Wherever There Is Light

by Peter Golden

  “Isabella invited us for cassoulet.”

  “Yum.”

  They crossed the boulevard to Rue Cujas. The limestone buildings of the Sorbonne and the hotels and houses were close together blocking the sun, so it was chilly and students hurried by, shivering, and the light was as gray as the smoke from the braziers warming the terraces of the cafés.

  “I went to Thayer’s,” Kendall said, taking Julian’s arm. “Her concierge says she hasn’t been there in days, and I spoke to Otis and he hasn’t seen her.”

  Julian dreaded telling her; the story was more involved than Thayer’s death, and he recalled how angry Kendall had been about his not mentioning that he owned the house in the Village.

  As the street widened at the Place du Panthéon, Julian said, “I have some bad news.”

  Kendall stopped walking but still held on to his arm.

  “Thayer is dead.”

  Kendall gasped. “Dead? Who told you that?”

  “Some reporters.”

  “Reporters? What reporters?”

  “The reporters were by the Seine. Thayer drowned in the Seine.”

  “The Seine? Why—what was Thayer doing in the Seine?”

  “The police are working on it.”

  Kendall studied him, trying to discern—he thought—if she were hearing the whole truth. “Thayer wouldn’t commit suicide. Jesus, God, does Simon know?”

  “You—or me if you want—can tell him tonight.”

  Her eyes misted up. “I’ve known her since I was five. She was so young.”

  “It’s terrible.”

  Kendall glanced up the hill at the Church of Saint-Étienne-du-Mont, a Gothic gem with a rosette window of stained glass and students lounging on the steps smoking. “Let’s light a candle for her and make a donation to the poor.”

  “Thayer was Catholic?”

  Kendall laughed sadly. “No, but Fiona got me in the habit.”

  They went toward the church. Julian would come clean after they ate. It would be easier on both of them if she heard the rest of the story on a full stomach.

  Chapter 52

  The dining area at Dans le Vent was redolent with Isabella’s cassoulet—a garlicky aroma rising from the bowls of sausage, confit of duck and pork shoulder, sweet onions, tomatoes, and plump tarbais beans that were slow-cooked under a crust of bread crumbs and tasted like the coziest starlit autumn night you could remember.

  Isabella kept them company while they ate, a break for Julian because Kendall wouldn’t question him about Thayer in front of her. They finished a bottle of heavy red wine from Cahors, and Julian hoped it would make Kendall sleepy, but she drank an espresso and smoked her Gauloises and, after Isabella went to greet customers, eyeballed Julian through the candlelight as if she were ready to give him the third degree. Just then, however, Otis came in with a waiter Julian recognized from La Contrescarpe. He had milky skin and hair the color of a new penny. Otis’s quartet was playing downstairs later.

  “You hear about Thayer?” Otis asked, his speech thick, his eyes half-closed. “It’s all they talkin’ ’bout in Saint-Germain.”

  “We did,” Kendall said. “It’s unbelievable.”

  “Yeah, baby, October ain’t no month for a swim.”

  The waiter put his arm around Otis’s waist, and they went to the bar.

  “He’s hopped up,” Julian said.

  “So’s his new friend. I talked to Otis about it, and he told me it’s none of my business. You’re not going to tell me that, are you?”

  “Doubt I could get away with it.”

  In his apartment, Julian lit the candles in the jars on the mantelpiece, then sat at one end of the couch while Kendall sat at the other. On the walk home, Julian had resolved to give it to her straight. “Arnaud—or one of his Commie buddies—murdered Thayer.”

  Kendall stared at him as if Julian had merely informed her that Arnaud and Thayer were seen talking at Deux Magots. In a voice equal parts disbelief and contempt, she said, “That’s absurd. You just don’t like Arnaud because—we both know why.”

  “According to a detective, Thayer was knocked out and dumped in the river.”

  “And that proves Arnaud did it?”

  “Or had it done. Thayer was working with him.”

  “Thayer never worked a day in her life.”

  “Arnaud was sleeping with her. Maybe that made her more industrious. I can’t say.”

  Kendall glared at him. “And you’re implying I can?”

  “They were storing small arms in an apartment in Pigalle.” Julian removed the Smith & Wesson from his waistband and set it between them on the couch. “This is one of the pistols.”

  “Why were you in Pigalle? And how do you know any of this?”

  Here we go, Julian thought. “I came to Paris to check out Arnaud.”

  “To— Who sent you?”

  “The same people who sent me to war.”

  “That Wild Bill character? And he knew I was involved with Arnaud?”

  “He told me you were.”

  “You— This . . . this has to be a new low for jealous ex-boyfriends. Snake-belly low.”

  “Hanging around with Arnaud, you were in danger.”

  “Please. He edits a newspaper.”

  “I saw Arnaud order his men to crucify German prisoners. Not that they didn’t deserve to die, but crucified? He watched that mob cut Isabella’s hair and didn’t try to help her. Now he’s shaking her down.”

  Her arguing with him as if this were a lover’s spat instead of a predicament that could get someone else killed exhausted his patience, and as Kendall started to speak, Julian cut her off. “Arnaud was in Moscow talking to Red Army intelligence, who likely paid for the weapons. That way Stalin can have some guerilla support if we get to World War Three. The Soviets aren’t fucking around. And Arnaud isn’t either.”

  The light of the candles flickered across the stony expression on her face. “Julian to my rescue—again. I can’t trust you. You and your secrets.”

  Julian felt himself boiling over. “You don’t want to get married, you’ve got your excuse. Race can’t be it—we’re in Paris.”

  Kendall snapped, “How about deceiving me? Is that an excuse?”

  “Damnit, if I had a choice, I wouldn’t have told you anything. I have to take Simon to the States. Tomorrow.”

  “Tomor—”

  “Simon was at the apartment in Pigalle. Arnaud can’t be sure what Thayer told him, and if he wanted Thayer dead, why would he leave Simon alive?”

  Kendall was quiet, and Julian said, “Simon’s caught in the middle. He’s been writing articles about our troops in Europe, interviewing senior officers, and touring our bases. Who can say what Thayer got out of him and passed to Arnaud? People in our embassy are aware they were a couple. America’s in the spy business now—we have a federal agency for it. Wild Bill has contacts who can get Simon out of this. Otherwise, he’s screwed. By us or the Commies.”

  Julian glanced at his watch, then put on his beret and overcoat and stuck the pistol in one of the pockets. “I’ll be at the Sélect. When Simon calls, send him there. If you feel up to it, tell him Thayer had an accident. But he can’t go to his hotel. He’s gonna have to sleep here on the couch. I’ll explain it to him.”

  Kendall stood. Her expression had softened. “I’m sorry I was upset with you.”

  “It’s upsetting to hear.”

  “Why are you doing this for Simon?”

  He shrugged, not wanting to dig up ancient history.

  “Tell me. You know. You always know.”

  “Derrick.”

  “Derrick wasn’t your fault.”

  “You said it a long time ago: if Eddie and I hadn’t been there, Otis wouldn’t have gone in the ocean and Derrick wouldn’t have slapped Hurleigh.”

  “I was young and scared and I was wrong to say that.”

  “And I could’ve taken care of Hurleigh permanently. I didn’t realize he’d lynch Derrick
over a slap. But I got Arnaud’s number. He’s not getting to Simon. Or Isabella or you. He knows I’ll kill him. How’s that for a jealous boyfriend?”

  Kendall stroked his face. “Good.”

  It was too early for les vagabonds nocturnes, but the Sélect was hopping, and Julian nursed a Scotch at a small round table beside a brazier on the terrace and watched the evening traffic on Boulevard Montparnasse. When Simon emerged from a taxi in a trench coat and holding a valise, Julian waved him over.

  “How does a grown woman drown in the Seine by accident?” Simon asked after ordering a drink from a waiter. “Kenni-Ann didn’t answer that one.”

  Julian waited until Simon had taken a swallow of his brandy and soda before telling him the story. When he was done, Simon had a hand pressed to his forehead. “What’d I get myself into? I wasn’t serious with Thayer. I was having fun. Does Arnaud skate on this?”

  “Not forever. Why’d you go to that house in Pigalle?”

  “Thayer forgot the key in my hotel room, and she called and asked me to bring it over. She said a girl she knew from the Sorbonne was moving in.”

  “And she didn’t ask you about your work?”

  “Thayer was interested in Thayer. I’m writing about Negro soldiers in Europe and Negro veterans that stayed because they hate Jim Crow. The higher-ups I interviewed talked about integrating the military. Nothing the Soviets couldn’t read elsewhere.”

  “You’ll sack out on my couch tonight.”

  “Thanks, but I’m at the Hôtel de l’Avenir. It’s nearby.”

  “It’s not safe. Arnaud could be watching it, or someone from our embassy. And tomorrow we’ll fly home. You can talk to Bill Donovan in New York, and I’ll vouch for you. You need to leave Paris and get squared away with the government before somebody in this new Central Intelligence Agency hears the story and figures to make a name for himself by treating you like a traitor. I got a guy can collect your stuff and pay your hotel bill.”

  “Why you doing this?”

  Julian couldn’t blame Simon for sounding suspicious. Between Julian being white and in love with Kendall, how could Simon not be skeptical about his motives. “For Kendall. For me. It’s not important why.”

  Simon sat back, fiddling with the brass Double-V pin in the lapel of his trench coat. The Pittsburgh Courier had kicked off the Double-V campaign right after the war started: one V for victory overseas, the other for victory over prejudice at home.

  Julian said, “We got the first V.”

  Simon stopped touching the pin. “Yeah, and I’m in no rush to get back to the fight for the second one.”

  “You have to go. Believe me.”

  “I do, but I like Europe. It gave me the chance to worry about everything except the color of my skin.”

  “Look on the bright side. America’s got Jackie Robinson.”

  “That’s something,” Simon replied.

  It was after eleven when Julian came into the apartment. Kendall had made up the couch, and in the bedroom Julian undressed with a sliver of moonlight, curved like a scimitar, visible in the space between the curtains.

  “I’m awake,” Kendall said.

  She was also naked, Julian discovered, when he got under the quilt.

  “Is Simon here?”

  “We stopped by the club. Simon’s listening to Otis play and drinking with some friends he ran into. A last-night blowout. Marcel’s there, and Simon will stay downstairs with him.”

  “Marcel’s on our side?”

  “Yeah, and if Arnaud pops up while I’m gone, talk to Marcel. He’ll handle him.”

  Her hand went inside his boxers. “Who should I talk to about this?”

  “That’s my department,” Julian said, and then they were done talking.

  In the morning, Julian walked to the TWA office. It was on the Right Bank, and he paused on the Pont Neuf. A barge loaded with coal was heading up the Seine, passing the beautifully carved stone of the Pont des Arts and a boy waving from the bridge. As the barge went by the Tuileries and grew smaller in the distance, with the river as gray as the bare trees except for the trails of foam the barge cut into the water, he finally made up his mind and bought the tickets. The plane departed at six. Julian had skipped breakfast, so he found a table outside at Café de la Paix. The opera house was up the street. With its colonnades and arches and gold sculptures on the roof and greenish-blue dome, it looked as though it had been built so the angels would have a place to sing. He’d miss Paris if things didn’t work out, but it was unavoidable if he was going to be happy. His café crème was cold, and he didn’t eat his pain au chocolat. It was almost noon when Julian got back to Place de l’Estrapade. Kendall was on a bench in the square reading Le Monde.

  “I was getting nervous,” she said, folding up the newspaper. “Everything okay?”

  He sat and handed her a TWA ticket envelope.

  “I can’t leave today.”

  “It’s for a month from today. It’ll give you a chance to get organized.”

  “Aren’t you coming back?”

  “If you’ll marry me.”

  Julian was amazed how surprise, hurt, and anger all filled her hazel eyes at once.

  “I have an engagement ring I bought at Tiffany’s for you years ago. Fly to the States, I’ll give it to you, and we can have Thanksgiving with your mother or with Fiona and Eddie. Then you can choose a date, we’ll get married wherever you say, and come back here.”

  “Julian, why are you pressuring me?”

  “I can’t live in limbo anymore. I never had much of a family and didn’t want one until I met you. Not seeing you would be painful—not having a family with you is worse.”

  “I’m not trying to hurt you.”

  “I know. I just made a choice for me. You make a choice for you.”

  “It’s not that simple.”

  “I know that too. But for me it’s necessary.”

  Her tone irritated and amused, Kendall said, “All this choice jazz. You sound like the existentialists. Where’d you pick that up?”

  Julian, wanting to end the discussion, kissed her and quipped, “In a café.”

  Chapter 53

  A week after Julian and Simon boarded their flight at Le Bourget, Kendall gave up her suite at the Trianon and rented the newly renovated three-bedroom that she planned to share as Julian’s wife. The rooms were flooded with light from the windows facing Place de l’Estrapade on one side and Rue Lhomond on the other. Marcel had the workmen bring up the couch, bed, and armoire that Julian had given her when he cleared out his things downstairs, and in the salon there was a window seat, which a minute after Kendall unpacked was her favorite spot in the apartment. Autumn was flirting with winter, but Kendall raised the window because the air—cold and bright and blue—was seasoned with the aromas of the spécialités de la maison cooking in the bistros.

  “Wife,” Kendall said.

  The word had an unpleasant ring to it. Exhausted, frustrated, someone destined to nag her husband and children. Kendall preferred the French word femme, which meant “woman” but was also used for “wife.” So there was no change. You’re a woman, then you’re a wife, and nothing’s different. Kendall laughed and uncorked a bottle of Beaujolais. Merde. A crock of merde. A large crock, maybe the largest crock of shit ever invented. It changes everything. Rearranges who you are and who you will be.

  Yet Kendall intended to marry Julian. She loved him. Since he’d been gone, she ached for him and thought about all his qualities that she adored, cycling through handsome, smart, generous, protective, and that she couldn’t get enough of him in bed. This last one was tricky. With other men it was easy; afterward, a tension was gone, and if her partners had any complaints, they could go elsewhere. With Julian, though, she wanted to please him, wanted to obliterate every strip of flesh that separated him from her, wanted to drag him with her into that shimmering, tranquil, bottomless darkness, and when they were done she felt as though a star had burned out in the sky.<
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  That was her thinking as she drank her glass of wine. She would change the departure date on her ticket to the day after tomorrow and surprise Julian by taking a cab from the airport to South Orange. She could picture his expression when he saw her, that curious pairing of manly calm and boyish glee, and how happiness seemed to deepen the blue of his eyes. They would make love and walk to Gruning’s for ice cream and make love again, and the next evening they could go out with Fiona and Eddie, draft them as their matron of honor and best man over prime rib at the Tavern, and finalize the details of their wedding.

  Kendall poured herself a second glass of Beaujolais, but after a sip she set it on the floor. She had started wondering if Julian would keep his promise to live in Paris if she married him. Why wouldn’t he? Lots of reasons, beginning with New Jersey was his natural habitat and after a while in Paris he’d end up as miserable as a lion in a zoo. That wasn’t what scared her, though: it was that if he chose to go home, would she be able to live without him? Or would she miss him with the same dull, joy-sapping ache as she felt missing him now?

  Perhaps she was being silly. She got up and dug through one of her boxes and retrieved a copy of her first book, Double Lives. She flipped through the pages, remembering her days shooting in Harlem; her desperation to make a name for herself as an artist and her shock when Léo Sapir offered her a show at his gallery. She recalled how the publishers, Ada and Aaron Robbins, came, and Ada bought her Little Girl & the Rainbow for her office wall, telling her that she had once been that girl, and at lunch a week later they’d offered her a contract for a book. It had all happened so fast, and so long ago.

  Back then, Kendall had considered the double exposure a self-portrait, and now she looked at the photograph in her book with the same sense of recognition—the window of the five-and-dime, and the little girl with pigtails and the faded dress gazing at the dolls from The Wizard of Oz under the papier-mâché rainbow. It wasn’t the image of a child wishing to own a doll that caught Kendall’s attention. It was the other image, the ghostly image in which the girl appears far older, with that bitter look of disappointment on her face because she understands that cuddling a doll in her arms or traveling over the rainbow will not satisfy her—that this longing beyond longing was the essence of who she was and to renounce it was to become someone she didn’t want to be.