by Hy Conrad
“He still has the ring?” Nicolas asked. “I want it.”
“The Virgin of Monte Carmelo has the ring.” The general’s wound gurgled red around Amy’s hand. “An offering for my sins.”
Amy tried to keep Nicolas focused and away from his victim. “All your life you wanted revenge. After his trial, the general must have disappeared. But you tracked him down—to the one place where you couldn’t just go and kill him. It must have been maddening that he was so cut off from the world. But then you heard the gates of Monte Carmelo would open for one day. You and the train engineer. You were responsible for the accidents.”
Nicolas shrugged. “The engineer was our neighbor in La Boca. He took me from the empty house and raised me by himself. A saint who called me his nephew. It was just luck, or maybe the hand of God, that he had worked as an engineer and could get hired if he made his money demands small. I was an art student, and I was not so lucky. Pablo was hired.”
“The engineer caused the first delay in Buenos Aires?”
“That was an experiment, to see if the explosion would work. In Patagonia, it worked perfectly. We didn’t want to hurt Pablo, just do enough to send him to the hospital in the middle of the wilds, where no one could take his place but me. ”
“And the chimney? That was you?”
Nicolas made a face and shrugged again. “Senor O’Bannion was going to cancel the visit. After all we had gone through to get here. I had to make the train stay. A crowbar from the garage was all I needed. . . .” He broke off abruptly, his gaze going out to the hollow square in the middle of the staircase. Amy was about to say something when he raised his hand and stopped her.
There were people below, on the dirt floor, half the height of the tower down from them, speaking in hushed whispers. Two people at least, from the sound of it. “Amy? Nicolas?” None of the intruders wanted to raise their voices in the reverent hush of the monastery, not even Fanny. “Amy, sweetie. It’s time to go.”
The wounded monk, the guide, and the tourist waited in silence until the voices below them exited the bell tower and continued their search elsewhere.
“We have to go,” Amy whispered. “This isn’t easy for you, I know.”
“He killed my mother and my father.”
The old general sat himself a little straighter. “I am responsible, yes, God help me. So many were taken. This is horrible to say, but I do not remember your parents.”
Nicolas took a step closer, almost reaching their feet. The knife that he’d used to cut the robe was still in his hand. “No te acuerdas?”
“Lo siento, pero no.”
The conversation had switched into Spanish. Amy had no choice but to listen for a few recognizable words and watch their body language. What if the talk turned angry again? What would she do? Would she try to protect the general? Could she? And then what? Would Nicolas willingly turn himself in? Even though she wasn’t a religious person, Amy couldn’t help but say a muted prayer.
The monk who had been the general spoke softly. The orphaned boy didn’t want to listen, but he did. Then it was his turn to say impassioned things while the man he had dreamed about all his life listened. For Amy, the exchange seemed to go on forever—while she sat by and continued to apply pressure. She had stopped the flow of blood, at least for the time being.
* * *
Fanny and Alicia returned to the main courtyard. Before anyone could blame her for anything, Fanny threw up her hands in frustration. It was one of her most effective tactics, to seem more annoyed than anyone else.
“We looked everywhere. This is not like my daughter to lose track of time.” She glared at Jorge O’Bannion. “It must be your employee’s fault.”
The courtyard was filled with the seven tourists, showing various levels of concern; their leader, O’Bannion; his patient cousin, the abbot; and the ten impatient donkeys, braying and defecating and waiting to take their heavy loads back down the mountain. It had been no more than fifteen minutes since the group had realized that Amy and Nicolas were not showing up.
“What do we do now?” asked Alicia.
Fanny bristled. “Well, I’m certainly not leaving without my daughter.”
“I would never ask you to,” said O’Bannion. “But if they’re not here, then they must have left on foot. The abbot is anxious to return his monastery to its normal life.”
“So you are asking me to leave without my daughter.”
“No, no. But if they are not here . . .”
“What if they fell down a well?” she asked. “What then? Or fell off a wall? Or if Nicolas decided to become a monk, and she’s with him in one of those cells, trying to talk him out of it?” Fanny was just getting warmed up. “Or if the monks were so starved for female companionship that Nicolas sold my Amy into white slavery? No offense, but it’s a possibility. Or if they both got sold into white slavery? Or if they . . . Oh, there you are, dear! It’s about time.”
Amy and Nicolas had just walked through the archway. They were smiling—fixed, artificial smiles—which only made the blood more obvious: the bloody streaks on Nicolas’s neck and the dark, wet stain on Amy’s skirt.
Todd Drucker was the first to speak up. “What the hell happened?”
Amy ignored his question and walked straight up to O’Bannion and the abbot, then motioned the two men away from the crowd. Whatever Amy whispered seemed to have an immediate effect. O’Bannion’s hands flew to his chest in shock, and seconds later, after the translation, his cousin had a similar reaction.
“Stay here,” O’Bannion told his charges in both languages, foregoing any reassuring pleasantries. “Amy, make sure Nicolas doesn’t move until we come back. Mr. Drucker. Mr. Wolowitz. Do as she tells you.” And then the cousins hurried through the arch and vanished into the monastery proper. Nicolas didn’t make any attempt to move.
“What the hell happened?” Todd repeated. “Is that blood yours? Is someone dead?”
“It’s not mine,” Amy said, holding up her hands. “It’s not from Nicolas, either. We’re okay.”
Fanny collided into her daughter’s arms. “Are you sure you’re okay? I was so worried. What happened?”
“I’m fine.”
Fanny stretched herself up toward her daughter’s ear. Amy met her halfway. “Are you sure you’re fine?” Fanny studied her face. “Was there white slavery involved? You can be honest.”
“What? No. No white slavery.” Amy straightened up and addressed the English speakers. “We had an accident, that’s all.” She tried to sound flippant, but her voice was shaky.
“An accident with blood marks around his neck?” Todd asked. “Is this a TrippyGirl murder? Is that it? I should have known.”
“No murder,” Nicolas said, the first words out of his mouth since they’d returned. “Thanks to Ms. Abel.”
“Nicolas, be quiet,” Amy said. “For your own sake, nothing happened.”
Nicolas allowed himself a solemn half nod. He had calmed down and no longer looked like he was ready to flee.
“So you’re not going to tell us?” Todd’s sigh was extravagant. “Yes, Nicolas. We mustn’t ruin the surprise. No one can know anything until it gets revealed on TrippyGirl. Never mind that we’ve all been worried sick.”
“I thought you didn’t believe in Trippy,” Fanny reminded him. “According to you, Amy and I made it all up. Well, maybe that’s what happened. She made it all up.”
“Don’t act so superior,” Todd replied. “You don’t know any more than I do.”
“Oh, but I will,” said Fanny. “I’ve had over thirty years of practice.”
“No. I don’t think I can tell anyone.” Then Amy corrected herself. “I mean, it was a silly accident. Not worth talking about.”
“Don’t worry, Todd,” said Fanny with a conspiratorial wink. “I’ll get it out of her. Right, sweetie?” And she stretched up and kissed her daughter on the cheek.
CHAPTER 23
By 10:00 a.m. the next day they were ba
ck on the Patagonian Express. Jorge O’Bannion had managed to find lodgings somewhere among the eight remaining cars. The track had been cleared of debris. And the last leg of their trip was turning out to be scenic and uneventful. As always, the express moved at a snail’s pace, meandering around the lakes and fjords and crossing broad rivers on Chile’s ancient railway bridges.
On their last night, after repeated assurances from the engineer, the Abels decided to take their lives into their own hands and build a fire in their carriage’s fireplace. Amy was glad they did. It was an amazing, almost surrealistic sensation—the earthy smell, the flames in the grate, the sparks popping in their Victorian living room, all combined with the passing late-evening scenery, the gentle rocking motion, and the long howl of the silver engine’s steam whistle.
“The engineer was very accommodating,” Fanny said, then treated herself to another pinch of herbal holly in her maté bowl.
“He should be,” Amy replied. “I kept him and his adopted son out of jail.”
“A lot of that was Jorge’s doing, don’t you think? He couldn’t afford the bad publicity of the arrest. Neither could the abbot. I mean, it’s one thing to preach God’s forgiveness. It’s another to be harboring a man who was so hated by so many.”
“Mother, give me some credit. If it hadn’t been for me . . .”
“You’re right, sweetie, you’re right. If it hadn’t been for you, someone would be dead, instead of in an infirmary for a day. The story would be all over the media, and people’s lives would be ruined. On the plus side, I would have really juicy material for a month’s worth of TrippyGirl blogs, at least.” She mashed and stirred and took a sip. “Just kidding.”
“You’re only half kidding.”
“I know. But there must be something we can use.”
“You mean create a fake version of what happened?”
“You make fake sound so negative. You saved a life and you deserve a story. The Toad will believe every word. He was quite impressed.”
“You have to stop calling him Toad.”
“We’ll come up with something involving blood and a mountaintop monastery. There’ll be no one to deny it. A little disclaimer saying we changed the names and certain details to protect the innocent. Blah, blah, blah. It’ll be our best Trippy ever, just in time for the book release.”
“Maybe,” said Amy, a word she regularly utilized to mean no. But in this case it was a qualified no. It all depended on her mother’s discretion and creativity, which might just turn it into a yes. So, it was a real maybe, after all.
“Did you talk to Nicolas? Everyone’s talking about the poor boy—in two languages that he understands. I’m surprised he got back on the train.”
“I’m proud of him,” Amy said. The fire was getting a little too warm, so she put aside her pashmina on the nearby ottoman. Would she ever be able to wear it without remembering that day? “I can’t imagine nursing a hatred for so many years and then just letting it go. There must be such a void in his life.”
“Or a peace,” said Fanny. “Let’s give him the benefit of the doubt.”
They basked in the glow of the fire. A comfortable silence fell between them, broken only by the rattling of the tracks and the occasional slurping from the gourd.
“I guess there’s no chance that Nicolas murdered Lola Pisano,” Fanny suggested. “That would be too easy.”
“Easy and impossible.”
“How about the general? Maybe he got a day pass and went on a murder spree, for old time’s sake.”
Even after a lifetime together, Amy couldn’t always tell when Fanny was joking. “Ha-ha.”
“What do you mean, ‘Ha-ha’? Why not? Someone had to kill her.”
Amy gave it some thought, not her mother’s suggestion, of course, which was ridiculous, but... “To be honest, Mom, I’m not even sure Lola was murdered. It’s just the lack of a blunt object and my own nagging suspicion.”
“Well, the trip’s not over, sweetie. We may still get lucky.”
* * *
Marcus was relieved to see that the Abel girls were still alive and blogging. It had been nearly two days without a call or a note—and right after Amy had asked him to run down information on possible suspects. But just as he was about to send off another e-mail, his computer pinged with an alert. A brand-new posting from TrippyGirl. A little after 8:00 p.m., 10:00 p.m. Patagonian time.
He read through it quickly and couldn’t quite make sense of the logistics. He had expected the story to have something to do with the train explosion, the subject of the last blog, perhaps connecting it to Fanny’s vision or Lola Pisano’s death. But this was entirely different.
The resourceful TrippyGirl was still in Patagonia. She had somehow wound up on a runaway donkey and found herself banging on the door of a hilltop monastery during a thunderstorm. Faced with having a beautiful young traveler on their doorstep, one who was dying from exposure, the kindly abbot took her in. She spent the night on a cot in the bell tower, which acted just like a booming alarm clock one hour before dawn, when the monks got up for their morning vespers. The TrippyGirl blog was illustrated with several shots of Amy on a donkey in front of what could have been a real monastery. At the end, Marcus noticed for the first time a disclaimer printed in red: “Based loosely on true events.”
While he was reading it through for the second time, a Skype window materialized in the corner of his screen, along with the familiar bongo beat. Before her face even popped up, he had to ask. “Did you really take shelter in a monastery? Are you still there? Did you take a vow of chastity? I hope not.”
“Based loosely. I made Mom put that in.” Amy straightened her glasses and smiled into the camera. “But there was a bell tower. We’ll tell you the whole story later, over drinks.”
“Tell me now.”
“I promised Fanny we’d tell you together. Give her a chance to embellish. Where are you?”
Marcus turned the screen so that she could see the exposed brick walls and the dirty clothes on the sofa. “In my own apartment for once. Terry and Fiona drove up to Vermont for the weekend to ski. Was there another murder? Is Fanny all right?”
Amy pretended to pout. “You ask about Fanny before you ask about me?”
“I can see that you’re all right. Better than all right.”
“Yeah, yeah.” Amy waved away the compliment. “And yes, Mom is fine. And no, there’s no extra murder. We’re in Puerto Natales.” She moved her own screen to show a large but perfectly ordinary hotel room. It could have been a Holiday Inn.
“It looks like your Patagonian adventure is over,” Marcus said.
“Pretty much. Last night was our last night on the train. The airport here is tiny, so everyone has to stay in town until morning. Sorry about the news blackout. I did get your e-mails. Thanks.”
“There’s not much info on your victim. I Googled the hell out of Lola Pisano. Her husband was Esteban Pisano. Like your friend O’Bannion, he came from an old ranching family. But he got into banking and real estate, where the big money apparently was. I’m telling you stuff from the e-mail.”
“Go on. It’s better to hear it from your face. I pay more attention.”
“Glad to hear it. Were you able to open the obituary? It’s from the Buenos Aires paper, the Clarín. Lola dressed to the nines at some society function. I know you said not to send attachments.. . .”
“It’s fine. I was just looking at it,” Amy said. “The picture’s not very flattering. I think she liked to wear flashy jewelry to help distract the eye.”
“There aren’t many photos of her. At least not online. A society column or two. Pretty gossipy stuff. Her relationship with Jorge O’Bannion started about a year ago, although her family disapproved. Called him a wellborn gigolo. It actually said that in the paper. ‘Un gigolo de buena cuna.’ And they hate that he’s Chilean. To his credit, it seems like he brought the widow out of herself a little. There’s a photo of them dancing in a tango parlor.
”
“That’s where I met her,” said Amy. “And she wasn’t happy to see me talking to Jorge. Anything else in the obituaries? I couldn’t read much of the text.”
“I’ll have to teach you Spanish someday. They say that the cause of death was a riding accident and that because of the ‘animal damage,’ it would be a closed casket.”
“I think that’s what she would have wanted.”
“Ouch,” said Marcus, even though he couldn’t help laughing. “Bad joke.”
“Sorry.” From five thousand miles away, he could see her blushing. “Anything on Gabriela Garcia?” she asked.
Marcus nodded. “Gabriela is much more Google friendly. Her husband, Arturo, was quite the charmer. A full-page obituary for him, nothing but praise. A suicide, by the way. Did you know that?”
“That’s what you said in the e-mail. Any details?”
According to Google and its minions, Arturo was a Buenos Aires boy made good. He had begun as a young guide on the streets, arranging tours on the spot for North American visitors. By the age of twenty, he had married Gabriela and founded Hemispherio Travel. The two of them thrived and eventually expanded to vacation resorts and a cruise line.
“From all accounts, Arturo did a pretty amazing job of surviving the political and social upheavals.” Marcus vanished from the screen and reappeared with a few pages of printouts to look at. “But he finally got hit by the recession. Big-time bank problems.”
Amy scratched at her hairline. “Didn’t you say Lola’s husband had been a banker?”
“You’re one step ahead of me. Banking and real estate.”
“Gabriela mentioned something unpleasant about the Pisano legacy. That must be the connection. If Esteban Pisano had been personally responsible for her husband’s financial problems . . . I can see why Lola would ride away and not want to confront her.”
Marcus put aside his printouts and scowled. “You don’t even need me, do you?”
“I need you plenty,” Amy said. “So I’m right about the connection?”
“Arturo’s obituaries were a little vague.” Marcus returned to his printouts. “They mentioned loan defaults and business worries. But suicide is a complex thing.”