The Constant Gardener

Pellegrin caught his eye, measured it a moment, smiled, then smiled again. "Turn of phrase," he explained dismissively. "Not to be taken literally. Those young coppers were looking the wrong way from day one," he resumed, diverting himself while the waiter refilled their glasses. "Deplorable, actually. De-fucking-plorable. Not you, Matthew, old chap — " this to the waiter, in a spirit of good fellowship toward ethnic minorities — "and not a member of this club either, I'm pleased to say." The waiter fled. "Tried to pin it on Sandy for five minutes, if you can believe it. Some fatuous theory that he was in love with her, and had 'em both killed out of jealousy. When they couldn't get anywhere with that one, they hit the conspiracy button. Easiest thing in the world. Cherry-pick a few facts, cobble 'em together, listen to a couple of disgruntled alarmists with an axe to grind, throw in a household name or two, you can put together any bloody story you want. What Tessa did, if you don't mind my saying so. Well, you know all about that."

Justin blindly shook his head. I'm not hearing this. I'm back on the plane and it's a dream. "I'm afraid I don't," he said.

Pellegrin had very small eyes. Justin hadn't noticed this before. Or perhaps they were a standard size, but had developed the art of dwindling under enemy fire — the enemy, so far as Justin could determine, being anyone who held Pellegrin to what he had just said, or took the conversation into territory not previously charted by him.

"Sole all right? You should have had the meuniere. Not so dry."

His sole was marvelous, Justin said, forbearing to add that meuniere was what he had asked for. And the sub-Meursault also marvelous. Marvelous, like marvelous girl.

"She didn't show it to you. Her great thesis. Their great thesis, if you'll forgive me. That's your story and you're sticking to it. Right?"

"Thesis about what? The police asked me the same question. So did Alison Landsbury in a roundabout way. What thesis?" He was acting simple and beginning to believe himself. He was fishing again, but in disguise.

"She didn't show it to you but she showed it to Sandy," said Pellegrin, washing the information down with a pull of wine. "Is that what you want me to believe?"

Justin sat bolt upright. "She what?"

"Absolutely. Secret rendezvous, whole works. Sorry about that. Thought you knew."

But you're relieved I don't, thought Justin, still staring at Pellegrin in mystification. "So what did Sandy do with it?" he asked.

"Showed it to Porter. Porter dithered. Porter takes decisions once a year with lots of water. Sandy sent it to me. Coauthored and marked confidential. Not by Sandy. By Tessa and Bluhm. Those aid heroes make me sick, by the way, if you feel like letting off steam. Teddy bears' picnic for international bureaucrats. Diversion. Sorry."

"So what did you do with it? For God's sake, Bernard!"

I'm the deluded widower at the end of my tether. I'm the injured innocent, not quite as innocent as I'm sounding. I'm the indignant husband, cut out of the loop by my wandering wife and her lover. "Will somebody please finally tell me what this is about?" he went on, in the same querulous voice. "I've been Sandy's reluctant houseguest for the better part of an eternity. He never breathed a word to me about a secret rendezvous with Tessa or Arnold or anybody else. What thesis? Thesis about what?" Still prodding.

Pellegrin was smiling again. Once. Twice. "So it's all news to you. Jolly good."

"Yes. It is. I'm completely fogged."

"Girl like that, half your age, stepping high, wide and loose, never crossed your mind to ask her what the fuck she's up to."

The Pellegrin is angry, Justin noted. As Landsbury was. As I am. We're all angry and we're all concealing it.

"No, it didn't. And she wasn't half my age."

"Never looked in her diary, picked up the telephone extension by-mistake-on-purpose. Never read her mail or peeked in her computer. Zero."

"Zero to all of it."

Pellegrin was musing aloud, eyes on Justin. "So nothing got through to you. Hear no evil, see no evil. Amazing," he said, barely managing to keep his sarcasm within bounds.

"She was a lawyer, Bernard. She wasn't a child. She was a fully qualified, very smart lawyer. You forget."

"Do I? Not sure I do." He put on his reading spectacles in order to work his way to the lower half of his sole. When he had done so, he held up its spine with his knife and fork while he peered round like a helpless invalid for a waiter who could bring him a debris plate. "Just hope she confined her representations to Sandy Woodrow, that's all. Pestered the main player, we know that."

"What main player? You mean you?"