House of All Nations (97 page)

‘Come up!' He said to them, ‘Manray knows something.'

Manray looked round at the company when he came in. ‘I must see you alone: it's urgent,' he said low and earnestly. His round face looked tired, too.

‘If it's about Raccamond, you can tell everything: we know all about it.'

Manray was embarrassed but he said manfully, ‘Mr. Bertillon, I just went over to Raccamond's house, and,' his voice fell, ‘he looked wretched. I know everything that he has to tell. He has a lot of books there, the London Finance Corporation, and all, and he says they're blinds, for the bank to sell out the investments of its own clients. He says no shares were done in the markets, only written on our books.'

Jules cried, ‘What the hell did you go down there for, anyway? I told you to wait in the board room.'

‘Mr. Bertillon, what else could I do? As soon as I got downstairs, he was on the phone. I rang off, telling him I was busy. He rang up again, then she spoke and they kept insisting, “Come right away, most important, secret, for the bank; otherwise it would mean ruin.” They said not to tell you: I was scared.'

‘You had no right going down there without telling me. What did he say to you?'

‘It was the woman who kept talking all the time. He hardly said a word, and when he began to speak she shut him up and turned to me and said, “No, this is the situation.” She's the real Raccamond, Mr. Bertillon.'

He told them the conversation he had had with them. Bertillon said, ‘And are you going to resign, Jacques.'

Jacques hesitated, ‘No, Mr. Bertillon. I didn't know what to do. It was all news to me; I was confused, and I was trying to make out why they wanted me over there to tell me all that. I couldn't make out why the woman was doing all the talking. I said that to gain time. And I didn't know what I was going to do. But I didn't want to play whatever game they had.' He hesitated, looking round the circle, said in a lower but firm tone, ‘Raccamond's sick but that wife of his is determined: either they want to ruin the bank, or they want blackmail. I can't make out. Maybe Carrière is behind him. He used to be Carrière's man.'

‘I don't think so,' said Jules. ‘No, no: Carrière wants us to pay him, doesn't he? Listen, Jacques, are you going to stick by me?'

‘Yes, Mr. Bertillon,' said Jacques in a low tone. ‘I don't see what else I can do.' He realized that Alphendéry and Comte de Guipatin were standing by Jules. Jacques was worried, though; he got up the courage to say, ‘Only, I'd just like to know—if what he says is true.'

‘You've given us prices yourself, Jacques,' said Alphendéry.

‘I know, I know,' worried Jacques, ‘only' (almost to himself) ‘I didn't know it was so ba—so much. But the rest—that you never bought or sold at all?'

‘No,' Jules reassured him, ‘in that he's just gone clean off his head. Don't bother about that.'

Jacques thought of something else. ‘They're going to ring me again tomorrow and make another appointment with me: they say they'll show me the books, they think. I don't know what they want me for. I told them I couldn't stay long this afternoon, because there was work to do. They kept saying, “You're working for nothing: it's all a swindle.” What shall I do?'

‘Put him off.'

Jacques worried, ‘He might go to others.'

‘Listen, Jacques: he's been to about a dozen people already. He spoke to Mouradzian two months ago, and since. Mouradzian came here and warned me in his own way. If he wants you so badly, he must have something in mind. Be nice to him but coax him along till we find out his game.'

‘It's a time equation,' said William.

‘He must have something in mind for you,' said the Comte. ‘Let me do something for you, Jules? I'll go and see the Raccamonds this evening myself.'

‘Say,' Jules exclaimed, ‘while you're there, see if he's in cahoots with this rat Parouart. There's some tangle there.'

* * *

Scene Eighty-six: Samson Redivivus

A
ristide strode into the Paris office on the morning of the next day with a portentous air. He frowned at the appointments of the bank. ‘Handsome as a share pusher's bank,' he muttered. He said nothing to any of the personnel, simply went in and said to Urbain Voulou, ‘Everything all right while I was away? I caught flu: I've still got a fever, but urgent business arising from the Brussels visit—I hope Mme. de Sluys-Forêt got her
restitutions
!'

‘Yes,' said Voulou meekly. The market being down, he was ready to flatter the proud. ‘Alphendéry saw to that. She was very nice when she left.'

Aristide waved this aside. ‘Is Bertillon in yet? I think I saw his Hispano outside.'

‘Yes,' Voulou admitted in mild surprise, ‘but I think he's got someone with him.'

‘He will see me,' Aristide said.

Aristide Raccamond burst into the room, haggard, swept them all with a ‘terrible' avenging grimace, and threw three large books on to the carpet in front of them. Then he placed his right foot on top of them, balancing his great body with an elephantine dignity, and thrusting his head forward, glared under bent eyebrows at Jules.

Jules surveyed this with calm. ‘Well, Aristide!'

‘Answer,' said Aristide, pointing at the books with an accusing finger.

Alphendéry had a flash of illumination: he cried, ‘Harry Baur!'

Jean de Guipatin gave a clap of laughter. ‘That's it!'

‘What?' asked Jules, turning his head with the slow dignity of a stick insect.

‘Aristide's imitating Harry Baur in a Bernstein play,' explained Jean de Guipatin.

But they did not laugh. Jules turned his head with the same motion, back to Aristide. Aristide looked suddenly at them, bent and picked up the books. At the same moment, they all had the same regret: why hadn't Jean given Aristide a blow and got the books? Had Aristide this idea, too? He looked at Jean de Guipatin and moved away from him, replacing the books cannily under his coat.

‘Answer,' he said to Jules. ‘You have no answer.'

‘Don't act the fool, Aristide,' said the Comte de Guipatin.

Aristide swung round to him. ‘You,' he said weightily, ‘you, Comte de Guipatin, do not know what they have done? You do not know that your friend Jules Bertillon is a blackguard?'

‘What Bertillon has done is his own affair: I don't steal books,' said the Comte roughly. ‘You are acting like a blackmailer, Aristide, and you deserve to be treated like one.'

‘Monsieur le Comte, you stand by your friends—but if you knew what I know, you would consider it an affair of honor: you have been swindled by this—' he turned round and gave Jules a glance of contempt, ‘this skipjack.'

Before the Comte could answer, Jules said sharply, ‘Cut the act, Raccamond: give me the books and tell me what you want. You want something.'

‘Gangster,' said Raccamond forcibly.

‘I'll knock you down if you insult my brother,' remarked William, rising and eying him. Guipatin motioned William back; William took no notice of this, for Aristide was a coward and had taken a step towards the door. In his warm, pleasant voice, Guipatin begged Raccamond to be reasonable, give up the books which he had no right to, and which concerned private accounts. He was surprised, he said, to see Raccamond, of whose ability he had the highest opinion, behave so irresponsibly. Someone had lied to him, some miserable clerk, perhaps, with the idea of plundering Raccamond. What a position Raccamond was in! He could be blackmailed by this clerk forever. And Raccamond was lucky if Jules Bertillon did not dismiss him immediately without handing over his clients, for, Guipatin assured him, ‘People of my acquaintance do not deal with blackmailers. A blackmailer is welcome nowhere. You do not realize, Aristide, that your present behavior will only be called blackmail by persons of position. You do not see yourself this way, Aristide, because you are a dramatic type and you see yourself as a personage in a financial drama. You are excited by the Kreuger history. You think you have walked into a robbers' lair; you have only walked into a mare's-nest. My poor, my good friend, collect yourself; think where you stand. If you think you've been robbed, let's go over the accounts, all together. No one here wants to rob you. You're not a subordinate—you're a person very much valued by Mr. Bertillon and by myself. I myself asked Mr. Bertillon to accept your clients.' A pause. The Comte de Guipatin was every inch a comte!

Raccamond looked at them all dubiously, with a certain cunning. He looked strange enough, in his lamentable heavy fat, with the books bulging his coat. After a moment he said, addressing himself only to Guipatin, ‘Monsieur de Comte, I must respect what you say: you are an honest man. I must see you alone. Will you come outside with me?'

Jules nodded faintly. ‘What have you to tell me that you cannot say here before my friends, Raccamond?'

‘You don't understand, Monsieur le Comte!'

‘I can't speak to you while you have some books stolen from the offices of my friend. You don't seem to understand, Aristide, that it is—simply and plainly impossible for me.'

‘I will take these books home and come and meet you,' said Aristide. ‘Monsieur le Comte, I cannot give the books back, I cannot: they are my only defense! They have ruined us all,' he cried suddenly, looking at them all, in misery. ‘We are all ruined, Monsieur le Comte.'

‘You had better leave the books here, Aristide: whatever you think, it is not your business,' said Guipatin.

‘No, never!' cried Aristide, starting back. ‘No, my whole future is bound up with them!'

‘Where shall we meet?' asked the Comte.

Aristide moved impulsively nearer to him; the Comte, carefully indulgent, watched him come. ‘Come with me, Monsieur le Comte!'

‘Go,' said Jules coldly.

They waited. In half an hour they had a phone call from the Comte, telling them that Aristide, who was very decided, had agreed to come to a parley at Jules's house at eight-thirty that evening.

‘Why my house?' argued Jules. ‘I don't want him there: let him come to the bank.'

Jean de Guipatin's persuasive voice over the phone detailed their conversation. ‘He's always been anxious to see your interior, Jules: if he can achieve this great visit, with his books, perhaps we'll have him calmer. Raccamond is a holdup man with weaknesses: his chief foible is luxury and period furniture. Be as grand as you like, Jules: put on evening dress … pretend you've just come from dinner. I told him you were dining with Débuts of the Banque du Littoral du Nord. He's impressed. I'll be in dinner jacket myself. Tell your butler to be theatrical. That is what Aristide understands. I can't say I've succeeded. He's gone home to talk with his wife. But this is the first step gained, at any rate. He's not going to the police tonight. By the way, he insists on seeing you alone, without your aides-de-camp, in his language. At the same time, have someone there—William, Michel perhaps. Do you mind my coming? I'm supposed to meet him this evening and act as his second. I thought it the most likely way to get hold of the books!'

‘Yes: meet him at my house.'

‘Let it be grand, Jules: put the lusters on … act the grandee!'

‘Trust me!'

* * *

Scene Eighty-seven: An Interview

A
fter dinner Jules took a book and seated himself in a divided reception room. The others went behind the double-doors and took coffee with Claire-Josèphe. She was one of the prettiest women in Paris. She was now in a sober dinner dress from Molyneux, without ornaments, but with her hair curled and piled in a ravishing design, calculated to impose respect even on a blackmailer.

When Aristide rang at the door, the footman, in evening dress, opened it and greeted Aristide with the air attributed by the good-hearted to grand dukes. Aristide did not reply, but walked in heavily, burdened with the three books.

‘Mr. Raccamond?' said the footman.

‘Yes.'

‘Mr. Raccamond,' announced the footman, in half-tones.

Aristide looked up, saw another splendid domestic at the head of the staircase, and bit his lip. He thrust his hat at the footman and began to climb the stairs, his eyes wild, sorrowful, and rimmed with fatigue. He now stared with spite and hate at the white stone stairs, the tapestries, the carved chest, the metal plates.

‘Mr. Raccamond,' announced the butler loudly at the entrance to the salon. Raccamond lingered behind him for a moment to adjust the sliding books and his eye fell on a beautiful lacquer vase. He trembled. He pushed aside the half-draped curtain, pushed back the butler, and, rushing towards Jules, cried with trembling finger, ‘You're a thief, you've stolen all you've got. I know you!' He looked back at the butler to see if he had heard and cried again, ‘You're a shark, a low thief, a pickpocket: you're not the grandee you pretend to be. I know you.'

The butler hesitated, waiting for a sign from Jules to pinion Raccamond.

‘That is all, Meadows,' said Jules.

The butler went off to tell Claire-Josèphe and the coffee drinkers that their visitor had arrived. But they were already silent, listening to the raised voice. Guipatin frowned. He had left Raccamond in a reasonable state of mind: where had he drunk up this fury?

‘From that woman,' said Claire-Josèphe. ‘I just know she twists him round her finger. She's like these men that climb telegraph poles: he's the bit of rope she pushes up, knots up, and puts her foot in.'

William was listening at the door.

Aristide, bowed, bullish, his loose lapels hanging largely out from his tortoise belly, stood in the archway looking at Jules.

Jules got up and came forward. ‘Aristide, sit down. Put the books down. What are you afraid of?'

Aristide came slowly forward until he stood in the middle of the room: his grip on the books tightened. Then he suddenly said in a loud stormy tone, ‘I brought you clients worth millions of francs and I don't know what's going on in the bank. They might all have been ruined! I would have had to commit suicide. These books conceal gigantic—' he took a step forward as if he staggered slightly—'incredible operations of fraud.'