The Comedians

'He longs to be off. He cannot endure this place. His temper will not be right until we are at sea again.'

'And the man with the tin hat? Did you leave him safely in Santo Domingo?'

I felt an odd nostalgia when I talked of my fellow passengers, perhaps because it was the last time that I had experienced a sense of security - the last time too I had possessed any real hope; I had been returning to Martha and I had believed then everything might be changed.

'The tin hat?'

'Don't you remember? He recited at our concert.'

'Oh yes, poor fellow. We left him safely behind all right in the cemetery. He had a heart-attack before we landed.'

We gave Baxter the tribute of two seconds' silence, while the ball bounced and chinked for Luigi alone. He won a few more gourdes and rose with a gesture of despair.

'And Fernandez?' I asked. 'The black man who wept.'

'He proved invaluable,' the purser said. 'He knew all the ropes. He took charge of everything. You see, it turned out that he was an undertaker. The only thing which worried him was Mr Baxter's faith. In the end he put him in the Protestant cemetery because he found in his pocket a calendar about the future. Old something …'

'Old Moore's Almanack?'

'That was it.'

'I wonder what the entry was for Baxter.'

'I looked to see. It was not very personal. A hurricane was going to cause great damage. There would be a severe sickness in the Royal Family, and the price of steel shares would rise several points.'

'Let's go,' I said. 'An empty casino is worse than an empty tomb.' Luigi was already cashing in his chips, and I did the same. The night outside was heavy with the usual storm.

'Have you got a taxi?' I asked the purser.

'No. He wanted to be paid off.'

'They don't like to stay around at night. I'll drive you to the ship.'

The lights across the playground flashed on and off and on. ' Je suis le drapeau Haïtien, Uni et Indivisible. François Duvalier.' (The 'f' had fused, so it read ' rançois Duvalier'.) We passed Columbus's statue and came to the port and the Medea. A light shone down along the gangplank upon a policeman standing at the foot. There was a light shining too on to the bridge from the captain's cabin. I looked up at the deck where I had sat watching the passengers reel by me on their morning rounds. In port (she was the only ship there) the Medea seemed oddly dwarfed. It was the empty sea which gave the little boat her pride and magnitude. Our footsteps ground upon coal-dust and the taste of grit lodged between our teeth.

'Come on board for a last drink.'

'No. If I did I might want to stay. What would you do then?'

'The captain would ask to see your exit-visa.'

'That fellow would ask first,' I said, looking at the policeman who stood at the foot of the gangplank.

'Oh, he is a good friend of mine.'

The purser mimicked the action of a man drinking and pointed towards me. The policeman grinned back. 'You see he has no objection!

'All the same,' I said, 'I won't come up. I've mixed too many drinks tonight.' But yet I lingered at the plank.

'And Mr Jones,' the purser asked, 'what has become of Mr Jones?'

'He's doing well.'

'I liked him,' the purser said. For a man of such ambiguity, whom we all trusted so little, Jones had a knack of winning friendship.

'He told me he was Libra - a birthday in October, so I looked him up.'

'In Old Moore? What did you find?'

'An artistic temperament. Ambitious. Successful in literary enterprises. But as for the future - I could find only an important Press conference by General de Gaulle and electrical storms in South Wales.'

'He tells me he's about to make a fortune of a quarter of a million dollars.'

'A

literary

enterprise?'

'Hardly that. He invited me to be his partner.'

'So you will be rich too?'

'No. I refused. I used to have my dreams of making a fortune. Perhaps I'll be able to tell you one day about the travelling art-gallery, it was the most successful dream I ever had, but I had to get out quick, and so I came here and found my hotel. Do you think I'd give up that security?'

'You think the hotel security?'

'It's the nearest I've ever come to it.'

'When Mr Jones is a rich man you will be sorry you did not give up that kind of security.'

'Perhaps he'll lend me enough to carry on with my hotel until the tourists return.'

'Yes. I think he is a generous man in his way. He gave me a very large tip, but it was in Congo currency and the bank

wouldn't change it. We shall be here till tomorrow night at least. Bring Mr Jones to see us.'

The lightning began to play over the slopes of Pétionville: sometimes a blade quivered in the ground long enough to carve out of the dark the shape of a palm or the corner of a roof. The air was full of coming rain, and the low sound reminded me of voices chanting the responses at school. We said good night.

PART III

CHAPTER I

1

I FOUND it hard to sleep. The lightning flashed on and off as regular as Papa Doc's publicity in the park, and only when the rain ceased for a while did some air filter through the mosquito-screens. I thought quite a lot about Jones's promised fortune. If I could really share it, would Martha leave her husband? But it was not money which held her, it was Angel. He would be happy enough, I imagined myself persuading her, if I pensioned him off with a weekly issue of puzzles and bourbon biscuits. I fell asleep and dreamt I was a boy kneeling at the communion-rail in the college chapel in Monte Carlo. The priest came down the row and placed in each mouth a bourbon biscuit, but when he came to me he passed me by. The communicants on either side came and went away, but I knelt obstinately on. Again the priest distributed the biscuits and left me out. I stood up then and walked sullenly away down the aisle which had become an immense aviary where parrots stood in ranks chained to their crosses. Someone called out sharply behind me, 'Brown, Brown,' but I was not certain whether that was my name or not, for I didn't turn. 'Brown.' This time I awoke and a voice came up to me from the veranda below my room.

I got out of bed and went to the window, but I could see nothing through the mosquito-screen. Footsteps shuffled below and a voice further off called urgently, 'Brown,' under another window. I could hardly hear it through the holy mutter of the rain. I found my torch and went downstairs. In my office I picked up the only weapon handy, the brass coffin marked R.I.P. Then I unlocked the side-door and shone my torch to show that I was there. The light fell on the path leading to the bathing-pool. Presently round the corner of the house and into the circle of the light came Jones. He was drenched with rain and his face was smeared with dirt. He carried a parcel under his coat to guard it from the rain. He said, 'Turn out the light. Let me in quick.' He followed me into the office and took the parcel from under his wet jacket. It was the travelling cocktail-case. He laid it gently on my desk like a pet animal and stroked it down. He said,

'Everything has gone. Finished. Capot in three columns.'

I put out a hand to turn on the light. 'Don't do that,' he said, 'they might see the light from the road.'

'They can't,' I said and pressed the switch.

'Old man, I'd rather if you don't mind … I feel better in the dark.' He turned out the light again. 'What's that in your hand, old man?'

'A

coffin.'

He was breathing heavily - I could smell the gin. He said, 'I've got to get out quick. Somehow.'

'What

happened?'

'They've begun investigating. At midnight I had a call from Concasseur - I didn't even know the bloody telephone worked. It gave me a shock ringing like that suddenly by my ear. It had never rung before.'