Part 18 (1/2)

'Me too,' Doolittle agrees earnestly.

'So how's about we unpack this lot and find ourselves a spot of food?' Milton suggests.

'Good idea,' says Doolittle.

But what they're really thinking is: if the match is rained off, what on earth will Dima do?

Perry's mobile is ringing. Hector.

'Hi, Tom,' says Perry idiotically.

'Checked in OK, Milton?'

'Fine, just fine. Good trip. Everything went perfectly,' Perry says with enough enthusiasm for both of them.

'You're on your own tonight, OK?'

'You said.'

'Doolittle in the pink?'

'Blooming.'

'Call if you need anything. Service round the clock.'

In the hotel's minuscule hallway on their way out, Perry discusses his anxieties about the weather with a formidable lady named Madame Mere after the mother of Napoleon. He has known her from his student days and Madame Mere, if she is to be believed, loves Perry like a son. She stands four foot nothing in her bedroom slippers and n.o.body, according to Perry, has ever seen her without a headscarf over her curlers. Gail enjoys hearing Perry rattling away in French, but his fluency has always been a challenge to her, perhaps because he is not forthcoming about his early instructors.

At a tabac tabac in the rue de l'Universite, Milton and Doolittle eat indifferent steak frites and a tired salad and agree it's the best in the world. They don't finish their litre of house red, so take it back to their hotel. in the rue de l'Universite, Milton and Doolittle eat indifferent steak frites and a tired salad and agree it's the best in the world. They don't finish their litre of house red, so take it back to their hotel.

'Just do whatever you'd normally do,' Hector had told them airily. 'If you've got Paris-based buddies and want to hang out with them, why not?'

Because we wouldn't be doing what we normally do, is why not. Because we don't want to be hanging out in a St Germain cafe with our Paris-based buddies when we've got an elephant called Dima sitting in our heads. And because we don't want to have to lie to them about where we got our tickets for tomorrow's Final.

Back in their room, they drink the rest of the red out of tooth-mugs and make deep and adoring love without speaking a word, the best. When morning comes Gail sleeps late out of nervousness, and wakes to find Perry watching the rain spotting the grimy window, and worrying again about what Dima will do if the match is cancelled. And if it's postponed till Monday Gail's thought now will she have to call her Chambers with another c.o.c.k-and-bull story about a sore throat, which is Chambers code for a bad period?

Suddenly everything is linear. After coffee and croissants brought to their bedside by Madame Mere with an appreciative murmur to Gail of 'Quel t.i.tan alors' and a vacuous call from Luke asking whether they had a good night and are they feeling fit for tennis, they lie in bed discussing what to do before start of play at 3 p.m., allowing plenty of time to get to the stadium and find their seats and settle in.

Their answer is to take it in turns to use the tiny handbasin and dress, then march at Perry's pace to the Musee Rodin, where they attach themselves to a queue of schoolchildren, make it to the gardens in time to be rained on, shelter under the trees, take refuge in the museum cafe and peer through the doorway while they try to work out which way the clouds are moving.

Abandoning their coffees by mutual consent, but for no reason either of them can fathom, they agree to explore the gardens of the Champs-Elysees, only to find them closed on the grounds of security. Mich.e.l.le Obama and her children are in town, according to Madame Mere, but it's a State secret, so only Madame Mere and all Paris knows.

The gardens of the Marigny Theatre, however, turn out to be open and empty, except for two elderly Arab men in black suits and white shoes. Doolittle selects a bench, Milton approves her choice. Doolittle stares into the chestnut trees, Milton at a map.

Perry knows his Paris and has of course fathomed exactly how they will reach the Roland Garros Stadium metro to here, bus to there, a fat safety margin to make sure they meet Tamara's deadline.

Nevertheless, it makes sense for him to be burying his face in the map, because what else is there to do if you're a young couple on a spree in Paris and have decided, like a pair of idiots, to sit on a park bench in the rain?

'Everything on course, Doolittle? No little problems we can solve for you?' Luke directly to Gail this time, sounding like the Perkins' all-male family doctor when she was a girl: Sore throat, Gail? Why don't we have those clothes off and take a look? Sore throat, Gail? Why don't we have those clothes off and take a look?

'No problems, nothing you can help us with, thanks,' she replies. 'Milton tells me we'll be hitting the trail in half an hour.' And there's nothing wrong with my throat either. And there's nothing wrong with my throat either.

Perry folds his map. Talking to Luke has made Gail feel angry and conspicuous. Her mouth has dried up, so she sucks in her lips and licks them from the inside. How much madder does this get? They return to the empty pavement and set course up the hill towards the Arc de Triomphe, Perry stalking ahead of her the way he does when he wants to be alone and can't.

'What the f.u.c.k f.u.c.k d'you think you're doing?' she hisses into his ear. d'you think you're doing?' she hisses into his ear.

He has dodged into an airless shopping mall that is blaring out rock music. He is peering into a darkened window as if his whole future is revealed there. Is he playing spy? and incidentally flouting Hector's injunction not to look for imaginary watchers?

No. He's laughing. And a moment later, thank G.o.d, so is Gail as, arms slung round one another's shoulders, they gaze in disbelief at a veritable a.r.s.enal of spy toys: brand-name photographic wrist.w.a.tches that cost ten thousand euros, briefcase microphone kits and telephone scramblers, night-vision gla.s.ses, stun guns in all their glorious variety, pistol holsters with non-slip lap-straps as optional extras, and pick-your-own bullets of pepper, paint or rubber: welcome to Ollie's black museum for the paranoid executive who has nothing.

There had been no bus to take them there.

They hadn't ridden on the metro.

The pinch on the b.u.m she'd received from a departing pa.s.senger old enough to be her grandfather was non-operative.

They had been wafted here, and that was how they had come to be standing in a queue of courteous French citizens at the left side of the western gate to the Roland Garros Stadium exactly twelve minutes before the time appointed by Tamara.

It was also how Gail came to be smiling her way weightlessly past benign uniformed gatekeepers who were only too happy to smile back at her; then sauntering with the crowd down an avenue of tented shops to the thump-chump of an unseen bra.s.s band, the mooing of Swiss alphorns and the unintelligible advice of male loudspeakers.

But it was Gail the cool-headed courtroom lawyer who counted off the sponsors' names on the shopfronts: Lacoste, Slazenger, Nike, Head, Reebok and which one did Tamara say in her letter? don't pretend you've forgotten.

'Perry' tugging hard at his arm 'you promised me faithfully faithfully you'd buy me some decent tennis shoes. you'd buy me some decent tennis shoes. Look Look.'

'Oh, did I? So I did,' agrees Perry alias Milton, as a bubble saying REMEMBERS! REMEMBERS! appears over his head. appears over his head.

And with more conviction than she might have expected of him, he cranes forward to examine the latest thing by Adidas.

'And it's high time you bought some for yourself yourself too, and threw away that stinky old pair with verdigris round the uppers,' bossy Doolittle tells Milton. too, and threw away that stinky old pair with verdigris round the uppers,' bossy Doolittle tells Milton.

'Professor! I swear to G.o.d! My friend! You don't remember me?' My friend! You don't remember me?'

The voice had come at them without warning: the disembodied voice of Antigua bellowing above the three winds.

Yes, I do remember you, but I'm I'm not the Professor. not the Professor.

Perry is.

So I'll keep looking at the latest thing in Adidas tennis shoes, and let Perry go first before I turn my head in an appropriately delighted and highly astonished manner, as Ollie would say.

Perry is going first. She feels him leave her side and turn. She measures the length of time it takes for him to believe the evidence of his eyes.

'Christ, Dima Dima! Dima from Antigua! incredible!'