‘He’s an old friend,’ Wormold said.
‘But you and I, Mr Wormold, know that there is no such thing as friendship between a man and a woman.’
‘Milly is not yet a woman.’
‘You speak like a father, Mr Wormold. No father knows his daughter.’ Wormold looked at the champagne bottle and at Captain Segura’s head. He was sorely tempted to bring them together. At a table immediately behind the Captain, a young woman whom he had never seen before gave Wormold a grave encouraging nod. He touched the champagne bottle and she nodded again. She must, he thought, be as clever as she was pretty to have read his thoughts so accurately. He was envious of her companions, two pilots from K. L. M. and an air-hostess.
‘Come and dance, Milly,’ Captain Segura said, ‘and show that I am forgiven.’
‘I don’t want to dance.’
‘Tomorrow I swear I will be waiting at the convent-gates.’
Wormold made a little gesture as much as to say, ‘I haven’t the nerve. Help me.’ The girl watched him seriously; it seemed to him that she was considering the whole of the situation and any decision she reached would be final and call for immediate action. She siphoned some soda into her whisky. ‘Come, Milly. You must not spoil my party.’
‘It’s not your party. It’s Father’s.’
‘You stay angry so long. You must understand that sometimes I have to put work even before my dear little Milly.’
The girl behind Captain Segura altered the angle of the siphon. ‘No,’ Wormold said instinctively, ‘no.’ The spout of the siphon was aimed upwards at Captain Segura’s neck. The girl’s finger was ready for action. He was hurt that anyone so pretty should look at him with such contempt. He said, ‘Yes. Please. Yes,’ and she triggered the siphon. The stream of soda hissed off Captain Segura’s neck and ran down the back of his collar. Dr Hasselbacher’s voice called ‘Bravo’ from among the tables. Captain Segura exclaimed ‘Go-o’.
‘I’m so sorry,’ the young woman said. ‘I meant it for my whisky.’
‘Your whisky!’
‘Dimpled Haig,’ the girl said. Milly giggled.
Captain Segura bowed stiffly. You could not estimate his danger from his size any more than you could a hard drink.
Dr Hasselbacher said, ‘You have finished your siphon, madam, let me find you another.’ The Dutchmen at the table whispered together uncomfortably. ‘I don’t think I’m to be trusted with another,’ the girl said.
Captain Segura squeezed out a smile. It seemed to come from the wrong
place like toothpaste when the tube splits. He said, ‘For the first time I have
been shot in the back. I am glad that it was by a woman.’ He had made an
admirable recovery; the water still dripped from his hair and his collar was limp with it. He said, ‘Another time I would have offered you a return match, but I am late at the barracks. I hope I may see you again?’ ‘I am staying here,’ she said.
‘On holiday?’
‘No. Work.’
‘If you have any trouble with your permit,’ he said ambiguously, ‘you must come to me. Good night, Milly. Good night, Mr Wormold. I will tell the waiter that you are my guests. Order what you wish.’ ‘He made a creditable exit,’ the girl said.
‘It was a creditable shot.’
‘To have hit him with a champagne bottle might have been a bit exaggerated. Who is he?’
‘A lot of people call him the Red Vulture.’
‘He tortures prisoners,’ Milly said.
‘I seem to have made quite a friend of him.’
‘I wouldn’t be too sure of that,’ Dr Hasselbacher said. They joined their tables together. The two pilots bowed and gave unpronounceable names. Dr Hasselbacher said with horror to the Dutchmen, ‘You are drinking Coca-Cola.’
‘It is the regulation. We take off at 3.30 for Montreal.’
Wormold said, ‘If Captain Segura is going to pay, let’s have more champagne. And Coca Cola.’
‘I don’t think I can drink any more Coca Cola, can you, Hans?’
‘I could drink a Bols,’ the younger pilot said.
‘You can have no Bols,’ the air-hostess told him firmly, ‘before Amsterdam.’
The young pilot whispered to Wormold, ‘I wish to marry her.’
‘Who?’
‘Miss Pfunk,’ or so it sounded.
‘Won’t she?’
‘No.’
The elder Dutchman said, ‘I have a wife and three children.’ He unbuttoned his breast pocket. ‘I have their photographs here.’ He handed Wormold a coloured card showing a girl in a tight yellow sweater and bathing-drawers adjusting her skates. The sweater was marked Mamba Club, and below the picture Wormold read, ‘We guarantee you a lot of fun. Fifty beautiful girls. You won’t be alone.’
‘I don’t think this is the right picture,’ Wormold said.
The young woman, who had chestnut hair and, as far as he could tell in the confusing Tropicana lights, hazel eyes, said, ‘Let’s dance.’ ‘I’m not very good at dancing.’
‘It doesn’t matter, does it?’
He shuffled her around. She said, ‘I see what you mean. This is meant to be a rumba. Is that your daughter?’
‘Yes.’
‘She’s very pretty.’
‘Have you just arrived?’
‘Yes. The crew were making a night of it, so I joined up with them. I don’t know anybody here.’ Her head reached his chin and he could smell her hair; it touched his mouth as they moved. He was vaguely disappointed that she wore a wedding-ring. She said, ‘My name’s Severn. Beatrice Severn.’ ‘Mine’s Wormold.’
‘Then I’m your secretary,’ she said.
‘What do you mean? I have no secretary.’
‘Oh yes you have. Didn’t they tell you I was coming?’
‘No.’ He didn’t need to ask who ‘they’ were.
‘But I sent the telegram myself.’
‘There was one last week but I couldn’t make head or tail of it.’
‘What’s your edition of Lamb’s Tales?’
‘Everyman.’
‘Damn. They gave me the wrong edition. I suppose the telegram was rather a mess. Anyway, I’m glad I found you.’
‘I’m glad too. A bit taken aback, of course. Where are you staying?’
‘The Inglaterra tonight, and then I thought I’d move in.’
‘Move in where?’
‘To your office, of course. I don’t mind where I sleep. I’ll just doss down in one of your staff rooms.’
‘There aren’t any. It’s a very small office.’
‘Well, there’s a secretary’s room anyway.’
‘But I’ve never had a secretary, Mrs Severn.’
‘Call me Beatrice. It’s supposed to be good for security.’
‘Security?’
‘It is rather a problem if there isn’t even a secretary’s room. Let’s sit down.’
A man, wearing a conventional black dinner jacket among the jungle trees like an English district officer was singing: ‘Sane men surround You, old family friends. They say the earth is round My madness offends. An orange has pips, they say, And an apple has rind. I say that night is day And I’ve no axe to grind.
‘Please don’t believe…’
They sat at an empty table at the back of the roulette-room. They could hear the hiccup of the little balls. She wore her grave look again a little self-consciously like a girl in her first long gown. She said, ‘If I had known I was your secretary I would never have siphoned that policeman -without your telling me.’
‘You don’t have to worry.’
‘I was really sent here to make things easier for you. Not more difficult.’
‘Captain Segura doesn’t matter.’
‘You see, I’ve had a very full training. I’ve passed in codes and microphotography. I can take over contact with your agents.’ ‘Oh.’
‘You’ve done so well they’re anxious you should take no risk of being blown. It doesn’t matter so much if I’m blown.’
‘I’d hate to see you blown. Half-blown would be all right.’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘I was thinking of roses.’