He was tall and lanky, with his mother’s dramatic looks. A lock of glossy, abundant black hair fell over his forehead, shading bright blue eyes. His face was not quite long enough to be horsy, his cheekbones were high, his mouth curled in a smile you’d immediately tag as sardonic. He was wearing tight faded jeans, scuffed boots, a waist-length denim jacket over a white T-shirt.
He looked me over appraisingly during our handshake. I debated whether to stick with innocuous chatter or jump right into the tragedy of Pedro and get it out of the way. I opted for innocuous chatter and asked him when he’d arrived in France.
“This morning. Flew into Nice and got the train to Avignon.” He continued to size me up, his blue eyes acute behind heavy lids. I could see he was a man who expected women to approve of him, but I wasn’t sure I could oblige. There was something smarmy in his slow grin, the way he stood with his hips thrust forward.
The grin got wider as he looked toward the door. “Hey! Blanchie!” he said.
It was Blanche. Not only had she shown up, she had dressed up, in a pale salmon shirt with pearl buttons and wide-legged white silk pants. Her hair was pulled back in a style similar to her mother’s that gave her face, to my eye at least, a severe beauty. She even had on gold hoop earrings. Elated at her transformation, I tried to catch her eye when she walked in, but she ignored me as she said, “Hi, Alex,” and crossed the room to present her cheek for his kiss.
Right after her arrival, dinner was served. It was a strained meal, as I’d expected it to be. Only Alexander seemed unaware of the awkward atmosphere, and he alone did justice to the lamb, eating hungrily and having seconds. He had taken off his denim jacket. His T-shirt had cut-off sleeves, perfect for exhibiting his biceps. On his sinewy wrist, a heavy gold watch gleamed. I recognized the crown insignia of a Rolex, a very fancy ornament for a man so scruffy otherwise.
Ignoring the almost total silence of Ross and Blanche, he quizzed Vivien about Pedro’s death. I still couldn’t get a fix on her manner toward him. She talked in a compulsive rush that could pass for vivacity. Although the fear never left her eyes, I saw hunger in her look as well.
The meal limped to a close, the leftover lamb congealing in its juices, the Chateauneuf-du-Pape down to the dregs. Alexander moved back from the table, stretched out his long legs, and said to me, “I hear you and Vivi are writing a best-seller.”
I could’ve guessed he’d call her “Vivi” instead of “Mom.”
“We hope so.”
“How’s it going? You pretty far along?”
I hesitated, not wanting to say we’d be a lot farther if his mother would buckle down. Vivien put in, “I don’t think it’s going as fast as Georgia Lee would like. And now, with Pedro—” she faltered. Pedro, I saw, was going to cause some delay.
Alexander leaned toward Vivien with a wicked smile. “Who’s going to play you in the movie version?”
Vivien shook her head. “Come on, Alex.” Beside me, I felt Ross stir in his chair.
Alexander went on, “No, really. Let’s do the casting. We need a sort of Ava Gardner type for you. Too bad Ava’s too old. Liz Taylor’s too old, too. And too short. Meryl Streep might do, if she dyed her hair. Or what about—”
Ross moved his chair back abruptly, and at the same moment Blanche said, “I’m tired. I’m going up.”
I thought at first Ross wasn’t even going to excuse himself, but he muttered something about a long and stressful day. When Blanche said good night, she gave me a glance I couldn’t interpret. She might have been telling me I owed her one.
Feeling deserted, wishing I’d made my excuses at the same time, I sat through an interminable cup of coffee with Vivien and Alexander. Then Alexander, too, professed to be exhausted. He stretched, exposing tufts of black armpit hair, and said to Vivien, “I guess the cycle will be OK where it is, right?”
My last swallow of coffee was in my mouth. I held it there, not even trying to choke it down, the rim of my cup resting lightly on my bottom lip.
The cycle. I hadn’t heard any cycle. But I’d been in the shower when Alexander got here.
As Vivien assured him the cycle would be all right, I put down my cup. With an immense effort, I swallowed my coffee. I said I was going to get some air before bed and headed for the kitchen.
Marcelle was putting up the dishes. Her spirits had improved. “He’s very handsome, isn’t he, Madame? The son?” she whispered as I walked by.
“Gorgeous.”
Outside, in the light from the kitchen, I located the motorcycle parked next to the shed. A handkerchief was tied to the handlebars. I couldn’t see the color, or make out the design, but I didn’t have to. I knew what it was.
A MOTORCYCLE RIDE
At midnight, I was sitting on a chair next to my bedroom window, hugging my knees, staring out at the dark. I was thinking about Twinkie. When she was a kitten, I’d pick up feathers and bring them home to her. She loved them. She’d pounce on a feather, roll around with it, chew it, kick it with her hind legs. I assume she knew instinctively it was part of a bird. It wasn’t a bird, though. It was only a feather— a wrecked and mangled one after she finished with it.
I asked myself if I was on to something substantial here, or was I kicking my hind legs at trivialities? Bird or feather?
The bird argument went like this: Alexander was the solitary motorcyclist. He hadn’t, as he’d claimed with a straight face, landed in Nice this— now yesterday— morning. He’d been here, lurking in the woods at least part of the time, since the day we went to Les Baux. His motorcycle had been parked in front of the Auberge de Ventoux in Beaulieu-la-Fontaine yesterday afternoon. He was probably in this vicinity when Pedro went off the cliff. If he had no sinister motives, why sneak around and lie?
The feather argument went: You didn’t see Alexander. You saw a Yamaha motorcycle and a Bingo’s Buckaroo BBQ bandanna. Maybe he borrowed the cycle from somebody yesterday, when he got here.
Sure. Some Frenchman who happens to have a handkerchief imprinted with the name of an unmistakably American restaurant.
It’s possible. The French love American-sounding stuff. What about those “University of Harvard” sweatshirts you see?
All right, all right. I still think—
But you don’t know. That’s the point.
I didn’t know. Which made it too soon to lay my bird at the feet of Constable Reynaud, or some more enthusiastic member of the police force, and risk having it recognized as nothing but a feather after all. The best I could do was talk to Alexander and keep an eye on him. The worst I could do was let him know my suspicions.
After formulating this semblance of a game plan, I allowed myself to go to bed. When I finally fell asleep, I had nightmares. Pedro’s body was lying in the rain at the foot of the bluff. He got up and walked toward me, rain pouring from his eyes. Paralyzed with horror, I allowed him to kiss me, a soft, tender kiss that woke me in a gurgling panic. Day was breaking before I got back to sleep.
I woke late, only to discover, via Marcelle, that Constable Reynaud had phoned and summoned Vivien to sign some papers. She and Ross had driven to Beaulieu-la-Fontaine more than an hour before. “I answered the telephone when he called,” Marcelle told me. “I believe it has to do with the disposition of Monsieur Pedro’s body.”
“The disposition of his body? Already?”
She raised an eyebrow. “That’s what he said, Madame.”
What else had I expected? I’d known Constable Reynaud wanted to get this foreign and unwelcome case closed fast.
Blearily, I poured coffee. Marcelle said, “Would you like an omelette? I made one for Monsieur Alex. He said it was super.” She pronounced the word with an American accent, accompanied by the “perfect” symbol of a circle made with thumb and forefinger.
“No, thanks.”
“He’s so funny, you know? He knows some French, and he isn’t afraid to talk. Not like Mademoiselle Blanche.”
“No, I guess the two of them are ve
ry different.” I tried to hide my annoyance at Alexander’s easy conquest.
After breakfast I went out in search of him, intending to have an exploratory chat. Handy to my purpose, he was by the shed tinkering with the Yamaha. When I approached he wiped his hands on the Bingo’s bandanna. I said, indicating the cycle, “Are you having trouble?”
“Not really. Just fine-tuning.” He’d changed his T-shirt. This one had sleeves. Otherwise his outfit, including the watch, was the same as yesterday’s.
I hovered near. “Did you bring the cycle with you from the States?”
He tucked the bandanna in his back pocket. “Nope. Bought it in Avignon. Used.”
“You bought it just for this trip?”
“Sure. I’ll sell it when I leave.” He turned his attention from it to me. “Want to go for a ride?”
“Oh, no. I’m not much of a one for motorcycles.”
He ignited his certified charm. “Come on. Be a sport. I need to test it out.”
If we were pals, bikers together, I might learn more about what he was up to. “All right, then.”
He straddled the bike. “Get on.”
I climbed gingerly on the seat behind him as he kicked the engine into life. “Hang on. Don’t be shy,” he yelled over the noise, and as we wheeled around, out of sheer terror I clamped my arms around his rib cage. We roared out of the gate at what felt like seventy miles per hour, kicked up gravel as we skidded on to the road, and hurtled up the hill so fast I thought we’d be airborne by the time we reached the summit.
“Slow down!” I yelled, my words lost in the racket of the engine. I molded myself to his back, pressed my head between his shoulder blades, and screwed my eyes shut.
I hadn’t been lying when I said I wasn’t much of a one for motorcycles. I was afraid this maniac would kill us both. I opened my eyes to see that we were gaining, fast, on a tractor put-putting along, driven by a sunburned farmer. Right before impact we veered sharply and cruised around him, and moments later he had receded to a bucolic bump in the road.
Wind whipped my hair. Neither of us was wearing a helmet. When I’d seen the motorcyclist, he’d had on a black one, with a smoked face screen. If I lived, I’d find out if Alexander owned such a thing. In the meantime, I bowed my head and did what I always do on bumpy airplane flights: I vowed that if I got out alive I’d never do anything so stupid again.
Eventually he slowed, and we jounced off the road and pulled up in long grass under a tree. For a second or two, I couldn’t make my arms let go of him. He cut the motor and said, “I want to talk to you.”
Suddenly, everything was dead quiet. I scrambled off the bike. If he tried anything I’d run like hell. “What is it?”
He put down the kickstand and sat easily on the seat, one knee bent in front of him. Frightened as I was, I had to admire his strategy. He’d intimidated me, removed me from any support, gotten me in his power, and he’d done it with my willing cooperation. “I don’t like this book you and Vivi are doing,” he said.
I was working on getting my breath back. “Why not?”
“It’s not good for her. She knows it. I’ll bet you know it, too.”
What was this officious punk getting at? “I hate to sound heartless, but isn’t the book Vivien’s business? It wasn’t my idea.”
“No.” He rubbed at one of many scratches on the side of his boot. “But if you pulled out she’d have to let it go.”
“Not necessarily. She could find another writer.”
“She wouldn’t, though. She wouldn’t have the heart.”
Beyond the tree I was standing under was a vineyard, long straight rows of young grapevines. In the vineyard, I was delighted to see, was a man, walking from plant to plant, doing something to each one in turn. A fly buzzed around my face, and I brushed at it impatiently. “Maybe you should talk to her,” I said.
“I have. She’ll never quit.”
“Well, then—”
“That’s why I’m talking to you.” His eyes were hooded. He looked sexy and dangerous, and I was sure he knew it.
I expelled a frustrated breath. “Look. I was hired to do a job. I’ve been paid—”
“That doesn’t mean you can’t quit.”
“I’ve already spent the money. If I quit, I have to pay it back.”
“So tell me how much. I’ll make it up to you.”
I was silent, taking this in. The first time I’d ever been offered a bribe, and it was by a ne’er-do-well former barker in a San Francisco sex show. How much did he think I charged to write a book— two dollars and ninety-eight cents? “You don’t have that kind of money,” I said at last.
“I can get it.”
I shook my head with a dazed chuckle, still not believing the turn the conversation had taken. “You’re serious, aren’t you?”
“I’m serious.”
“But why? Maybe you’re right and the book isn’t such a hot idea—”
“It’s a terrible idea. If Vivi were thinking straight, she’d never do it.”
I looked at the man in the vineyard. He was wearing bright blue work clothes, his sleeves rolled up. He was close enough now so I could see that he was carrying some implement with a long chrome nozzle, and was giving each plant a squirt with it. “I can’t let you buy me off. It wouldn’t be right,” I said, turning back to Alexander.
He shifted his body as if searching for a more comfortable position. “You don’t have to decide right now. Think about it.”
“The answer is no.”
He didn’t even look disappointed. “Let me tell you what I believe,” he said calmly. “The book will not be written. I strongly believe that.”
“We’ll see.”
“Right. We’ll see.” He arranged himself on the seat of the motorcycle and motioned with his head for me to get on behind him.
The trip back was more sedate. When we pulled into the yard the car was there, and Ross and Vivien were walking toward the house, back from their meeting with Constable Reynaud. They told us Constable Reynaud had concluded the evidence didn’t warrant an investigation of Pedro’s death. The case was closed.
RAPPROCHEMENT
“Cremated? Why cremated?” I asked.
“Because it was cheapest, and none too cheap at that,” Vivien snapped. “Am I supposed to buy him a cemetery plot? Or have him stuffed and keep him as a souvenir?” She dropped on the sofa in an attitude of collapse.
Cremation might well be cheapest. It was also the surest way to destroy evidence of foul play, if any existed. “Having him stuffed is an interesting idea,” Ross said.
She gave him a poisonous glance. “Spare me your macabre humor, please.”
“It was your macabre humor, Vivi,” Alexander put in. “You mentioned stuffing him in the first place.”
She didn’t answer. “Pedro had no family at all?” I asked.
“None that he ever admitted to,” said Vivien.
“Or friends?”
The set of her mouth told me she was sick of my questions. “He may have had buddies he drank with, or saw at the track, but I don’t know their names.” She narrowed her eyes. “Why?”
“Nothing. It seems sad that he was so alone,” I said.
“Leave it to Georgia Lee to raise the tone of the conversation,” Ross said caustically.
I bit my lip. Ross’s vexation at seeing me ride up with Alexander had been obvious, at least to me.
Alexander began to massage Vivien’s temples. “What are you going to do with the ashes?” he asked.
“I have no idea. I guess we could scatter them somewhere.” Under his ministrations she sounded calmer.
Once the ashes were scattered, and the clothes given to charity, there would be little evidence that Pedro Ruiz ever existed at all.
“Thank God it’s over,” said Vivien, her voice remote, as Alexander’s fingers moved round and round, round and round near the corners of her closed eyes, the motion dislodging strands of her swept-back hair.
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Ross, watching them, looked disgusted. He turned and left the room, and I followed him upstairs. Although he must have heard my footsteps, he didn’t turn and look at me or speak. He strode to his room, went in, and closed the door with a thump.
Well. I went to my own room, feeling vexed in my turn. I wasn’t going to apologize for my motorcycle ride with Alexander. I was free to ride motorcycles with whomever I damn pleased. Since Ross considered Alexander his enemy, I was sorry he thought I’d joined the opposite camp, but if he wouldn’t give me an opening to talk about it he’d have to stew. I had more than enough on my mind figuring out what Alexander was up to.
I closed my door and took out my envelope of ever-more-dog-eared clippings. I had studied these articles from New York and People and Patrician Homes as if they were holy scripture. This time, however, I was looking for something I had paid no attention to thus far— references to Alexander McBride.
They were few and far between. In all the clips I found only one photo, a high school yearbook shot some enterprising person at New York had unearthed. In it, Alexander looked like a gawky kid, but with his sly grin already in place. When he was mentioned in the stories at all, it was in a virtually parenthetical aside, stating that Vivien’s son had been in California at the time of the Carey Howard murder. As an alibi, it sounded more than acceptable.
Why, then, was Alexander so threatened by Vivien’s book? As much as I believed he was fond— even over-fond— of Vivien, I didn’t think his primary motive was her mental health. “It’s not good for her” wasn’t good enough for me.
The rafters began to tremble to the love laments of Bernart de Ventadorn. I welcomed the noise, as I took it to mean Blanche was feeling better. I hoped she was back at work on The Book of Betrayal.
The music was so loud I almost didn’t hear Ross’s knock. He came in looking chastened. He had changed from the sport coat and tie he’d worn for the visit to Constable Reynaud, and now wore his familiar running shorts. Without preamble, he said, “I was rude to you. I’m sorry.”
The Grand Tour: Four International Mysteries Page 32