“Very well,” he said. “I am travelling this way to avoid someone who is trying to shoot me.”
She stopped dead. “I think it is too cold out here,” she said calmly. “I shall go in.”
He was so surprised that he laughed.
She turned on him quickly. “You should not make such stupid jokes.”
There was no doubt about it; she was genuinely angry. He held up his bandaged hand. “A bullet grazed it.”
She frowned. “You are very bad. If you have hurt your hand I am sorry, but you should not make jokes about it. It is very dangerous.”
“Dangerous!”
“You will have bad luck, and so shall I. It is very bad luck to joke in that way.”
“Oh, I see.” He grinned. “I am not superstitious.”
“That is because you do not know. I would sooner see a raven flying than joke about killing. If you wish me to like you, you must not say such things.”
“I apologise,” said Graham, mildly. “Actually I cut my hand with a razor.”
“Ah, they are dangerous things! In Algiers José saw a man with his throat cut from ear to ear with a razor.”
“Suicide?”
“No, no! It was his petite amie who did it. There was a lot of blood. José will tell you about it if you ask him. It was very sad.”
“Yes, I can imagine. José is travelling with you, then?”
“Naturally.” And then, with a sidelong look: “He is my husband.”
Her husband! That explained why she “put up with” José. It also explained why Colonel Haki had omitted to tell him that the “dancing blonde” was travelling on the boat. Graham remembered the promptitude with which José had retired from the dressing-room. That, no doubt, had been a matter of business. Attractions at a place like Le Jockey Cabaret were not quite so attractive if they were known to have husbands in the vicinity. He said: “Kopeikin didn’t tell me that you were married.”
“Kopeikin is very nice, but he does not know everything. But I will tell you confidentially that with José and me it is an arrangement. We are partners, nothing more. He is jealous about me only when I neglect business for pleasure.”
She said it indifferently, as if she were discussing a clause in her contract.
“Are you going to dance in Paris now?”
“I do not know. I hope so; but so much is closed on account of the war.”
“What will you do if you can’t get an engagement?”
“What do you think? I shall starve. I have done it before.” She smiled bravely. “It is good for the figure.” She pressed her hands on her hips and looked at him, inviting his considered opinion. “Do you not think it would be good for my figure to starve a little? One grows fat in Istanbul.” She posed. “You see?”
Graham nearly laughed. The picture being presented for his approval had all the simple allure of a full-page drawing in La Vie Parisienne. Here was the “business man’s” dream come true: the beautiful blonde dancer, married but unloved, in need of protection: something expensive going cheap.
“A dancer’s must be a very hard life,” he said dryly.
“Ah, yes! Many people think that it is so gay. If they knew!”
“Yes, of course. It is getting a little cold, isn’t it? Shall we go inside and have a drink?”
“That would be nice.” She added with a tremendous air of candour: “I am so glad we are travelling together. I was afraid that I was going to be bored. Now, I shall enjoy myself.”
He felt that his answering smile was probably rather sickly. He was beginning to have an uncomfortable suspicion that he was making a fool of himself. “We go this way, I think,” he said.
The salone was a narrow room about thirty feet long, with entrances from the shelter deck and from the landing at the head of the stairs to the cabins. There were grey upholstered banquettes round the walls and, at one end, three round dining tables bolted down. Evidently there was no separate dining-room. Some chairs, a card table, a shaky writing desk, a radio, a piano and a threadbare carpet completed the furnishings. Opening off the room at the far end was a cubby hole with half doors. The lower door had a strip of wood screwed to the top of it to make a counter. This was the bar. Inside it, the steward was opening cartons of cigarettes. Except for him, the place was deserted. They sat down.
“What would you like to drink, Mrs.…,” began Graham tentatively.
She laughed. “José’s name is Gallindo, but I detest it. You must call me Josette. I would like some English whisky and a cigarette, please.”
“Two whiskies,” said Graham.
The steward put his head out and frowned at them. “Viski? ? molto caro,” he said warningly; “très cher. Cinque lire. Five lire each. Vair dear.”
“Yes, it is, but we will have them just the same.”
The steward retired into the bar, and made a lot of noise with the bottles.
“He is very angry,” said Josette. “He is not used to people who order whisky.” She had obviously derived a good deal of satisfaction from the ordering of the whisky, and the discomfiture of the steward. In the light of the saloon her fur coat looked cheap and old; but she had unbuttoned it and arranged it round her shoulders as if it had been a thousand guinea mink. He began, against his better judgment, to feel sorry for her.
“How long have you been dancing?”
“Since I was ten. That is twenty years ago. You see,” she remarked, complacently, “I do not lie to you about my age. I was born in Serbia, but I say that I am Hungarian because it sounds better. My mother and father were very poor.”
“But honest, no doubt.”
She looked faintly puzzled. “Oh no, my father was not at all honest. He was a dancer, and he stole some money from someone in the troupe. They put him in prison. Then the war came, and my mother took me to Paris. A very rich man took care of us for a time, and we had a very nice apartment.” She gave a nostalgic sigh: an impoverished grande dame lamenting past glories. “But he lost his money, and so my mother had to dance again. My mother died when we were in Madrid, and I was sent back to Paris, to a convent. It was terrible there. I do not know what happened to my father. I think perhaps he was killed in the war.”
“And what about José?”
“I met him in Berlin when I was dancing there. He did not like his partner. She was,” she added simply, “a terrible bitch.”
“Was this long ago?”
“Oh, yes. Three years. We have been to a great many places.” She examined him with affectionate concern. “But you are tired. You look tired. You have cut your face, too.”
“I tried to shave with one hand.”
“Have you got a very nice house in England?”
“My wife likes it.”
“Oh là-là! And do you like your wife?”
“Very much.”
“I do not think,” she said reflectively, “that I would like to go to England. So much rain and fog. I like Paris. There is nothing better to live in than an apartment in Paris. It is not expensive.”
“No?”
“For twelve hundred francs a month one can have a very nice apartment. In Rome it is not so cheap. I had an apartment in Rome that was very nice, but it cost fifteen hundred lire. My fiancé was very rich. He sold automobiles.”
“That was before you married José?”
“Of course. We were going to be married but there was some trouble about his divorce from his wife in America. He always said that he would fix it, but in the end it was impossible. I was very sorry. I had that apartment for a year.”