Spy Hook (11 page)

We spent the last evening of that hectic weekend in Provence at the nearby home of Gloria's 'uncle'. Gloria's parents were Hungarian; and this old friend wasn't actually a kinsman, except in the way that all Hungarian exiles are a family of crazy, congenial, exasperating individuals who, no matter how reclusive their mode of living, keep amazingly well informed about the activities of their 'relatives'.

Zu he called her. All her Hungarian friends called her Zu. It was short for Zsuzsa, the name she'd been given by her parents. This 'Dodo' lived in an isolated tumbledown cottage. It was on a hillside, sandwiched between a minuscule vineyard and the weed-infested ground of an abandoned olive oil mill. One small section of earth had been partitioned off to be Dodo's garden, where the remaining leaves of last year's winter vegetables were being devoured by slugs. Perched precariously over a drainage ditch at the front there was a battered Deux Chevaux with one headlight missing.

He was introduced to me as 'Dodo', and judging by the vigorous way he shook my hand was happy enough to be called that. My first impression was of a man in his middle sixties, a short fat noisy fellow who any casting director would engage to play the role of a lovable Hungarian refugee. He had a lot of pure white hair that was brushed straight back, and a large unruly moustache that was somewhat greyer. His face was ruddy, the result perhaps of his drinking, for the whole house was littered with bottles, both full and empty, and he seemed quite merry by the time we arrived. To what extent his imbibing advanced his linguistic ability I'm not sure but his English was almost accentless and fluent, and – apart from a tendency to call everyone 'darling' – his syntax had only the imperfections of the natives.

He wore old brown corduroy trousers that had, in places, whitened and worn to the under-fabric. His shaggy crimson roll-neck sweater came almost to his knees and his scuffed leather boots had zipper sides and two-inch heels. He gave us wine and sat us down on the long lumpy chintz-covered sofa, in front of the blazing fire, and talked without taking breath.

His house was about thirty kilometres from Le Mas des Vignes Blanches, where the Winters lived, but he seemed to know all about them. The Hitler woman' the locals called Inge Winter, for some talkative plumber had been there to fix a pipe and broadcast news of the old woman's photo of Hitler all round the neighbourhood.

When he heard that we'd visited his mysterious neighbours he added to my knowledge, telling amusing stories about Inge's father-in-law – old Harald Winter – who'd been a rich businessman. Vienna abounded with all sorts of tales about him; his motorcars, his violent temper, his unrelenting vengeance, the titled ladies seen with him in his box at the opera, huge sums of money spent on amazing jewellery for women he was pursuing, his ridiculous duel with old Professor Doktor Schneider, the gynaecologist who delivered his second son.

'In my father's time, Harry Winter was the talk of Vienna; even now the older people still tell stories about him. Most of the yams are nonsense I suspect. But he did keep a very beautiful mistress in Vienna. This I know is true because I saw her many times. I was studying chemistry in Vienna in 1942 and living with my aunt, who was her dressmaker for many years. The mistress was a bit down on her luck by that time: the war was on, the Nazis were running Austria and she was a Jew. She was Hungarian and she liked to gossip in her native language. Then one day she didn't turn up for a fitting; we heard later that she'd been taken off to a camp. Not all the money in the world could save you from the Gestapo.' Having said this he sniffed, and went to stir something in the kitchen. When he returned he heaved a big log on to the fire. It was wet and it sizzled in the red-hot embers.

Dodo's little home was as different as could be from the well ordered good taste of the Winters' house. The Winter mansion had a Spartan luxury but Dodo's 'glory hole' was a wonderful squalor. Half the south-facing wall had been replaced by sliding glass doors and through them – just visible in the twilight – there was a ramshackle terrace. In retirement he'd become a painter. The only other sizeable room in the house faced north and he'd put a skylight into it and used it as a studio. He showed us around it. There were some half-finished canvases: landscapes, bold, careless, competent pastiches of Van Gogh's Provencal work. Most of them were variations of the same view: his valley at dawn, at dusk and at many of the stages between. He claimed to have a gallery in Cannes where his works were sold. Perhaps it wouldn't be too difficult to sell such colourful pictures to the rich tourists who came here in the holidays.

When we returned from our tour of the premises the damp log in the living room fireplace oozed blue smoke that billowed into the room, blackening still more the painted walls and irritating the eyes. Gloria set the table that was conveniently near the door of the kitchen. Behind it stood a massive carved wardrobe that almost touched the ceiling. Its doors missing, it had been provided with unpainted shelves for hundreds of books. Philosophy, history, chemistry, art, dictionaries, detective stories, biographies, they were crammed together in anarchic disorder. Everything was worn, stained, bent or slightly broken.

When we sat down at the big table, he pulled a wheelback chair into position for me and the arm of it came away in his hand. He roared with laughter and thumped it back into position with a deftness that had obviously come from practice. He laughed often, and when he did his open mouth revealed gold molars only slightly more yellow than the rest of his teeth.

I knew of course that we'd come here because Gloria wanted to show me to 'Dodo' and that his approval would be important to her. And in turn, important to me. In loco parentis, he eyed me warily and asked me the casual sort of questions that parents ask their beloved daughter's suitors. But his heart wasn't in it. That role was soon forgotten and he was laying down the law about art:

'Titian loved reds and blues. Look at any of his paintings and you'll see that. That's why he was always painting auburn-haired models. Wonderful women: he knew a thing or two about women, eh?' A roar of laughter and a quick drink. 'And look at his later work… never mind
The Assumption of the Virgin
, or any of that… Look at the real Titians: he was putting the paint on with his fingertips. He was the first Impressionist: that's the only word you can use. I'll tell you, darling, Titian was a giant.'

Or on Gloria's interest in British higher education:

'You won't learn anything worth knowing at Oxford or Cambridge. But I'm glad to hear you're not going to study Modern Languages. I had a graduate here last year: he couldn't even read a menu, darling! What are quenelles, he asked me. Ignorant beyond belief! And his accent was unimaginable. The only people who can understand an Englishman speaking French are people who have been taught French in England.'

Or about gambling:

'Use two dice and you change the odds of course. Why, I've seen men backing the same odds on two as on six.'

Gloria provided the cue. 'Shouldn't they have?' she asked.

He swung round to the fire and, supporting himself with a hand on each armrest of his dining chair, he aimed a kick at the log so that it exploded in sparks. 'Naw! With two dice? No! You can throw six so many different ways. You can get it with two threes; with a four and a two; four and a two the other way; a five and a one; five and a one the other way. That makes five different ways. But you have only one chance to get two; both dice have to come up right for you. Same with getting twelve.'

He swung back to face us and reverted to being Gloria's guardian. He looked at Gloria and then examined me as if trying to decide if my motives were honourable. What he decided did not show on his face. He was remarkably good at concealing his feelings when he was so inclined.

Art and science and cookery and politics and weather forecasting and ancient Greek architecture, and every so often there came that penetrating stare. And so for the whole evening he was roaring down the motorways of conversation and then slamming on the brakes as he remembered I was the man who was taking his old friend's little girl to bed every night.

It was during one of these abrupt pauses in the conversation that he suddenly extended his fist so it was only a few inches from my nose. I stared at him and made no move. Click! There was the handle of a flick-knife concealed in his hand and now its blade snapped forward so that its shiny point was almost touching my eye.

'Dodo!' Gloria yelled in alarm.

Slowly he drew his knife back and folded the blade back into the handle. 'Ha ha. I wanted to see what this fellow had in him,' he said and sounded disappointed that I'd been able to conceal my alarm.

'I don't like that sort of joke,' she said.

Gloria had bought two bottles of Hine brandy in the duty-free shop, and Dodo had got the cork out of the first one before we were far through his front door. I stuck to the local rose wine, a light and refreshing drink, but Dodo favoured the Hine through the black olives, the chicken and vegetable stew, the goat cheese and the bowl of apples and oranges that followed. By the end of the meal, he was uncorking the second bottle and when we went out on his patio to see the view, he was talking loud enough to be heard in Nice. The sky was clear and every star in the sky was gathering over his house but it was damned cold and the chilly air had no discernible effect upon his ebullience. 'It's cold,' I said. 'Damned cold.'

'One hundred and fifty years,' he answered and wiped drink from his chin. 'And the walls are a metre thick, darling.'

Gloria laughed. 'Shall we go back inside?' she said. I suppose she was used to him.

He held tight to the balcony to get back in through the sliding door.

Even so, he collided with the fly screen and banged his head on the door's edge.

Despite all his shouting about it not being necessary, Gloria went in to the kitchen to wash the dishes. In an attempt to show him what a good-hearted and inoffensive fellow I was, I tried to follow her but he pulled me aside with a rough tug at my sleeve.

'Leave her alone, darling,' he said gruffly. 'She'll do what she wants to do. Zu has always been like that.' He poured more wine for me and topped up his tumbler of brandy. 'She's a wonderful girl.'

'Yes, she is,' I said.

'You're a lucky man: do you know that?' His voice was soft but his eyes were hard. I was on my guard all the time and he knew that, and seemed to enjoy it.

'Yes, I do.'

He went suddenly quiet. He was staring out through the glass door at the lights that wound up into the hills: orange lights and blue lights and sometimes the headlights of cars that shone suddenly and then disappeared like fireflies on a summer's evening. The wonderful view seemed to wreak some profound change upon him. Perhaps it has that effect upon people who spend most of their working days studying the same landscape, its colours, patterns and contradictions. When he spoke again his voice was soft and sober. 'Make the most of every minute,' he said. 'You'll lose her, you know.'

'Will I?' I kept my voice level.

He sipped his brandy and smiled sadly. 'She adores you of course. Any fool could see that. I could see it in her eyes as soon as you walked into the house. Never takes her eyes off you. But she's just a child. She has a life ahead of her. How old are you… over forty. Right?'

'Yes,' I said.

'She's determined on this university business. You'll not persuade her otherwise. She'll go to college. And there she'll meet brilliant people of her own age, and because they are at college they'll all end up sharing the same appalling tastes and the same half-baked opinions. We're old fossils. We're part of another world. A world of dinosaurs.' He swigged his brandy and poured more. There was a lot of spite in him. His friendly advice was really a way of hurting me. And it was a method difficult to counter.

I said, 'Yes, thanks a lot Dodo. But the way I see it, you are indisputably an old tyrannosaurus but I'm a young dynamic brilliant individual in the prime of life, and Gloria is an immature youngster.'

He laughed loudly enough to rupture my eardrums and he grabbed my shoulder to save himself from falling over.

'Zu, darling!' he shouted gleefully and loud enough for her to hear him from the kitchen. 'Where did you find this lunatic?'

She came from the kitchen wiping her hands on a tea-towel decorated with a picture of the Mona Lisa smoking a big cigar. 'Are you on some sort of diet, Dodo?' she asked. 'How can you eat three dozen eggs?'

For a moment words did not come but then he stammered and said that they were the finest eggs he'd ever eaten and a nearby farmer supplied him but he had to take a lot at a time. 'Have some,' he offered.

'I'm not that fond of eggs,' said Gloria. They are bad for you.'

'Rubbish, darling. Arrant rubbish. A newly laid soft-boiled egg is the most easily digested protein food I know. I love eggs. And there are so many delicious ways of cooking them.'

'They won't be so newly laid by the time you get through three dozen of them,' said Gloria with devastating feminine logic. She smiled. 'We must be leaving you, Dodo.'

'Sit down for a moment longer, darling,' he pleaded. 'I have so few visitors nowadays and you haven't told me the latest news of your parents and all our friends in London.'

For the next ten minutes or so they talked of the family. Small-talk of Gloria's father's dental practice and her mother's charity committees. Dodo listened politely and with ever more glazed eyes.

At 10.25 exactly – I looked at my watch to see the time – Dodo threw himself up to his full height, drank to the health of 'Zu and her lunatic' and having upended his glass, bent and fell full-length on to the floor with a horrifying crash. The tumbler broke, and there was a flare from the log fire as brandy splashed on the embers.

Gloria looked at me, expecting me to revive him, but I just shrugged at her. He groaned and moved enough to reassure her that he wasn't dead. Having stretched himself across the carpet before the fire, he began to snore heavily. Gloria's attempts to wake him failed.