Remember (12 page)

Nicky had laughed dismissively. “Don’t forget, Mother, I have a guardian angel.”

Elise Wells had chosen to ignore this remark and suggested that Nicky return home to New York for the remainder of her vacation if she was tired of France. “You can always join us in Connecticut, if you wish.

Your father and I are going to stay at the house for the rest of the summer, and you know how much we adore having you with us.”

They had chatted about the idea of a visit for several minutes, and Nicky had agreed to spend a few days in the country with her parents when she got back to the States.

They were close, the three of them, and they had been for as

long as Nicky could remember. She was an only child, and sometimes she felt the responsibility of being one. An only child was expected to excel, since parents generally centered their hopes and dreams in that one child.

Her parents were eminently fair and had never made unreasonable demands on her. She loved them as much as they loved her, they were her champions, her chief supporters in everything she did.

They had been especially wonderful to her through the entire Charles Devereaux crisis.

Immediately she pushed the thought of Charles away. She had no wish to remember someone who had caused her pain, however long ago that was.

Reaching the pool area, Nicky put her book down on one of the tables, took off the loose cotton shirt she was wearing over her black bikini and settled on a chaise.

Diffused sunlight trickled through the cool green canopy of leafy branches above her head, and she stretched out her long legs, closed her eyes and for a while drifted with her thoughts, which were still focused on her parents. She knew her mother and father wondered why she had not had a serious involvement with a man since Devereaux, and that at one time they had even believed her to be hung up on him. But she had explained that she was not, and she had spoken the truth. The reason why there was no special man in her life was very simple really.

She hadn’t met anyone who had genuinely interested her in the past two and a half years, at least not for a long-term relationship.

One day, she thought, one day my prince will come. When I’m least expecting it. And no doubt he’ll knock me for a loop. That was the way it was supposed to be, wasn’t it? Wobbly knees, palpitating heart and all that stuff. She laughed to herself.

In the meantime, she wasn’t unhappy with her life. She had a successful career and she loved her work, whenever she wanted it, there was a family life with her parents, and she had several close girlfriends with whom she shared a great deal. And then there was her friend Cleeland Donovan. He was caring and protective, and she treasured his friendship.

Suddenly Nicky realized how disappointed she was that Clee had not been able to come down for the weekend. It would have been nice to see him, she would have enjoyed his company in these peaceful surroundings.

Usually when they were together they were in a combat zone or some other trouble spot in the world. At those times they were under immense pressure, intensely involved in what they were doing, scrambling to do their work properly, to get the story, usually under the most adverse circumstances—they also had to fight the horror of what they were witnessing, plus the fear, which never failed to surface at some point.

What a lovely change it would have been if they could have relaxed together and had some fun this weekend. But he could not get away, or did not want to, or was otherwise engaged, and that was that.

Now that she thought about it, spending a few days with her mother and father in New Milford was a rather appealing idea. If she left the farm on Monday morning, went to Marseilles and then directly on to Paris, she could take the Concorde to New York on Tuesday morning, and drive up to Connecticut on Wednesday afternoon. She would speak to Guillaume later about ordering a car and have the driver Etienne come and get her.

Having made this decision, Nicky pulled her reading glasses out of the pocket of her shirt and picked up her book. It was Richard Whelan’s biography of Robert Capa, which she had found in the library upstairs, and it made fascinating reading. From the moment she started it she had understood why Clee had always been so intrigued by Capa.

Nicky began to read and was soon completely absorbed in Capa’s life story. An hour slipped by, and then another.

In the middle of the morning Amelie appeared, sailing down the garden path carrying a tray.

“Eh, voila!” she cried, standing next to Nicky’s chaise. “I have made fresh lemonade for you, I know how much you enjoy it, mademoiselle.”

She poured a glass from the jug.

“Thank you, Amelie,” Nicky said, taking it from her. “This is just what I need. It’s getting hotter by the minute out here.”

“Oui. The sun can be dangerous, faites attention, ” the housekeeper cautioned and hurried back to the farmhouse.

Nicky looked up from her book at the exact moment that Clee reached the middle of the garden path leading down to the pool.

He stood perfectly still, smiling at her, and after a second, Nicky’s face broke into a delighted smile. She threw her book down and leaped to her feet.

“Clee! How did you get here!” she cried and ran toward him.

Throwing her arms around him, she hugged him. He hugged her back, and then they walked back to the pool area.

“How did you manage to get away?” she asked, looking up at him, her smile radiant.

“JeanClaude reshuffled the assignments, gave my jobs to the other guys,” Clee lied. “He thought I looked tired, decided I needed a rest.

So I took the last flight from Paris to Marseilles yesterday. When I arrived it was too late to start driving here, and anyway I didn’t want to disturb the household at that late hour, so I stayed at a hotel in Marseilles. Etienne drove me up this morning.”

“I’m so glad! It’s wonderful to see you!” Nicky said, her enthusiasm bubbling up. “I was getting a bit lonely.”

He looked at her and nodded, but did not say a word.

Nicky continued, “I almost drove to Arles today, but Amelie persuaded me to stay here because of the heat—” Abruptly she broke off and shook her head as the truth dawned on her. “She knew you were coming.

That’s the reason why she went on and on about the weather—said it was far too hot to go into the city.”

“As a matter of fact, she was right about the weather, it is murderous in the cities at this time of year, much worse than out here,” Clee said. “But yes, she did know I was coming. I told her not to tell you, when I spoke to her yesterday. I wanted to surprise you.”

“Well, you succeeded!” She laughed as she flopped down on the chaise and stared up at him. “Why don’t you take your clothes off?”

Startled, he gaped at her, then laughed. “What?”

“You look so hot, I mean. Don’t you think you’d be more comfortable in swimming trunks?”

“Yes. Yes, of course, I’ll go and change. What I need after that long drive is a swim in the pool and a glass of ice-cold champagne. I’ll be back in a minute, with a bottle of Dom Perignon.” think of it, Nick, I was only four years old when Capa died in Vietnam during the French Indochina war,” Clee said and paused, staring at her for a long moment.

Then he added quietly, “He’s the only person I’ve ever really missed not knowing.”

Nicky made no comment.

Clee went on in the same quiet voice, “I just wish I’d met him, been a friend. I really do miss not having known him. Do you understand what I mean?” He laughed a bit self-consciously and muttered, “I bet you think I’m nuts.”

“No, you’ve explained it very well. It’s a kind of sadness inside, a feeling of regret that you were born too late to meet someone you consider somehow very meaningful to you, even though your lives never crossed.”

“Yes.”

“Quite aside from being a remarkable photographer, Capa was obviously a fascinating man, by all accounts,” Nicky continued.

“In the biography I’ve been reading, the photographer Eve Arnold is quoted as saying Capa had charm and grace and a lightness, that when he came into a room it was as if a light had been turned on. She said you wanted to be near him, that you wanted to be part of that ebullience, part of that zest. He had enormous .

. . charisma. I think that’s the word for it, Clee. The only word, actually.”

“I remember reading that myself. Also there’s a wonderful description of Capa by Irwin Shaw that was also quoted in Whelan’s biography. ” “Yes, I read it, too.” Nicky smiled at him. “Capa must have seemed so glamorous to you when you were growing up, and his life must have seemed very adventurous and exciting.”

‘LHe did, it did,” Clee admitted. “But actually, I’d wanted to get into combat to take war photos long before I’d ever heard of Robert Capa. Still, he was my inspiration in so many different ways.” Clee shifted in the chair, crossed his legs and after a moment asked, “When did you decide you wanted to be a war correspondent?”

“When I was little, same as you. I was emulating my father, I suppose

.”

“Do you think that’s really why you do it? I mean now, today, after all these years?”

“Oh no, not anymore. I do what I do because I want to report on history in the making. I want to witness events, to report on them as accurately and as truthfully as I can. I want to bring the news to the people—and with as much integrity as possible.”

“I think our reasons are much the same. I just hope my pictures have as much integrity as your newscasts.”

“They do.” Nicky looked at him probingly. “Do you think you’ll ever give it up?”

“I doubt it.” Clee shrugged, then grinned at her. “Well, maybe one day, when I’m too old to dodge the bullets. And what about you?”

“I feel the same. It’s funny about the fear, isn’t it? And how alike we are in that respect. You and I never seem to experience the fear until after the action is over. Do you think all journalists are the same?”

“No, I don’t. Some feel the tear at the time they’re working, others are like us—get knocked out by it afterward. Joe Glass of the London Sunday Times once told me when we were in Lebanon together that he suffers immense fatigue immediately after he’s had a very frightening experience in a war zone. You and I are lucky in a sense, Nick, because our emotions don’t close in on us until much, much later.”

“You take too many risks on the battlefield, Clee.”

“Calculated risks. Anyway, you’re exactly the same.”

“No, not really. I’m much more cautious than you, despite what you and Arch think.”

“I should hope you are.”

A thoughtful expression settled on Nicky’s face, and after a moment, she said slowly, “We broke the golden rule in Beijing, didn’t we, Clee?”

“What do you mean?” His brows puckered, he was mystified.

“We became involved with Yoyo. That has such inherent dangers, we should never let our emotions become engaged with a subject when we’re covering a story. We have to remain a little aloof, a bit removed, to do our job. We have to keep a proper perspective.”

“Sometimes it’s pretty tough not to get involved,” Clee responded quickly. “None of us are that hard-boiled, are we? And listen, Arch and the guys felt exactly the same as we did about Yoyo. How could you not get involved with the kid, he’s something else, really special, wouldn’t you say?”

“Yes, that’s true.”

Nicky leaned against the sofa and looked across at Clee. There was a small silence before she asked softly, “What do you think happened to him? You don’t think he’s … dead, do you, Clee?”

“No, I don’t. I have a feeling Yoyo is hiding out, that he went underground. I’ve always said that to you, and I can only reiterate it now. You’ll see, he’ll turn up, and probably sooner than we think.”

“You’re not just saying that to make me feel better, are you?” she said focusing her eyes steadily on his.

“No, I’m not,” he said adamantly. He leaned forward, intent on what he had to say to her. “Yoyo is bright, enterprising, resourceful. He’ll make it out of China, I feel very strongly about this—I really do have a lot of faith in him.”

Clee rose and went to the door of the library, where they were sitting.

“I want to show you something. I’ll be back in a minute.

” While Clee was gone, Nicky closed her eyes, thinking of Yoyo.

Clee had spoken with such conviction, she had to believe that he was correct in his assessment of what had happened to the boy.

She had no alternative, she must go on hoping that he would surface eventually, either in New York or Paris or Hong Kong.

Practically the last thing she had said to him was that if he arrived in the British Crown Colony and needed help, he was to telephone one of them immediately. Person to person collect. She had promised Yoyo that she or Clee or Arch would take it from there, would get him out of Hong Kong no matter what.

Opening her eyes, Nicky sat up and reached for her glass, took

a sip.

Knowing it was futile to worry, she put thoughts of Yoyo at the back of her mind.

She glanced around, taking in the peacefulness of the room, and understood why it was Clee’s favorite. It had also become hers.

Its tranquillity acted as a balm to her troubled spirits.

Decorated throughout in pale colors, primarily white and cream with touches of melon and terra-cotta, it was filled with numerous bowls of flowers and tall pots of leafy branches.

Hundreds of books filled the shelves soaring to the ceiling, and there were magazines and big art books arranged on various tables. Some of Clee’s photographs, obviously those he liked the most, were framed on the walls, and hanging above the gargantuan stone fireplace was a collection of ethereal watercolors of the area done by a local artist.

With the emphasis on comfort, it was a casual room, designed for relaxing, reading, listening to music, and watching television and films.

Today the weather had been extremely hot again, oppressively so.

Fortunately, the two large fans on the ceiling—Casablanca fans she called them—circulated the air, and now that the sun had slunk off to the west the atmosphere was pleasant. Outside the windows the summer light was rapidly fading, the sky turning a deeper blue as night fell.