The Only Problem (10 page)

There’s a lot more,’ said
Stewart. ‘If you’re not coming back to England I’d better come there. Have you
got hold of Martin Deschamps?’

‘Who
the hell is he?’

‘Your
Paris lawyer.’

‘Oh,
him. No. I don’t need lawyers. I’m not a criminal. Look, I’ve got to get rid of
these reporters. By the way,’ Harvey continued, partly for the benefit of the
police who had undoubtedly tapped the phone, and partly because he meant it, ‘I
must tell you that the more I look at La Tour’s “Job” the more I’m impressed by
the simplicity, the lack of sentimentality above all. It’s a magnificent —’Don’t
get on the wrong side of the press,’ shouted Stewart.

‘Oh, I
don’t intend to see them. Ruth and I have had very little sleep.’

‘Make
an appointment for a press conference, late afternoon, say five o’clock,’ said
Stewart. ‘I’ll send you Deschamps.’

‘No
need,’ said Harvey, and hung up.

None
the less, he managed to mollify the soaking pressmen outside his house,
speaking to them from an upstairs window, by making an appointment with them
for five o’clock that afternoon. They didn’t all go away, but they stopped
battering at the doors.

Then,
to Ruth’s amazement their newly-engaged, brisk domestic help, Anne-Marie,
arrived, with a bag of provisions. It was her second week on the job. She
managed to throw off the reporters who crowded round her with questions, by
upbraiding them for disturbing the baby, and by pushing her way through.
Inside the front door, Harvey stood ready to open it quickly, admitting her and
nobody else.

‘The
police,’ Anne-Marie said, ‘were at my house yesterday for hours. Questions,
questions.’ But she seemed remarkably cheerful about the questions.

SEVEN

A long ring at the front
doorbell. Outside in the pouring rain a police car waited. From the upper
window Harvey saw the interrogator he had left less than twelve hours ago in
the headquarters at Epinal.

‘Ah,’
said Harvey from the window. ‘I’ve been missing you dreadfully.’

‘Look,’
said the man, ‘I’m not enjoying this, am I? Just one or two small questions to
clarify —’

‘I’ll
let you in.’

The
policeman glanced through the open door at the living room as he passed. Harvey
conducted him to a small room at the back of this part of the château. The room
had a desk and a few chairs; it hadn’t been furnished or re-painted; it was less
smart and new than the police station at Epinal, but it was the next best
thing.

‘You
have no clue, absolutely no idea where your wife is?’

‘No.
Where do you yourselves think she is?’

‘Hiding
out in the woods. Or gone across into Germany. Or hiding in Paris. These people
have an organisation,’ said the inspector.

‘If she’s
in the woods she would be wet,’ said Harvey, glaring at the sheet rain outside
the window.

‘Is she
a strong woman? Any health complications?’

‘Well,
she’s slim, rather fragile. Her health’s all right so far as I know,’ Harvey
said.

‘If she
contacts you, it would be obliging if you would invite her to the house. The
same applies to Nathan Fox.’

‘But I
don’t want my wife in the house. I don’t want to oblige her. I don’t need
Nathan Fox,’ Harvey said.

‘When
things quieten down she might try to contact you. You might oblige us by
offering her a refuge.’

‘I
should have thought you had the house surrounded.’

‘We do.
We mean to keep it surrounded. You know, these people are heavily armed, they have
sophisticated weapons. It might occur to them to take you hostages, you and the
baby. Of course, they would be caught before they could get near you. But you
might help us by issuing an invitation.’

‘It’s
all a supposition,’ Harvey said. ‘I’m not convinced that this woman-terrorist
is my wife, nor that my wife is a terrorist. As for Nathan Fox, he’s a mystery
to me, but I wouldn’t have thought he’d draw attention to himself by going off
and joining an armed band at the very moment when they were active.’

‘If
your wife is a fascinating woman —’I hope,’ said Harvey, ‘that you’re taking
special precautions to protect the baby.’

‘You
admit that the baby might be in danger?’

‘With
an armed gang around, any baby might be in danger.’

‘But
you admit that your wife’s baby might be an object of special interest to your
wife.’

‘She
has taken no interest in the child.’

‘Then
why are you suggesting that we specially protect this child?’

‘I hope
you have made arrangements to do so,’ said Harvey.

‘We
have your house and grounds surrounded.’

‘The
baby,’ said Harvey, ‘must be sent back to England. My sister-in-law will take
her.’

‘A good
idea. We can arrange for them to leave, quietly, with every protection. But it
would be advisable for you to keep the move as secret as possible. I mean the
press. We don’t want this gang to know every move. I warn you to be careful
what you say to the press. The examining magistrate —’The press! They’ve
already —The man spread his hands helplessly. ‘This wasn’t my fault. These things
leak out. After all, it’s a matter of national concern. But not a word about
your plans to send the child away.

‘The
maid will know. They talk —’

‘Anne-Marie
is one of our people,’ said the inspector.

‘You
don’t say! We rather liked her.’

‘She’d
better stay on with you, then. And hang out baby clothes on the line, as you
always want to do. I might look in again soon.’

‘Don’t
stand on ceremony.

‘How is it possible,’ Ruth
said, ‘that the police think the gang might turn up here, now that this story’s
all over the papers, on the radio, the television? It’s the last place they
would come to. Clara’s safer here than anywhere. How can they think —’

‘The
police don’t think so, they only say they think so.’

‘Why?’

‘How do
I know? They suspect me strongly. They want the baby out of France. Maybe it’s
got something to do with their public image.’

‘I don’t
want to go,’ said Ruth.

‘I don’t
want you to go,’ said Harvey, ‘but I think you should. It’s only for a while. I
think you must.’

‘Are
you free to come, too? Harvey, let’s both get away. ‘On paper, I’m free to go.
In fact, they might detain me. The truth is, I don’t want to leave just at this
moment. Just bloody-mindedness on my part.’

‘I can
be stubborn, too,’ said Ruth; but she spoke with a fluidity that implied she was
giving way. ‘But, after all,’ she went on, ‘I suppose you didn’t ask me to come
here in the first place.’

Harvey
thought, I don’t love her, I’m not in the least in love with her. Much of the
time I don’t even like her very much.

Anne-Marie
had put some soup on the table. Harvey and Ruth were silent before her, now
that she wasn’t a maid but a police auxiliary. When she had left, Ruth said, ‘I
don’t know if I’ll be able to keep this down. I’m pregnant.’

‘How
did that happen?’ Harvey said.

‘The
same as it always happens.’

‘How
long have you known?’

‘Three
weeks.’

‘Nobody
tells me anything,’ Harvey said.

‘You
don’t want to know anything.’

Had
Ruth stopped taking the pill? Was it his child or Nathan’s? She didn’t guess
his first thought, but she did his second. ‘I never slept with Nathan, ever,’
she said. ‘His mind’s on Effie — That’s one thing I didn’t mention to the
police.’

‘Take
some bread with your soup. You’ll keep it down better.’

‘You
know, I’d rather not go back to England. Now that Edward’s having this amazing
success —

‘What
success?’

‘He’s
having an astonishing success on the West End. That play —’

‘Well,
how long have you known about this?’

‘Three
weeks. It’s been in the papers, and he wrote —’

‘Nobody
tells me anything.’

‘I
think it funny Edward hasn’t rung us up to-day. He must have seen the papers,’
Ruth said. ‘Maybe it scared him. A scandal.’

‘Where
would you like to go?’ Harvey said.

‘Have
you got anyone in Canada I could take Clara to?’

‘I have
an aunt and I have an uncle in Toronto. They’re married but they live in
separate houses. You could go to either. I’ll ring up.

‘I’ll
go to the uncle,’ said Ruth. She started to smile happily, but she was crying
at the same time.

‘There’s
nothing to worry about,’ Harvey said.

‘Yes
there is. There’s Effie. There’s Edward.’

‘What
about Edward?’

‘He’s a
shit. He might have wanted to know if I was all right. He’s been writing all
the time I’ve been here, and phoning every day since we got the telephone put
in. Up to now.’

Anne-Marie
came in with a splendid salad, a tray of cheeses.

‘Shall
I help Madame to pack after lunch?’ she said.

‘How
did she know I was leaving?’ Ruth said when the maid had gone out.

‘Somebody
told her. Everyone knows everything,’ said Harvey, ‘except me.’

Ruth was in the bedroom,
packing, and Harvey was pushing the furniture here and there to make a distance
between the place where he intended to sit to receive the reporters, and the
part of the room reserved for them. Ruth, Harvey thought as he did so, has been
crying a lot over the past few weeks, crying and laughing. I noticed, but I
didn’t notice. I wonder if she cried under the interrogation, and laughed?
Anyway, it isn’t this quite unlooked-for event that’s caused her to cry and
laugh, it started earlier. Did she tell the police she was pregnant? Probably.
Maybe that’s why they want to get rid of her. Is she really pregnant? Harvey
plumped up a few cushions. Yellow chintzes, lots of yellow; at least, the
chintzes had a basis of yellow, so that you saw yellow when you came into the
room. New chintzes: all right, order new chintzes. Curtains and cushions and
cosiness: all right, order them; have them mail my lawyer the bill. You say you
need a château: all right, have the château, my lawyers will fix it. Harvey
kicked an armchair. It moved smoothly on its castors into place. Ruth, he
thought, is fond of the baby. She adores Clara. Who wouldn’t? But Clara belongs
to me, that is, to my wife, Effie. No, Clara belongs to Ruth and depends on
Ruth. It’s good-bye, goodbye, to Clara. He looked at his watch. Time to
telephone Toronto, it’s about ten in the morning there. The story of playboy
Harvey Gotham and his terrorist connections are certainly featured in the
Canadian press, on the radio, the television.

Anne-Marie
had come in, shiny black short hair, shiny black eyes, clear face. She had a
small waist, stout hips. She carried a transistor radio playing rock music
softly enough not to justify complaint.

‘Do you
know how to get a number on the telephone, long-distance to Toronto?’ Harvey
said.

‘Of
course,’ said the policewoman.

He
thought, as he gave her the number, She doesn’t look like a police official,
she looks like a maid. Bedworthy and married. She’s somebody’s wife. Every
woman I have to do with is somebody’s wife. Ruth, Job’s wife, and Effie who is
still my wife, and who is shooting up the supermarkets. Twelve people hurt and
millions of francs’ theft and damage. If the police don’t soon get the gang
there will be deaths; housewives, policemen, children murdered. Am I
responsible for my wife’s debts? Her wounded, her dead?

Anne-Marie
had left the transistor while she went to telephone; the music had been
interrupted and the low murmur of an announcement drew Harvey’s attention; he
caught the phrases: terrorist organisation … errors of justice …; he
turned the volume up. It was a bulletin from FLE issued to a Paris news agency,
vindicating its latest activities. The gang was going to liberate Europe from
its errors. ‘Errors of society, errors of the system.’ Most of all, liberation from
the diabolical institution of the
gendarmerie
and the brutality of the
Brigade
Criminelle.
It was much the same as every other terrorist announcement
Harvey had ever read. ‘The multinationals and the forces of the reactionary
imperialist powers …’ It was like an alarm clock that ceases to wake the
sleeper who, having heard it morning after morning, simply puts out a hand and
switches it off without even opening his eyes.

The
bulletin was followed by an announcement that fifty inspectors of the
Brigade
Criminelle
were now investigating FLE’s activities in the Vosges where the
terrorists were still believed to be hiding out. End of announcement: on with
the music.