On the second floor I fiddled around at the door of Number 17 with the Number 15 key, cursed aloud because I couldn’t open it and then went to the chambermaid’s room at the end of the corridor and asked her to open my room for me. I’d been given the wrong key at the desk. She obliged and took key Number 15 off me. The world is full of unsuspecting women always ready to help a man out of trouble.
I did a quick and neat turnover of Paulet’s room. Quick, because there wasn’t much to see, and neat because I didn’t want him to know anyone had been in the place rummaging. I learned that he was in a poor way so far as pants and shirts were concerned, and was halfway through a livre de poche called Vipère au Poing by Herve Bazin; that his second pair of shoes wanted resoling, and that men have a way of stuffing things in their dressing-gown pockets and forgetting them. For him I suppose there was some excuse because he had actually found the letter in his pocket. It had been put there by the woman he lived with in Paris—his estranged wife would never have written in the same terms. I sat down and applied my rather fractured French to it. The first sentence explained that she was packing it, unknown to him, in his dressing-gown pocket—so that he would have a nice surprise when he found it. After that it was mildly erotic in a pleasant way. The woman was obviously stuck on him. She signed herself Thérèse and had added a footnote which came out in my translation as:
You rightly have a high regard for Monsieur Carver’s reputation, so please be careful. Men who are both pleasant and clever can be dangerous. I know this because that is the way you are. So watch yourself. To lose you, my darling, would make life empty for me. A thousand embraces. T.
Pleasant, clever, dangerous. I didn’t know whether to be flattered. It was interesting to know, however, that she put Paulet in the same category. Very interesting. I made a mental note of the address on the headed notepaper. You never knew when a detail like that might be useful. If I had been Paulet, knowing me as he was supposed to do, I would —if I’d been up to anything—have destroyed the letter. That he hadn’t was a point in his favour. Or did it mean that he just wasn’t quite clever enough to appreciate how clever I was? I decided to defer a decision but to keep my eyes open.
I went round to the Piazza Santo Spirito. Paulet was sitting on a bench under a tree opposite Number 23. He looked gloomy.
‘Buon giorno, François,’ I said cheerfully.
‘She has gone, Monsieur Carvay.’ He nodded across the street. The white Thunderbird was no longer there.
‘You saw her go?’
‘No. She went at eight o’clock this morning. This I learn from the woman in the opposite flat. I pretend to be from one of the city stores. Come to measure the big room for new curtains. With women it is always better to be something to do with furnishings. That is their world.’
‘What did you get out of her?’
‘Coffee. She is a compulsive talker and has bad breath. The woman in the opposite flat, I mean. She wants my opinion on the purchase of a new carpet, and she is watching us from the window up there now, but that is all right because I said I have to wait here for my assistant who comes from another job.’
‘What did you get about the Pelegrinas?’
‘The flat belongs to La Piroletta. She does some cabaret act, has money, and is not often here. Just a flying visit like this one. The woman does not like her but that is because she is beautiful and this woman is not. Leon Pelegrina was there more often, though not lately. His last visit was only for four or five days. She did not like him either. She would not want to be quoted but she thinks he is a crook and lucky not to be in prison. There was, some years ago, a scandal about him over some holiday villa development on the coast near Viareggio, but nothing was ever done about it for lack of proof. Also, she did not care for his taking women into the flat.’
‘Where else would he take them?’
Paulet raised a sad eye to me. ‘These women were puttane.’
‘Well, he’d still need a flat—unless he didn’t mind frightening the horses in the street. Come on, let’s go.’
‘You do not want to go in and have another look around?’
‘It wouldn’t help. Besides, I want to get down to Rome and take a plane to Tripoli.’
‘Tripoli? But that will be expensive.’
‘My client pays—for me. What about yours?’
‘I must contact him.’ He made a face. ‘He hates spending money.’
‘If you want results you’ve got to. Where is he?’
‘I think in Naples.’
‘What do you mean, you think? You know, don’t you?’
‘I am reasonably sure, yes.’
‘Then ask him to meet us in Rome. I’d like to talk to him.’
‘But why Tripoli?’
‘Because I am reasonably sure that that is where Freeman is.’
‘How you know this?’
I’d noticed that in moments of depression or excitement Paulet’s syntax was inclined to slip.
‘Later, perhaps, I’ll tell you.’
Actually, in my pocket was a cable from Wilkins which had arrived for me early that morning at the hotel. It read:
M.F. DEFINITELY HERE SIX DAYS AGO STOP ADVISE ARRIVAL STOP ENQUIRY BLANKET LOCAL BOGEYS STOP REGARDS H.W.
It was the first time in her life that Wilkins had sent me her regards. Best wishes, of course, I got every year on a Christmas card, but that didn’t count. And when it came to it she could use underworld slang with
