The Body in the Vestibule

a group of suppliants immersing themselves in the waters at that very moment. The Lourdes police had called Ravier and gone to check it out. Now they were filing their report. It was an American woman, all right—sixty-five and on crutches.

“She's got to be somewhere. All the borders, airports have been under constant surveillance. Her face has been on the front page of every paper in Europe. How can it be that no one has seen her?”

Tom stared bleakly across the desk at the inspector. 'You know why, Michel.'

“No, my friend. It's not the time for this. Have faith.”

It produced a wan smile. 'I hope to.”

Faith was not wearing a watch and swore that she would never be without one from now on. She had no idea how much time had passed since she'd last heard Christophe's voice, but judging from the stiffness of her body, it had been some hours. She had been too frightened to sleep. She crept cautiously to the front of the cave. The sun was lower in the sky. It was late afternoon. She didn't want to be in these woods in the dark. Christophe had threatened wild animals, and while she was sure he was lying, she didn't want to put it to a test. She'd have to try to find the road and follow it until she came to some sort of dwelling or village. Before her ascent, she'd noted that the clearing she'd been in seemed to offer the best passageway and she started to climb back down to it, carefully fitting her feet in the crevices of the rocks. There were plenty of short bushes to hold on to and it wasn't difficult, just scratchy. Vivid images of Christophe lying in wait for her at the bottom filled her with terror, but she couldn't continue to climb. There would be no road.

The forest at one end of the clearing was as she remembered—a dense carpet of pine needles and mosses with little low undergrowth or fallen trees. It was blessedly empty.

As she walked, she looked about at the wide variety of plant life. She'd never been a Girl Scout and her family had tended toward vacations where her father could do research on Thomas Hardy's theological metaphors and her mother could hole up in an English country inn with a stack of Agatha Christies. Faith and her sister, Hope, explored on foot and bicycle but never learned much about flora and fauna—or any survival tips other than the advisability of avoiding British railway food.

Faith knew there were plenty of things to eat in the woods—mushrooms, probably truffles right below her feet; however, the only thing she would have trusted not to poison her at the moment would have been a slice of crusty bread spread with butter, and there didn't seem to be a tree of those.

She plodded on. Her shoes had become part of her foot, adhering like a second skin more tightly with each step. How far could these woods possibly extend? The answer, she knew, could well be miles and miles hi this part of France.

After what she judged to be an hour, she saw a break in the trees and what looked like a road, certainly flat, open land, on the other side. She picked up the pace. Her shoes, so comfortably a part of her body earlier, had now turned traitor and were rubbing blisters on her heels. She took some tissues and tried to make a little cushion, which helped marginally.

Faith stepped through the trees. The land was flat as far as the eye could see. The plateau was covered with low ground covers, and as she stepped forward, she smelled the strong fragance of wild thyme and rosemary. She was dizzy with hunger. There was no road in sight. Nothing in sight at all, except what looked like a pile of stones in the distance. For no other reason than that it was there, she headed for it. As she walked toward it, Faith felt a breeze that she did not doubt would become a strong wind by nightfall. Up above her, birds circled. Hawks. Birds of prey.

“Not me, you vultures,' she yelled at them, and felt better.

As she approached the pile of rocks, she was disappointed to discover it was not a shepherd's hut where she might have bedded down for the night, but a dolmen, a burial chamber from megalithic days. Whoever had occupied it thousands of years ago had become one with the plateau, yet even if she could have squeezed into the chamber, Faith was uneasy with the implications. Besides, it was still daylight and she needed to press on.

How fascinated Tom would be with all this, she thought as she picked a few wildflowers, then looked at them slightly dazed, dropped them, and pinched herself. Keep walking. Keep moving. Don't stop. She started to say it out loud. It wasn't a desert, though it felt like one. Everything was so flat. She wasn't thirsty—there had been a stream in the woods—but mirages seemed to beckon. She thought she saw a cross ahead of her. She was hallucinating.

“Don't waste my time!' Michel slammed the receiver down. He'd sent Tom back to the Leblancs ostensibly to check on Benjamin, but in reality to keep him from hearing too much of what was going on. Now Faith had been sighted in the chorus at the Folies Bergere in Paris.

Gina Martignetti had disappeared into thin air. There was no record of anyone of that name and age living in Rome. Giovanni had been grilled but apparently knew nothing at all. The other two prostitutes, Marilyn and Monique, had also gone underground—and Michel hoped not literally. Everybody was missing and he was at a loss to figure out what it all meant. ^ It was a cross. Intricately carved and standing straight up. Cared for. No lichen. Which meant someone came here sometimes. Faith took it as the good sign it was and continued to walk. She was slowing down and she saw her shadow lengthen. It would be dark soon.

Where was Christophe now? she wondered. Far, far away. Having failed to find her, she assumed he would have made for the nearest border. Spain? Poor Solange and Jean-Fransois. A child like that wasn't just sowing wild oats, but bad seeds. She'd feel a whole lot sorrier for them if she hadn't been the victim, or one of them.

The two girls must have heard the shots or maybe they'd left by then. She couldn't figure out where they fit in or what the business with the clochards and the break-ins meant. She certainly had plenty of time to try now. She matched her steps to her mental gymnastics. The kids figure out who's going to be out of town and one of them robs the apartment—or maybe a pair of them. More than that would be too risky. She wondered how many kids were involved. Could there be a giant ring of adolescent cambri-oleurs in Lyon? Christophe, Dominique, Berthille, and the other boy, Benoit, had seemed so tight at the gallery—a little world unto themselves. She wouldn't be surprised if it was just the four of them. So they robbed the apartments and what did they do with the stuff? Hard to explain to Maman where the new diamond and emerald choker had come from.

“I don't care about the clochards,' Dominique had said, and something about their being lazy and drunk, that they could get jobs. Was it some sort of nouveau Robin Hood enterprise? Steal from the bourgeoisie and give to the poor? Passing the loot to Christophe's uncle to hand out to his friends? But the first time one of them tried to buy a bottle of wine at Monoprix with a gold medallion of the Sun King, the smiling lady at the register would be more likely to call the police than say 'Merci beaucoup. Bonne journee,' as she invariably did. So polite—like everyone else in other stores.

And what about Faith's own clochard? The dead one. Bernard. Had he wanted too many goodies? No, the whole thing didn't make any sense at all, she thought wearily. And how did Marie connect with the kids? She wouldn't have been afraid of them. She'd have told their parents.

Faith realized the land was sloping down again and decided to follow it. Nothing except sheep or goats could live on such a plateau. She might not know a great deal about animal husbandry, but this much was clear. She wouldn't mind encountering a sheep or two about now. They'd make cozy companions for the cold night ahead, plus she did have a very serviceable knife and a few matches. There was plenty of rosemary around. She began to salivate. Bo Peep would have done the same thing in Faith's place, she was sure.

But there were no sheep and she started down the slope that soon became a steep incline. She had to walk sideways to keep from tumbling forward on the loose stones. The sun set slowly. It was glorious, streaking vivid pinks and oranges across the sky until they faded to deep violet. Another night alone. Yet, she was still alive, she'd saved her baby's life, and in the morning, she was sure she would come across a road and find help. She had faith, she told herself—both.

Before long it was pitch-dark, but soon the moon rose, a bright golden half, joined by more stars than she had ever realized existed in the firmament. She noticed she was now following a rough track that showed an occasional tire mark in the ruts. Faith didn't think any find could excite her more than the Missoni sweater dress marked 50 percent off that she'd unearthed at Bergdorfs last January, but it paled in comparison with the exquisite pattern of these tires— proof that civilization and help were at hand. This track couldn't be called a road, yet it was bound to lead somewhere.

It did. Straight down again.

Standing at the top, Faith thought she detected the glimmer of a light far off in the distance. Without