Jay crossed the lounge and removed one of the scarlet silk cords that held the cream curtains in place. He ran the cord through his fingers. It felt smooth and strong to his touch. He coiled the cord and then placed it on the settee, putting a cushion over it to hide it from sight.
He looked down at his watch. The time was one minute to four.
He sat down.
In another minute she would be here. In five or more minutes she would be dead and then what was to be the most exciting experience in his life would begin.
He remained motionless, his eyes on the hands of his watch while he listened to the thump-thump-thump of his heart.
As the minute hand of his watch centred exactly on the hour, there came a gentle rap on the door.
II
The Festival offering for that afternoon was a documentary made in India and Sophia Delaney found it unbearable.
The background music set her teeth on edge, the scenes were of poverty and squalor and it went on and on and on. She thought longingly of the beach and the sea and the sunshine. Finally, when the picture switched to an Indian hospital to show men and women suffering from tropical diseases with close-ups of revolting sores and gigantic limbs swollen out of all recognition, her spirit rebelled.
She glanced at her husband, who sat huddled down in his seat, his eyes riveted on the French subtitles while he strove conscientiously to follow the action of the film. She realized there was no hope of getting him to leave. He would never set the bad example of walking out on another man’s film. She knew he had always at the back of his mind the possibility that one day, someone as important as himself might be tempted to walk out on one of his films and she knew how superstitious he was about tempting providence.
A man with a deep sore on his chest appeared on the screen and this picture revolted her. She touched Floyd’s hand.
“Darling, do you mind? I think I’ve about had enough of this,” she said softly.
In the semi-darkness she saw his look of surprise, then because he loved her and treated her like a child, he nodded, patting her hand.
“Yeah. You skip, honey doll. I’ll have to stay with this thing, but you go. Have a swim or something.”
His eyes were drawn back to the screen as the camera tracked up to a close-up shot of the sore.
She brushed his cheek with her lips.
“Thank you, darling,” she murmured and then slipped past him into the aisle.
The nine hundred odd men and women in the cinema observed the kiss and enviously watched her leave.
Sophia sighed with relief as she left the dark auditorium. She glanced at her wrist-watch. The time was ten minutes to four o’clock.
She would return to the hotel, get her swim-suit and then drive down to the bathing station by the Casino, away from the activities in front of the Plaza and have a bathe in peace.
Floyd would be tied up with that ghastly film and then with the discussion that would inevitably follow until six o’clock, so she had plenty of time.
She walked from the cinema to the Plaza, along the crowded pavement, smiling at the people she knew and once stopping to exchange a few words with a famous Italian star who Floyd was anxious to sign up but who was showing temperament and demanding an outrageous sum for his undoubted talents.
The Italian star caressed her body with his eyes and conveyed to her by his direct, insolent stare that he would be amused to have her in his bed.
Sophia, long accustomed to this kind of approach, said the right thing, smiled the right smile and kept out of reach of the star’s wandering hands and then moved on, hoping the greasy little beast would be more amenable when Floyd’s casting manager approached him again.
The lobby of the Plaza hotel was as usual crowded with celebrities as Sophia made her entrance.
Over in a corner was Georges Simenon, pipe clenched tightly between his teeth while he listened to Curt Jurgens discussing his latest movie.
Eddie Constantine, his peak cap at a rakish angle, waved to Sophia and pantomimed that he would like to join her only he was tied up with a producer who seemed determined to talk him into something.
Michele Morgan and Henri Vidal were arguing amiably while photographers stalked them with their cameras.
Jean Cocteau in his short dark cloak swept through the lobby and out into the sunshine without paying attention to anyone.
Henri Verneuil, the famous French director, was listening with a broad smile to the gentle cajolings of Marese Guibert, who was trying to persuade him to make an appearance on the Monte Carlo television.
Sophia moved through the crowd to the reception desk. The hands of the wall clock stood at four o’clock as she asked for the key to suite 27.
“Mr. Delaney junior has it, Madame,” the clerk told her. “He went up a few minutes ago.”
This surprised Sophia, but she thanked the clerk and then made her way across the crowded lobby, smiling and nodding and giving her left hand the way the Italians have to show special intimacy, but not stopping.
The elevator whisked her to the second floor and she noticed as she stepped out of the cage that the hands of the wall clock now stood at seven minutes past four.
She crossed the corridor, turned the handle of the door to suite 27, then frowned as she found the door locked.
She rapped sharply.
“Jay! It’s Sophia,” she said and waited.
There was a long pause of silence and with a little movement of exasperation, she rapped again.
She had been Floyd’s wife long enough now to have acquired the veneer of a millionaire’s wire and to be kept waiting in a hotel corridor was insufferable to her.
“Jay — please, for heaven’s sake!”
Again the silence and this time, becoming angry, she rattled the door handle and rapped again.
“Excuse me, Madame.”
The floor waiter had come from the still room.
“Have you a key?” she asked, controlling her irritation and smiling at him. “I think my step-son must be sleeping.”
“Yes, Madame.”
She moved aside and the waiter unlocked the door with his passkey and pushed the door open. Sophia thanked him and walked into the big lounge, closing the door sharply behind her.
The first thing she noticed was a perfume in the air that was unfamiliar to her.
She came to an abrupt standstill, sniffing at the fragile, almost imperceptible perfume, her lovely blue eyes narrowing.
Their suite was strictly private. Floyd made a point of never having anyone up there, so the unfamiliar perfume meant that there had been an intruder in the room.
Was it possible that Jay had brought a girl up here? Sophia wondered. Had she walked in on some sordid sexual adventure?
Floyd had told Jay that they would not be back to the suite until after six. Had the boy dared to take advantage of this to brine to their suite one of those ghastly, half-naked little morons who paraded in the lobby of the hotel like lost souls in search of financial salvation?
Sophia felt hot, indignant anger surge through her.
“Jay!”
She heard a movement in Jay’s bedroom and then the door opened.
Jay came into the lounge and very carefully closed the bedroom door. He was wearing his heavily tinted sun-glasses. This habit of his, wearing sun-glasses indoors, always irritated Sophia.
The glasses made a barrier between them. She never knew of what he was thinking or how he was reacting to what she said to him. When speaking to him she always had the impression that she was talking over a high wall to a voice that answered her from the other side.
But this time, although his face was, as usual, expressionless, she was immediately aware that he had brought into the room an atmosphere of extreme tension and she also noticed that his upper lip glistened with tiny beads of perspiration.