Beside an open window Mallory and Anne faced each other across a small table, smoking cigarettes. Far out to sea the lights of a ship moved slowly across the horizon like something from another world and Anne sighed.
“A big one. I wonder where she’s going?”
“Tangiers, the Azores. Take your choice.”
“An invitation?”
“Of the most improper kind,” he said, and smiled.
“You should do that more often,” she said. “It suits you.”
Before he could reply a shadow fell across the table. Juliette Vincente was standing there, a half-bottle of champagne and two glasses on her tray. She was perhaps thirty-five, a plain, rather simple-looking woman in a blue woolen dress, thickening slightly at the waist, but her skin was fresh and clean, the cheeks touched with crimson.
“From Monsieur le Comte, madame,” she said simply, and placed the bottle and glasses on the table.
At the far end of the bar two or three broad steps lifted to another room where de Beaumont sat beside a pleasant fire. Anne nodded and he raised his glass.
“Small return for a delightful meal.”
“Shall I ask him over?” Mallory said.
She shook her head. “Not unless you want to.”
A moment or two later the station wagon braked to a halt outside and Raoul Guyon and Fiona got out, turning to help the General. The old man led the way up the steps confi-dently and entered the bar.
“Over here, Hamish!” Anne called, and he turned and came towards them.
Mallory got to his feet and brought a chair forward and Fiona slipped into the window-seat beside Anne. Guyon picked up the bottle and nodded approvingly.
“Heidsieck, 1952. How typical for the English to reserve the best for themselves. I must really do something to upset the balance.”
He moved across to the bar and Hamish Grant produced a brown leather cheroot case and proffered it to Mallory. “Try one of these. Filthy things, but nothing quite like “em. Picked up the habit in India.”
Mallory took one and offered the old man a light as Guyon returned. “Our good friend Owen is raiding his cellar. He can’t guarantee that everything will have necessarily come in through the proper channels, but no matter. He tells me that the revenue man only comes once a year and always warns him in advance.”
“Understandable,” the General said. “They were in the navy together.”
Owen Morgan appeared a few moments later and came across with a wide grin. “No need for ice,” he said to Guyon as he offereda bottle for inspection. “It’s cold enough where that’s been.”
“Excellent,” Guyon said. “I’ll open it while you fetch some glasses.”
His gaiety was quite infectious and within a few moments he had them all laughing with a description of an outrageous and quite untruthful incident from his past. The con-versation which followed moved along spontaneously.
Once or twice Mallory noticed the three men in the corner looking towards them, obviously irritated after some particularly loud burst of laughter from Fiona or Guyon. One of them hammered on the table and called loudly to Owen Morgan for more cognac.
Mallory leaned across to Anne. “The one on the left with the haircut. He was at the wheel of de Beaumont’s boat this afternoon. Who is he?”
“They call him Jacaud,” she said. “That’s all I can tell you. He seems to go everywhere with de Beaumont. I think the others are afraid of him.”
“Hardly surprising,” Guyon put in. “There’s about fifteen stone of bone and muscle there, mostly muscle from the look of him.”
Jacaud got to his feet, crossed the bar and mounted the steps to the other room. He leaned on de Beaumont’s table and they held a short conversation. Mallory watched them over the rim of his glass. Once, de Beaumont turned and looked towards them. He gazed coolly at Mallory for a moment, then turned back to Jacaud.
The big Frenchman rejoined his friends and Owen Morgan turned on the radio, the sound of music filling the room. Guyon pulled Fiona to her feet and grinned.
“Come on, let’s liven the place up a little.”
They made an attractive couple as they circled the room. The beautiful young girl on the threshold of womanhood, and Guyon, his lean, sun-blackened face animated and full of life.