Brian Freemantle: The Namedropper

Harvey Jordan, whose vocation was seduction in every sense and definition of the word, didn’t hurry. He never did once the first barrier was breached. The initial isolation and pursuit of a victim was as much an orgasmic pleasure as its culmination, either sexual or financial, and he had a lot of mental foreplay to savour here. Remembering her half glass abstinence the previous lunchtime he chose a single glass – not even a half bottle – of champagne for their aperitif and distanced himself from her at the furthest end of the couch. He gave her his real name – Christian as well as family – and learned that hers was Alyce (‘with a y, just to be different’) and that it was her first visit to France. She hadn’t yet felt confident enough to try the French in which she’d graduated, as well as in Spanish, both with A plus, from Smith college; she admired the ease with which he spoke French to their waiter, ordering the drinks and asking for the luncheon menu and for a table, not outside on the open terrace, but directly inside the better shaded floor-to-ceiling veranda doors which, still imposing his own pace, Jordan did without inviting her in advance. She accepted at once when he belatedly apologized for his feigned presumption. Jordan felt a fleeting jump of unease at her mention of the park-view appartment, because his last identity sting had been in Manhattan, quickly dismissed by the self-assurance that small though the island was, the likelihood of her knowing anyone with whom he’d had a chance encounter was remote, particularly after her reference to a weekend house in the Hampton’s, which she preferred to the city. And he hadn’t been using his own name then anyway. There was no reference to a job, or a profession, or to the husband who had presumably provided the diamond and the wedding band, and Jordan held back from any curiosity: it was a not infrequent reflection of his that so easily did he find it to encourage people to unprompted disclose their life histories that had he chosen a legitimate profession he could have lived well – although not as well as he did now – by setting himself up as a psychologist. Or an end-of-the-pier fortune teller, complete with crystal ball.

Jordan’s restricted offering was well rehearsed and faultlessly delivered in the hope of encouraging further disclosures from her: he’d been fortunate with a family inheritance, which he’d used to develop a so far sufficiently successful career as a venture capitalist. It enabled him to travel extensively, although that freedom brought with it personal restrictions, chief among them a difficulty in establishing permanent relationships; there had been someone, a few years earlier, with whom he believed himself to have been in love – although now he was no longer sure – but against whom he felt no resentment or disappointment for refusing to put up with his too frequent absences, and abandoning him for someone else to whom he believed, and certainly hoped, she was now very happily married. They still exchanged Christmas cards: last year’s had featured a family photograph that included a baby girl. In reality it had been the drunken self-pity that Rebecca had refused to put up with. He’d seen the announcement of her second marriage in the Daily Telegraph. And the birth announcement. He certainly didn’t feel any resentment against her walking out on him as she had; he’d have done the same in her circumstances.

‘That’s sad,’ responded Alyce, although not offering an explanation for the wedding band now covered by her other hand.

‘Not for Rebecca – that was her name,’ further tempted Jordan. ‘She’s got a husband and a baby and a proper life, not someone whose existence is regulated by airline schedules.’ Or, after the bankruptcy, the availability of a gin bottle, he remembered.

‘Sad for you,’ she insisted, still without volunteering more.

‘But not today!’ declared Jordan, briskly. ‘Today I am on vacation and we’re having lunch together and I am no longer lonely.’

Alyce hesitated and for the briefest moment Jordan thought she was going to change her mind and decline the belated invitation. Instead she said, ‘No. Now neither of us are lonely.’

Jordan did order a whole bottle of wine, a grand cru Chablis, and took time consulting the menu with Alyce, who followed his recommendations. He’d seen a film version of Pride and Prejudice and speed-skimmed enough of Sense and Sensibility to maintain a conversation about Jane Austen and her books -his familiar, never-yet-failed technique now fully on track – and went easily into his well practised repertoire of fictitious venture capitalist and investment anecdotes. She laughed on cue but once more brought him up short after the third story by saying, ‘Your experiences seem much more amusing than my husband’s.’

‘He’s in the business?’ queried Jordan, his stomach lurching.

‘Wall Street. He’s the Appleton of Appleton and Drake, the commodity traders.’

‘Different sort of finance altogether,’ insisted Jordan, the alarm receding. ‘All far too clever for me.’

‘And me,’ she said as she smiled. ‘I don’t understand any of it.’

Thank God he hadn’t gone on to his two New York inventions, Jordan thought. ‘I’ve visited New York, of course. Great city. But I haven’t done any business there.’

‘I prefer the Hampton’s,’ she repeated.

She’d opened the subject at last! Jordan said, ‘Is your husband joining you here?’

‘No!’ Alyce said, sharply.

‘I’m sorry,’ hurried Jordan, feigning the embarrassment to match hers earlier. ‘I didn’t… forgive me…’

‘Let’s talk about something else.’

‘Let’s,’ agreed Jordan, anxious to maintain his self-imposed schedule. ‘Have you read Dumas?’

Alyce frowned, confused by such an abrupt switch. ‘I tried him in the original French but ended up with the translation.’

‘Which book?’

‘ The Man in the Iron Mask. What else?’

It was like winding a clockwork toy, knowing how it would respond when the catch was released. ‘Have you any plans for tomorrow?’

The frown returned at the further apparent switch. ‘No?’

‘Will you trust me to take you on a mystery journey?’

‘Should I?’

The first hint of flirtation, Jordan recognized. ‘That’s for you to decide.’

She made as if to consider it. ‘I’ll take the risk.’

‘You’ll need sun protection: something to cover your arms as well as oil or cream. Not the sort of hat you’ve got over there. A bill cap. A swimming costume, if you decide to swim. Bring one anyway.’

‘Are those all the clues I get?’

‘It’s too many already.’

‘I like mystery.’

‘So do I.’ She really was quite beautiful, Jordan decided.

Should he cool things down before things even got started? Jordan asked himself, observing the familiar precaution. He would certainly stage the promised, now inescapable excursion, but then move on further along the coast, which had always been the intention. But not with Alyce Appleton as a companion, which, objectively, she might not be persuaded or want to be anyway. Jordan had worked often and successfully in New York but knew there was no way his path could have crossed or intertwined with that of Alyce’s husband. If they had, he would have immediately recognized her name, even before she identified her husband. And she was hardly going to mention him or his name when she got back to America. There couldn’t be the slightest risk of any professional difficulty arising from her husband being in commodity trading, which really was a quantum leap from any company identity theft with which he might involve himself in the future, doubly so now by his knowing the name of her husband’s firm. The more Jordan rationalized it, the more he accepted his concern at learning what her husband did had been exaggerated. Too early to abandon his pursuit of Alyce, he determined. Just something to keep in mind.