The Ninth Life of Louis Drax (26 page)

     I entered the sulphur-reeking glasshouse, paid my coin and sat among the halt and the lame who were sipping the rancid, lukewarm water from plastic tumblers or their own little china cups. Some were filling thermos flasks. The steaming air seemed to swirl with real and imaginary infection.

     Exactly when Philippe arrived I can’t be sure, because at first I didn’t recognise him. I’d taken the shuffling, shambling man who looked around him vaguely – as though in search of a seat – for another invalid, someone who had only recently left his wheelchair and was keen to get back to it. He seemed smaller and greyer than I remembered him, like a faded old photo of himself.

     —Pascal, he said, giving me a weak handshake. Even his voice sounded faded. Lost.

     —Philippe.

     We sat down at a small table. Sparrows hopped about us. The stinking vapour rose from the taps, clogging the air around us.

     —I’ve been waiting for you to come, he said. —I thought it might be sooner.

     Gaunt. Haggard. He’d aged ten years in six months.

     —You have to tell me what happened with Natalie Drax, I said.

     He shut his eyes and took a deep breath. I observed him closely, watching for the physiognomical shifts that betray us all. He told me how, during his stay in Vichy, Louis had been making signs of recovery. This had agitated Natalie: she became very preoccupied with what her son’s mental state would be if he emerged from his coma, and what he would remember.

     —I’ve had that too, I said. —Hardly surprising.

     —She also claimed to be convinced Pierre Drax was stalking her. She said she thought she had seen him on several occasions – but the thing is, no one else spotted him. He paused as though waiting for me to ponder this, but I was impatient, and signalled for him to continue. —Then one day Louis’ condition suddenly deteriorated. No one was with him that morning except his mother. Again, she kept saying she thought she’d caught a glimpse of Pierre – but again, no one else had seen him and the security cameras showed no sign of him entering the clinic. Do you see what I’m saying, Pascal? About dilemmas?

     It took a little while for this to sink in.

     —Are you saying she actually – she tried to interfere with him? And blame Drax?

     —I don’t know, he sighed, taking off his glasses and de-steaming them with a corner of his shirt. —But when I saw on the local news yesterday that they’d found his body, I couldn’t help wondering. She knows a lot about medicine, more than you’d think. You know how easily it could be achieved. An oxygen block ... no one would ever know. Nothing can ever be proved.

     —So did you confront her?

     —Yes. And that’s when it blew up in my face. She denied it, and accused me of professional incompetence. There was no proof then that Pierre Drax was dead – we thought he was on the loose. So it was just a hunch on my part, nothing I could back up. She knew that. She said I was slandering her. She got quite hysterical. She said I was trying to frame her. You name it.

     —Did you tell Detective Charvillefort?

     He met my eye briefly, then looked away. A rotten pall of silence hung between us as we contemplated the implications of his failure.

     —You were scared, I said flatly. I could picture it all so easily.

     —Of course I was scared, he snapped. —Medically, what happened shouldn’t have happened. Easy enough to present it as another mistake on my part. Easy to call it negligence. She knew that, and she played on it. I’d already pronounced Louis dead once, remember. Think how it looked. Not good. Pascal, listen. Listen carefully. This is my career. You’d have done the same.

     He looked me in the eye then, hoping to see recognition. But I couldn’t give it. I wouldn’t have done the same. Ever. I shook my head. There was another silence. Smaller, but tenser. —So you had Louis transferred to my clinic to get rid of her?

     I couldn’t hide my bitterness. My rage. He reddened, and for a moment I wondered about his heart. If he went into cardiac arrest on the spot, would I help him or watch him writhe?

     —You know it wasn’t as simple as that, he said pleadingly. —He was heading for PVS. It’s hospital policy. She wanted him transferred too. We struck a deal. If I kept quiet, she wouldn’t accuse me of negligence. We’d both be rid of each other.

     I’d watch him writhe.

     —Thanks. Thanks, Philippe.
Thanks!
Several of the invalids were beginning to watch our animated conversation with interest. Instinctively, Philippe and I leaned closer towards one another across the table.

     —Look, Pascal, you’ve got to understand, he said. —I was in a terrible state. I couldn’t prove anything. I couldn’t cope with her. Her grief, her anger, her strangeness – any of it. The whole thing made me quite ill. I nearly had to take early retirement. I’m sorry, Pascal. I behaved badly. I should have warned you – but I was struggling. I thought I was going mad. Have you ever thought you were going mad?

     I stood up sharply, knocking over my chair, which fell with a heavy iron clang. I righted it, and leaned on it heavily for a moment. People were now openly staring.

     —I have to go, I said abruptly.

     The fact was, I felt that I was going mad right now. I had to get away from here and try and make sense of what I’d heard. The world was shifting around me. But I wasn’t going to let it. I had to hang on to the life I knew. The Natalie I knew. My love understood and knew her. My love knew the truth of her. Philippe didn’t have that, and couldn’t possibly know her the way I did. It was as simple as that. I left him sitting at the table amid the steam and the invalids. My mind raced painfully as I walked towards the morgue. Meunier had suspected Natalie: absurd. And – equally absurdly – said nothing. And what about Perez?
I take the blame for Louis’ accident
, he had said. Very clearly.
I should have seen it coming, but I didn’t
.

     There was only one person on this earth who could stem my anxiety. She had the answer.

     I rang her mobile and she picked up right away.

     —Tell me you never tried to hurt Louis, I said.

     —Pascal, what on earth?

     —Just tell me. Just tell me you never tried to hurt Louis. There was a long silence. When she finally spoke, her voice was gentle.

     —I’m sorry about the message I left before, Pascal. I was so confused. You can explain why you wrote those letters, I know you can. You’ve heard that Pierre’s dead?

     —Tell me you never tried to hurt Louis, I said again. I could hear the harshness in my voice, the cruelty of my need. There was another pause. Longer this time. I tried to picture her face, but I couldn’t. Nothing hung together. —Just tell me! I blurted.

     —Oh Pascal. I never tried to hurt Louis, she said quietly. There it was in her voice, unmistakably: a tone of forgiveness; forgiveness of the mess I had made of myself, of her, of the us I had so hoped for and so betrayed. Reassurance. Lovingness, even. Yes, I could feel it. My heart slid gratefully back to its normal place. —How could I, Pascal? I love Louis more than anything else in the world! Pascal, come on. How could you doubt that?

     —Because I’m an idiot, I told her, smiling foolishly with relief. And I hung up.

     I punched in Perez’s number, then changed my mind and rang Charvillefort. I noticed my fingers were shaking. Charvillefort said she was still at the morgue with Madame Drax. I told her that I was on my way over. Then, almost with reluctance, I reported what Philippe Meunier had told me. I felt I had a duty to, but at the same time I squirmed with anxiety. What would she read into it? I could sense her listening carefully.

     —I’ll go and see him now. She said. —I’ll need a statement from him. He never told me he suspected Natalie of interfering with Louis, but I did wonder.

     I was speechless. —You can’t really believe – I didn’t mean you to think–

     —No. It’s not evidence. It’s a possibility. A theory. One scenario of many. Don’t think I didn’t interrogate her thoroughly. But she’s always stuck to the same story. Nothing could be proved, and it still can’t. Look, Dr Dannachet, now that Pierre Drax’s death has been confirmed, I need to talk to Dr Meunier and re-interview Marcel Perez in Lyon. Right now. Could you take Lucille Drax back to Provence for me?

     Briefly, we discussed arrangements: of course I would accompany Lucille back to Provence, if she could be booked on the early evening flight I was taking to Nice.

     —Good, said Charvillefort, relieved. —She’s very distressed, and I think it’s better she’s with someone she knows. They won’t release the body until there’s been a full post-mortem anyway.

     Five minutes later I was at the morgue, a low-slung concrete building connected to the hospital. I found Lucille Drax and Detective Charvillefort waiting in the lobby. The detective seemed harassed; she excused herself to make some phone calls and I was left with Madame Drax. I sat next to her and we stared into space for a moment, watching the comings and goings in the lobby. When I offered my condolences, she seemed to hear the words but not really register them. I recognised that stunned look. I have seen it before on the faces of parents who have lost a child. Their world has collapsed and they have no bearings. She began hunting for something in her handbag, with furious, digging movements.

     —We didn’t finish our conversation, she said, still digging.

     —I’m sorry it had to be interrupted by such terrible news.

     —My son was a wonderful man, she said, finding what she was looking for. —A wonderful father.

     —I’m sure he was, I said. She pulled a photograph from her bag and showed it to me. It was Pierre Drax being a wonderful father. The proof. Father and son, smiling together at the camera. Louis was holding a model aeroplane high above his head. They looked like a good father and a good son. Proud to be together, proud of their plane.

     —How did it fly?

     —It crashed, she said with a small laugh. —They all crashed in the end. And she looked away.

     —I’m taking you back to Provence, Lucille, I said gently. Louis needs you.

     I led her away to the car. She walked stiffly, as though she had aged a thousand years. We drove in silence until we had cleared the city and reached the big curved
route nationale
. My thoughts churned as I remembered the doubts Philippe had planted in my mind. I’d been right to call Natalie right away, right to get her assurance. But for some reason, the doubts were still eating at me. For a horrible, vertiginous moment, I let myself imagine that Natalie had indeed harmed her son. Instantly, fear sliced its way in. A selfish fear, about what kind of creature might do such a thing, and how I might love – could still love – such a creature. And then, a shriller fear: was Louis safe?

     —I don’t suppose you know about how Pierre and Natalie met, do you? asked Lucille suddenly. The question came as a welcome interruption.

     —No, I said.

     —It was something I meant to tell you. It shows you – well. It shows you what sort of a man my son was.

     —Go on, I said gently. It helped that we were sitting next to one another, free of the need for eye contact. The landscape shimmered before us, the sun casting mirages on the road ahead.

     —It was through an adoption agency. Natalie had put Louis up for adoption, and Pierre and his wife Catherine had been selected as adoptive parents. They couldn’t have children of their own, you see. They’d been trying for a long time.

     —Go on, I said slowly.

     —Natalie had wanted to see who her child was going to live with. But shortly after their first meeting, she pulled out. She changed her mind before any of the papers were signed. Pierre and Catherine were desperate. And then they got a phone call from her. Natalie wanted Pierre to come and see her. Alone. And so he did. He thought he could persuade her to let him and Catherine have Louis after all. But – well. Something else happened. They started seeing each other. At first it was about Louis.

     —But then it wasn’t?

     —Catherine suspected something almost right away. My son didn’t behave very honourably, I’m sorry to say. There’s something about Natalie that gets to men. Certain men. She brings out the rescuer in them.

     The remark reminded me of something Sophie had said. I felt a rush of blood to my face and turned slightly to concentrate on my wing-mirror.

     —She rang him one night from the hospital, where Louis was having breathing trouble. Pierre went there and stayed all night in the waiting room with her. That’s the sort of man he was. But it was the end of him.

     I could feel Lucille Drax fixing me with her clear eyes as she spoke, and I knew she wasn’t lying. I could see how it could have happened. I could picture it. Picture myself doing the same thing in Pierre Drax’s shoes. Falling, through a mixture of pity and admiration, for a single mother struggling to bring up a child who was the product of rape.

     —So Pierre left his first wife for Natalie? I asked. Something seemed to buckle inside me. I felt uncomfortable, although there was no reason for it. Why shouldn’t a man leave his wife for a woman he loved, and be a father to her child?