Murder at the Lanterne Rouge

She ran past waiters with plates of food who scattered in her path, meeting the maitre d’, who blocked her exit at the door. “Mademoiselle, please sit down, restez tranquille …”

A hard kick to the shin sent him reeling into an arrangement of white roses. She was out the door, running under the vaulted arcade. Her heels clicking, tears streaming down her face, freezing on her cheeks.

It all reeled in front of her. Her mother, the DST, Samour’s murder, Meizi, the attack that almost killed her last night, the alchemical formula, the secret to the fiber optics. She grabbed the freezing stone arcade, racked by sobs. Shaking, trying to draw strength from the ancient stone. She forced herself to take deep breaths of slicing cold. Again and again, until determination surfaced. Her mind cleared in the crystal night. Now, she knew what she had to do.

“STORM PREDICTED, ma chere,” the homeless man said.

Thunder shook the sky. Strains of the weather channel came from the vent under his mound near the sleeping bag. Her shoulders shook. “Too bad I don’t have my raincoat,” she said, scanning the area around the Carreau du Temple.

“Have a dinner date?” His gaze ran over her outfit.

“Past tense. I didn’t care for the company.” She pushed down her emotions. An entwined couple stood in front of Cafe Rouge by the rue de Picardie door to the courtyard of the tower.

“Fifty francs for you if you keep an eye on them,” she said. “Another fifty if you go along with me when I get back.”

“But ma chere, I have a new radio,” he said.

“Then something for your daughter, eh?”

He grinned.

She pulled her copper-colored coat tighter, kept to the shadows. Within five minutes she had entered the courtyard and unlocked the door of Samour’s tower room.

Saj sat on the floor surrounded by burning candles and several laptop screens.

“Meizi’s dead, Saj,” she said, her voice cracking. If only she’d protected Meizi. Hadn’t failed Rene.

“Mon Dieu. That’s terrible.” He shook his head. “How’s Rene?”

“He won’t leave the hospital.”

Another shake of his head. “We have to let him grieve in his own way, Aimee,” Saj said. “You know we’re missing a piece, don’t you?” Saj hadn’t looked up from the screens, his eyes darting from one to another. “That’s what I’ve been trying to find.”

“Whatever Meizi had, it’s gone.”

He nodded. Took a deep breath. “Samour left a trail of crumbs.”

“You think so?”

Saj sat up. “Wouldn’t a brilliant mind with his skill set back up the steps of his fiber-optic process? His notes, his formulas? He’d store it away like a squirrel.”

Made sense. “But on Friday he was desperate, he tried to contact Coulade—”

“Coulade’s hard drive’s a wash,” Saj interrupted. “Nothing.”

Her mind went back to Coulade’s words in his office. “Samour left his last message for Coulade at five P.M.,” she said. “At seven P.M. Samour passed Chez Chun on his way to meet his killer.”

“Et alors?”

“What did he do in those two hours?”

Saj hit a few keys on Samour’s keyboard. “His laptop shows no activity,” he said, “so he didn’t come here.”

“Pull up the diagram copy Rene made.”

Saj stared, his eyes widening. “That’s it.” More key clicks and it popped up on the screen. “See? We need to think in two directions, not just the one.

“What?” Aimee said, frustrated. “I still don’t get it.”

“This tower, his flat, and extend the line.”

She took a deep breath so she wouldn’t shout. “What do you mean?”

“Pascal followed the diagram—that’s his message. Followed it to the other end of this line. That’s where the rest of the manuscript lies. And it looks to me like …” Saj superimposed a clear street map over the diagram and traced his finger. “Here.”

The Musee. Aimee nodded. “He followed the diagram. So will I.” She stuck her laptop in her bag. Noticed his brown wool Tibetan cap with earflaps. “Mind if I borrow this?”

“As long as both of you come back in one piece.”

OUT IN THE courtyard, she pulled the cap’s earflaps low, turned her metallic coat inside out to show the black lining, lit up a cigarette from the pack of filtered Gauloises that the blonde had given her. Felt the jolt of nicotine.

Now or never.

Head down, she stepped out of the doorway and kept to the right. A church bell chimed in the distance. A moment later she’d joined the homeless man under the sleeping bag, trying to ignore his pungent aroma. Impossible. She’d make this quick.

“Any action?”

“Only they used their cell phones after you went inside.”

Just as she’d thought. Watchers.

But chances were they hadn’t keyed in on her location. Otherwise they’d have a crew waiting.

“What’s your name, Monsieur?”

“Hippolyte,” he said. “Would you be interested in exchanging coats, ma chere? ”

“You read my mind, Hippolyte. But only if you take this too,” she said, handing him the last of Tso’s francs.

SHE LEFT THE warm vent, confident no one would follow her.

She kept to the narrow side streets below Place de la Republique. She felt invisible. No one looked twice at a clochard shuffling along in a Tibetan hat and moth-eaten raccoon coat—more fragrant now after a spritz of Chanel No. 5.

She hit Martine’s number on her cell phone. Martine answered on the first ring.

“About time, Aimee,” she said. “When can I meet Meizi?”

“Bad news, I’m afraid,” she said, her chest tightening. That awful taste of guilt clutched the back of her throat.

“What now, Aimee?”

She took a breath and filled Martine in as she walked.

“Dead? Meizi’s dead? Poor Rene.” Martine exhaled. A cough. “Not to sound mercenary, but it shoots down my expose,” she said. “Liberation’s interested in a three-part series documenting conditions, Aimee. But for that I need a connection in the sweatshops. People who will talk to me. Open doors. Proof.”

Aimee’s heart fell. Martine couldn’t pull out now.

“She’s not the only one, Martine.”

“Get real, Aimee. It’s a closed world. They live in fear, held hostage by their families in China. Who’d talk to me?”

Aimee had to make her understand. And she didn’t have time. “I found Meizi chained, Martine,” she said. “Treated worse than a dog. The flics snared a few snakeheads to ante up on their taxes.”

Pause.

“No one cares about the women or the men living ten to a room, sleeping under the machines,” Aimee said. “Who’s fighting for them? Or for the unnamed dead in paupers’ graves at Ivry. I sent Prevost proof, he just doesn’t know it yet.”

Another pause.