“Three I saw for certain,” he announced, “and I believe there were four. I thought I had found the dray, too, though on the way home I had to admit to myself that it was an old magpie’s nest.”
He told us how he had stayed perfectly still for twenty minutes —the amateur always feels that anything over ten is a marvel of patience — and that one of the squirrels had actually come close to his feet, trustful as a gray squirrel in a park.
“I ventured greatly,” he went on. “I offered a piece of biscuit. It took it in its paws and ate it, looking at me all the time. I — I was amazed! And flattered! Do you feel, Dennim, that I was justified?”
“Oh, Daddy, it was somebody’s pet!” said Benita.
It must, of course, have been a squirrel brought up by human hands and then turned loose. But I did not want to spoil the vicar’s vision of himself as a humble disciple of St. Francis. In any case he had every right to pride himself on moving cautiously and giving an impression of saintly harmlessness. It does not take long for a tame animal to become as wild as its companions.
I could not resist going up to have a look at the squirrels myself. I went alone, for it would have been impossible to explain to Benita why I took such care to avoid cover till I knew it was empty. There were four of them, fine little beasts with rather darker tails than usual.
I could not find the two drays any more than the vicar. Normally that would have been a challenge and I should have spent a couple of weeks on verifying what the family life of the two pairs really was. But I was impatient. My time was fully taken up. Nur Jehan had just begun to answer his helm, as the admiral put it, by pressure of legs alone.
I saw little of my host except at dinner, for his local dictatorship extended beyond his own village and vicar, and he kept himself busy with all the usual bumbling committees, where he was dreaded for his outspokenness, but indispensable. He considered it a duty of hospitality to preserve his guests from the teas and luncheons which accompanied these activities, so that I was surprised when he told me that I had been especially included in an invitation from General Sir Thomas Pamellor.
“Who is he?” I asked.
“The county’s prize pongo,” said the admiral. “Lives just the other side of Cirencester. But he’ll give you the best lunch outside London if you can stand him.”
“What’s the matter with him?”
“Matter with him is that he’s a bore, boy! Good God, when Thomas retired they had to call in extra police to control the celebrations in Whitehall! It had got so bad that if you had a position of any responsibility in this country you couldn’t talk to a visiting Frenchman without Thomas dropping in beforehand to tell you what you oughtn’t to say. Hell’s bells, if there’s anything we and the French don’t know about each other after a thousand years of fun and games, that ass Thomas is the last person to spot it! But his cook, boy! Mustn’t miss that! A pity we can’t take Frank with us. He might pick up a hint or two.”
General Sir Thomas Pamellor at once reminded me of a fine freshly caught shrimp. Not that he was small, but he sprouted hair at odd angles from eyebrows and mustache, and his coloring was exactly the right mixture of sand and gray. Lady Pamellor was a slightly smaller shrimp, but cooked. She was bright pink and had a good deal of pink in her dress. She gazed at her still-living companion with admiration. There was not much else she could do, for Sir Thomas never stopped giving us extracts from his unwritten memoirs throughout six courses.
“Frankly, I never knew a Frenchman I couldn’t get on with,” said Pamellor. “I was only a colonel then, but whenever and wherever there was trouble with the French, Churchill gave the same order: Turn Pamellor loose on ‘em!”
“Very right!” the admiral agreed naughtily. “You’re the last person they would suspect of playing a deep game.”
“Exactly, Cunobel! A simple soldier and simple liaison. You can’t have too much of it. Now then, mon vieux, I used to say, here’s British policy! And I’d tell him. Here’s French policy! And I’d tell him that, too. Then all we had to do was to go our own way and make the thing work.”
“He speaks such very beautiful French,” said Lady Pamellor, making her sole contribution to the conversation.
And on he went.
“Just tell me what you want, I said to de Gaulle, and I’ll see that Churchill falls in with it. So far as he can, of course, so far as he can! Our own army, that was the trouble. I remember one of our very high commanders. I won’t mention his name. ‘Any more from you,’ I said, ‘and I’ll send a signal straight to the Cabinet.’”
“And did you?” Cunobel asked.
“God bless my soul, yes! I was always sending signals direct to the Cabinet. I remember a major of the Deuxieme Bureau, when I was in Paris after the war, warning me that they had copies of all of them.”
“Broke your cipher, you mean?”
The admiral choked, and did his best to pretend that a truffle had gone the wrong way.
“Good Lord, no I My little secretary had been pinching the en clair drafts from the wastepaper basket. ‘Never mind!’ I said to the major. ‘There’s nothing I tell my government that I am not prepared to tell yours.’ A pity that I hadn’t more influence on policy! I could have made us just a band of brothers.”
When Lady Pamellor had swum delicately off and hidden herself beneath the rocks of the drawing room, Sir Thomas pressed cigars upon us and one of the finest brandies I have ever tasted. I can well imagine the French putting out a legend that they found him useful.
“I hear you’ve been in a spot of trouble, Dennim,” he said.
I instantly joined the odd thousand Europeans who must have thought it wise to impress Sir Thomas with their sincerity.
“Trouble?” I asked, puzzled. “No.”
“Bomb, eh?”
“Where did you hear that?”
“Shall we say I read it in the paper?” replied the general with heavy diplomacy.
Cunobel was magnificent.
“Damned Cypriots!” he exclaimed. “Didn’t leave that kind of thing to the army when I was a boy! Sent a cruiser, gave ‘em a party and showed ‘em over the gun turrets!”
“Cypriots?” Sir Thomas asked. “They didn’t tell me you had been in Cyprus.”
“I’ve been in a lot of places, my dear general,” I said mysteriously. “Now which particular they are you referring to?”
He was a little taken aback. He had evidently thought this was going to be a straightforward job where the renowned Pamellor frankness would be effective.
“There’s no reason why I shouldn’t tell you,” he said. “I’ve been directly approached by French police. They want to know if you can give any description at all of the man who sent the bomb.”
“No, I can’t,” I answered. “And, anyway, Scotland Yard knows all I know. But how did the Surete find out that I was staying somewhere near you?”
“I don’t know. I suppose Scotland Yard told them that much but wouldn’t tell them any more. Hidebound! I could recommend them half a dozen first-rate fellows who would improve liaison with the Surete out of recognition. But there it is! They are up against British mistrust all the time! So what more natural than to appeal to me? Our good friend Pamellor, somebody says, hides himself in his little gentilhommiere at a few kilometers from Chipping Marton. Lui, il fera notre affaire!”
“I do wish I could help a bit more,” I said heartily. “But, to tell you the honest truth, I am not even sure that the bomb which killed our postman was meant for me.
“I may pass that on, Dennim?”