The 13th Fellow: A Mystery in Provence (15 page)

“Here. Here. Here,” she repeated like an incantation. “All from Nashville. Nashville.” She placed the cigarette, holding only the tobacco end, the notes, and envelope beside the other hostile missive to her. Thierry noted the visible shaking of her hands.

“Kit had been threatened. Someone threatened him.”

He studied her for a moment longer. He looked over the evidence she presented, puzzling this entire Nashville connection. Her warning resembled the first two bold-lettered “STOPs” rather than the last note sent to Professor Beirnes. “Are you okay?”

She nodded. “I was going to tell you everything this morning.” She had a hangdog look on her face.

He tried for a combination of sternness and empathy. “You’ve been rather busy. I’ll need to make a few calls.”

Quickly, he arranged for the retrieval of all the evidence as well as the feed from the cameras in the lobby and elevators. There was only one way in and out of the hotel. Everyone passed through the lobby. Unfortunately, he had noted that there were no surveillance cameras on the individual hall floors. He would have never approved this hotel for high value assets. But he hadn’t selected these accommodations. Havilah Gaie had.

“They’ll be here in fifteen minutes to collect everything. Are you sure you’re okay? Havilah, did the professor smoke? Do you know who would have taken the trouble to send him these notes from Nashville?”

“Yes, I’m fine. Really. Kit smoked occasionally. Usually only to celebrate things. In the message he left me the night he was murdered, he said he had completed the proposal and his remarks for the Centennial. He said the work was
electrifying
. So yes. He may have smoked that evening,” she whispered. “I have no idea about the Nashville connection.” She was shaking her head now.

“The hotel is full. I will need to button you up, Havilah. Do you understand me?” He stared at her again.

He had already obliged the hotel’s manager to rebook someone else in order to secure his room. He knew his countrymen well enough that a second inconvenience, even for SPHP, would set off a round of shrugging and gesticulations before the onset of frostiness. These people, his people, had stormed the Bastille and staged strikes whenever the mood hit them. They had never been sufficiently intimidated by those hired to protect and serve. Indeed, quite the opposite. Another room, another hotel even, he knew would be impossible to secure in Cassis in June.

Havilah nodded up at him absently, her eyes beginning to tear up. She closed them for a minute and cleared her throat. “But if you shuttle me off now, how do you know they won’t come after me later? When I’m back in the U.S.? Wouldn’t it be better to force them out of the shadows?” Her eyes seemed to be pleading with him.

He ignored her reasoning for the moment. “Besides Laurent, who else knew where you were staying?”

“I only told Laurent, and I never told him my room number,” she said protectively. It was clear to him that she didn’t want him to draw a bullseye around her friend.

He knew her mind had to have also wandered in that direction. She obviously didn’t want to believe that Laurent, who probably knew a good deal about her undertakings since arriving in Cassis, could possibly be involved in this sordid business.

The agent looked at her as if reading her mind. “And yes, it would be better to force the killer out of the shadows. My task is to protect you, though. Not use you as bait.”

“Bait, a honeypot to lure a bear, or manna from the gods. Think of me however you want, but the way I see it, we don’t have a choice. I leave out of here in a tear, whoever did this just lies in wait for another opportunity. They know I know something. They don’t know how much, so they might just chance neutralizing me, just in case. So that makes me all yours, Agent Gasquet.”

She looked awkwardly in his direction, while she adjusted her bathing suit cover-up.

Thierry Gasquet knew Havilah Gaie was terrified now; but he also knew that she’d begin coloring outside the lines just as soon as the shock wore off. It was that determination that made his job of keeping her safe much harder. Her snooping had delivered some goods. He wondered how those investigating the crime scene had not recovered those notes and that cigarette.

He sighed.
What does a cigarette mean in France?

Nothing unusual.

“I need to make some inquiries discreetly at the front desk. We’ll change rooms for the evening.”

“Then can we swim? It will help me relax and think.” Her stomach growled loudly. Thierry wondered if it was genuine hunger or nerves.

“Followed by breakfast,” he responded. He could only imagine what giving her an opportunity to “think” would portend next.

They decided they would take the stairs. As they moved from the lobby to the terrace, they could see the hotel’s staff bustling about preparing the buffet for breakfast. Thierry motioned for Havilah to stop.

He asked casually if anyone had contacted the hotel about Mademoiselle Gaie. He explained that she was expecting a visitor last evening. A chorus of “Non, Monsieur” led to a dead end. The agent decided he would have his colleagues find out who worked the evening shift as well and make some inquiries. He then picked up four towels from the basket on the terrace.

“Pool?”

“No,” she said shaking her head vigorously.

A few curls took the opportunity to escape from her high ponytail. He followed Havilah to the property’s edge where they climbed down the ladder to a very large sandstone rock. In the distance, the rocks looked like golden sand.

Thierry opened their towels. Havilah, he thought, despite her entreaties to swim, just wanted to lie in the warmth of the sun for just a few minutes. She closed her eyes and he imagined she was trying not to think about anything but how good the rays felt against her skin. Thierry entered the cool, clear water.

* * *

After ten minutes, she went for a swim to cool off. The water was so clear you could see the marine life— the colorful fish and plants. She saw a small octopus. It scampered off as she swam in its direction. She and Thierry reached the rock’s edge at the same time. Havilah lifted herself back on the rock, letting her feet dangle in the cool water. She felt something around her ankle. She squeaked rather than screamed. Thierry jumped. And she pointed. The octopus had wrapped one of its dark tentacles around her ankle. She slapped its tentacle away. It went back into the water, only to place a tentacle around her other ankle.

“A persistent suitor. Ansell Neely, is that you?” The agent dove back into the water, smiling. Startled by the splashing water, the creature quickly disappeared into the sea.

Havilah giggled and then pulled her feet up and lay back on the sandstone rock to dry. Her mind was rapidly putting together different scenarios. Kit’s research was explosive. She had been able to put together a vague outline. He was going to sully the reputations of two very prominent men, their families, the Friedrichs and the Knowltons, and the foundations associated with them. The access to the grounds was another issue. And someone had seen her entering Kit’s apartment. She thought about the motives for the murder. The seemingly unflappable Lowery Jason was at the top of her most likely list. Then she thought that they all could have had a hand in killing Kit. Everyone had a stake, more or less. He had had 10 broken fingers— a lesson to the writer. Perhaps each broken finger represented one of the six, excluding her as the seventh, powerful board members. They had reputations to uphold. Laurent snapped a pinkie because Kit would have ruined the reputation of the foundation; Salazar because he would no longer be able to live in a villa on the Mediterranean, and the cleaning woman who discovered the body snapped a digit because she would have been out of a job. Améline snapped the last pinkie because Kit squelched on the job offer. The imagined conspiratorial scenario was like the denouement of
Murder on the Orient Express
. Havilah shook her head vigorously at the absurdity of her mind’s machinations.

Thierry, who had swum up a few minutes earlier, was lying down on a towel beside her. He rolled over on his side. She sensed he was studying her though her eyes were closed and she was wearing sunglasses.

“You are thinking over all the angles?”

“Yes,” was all she offered. And then she shot up into a seated position.
A bluff. A bluff
.

She asked Thierry if he was ready for breakfast.

* * *

“I don’t think I need to tell you to be as composed as the situation calls for. I’ll take a walk around the Académie to make sure everything is fine. Then I’ll pick you up at 10:30.” He glanced down at his watch. “It’s 8:40.”

She nodded nervously at first. She was collecting her thoughts and glanced down at the meeting agenda: laptops and the centennial celebration. She looked over at the agent, who was dressed casually in khaki cargo pants, a flattering loose-fitting shirt, and leather sandals. His hair was slightly damp and he was beginning to sprout a five o’clock shadow. She wondered how he knew the meeting was scheduled for 90 minutes. She didn’t ask. When he walked her to the Académie’s library, she remembered once again:
Bluff
.

XVIII

Havilah was still a little early for the meeting; not everyone had arrived when she walked into the library. She counted 6, including Laurent, seated around the longish table in the middle of the room. Laurent introduced her to Jean-Luc Cabassol. She smiled and nodded to rat bastard Lowery Jason, cane-wielding Ellis Wise, odious Donovan Betts, and odd Celestine Valens. She took a seat next to Laurent.

“Would you like something to drink? We have coffee, tea, and bottled water.”

“I’ll take some water. Where is it?”

“No, let me.”

Laurent rose to go downstairs. When he returned with a bottle of Perrier in his hand, he was followed by a very lean, light-complexioned woman with thick, long, professionally straightened dark brown hair with bands of red-gold highlights. She wasn’t pretty, but she was undeniably striking and sensual, with black-brown eyes. She wore very tight white jeans with an expensive loose top and jewelry. She wasn’t as tall as Havilah, only slightly taller than Améline Fitts, but her bejeweled high-heeled shoes gave her the illusion of length. Her Hermès scarf and green tea leather handbag made her look as if she had stepped out of the pages of Vogue.

Sophie Fassin
? Havilah wondered.

“Sophie is here, everyone. It’s so good to see you,” Laurent said to the newcomer, confirming Havilah’s guess. He gave Sophie
deux bises
.

Everyone stood up as if to part the sea for this sweet-smelling, brown Titian maiden.

“Let me introduce you to Havilah Gaie. She’s our newest board member.”

“Bonjour, Havilah.” Her voice was very soft and feminine.

“Bonjour, Sophie.” Havilah smiled brightly as she rose to greet her.

Havilah decided Sophie’s pretty, dainty ways must have made men and women swoon. In the U.S., she would have been mistaken for black and presumed to be African-American and she would certainly have corrected that assumption. She was all
française.
Havilah was often described as thin to lean, but next to this well put-together, delicate woman in tight jeans, she felt Amazonian. Sophie was no more than a size 34, US size 4, with the narrowest possible hips and small, pert breasts. She was
typiquement Parisienne.
Havilah immediately plopped her 5’9”,
typiquement Américaine
size 8, ta-tas galore self down in a chair.

Laurent began the meeting by saying they would address the unfortunate events last so that they could get through item one on the agenda: furnishing laptops to fellows. He had already provided various updates on the Centennial via email in order to avoid a drawn out report at the meeting so there was little left to the June agenda. Havilah would wait for an opening.

After a boring twenty minute back and forth about laptops, Donovan Betts made a motion to put the agenda item to a vote, which was seconded by Laurent. The Félibrige Foundation would have a few loaner laptops on-site and an upgraded computer facility despite objections from the ill-humored, tightfisted treasurer Lowery Jason.

Betts then turned solemn, as he suggested the board move on to the pressing agenda item.

“Do the police have any leads, Laurent?”

“Not as far as I can tell. The news of the murder has spread quickly. I am glad the Centennial events begin in town. However, we do need to figure out what to do about Havilah’s opening on Wednesday at the Académie. And of course we have the problem of Kit’s opening for the “An American in Cassis, an exhibition of paintings and watercolors.”

“I think we should just allow the exhibit to go forward with no commentary. After all, it’s not on any printed program that he was going to offer some remarks. Thank God. It would have caused a horrible sensation around the exhibit. Dead man talking and all that,” Donovan thundered. He then grinned at what he thought was a witticism.

His remarks produced a light tittering from the direction of Jason and Wise.

Havilah was put out by Donovan Betts’ sheer impudence and classlessness. Kit had not been well liked by any of these men. And with the exception of Laurent, she did not like or trust anyone in the room. As far as she was concerned, any one of them could have been responsible for threatening her this morning.

“I’m glad you brought that up, Laurent. Since I was not on a printed program either, I think you should do the welcoming on Wednesday at the exhibit. I would like to give Kit’s written remarks in his stead on Thursday as planned. It’s the least we can do. It would be in bad taste to do otherwise. We can’t simply ignore the death of our colleague. The entire Aix-Cassis-Marseille corridor is abuzz.” She looked around the table to gauge expressions.

“I think it is a lovely idea,” said Jean-Luc Cabassol.

“That is a terrible suggestion. Who cares about taste, bad or good? It would be a circus. Surely Charlie would not approve,” yelled the red-faced Betts. His fists were in a ball.