Дик Фрэнсис: Bolt

‘As you know,’ he said, ‘I have been for a long time...’ He gestured down his body, not spelling it out. ‘We have lived also a long time in London. Far away from the business, you understand?’

I nodded.

‘Louis Nanterre, he used to go there quite often to consult the managers. We would talk often on the telephone and he would tell me everything that was happening... We would decide together if it looked sensible to go in new directions. He and I, for instance, developed a factory to make things out of plastic, not metal, nor concrete. Things like heavy drain pipes which would not crack under roads, nor corrode. You understand? We developed new plastics, very tough.’

He paused, more it seemed through lack of breath than of things to say. The princess, Greening and I waited until he was ready to go on.

‘Louis,’ he said eventually, ‘used to come to London to this house twice a year, with auditors and lawyers — Gerald would be here — and we would discuss what had been done, and read the reports and suggestions from the boards of managers, and make plans.’ He sighed heavily. ‘Then Louis died, and I asked Henri to come over for the meetings, and he refused.’

‘Refused?’ I repeated.

‘Absolutely. Then suddenly I don’t know any longer what is happening, and I sent Gerald over, and wrote to the auditors...’

‘Henri had sacked the auditors,’ Gerald Greening said succinctly into the pause, ‘and engaged others of his own choice. He had sacked half the managers and was taking charge directly himself, and had branched out into directions which Monsieur de Brescou knew nothing about.’

‘It’s intolerable,’ Roland de Brescou said.

‘And today?’ I asked him tentatively. ‘What did he say at Newbury today?’

‘To go to my wife!’ He was quivering with fury. ‘To threaten her. It’s... disgraceful.’ There weren’t words, it seemed, strong enough for his feelings.

‘He told Princess Casilia,’ Gerald Greening said with precision, ‘that he needed her husband’s signature on a document, that Monsieur de Brescou did not want to sign, and that she was to make sure that he did.’

‘What document?’ I asked flatly.

None of them, it seemed, was in a hurry to say, and it was Gerald Greening, finally, who shrugged heavily and said, ‘A French government form for a preliminary application for a licence to manufacture and export guns.’

‘Guns?’ I said, surprised. ‘What sort of guns?’

‘Firearms for killing people. Small arms made of plastic’

‘He told me,’ the princess said, looking hollow-eyed, ‘that it would be simple to use the strong plastics for guns. Many modern pistols and machine-guns can be made of plastic, he said. It is cheaper and lighter, he said. Production would be easy and profitable, once he had the licence. And he said he would definitely be granted a licence, he had done all the groundwork. He had had little difficulty because the de Brescou et Nanterre company is so reputable and respected, and all he needed was my husband’s agreement.’

She stopped in a distress that was echoed by her husband.

‘Guns,’ he said. ‘I will never sign. It is dishonourable, do you understand, to trade nowadays in weapons of war. It is unthinkable. In Europe these days, it is not a business of good repute. Especially guns made of plastic, which were invented so they could be carried through airports without being found. Of course, I know our plastics would be suitable, but never, never shall it happen that my name is used to sell guns that may find their way to terrorists. It is absolutely inconceivable.’

I saw indeed that it was.

‘One of our older managers telephoned me a month ago to ask if I truly meant to make guns,’ he said, outraged. ‘I had heard nothing of it. Nothing. Then Henri Nanterre sent a lawyer’s letter, formally asking my assent. I replied that I would never give it, and I expected the matter to end there. There is no question of the company manufacturing guns without my consent. But to threaten my wife!’

‘What sort of threats?’ I asked.

‘Henri Nanterre said to me,’ the princess said faintly, ‘that he was sure I would persuade my husband to sign, because I wouldn’t want any accidents to happen to anyone I liked... or employed.’

No wonder she had been devastated, I thought. Guns, threats of violence, a vista of dishonour; all a long way from her sheltered, secure and respected existence. Henri Nanterre, with his strong face and domineering voice, must have been battering at her for at least an hour before I arrived in her box.

‘What happened to your friends at Newbury?’ I asked her. ‘The ones in your box.’

‘He told them to go,’ she said tiredly. ‘He said he needed to talk urgently, and they were not to come back.’

‘And they went.’

‘Yes.’

Well... I’d gone myself.

‘I didn’t know who he was,’ the princess said. ‘I was bewildered by him. He came bursting in and turned them out, and drowned my questions and protestations. I have not...’ she shuddered, ‘I have never had to face anyone like that.’

Henri Nanterre sounded pretty much a terrorist himself, I thought. Terrorist behaviour, anyway: loud voice, hustle, threats.

‘What did you say to him?’ I asked, because if anyone could have tamed a terrorist with words, surely she could.

‘I don’t know. He didn’t listen. He just talked over the top of anything I tried to say, until in the end I wasn’t saying anything. It was useless. When I tried to stand up, he pushed me down. When I talked, he talked louder. He went on and on saying the same things over again... When you came into the box I was completely dazed.’

‘I should have stayed.’

‘No... much better that you didn’t.’

She looked at me calmly. Perhaps I would have had literally to fight him, I thought, and perhaps I would have lost, and certainly that would have been no help to anyone. All the same, I should have stayed.

Gerald Greening cleared his throat, put the clipboard down on a side table and went back to rocking on his heels against the wall behind my left shoulder.

‘Princess Casilia tells me,’ he said, jingling coins in his pockets, ‘that last November her jockey got the better of two villainous press barons, one villainous asset stripper and various villainous thugs.’

I turned my head and briefly met his glance, which was brightly empty of belief. A jokey man, I thought. Not what I would have chosen in a lawyer.

‘Things sort of fell into place,’ I said neutrally.

‘And are they all still after your blood?’ There was a teasing note in his voice, as if no one could take the princess’s story seriously.

‘Only the asset stripper, as far as I know,’ I said.

‘Maynard Allardeck?’

‘You’ve heard of him?’

‘I’ve met him,’ Greening said with minor triumph. ‘A sound and charming man, I would have said. Not a villain at all.’

I made no comment. I avoided talking about Maynard whenever possible, not least because any slanderous thing I might say might drift back to his litigious ears.

‘Anyway,’ Greening said, rocking on the edge of my vision, and with irony plain in his voice, ‘Princess Casilia would now like you to gallop to the rescue and try to rid Monsieur de Brescou of the obnoxious Nanterre.’

‘No, no,’ the princess protested, sitting straighter. ‘Gerald, I said no such thing.’

I stood slowly up and turned to face Greening directly, and I don’t know exactly what he saw, but he stopped rocking and took his hands out of his pockets and said with an abrupt change of tone, ‘That’s not what she said, but that’s undoubtedly what she wants. And I’ll admit that until this very moment I thought it all a bit of a joke.’ He looked at me uneasily. ‘Look, my dear chap, perhaps I got things wrong.’