Scoop-Evelyn-Waugh [28]
� not popular." Then turning again to Mrs. Jackson with his most elaborate manner he said: "Mrs. Jackson, you misunderstand me. This is a matter of public importance. What do the women of Ishmaelia think of the proposal to introduce a force of international police?" Mrs. Jackson took the question badly. "I will not stand for being called a woman in my own house," she said. "And I've never had the police here but once and that was when I called them myself for to take out a customer that went lunatic and hanged himself." And she swept wrathfully away to her office and her rocking-chair. "Staunchly anti-interventionist," said Corker. "Doyenne of Jacksonburg hostesses pans police project as unwarrantable interference with sanctity of Ishmaelite home...but it's not the way I'm used to being treated." They went to the front door to call a taxi. Half a dozen were waiting in the courtyard; their drivers, completely enveloped in sodden blankets, dozed on the front seats. The hotel guard prodded one of them with the muzzle of his gun. The bundle stirred; a black face appeared, then a brilliant smile. The car lurched forward through the mud. "The morning round," said Corker. "Where to first?" "Why not the station to ask about the luggage?" "Why not? Station," he roared at the chauffeur. "Understand �station? Puff-puff." "All right," said the chauffeur, and drove off at breakneck speed through the rain. "I don't believe this is the way," said William. They were bowling up the main street of Jacksonburg. A strip of tarmac ran down the middle; on either side were rough tracks for mules, men, cattle and camels; beyond these the irregular outline of the commercial quarter; a bank, in shoddy concrete, a Greek provisions store in timber and tin, the Cafe de La Bourse, the Carnegie Library, the Cin�arlant, and numerous gutted sites, relics of an epidemic of arson some years back when an Insurance Company had imprudently set up shop in the city. "I'm damn well sure it's not," said Corker. "Hi, you, Station, you black booby." The coon turned round in his seat and smiled. "All right," he said. The car swerved off the motor road and bounced perilously among the caravans. The chauffeur turned back, shouted opprobriously at a camel driver and regained the tarmac. Armenian liquor, Goanese tailoring, French stationery, Italian hardware, Swiss plumbing, Indian haberdashery, the statue of the first President Jackson, the statue of the second President Jackson, the American Welfare Centre, the latest and most successful innovation in Ishmaelite life � Popotakis's Ping-Pong Parlour � sped past in the rain. The mule trains plodded by, laden with rock salt and cartridges and paraffin for the villages of the interior. "Kidnapped," said Corker cheerfully. "That's what's happened to us. What a story." But at last they came to a stop. "This isn't the station, you baboon." "Yes, all right." They were at the Swedish Consulate, Surgery, Bible and Tea Shop. Erik Olafsen came out to greet them. "Good morning. Please to come in." "We told this ape to drive us to the station." "Yes, it is a custom here. When they have a white man they do not understand, they always drive him to me. Then I can explain. But please to come in. We are just to start our Sunday hymn singing." "Sorry, old boy. Have to wait till next Sunday. We've got work to do." "They say Schombol has some news." "Not really?" "No, not really. I asked him...but you can do no work here on Sunday. Everything is close." So they found. They visited a dozen barred doors and returned disconsolately to luncheon. One native whom they questioned fled precipitately at the word "police." That was all they could learn about local reactions. "We've got to give it up for the day," said Corker. "Reactions are easy anyway. I'll just say that the Government will co-operate with the democracies of the world in any measures calculated to promote peace and justice, but are confident in their ability to maintain order without foreign intervention. This is going to be a day of rest for Corker." Shumble kept his story under his hat and furtively filed a long message