Miss Self read the letter aloud. "Now," she snapped, "what do you say to that?" When I did not readily reply, she said: "There's something wrong. Something suspicious. But putting that aside, it stands in contradiction to one of our primary rules: a Service employee must never associate socially with a client. These rules are not arbitrary. They are founded on experience." Frowning, she tapped the letter with a fingernail. "What do you suppose this man could have in mind? A partouze? Involving his wife?"
Careful to sound indifferent, I said: "I can't see any harm in that."
"Ah, so," she accused me. "You see nothing against this proposal? You want to go."
"Well, frankly, Miss Self, I'd welcome a change of scenery for a few days. I've had a pretty rough time this past year or so."
She slugged down another double dose of the cactus juice; shuddered. "Very well, I will write Mr. Appleton, and ask a fee of five hundred dollars. Perhaps, for a sum like that, we can for once overlook a rule. And with your share of the profits, promise me you'll buy a raincoat."
Aces waved to me as I entered the Ritz bar. It was six o'clock and I had to squeeze my way toward him between the populated tables, for at cocktail time the bar brimmed with suntanned skiers recently descended from Alpine holidays; and pairs of expensive tarts keeping each other company while waiting to be winked at by German and American businessmen; and battalions of fashion writers and Seventh Avenue rag traders gathered in Paris to view the summer collections; and of course, the chic old blue-haired ladies-there are always several of them, elderly permanent residents of the hotel, ensconced in the Ritz bar sipping their allotted two martinis ("my doctor insists: so good for the circulation") before retiring to the dining room to chew in mute chandeliered isolation.
I had no sooner sat down than Aces was summoned to answer a telephone call. I had a good view of him, for the telephone is located at the far end of the bar; occasionally his lips moved, but mostly he seemed to be just listening and nodding. Not that I was really watching him, for my mind was still upstairs contemplating Kate McCloud's loose hair, her dreaming head-a spectacle so consuming that Aces' return startled me.
"That was Kate," he announced, looking self-satisfied: a mongoose digesting a mouse. "She wanted to know why you left without saying good-bye."
"She was asleep."
Aces always carries a mess of kitchen matches in a jacket pocket, it's one of his affectations; he lighted one with his thumbnail and touched the flame to a cigarette. "She may not seem so, but Kate's a very knowledgeable young woman—her instincts are usually sound. She liked you very much. And so," he said, grinning, "I'm in a position to make you a solid offer. Kate would like to hire you as a paid companion. You will receive a thousand dollars a month and all your expenses, including clothing and your own car."
I said: "Why did she marry Axel Jaeger?"
Aces blinked, as if this was the last reaction he had expected from me. He stalled. Then: "Perhaps a more interesting question would be—why did he marry her? And an even more interesting question is—how did Kate meet him? You see, Axel Jaeger is an elusive man. I've never encountered him myself, only seen paparazzi photographs: a tall man with a Heidelberg sword-scar across his cheek, thin, almost emaciated, a man in his late fifties. He comes from Dusseldorf, and inherited an ammunitions fortune from his grandfather, a fortune he has astronomically increased. He has factories all over Germany, all over the world-he owns oil tankers, oil fields in Texas and Alaska, he has the largest cattle ranch in Brazil, over eight hundred square miles, and a fair share of both Ireland and Switzerland (all the rich West Germans have been buying up Ireland and Switzerland: they think they'll be safe there if the bombs start falling again). Jaeger is easily the richest man in Germany-and possibly Europe. He's a German national, but he has a permanent Swiss residence permit; for tax reasons, naturally. To keep it, he has to spend six months of the year in Switzerland whether he likes it or not. God, what tortures the rich won't endure to protect a penny. He lives in a colossal, and colossally ugly, chateau on a Mountainside about three miles north of St. Moritz. I don't know anyone who has ever been inside the place. Except Kate, of course.
"As I understand it, he was, and is, a very convinced Catholic. And for that reason he remained married to his first wife for twenty-seven loyal years, or until she died. Even though she was unable to give him a child, which seems to have been the crux of the matter, for he wanted a child, a son, to continue the Jaeger dynasty. That being the case, why didn't he do the obvious and marry a well-bred, wide-hipped German girl who could fill up a nursery bim-bam? Certainly a clever soigné beauty like Kate would hardly seem the ideal choice for a man of Herr Jaeger's constrained austerity. And, so far as that goes, it's incomprehensible that Kate would find herself attracted to such a person. Money? That couldn't have been as issue. Actually, after I first really got to know Kate, she told me that her first marriage had been such a trauma, she never intended to marry again. And yet, within a few months, and without any signal, without ever mentioning that she even knew this legendary tycoon, she obtained a papal annulment from her first marriage and marries Jaeger in a Catholic ceremony at the Dusseldorf Cathedral. One year later the prayed-for heir arrives. Heinrich Rheinhardt Jaeger. Heinie. And a year after that, less than a year, she seems to have been dismissed from the Jaeger chateau, luggage et al., leaving the boy in the father's custody-though granted certain highly limited visiting privileges."
"But you don't know why?"
Aces thumbnailed another kitchen match, and blew it out. "The fall-out, or whatever one may call it, was as enigmatic as the alliance itself. She disappeared for several months, and a doctor I know told me she had spent them cloistered at the Nestlé Clinic in Lausanne. But as for what happened, she's not confided in me, and I've never had the courage to inquire. I suppose the only person who really knows is Kate's maid, Corinne. And when it comes to Miss Kate, Corinne is as close-mouthed as an Easter Island monument."
"Well. But why didn't they get a divorce?"
"The Catholic hang-up, I suppose. He would never countenance divorce."
"For Christ sake, she could divorce him, couldn't she?"
"Not if she ever wanted to see Heinie again. That door would be shut forever."
"Sonofabitch. I'd like to shove a shotgun up his ass and pull the trigger. Bastard. But you mentioned danger. I can't see where she has anything to be afraid of."
"Kate thinks she does. So do 1. And it isn't any paranoid fantasy that Jaeger has agents following her, or gathering information on her wherever she goes, whatever she does. If she changes a Kotex, you can be sure the Grand Seigneur hears about it. Look," he said, snapping his fingers for a waiter "let's have a drink. It's too late for daiquiris. How about a Scotch-soda?"
"I don't care."
"Waiter, two Scotch-soda. Now, as to this offer I've made you—are the terms satisfactory, or would you like a few days to think it over?"
"I don't have to think it over. I've already decided."
The drinks arrived, and he lifted his glass. "Then we'll drink to your decision, whatever it is. Though I hope it's yes."
"Yes."
He relaxed. "You're a godsend, P. B. And I'm sure you'll not regret it." Seldom has a more untrue prophecy been prophesied.
"Yes, it's yes. But. If he doesn't want a divorce, what does he want?"