Black Mischief (14 page)

‘It
will puzzle him terribly.’

‘Envoy,
who’s that young man? I’m sure he’s English.’ Basil had gone across to
Connolly’s table.

‘Hullo,
old boy. Take a pew. This is Black Bitch.’

‘How do
you do.’ The little Negress put down her trumpet, bowed with grave dignity and
held out her hand. ‘Not Black Bitch any more. Duchess of Ukaka now.’

‘My
word, hasn’t she got an ugly mug?’ said the Duke. ‘But she’s a good little thing.’.

Black
Bitch flashed a great, white grin of pleasure at the compliment. It was a
glorious night for her; it would have been rapture enough to have her man back
from the wars; but to be made a Duchess and taken to supper among all the white
ladies … all in the same day …

‘You see,’ said M. Ballon
to his first secretary.
‘That is
the man, over there with Connolly. You
are having him watched?’

‘Ceaselessly.’

‘You
have instructed the waiter to attend carefully to the conversation at the
English table?’

‘He
reported to me just now in the cloakroom. It is impossible to understand. Sir
Samson speaks all the time of the dimensions of the Great Pyramid.’

‘A
trap, doubtless.’

The Emperor had signified
his intention of making an appearance some time during the evening. At the end
of the ballroom a box had been improvised for him with bunting, pots of palm,
and gilt cardboard. Soon after midnight he came. At a sign from Prince Fyodor
the band stopped in the middle of the tune and struck up the national anthem.
The dancing couples scuttled to the side of the ballroom; the guests at supper
rose awkwardly to their feet, pushing their tables forward with a rattle of
knives and glass; there was a furtive self-conscious straightening of ties and
removing of paper caps. Sir Samson-Courteney alone absent-mindedly retained his
false nose. The royal entourage in frogged uniforms advanced down the polished
floor; in their centre, half a pace ahead, looking neither to right’ nor left,
strode the Emperor in evening dress, white kid gloves, heavily starched linen,
neat pearl studs and jet black face.

‘Got up
just as though he were going to sing Spirituals at a party,’ said Lady
Courteney.

Prince
Fyodor glided in front and ushered him to his table. He sat down alone. The
suite ranged themselves behind his chair. He gave a slight nod to Prince
Fyodor. The band resumed the dance music. The Emperor watched impassively as
the company began to settle down to a state of enjoyment.

Presently,
by means of an agency, he invited the wife of the American minister to dance
with him. The other couples fell back. With gravity and grace he led Mrs
Schonbaum into the centre, danced with her twice round the room, led her back
to her table, bowed and returned to his box.

‘Why,
he dances beautifully,’ reported Mrs Schonbaum. ‘I often wonder what they would
say back home to see me dancing with a man of colour.’

‘I do
pray he comes and dances with Mum,’ said Prudence. ‘Do you think it’s any use
me trying to vamp him, or does he only go for wives?’

The
evening went on.

‘The
maître
d’hôtel
approached Prince Fyodor in some distress.

‘Highness,
they are complaining about the champagne.’

‘Who
are?’

‘The
French Legation.’

‘Tell
them we will make a special price for them.’

‘….Highness, more
complaints of the champagne.’

‘
Who this time?’

‘The
Duke of Ukaka.’

‘Take
away the bottle, pour in a tumbler of brandy and bring it back.’

‘…
Highness, is it proper to serve the Minister of the Interior with more wine? He
is pouring it in his lady’s lap.’

‘It is
proper. You ask questions like an idiot.’

The English party began to
play consequences on the menu cards. They were of the simplest sort:
The
amorous Duke of Ukaka met the intoxicated Mine Ballon in the Palace w.c. He
said to her ‘Floreat Azania’
…

‘Envoy,
if you laugh so much we’ll have to stop playing.’

‘Upon
my soul, though, that’s funny.’

‘Mum,
do you think that young man with the Connollys is the one who called?’

‘I dare
say. We must ask him to something some time. Perhaps he’ll be here for the
Christmas luncheon … but he seems to have plenty of friends already.’

‘Mum,
don’t be snobbish — particularly now Connolly’s a Duke. Do let’s have him to
everything always …

Basil said, ‘I’ve been
trying to catch the Emperor’s eye. I don’t believe he remembers me.’

‘The
old boy’s on rather a high horse now the war’s over. He’ll come down a peg when
the bills start coming in. They’ve brought us a better bottle of fizz this
time. Like Fyodor’s impudence trying to palm off that other stuff on us.’

‘I
wonder if it would be possible to arrange an audience.’

‘Look
here, old boy, have you come here to enjoy yourself or have you not? I’ve been
in camp with that Emperor off and on for the last six months and I want to
forget him. Give Black Bitch some bubbly and help yourself and for the love of
Mike talk smut.’

‘Monsieur Jean, something
terrible has come to my knowledge,’ said the French second secretary.

‘Tell
me,’ said the first secretary.

‘I can
scarcely bring myself to do so. It affects the honour of the Minister’s wife.’

‘Incredible.
Tell me at once. It is your duty to France.’

‘For
France then … when affected by wine she made an assignation with the Duke of
Ukaka. He loves her.’

‘Who
would have thought it possible? Where?’

‘In the
toilette at the Palace.’

‘But
there is no toilette at the Palace.’

‘Sir
Samson Courteney has written evidence to that effect. The paper has been folded
into a narrow strip. No doubt it was conveyed to him by one of his spies. Perhaps
in a roll of bread.’

‘Extraordinary.
We will keep this from the Minister. We will watch, ourselves. It is a secret
between us. No good can come of it. Alas, poor Monsieur Ballon. He trusted her.
We must prevent this thing.’

‘For
France.’

‘For
France and Monsieur Ballon.’

‘… I
have never observed Madame Ballon the worse for drink …‘

Paper caps were resumed:
bonnets of liberty, conical dunce’s hats, jockey caps, Napoleonic casques, hats
for pierrots and harlequins, postmen, highlanders, old Mothers Hubbard and
little Misses Muffet over faces of every complexion, brown as boots, chalk
white, dun and the fresh boiled pink of Northern Europe. False noses again:
brilliant sheaths of pigmented cardboard attached to noses of every
anthropological type, the high arch of the Semite, freckled Nordic snouts,
broad black nostrils from swamp villages of the mainland, the pulpy inflamed
flesh of the alcoholic, and unlovely syphilitic voids. Ribbons of coloured
papers tangled and snapped about the dancers’ feet; coloured balls volleyed
from table to table. One, erratically thrown by Madame Fifi, bounced close to
the royal box; the Minister of the Interior facetiously applauded her aim.
Prince Fyodor glanced anxiously about him. His patrons were beginning to enjoy
themselves. If only the Emperor would soon leave; an
incident
might
occur at any moment.

But
Seth sat alone among the palms and garlands, apparently deep in thought; his
fingers fidgeted with the stem of his wine glass; sometimes, without raising
his head, he half furtively surveyed the room. The equerries behind his chair
despaired of permission to dance. If only His Majesty would go home, they could
slip back before the fun was all over …

‘Old boy, your pal the
Great Panjandrum is something of a damper on this happy throng. Why can’t the
silly mutt go off home and leave us to have a jolly up?’

‘Can’t conceive why young
Seth doesn’t move. Can’t be enjoying himself.’

But the Emperor sat tight.
This was the celebration of his Victory. This was the society of Debra Dowa.
There was the British Minister happy as a parent at a children’s party. There
was the Minister of the Interior, behaving hideously. There was the
Commander-in-Chief of the Azanian army. And with him was Basil Seal. Seth
recognized him in his first grave survey of the restaurant and suddenly, on this
triumphal night in his own capital, he was overcome by shyness. It was nearly
three years since they last met and Seth recalled the light drizzle of rain in
the Oxford quadrangle, a scout carrying a tray of dirty plates, a group of
undergraduates in tweeds lounging about among bicycles in the porch. He had
.been an undergraduate of no account in his College, amiably classed among
Bengali babus, Siamese, and grammar school scholars as one of the remote and
praiseworthy people who had come a long way to the University. Basil had
enjoyed a reputation of peculiar brilliance among his contemporaries. On the
rare occasions when evangelically minded undergraduates asked Seth to tea or
coffee, his name occurred in the conversation with awed disapproval. He played
poker for high stakes. His luncheon parties lasted until dusk, his dinner
parties dispersed in riot. Lovely young women visited him from London in
high-powered cars. He went away for week-ends without leave and climbed into
College over the tiles at night. He had travelled all over Europe, spoke six
languages, called dons by their Christian names and discussed their books with
them.

Seth
had met him at breakfast with the Master of the College. Basil had talked to
him about Azanian topography, the Nestorian Church, Sakuyu dialects, the
idiosyncrasies of the chief diplomats in Debra Dowa. Two days hater he invited
him to luncheon. There had been two peers present and the President of the
Union, the editor of a new undergraduate paper and a young don. Seth had sat
silent and entranced throughout the afternoon. Later, after long consultation
with his scout, he had returned the invitation. Basil accepted and at the last
moment made his excuses for not coming. There the acquaintance had ended. Three
years had intervened, during which Seth had become Emperor, but Basil still
stood for him as the personification of all that glittering, intangible Western
culture to which he aspired. And there he was, unaccountably, at the Connollys’
table. What must he be thinking? If only the Minister for the Interior were
more sober …

The
maitre
d’hôtel
again approached Prince Fyodor.

‘Highness,
there is someone at the door who I do not think should be admitted.’

‘I will
see him.’

But as
he turned to the door, the newcomer appeared. He was a towering Negro in full
gala dress: on his head a lion’s-mane busby; on his shoulders a shapeless fur
mantle; a red satin skirt; brass bangles and a necklace of lion’s teeth; a
long, ornamental sword hung at his side; two bandoliers of brass cartridges
circled his great girth; he had small bloodshot eyes and a tousle of black
wool over his cheeks and chin. Behind him stood six unsteady slaves carrying
antiquated rifles.

It was
one of the backwoods peers, the Earl of Ngumo, feudal overlord of some five
hundred square miles of impenetrable highland territory. He had occupied
himself ‘throughout the civil war in an attempt to mobilize his tribesmen. The
battle of Ukaka occurring before the levy was complete, saved him the
embarrassment of declaring him-self for either combatant. He had therefore left
his men in the hills and marched down with a few hundred personal attendants to
pay his respects to the victorious side. His celebrations had lasted for some
days already and had left some mark upon even his rugged constitution.

Prince
Fyodor hurried forward. ‘The tables are all engaged. I regret very much that
there is no room. We are full up.’

The
Earl blinked dully and said, ‘I will have a table, some gin and some women and
some raw camel’s meat for my men outside.’

‘But
there is no table free.’

‘Do not
be put out. That is a simple matter. I have some soldiers with me who will
quickly find room.’

The
band had stopped playing and a hush fell on the crowded restaurant; scared
faces under the paper hats and false noses.

‘Under
the table, B lack Bitch,’ said Connolly. ‘There’s going to be a rough house.’

Mr
Youkoumian’s plump back disappeared through the service door.

‘Now
what’s happening?’ said the British Minister. ‘Someone’s
up to something, I’ll be bound.’

But at
that moment the Earl’s bovine gaze, moving up the rows of scared faces to its
natural focus among the palms and bunting, reached the Emperor. His hand fell
to the jewelled hilt of his sword — and twenty hands in various parts of the room
felt for pistols and bottle necks — a yard of tarnished damascene flashed into
the light and with a roar of homage lie sank to his knees in the centre of the
polished floor.