LACKING VIRTUES (65 page)

“Sounds fair to me,” Steven said, marveling at Nicole’s wonderful ability to bring lightness and joy to all sorts of tough situations.

“Now that we’ve got that behind us,” she said, “let’s seal our agreement with a toast.”

Henri had turned around to fish something out of his battered satchel on the floor. He raised his hand without looking up. “Not yet, Nicole. I have a little something for Steven I would like to include it in our toast.”

Steven frowned. This was one of the strangest things he had ever seen. How could Henri have read Nicole’s lips? He hadn’t even been looking in her direction.

“Excuse me,” he said. “Henri was bending down when you spoke, Nicole. He couldn’t see your lips. What’s going on?”

Henri stood up, smiling. He held a gift-wrapped package in his calloused hands. “Good for you, Monsieur LeConte. You are observant. It is a virtue.”

“You mean you
can
hear? You mean all of that deaf stuff was fake?”

Henri laughed. “That’s right, my son, though I’m starting to think the time for a hearing aid is near.”

“Holy Madonna!”

“Steven, your language!”

“But this is incredible! What about you, Isabelle? Can you hear, too?”

“No, Monsieur LeConte. Just Henri.”

Steven was flabbergasted. “Why didn’t you tell me, Nicole?”

“Because I did not know. I found out today when they put my father in the ground. It’s really quite a beautiful story. Henri, would you mind telling it again?”

“For you, I’ll tell it a hundred times. More than twenty years ago, I overheard a conversation. This was not a pleasant conversation. It was about Monsieur financing his political party with illegal money.

“Now you must understand, Steven. Isabelle and I had nowhere to go, no family, no training. On top of that, Isabelle had her disability. We were totally dependent on Monsieur’s good will.

“The more I thought about it, the more frightened I became that I might overhear something again, or that Monsieur might think I had overheard something, and that we might be driven from this land because of it.

“So I decided to lose my hearing, too. I had to learn to read Isabelle’s lips, so I made it a gradual process, growing a little harder of hearing every month. By the time Nicole’s mother died, I was stone deaf.”

“Then you knew about the airplanes?”

“Oh, no, Monsieur LeConte. When I became deaf, I was still careful not to overhear anything. It was better that way. It let us live our simple lives in peace. More important, it let us look after Nicole during the summers when she did not attend the convent school. We did not know about the airplanes. But we suspected evil things were going on, especially after all that panic about you in the wine cellar.”

“Extraordinary,” Steven said. “This is extraordinary.”

“Yes,” Henri said. “So it is. Now I would like you to open your gift. I hope it is something you can still use.”

Steven unwrapped the package, preparing to make a display of gratitude. He didn’t recognize the strange-looking reel inside. “What is it?” he whispered to Nicole in English.

“I don’t know,” she whispered back. “Ask Henri.”

Steven held the reel up to the light. “It is . . . what in the world is it, Henri?”

The old man’s face darkened. “You don’t know?”

“No, I  –  ”

“It’s what was inside that device you had in the wine cellar. Monsieur took it out. But something distracted him and it ended up lying on the table. I picked it up to keep for him when I was clearing the dishes. Later they were looking for it. I was in the kitchen, listening. Before I could go out there as a deaf man and learn what was going on, they decided the German man had taken it, the man they called Walter.”

“You mean this is the recorder?”

“Yes, Steven.”

“Henri, I didn’t know what it looked like. I’d never seen it before. See, it’s not a normal tape. You couldn’t have given me a better present. Nicole, Frank is going to be as happy as I am!”

“Henri, that’s wonderful,” Nicole said, smiling sweetly.

Steven took the grizzled old man in his sore arms and gave him a bear hug all of the garlic and wine fumes in the world couldn’t have discouraged. “You will someday star in an article I’m going to write.”

He walked over and hugged Isabelle, kissing her French style on both cheeks. “Thank you, too” he said. “I thank you with all my heart for protecting Nicole those summers I wasn’t here. I always wondered how she could have turned out so perfect with a father like Georges Michelet. Now I know. Thank you.”

***

Warner sat on the edge of his bed and lit the candle. “You should have seen their eyes in the Oval Office today when Simmons played the tape and passed around the photographs. I don’t want to sound vindictive, but it was gratifying in the extreme.”

“Oh, Frank, I’m so happy this mess is over.”

“You’re happy?”  He climbed into bed and turned off the lamp. In the rose glow of the candle, Claire looked 19 years old. “I’ve been a very negligent lover,” he said.

“Only because you’ve been away. Remember what I said about quality versus quantity? I also happen to love you. Believe me, Frank, that counts for something.”

His hands slid beneath her nightgown. The trips, the night meetings, the intrusions of every sort. How, he thought, could he do this to her any longer? How could he do it to himself?

The telephone rang, the emergency phone.

“Goddammit,” he growled. “For once I’m not here. I
am not
here.”

“Frank  – ”

“What?”

“Answer it. It’s all right. I’m not going away.”

He started to get out of bed and take it in the other room. She held his arm.

“Warner here,” he said. “Give me the details.”

“Good evening, Frank. I hope I’m not calling too late. This is the president. Your assistant gave me your number.”

“Mr. President! No, of course it’s not too late. How can I help you?”

Claire put her head beside his and he tilted the receiver so she could hear.

“First, let me commend you once more on the incomparable job you did beating the odds. That’s leadership, Frank. It’s what we need in this administration, and it’s what we haven’t been getting. I’ve reviewed the behavior of all members of my staff and administration. I thought you’d be happy to know that I’ve given Chief of Staff Galloway his walking papers. Heads are going to roll at the CIA, you can count on that. I’m going to act on your advice. I’m firing Willis tomorrow, and I’ve asked for a list of the agency people in Paris who shunned Mrs. Marx. We’re even thinking about criminal action here, Frank. The kind of blindness that led an entire nation down the wrong path simply cannot be tolerated.”

“Those are good decisions, Mr. President.”

“I’m also proposing several honors for those who helped you. We can talk more about this later. The real reason I’m calling is that I would like you to take over the FAA. A desk job, Frank, but one with plenty of responsibility. Things are going to change, I assure you. You’ll have to give up your travels, but you’ll have the opportunity to play a major role in shaping the future of air travel in this country.”

“That’s certainly an honor, Mr. President, but something I wouldn’t want to accept without serious thought.”

“Of course, Frank. You think about it until tomorrow morning. I want you to come to the White House for breakfast. Oh, yes, one last thing. After this chat, your emergency calls are being rerouted to your assistant’s number. Simmons and I both feel you need a rest. Enjoy it, Frank. I’ll see you at nine.”

That meant about seven undisturbed hours right here, thought Warner, seven hours he wasn’t going to waste on sleep. He lay back on the bed and pulled Claire down on top of him.

Epilogue

Boulder, Colorado

August 6, 2001

Warner didn’t like weddings any better than politics, but turning down the LeContes’ invitation would have been unthinkable.

It was a fine summer day along the front range of the Rockies. The sky was deep blue, the wind calm, the air so exquisitely inviting he hated to go inside.

The outdoor wedding ceremony had been simple and mercifully brief. The reception at the LeContes’ home was even more relaxed. The only guests were Steven’s parents and brothers, Nicole’s aunt, uncle and cousins, Sophie Marx’s brother and a few of the newlyweds’ best local friends, people dressed in everything from tuxes to running shorts.

Nicole, with Claire’s help, had prepared the hors d’oeuvres. Henri and Isabelle, along with their regrets, had sent a shipment of excellent champagne, wine and cognac.

Warner drifted off by himself. He couldn’t speak French, so that ruled out any casual conversation with Nicole’s relatives. He didn’t particularly care for the Boulder guests, fine intelligent people that they were. Their eccentricities just rubbed a man from Winnemucca the wrong way.

Well, he thought, he shouldn’t complain. He didn’t have to deal with celebrities, writers, journalists, publishers and, God forbid, politicians. The gritty best-seller Steven had written and sold for a record sum didn’t seem to have gone to his head. This was a pretty down home affair.

Warner went outside to shoot hoops with Nicole’s cousins and almost managed to enjoy himself. Later, with some delicacy of Nicole’s he couldn’t pronounce in hand, he strolled across the combination of meadow and horse pasture Steven called the lawn.

The LeConte home was in a beautiful location, high on the plains about eight miles east of Boulder. There was a good view of the city, nestled in a bowl at the base of the foothills, and an even better view of the towering peaks of the Continental Divide beyond. This was where the Great Plains met the Rockies. If you looked one way, you were in Kansas; if you looked in the other direction, it was Aspen.

Warner had seen enough of the mountains. He turned toward Kansas. At the far end of the meadow was a horse barn. He didn’t have anything better to do, so he decided to check it out.

The door was unlocked. When he swung it open a gaggle of enormous geese rushed out to meet him. He was trying to coax the unruly birds back into the barn when he saw something he didn’t like: two yellow ultralights – the most dangerous of all flying machines – loomed in the dusty shadows. What the hell were they doing here?

“Exploring?” Steven asked, walking up behind him. The geese that had remained outside followed him into the barn.

Warner turned around, shaking his head. “Steven, what in the world are you doing these things?”

“I’ll show you later. First we need to talk business.”

“On your wedding day?”

“On my wedding day. That’s why Uncle Emmanuel is here.”

“Uncle Emmanuel?”

“Michael. Sophie’s brother.”

Steven gestured to a gravel road. When they were out of sight of the house, Warner said, “Okay, what’s this all about?”