The Avignon Quintet (143 page)

She wrapped him softly in the great perfumed bath-towel and then powdered him with talc before putting him to bed in the quiet bedroom with its faithful night-light burning – a tiny Christmas tree lighted by electric bulbs. Here he seemed at last to cave in, to succumb to a profound slumber, completely extenuated. For a while he turned hither and thus with a trace of his former restlessness, and then turned on his side and like a ship going down, nosedived into sleep. But he did one thing that he had never done before – he thrust his thumb into his mouth. It was an archaic gesture which suggested a fruitful and deep regression to some place of psychic hurt – like someone fingering the scar tissue, the cicatrice of an old wound. As she sat beside him and watched quietly her hopes rose for his restoration to the human world. But she frowned as she thought of the elder Affad, of his delight and perhaps gratitude: had her motives been entirely disinterested? Was it on these grounds …? But she shook her head sharply to banish the thought and then looked at her watch. There was half an hour before the Swiss girl came back on duty. He slept so soundly that it might have been possible to tiptoe away, but she did not wish to risk it in case there was some new and fruitful departure in behaviour to be studied. She crossed the room to the daybook and entered a few notes which she would afterwards expand into a case-history, dictating it on to her magnetophone before handing it to her typist. The time passed quickly and by the time the Swiss girl tiptoed into the room she had finished and was ready to polish herself up for the party and take her leave. As she did so she communicated the events of the afternoon and evening to the girl, who showed great delight at the news of a deviation in behaviour. “It might be the beginning of a radical shift,” Constance admitted, “But we must be patient and not force.”

But she herself was joyfully optimistic and so fully absorbed in her thoughts that she drove extremely badly, and when she got to the town had trouble parking. But she was not too late, and Schwarz’s relief was very pleasant to experience
;
not less, she was forced to admit to herself, the obvious admiration of his colleagues. The new hair-style was a distinct success – that was something pleasurable to experience. But as soon as she could get Schwarz alone she told him excitedly about the events of the afternoon. He whistled with surprise and delight. “What a break-through,” he said. “Maybe your original diagnosis was almost right –
histoire de biberon!
What luck if he can find his way back like an electrician going back along a wire to find and seal a break.… You are lucky, Constance! I never have these sharp cathartic changes, dammit! But the important thing is the whole continuity – I hope he keeps on until he discharges the whole weight of the trauma. If he does tomorrow and for a while,
please
phone me. I want to know.” To her surprise, and indeed a certain mortification, she almost started to cry herself, but managed to check the impulse as she blew her nose. It was a poor advertisement for a cool and scientific therapist, she told herself bitterly.

Schwarz had done a tour of the room and had finally drifted back to her side again with his replenished whisky. “By the way,” he said, “I almost forgot to tell you. I am having difficulty defending your privacy, endless telephone calls keep coming in – no, not from Affad, but from the Prince, for example asking where you were and for how long? I said you were on sick leave for at least two months, and away from the country. Is that all right?” She was a little cast down that Affad himself had sent no message, but reproved the sentiment immediately. “Of course,” she said, “I owe nobody anything, I am quite free am I not?”

“They are worried about a letter addressed to Affad which came in the Red Cross pouch and which you apparently have; I can’t profess to tell you what
that
is all about but he sounds very concerned, asking if you have destroyed it, or opened it or what the hell you have done with it. What do I say?”

She felt herself blushing slightly. Schwarz’s glance was a trifle quizzical, although in the matter of Affad he was not fully in her confidence. “If the Prince asks again, please give him my love and tell him that the letter in question was misdirected by Aubrey Blanford’s stupid servant and I took charge of it, hoping to see Affad before he left and give it to him. However I didn’t, and so I still have the letter. It is waiting for him, unless he wants me to send it on to Egypt; but he spoke vaguely of coming back’soon so I put it in a safe place to await his arrival and …”

But suddenly at this juncture her blood ran cold, she put her hand to her cheek. Schwarz was saying, “But the old boy was in quite a bother, he seemed to think that you had either destroyed it in a fit of pique or that you had opened it yourself and knew the contents … what the devil is it, a love-letter?” He broke offas he saw the expression on her face. “Constance!” he cried sharply; and now she said, “Did you say Mnemidis had been at my bookshelf?” He spread wide his arms with an air of puzzled resignation. “But you gave him permission to borrow books, did you not?” She nodded, for she had in fact told him that he might have any book he wished to read, though her own shelves contained mostly text books and dictionaries and fat volumes of reference. She had really been thinking of the general clinic library which was not a bad little one, full of novels and general literature. “I
told
you he had carried off a lot of your books,” said Schwarz somewhat irritably, “but he had your express permission.” She nodded. She had missed the first allusion to the subject. “But the
Bible
” she said now, “the
Bible!
The letter of Affad I slipped into the Bible for safe-keeping!” She had gone quite pale and this puzzled him for he said, “Well, what about it? You can easily retrieve it. Mnemidis won’t
eat
it after all, will he?” She hoped to goodness not; at the same time she was furious to think that all this fuss should be made over this petty question of a letter – though of course she knew (without really believing in them) what momentous issues hung upon its receipt. To know the hour of one’s death – was it really so important? “You must ring up Pierre when he’s on duty and tell him to retrieve it from the book. Mnemidis himself will be under full sedation for a while yet; he liked it so much that he asked for a second vacation from himself.” He was perfectly right; Pierre would certainly secure the detested letter if he were asked. All this was quite true but so great was her anxiety and impatience that she slipped out into the lobby of the hotel and found a telephone. She rang the clinic and asked for the secretariat so that they could tell her the duty-hours of Pierre. Unfortunately he did not come on duty again until eight the following morning; the patient himself was in a sedation booth and his little room was locked up, so that it was idle to ask somebody else to hunt down the letter at such an hour. The best was to wait until Pierre came on deck again. For some reason or other she felt full of anxiety; she admitted to herself that there was really no reason to suppose that she would not recover the letter intact. Yes, but nevertheless … the whole matter rattled her in an obscure way.

She found the speeches stuffy and quite interminable and was glad when the evening came to an end and she was able to say goodnight to the glowing Schwarz and retrieve her car for the long drive back to the solitary lake house. She arrived late in a sort of remorseful triumph – a strange mood which shared the anxiety over the letter with the delightful sense of having advanced a pace in the direction of the child’s good health. In both moods of course the thought of Affad echoed in her ears, so that she dreamed of him and woke somewhat disconsolate and disturbed.

The little alarm told her when to get her car and motor to the
auberge
to telephone to Pierre whose day watch began at eight in the morning. However, it took a moment to locate him and when she did he was at first quite startled and intrigued that she should ring so early. He listened to her with care and verified the fact of Mnemidis’ borrowings; and, yes, among the books had been a Plato and a Spengler. But had been very specially glad of the little Bible, because (so he said) he had some things to confirm and verify. “C’est un drôle de coco celui-la!” confided the giant with a chuckle, but added that all the books were in the locker by his bed and would come to no harm. “Please,” said Constance, “I want to ask you a favour – will you go and find the Bible? In it you should find a letter addressed to a M. Affad. It is from Egypt. If you can get hold of it I will come round and pick it up.” He promised to go and have a look while she held the line. He was away for a considerable time, but this was not unusual for the high-security wing of the clinic had a bewildering number of sealed doors which one had to open first and then lock behind one.

But the letter was not in the book!

Nor was it any use repeating: “Are you sure? Are you absolutely
sure?
” Pierre felt the urgency in her tone and was correspondingly troubled. “I looked in all the books, and in the bundle of papers and folders. I also looked in his handbag to make sure it was not there. Then I went round the room, the shelves the shower cubicle, the … but everywhere, doctor, everywhere possible!” She closed her eyes and in her imagination photographed her consulting-room as well as the alcove with the built-in bookcase. Could it be perhaps that the letter had fallen out during the actual removal of the books? She telephoned to her secretary to ask if she had rescued any letter from the floor during her own absence, but the answer was in the negative. Where the devil had it got to? Had Mnemidis perhaps destroyed it, thrown it out into the wastepaper basket? Her heart sank at the thought of the complicated search which would have to be undertaken to verify such a hypothesis. She reproached herself for the exaggerated anxiety she felt about this trifling contretemps. Of course it would turn up, perhaps even Mnemidis when he woke might throw some light on the matter. It was best to wait calmly and let things take their course. This harangue to herself did little more than allay her native impatience for a brief spell. She looked at her watch. There would be time to verify matters for herself and still arrive (if she hurried) in time for the child’s evening session which closed with dinner. She drove to her office and startled the somnolent Schwarz who was not used to late nights, and paid for them with several days of apathy and fatigue. “What’s got into you?” he demanded plaintively; and she replied, “It’s that bloody letter of Affad’s. It has got mislaid. It has disappeared. It was in the Bible which Mnemidis took to study and which is now beside his bed covered apparently in jottings. I phoned Pierre to check. But no letter!”

With considerable exasperation she now went through her own consulting-room with a fine-tooth comb, so to speak, in the hope of tracing the article. In vain. Mnemidis had not after all taken so very many books: half a dozen in all. But of course the Bible had been among them.

She drove now up to the central clinic and the remote grey building which housed the dangerous cases, and just managed to catch Pierre as he was going off duty. Together they went upstairs, unlocking and locking a network of doors until they came to the little room where Mnemidis lived out the greater part of his strange life. The books were all there, and yielded nothing: nor did the patient’s own papers, in the form of several folders containing letters and newspaper clippings. The bible was quite heavily marked up in pencil, as though he had read it with special attention. Perhaps for new impersonations? “And his handbag?” she asked. Pierre said, “It’s with him. But I’ve been through it. Nothing!”

“Nothing!” she echoed with a sigh.

She sat down on the nearest chair and reflected deeply for an instant. The only hope left was perhaps that Mnemidis himself might provide a solution to the problem when it became possible to interrogate him – but that would not be for ten days as yet. She must possess her soul in patience until this last avenue could be explored. Perhaps he had inadvertently thrown it away or destoyed it: perhaps opened it? “Pierre,” she said “I’m so sorry for the trouble I’ve given you. But the minute he comes round please help me interrogate him. He trusts you now, after that ridiculous episode with the egg!” The big “Malabar” smiled his slow saintly smile and nodded.

She calculated that there was just time to circle the town and visit her flat before returning to the château and her charge: she needed some clothes to wear in the little lake house by the water. While she was busy turning out a chest-of-drawers the phone rang. It was Sutcliffe, who was both surprised and delighted to catch her, though he sounded a trifle nettled that she had disappeared from circulation without leaving him a message. “Ah! There you are!” he said with a sort of testy joviality. “Perhaps you will favour me with some information as to where the devil you have gone to and why. Everybody is asking me. I have a right to know – or have I?” She explained that she had decided to deal with her fatigue by drastically reorganising her holiday-time – in fact she confessed where she was and what was afoot, though she swore him to secrecy. “That’s the point,” he said, “what do I tell the Prince? It’s all about the fatal letter addressed to Affad. He is under the impression that you have taken destiny by the forelock and intervened.”

“In what sense?”

“I mean simply carried off the letter with the intention of suppressing it or of losing it. I can just hear him saying to Affad, ‘You see, the
moment
a woman interferes everything goes wrong.’ So I implore you, for your own peace of mind and mine, to surrender that bloody letter to me and I will put it back in the bag and bang it off to Egypt.”

“The letter has been mislaid!”

Sutcliffe whistled and fell silent. Then he said, “They won’t believe you, you know.”