Spit and polish

Today was a day when the scrubbers and polishers were hard at work. Some examples from the many: a shaven headed mariner lovingly polishing the chrome lettering of the good ship Dilbar (named after the tycoon's mother); a poor sod told to clean the waterline of another yacht whilst lying on his back in a softly inflated rubber canoe, slowly sinking into the none too clean, jellyfish infested waters of the port. But today's best polished toy award has to go to a car...

This impeccably lustrous black mastodon, a Roller the size of a Humvee, screamed along the quay, heeling alarmingly as it dodged cars and pushed pedestrians to one side. At one point it headed straight for me, and I thought I was a goner. Luckily, the ramparts contain arcades, like the permanent way workmen's refuges in railway tunnels, and I was able to jump into one of these just in the nick of time. The car didn't slow one jot for me, though I did have the pleasure of seeing it brake at the last minute when confronted with a particularly angular sleeping policeman. Judging by the protest of the suspension, and the fact that the car didn't jump in the air, the likelihood is that it was armoured.

Further round, near the Porte Marine, the offending car stopped, miraculously surrounded by people carriers filled with exceptionally large men in shades. Their expensive suits draped over their muscled frames like Christo's attempts to clothe iconic monuments. They just parked, blocking the port completely. Clearly people with influence. Not wanting to be roughed up as a paparazzo, I only risked a photograph from round the corner. Now that I can look at it in the safety of my own home, I realise that the murderous chauffard was none other than the chauffeur of the Prince of Monaco.