She was over six feet tall, wearing a very short skirt and a gold lame blouse. She was good-looking, with big, moist brown eyes and a laughing mouth full of the most splendid teeth I had ever seen, though I felt that there were too many of them. In fact there was too much of her altogether. Her legs were too long and her arms were too long, and as she pirouetted in front of me she gave off a hum as though she were driven by some high-powered dynamo. Her skin was a pleasant milky-coffee colour, and her hair was a mass of tight black curls. From her ears dangled gold earrings, each shaped to represent a man hanging from a gallows.
Najib said, 'My assistant, Miss Panda Bubakar. Pay no attention to her. Tonight she is full of beans.'
'Panda hungry. Panda want man,' said Panda.
'Panda search room,' said Najib, smacking her on the bottom. Standing, he could just reach it.
'Panda can search room,' I said, 'but what the hell is she looking for — apart from a man?'
'In England,' said Najib, holding the gun on me, 'you were given damned honourable offer of cash for non-cooperation with O'Dowda. Now, cash offer withdrawn. We just take the goods.'
From behind me, where Panda was turning over my bed, she said, 'Ra-ra! Ritzy pyjamas. Any time you want those pressed, Rexy, just call for me.'
Something bit me gently on the back of the neck and I jumped.
'Leave Mr Carver alone and get on with job,' said Najib.
I slewed round, rubbing my neck and watched her. Winking at me, she started to go through the room. She did it well — not as well as some people I'd seen, but good enough to prove she was no amateur.
Some of her remarks as she went through my case and the bathroom wouldn't have gone down well at a vicarage garden party, but there was no denying her high spirits and exuberant bonhomie. At a distance she was — once you got used to the length of her — quite good to look at, but I didn't trust the hungry man-glint in her eyes. After mating, she was the kind that topped it off by making a meal of her consort.
She came back from the bathroom and said, 'Nothing, Najib — except he wants a new toothbrush and he's almost out of sleeping pills. You sleep bad, honey?' She kicked out a long leg. 'Whoof! Whoof! Mamma has something for that, too.'
'Give me your number,' I said. 'The next time I have insomnia I'll ring. Now will the two of you get to hell out of here?'
'If it is not here, then it must be in the car still. The key, please?' Najib held out his hand.
Panda sat on the bed behind me and wrapped her arms around my neck. 'Give the man the key, honey.'
I said, half choked, 'What's all this about a car?'
Najib said, 'The car you find. I wait here all this evening and see you arrive, but I am not quick enough to see which garage you took it to.'
One of Panda's hands had snaked down inside my jacket and now came out. holding my car key. She slid around me and handed it to Najib.
'Okay,' I said, 'it's in the Renault Garage just up the avenue and behind the Rue d'Antibes. Just leave the key with the hall porter when you've finished. I'm going to bed.'
It was a stupid thing to say.
Panda gave a couple of barks and high kicks and said, 'Mamma stay and tuck Rexy up.'
I said, 'Take this praying mantis with you, too.'
Najib looked at the key which lay like a fat tear-drop in the palm of bis black hand, and then raised a pair of puzzled eyes to me.
I went on, 'It's not the car you want, but one I hired in Geneva to drive down here. Why didn't you check the registration number when I arrived?'
'Numbers can be changed, honey,' said Panda. 'You go check, Najib.'
'You both go,' I said. 'Check the car. There's one thing will tell you whether it's the right one. The secret compartment. You know where it is supposed to be?'
Najib grinned suddenly. 'I know where it is, Mr Carver, sir. But I don't think you do. O'Dowda would never have told you. Damn right, yes?'
'Course he doesn't know,' said Panda. 'Mamma can tell from his eyes.' She made for the bathroom.
'That's not the way out,' I said.
'Man, I know that. I'm going to fix your bath and rub you down after.' She opened her mouth and snapped her fine teeth at me, her eyes rolling.
'You come with me, Panda,' said Najib. Then to me, he went on, 'I make the check and return the key. Some time, also Mr Carver, after you have seen Miss Zelia, we must have a man-to-man talk because it could be to your profit.' He got hold of Panda's arm and began to tug her towards the door.
'Mamma stay,' she cried.
'Mamma go,' I said. There was a moment's temptation, but I put it firmly aside. I just wasn't in her league.
From the door Najib said, 'While you are in this town, if there's anything you need, just let me know.'
'Double it for me,' said Panda.
'After all' — Najib ignored her — 'we are in the same line of business, so no need not to be friends unless it becomes absolutely damned necessary otherwise.'
'Nicely put,' I said.
'Sleep well, Mr Carver.'
'I don't like to think of you all lonely in this room, lover-boy,' said Panda. 'I'll survive.'
'Say, Rexy' — her eyes open wide with a thought — 'you ain't discriminating about colour are you?'
I shook my head. 'I like your colour. But I need a lot of building up to deal with the size it comes in. Goodnight.'
They went. And I went to bed. Both of them were putting on a big fooling act. But neither of them were fools. And how the hell had they known that I was coming to the Majestic? Nobody had known until I told Wilkins, and she had phoned the O'Dowda place in Sussex. Within three or four hours of that time Najib had been on my trail. Somewhere in the O'Dowda menage there was somebody who was tipping off the other side. Somebody in the household didn't want O'Dowda to have his Mercedes back, and they weren't being very subtle about it. My' guess was that it was Durnford. Working for O'Dowda, he could be expected to have a healthy dislike for him, but this went farther, this was a horse called Revenge out of Dislike by Disloyalty. Good lines but obvious breeding. As far as O'Dowda was concerned something was really burning up Durnford, and quite clearly he wasn't overworried about what the man said, that you can hide the fire, but what do you do about the smoke? When O'Dowda saw that smoke Durnford was due for trouble.
CHAPTER FOUR
'Fate cropped him short — for be it understood
He would have lived much longer, if he could!'
It was a warm, gentle, late September morning, full of soft yellow light bouncing off the sea from a golden mesh of ripples.
The Ferox was anchored just outside the port, floating like a fluffy white meringue, the final threat of confection piped out to a narrow prow. For ten francs, a gross overcharge, a boy of about fifteen rowed me out in a pram dinghy. He was bare to the waist and the sight of his brown, muscular torso, not a spare ounce of fat on it anywhere, made me consider the possibility of starting my early morning exercises again.
I went up the gangway to the deck and blinked my eyes at the white and gold paint, the polished brass and chromium, did a quick sum in my head of what this outfit probably cost O'Dowda a year, shuddered, and became aware of a woman sitting in a deckchair reading a copy of Vogue. She had silvery hair, touched with a purple rinse, and was wearing red shorts and a red blouse. She was somewhere around thirty, had a baby face, a tiny pout to her full lips, and was smoking a long thin cigar.
I said, 'I have a kind of appointment with Miss Zelia Yunge-Brown. Carver is the name.'
She dropped the Vogue lazily on to the deck, studied me, and in an American accent said, 'What kind of appointment? Personal, medical, social or just hopeful?'