The Constant Gardener

"Justin, you poor chap, how's it going?" Woodrow cried, pouring himself an unusually modest glass of wine before crashing onto the sofa. "No more news, I'm afraid. Good or bad. No clues, no suspects, not as yet. No trace of Arnold. The Belgians are supplying a helicopter, London's coming up with a second. Money, money, curse of us all. Still, he's a Belgian citizen, so why not? How very pretty you're looking, sweet. What's for dins?"

He's been drinking, Gloria thought in disgust. He pretends to work late and he sits there in his office drinking while I make the boys do their homework. She heard a movement from the window and saw to her dismay that Justin had braced himself to take his leave — scared off, no doubt, by her husband's elephantine flat-footedness.

"No food?" Woodrow protested. "Got to keep your strength up, you know, old boy."

"You are very kind but I fear I have no appetite. Gloria, thank you again. Sandy, goodnight."

"And the Pellegrin sends strong supporting messages from London. Whole Foreign Office struck down with grief, he says. Didn't want to intrude personally."

"Bernard was always very tactful."

She watched the door close, she heard his footsteps descend the concrete staircase, she saw his empty glass resting on the bamboo table beside the French window, and for a frightening moment she was convinced she would never see him again.

Woodrow bolted his dinner clumsily, not tasting it as usual. Gloria, who like Justin had no appetite, watched him. Juma their houseboy, tiptoeing restlessly between them, watched him too.

"How we faring?" Woodrow murmured with a conspiratorial slur, keeping his voice down and pointing at the floor to warn her to do the same.

"Been fine," she said, playing his game. "Considering." What are you doing down there? she wondered. Are you lying on your bed, flailing yourself in the darkness? Or are you staring through your bars into the garden, talking to her ghost?

"Anything of any significance come out?" Woodrow was asking, stumbling a bit on the word "significance" but still contriving to keep their conversation allusive on account of Juma.

"Like what?"

"About our lover boy," he said and, leering shamefully, jabbed a thumb at her begonias and mouthed "bloom," at which Juma hurried off to get a jug of water.

For hours Gloria lay awake beside her snoring husband until, fancying she heard a sound from downstairs, she crept to the landing and peered out of the window. The power cut was over. An orange glow from the city lifted to the stars. But no Tessa lurked in the lighted garden, and no Justin either. She returned to bed to find Harry diagonally asleep with his thumb in his mouth and one arm across his father's chest.

* * *

The family rose early as usual, but Justin was ahead of them, dressed in his crushed suit and hovering. He looked flushed, she thought, a little overbusy, too much color under the brown eyes. The boys shook his hand, gravely as instructed, and Justin meticulously returned their greetings.

"Oh Sandy, yes, good morning," he said as soon as Woodrow appeared. "I wondered whether we might have a quick word."

The two men withdrew to the sun lounge.

"It's about my house," Justin began, as soon as they were alone.

"House here or house in London, old boy?" Woodrow countered in a fatuous effort to be cheerful. And Gloria, listening to every word through the serving hatch to the kitchen, could have brained him.

"Here in Nairobi. Her private papers, lawyers' letters. Her family-trust material. Documents that are precious to both of us. I can't leave her personal correspondence sitting there for the Kenyan police to plunder at will."

"So what's the solution, old boy?"

"I'd like to go there. At once."

So firm! Gloria rhapsodized. So forceful, in spite of everything!

"My dear chap, that's impossible. The hacks would eat you alive."

"I don't believe that's true, actually. They can try and take my photograph, I suppose. They can shout at me. If I don't reply to them, that's about as far as they can go. Catch them while they're shaving."

Gloria knew her husband's prevarications inside out. In a minute he'll call Bernard Pellegrin in London. That's what he always does when he needs to bypass Porter Coleridge and get the answer he wants to hear.

"Look here, tell you what, old boy. Why not write me a list of what you want and I'll pass it to Mustafa somehow and have him bring the stuff here?"

Typical, thought Gloria furiously. Dither, haver, look for the easy way out every time.

"Mustafa would have no idea what to select," she heard Justin reply, as firmly as before. "And a list would be no good to him at all. Even shopping lists defeat him. I owe it to her, Sandy. It's a debt of honor and I must discharge it. Whether or not you come along."