had a big head, a big tanned head for a big hairy body. He was very strong but with no use for his strength other than drumming figures into a calculator. He was benign when sober, hard but not unpleasant when he was doing business, affable and charming when he was being social, but when he was drunk there were probably only a couple of things in the world more unpleasant – a fighting bull that’s caught your eye in an open street is one of those things that springs to mind. He was wearing a pair of dark blue chinos, a yellow short-sleeved shirt and no watch. He kept that in his pocket on a long chain connected to his belt.
He introduced me to the two women who had both looked up with their eyes. Jasmin, who had her tanned foot in the tiger’s mouth, had very long legs inside some equally long, baggy blue jeans. She wore a white T-shirt with what looked like her DNA on the front. She had short, straight blonde hair, very big blue eyes, a long and pointed nose and a mouth full of £25.50 teeth which were all her own and looked it. She had to be English, which she was.
Her arms were long and slender with small hands, one of which played with a lighter, the other held a cigarette. She smoked like a schoolgirl, the cigarette held at the very tips of her fingers and puffed at like a pecking hen. She was nervous despite the relaxed sprawl. There was a lithe sexuality to her boyish body and a surprised innocence to her eyes which I am sure triggered off base thoughts in the minds of a lot of men. I realized that she was the woman I’d seen on horseback that morning on the way to Ghana.
Yvette, who sat at the other end of the sofa from Jasmin, had more sophistication than the rest of us put together. She had very dark, shoulder length brown hair, styled with a nostalgia for the fifties movie star. You could see the same head of hair with one of the non-hats and some netting that they used to wear in those days. Her eyes were quite wide apart and, although large and rounded, narrowed at the edges with an Oriental sharpness that wasn’t done with make-up. They were violet in colour and made her look more feline than any woman I’d ever seen. Her nose was small for her face, which had high wide cheekbones and a wide, full-lipped mouth with a pronounced cupid’s bow. She wore a pale purple lipstick and her teeth were small and white with a gap between the front two which she had a habit of tickling with the tip of her tongue. Her skin was perfect white with not even the first hint of a line or a crease. I was looking too hard and too long.
‘Did I miss something shaving?’ she said to me in a deep, cracked voice with a French accent.
‘No,’ I said, taking the opportunity to look over her face again. ‘Very close, no cuts. Perfect…not the first time, right?’
She threw her head back and laughed through some gravel in her throat which trembled the white skin and light blue veins of her neck.
I sat down opposite her and took another look while Charlie did something about everybody’s drinks and looked over his shoulder at Yvette – a lot. She wore a pink crêpe jacket, and a blood orange crêpe sarong which was split to mid thigh. The jacket wasn’t fastened and I could see from her exposed waist that she was naked underneath it. A long orange and pink silk scarf dropped down from around her neck and covered her breasts. Like Jasmin, she sat low on the sofa, her legs crossed at the knee, and her bare feet nodding. She smoked an untipped Gauloise, thick and fat as a chalk stick, with the relish of a true professional. Charlie handed me a Scotch with ice and sat on the sofa next to me.
‘Yvette tells me they don’t believe in marriage in France,’ Charlie said as he sat down. ‘Says they have this thing concubinage instead.’ He strained his whisky through his moustache. ‘Sounds kind of interesting, you know, concubines and that. Sounds to me as if you could trade ‘em.’
‘Like pork bellies, you mean?’ I asked Charlie, wondering how they got to be talking about this kind of stuff.
‘I was thinking more onna lines with “1987 Concubine convertible. Low mileage, one previous owner, swap plus cash considered”.’
‘I think you’re over-romanticizing it, Charlie,’ I said.
‘No, no, Bruce, you gotta understand, marriage – that ol’ roman’ic institution – is old-fashioned. Strictly wartime only before you fly off to a certain death. That’s what the lady says.’
‘Don’t you think so, Bruce?’ Yvette dared me, having dug deep to pronounce my name.
‘I’ve heard there’s a very high success rate when the man dies immediately.’
‘Whose side you on?’ asked Charlie. I ignored him.
‘The woman is left with a memory of perfect love and consummation…’
‘Yeah,’ said Charlie, with no encouragement.
‘…and, if it’s really a perfect marriage, a load of money.’
‘Now here is a man who really understands,’ said Yvette, uncrossing her legs and leaning forward.
‘And the guy?’ said Charlie. ‘What the hell does the guy get out of this perfect marriage?’
‘The guy gets to die at the pinnacle of his achievement. Wedding night followed by heroic death.’
‘What more could a man want?’ asked Jasmin.
‘To do it again?’ asked Charlie.
‘It’s never as good the second time,’ said Jasmin, ‘and anyway, men are always looking for the ultimate thrill.’ She pecked at her cigarette. ‘Sex and death. In Japan they don’t always need the sex…I’ve seen them sit down to eat puffer fish knowing that if the chef’s carved it up wrong any one of them could get the chop.’
‘Raw fish,’ said Charlie, ‘is not my kind of thrill.’
‘Yes,’ said Jasmin smugging at her Gauloise. ‘I think the spider gets it right. She shows her mate a good time, gets herself pregnant and has a problem free dinner.’
‘I think I’m coming round to concubinage,’ said Charlie. ‘I don’t wanna give you indigestion or anything.’
‘Don’t worry about us,’ said Yvette. ‘We have huge appetites. You must think of it as an act of kindness. We’re saving you from yourselves.’
‘Kindness was not the word I had in mind,’ said Charlie.
‘All this talk and now I’m hungry,’ said Yvette. ‘It’s time to eat.’
‘Will you be our guests?’ offered Charlie.
Yvette had stood up and looked Charlie over.
‘You look too tough for me. I like my meat very tender,’ she said baring her teeth.
‘The tender bits are inside,’ I said for Charlie.
Yvette raised an eyebrow. ‘Can I use a phone?’
Charlie pointed to the desk at the far end of the room behind our sofa. He saw Yvette hesitate. ‘Sorry, it’s the only one inna house. My rules. Somebody wants to use my phone, I wanna know what they’re saying. It’s business…’ he smiled, ‘something personal.’
She gave Charlie a look which left me charcoal broiled and I was only sitting next to him. She walked over to the phone and punched out some numbers.
‘Camilia?’ she asked and started speaking in Italian. Charlie nodded and drank some more and sneaked a look at Jasmin who had stood up and walked to the window to look at the dark.
Yvette put the phone down and walked back over. ‘I’m sorry…’ she said.
‘I heard,’ said Charlie.
‘You speak Italian?’ she asked.
‘I am Italian,’ he said. ‘Carlo Reggiani.’
Yvette and Jasmin slipped into their shoes. ‘We have to go. Tonight we are meeting someone for dinner who says they know somebody who probably knows lots of other somebodies who might be able to sell me something I want,’ explained Yvette.
‘That’s