Cupid's Arrow

by Isabelle Merlin

  Then we are driven away, out of the woods and down the night roads out of Quarré to the hospital at Avallon. And as we go along, I tell Remy quickly what happened to me, and then he tells me what happened to him. He says he's got a much harder head than Christine Foy realised and when he came to in the cellar he realised what had happened. He didn't know why she did what she did, but he knew that for some reason she had attacked him and that it was more than likely I'd be in danger. She had tied his hands but not his feet and he had managed to wiggle along the cellar floor till he got to one of the racks of wine she kept in there, then kicked out a couple of bottles from the rack. They smashed, spilling wine and broken glass everywhere and he was able to use bits of the broken glass to hack at the tape around his hands. It wasn't easy – the glass slipped once or twice, and cut his hand. He was soon free. He looks very sad then and tells me how once he got out of the cellar, he'd found Patou lying in one of the rooms, dead.

  'There's not much more to tell,' he says, after a silence. 'I rang the police and they came pretty quickly and searched the house but found nothing. They thought she must have taken you somewhere in the car because it was gone. But then a couple of them were still searching the grounds with the dogs and they went out through the back garden and discovered Oscar's body.' He looks at me. 'Well, then, I don't know how to explain it, but I saw you. I saw you running in the woods, and I remembered that dream you told me about, and suddenly I was sure that it had been a premonition. I thought that's what she was doing, she was hunting you through the woods. I remember you telling me about how in your dream you came to that place – that rocky place. We'd thought it was the Lady's House, near Bellerive; but what if it was near here? So I said to the police, is there any place around here in the woods where there are big rocks, places where you might hide? And one of them comes from Quarré, and he said, yes, there's La Roche des Fées, it's not very far from here.'

  'You saw me,' I say.

  'Yes. I did.'

  I swallow. 'Did you, did you send me a picture of what to do?'

  He stares at me. 'What do you mean?'

  So I explain. Jerkily, anxiously. He says nothing for an instant after I've spoken, then he sighs and takes my hand. In soft French, he says, 'It wasn't me, Fleur, chérie. Not me.' He shoots me a sideways look and switches back to English. 'You know what people say about places like that. It's called Fairy Rock for a reason. It's said there are otherworldly presences there. Helpful, sometimes. To the right sort of people.'

  'But I don't believe in that sort of stuff,' I say, loudly. 'They're just stories. I imagined it, that's all.'

  'Maybe. Maybe not. But I think, I think you have something, Fleur. Something that picks up on – on something most people don't.'

  I snort. 'I'm psychic, you mean? Don't be silly. I'm just ordinary.'

  'You're anything but,' says Remy, very quietly, and what I see in his golden eyes then makes my heart beat so fast I feel as though it's going to jump into my throat. He goes on, gently, 'There's that dream, too, Fleur. You can't explain that away.'

  'No,' I say, after a moment. 'I can't. Not really. But I don't, I don't want to think about it. It scares me, Remy.'

  He nods. 'I understand.' He puts an arm around me.

  'Remy,' I say, after a while. 'You really did see me? I mean, in your mind?'

  'Yes,' he says, looking into my eyes. 'I really did.'

  I nod, and suddenly my whole body is flooded with a strange sense of wellbeing and happiness. I say, 'Remy, you know what my mother told me?'

  'To keep away from men like me?' he says, teasingly, the golden eyes alight.

  'No. She – she said she would be glad to meet you. And she said – she said she'd done something that she should have done long ago but wasn't brave or unselfish enough to do before.'

  'What's that?'

  'She'd read the cards, she said, and they'd told her she should do it. For me.' I think of Mum, even in her distress and fear, spreading out her Lady of the Lake tarot, and I feel a mixture of love and annoyance. 'She said it was time. Time I needed to know Tom Mallory, my father. So, Remy, she called him! I didn't know she knew where he was. She's never even wanted to talk about him. And there was that story about him being a spy, too. I didn't know what to think. And now she's called him. She said she was sorry, she knew how much I've wanted to know about him. Oh, Remy! It's, like, such a huge thing for her to do. So amazing. I–I might even get to meet him, if he can be bothered to come over and see me, that is.' I break off. I can't continue. Remy holds me tighter. And so we stay together, like that, all the rest of the way to Avallon, without speaking, without needing to.

  The garden

  Mum was at the hospital when we arrived, sitting in the waiting room with Nicolas Boron and Wayne Morgan on either side of her. Once we'd got out of the ambulance, we'd been met by nurses and made to sit in wheelchairs, though I hardly think we needed it – at least I didn't – so it must have looked worse than it really was. Poor Mum. She already looked terrible – her face drawn, white as a ghost, black circles under her eyes – but when she saw me in the wheelchair, it seemed like she was going to faint. She got to her feet with a little cry and would have fallen if Nicolas hadn't gently steadied her.

  'Don't worry, Mum,' I said, rather embarrassed now because everyone was looking at us. 'I'm fine, I am, really.'

  She said nothing, just came to me and hugged me. I could feel her trembling. Her skin felt cold. My stomach churned. I hated to see her like this. And it was all my fault. I said, helplessly, 'I'm sorry, Mum.'

  'Fleur,' she murmured, 'my little Fleur. I'm so glad you're –' But it seemed she couldn't go on. She held me a moment longer, then she straightened. She looked at Remy, then back at me. I swallowed and said, 'Mum, this is Remy. Remy, this is my mother, Anne Griffon.'

  It's got to have been the strangest introduction in the history of the world. Not the best way for your mother to meet your boyfriend, that's for sure. Mum and Remy stared at each other without speaking for an instant and I held my breath. If the two people I loved best in the world hated each other on sight, if Mum blamed Remy for what had happened and Remy reacted badly, then life would be very hard for me in the future. To say the least.

  Then Mum laid a hand gently on Remy's shoulder, and just as gently withdrew it. She said, 'Thank you for finding my daughter, Remy. The police have explained what happened.'

  I could feel tears in my eyes. I knew that had cost her. I knew she could have raged at him, said hurtful and horrible things to him. I knew he'd been expecting that, that he wouldn't really have blamed her either. I saw the relief that flooded over his face, and the smile lighting up his whole face. He bowed his head and said, formally, 'You are very kind, Madame.'

  'Not Madame,' she said. 'My name's Anne. And I'm not at all kind, as I'm sure Fleur might tell you. I'm just telling the truth. I'm glad you were there for her tonight.'

  They looked at each other – and in that moment, I knew things would be all right. Oh, there was still a long way to go and I didn't know whether Mum would be at all comfortable with the idea that at 'only' sixteen I knew I'd met my soul mate, the love of my life, and that I wanted to be with him always even if we had to wait to be together properly – but things would be okay. They liked each other. At least, they didn't dislike each other. Mum would try, for my sake, perhaps at first, but eventually, I hoped, because she really did like Remy and did understand what there was between us.

  One of the nurses coughed, breaking the atmosphere. 'I'm afraid the young people have to be examined by a doctor.' She looked over at Nicolas and Wayne, hovering rather uneasily behind Mum. 'Are either of you gentlemen the father of this young lady, or of the young man?'

  Nicolas blushed, and shook his head. But it was Wayne who said, in strongly accented French, 'Neither of us has the honour, Nurse. But we are good friends of Anne and would like to support –'

  'No, no,' said the nurse briskly. 'I'm afraid you will have to stay here. But
Madame can come in with her daughter. Is there any family you would like us to contact, Monsieur?' She looked at Remy.

  He shook his head, and a shadow passed over his face, turning his face into a mask of sorrow. 'There is no-one,' he said bleakly. The quiet words fell like stones and I found I couldn't say a word, not say a thing, to help him. All I could do was reach over to him, take his hand, and squeeze it. Then, as the nurses wheeled us down the corridor towards the ward, Mum, who'd been walking beside me, went over to him and said something quietly to him, something I didn't hear, that wasn't meant for my ears. But I saw that though his eyes were still full of grief for his mother, the mother he'd hardly even had a chance to mourn really, whose loss he was only going to start coming to terms with, the shadow lightened just a fraction. And I thought I knew then what Mum might have said to him and my heart leapt with gladness and hope. Yes, he was an orphan – but he wasn't alone.

  The doctors found nothing wrong with me and discharged me immediately. They kept Remy in till the next day though because of the fact he'd been hit on the head and they wanted to make sure he didn't have concussion or any other problems stemming from his injury. Mum and I stayed with him till he fell asleep and then we went to Nicolas Boron's house in Avallon, where I had a shower and went to bed in his spare room because I was suddenly so tired I could not keep awake a moment longer. I fell asleep immediately and slept dreamlessly till the morning when I had the dream: not the nightmare of running, the one that had come true, but my old dream, of the green road, and the door in the wall. But this time, I walked up that green road, up the hill, and I put my hand on the door handle, and I opened it.

  And there, behind the door, was a garden. A beautiful walled garden, like in that kids' book, you know, The Secret Garden. It was full of roses and smelled of heaven and there was a bench there where someone was sitting. I couldn't move. The person who sat there and smiled at me was so beautiful it took my breath away, but that wasn't the only reason. I recognised her, you see, and she wasn't how I'd last seen her, twisted in hate and fear, the past burnt into her face, but serene and lovely and gentle. It was Valerie Gomert sitting in that heavenly garden, Valerie Gomert with a whole face and the sunlight shining on her hair. Smiling, she held out a hand to me, not to beckon me in but to show me something she held in her palm. I could see it clearly now. It was a tarot card. The card known as The Lovers, one of the best cards in the tarot pack, which represented love and trust and the marriage of minds and hearts, and the fulfilment of heart's desire.

  I woke up then, and lay there in the sunlight – it was already past midday, I'd slept for ages – with my heart beating fast, thinking of what it all meant, and remembering how she'd looked, and her smile. And that card. It had felt so real. It had felt like I had really seen her, in the place where her spirit was now – and that she'd given us her blessing. Yes, it was a dream. Yes, I don't believe in woo-woo stuff. But this wasn't woo-woo. It was real. A dream could be more than the subconscious working out of problems or a jumble of disconnected images. A dream could be a genuine foretelling, even if you don't understand it – like my running nightmare. Or it could be something even more amazing. In the old days, people thought dreams could sometimes be direct messages from the dead. This one felt like that, even in the daylight. Maybe it wasn't. But I would tell Remy about it when I went into the hospital. For that was the purpose of it. I'd been given this dream – to give to him. So that he would be comforted. So that he could begin the long, hard journey from sorrow to hope.

  But before we got to the hospital that day, the police arrived. It was my old friend Lieutenant Balland, and a colleague. They'd just been to interview Remy in the hospital. He was much better, and he'd been able to fill them in on a good deal, but they needed to speak to me too, just to clear up certain things. I didn't mind, though I could see Mum looked ready to protest that they should leave me alone right now, I'd had a bad time. She sat beside me on Nicolas Boron's sofa and glowered at the police officers, while Nicolas hovered. There was something I needed to know, though, before I could concentrate on the police questions. Something that lay in the back of my mind, far away, but like a distant dark cloud.

  'Am I going to be charged with murder, or manslaughter?' I blurted out, in the middle of Lieutenant Balland's spiel about needing only a bit of stuff from me. I saw Mum wince and Nicolas make a movement of protest but I couldn't help it. I just had to ask.

  Lieutenant Balland looked at me, surprised. I'd spoken in English, not knowing the French words for those terms. She said, 'Why would we do that, Fleur?'

  'She –' I swallowed. 'Christine Foy – I, she's –'

  'She's certainly not dead, if that's what you mean,' said Lieutenant Balland grimly. 'And even if she was, there is something known as self-defence. I doubt you would have been charged. In any case, the matter does not arise. She is well and truly alive.'

  'But the rock – I hit her – I heard it.'

  'She was only stunned, though she had a flesh wound that bled profusely.' Lieutenant Balland smiled faintly. 'When my colleagues arrived at Fairy Rock, she was just coming to. They had quite a time subduing her. She fought like a wildcat.' She looked at me. 'That rock you hit her with – where did you find it, Fleur?'

  The memory flashed into my mind, and with it, all the strange feelings I'd had in that darkness under Fairy Rock. 'It was in a cranny – in the wall – I just – I just sort of found it.'

  She nodded. 'Fleur, there is something you should know. It is official now. Valerie Gomert was killed not with an arrow, as you know – the arrow wound was inflicted after death, to throw suspicion on Remy Gomert – but with a rock. She was battered to death with a rock.' She cleared her throat. 'Preliminary forensic results on the piece of rock we found near Foy – the rock you hit her with – show that there are faint traces of blood on it, other than Foy's own, which we would have expected. Fleur – those blood traces are of the same blood group as Valerie Gomert's.'

  I stared at her. The hair stood up on my neck. My blood ran cold. It really felt like that. I stammered, 'What, what do you mean?'

  'We think that it was the very rock that was used to kill Madame Gomert,' said Lieutenant Balland calmly, her eyes fixed on my face.

  I felt sick. I thought I could see things in her eyes, accusations. I struggled to my feet. I faltered, 'Are you, are you saying I–I killed her?'

  'Fleur!' said Mum, in an anguished tone.

  Lieutenant Balland gestured at me to sit down. 'No, no, no. I'm sorry, Fleur. Of course I did not mean to give you that impression. We know who killed Valerie Gomert. The same person who killed Oscar Dulac and his uncle Raymond and Jules Chassin.' I almost asked who that last person was, but then realised it must be the PI from Vezelay. Poor man, I had never even known his name till then. 'Each of them killed by a different method, so as to confuse us. But now we know all the murders were done by one person. And that person is Christine Foy, as she calls herself. Even if she hadn't made a full confession – which she has, in fact, she seemed eager to talk – Monsieur Boron here gave us something that would have alerted us to her.' She glanced at Nicolas, who took his cue.

  'I found a letter from Oscar first thing this morning,' he explained. 'He must have put it under my office door last night sometime. It detailed his suspicions of his fiancée – the poor man was obviously in agony about it.' I thought of the last time I had seen Oscar alive – how haunted he'd looked, how drawn. He must already have been in torment about his suspicions. If only he'd talked to someone, sooner.

  'He didn't want me to tell the police,' Nicolas Boron went on. 'He just wanted me, as a family friend and a lawyer, to advise him on what to do. I wish, I wish I'd seen him. I don't understand why he went to see that, that murderess.'

  'He loved her. He wanted to give her a chance,' I said sadly. 'He wanted to tell her to run away, to go away and never come back. At least, I think so.'

  'You are probably right,' said Lieutenant Balland. 'But I don't suppos
e we'll ever know for sure, for he cannot tell us now.' She paused. 'Foy told us that she had hidden the rock with which she killed Valerie. She had hidden it in that place where you found it. Why, we're not sure, but she seems to have been the sort of killer who likes to keep souvenirs, as we've discovered. Maybe the rock would have gone into her collection. What is certain though is that it was the very same thing with which she so brutally took the life of that poor lady, which proved to be her own undoing. Life can be full of strange ironies and coincidences.'

  'Yes,' I echoed, remembering being in that darkness under the rock, my hand finding the cranny, the stone, the picture of what I must do in my head. It had been so clear. I had been shown. Shown by something – or someone. I thought of the dream I'd had that morning, Valerie Gomert with her whole face smiling at me and showing me The Lovers, giving us her blessing, and my heart filled with a wonder touched with just a little thrill of fear.

  But it wasn't something I could talk about, not in front of the police, and not yet to Mum, either. It was something I could only share with Remy.

  'Did you find the dream book?' I asked.

  Lieutenant Balland looked puzzled for an instant, then her face cleared. 'Yes. It was in Christine Foy's house. She's admitted to taking it from Madame Gomert's house.' She looked at me. 'Now, I've also heard about a website called Dreaming Holmes. Remy Gomert has told me you contacted this person. Can you tell me more?'