Moroccan Traffic: Send a Fax to the Kasbah Read online

  Copyright & Information

  Moroccan Traffic

  First published in 1991

  © Estate of Dorothy Dunnett; House of Stratus 1991-2012

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

  The right of Dorothy Dunnett to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted.

  This edition published in 2012 by House of Stratus, an imprint of

  Stratus Books Ltd., Lisandra House, Fore Street, Looe,

  Cornwall, PL13 1AD, UK.

  Typeset by House of Stratus.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library and the Library of Congress.

  ISBN: 075513155X EAN 9780755131556

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  This is a fictional work and all characters are drawn from the author’s imagination.

  Any resemblance or similarities to persons either living or dead are entirely coincidental.

  The Dorothy Dunnett Society can be contacted via http://dorothydunnett.org

  www.houseofstratus.com

  About the Author

  Dorothy, Lady Dunnett, was born in Dunfermline, Scotland in 1923, the only daughter of an engineer, Alexander Halliday, and his wife Dorothy. Whilst gifted academically and musically, she was not encouraged to further her talents by attending university, and instead joined the civil service in Scotland as an assistant press officer. In 1946, she married Alastair Dunnett, who was at the time the chief press officer to the Secretary of State for Scotland. He went on to become editor of The Scotsman newspaper, whilst she later worked on a statistics handbook for the Board of Trade.

  After a brief spell in Glasgow, the couple settled in Edinburgh where their home became a centre for hospitality and entertaining, mostly in support of Scottish art and culture. Dunnett had also taken evening classes at the Edinburgh College of Art and the Glasgow School of Art, and from 1950 onwards she established a prominent career as a portrait painter, being exhibited at both the Royal Scottish Academy and the Royal Academy. She was also an accomplished sculptress.

  Her interest in writing developed during the 1950’s. Her own tastes took her to historical novels and it was her husband who eventually suggested she write one of her own, after she had complained of running out of reading material. The result was The Game of Kings, an account of political and military turmoil in sixteenth-century Scotland. Whilst turned down for publication in the UK, it was eventually published in the USA where it became an instant best seller. Other titles, such as the Lymond Chronicles and House of Niccolo series followed and which established her international reputation.

  She also successfully turned her hand to crime, with the Johnson Johnson series. He is an eccentric artist, famous for bifocals, and of course amateur detective. All of the titles in the series somehow also feature the yacht ‘Dolly’, despite ranging widely in location from Scotland, to Ibiza, Rome, Marrakesh, Canada, Yugoslavia, Madeira and The Bahamas. There is plenty of sailing lore for the enthusiast, but not so much it detracts from the stories genre; crime. Each of them is told by a woman whose profession explains her role in the mystery and we learn very little about Johnson himself, save for the fact he is somewhat dishevelled in appearance.

  Dorothy Dunnett somehow fitted in her many careers and voluntary work, along with supporting her husband’s endeavours, yet still found the time to correspond widely with her readers from all over the world, and was often delighted to meet with them personally. She held the rare distinction of having a Dorothy Dunnett Readers’ Association formed during her lifetime and collaborated with it as much as possible. A writer who has been described as one of great wit, charm, and humanity, yet whose work displayed toughness, precision, and humour, she was appointed to an OBE in 1992 for services to literature and became Lady Dunnett in 1995 when her husband was knighted. She died in 2001, being survived by her two sons; Ninian and Mungo.

  Note by the Author – Jophnson Johnson

  This is the seventh novel about the international adventures of Johnson Johnson (his first name is the same as his second), the portrait painter, yachtsman and unpaid official investigator.

  Son of an English career diplomat, Johnson joined the Royal Navy after university and art college. From Naval Intelligence he was recruited to the department he now serves, whose head is a friend of his family. His flat in London is also his studio.

  His present way of life dates back to the death of Judith, his wife, in a mysterious crash from which he himself escaped with serious injuries. (The events immediately after the accident are told in the novel Tropical Issue, previously entitled Dolly and the Bird of Paradise.) Since then, as a trouble shooter and government watchdog, he has drifted about the world on his yacht Dolly, painting the portraits of the famous, and welcome everywhere as an amiable if dishevelled guest. Despite his self-imposed detachment, he has a ruthless knack of altering the lives of the young women who narrate each adventure, very few of whom understand him at all. What other purpose he may have is at present unclear. The order of publication of the Johnson novels is not the strict chronological order of the stories so far, which begins with Tropical Issue. The four adventures that follow, which can be read in any order, are Rum Affair, Ibiza Surprise, Operation Nassau and Roman Nights. The events in Split Code (previously called Dolly and the Nanny Bird), which is next, take place a few months before the action of Moroccan Traffic, the present novel.

  Chapter 1

  ‘Bifocal spectacles!’ shouted my mother, coughing heavily over her daisywheel printer. ‘Now my daughter wastes her time on some self-employed painter with no index-linked company pension?’

  The dog in the next house began barking.

  I took off and hung up my coat. This is my welcome, arriving bombed out from my office. I yelled, ‘He paid for my lunch. He fed me better than you do.’ I have strong, healthy lungs. I don’t know where I could have got them from.

  She is a devil, my mother. She went on shrieking from inside the sitting-room. ‘And so this painter goes blind? What happens to you and the children?’ The printer volleyed out some professor’s closely spaced argument (she types for a living) while I shut the door and looked about for my supper.

  I have no children; and after the events of that day, I shouldn’t have counted on Johnson to father them. Whoever fathered my children would receive my mother as mother-in-law within a few skid-marked weeks of the pregnancy test. My widowed parent, with her business training cassettes and her annotated ba
ck numbers of the Woman Executive Quarterly. My mother, who has taken, for the sake of my career, seminars on everything from The Team Management Wheel to (providentially) a teach-in on Plans for Disaster. My mother is fat and fifty and nosy. I hate her.

  I knew of Johnson Johnson, of course, before he came to the office that morning. I’d drafted the letter that commissioned him to paint the Chairman in oils. I’d drawn up the company cheque with four zeros on it. After that, I’d gone on vacation (Treasures of France: singles and retired people welcome), and forgotten all about Mr. J. Johnson. Until I returned, fit and fresh to serve my company.

  It is a well-paid position, that of Executive Secretary to the Chairman of Kingsley Conglomerates. Their central office in London is a four-storey building in tasteful caramel glass. On the third floor are the Chairman’s suite and the Boardroom, fitted with leather, mahogany and romantic photographs of electrical domestic machinery. Beyond that is an outer office occupied by me, by Sir Robert’s Personal Assistant and by Trish, our personal typist. When I am not there, Trish looks after the Chairman.

  I enjoy healthy holidays away from my absorbing and interesting work. If I were to dislike holidays (which I don’t), it would be because of what I might be missing. When I got back to the office that morning, I saw at once that the Special Board Minutes had gone, and the Acquisition Subcommittee Minutes were absent, and so were a few other files my mother suggested I look at. Even the Boardroom was locked. Then I noticed that the morning mail had also vanished, which meant that Sir Robert’s PA had got into town even faster than I had.

  If he knew I was after his job, Val Dresden didn’t show it that morning. Emerging from Sir Robert’s room with the post, he came across in his usual manner. ‘Who do I see? Wendy back in the Wendy house! Divinely tanned, and a new lacy ruffle. Were the beach boys too luscious?’ He bent at the hips and gave me a deep, humming kiss on the cheek. He had changed his colour rinse and his aftershave. Trish, who had only just sauntered in, sat down and began to fix her hair, surveying us both through her mirror. She was wearing a designer top and real pearls. RWT, Dresden calls her when chatting her up. It stands for Rich White Trish, and she likes it.

  I said, ‘The beach boys are always lovely in Paris. So what’s been happening? Sir Robert is early?’

  Val flipped some mail on my desk, covered with ticks and scribbled instructions. ‘Slept in the office last night. Don’t go rushing in, sweetie: he’s shaving. Wants to be fresh and pretty, does Bobs.’ Sir Robert thinks the world of Val Dresden.

  The diary smelt of chocolate and described Sir Robert’s engagements in Trish’s large childish writing. I flipped through the two weeks I’d sacrificed.

  There was no direct mention of the company I was looking for. Our favourite stockbroker had been in and out, and a man from our corporate lawyers; and our biggest institutional shareholders had each been given a slap-up Savoy Grill Room luncheon. A Boardroom lunch had been held, and attended by the new head of our corporate money consultants. In between, the traffic among our own senior staff seemed to have been about normal.

  There were quite a lot of social engagements, some with Lady Kingsley but more often without. She was away at the moment and hadn’t gone, then, to last night’s big affair at the Oppenheims’. Sir Robert had. It was down in the diary. Which explained, of course, why the Chairman had slept in the office. He had had a night on the town without Charity.

  The diary, of course, said nothing of that. It produced, for today, a single early date to receive a J. Johnson, and then nothing till lunch with a banker. So why Val’s smirk, and fresher and prettier? Then I got it. I remembered who Johnson was.

  As I’ve said, the Board had decided to honour its Chair with a portrait. Sir Robert, who always liked quality, had chosen the artist at the top of all the lists discreetly provided. He didn’t know he was going to regret it. Johnson Johnson sent to say he couldn’t accept Sir Robert at all for six months. Courted, he conceded that he could make a start sooner, but not away from his studio. Shamefully seduced, he finally named a day upon which he could begin work on the portrait on Sir Robert’s own premises, subject to interruption without previous notice; early resumption not guaranteed.

  Chairmen are a separate breed. I would have sent him a three-line dismissal, but Sir Robert told me he would ring Mr. Johnson himself. And he must have used all his charm, for work had begun, Val Dresden informed me, and Sir Robert was thrilled with the likeness, and could be heard to kiss it in greeting each morning.

  ‘What’s it like?’ I asked, shutting the diary.

  ‘Nobody knows,’ Val Dresden said. ‘The Boardroom’s locked, as I’m sure you found out, and I’m told the priceless canvas is shrouded. Dear old things; Trish claims they’re using it to watch video nasties.’

  I picked up the mail and got on with my work. I was glad when Reception rang, and I was able to buzz through to Sir Robert, and tell him Mr. Johnson was here.

  The Chairman sounded pleased that I was back. ‘Wendy, my dear! How splendid! Did you have a good holiday?’ He has a nice voice. He won all his directorships and an early constituency with the help of that fizzing enthusiasm. That, and his flamboyant size, and his rebellious hair, and his ear for mimicry, and his ability, at the right time, to knock off and have fun with the boys. And the girls.

  I said, ‘A very good time, thank you, Sir Robert. If you aren’t quite ready, I could offer Mr. Johnson some tea while he’s waiting.’

  ‘Do that,’ he said. ‘Then come into the Boardroom. You and I must have a session, if the great man, of course, will allow it. The smell of oil paint doesn’t bother you?’

  It didn’t bother me. I lobbed a smile of fake triumph at Val and Trish as I told them. Beneath was a smile of real triumph. I was going to see the Chairman’s oil before they did.

  Down in Reception, there was no one but a tweedy man with black hair, a shapeless satchel, and an expensive Burberry heaped up beside him. He was printing doggedly on a doubled-up crossword. When he began to look up, there was nothing to see but two lenses, separated by a nose which had once been reset. Presently his glasses inclined, and he saw me. ‘Mr. Johnson?’ I said.

  The great man gazed at me. I realised he was used to Val, or to Trish. I said (Handling Callers with Confidence and Care), ‘I’m Wendy Helmann, Sir Robert’s Executive Secretary. Would you care to come up?’

  He rose, bringing coat, bag and newspaper to the door with more agility than I expected. He said, ‘Workout at the Veterans’ Athletic Club. You’ve been on holiday. Nice to be back?’ His accent was the same as Sir Robert’s, but with nothing hearty about it.

  If I was surprised, I took care not to show it a second time. Nice to be back? Very few people say that, outside situational interviews. ‘The first day?’ I said, smiling. I am not my mother. I knew at once he was Casual Old Money. At the lift, I added, ‘I’ll begin to enjoy it tomorrow.’

  ‘That’s right,’ he agreed. I heard, but no doubt misinterpreted, a trace of approval. The lift began to ascend. He said, ‘Who was the boudoir-eyed stud I met last time? Valentine somebody?’

  I began to realise then that he was enjoying an idle hour drinking blood. I said, ‘I don’t know, Mr. Johnson. Perhaps you met Mr. Dresden, the Chairman’s Assistant. He would paint very well.’

  ‘He thinks so,’ said Mr. Johnson. ‘And Vampirella?’

  The words floated out through the lift doors, which opened to reveal Valentine Dresden, lingering beside Trish’s desk in his voile shirt and a cloud of citrus top-notes and a further new double cloud of resentment. ‘And a very good morning to you both,’ said Mr. Johnson, in exactly the same tone of voice. ‘The Boardroom? Or am I too early?’

  He didn’t mean it. He meant he was exactly on time, but the Chairman wasn’t waiting to greet him. I said, ‘Could I offer you a seat for five minutes? Sir Robert had to work late last night, and slept in
the office. He asked me to offer you tea.’

  ‘Too kind, but I never drink before painting,’ said Mr. Johnson. ‘Why don’t I go through to the Boardroom and start?’

  ‘Don’t you need Sir Robert?’ said Trish. Trish is forward because of her upbringing; a nuisance not worth correcting, since she never stays anywhere long.

  He said, ‘Not if Miss Helmann will sit in his jacket.’

  He seemed to be serious. Trish said slyly, ‘Wouldn’t Mr. Dresden be better?’ Dresden went sallow. It was interesting. I’d thought they were sleeping together.

  Mr. Johnson Johnson inhaled. He said, ‘But is Mr. Dresden’s aura quite right? And really, the young lady’s attributes would be wasted. So what is left but the resourceful Miss Helmann?’

  We all got it. Val was scented, Trish was bosomy and I could bring him tea when he wanted it.

  My mother has trained me a body language. I received the key to the Boardroom from Dresden, and walked without haste to insert it. I opened the door at the second try. Mr. Johnson didn’t hurry me. He said, ‘Why should I bore you with advice? There’s decaffeinated coffee, or early retirement. You want to see the Chairman’s picture?’

  I followed him slowly in. It was there, covered up on an easel. At the other end of the room stood Sir Robert’s chair and his jacket. The door to his bedroom and office was shut. It was time to deal with Mr. Johnson. Comfort, Question and Listen; I knew what to do when insulted. I said, ‘Mr. Johnson, may I ask you a question?’

  He thought. He nodded. My mother, baiting me, looked just like that.

  I said, ‘Why do you paint, if you don’t like it?’