about getting back at Rubens for being close to her father.
“He was really an incredible man,” Rubens told the doctor. “I owe him a great deal.”
“I’m sure.”
The attorney gave Rubens another of his forced smiles, then nudged the doctor forward down the hall, asking when his report would be ready. Rubens heard him reply that it would be ready by the morning.
“I’m not going to move him,” Rebecca told Rubens. “Not to Mount Ina.”
Rubens wasn’t sure what to say.
“Mount Ina is a better facility,” he admitted. “But the General would rather die than live where his cousin lives.”
“I agree. Here.” She reached into her pocket. “I just want you to know, that if you’re concerned. .” Her voice broke, but she continued. “We don’t get along, I know. But you and Daddy do. Always. And… you care about him. When I started this, I wasn’t sure that was true. I thought because the agency wanted to control him — I know that they do, so you don’t have to deny it. But I don’t think you do. So I just want you to know, that when we do get the decision, you can still visit. Here. No strings.”
Rubens took the paper and began to read it. It was a letter on her lawyer’s stationery, attesting that she believed Rubens was a good friend to her father and should be allowed visiting privileges similar to those he had enjoyed as custodian. It was signed and notarized.
He suspected a trick. He looked up after reading it, but Rebecca was gone.
60
Karr took the bottle of sparkling water and stepped away from the bar, forcing his eyes away from the doorway. It was 11:30. Deidre hadn’t shown up.
The Ritz did have a bar, an expensive one called the
Too stinking bad.
61
Mussa backed the van into the garage, nudging the gas for just a moment after slapping the vehicle into park. It was an old habit, taught by his uncle when he’d learned to drive. He’d heard a dozen times that it was bad for the car — and certainly unwise in a garage — but the habit was difficult to break.
Mussa got out of the truck. A surge of paranoia crept over him as he locked the garage, and he walked around the outside of the rented house, carefully checking to make sure that no one was lurking in the shadows. Satisfied, he let himself in, then checked each room, including the closets and under the beds, scanning for bugs. Satisfied, he sat in the living room and turned on the AOL instant messaging device he had obtained specifically for tonight. There was one message waiting:
It meant that the brothers were ready to proceed.
Tomorrow’s itinerary was now set. Even if one element failed, the overall effect would be a masterpiece.
Mussa turned off the device and slid it into his pocket. He set three alarm clocks to wake him; one was a radio, another a CD player attached to a clock, the last a windup device that would go off even if the electricity failed. Little things could undo even the most elaborate plot, and Mussa did not intend to be undone.
Nostalgia replaced paranoia; he thought of the great difficulties he had overcome during the past few years and even the slights that would now be avenged.
The greatest was the murder of his father, but Mussa did not dwell on that. Nor, surprisingly, did he think about the sneers of the Frenchmen he met every day, the heathens who thought no believer could be their equal. He thought. instead of the smirks he had gotten from the Saudis when he had first expressed his desire to prove his faith and earn his place in Paradise.
They saw him as a useful idiot, a man whose network might be used — or, to put it more honestly, a man whose greed might be convenient but whose courage and faith were lacking.
He would laugh at them tomorrow.
62
The earliest train from Paris to Aux Boix on Friday left at 4:50 a.m.; Karr was one of only a half-dozen people on it. He got into LaFoote’s house through the back window and spent an hour looking around, without finding anything useful. Around 6:30 he snuck back out and walked to the village center, a short distance away. The mass Father Brossard was to celebrate wasn’t until eight, and so Karr had breakfast in a
The owner refused to sell him more than five. He took those, along with two croissants, and sat at one of the two tables in the window. Neither susceptible to flattery nor particularly talkative, the woman failed to respond to Karr’s attempt to make conversation. Finally he asked flat out if she knew LaFoote; she simply shrugged, then went to tend to her ovens.
There was a park near the center of town, cattycorner from the church. Karr imagined that retired people — like LaFoote, before he got involved in his crusade to find his friend — would spend at least part of the day on one of the three benches there. But if so, it was too early for them; Karr sat alone for a while, watching the light traffic. Around 7:45 an altar boy unlocked the front door of the church, peeked out briefly, then disappeared back inside. Karr got up and ambled over.
Deidre Clancy pulled on her robe as she got out of bed. Her stomach felt somewhat better than it had yesterday, but…
She lurched forward, barely making the bathroom in time. By now, her stomach was completely drained, and she managed to expel only a small bit of fluid as she hung over the ceramic bowl.
Bad snails? Or the flu?
She’d gotten sick yesterday immediately after lunch at a fancy reception and lecture on the Postimpressionists at the Musee d’Orsay. It served her right for blowing off the class she was supposed to attend.
Deidre got up slowly, ran some water on her face, then walked shakily back to bed. The sun was up, but she was tired and there was no question of doing anything but sleeping for quite a while. She glanced at the blinking answering machine in the living room — she’d heard the phone ring several times but was in no condition to answer. She’d deal with it all later, or tomorrow, or next week, or never.
“Father Brossard?”
The priest, dressed in a simple black cassock, turned from the side altar where he had been fussing over some of the candles.
“I was a friend of Monsieur LaFoote’s,” said Karr in French. “Can we talk?”
“You are the American?” said the priest in English.
