17

After dropping Jonathan, Tom had an impulse to stop at a bar- café and ring his house. He wanted to know if all was well, and if Heloise was home. To his great relief Heloise answered.

‘Oui, chéri, I just got home. Where are you? No, I had only a drink with Noëlle.’

‘Heloise, my pet, let’s do something nice tonight. Maybe the Grais or the Berthelins are free… I know it’s late to ask anyone for dinner, but for after dinner. Maybe the Cleggs … Yes, I feel like seeing some people.’ Tom said he would be home in fifteen minutes.

Tom drove fast, but carefully. He felt curiously shaky about tonight. He was wondering about any telephone calls that Mme Annette might have got since he left the house.

Heloise, or Mme Annette, had put the front light on at Belle Ombre, though the dusk had not yet fallen. A big Citroen cruised slowly past, just before Tom turned into his gates, and Tom looked at it: dark blue, lumbering on the slightly uneven road, with a licence plate ending in 75, meaning a Paris car. There had been two people in it at least. Was it casing Belle Ombre? He was probably over anxious.

‘Hello, Tome! Les Clegg can come for a quick drink, and les Grais can come for dinner, because Antoine didn’t go to Paris today. Does that please you?’ Heloise kissed his cheek. ‘Where were you? Look at the suitcase! – I admit it’s not very big —’

Tom looked at the dark purple suitcase with a red canvas band around it. The clasps and the lock appeared to be brass. The purple leather looked like kid, and perhaps was.

‘Yes. It really is pretty.’ It really was, like their harpsichord, or like his commode de bateau upstairs.

‘And look – inside.’ Heloise opened it. ‘Really str-rong,’ she said in English.

Tom stooped and kissed her hair. ‘Darling, it’s lovely. We can celebrate the suitcase – and the harpsichord. The Cleggs and the Grais haven’t seen the harpsichord, have they? No How is Noëlle?’

‘Tome, something is making you nervous,’ Heloise said in a soft voice, in case Mme Annette might hear.

‘No,’ said Tom. ‘I just feel like seeing some people. I had a very quiet day. Ah, Mme Annette, bonsoir! People tonight. Two for dinner. Can you manage?’

Mme Annette had just arrived with the bar cart. ‘Mais oui, M. Tome. It will have to be à la fortune du pot, but I shall try a ragoût – my Normandy style, if you remember …’

Tom didn’t listen to her ingredients – there was beef, veal and kidney, because she’d had time to pop out to the butcher’s this evening, and it was not going to be pot-luck at all, Tom was sure. But Tom had to wait until she finished. Then he said, ‘By the way, Mme Annette, were there any telephone calls since six when I left?’

‘No, M. Tome.’ With expertise Mme Annette extracted the cork of a small bottle of champagne.

‘None at all? Not even a wrong number?’

‘Non, M. Tome.’ Mme Annette poured champagne carefully into a wide glass for Heloise.

Heloise was watching him. But Tom decided to persist, rather than go into the kitchen to speak with Mme Annette. Or should he not go into the kitchen? Yes. That was quite easy. When Mme Annette went back to the kitchen, Tom said to Heloise, ‘I think I’ll get a beer.’ Mme Annette had left him to make his own drink, as Tom often preferred to do.

In the kitchen, Mme Annette had her dinner in full swing, vegetables washed and ready, and something already boiling on the stove. ‘Madame.’ Tom said, ‘it’s very important – today. Are you quite sure nobody telephoned at all? Even somebody – even by error?’

This seemed to jog her memory, to Tom’s alarm. ‘Ah, oui, the telephone rang around six-thirty. A man asked for – some other name I can’t recall, M. Tome. Then he hung up. An error, M. Tome.’

‘What did you say to him?’

‘I said it was not the residence of the person he wanted.’

‘You told him it was the Ripley residence?’

‘Oh no, M. Tome. I simply said it was not the right number. I thought that was the correct thing to do.’

Tom beamed at her. It had been the correct thing to do. Tom had reproached himself for going off at 6 p.m. today without asking Mme Annette not to give his name under any circumstances, and she’d handled everything properly on her own initiative. ‘Excellent. That’s always the correct thing to do,’ Tom said with admiration. ‘That’s why I have an unlisted number, in order to have a little privacy, n’est-ce pas?’

‘Bien sûr,’ said Mme Annette, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

Tom went back to the living-room, forgetting all about beer. He poured a scotch for himself. He was not much reassured, however. If it had been a Mafioso looking for him, he might be doubly suspicious because two people at this house had refrained from giving the name of the proprietor. Tom wondered if some checking was going on in Milan or Amsterdam or perhaps Hamburg? Didn’t Tom Ripley live in Villeperce? Couldn’t this 424 number be a Villeperce number? Yes, indeed. Fontainebleau numbers began with 422, but 424 was an area southward, including Villeperce.

‘What is worrying you, Tome?’ Heloise asked.

‘Nothing, darling. – What’s happening with your cruise plans? Have you seen anything you like?’

‘Ah, yes! Something which is not casse-pied swank, just nice and simple. A cruise from Venice around the Mediterranean, including Turkey. Fifteen days – and one doesn’t have to dress for dinner. How does that sound, Tome? Every three weeks during May and June, for instance, the boat leaves.’

‘I’m not much in the mood at the moment. Ask Noëlle if she’d go with you. It would do you good.’

Tom went upstairs to his room. He opened the bottom drawer of his bigger chest of drawers. On top was Heloise’s green jacket from Salzburg. At the back on the bottom of the drawer lay a Luger which Tom had acquired just three months ago from Reeves, oddly enough, not directly from Reeves but from a man whom Tom had had to meet in Paris in order to get something the man was delivering, something that Tom had had to hold for a month before posting it. As a favour, as a kind of payment really, Tom had requested a Luger, and it had been given him – a 7·65 mm with two little boxes of ammunition. Tom verified that the gun was loaded, then he went to his closet and looked at his French-made hunting rifle. It was loaded also, with the safety on it. It was the Luger he would need in case of trouble, Tom supposed, tonight or tomorrow or tomorrow night. Tom looked out the two windows of his room, which gave in two directions. He was looking for cruising cars with dimmed lights, but he didn’t see any. It was already dark.

A car approached with a determined air from the left: this was the dear, harmless Cleggs, and they turned in smartly through the gates of Belle Ombre. Tom went down to welcome them.

The Cleggs – Howard, fiftyish, an Englishman and his English wife Rosemary – stayed for two drinks, and the Grais joined them. Glegg, a retired lawyer, retired because of a heart condition, nevertheless was more animated than anyone eke. His grey, neatly cut hair, seasoned tweed jacket and grey flannels, lent the air of country stability that Tom needed. Clegg, standing with his back to the curtained front window, scotch in hand, telling a funny story—What could happen tonight to shatter this rural conviviality? Tom had left his room light on, and he had turned on the bedside lamp in Heloise’s room also. The two cars were parked carelessly on the gravel. Tom wanted his house to present the picture of a party in progress, a party bigger than it was. Not that this would really stop the Mafia boys, if they chose to toss a bomb, Tom knew, and therefore he was putting his friends in danger, perhaps. But Tom had the feeling the Mafia would prefer a quiet assassination for him: get him alone and then attack, maybe without a gun, just a sudden beating up that would be fatal. The Mafia could do it on the streets of Villeperce, and be away before the townspeople knew what had happened.

Rosemary Clegg, slim and beautiful in a middle-aged way, was promising Heloise some kind of plant that she and Howard had just brought back from England.

‘Are you intending to set any fires this summer?’ Antoine Grais asked.

‘Not really my dish.’ Tom said, smiling. ‘Come out and take a look at the greenhouse-to-be.’

Tom and Antoine walked out the french windows and down the steps on to the lawn, Tom with a flashlight. The foundation had been laid with cement, the pieces for the steel frame were stacked alongside, doing the lawn no good, and the workmen hadn’t been around for a week. Tom had been warned by one of the villagers about this crew: they had so much work this summer, they hopped from one job to the next, trying to please everybody, or at least keep a lot of people on the hook.

‘That’s coming along, I think,’ said Antoine finally.

Tom had consulted Antoine as to the best type of greenhouse, paid him for his services, and Antoine had also been able to get the materials for him at a professional discount, or anyway more cheaply than the mason would have got them. Tom found himself glancing towards the lane through the woods behind Antoine, where there were no lights at all, certainly no car lights now.

But by 11 p.m., after dinner when the four of them were drinking coffee and Benedictine, Tom made up his mind to get both Heloise and Mme Annette out of the house by tomorrow. Heloise would be the easier. He’d persuade her to stay with Noëlle for a few days – Noëlle and her husband had a very large flat in Neuilly – or to stay with her parents. Mme Annette had a sister in Lyon, and fortunately the sister had a telephone, so something might be arranged quickly. And the explanation? Tom shrank from the idea of putting on an act of crotchetiness, such as, ‘I must be alone for a few days’, and if he admitted that there was danger, Heloise and Mme Annette would be alarmed. They’d want to alert the police.

Tom approached Heloise that evening, as they were getting ready for bed. ‘My dear,’ he said in English, ‘I have a feeling something awful is going to happen, and I don’t want you here. It’s a matter of your safety. Also I would like Mme Annette to leave tomorrow for a few days – so I hope, darling, you can help me persuade her to visit her sister.’

Heloise, propped up on pale blue pillows, frowned a little and set down the yoghurt she was eating. ‘What is happening that is awful? – Tome, you must tell me.’

‘No.’ Tom shook his head, then he laughed. ‘And maybe I’m only anxious. Maybe it’s for nothing. But there’s no harm in playing it safe, is there?’

‘I don’t want a lot of words, Tome. What has happened? Something with Reeves! It is that, isn’t it?’

‘In a way.’ It was a lot better than saying it was the Mafia.

‘Where is he?’

‘Oh, he’s in Amsterdam, I think.’

‘Doesn’t he live in Germany?’

‘Yes, but he’s doing some work in Amsterdam.’

‘But who eke is involved? Why are you worried? – What have you done, Tome?’

‘Why, nothing, darling!’ It was Tom’s usual answer under the circumstances. He wasn’t even ashamed of it.

‘Then you’re trying to protect Reeves?’

‘He’s done me a few favours. But I want to protect you now – and us, and Belle Ombre. Not Reeves. So you must let me try, darling.’

‘Belle Ombre?’

Tom smiled and said calmly, ‘I don’t want any disturbance at Belle Ombre. I don’t want anything broken, not a pane of glass. You must trust me, I’m trying to avoid anything violent – or dangerous!’

Heloise blinked her eyes and said in a slightly piqued tone, ‘AH right, Tome.’

He knew that Heloise would ask no more questions, not unless there was an accusation by the police, or a Mafia corpse to account for to her. A few minutes later, they were both smiling, and Tom slept in her bed that night. How much worse it must be for Jonathan Trevanny, Tom thought – not that Simone appeared difficult, prying or neurotic in the least, but Jonathan was not in the habit of doing anything out of the ordinary, not even of telling white lies. It must be, as Jonathan had said, shattering if his wife had begun to mistrust him. And because of the money, it was natural that Simone would think of crime, of something shameful that Jonathan couldn’t admit.

In the morning, Heloise and Tom spoke to Mme Annette together. Heloise had had her tea upstairs, and Tom was drinking a second coffee in the living-room.

‘M. Tome says he wants to be alone and think and paint for a few days,’ said Heloise.

They had decided this was best after all. ‘And a little vacation wouldn’t do you any harm, Mme Annette. A little one before the big one in August,’ Tom added, though Mme Annette, sturdy and lively as always, looked in the best of form.

‘But if you wish, Madame et M’sieur, of course. That is the big thing, is it not?’ She was smiling, her blue eyes not exactly twinkling now, but she was agreeable.

Mme Annette at once agreed to ring her sister Marie-Odile in Lyon.

The post came at 9.30 a.m. In it was a square, white envelope with a Swiss stamp, the address printed – Reeves? printing, Tom suspected – and no return address. Tom wanted to open it in the living-room, but Heloise was talking with Mme Annette about driving her to Paris for the train to Lyon, so Tom went up to his room. The letter said:

May 11

Dear Tom,

I am in Ascona. Had to leave Amsterdam because of a near thing in my hotel, but have managed to put my belongings in store in Amsterdam. God, I wish they would lay off! I am here in this pretty town, known as Ralph Piatt, staying at an inn up the hill called Die Drei Baeren – cosy? At least it is very out of the way and family pension style. Wishing the very best to you and Heloise,

As ever,
R.

Tom crushed the letter in his hand, then shredded it into his wastebasket. It was exactly as bad as Tom had thought: the Mafia had caught up with him at Amsterdam, and had doubtless got Tom’s telephone number by checking all the numbers Reeves had called. Tom wondered what the near thing at the hotel had been? He swore to himself, not for the first time, that he’d never have anything to do with Reeves Minot in future. In this case, all he’d provided was an idea for Reeves. That should have been harmless, and it was harmless. Tom realized his mistake had been to try to help Jonathan Trevanny. And of course Reeves didn’t know that, or Reeves wouldn’t have been stupid enough to ring him at Belle Ombre.

He wanted Jonathan Trevanny to come to Belle Ombre by this evening, even this afternoon, though he knew Jonathan worked on Saturday. If anything happened, the situation could be more easily handled by two people, at front and back of the house, for instance, because one person couldn’t be everywhere. And who eke had he to call on but Jonathan? Jonathan wasn’t a promising fighter, and yet in a crisis he might come through, just as he had on the train. He’d done all right there, and had also, Tom remembered, yanked him back to safety when he’d been surely going to fall out the train door. He wanted Jonathan to stay the night, and he’d have to fetch him, too, because there was no bus, and Tom didn’t want him to take a taxi, in view of what might happen tonight, didn’t want any taxi-driver to recall that he’d driven a man from Fontainebleau to Villeperce, a rather unusual distance.

‘You will telephone me tonight, Tome?’ Heloise asked. She was packing a big suitcase in her room. She was going first to her family.

‘Yes, my love. Around seven-thirty?’ He knew Heloise’s parents dined promptly at 8 p.m. ‘I’ll ring and say “All is well”, probably.’

‘Is it only tonight you are worried about?’

It wasn’t, but Tom didn’t want to say so. ‘I think so.’

When Heloise and Mme Annette were ready to leave around n a.m., Tom managed to enter the garage first, before he even helped them with their luggage, though Mme Annette had the old French school idea that she should carry the luggage of both in instalments, simply because she was a servant. Tom looked under the hood of the Alfa. The motor presented the familiar picture of metal and wires. He started the motor. No explosion. Tom had gone out and padlocked the garage doors last evening before dinner, but Tom believed anything when it came to the Mafia. They’d pick a padlock and snap it shut again.

‘We will be in touch, Mme Annette,’ Tom said, kissing her cheek. ‘Enjoy yourself!’

‘Bye-bye, Tome! Ring me tonight! And take care!’ Heloise shouted.

Tom grinned as he waved good-bye. He could tell that Heloise wasn’t very worried. That was all to the good.

Tom then went into his house to telephone Jonathan.