Free The Driver's Seat by Muriel Spark Page B

one of the houses, wiping her mouth and
screaming, ‘Police! Call the police!’ Big Carlo overtakes her at the gate. ‘Quiet!’
he says. ‘Be quiet, and get into the car. Please. I’ll take you back, I
promise. Sorry, lady, I haven’t done any harm at all to you, have I? Only a
kiss, what’s a kiss.’
    She
runs and makes a grab for the door of the driver’s seat, and as he calls after
her, ‘The other door!’ she gets in, starts up, and backs speedily out of the
lane. She leans over and locks the other door just in time to prevent him from
opening it. ‘You’re not my type in any case,’ she screams. Then she starts off,
too quickly for him to be able to open the back door he is now grabbing at.
Still he is running to catch up, and she yells back at him, ‘If you report this
to the police I’ll tell them the truth and make a scandal in your family.’ And
then she is away, well clear of him.
    She
spins along in expert style, stopping duly at the traffic lights. She starts to
sing softly as she waits:
     
    Inky-pinky-winky-wong
    How do you like your potatoes done?
    A little gravy in the pan
    For the King of the Cannibal Islands.
     
    Her
zipper-bag is on the floor of the car. While waiting for the lights to change
she lifts it on to the seat, unzips it and looks with a kind of satisfaction at
the wrapped-up objects of different shape, as it might be they represent a good
day’s work. She comes to a crossroad where some traffic accumulates. Here, a
policeman is on duty and as she passes at his bidding she pulls up and asks him
the way to the Hilton.
    He is a
young policeman. He bends to give her the required direction.
    ‘Do you
carry a revolver?’ Lise says. He looks puzzled and fails to answer before Lise
adds, ‘Because, if you did, you could shoot me.
    The
policeman is still finding words when she drives off, and in the mirror she can
see him looking at the retreating car, probably noting the number. Which in
fact he is doing, so that, on the afternoon of the following day, when he has
been shown her body, he says, ‘Yes, that’s her. I recognize the face. She said,
“If you had a revolver you could shoot me.”’ Which is to lead to many
complications in Carlo’s private life when the car is traced back to him, he
being released by the police only after six hours of interrogation. A
photograph of Carlo and also a picture of his young apprentice who holds a
lively press conference of his own, moreover will appear in every newspaper in
the country.
    But
now, at the Hilton Hotel her car is held up just as it enters the gates in the
driveway. There is a line of cars ahead, and beyond them a group of policemen.
Two police cars are visible in the parking area on the other side of the
entrance. The rest of the driveway is occupied by a line of four very large
limousines each with a uniformed driver standing by.
    The
police collect on either side of the hotel doorway, their faces picked out by
the bright lights, while there emerge down the steps from the hotel two women
who seem to be identical twins, wearing black dresses and high-styled black
hair, followed by an important-looking Arabian figure, sheikh-like in his head-dress
and robes, with a lined face and glittering eyes, who descends the steps with a
floating motion as if his feet are clearing the ground by an inch or two; he is
flanked by two smaller bespectacled, brown-faced men in businesslike suits.
The two black-dressed women stand back with a respectful housekeeperly bearing
while the robed figure approaches the first limousine; and the two men draw
back too, as he enters the recesses of the car. Two black-robed women with the
lower parts of their faces veiled and their heads shrouded in drapery then make
their descent, and behind them another pair appear, menservants with arms
raised, bearing aloft numerous plastic-enveloped garments on coat-hangers.
Still in pairs, further components of the retinue appear, each two moving in
such unison that