The Lost Concerto

by Helaine Mario

  Beckett frowned. “He’ll have to be pulled out now, for his safety. One more dangerous, embarrassing leak.”

  “All these recent attacks. They seem so personal.”

  “There are men and women who hate America. Too often their mothers, sisters, children are collateral damage in war. If someone they love is harmed, they will fight us forever.”

  “How do we stop them?”

  “It’s too damned easy to hurt people. We have more satellites and drones and high-tech weapons than we can use, and it still comes down to a faceless man in a wired truck or plane who’s not afraid to die. So the best way to stop them is to cut off their funding. Don’t give them the chance to train and grow strong, to travel and communicate, to wire that truck.”

  Beckett reached down to touch the Golden, but the dog shied away. “Have you ever loved someone—or something—enough, Mrs. O’Shea, to do anything for them?”

  Her eyes locked on his. “I hope I never have to find out.”

  He nodded slowly. “Back to our mission, then. I’m here to help you trace your godson, ma’am. Not a terrorist. We need to find Zachary Law.”

  She glanced around the café. “And this is where he was seen last.”

  Beckett reached for her husband’s calendar book on the small round table and tapped it with the palm of his hand. “Your husband was damned close to finding Law. These notes of his—two libraries, a cathedral, the city of Vienna. Most of the information in this calendar circles back to one connection.”

  “Music.” She gazed across the busy square at the Opera House. “It’s music.”

  She was too damned quick, her thoughts as unsettling as the scent of her hair. “I agree with you. But help me understand why your husband started his search in Vienna.”

  “It’s the city of music. It was Zach’s dream, to go there. I told Johnny that, once. And Johnny said that we all have that one special place we’d go to hide when our lives are falling apart.” She looked down at her wedding ring. “For me, it was Martha’s Vineyard.”

  Beckett regarded her in silence. True enough, he thought. When he’d been released, finally, from Walter Reed, he’d only wanted to go to ground in his cabin in the mountains.

  “But I’m sure Johnny had other sources as well,” smiled Maggie, “considering he drank whiskey every Friday night with most of the Pentagon brass.”

  He returned the smile before he could stop himself. “Okay. So Zach Law survives Beirut, eventually makes his way to Vienna, and goes to ground. Gets himself a new identity. Then…”

  “Music,” she repeated. “A musician can’t live without music, it’s as simple as that. So, if he felt he couldn’t play the piano publicly, then he would have chosen some other kind of musical life. Composing, teaching, writing about music, studying—oh, my God.” She turned so quickly that her cup rattled. “Vanessa Durand said that she was hired by Orsini to catalog his art collection. And that Orsini also collected rare musical scores. What if Orsini hired Zach to authenticate the pieces in his music collection?”

  He looked up sharply. “You may be on to something. And that would connect with the research you did on those two libraries your husband mentioned.”

  “The Morgan in New York and Israel’s National Library. Yes.”

  He pulled on his glasses, squinted down at the papers in his hand. “According to your research, The Morgan has an extraordinary collection of illuminated music manuscripts, letters, printed scores.”

  She smiled. “The library is beautiful, filled with priceless cultural treasures—original sheet music by Haydn, Liszt, Chopin. Letters from a thirteen-year-old Mozart. Best of all, an autographed manuscript of Beethoven’s Violin Sonata in G. My God, seeing—touching—the very same pages Beethoven touched! Can you imagine?”

  “No,” he said honestly, trying to keep a straight face.

  She laughed. “Okay. But there’s a connection.”

  “To the Israeli National Library.” He tilted his glasses, read aloud the caption of the newspaper article she’d copied. “Stolen manuscripts plague Israeli Archives in Jerusalem. Hundreds of items missing from the music collection, including manuscripts and letters by Yehudi Menuhin, Jascha Heifetz, Pablo Casals, Mendelssohn, Strauss…”

  He took off his glasses, leaned toward her. “It fits. Your husband saw it, you see it, too. Orsini is not simply a collector of rare music. His collection must include stolen music.”

  Her eyes flashed at him. “Yes. And that’s why Johnny was interested in Spain’s Las Palmas Cathedral. Four hundred music manuscripts stolen from its archives, still unsolved. All those priceless cultural treasures—Victor Orsini is a thief as well as a murderer.”

  He tilted back in his cane chair and nodded at her. “Your husband must have found this link months ago. He was searching for Zach Law and your godson, and somehow he stumbled on something even bigger—”

  “My husband was too smart to stumble on anything, Colonel. He had to be investigating Orsini as well. But why?”

  Beckett’s fingers tightened on his coffee cup. Beyond her, the buses and cars swept around the Place de L’Opéra in a bright, frenetic blur.

  Above the blaring horns in the square, a sudden, whomping sound.

  Louder.

  They looked up. A helicopter, coming in quickly, low, over the rooftops.

  The Golden snarled, fur bristling.

  “Incoming!” shouted Beckett, throwing his arms around Maggie and knocking her to the ground as the Golden let out a howl of fear.

  As the helicopter roared overhead, a stunned Maggie struggled from beneath Beckett’s body and saw the Golden, teeth bared in terror, tear away to stagger blindly out into the swirling traffic.

  “No!” She leaped to her feet and dashed after the dog.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  PARIS. MORNING, JULY 7

  Screams. Horns blaring. The screech of tires and blasts of hot air as bicycles, cars, trucks, buses careened around her. Someone shouted her name. The world blurred.

  God, God. Where was the dog? A flash of golden fur. There!

  A huge truck, hurling across the square. “Watch out!” she screamed, lunging toward the terrified animal.

  She threw out her arms, flung herself toward the Golden.

  All sound stopped. And then she felt him, a body almost her own size, fur and muscle wrapped in her arms.

  A moment of horror, the giant spinning wheels of the truck so close she could touch them.

  She was tackled from behind.

  They fell to the pavement. Hard.

  She opened her eyes. Looked into the deep brown, glistening eyes of the Golden. “Are we alive?” she whispered.

  Sound came back.

  The Golden barked, once.

  The Colonel’s voice, low, fierce.

  Blackness.

  * * *

  “Of all the crazy, bloody damn fool things to do…”

  “Please, Colonel. I’m just glad we’re all okay.” The coffee was strong, hot, stinging her mouth. They were back at the café table, the Golden once more safely curled behind the Colonel’s chair, quivering but unhurt, with a huge beef bone and a fresh bowl of water. Traffic had resumed speeding around the square, the crowd of concerned onlookers dispersed.

  Maggie untied the sweatshirt from her waist and pulled it over her head.

  Beckett shook his shaggy head back and forth. “I’m supposed to protect you, damn it!”

  “The only thing broken is a pair of sunglasses. And the only thing bruised is my ego. I can’t believe I fainted.” She tried a small smile. “I’ve suffered more stress on the stage at Carnegie Hall.”

  She reached out, covered his large hand with hers. “But I wasn’t in any danger. That was a traffic helicopter. Your dog has post-traumatic stress, doesn’t he?” She refused to add, and so do you.

  “Afghanistan.” He pulled his hand away from her. “The doc calls it Battle Fatigue. Nightmares, flashbacks, startling, insomnia. We’re working on
it,” said Beckett, his tone angry. Raw.

  “I know you’re angry, Colonel, but—”

  The silver brows bristled at her. “Angry? You ran into eight lanes of speeding traffic to save a damned dog with three legs, Mrs. O’Shea!”

  “But you were right behind me. You’re the one who pushed us away from that truck.”

  * * *

  She’d refused to return to the hotel, insisting on staying at the café while Beckett spoke to the staff. Thirty minutes later, he sat down across from her once more.

  Cocking an eyebrow in surprise, he stared at the dog, whose large head was now resting in Maggie O’Shea’s lap. The dog hadn’t looked that peaceful since.well, never. “Et tu, Brute?” he murmured.

  She smiled as she stroked the sleek fur. “Any luck?”

  “Everyone has been questioned,” he told her. “No one remembers the people in the photograph or the day the photo was taken. I’m afraid it’s a dead end, ma’am.”

  She gazed past him toward the Opera House. “There has to be something more we can do besides drink coffee and stare at every man who enters the café.”

  He took another slow, thoughtful drink of coffee. “Einstein said that if you have one hour to save the world, spend fifty-five minutes thinking about how and five minutes doing it.”

  She raised an eyebrow, sat back. “Okay, then, we think. Zach was here, we know that from the photograph. Someone must have talked with him, served him a drink…what?”

  He was looking through the café doors at a large, hard-looking woman with bleached hair and dark armpits who polished wine glasses behind the café bar. “That woman,” he said. “The one who looks as if she could tear the New York telephone book in half? There was something in her face…” Beckett stood up. “I’ll talk to her again.”

  Maggie laid her hand on his arm, stopping him. “Let me.” She gave the Golden a gentle nudge, and stood. “I’ll talk to her.”

  “Mrs. O’She—”

  “My friends call me Maggie, Colonel.”

  “Professional boundaries, Mrs. O’Shea. Under the circumstances, it’s better to maintain a strictly professional relationship.”

  She stepped back as if he’d pushed her and walked away from him into the smoky café.

  * * *

  Maggie slid onto one of the round stools along the zinc bar of the Café de la Paix.

  The woman called Yvette eyed her with suspicion. The arched, darkly-painted eyebrows gave her a look of perpetual surprise.

  “Madame,” said Maggie, “I need your help.” She spoke slowly in French, her voice soft and confidential. She nodded toward Beckett, who leaned against the doorway. “That gentleman only told you part of our story.” She beckoned Yvette closer.

  Unlike many of her countrymen, the Frenchwoman seemed to appreciate the polite attempt to speak her language. She leaned her rough elbows on the bar and waited.

  “You’re the crazy American who ran into the square after the dog,” she said suddenly, in English.

  “That would be me,” admitted Maggie.

  “I love my little Papillon,” said Yvette. “What help do you need?”

  “My friend thinks this is an official matter. But no, Madame. Woman to woman, this is…une affaire dun coeur.”

  “Ah,” murmured Yvette knowingly, turning a baleful glare on Beckett.

  Maggie caught the colonel’s eye in the long mirror over the bar. Then she held out the photograph and pointed to Zach. “Please, Madame,” she implored, searching for the words that would reach this cynical, weary woman. “I’m searching for my son’s father. Thirty years ago, I was going to marry this man. We were very much in love.” Maggie saw a tiny spark of response in the tired eyes. You, too, once upon a time, Yvette?

  “But then he went to Beirut. There was a bombing…” Now the words came quickly, in English. “All these years, I’ve believed he was dead. Until now. The man in this picture is so much like him. Like my son…”

  Yvette had not taken her eyes off the photograph.

  “If you know this man,” whispered Maggie, “tell me where I can find him.”

  Yvette’s eyes were bright with some indefinable expression. Finally she said, “Alors. I remember the one you seek. American, oui? The handsome one with—” She stopped abruptly. “You say you haven’t seen him in thirty years, chérie?”

  “Oui, Madame.” What was she going to tell me?

  Yvette looked at the photograph again, this time more carefully, then something darkened her eyes. “I will tell you this,” she said. “He came in two, maybe three times in the last few months. He always liked to sit outside in the sunshine. His companions called him Gid.” She pronounced it “Geed.”

  “Gid,” said Maggie aloud. “Gideon?” The name meant nothing to her. But then a small cymbal sounded in her head. Something she should remember… “A last name, Madame?”

  “But who can be sure?” Yvette held out her hands, reddened palms up. “So many people come to Café de la Paix. C’est impossible.” The Frenchwoman tilted her chin toward the old Opera House across the square. “They always came before the performances. He teased me, eh, because I said I would rather spend the evening with Monsieur Mozart than with my husband.” She chuckled at the memory.

  “I’ve spent many evenings with Monsieur Mozart myself,” smiled Maggie.

  “Then they went off to the Opera House and left me to polish my glasses.” Yvette turned away.

  “Please, just a moment more.” Maggie held out the photograph again. “What about the other faces?”

  Yvette pursed her lips. “The girl was quiet. Always—” she glanced at Maggie—“touching your Gid. He called her—Celene? Cecile? The older man standing behind Gid, I don’t remember him at all.”

  Maggie glimpsed the colonel’s grim face in the mirror above the bar. “What about the man in the sunglasses?” she asked quickly.

  Yvette spat on the floor. “Him, I remember. Handsome, yes, but there was something—bad about him. I am not easily frightened, petite, but he frightened me.”

  Maggie looked down once again at the menacing, wolf-like face. “Oh, I believe you, Madame,” she said. “But I need a last name, an address?”

  “I am sorry. Perhaps, if they lived here in Paris…” A true Parisian, Yvette raised a hand in dismissal of all imbeciles who chose to live anywhere else. “You say Gid is your son’s father, eh? Then—perhaps there is something.”

  “Oh, please! Anything that would allow me to hope.”

  “Alors…” Yvette searched Maggie’s face for a long moment, making up her mind. Finally she nodded and reached beneath the counter for a large black handbag. Maggie watched in fascination as Yvette pulled out make-up, brushes, a heavy coin purse. Rolls of candy. Two thin books of…poetry? Then she extracted a small notepad from the clutter and studied the crowded script.

  “Eh bien! Here it is.” There was a look of triumph in her eyes. “Across the way, at the Opera House. An usher named Jacques. Your friend said that if I ever wanted to hear Monsieur Mozart, I should go to Jacques, and he would find me a ticket.”

  Maggie leaned across the countertop and kissed the rough cheek. Yvette blinked in surprise. “But I do not understand, petite. It is only the name of an usher.”

  And a memory of a stranger with the face of her son, who loved music. “You have given me hope, Madame.”

  Yvette rolled her heavily mascaraed eyes. “Hope is for the very young, chérie”

  Maggie fingered the clasp of her own small purse. “How can I thank you?”

  The rough red hand came down with strength on Maggie’s wrist. “Between women, eh? Come back with your handsome Gid one day and tell me how your story ends.” She eyed the colonel standing by the door. “More handsome than that one, eh?”

  Maggie touched the older woman’s hand and slipped from the stool.

  Yvette was looking at her with an odd expression. “Wars change people, petite. Just be careful.”

  Again, there
was that fleeting shadow of sadness in the woman’s eyes. Wars change people..the words echoed for Maggie like the last haunting notes of a Debussy nocturne. “What is it, Yvette? What else do you remember?”

  The French woman only shook her head as she shuffled slowly toward the far end of the bar.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  PARIS. MORNING, JULY 7

  Dane entered Room 18 in the Relais Odette.

  It had been ridiculously easy to gain access to the small hotel. He’d found the staff entrance in the deserted alley near the kitchen. Then he had waited, just off the tiny lobby, until the lone concierge had gone in search of a taxi for a guest. It was a simple matter to glance at the register. Magdalena O’Shea, Chambre 18. The clerk at the Ambassador Hotel had told the truth.

  He was in the elevator before the concierge returned. The ancient lock had given easily under his knife.

  He scanned the hotel room with care. Antique bed, oak armoire, window seat, Chinese dressing screen in one corner. The perfect stage setting for a Molière farce.

  The bathroom was empty, scented with powder and roses. Dane prowled around the room, stopping to touch a hairbrush, a small CD player, a biography of Leonard Bernstein. He lifted a pair of gold hoop earrings and held them up to the light.

  He found the two photographs hidden beneath silken lingerie. A worn picture of a young man in a relief worker’s uniform, face shadowed by sunglasses and the brim of his cap. And a photo of a smiling red-bearded man with an arm around O’Shea’s brat. There was something familiar about both men. A young aid worker. And a father with his son. Dane examined the faces more closely. What was it?

  Had he seen these men before? Let it be, he told himself. It will come to you. He slipped the photographs back into the drawer.

  A pianist… Who was she, really? Why was Victor so interested in her?

  In the armoire he found a green silken scarf that held a subtle scent of her perfume. He slipped the silky square into his jacket as he pressed the Play button on her CD player. Bolling’s Jazz Piano Suite filled the room. Whoever she was, she had good taste in music. And perfume.