A Tangled Web

by Judith Michael

  She looked for steeples and drove toward the one that seemed nearest and in a few minutes she came to a large church with an attached rectory and school. I’ll ask inside, she thought; they’ll know every priest in town.

  She saw no one in the church, so she went to the school. Its double doors opened onto a large corridor stretching to left and right; directly opposite was a door with a translucent glass window, and the word “Director.” Sabrina knocked once and went in, and found herself in a small anteroom with an empty desk. An open door led to an office where a small man with a neatly trimmed beard shot with gray sat at a desk. He looked up, then leaped to his feet. “Sabrina! My dear, what can you be thinking of? Why have you come back? Where is Léon? Have you both gone mad?”

  He knows. He knows everything. Sabrina walked into his office and closed the door behind her. “I must talk to you. Is it all right to talk here, or will we be interrupted?”

  “What is it? Has something happened to Léon?”

  “That’s not why I’m here. Please, I must talk to you and it will take quite a while.”

  Frowning deeply, he studied her. “My dear, you are very strange. Well, then, come. My apartment is the quietest place, and for a change no one is sleeping on the sofa.”

  He glanced at her with a smile, but Sabrina did not even pretend to understand. She would tell him the truth. And he would take her to Stephanie.

  He led her outside and along the building to a door that led upstairs to a tiny apartment: a living room with a couch, a chair, a lamp, and a small sink and hot plate in a corner. A narrow bed could be seen through a partially opened door. “Would you like tea? Or coffee?”

  “Tea. Thank you.”

  He brewed it on the hot plate, his back to her. They were silent; both tense, both expecting a surprise.

  “So, my dear.” He put two thick white mugs on a small bench in front of the sofa and sat beside Sabrina. “What is it that you wish to tell me?”

  “A complicated story. And I will ask you to help me when I’ve finished.”

  “I will always help you when you need me, Sabrina; you know that.”

  “Yes.” She gazed at him. A good friend. A good man. She sipped her tea, then put down the mug and folded her hands in her lap. “First I must ask you to tell me your name.”

  “You are serious?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, then. Robert Chalon. As you have known for almost a year.”

  “Thank you. Now I would be grateful if you will let me speak without interruption.”

  His eyebrows rose. “So authoritative suddenly. But of course, my dear, if you wish, I will not interrupt.”

  “Well, then. My name is Sabrina Longworth. I was born in—”

  “Sabrina! Your memory has returned! Oh, what a wonderful gift; why did you not tell me immediately?”

  Sabrina stared at him. Your memory has returned. Why had she never thought of that? It explained everything. And it seemed so obvious: the yacht, the explosion, injuries . . . and a year of silence because Stephanie did not know who she was.

  But why did she think her name was Sabrina?

  Max.

  Both of them had survived and he’d told her that her name was Sabrina. Sabrina what?

  “My dear Sabrina, please go on. I’m sorry; I did promise not to interrupt.”

  Not Longworth; the name was new to Robert. So something else.

  “Sabrina?”

  “It’s not what you think. Please, let me tell the whole story. I was born in America and grew up in Europe. I lived in London, I was married and divorced, I owned an antique shop. My sister married a professor in America and had two children. Her name was—is—Stephanie Andersen; she is my identical twin, and she is the woman who was on the yacht with Max.”

  Robert’s face was frozen, stunned; he leaned forward, his eyes locked on hers.

  “One day, in September of last year, we took a trip to China together and decided to change places, just for a week. We both needed to get away and we thought it would be a lark, an adventure, and no one would know and no one would be hurt. But deceptions”—the word caught in her throat—“deceptions don’t work that way.”

  She told it all then, from her broken wrist to the explosion on the yacht, her mourning for her sister, the passionate love that had grown between her and Garth and the children, the life they had made together.

  “Last month a friend called and said she had seen me in Europe. She said it had to be”—the words caught again—“my sister or a ghost.”

  “And it was both,” said Robert when she did not go on.

  She nodded. After a moment Robert poured their cold tea into the sink and brewed another pot. “A most incredible story.”

  “I know. So fantastic it seems to have nothing to do with everyday life. But it’s all true.”

  He unwrapped two tea bags. “All of us lead fantastic lives, you know. I would not deny the drama of any life.” He tilted the teapot and refilled their cups. “Of course your story goes beyond that: it is fantastic and outrageous. I believe it and I am sorry for it—from a whim you have reaped a maelstrom—but it is not productive to talk about that now.” He sat beside her. “The explosion on the yacht. You don’t know what happened before it?”

  “No. Stephanie called from London the day before she left. That was the last time I talked to her. The next day . . . a telephone call . . .” A tremor ran through her.

  “You miss her greatly.”

  “We were so much a part of each other; it was as if a piece of me had died, as if something inside me had been torn away. That didn’t change, no matter how happy I was . . .”

  “My poor child,” Robert said, understanding what torments crouched, waiting, for both sisters. But he had said enough; it was not the time to say more. This woman still had to come to terms with the reality of a sister who lived, and how she would welcome her back.

  Sabrina had fallen silent again. She was exhausted, but pleasantly comfortable. “You’re very easy to talk to.”

  “I hope so. Sabrina always thought so. But it is Stephanie, isn’t it? I can’t think of her that way.”

  “Please tell me where to find her.”

  “She and Léon have gone to Vézelay.”

  “Vézelay? In Burgundy?”

  “Yes, fairly near Paris. A lovely town filled with tourists. They thought they could be anonymous there.”

  “Why should they be? What are they afraid of? Are they hiding?”

  “Yes . . . perhaps. We’re not sure, but it is possible that Sabrina—Stephanie—is in danger and it seemed wise for them to leave. They wanted to start a new life since Max—”

  “Max. Is he here?”

  “No, he—”

  “He was the one who told her she was Sabrina, wasn’t he? When she lost her memory. Of course he had only known her as Sabrina. What did he say her last name was?”

  “Lacoste. The same as his.”

  “The same? Why?”

  “Because she was his wife.”

  “But she wasn’t. She wouldn’t have married him; she couldn’t have.”

  Startled, Robert said, “No, of course not. Of course not; she couldn’t have married Max. But he told her he was her husband, and she had no information that would contradict that. Although she told me often that she did not feel married to him, even though he was deeply in love with her and she was grateful to him for the home he gave her. But I should tell you that Max—”

  “I have to find her. How do I get to Vézelay? I have a car; I can drive. If I leave now—”

  “My dear, wait until tomorrow. You look worn out. One more night won’t make a difference and I could help you by telling you something of her life, of the things that have happened to her.”

  “No, I know you want to help, but I want to see her, I want to hear it from her. And I can’t wait another night; my God, to know that she’s alive—I have to find her!”

  “But there is something else. I told
you that your sister may be in danger. Things have happened here—”

  “Danger from whom?”

  “We don’t know. But—”

  “You don’t know? Then why are we wasting time talking about it? Good heavens, are you saying I should be frightened? Whatever it is, Stephanie will tell me about it. And we’ll share it.”

  “Léon is with her.”

  “That doesn’t matter! It never has. Whoever else came into our lives, there was still the two of us. Nothing ever changed that.”

  But now something could. Garth . . . Penny . . . Cliff . . .

  She shook her head roughly. Not now. Later.

  “Please, I can’t stay and talk; please tell me how to get there. And where she lives.”

  “Well, then.” Robert rummaged in his desk and found a map of France. In the margin he wrote an address and telephone number. “It’s a little more than five hundred kilometers, and you are not familiar with the roads. If you would like, I can come with you.”

  “No. Thank you, but I can’t . . . no one but the two of us.”

  He nodded. “I understand. Now let me show you . . .” They bent over the map and Robert marked the route. “It is not a difficult drive, but some of it may be tedious. And if you get tired, you must rest; don’t push yourself.” He met her eyes. “But of course you will. My dear, I wish you well.”

  Tears came to Sabrina’s eyes. He feared for her, and for Stephanie, too. She bowed her head and he took her in his arms like a child and held her with a slight rocking motion.

  “You are a strong woman, my dear, but sometimes strength is not enough. If you need me, I am here. For both of you. I hope you will always remember that.”

  “I will. Thank you.” Sabrina took the map, with the most direct route to Vézelay brightly outlined with a yellow marker. “You must have been a very good friend to Stephanie.”

  “And to you,” Robert said and they exchanged a smile as Sabrina gently closed the door, then ran down the stairs and down the street to her car.

  * * *

  Stephanie and Léon lingered over coffee in the long, slow evening, drifting in reverie, reaching out now and then to touch each other and exchange a smile of wonder. They were together, and no one but Robert knew where they were.

  Cavaillon, and the violence and fear that had come to it, had been left behind. They sat in the courtyard of a small, square two-story stone house with a steeply pitched orange tile roof, hidden from the street by a high, rough stone wall covered on both sides with bougainvillaea. The pale purple blossoms hung in lacy clusters from long looping branches that tumbled over the stones and the white wooden gate set deep into the wall. The scent of the flowers mingled with that of the roses and wisteria in the courtyard, the coffee in small porcelain cups, the spicy pears in a glass bowl on the table.

  “Like honeysuckle and red wine,” Stephanie murmured.

  Léon looked at her quickly. “Yes. Where? A garden?”

  She tried to hold on to the brief flash of memory. “It must have been. Honeysuckle bushes and red wine. And people, lots of people. A party. Léon, there was a party! And it was in a yard, not a garden, a yard, and the bushes, the honeysuckle bushes, were all around it.”

  “Yes, good, and who was at the party? Who were the people, Sabrina?”

  After a moment she shook her head. “I don’t know. I can’t even see myself there. Oh, I hate this, I feel so unconnected when I see a flash of something and then nothing else; it’s like finding a sliver of china and never knowing what the bowl or vase it came from looked like.”

  “But you’re not unconnected.”

  “No.” She smiled at him, grateful for his quiet presence, and his love. “Not anymore.”

  They held hands on the table and the calm of the evening enfolded them and they returned to their reverie and sense of wonder. The sun had gone down, but still the light held, shadows more sharply creased, the sky above their small enclosed courtyard arching gray-blue, streaked with peach and lilac clouds. Muted voices came from beyond the wall; somewhere a violin sang a plaintive folk song of Burgundy. Stephanie, fully in the present, breathed deeply, sensually, and stretched her arms above her head. “I love you,” she said, and Léon stood behind her and bent to kiss her neck, his hands on her breasts.

  “We’ve come home,” he murmured. “My darling Sabrina, we have come home.”

  Later, they cleared the table together, stacking the dishes in the sink, and went out, to walk through the town. Vézelay was built on a hill, the streets leading steeply to the great basilica of La Madeleine at the top. In the growing darkness, Stephanie and Léon strolled past low stucco buildings, holding hands, looking into shops and art galleries so tiny they were barely wider than their open doorways. Above were apartments, shutters open wide in the soft air. Geraniums bloomed on windowsills and in wooden planters and clay flowerpots spaced along the stone sidewalk and beside every entrance. Interspersed with the shops were houses turning a blank face to the street, showing to the throngs of tourists only their locked front doors and garage doors so old they were deeply fissured, held together in wildly random patterns by the square handmade nails of another age.

  The tourists were leaving, walking down the hill to their buses, and the higher Stephanie and Léon walked, the quieter the town became. Soon, at the top, they were alone. “Now, briefly, Vézelay is ours,” Léon said in amusement. “Until tomorrow when the buses return.”

  “I like it both ways,” Stephanie said. “Even when it’s so crowded we can’t walk up the street, everyone is so happy. They like being here and they’re always smiling.”

  He kissed her lightly. “And so am I, it seems.” They walked around the great church with its tiled conical roof topped with a cross and the narrow arched windows that reminded Stephanie of eyes open in surprise. At the far end of the flat summit was a stone wall overgrown with grasses and wildflowers, and Stephanie and Léon perched on it and looked over it, down the long, long slope to the flat green fields of Burgundy outlined by rows of trees and the lazy bend of the Cure River, a sinuous ghost in the fading light. In the two weeks they had been in Vézelay, it had become their favorite spot. “A destination for pilgrims over a thousand years ago,” Léon had said when they first visited it. “And still today, for aren’t we on a pilgrimage to find safe haven and a home?”

  They sat there until it was almost too dark to see; then they turned and walked back the way they had come. “Come to the studio,” Léon said suddenly when they were near their house. “I want to show you something. I was going to wait, but I want you to see them now.”

  He had rented a studio above a wineshop and charcuterie; it was flooded with light from the north and east and large enough for the wide canvases he had begun painting in his studio in Goult. At the top of the stairs he unlocked the door and threw the light switch. From the doorway, Stephanie saw the two portraits of her that he had almost finished when they left Provence and, on another wall, a series of paintings that were new. Léon stepped back and she went up to them, moving slowly from one to the next.

  They were blocks and fragments of color, but within the abstract breakdown of form could be seen the essence of each painting: four children playing, sitting, hiding, sharing secrets, urgently racing to a destination unseen.

  “Of course they’ll get more abstract, more essential,” Léon said as Stephanie gazed at them for a long time. “But this is the beginning.” He put his arm around her. “What is bothering you?”

  “A dozen paintings of children.”

  “Yes?”

  “We’ve never talked about children.”

  “Of course not. We were getting acquainted. And you were married. I never felt it was urgent, did you?”

  “But you’ve never even said you like children. Or that you want them. I still don’t know if you want them.”

  “I’ve always liked them. I find them baffling and secretive, and it’s a little daunting the way they often make one feel extraneous
, but they’re really quite fascinating and likable, even lovable. Why are you laughing at me?”

  “Because you’re so solemn, as if you’re analyzing aliens. Children are just like us; they’re just more open about everything. Even when they’re secretive, they’re more honest about it than we are.”

  “I don’t know what that means.”

  “Oh, that they want to be found out.” She had moved closer to the row of paintings pinned to the wall, so engrossed in them she was almost talking to herself. “They leave clues so others will stop them from doing something they know is wrong. Cliff made sure I’d find that radio and those other things in his room; he didn’t even try to hide—”

  She turned slowly. She was pale, her eyes as startled as those of a sleeper awakened by sudden light.

  “Who is Cliff?” Léon asked.

  “I don’t know. It sounds as if he’s . . . my son.”

  “Or a brother?”

  “Oh. Yes, I suppose . . . But he would have to be much younger.”

  “That would not be so unusual.” He drew her to him. Her face was against his neck; he could feel her quick short breaths, the trembling of her slender body. He held her until the trembling subsided and she drew back.

  “What if he’s my son?”

  “Then we have a greatly complicated situation. And I think we will know, one way or another, before much more time passes; it seems to me you are remembering more these days, are you not?”

  She made a gesture of frustration. “As I said: flashes. Bits and pieces.”

  “But from them you will build a past; one day they will all fall into place, like the chips of marble an artist embeds into a mosaic. Each is valuable but meaningless; then suddenly it is part of a whole and tells a story. Do you believe this?”

  “Yes.” And, hearing him say it, she did. One day she would know.

  “But we will not let ghosts and fancies interfere,” he said, and kissed her again. “We are going to make our own life, and take what comes each day and conquer it. We will talk about having children, because of course I want them. I never did before, but now I do, and I think that must be why I made these paintings. Often I find my dreams on paper before I know I have dreamed them. What do you think?”