‘Now, Divisionnaire,, Doctor Fischer said, ‘the odds are even.’ I had never hated Fischer so much as I did then. He was taunting us both. He was taunting my disappointment and he was taunting the Divisionnaire’s fear.
‘At last you are facing the enemy’s fire, Divisionnaire. Isn’t it something you have dreamt about during all those long years of our Swiss neutrality?’
I heard the Divisionnaire’s sad voice, while I stood staring at the dead and useless cracker in my hand.
‘I was young then. I’m old now.’
‘But two million francs. I’ve known you a long time, Divisionnaire, and I know how much you value money. You married money, you certainly didn’t marry beauty, but even when your wife died and left you all she had, it didn’t satisfy you, or you wouldn’t have come to my parties. Here’s your chance. Two million francs for showing a little courage. Military courage. Facing fire, Divisionnaire.’
I looked across the grass at the table and I saw that the old man was near to tears. I put my hand in the bran tub and pulled out the last cracker, the cracker which should have been Kips’s. Again I tugged with my teeth and again there was the same small crack no louder than a match striking.
‘What a fool you are, Jones,’ Doctor Fischer said. ‘Where was the hurry? You’ve irritated me all the evening by your mere presence. You aren’t like the others. You aren’t in the picture. You haven’t helped. You prove nothing. It isn’t money you want. You are just greedy for death. I’m not interested in that sort of greed. ‘
The Divisionnaire said, ‘But there’s only my cracker left.’
‘Yes, Divisionnaire, and it’s your turn now all right. No getting out of it. You must play the game to the end. Get up. Put yourself at a safe distance. Unlike Jones I don’t want to die,’ but the old man didn’t move.
‘I can’t shoot you for cowardice in the face of the enemy, but I can promise you the story will be all round Geneva. ‘
I took the two cheques out of the two cylinders and returned with them to the table. I tossed one of the cheques to Fischer. ‘There’s Mr Kips’s share,’ I said, ‘to divide among the others.’
‘You are keeping the other?’
‘Yes.’
He gave me one of his dangerous smiles. ‘After all, Jones, I have hopes of fitting you in the picture. Sit down and have another glass while the Divisionnaire picks up his courage. You are quite well off now. Relatively. In your own eyes. Draw the money out of the bank tomorrow and tuck it safely away, and I really believe that soon you will begin to feel like all the others. I might even start the parties again if only to watch your greed growing. Mrs Montgomery, Belmont, Kips, Deane, they were much like they are now when I first knew them. But I shall have created you. Just as much as God created Adam. Divisionnaire, your time’s up. Don’t keep us waiting any more. The party’s over, the bonfires are going out, it’s getting cold, and it’s time for Albert to clear the table.’
The Divisionnaire sat silent, his old head bowed towards the cracker on the table. I thought, He is really crying (I couldn’t see his eyes), crying for the lost dream of heroism that i suppose every young soldier goes to bed with.
‘Be a man, Divisionnaire.’
‘How you must despise yourself,’ I said to Doctor Fischer. I don’t know what made me say those words. It was as though they had been whispered in my ear, and I had simply passed them on. I pushed the cheque down the table towards the Divisionnaire. I said, ‘I’ll buy your cracker for two million francs. Give it me.’
‘No. No.’ He was hardly audible, but he didn’t resist when I drew the cracker from his fingers.
‘What do you mean, Jones?’
I couldn’t bother to answer Doctor Fischer - I was on more important business - and anyway I didn’t know the answer. The answer hadn’t been given me by whoever had given me the words.
‘Stop where you are, damn you. Tell me, what in Christ’s name do you mean?’
I was far too happy to reply for I had the Divisionnaire’s cracker in my fingers and I walked away from the table down the slope of the lawn towards the lake, the direction which I had imagined Anna-Luise taking. The Divisionnaire buried his face in his hands as I passed; the gardeners had gone, and the bonfires were dying. ‘Come back,’ Doctor Fischer called after me, ‘come back, Jones. I want to talk to you.’
I thought: When it comes to the point he’s afraid too. I suppose he wants to avoid a scandal. But I wasn’t going to help him over that. This was a death which belonged to me, it was my child, my only child, and it was Anna-Luise’s child too. No skiing accident could rob the two of us of the child I held in my hand. I wasn’t lonely any longer - they were the lonely ones, the Divisionnaire and Doctor Fischer, sitting at opposite ends of the long table, waiting to hear the sound of my death.
I went down to the very edge of the lake, where the slope of the lawn would hide me from both of them, and for the third time, but this time with complete confidence, I took the tape between my teeth and pulled the cracker with my right hand.
The silly insignificant crack and the silence which followed told me how utterly I had been fooled. Doctor Fischer had stolen my death and humiliated the Divisionnaire; he had proved his point about the greed of his rich friends, and he was sitting at the table laughing at both of us. It had certainly been a good last party as far as he was concerned.
I couldn’t hear his laughter at this distance. What I heard was the pad and the squeak of footsteps in the snow as they came along the edge of the lake. Whoever it was stopped abruptly when he saw me - all I could make out was a black suit against the white snow. I asked, ‘Who are you?’
‘Why, it’s Mr Jones,’ a voice said. ‘Surely it’s Mr Jones. ‘
‘Yes.’
‘You’ve forgotten me. I’m Steiner.’
‘Why on earth are you here?’
‘I couldn’t stand it any more.’
‘Stand what?’
‘What he did to her.’
At that moment my mind was occupied with Anna-Luise and I had no idea what he meant. Then I said, ‘There’s nothing you can do about it now.’
He said, ‘I heard about your wife. I am very sorry. She was so like Anna. When I heard she had died it was just as though Anna had died all over again. You must forgive me. I am talking clumsily.’
‘No. I can understand what you felt.’
‘Where is he?’
‘If you mean Doctor Fischer, he’s been playing his best and final joke and he’s up there laughing to himself, I imagine.’
‘I’ve got to go and see him.’
‘What for?’
‘When I was in that hospital I had a lot of time to think. It was seeing your wife which made me start to think. Seeing her in the shop was like Anna come alive. I had too much accepted things - he was so powerful - he had invented Dentophil Bouquet - he was a bit like God Almighty - he could take away my job - he could even take away Mozart. I never wanted to listen to Mozart after she died. You must understand, please, for her sake. We were never really lovers, but he made innocence dirty. Now I want to get near enough to him to spit in God Almighty’s face.’
‘It’s a bit too late for that, isn’t it?’
‘It’s never too late to spit at God Almighty. He lasts for ever and ever, amen. And he made us what we are.’
‘Perhaps he did, but Doctor Fischer didn’t.’
‘He made me what I am now.’
‘Oh,’ I said - I was impatient with the little man who had broken my solitude - ‘go up there then and spit. A lot of good may it do you.’
He looked away from me up the slope of the lawn which we could barely distinguish now in the dying light of the fires, but as it happened Mr Steiner didn’t have to climb up the slope to find Doctor Fischer, for Doctor Fischer came climbing down to us, climbing slowly and laboriously, watching his own feet, which sometimes slid on an icy patch.