Doctor Frigo (16 page)

‘Money that
he
can control I’m talking about. He personally. I don’t see those people in Paris being very helpful in that area, do you? They’ll be watching the sous and keeping a tight rein. What he’s going to need are associates who understand that particular set of problems and are ready to help solve them. And when I say help I don’t mean with sympathy. I mean with cash on the line.’

‘I’m his doctor, Señor, not his financial adviser.’

‘You’re the son of his old friend and leader, aren’t you? A friend yourself? What’s wrong with a friend telling him that my clients happen to have a five-million-dollar floater already allocated to the private Villegas presidential patronage fund? I’d say he’d be glad to hear that particular piece of good news.’

‘And that’s what is meant by “spreading the premium”?’

‘Right.’

‘I should have become indignant, I suppose, but I didn’t. As I say, I’ve never been involved in bribery before. One of my colleagues at the hospital was approached last year by Venezuelan pushers trying to get hold of narcotics. The police set traps, there were arrests and the island papers made a suitable fuss, but that was all. The colleague in question seemed to have enjoyed the experience. Had I been in his shoes perhaps I would have done so. As it was, sitting in Chez Lafcadio listening to Rosier casually offering, through me, to buy Villegas for five million dollars my dominant feeling was one of embarrassment. To this was added a sudden, and obviously psychogenic, need to empty my bladder. I controlled it as firmly as I could and signalled for my bill.

He gave me a surprised look.

‘Time I went,’ I said.

‘But I just ordered brandy.’

‘You’ll have to drink it yourself, I’m afraid.’

He gave me a beady look. ‘Doctor, we have things to talk about, business. I’ve made you a serious proposal. Remember?’

‘Medical consultant in St Paul for ATP-Globe?’

‘That would be additional, of course, the official first step.’

‘But not for me, Señor Rosier. However, I can strongly recommend Dr Massot. He’s in private practice here.’

He started to protest. ‘Doctor, if I’ve said something to offend you …’

‘Nothing much. And Dr Massot has an additional qualification
from your point of view. He dislikes Señor Villegas. For assessment purposes that could be important, I think. You would get a strictly objective opinion from him.’

My bill arrived. I already had the money ready. I put it down and stood up.

‘He could also pass your other offer on to the patient. He would probably be more tactful about it than I would.’

I had expected some further protest from him. However, there was none. Disconcertingly, he was grinning.

‘Doctor Frigo rides again,’ he said in English.

‘I beg your pardon.’

‘Be seeing you, Doc.’ He was still grinning.

I left.

By the time I got back home I had decided to telephone Gillon.

Had he not ordered me to report all approaches by outsiders? He had. True, it was late and he would probably be at home with his family, but that couldn’t be helped. His call to me this morning woke me from a very sound sleep. Quite unnecessarily. If I should happen to wake him from a sound sleep, too bad.

He was certainly not asleep.

He had told Delvert to get his private number from the Hotel Ajoupa operator, so that’s what I did. It rang for a full minute before anyone answered. The answerer could have been a Frenchwoman, his wife, presumably, though it was difficult to tell because she was shouting above the noise of a hi-fi playing an old Piaf record at full blast. I heard Gillon bellowing for the volume to be turned down long before he got to the phone himself. It was turned down, but not much. He went on shouting over the music.

‘What is it, Doctor?’

I told him about Rosier. When I got to the insurance policy he began to snigger. By the time I reached the five-thousand-dollar fee as medical consultant he was laughing heartily.

‘Magnificent! I hope you accepted, Doctor.’

‘What?’

‘I said I hope you accepted.’

I started to say that of course I hadn’t, but he had started laughing again. Piaf moaned on in the background.

‘What else did he want?’

I told him about the five-million-dollar bribe which I had been invited to offer Villegas.

More laughter.

‘What a rich and splendid evening you have had, Doctor,’ he said when he could draw breath.

‘I’m glad you think so, Commissaire.’

‘Anything else?’

‘Isn’t it enough? Who is this man Rosier in fact?’

‘But I thought you said he told you. Insurance.’

‘That doesn’t mean I believe him.’

He started cackling again. ‘But you should, Doctor, you should.’

‘Should what?’

‘Believe him. Insurance is a most exact description of the kind of work he does.’

With a final laugh he rang off.

He seemed to me to have been drinking.

If, after that idiot display, he expects a written report from me he is much mistaken.

Have at last had a few hours’ sleep.

At the hospital I made a fresh series of appointments for Villegas and had the letter informing him of them typed up on X-ray department paper.

During the lunch break I went up to Les Muettes myself – the new plug is still working well – and handed the letter
to Monsieur Albert at the gate. He promised to see that Antoine delivered it personally to Villegas.

He was eating his lunch from a basket in the 2 cv. and invited me to join him. I didn’t accept, but as he was clearly bored with the assignment I stayed for a few minutes. We chatted.

‘Have you heard about the visitors we’re having next week, Doctor?’

‘Visitors? Here?’

He nodded. ‘I expect the Commissaire will be warning you. Countrymen of yours, I understand. Three of them. Important.’

I didn’t get much more out of him on the subject. He had warned me because from Monday next the guard on the villa is to be doubled. Extra men are being sent from Martinique. This means a revision of the duty roster and strange faces.

To my surprise Doña Julia telephoned me. The Monday X-ray appointment now proposed, she said, would be convenient for her husband. She wanted to know if I would be present. I said that I would be there and would see that he was put to a minimum of inconvenience. She thanked me politely.

I was surprised because, despite Gillon’s confidence and Delvert’s dark talk of putting pressure on Uncle Paco, I had not expected such a prompt reply to my letter. I telephoned Gillon to report Doña Julia’s call. The assistant told me that he was in a meeting and could not be disturbed, so I left a message and got on with my work.

I had just finished for the day when there was a call from Delvert. Yes, he had heard about the X-ray appointment for Monday. He wished to speak to me on another matter.
On my way home would I mind stopping by to see him at the Hotel Ajoupa, room 406?

Going to the hotel involved a twenty minute detour and I had arranged to be at Elizabeth’s by seven; but he gave me no chance to tell him so. The moment I started to speak he cut in to say that he would expect me shortly and then hung up.

Room 406 turned out to be the sitting-room of a suite. Expensive. Or does S-dec get special rates?

There was a uniformed army lieutenant already there when Delvert let me in, but he made no effort to introduce us. Instead he waved me towards a side table on which there was a bottle of whisky, glasses and an ice bucket.

‘Please help yourself, Doctor. I won’t be a moment.’

It was an odd situation. In fact I know the lieutenant quite well. His name is Billoux and he is a technical officer in charge of the signals section at the Fort. He is also a fellow tennis member of the Club Savane which has two good clay courts and where we have occasionally played as partners in men’s doubles.

This evening, however, he did not seem to want to meet my eyes, much less recognize me. He was carefully inserting a wad of papers into an official-looking satchel attached by a chain to his wrist and sweating slightly as if he were engaged in fusing a peculiarly sensitive bomb. Perhaps, in a way, he was. Obviously Commandant Delvert and S-dec prefer to use army channels of communication rather than those of Préfecture telex or the PTT.

When military courtesies had been exchanged and Billoux had left, satchel under his arm but still without a flicker of recognition in my direction, Delvert visibly relaxed.

‘My apologies for the delay, Doctor.’ He glanced at my drink, added a little more whisky to it and then poured one for himself.

‘I think that you and that young man must know one another,’ he remarked.

‘We’ve played tennis sometimes, yes.’

‘Oh, so that’s it. I saw you trying to catch his eye. Why didn’t you say “hello” to him?’

‘Because he obviously didn’t want me to.’

He sighed. ‘I thought the same. I’m afraid, Doctor, that you are now smeared at your tennis club with the tar-brush of S-dec. I should have introduced you and said that you were here to give me a typhoid injection or something like that. I’m sorry. You see now how it is with us. We are suspect and unloved.’

‘It takes a lot to make me weep, Commandant.’

He smiled and took one small sip of his drink before unlocking the drawer in the table and taking out his briefcase.

‘I know you have an appointment with Madame Duplessis,’ he said, ‘so I won’t keep you long.’

He took papers from the case. ‘Yesterday,’ he went on, ‘you asked for specimens of Villegas’ handwriting. I have them, such as they are. Generally he dictates into a tape-recorder and his wife or a secretary types the stuff out. However, we’ve done our best. Here are two drafts. One is of some lecture notes, the other of an article for his Party news sheet. Both have fairly extensive handwritten corrections.’ He handed them to me. ‘The dates on the top were added by us. The notes, as you see, are over a year old. The article was written three months ago. Will they do for what you want?’

I took the papers over to a chair by the window, sat down with them and made the comparison.

They were photocopies but very clear ones. ‘You’re sure that this is his handwriting and not his wife’s or the secretary’s?’ I asked.

‘Quite sure.’ He had followed me over.

I handed them back to him.

‘Well, Doctor? You look unhappy.’

‘It had crossed my mind that Villegas’ speech impediment
might be an early symptom of Parkinson’s disease. Do you know what that is, Commandant?’

‘Yes.’

‘The slightly fixed expression he has would also be characteristic. But it’s difficult to spot in the early stages. You can sometimes get a clue from the handwriting. It gets much smaller and the lines tend to curve down. That can happen before there’s any visible tremor. If you can catch Parkinsonism in the early stages treatment nowadays can do a lot to help the patient.’

He compared the two samples himself. ‘The fact that the writing
hasn’t
become smaller, is that in any way conclusive?’

‘Only of the fact that one shouldn’t make guesses based on insufficient data. I’m sorry I wasted S-dec’s time.’

‘The relief in knowing that this particular patient does not suffer from Parkinsonism is ample compensation.’

‘I didn’t say that he didn’t suffer from it. I said that there are no signs of it in his writing. Anyway, I’ve only seen the man once.’

‘Well, you’ll be seeing him again now.’

‘Yes.’ I didn’t propose to continue discussing my patient with him, so I changed the subject. ‘My encounter with this man Rosier seemed to amuse Commissaire Gillon. Did it amuse you, Commandant?’

‘A little.’ He gave me the beguiling smile.

‘May I be allowed to share the joke?’

‘Oh, there’s no joke. It’s just that, though it was expected, the contact was made a little early.’

‘It was expected that he would offer me a bribe to bribe Villegas?’

He shrugged. ‘These multi-national corporations are always out to buy political leverage if they think it may be for sale. You can’t blame them. It usually
is
for sale.’

‘And in this case?’

‘You could easily check. Why not try relaying the offer
to Villegas and seeing how he takes it? He’ll know whom it comes from I can assure you.’

‘How?’

‘The use of Rosier as agent and the size of the bid. It’s up two million on the last one, you see, and that was made so tactlessly that it could only be rejected.’

‘But bid for what?’

‘Favour, naturally. If all goes well there will very soon be a rewriting of contracts. Renegotiation of the percentages assigned to the various members of the consortium will have to take place in order to accommodate the new government’s membership. There’ll be haggling. Villegas will have the casting vote, if it is needed.’

‘But this man Rosier – who does he represent?’

‘Several of the multi-nationals own insurance companies. If you’re really curious why don’t you find out which of them owns ATP-Globe? The Chamber of Commerce reference library probably has the information. There’s nothing secret about that.’

‘Are you telling me, Commandant, that Rosier really is an insurance assessor?’

‘Good heavens, no. He’s a professional agent, a very experienced man. We wouldn’t use him of course – he doubles too easily and too often, works for both sides I mean – but he is most able. His supposition that you had at last become a fully integrated part of the package may have been a little reckless, but see how quickly he moved in on you.’

‘Package?’ He had used the English word.

‘I’m sorry to have to employ these Anglo-Americanisms but there seems to be no precise French equivalent.’

‘The package being Plan Polymer?’

‘Oh, he mentioned that, did he?’ He grinned. ‘The secret codeword.’

‘He didn’t seem to think it very secret. He spoke as if it were common knowledge.’

‘I’ve no doubt it is, in some circles. Conspiracy breeds codewords. They multiply like flies on a manure heap.’

‘He described this one as inappropriate. He preferred Fait Accompli.’