Chapter 1: A Small Matter

IT WAS A SMALL MATTER, his secretary told me when she telephoned. A trifle, really. The son of an old friend of Marcel Dubois, known to almost everyone as Monsieur M, was traveling to the U.S. tomorrow morning early, and only an hour or two ago saw that his visa had expired. Monsieur M wonders if I would be able to assist.

I looked back at my dining room table, at the half-consumed roast chicken done the way only Mme Bertha could do it. She’d learned as a child back in her village and hadn’t lost her touch. I was lucky to have her. To have her and her niece, Sof°a, now a first-year veterinary medicine student at the national university who came over to help with the housework and laundry after classes every day during the week and have dinner in the kitchen with her aunt before walking home. She stayed over some weekends as well. The eldest of six children, I knew she ate at my house to give her mother, divorced and a secretary in one of the city’s largest insurance firms, one less mouth to feed. Sof°a had a full scholarship but I’d already decided I’d make up whatever gap there was between her scholarship and her expenses.

“Of course,” I answered. “It would be my pleasure.” The secretary could not see my gritted teeth as I spoke nor the grimace that followed, but I wondered if some of that hadn’t transmitted itself anyway.

“Young Roland can be at the embassy in a half-hour. Will that suit?”

“Perfectly. I’ll leave word at Reception to escort him in. And would Monsieur M. like me to suck young Roland’s dick, as well?” Lucky I didn’t say that last part aloud.

It was a small thing, a trifle. Of course. To Monsieur M. it was indeed a trifle, something he didn’t think twice about requesting and something he would never expect to be refused. That he’d interrupted the first quiet dinner I’d managed to enjoy this week was of no importance to him.

There wasn’t anything wrong with the request in itself. Everyone from this country needed a visa, and while it was a mixed population, meaning many who intended a trip to “Disneylandia” planned it to be a one-way journey, anyone who could claim a place amongst the commercial and professional and business classes generally were good risks. The elite, those at the top through luck, inheritance, graft or even genuine talent, expected treatment that reflected their position in society and their own exalted view of their worth.

From the point of view of someone who was well and favorably known to the current government, a close ally of the current prime minister, Monsieur M had some basis for expecting special treatment when he asked for it.

Young Roland, or “Dickhead” as I was already calling him in my mind, had received a visa a few years earlier, which meant he was even less likely to be a problem. The problem, but only if I let it be one and my own personal jury was still out on that question, was the off-handed way Monsieur M. and his ilk expected to be treated.

There’s that thing about heat and kitchen and leaving if you can’t stand it, so I really don’t have anyone but myself to blame or credit for my position. This was my third diplomatic posting and I was on my way up. That sounds pretty swell-headed, I know, but I was getting the right signals from the right people. “Mature for his age,” “Manages with a light but deft hand,” “Fluent in the language, with an easy familiarity with local customs and traditions and courtesies,” and so on peppered my evaluation reports.

The small French-speaking community Monsieur M and Mme Bertha others came from had established itself during an unsettled time early in the last century when the country changed European colonial rulers. Fully integrated now and fluent in both languages, members of the community were almost indistinguishable from the majority Spanish-speaking population. That said, their cultural and linguistic identity persisted even as their importance in and integration with the economic and political life of the host country continued to grow. In Canada, Quebec was an insular backwater in comparison to this community. Nevertheless, they persisted in using French titles.

“Roland, pleased to meet you.” I stuck out my hand. After a pause on his part that said {it I’m important and you’re not}he extended his. Not twenty years old, maybe not even out of high school, medium height, fair hair in a country where most of the population ran darker, a sort of pout to his lips that made me want to re-arrange them for him. Not a very diplomatic thing to think or do, of course, but I wasn’t feeling very diplomatic right then. I brought him into my office and got him seated and moved behind my desk.

I sat down and smiled. I knew I was being a jerk but I didn’t care. I was still pissed about the roast chicken I’d left behind. We sat there in silence for a minute before he shuffled his messenger bag, soft leather, I noticed, and pulled out his passport. Wonder of wonders, he’d already filled out the application and had the needed photo.

Doing what I was going to do, issue a visa out of office hours and without calling in one of our staff and cranking up various specialized pieces of equipment, would be impossible today, never mind the details. Back then, in those pre-9/11 days, it was simpler. A fast name check which we finally could do from a desktop terminal instead of a teletype machine, and a quick run through an old Burroughs Standard Register Protectograph modified with visa plates, kept always in sight of one of our officers or under lock and key when not in use, and you’re done.

None of this was in the least bit unusual or inappropriate or suspicious. At least not in the case of young Jackass, I mean, young Roland. If he’d planned ahead he’d never have had to come anywhere near the embassy. He could have sent his passport over through a travel agency or even through the mail.

With only the most cursory of nods young Roland took himself and his sorry ass out of my sight. I was pretty sure he wasn’t going to get lost on the way to the front entrance, but if he did the Marine guards would find him and help him to the exit fast. That’s what our million-dollar security camera system was for.