedence over—public ones. It would please me a lot to see Bénat go to prison.… But it pleases me more to keep him out. I can't explain why.”

Charles said suddenly, contemptuously: “I've no use for magnanimity.”

‘I
know
.” That was just it. That was what I'd been trying to get clear in my own mind. He had no place in his life for the magnanimous. It didn't fit. And because it didn't fit he would find it intolerable. For courage and all the virtues of the jungle, for revenge and betrayal and all the vices of man.…

He said again: “ Don't let me tempt you into any gesture you'd be likely to regret. Deffand implores you to help him.”

“No,” I said. “There's nothing I want to say.”

“You see,” said Charles to Deffand. “He's trying to buy nobility by withholding what he doesn't know.”

Armand Delaisse pushed his chair back with a sharp irritable movement. “If this farce is over perhaps we can go.” It was plain enough he didn't care two sous what was going on between us; all he knew was that I was willing to keep quiet.

Deffand said: “Have a care for yourself, M. Gordon.”

“Can I go?” persisted Delaisse.

Deffand put out his cigarette. “ You can stay, if that's what you mean. I am going. But don't make any mistake, I shall be back. To-morrow, if some of your friends will talk. Next week or the week after if they will not.” He breathed nasally. “As for you, M. Gordon, if I were you I should take the first train home. Come, Lemierre.”

I said: “Are you going to Nice? Could I ask the favour of a lift?”

He looked me over, professionally, with contempt “ It is possible.”

He went out followed by the other man.

I looked at Alix. She hadn't shifted from her chair and she had her eyes down. She looked pretty bad. I thought bitterly, this is the last time I shall see her. It didn't seem to matter. I turned to go.

Armand Delaisse said in an undertone: “ One moment.”

“Well?”

“We were told—we understood you had given us away to the police—that that was why we had been raided.”

“Did you run the Resistance movement on wild guesses?”

“Immediately after your last visit here you were seen to go to the British Consulate. Next day your friend from the Consulate met Deffand at lunch. Then Deffand called on you. Two days later the Café des Fourmis was raided. That and your other interferences—can you wonder at our mistake?”