Murder in Nice (16 page)

The giant plane trees lined the road, their
overhead boughs thick with cool green leaves, shading her as they
had shaded the marching Roman soldiers, and of course the advancing
German army in the last war.

Is there a single place in
the States that can transport you back into time like
this
? she thought, her heart already lifted
and buoyant.
A single place that can make
you feel both light and free and yet entrenched in
history?

The bridge was visible from the last
graceful turn she negotiated and Grace backpedaled to slow her
speed. She saw a car coming toward her so she coasted to a stop on
the side of the road. When it passed, she rode slowly around the
sharp turn, and the entrance to the village opened up immediately
on the other side.

From here she could see Le Canard, the café
facing the ancient stone square, which was punctuated by a fountain
that didn’t work and a trio of mammoth plane trees cemented right
into the square itself. Across from Le Canard, she saw Laurent’s
car.

So he did come to the
village.
Grace glanced at the terrace of
umbrella tables in front of Le Canard as she rode past. She had no
reason to think he would look at a woman on a bike. They were not
uncommon in and around St-Buvard, although the riders were usually
in their seventies. Grace rode to the front of the
tabac
that anchored the
opposite side of the square and parked her bike. She felt flushed
from her accomplishment.

Who needs a car? Who needs
a taxi?
She smiled at the proprietor of
the
tabac,
who
watched her enter with stark surprise and then moved to look behind
her as if he expected to see a saddled elephant tied up out front.
Grace slipped into the side room of the
tabac
and took a seat at the window.
There was no coffee or
cocas
on offer here—not with Le Canard a mere thirty
steps away—but the French liked to rest and reflect, Grace thought.
There would always be a spot to sit and think even if one’s hand
wasn’t filled with a drink.

She squinted at the busy café across the
street. Laurent was unmistakable anywhere he went. Too large to be
hidden, true, but also because he carried himself with the affect
of someone who didn’t care who saw him.

I wonder how that worked
during his years as a conman
, Grace found
herself musing.

She quickly picked him out of the group of
patrons seated at one of the six outdoor tables of Le Canard. She
frowned. She hadn’t expected him to be alone. Laurent was very
popular in the village, spending half his time exchanging kisses
and handshakes with literally every person he met. So she wasn’t
surprised to see he was with someone.

She just hadn’t expected that someone to be
so beautiful.

Grace had never seen her before. She was
clearly French, although Grace couldn’t put into words how she knew
that exactly. Perhaps it was her easy elegance and nonchalant way
she wore her beauty, perhaps it was the comfort with which she
spoke to Laurent and the waiter when he appeared with their
drinks.

This can’t be what I’m
seeing
. Grace was stunned when the woman
leaned over and placed her hand on Laurent’s arm—in a way that
indicated it wasn’t the first time she’d done it.
There’s no way this is what I’m
seeing
.

Laurent was partially hidden from view by a
table of boisterous village men but Grace had a clear line view of
the woman. Grace knew a little something about the body language of
women on the prowl.

This cat was hunting.

Maggie, where the hell are you? You need to
be home dealing with this, not prancing around the Côte d’Azur
looking for closure for someone else’s problems!

She felt a light tap on her
shoulder, and when she turned she saw the
tabac
proprietor’s wife standing there
with a stern look on her face.

“
Are you here to buy
something, Madame?” she asked acerbically.

So much for the French attitude of
reflection and rest, Grace thought as she got up from the seat with
as much dignity as she could muster. She’d forgotten to bring any
money.

“
Non,
merci
,” she said haughtily and exited. She
released the kickstand on the bike and pointed it back out of the
village, glancing briefly at Le Canard before she climbed
on.

The woman was gone but her purse still
remained at the table so she would be back. Laurent was studying a
paper in his hands, oblivious to his surroundings. Grace saw a thin
curl of smoke rising from the ashtray in front of him.

She rode past the café, her head turned
away, and already felt a light perspiration forming on her upper
lip. It had been an easy downhill coast most of the way to the
village. Clearly, the return trip was going to be a different
ride.

*****

The sea sparkled like glittering glass,
Maggie thought. No wonder the world’s rich and celebrated chose
Saint-Tropez as their personal paradise. Even today with the
glamour of its fabled past well behind it and the encroachment of
an unbroken string of t-shirt kiosks lining its main drag, nothing
could detract from the natural beauty of the water—so blue it
looked like a shimmering cerulean mirror.

And as exquisite as the picture before her
was, her stomach still roiled painfully when she called to mind
Haley’s bruised face.

He was hitting her. Her brother.

And everybody on this tour knew it.

Who are you, Ben? What happened to you?

When her phone rang, Maggie jumped as if
she’d been goosed. A quick glance at the screen showed it was
Annie. Maggie hesitated, tempted to let the call go to voicemail.
She had nothing to tell Annie and she didn’t feel up to lifting
someone else’s spirits.

“
Hey, Annie,” she said
brightly into the phone. She saw Desiree appear at the entrance of
the restaurant where they’d just had lunch and motion for Maggie to
come. It must be time to leave for Cassis. “What is it, eight
o’clock your time?”

“
Hello, dear,” Annie said.
“Yes, just a bit after. Where are you today?”

“
Saint-Tropez.”

“
Oh, that’s nice. I was
wondering if you have any news about…anything?”

Maggie sighed. This whole trip was a waste
of time. Except for discovering that her brother was a wife beater,
she hadn’t learned a single new bit of information. “There really
isn’t much, Annie,” she said. “Except a confirmation that just
about everyone here on the tour was seriously jealous of
Lanie.”

“
You mean,
professionally?”

“
Uh, yes.”

“
I suppose that’s not
surprising.”

“
You know, I have to say,
it’s starting to look like Olivier isn’t such a bad choice as a
suspect after all.”

“
But then why would he
agree to take the DNA test?”

“
Just because he was
convinced the baby was his doesn’t mean he didn’t…you
know.”

There was a brief pause. “I really
appreciate you doing this, Maggie and I know you could be home with
your baby, so if you want to call it quits I completely
understand.”

“
It’s just that there
doesn’t seem to be anything to find out,” Maggie said. Desiree was
gesturing more vividly now, her whole face was flushed with her
obvious annoyance at Maggie not coming immediately when
called.

“
No, I understand. Did you
get a chance to talk to the maid at the hotel?” Annie
asked.

Now Desiree was stomping over to Maggie.

“
The maid?”

“
I can’t believe I forgot
to tell you,” Annie said. “One of the maids approached me as I was
leaving and was trying to tell me something. I guess I was
distracted by everything that day.”

“
Sure, you would
be.”

“
Do you think you might
call and find out what it was all about?”

“
Is there a reason why you
think you’re so important you can keep all of us waiting like your
pathetic servants or slaves back where you come from?”

Maggie looked into Desiree’s twisted face.
“Are you serious?” she asked the Frenchwoman coolly.

“
Maggie?” Annie said on the
phone.

Without taking her eyes off Desiree, Maggie
said to Annie. “I’ll check with the hotel in Nice and find out what
the maid wanted, Annie, and then call and let you know, okay?”

“
Thank you, dear. And God
bless you.”

After she hung up, Maggie put her phone in
her bag and stood. “My goodness, Desiree. It would be a shame to
pee yourself in one of the most glamorous places on earth.”

*****

An hour later, Maggie was
sitting in a boat in the
Massif des
Calanques
, an inlet running along a
twelve-mile stretch of beach that ran all the way to Marseille. She
had spent the car ride to Cassis staring daggers at Desiree and
concomitantly trying to mull over what possible news a maid could
have wanted to pass on to Annie. Twenty minutes into the ride, she
called the hotel but was told it was hotel policy not to reveal the
names of their employees on the telephone.

“
Beautiful Cassis,” Desiree
intoned from where she stood at the helm of the small boat. “Home
to the
Calanques
,
steep-sided valleys enclosed by majestic limestone cliffs that are
actually Mediterranean fjords.”

Maggie sat opposite Jim and Janet Anderson
in the small six-person boat. Dee-Dee and Desiree stood at the head
of it taking turns steering and presenting their recited tours.

When Desiree finished the first part of her
spiel, she sat down and reached for a water bottle. She looked at
Maggie. “Because our program does not target armchair travelers,”
she said, “Bob insists we hike or kayak to many of the Côte
d’Azur’s special destinations spots. He is very attentive to the
true French experience.”

“
I notice he isn’t hiking
with us today.”

“
He has done this tour many
times. The first time I saw him was on his show. He was standing at
the tip of the
Calanque
d’En-Vau
, stripped to the waist, explaining
how the sea level would rise—”

“
Where was the mic
clipped?” Maggie asked.

“
Comment
?” Desiree turned to her in exasperation.

“
Well, you said he was
stripped to the waist. I was just wondering—”

“
There was a boom
mic.”

“
Oh, sure. I can see that.
On a ledge of a fjord. Wow. No wonder he’s the best. That’s some
good television.”

“
I don’t need to be fluent
in your language, Madame, to comprehend your sarcasm.”

“
Oh, I think you are
totally fluent in my language, Desiree.”

Desiree bristled and turned to face the
Andersons, who were gripping the side of the small boat with
matching grimaces on their faces. Janet wore a broad-brimmed straw
hat in clear hopes of avoiding the sun. Jim just winced into the
light with a let’s-get-this-over look on his face.

“
For many travelers to this
area,” Desiree said, standing again and addressing the little
group, “the most
calanque
merveilleux
is the
Calanque d’En-Vau,
which is an easy
two-hour hike that—”

“
Is she supposed to use
French words?” Dee-Dee said loudly. She held her phone to her mouth
as if it were a walkie-talkie. “Bob? Desiree is using a mixture of
American and French words.”

“
Tell Desiree to stick to
the script,” Randall said over the phone’s speaker. Maggie could
hear the noise in the background of wherever he was. Sounded like a
bar.

Desiree gave Dee-Dee a sour look and then
readdressed the Andersons and Maggie as the facsimile of her
someday TV audience.

“
The most
extraordinary
calanque
," she said, "is often considered to be the
Calanque d’En-Vau,
which
is an easy two-hour hike that plummets to a thrilling and quite
steep descent to the beach below.”

“
Like hell I’m going on
that mother,” Jim said flatly.

Desiree sat down in the boat with a thud. “I
cannot believe I must do this without a cameraman,” she said. “I
could kill that stupid Olivier for his selfishness!”

Before Maggie had a chance to react, she
heard a violent splash and a startled squawk. She twisted in her
seat to see Dee-Dee standing at her seat in the boat, pounding her
fists against her thighs in fury and frustration.

“
Damn duck!” she screamed.
“He bit me! Did you see that? Goddamn him!”

What Maggie saw when she turned to the
vortex of churning water off the side of the boat was a flurry of
feathers and bursts of foam. She held her breath, hoping she
wouldn’t see blood, too. Bobbing on top of the maelstrom of
agitated, escaping duck, was a sparkly periwinkle blue cell phone
case that quickly submerged and sank from sight. Maggie looked at
Dee-Dee, who was now shaking her fist at the wounded animal—her
omnipresent blue cell phone nowhere in evidence.

These people are insane.