knowing what your son did? Could you imagine bearing that? Could you imagine your wife bearing that?”
It was too much, and Sherlock wanted to kick herself. If they were innocent, she had caused needless pain for these grieving parents.
Estelle waved a fist at them, the diamonds glittering madly off a huge ring on her right hand. “You listen to me. What our son did or did not do, none of it is important any longer. Jean David is dead, do you hear me? He is dead! All his thoughts, his deeds, his beliefs dead, drowned in a tragic accident—your damned Coast Guard couldn’t even find him! And none of it would have happened if Dr. MacLean had kept quiet, as a doctor is supposed to do.
“Let me tell you, doctors in France are discreet, they do not preach. They do not make threats or issue ultimatums! But here? Obviously nothing is sacred here. The ethics of your American doctors, well, they have none, their behavior is inexcusable.”
THIRTY-SIX
Someone found out that Timothy had spoken to his friend Arthur Dolan, and Dolan conveniently died. A coincidence? Savich didn’t believe in coincidence. But how could the Barbeaus have found out about it?
He said, “You are right that Dr. MacLean spoke to several people about your son. Are either of you interested in knowing
Estelle said, “We are not interested in any paltry excuses. The man is an abomination. We want you to leave now. We have nothing more to say.” She jumped to her feet. Her husband, however, remained seated, rolling the Diet Coke can between his hands.
Savich said, “The last attempt on Dr. MacLean’s life was a bomb placed on board a plane. He survived, barely.”
Estelle shrugged. “What is this? A bomb? We know nothing of any bomb. We do not care what happens to him.” She picked up a framed photo from a side table and waved it in front of their faces. “This is our son. This is Jean David. An elegant, brilliant boy, good, so very good. Look at him! He will never grow older, he will never have a wife and children.”
He was indeed a handsome man, Sherlock thought, studying the photo. Dark hair, deeply tanned, his smile beguiling and utterly charming, his father’s dark eyes shining out of his face. Such a waste, she thought, such a waste.
Savich decided not to tell them about MacLean’s disease. He knew it wouldn’t matter. It would mean less than nothing to them. He said, knowing it was a very risky roll of the dice, “Mr. Barbeau, I have read your statement to the authorities about the day your son drowned after saving you. After some dithering, it was determined to be a tragic accident. However”—he paused for effect— “however, I know that is not the truth. Please tell me what really happened that day.”
Pierre grew very still, and Savich thought,
When Estelle would have spoken, Pierre raised his hand to quiet her, shrugged, and said, “Why does it matter now? I say it no longer matters at all, nothing matters now that he is dead. Why not? I will tell you all of it.”
Estelle stared at her husband. “What are you planning? No. Pierre?”
“I’m sorry, Estelle, but I knew it would come out eventually. And now, I’m tired, very tired, you see.” He held up his hand to his wife once again and repeated, “It does not matter, Estelle. Agent Savich, Jean David did not die an accidental death.”
Savich said, his heart racing at a fine clip, “Tell us what happened, sir.”
Pierre raised his head, his face leached of color, but surprisingly, his voice was strong and steady. “My son came to me, told me what he’d done, asked me to help him. He knew, you see, knew his superiors would figure out soon enough he was the one responsible. I could not believe it. He gave me the details, convinced me. I told him I had to think about it.
“Two days after he asked me for help, I told him I’d spoken to Timothy, and I told him what he advised us to do, then I told Jean David of his threats. My son looked at me for a very long time, silent, and it broke my heart. He told me that he, just as I, must think about it. He left me. I feared he would try to escape but he did not. I am not lying to you. He did not.
“Two days later, on Friday, he asked me if I would like to go fishing, even though the weather was getting worse.
“And so we fished for striped bass in the Potomac, something we’d done many times, a ritual, a special time for us, to be together. But that day we really weren’t fishing, we were silent for the most part, both of us in misery. I was afraid, Timothy’s ultimatum rang in my mind. I finally broke the silence, told him I didn’t know what to do. I loved him, but what he had done—I had to tell him I couldn’t imagine his getting fooled so completely by that woman. And once again, I shook my head and told him I did not know what to do.
“Jean David leaned over and kissed me. He sat back, his fishing pole in his hand, and said he’d thought about it and decided he was going to kill himself, it was the only way, and that was why he’d wanted to come out in this storm. He told me he couldn’t live with what he’d done, you see, and there were tears in his eyes when he spoke. The woman, he agreed, had made a fool of him, that was true enough, she’d led him to commit inexcusable crimes, to break sacred laws. He was a traitor, an unwitting one, but it was his own fault for being so gullible. He and only he was responsible.”
Pierre’s heavy breathing was the only sound in the large living room. Estelle said nothing, merely stared at this man who was her husband, this man radiating pain. There was no pity in her eyes, there was condemnation. Why? Because he’d told them the truth, and left them both naked.
Savich let the silence and Pierre’s breathing hang thick in the air. He watched a dust mote sparkle in a shaft of bright sunlight.
Pierre said finally, “I told my son I would not forsake him, that I would hire the best lawyers, maybe I could even arrange for him to leave the country, but he only shook his head, smiled at me sadly.
“That storm, he had known it would be bad. The winds roared, the fog began to creep over us, and the rain pounded down, thick and wet, but to be honest, I didn’t even notice. The waves were whipping up around our boat, but again, it simply wasn’t important. Jean David said only, ‘I cannot, Father.’ And I knew in my heart that he was already gone from me.
“The wind became fierce. And I became aware that our boat was rocking wildly. Jean David stood up and I knew what he was going to do. Then a speedboat struck us as he jumped overboard. I jumped in after him. The people on the speedboat tried to help us, and they did save me, but not Jean David. Someone pulled me out, and I was screaming for my son, and then the Coast Guard was there, and they searched for him for hours.
“But he was gone, he killed himself, as he said he would. The truth is, Agent Savich, I was surprised my story was believed, it was so utterly unbelievable, silly really, but it was believed.” He sighed. “But not by you. I suspect others are questioning it, as well. Perhaps they will believe something worse, that we staged the entire thing so Jean David could escape. But he didn’t. He died, just as he’d intended.
“But it doesn’t matter now. My son is dead. He paid for his crime. Hle paid with his life.”
He looked down at the mangled Coke can in his hands, then raised his head once more. “They never found him. I wish they had found him.”
Tears flowed down his cheeks. He didn’t move, merely continued to stare at them, beyond them, really his eyes dead and weeping. “It happened so fast, so very fast, as if someone had speeded up time. My son jumped into that cold rough water. He was not a good swimmer. I tried to teach him how to swim when he was a boy, but he never took to it. He said the water scared him because he knew it just went on and on, deeper and deeper, that there was no bottom. He always believed that. There was no bottom, he’d say. I have thought of that many times, Agent Savich, and I see my son and he is only a vague outline because the water is so deep and it is dragging him down.
“My son died that day. He took his own life. He is gone now, forever.
“I did not tell the police. I could not. The storm, the winds, the speedboat in the fog, all of that is the truth. All of that helped my fiction. Everyone believes it was an accident.
