Mediterranean Nights (6 page)

‘God, how I hate that farm! What with getting up on icy
mornings while it's still dark, being out in all weathers, not a soul fit to talk to within miles, the whiskey being locked up in a cupboard as medicine, and looking after those blasted animals day in day out; it's my idea of hell. No wonder that, come Christmas, I felt I couldn't stick it a week longer. I wouldn't have, neither, if the idea hadn't come to me of doing the old man in.

‘That was Boxing Day—after he'd shown us the new will he'd made leaving the farm to Minnie—and by then I knew it needed only a sudden shock to make his heart conk out. Now he's had it, we'll sell up; then heigh-ho for good old London. Pity I'm finished as a bookie, but I think I'll start one of those amusement parlours—slot machines and all that—somewhere off the Edgware Road. Plenty of easy money to be made in one of them, and no risks attached.

‘Cooking the old boy's goose proved more of a conundrum than I'd thought. What a comfort now, though, to think how leery I was about not starting anything before I'd got the whole job worked out. I suppose it was his bad driving that gave me the idea of rigging a car smash.

‘I puzzled over the snags to that—the chance that the shock might not kill him after all; and how, if I'd been seen in the car with him, I might have some very awkward moments explaining things afterwards. My real brain-wave was about his driving into market and collecting the farm wages from the Bank every Thursday. I saw how easy it would be for me to have him pick me up on the way back, one time when there was nobody about, then if the crash didn't do the trick it would be thought that he had given a hiker a lift and the chap had coshed him in order to rob him of his money.

‘Laying in wait for him down in the valley was a bit of a strain, in spite of the two doubles I had broken open the medicine cupboard to get down me before I started out. Still, I felt calm as a cucumber once the car came in sight and I was flagging him for a lift. I can see it all again as clear as clear, from the moment he picked me up.

‘I waited till the car had reduced speed going up the hill, then used my elbow to jab him in the ribs with all my force. As he doubled up his hands lost their grip on the wheel. The car swerved and ran into the ditch. His head shot forward
and splintered the windscreen, but I was braced ready for the crash, so suffered no harm. It was a nasty moment when I felt his heart and found it still going. That meant I'd got to go through with the whole business and count on the hiker set-up. Pulling on a pair of gloves, I yanked the tyre-lever out from under the seat and gave him a crack on the back of the head. The one blow settled his hash all right; so I dropped the blunt instrument into the back of the car, whisked his wallet and scrambled out into the road.

‘A quick look round showed me that there was no one about, and I intended to go home as though nothing had happened; but I still had fifty yards to cover to the farm-yard when I spotted a lorry in the distance. Its driver might have seen that I was walking away from the ditched car, so I had to play for safety by running up to the house and breaking the news to Minnie myself.

‘I told her that I had come on the car with the old boy dead in it as I was walking home from the four acre. Naturally she went a bit white, and whiter still when I added: “It wasn't an accident. His wallet's gone with tomorrow's wages. Some roughneck that he gave a lift to slogged him on the head. It looks like the work of one of those tough young conscripts up at the camp—probably he done it to get money to desert with.”

‘ “Why d'you think that?” she asked after a moment. “Did whoever done it leave anything behind?”

‘ “No,” I said, “I wish they had, though; or that someone else had been the first to find your uncle. As we're the gainers by his death it's just on the cards that the police may think I had a hand in it.”

‘Selling her that line was typical of smart little Arty. My saying that I might be suspected was a cert for killing any faint suspicion of me that she might have herself. She reacted instantly, and exclaimed:

‘ “Oh, Arty, that would be awful! They're so clever it's certain they'd twist whatever you say against you. Couldn't we do something to take their minds off even getting the idea that it might have been you?” Then I could almost see her poor brain creaking before she stammered: “Couldn't… couldn't we put something in the back of the car as though
it had been left by whoever done it—some old thing that doesn't belong to us?”

‘The notion of laying a false trail hadn't occurred to me; but it seemed a good one and exceptionally bright for her. But the very next moment she showed how damn' stupid she really is by anteing up a suggestion which might quite well frame her own boy-friend for the murder. A few evenings before, the corporal had made her a present of a few tinned things from the N.A.A.F.I. He'd forgotten to take away the old haversack in which he'd brought them and it was hanging up there in the hall, where we were talking. Pulling it off the peg she said:

‘ “Here, take this! It might belong to any soldier, so you couldn't have nothing better.”

‘She hadn't the sense to realise that it would have the Corp's name and number in it. How far the two of them have gone together when I've been out of the way, I don't know—or care; but if he can't prove an alibi, he's going to pay plenty for having fooled around with another chap's wife.

‘I had hardly agreed to her suggestion when there came a knock on the door. It was the driver of the lorry. On coming up the hill he had seen the ditched car, got out to have a look, then walked through the yard to the farm. I explained about it being my wife's uncle and that I'd just broken the news to her. He gave me a lift into the town and I told my story to the police. They brought me back to the scene of the crash in one of their cars and when we got there I saw the haversack lying on the back seat behind Uncle Sid's battered head. I give Minnie full marks for having put it there when she saw I wouldn't have the chance to do so myself.

‘The police jumped to it that a soldier must have done the job, and after a session with Minnie and me they left us for the night. Their having brought me in for questioning this afternoon would shake most people. But I'm not scared. Why should I be? Even if they find out that the haversack was a phoney, they still won't have anything on yours truly. I didn't put it there; Minnie did. The cops may be pretty bright but they won't get nothing on little Arty.'

.      .      .      .      .

Next morning the Inspector informed Arty that he was to be further detained on a charge of murder. That shook Arty pretty badly; but as the Inspector went on to issue the usual caution, he got his wits back sufficiently to stammer out that he would like to see a solicitor.

The Inspector nodded and said: That reminds me. Your wife has been asking if she can have your post office savings book back and your authority for drawing the money towards the expenses of your defence. We have told her that if you will sign the necessary withdrawal form, we will arrange matters with the P.M.G.'s office. But we can't let her have the book back. We must retain it as Exhibit No. 1 at your trial, as it was found in that old Army haversack and the owner has already proved a cast-iron alibi.'

Arty had never fainted in his life, but he fainted then; and his last conscious thoughts ran: ‘How the hell did my savings book get into that haversack? How did Minnie know it was there? It could only be because she put it there herself. She must have smelt the whiskey on my breath and guessed I done it. By God, she shopped me. She's not so stupid as I thought her, after all.'

STORY IV

A
BOOK
called
Mediterranean Nights
is quite unthinkable without a tale about Monte Carlo in it; and, although the series as originally planned was never completed, this at least was ticked off on my list quite early in the game.

On reading it through after a period of years I am a little disappointed to find that it is mainly about love and gamblers' luck instead of spies and sinister adventure; and that it makes little attempt to portray Monte Carlo as I first knew it. Those were in the days when something of the glamour which attached to it before the First World War still lingered there. The Grand Dukes who had thrown fantastic parties in the Monte of their youth had returned as ‘elderly' men not yet accepting their exile as a permanency, and therefore not yet adopting obvious petty economies. The famous Greek syndicate still gambled impassively in thousands each night at the Sporting Club. Monsieur Fleurie, that Emperor among
maîtres des hôtels
, still dominated the scene at the Hôtel de Paris and dispensed to his most favoured patrons the world-renowned old brandy from his
Caves
in Burgundy-shaped, crested medallion bottles. The great yachts of the Duke of Westminster and Lord Furness lay with a score of others in the blue bay. The diamonds in the bracelets which flashed upon the arms of the women in the Salle de Jeux at nights were not
ersatz
, as they afterwards became, but real jewels worth fifty times the price of the gambling plaques scattered upon the green baize of the tables.

I am so glad that I saw it all when I was young; because last time I visited Monte it had fallen into a state of sad decay. Forty years had changed such of the exiled aristocrats as remained into aged seedy folk, many of them haunting the bars with what was pretty clearly the pathetic hope that some ‘old friend' or even a chance acquaintance would offer them a really enjoyable free meal. Most of the yachts had
gone, and with them the millionaires, to playgrounds farther afield—South Africa, Miami, the Bahamas, Santa Catalina, Bali, and the South Seas. The women in the rooms were no longer great ladies or splendid courtesans; they were just respectable middle-class women or shoddy little hussies casting anxious, hopeful glances at each man who entered the door. In the square before the Casino there was a row of 'buses doing a good trade in taking crowds of indifferently clad tourists in and out from Nice and Cannes, to spend a few hours in the golden acre where once the last heirs of a vanished world of nobility and elegance had strolled with leisured peace enjoying the midday sun.

But let us not think of poor Monte Carlo as she is today.

This story was offered to one or two editors, but they displayed no interest in it, so it was thrown aside, and appears here in print for the first time. On re-reading it I make bold to suggest that those editors might have found a better use for their rejection slips. Admittedly the yarn is light, but hangs together well and it possesses that very rare virtue, so difficult to achieve in a short story yet so eminently desirable—a double twist.

BORROWED MONEY

S
ALLY
watched the croupier rake in her last red plaque. She opened her handbag and looked inside, although even as she did so she knew that it was useless. A handkerchief, two lipsticks, and four francs seventy-five centimes. She shut it with a snap.

She looked at the double tier of faces round the table, and noticed with a little shock how hard the eyes of the women had become, how abrupt and almost rude the manners of the men. Monte Carlo madness was upon them—the veneer of courtesy and kindness with which they conducted their daily lives had dropped away; the naked lust of gain showed openly as they watched the spin of the roulette wheel, or lay beneath lowered lids as they sat with assumed
placidity. Not one of the players evinced the slightest interest in her ill-fortune—only the dark young man, who had stood looking on for the last hour from the other side of the table, displayed any understanding. She caught his eyes—he was smiling at her now.

Sally was just a little bewildered; everything seemed to have happened so quickly. At half past nine she had had before her piles and piles of plaques, of different shapes and various colours, representing several hundred pounds. It was now barely eleven, and every one of them had disappeared. In ordinary circumstances she would have looked quickly away from that young man; half-dazed as she now was she found herself looking straight into his brown eyes. Then she realised that her schoolgirl habit of making faces had betrayed her. Her eyebrows slipped up and her mouth slipped down into a half-rueful, half-humorous smile.

‘
Pardon, Mademoiselle
, you play no more?—I may then 'ave your chair.' It was a Frenchman behind her speaking. As she stood up he settled himself eagerly—it was his lucky seat, and he had been waiting for it for an hour.

Sally moved away from the table. The dark young man stood before her. ‘A glass of champagne and a breath of fresh air on the terrace is the only thing,' he said, smiling into her eyes.

She regarded him gravely, she had recovered herself a little now. ‘I'm afraid I don't know you,' she said coldly.

‘Of course not,' he laughed, ‘but unlucky at cards … you know.' He suddenly went scarlet. ‘I say—I didn't mean that—I meant the other way on—lucky for me!—no, I didn't, I mean… hang it all I don't know what I do mean—you must think I'm an utter fool, but honestly I didn't mean to be impertinent—just thought I might be able to cheer you up a bit.'

He was so obviously embarrassed that Sally could not help feeling sorry for him. But for his blunder she would most certainly have given him an admirable view of her charming back; as it was, her sense of humour got the better of her. ‘All right,' she smiled, ‘don't distress yourself—good night.'

‘But I say,' he pleaded, ‘if I really am forgiven won't you let me give you a drink—it's early yet.'

Sally considered; it was early, she would not be able to sleep if she went back to her hotel—the thought of standing round the tables to watch the other people win was unendurable. After all, why not?—he looked a very nice young man with his brown eyes and pugnacious chin. ‘Oh, well,' she said, ‘if you really want to.'