Quest for Alexis

by Nancy Buckingham

  In an effort to placate him, I said, “Perhaps I made a mistake deciding not to tell Madeleine, only at the time it seemed best. A shock like that ... I didn’t know how she’d react. I just felt I had to try and talk to Alexis, to try and persuade him to come home before it was too late. And now I’ve got this far, Brett, I can’t give up. Not yet.”

  In the darkness of the taxi, I felt his fingers touch my wrist, resting there for an instant. Considering that he and I had once been lovers, it was a trivial gesture. But the effect upon me was out of all proportion. I felt suddenly breathless and had to fight a wild yearning to throw myself into his arms.

  Chapter Seven

  There was a disturbing feeling of intimacy about staying the night under the same roof as Brett, in a bedroom just across the corridor from him. I wondered if he was conscious of it, too. I wondered if it brought back to him, as vividly as it did to me, the other times we had been together.

  Not that this palatial hotel was anything like the places we had stayed at before. We had chosen sleepy country pubs where we felt shut away from the outside world, where they served roast beef and Yorkshire pudding for dinner and a huge platter of bacon and eggs to entice us down in the morning. We’d had a special favorite, an ancient millhouse lying in a fold of the Sussex Downs, a few miles inland from Brighton. Our bedroom was cozy under the thatch, with heavy oaken beams and beeswax-scented furniture. The whispering of water from the stream outside was a gentle background to the night hours.

  A favorite place. My memory was running riot. In reality Brett and I had stayed there only twice.

  The white telephone on the bedside table reminded me that I had promised to call Rudi. I felt a curious reluctance, but I wanted to ask about Madeleine, too. The operator told me there would be a delay, so I undressed and slipped into bed. I waited with growing impatience for over an hour before at last the call came through.

  “Rudi, it’s Gail. Is everything all right? How is Madeleine?”

  “She still suspects nothing, thank heaven,” he told me. “But, Gail, you’re so late phoning me. I’ve been worried, expecting a call the whole evening. Have you seen Alexis? What did he say?”

  “No, I haven’t been able to contact him, not yet.”

  “Why not? Is something wrong, Gail?”

  “The thing is, Alexis and Belle left Majorca before we even got here.”

  “Left?”

  “They hired a fishing boat, and we don’t know where they’re heading for.”

  “I see.” There was a brief pause. “Gail, you said ‘we.’ Who do you mean?”

  Why did I hesitate? Rudi would have to know sooner or later.

  “Brett is here too,” I said slowly. “He turned up at London Airport just before the plane took off.”

  “But how did he know you were going? I told him you’d decided not to.”

  “It seems he phoned Deer’s Leap this morning, and Mrs. Cramp told him I’d gone to catch a plane. So he put two and two together.”

  “Damn the woman. You can’t stop her from gossiping.”

  I said quickly, “There’s no real harm done. Brett isn’t being a nuisance or anything.” I didn’t add that I was actually glad, now, to have Brett here with me.

  “What are you going to do, Gail? I suppose you’ll come straight back home, won’t you?”

  “No, I’m staying here until we get news of where they’ve gone. It shouldn’t be long—not more than a few hours, according to Brett.”

  Rudi asked, with a sudden rush of suspicion, “Is Brett there with you now?”

  “No, we separated over an hour ago. I’m in bed now. We’ve checked in at the same hotel where Alexis was staying.”

  There was silence at the other end of the line. I wanted to end this pointless conversation, yet I couldn’t bring myself to hang up on Rudi.

  “I can’t help feeling anxious about you, Gail,” he said at last. “Being there with Brett. I know how deeply he hurt you once before. I don’t want that to happen again. I beg you, please come home.”

  “I can’t, Rudi. And you don’t need to worry about me—at least not because of Brett. It was all over between us long ago. Finished and dead. It could never happen again.”

  “Then why is he in Majorca with you?”

  It was a question I’d been asking myself constantly, a question I could find no answer to. I fell back on repetition. “I tell you it’s all over between us. Surely you could see that for yourself, when Brett and I met at Deer’s Leap yesterday.”

  “Perhaps,” said Rudi. He made one last attempt. “Gail, if you have no more news of Alexis within the next twenty-four hours, then will you agree to give up and come home to England?”

  “I can’t promise anything, Rudi. But I’ll call you again sometime tomorrow. Tell Madeleine I phoned, will you, and give her my love. And Caterina. Goodbye for now.”

  For a moment my hand lingered on the telephone, reluctant to give up the feeling of closeness with Deer’s Leap. Then I turned off the bedside lamp and lay back. I felt tired to the point of exhaustion, yet I knew it would be hard to sleep.

  My mind was dazed, bewildered by the day’s swift flow of events. More than once when sleep was edging up on me, a knife-thrust memory of glaring yellow headlights and the scream of a revving engine brought me snapping back to wakefulness. I was left weak and shaking from the sudden recall of those terrifying seconds when my death had seemed a certainty.

  But I must have slept, because I wakened to a new day.

  * * * *

  Brett and I breakfasted on the paved terrace that overlooked the bay. A soft breeze blew in off the sea, and the golden sun shone down on us. It was blissfully warm—February like April sometimes is in England.

  Below us, a sloping shrub garden hid the traffic-busy Paseo Maritimo that rimmed the sea. Mimosa and almond trees nodded their delicate blossoms, and freesias grew at their feet. The air was filled with birdsong.

  On such a glorious morning I couldn’t believe that things were really as bad as they had seemed last night. I felt bright with confidence that today we would get news of Alexis, news that would lead us to him. And when I had seen him, talked to him, then everything would come right again. As if the clock had miraculously been turned back.

  I was going to succeed. I had to succeed. To fail would play right into the hands of Alexis’s enemies. My uncle, I felt convinced, could have no idea how his present behavior was aiding the Communist cause— deserting the wife who had suffered so deeply on his behalf, seeming to turn his back on millions of friends and admirers, callously abandoning the refugees he had always helped—and now leading a life of ostentatious luxury. As a piece of propaganda for the Communists, it was devastating.

  Nobody who was not on their side, openly or secretly, could wish me to fail in my mission.

  Brett signaled the waiter. “Could you get me an English newspaper, do you think?”

  “Sí, senor. I will send for one.”

  The paper, when it came, was yesterday’s edition, which Brett had already seen in London. He handed it to me. “You’d better read it and see what they’re saying about Alexis. He’s certainly been given the treatment.”

  The story began on page one and continued on an inside page. There were pictures of them both—Alexis walking on the grounds at Deer’s Leap, the lake in the background. I recognized it as the one chosen for the dust jacket of his book. It was a splendid likeness of him, showing the strong jawline and fine intelligent eyes, the thick white hair which made him look so distinguished.

  But the photograph of Belle was quite something else. Where the paper had dug it up I couldn’t imagine. Very overposed, it made Belle look cheap and tarty, completely lacking the cool, poised beauty that characterized her. Maybe it was because her hair was shaken loose about her shoulders instead of in the neat coil she usually wore.

  Miserably, I passed the newspaper back to Brett. “They make it all sound so horribly sordid.”

  “How wo
uld you describe it, then? Romantic?”

  I had taken all I could stand of Brett’s cynicism about Alexis. But as I started to denounce him for it, he laid a warning hand on my arm.

  “Look out. Here comes Dougal Fraser.”

  I saw a man’s head and shoulders moving among the shrubs of the sloping garden and realized there must be a zigzag path leading up from the promenade to the hotel terrace. Brett hailed him, and the man waved back.

  Leaning toward me, Brett said, “Don’t show too much interest in Alexis. Dougal doesn’t realize who you are, and it’s better to keep him ignorant.”

  “Who does he think I am, then?”

  Brett gave me an odd look. “Gail, you’ve got to understand that if it leaked out to the press boys that you’re Alexis Karel’s niece, they’d be after you like a pack of wolves. It would put new meat on the bones of a tired story—the way you’ve come flying out here to bring your errant uncle to heel.”

  “Why do you always have to put things ... ?” I began. But again he touched my arm.

  “Careful. He’ll be here in a second. Wipe that angry expression off your face and smile sweetly. Come on now—as far as Dougal Fraser or anyone else in Majorca is concerned, you’re my girlfriend.”

  I stared at him, frowning. “Is that what you’ve been saying?”

  Brett’s eyes narrowed swiftly. “Is it such a difficult thing to pretend, Gail?”

  Perhaps it was as well I had no time to answer that. Dougal Fraser sprang up the last of the steps and came striding over to our table. He was around thirty years old, big-boned and tall—taller even than Brett—with sandy hair and very deep-blue eyes. Outwardly, he had a cheerful, carefree manner. Inwardly, I guessed, he would be very shrewd. When he spoke his voice had the attractive lilt of the Highlands.

  “Hi, Brett. You seem to be enjoying life, lazing around in the sun, taking it easy.”

  Brett leaned back and hooked an extra chair for him from the next table. Dougal flopped into it and proceeded to look me over. “Some people,” he remarked to Brett, “have all the luck.”

  Brett signaled the waiter to bring another cup for Dougal. “I thought you were going to phone me. Why come yourself—is there some news?”

  “Yes. But I don’t trust the telephone when there are too many press guys around. So I thought I’d stroll over and see you.”

  I couldn’t contain myself a second longer. “What is the news? Where is Alexis—er, Dr. Karel, I mean?”

  Dougal turned his blue eyes on me, speculatively. Brett gave an uneasy laugh. “Gail’s even more burned up than I am about my film being ruined.”

  “So it seems.” Dougal shrugged. “The fishing boat they’re on is still at sea. But I’ve got a few contacts with airline people, and I’ve just had a call from the captain of a freight plane which landed at Marseilles this morning that he spotted La Golondrina soon after sunup. A positive identification—he went down low enough for his navigator to read the name through glasses. At the moment, it’s still exclusive to me. And apart from you, Brett, that’s how I’m going to keep it.”

  “So it’s Marseilles next stop?” said Brett.

  Dougal shook his head. “Not necessarily. They were still well out to sea. It could be anywhere along the Cote d’Azur. Marseilles, Toulon, Cannes, Nice. Or one of the smaller places.”

  “How are we going to find out which?” I asked and too late saw Brett’s swift warning glance.

  “You can leave that to me.” Dougal gave a slow grin. “The dear old Globe has a long reach when it comes to a really gutsy story. There’s a flight from here to Nice this afternoon, and I’ll be on it, ready to shoot off to wherever it is that pair finally turn up.”

  “Brett,” I exclaimed. “we must be on that plane, too. Can you go and phone right away?”

  From the look Dougal flashed me, I knew with a sinking heart that I’d been too eager. As Brett tried a second time to cover up for me, Dougal waved him down to silence.

  “You called her Gail just now. Gail what, might I ask?”

  Lifting his shoulders, Brett said carelessly, “It’s Gail Fleming. Does it matter?”

  Dougal’s eyes widened with interest. “In other words, she’s the niece. Brett, I thought we were buddies. You’ve been taking me for a ride.”

  “You don’t have to worry. I wasn’t trying to steal your story.”

  “Maybe not, but you were sitting on an even bigger one.” Dougal turned to me with a slow, confident smile. “Suppose I do the escorting from now on, Gail? I’ll get you to see your uncle, on condition that I’m in on the meeting. But I want it exclusive, mind.”

  “It’s no go,” said Brett. “Gail stays with me.”

  “The only trouble is, Brett, that you won’t know where Alexis Karel is unless I choose to tell you. And I’m not going to, not any more.”

  I said beseechingly, “Please, Dougal, don’t you see, it would ruin everything if you were present. I’ve got to talk to my uncle privately. Given a chance, I’m sure I can persuade him to return home.”

  Brett weighed in too, pressuring Dougal out of friendship. It was an unfair tactic, and not unnaturally he resented it.

  “You’re asking the impossible,” he said at one point. “You of all people ought to know that, Brett.”

  But in the end Dougal did agree to help us track down Alexis. And to keep the secret of my identity.

  “Thanks,” Brett said warmly. “I won’t forget this.”

  Dougal made a sour face. “If my editor ever finds out what I’ve done, I won’t be allowed to forget it.”

  He finished his coffee in one gulp and stood up to go. Then he hesitated, looking down on Brett and me.

  “Bless you, my children,” he said indulgently and strode off down the terrace steps, his jacket hitched over his shoulder.

  Chapter Eight

  It was five in the afternoon when Brett and I arrived at the Hôtel de l’Etoile in Nice. We checked in and went upstairs. At the door of my room, Brett paused and looked at me, his dark eyes lingering on my face.

  “Gail, can I trust you not to run off again on your own? Dougal is really going out on a limb for you, so you’d better play it straight with him, even if you don’t with me.”

  Remembering where my rash act of independence in Majorca had led me, I shivered.

  “You needn’t worry. I’m not moving an inch until we hear from Dougal. When do you think it’ll be— this evening?”

  “I’ve no idea. From what I could make out, that fishing boat Alexis hired is a slow old tub. You’ll just have to be patient.”

  Left alone, I slid out of my coat and sank down on the bed, kicking off my shoes and drawing up my legs. I lay back, gazing out through the window at the hyacinth-blue Mediterranean sky.

  All the way from Palma to Nice, I had scanned the sea far below us, wondering if I might catch a glimpse of the small boat that carried Alexis and Belle. But it was a vain hope. There were dozens of tiny craft upon the glittering water, any one of which could have been theirs. Or they might have been on a different course altogether.

  Surely, though, they’d have to make landfall soon. But where? Brett and I were all set to make a quick dash to any point along the Riviera coastline the instant Dougal gave us the answer to that question. There was a car waiting for us downstairs in the hotel garage, a little Renault that Brett had hired at the airport.

  The feeling of expectancy had me all tensed up and on edge, as if even a split second lost might prove vital.

  I roused, startled by the sound of a knock on my door.

  “Gail. It’s me—Brett.”

  In a single moment I leaped up off the bed, running in stockinged feet to let him in. As I opened the door, a sudden wave of giddiness hit me, and I staggered. Brett shot out his arms to steady me.

  “What’s the matter? Aren’t you well?”

  “I’m all right,” I snapped, furious with myself. “Have you heard something from Dougal?”

  “No, not ye
t. But it’s more than time we had some dinner.”

  I shook my head. “I don’t feel like anything to eat.”

  “You’ve hardly had a thing since breakfast,” he protested. “Gail, are you quite sure you’re all right?”

  His hands still held me by the shoulders, supporting me. Feeling suddenly self-conscious, I broke away and took a step back.

  “I was lying down when you knocked, and I suppose I must have jumped up too quickly. I was a bit dizzy, that’s all. I’m okay now.”

  “Then come and eat. I’ll see you downstairs in ten minutes.”

  Brett had made the hotel reservation from Nice Airport because we needed to give Dougal a definite phone number where we could be reached in a hurry. Dougal was staying a few miles along the coast at Cannes, in a hotel where he’d often stayed before.

  “It’s just as well for us to separate,” he’d said. “On a hot story like this, everyone’s jumpy, suspecting everyone else of pulling a fast one. If we stick together, it might raise suspicions. Anyway, you two won’t want me sticking so close to you.”

  The Hôtel de l’Etoile was very French, a superior family-type establishment to which I could imagine the same people returning year after year for their vacances. The staff tended to speak in murmurs, adding to the general atmosphere of hush. The dining room was ornately splendid in Empire style, dominated by a pair of glittering crystal chandeliers.

  The food was splendid, too, and I quickly found my appetite. We ate a delicious sort of onion tart with anchovies, and then pork cutlets. With it we drank a rose wine, light but quite heady. I found myself relaxing, my thoughts straying. Once upon a time, I reflected dreamily, Brett and I would really have enjoyed eating in a place like this.

  Brett was more relaxed, too. He smiled at me across the table.

  “Upstairs just now, I really thought you were going to pass out on me. Gail, why don’t you give up this fool idea of finding Alexis? No one would blame you.”