Anything Considered (18 page)

“Let me have some of that.” Anna held out her cup, took a swallow, and shuddered. “Jesus. OK, Bennett, here’s what I think.” She put down her cup and took a deep breath. “Poe’s a crook, right? A rich crook. He’s also a mean son of a bitch who screwed up my life for a couple of years. Someday I’ll tell you about it. It was bad, believe me. He’s a lousy human being.”

“And you want revenge. Well, this isn’t—”

“Part of it’s revenge, sure. I’m human. But I need money for my mother. Fifty grand doesn’t go far in America if you get sick. I want more for the case. I want a lot more, and he’s got it.”

“How much are you talking about?”

Anna held up an index finger. “A million. The case would have fetched at least that in the auction.”

“A million? Why not two? Why not five?” Bennett sank onto the couch, shaking his head. “This is ridiculous. You’re going to ask a certified crook and his army of thugs to pop round, hand over a million dollars, and let us go. Why should they?”

“Because they want the case back.”

“They can take the bloody case anytime they like.”

“They have to find it first.” Anna’s mouth set in a stubborn line. “Bennett, listen to me. A million is nothing to Poe. It’s one lousy deal with his friends in Iraq, or Africa. He’ll pay.”

Bennett looked at her determined, unsmiling face. The bloody woman was serious. It was a cockeyed scheme, and he’d be insane to get involved in it. They were already in enough trouble with Tuzzi, but at least Tuzzi didn’t know where they were. Poe would know where to come looking, and Poe would not be pleased. No, the whole idiotic idea was out of the question. If Anna wanted to go off and play dangerous games with dangerous men, she could damn well get on with it. But not with him, not in a million years.

As if reacting to a signal concluding a meeting, they both stood up. Anna came over to Bennett and took his face between her hands. Her eyes, dark, enormous, liquid in the half-light, were inches from his.

“Bennett. Help me.”

He couldn’t look away. He felt himself drowning. But
a part of him was detached, off to one side, watching with amusement as his resolve faltered, weakened, and collapsed. He realized he’d been holding his breath, his shoulders tense. “Oh, shit,” he said, and then again,
“Shit.”
And Anna’s face lit up.

AS the darkness of the sky over Saint-Martin softened to gray, and then to pink, Anna and Bennett considered their immediate problems. They needed a legitimate car. They needed a safe hiding place. They needed a plan. And they had a few hours, no more, of breathing space.

Bennett surprised himself. The combination of
marc
, adrenaline, and Anna’s gratitude was turning him from the unwilling fugitive into a figure he’d never expected to become, the man with a mission. He wanted to outwit Poe and Tuzzi. He wanted to collect the million dollars. He wanted to win. He paced back and forth across the living room, thinking out loud.

“Now, a car. We’ve got a car. It happens to be in Monaco, but I’m pretty sure nobody will be watching the apartment. Why should they? Poe won’t know anything’s wrong until the boat gets to Marseille. Tuzzi has no reason to connect us to Monaco. We can duck in, pick up my car, and get out. Next question: Where do we go?”

“We can’t stay here?”

Bennett shook his head. “It’s too close to Poe. Anyway,
Shimo knows the house. And besides, we couldn’t hide in this village. Everybody would know by lunchtime. Maybe we can find a hotel out in the hills somewhere, but I’m not too keen on hotels, not with Poe’s fake policemen wandering around checking the registers. No, I think I know somewhere better.” Bennett stopped his pacing and frowned at the case that was next to Anna on the couch. “I don’t want to be lugging that around, though. Too risky. We’ll leave it with Georgette. It’ll be safe with her. Give her something else to polish.” He looked out the window. It was light enough to make out the shapes of rough stones in the wall of the house on the other side of the alley. Full dawn was a few minutes away.

“Bennett?” Anna was smiling. She sensed the change in him, from an amiable but uninvolved companion to a true partner in crime. “You’re kind of enjoying this, aren’t you?”

“Absolutely,” he said. “I can’t think of anything I’d rather do than be chased around the countryside by bad-tempered men with guns.” He picked up the case and switched off the lights. “Let’s get going.”

Walking quickly through streets that still had the cold stone smell of night, they turned into the cul-de-sac where Georgette lived. Bennett heard the echo of the doorbell inside the house, and then the creak of a shutter being opened. A suspicious face under a turquoise hair net looked down at him from an upstairs window.

“Eh, alors
,
”
said Georgette. “The Englishman returns. What’s the matter? Lost your key?”

Bennett put a finger to his lips and nodded toward the front door. Georgette sighed loudly, closed the shutter, and came down to let them in.

“This is Anna,” Bennett said, “a friend.”

Georgette took in the T-shirt, the boxer shorts, and the bare feet, and pursed her lips.

“Now, Georgette, listen. I want you to look after this case for us. Hide it. Tell nobody—it’s very important you tell nobody. We’ll be back to pick it up soon. There’s no time to explain now. Will you do that?”

Georgette looked down her nose at the case, flicked a finger at it. “And in the little valise there, what is so precious?”

“Documents. Business papers. Nothing illegal, I promise—it’s just that we don’t want to be carrying them around.” Bennett tried his most ingratiating smile. “Trust me.”

“The whole thing stinks.” Georgette nodded with satisfaction, as though she had solved a particularly difficult problem. “Yes, it is without doubt a
magouille
. Are you in trouble?”

Bennett looked at Anna. “Well …”

“As I thought,” said Georgette. She held out a hand. “Give it to me. I will put it in the
cave
, under the gravel. Something else to worry about, as if I didn’t have enough.”

“You’re a sweetheart.” Bennett gave her the case and kissed her. She watched them leave from the doorway, one hand on her hip, the other clutching the case, her suspicious
expression at odds with the garish brightness of her hair net.

They hurried through the village, now beginning to show signs of life: cats sidling home after a night out, shutters opening, a warm breath of fragrant air drifting from the bakery, the sound of a radio and some virtuoso coughing in the café, the distant clatter of an ancient tractor being persuaded to start, the church clock whirring and clanging six times. Bennett was glad they had parked the car in a dark corner of the village square, half hidden by the squat concrete box that housed Saint-Martin’s public
toilettes
.

As Anna crouched to connect the wires, he crossed his fingers and looked around the square. It wouldn’t be long before the elderly ladies whose self-appointed task it was to monitor the comings and goings of everything that moved would be taking up their positions—the more blatant in chairs outside their front doors, the more discreet behind yellowing scraps of lace curtain. The sight of a young woman in gentleman’s underwear tinkering with a car would provide material for an entire morning of speculation. Bennett thought of going back to borrow a skirt from Georgette. No. There wasn’t time.

The engine spluttered to life, and Bennett breathed again. They coasted down the hill, crossed the N100, and headed east, keeping to the back roads in the hope that the gendarmes of Provence would be fully occupied with their summer work of distributing speeding tickets to the poor and needy on the autoroute.

——

On board the
Ragazza
, now moving slowly toward Marseille, Lord Glebe was preparing to conduct the auction. Tuzzi’s bandaged head and tentative walk had been explained as the result of an unfortunate fall after too much champagne. Bennett, so the others were told, was experiencing problems with his backers, and was in his cabin on an extended conference call. However, as Lord Glebe said, plans must be adhered to, they were all busy men here, time was money, and there was no reason why the auction couldn’t begin as soon as the merchandise had been inspected.

With the air of a magician fully equipped with white rabbits, Glebe opened the case and presented a view of the contents to the three bidders. “Naturally,” he said, “you’ll want your specialist chaps to vet everything later, but I’m sure you’ll find it’s all in order—book of rules, jungle juice, gardening tips, and so forth. But to be serious for a moment”—he adopted the expression of concerned sincerity that he had practiced in the course of many soporific debates in the House of Lords—“I should remind you once again that the purchaser of this case will be able to control the black-truffle market.”

Tuzzi crossed himself vigorously. “On the head of my mother,” he said.

“Indeed, Enzo, indeed. And God bless the dear lady. Now, whoever controls the black-truffle market can realistically
expect an annual income in the millions. I’m sure you’ve all done your sums, and I’m sure your bids will reflect the potential return—a damned sight better than Lloyd’s, even in the old days. Any questions?”

The three bidders studied the row of vials and the dossiers of paperwork with no more than a polite show of interest. They were moneymen, here to buy. Technicians would take care of the details of analysis and verification, and Tuzzi wasn’t a difficult man to find if any problems should crop up. There were no questions.

“Splendid,” said Glebe. “Multiples of one hundred thousand dollars please, gentlemen. Now, who’ll start me off with a nice round million, just to get us warmed up?”

Kasuga lifted a finger. Penato nodded, then Polluce. Kasuga again, and then a pause.

“I have one million three,” said Glebe, “which is an insignificant price to pay for a fortune. Come along, gentlemen. I think we can do better than this. Mr. Tuzzi has put a reserve on the case, and I’m afraid the bids are nowhere close so far.” He put a hand up to his ear. “Do I hear something more realistic? Two million? What?”

“OK,” said Penato.

Another raised finger from Kasuga.

Polluce looked at the expressionless faces of the other two bidders. How high would they go? They were businessmen, looking merely for profit. But he, Polluce, had another, higher purpose: to screw the French. His colleagues in Calvi had given him a mandate to get the formula, whatever the cost. He nodded at Glebe. “I bid
for Corsica,” he said, and raised three fingers. “Three million.”

Glebe beamed. “Well played, Corsica.” He rubbed his hands. “That’s more like it.”

——

Gérard and his partner sat in the unmarked black Citroën outside the Club Nautique, at the entrance to the Vieux Port, smoking and cursing the heat, the tedium, and the chafing of their creased uniforms. Earlier that morning, Shimo had called from the helicopter to tell them that the
Ragazza
was heading for Marseille, but the old tub was taking her time about it, the temperature inside the car was over a hundred, and Gérard was thirsty and uncomfortable.

“
Putain
,” he said. “I could murder a beer.”

His partner took off his sunglasses to mop the sweat from his face, and squinted out to sea. A pastis would go down well, he thought, in the bar of the Club Nautique, followed by a decent meal. An enforced diet of sandwiches and pizza over the past few days was playing hell with his digestion. Much more of this, and he’d develop a
crise de transit intestinal
; he could feel it coming. He took the binoculars from the dashboard and trained them on a girl in abbreviated white shorts who was waving at an incoming sailboat.
Merde
, look at the legs on her, right up to her armpits.

Gérard saw the
Ragazza
first, as she came slowly into
view and dropped anchor halfway between the mainland and the Île d’If. Before he’d taken the binoculars from his partner, a motor launch had pulled away from the quay and was heading for the big boat. Thank God something was finally happening. He watched the launch come up to the
Ragazza
, where a group of figures waited on the stern. He picked up the car phone and punched in Poe’s number.

“They’re here. A launch is just picking them up.”

Shimo’s voice came through the blur of static. “How many? Can you identify them?”

“Wait.” Gérard watched the launch turn slowly away from the
Ragazza
before picking up speed. A figure on the stern of the big boat, who seemed to be wearing a turban or a bandage on his head, was waving them off. Gérard adjusted the focus as he picked up the launch. “Four men in the back.” The foreshortened images through the binoculars were becoming sharper and more detailed. “One with gray hair. A Japanese. An old man, thin. A younger one, dark hair.”

“Is that the Englishman?”

Gérard studied Penato’s broad, fleshy features, and compared them with the face he’d seen in Monaco. “No, not the Englishman.”

“And the girl?”

“No girl.”

The launch drew into the quay. Three men walked across from cars that were parked on the quay and waited at the top of the steps. Gérard continued his commentary. “The tall one with white hair has a case. He and the old
thin
mec
are going to a Mercedes. The other two have Citroëns.”

“Follow the case. The Mercedes. Keep in touch.”

Shimo switched off the speakerphone and lit a cigarette. On the other side of the desk, Poe sat chewing his bottom lip and staring out the window, trying to sift through all the possibilities. Was the man with the white hair carrying the real case or the substitute? Had Bennett and Anna made the switch? Had they been found out? Were they still being held on the
Ragazza
, or had Tuzzi dumped them overboard?

——

The Peugeot limped into Monaco. Bennett coasted into the first spot he could find, and disconnected the engine. They’d been lucky, running on hope for the final half hour, with the fuel gauge showing minus empty.

As they walked up the hill to the Place du Casino, an ancient couple with an elaborately coiffed poodle stopped and stared, shaking their heads with disapproval.