Грэм Грин - The Comedians

'Has he a family?'

'A wife and a boy of six. I suppose he thought that suicide was safer for them.'

We got back into the car and reversed into the road. At the entrance of my drive I got out. 'All depends now on the servants,' I said.

'They'll be afraid to talk,' Doctor Magiot said. 'A witness here can suffer just as much as the accused.'

2

Mr and Mrs Smith came down to breakfast on the verandah. It was almost the first time I had seen him without a rug over his arm. They had slept well and they ate with appetite the grapefruit, the toast and the marmalade: I was afraid they might require some strange beverage with a name chosen by a public relations firm, but they accepted coffee and even praised its quality.

'I woke up only once,' Mr Smith said, 'and I thought that I heard voices. Perhaps Mr Jones has arrived?'

'No.'

'Odd. The last thing he said to me in the customs was "We'll meet tonight at Mr Brown's".'

'He was probably shanghaied to another hotel.'

'I had hoped to take a dip before breakfast,' Mrs Smith said, 'but I found Joseph was cleaning the pool. He seems to be a man of all work.'

'Yes. He's invaluable. I'm sure the pool will be ready for you before lunch.'

'And the beggar?' Mr Smith asked.

'Oh, he went away before morning.'

'Not with an empty stomach, I hope?' He gave me a smile as much as to say: 'I'm only joking, I know you are a man of goodwill.'

'Joseph would certainly have seen to that.'

Mr Smith took another piece of toast. He said, 'I thought that this morning Mrs Smith and I would write our names in the embassy book.'

'It would be wise.'

'I thought it would be courteous. Afterwards perhaps I could present my letter of introduction to the Secretary for Social Welfare.'

'If I were you I would ask at the embassy whether there has been any change. That is, if the letter is addressed to someone personally.'

'A Doctor Philipot, I think.'

'I would certainly ask then. Changes happen very quickly here.'

'But his successor, I suppose, would receive me? What I have come here to propose would be of great interest to any minister concerned with health.'

'I don't think you ever told me what you were planning …'

'I come here as a representative,' Mr Smith said.

'Of the vegetarians of America,' Mrs Smith added. 'The true vegetarians.'

'Are there false vegetarians?'

'Of course. There are even some who eat fertilized eggs.'

'Heretics and schismatics have splintered every great movement,' Mr Smith said sadly, 'in human history.'

'And what do the vegetarians propose to do here?'

'Apart from the distribution of free literature — translated, of course, into French — we plan to open a centre of vegetarian cooking in the heart of the capital.'

'The heart of the capital is a shanty-town.'

'In a suitable site then. We want the President and some of his ministers to attend the gala opening and take the first vegetarian meal. As an example to the people.'

'But he's afraid to leave the palace.'

Mr Smith laughed politely at what he considered my picturesque exaggeration. Mrs Smith said, 'You can hardly expect much encouragement from Mr Brown. He is not one of us.'

'Now, now, my dear, Mr Brown was only having a little joke with us. Perhaps after breakfast I could ring up my embassy.'

'The telephone doesn't work. But I could send Joseph with a note.'

'No, in that case we'll take a taxi. If you'll get us a taxi.'

'I'll send Joseph to find one.'

'He surely is a man of all work,' Mrs Smith said to me harshly, as though I were a southern plantation-owner. I saw Petit Pierre walking up the drive and I left them.

'Ah, Mr Brown,' Petit Pierre cried, 'a very very good moming.' He waved a copy of the local paper and said, 'You'll see what I have written about you. How are your guests? They have slept well, I hope.' He mounted the steps, bowed to the Smiths at their table and breathed in the sweet flowery smell of Port-au-Prince as though he were a stranger to the place. 'What a view,' he said, 'the trees, the flowers, the bay, the palace.' He giggled. 'Distance lends enchantment to the view. Mr William Wordsworth.'

Petit Pierre had not come for the view, I was certain, and at this hour he would hardly have come for a free glass of rum. Presumably he wanted to receive information, unless perhaps he wished to impart it. His gay manner did not necessarily mean good news for Petit Pierre was always gay. It was as though he had tossed a coin to decide between the only two possible attitudes in Port-au-Prince, the rational and the irrational, misery or gaiety; Papa Doc's head had fallen earthwards and he had plumped for the gaiety of despair.

'Let me see what you've written,' I said.

I opened the paper at his gossip-column — which always appeared on page four — and read how, among the many distinguished visitors who had arrived yesterday in the Medea, was the Honourable Mr Smith who had been narrowly defeated in the American Presidential elections of 1948 by Mr Truman. He was accompanied by his elegant and amiable wife who, under happier circumstances, would have been America's First Lady, an adornment to the White House. Among the many other passengers was the well-loved patron of that intellectual centre, the Hotel Trianon, who was returning from a business visit to New York … I looked afterwards at the principal news page. The Secretary for Education was announcing a six-year plan to eliminate illiteracy in the north — why the north in particular? No details were given. Perhaps he was depending on a satisfactory hurricane. Hurricane Hazel in '54 had eliminated a great deal of illiteracy in the interior — the extent of the death-roll had never been disclosed. There was a small paragraph about a party of rebels who had crossed the Dominican frontier: they had been driven back, and two prisoners had been taken carrying American arms. If the President had not quarrelled with the American Mission, the arms would probably have been described as Czech or Cuban.

I said. 'There are rumours about a new Secretary for Social Welfare.'

'You can never trust rumours,' Petit Pierre said.

'Mr Smith has brought an introduction to Doctor Philipot. I don't want him to make a mistake.'

'Perhaps he ought to wait a few days. I hear that Doctor Philipot is in Cap Haпtien — or somewhere in the north.'

'Where the fighting is?'

'I do not believe there is really much fighting.'

'What kind of a man is Doctor Philipot?' I felt an itch of curiosity to know more of someone who had become a kind of distant relative by dying in my pool.

'A man,' Petit Pierre said, 'who suffers very much from his nerves.'

I closed the paper and handed it back to him. 'I see you don't mention the arrival of our friend Jones.'

'Ah yes, Jones. Who exactly is Major Jones?' I was sure then that he had come with the purpose of receiving rather than giving information.

'A fellow-passenger. That's all I know.'

'He claims to be a friend of Mr Smith's.'

'In that case, I suppose he must be.'

Petit Pierre imperceptibly moved me away down the verandah until we turned the corner out of sight of the Smiths. His white cuffs fell a long way out of his sleeves on to his black hands. 'If you would be frank with me,' he said, 'I might perhaps be of a little help.'

'Frank about what?'

'About Major Jones.'

'I wish you wouldn't call him Major. Somehow it doesn't suit him.'

'You think perhaps he is not …?'

'I know nothing about him. Nothing at all.'

'He was going to stay at your hotel.'

'He seems to have found a lodging elsewhere.'

'Yes. At the police station.'

'Why on earth …?'

'I think they found something incriminating in his baggage. I don't know what.'