“Good heavens!” Almira exclaimed in a way that told me she was furious we’d not returned earlier. Probably planned how we’d be sipping aperitifs or something clearly innocent when he arrived. “Look who’s here! How ever did you manage to find us, Paul?”
With a man of vigour, you’d say uncoiled from the car. Paulie unravelled.
“Good evening, Almira.” He’d been ordered to sound portentous. “Lovejoy.”
“Wotcher, Paulie. Alone, I see.”
“Afraid so. It’s Cissie.”
“Oh, aye.” When was it ever not? I didn’t say it.
“She’s ill, Lovejoy. She wants you to come. I phoned home to find you, Lovejoy. And heard you were here, at your friend Claudine’s chateau, Almira.”
Suspicious, but maybe true.
“What are you doing in France, Paulie?” I asked, eyes narrowing, ready to disbelieve.
“We were on our way to Marseilles, a clinic there. Cissie’s been ill, took a turn for the worse on the journey. I got her seen at the local hospital. She’s there now, Lovejoy.”
It might just be true. I looked at Almira, who was being all concerned. “Oh, poor thing,” and all that. I wondered how genuine we three were all being. He honestly did look distressed. But was Cissie truly honestly ill, or had Paulie merely been ordered to do King Lear?
“Come where?” I gave back, wary. Coming on Cissie’s orders was no simple matter.
“The general hospital, Lovejoy. It’s about forty miles. I’ll drive as soon as I’ve got myself together.”
Madame Raybaud hove into view, sombre of mien. Old women everywhere have this knack of sensing morbidity. They’re drawn to it like motorists to an accident.
“Poor thing!” et sympathetic cetera from Almira. “I hope it’s nothing serious…?”
His eyes wavered. “I… I’d better let them tell you there,” he said. “She wants to see Lovejoy. For his help.”
If he was acting, it wasn’t bad. If it was genuine, it was, well, a totally different game. Maybe not even a game at all.
“How come you know Almira?” I asked, still wary.
“Know each other?” She gave me her huge eyes, a half-incredulous laugh. “This is no time for silly jealousy, Lovejoy!” She coloured slightly. “Paul has been my investment counsellor for over six years!”
So the party line was that she knew about Cissie and, formerly, me. And about Cissie and, now, good old Paulie. Therefore Cissie knew about Almira and me, and wouldn’t blab to Jay. One thing rankled, though. I’d never known Cissie pass up a chance to stab an orphan kitten, let alone make a cutting remark about my indiscretions. Cissie would have slashed me with some remark about consorting with rich married women. Apart from that little flaw, their combined story could just be true.
“Why does she want me?” I asked. She never had before.
“She wants to tell you herself, Lovejoy.” He looked at me, then away. “We’ve not got all that long.”
“Oh, my
An hour later, we hit the road in Paulie’s Jag. I looked back several times, but we weren’t followed, far as I could tell. I perked up. Maybe the hospital had some antique medical instruments for sale. I know a collector in the Midlands gives good prices for mint surgical stuff. I’d ask Cissie, if we were on speaking terms. I wondered if she knew the word for charades in French.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
« ^ »
Maybe it’s the ambience—or one of those other words that sound full of the ineffable—but foreign hospitals seem more scary. Our own always smell of overboiled cabbage, resound to the clash of instruments and lifts whirring down to green-painted underground corridors with lagged pipes chugging overhead. Hideous but knowable. Hideous and unknowable is worse.
The day slid into dusk as we drove. What little I could see of the countryside was sculptured. Quite classic, really. From a prominence in a small lane you could see the line of sea with a small ship, though I’m bad on direction. Almira sat in the back, talking Poor Cissie’s Ordeal and occasionally sobbing, though women’s tears are often not. I dithered between doubt and doom. I mean, I didn’t even want to be here. I wanted home.
“How come you’re here really, Paulie?” I asked in a straightish bit. Don’t distract the driver.
“Ah,” he said. He hadn’t been told what to say when cross-questioned. But it still didn’t mean fraud. Like I said, he’s thick.
“In France,” I said. “If we are in France,” I added to rub it in. Then I thought, hey, hang on. What had I just said?
“Well, ah, you see, Lovejoy,” Paulie was saying, lost, when Almira put her oar in.
“Didn’t you mention you were coming over for Cissie’s health, Paul? That clinic, Marseilles?”
