A Tangled Web (26 page)

“And the fun?”

“I've never been sure what that is. I don't ask myself if I'm having fun. I take great pleasure in what I do; is that good enough?”

“What do you do?”

“I live with you and introduce you to Provence; I spend time with Robert and business associates in Marseilles—”

“I meant, what do you do for a living?”

“I told you. I export farm and construction equipment to developing countries.”

“Did you tell me that before I lost my memory?”

“I don't remember. It's possible, but as I told you, we talked mostly about the future.”

“Well, I think you do more than export equipment.”

“Do you indeed. And why do you think that?”

“Because you take great pleasure in what you do. And you're not a dull man; you like challenges. So I think you
do something more interesting than exporting machinery, and I'd like to know what it is.”

The waiter brought their coffee and Max waited until he left. “Do you know, Sabrina, that is the first compliment you have paid me since you were injured.”

She looked startled. “Is it? I'm sorry; you've been very good to me.”

“There is a difference between compliments and gratitude.”

“You mean you want me to admire the person you are. I do, from what I know. Robert says you're a man of your word. I admire that. But how do I know whether there is more to admire, or less?”

Max was growing bored. He loved her, he was obsessed with her, but not even she would know any more about him than he was willing to share. He had never been open with anyone; he had no intention of starting now. But what would she say, he wondered idly, if he told her what he did?
My dear Sabrina, I own a small printing job shop in Marseilles where we print party invitations and letterhead stationery and thousands of other innocuous jobs, but our main job is to print money. We ship the equivalent of hundreds of millions of francs' worth of counterfeit money to customers all over the world, packed neatly and efficiently inside farm and construction equipment . . .
He had no idea how she would react.

But it was only an idle thought. He would not tell her; he would not tell anyone, because he trusted no one but the few men who worked with him. And it would have no effect on their life together; they would be happy and she would love him, knowing exactly as much as she knew and no more. It was as much as she needed to know.

But for now he was not interested in playing games; he would not waste time dancing around her questions. “I'll try to make sure you find more to admire, the longer we're together. Now tell me about your work; what did you do this morning?”

“Oh, stop it!” Stephanie cried. “I'm not a child; I
won't be treated like one. You build a wall of secrets around yourself; do you expect me to admire that? I hate secrets—my whole past is a secret—and, I refuse to live with them now.”

She pulled on her raincoat and rushed out of the cafe. The rain had stopped, and she made her way between the few soggy tourists sitting doggedly at the rows of tables and chairs lined up as if in a theater. On the broad sidewalk that ran the length of the street she turned toward the main square, walking rapidly, pulling on her rain hat as protection against the drops falling from the trees. When she reached the main square with its enormous fountain, gray-green with wet moss, she sat on the broad stone edge, looking away from the direction Max would come when he followed her.

Her back was rigid, her hands clenched, and it was a moment before she realized that what she felt was not aloneness or anxiety, as so often before, but a cold, hard anger. She sat in the windswept square, the gray plumes of water behind her splashing invisibly into the gray sky, wet stones gleaming faintly beneath dripping trees, and let her anger grow, knowing that it was important to her: that anger at being treated like a child was the beginning of standing alone in this new life she was making. She remembered that she had felt like a child the day she met Robert, as she sat between him and Max at lunch; she remembered feeling like a child when she first began to cook in the kitchen, when she first sat behind the wheel of the car, when she first moved into Max's arms and grew panic-stricken at the thought of making love to him.

But I'm growing up, she thought; I'm learning my way around. And Max and everyone else will have to treat me like an adult, like one of them.

In front of her, three women led a long line of schoolchildren across the square. The children, wearing yellow slickers, were strung together like beads, holding on to a bright red rope that trailed on the wet stones behind the last child. Their high-pitched voices rang excitedly
through the square above the sound of the splashing fountain. Stephanie watched them, and suddenly she was swept by a wave of longing so powerful she stood up and started toward them, following them partway across the square before she realized what she was doing and came to a stop.
What a crazy thing to do; why am I doing this?
She watched them file into a narrow street and disappear around a bend. I wonder how old they are. Eight? Nine?
Such a lovely age, so open and full of love.

A child ran past her, one child alone, wearing a yellow slicker, tears streaming down her face. Without thinking, Stephanie reached out and stopped her, and knelt down to hold her close. “It's all right, I'll help you, don't cry. Tell me what happened. Did you lose your friends?”

The child nodded, gulping through her tears. “I saw a puppy and I stopped to pet it . . . I wasn't supposed to . . . they said hold on to the rope . . . and now I don't know where they are!”

“I saw them go past. We'll find them.” Stephanie smoothed the child's hair from her wet face and kissed her forehead and her cheeks. Through the bulky slicker she felt the trembling of the small, wiry body and she tightened her arms and felt that the child had become part of her. She could not hold her close enough; she never wanted to let her go.

“But where are they?” the child cried. “They will be so angry . . . and my mama and papa will punish me if they find out . . .”

Reluctantly Stephanie stood up and took her hand. “What is your name?”

“Lisa Vernet.”

“Well, Lisa, let's find your class and perhaps no one will tell your mama and papa that this happened.”

Lisa looked up, her eyes wide. “Is that possible?”

“I don't know. But we'll try.” They set off, walking rapidly toward the street where the class had gone. The buildings here were of old mottled stucco with shutters streaked and faded from rain and sun, the heavy wooden
doors deeply grained and scarred with age. The street was barely wide enough for a small car and there was no sidewalk. Stephanie and Lisa walked down the center on wet cobblestones until they came to a tiny square with three streets leading from it. Lisa looked up, waiting for Stephanie to show her which way to go. Stephanie had no idea. “This way,” she said firmly, and took the street to the left, in every way identical to the one they had just been on.

“—and we always go somewhere on Thursday,” Lisa chattered as they walked. “Madame Frontenac, she's our teacher, you'll like her, she's very pretty, like you, and she has a daughter of her own, so she is very kind to the girls, very understanding, you know, and then she
was
one, too, when she was growing up and she remembers what it was like, but with the boys she is much more firm, but then that is proper, they need it, they are very rough—some of them are bullies—and they need to be told—”

Stephanie was walking as fast as she could with Lisa clutching her hand. There was no sign of the class. How far ahead could they be? It had only been a few minutes . . . Her heart was pounding; she could have guessed wrong, she could have gotten them both lost. Lisa would stop her cheerful chattering and become frightened again, and it would be Stephanie's fault for pretending she was grown up and could take care of a child.

The street bent to the right and they followed it and then, above Lisa's chattering, Stephanie thought she heard the babble of young voices.

“Hush, Penny, just a minute,” she said. “I want to listen.”

“What?” Lisa asked.

“Wait,” Stephanie said, and they stood still and heard the sound of voices and laughter.

“Oh, we found them!” Lisa cried and ran on ahead, around another corner. Stephanie followed and found the class clustered around Lisa, everyone talking at once.

One of the teachers stepped forward. “Are you the good person who found our naughty girl?”

“Oh, but she isn't naughty at all,” Stephanie said. She held out her hand. “Sabrina Lacoste.”

“Marie Frontenac,” the teacher said.

Stephanie smiled. “And you have a daughter, so you are very understanding with the young girls and very firm with the boys, especially the bullies.”

“Ah, Lisa is a chatterbox. But how interesting that she thinks that I am gentler with the girls because of my daughter. Do they all, I wonder? Probably, if Lisa talks of it. And perhaps I am. Well, but now we must do something.” She looked at Lisa, surrounded by her friends, all of them talking at a high pitch of excitement. “We cannot let our young people wander off; she must be punished.”

“She was terrified,” Stephanie said. “She felt alone and lost, and the square seemed strange to her, like a world she didn't know. Isn't that punishment enough?”

“Perhaps, but I cannot let the incident vanish. I must say something to the others.”

“Ask Lisa to tell them how frightened she was. She'll probably exaggerate—they all do, at that age—and it will become a better lesson than anything you could say.”

Their eyes met and they laughed. “Ah, Madame Lacoste, how well you know children,” said Marie Frontenac. “Are you a teacher?”

“No.”

“But of course you have children of your own.”

“No. And I didn't think I knew . . .” Her voice trailed away. “I work in an antique shop in Cavaillon,” she said abruptly. “Jacqueline en Provence.”

“Ah, I know that shop, it is exquisite. Oh, madame, perhaps you will consent to speak to our class sometime on what that means—antiques. Children cannot comprehend the past, and perhaps you can help them understand how it still lives and comes to us in furniture and buildings and art and other antiquities.”

“I'm not an expert,” Stephanie said. “I'm just beginning.”

“But you know more than we do. Would you consider it?”

Stephanie thought about it. She wanted to see Lisa again; she wanted to be with children.
Maybe I was a teacher. Or I did have children after all. No, Max said I didn't. How strange this is.
“Maybe I will,” she said. “I'll call you when I decide.”

“My address and telephone . . .” Marie Frontenac wrote on a pad of paper and tore the top sheet off. “I look forward to it. Now I must leave. I thank you from my heart, Madame Lacoste—”

“Please. Call me Sabrina.”

“Ah, Sabrina. I thank you from my heart for returning Lisa to us. Lisa, come here; you of course wish to say goodbye to this good lady who rescued you.”

Stephanie bent down and Lisa kissed her on one cheek, then the other, then back to the first. “Thank you, madame. But could I ask you a question?”

“Of course.” Stephanie's arms were around her and she was thinking of nothing but the good feeling of that slender body against hers.

“Why did you call me Penny?”

Stephanie pulled back. “I didn't know I did. I called you Penny?”

“When you told me to hush. You said, ‘Hush, Penny.' I think you were trying very hard to hear if my class was nearby. And it was.”

“Yes. I don't know, Lisa. Perhaps you reminded me of someone named Penny. But I do know your name and I'm coming back to see you one day.”

“Oh, how lovely.” She looked at Stephanie searchingly. “And no one is going to tell . . .”

“It doesn't seem at all necessary to tell Lisa's parents, does it?” Stephanie asked Marie Frontenac. “If Lisa talks to the class as we discussed . . .”

“Well, no, I think this time it will not be necessary. Of
course if Lisa makes a habit of running off whenever she feels like—”

“I didn't run off!” Lisa cried. “I stopped to pet a puppy, but then I got lost and it was terrible!”

“Yes, that is what we are counting on.” Marie Frontenac held out her hand. “Thank you again, Sabrina. I hope, when you return, we will have time to get acquainted.”

“I'd like that very much.” Stephanie bent down and kissed Lisa's forehead. “I'll see you soon.” She turned and went back the way she had come, trying to remember the twists they had taken. Here and there, like guideposts, she saw a broken shutter, a strange pink door, a toppled flowerpot, and she followed them, thinking, I remember, I remember; I remember everything now.

But in a few minutes the silence of the narrow streets closed in upon her. No one was about; she turned and turned, but behind her and ahead of her the street was deserted. There were no clues in this part of the walk, nothing that looked familiar; she could have been ten miles from the square or a few feet from it. Fear built inside her.
She felt alone and lost, and the square seemed strange to her like a world she didn't know. Isn't that punishment enough?

But I'm not being punished, she thought. I haven't done anything wrong. Or have I? What did I do, in those years I can't remember, that led me here?

She began to run, turning a corner, then turning another and another, looking for anything familiar, but by now all the buildings looked identical, and there were no guide-posts, and she wondered if perhaps she only thought she was running but in fact she was standing still. The thought made her dizzy and she leaned against a building.
I don't know where I am or where I'm going.