Lovers and Liars Trilogy (21 page)

There was a silence, a long silence. Pascal turned away and Helen sighed.

“Precisely,” she said, and this time the bitterness came through in her voice. “Maybe that’s why I never felt like your wife even with your ring on my hand. Face facts, Pascal. You married me because I very unwisely let you get me pregnant. You married me because it was the decent thing to do, and you can be a decent man. Very sweet, very touching—only then, unfortunately, I lost the child.”

Her voice had risen. It hit a high, strained note. Pascal swung around.

“Why?” he said. He could scarcely speak. “Why, in God’s name, do you do this?”

“Because it’s the truth. Do you think I’m totally blind? After my miscarriage I knew exactly what you were thinking. You were thinking you needn’t have married me after all.”

“How can you say that?” He advanced on her, white-faced. “I was here. I did everything possible. I found us this apartment—you said you wanted this apartment. I gave up job after job—for six months, longer, I scarcely left your side. My mother tried to help.”

“Oh, don’t bring your bloody boring mother into this. Your mother thinks like a French peasant. She thinks childbirth’s nothing. She expects a woman to give birth like some bloody animal in a farmyard. What does she understand?”

Pascal bit back an angry reply. His mother had come up to Paris, had stayed several months, had tried hard to help Helen after the miscarriage: She had shopped for her, cooked for her, and been insulted for her pains. He looked at his wife, and his face hardened.

“Forget that, then,” he said. “Distort everything. There’s one thing even you can’t forget. We had Marianne.”

A tiny spasm of pain tightened her face. She made a shaky gesture of the hand, then regained control. “Ah, yes. We had Marianne. I finally gave you a reason to stay with me. Thanks, Pascal.”

She turned away and began to set the table for Marianne’s meal. She shook out a tablecloth, found a bib, a child’s plate, Marianne’s special spoon. Pascal felt a sense of pain and bewilderment. Some of these charges were old, some new, and they left him wary. He had been down this particular road so often before. He could go to Helen and hold her; she would cry. Later, a day later, two days later, it would begin all over again.

Perhaps she had been expecting him to make just such an overture, because when he did not, it angered her. Two patches of color rose in her cheeks. She stopped setting the table, looked up at him.

“I always knew,” she said on a tight shrill note of control. “Right from the very beginning. Before you married me—I knew then. I knew there was someone else at the back of your mind. Well, at least she has a face now. I’m glad I’ve seen her. And she has an interesting face, I’ll say that much. A lover in tow, of course, but I’m sure that won’t worry you. He was so much older than she was, and your little Genevieve didn’t seem very keen.”

Her use of Genevieve’s name made him flinch. His face became pale with anger. He turned, and moved toward the door. “That’s enough.” He could not bring himself to look at her. “I’m going out. I’m not listening to this anymore.”

“Just tell me, was it really an accidental meeting, Pascal? Or did you know she was in Paris? Was it planned?”

“No, it damn well wasn’t planned. I told you. I had no idea she was here. I haven’t seen her in years.”

“I’m sure you’ll make up for lost time.” She smiled. “Take my advice. Pursue her to London. Maybe then you’ll learn the lesson I’ve learned, the hard way.”

Pascal was in the doorway. He stopped. “Lesson? What lesson?”

“Perfection doesn’t exist, Pascal. And if it does, it doesn’t last. So fuck around in London. Have your affair. Then you’ll find out how it feels.”

“I do not understand. I do not damn well understand….”

“You will. Because you’ll find out she’s not the person you imagined, just the way you weren’t the person I imagined. Try it, Pascal.” She gave a thin tight laugh. “Find out how it feels to fuck a dream.”

He could still hear the words, their precise intonation. They repeated themselves, and again repeated themselves. They invaded Gini’s living room. Pascal looked around him blankly. He had been asked a question, and he had not answered it. Gini was still watching him expectantly. In the interval, how many centuries, how many seconds had passed? Helen’s advice had never been taken, and one of the many reasons for that was a residual fear, still with him, that her final remark might be true.

He turned back to face Gini. She continued to stroke her cat; Napoleon purred. Gini bent to him affectionately; one gold strand of her hair mingled with his marmalade fur. Pascal thought:
She does not look like a dream, or an invention, she looks as I remember her—actual, exact, real.
“London?” he said. Gini smiled; the time gap, then, must have been short between question and reply. How odd, the distortions of the mind.

“Yes, London,” she replied. “You must have come here very often. You never called.”

“I know.” He gave an awkward gesture. “Superstition, maybe.”

“Not anger?”

“No. Not anger. Never that. I was angry when you left Beirut. Not afterward.”

“Truly?”

“Truly.”

She gave a sigh. “I’m glad.”

There was a silence. Outside, the rain still fell, and Gini listened to it. It was lulling, peaceful; she could feel a new contentment creeping up on her. She closed her eyes, then opened them. Pascal was still standing, watching her, his manner awkward. “You’re tired,” he said, “it’s late. I ought to go.” But he hesitated. “You’ll lock the door after me? Bolt it? You promise me?”

“Of course.”

“Gini, I mean it. I don’t like to leave you alone, in a basement flat.”

“Pascal, I’ll be perfectly fine. I told you. I’ve never had a break-in, and—”

“And you’ve never been sent a pair of handcuffs before,” he said. “Gini, take this seriously. This story on Hawthorne. It’s a story about sadism. With women as the victims.”

“We don’t even know if the story is true.”

“Maybe not. But someone knows where you live. Whoever sent those handcuffs knows where you live. If he knows that much, he probably also knows you live alone.”

“Pascal, don’t.” She rose and crossed to him. “You’re adding two and two and making ten.”

“Oh, no.” He looked down at her gently, touched her face, then drew away. “I have an instinct for trouble. And I can feel it coming. I know.”

There was obvious concern in his voice and his eyes, and Gini was touched by it. Looking up at him, she said, “No one’s safe, not these days, Pascal. Not me, not you…”

Something flickered in his eyes, some glint of amusement or irony. “Oh, I know that,” he replied. “Believe me, I know.” There was a tiny pause, a beat, as if he waited for her to pick up some meaning in this remark, then Pascal turned to the door. “I’ll call you in the morning, at eight?”

“Eight would be fine.”

“I’ll pick you up around eight-thirty. We can be down at that courier office by nine.”

Still he lingered. Gini, who wanted him to linger, stared at the floor.

Eventually, still awkwardly, he touched her hand. “Good night,” he said.

“Good night, Pascal.”

She closed the door behind him, and bolted it, as promised. Then she stood for a long while, looking at her own warm, familiar room. Something about it puzzled her, and it took her some time to understand what it was. Then she realized. It was the same room but depleted. It lacked Pascal’s presence. It felt a thousand times emptier than it had ever felt before.

T
HE NEXT MORNING THEY
were at the ICD offices at nine. Susannah quickly gave them the information they needed.

“Handcuffs?” She looked first at the woman journalist, then at her photographer companion. Both seemed pale and strained, as if they had slept little the night before. The woman worked for the
News
and this little episode was not the kind of publicity ICD needed.

“I’m most awfully sorry,” she began. “Obviously, if I’d had any idea…And she seemed such a nice woman as well. Anything I can do, in the circumstances…Of course. I remember her very well. And I have the details on computer, right here.”

The meeting lasted half an hour. Pascal and Gini were in Belgravia shortly after ten. It was raining again. Pascal parked the motorbike. They walked the length of Eaton Place twice before they admitted the obvious. The beautiful blonde claiming to be Mrs. J. A. Hamilton had given a plausible but false address. There was no 132 Eaton Place. They tried Eaton Square and Eaton Terrace without success. They returned once more to Eaton Place. The rain stopped, then started again.

“Merde,”
Pascal said, looking along the line of discreet, expensive white-stuccoed houses. “
Merde.
We might have known it. I’ll check the phone number that Hamilton woman gave—if her name
was
Hamilton, which I doubt. You try knocking on doors. Describe her, mention the coat. It’s worth a try. She could live in the neighborhood. Something might jog people’s memory.”

There was a telephone booth across the street. Pascal made for that. Gini walked slowly along the street. She examined the houses to the right and left. Their white façades were immaculate, their iron railings perfectly preserved. There were window boxes here, expensive curtains and shades, an atmosphere of affluence. A few minutes’ walk from the fashionable shops of Sloane Street, a brief taxi ride to Harrods or Harvey Nichols, it was the perfect address, no doubt carefully selected, for a woman delivering parcels dressed like a fashion plate in
Vogue.

An idea was coming to her, a route she could explore next. Meantime, she would try knocking on doors. She could see Pascal down the street, on the telephone, gesturing. When he had arrived at her apartment that morning, he looked tense and exhausted, and she wondered if he, as she had, had spent a wakeful night. Now, even at a distance, she could see the familiar energy returning. He seemed to be arguing with someone; she saw him slam down the receiver and redial. She smiled to herself, and turned into the gate of the end house. Like its neighbors, its paint was new, its curtains crisp.

Its owner finally answered on the third ring: a slender, well-dressed woman with short, dark hair.

“If it’s about the jumble sale,” she said rapidly, “you’re too late. I did ring and explain. We spent
weeks
waiting for you to collect them. Now I’ve taken them to Oxfam.
Including
the Ozbek evening dress which is really the most awful waste….”

“It’s not about the jumble sale,” Gini began.

“Oh, God, it’s not religious, I hope?” The woman looked harassed. “If you’re one of those Mormons, or those Witness people, I’m afraid it’s no good. We’re all C of E here.”

Gini explained. The woman looked inclined to close the door, but grew more interested as Gini described the coat.

“Sable? Good Lord…Tall and blond-haired?”

“Very recognizable.” Gini smiled. “We roomed together in college. She always was vague. Such an idiot, giving me the wrong address…”

The woman frowned. “Well, it could be one of the other Eatons, I suppose. There’s quite a few. Eaton Square, Eaton Terrace…”

“I know. I already tried them. No luck.”

“Well, we’ve lived here three years, and there’s certainly no one like your friend in this street. Actually, most of the neighbors are getting on—or foreign. You know how it is—oh, sorry, I don’t mean American.” She smiled. “Arab. Quite a lot of Japanese. That sort of thing.”

“Could she have stayed here some time—or visited?…”

“Well, of course, it’s always possible. Hamilton? No, I’m sure there’s no one of that name that I’ve met. Why don’t you try Lady Knowles across the street? She knows everyone. She’s lived here yonks….”

“Yonks” turned out to be thirty years, and Lady Knowles knew no resident by the name of Hamilton either. The description evoked no response. Gini tried five other houses, then returned to the bike. Pascal was astride it, the helmet under his arm. He looked gloomily up at the sky.

“Does it ever stop raining in this country?” he said.

“Not in January. No.”

“No luck?”

“None. A total blank, just as we expected. You?”

“Nothing. The number she gave doesn’t exist. No listing for any J. A. Hamilton, male or female, anywhere in London. So. That’s that.”

“Never mind. That girl at ICD was very useful. We’ve got an address for McMullen now.”

“In Venice.” Pascal sighed. “That’s three hours away, minimum—and I’ll bet he’s not there.”

“And Johnny Appleyard. I told you, I
know
Appleyard. I can always get hold of him.”

“He’s a gossip columnist?”

“No. Not really. A tipster for gossip columns, among other things. The kind who keeps in touch with Hollywood gynecologists so he can tell the
National Enquirer
a movie star’s pregnant about one hour before she gets the results of her tests.” Gini made a face. “A real creep.”

“Appleyard. Appleyard.” Pascal frowned. “Why send a parcel to him?”

“I don’t know. But I can call and ask him. He knows me. Jenkins is always using his stuff. I’ve talked to him on the phone several times. I’ve met him once—no, twice.”

“And McMullen? In Venice? In January? Why would he go there when Lise Hawthorne was so eager to keep him in London?”

“He might have connections in Venice. Besides, it’s a quiet place in winter. A good enough hiding place, if he wanted to disappear.”

“He hasn’t disappeared.” Pascal met her eyes. “Or not effectively enough. Someone knows where he is. And sent him a parcel. Just like us.” He ran his hands through his hair. The worried look returned to his face. “Who’s the puppet master?” he said. “I would like to know who’s pulling the strings. Someone is.”

“Who’s jerking us around, you mean?” Gini smiled. “No one perhaps. It could all be coincidence.”

“I think not. I feel maneuvered.” Pascal glanced away. Farther along the street, a black car pulled into the curb. Its engine was left running; no driver or passenger emerged.

“I feel watched.” Pascal frowned.

Gini shivered, and drew her coat tighter around her. She glanced toward the black car; she could just make out two occupants, a man and a woman. As she watched them, the man took the woman in his arms.