City of Light (City of Mystery) (43 page)

“Because something
is stuffed inside of it,” Tom said.  He was struggling to undo the strip of
cloth tied around the glove, which had been doubled back and knotted multiple
times.  “I found it in the yard near this very strange building located upstream.
 It was dropped, I suppose, by someone in the process of entering or leaving.”

“Dropped on purpose,
perhaps?” Geraldine ventured.  “For this is not merely a glove, it is a
package.”

“Perhaps,” Tom
agreed, finally unsnarling the last knot and pulling the string from the bundle. 
He shook the glove with his right hand and a bloody rat dropped out into his
left.

“Heavens,” Geraldine
said, startling to her feet despite herself.  Tom, who had managed to muffle
his own cry of surprise, let the rat bounce to the ground and stared at what
was left in his palm.  A few shards of glass which, if pieced together, would
form a thick round lens.  The sort of lens that resided in the eyeglasses of
only one person he knew.

“Look ,” Geraldine
said, unraveling the long strip of cloth.  “It’s from a men’s store in London,
is it not?”

“Excellent,” Tom
said, staring at the evidence before him.  The fine glove, the dead rat, the
shattered spectacle, and the label from Morgan and Taylor.  “Most excellent. 
Rayley has sent us a letter.”

2:21 PM

The posters were
shocking to behold, an unflinching portrait of a beautiful young girl,
photographed at such close range that her features, from her doll-like eyes to
her full lips, were each rendered slightly larger than life.  Emma and Marjorie
had nailed one to every side of the kiosk which was located closest to the tower.

“There certainly are
a lot of people coming and going,” Emma said, looking up at the base of the
tower.  “We couldn’t pick Isabel out of this crowd if we tried.”

 Marjorie shrugged.
“With May 9 approaching, they’re got crews up from dawn to dusk, with little
regard for what constitutes a humane workday.  But everyone comes down at
sunset so any worker who has managed to avoid seeing the poster up to that
point will surely be assaulted by Henry’s image then.  Come on.  I think the
next place we should visit is the Champs-Elysees.”

“Of course,” Emma
said, falling in step behind her.  “It’s very kind of you to help in exchange
for an interview with Trevor, especially considering it may not further your
own cause.  He told me that your editors expect you to produce a very different
kind of story.”

The two women were
walking across the broad lawn leading from the tower.  Construction was going
on all around them, the international pavilions, Emma could only assume, and a
miniature railroad was already in place, looking more like a child’s amusement
than a serious means of transporting a crowd.  Marjorie was tall, and evidently
unaccustomed to adapting her gait as a man might do as a courtesy to a smaller
woman, so Emma found herself almost trotting beside her.

“This is one serious
story he might actually find fit to print,” Marjorie said with a snort. “Seeing
as how it has plenty of sex and scandal.  But even if he doesn’t accept it, I
won’t so much mind.  I’m doing this for Patrick.”

Emma nodded, glad
that at least one person in this mad little chase was motivated by the
newsman’s memory, for he was certainly getting the least attention of
Delacroix’s triad of victims.  They had come to the end of the lawn and turned
right and Emma found herself approaching one of the most beautiful streets in Paris,
if not the world.  She had always sworn that someday she would stroll the
Champs-Elysees, although she had never imagined the scene quite like this one,
with her all but running alongside a hammer-swinging American reporter.  But
her life and her frustrations are probably much like mine, Emma thought, as
they arrived at their first kiosk and Marjorie pulled a poster from the
saddlebag slung over her shoulder.

“Does it ever bother
you,” Emma asked, while holding the poster straight for Marjorie, “being told
what the news of the day is or is not to be?”

Marjorie smiled
grimly around the nails she was holding in the corner of her mouth.  “Does it
ever bother you,” she answered, “being told what is and is not a crime?”

2:30 PM

Over the seven
decades of her life, people had called Geraldine Bainbridge many things, but no
one had ever called her a fool.  She knew that she had been posted at this
extraordinarily unremarkable spot on the river bank for one reason and one
reason alone:  to be kept out of the way. 

When the contents of
the glove had proven that they were indeed on the verge of finding the precise
location where Rayley had been taken, Tom had headed towards the street, hoping
to waylay a flic for assistance or, better yet, to intercept Trevor on his way
back to the river.  He had brushed aside Geraldine’s quite sensible suggestion
that she would be of more use if she moved upstream to stand guard at the sewer
fortress itself.

“It’s not safe,
Auntie,” Tom had said, in what was a rather infuriatingly condescending tone
for a twenty year old man to assume.  “It’s one thing for you to sit here, in
this area which may be dreary but is at least well-traveled.  In fact, it’s the
bloody Champs-Elysees compared to what awaits upstream.  It’s impossible to blend
in and observe when there are no people to blend in with.  You understand, do
you not?”

She understood
perfectly.  He was saying that she was old and fat and female - a bad
combination in a detective.  He was right on all counts, of course, but that
did not excuse the sentiment.

Geraldine watched
Tom disappear up the bank and then stood to better survey her options.  Tom was
correct inasmuch as she could hardly sit herself down outside a fortress and
wait for someone to approach, when that person would most certainly be either
Delacroix or one of his dreadful minions.  But there must be a way in which she
could draw close enough to discreetly observe.  Geraldine pinched her lower lip
between her thumb and forefinger, a gesture which from girlhood had been a sign
she was deep in thought, and slowly turned in a circle to peruse the area. 

Ah yes.  Of
course.    

Seventy-one years
under Rule Britannia had left Geraldine Bainbridge with a profound appreciation
of the tactical advantages of a naval assault.   She had been quite silly not
to think of it earlier, for within sight were any number of small watercraft which
she might logically commandeer.  Simple rowboats, most of them, piloted by men
in rags who were dragging the riverbank with nets, presumably in search of
fish.  Geraldine quickly settled on one of the boats, which was a bit more
sizeable than the others and held two men.  If rowed upstream, it would offer
the perfect vantage point for her surveillance mission and would provide safety
besides.  For no man on foot, no matter how angry he might be, could overtake a
rowboat.

Geraldine walked
resolutely down to the edge of the water where, in lieu of a proper dock, the
fishermen were merely launching from the muddy bank.  “Good day,” she called
out, in what she considered her best French. “I am in need of assistance.”

None was
forthcoming.  In fact, all the men within earshot turned away in a most rude
fashion, proving that when it came to badly spoken French, even the indigent
fishermen of Paris were snoots.  Geraldine tried again.

She didn’t quite
know how to say “I wish to hire you,” so instead she called out “I wish to buy
something,” which were indeed the first words she had ever learned in French.

A collective
deafness continued to possess them all.  Geraldine decided to switch to a more
universal language.  She unfastened the purse which dangled at her side, pulled
out a wad of money, waved it in the air, and shrieked “Voila.”

The auditory senses
of their captains thus miraculously restored, the entire small fleet paddled
around in the water and began to approach her position on the bank.   Geraldine
signaled to the half-rotted tub she had come to think of as “the big boat,”
which was indeed bearing down upon her with the most speed.  The others stopped
rowing and fell back, filling the air with curses, and within minutes Geraldine
was seated on the back bench of the rowboat, her two oarsmen paddling upriver
in an enthusiastic, if somewhat unsteady, cadence. 

“To the sewer,” she
called, and one of them looked back at her and nodded, although it was unlikely
he understood what she meant.  Going upriver, even against the gently
meandering flow of the Seine, seemed to confound them and as a team they were badly
yoked, with one of the men far larger than his partner.  They hit the rocks on
one side of the bank with a thud that caused Geraldine to release a little yelp
of surprise, then grossly overcorrected and hit the bank on the other side. 
Snarling at each other, pushing off from the rocks with their splintery oars, the
two finally managed to somewhat synchronize their strokes and begin to progress
upstream, accompanied by the derisive hoots of their comrades and the vagrants
on the shore.

Geraldine clutched
both sides of the boat and prepared herself for a bumpy voyage – or perhaps
even a swim.  There was, she reflected, a reason why no one ever spoke well of
the French navy.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

Paris

2:49 PM

Arrest warrant in
hand, Trevor, Rubois, Carle, and a half dozen flics climbed into a police wagon
and headed out in search of Armand Delacroix. To his gratification and
surprise, Trevor had been handed a set of paperwork by Rubois before they left
the station.  It was embossed with a seal, some sort of document that Trevor
could only assume temporarily afforded him the privileges of the French
police.  

But at the white
brick house on the Boulevard Saint Michel, they found nothing but a handful of
servants and a twelve year old boy in knee breeches, who was in the back yard
lazily swirling on a swing.  Marianne, evidently, caught in his more natural form,
and the police swept up the child along with the others, herding them toward a
second wagon for transfer back to the station.  Repeated shouted assurances
that they were being carted in as witnesses, not suspects, did nothing to calm
the excitable flock, who were weeping and wailing as if they were standing
witness to the Biblical end of days.  The cook, forced to abandon a half-baked
chicken, had proven especially vocal.

“You will be all
right,” Trevor said at one point to the boy, who was standing solemnly to one
side.  The child blinked slowly, as if he did not understand what Trevor was
saying.   But he couldn’t have forgotten his English so quickly, so it was more
likely a matter that he understood Trevor well enough, but simply did not
believe him.  Waiting amid the loudly lamenting servants the child remained
silent, and when it was time to board the wagon, he climbed in passively,
prepared to be transported to this unexpected new fate without protest or even
a question.  Trevor gazed after him sadly as the wagon lumbered up the street.  It
was hard to predict what life held in store for the boy known as Marianne.

After that, the
remaining officers reassembled and reentered their own wagon.  Through Carle,
Trevor managed to convey to Rubois that it might be a wise move to return to
the river.  That was their agreed-upon meeting place, after all, once Emma
finished with the posters and Tom with the addresses.  And Gerry would be
waiting there too, of course, her mind undoubtedly churning with possibilities.
 Considering her nature, Trevor feared he may have already left her too long on
her own.

3:01 PM

Henry was dead. 
This was the private shame Armand Delacroix had lived with for the past two
weeks, but did the entire city of Paris have to know it as well?

His nightmare had
rendered him unwilling to return to sleep, so Armand, who had never held to
traditional hours of work and rest, had risen from his bed and taken to the
streets.  Under the circumstances, it was probably not a bad idea to make a few
social calls.  All those men who claimed to miss Isabel so badly…they needed to
be reassured that business would proceed as usual, that Armand had options
still available for their perusal.  If not Marianne, then someone else. 
Perhaps even a boy who looked like a boy if that was how their inclinations
lay, for he was hardly one to judge.  In a time of crisis, as this most surely
was, it was essential that Armand cement the trust of his most important
clients, and that he bring any lost sheep resolutely back to the fold.

He had gone first to
see a trader of bonds, an unpleasant blowhard with strong ties to the financial
community of Paris and thus to the Exhibition.  After a brief chat with the
fellow – and an invitation to Armand’s next soiree on April 29 – Armand was
back on his rounds and making his way toward the office of a minor politician,
a man whose own pockets were not particularly deep but who had proven connected
to a wide spectrum of potential investors.  And as he had paused at the corner
of a residential street, Armand had seen it.