The concierge gave them the required information. Yes, the prince was living at the Carlton, as he did every year at this time. He was one of their longest-standing customers. The Côte d’Azur air calmed his asthma. Well, usually … although this year he had not left his room for two weeks, and a doctor, plus nurse, was in permanent attendance. His was telephone was never answered, apart from once a day, in the evening, always at the same time, when it took a call from London. A black secretary, an Egyptian, took care of all the practical details.
Jean immediately had a note sent to Salah, whom he met at the bar an hour later, before dinner. Salah had not changed, apart from a few grey hairs at his temples and early wrinkles that betokened a face of deep creases in old age. The last time they had seen each other was the evening they had spent at Via del Babuino.
‘I greatly regretted leaving in such a hurry the next morning,’ Salah said. ‘The prince wanted to go to Venice. The doorman at the Adler was meant to give you an envelope with 500 lira from the prince that I left in your name.’
‘Not only did he not give me the money, but he was also vile to me. Because of him I conceived a deep hatred for doormen, and have been punished for it. For six months I had to work as a doorman myself.’
He told Salah the story of his return from Italy, the year he had spent portering at La Vigie, his winter in London.
‘Yes, I knew you were there. The prince was not well. He couldn’t cope with the fog and cold. Afterwards he was in remission, but at the moment we are going through a difficult period: acute shortness of breath and neurasthenia. Madame is to come in the next few days, although every evening he does his best to reassure her …’
Salah stopped talking. Palfy was standing at Jean’s side in such a way that it was impossible not to introduce him. Salah’s expression changed barely perceptibly, as if he felt a secret aversion for this figure deliberately imposing himself on them, this man in blue blazer and white flannel trousers with a cravate tucked into his open shirt and an ironic smirk on his lips. In common with other former servants, Salah had learnt to judge at a glance those who belonged to the owning classes. Rich or broke, Palfy was one of them.
‘I must go back,’ Salah said. ‘We shall meet tomorrow.’
‘Won’t you stay and have a glass of something?’ Palfy asked.
‘I don’t drink alcohol. Two orangeades is one too many.’
Alone with Jean, Palfy rubbed his hands.
‘A quite remarkable fellow!’
‘What makes you say that?’
‘His instinctive wariness. I much prefer that to the dupes who say yes immediately. This one is no dupe, I guarantee. Nor his prince … Nothing could be more promising for what I have in mind.’
‘Constantin, I’ve had enough of your mysteries.’
‘Never mind! Mysteries they must remain a little longer, then you’ll understand. But do me a favour this minute, will you? Write to your friend Madeleine, ask her to join us. I’ll write her a little cheque so that she can buy herself some respectable clothes and book a sleeper.’
‘You must be mad! You saw her for all of five minutes. Don’t try to tell me you’ve fallen in love!’
‘Me in love? I should not dream of being so vulgar, dear boy. No. But I think she may be just the woman I need to manage my business.’
‘Listen, Madeleine earns her living by turning tricks. That’s bad enough for her. Do not get her involved in one of your rackets. She was kind to Chantal and me. I like her. Leave her out of it.’
‘Fool! These are her last years. In a year or two she’ll be picking up Arab labourers at the factory gates. So let us rescue her.’
‘I didn’t know you belonged to the Salvation Army.’
‘A brand-new side to me, eh? Just do as I ask. You have no right to spoil her chance of a lifetime.’
Jean wrote to Madeleine, enclosing Palfy’s cheque. Three days later they waited at the station for her to step off the train. Her transformation into a respectable woman had not been entirely successful. Palfy took her in hand, booked her into a modest hotel and reassured her that he would soon find her an apartment worthy of her. With a telephone.
‘A telephone? What for?’ she asked, suddenly anxious. ‘I don’t know anyone here who will call me.’
‘But I know plenty.’
She confided her anxiety to Jean.
‘Your chap is strange. He’s got to be a pimp. And if he thinks he’s going to drop in and read my meter for me, he’s wrong. I work for myself.’
‘I don’t think he is a pimp. If he turns into one, you can drop him like a shot.’
Jean met Salah again, to ask if he would help him find a job. He waited less than a week before a travel agency engaged him to organise the leisure activities of groups of English tourists who had come to the Riviera to rest. How was he to organise leisure activities for English people on holiday? He had no idea at all. He moved out of the Carlton and took a room in the same hotel as Madeleine. The agency’s office looked out onto the Croisette. Several times a day he saw through the window the garnet-red Austro-Daimler driving past with Madeleine at Palfy’s side. He had persuaded her to dye her hair black. She wore very little make-up and smoked with a tortoiseshell cigarette-holder. From time to time the Hispano-Suiza also stopped outside the office, and Salah came in to talk to Jean.
‘Are you all right?’
‘Yes, it’s not boring, and I’m earning my keep; I’m not dependent on Palfy. How is the prince?’
‘No better nor worse. He’s still in his room. I talked to him about you. He would like to see you as soon as he is better. Madame spoke very highly of you to him. Although she also spoke highly of your unusual friend …’
Jean did not dare ask if she was going to come to Cannes. He dreaded her coming, and longed for it. Dreaded because of the unspeakable confusion she had thrown him into, longed for her to come because she had been a revelation, a dazzling revelation, to him. Alone again, he found it hard to bear the lack of a woman’s company that left him facing the first genuine failure of his life so far. From the nights spent in anguish and distress he assessed the appetite and needs created in him by Chantal. He went to see Madeleine, in her room above his, and unburdened himself to her.
‘I’ve picked up a really bad habit, a very lazy streak. I need to be with a good woman. Do you think I’ll get over it?’
She kissed his forehead.
‘You’re a very nice boy. For a little while you two made me believe in love. But there’s always disappointment waiting. I need to thank Chantal for reminding me. Don’t fall in love any more, sweetheart. It hurts, and it’s stupid.’
He realised quickly that Madeleine was changing from one day to the next. Supposing Palfy was Pygmalion? Madeleine was working on her English, which she had spoken fairly fluently when she lived in London, and he found out she was also taking elocution lessons. Her Parisian drawl was fading. She started expressing herself more clearly, in a calm voice.
‘Your friend will end up making me sit my school certificate. He’s a strange chap all right. He ain’t even — I mean he has not even asked to sleep with me. You see how I use negatives now? I didn’t think about it before. Apparently it’s very fashionable.’
Palfy’s ultimate goal still remained a mystery. With his aplomb, psychological acuity and, even more, his phoney barony, address at the Carlton and Austro-Daimler, he had not dragged his heels about meeting Cannes high society. The Éclaireur de Nice et du Sud-Est published a picture of Baron Palfy dining at the same table as the Aga Khan and the Begum, hugely distinguished company in the eyes of idiots. Like Salah he frequently paused at the agency to talk to Jean.