Patricia Highsmith - Ripleys Game

T HERES no such thing as a perfect murder, Tom said to Reeves. Thats just a parlour game, trying to dream one up. Of course you could say there are a lot of unsolved murders. Thats different. Tom was bored. He walked up and down in front of his big fireplace, where a small but cosy fire crackled. Tom felt he had spoken in a stuffy, pontificating way. But the point was, he couldnt help Reeves, and hed already told him that.

Yes, sure, said Reeves. He was sitting in one of the yellow silk armchairs, his lean figure hunched forward, hands clasped between his knees. He had a bony face, short, light-brown hair, cold grey eyes not a pleasant face but a face that might have been rather handsome if not for a scar that travelled five inches from his right temple across his cheek almost to his mouth. Slightly pinker than the rest of his face, the scar looked like a bad job of stitching, or as if perhaps it had never been stitched. Tom had never asked about the scar, but Reeves had volunteered once, A girl did it with her compact. Can you imagine? (No, Tom couldnt.) Reeves had given Tom a quick, sad smile, one of the few smiles Tom could recall from Reeves. And on another occasion, I was thrown from a horse dragged by the stirrup for a few yards. Reeves had said that to someone else, but Tom had been present. Tom suspected a dull knife in a very nasty fight somewhere.

Now Reeves wanted Tom to provide someone, suggest someone to do one or perhaps two simple murders and perhaps one theft, also safe and simple. Reeves had come from Hamburg to Villeperce to talk to Tom, and he was going to stay the night and go to Paris tomorrow to talk to someone else about it, then return to his home in Hamburg, presumably to do some more thinking if he failed. Reeves was primarily a fence, but lately was dabbling in the illegal gambling world of Hamburg, which he was now undertaking to protect. Protect from what? Italian sharks who wanted to come in. One Italian in Hamburg was a Mafia button man, sent out as a feeler, Reeves thought, and the other might be, from a different family. By eliminating one or both of these intruders, Reeves hoped to discourage further Mafia attempts, and also to draw the attention of the Hamburg police to a Mafia threat, and let the police handle the rest, which was to say, throw the Mafia out. These Hamburg boys are a decent batch, Reeves had declared fervently. Maybe what theyre doing is illegal, running a couple of private casinos, but as clubs theyre not illegal, and theyre not taking outrageous profits. Its not like Las Vegas, all Mafia-corrupted, and right under the noses of the American cops!

Tom took the poker and pushed the fire together, put another neatly cut third-of-a-log on. It was nearly 6 p.m. Soon be time for a drink. And why not now? Would you

Mme Annette, the Ripleys housekeeper, came in from the kitchen hall just then. Excuse me, messieurs. Would you like your drinks now, M. Tome, since the gentleman has not wanted any tea?

Yes, thank you, Mme Annette. Just what I was thinking. And ask Mme Heloise to join us, would you? Tom wanted Heloise to lighten the atmosphere a little. He had said to Heloise, before he went to Orly at 3 p.m. to fetch Reeves, that Reeves wanted to talk to him about something, so Heloise had pottered about in the garden or stayed upstairs all afternoon.

You wouldnt, Reeves said with a last-minute urgency and hope, consider taking it on yourself? Youre not connected, you see, and thats what we want. Safety. And after all, the money, ninety-six thousand bucks, isnt bad.

Tom shook his head. Im connected with you in a way. Dammit, hed done little jobs for Reeves Minot, like posting on small, stolen items, or recovering from toothpaste tubes, where Reeves had planted them, tiny objects like microfilm rolls from the unsuspecting toothpaste carriers. How much of this cloak and dagger stuff do you think I can get away with? Ive got my reputation to protect, you know. Tom felt like smiling at that, but at the same time his heart had quickened with genuine feeling, and he stood taller, conscious of the fine house in which he lived, of his secure existence now, six whole months after the Derwatt episode, a near-catastrophe from which he had escaped with no worse than a bit of suspicion upon him. Thin ice, yes, but the ice hadnt broken through. Tom had accompanied the English Inspector Webster and a couple of forensic men to the Salzburg woods where he had cremated the body of the man presumed to be the painter Derwatt. Why had he crushed the skull, the police had asked. Tom could still wince when he thought of it, because he had done it to try to scatter and hide the upper teeth. The lower jaw had easily come away, and Tom had buried it at a distance. But the upper teeth Some of them had been gathered by one of the forensic men, but there had been no record of Derwatts teeth with any dentist in London, Derwatt having been living (it was believed) in Mexico for the preceding six years. It seemed part of the cremation, part of the idea of reducing him to ashes, Tom had replied. The cremated body had been Bernards. Yes, Tom could still shudder, as much at the danger of that moment as at the horror of his act, dropping a big stone on the charred skull. But at least he hadnt killed Bernard. Bernard Tufts had been a suicide.

Tom said, Surely among all the people you know, you can find somebody who can do it.

Yes, and that would be a connection more than you. Oh, the people I know are sort of known, Reeves said with a sad defeat in his voice. You know a lot of respectable people, Tom, people really in the clear, people above reproach.

Tom laughed. Howre you going to get such people? Sometimes I think youre out of your mind, Reeves.

No! You know what I mean. Someone whod do it for the money, just the money. They dont have to be experts. Wed prepare the way. Itd be like public assassinations. Someone who if he was questioned would look absolutely incapable of doing such a thing.

Mme Annette came in with the bar cart. The silver ice bucket shone. The cart squeaked slightly. Tom had been meaning to oil it for weeks. Tom might have gone on bantering with Reeves because Mme Annette, bless her soul, didnt understand English, but Tom was tired of the subject, and delighted by Mme Annettes interruption. Mme Annette was in her sixties, from a Normandy family, fine of feature and sturdy of body, a gem of a servant. Tom could not imagine Belle Ombre functioning without her.

Then Heloise came in from the garden, and Reeves got to his feet. Heloise was wearing bell-bottom pink-and-red-striped dungarees with LEVI printed vertically down all the stripes. Her blonde hair swung long and loose. Tom saw the firelight glow in it and thought, What purity compared to what weve been talking about! The light in her hair was gold, however, which made Tom think of money. Well, he didnt really need any more money, even if the Derwatt picture sales, of which he got a percentage, would soon come to an end because there would be no more pictures. Tom still got a percentage from the Derwatt art supplies company, and that would continue. Then there was the modest but slowly increasing income from the Greenleaf securities which he had inherited by means of a will forged by Tom himself. Not to mention Heloises generous allowance from her father. No use being greedy. Tom detested murder unless it was absolutely necessary.

Did you have a good talk? Heloise asked in English, and fell back gracefully on to the yellow sofa.

Yes, thank you. said Reeves.

The rest of the conversation was in French, because Heloise was not comfortable in English. Reeves did not know much French but he got along, and they were not talking about anything important: the garden, the mild winter that seemed really to have passed, because here it was early March and the daffodils were opening. Tom poured champagne for Heloise from one of the little bottles on the cart.