At home – the French Quarter, Casablanca, Morocco

Characters

GM’s Note:

This is the first move of a play-by-mail written by Neil Fraser. It has some responses from the player, with some questions at the end. Neil was a big fan of play-by-mails, and usually had several on the go at the same time.

All characters in this play-by-mail, with the exception of Solar Pons and my PC Aletta, are Neil’s inventions. It was Neil’s intention for Aletta and Victor to get together while bringing about the end of Johannes van der Kren, Aletta’s enemy. Victor was always guaranteed to get Aletta’s complete and undivided attention. How could she resist a Captain in the French Foreign Legion?

Written by Neil Fraser

The car wasn’t large, a flamboyant scarlet Peugeot, but Aletta had plans for a radical improvement in the future. However, the streets were quite narrow in Casablanca, Ad-dar al-Bayda, even the Boulevard Hansali that led to the docks. Aletta was concerned that a bigger vehicle would be difficult to manoeuvre.

Ipande was driving the car, Aletta sitting beside him. He refused to allow her to sit in the back and have the locals thinking he was a mere chauffeur. He grinned sidelong at her.

“You’re sitting there like the fabled cat that swallowed the cream” he said in English.

His accent was Oxford, where he had studied for three years before dumping it all to join the circus as a lion tamer. That’s where the two had met, the brave lion tamer and the daring trapeze artist. It had been lust at first sight. Aletta preferred to speak in English as his Arabic was either scholarly and precise, or so mangled by contact with his native Fulani that she couldn’t understand him. He claimed that was because she had been raised in the Cairo slums and hadn’t learnt to speak properly. Really!

Ipande Ikamande was a Nigerian and a Muslim, though scholars would have strongly disputed his Orthodoxy. His religion was tainted with native magic and ancestor worship. However, he was British and he had gone to Oxford, though Aletta suspected this was probably on the strength of his father’s not inconsiderable wealth. Ipande’s father was the Deputy Fon of Kamande in northeast Nigeria. Ipande’s uncle was the Fon and paramount chiefs attracted a great deal of wealth. Kamande and Bafut were two of the biggest Fonates along the Bight coast.

He was of medium height and strongly built. Whites may have thought him ugly but Aletta thought he was a very handsome Bantu. She was proud to be seen with him, even though Arabs on the whole scorned their black co-religionists and found them inferior. Ipande was so black, the colour of his skin so intense and vibrant that he looked almost dark blue if the light fell in a certain way across his skin.

As flamboyant as the car, he had chosen to dress all in white this day. A white silk three piece suit and a white shirt with ruffled sleeves contrasted with his skin and the delicate pink of the silk rose in his lapel. Only the gleaming dove grey of his shoes, his coat pocket handkerchief of silk and the banding of his broad-brimmed planter’s hat, now thrown on the back seat, contrasted with his snow white appearance. It was summer and the temperature was in the high thirties to low forties, the humidity was well over fifty percent, but not a drop of perspiration bathed his forehead or stained his immaculate suit.

Aletta had no real surname, but she had been known by a few in her time. One that she had used for a short while had become almost permanent, purely from the dogged determination of Detective Chief Inspector Stanley Jenks. He refused to call her anything but “Miss Yasmini”, the name she was using when they first met. Aletta had decided to avoid Jenks while she was “working”, he could well blow any cover she had developed. He was determined, honest and intelligent and it had been by luck alone that she had avoided being caught by him on a couple of occasions.

Aletta liked him, and he liked her, but they were on opposite sides of the law. She admired his sense of justice, which he retained even though it put him at odds with his superiors and had damaged his career. Aletta hoped that the ugly little bulldog of a man was still in London, but she missed him all the same. She didn’t believe that he would really disapprove of her stealing from Johannes Van der Kren, a most unpleasant individual, but she wouldn’t have enjoyed the lecture.

Aletta sighed and clung more closely to Ipande, looking the very picture of romantic devotion. Both knew this to be a lie. She and Ipande liked each other greatly and relied upon each other, she for support and he for someone to turn aside the prejudice when his status of Prince opened no doors and his black skin closed many. In patriarchal Morocco amongst Arabs or even Berbers a rich and beautiful woman of mysterious background could still go places and do things. Aletta mixed as much as possible with the French community, so much less patriarchal and far more partial to a well turned calf, a flutter of eyelashes over dark eyes and the swirl of a silken skirt.

Ipande slowed the car and stopped near the French owned newsagent on the Boulevard Hansali. Aletta got out of the car and went to buy her daily “Times” and other less reputable gossip papers. A quick scan showed that neither she nor anyone she knew had made the front pages, so she returned to the car and sat next to Ipande again. He gave her an apologetic shrug.

“I’m sorry my darling, but he got in while you were buying the papers.” He gestured backwards.

“A capital mistake” the stranger commented dryly in perfect English. “To allow oneself to fall into a pattern, or habit, especially when one is being pursued. I am here about Mijnheer Johannes, or Mr John.” He added as an aside “Van der Kren”.

The stranger raised one thin eyebrow from over a grey eye as cool as the metal of the small but efficient looking automatic pistol he pointed approximately midway between the couple ahead of him.

Aletta regarded the stranger with fathomless dark eyes. “We will be noticed if Ipande does not move the car away from the kerb and drive on down the street”.

“Very well” replied the man in the back of the car. “But I know the street plans of Casablanca quite well. If I ask you to cease going somewhere, you will oblige me.”

Aletta was encouraged by the stranger’s willingness to talk.

“Drive wherever you please, subject only to our guest’s orders” Aletta told Ipande. “But bear in mind that we wish to be discrete. I will discuss with this individual what business he has with us.”

Aletta turned to the stranger, knowing that if he had wanted to kill her she would already be dead. Therefore he must want something else, either her knowledge or her skills, or perhaps both. She took her first good look at him. He was over six feet tall and very lean. A long, thin nose and receding hairline emphasised his high forehead. Aletta guessed his age at the mid forty mark. She wondered at his inappropriate choice of clothing, given the current temperature. He wore a three piece tweed suit that Aletta recognised as the work of a Bond Street tailor. He didn’t seem to notice that he was perspiring. A floppy brimmed hat shadowed his eyes, but Aletta suspected his were the sort of eyes that would be shadowed even in bright sunlight. An Englishman certainly, probably upper class but very hard, unlike the effete gentlemen of stories. He had all the manners of a gentleman but seemed both more and less than one.

Ipande had told Aletta that her hunches were a common talent of women. She silently acknowledged the hunch she felt while looking at the stranger. This Englishman was a dangerous man. From the glint in his eye Aletta guessed he knew approximately what her thoughts had been.

“Well, what is it that you want with me?” she asked.

“Excellent! That rarest of creatures! A woman who is concise and to the point.” Aletta bristled at his words, but he relaxed, leaned back into the seat and put away his gun. “My amanuensis, Parker, is the better suited of the two of us to point pistols at others. Not that the good doctor is prone to threaten women!”

He lifted his hat slightly and revealed to Aletta that his eyes were indeed hard to read. “I know who the two of you are. I have received extensive briefing from the private papers of ex-Detective Chief Inspector Stanley Jenks of the C.I.D., Scotland Yard. Though most of the information on His Highness I had to obtain from private sources.” As an aside he said “I understand your uncle and father are quite worried as to your fate, Your Highness.”

Ipande responded with irritation, not taking his eyes from the crowded streets. “Mr Ikamande, by preference. Just who the hell are you and what do you want with us?”

The other nodded fractionally. “Mr Ikamande. I regret that I must disappoint you, Mr Ikamande. I am here principally to speak to Miss Yasmini, though merely ‘Aletta’ is preferred by you, is it not?” he said, turning once again to Aletta. She made no reply but swung her legs up onto the crimson leather seat and moved to better see the stranger. He regarded her politely with no trace whatsoever of the distaste so often exhibited by whites. The poorly concealed lust Aletta had often seen in men was also absent. She felt small and insignificant under his dispassionate gaze, feelings she did not like at all.

Aletta remembered others spoken of by Stanley Jenks. There was one that seemed to fit the stranger’s description, but she wanted to be certain. “I don’t recall Stanley ever mentioning you” she said conversationally.

“Ah! You do recognise me then.” In a way his tone was triumphant, that of a man used to being recognised and secretly proud of his fame.

The great cat inside Aletta purred pure pleasure. “No,” she replied in a sweet tone. “I was merely making small talk.”

The tightening of the man’s face told Aletta she had hit home, he did not like to be belittled. Some of her ire at being so easily surprised trickled away.

“Very well then, permit me to introduce myself. My name is Solar Pons.” He waited for a brief time to exactly no response from Aletta. Her memory was correct, but she didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of recognition.

“Ah well, fleeting is literary fame. Parker will be disappointed.” He had recovered his poise.

Ipande made a small gesture with his hand on the front seat between himself and Aletta, out of sight of Pons. A gesture urging care? Aletta couldn’t tell what it meant, but she guessed her lover also recognised the name. Pons looked gratified.

“Ah, I see that Mr Ikamande does know me. Well,” he went on before Ipande had a chance to respond, “why not stop this aimless driving and take me back to your house? You will feel all the more comfortable and secure there. I have a proposition to make to you, Miss Aletta. I am not your enemy and have no interest in your crimes past. Especially that of your robbery from Mijnheer van der Kren.” Pons shrugged. “The pistol was merely to assure that you listened to me initially. It has been my past experience that women frequently lack the capacity for logical thought.”

Aletta was somewhat taken aback by his last comment. How logical was it for a man to point a gun at a woman when he only wanted her to listen to him? She felt that here was yet another man who blamed his inability to communicate with women on their unrestricted emotions instead of on his own obvious shortcomings. She sighed as Pons tapped Ipande on the shoulder, making Ipande jump.

“The next turn left, Mr Ikamande, will bring you back most expediently to your villa”. He pronounced the villa’s Arabic name carefully, but very fluently. Pons went on musingly. “I wonder, Miss Aletta, if you would have been so swift to retire to Casablanca if you had realised that Mr Van der Kren owns two villas here, a hotel, a jeweller’s shop and two pawn shops? He poses as a Walloon named Jean Crenques. You did know that he was a Belgian, rather than a Netherlander? Or didn’t you care?”

Aletta’s beautiful rose-coloured villa was tucked away from open view by a bank of trees. The back of the villa overlooked the sea, a breeze from which cooled and refreshed all the rooms. Its isolation had been one of the main attractions for Aletta when she bought it. She loved to bathe nude in the sea and then lie for a while with only a large towel between her and the warm sand. Her nearest neighbour was almost half a kilometre away. Although Aletta had not seen him, she knew him to be an officer of the Legion Etranger, the French Foreign Legion. Obviously he was rich, but on duty most of the time. She remembered his name was Viktor Besarab. Aletta was planning to move on eventually and hoped to be able to sell the villa to Besarab. It was better situated than his and its resale value was another of its attractions. Ipande had expressed admiration at her planning, but he had always tended to show the carelessness of the rich towards money. Aletta had only what she earned herself and was careful with it all.

After Ipande had garaged the car they made their way inside the villa to one of the large informal rooms off the central courtyard. Aletta gave instructions to Hassan, the young houseboy, for refreshments and made herself comfortable on the piled silken cushions. There was a distinct air of decadent luxury about the room, one she had taken great pains to establish. Everything was in the finest taste with the jarring exception of three grotesque and ugly little Nigerian fetishes that Ipande had insisted on adding to the decor. She had covered them up as much as possible, but the withered features seemed to glare at her every now and then. She was beginning to believe they hated her for luring Ipande away from his home, even though it was the circus and not her that he had originally followed. The fetishes never listened to her explanations. Ipande said they protected the villa and its inhabitants, especially Aletta and himself, from malign influences. He had told Aletta about his maternal great grandfather, a powerful “juju man”, and how his great grandfather had made the fetishes. Aletta had the distinct impression from Ipande’s words that the old man was still alive.

Ipande prowled about casting dark glances over Pons. The Englishman seemed quite oblivious to the scowls and sipped cautiously at the coffee Hassan had provided. “Miss Aletta, we both have reasons for wanting Jean Crenques – forgive me, but I first came across him using that name – out of business, as they say. You, because as long as he is alive, let alone in Casablanca, he is an extreme danger to you. He will never forgive you for robbing him. Jenks put me onto you. A top rate fellow, that Jenks. It is only a shame Scotland Yard do not recognise quality when they see it. Jenks based his methods on my predecessor, you see. I was partly influenced by Jenks’ work. More so by the Master, naturally. The Master’s solution to the Hoxley double murder was classic!” Pons pressed the bridge of his nose with thumb and forefinger. “I apologise for rambling. I am recovering from a wound. I am interested in removing Crenques from operations because of his line in blackmail. I was hired in London by a young woman … Well, exactly why she hired me I shall omit to say.”

“Why hire you?” interrupted Aletta. “My God, Aletta! Don’t you know him yet?” Ipande’s shocked outburst startled Aletta, but she remained outwardly unperturbed. “No,” she lied. Now she would find out just what Ipande knew of this man. “He’s Solar Pons. They call him the Sherlock Holmes of Praed Street! He’s the world’s finest private investigator!”

“And I’m the world’s finest … trapeze artist” she finished, glancing in Pons’ direction.

“Inquiry Agent, if you please, Mr Ikamande.” The gleam was back in his eyes. Aletta recognised a man who purported to scorn fame, but who wished for its lustre. Pons was supposed to investigate crimes more spectacular than hers, crimes that attracted more attention. Aletta had never considered a crime that garnered attention successful. Her idea of the perfect crime was one that remained undetected, or did so for some time, the longer the better. A wicked grin crossed her lips as she considered the man’s transparent motivation and the use to which she could put her new knowledge.

“What do you propose?” she asked Pons guardedly.

“I am very much afraid that a terminal and violent solution is the only option available to me” he replied. “I dislike such extremely messy procedures, but the law here is not as it is in Britain. Crenques has the Chief of Police in his pocket, and at least two lawyers besides. Justice is not so easy to buy at home. However, the blackmail material which I estimate to stand at some 10 to 15 pounds of letters and documents must be recovered first. Crenques has enough dedicated lieutenants that his vile work can continue almost without pause. Chief amongst these lieutenants is the Honourable Peter Houghton-Pentecost, third son of the Earl of Canwell and as thorough-going a rogue as I have ever had the misfortune of encountering. When the upper classes turn, they do so with a vengeance.” Pons seemed slightly embarrassed by the flowery nature of his speech.

He went on after coughing quietly into his handkerchief. “Roughly what I propose is that you express willingness to put yourself at risk. Insert yourself into Crenques’ household. As a native maid or some such.”

Aletta was disappointed, a household servant! Surely Pons was more imaginative than that, after all, his reputation bespoke imaginative solutions to spectacular crimes. Perhaps it was this Parker he had spoken of before who actually solved the crimes. Pons held up a forestalling hand, causing Aletta to suspect him of mind reading.

“I do not propose anything more. All that I know at the moment is that Crenques carries the papers with him from place to place. They are therefore here in Casablanca. He knows only too well what I look like, no matter how I disguise myself. He has no idea at all of your appearance. Jenks confided in me that you have never actually been caught, though there is a file concerning your suspected activities at Scotland Yard.”

Aletta immediately decided to curtail her “activities” in Britain and concentrate on Europe, or perhaps America.

“As soon as Jenks heard about the Van der Kren job he recognised your “modus operandi”. It took Van der Kren considerably longer to narrow the field of suspects down to three. In the meantime Jenks had gone to the Yard, on the pretext of a visit to old friends, and had swapped your photograph for one of a young, already deceased lady who bears no resemblance to you at all. He also altered some vital facts.”

Aletta reviewed her previous decision to curtail her activities, but she knew Stanley would be so annoyed if she continued, especially on his home soil.

Pons coughed again and his pale faced glistened with perspiration. Aletta exchanged a concerned glance with Ipande. “My man within Crenques organisation has been killed” Pons continued. This is why Crenques fled to Casablanca. I will be more obvious here than in London, or even Brussels. Everything that you recover from Crenques place is yours. In addition, I am willing to pay you £100.00 for the tedium of having had to listen to me. But only if the offer will not insult you. If you accept, £250.00 more. If the job is completed satisfactorily, £1,000.00. Or you may bargain with me as you wish. I regret to say that I will not bargain well. Or you can come up with a plan of your own. To say I will not bargain very well,” he repeated, slumping to one side on the fluffy cushions.

The handkerchief, stained red, fell from his hand. Pons was unconscious. Aletta and Ipande sprang to his side. Ipande picked up the cloth, looked at it and felt it gingerly. “Blood,” he said. Aletta quickly took the Englishman’s pulse and found it thin and racing. Ipande carefully wiped at Pons’ mouth.

Aletta recalled the deep, lung-y quality of the coughs and unbuttoned his jacket, then his waistcoat. She had already seen something while unbuttoning his jacket that told her what was wrong. Ipande was still fussing at Pons’ mouth and face.

“Ipande, my hot little leopard, go and fetch Hassan, tout de suite.” She carefully cut away Pons’ shirt buttons, choosing not to undo them. Ipande saw the source of her concern and touted, suitest.

There were three large blood stains in a straight line across his abdomen, but rising diagonally from left to right. Or would have been, were the man standing. His belly was flat and very hard, lightly tanned and quite hair-free. It was also almost wholly obscured by copious quantities of bandages, once neatly and expertly applied but now somewhat old and carelessly tended. They were liberally blood soaked, most of it new and wet. The amount of blood Pons was losing tended to indicate to the experienced Aletta that the wounds were major and he should never have been up and around in the first place.

Hassan trotted in, wearing his best stripped robe. He always wore it when Aletta had company. He squatted down, street fashion and stared at the Pons. Then he transferred his dark gaze to her. There was adoration in there, but also that growing respect Aletta had been noticing more of late. He spoke Arabic now, though he had a fair command of gutter French, some Spanish (Aletta suspected that he’d actually come from the Spanish zone years before) and she had been teaching him English. That had been hard, but he was fluent enough now.

“Bad, Mistress, bleeding from the mouth.” He pointed to the bloodied stomach. “Lungs and probably the guts too. The bad air will get in, Mistress and he will die. In sh’allah,” he said, philosophically.

“He is a guest in my house Hassan and he will not die while I have anything to say on the matter. I want you to drive to the City – not you, you rogue, but Ipande – and get a doctor and all that he will need. But he must be the best available and discrete, or buyable. You understand?”

“Of course, Mistress.” Hassan smiled conspiratorially. He and she knew each other far better than she and Ipande would ever know each other. “I think Dr Sampson, who lives in the medina.”

“Well, you would know, my Hassan. Off you go to Ipande.”

“I am here,” came the man’s voice from behind her. “It is no use, my flower. The battery is dead. I thought it would be all right, but..”. He reached across and patted her shoulder.

“No, that is not a problem!” Aletta exclaimed. This was the perfect opportunity to solve the problem and arrange a long overdue introduction. “Hassan. M. Besarab is home at this time, is he not? The boy nodded, seeing where she was going.

“Indeed Mistress. M. le Capitaine is back from the Legion and is alone. He has a very powerful car, a dark blue Hispano-Suiza. Ideal for a drive into the City.”

“Then run along Hassan and ask his assistance!”

“Yes Mistress.” Hassan turned as he got to the door and flashed a sly smile at her. “I am sure he will come, Mistress. He was also interested in the seagulls on the sand yesterday.” The boy took off, his bare feet making virtually no sound on the floor.

Aletta stood and put her arms around the Negro. “If he comes, Ipande, I want you to go in to Casablanca with Hassan and him. Keep an eye on him and on anyone who might be showing an interest in you or M. le Capitaine.”

“Very well, Light of my Life.” He grinned. “Should I prepare to be discarded?”

“Don’t be foolish. Never discarded, even if the time comes that we part. You are altogether too delicious to merely ‘discard’.”

He grinned, showing teeth so white Aletta marvelled that they didn’t dim the electrics. (The villa had its own generator, which hummed, barely audibly in the background.)

“Will you be all right here?’ he suddenly asked. “If someone saw us with Pons…”. He let his voice trail off.

“I have this,” she said and hefted the detective’s gun in her hand. A few shells rattled beside it. “I won’t be bored. I have all the contents of his pockets to browse through!” She pointed to the small, untidy pile to Pons’ side. “And these excellent cigarettes of mine.”

“Ah!” Ipande exclaimed in satisfaction. He swooped on the box and extracted a small handful of the fragrant marijuana reefers. “You are right, Gazelle of the Desert. All a woman would need.”

There was the roar of a large engine steadily growing closer.

“That was quick,” said Aletta. “He must be alert.”

“Or Hassan’s young body galvanised him,” Ipande said, laughing. “I’ve always believed the reputation of the French to be over-stated!”

Aletta ignored the cheap gibe and pushed the revolver carefully into the multi-purpose clips fastened around her fore-arm under the loose, flowing silken sleeves of her blouse.

The engine’s noise was a throbbing thunder by the time she got to the forecourt door. The automobile was huge with gleaming silver exhausts and a midnight-blue painted, custom-built, two-seater body. Hassan’s face was alight and he was crying out in pleasure. When the engine abruptly died he kept on yelling for a split second. The driver vaulted out of the right side, not bothering to open the door, and stood before Aletta.

He looked down at her, for he was much taller than she, three inches over the six foot mark. He was built like an athlete too, a runner; broad shoulders and narrow hips. His hands were long and slender, but finely muscled. There was an elaborate gold ring bearing a carved emerald signet on his right second finger. She could not see the design for the glowing in her eyes. His face was a strange mix of races. He had the wheaten-blond hair of the northern German, but the high cheeks of the Slav. He had the blue eyes of a German too, but the lips of a Frenchman, or of an Italian. He was by no means quite handsome, yet at the same time, he was infinitely better looking – in an interesting way – than most men Aletta had seen before. There was a tiny, lightning-bolt shaped scar on his left temple and a larger, more ragged looking scar, star-shaped, in the middle of his right cheek. Though the colour of an old scar, it was stark against the tan of his skin.

He smiled then, briefly and in a way that only revealed his front teeth. He took her hand. Aletta knew that he had inspected her as closely as she had him and had approved of what he had seen. He bent over her hand and kissed it. She felt the touch of late night bristles on his upper lip and chin.

“Enchanted, Mademoiselle. Je suis Viktor Besarab, Capitaine de Legion Etranger.”

“Do you speak English, M. le Capitaine?” Aletta smiled back at him.

“Oh, assuredly, mlle.” He let her hand go. “I feel we are acquainted in some small way already, mlle. I have seen you on occasion partaking of the blessings of the sun.” He smiled again, that same brief little tooth-showing. From another man it would have been a grimace.

Aletta half-curtsied.

“Then you have the advantage of me, M. I thought I was swimming by myself!”

“Ah, but I especially delighted in the sight of you toiling over the sands.” His eyes brightened and for a second they turned a living green, like the emerald he wore.

“Perhaps we might toil over the sands together sometime in the future, M.?” Aletta was not coy; there was nothing of coyness in her, but she played the diffidence perfectly.

“Oh, I trust so!” said Besarab. “In the meantime, your boy said that you have need of myself and my Hispano-Suiza?”

Aletta was called back to full reality by the new crispness in the man’s voice.

“Yes, my car is ill and I have a friend in the house who is hurt. I need a doctor and would count it a favour if you would take Hassan and Ipande into Casablanca to fetch one. Hassan to find a doctor and Ipande to convince one to come out here at this hour.”

The captain seemed lightly amused now and he gazed at Ipande. “Indeed, M.” he said. “I can see how some would not fail to be impressed and persuaded by you.” As with Pons, there was no disrespect to that of another race in Besarab’s voice, merely honesty.

“Well, mademoiselle” he said, turning back to Aletta again. “I will bid you adieu for the moment.” He kissed her hand again then turned back to the car. Hassan had already figured out how the rumble seat opened and sat within, his face glowing again in anticipation of the ride to come.

“Truly this is a wonderful car Mistress! You will have to get one too!”

Besarab vaulted into the vehicle again and Ipande took the passenger seat, though more sedately. He flicked a quick white smile to Aletta, then the great motor roared into life and they were off, back onto the road to Casablanca in the time it would have taken the Peugeot to have turned around. Aletta stared after the car, thinking about her neighbour. So, he had been spying on her, had he? Just as well! She wouldn’t have wanted to have wasted all her time in the sun, getting a tan that never darkened her skin in the slightest.

But it was time to see about his house, so she knew a little more about him. Maybe one night in a week or so. She recalled the faint, unfamiliar accent in his voice and its baritone timbre, well suited to a parade-ground and a bedroom. She smiled wickedly. Things were looking up again! But she’d have to watch herself. From his attitude when Hassan spoke, she was reasonably sure he understood Arabic. He spoke English too and French. But his native tongue was none of those three. She sighed, happy with a mystery and set off inside to investigate Mr Solar Pons’ pocket contents.

She lit one of her cigarettes and made sure the Englishman was comfortable. He lay breathing raggedly and his pulse was quick, but Aletta could do no more for him than she had done already. She inspected his wallet first. There was a thick bundle of notes in it and her eyes widened in surprise as to the amount. There was more than £300 there and over 1000 francs and assorted coins, French and British. His passport was bundled with the wallet and showed him in a photograph looking hard and impatient.

He was Solar Pons, born 31-10-1880 in Prague, Austro-Hungarian Empire, now Czechoslovakia. The passport was British though. The passport was also laden with entry and exit stamps; the U.S.A., Canada, France, Austria, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Yugoslavia, Romania, Poland, Latvia. Some of the stamps were indistinct, but they made an exotic collection. She found the Moroccan one at last and realised that he’d only arrived in the country yesterday.

There was also a slim sheaf of cards indicating membership of various London clubs (the last bastion of male supremacy). Savile, Diogenes, Athenaeum, Cliff Dwellers(!) and Lambs. There was a letter on Foreign Office headed paper, but the whole was in some sort of code and the signature was merely “B.P.” She laid it aside thoughtfully. There was also a scattered few other bullets for the Belgian automatic pistol. She noticed that the passport had not mentioned a license for a gun and there were no other papers relating to such an item in his pockets.

There was a hotel key for the Hotel Majestueux on the fringes of the French Quarter. It was, as she recalled, a quiet, boring, but out of the way place. The room number was 27. The key indicated the place would be laughably easy to break into, should things come to that. There was a bar bill for a single whisky and soda and a pouch which, when unwrapped, revealed a curved meerschaum pipe with a chewed ivory mouthpiece and a tobacco smelling blackened bowl. The tobacco in the pouch was a particularly foul-smelling near-eastern brand. In his waistcoat pocket was a plain, but magnificent-quality hob-watch in a gunmetal case. The works were undoubtedly Swiss. It was engraved inside with the words “To Solar Pons, with all my gratitude. Geo. V”

She looked at that respectfully. She couldn’t even begin to imagine how much that might fetch, assuming she could ever find anyone idiot enough to want to buy it. Mr Pons moved in high circles! Though no higher than Aletta herself wanted to one day. There was a twisted bullet hanging from the electrum watch-chain. Or, at least it seemed to be a bullet, though it was of silver.

Inside the waistcoat pocket and flecked with blood was a letter from the publishing house of “William Wanderley and Sons”. Essentially, it was a rejection slip for a manuscript of Pons’, for a book entitled “An Examination of the Cthulhu Cult and Others”. It was apparently “unsuitable for the current readership climate at the present time.” It was dated over 4 months earlier. There was a savage red scrawl across the top of the sheet; the single word “Fools!”

There were also a couple of other letters, one from a Thomas Carnacki, of Cheyne Walk, Chelsea, stating that “I cannot help you at the moment Pons; this devilish Shrieking Stone holds my attention, but you could try the Third Sign, as noted in the Sigsand MS. If you can’t get access to the copy in the British Museum, by all means, you may borrow mine.” There also was one from a Dr Petrie, inquiring of Pons as to the likely current whereabouts of a Hui P’an Ko, whom “Smith has lost contact with. We know your expertise in these matters.” At the top was scrawled, in the same writing as the red on the publishing letter, the address “7 Belcher St, Limehouse. F.M. again?”

There was also a scrap of paper liberally strewn with musical notation. There were a score of little paper envelopes, most empty, but two with dirt in them. And there was a sealed envelope addressed to her in Stanley’s handwriting. She glanced at Pons’, but he seemed unchanged, still hanging onto unconsciousness. He had not moved at all, save for one pathetic moan once when she had injudiciously tried to stir him to check at the back of his belt. She had not persisted. She sliced the envelope open. The paper was square-cut, but cheap. She remembered the even more than usually straitened circumstances Stanley found himself in and smiled wryly. Then she smoothed her face out. He would not want pity from her. If she gave it, she’d be risking their friendship, or whatever shared emotion it was that they had.

“Dear Miss Yasmini,

I am pleased to see you well out of the way of John Vanderkren. Mind you, you do not need me to tell you how foolish you have been! Or perhaps you do. You do not possess the sense you were born with! But thank God you did get out when you did. Vanderkren has a pretty nasty reputation and does not have this “gentlemanly” attitude towards women, as some of our own home-grown dishonest have. I have given this to Mr Solar Pons who is a friend of mine though he is a queer bird, as I have no doubt that you have worked out already.

He intends to go to Morocco shortly to root out the last of Vanderkren’s organisation there, after he has done for the heart of it here in England. I think Pons was a bit upset about your little job. You will also have determined that he has a reasonably narrow minded attitude about women. But do not make the mistake of thinking him unable to alter an opinion, even of a woman! Anyway, in time he luckily came around to the idea that your escapade (Well done, Miss Yasmini!) was of value to him, as it diverted Vanderkren’s attention from Pons’ plans.

Though Pons is a hound for searching out and detecting crime, he is like the Master in other ways. If you like, there are degrees of crime and your robberies, elegant though they be, are not much to him against the worse sort; murder, blackmail, kidnapping, slavery (yes Miss Yasmini; even from England!) and so on. That is not to say that he will not turn his hand to solving robberies such as yours, but only when there is no other matter in hand at all. He is not like the Master and has never turned to any artificial stimulants for his mind.

Anyway, what I am trying to come around to is that Pons will do nothing whatsoever against you for your job against Vanderkren. You may trust him absolutely and initial appearances notwithstanding, he is a gentleman of the noble kind. Though that sort of phrase seems very much out of date now. Oh, if Dr Lyndon Parker is there, you may trust him absolutely too. He is to Pons as Watson was to the Master. And he will be very taken with you!
I remain, yours respectfully, Stanley A. Jenks.”

P.S.: If you let anything happen to you, I shall be bloody angry with you! SAJ.”

Aletta knew that handwriting; the painful care in every letter. She knew that he’d learnt to read and write late and that every letter still came hard to him. But he was like a bulldog in more than looks. He never gave up. She touched the “P.S.” carefully. There was powerful emotion in the spluttering pen strokes there. He’d dug a hole through the paper, in fact. She turned the sheet over wonderingly and saw that there was a further postscript.

“P.P.S.: I have fixed it so when Vanderkren goes through his hired scum at the Yard, he will not get anything on you. I’ve fiddled their records. If they do owe me anything, it is that if anyone is ever going to stop you, it will be me. No-one else deserves that pleasure. So the only true record on your activities is owned by yours truly and since the Yard does not want to know about you, why should I care?

By the way, in case you do not think he could do it, I outlined your finest eight robberies to him and he solved them all in five minutes each flat! I had solved them too – that is, how you done them – but I took a few weeks on each! Thank God the Yard never listened to me! You are too much the bird to be caged! Remember, for me, if not for yourself: TAKE CARE!”

That definitely was the letter this time. She folded it carefully and tucked it away. Pons’ voice was thin, but very clear. She looked up in startlement. He should not have been awake, let alone lucid in the state he was in!

“I see that Jenks did not underestimate your abilities, Aletta. As neat a little job of frisking as I’ve ever seen. Supremely economical. I did have every intention of handing you the letter, but I am afraid that at first I failed to take our mutual friend at his word. I chose to believe that you would be the sort of panicky, illogical woman who is, alas, all to common in the world. I apologise to you for so thinking.”

He paused, then gestured weakly. “It is a shame that I cannot have a drink. But it would not be good for me at the moment. As you will have found out by now, I was shot in the last stages of cleaning up Crenques’ British organisation. I was unutterably stupid, Aletta, so unbelievably idiotic that I cringe at the memory of my foolishness. One of his lieutenants shot me with what is called a sub-machine gun; a Beretta, I believe.”

He paused a while more. “Might I have a cigarette however? The ones you are smoking, though hemp, smell very tantalising. Local, I would say from the smell, though hand-made. Somewhat south of here, I deduce?” He puffed contentedly.

“Forgive me again Aletta. I am rambling, a thing I despise in others, but at times, I fear, I am all too human. Parker will be tremendously displeased with me. After his careful tending, probing, cutting and sewing, I treat his handiwork like this.” He pointed at his bloodied belly.

“You might like Parker, Aletta. You and he have something in common. He spent the years 1910-15 in charge of a hospital for the fellaheen at Mansura, in Egypt. He speaks Arabic even better than I, though only in the Egyptian dialect. Well, I trust he will not find me! That he is patiently back at 7B Praed St still!” He paused again and seemed to have dozed off. Aletta gently took the cigarette from his mouth and finished it herself.

She looked at him again. Three wounds in a rising line. That would be typical of a sub-machine gun. She’d had contact with them before. And this man, shot three times and treated for them, had then proceeded to sail to Morocco to finish what he had started. Fresh wounds or no. It appeared to Aletta that no matter how harshly he might treat others, he would always treat himself worse and drive himself harder than any others. She’d come across others like him before. By the time they’d got to about his age most of them had a name. Corpses is what she called them.

Pons’ spoke again. “I need a partner, Aletta. I am in no state to do any real work, though I have a certain amount of information that you will find useful. I cannot presume to tell you what to do. A mind that thought up the ploy to remove the Hacken Diamonds from their guard-dogs does not need me to attempt to dictate to it. Earlier though, I feared that you would think I was merely trying to exploit you. I would not have you think that I believe a maid is the best you could manage. But I feared to seem to dictate to you.”

He stopped again. His colour was worse. He was breathing rapidly and more shallowly. “I am beginning to repeat myself. Therefore, I will cease my maunderings before I bore you to death.” But he opened his eyes again and went on. “At the back of my belt is the other information you will want. I stopped you with a groan before you relieved me of them too, at least until you read Jenks’ letter. However, I fear that moving me now would cause me some amount of harm. So, if you would be patient.” This time he did slump unconscious.

The time until the men returned was quiet. Aletta was well aware of the car in the distance; the powerful engine was heard long before even the headlights could be easily distinguished amongst the shadows. The car pulled to a flourishing halt, its blue almost rendering it invisible in the soft light. Ipande stepped regally from the passenger side, flashed a brilliant grin to Aletta, said “I want one!” and turned to help the doctor from the back seat. Hassan had already leapt out, emulating the Capitaine. Besarab was dimly visible in the moonlight dressed in a Legion uniform, all in white except for the various rank and other badges. The uniform was tailored, not bought from off the rack of some seedy tailor-shop catering to the Legion trade.

Hassan shot to Aletta’s side. “You must get a piece of him,” he whispered. Then he went on in a normal voice. “This is the Dr, Mistress. Dr Mahmud Sampson.” That individual straightened up with the bag that he’d retrieved from the rumble seat.

“You are Aletta, of no surname?” he demanded without preamble. He spoke the local Arabic and she had to strain to understand him.

He held out a hand and when she rather hesitantly put her own in his, shook it once, sharply. The skin of his palm was dry and felt scaly, like a lizard’s. Pons was tall and lean; Dr Sampson was as tall, but emaciated to the point of skeletalness. She had felt each of the joints of his hand and she could see the knobs that were his elbows and his knees beneath the short sleeves and pants he wore. As well as looking starved, he also seemed badly coordinated. Everything that he was flapped and dangled as he moved. At the same time, there was a peculiar grace in all that he did. He was young to be a doctor and Aletta had no real faith as to the completeness of his qualifications, but Hassan had chosen him.

He flapped ahead with the boy dancing backwards before him to show him the way. Ipande, with a slow smile tinged perhaps with a little sadness, waved for Aletta to go next. Viktor took her arm with a perfect, yet not quite Gallic courtesy. He effortlessly shortened his pace to match hers.

“Ipande tells me you have an injured man here that you found outside town. Have you been able to find out what he was doing there? How he was injured?” His questions seemed idle, no more than would be asked by a man in his situation. She looked up to his left cheek in contradiction to normal etiquette, as he had taken her firmly on his left arm, and thought for an answer.

“He is not well, Capitaine. He has told me little that makes any sense. I believe he is English and that he has fallen foul of less tolerant natives than ourselves. Thankyou for your timely assistance. Perhaps when the doctor is finished and the Englishman is comfortable, you will stay a while and help me decide what I am to do with him?” Aletta smiled at Besarab, a smile full of warm nights and darkened rooms.

In the lounge room the doctor was already kneeling beside Pons. Hassan was standing quietly nearby. There was now a stethoscope in his ears with the cold end upon Pons’ chest. He was counting by an ugly, turnip-shaped, brass-cased watch. Then he made a disgusted noise in his mouth and curled the piping up with one hand, stowing it in the worn carpet-bag without looking. There was nothing approaching clumsiness in his motions now. His head swung about on his scrawny neck and happened to spy Aletta first. “Well, what are you there for? Get some hot water. And plenty of towels!”

Hassan vanished already. The doctor’s voice did not soften. “All these bandages will have to come off for me to see what lies beneath. A professional put them on but he has been tended by a fool ever since!” Aletta was in a position to see the weak smile curve Pons’ lips. No-one else was.

Hassan returned laden down with many huge white towels and hauling the trolley with the urn. He had never wholly been able to understand Aletta’s mania for cleanliness, but he had accommodated himself to it as he did to all else that his Mistress wanted. He even bathed regularly now. All over.

“Good,” said Dr Sampson. He made it sound like a swear word. “Away, all of you. You can’t help me and you’ll only distract me. Not you, boy! Unless you’re squeamish. I need a small pair of hands. And ears that can understand my words.” Then he dropped into a local dialect so thick that none of the other three could make out a word. They drifted away.

Player’s Next Steps

1. Pons speaks fluent Arabic and knows the street plans of Casablanca quite well. She would like to know how much time he has spent here and what he did (if he will tell her). Also, what did he mean by “literary fame.”
2. She will need to contact Parker and tell him what has happened to Pons. This will have to be done very discretely in case Parker is being watched or followed.
3. What has happened to Pons? She would like to discuss this with the doctor so that she can determine if he should be moved. The best idea is probably to hide him here at the villa until the whole exercise is finished. She can’t risk Van der Kren or anyone else linking her with Pons, and Pons is very obvious in Casablanca. If he needs further care she would like to arrange for it, preferably at the villa.
4. Names and addresses of the principals associated with the two villas, the hotel, the jeweller’s shop and the two pawn shops. Names and addresses of all of these properties. Are there any others?
5. Names, addresses, current whereabouts and activities of the Chief of Police, Van der Kren’s two lawyers and all other known lieutenants. Also need contacts or names of people in high places that are known enemies or adversaries of Van der Kren/Crenques and any of his supporters. She might want to try and get onside with Van der Kren’s opponents/enemies, etc.
6. Any rumours on what Van der Kren thinks of Arabic women? What sort of cover would fit in with his opinions (let’s not make him suspicious straight away).
7. More info about Peter Houghton-Pentecost – or whatever Aletta may know from reading the papers (including the gossip rags).
8. Does she have any specific contacts in the Arab, Berber or French community that may be of assistance in the current circumstances? This is your chance to introduce so more NPCs if you like/need, as I haven’t thought about this yet – on second thought, she will probably have her hands full just with Besarab (very nice, by the way!).
9. When Pons is stable, or after the doctor has removed more of his clothing, obtain the other information at the back of Pon’s belt.