An Expensive Place to Die. Len Deighton
living is attractive at the time, but middle age finds women left sans beauty, and men sans skills; result misery. Ask your friend Monsieur Datt about that.’
‘Are you a friend of Datt?’ Jean-Paul asked.
‘I hardly know him,’ I said. ‘I was asking Byrd about him.’
‘Don’t ask too many questions,’ said Jean. ‘He is a man of great influence; Count of Périgord it is said, an ancient family, a powerful man. A dangerous man. He is a doctor and a psychiatrist. They say he uses LSD a great deal. His clinic is as expensive as any in Paris, but be gives the most scandalous parties there too.’
‘What’s that?’ said Byrd. ‘Explain.’
‘One hears stories,’ said Jean. He smiled in embarrassment and wanted to say no more, but Byrd made an impatient movement with his hand, so he continued. ‘Stories of gambling parties, of highly placed men who have got into financial trouble and found themselves …’ he paused ‘… in the bath.’
‘Does that mean dead?’
‘It means “in trouble”, idiom,’ explained Byrd to me in English.
‘One or two important men took their own lives,’ said Jean. ‘Some said they were in debt.’
‘Damned fools,’ said Byrd. ‘That’s the sort of fellows in charge of things today, no stamina, no fibre; and that fellow Datt is a party to it, eh? Just as I thought. Oh well, chaps won’t be told today. Experience better bought than taught they say. One more sherry and we’ll go to dinner. What say to La Coupole? It’s one of the few places still open where we don’t have to reserve.’
Annie the model reappeared in a simple green shirtwaist dress. She kissed Jean-Paul in a familiar way and said good evening to each of us.
‘Early in the morning,’ Byrd said as he paid her. She nodded and smiled.
‘An attractive girl,’ Jean-Paul said after she had gone.
‘Yes,’ I said.
‘Poor child,’ said Byrd. ‘It’s a hard town for a young girl without money.’
I’d noticed her expensive crocodile handbag and Charles Jourdan shoes, but I didn’t comment.
‘Want to go to an art show opening Friday? Free champagne.’ Jean-Paul produced half a dozen gold-printed invitations, gave one to me and put one on Byrd’s easel.
‘Yes, we’ll go to that,’ said Byrd; he was pleased to be organizing us. ‘Are you in your fine motor, Jean?’ Byrd asked.
Jean nodded.
Jean’s car was a white Mercedes convertible. We drove down the Champs with the roof down. We wined and dined well and Jean-Paul plagued us with questions like do the Americans drink Coca-Cola because it’s good for their livers.
It was nearly one A.M. when Jean dropped Byrd at the studio. He insisted upon driving me back to my room over Le Petit Légionnaire. ‘I am especially glad you came tonight,’ he said. ‘Byrd thinks that he is the only serious painter in Paris, but there are many of us who work equally hard in our own way.’
‘Being in the navy,’ I said, ‘is probably not the best of training for a painter.’
‘There is no training for a painter. No more than there is training for life. A man makes as profound a statement as he is able. Byrd is a sincere man with a thirst for knowledge of painting and an aptitude for its skills. Already his work is attracting serious interest here in Paris and a reputation in Paris will carry you anywhere in the world.’
I sat there for a moment nodding, then I opened the door of the Mercedes and got out. ‘Thanks for the ride.’
Jean-Paul leaned across the seat, offered me his card and shook my hand. ‘Phone me,’ he said, and – without letting go of my hand – added, ‘If you want to go to the house in the Avenue Foch I can arrange that too. I’m not sure I can recommend it, but if you have money to lose I’ll introduce you. I am a close friend of the Count; last week I took the Prince of Besacoron there – he is another very good friend of mine.’
‘Thanks,’ I said, taking the card. He stabbed the accelerator and the motor growled. He winked and said, ‘But no recriminations afterward.’
‘No,’ I agreed. The Mercedes slid forward.
I watched the white car turn on to the Avenue with enough momentum to make the tyres howl. The Petit Légionnaire was closed. I let myself in by the side entrance. Datt and my landlord were still sitting at the same table as they had been that afternoon. They were still playing Monopoly. Datt was reading from his Community Chest card, ‘Allez en prison. Avancez tout droit en prison. Ne passez pas par la case “Départ”. Ne recevez pas Frs 20.000.’ My landlord laughed, so did M. Datt.
‘What will your patients say?’ said my landlord.
‘They are very understanding,’ said Datt; he seemed to take the whole game seriously. Perhaps he got more out of it that way.
I tiptoed upstairs. I could see right across Paris. Through the dark city the red neon arteries of the tourist industry flowed from Pigalle through Montmartre to Boul. Mich., Paris’s great self-inflicted wound.
Joe chirped. I read Jean’s card. ‘“Jean-Paul Pascal, artist painter”. And good friend to princes,’ I said. Joe nodded.
4
Two nights later I was invited to join the Monopoly game. I bought hotels in rue Lecourbe and paid rent at the Gare du Nord. Old Datt pedantically handled the toy money and told us why we went broke.
When only Datt remained solvent he pushed back his chair and nodded sagely as he replaced the pieces of wood and paper in the box. If you were buying old men, then Datt would have come in a box marked White, Large and Bald. Behind his tinted spectacles his eyes were moist and his lips soft and dark like a girl’s, or perhaps they only seemed dark against the clear white skin of his face. His head was a shiny dome and his white hair soft and wispy like mist around a mountain top. He didn’t smile much, but he was a genial man, although a little fussy in his mannerisms as people of either sex become when they live alone.
Madame Tastevin had, upon her insolvency, departed to the kitchen to prepare supper.
I offered my cigarettes to Datt and to my landlord. Tastevin took one, but Datt declined with a theatrical gesture. ‘There seems no sense in it,’ he proclaimed, and again did that movement of the hand that looked like he was blessing a multitude at Benares. His voice was an upper-class voice, not because of his vocabulary or because he got his conjugations right but because he sang his words in the style of the Comédie Française, stressing a word musically and then dropping the rest of the sentence like a half-smoked Gauloise. ‘No sense in it,’ he repeated.
‘Pleasure,’ said Tastevin, puffing away. ‘Not sense.’ His voice was like a rusty lawn-mower.
‘The pursuit of pleasure,’ said Datt, ‘is a pitfall-studded route.’ He removed the rimless spectacles and looked up at me blinking.
‘You speak from experience?’ I asked.
‘I’ve done everything,’ said Datt. ‘Some things twice. I’ve lived in eight different countries in four continents. I’ve been a beggar and I’ve been a thief. I’ve been happy and sad, rich and poor, master and manservant.’
‘And the secret of happiness,’ mocked Tastevin, ‘is to refrain from smoking?’
‘The secret of happiness,’ Datt corrected, ‘is to refrain from wishing to.’
‘If that’s the way you feel,’ said Tastevin, ‘why do you come to my restaurant almost every day?’
At that moment Madame Tastevin came in with a tray holding a coffee jug and plates of cold chicken and terrine