knew she could expect them to show towards the child.
Claudine didn’t attempt to contact Rosetti until after the weekend. When she failed to get a response from his apartment and found his answering machine turned off she called the medical division and was told that he’d taken leave for personal reasons, with no indication of a return date.
She was mildly unsettled by Blake’s dinner invitation but saw no reason to refuse. By coincidence he chose the restaurant by the lake to which Rosetti had taken her the first time they had gone out together.
‘It all got a bit hectic towards the end,’ he said. ‘How’s Hugo?’
‘He’s away, in Rome. His wife’s ill.’ Why was she offering explanations again?
‘Seriously?’
‘She won’t get better.’
‘Poor guy.’
‘Yes.’
‘You told me in Brussels you were lonely.’
‘Yes,’ she said again.
‘No reason why we shouldn’t be friends, is mere?’
‘No.’
‘Enjoy ourselves, without any serious commitment?’
‘No.’
‘Unless we wanted a serious commitment, that is.’
Why not? Claudine asked herself. The situation with Hugo was never going to resolve itself. And she’d decided she wasn’t going to wait for ever. ‘Why don’t we, just for a change, stop trying to analyse it and do just that. Enjoy ourselves?’
It was the third week of Rosetti’s absence – and Claudine’s affair with Blake – that the rumour began. Claudine heard it first from Kurt Volker, whose predilection for surfing into other people’s secret places made him a natural gossip. She was curious that he hadn’t already tiptoed down some darkened electronic alley to confirm it.
The Europol Commission did that at the beginning of the fourth week, in a formal announcement of Henri Sanglier’s resignation. It was timed to coincide with the Paris press conference at which Sanglier appeared flanked by Roger Castille and Guy Coty. Francoise, looking the epitome of French chic, was with him. There was a hugely enlarged photograph of Sanglier’s father being decorated by de Gaulle as a backdrop to remind television viewers of the family honour and Sanglier made an impressive vow to maintain that honour in a political career that had been declined by his father but he had decided to pursue. It was the cue for Castille to denounce the corruption of the present government that he would sweep aside in the coming election. Henri Sanglier, his intended Justice Minister, would be in the vanguard of every fight against crime, as he had been as the most famous of Europol’s governing commissioners.
It was only at the end of the televised conference that Claudine was reminded, annoyed that she hadn’t remembered it earlier. She actually considered telephoning Volker that night but decided there was no urgency. She did, however, call him as soon as she got into the Europol building the following morning.
‘I’m just tidying up my final report on the Mary Beth kidnap,’ she said.
‘I’ve already filed mine,’ said the German.
‘I was wondering about all that pornography you got in?’ she said, recalling the miniature bird tattoo on the thigh of a masked Francoise parading in Sanglier’s house.
‘What about it?’ asked Volker.
‘I know it’s hardly necessary to remind you, but the regulations are that it’s got to be destroyed. With all the chaos at the end I thought you might have overlooked it.’
‘No,’ said the German, unoffended. ‘I intended to.’
‘Intended?’
‘Sanglier asked for it all. When he said pornography was going to be his next priority I thought he meant here, in Europol. He meant when he becomes the French Justice Minister, obviously.’
‘Obviously,’ agreed Claudine.
Rosetti returned at the end of that week. He’d called from Rome, to warn her, and they met that night. It was virtually the only one she hadn’t spent with Blake.
‘Flavia died,’ he announced bluntly. ‘We actually thought there was going to be a recovery. Her eyes opened and there was some movement but it came down to muscle reflexes: even the squeezing of my hand.’
‘I’m sorry. So very sorry.’
‘The priest said it was for the best. So did the doctors. And they’re right.’
‘Yes.’
‘So now there’s us.’
Claudine didn’t reply.
‘I love you. I want to wait, obviously. Out of respect. But I’m asking you to marry me.’
‘Yes,’ said Claudine. ‘You should wait.’ Her period was already more than a week late. Now she didn’t think she should put off the pregnancy test any longer. That was the easy decision. The more difficult one was whether she still wanted to marry Hugo Rosetti.
