Crazy Lady

by James Hawkins

  “She’s gone. Sam,” he cries as tears well in his eyes. “I’ve lost her.”

  “Are you sure, Dad?” she asks as she dances outside an Old Bailey courtroom, knowing that if she doesn’t take her seat in less than two minutes she’ll get an earful from her leader.

  “Of course I’m sure,” he shouts. “She married him.”

  “But why?” asks Samantha. “She loves you. She told you. Didn’t she?”

  “A thousand times, Sam,” he keens. “She told me a thousand times. She told me I was the only one for her and the best lover she had ever had. She looked into my eyes and told me that she’d had my face in her mind from the day she was born. Even before that.”

  “Then why would she marry him?”

  “Bloody Klaus,” he yells in desperation. “I bet he couldn’t wait to get a ring on her finger.”

  “Dad, I’ve got to go —” she starts but Bliss holds onto her.

  “No wait, Sam. You’ve got to help me. What can I do?” Samantha checks her watch… a minute late. “Dad, hurry up, what —”

  “Why did she do that?” he carries on, but his voice breaks.

  “Why did he do it?” asks Samantha more to herself than her father. “He must be crazy, Dad. Why would he marry someone he knows is in love with another man?”

  “He doesn’t love her, Sam,” mumbles Bliss. “He just doesn’t want me to have her.”

  “Wait, wait,” says Samantha, slowing down, no longer concerned at the rebuke she’ll get when she takes her seat on the defence bench. “Are you sure they’re married?”

  Bliss skims through the short letter again, feeling himself close to vomiting as he finds the word married, then he reads, “Klaus and I are getting married.”

  “There you are,” yells Samantha. “It doesn’t say ‘we are married.’ She might mean next month, next year, or even five years’ time for all you know.”

  Bliss reads it over again. “True,” he agrees.

  “Well then stop her, Dad. How long will it take you to finish your novel?”

  “Three, maybe four days if I work around the clock.”

  “Well work around the clock. Put everything you’ve got into it, every bit of passion, every bit of love. I’ll track her down and as soon as you’ve finished you can get it to her.”

  “But what if she’s already married?”

  “Then Oprah will have one of the best shows ever, and you’ll be writing bestsellers for the rest of your life. Now get on with it.”

  chapter nineteen

  “There is a small pinnace approaching the island, Captain,” writes Bliss, in the voice of a seventeenth-century legionnaire as he sits across the road from L’Escale on the promenade at St-Juan-sur-Mer with fifty clean sheets of paper under his hand. Then he looks across the calm waters of the bay to the masked man’s fortress and spins himself back to 1698.

  “I see a royal pennant flying from the mast, Captain,” sang the lookout. “I think it is a messenger from Versailles.”

  “Very well,” replied Captain Montelban, the captain of the guard. “Bring him to my quarters the moment he arrives and I will escort him directly to Maréchal Mars.”

  “As you command, Captain.”

  Prince Ferdinand, peering hopefully through the bars of his cell window, also saw the courier skimming across the bay and his heart momentarily leaped. Perhaps today is the day, he told himself. Perhaps the woman I crave has finally consented … But eleven years of dashed expectations have weakened his resolve. The trickery of his mentor, Louis XIV, has become more evident in his mind…

  “Would you like another café?” interrupts Angeline, but Bliss shoos her away.

  “Busy,” he says, but then he looks up to see Daisy eyeing him from the next table.

  “Are you all right, Daavid?” the sad-faced real estate agent asks, and he’s tempted to tell her of his problems but doesn’t see the point of adding to her woes.

  “Fine… just working, Daisy,” he says, bending his head back to the page, but she’s not fooled.

  “I zhink you have been crying, no?” she says.

  “No, Daisy. I’m fine. But I have to get my book finished.”

  “But where is your lady friend? I have not seen her…”

  Bliss stops, gives up, and gives in. “All right,” he admits fiercely. “She’s gone, Daisy. She left me… she’s marrying someone else.”

  “But, Daavid,” Daisy protests. “She loves you.”

  “I know she loves me.”

  “And you love her.”

  “Yes, Daisy, I love her. I love her more than any man has ever loved a woman. I would happily die for her…” then he pauses to correct his tense. “I would have died for her.”

  “Oh, Daavid,” she says with a compassionate hand on his shoulder. “I am so sorry for you.”

  “Thank you, Daisy,” he says forcing a brief smile. “But now I must get my book finished.”

  The bounce has gone from Daisy as she walks back to her office along the street from L’Escale and Bliss watches her for a second.

  “She’s still yours if you want her,” a voice tells him deep in his mind, but he shakes his head. No spark… no magic, he tells himself and continues writing.

  “It is a message from someone in Paris,” the governor of the fortress, Maréchal Mars, told the masked prisoner as he handed over the letter with its wax seal.

  “She is coming, she is coming,” mused the prisoner, and he broke the seal with impatience.

  “My dear Prince…” Bliss begins, with the words I regret to inform you already formed in his mind, when he stops himself. “What the hell am I doing?” he questions aloud. “She has to come to him.”

  Bliss’s cellphone shakes him back to the present, and he’s amazed to discover he already has four pages written.

  “Yes,” he says no longer considering that it might be Yolanda.

  “It’s Trina,” says a faraway voice. “Daphne told me what happened.”

  “Oh,” he says.

  “Don’t worry David,” she carries on. “We’re all praying for you.”

  “It might take more than prayers. It might take a miracle.”

  “I’ve just called Raven in Vancouver,” she carries on as if Bliss should know that the young woman is a seer. “She says she’s been in touch with Serethusa on the other side and you will get your wish.”

  “Serethusa…?” he questions vaguely then changes his mind. “OK. Thanks,” he says hurriedly, but he’s forced to listen for a few more seconds while Trina bleats about the success of her subterfuge.

  “We did it, Dave. Daphne and me; Lovelace and Button, International Investigators. We solved the Creston murders.”

  “With a little help from me,” he mutters under his breath, but he doesn’t want any credit. He just wants to finish his script.

  Day two is simply an extension of day one for Bliss. He has catnapped a few times during the night and has often been tempted to simply write, and the masked man’s great love returned to him, but he knows that won’t wash; knows that he has to finish the saga with as much passion as he began; knows the end of the book is what the readers will react to. And he knows that if he is too late to save Yolanda from making the biggest mistake of her life, he must offer publishers and the media the most compelling bittersweet love story of all time.

  The days dragged more slowly than ever for the masked prisoner as he sat in his cell reading and rereading the letter, wondering if it was just another of the illegitimate king’s callous deceptions… Bliss is writing, when Samantha calls.

  “I’ve found her, Dad,” she enthuses, and for a few seconds he’s scared to ask if he’s missed his chance.

  “I don’t know,” she replies honestly, when he’s plucked up the courage. “But I’ve had a lawyer friend of mine in Holland track her down to a place on the outskirts of Amsterdam.”

  “I could just go to her, Sam…” he starts, but she’s less sure.

  “Finish the boo
k, Dad. A couple more days won’t make any difference.”

  “You’re just humouring me again,” he accuses. “She’s already married isn’t she?”

  “No, I told you I don’t know.”

  “Then I should just jump a flight to Schipol today.”

  “Dad. Do the book,” she says fiercely. “I’ve asked my friend to find out the score.”

  “OK,” he says, though he yelps in pain as he picks up his pen. “Damn,” he swears, seeing that he has a blister the size of a peanut on his middle finger.

  By lunchtime, with the masked prince picturing his great love’s carriage heading south from Lyons down the valley of the Rhône towards Avignon, Bliss has written himself to a standstill. He frantically fights off the drowsiness with several strong espressos, but he finally drops.

  In London, Trina drags a petrified Clive Sampson onto a tube train, where he sits mesmerized by the flashing lights and the constant bustle as he admits that he’s never previously been further than Saskatchewan.

  “We’ll do the town: St. Paul’s, Buckingham Palace, The Tower, Big Ben,” Trina tells him as she holds onto his hand. “But first we’ll see Janet.”

  Janet Creston has put on ten pounds and lost twenty years since Clive last saw her, and there have been a number of other changes in her life that have yet to sink in.

  ”The thing is, Mrs. Creston,” says Edith Milsom, a junior member of Creston’s legal team specially chosen because of her soft voice and trustworthy face. “Your husband really loves you. I’m sure you are aware of that.”

  Janet’s face suggests that she is unconvinced, so Edith sits on the edge of her bed and reassuringly strokes one of her hands as she carries on. “Joseph realizes that you may be a little confused.”

  “No, I’m not,” Janet says firmly, snatching her hand away.

  “Well. We think you might be…” Edith is trying when the door opens and a trio of visitors arrive.

  “Samantha Bryan,” says Bliss’s daughter, summing up the situation at a glance and stepping in with an outstretched hand. “I’m Mrs. Creston’s personal legal advisor.”

  Janet Thurgood looks more confused than Edith Milsom, although she keeps quiet as her husband’s lawyer tries to bluff.

  “Milsom — Barnes, Worstheim, and Shuttlecock,” says the young woman, putting on her courtroom voice. “We represent Mr. Creston and his companies.”

  “Good,” Samantha replies plunking herself down on Janet’s bed in Ms. Milsom’s place and offering her adversary a business card. “Then please advise your client that all future contact with his wife should be addressed through me. Good day.”

  “Her face was a picture,” Samantha tells her father later when she calls to check on his progress. “I think she was about to get Janet to sign a waiver relinquishing her rights…” she is saying when she pauses, sensing a deep melancholy on the other end. “Are you all right, Dad?” she asks.

  “This is useless Sam,” he says. “My fingers are bleeding. I’m still miles away from the end, and she’s probably on her honeymoon in Taipei or Timbuktu by now.”

  “Dad, listen to me. Think positive. No more excuses. Get that fucking manuscript finished in forty-eight hours or I’ll personally ram it down your throat.”

  “Language.”

  “Yeah and you’ll get more if you don’t get a move on. It’s Wednesday today — Friday at the latest, and book a flight… no…,” she pauses, “I will book a flight for you. Now get on with it.”

  “Roger, wilco,” he says and picks up his pen.

  “This mask weighs too heavily upon my shoulders,” mused the prince in despair and was sorely tempted to abandon his quest…

  Bliss crashes again near midnight. “Sam,” he bleats catching his daughter as she readies for bed. “This won’t work; she’ll never be able read my writing.”

  “Get it typed then.”

  “Typed,” he echoes as if it is a foreign word.

  “Yes, Dad. You’re near Cannes and Nice. There must be loads of typing agencies.”

  “French ones.”

  “International ones if it’s anything like London. Take everything you’ve got first thing in the morning —”

  “It’ll cost a bomb…”

  “And you care? I thought you loved her.”

  “I do, Sam, I really love her, OK. You’re right.”

  “And if you have to finish the last chapter on the plane to Amsterdam then you can read it to her when you get there.”

  “Thanks, Sam,” he says, wanting to ask if she has any news from her friend about Yolanda’s marital status, but he chooses not to.

  Billie Holiday is singing “What a Little Moonlight Can Do” as he picks up his pen, painfully popping a blister in the process, then writing,Moonlight bouncing off the Mediterranean picked out the turrets of the Château Roger…

  “Joseph Crispin Creston. You are charged that you did, on or about the seventh day of December, 1961, wilfully and maliciously murder…”

  “Let’s see him try to buy his way out of this one,” whispers Donaldson to Peter Bryan as they listen to Creston’s application for bail.

  “He’d probably get it if he wasn’t already on bail for bribing Edwards,” suggests Bryan and Donaldson pats him on the back. “Smart move that, Peter.”

  “I thought so,” says the London officer with a smile.

  Bliss is right about the cost of transcribing his manuscript, but he doesn’t care. “Whatever it takes,” he says, handing over nearly six hundred pages. “But I must have it by lunchtime tomorrow — two copies.”

  The Englishwoman in charge of the agency in Cannes runs her eye over the first few pages. “It won’t be perfect,” she begins, but Bliss isn’t concerned.

  “As long as it makes sense.”

  Malcolm Jackson, of Barnes, Worstheim and Shuttlecock, puts up a fight that will get him a seat on the top table of the firm’s annual Christmas dinner, and his client walks. But while Creston may be free, he is now severely shackled, and Peter Bryan is on the phone to his wife in seconds. “He’s had to hand in his passport, no contact with Edwards, and — and you will love this — neither he nor anyone representing him must go within five hundred yards of his wife.”

  “Brilliant,” yips Samantha, and seconds later she’s in her car headed for St. John’s Wood.

  It is an hour and a half from Westchester to the centre of London on a good day, but today is not good — not for Joseph Creston and his crony.

  “We should have taken the chopper,” he moans to Mason as he thrums his fingers on the leather upholstery in the back of his limousine while they slow for yet another set of road works.

  “Sorry, J.C.,” says Mason. “But I didn’t know if they would let you out.”

  “I’m going to fight this,” spits Creston, boiling at the perceived injustice. “They can’t do this to me. I’m going to fight this all the way. Do I make myself clear?”

  “Yes, J.C. Very clear.”

  It is nearly 4:00 p.m. by the time Creston’s limousine pulls up at the front of his towering office building, and he’s not at all surprised to see the paparazzi setting up shop against a cordon hastily thrown up by his security staff.

  “Shall I tell the driver to take us round the back…” starts Mason, but Creston is in a fighting mood.

  “No way. I’m not having some snide reporter saying I weaselled out. I’ll front ’em and tell ’em straight out. I’ve got nothing to hide.”

  “Mr. Creston… Mr. Creston…” yell reporters as they scramble to get his attention when he emerges from his car with a celebrity smile.

  “Did you do it?” questions a pushy stringer, and Creston asks for silence with a hand gesture and waits until he is sure he is fully in the frame before pronouncing, “I am totally innocent of all these accusations. My lawyers assure me that it is simply a formality and that the authorities will be forced to drop these scurrilous charges within a few days.”

  “What are your plans now?�
� shouts a reporter from the back, and Creston turns to point at his towering edifice.

  “Back to work, of course,” he says and laughs. “Creston chocolates don’t make themselves. Someone has to keep the machinery oiled and the vats stirred.”

  “Good one,” whispers Mason as the two men head for the plate glass doors, then a plainclothes sergeant and two uniformed constables step across the security ribbon.

  “Mr. Creston?” queries the sergeant.

  “What now?” he spits, dropping his smile.

  “I’m afraid you can’t go any further, sir.”

  “What?”

  “Sorry, sir,” continues the sergeant as if he has never been less sorry of anything in his life. “But I have here a copy of your bail conditions from Westchester Magistrate’s court, and I see that you are not permitted within five hundred yards of your wife.”

  The cameras move in; the microphones are back on; the security guards are getting squeezed.

  “Out of my way,” fumes Creston, and he gives the sergeant a push. The two uniformed men are on him in a flash and wrestle him to the ground.

  “Now,” says the sergeant in Creston’s ear, while the cameras and microphones zoom in. “Your wife, who I understand is, by reason of the married person’s property act, a half owner of this company, is currently in her office together with her attorney. Therefore, you are in breach of you bail conditions.”

  Mason stands back and buries his head in his hands.

  “But,” continues the sergeant to the prone man, “I’ll assume you didn’t know that on this occasion and I’m just giving you a warning.” Creston’s blood is up and he has no intention of saying thank you as the sergeant continues, “However if you persist I’ll have no choice —”

  “Mason,” yells Creston, calling for backup.

  Daphne Lovelace, watching TV at home, can’t resist phoning Bliss.

  “Daphne… no… sorry…” he says and he turns off the phone.

  “Mason,” shouts Creston as he’s pinned to the ground. “Get in there and get her out.”

  Sergeant Williams points a warning finger to Creston’s right-hand man. “Actually, sir,” he says, “as you are acting as Mr. Creston’s representative you are also barred from the building while his wife is in residence.”