Mr Hire's Engagement Read online

  He had finished. Smiling, he put his jacket on again for fear of catching cold, and strolled towards his companions. 'Have I another game to play?'

  'Presently, against Godard.'

  He did not join in any conversation. Holding his handkerchief in his clammy hands, he strolled nonchalantly from one game to another and watched the balls rolling, gave kindly applause for fours or fives.

  The light, the warmth, the austere surroundings, the gravity of all these men, were reminiscent of a fencing saloon or a riding school. This was a serious business. There was not one woman present. Whereas the billiard players, on the other side of the door, were right out in the public eye, with the music playing and children roaming around the green tables. Further along, the card-players were watched by their wives, who kept asking:

  'Why don't you cut in?'

  And beyond them, again, was the cinema. Between these walls there were perhaps three thousand people drinking, eating, playing, smoking, and the various noises went on together without blending, without drowning one another, even the thin note of the bell that rang each time a drink was served, and the bell on the cash-till, whose ringing was preceded by the sound of the handle being turned.

  Where was the little policeman? There was nobody now by the green-topped tables. Only his hat was still lying on the chair.

  Mr. Hire, his hands in his pockets, took a stroll, and on reaching a point where he could see through the open door, he spotted his inspector talking to the waiter. He smiled and looked at his watch.

  'You say he comes the first Monday of every month?'

  'That's the club day. Some members practise on other days, but not him.'

  The waiter was surprised, looked suspiciously at the inspector.

  'If you're from the police you ought to know him, he's a police officer too, in fact he must be pretty high up in the force.'

  'Oh! So he says he belongs to the police?'

  'Everybody thought so even before he mentioned it. He looks as though he did.'

  'Has he been a member of the club for long?'

  'About two years. I remember, because I was already the waiter for the bowling-room. He came in timid-like, just the way you did, one evening, and he asked me if it was open to the public. He sat down over there, with his briefcase on his knee, and ordered a café crème. The game interested him so much that he stayed there for two hours; then, when everybody had left, he stood the skitties up and had a go, all by himself. He went red in the face when he saw me watching, and it was me who advised him to join, seeing it only costs thirty francs a year . .

  Mr. Hire was looking at them from a distance.

  'And he was the one who mentioned the police?'

  'For months we were wondering what his job could be. He's not the chatty kind. Even now he's the best player in the club, he doesn't meet any of the others except here. Anyhow, one day the Treasurer had made a bet that he'd find out, and he asked him point-blank.'

  'Asked him what?'

  'He said to him, "You're a big hat in the police, aren't you?"

  'Mr. Hire blushed, and that gave him away. Then somebody remembered that police officers sometimes get free seats for theatres, and asked him if he had any to spare. He brings some along nearly every time now . . .'

  When the inspector went back to the bowling-room, Mr. Hire was finishing his second game; and as the award of the monthly poultry prize depended on it, everybody was crowding round. To-day's prize was a turkey, which the Treasurer had put out on a table near the players. People had come in from the billiard-tables, to watch the end of the match.

  Mr. Hire went to and fro, in his shirt sleeves, with well-curled moustache and red lips. All his movements were marked by a preternatural ease. His feet trod at the exact spot where they ought to tread. His arm made the ball describe a trajectory of geometrical precision.

  The club President's wife stood waiting for her husband, buttoning her grey cotton gloves and gazing at the turkey, whose yellow breast she had already pinched.

  'Nine!'

  There was a mechanical accuracy about it. Mr. Hire was unconscious of the spectators. They were only a background, a row of statues to either side of the game. While waiting for the skittles to be re-erected, he went so far as to toss the ball casually in the air, catching it again with three fingers in the holes. The inspector was one of the nearest onlookers, and it was perhaps for his benefit that Mr. Hire added a touch of bravado to his style, whirling his arm three times before finally making his shot.

  'Nine!'

  At this he held out a hand towards the crowd.

  'A scarf,' he requested tersely.

  Someone produced a grey scarf and he tied it round his head, blindfolding himself. He reached out his hand again, groping to find the ball. 'Eight!'

  Applause broke out as he pulled off the scarf and murmured hesitantly:

  'Whose is this?'

  He had one more shot to play, and he was trying to think of some other fantastic trick, no matter what. He was bound to bring it off! He was no longer skipping. He was bouncing, light as a balloon.

  'Three more points and you've won,' announced the Secretary.

  For a moment he stood still, as though scared; then he walked to the end of the board along which the ball must run, turned his back to it, straddled his legs apart. He saw the poor little inspector standing in front of him. He raised the ball level with his head and flung it behind him, between his knees.

  'Seven!'

  Everybody was talking at once. They were putting on their jackets and overcoats. They were leaving. Mr. Hire went up to the President's wife.

  'Allow me to offer you . . .'

  He pointed to the turkey.

  'On one condition, that you come along and help us to eat it.'

  'I'm so sorry, I really can't. My duties . . .'

  It was all over. Nobody was paying any more attention to him. Hands were being shaken absentmindedly.

  'See you to-morrow?'

  And the clicking of billiard balls was again the dominant sound. The waiter had switched off half the lights, as they do in a circus the moment the last turn is finished, and the place had the dusty glow and the empty feeling of a circus, too. Mr. Hire, however, had not worked off all that liveliness that seethed within him. He was pacing up and down, unheeded, unnoticed, with flushed cheeks and sparkling eyes, and suddenly he came to a stop in front of the inspector, who stood counting the change he had just received from the waiter.

  'Well, my little man?'

  The words came out spontaneously, emphatically, and Mr. Hire's face had a protective look.

  'Funny job I've let you in for, haven't I?'

  In spite of everything his lips were quivering, with excitement rather than fear. The policeman was perhaps equally ill at ease, for after coughing behind his hand, he stuttered:

  'Are you speaking to me?'

  'Joseph, my overcoat!' called Mr. Hire instead of answering.

  The club President took him aside.

  'My wife tells me ... Won't you really take your turkey? Somebody would be glad to have it.. .'

  'No, I assure you . . .' he said, with a chilly smile.

  Nobody could have explained why the evening always finished like this, with a sort of anti-climax. There was only a group of four or five members of the committee left, discussing some new rules. They merely waved good-bye to Mr. Hire from a distance and, as soon as his back was turned, nudged one another, muttered together, called the waiter.

  'Who was that other fellow?'

  'The little bearded chap in the shabby overcoat? A police inspector.'

  They exchanged delighted glances.

  'What did I tell you?'

  Mr. Hire went through the main room with his briefcase under his arm, swimming against the stream. It was the interval at the cinema, and the audience was pouring out into the café. He was jostled, pinned in between people's elbows. He hat was pushed off and he found it three steps further on, balancing on
someone's shoulder.

  He stood, hesitating, at the edge of the pavement, in the orange glow from the neon sign. The boulevard was deserted, except for such of the cinema audience as did not want a drink, who were lounging in the shadows, smoking cigarettes and waiting for the bell to ring again.

  A couple of yards further along, also on the edge of the pavement, the inspector was stamping his feet and turning up his overcoat collar, as a cold drizzle was beginning to fall.

  'To the Public Prosecutor…'

  'To the Pub . . .'

  Indecision could be read in Mr. Hire's attitude. From his left came the sound of an engine starting up, and he caught sight of the President of the club and his wife in a shaky little closed car. The turkey, roughly wrapped in a sheet of newspaper, lay in the woman's lap.

  As they went past Mr. Hire, the President waved his hand, but his wife did not even notice.

  In the middle of the boulevard five taxis were waiting, one behind the other, and Mr. Hire beckoned. The first driver got out to crank the engine. The inspector's face clouded.

  'To Villejuif, just beyond the cross-roads. I'll tell you when to stop.'

  The taxi smelt of face-powder and there was a faded carnation lying on the seat. Looking through the closed window, Mr. Hire watched the bearded inspector still hesitating and finally setting out on foot towards the Métro.

  The kummel was giving him heartburn. His knees were shaking, as they did on the first Monday of each month after he had been playing skittles.

  It was a slow cooling-down process. Mr. Hire gradually sank to the temperature of the taxi. His tension, his over-excitement, his verve left him, and he buried himself to the nose in the collar of his coat. Without moving from his seat or slowing down, the driver opened the door with one hand and shouted, leaning out a few inches: 'Shall I go by the Porte d'Italie?'

  'Whichever way you like.'

  The door slammed. The window slid down an inch and straight away an icy draught made itself felt.

  'To the Public Prosecutor . . .'

  They drove past the waste ground where the woman had been killed. The driver must have known about it, for he slowed down to stare at the hoarding. As usual, a prostitute was standing at the corner of the street, and she gazed indifferently after the taxi.

  It was difficult to rouse the concierge. When Mr. Hire called his name as he passed in front of the lodge, he heard a bed creak. He went slowly up the four flights of stairs and the light had gone out by the time he reached his own landing.

  On opening his door he frowned, surprised by something unusual. It was not pitch-dark in the room. There was a reddish glow on the floor, a faint crackling, and the air was warm.

  Switching on the light, he saw the fire was lit, and that his coffee-pot stood steaming on the stove. His bed had been turned down. A glass in the middle of the table held four or five flowers, rather melancholy ones, it was true, for Villejuif sells few flowers except those suitable for cemeteries.

  Mr. Hire shut the door behind him and, without waiting to take off his coat, crossed to the window, lifted up a corner of the brown paper. The light in the opposite room was still on. But Alice had fallen asleep. Her book had slipped down on the eiderdown. The girl's eyes were closed, her breast rose and fell to the rhythm of her regular breathing; her head was cradled on one arm, which was bent so that the reddish hair of the armpit could be seen.

  'To the Public Prosecutor .. .'

  He was almost stamping with impatience and helplessness.

  'To the Pub . . .'

  With a furious gesture he ruffled his hair and began to undress, glancing from time to time at the flowers, the bed, the lighted stove.

  Then he went back to the window. Alice had straightened her arm. She was now lying on her back, and had pushed off the eiderdown. Her full, heavy breasts were pointing up through the cotton nightdress.

  The evening before, she had been lying on Mr. Hire's bed. He sat down on it to take off his socks, went barefoot to half-close the stove and removed the piping-hot coffee-pot.

  Finally, after a last sidelong glance, he pulled down the brown paper over the window. His light went out. His bed creaked. Something went clattering through space along the road: this was the express lorry from Lyons, travelling at sixty miles an hour with an eight-ton load. Even after the noise had died away, the cup still quivered on the saucer.

  It was an hour before Mr. Hire's breathing became regular. One hand was hanging out of the bed. Every time he breathed out his lips parted with a 'pfff. ..' and the lower edge of his moustache quivered.

  He was still asleep, as on every other morning, when the girl got up at six o'clock, stopped the ringing of her alarm clock and put her clothes on without washing, her eyes heavy with sleep and a sticky feeling in her mouth, to go and swill out the shop and deliver the milk.

  VII

  'BOLDNESS does it!' Mr. Hire kept assuring himself.

  And as he made his way along, he mumbled continually:

  'Sorry . . . Sorry . . .'

  It was raining cats and dogs, and the problem this morning was not how to slip through the crowd, but how to steer an umbrella through the mass of other umbrellas. The umbrella cover was so wet that, once in the tram, Mr. Hire had to hold it at arm's length.

  'Boldness does it!'

  The inspector was sitting opposite him, not the little bearded fellow but the one who was always in the concierge's lodge, and Mr. Hire was fixing him with an unblinking stare. The tram jangled its bell and set off towards Paris. In spite of the depressing weather and the sullen faces around him, Mr. Hire stuck out his chest as he had done the night before when he was playing skittles, and sat very upright on his bench. He looked out from under his inky-black eyebrows with the glare that grown-ups turn on noisy children to frighten them into silence. With slow, ceremonious movements, when the conductor approached, he took off his glove, brought out his pocket-book, and produced his season-ticket from it.

  'Boldness does it!'

  At the Port d'Italie he ignored the Métro and seated himself in a bus, in the first-class section, while the inspector stayed outside on the platform. As he drew near to his destination, he was overcome by a kind of giddy impatience. In the Place du Châtelet he literally flung himself out of the bus and scampered along the Quai des Orfèvres.

  'Boldness does it!'

  Not till he was mounting the dusty expanse of stairs in Police Headquarters did he unfold the paper summoning him there for the following day, and read the superintendent's name.

  'Superintendent Godet, please?' he was asking the office-boy a moment later.

  And he shot a piercing glance at the lad, sighed, fidgeted a little with his feet, like a gentleman in a great hurry who ought to be admitted at once.

  'Were you sent for?'

  'Yes . . . No . . . Take him my card . . .'

  An hour went by. At first there were five visitors waiting in the glass-panelled room furnished with green armchairs, at the end of a passage that echoed like a drum, along which people were continually walking, stopping, starting off again, opening doors and walking further. Then there were seven visitors, then only six, then three, then five again. The messenger came from time to time to call one of them, but it was never Mr. Hire.

  'You aren't forgetting me?'

  No! The messenger shook his head, and went up to a nondescript young woman who had been the last to arrive.

  'Was it you who asked to see Monsieur Godet? Will you please come this way?'

  All the same, it was with an air of importance that Mr. Hire paced up and down the waiting-room, his briefcase under his arm, or paused under the tablet bearing the names of policemen killed in the war. At last the messenger came back, jerked his chin at him, and went off along the corridor without attempting to see whether anyone was following him. He opened a door and stood back. A man seated at a mahogany desk, bending over some papers he was signing, said without looking up:

  'Shut the door. Sit down.'
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  He went on signing, while Mr. Hire, his briefcase on his knees, made a last attempt to puff out his chest.

  'What do you want?'

  'I had a summons to come here to-morrow.'

  'I know that. Well?'

  He was still signing away. He had not once raised his head, and could hardly know what his visitor looked like.

  'I thought the best thing would be to make a frank, sincere approach . . .'

  The superintendent glanced at him for a fraction of a second, his indifferent expression touched with the merest shade of surprise.

  'You mean you've come to confess?' he inquired simply, as he resumed his writing.

  Mr. Hire made a superhuman effort and spoke in a confident voice.

  'I came of my own accord to talk to you as man to man, and I give you my word of honour, as man to man, that I am innocent and that I never set eyes on that woman who was murdered. We're wasting your time and mine. For the last three days your inspectors have been following me about, searching my drawers and ...'

  'Now wait a minute!'

  The superintendent looked up, his eyes still full of the work he had just been doing.

  'Do you want your interrogation to take place to-day?'

  'I was saying . . .'

  'If so, would you prefer a lawyer to be present?'

  'Since I am innocent, and as I shall explain to you . . .'

  The superintendent touched a bell. Mr. Hire opened his mouth, but the other signed to him to keep quiet. The door opened.

  'Come in, Lamy. Sit down here and take a statement.'

  The desk was a mass of papers, and every now and then the superintendent picked one up, as though at random, and read it attentively, but this did not prevent him from speaking.

  'Tell me, Mr. Hire, what were you doing on the night of the crime?'

  'I was at home, in my room, as I always am in the evening. I went to bed and . . .'

  'Are you able to prove that?'

  'The concierge will tell you so.'

  'That's just it. The concierge says you got home at about ten-past seven, as usual, but that you must have gone out again, because you called for the door to be opened from outside, during the night.'