Bolt - By Dick Francis Page 0,10

and high morals. The two men liked and trusted each other and agreed that their joint business should adhere to the highest principles. They installed managers of good reputation and sat back and … er … increased their fortunes.’

‘Mm,’ I said.

‘Before and during the Second World War, the firm went into recession, shrinking to a quarter of its former size, but it was still healthy enough to revive well in the nineteen fifties, despite the deaths of the original managing friends. Monsieur de Brescou remained on good terms with the inheriting Nanterre – Louis – and the tradition of employing top managers went on. And that brings us to three years ago, when Louis Nanterre died and left his fifty per cent share to his only son, Henri. Henri Nanterre is thirty-seven, an able entrepreneur, full of vigour, good at business. The profits of the company are annually increasing.’

Both the princess and her husband listened gloomily to this long recital, which seemed to me to have been a success story of major proportions.

‘Henri Nanterre,’ Greening explained carefully, ‘is of the modern world. That is to say, the old values mean little to him.’

‘He has no honour,’ Roland de Brescou said with distaste. ‘He disgraces his name.’

I said slowly, to the princess, ‘What does he look like?’

‘You saw him,’ she said simply. ‘In my box.’

THREE

There was a brief silence, then the princess said to Greening, ‘Please go on, Gerald. Tell Kit what that … that wretched man wants, and what he said to me.’

Roland de Brescou interrupted before he could speak and, turning his wheelchair to face me directly, said, ‘I will tell him. I will tell you. I didn’t think you should be involved in our affairs, but my wife wishes it …’ He made a faint gesture with a thin hand, acknowledging his affection for her. ‘… and as you are to marry Danielle, well then, perhaps … But I will tell you myself.’ His voice was slow but stronger, the shock receding in him too, with perhaps anger taking its place.

‘As you know,’ he said, ‘I have been for a long time …’ He gestured down his body, not spelling it out. ‘We have lived also a long time in London. Far away from the business, you understand?’

I nodded.

‘Louis Nanterre, he used to go there quite often to consult the managers. We would talk often on the telephone and he would tell me everything that was happening … We would decide together if it looked sensible to go in new directions. He and I, for instance, developed a factory to make things out of plastic, not metal, nor concrete. Things like heavy drain pipes which would not crack under roads, nor corrode. You understand? We developed new plastics, very tough.’

He paused, more it seemed through lack of breath than of things to say. The princess, Greening and I waited until he was ready to go on.

‘Louis,’ he said eventually, ‘used to come to London to this house twice a year, with auditors and lawyers – Gerald would be here – and we would discuss what had been done, and read the reports and suggestions from the boards of managers, and make plans.’ He sighed heavily. ‘Then Louis died, and I asked Henri to come over for the meetings, and he refused.’

‘Refused?’ I repeated.

‘Absolutely. Then suddenly I don’t know any longer what is happening, and I sent Gerald over, and wrote to the auditors …’

‘Henri had sacked the auditors,’ Gerald Greening said succinctly into the pause, ‘and engaged others of his own choice. He had sacked half the managers and was taking charge directly himself, and had branched out into directions which Monsieur de Brescou knew nothing about.’

‘It’s intolerable,’ Roland de Brescou said.

‘And today?’ I asked him tentatively. ‘What did he say at Newbury today?’

‘To go to my wife!’ He was quivering with fury. ‘To threaten her. It’s … disgraceful.’ There weren’t words, it seemed, strong enough for his feelings.

‘He told Princess Casilia,’ Gerald Greening said with precision, ‘that he needed her husband’s signature on a document, that Monsieur de Brescou did not want to sign, and that she was to make sure that he did.’

‘What document?’ I asked flatly.

None of them, it seemed, was in a hurry to say, and it was Gerald Greening, finally, who shrugged heavily and said, ‘A French government form for a preliminary application for a licence to manufacture and export guns.’

‘Guns?’ I said, surprised. ‘What sort of guns?’

‘Firearms for killing people. Small arms