The Paris Key (34 page)

T
hat night, after writing an epic, overwrought entry in her journal (her mind racing with the possibilities), Genevieve called her brother, Nick. First they traded pleasantries: Genevieve asked about the turkey hatchlings, and Nick asked about Paris.

Finally she addressed her real reason for calling: “You were old enough to know things when Mom came back from Paris. Did Mom . . . do you remember when Mom was pregnant with me?”

“Do you mean when she came back from France, pregnant?”

Genevieve's hand was wrapped so tightly around the phone she was glad it was an old-fashioned landline, the heavy kind that could take a squeezing.

“Are you saying that she wasn't pregnant when she
left
for France?”

There was a pause. “I don't know, Gen. I mean, not one hundred percent. I was just a kid myself. But Dad said a few things over the years. . . . He loved her, you know. To the day he died. And he loved you.”

Genevieve's gaze rested on the piles of documents and bills on her uncle's desk. The paper effluvia of modern life that threatened to drown a person, but which, in the end, was meaningless.

Nick was still speaking.

“Listen, Gen, you always sort of idolized Mom. And I get that—you were just a kid when she died, after all. But she was . . . I don't think she was ever diagnosed or anything like that, but now when I look back on it, I think she might have had a problem with depression. Like, serious depression. Dad always said Mom wasn't really of this world, that she sort of existed on another plane.”

Genevieve thought of all those times Angela seemed to be looking elsewhere, the times she couldn't get out of bed.

“And for some reason, she seemed to feel that she had to pay penance. I mean, she loved us; she was a good mother; we had some good times together. And I was one of the few who loved those sugarless carrot muffins she used to make. But I don't know—neither you nor she ever seemed particularly happy here, right?”

“I don't think I was cut out for farm life.”

“Like everyone always said, I took after Dad; you took after Mom.”

“So, just to be very clear: Are you saying that maybe Dad . . . that maybe he wasn't my real dad?”

Another long pause. She could hear clucking sounds in the background and imagined Nick trying to keep the phone between his shoulder and his ear while he attended to his never-ending list of tasks: feeding animals, collecting eggs, tilling soil.

“I'm not saying that,” Nick said finally. “I really don't know the absolute truth. I sort of figured
you
did, that maybe that's why you moved to France.”

“How come you never said anything about any of this to me?” Genevieve asked, though she knew the answer. Nick wasn't like that, just like Jim; they didn't speculate. They didn't pry. They lived in the world in front of them, the here and now, and expected everyone around them to tend to their own business.

“What I
do
know is this,” Nick said. “Dad was your father as much as he was mine. He loved you, Gen. He raised you. He did well by you. In my book, that's what makes a dad, no matter the details of biology.”

After she hung up, Genevieve remained sitting at Dave's desk for a very long time.

Her dad—Jim Martin—had never made Genevieve feel as though she didn't belong. She had never felt less loved than Nick; there had been no favoritism. Genevieve had always felt like a misfit, but that was because of her own personality and dissatisfaction, not due to anything Jim had done, or
hadn't
done.

Details of biology.
They seemed like pretty important details, all things considered. Still, Nick was right: Jim had raised her; he was her dad. And he was a good father. Quiet, undemonstrative, but as steady as a rock.

In fact, what struck her more profoundly was what Nick said about their mother. At eight years Genevieve's senior, Nick had been twenty-two when Angela died. He had experienced her as an adult, had been able to understand her in a way the young Genevieve hadn't.

All those years Genevieve thought she had failed at making her mom happy. But . . . maybe there
was
no making Angela happy. At least, nothing a little girl could have done.

O
n the pretense of doing more work in Philippe's house, Genevieve returned to the basement and descended through the trapdoor to the catacombs. She made her way into the secret chamber, holding close her newfound knowledge about her mother and her suspicions about what had happened while she was in Paris.

She cast the flashlight beam around the little room, taking in the mural and the pile of clothes and the book from her uncle's collection.

Killian said he tried not to touch things when he crept around abandoned houses: His role was to photograph things just as they were. But Genevieve was not bound by such rules. Especially in this case.

She looked through the pile of clothes and spied the edge of an envelope sticking out from under a plaid shirt. She pulled it out.

There was a single name on the front:
Xabi.

Genevieve perched on the side of the cot, taking a moment to turn the envelope over in shaking hands before ripping it open.

In the envelope was money—U.S. dollars and old French francs—and a note.

Dear Xabi,

You are right: I have to return to my husband, to my son. To America. My place is there, with them.

I want you to know that you gave me grace, and light, and warmth. Our love has brought me new breath, new life. I don't think I will ever understand how I could feel such things with you; and I know I will never forget them. Just as I will never forget you.

We will live together, forever, in my memories.

Your Angel

Genevieve folded the note and put it back in the envelope. Turned out her flashlight. Allowed the inky blackness to flow over and around her, the silence complete and total. In the absence of sensation, her mind came up with images: a young Angela, flushed with excitement, gilded with candlelight; her handsome lover leaning toward her, sharing a glass of wine.

A sudden sound at the door made her start. She jumped up and snapped on her light.

Killian.

“You scared me to death!” Genevieve said, hand over her pounding heart.

“Sorry about that. You gave me a bit of a fright as well, I gotta say.”

“What are you doing here?”

“Philippe let me in on his way out. I found the trapdoor in the
cave
open, so I assumed you were down here. But then it was so dark I figured I was wrong. Hey . . . are you all right?”

Genevieve had stumbled back into the cramped chamber. The weight of the place was crashing in on her. Everything it might mean. Everything it
did
mean. She knew it in her soul.

“I'm just . . . I'm putting a few things together. About my mother. And . . . my father.”

“Down here?”

“It's a little complicated.”

The handsome terrorist, hiding from the authorities. Her wounded mother bringing him supplies. The tears she would have shed. The betrayal she must have felt.

“You said you think she was unhappy when she came to Paris?” said Killian. “That she might have been thinking of leaving your father?”

His voice was very gentle, filling the space, pushing the ghosts away. Genevieve had not realized until just that moment how alone she had felt and how comforting it was to have him there, his presence at her side.

She nodded. “But there's more. Remember the newspaper we found down here? About the bombing? An American tourist was hurt.”

“I don't understand. You think . . . was that your mother?”

She nodded.

“But what does this have to do with this room?”

“I think the man named in the paper, Xabier Etxepare, and my mother were lovers. Maybe she was trying to stop the bombing, something like that.” It was too much to think that her mother, Angela Martin, could have actually been party to the crime, wasn't it? Impossible. She, who had gone to rallies at San Quentin to protest the death of a stranger; who thought it was wrong to kill, no matter what.

It took a moment for Genevieve to realize that Killian hadn't replied. She looked up to see his gaze, troubled, lingering on her.

“You're saying your mother was involved with a terrorist?”

“No, of course not. I think . . . maybe there's another explanation.”

He was looking around the room now. Putting things together.

“So you're thinking they hid down here, afterward?”

“Maybe. He must have, anyway. Like I said, she was hurt in the explosion.”

“Was she charged?”

“What? Of course not. She wasn't
involved
in the bombing; she was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. In fact . . . maybe she went there that day because she was trying to stop it.”

A long pause. “Then who was helping him down here? Philippe?”

“No. He wasn't even in Paris at that time. My mother—Angela—was helping them pack up the house . . .”

“So your mother let him in? Helped him?”

“Why are you saying it like that? You didn't know her. She was the gentlest—”

“You told me yourself you have only a child's memories of her. Even terrorists can make caring parents, I imagine.”

A dark veil of shame and anger and pain settled over her. Genevieve wanted to turn off all the lights, to remain here in the dark of the anonymous chamber, alone. After a long moment, Killian let out a long breath that seemed to reverberate off the stone walls.

“I'm sorry, Genevieve. It's just . . . I'm Irish. The whole terrorism thing is a bit fraught for us. I had friends on both sides, and I know there are several sides to every story, but I've had enough of that crap to last more than a lifetime.”

Genevieve remained perched on the side of the iron bed. She found herself wondering: Was this what happened? Had her mother—sweet, depressed, anguished Angela Martin—actually taken up with a terrorist while in Paris and had a relationship with him? A relationship that had produced a child?

Killian was staring at her, awaiting her response. Leaning up against the wall, arms crossed over his chest.
Not taking pictures now,
Genevieve thought. Finally, something to stop that incessant clicking.

“We're talking about my mother,” she said, voice sounding hollow yet echoing off the walls. “Not some radical extremist. She couldn't have been involved in anything like that. She was from a little town in
Mississippi
,” she concluded, as though Angela's origin meant she must be an innocent in all of this.

“By way of California,” Killian said. “The area you're from in California is known for some pretty radical politics, Berkeley and all that. Especially back in the day.”

“Yes, but . . .” Genevieve thought of the faraway looks her mother would get when gazing out the kitchen window. Still, the idea of her mother taking part in something like this felt as unreal as Genevieve's own adolescent fantasies of returning from Paris a trained superhero.

But then again . . . would Genevieve ever have guessed that her biological father was anyone other than the silent, stoic Jim Martin?

Had Jim always been so somber? Or was it partly the result of the knowledge that his wife had had an affair in Paris, had become pregnant, and that his daughter was flesh of another man?

Pasquale had been saying as much, hadn't she?

Suddenly everything was falling into place. The strange, almost formal relationship between her parents—Angela and
Jim
, because Jim would always be her father no matter what. The argument between Dave and Angela, a disagreement so profound that it would lead to more than fourteen years of estrangement between beloved siblings. Her mother's secretive ways.

Had they all known about this?

Jim must have known. He must have. And Nick certainly hadn't seemed bowled over by her query, so he must have had an inkling, at least. Still, she was willing to bet neither man knew anything about Genevieve's biological father's involvement in a national incident.

Genevieve had wanted to know what Angela was like, not as a mother, but as a
woman
. And now she had found out.

“Be careful what you wish for.”

Killian broke into her reverie. “Listen, Genevieve, I didn't mean to say—”

“That's fine,” Genevieve cut him off. “Please, would you mind leaving me alone now?”

“Genevieve—”

“Please don't say anything more. You don't know me, you didn't know my mother, and you have no right to be here. The catacombs are
interdits
.”

“I—”

“
Go.
Please.”

•   •   •

G
enevieve remained in the tiny room for . . . how long was it? She lost track of time down in the dark. Breathing the musty, stale air. Imagining her mother coming to visit him here. At what point had her mother decided to return to the States? And how had she kept such a secret from Genevieve her whole life?

How
could
she?