Her Lover (13 page)

The ringing of the phone made him jump and brought his chin back to a less imperious angle. He sighed with a weariness born of impatience, said that there was no peace in this place, and picked up the receiver.

'Deume. Yes, sir. I most certainly do have it and I shall bring it up at once. (He got to his feet and buttoned his jacket.) That was V V, he gets on my wick, a dratted nuisance, wants the verbatim record of the Third Session of the PMC, damn it all I'm not the section archivist, that man is getting to be a real pain in the neck. (He unbuttoned his jacket and sat down again defiantly. To keep VV waiting for a few minutes was not to run much of a risk, and Ariane would see that he was not a slave at everybody's beck and call. He'd tell van Vries that it had taken him some time to unearth the verbatim record, which was old. Anyway, what the hell, there was the pat on the back.) So, high and mighty lady,' he went on, 'what do you reckon to this grand dinner party in honour of our beloved Under-Secretary-General?'

'I'll
tell you . . .' she began, resolved to reveal the whole story.

'Just a moment, darling. I'll have to stop you there. I've just thought of something. (VV did not like to be kept waiting, and his voice had sounded rather sharper than usual. Besides, it would create a bad impression if he said he'd had to look high and low for the verbatim record. It would make him look like the kind of disorganized civil servant who can't find his way round his own files. He got up, opened a filing-cabinet, took out a document, and did up his jacket.) Listen, darling, on second thoughts, I'd rather go now. Though generally speaking I take a great pleasure in making old VV wait. But just for once I want to have a bit of peace to chat things over with you, so might as well get it over and done with at once. I'll be off then, but I'll be back straight away. What a bore! Right then, see
you shortly, all right?' he said with a smile, and headed for the door, slowly, to cover up the fact of his capitulation.

Once he was in the corridor, he set off at a run towards the rocket he felt was coming his way. Van Vries's tone had not been reassuring. Outside the door of his hierarchical superior, he prepared a smile, knocked gently, then turned the knob gingerly.

CHAPTER 6

He came in, casual in manner and whistling through his teeth. He sat down, drummed on his desk-top with his fingers, closed the three files, and smiled.

'What's up with you?'

'Nothing, nothing at all,' he said, all innocence. 'Just the opposite, everything's fine. Feeling a touch liverish, that's all,' he said after a moment's silence, and he got to his feet, pressed his hand to his right side and smiled again.

'Oh come on, you'll get round to telling me all about it in the end. Is it your boss?'

He collapsed into his chair and gave her a shipwrecked look.

'He threw the book at me. On account of the British Memorandum. Because I hadn't submitted my comments yet. How he thinks anybody can work in the middle of constant interruptions . . . (He paused, hoping she would ask questions. But she said nothing, so he went on.) He's going to put my shilly-shallying in my annual report, anyway what he calls my shilly-shallying. That means goodbye to my annual increment, and it could perhaps mean I'll get an official warning or even a reprimand from the Secretary-General. So that's how things stand. (His fingers drummed scales of stoical despair on his desk-top.) Naturally it's going to put paid to any chance of promotion, it'll be a black mark in my record. Stuck with it. Like Nessus's tunic, you know. But I've done my best, I told him I'd forward my comments tomorrow morning first thing. He said it was too late, and then he brought up the Cameroon Acknowledgement.
Scathing he was, really scathing. So there we are, it's a disaster. (Again he drummed out the tragic submission to destiny.) I wasn't going to say anything to you, no point you suffering too. (In silence, he glumly turned the handle of the pencil-sharpener.) Retaliation, that's what it is, I'm pretty sure it's because he saw me talking to the USG, it'll be his way of getting even. Jealousy - I told you, didn't I? It didn't take him long. (He looked at her, hoping for support.) You get something like that in your annual report and you're for the chop, curtains, a B for life. So that's it, I've had it, bang goes my future in the international civil service,' he concluded, with a brave smile.

'You're imagining things, it's not as bad as all that,' she said, sensing that he was deliberately exaggerating the seriousness of the situation as a way of extracting words of comfort.

'How come?' he asked eagerly. 'What do you mean?'

'If you let him have the work tomorrow, he won't be cross any more.'

'You think so? Do you really think so?'

'Of course. You can do it at home tonight.'

'Two hundred pages,' he sighed, and shook his head several times, looking like a chastened schoolboy. 'You do realize, don't you, that it'll take me all night?'

'I'll make you lots of black coffee. I'll keep you company, if you want.'

'So you really think it will all turn out all right?'

'Of course it will, don't be silly. Besides, you've got someone on your side now.'

'You mean the Under-Secretary-General? (He knew very well that was who she meant, but wanted to hear her say it. Moreover, he found it comforting to say the prestigious title aloud in full and through its majestic syllables conjure up the shadow of a guardian angel. A magical incantation, in other words.) The Under-Secretary-General?' he repeated, and he gave a wan smile, drew his chair closer, and with one hand clutched his wife's skirt.

'Who else? Judging by what you told me, he was very sweet to you just now.'

'That's right, the Under-Secretary-General,' he said with another smile. He reached mechanically for his pipe, sniffed at the bowl, which was now cold, and put it down again on his desk. 'You're right. Very sweet.'

'You said he asked which section you worked in?'

'Asked very nicely too, really, wanted to know what I specialized in, if I liked my work, took an interest. And he called me Deume.'

'And he asked you to sit down and you chatted.'

'Man to man. Never made me aware of the difference in rank.'

'And then there's the pat on the back.'

'Oh yes, the pat on the back,' he beamed, and he knocked his pipe out and refilled it.

'I believe it was a hefty pat?'

'Very. Just here, it was. I bet my shoulder is still red from it. Would you like to see?'

'No, don't bother. I believe you.'

'And coming from someone who is more important than the Deputy Secretary-General!'

'Or even the Secretary-General,' she said, going one better.

'Quite! Because Sir John, you know, is golf, golf and golf, apart from that he's just a figurehead who says amen to whatever the USG tells him to. So you see how important that pat on the back was!'

'I do see,' she said, and she bit her lip.

He lit his pipe, sucked in a sweet, calming lungful, then got up and paced around his small office, wreathed in a cloud of tobacco smoke, with one hand in his pocket and the other round the bowl of the pipe.

'I'll tell you shumthing, Arianny,' he said, without removing the pipe from between his teeth, which made him slurp his words like van Goelerkhen's fat wife, 'I'm shertain VV won't take it any further, hish bark'sh louder than hish bite, sho don't worry your head about it, and even if he putsh in a bad report on me it doezhn't bother me none, shee? I'm not schcared of the shwine, the mountain will bring forth a moushe! (He sat down again, propped his feet on his desk and see-sawed. His pipe, still airily clamped between his teeth, purred damply at intervals.) But the charm of the man! You musht have notished it at the Brajilian reshepchion. An indefinable miksh, don't you think? The impreshion hish mind'sh elshewhere when you talk to him, that short of shcornful tilt of the head, like a marble busht, and then all of a shudden that disharming shmile of hish, sho attractive. He'sh a real charmer. Anyway, Countesh Kanyo and I shee eye to eye on that, take it from me. Did I ever tell you about the woman who doesh for Petrechco?'

'No,' she said. (He put his pipe, now out, in the ashtray.)

'It's quite fascinating. I forgot to tell you. Yes, Petresco lives at Pont-Ceard, not far from the Countess's chateau.'

'I've been to Pont-Ceard. There's no chateau there.'

'Well, a rather splendid house, then. But that's beside the point. The woman who looks after Petresco is very pally with the Countess's personal maid, which means that Petresco has a pretty good idea of everything that goes on at the Countess's. He told Kanakis, who told me in strict confidence. Apparently the Countess waits in for the USG every night. (Privily, excitedly, slyly, guiltily, deliciously shocked by this titbit of rather scandalous gossip, he poked out his tapered tongue.) Apparently every night she dolls herself up to the nines, sumptuous dinner on the table, bowls of super-duper fruit, flowers, the whole shoot. She waits for him for hours. (He gave a perfunctory glance to right and left and lowered his voice to a whisper.) Apparently more often than not he doesn't show up. Every evening, she gets ready as if he's supposed to be coming, sits for hours by the window watching to see if he'll turn up in his Rolls, and then he doesn't. Highly significant, wouldn't you say?'

She stood up, read the title of the books on a shelf, and forced a yawn.

'Have you ever seen this baroness?'

'Countess,' he corrected her. 'Higher rank altogether. Old Hungarian aristocracy, oodles of diplomats in the family. Of course I've seen her, she's always at the Assembly, comes to meetings of the Council, committees, anywhere he's likely to be, can't take her eyes off him. It wouldn't surprise me if she were downstairs this very minute, hanging about in the lobby, especially since she knows all the best people, she would, wouldn't she, seeing that her father was such a high-up. What's the matter, darling?'

'Nothing. I don't much care for such goings-on. That's all.'

'Well, he's not married and she's a widow, so they're both free.'

'They should get married, then.'

'Some of the very best people have affairs, you know. What about Louis XIV and Madame de Maintenon?'

'That was a morganatic marriage.'

'All right then, Aristide Briand has been having an affair, everybody knows, but no one thinks the worse of him on that account.'

'I do.'

He looked at her, his eyes large and kindly behind his glasses. What was biting her? Better change the subject.

'So, great and high-born lady, you don't think too badly of my little
chez moil
Obviously, there aren't any Gobelin tapestries on the wall like in the USG's office, but it's not too awful, is it? If you'd seen the offices they have in ministry buildings in Belgium, you'd realize how luxurious things are here. Besides, it's a pretty privileged set-up. In this place, we're on a Diplomatic footing, you know. Hours, for example. In the afternoon we generally make a start at three or even later, but if required we've got to stay on until easily seven, eight at night, as they do in the Quai d'Orsay or the Foreign Office. Here the atmosphere is very different from the International Labour Office, where everybody has to go at it hammer and tongs, I say "has to" but in fact they love it, it's another world, you know, all those trade unionists and left-wingers. Here the tone is Diplomatic Service and life's very pleasant. Look, I'll show you, I'll tot up the days when I don't work. (Highly pleased with himself before he had even begun, he took out a propelling pencil and a pad and ran his tongue over his lips.) To kick off, every month, there's the day's leave every official can take without having to send in a doctor's certificate, article thirty-one of Staff Regulations. I make the most of that, as you'd imagine. (He made a note.) So, twelve extra days a year off work.'

(This calls for a word of explanation. The said article thirty-one was intended to cover an indisposition unique to women, but the prudish men who had drafted the Staff Regulations had not dared be so specific. It followed therefore that male officials also had the right to be indisposed on one day every month without the requirement to supply medical evidence.)

'So,' repeated Adrien Deume, 'twelve extra days a year off work. Are you with me? (With his handsome gold propelling pencil and a relaxed, easy smile, he carefully noted the figure twelve.) Then twice a year I can wangle special sick-leave, as long as I can provide a doctor's certificate. Overwork, say. Incidentally, what they put on the last certificate was a peach. Reactive stress. Isn't that just marvellous? So, two lots of sick-leave, a couple of weeks apiece, say, no inching on. So, another thirty extra days off work! Thirty plus twelve makes forty-two, that's right, isn't it, agreed? Forty-two it is. (When he had written the figure down, he acknowledged it with a delighted "ta-ra!") Then we have the thirty-six working days of official leave a year, the normal leave, all above board, article forty-three of the Regulations. Right! But note they are
working
days!' he exclaimed excitedly. 'So in practice, it comes to more than thirty-six days off! There are five and a half working days in a week. That means that my annual leave of thirty-six working days turns out in fact to be forty-five days when I don't have to come in! We'd got up to forty-two extra days' leave. Add the forty-five for official leave and that brings us up to eighty-seven! That's correct, isn't it? (Eagerly:) Will you do the adding-up the same time as me, darling? (He passed her a piece of paper and a pencil. He was civility itself.) So, eighty-seven rest days! Next,' he whispered like a guilty but playful schoolboy owning up, 'there are the fifty-two Saturday mornings which should be worked in theory but never are, when Lord Adrien of Deume sits back and enjoys the good life! (Riding high on his buoyant mood and forgetting the need to maintain his dignity and manly, sober bearing, he let out one of his braying schoolboy laughs which emerged from a tremendous clearing of the throat.) It's all above board and you can't say different, what can anybody do in an hour or two? It really isn't worth traipsing in all that way from Cologny to the Palais for a couple of hours' work at most, because even chaps who come in on a Saturday are away by noon! There's no point. Anyway, VV never turns out on a Saturday, come Friday evening he shoots off in a plane to look after his VIPs from The Hague or Amsterdam, which means a lot of sucking-up. So why should I put myself out? So, fifty-two Saturday mornings amount practically speaking, note the practically, to twenty-six special little days off. Eighty-seven plus twenty-six, that makes a hundred and thirteen, unless my maths have let me down. Aren't you totting it up too, to check I've got it right?' he said anxiously. 'Oh well, please yourself. So we'd got up to a hundred and lovely thirteen. (Sticking his tongue out, he wrote the figure down.) One hundred and thirteen!' he hummed. 'Oh, and then we mustn't forget the fifty-two Saturday afternoons and fifty-two Sundays. But let's get this absolutely right: I've counted six of each in my official holiday already plus four of each when I was adding up my sick-leave. Are you with me?'