Marianne assessed this. There was a tiny flicker in the eyes, a pursing of the lips. To her, Pascal realized, thirty-five must indeed sound very old. My father, Methuselah. He gave a small shrug: Some shadow passed at the back of his mind. To Marianne, age was a fact without corollaries or consequences. She was still too young to associate aging with sickness or with death.
“The egg’s a failure, isn’t it?” He smiled. “Don’t struggle with it. Eat the tartine instead.”
Marianne gave him a grateful look and took a bite of the crisp bread with its coating of strawberry jam. Jam at once adhered itself to chin, hand, tablecloth. Pascal reached across tenderly and transferred a morsel from her chin to the tip of her nose. Marianne giggled. She munched with a contented expression, then slid the parcel across to him.
“It might be a present,” she said seriously. “A nice present. You never know. Open it, Papa, please. Before we go.”
Pascal glanced at his watch. He had one hour in which to deliver Marianne back to her mother in the suburbs, brave the rush-hour traffic back into the center of Paris, get to a meeting with his editor at Paris Jour, and hand over the new batch of photographs. If he was not delayed, he could easily make it to De Gaulle Airport for the noon flight to London. He hesitated. They should have left his apartment ten minutes before. …
On the other hand, Marianne’s expensive and pathetic suitcase, the suitcase he had bought her himself, was already packed. The menagerie of teddy bears and rabbits, and the sad stuffed kangaroo without which she could not sleep, were all ready and waiting in the hall. He hated to disappoint her, and he could see the expectation in her eyes.
“Very well,” he said. “Let’s see what I have here.” He drew the parcel toward him. Now that he examined it more closely, it did look interesting—and unusual too, not the kind of package sent out by PRs. Brown paper, new, enclosing some kind of box. Light in weight. A neat parcel about six inches square. The string binding had been knotted at intervals, the knots sealed with red wax. He had not seen, let alone received, such a parcel in years. His name and address, he saw, had been printed by hand in capitals with precise care. He looked more closely, and then realized that the precision could be explained—a stencil had been used.
He was careful to betray no reaction, but thinking back afterward, he realized he had moved too quickly, scraping back his chair. Perhaps he paled—there must have been some hint of his feelings, and Marianne picked up on it. She had an only child’s thin-skinned sensitivity to nuance, a sixth sense for trouble that had been honed by years of parental arguments behind closed doors. Now, as he casually picked up the parcel and began to move away, her face clouded. She looked at him uncertainly.
“Papa, what’s wrong?”
“Nothing, darling. Nothing.” He kept his voice level. “I’ve just realized the time, that’s all. Run and get your coat, will you?”
She sat for a moment, watching him. She watched him leave the cigarette burning in the ashtray. She watched him carry the parcel through into the kitchen and place it on the stainless steel countertop. She watched him start to run the water in the sink. Then, suddenly obedient, she climbed down from her chair.
When he next looked around, she had fetched her coat and returned to the kitchen. She stood in the center of the large room, watching him, the light from the tall windows striking her hair. On her face was an expression Pascal had not seen for months, an expression he had promised himself he would never provoke again once the divorce was over: a pinched expression of confusion and guilt. Leaving the package, Pascal returned to her. He kissed the top of her head, put his arm around her, and began to steer her gently toward the front door. She stopped just inside it and looked up at him, her face pink with anxiety.
“Something’s wrong,” she said again. “Papa, what did I do?”
The question cut Pascal to the heart. He wondered if this was the fate of all children of divorced parents—to go through life blaming themselves for their parents’ failings.
“Nothing, darling,” he replied, catching her against him.
“I told you—we’re terribly late, and I just realized how late, that’s all. Listen, Marianne …” He opened the doorway onto the landing and edged her gently outside. “I’ll open that stupid package later, when I get back from London. And if it’s anything exciting, I’ll phone and tell you, I promise. On with the coat, that’s it. What have we here? One bear, one rabbit, one kangaroo—now, I have an idea. You run downstairs and wait for me there, will you do that? Wait right by the door, don’t go outside, and I’ll be down in a second. Papa just has to find a few papers, his airline ticket. …”
It was working. Marianne’s face had cleared. “Can I say hello to Madame Lavalle, like I did last time?”
Pascal smiled. He silently blessed an amiable concierge, who was devoted to his daughter. “Of course, darling. Introduce her to the animals, I bet she’d like that.”
Marianne nodded, and ran to the staircase. Pascal listened to the clatter of her shoes as she descended, the sound of a door opening, then Madame Lavalle’s voice.
“My goodness, and what have we here today? A rabbit. A bear and—Mon Dieu, what can this be? I never saw such an animal!”
“It’s a kangaroo, madame.” Marianne’s high voice floated up the stairwell. “And you see, look, she can keep her baby very close, safe in this little pouch. …”
Pascal closed the door. He wiped the sweat from his brow. He walked back into the kitchen and stood looking at that neat old-fashioned parcel, foursquare on the counter, the knots neatly sealed. It was five years since he had covered the PLO story, six since he had been in Northern Ireland. His work now might be very different, but the wariness, once necessarily acute, still remained.
Reaching across, he rested his hand on the parcel lightly. He ran his fingers across the surface of the paper, feeling for ridges, for the telltale presence of wire.
He could detect nothing. He turned the package so the edges of the wrapping paper faced him. The overlap was unsealed but taut. He hesitated, then picked up his sharpest kitchen knife. He prised the seals loose first. He cut the string in four places and eased it off.
Nothing. He was already beginning to feel foolish, to see his suspicions as exaggerated. Yet why a stenciled address? He looked at the stains of developing fluid on his fingernails. He frowned at the parcel, and thought of the photographs packed in his briefcase, awaiting delivery.
To obtain those pictures he had donned camouflage clothing and crawled five hundred yards through the outlying scrub of a Provençal estate. He had carried with him a 1200mm telephoto lens that weighed more than twenty pounds, and a special low-level tripod made to his specifications. Together these insured that he could take clear, unblurred portraits at a range of three hundred yards from his unsuspecting quarry while lying on his belly like a snake. Once upon a time he had been a war photographer. The lessons and techniques learned then were now applied in other ways. What was he now, he wondered, still looking at the parcel. A paparazzo—not a man worth injuring anymore, not someone worth the damage a letter bomb could inflict. He felt a second of self-loathing, a familiar shame. Then with a quick movement he unfolded the brown wrapping paper and eased the lid from the box.
Inside the foldings and interleavings of tissue there was no note, no accompanying card or message, just a crumpled black shape that he took at first to be a scrap of material.
He drew it out, and found to his surprise that the material was leather, the finest, softest black kid, and the object was a woman’s glove.
A left-handed glove, and brand-new—unworn, he thought at first. Then he noticed the faint creases across the palm, as if a hand had worn this glove, if briefly, and that hand had been tightly clenched. He examined it more closely. It was narrowly cut, made to fit a delicate hand. An evening glove. Against a woman’s arm, he estimated, this glove would encase from elbow to fingertips.
He stared at it, trying to decipher its message.
Was it meant to be seductive or threatening? Was it a clue or a prank? He was about to toss it back in its box, when a lingering curiosity made him examine it more closely. He pressed it against the back of his hand and felt it slip easily against his skin as if it had been oiled. Then he raised it to his face, and sniffed.
The glove had a pungent and disturbing scent. He could detect the odor of a woman’s perfume, and beneath that, imperfectly masked by ambergris, civet, and damask, another, earthier smell. Fish, blood—something like that. Suddenly the supple glove disgusted him.
He threw it down. Late, he thought, checking his watch one more time; that damned parcel had delayed him. He grabbed his briefcase, his camera cases, and the small battered valise of inexpertly packed clothes. As he opened the door, his daughter’s voice floated up to him. A week until the next visiting day. He felt a surge of love and protectiveness so painfully sharp that for an instant it immobilized him.
He stood on the landing, staring out unseeingly at a view of roofscapes, a pale, drab leaden sky. Rain today, rain yesterday, rain the day before that: endless winter. Spring, he thought with a sudden and passionate longing; and there, for a brief second, he glimpsed it, even sensed it on his skin, all the springtimes of his boyhood, the optimism and elation that accompanied them. He could see and smell the fields, the vineyards, the oak woods of his childhood. Across the endless gold of the long afternoon he heard his mother call to him, and watched the river coil through the valley below as the light paled to the silver of spring evenings.
Now that house was sold and his mother was dead. It was years since the coming of spring had brought him any sense of hope or renewal.
Nostalgia was weak. He slammed the door on it. From below, his daughter called to him. Shouldering his cases, Pascal turned and ran down the stairs.
Chapter 2
JOHNNY APPLEYARD
THE BUILDING JOHNNY APPLEYARD lived in lay on the southwest corner of Gramercy Park. It was tall, turreted, gothic. Julio Severas, the ICD courier for that area of New York, arrived there shortly before ten A.M. It was a clear, cold day, and had snowed during the night. The sidewalk outside Appleyard’s building was well swept; Julio paused to admire the building’s massive portico, its gleaming marble steps. Julio liked his job—it gave him the opportunity to see how the other half lived. He looked around him with interest as he entered the lobby: dark paneling, a stained-glass window—weird, he thought, like some kind of church.
The porter, a Greek, showed no inclination to talk. He escorted Julio into an elevator—more paneling, a little leather-covered seat. The elevator was hand operated. Julio stared in astonishment as the porter hauled expertly on a rope. There was the sound of machinery, of counterweights. With a surprising efficiency, the elevator glided up.
“Some system,” Julio said. “No electrics, right?”
The porter pointed to a brightly polished brass plate. It said OTIS ELEVATORS 1908. “Original,” he said. “Hand operated. One hundred percent reliable. The only one in New York.”
“Regular antique, huh?” said Julio, and stored this piece of information away for his wife. She, too, was fascinated by details of how the rich chose to live. “Expensive building, I guess. Exclusive,” he ventured to say, as the Greek brought them to a halt.
The Greek gave him a look of contempt. He ushered him out onto polished parquet, facing a tall mahogany door. He rang the bell and stood there with Julio, shoulder to shoulder. From behind the door came the roar of rock music.
Julio sighed and tried again. “You get a lot of celebrities here, maybe? Rock stars? Actors? Art-world types?”
The porter gave him a withering look. “Listen,” he said. “I told you downstairs already. Mr. Appleyard, he’s not here. No reply, okay? Now, you want to leave that package with me?”
“No,” said Julio, getting his own back. “I don’t.”
The porter lifted his hand to try the bell again, but before he could ring, the door suddenly opened. A strong scent of rose bath oil eddied out. An exquisite girl stood in the doorway, swathed from shoulder to ankle in a white terry bathrobe. When she saw the two men, her face fell.
“Oh. I thought it was Johnny…” she began in a low, husky voice. The rest of the sentence trailed away.
Julio blinked. He looked more closely and realized his mistake. Not a young woman, a young man: a young man with clear olive skin, hyacinth-blue eyes, and long, thick, waving blond hair. The hair brushed his shoulders; one damp tendril clung to the damp skin of his throat. He was wearing a gold earring in his right earlobe, and a narrow gold bracelet on his right wrist He was about twenty years old, tall, slender, and devastating. Only the pitch of his voice declared his sex. If Julio had encountered him elsewhere, just passed him by on the sidewalk, he’d never have guessed. Jesus; Julio felt himself blushing. He averted his gaze and stared hard at the boy’s bare feet.
“Parcel for Mr. Appleyard,” the Greek announced in an insolent tone. He jerked a thumb at Julio. “I told him already. He’s out, right? Haven’t seen him in days.”
The remark sounded oddly like a jibe. The boy blushed. Looking up, Julio saw he was fighting back tears.
“He’s out now,” he replied in a defensive way. “But I expect him back real soon. This afternoon, maybe later this morning…” He held out one slender hand for the parcel. “I’ll take that. I’ll give it to Johnny the minute he gets back. You need me to sign?”
Julio handed the parcel across. The kid had a rural accent, slow, with a kind of hick twang. Out west someplace, Julio thought. The boy was examining the package in a childlike way, turning it this way and that. He gave it a little shake, frowned at the customs slip. “Articles of clothing. Birthday gift,” he read out. “Birthday gift?” The boy looked confused. “Johnny’s birthday’s in July. He’s a Leo, like me. Someone’s six months early. That’s weird.”
He gave the parcel another little shake. There was a faint rustle. Julio glanced at the porter.
“He lives here?”
“Sure he lives here. Stevey’s Mr. Appleyard’s roommate, right, Stevey?” He grinned. “Been here three years now, maybe four. Looks after Mr. Appleyard real nice. Looks after his apartment when he’s away.”
Julio felt sorry for the boy. The insinuation in the porter’s tone was obvious; insolence now veered toward the rude. The porter rocked on his heels, still grinning, looking the boy up and down. Julio waited for Stevey to come back at him, put him down. What was the guy, after all? Just hired help.
To his surprise, the boy made no comeback. He looked at the Greek in a wide-eyed, hesitant way, as if hoping the remark might be a compliment. Julio gave the Greek a glance of dislike. He proffered his clipboard and a pen; the boy hesitated, then signed an illegible scrawl.
“Have a nice day now,” Julio said, trying to make amends for the porter. The boy nodded, smiled shyly, and closed the door on a gust of rose-scented air.
“Fucking faggots,” said the Greek succinctly, then gave Julio a malicious grin. “Poor little Stevey. What’s he gonna do now that Mr. Appleyard’s not so keen anymore? The kid’s getting anxious. You saw? Jesus, he was nearly in tears. Mr. Appleyard, he ain’t set foot in the building in over a week. Got himself a new toy-boy, I guess. Still, who the fuck cares?”
Downstairs, he waddled out into the lobby. Julio followed, more slowly. He still felt a lingering sympathy for the boy. He was rehearsing in his mind how he’d relate all this to his wife later that evening, what he’d leave out, what he’d put in. This was the aspect of his job he liked best. It was like a movie: little clips from other people’s lives.
“So, this Appleyard guy¼” In the doorway now, he gave it one last try. “The name’s kind of familiar. I’ve heard of him, maybe? A singer? Musician?”
“Works for the newspapers. Hangs out with the stars. A tightwad. Likes pretty boys. Lots of them.”
“Each to his own, right?” Julio said uneasily. The porter rolled his eyes. “And this Appleyard, he’s older,
I guess?”
“Forty years old and a prize asshole. The prince of shits.” The Greek gave one last malevolent grin and slammed the door.
Chapter 3
JAMES
McMULLEN
GIOVANNI CARONA WAS THE ICD courier in Venice. It was not a full-time job. Giovanni, newly married, living still with his parents and saving up for an apartment, fitted it in when the calls came. Come summer, come the tourists, he did well enough, ferrying Americans and Japanese up the Grand Canal and out onto the lagoon. Come winter, he took whatever work he could get.
The package was due in at the airport at nine o’clock. At eight on a bitterly cold morning, Giovanni was out on the tiny canal behind his father’s house, coaxing the engine of his father’s old launch into life. By eight-thirty he was easing his way through a maze of narrow waterways. A grayish mist lingered above the canals. The city was just coming to life.
Out past the cemetery isle of San Michele—Giovanni crossed himself as he passed—and into the channel that led to the airport. The boat chugged between the black piles that marked the route. The mist was denser there, clammy against the skin. Up ahead, where the industrial sector of Mestre was situated beyond the airport, the fog was yellowish, bunched like thunderclouds, dense.
Fog delayed the London flight by an hour. It was almost eleven by the time the formalities were completed, and Giovanni was making his way back. He took a different route this time, approaching the city by the Grand Canal, then turning into the snaking maze of waterways on its southern flank.
This was a part of Venice few tourists penetrated, but it was Giovanni’s home ground. He relaxed; he felt no sense of urgency. A thin sun was coming out, warming and dissipating the mist. By the time he drew alongside the Palazzo Ossorio, it was nearly noon. He tied up and surveyed the building, hands on hips. The place might once have been magnificent, but now it was a wreck.
Lovers and Liars Trilogy Page 2