The Lighthearted Quest (20 page)

Almost for the first time since she had started her enquiries the mention of Colin's name produced no reaction at all. Bathyadis looked benevolently blank; apparently Monro meant nothing to him. With one of her intuitions, as Mme La Besse called them, Julia drew a bow at a venture. “I believe,” she went on, “that he is in company with another Englishman, very tall, with hair as red as fire.”

That
did
register, she saw—Bathyadis looked serious, and
suddenly much more alert, too. “My cousin however is very dark with the face pale,” she added, watching the old man closely; and she thought that that description registered too—Bathyadis continued to look serious, and did not answer at once. “He has a curious trick with his right thumb,” Julia pursued—what
was
the French for double-jointed? Never mind. “When he is nervous he pushes the joint out, as if it was broken, with a small noise,
plutôt désagréable.”

At that Bathyadis actually laughed.

“I think I know
le jeune Monsieur
you mean,” he said carefully, “but could you perhaps indicate to me why you ask
me
about him?—since you know that he is here, and who he is with?”

Julia could have jumped with excitement at the last words. Her arrow had gone right into the gold—it had quite undoubtedly been Colin that she had seen up in the Kasbah with the red-haired man. But she remained calm outwardly, and told Bathyadis in vague sentences of her urgent need to get in touch with the young man immediately. (She did not, this time, say why—another intuition.) Most unfortunately she had just missed him in Tangier, she added casually, as if she would certainly have seen him had she arrived in time; and she had been sent on to him, M. Bathyadis.

The old man listened, and made a sympathetic reply, but Julia got a curious impression that he was puzzled by something; he kept on glancing at the little trunk, which she still held on her knees. At last he said, slowly and doubtfully—

“But if Mademoiselle is interested in the affair, why does she require the
little
coffer?”

Julia was completely taken aback by this. What affair? And what had velvet coffers to do with it anyhow, little or big? She lit a cigarette before replying, to gain time, and thought quickly. Blowing out smoke she said at last, non-committally and airily—“A coffer can always come in useful, can it not?—and for all sorts of purposes? And this”—she touched the object on her lap—“is also beautiful.”

“Beautiful, yes—but it is so
small.
Would not the larger one be better?”

“I wonder,” said Julia, still trying to gain time, and putting on a vague, meditative air. For one thing she couldn't possibly afford the big trunk, that was flat. “You really think so?” she asked, looking at the old Moor confidingly, enquiringly.

“It is usually the larger ones that they buy, and several at a time, Mademoiselle,” he replied positively.

This astonished Julia more than ever. Who were “they”? Presumably Colin and the red-haired man—in French Bathyadis' words were perfectly clear: he had said “Ils”—they, not “on”—one, as in “people buy” or “one buys”; in the context he could only be referring to Colin and his red-haired friend. But why in the world should they be buying velvet trunks, and big ones, in bulk, in Fez? Her mind flew to possible reasons—Colin wanting to make a little money on the side, poor darling, in the new curio-shops down on the coast? Seething with curiosity, quite at sea, but with this idea in her head she observed, still looking vague—

“I suppose they do business with your son in Casablanca—my cousin and his friend, I mean.”

When she said that old Bathyadis bent on her the indulgent look that a kind and wise elder bestows on a peculiarly ignorant or idiotic child.

“But
naturellement,
Mademoiselle. This is how the
expédition
is arranged, as Mademoiselle of course realises.”

Julia didn't realise—as she herself would have said, she hadn't a clue. Obviously Bathyadis assumed that she understood all about Colin's activities, whatever they were, whereas in fact she knew nothing. For a moment the word
expédition
held her up—Purcell had said that the red-haired man had bought cases of whisky and gin to take on a journey, therefore on an expedition; but why vast velvet trunks to put the booze in? Then she remembered that in French
expédition
can also mean the despatch of goods; the man who sends one's luggage
and furniture from one place to another in France is called an
expéditeur
—so the velvet trunks might conceivably be used for the transport of something, somewhere. Probably that was it. But transport of what and where to? About Morocco? Hardly. Her mind, behind her blank face, raced wildly. Curios at the ports, dealings with the son in Casablanca, a port;
expédition
—oh, she
must
find out. Putting on her most vacant expression she risked another arrow at a venture.

“The export, you wish to say,” she asserted, very slowly. And equally slowly a benignant smile showed itself above M. Bathyadis' beard, the smile of one who approves at least one piece of intelligence on the part of the ignorant child. He didn't even nod—but the smile was enough for Julia. She had got it—or got something.

Unluckily, at that precise moment she happened to observe that Abdul had again come into the shop, and had edged his way up close beside them. In her anxiety, her intense concentration, and her bewilderment, this was the last straw; she completely lost her temper.
“Ote-toi de là!”
she fairly shouted at the guide—“Remain outside, as I have already twice bidden you!” As Abdul withdrew she saw another smile—small, shrewd, but still approving—appear in M. Bathyadis' patriarchal beard.

Temper throws one off balance; Julia felt then like an actor who has lost his cue. She returned to the charge, but on another line.

“Is my cousin here just now?”

“Ah, no, Mademoiselle—they were here some days ago, but they have gone.”

“Where?”

Bathyadis waved a vague hand.

“To the South, as usual, I imagine.” Again he spoke as if Julia would know what was meant. This was all inconceivably tantalising: Bathyadis, with his wholly mistaken assumption
that she knew all about Colin—though why he should have made that assumption she couldn't for the moment work out—was clearly perfectly willing to talk to her, willing as no one else had yet been, if only she could manage to ask the right questions. She had had extraordinary luck so far, but she must go very warily, and continue to feel her way.

“Ah, yes,” she said, nodding her head wisely. Once more she took out her cigarette-case, and this time offered it to the dealer, not realising that devout Moslems (unlike the Berber labourers at the dig) do not smoke; he declined majestically. She lit one herself.

“How soon do you expect them back?” she asked. This seemed a safe question, and it was really more important to contact Colin than to find out what he was expediting abroad in Moroccan trousseau-trunks.

“Probably after the usual interval,” the old man replied.

God, what
was
the usual interval? How maddening. She blew out smoke, and then chanced her arm again.

“In a month, perhaps?”

“Ah, no,
voyons,
Mademoiselle—it is usually six weeks at least, more often two months, before they return.”

“Tiens,”
said Julia non-committally.
That
was no good. “Two months is a long time,” she said reflectively. “Since my business is so urgent, I think perhaps I had better follow my cousin, and see him.”

“Ah,
non,
Mademoiselle—that is impossible!” The old man was evidently shocked at this idea. “They work in horrible places” (
viles endroits
was the expression Bathyadis used) “where a young lady like yourself could not possibly go. How could you stay in those
cantines?
—a young lady alone? And it is a desolate country, terrible!”

Poor Julia groaned inwardly. Where were these
“viles endroits”?
And what on earth, in a Moroccan context, were “cantines”? In England one never
stayed
in canteens—they were places where factory-hands or soldiers ate.

“Then I must have his address, that is all,” she said, with a firmness she was far from feeling.

At this Bathyadis recoiled in absolute horror.

“But no, Mademoiselle—no, no, no! To begin with they are naturally constantly moving from one place to another; and as Mademoiselle must very well know, above all one must never
write
anything—least of all the names. A name on a letter, in a
bureau de poste!
—this could be fatal. Mademoiselle does not reflect,” the old man said, gently reproving, with a return of his kind benignant manner.

Julia, who had been reflecting till her brain almost cracked, smiled wryly—only no smile ever came out awry on her beautiful mouth, and her eyes remained doves' eyes even when she was frowning above them with worry, as now. Bathyadis smiled benevolently at her, returning a smile which to him merely seemed ravishing.

“Then what do I do?” she asked helplessly.

“Wait till they return, and repose upon the Merciful Goodness of God,” said the old man, with a splendid calm confidence.

Those words and the way in which he spoke them did in fact give Julia, suddenly, a strange sense of peace. It might have lasted longer if at that very instant she had not seen, over M. Bathyadis' monumental shoulder, the seedy little crosseyed man from Purcell's bar peeping into the shop from the entrance. Mastering her exasperation she spoke slowly, and very low.

“Please, after some instants look round, and tell me if you know who this little man is, who regards through the door. He was here yesterday also.”

With elephantine deliberation Bathyadis turned slowly, and moved to a show-case behind him, which he opened, taking out a piece of jewellery; he had a fair view of the entrance before the little man with the cast in his eye bobbed hurriedly out of sight.

“Well?” Julia asked.

“It is a Jew—a German I think by nationality. Mademoiselle says he was here yesterday?”

“Yes—when I went out he was talking with your boy.”

“Ah,
méfiez-vous de cet homme-là!
I do not like the little I know of him. Where has Mademoiselle seen him before?”

“Several times in Tangier, and I also thought I saw him at Petit-Jean on the way up—probably it was him, since he is here now.”

“Then greatly beware of him. If he is what I think, German, he will be of our enemies,” said Bathyadis. He looked troubled. “It is bad, this, very bad, if someone already follows Mademoiselle. They will have been alerted.”

Dared she ask who “they” and “our enemies” were, Julia wondered, without giving away how far she was from being what Bathyadis so fortunately imagined her to be? While she pondered this question, looking appropriately serious, a number of American tourists suddenly surged into the little shop, escorted by a replica of Abdul, except for the wart on the nose. That, for the moment, was
that.
She said goodbye, gave Abdul the little coffer to carry—which he instantly passed on to an urchin the moment they reached the street—and returned to her hotel. On the way Lady Tracy's remark about the value of having cover popped up into her mind. Well, perhaps
Yes.

Julia sat eating rolls and drinking coffee in her room next morning, wondering what she should do if Steve Keller didn't come. He was only a stray pick-up in the train, anyhow; but she didn't much care to go out with the inquisitive Abdul again, who anyhow cost a lot, and what else was there to do, except get hold of Mr. St John and see if he would tell her what all the mystery was about? She had lain awake half the night, trying to piece together the various items of fact that the old Moor had let fall, and to make some sense out of them—now, by daylight, she ticked them off on her fingers. Whatever Colin was doing, he was doing it with the red-haired man, who either had that house, or stayed in it, in the Kasbah at Tangier—that was one fixed piece of information. Second, they went at intervals to
viles endroits
in ‘the South', remaining from six weeks to two months at a time—but not in one spot, they moved about, and stayed in
cantines.
Probably St John could tell her what
cantines
were, and very likely would, if she asked him without letting on why she wanted to know. (Julia was acquiring a very reasonable distrust of anybody's willingness to tell her anything that they knew to relate to Colin Monro.) Third—she drank some more coffee and buttered another roll; very few things ever interfered with Julia's appetite—they dealt with Bathyadis' son in Casablanca for the
expédition,
or export. But export of
what?
Not of the velvet trunks—munching her roll, Julia now totally rejected this hypothesis. There could not be so much mystery about straight sales of antique Moroccan bridal coffers; moreover the Bank of England would surely never facilitate the financing of such a simple and modest enterprise. Then what was the real enterprise? And why the bigger coffers? Presumably to contain as much as possible of something, but once again, of
what,
in Heaven's name?

Well, she had her three facts, Julia thought with a certain satisfaction as she continued to eat her breakfast; sometime or other they might fall into place and make sense. This really
was
detection!—trying to make the pieces of the puzzle fit. At least the ‘export' part of it explained Purcell's getting into such a fuss when she had spoken of the curio-dealers' sons in the ports—yes, oh yes! How much, she wondered, did Purcell really know?
Todo?
Quite a lot, if not all, evidently. But one thing still bothered her: why had old Bathyadis so readily assumed that she knew what Colin's activities, still a complete mystery to her, were? She ran over their conversation in her mind, and decided that the first key point had been her reference to the red-haired man—after she had mentioned him the Moor had spoken freely; he was obviously the important person in this queer business. And—oh yes, she might have thought of that before—very likely, almost certainly, the fact that Mr. St John had brought her to the shop had pre-disposed the antique-merchant to think she knew about the whole affair, since, according to Purcell, St John himself was also a source of information. And, of course, she had at once tried to buy a trunk. But who were “they”?—Germans, Bathyadis thought; and “enemies”. Who
had
talked to her in Morocco about Germans? She still could not remember. And—was it in Tangier or Casablanca? Bother!—why need she have forgotten this?