by Stuart Woods
Finally, LaRose was handed off by an uninterested knot of people to Stone and Helga. Stone introduced them both; LaRose spoke a few words to Helga in a language he did not recognize, then returned to English.
“Your Swedish is very good, Mr. LaRose,” Helga said.
“Thank you. I spent some time in our embassy there.”
“Are you a diplomat?”
“I am the commercial attaché at our Paris embassy,” he replied, glancing at Stone as if to see if he caught his drift.
“What does that mean?” Stone asked, as if he were really interested.
“It means that I work to promote commerce between the United States and the country in which I am serving,” LaRose replied smoothly.
Helga looked across the room and spotted a woman waving at her. “Please excuse me for a moment,” she said. “I’ll be right back.”
“Richard,” Stone said quietly, “if you’re going to mix with this crowd, ostensibly on embassy business, you should find yourself a good tailor at once.”
“You have a point,” LaRose said. “I was unprepared for the invitation and had to rent this suit. Can you recommend a tailor?”
“Charvet is very good, if your employer is paying.”
“They’ve offered me a clothing allowance, but I haven’t taken advantage of it.”
“Tomorrow would be a good time,” Stone said. “European tailors work at a deliberate pace. Charvet makes shirts and ties, as well.”
“The people with whom I mixed at my previous postings were not so demanding,” he said. “What clothing should I have made? It’s a serious question.”
“Half a dozen suits, a dozen shirts, not all of them white, and, by all means, a tuxedo. Then a navy blazer and a couple of tweed jackets for less formal occasions.” He looked down. “And shoes, though they need not be custom-made. Try Berluti.”
LaRose was taking notes on a jotter. “I’m grateful to you,” he said. “My only other avenue of advice would be the ambassador, but he’s too far above my pay grade.”
“And find somebody who has a good haircut and ask him where he got it.”
“Good idea,” LaRose said, making a note. “I’ve been cutting it myself.”
“What are you doing here, Richard, if I may ask?”
“It’s Rick, and I’m here on business.”
The butler’s voice rang out. “Ladies and gentlemen, my lords and ladies, dinner is served.”
The group began streaming out the doors and across the hallway to the dining room, where a long table had been elegantly set. Stone estimated twenty-four chairs. He found his place card near the center, next to his host, and a moment later, Helga took his other side. “I’m sorry to have stuck you with that rather strange gentleman,” she said. “There was someone I just had to speak to. Who was that man?”
“Richard LaRose, commercial attaché at our embassy. He was more interesting than you might have thought.”
“He was dressed rather oddly.”
“His luggage was lost, and he had to make do.”
“Ah,” she said, nodding. “His Swedish was commendable, though. I don’t think he could have learned it simply by working in the U.S. Embassy in Stockholm.”
“I imagine he went to a rather good language school,” Stone said.
“I suppose the State Department has such a school,” Helga said. “That hadn’t occurred to me.”
It hadn’t occurred to Stone that Helga was Swedish, not German.
“Are you from Stockholm?”
She shook her head. “From a small town north of there, on the Baltic.”
“Do you live permanently in Paris?”
“My legal residence is in Monaco, for tax reasons, but I keep a flat here in a hotel.”
“What do you do, Helga?”
“I was married for a living for some years. Now I’m divorced for a living.”
Stone smiled. “Congratulations.”
She shrugged, emphasizing her cleavage. “The work suits me.”
The waiter poured Stone some white wine, and he caught sight of the label: Le Montrachet, with ten years in the bottle. He sipped it, rolled it on his tongue.
“Do you like the wine?” Marcel duBois asked.
“As we say in New York, ‘What’s not to like?’ Le Montrachet would be my favorite white, if I had it often enough to remember.”
“The secret to drinking good wine is to buy it on release, or in futures, then lay it down until it’s ready to drink. You can save hundreds of dollars a bottle by doing that.”
“Very good advice,” Stone replied. “I have a cellar in my house, but I’m a bit slapdash about stocking it on any regular basis.”
“Then you are condemned to drink wines of the second and third rank,” duBois said. “Find yourself a good wine merchant in New York and place some standing orders with him.”
“Perhaps you’re right. I’ll mend my ways.”
DuBois laughed. “I hope so for your sake.”
“Marcel, I’d like to thank you for seating me with Helga. She’s absolutely spectacular.”
“There was a time when I would have thought it dangerous to introduce you to her, but now she’s happily and profitably divorced, so she’s no longer a threat to your net worth, though perhaps to your liquidity.”
Stone laughed. “Was she really so predatory?”
“She arrived in Stockholm from some rural village and knocked the town on its ass, as you Americans would say. She attracted the industrialist son of a very big industrialist father, who had the grace to die in his sixties and leave the boy a very large fortune, comfortably tucked away in various tax havens. When she’d had enough of him and requested a divorce, he was reportedly so grateful to her for establishing his reputation as a ladies’ man that he wrote her a very large check as a farewell gift—rumor has it for forty million euros, which hardly dented his fortune.”
“An enterprising woman,” Stone said. There was a tap on his shoulder, and Stone turned to find Helga looking at him curiously. “Are you two talking about me?”
“Only in the most admiring terms,” Stone replied.
A waiter heaped a large portion of beluga caviar on their plates, ending their conversation. Stone observed that the table was much quieter while the diners contemplated their good fortune.
6
They were served three more courses after the caviar, and Stone had to restrain himself. Then, just when he thought the dining was over, footmen with large trays of cheeses appeared. He accepted a chunk of Pont l’Évêque and found it to be à point. A decanter of port was passed from his right; he poured himself a glass and passed the decanter on to his host. He sniffed and sipped. “Mmmm,” he said to duBois, “what is it?”
“A Quinta do Noval, 1972,” duBois replied. “It has been waiting patiently in my cellars for forty years just to please you.”
“I’m much easier to please than this,” Stone said. “I’m more in the line of overwhelmed.”
“You have a good palate,” duBois said. “Look at others around the table—most of them haven’t even noticed that they have been given something wonderful.”
“If I begin to buy vintage ports now,” Stone said, “I’ll be a very old man when they’re ready.”
“Fortunately, I bought well when port was out of fashion,” duBois said, “and I bought enough to keep me for all of my life.” He raised his glass. “I hope to drink the last bottle of this on my deathbed.”
Stone smiled. “I hope God gives you that favor.”
“Would you like to experience something else beautiful?” duBois asked. “You may bring your port with you.” He stood and rapped a knife against a wineglass. “My friends, please bring your glass with you and adjourn with me to my forecourt. I have more beauty to offer you.”
Stone gave He
lga his arm and followed duBois through some French doors and out of the house. On the way, he brushed past Rick LaRose. “See if you can find out why I’m at this party,” he whispered to the man.
Then there before him, gorgeously lit, Stone saw perhaps the most beautiful automobile he had ever seen. It was somewhat larger than a Porsche or Ferrari, but smaller than the usual sports sedan, like the Panamera or the Maserati. It was a gleaming black, and as Stone and Helga approached an open door, he looked inside and saw an interior of soft, glowing leather, so perfectly cut and stitched that it might have been the inside of an Hermès handbag. There was much oohing and aahing among the guests.
DuBois reached past them, flipped a lever, and pulled the front passenger seat forward. “Helga, I would be grateful if you would assist me in making a point. Please climb in.”
A footman took her port glass. Helga put a foot inside, turned, and was swallowed by the seat. DuBois allowed the front seat to slide back into place. “Are you quite comfortable?” he asked.
“Very comfortable,” she replied. “I even have plenty of legroom.”
“So you see, my friends, that the rear seat of the Blaise can accommodate even so statuesque a person as the lovely Helga. Stone, take the driver’s seat, please.”
Stone gave the footman his glass, walked around the car, and lowered himself into the bucket seat, even as duBois got in on the passenger side.
“Wait a moment,” duBois said. “The seat will accommodate itself to you.”
Stone felt the seat move in all sorts of ways for perhaps two seconds. He put his hands on the wheel. “Perfect,” he said.
“Press the start button, here,” duBois said, pointing. “The key is in my pocket.”
Stone pressed the button and the engine came alive; he had not even heard the starter button. The headlights came on, as well.
“Now,” duBois said, “drive to the end of my road and turn right.”
Stone did so.
“Now just follow your nose and drive,” duBois said. “At this time of night there will be little traffic.”
Stone goosed the accelerator, and the car pressed him into his seat as it leaped forward, making a noise like a distant Ferrari. Stone took a very sharp curve without touching the brakes, then gained more speed. For a moment he was at 180 kph, with effortless acceleration. “It’s so quiet and smooth,” he said.
“The windows and windscreen are double-glazed,” duBois replied, “and we have paid close attention to noise abatement. What you are experiencing is active noise cancellation, as if you were wearing a noise-canceling headset. Except the whole interior of the car is like a headset.” DuBois touched the instrument panel and symphonic music flooded the cabin. “The electronics also have the effect of enhancing the music.”
“I can hear nothing from outside the car,” Stone said, “except the muted sound of the engine.”
DuBois pressed another button on the dash, and suddenly the vehicle sounded like a race car, and there was road noise from the tires. “If you want the pleasure of hearing the car perform, there you are,” duBois said. He pressed the button again, and serenity was restored.
“What’s under the bonnet?” Stone asked.
“A twin-turbocharged V12-producing six hundred and fifty horsepower,” duBois said. “Top speed, two hundred ten miles per hour, zero to sixty in two-point-nine seconds.”
“I’ve never felt anything quite like this,” Stone said.
“Neither has anyone else. It has taken me six years to bring it from a clean sheet of paper to production.”
“What sort of price will you put on it?”
“In New York, with various taxes and dealer fees included, the MSRP would be about three hundred and fifty thousand,” duBois said. “However, if you would like one I will give it to you for, say, two hundred twenty-five thousand? I would like it to be seen being driven in New York.”
“And when would you be able to deliver one?”
“This is the first production model, which I have reserved for myself, so that I can test-drive it every day. We have thirty completed cars at the factory now, waiting to be shipped to various dealers in Europe and the States. One of them has your name on it, if you like. They are all metallic black and equipped exactly like this one. There are no options, so you have no other decisions to make.”
“I’ll send you a check tomorrow,” Stone said. “I have just enough room in my garage for it.”
“Turn right here, and we’ll go back to the house,” duBois said. “I have abandoned my guests, and I imagine some of them would like to have a turn in the car. Your car will be delivered to your home in a week or ten days,” he said to Stone. “The cars for the U.S. are being flown over.”
• • •
Stone pulled back into duBois’s driveway and stopped before the gathered guests. He got out and called to the crowd. “You won’t believe this!” he said to the group.
DuBois assisted Helga from the car, and Stone took her arm. His driver from earlier in the evening appeared.
“Mr. Barrington, I will drive you back to your hotel whenever you wish,” he said.
“Thank you. Helga, may I give you a lift?”
“Yes, thank you, but I’d like to visit the powder room first.”
“I’ll be waiting.” She went back into the house.
Rick LaRose approached. “I’ve brought your name up a few times, and all that I could learn is that duBois considers you a very special guest.”
“He just sold me one of his cars,” Stone said.
“Then you are a very special guest indeed,” Rick replied, “because he has declined even to take orders for the car before it reaches showrooms. Billionaires all over the world will be clamoring for it. Tell me, have you recollected anything of the past few days?”
“Not a thing,” Stone replied, “and I’m wondering what I could possibly have done for Marcel duBois to make him so grateful to me.”
7
Stone and Helga stepped into the Maybach, the doors were closed by footmen, and the car moved away, its only noise being the crunch of gravel under the tires.
“Where would you like to go?” Stone asked.
“The Plaza Athénée Hotel, please,” she replied. “I have an apartment there.”
“What a coincidence,” Stone said, wondering if it actually was.
“You are at the hotel, too?”
“I am.”
“How convenient,” she said, placing a hand on his thigh.
Stone could not but agree. “How long have you known Marcel?”
“Since my divorce—about two years.”
“Was this evening typical of his style of entertaining?”
“Except for the presence of the Blaise, yes, entirely typical. Marcel once told me that as a young man starting out, he always desired the best he could afford, and now that he can afford anything he likes, the results are remarkable. Can you afford whatever you like?”
Stone laughed. “Yes, but my desires are more achievable than Marcel’s.”
“That is probably wise. One should not try to compete with Marcel—not in any way.”
“That’s good advice.”
“I was astonished that Marcel offered you the car this evening, and flabbergasted that he gave you that price. That can only mean that he places a very high value on your acquaintance. Why is that, do you suppose?”
“Helga,” Stone said, “I have been trying to figure that out all evening. I don’t even know why I was at the dinner.”
She looked at him oddly. “Have you and Marcel known each other long?”
“For less than a week,” Stone replied.
“I am surprised that Marcel went out of his way to put us together,” she said. “He indicated to me that he had a very high opinion of you, and that impressed me.”
&nb
sp; The car came to a halt in front of their hotel.
“He has a high opinion of you, too,” Stone replied. “And if he wants so much for us to be together, it would be churlish of us to disappoint him.”
“Come with me,” Helga said, alighting from the car. She led him to an elevator he had not seen, one with only one button, which she pressed. The doors opened not into a hallway, but directly into a private vestibule, furnished with only an antique table and a very large floral display. She led him into a handsome drawing room, furnished with pieces clearly not from the hotel’s inventory, then into a bedroom, also beautifully decorated.
She stopped, turned to him, and touched her lips to his.
It was the first time, he reflected, that a woman had ever had to bend down to kiss him. As if reading his mind, she reached down and shed her shoes. That brought them exactly nose to nose. “There, is that better?” she asked.
“It’s perfect,” Stone said, kissing her again. She pushed his jacket off his shoulders; he caught it and tossed it onto a chair, then she pulled his bow tie loose and unbuttoned his collar.
“Do you think you can finish doing this while I step out for a moment?” she asked.
“I think I remember how,” Stone replied, working on his buttons. He watched her walk from the room, reaching behind her for a zipper, while he draped his dinner suit carefully over the chair and stood, waiting for her.
The lights dimmed, but not too much, and she came back into the room naked. Nothing like her since Anita Ekberg, Stone thought. They kissed again, and while he rubbed her nipples with the backs of his fingers, she reached down and took him in her hand.
“Ah, so you are glad to see me?” she said.
“It would appear so,” he replied.
They fell into bed, and the next hour would count among Stone’s fondest memories. Whatever two people could do, they did, holding nothing back.
• • •
Stone awoke alone in bed, completely disoriented. Not until she came into the room did it flood back. She was wearing a beautiful dressing gown, and she tossed a terry robe onto the bed for him. “Let’s not shock the room service waiter,” she said, leaning over and kissing him. “He’ll be here in a moment.”