‘What is all this nonsense of the milk?’
‘I think,’ Wormold said, ‘that Dr Braun is being a little too literal.’
‘Or funny,’ Carter said.
‘I don’t think Dr Braun has much sense of humour.’
‘And what do you do, Mr Wormold?’ the Swede asked. ‘I don’t think we have met before, although I know you by sight.’
‘Vacuum cleaners. And you?’
‘Glass. As you know, Swedish glass is the best in the world. This bread is very good. Do you not eat bread?’ He might have prepared his conversation beforehand from a phrase-book.
‘Given it up. Fattening, you know.’
‘I would have said you could have done with fattening.’ Mr Svenson gave a dreary laugh like jollity in a long northern night. ‘Forgive me. I make you sound like a goose.’
At the end of the table, where the Consul General sat, they were beginning to serve the blueplates. Mr Mac Dougall had been wrong about the turkey; the main course was Maryland chicken. But he was right about the carrots and the French fried and the sausages. Dr Braun was a little behind the rest; he was still picking at his Morro crab. The Consul-General must have slowed him down by the earnestness of his conversation and the fixity of his convex lenses. Two waiters came round the table, one whisking away the remains of the crab, the other substituting the blueplates. Only the Consul-General had thought to open his milk. The word ‘Dulles’ drifted dully down to where Wormold sat. The waiter approached carrying two plates; he put one in front of the Scandinavian, the other was Wormold’s. The thought that the whole threat to his life might be a nonsensical practical joke came to Wormold. Perhaps Hawthorne was a humorist, and Dr Hasselbacher…. He remembered Milly asking whether Dr Hasselbacher ever pulled his leg. Sometimes it seems easier to run the risk of death than ridicule. He wanted to confide in Carter and hear his common-sense reply; then looking at his plate he noticed something odd. There were no carrots. He said quickly, ‘You prefer it without carrots,’ and slipped the plate along to Mr Mac Dougall.
‘It’s the French fried I dislike,’ said Mr Mac Dougall quickly and
passed the plate on to the Luxemburg Consul. The Luxemburg Consul, who was deep
in conversation with a German across the table, handed the plate with
absent-minded politeness to his neighbour. Politeness infected all who had not
yet been served, and the plate went whisking along towards Dr Braun, who had
just had the remains of his Morro crab removed. The headwaiter saw what was happening and began to stalk the plate up the table, but it kept a pace ahead of him. The waiter, returning with more blueplates, was intercepted by Wormold, who took one. He looked confused. Wormold began to eat with appetite. ‘The carrots are excellent,’ he said.
The headwaiter hovered by Dr Braun. ‘Excuse me, Dr Braun,’ he said, ‘they have given you no carrots.’
‘I don’t like carrots,’ Dr Braun said, cutting up a piece of chicken. ‘I am so sorry,’ the headwaiter said and seized Dr Braun’s plate. ‘A mistake in the kitchen.’ Plate in hand like a verger with the collection he walked up the length of the room towards the service-door. Mr Mac Dougall was taking a sip of his own whisky.
‘I think I might venture now,’ Wormold said. ‘As a celebration.’
‘Good man. Water or straight?’
‘Could I take your water? Mine’s got a fly in it.’
‘Of course.’ Wormold drank two-thirds of the water and held it out for the whisky from Mr Mac Dougall’s flask. Mr Mac Dougall gave him a generous double. ‘Hold it out again. You are behind the two of us,’ he said, and Wormold was back in the territory of trust. He felt a kind of tenderness for the neighbour he had suspected. He said, ‘We must see each other again.’ ‘An occasion like this would be useless if it didn’t bring people together.’
‘I wouldn’t have met you or Carter without it.’
They all three had another whisky. ‘You must both meet my daughter,’ Wormold said, the whisky warming his cockles.
‘How is business with you?’
‘Not so bad. We are expanding the office.’
Dr Braun rapped the table for silence.
‘Surely,’ Carter said in the loud irrepressible Nottwich voice as warming as the whisky, ‘they’ll have to serve drinks with the toast.’ ‘My lad,’ Mr Mac Dougall said, ‘there’ll be speeches, but no toasts. We have to listen to the bastards without alcoholic aid.’
‘I’m one of the bastards,’ Wormold said.
‘You speaking?’
‘As the oldest member.’
‘I’m glad you’ve survived long enough for that,’ Mr Mac Dougall said. The American Consul-General, called on by Dr Braun, began to speak. He spoke of the spiritual links between the democracies he seemed to number Cuba among the democracies. Trade was important because without trade there would be no spiritual links, or was it perhaps the other way round. He spoke of American aid to distressed countries which would enable them to buy more goods and by buying more goods strengthen the spiritual links…. A dog was howling somewhere in the wastes of the hotel and the headwaiter signalled for the door to be closed. It had been a great pleasure to the American Consul-General to be invited to this lunch today and to meet the leading representatives of European trade and so strengthen still further the spiritual links…. Wormold had two more whiskies.
‘And now,’ Dr Braun said, ‘I am going to call upon the oldest member of our Association. I am not of course referring to his years, but to the length of time he has served the cause of European trade in this beautiful city where, Mr Minister’ -he bowed to his other neighbour, a dark man with a squint -‘we have the privilege and happiness of being your guests. I am speaking, you all know, of Mr Wormold.’ He took a quick look at his notes. ‘Mr James Wormold, the Havana representative of Phastkleaners.’
Mr Mac Dougall said, ‘We’ve finished the whisky. Fancy that now. Just when you need your Dutch courage most.’
Carter said, ‘I came armed as well, but I drank most of it in the plane.
There’s only one glass left in the flask.’
‘Obviously our friend here must have it,, Mr Mac Dougall said. ‘His need is greater than ours.’
Dr Braun said, ‘We may take Mr Wormold as a symbol for all that service means modesty, quietness, perseverance and efficiency. Our enemies picture the salesman often as a loudmouthed braggart who is intent only on putting across some product which is useless, unnecessary, or even harmful. That is not a true picture….’
Wormold said, ‘It’s kind of you, Carter. I could certainly do with a drink.’
‘Not used to speaking?’
‘It’s not only the speaking.’ He leant forward across the table towards
that common or garden Nottwich face on which he felt he could rely for incredulity, reassurance, the easy humour based on inexperience: he was safe with Carter. He said, ‘I know you won’t believe a word of what I’m telling you,’ but he didn’t want Carter to believe. He wanted to learn from him how not to believe. Something nudged his leg and looking down he saw a black dachshund-face pleading with him between the drooping ringlet ears for a scrap the dog must have slipped in through the service-door unseen by the waiters and now it led a hunted life, half hidden below the table-cloth.
Carter pushed a small flask across to Wormold. ‘There’s not enough for two. Take it all.’
‘Very kind of you, Carter.’ He unscrewed the top and poured all that there was into his glass.
‘Only a Johnnie Walker. Nothing fancy.’
Dr Braun said, ‘If anyone here can speak for all of us about the long years of patient service a trader gives to the public, I am sure it is Mr Wormold, whom now I call upon…’
Carter winked and raised an imaginary glass.
‘H-hurry,’ Carter said, ‘You’ve got to h -hurry.’
Wormold lowered the whisky. ‘What did you say, Carter?’
‘I said drink it up quick.’
‘Oh no, you didn’t, Carter.’ Why hadn’t he noticed that stammered aspirate before? Was Carter conscious of it and did he avoid an initial ‘h’ except when he was preoccupied by fear or h-hope? ‘What’s the matter, Wormold?’
Wormold put his hand down to pat the dog’s head and as though by accident he knocked the glass from the table.
‘You pretended not to know the doctor.’
‘What doctor?’
‘You would call him H-Hasselbacher.’
‘Mr Wormold,’ Dr Braun called down the table.
He rose uncertainly to his feet. The dog for want of any better provender was lapping at the whisky on the floor.
Wormold said, ‘I appreciate your asking me to speak, whatever your motives.’ A polite titter took him by surprise he hadn’t meant to say anything funny. He said, ‘This is my first and it looked at one time as though it was going to be my last public appearance.’ He caught Carter’s eye. Carter was frowning. He felt guilty of a solecism by his survival as though he were drunk in public. Perhaps he was drunk. He said, ‘I don’t know whether I’ve got any friends here. I’ve certainly got some enemies.’ Somebody said ‘Shame’ and several people laughed. If this went on he would get the reputation of being a witty speaker. He said, ‘We hear a lot nowadays about the cold war, but any trader will tell you that the war between two manufacturers of the same goods can be quite a hot war. Take Phastkleaners and Nucleaners. There’s not much difference between the two machines any more than there is between two human beings, one Russian or German -and one British. There would be no competition and no war if it wasn’t for the ambition of a few men in both firms; just a few men dictate competition and invent needs and set Mr Carter and myself at each other’s throats.’
Nobody laughed now. Dr Braun whispered something into the ear of the Consul-General. Wormold lifted Carter’s whisky-flask and said, ‘I don’t suppose Mr Carter even knows the name of the man who sent him to poison me for the good of his firm.’ Laughter broke out again with a note of relief. Mr Mac Dougall said, ‘We could do with more poison here,’ and suddenly the dog began to whimper. It broke cover and made for the service-door. ‘Max,’ the headwaiter exclaimed. ‘Max.’ There was silence and then a few uneasy laughs. The dog was uncertain on its feet. It howled and tried to bite its own breast. The headwaiter overtook it by the door and picked it up, but it cried as though with pain and broke from his arms. ‘It’s had a couple,’ Mr Mac Dougall said uneasily.
‘You must excuse me, Dr Braun,’ Wormold said, ‘the show is over.’ He followed the headwaiter through the service-door. ‘Stop.’ ‘What do you want?’
‘I want to find out what happened to my plate.’
‘What do you mean, sir? Your plate?’
‘You were very anxious that my plate should not be given to anyone else.’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘Did you know that it was poisoned?’
‘You mean the food was bad, sir?’