by Joseph Flynn
Two minutes later, Callie Bao returned.
Buckingham Palace, London
18
Members of the household staff set out scones, strawberries and cream, and poured tea for the queen and the president. It was assumed the two eminent ladies were up to adding and stirring their own sugar, if they so desired. Neither did.
After making perfunctory but sincere observations about the beauty of the royal gardens, the president asked, “You’re feeling well, Your Majesty?”
The queen offered a polite smile but couldn’t hide the sadness in her eyes.
Patti knew that Galia had been right; something was seriously amiss.
“My physical constitution is as sound as ever, Madam President … even though my heart bears a heavy burden.”
“Is there any way I might be of service?”
“You already have. I very much appreciate your making time for me. I know how very busy you are. I’ve watched the start of your administration with great interest. It has been a unique opportunity to observe a woman wield such immense power.”
“How am I doing?” Patti asked with a hint of mischief.
“Brilliantly,” the queen replied, joy now filling her face. “I can’t tell you how much I envy you young women. The world has become a much different place for you.”
“Thanks to the women of your generation, Your Majesty.”
“Yes.” The light in the queen’s eyes dimmed. “I wish I’d had more to do with that.”
Patti wanted to suggest otherwise, but you didn’t contradict the queen.
Her majesty continued, getting to the point of the visit, “The Duchess of Cornwall is mortally ill.”
There it was, Patti thought. The Prince of Wales’ second wife was dying. Patti ran the possible consequences through her mind, without forgetting her manners.
“I’m terribly sorry, Your Majesty.”
“As am I, thank you. The prince has informed me he is withdrawing from the line of succession. He will be attending to his wife in her final days, and then he will withdraw from the public eye for an indefinite time. He feels he would no longer be fit to accept the throne.”
After seeing a second wife die, and waiting to be crowned well into the second half of his own life, Patti could understand that. The question now became—
“I’ve spoken to the Duke of York and the Earl of Essex.” The queen’s two younger sons. “I’ve explained to the duke that I feel the monarchy would best be served by a younger king; the earl has never been interested in the crown.”
After the monarch had let all three of her sons grow into middle age or older waiting for their mother to abdicate, that must have been a tough one for the duke to swallow, Patti thought. Even the earl might be having second thoughts. But what did she know about being a queen?
Well, she had a pretty good idea who the next king would be.
“My elder grandson will accept the crown.”
Better him than his younger brother, the president thought.
The queen averted her eyes for a moment, as if to gather strength, then looked directly at the president.
“My grandson’s willingness to claim his birthright did not come without conditions. He will not wait indefinitely to become king.”
Patti kept a straight face, but thought good for him.
“That is why I shall abdicate one minute before midnight on the thirty-first of December. The new monarch shall be crowned on the first day of the New Year.”
That tied things up with a ribbon and a bow, the president thought. But the queen was not finished.
“My grandson informs me that he will model his reign after The House of Orange and Nassau.” The Royal Family of the Netherlands. The queen frowned in displeasure. “Wilhelmina rides a bicycle in public; my grandson proposes to do so as well.”
As gently as she could, the president said, “Please remember, Your Majesty, the world is changing. In many ways.”
“Directly to that point, Madam President, my grandson also intends to speak out on the politics of the day, whether it discomfits our politicians or any others. If Whitehall doesn’t like that, he says they can pension off the lot of us.”
For the first time since they began their conversation, Patti put down her teacup and sat back to think of political implications for the United States.
“If your grandson’s opinions resonate with his subjects,” she said, “that will make him very popular, far more powerful, all but impossible to displace.”
The queen showed a rueful smile. “The monarchy ascendant.”
“That’s quite an idea to conjure with,” Patti said. “Thank you for giving me fair warning.”
The queen said, “I know the prime minister meddled in your election; I was too reticent to say anything, of course. I should have, and I’m sorry I didn’t. Please accept my apology.”
“If you wish, Your Majesty, of course.”
“I’m also aware of Norvin Kimbrough’s reputation for being less than genteel in his treatment of women, especially those who dare to involve themselves in governance. You must have been the ultimate affront to him. So I must confess no distress as to what happened to him at your hand. In fact, I thought what you did was beautifully played.”
Patti felt a chill. The queen knew what she had done? The president doubted her majesty had a working knowledge of Dark Alley, so she only said, “I hope the prime minister recovers quickly.”
“Not too quickly. Without ever saying so publicly, I hope his party replaces him. For reasons of health, of course.”
The president wanted him to be replaced for any reason.
“In any event, Madam President, I think you’ve served notice to your male counterparts, including my grandson should it ever come to that, not to trifle with you. My only wish now is that I might be of help to you in some way.”
Patti picked up her teacup, sipped, and pondered.
“There is one thing, your majesty.”
“What might that be?”
“The woman who killed my first husband has petitioned our Supreme Court to have her death sentence imposed without delay. Should the court rule in her favor, it becomes my decision whether to let the execution be carried out.”
The elder woman smiled once more. “Life or death, now there’s a decision worthy of a queen. What does your heart say?”
“My husband, Mr. McGill, said everyone involved in the crime should be strapped to gurneys. Given lethal injections, that is. I’ve never told anyone, including Jim, how many moments there have been when I’ve come to agree with him.”
“What other considerations do you face? Moral questions? Political ones?”
“Politics be damned,” Patti said, “but morality, there’s the rub. If I let Erna Godfrey be executed, I become a passive accomplice to her death. But there’s more to it: That woman is still too close to what she did. She hasn’t admitted in any way that taking Andy’s life was wrong. That’s what galls me most. If she were to die soon, it would be without ever feeling any remorse.”
“Then give her the opportunity to reconsider,” the queen said.
“Let her live?”
“I’ve read many commission reports regarding how dreadful our prisons are. I imagine yours are of a similar nature.”
“So I’ve been told.”
“Is this Godfrey woman in good health?”
“As far as I know,” the president said. “Her legal case is the one issue from which I’ve distanced myself.”
“Well, were she to be ill, I would let nature take her instead of the state. If she’s physically well, why not give her any number of decades to think about how gruesome her crime was, how feeble her excuses for committing it are?”
“I should commute her sentence then?” the president asked.
“Think of it as extending her sentence,” the queen answered.
Magistrate Pruet’s office, Paris
19
Yves Pruet watched the DVD of T
he Undertaker’s snuff match on a television set up directly in front of the table he used as his desk. McGill stood at his side and watched the action from an oblique angle. It was the third time he’d seen the fight, if it could be called that. The first two times he’d been both nauseated and infuriated. Now, he was getting into the metaphysical realm. What kind of mutant could do what The Undertaker had done? For that matter what kind of sociopath could hold a camera steady and record the savagery?
Pruet sat and watched stoically until the end, then clicked off the television.
He looked at McGill, his silence an invitation to his guest to speak first.
McGill said, “I’ve heard of American mobsters doing that, but not like that.”
Pruet sighed, lowered his head, still trying to comprehend what he’d seen.
McGill moved around to the other side of the table, moved the TV and video disc player aside and pulled up a chair.
“You’ve got the guy,” he said. “Committing murder on camera. You know his name. Ms. Martel must have told you everything she knew, so you should have some idea where he can be found. Now, it’s just a matter of sending enough cops to bring him in … right?”
McGill sat and waited for the magistrate’s response.
It was some time in coming, but McGill understood why and was patient.
Looking up, Pruet finally said, “Had I returned home earlier, that might have been me.”
“But it wasn’t,” McGill said. “God or fate, whichever you prefer, must have other plans for you.”
“It might have been Nicolette as well.”
“But she skated, too.”
“What do you think we should do with this creature, M’sieur McGill?”
The president’s henchman suspected it might come to this. For whatever reason, Pruet couldn’t play it straight. Send a couple dozen cops out and bring The Undertaker down—alive—with a hail of rubber bullets. That wasn’t an option.
“If you want me to help, you’ll have to put your cards on the table,” McGill said.
“I would be most surprised if you haven’t guessed every card I hold.”
“Okay. I’ll tell you the way I see things, now. I was wrong thinking Thierry Duchamp’s death might have been a mistake, that the intent was only to injure him, so crooked gamblers might make a—pardon the expression—killing.”
“You are correct,” Pruet said, “that was never the case.”
“But you let me think so,” McGill said.
The magistrate only shrugged.
“Because if I helped you succeed without really understanding the true nature of the case that would be as good as it gets for you,” McGill told Pruet.
“We would all prefer to be seen in our evening wear not our underwear.”
McGill smiled. Saw no reason to hold a grudge.
He said, “The more I learned, the surer I became that once you send Etienne Burel out to start pounding on someone, there’s going to be only one result.”
Pruet nodded, his expression grim.
“That being the case, I have to wonder why this thug wasn’t locked up or buried a long time ago. He makes an easy target, and there are rounds big enough to bring him down.”
“And your conclusion?” the magistrate asked.
“Someone with clout is protecting him.”
“Clout?” Pruet asked.
“Political muscle.”
The magistrate nodded, adding the word to his vocabulary.
“So you think politics are involved?”
McGill nodded. “Has to be. Just on the bad guys’ side, there are hardliners and people who want to cut their losses.”
Pruet was intrigued by McGill’s analysis. “And how do you know this?”
“Simple. The hardliners sent The Undertaker to visit first Durand and then you. The ones who want to cut their losses are the people who sent the video that show the Undertaker killing a man. Damning evidence in any nation, I would imagine.”
“It certainly would be here,” Pruet told McGill.
“Might even go farther than that,” the president’s henchman said.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean,” McGill said, “where there’s one incriminating video disk, there might well be another. And the second disk might be used as justification for someone to kill The Undertaker. Not only that, it might be used to criticize you, m’sieur le magistrat, for not eliminating him first. Those two things would put a crimp into your investigation of Thierry Duchamp’s death, wouldn’t they?”
Pruet was silent, but the look in his eyes acknowledged McGill’s point.
“Your insurance against something like that happening,” McGill said, “is to hang on to Glen Kinnard as long as you can. If you let Glen go, you’re telling the bad guys they better move fast.”
Pruet sighed. He said to McGill, “You have undoubtedly deduced your own usefulness in this affair.”
McGill nodded. “Sure. I saw that before leaving home. Things go to hell in a handbasket, I get to be the scapegoat. But who decided that, you or m’sieur le president?”
Pruet was silent for a moment. Then he said, “Jean-Louis. I insisted if there were a disaster to be borne, it would be mine alone.”
“Merci, m’sieur,” McGill said. “But your friend, Jean-Louis, could not accept that.”
“Why not? You think our bonds of friendship are that strong?”
“I do. But there’s more than that, as we both know.”
“What do we both know?”
“That you’re the French president’s henchman.” McGill saluted the magistrate.
Pruet saw any pretense that McGill was wrong would be futile.
“Actually,” he said, “Jean-Louis calls me le compagnon du bourreau.”
McGill arched an eyebrow. Qu’est-ce que c’est? Say what?
Pruet said, “In idiomatic English, the hangman’s companion.”
20
It was one of those moments where two men with a common background and a shared task might share a drink, and the magistrate was heading for his filing cabinet. McGill feared Pruet was about to bring out more cognac.
“You have anything without alcohol?” he asked. “I’m going to need both my wits and my reflexes soon, assuming I’m right in thinking that if you call in the gendarmes they might be the ones to shoot Etienne Burel on sight.”
The magistrate closed the file drawer. He returned to his table and picked up the phone. “De l’eau du minérale de Perrier?” he asked McGill.
“That’ll be fine.”
Pruet put in his order.
“I asked Odo and Ms. Casale to join us for our refreshments.”
McGill nodded and said, “You’ve been sorting things out for your friend Jean-Louis for a long time, haven’t you?”
“We met at the lycée. Got along famously from the very beginning. Truly enjoy each other’s company. More than meet each other’s needs.”
For a moment, McGill almost thought—
Pruet saw his misconception and shook his head. “No, m’sieur, not that way.”
“Désolé,” McGill said. Sorry.
“C’est rien.” No problem. “What I was getting at … Have you a friend who understands you better than anyone else? To whom you need never explain yourself? Who naturally sympathizes with you, but does not hesitate to tell you when you are in error? Never intending any malice when he does.”
“I do,” McGill said, thinking of Sweetie. “She looks like she could be Ms. Casale’s elder sister. My former wife is also like that to a certain extent. The president and I are more and more like that every day.”
Pruet had to laugh, and shake his head.
“I envy you your ease with women,” he said.
McGill replied, “A matter of luck, and not trying too hard.”
“I will do my best to remember that: not to try too hard. In any event, Jean-Louis and I met at a time of greater than usual social ferment in France. We, like everyone el
se with a spark of ambition, decided we would change the world. It went without saying that he would be the face of our effort; I would be the strategist. Over the years, our efforts have met with a certain success.”
McGill smiled. “I’d say so, if reaching the Elysée Palace was on your to-do list.”
“Not just to reach the palace, m’sieur, but to remain there long enough to do meaningful things for La Belle France, and to some extent the world at large.”
“When you first read Diana Martel’s police file,” McGill said, “you saw something in it you didn’t like. Something that told you Thierry Duchamp’s death had far larger implications than anything I was thinking. You saw something that threatened President Severin.”
“And by extension President Grant,” the magistrate said.
McGill thought about that for a moment and said, “The new defense doctrine they are championing?”
“Without Jean-Louis, there is no champion in Europe. The British prime minister opposes the plan; the German chancellor, for historical reasons, would not be permitted to lead.”
“So what are we looking at? Your president’s political enemies have set out to sabotage him? The Undertaker kills Thierry Duchamp, France’s biggest football star, on the eve of an international tournament. It’s chalked up as a street crime. Then what, the president is blamed? The opposition claims he can’t even keep the streets safe for a man who’s a national treasure?”
Pruet nodded. “Jean-Louis is demonized. He is called upon to strictly enforce law and order. Provocateurs spark riots in the immigrant communities. Portions of the capital are set ablaze. M’sieur le président is required to forsake the G8 meeting or, if he goes, is reviled further, and the government rejects anything he might try to accomplish there.”
McGill sat back in chair.
“You saw a name in Diana Martel’s file that gave it away?”
“The owner of the strip club, Paradis Trouvé.”