The 13th Fellow: A Mystery in Provence (21 page)

XXVI

Ansell began to maneuver the boat recklessly. He thought he had made a clear departure for another inlet until he saw Thierry Gasquet behind him in another souped-up inflatable boat. He had unfortunately bought the “old friend from Paris” story because Gasquet had been elegantly attired in black civilian clothing when Neely first saw him and Havilah leaving her apartment in Paris with the uniformed officer. He had initially hoped to beguile the lovely Havilah with his charm; but the police had obviously arrived at her Paris apartment first. And throughout these past few days in Cassis, he had still hoped to romance her into forgetting about this Kit business, but that bothersome Thierry Gasquet stood in the way of those plans. He now understood that Gasquet was with law enforcement. The boat had the insignia of the French National Police and was flying the French flag whose colors were flashed into view from the helicopter’s aerial lighting.

He reached for his waterproof knapsack. He had made it to the seventh inlet, Sugiton. He turned around, heading back towards the open water, only to veer the boat towards one of Sugiton’s cliffs. Ansell Neely jumped out and off the front of the boat into the waves of cool water.
The Errant Lover
crashed into a craggy side and exploded. Neely knew the terrain well, even at night. He ran up the small sandy beach towards the Grand Randonnée 8, the switchback-filled footpath that led to the port city of Marseille. He shed his wet clothes and put on the dry ones in the knapsack. He tossed the clothes into the night. He assumed he would have had a fairly large head start on the police. He had estimated that it would be at least morning before they discovered they could not locate his remains from the explosion. He would be in Marseille in less than five hours, where a small, chartered plane scheduled for Marrakesh would be waiting. To better navigate the footpath, he turned on the MagLite flashlight that he had used to incapacitate Kit Beirnes.

* * *

Thierry Gasquet watched the explosion from a safe distance. He couldn’t believe it had ended with Neely crashing into the cliffs. In his mad dash, the professor had obviously underestimated how close he had been to the cliff walls. Gasquet guided his boat at a safe distance around the wreckage to the shore. Other police boats followed his example. The bright lights from the two overhead helicopters were like nearly blinding spotlights. He put his hand up to his forehead and squinted into the dark Mediterranean. He heard one of the officers call for divers for Neely’s body and a clean up crew to attend to the floating debris and spillage.

“Hervé!” Gasquet called out after three hours into the clean up.

“
Oui?
” the English-speaking mouse-faced lieutenant responded absentedly.

“
Regardes!
” the agent shouted and pointed. Gasquet ran his flashlight up the sandy beach. There were fresh impressions that shouldn’t have been there because of the tide.

“
Si, si, je les vois!
” a different officer yelped, rapidly nodding his head and acknowledging that he too saw the impressions.

The three of them ran up the beach. At the entrance to the forested footpath, they saw men’s clothing.

“Marseille!” Hervé barked.

“
Oui
. Marseille-Luminy. There’s an airstrip there. We need one of the helicopters.
Allez
!
Allez-vite
!” Thierry shouted to the officers.

* * *

He was winded but he was almost there. Ansell Neely had hatched an alternate escape plan two days earlier after he’d overheard the conversation between Améline Fitts and Havilah Gaie at the dinner. He had taken the
Errant Lover
out late Monday evening and Tuesday morning and run her at full speed. He’d chosen his place of disembarkment and had his supplies packed. He would have taken Sophie. However, Ansell Neely was not especially bothered that she had been left behind. He had grown tired of their tortured relationship, her withholding of affection, her pettiness. She was tempestuous and spoiled.

He tapped his watch. It lit up blue.
60 minutes to go.
He’d been at it three hours and thirty minutes. The footpath was treacherous at night with its switchbacks, swelled tree roots that extended onto the narrow path, and the stray rocks that occasionally tripped him up and slowed him down. He felt a light stinging in his hands and face; sweat dripped into the thin scratches made by the unwieldy branches of the Aleppo pines.

* * *

The officers landed the helicopter at the airstrip in Marseille-Luminy. Thierry was relieved when he saw a small plane. Its lights were dimmed and the door was opened, awaiting its passenger. He knew it was about four hours by foot in daylight to Marseille on the hiking path. Ansell Neely, from what he had observed, was fit. Even without the assistance of daylight, Thierry figured Neely could make the route in that time, give or take thirty minutes. He now had to assume the murderous professor had practiced the route given his elaborate back up plan with the chartered plane. Neely, it seemed, had left very little to chance.

The agent directed two officers to the conveyance to question the pilot, while he and Hervé trotted towards the GR8 footpath’s terminus.

“
Regardes-toi! Écoute!
” Hervé whispered sharply and impatiently as he tapped Thierry’s shoulder. He pointed in the direction of the flashes of light through the foliage and the sound of rustling leaves.

Thierry nodded. Suddenly the light was gone and the rustling stopped. A dark figure emerged slowly from the forest.

“Monsieur Ansell Neely, arrêtez-vous!” Hervé shouted and passed his flashlight quickly over the professor-poet.

Neely turned and scurried back onto the GR8. Thierry Gasquet followed. The agent aimed his gun into the darkness and moved deliberately on the footpath. The path was unobstructed and wider at this end; he could barely feel the worn tree trunks underneath his feet and the trees and bushes seemed to turn away from the path. He figured that he was probably a minute or two behind Neely. He held his small penlight steady, the light’s tiny circumference making bright dots on the rocks and the pine trees along the way. He was closer to Neely than he initially guessed, only a few paces behind, it seemed, when he saw a bright round light clearing the murderer’s path. The path went dark. He heard a voice call out.

“Thierry Gasquet, is that you out for a night hike?”

The agent didn’t respond. He was trying to orient himself in the direction of the voice given the switchbacks. When he found it, he began creeping slowly towards Neely.

“I know it’s you. I had hoped to get the diversion past you, Officer Gasquet. It seemed I nearly had. It was quite an explosion, wasn’t it?”

“Yes it was,” Gasquet responded, only because the voice seemed to shift directions.

Ansell Neely was clearly in a garrulous mood.

“When did you suspect me?”

“Monday after the dinner.”

“That soon? What gave me away?” he snorted rather loudly.

“Besides Améline, you were the only Félibrige alumni in France. You lied about just arriving from Austin, Texas. You landed in Paris the week before and then disappeared. You were also on the flight from Avignon to Paris-Beauvais the night Professor Beirnes was killed.”

* * *

Sophie
, he spat in fit of pique. She had assured him that his name would not be on the passenger manifest. She had obviously intended to use his being an accomplice as future protection.

“That’s all circumstantial evidence, as we say in courts of law in the United States. It was all Sophie anyway. She was responsible for the hit and run on that agent in New York. She has a mean streak, that one. I never intended to harm anyone.”

Thierry was silent. “You certainly harmed Professor Lathan Beirnes.”

“You are quite ungrateful, Officer Gasquet. I’ve provided you a juicy piece of the puzzle.”

“No, you’ve just implicated your errant lover in a crime because she implicated you,” he responded.

Neely was stunned to silence for a moment. “How did you know about the boat?”

He wondered what trail of breadcrumbs Sophie had left to lead the police to the
calanques
and the boat.

“Your book of poetry.
The Errant Lover
just happened to be registered to a Sophie Daniel, otherwise known as Sophie Fassin, daughter of Georges-Guillaume Daniel Damas. And the GPS tracker on Professor Gaie’s cell phone led to the sea where you evidently threw it out from the boat. Professor Gaie also called me. I heard her call out Sophie and your name.”

“I didn’t anticipate Havilah’s wiliness. It’s Professor Gaie now, is it? Had I had as much time with her as you, we would have surely been on a first name basis.”

Neely was pissed about Havilah Gaie’s theatrics in the harbor. He had been improvisational but clearly not before Havilah had the opportunity to turn on her tracking device and call Mister Frenchie. He hadn’t even seen her making a phone call. And certainly he hadn’t thought the technology could be traced in the sea. He should have disassembled the damn thing before tossing it.

* * *

The usually cautious agent lurched in Ansell Neely’s direction, brushing up against a tree. He saw Neely turn upon hearing his approach. The professor-poet fired a shot, grazing Gasquet’s arm. He then scurried down the footpath, shaking branches and rustling leaves in his wake. Despite the injury, Gasquet pursued Neely through the shadows. He could see a glimmer of blue from Neely’s watch in the distance. He squeezed off a shot. Neely stumbled. He fell. Gasquet heard Neely’s gun explode and hit the ground with a loud thud. The stray bullet hit the professor. Neely let out a whoop and then moaned.

The agent flashed his penlight in the professor’s eyes. “I need a doctor, you French bastard,” he snarled.

XXVII

Thierry called for the emergency service and Hervé, whose radio he had heard in snatches in the forest. He inspected Neely’s wounds. A shot to the ankle, and the second stray bullet hit his calf on the opposite leg. He could neither stand nor walk.

“You’ll live,” Thierry told him as he ripped the professor’s pant legs to create ties at the wounds to staunch the bleeding.

“Hey! These pants are expensive,” Neely protested.

Thierry slightly increased the pressure on the ties, which had the effect of making Neely whimper in pain.

Hervé had arrived. He stood over Neely, who was trying to loosen the ties.

“We need his gun,” Thierry explained.

“
Oui, je vais le chercher
,” the officer ran his flashlight up and down a bush or two. “I shall look for it,” he repeated in the British-accented English he’d obviously learned in a European international school.

“Professor Neely, I’d like to pick up where you left off. Sophie has been in police custody for,” Thierry looked at his watch, taunting the murderer, “over four hours. I am certain her version of events will vary greatly from yours.” The professor’s silence told the agent that he was contemplating his options.

“You have to believe me when I say it wasn’t personal. None of it,” the panic level in Neely’s voice raised a pitch though it had not replaced his peculiar brand of pomposity. “I only sought to protect a noble family legacy,” he continued to reason. “I hadn’t meant to kill that preening prick of a professor. Things had gone too far and then one thing led to another. I had only meant to warn the fool.”

“That tells me nothing except that you are a killer with a self-serving motive.” Thierry sighed with exhaustion. They’d been at this hide and seek game since the chase on the high seas.

“It was Sophie,” Neely said almost desperately.

“Yes, so I’ve heard from you the second time in the wee hours of this morning.” He frowned at the prostrate professor through the darkness.

“You must understand Sophie wanted to giftwrap the prime minister post for her father
and
,” he emphasized, “keep her Daddy-financed gravy train going.”

“So the devil, Sophie Fassin, made you do it? How?”

“Let me walk you through it, Hercule Poirot.”

“I’m French not Belgian.” Thierry could see Neely gesticulating wildly up against a rock in a kind of ‘
whatever, as I was saying
’ gesture.

“Sophie arranged the flights, trains, and car rental. I arrived in Paris a week earlier as you discovered,” Neely harrumphed, “and then promptly took a train to Switzerland to meet Sophie. We knew the foundation would be quiet on a Sunday evening. No foot traffic from the help staff. And of course, we also knew Laurent liked to go to his condominium in Marseille over the weekends to get away from the Cassis tourists. So after a week in Zurich, I boarded a private jet from Switzerland to Avignon late Sunday afternoon, after which I took the 5:36 direct TGV from Avignon to the St. Charles Station in Marseille—a thirty-five minute ride. At the Marseille train station, I retrieved a one-way vehicle rental and then drove the thirty minutes to Cassis. I was in Cassis by 6:45. I parked near the foundation and watched and waited until the night rolled in. I watched him leave and then return. I used the pass code to enter the grounds and waited near his apartment.”

Neely paused and cleared his throat. “Might I have something to drink?”

Thierry radioed for Hervé to bring a bottle of water from the helicopter. They were still awaiting the emergency services unit.

“I thought I was going to have to roust Kit in his apartment,” Neely continued. “But he made it easy for me when he came out and began smoking. Can you believe he violated our foundation rules about smoking? That right there made him deserving of something, wouldn’t you agree?”

Neely waited for affirmation on the point. When he didn’t receive it, he soldiered on in a monotone voice as if he were reviewing the night of the murder on a highlight reel in his head. “I watched him smoke almost to the end of the cigarette. I figured I’d let the poor fellow enjoy himself a bit. I whacked him with that flashlight,” he pointed to his bag, “from behind while he was watching the stars from the Perched Terrace. The first blow stunned him, but he didn’t go down; instead he wobbled and I struck him again. He fell fairly hard, but he was breathing evenly. His eyes were shut. He wouldn’t have recognized me anyway in the darkness and I was also wearing black with sunglasses, a hat, and rubber gloves. I dragged him to the Greek Theatre. His shoe came off in my hand. It was made-to-measure John Lobb. Kit always had exquisite taste.