The Prisoner's Wife

by Gerard Macdonald

  Though obviously single, Shawn gathered not one but two tastefully tinted cocktails from a passing waiter and escaped to a balcony. He planned to ease the pain by drinking both and going back for more.

  Ellen, who followed him out, took one of the frosted glasses from his hand. “Kind,” she murmured, drinking deeply. “I’m Ellen.” Then she said, “Dear God, what do we have here? Rubbing alcohol? You may need to carry me home.”

  Shawn didn’t answer. He scanned her undernourished body. Young and skinny, Ellen looked coldly edible, white meat on a cooked chicken. Her clothes, at a guess, represented a couple of months of Shawn’s current salary. He searched for something to say. “So,” he said finally, “what are you doing here?”

  “On the balcony?” she asked. “Same as you. Getting out of there before I died of boredom.”

  She finished her drink and looked through the glass door, hoping to snag a waiter.

  “I meant,” he said, “what are you doing at this party?”

  She stared. “You’re asking me? God, we always come to these things. I have a husband somewhere. Robertson. You know? Owns half the city. I was wondering who invited you. You look like you’re going to a football game.”

  Shawn, who spent more than he could afford on clothes, could find no adequate reply. Rather than searching for words, he moved forward, pushing Ellen along the balcony. At the time, he wasn’t sure why he did that. When she was against the far railing, holding it to stop herself falling into the river, and when he figured they could no longer be seen from inside the room, he kissed her, bending her backward, like a drinking straw, over the ironwork.

  After a shocked moment, she kissed him back.

  When she freed her mouth and looked at him, she said, “Wow. That was nice. I mean, yum.” She shifted her jutting hips. “Forget about the football game. Where are we going?”

  Shawn, who hadn’t known they were going anywhere, shook his head.

  “Listen,” she said, “here’s the deal. I go in. I head for the bathroom. You wait like three minutes. You come in, have a quick drink—I mean quick—then you go to the bathroom.”

  Though it was mid-June, Shawn felt suddenly cold. He hadn’t bargained for this. “What are we doing in the bathroom?”

  “Don’t be coarse,” she said. “I don’t fuck in bathrooms. Not even in the Apthorp.”

  “So?”

  “So, we take the elevator to the lobby. The doorman gets us a cab. You tip him, like a serious tip, so he forgets he did it.”

  Shawn was short of cash. He said, “I’m a bridge-and-tunnel person. I don’t live in Manhattan.”

  She put fingers first to her lips and then to his. “I do,” she said.

  * * *

  In Paris, in the Agency’s hired limo, Shawn said, “Bob, that’s a hell of a thing to say about a buddy. I had a woman problem? The way you talk about me and girls, it’s like I’m the only one. Remember, I’ve known you a long time. I was in the house when Carly killed herself.”

  “If you had any decency,” Bobby said, “you wouldn’t remind me.”

  “You mean you forgot her?”

  They drove on in silence through the narrow streets of eastern Paris.

  Finally, coming into the quatrième, Shawn said, “Bob, moving on, two things you can do for me. Number one, check on Main Core. See what comes up for Darius Osmani.”

  “Spell it.”

  Shawn did. Bobby made a note. “Are you going to tell me why?”

  Shawn shook his head. “Has to do with me needing money.”

  “As ever,” Bobby said. “That’s one thing. What’s the other?”

  “Tell McCord, he wants to know about unhappy, I’ve got news for him. Tell him to come talk with me.”

  “Now,” Bobby said, “careful. I’m telling you, don’t mess with McCord. You still think Calvin’s the sad little guy you trained, back in the day. I’m here to tell you, he’s not. He’s all grown up. Takes no prisoners. Go easy with the guy.”

  Shawn tapped the smoked-glass screen. When the car stopped, he checked that he was at the right end of the rue des Vieilles Boucheries. He looked at the sky. It was going to rain.

  “I really hate eating alone,” Bobby said. “When you’ve done whatever you’re doing, come have lunch. By then I might have something for you.”

  “Lunch is where?”

  “Ma Bourgogne. Place des Vosges. They talk English, kind of. Ask someone. Two P.M., local.” There was thunder close by. Bobby glanced upward. “You should stay in the car, my friend. It is going to piss down.”

  Shawn waved to his buddy, climbed out of the car, and closed the door. The driver, a stocky man, glanced at him with some interest, then turned his attention back to the street. The Maserati was still in sight, heading south, when the rain started. Shawn backed under the awning of a deserted grocery store that was once, the sign said, a Spar Mini-Super. More mini than super. Its sticker-covered window displayed three matchboxes, a newspaper, and two burst packets of fine-ground couscous, plus a potpourri of mouse droppings and dying flies.

  A young woman in a summer coat and pink dress dashed under the awning to huddle against the store’s cracked glass. Shivering, she glanced at Shawn. He reached out to pull her into the doorway with him, farther from the rain. For a moment, she resisted, then relaxed. It was a while since he’d touched a woman. Rain fell as if God had opened a fire hose. In moments, gutters filled; water spouted from drains; puddles formed; the streets ran like snow-melt rivers.

  For some time the store’s awning held fast, bellying under a weight of water until, strained beyond bearing, the canvas tore apart. A small ocean fell suddenly to the sidewalk, showering Shawn.

  “Jesus Christ,” he said.

  The girl leaped back against him, as far as she could get from the flood.

  “This is not France,” Shawn said. He peered at the streaming sky. “This is the goddamn tropics.”

  The girl, too, was scanning the sky. “Il va passer.” She considered him; she was trying not to laugh. She said in English, “You are so wet.”

  “I’ll tell you something for free,” Shawn said. “Wet is what happens when you get a hundred gallons of water dropped off an awning.”

  She shook her head, not following. As abruptly as it had started, the rain eased.

  “Voilà. C’est fait.” She checked the time, checked the sky, freed herself, waved, and left, running down the drenched street.

  It’s always a pinprick of pain, a death of possibility, a girl who waves good-bye.

  8

  PARIS, RUE DES VIEILLES BOUCHERIES, 21 MAY 2004

  Shawn edged slowly out from under the awning. He didn’t trust this city. Truth was, these days, with his country’s reputation heading south, Shawn didn’t really trust any place outside of America, and not every place inside. He needed a drink. He surveyed street numbers, climbed three stone steps, and rang a bell.

  Moments later, a female voice spoke through an entryphone. “Oui? Vous voudriez?”

  “Shawn Maguire,” Shawn said. “American. I’m looking for Darius Osmani.”

  There was a pause. Then, “Third floor, apartment five,” she said in English.

  A buzzer sounded. Shawn pushed the metal-lined door and went inside. Before him was a tiny open-grilled gold-painted Parisian elevator, which Shawn was not inclined to take. He’d met these things before. He guessed they dated from the days before Otis: evolutionary ancestors of real elevators; primitive machines only the French would use.

  Switching on a dim, timer-controlled light, Shawn climbed narrow stairs that spiraled around the elevator shaft. Stairs like these—any stairs, in fact—made him feel his age. Once again, he resolved to stop drinking. By the time he reached the third floor, there was an ominous beat to his heart. Shawn waited awhile, until his breathing slowed, before he knocked at a door that bore a hand-painted figure five. Below the number was pinned a snapshot of the Buddhas of Bamiyan. Someone in this place, Shawn reflected, trav
eled the Silk Road before the Taliban dynamited those giant effigies.

  Something moved inside the apartment. There was a spyhole in the door: He was observed. When the door opened, he saw a thin and beautiful Afghan hound. The woman holding its collar was also thin and beautiful. Late thirties, he guessed. Her hair was clipped back and coming loose. Her breasts barely disturbed the fabric of her shirt. She was barefoot, wearing boot-cut jeans with a broad belt. Shawn knew women—Ellen, for one—who wore belts to minimize width of hip. With this girl, no need.

  She said, “I am sorry. My husband is not home.”

  Her accent was French, with American undertones. Exactly where in America, he couldn’t have said.

  “Your husband is Darius Osmani?”

  Still holding the dog’s collar, she nodded. “He is. And you are?”

  “Like I told you. My name’s Shawn Maguire.”

  He could see her thinking. Police? Intelligence? Feds?

  “Can we talk inside? I know some things you should maybe know.”

  She considered him, assessing. Free of makeup, her eyes were an unusually pure, unflecked green, showing the entire circle of pupil. She might, he thought, be wearing contacts, to achieve that quality of color. He’d need to get closer to be sure.

  Making a decision, she edged the dog aside and let him in. “Danielle Baptiste,” she said. “I kept my own name. Come in the kitchen. Coffee?”

  He would have preferred a drink. “Coffee’s fine.” He doubted she’d have fresh milk. He knew the French and their so-called refrigerators. “But make it black.”

  The kitchen was long and narrow. She swept off the table a volume of Ibn Warraq’s Koranic commentaries. A window looked out onto the brick wall of a light well. On the walls were detailed interiors of the Alhambra. Shawn remembered Martha, on her way back from Andalusia, poring over similar shots. He had to squeeze past the woman where she stood by the stove, lighting gas with a match from a hotel matchbook. He sat on one of three wooden chairs set around the table. Sighing, the dog lay beneath it, head on paws, frowning and watching the woman.

  “You are what?” she asked, not turning. “FBI?”

  “Uh-uh,” he said, “I was an intelligence agent. Currently, I’m suspended. I may be retired.”

  Now she looked around. “That’s an active verb? Like disappeared?”

  He thought about it for a moment, then nodded. The coffeemaker was in two metallic halves, screwed together. It gurgled and made digestive noises. “Is that thing safe?”

  “I guess,” she said. “If you screw it tight. Otherwise, they explode.” She pointed at the ceiling, which, he saw now, was coffee stained. “Sitting there, you’re pretty much okay.”

  On a high shelf was a history of America’s funding of the Nicaraguan contras: a well-organized criminal enterprise in which Shawn had played a small part. After a time, Danielle brought the coffee machine to the table. She set out cups and sugar cubes from a parrot-pictured packet.

  She thought for some moments, then spoke. “Let me tell you this,” she said. “It may save time. I’ve not seen my husband in a while. He is an academic. A researcher. As far as I know, he was in Pakistan, then Afghanistan, researching what he calls”—she paused a moment—“the Ghorid civilization? This is not a thing I have knowledge about.”

  “Me either.”

  “You should know, Darius never phones. Not when he’s working.”

  “Why? Pretty wife—why wouldn’t he?”

  She considered him, appraising. “Not everywhere is America. Sometimes Darius has no network. Clearly not on the Turquoise Mountain.” She shrugged. “You know what they say. No news is good news.”

  “You came here, though. Because he asked you?”

  She shook her head. “It was a woman, Catherine Someone. Parisienne. She said Darius was staying with her. I thought that meant petite histoire, maybe.”

  He shook his head. “I’m American. It’s all I speak.”

  “An affair. For a moment, I was, what’s the word, jealous. Then I thought, maybe not. Why would she phone me, if she was bedding him? Anyway, she said Darius disappeared. Went out and disappeared. If I want to come to Paris, I can take this apartment. She was leaving for a weekend. A long weekend. She is back this evening. She left a key.” Danielle bent down to touch the Afghan. “All I must do is feed the dog. If I can’t, I call the concierge.”

  He poured himself another cup of coffee, wondering how much of this he believed. She had the kind of body that got his attention. A body like Ellen’s.

  “You’re worried.”

  “I told you, not greatly. A little, of course. Would you not be, if it was your wife?”

  “I don’t have a wife. Did he go away, or was he taken away?”

  “Darius? How would I know?”

  “You could ask. Does this place have a janitor?”

  “I told you. A concierge.”

  “Can I mention something?” Shawn asked. “I mean, I still think you seem, what would you say, kind of cool? You know? Your man missing and all.” He made air quotes. “You’re a little worried?” He was watching her. “If it was me, I’d be calling people. I don’t know. Doing stuff.”

  She was quiet for a time. Then she said, “It is you who thinks he is missing. I think he is maybe doing what he always does. Working over some patch of desert in Afghanistan, looking for artifacts.” She got up and came back with biscuits for the dog. Her loose shirt made it hard for him to tell the shape of her breasts. Ellen had smallish boobs. Shawn hadn’t minded that; he’d never gotten off on top-heavy porn.

  “Okay,” he said. “Okay. If that’s what you think, we’ll ask the janitor, concierge, whatever he is. Those guys, they snoop. It’s what they do in life, pretty much. Don’t miss a lot.”

  “It’s a woman, the concierge. Tell me, why are you interested in Darius?”

  He thought about how to answer that. “I’ll be honest with you.”

  She smiled.

  “I know,” he said. “I know. You think that means I’m going to lie. Well, I’m not. I’m just working on a need-to-know basis.” Maybe not lying; just not telling the whole truth. He was not yet ready to mention Ayub Abbasi, his paymaster.

  She brought her knees to her chest and wrapped her arms around them. “D’accord. Okay. Tell me what I need to know.”

  “Far’s I recall, we tracked your husband. Tracked him through the North West Frontier, Wana, Miranshah, Khyber, into Peshawar, then back to Afghanistan. He got to meet some people we know about.”

  “You thought he was doing something he should not?”

  Shawn shook his head. “He didn’t act that way. Satellites, Predator drones, these days, over there, we see pretty much anyone that’s not hiding underground. We see where they go. Your man must’ve known that. So if he’s out in the open, we figured he was doing something else.”

  “He was doing research. I told you. That was his job.”

  Was?

  “Could be,” Shawn told her. She had Ellen’s musky aura, like a woman in heat. He wanted to touch her. “Let’s say I believe that. We were listening to his phone traffic. Maybe he didn’t call you. He called other people.”

  She stood, brushed past him, opened a window on the light well, and sat down again. “Is that a crime? Making calls?”

  “Depends who you’re talking to. Anyway, my agency lost interest. I didn’t. I’d still like to talk with your man.” He paused, then said, “I find him, I get paid.”

  She walked her fingers across the tabletop toward him, the way you do with a child. “You said you were suspended.”

  “What that means, I can do what needs doing, long as I have cash. Don’t have to do what some Yalie fuckwit tells me. Excuse my French.” He stood, putting his hands lightly on her shoulders as he squeezed behind her. “Come and have lunch, meet a buddy. We’ll talk to the janitor on the way out.”

  She hesitated. “I can’t leave the dog too long. Where would we go?”

  �
��Place des Vosges. How far’s that?”

  She shrugged and pointed. “Seven minutes, maybe eight, that way.”

  He hesitated, wondering whether to say what he was thinking of saying. “I guess people tell you you’re beautiful.”

  She nodded. “Some do.” She pulled on boots, then a coat. “If we’re going, let’s go.” To the dog she said, “Artemis, reste. Je vais revenir. Promis.”

  On the stairs, when she’d locked the door, Shawn said, “You don’t sound American. You sound like you’ve lived there.”

  “I went to school in Connecticut. New Haven. One of the fuckwits.” She went out onto the street, turned, and ran down another flight of steps, descending to a shadowy pit, below pavement level. Shawn followed, more slowly. Steps were beginning to bother him. Oil-stained water pooled below.

  “People live down here?”

  She knocked on a cracked glass door embossed with tiny stars.

  “Don’t be provincial.”

  To the squat and ageless person who answered the door, Danielle said in French, “Madame, I am looking for my husband.” She showed a photo: one taken for a passport, then enlarged. “He calls himself Darius Osmani. I think he was staying in this house.”

  The concierge had piled her hair in a shock the color of straw. Her mustache was bleached to an approximate match. She wore a flowered cotton dress but did not look, at first sight, like a woman. She glanced back at a dark-skinned younger man who sat at her kitchen table. With rapid, concentrated movements, he spooned a thin gray soup to his mouth, splashing a little. His shaven head was bent low to the plate.

  The concierge scratched in the region of her waist. “You?” she said to Danielle. “Woman like you? French? You married an Arab?”