Before the policy had been issued, nearly four years before, I had been subjected to an extensive medical examination. There had been no suspicion of a rare and terminal blood condition then. Plumridge had earnestly observed as much to Helen, something he combined with his renewed condolences, and the information that the two million pounds would be paid in seven days — which it was.
Shortly after this, Helen had arranged for the second hundred thousand pounds to be transferred electronically to Michelle’s new bank account in Lyons, which Henri’s true widow had set up under Boulanger’s instructions. He had stressed that it would be less noticeable for her to be with a branch of a large bank in a regional French capital.
It was the day before the money was due to be transferred that Pierre Boulanger turned up at Boddlestone. I had discreetly kept in touch with him during our time in England, so he knew where I was staying, as well as about the progress on the insurance payout. We were relying on him to guide Michelle on how to look after her money, as he had done with the first installment when her husband had been alive — and very competently, according to both of them, particularly Michelle. He was hardly a professional “money man,” but was proving a prudent, honest, down-to-earth advisor, which is what Michelle testified he had been to them from the start. He had told us, in his modest way, that he handled his mother’s financial affairs in the same practical fashion.
It was good to know that Boulanger stood so high in Michelle’s esteem, particularly as she had no near relation or friend in business to turn to otherwise. I certainly didn’t wish to become too closely involved in her affairs, since she would shortly be divorcing me.
I hadn’t expected Boulanger to come over from France unannounced. Unfortunately, I had been out when he had telephoned from Dover at nine o’clock in the morning and left a message with Shirley, the Ashley Hotel’s not very bright but curvaceous and leggy receptionist. He had come by car, a new one, he had said, and he estimated he’d be in Boddlestone by one o’clock for lunch.
“Must be a really fast car,” Shirley offered in an awe-struck way — fast cars probably equating with rich and equally fast owners in her estimation.
“It won’t be,” I answered, unconvinced that the thrifty, minor civil servant had treated himself to something capable of covering the distance in the time.
In fact, Boulanger arrived at twelve-thirty in a new beret and a not quite so new, but dashing, open white Porsche, looking flushed and shyly pleased with himself. It went through my mind that the car, though two or three years old, must have cost him a lot more than I would have expected him to spend on a replacement for the Citroen. But then, to my knowledge, he had never overindulged himself before. It occurred to me, also, that I might offer to pay for the car as a present, in lieu of the finder’s fee he had rejected. Indeed, it seemed possible that he now regretted this piece of self-denial, was too meek to say so, but had come in the new car naively hoping I’d take the hint and offer to defray the cost.
By keeping watch for my visitor through the lounge window, I had managed to stop him as he’d been about to climb the hotel steps. It was the kind of establishment where conversations were easily overheard. “Let’s have a late lunch along the coast. It’ll give me a chance to ride in your splendid new motor,” I suggested firmly and loudly after we’d shaken hands. “There was really no need for you to come over, you know.” I added, once we were out of earshot of the building. “And really it would have been wiser if we hadn’t been seen together in public.” I had sandwiches and some beer in a bag under my arm for our lunch. “Terrific car,” I added as we got into the Porsche, and to soften the effect of my admonition. “How much did it cost you, Pierre?” I watched to see if the enquiry would please him as much as I’d surmised it would. But he completely ignored it.
“We have important matters to discuss,” he responded solemnly. “Am I right in believing you originally proposed paying Michelle and her husband five percent of the insurance money, monsieur?” He was still addressing me in his formal way, despite the number of times I had pressed him to call me Edward.
Helen and I had never divulged to Boulanger what the total insurance payout would be. “No, we’d always committed a much larger percentage than that,” I answered, as it happened, quite accurately. Nor did his reference to what had been “originally proposed” register with me when he said it: We had only ever put up one proposal to him. “But, with great respect, Pierre, I don’t think the actual percentage is any of your business,” I ended.
At this point I was directing Boulanger to head the car out of town onto the coast road. He was driving with the ferocity that was so-wildly out of keeping with the rest of his persona — and which made him a good deal more menacing to other road users than when he had been at the wheel of a clapped-out jalopy. I had already needed to remind him several times that in Britain we drive on the left-hand side of the road, not the right. It surprised me that he had reached Boddlestone unscathed.
“Ah, but in the matter of the percentage you are mistaken, monsieur. It is very much my business. Mine and Michelle’s. I am here to tell you we now require the whole of the insurance payment you have received, less two hundred thousand pounds,” he completed.
As if to underline this aggressive and preposterous demand with a matching bellicose action, he gunned the accelerator, forcing the Porsche around an electric milk float whose astonished driver had been easing it out to the centre of the road prior to making a turn. We were still in a built-up area. After completing the foolhardy manoeuvre, my companion frowned intensely, but not at the milkman whose arm-waving protest he had totally ignored.
“What do you mean? It’s Michelle who gets the two hundred thousand,” I expostulated. “And she’s had half of it already, as you well know.” I was now very uneasy — and with good reason.
“But that was only the... the provisional arrangement, monsieur.” We had left the town now, and he had begun racing along at over eighty until I shouted at him that we’d have the police on our tail if he didn’t observe the speed limit. “Michelle has run the greatest risk in all this,” he went on, easing back a little on the pedal. “She deserves the, how do you say, the lion’s share. I believe you and madame have received four million pounds.”
“Nonsense, it was only half that,” I exclaimed without thinking, consumed by a mixture of anger and outrage, but then immediately regretting the disclosure.
“So it was two million, monsieur.” He seemed to have accepted this as fact. “It wasn’t very generous of you to offer Michelle only ten percent. So it’s justice that we match you. You must pay Michelle one million, seven hundred thousand. That’s the total, minus ten percent and the hundred thousand you have already advanced to Michelle. We shall he scrupulously fair in keeping to the revised agreement. Only we need Madame Talbot to transfer what we are owed to Michelle’s bank in Lyons by this time tomorrow.”
“Drop dead, Pierre,” I answered, nearly speechless with fury.
“It would not be in your interests if I dropped dead, monsieur...” he began, as I thought, arrogantly to imply that we were still dependent on his involvement for the pittance being offered.
“And what’s all this ‘we’ business when you speak about you and Michelle?” I broke in before he had finished his sentence. “I don’t believe she’s ready to renege on our original deal.”
Boulanger laughed aloud at this; well, not all that loudly, but he seldom made any noise at all when he showed amusement. “Michelle and I had been in love with each other for several months before I met you and your wife, monsieur.”