by Mj Roë
“Ah bon! Bonne nuit, alors.” There was silence.
“She’s very old and a bit sénile,” Diamanté said, tapping his temple with his index finger. “Every time she hears a noise in the middle of the night she thinks I am shooting ‘the critters,’ as she calls them. She won’t remember anything in the morning.” Then he turned to Elise. “You had best pack. I’ll take care of the body.” He looked sadly at his loyal mutt and corrected himself. “Bodies. We’ll leave at dawn and take Anna to Nice Airport, then we’ll head to Corsica.”
Elise nodded and went back into the kitchen. They could hear her slowly climbing the stairway.
When Elise was out of earshot, Diamanté said to Anna, “My half brother had a longstanding vendetta with me. That is where it started. You know that letter you told me about? The one Charlie wrote to you and I insisted you burn?” Anna nodded. “Well, other than Charlie and myself, the only person who knew the truth was André. An unlikely combination of events had put us all together in that strange situation. Charlie knew that he was being followed. I suspected André, but I couldn’t prove it. And furthermore, I couldn’t catch him, though I tried. Sometimes I even followed Charlie myself at a distance.”
“What about that night in the street outside the apartment in Paris? C-C was so afraid. It’s what drove him to leave.”
“I know. I departed on the same train. We arrived here together. André followed us. I’m amazed he didn’t try to get rid of us then. I asked him that tonight. He said…” Diamanté’s voice broke.
“I heard what he said to you. About the wedding gift for Elise. What a cruel man.”
“Anna, I do not believe that you are in any danger. Even André Narbon didn’t know of your existence.”
“But he was watching me tonight…when I was burning C-C’s letters.”
“Did you say anything aloud?”
“I don’t think so. I don’t know.”
Diamanté was considering what she had just said when he saw the dog move ever so slightly. He bent down on one knee and put his ear close to Max’s nostrils. “I think this old fellow isn’t done with this world quite yet,” he said as he picked up the limp-limbed canine. “I know someone who might be able to help nurse him back to health.” He turned to Anna and saw the tears in her eyes. “Try now to get some sleep, my dear. I’ve work to do before daylight.”
CHAPTER 70
The next morning, the sky was azure blue, and a few fluffy, white clouds danced merrily in a soft breeze. An emotionally and physically exhausted Diamanté was just putting the last piece of luggage into the trunk of the car when he was startled by a loud vibrating noise.
From behind the convent, a yellow helicopter rose like a dragonfly, rotors gleaming in the sunlight. In a moment it was circling low over the village square, looking for something.
Diamanté watched with keen, black eyes as it hovered above the Ajaccio for a moment, kicking up dust and scattering the outdoor furniture. He put two fingers to his forehead in salute. The pilot returned his salute, and then the dragonfly pulled up and was gone.
The monastery’s bells rang for the first time in months.
Diamanté glanced at Anna in the back seat as she stared after the disappearing helicopter. He smiled and whispered to himself, “They are safe.”
CHAPTER 71
As they drove out of Castagniers, Anna, exhausted and numb, stared at the back of Diamanté’s beret from the car’s backseat. She hesitated, then decided to ask a question she had been brooding over throughout the sleepless night. Clearing her throat, she began, “I am curious about your half brother. You said last night that he was a killer. How did he get to be that way?”
Diamanté gazed straight ahead in silence. It seemed to Anna that he was agonizing over the answer. She immediately regretted having asked him.
In the front passenger seat, Elise was watching her new husband. “She should know the truth, Lobo,” she said finally, putting her hand on his right arm. “Enfin, after all, she is your only blood relative now, your only legacy.”
Diamanté gently took her hand. It would be ten more long minutes before he spoke.
Finally he said, “Have you ever heard of a game, a child’s game, called “The Seven Turns,” Anna?”
“No.”
“It’s a game we played in Corsica, my brothers Ferdinand, André, and I. One player, the one who is it, gives a map to the others, a map with seven turns. It is always circular in nature, and at the seventh turn, often very near the starting point, there is a prize. The game’s name comes from an old expression: ‘the snail’s shell has seven turns.’”
Anna bit her lip. “Actually, I’ve heard that expression before, in a different context. A waiter in a Paris café once drew a map of the arrondissements for me. It looked like a snail’s shell. He called it ‘The Seven Turns of the Snail’s Shell.’ I just thought it was a clever way of remembering the numbering scheme of the arrondissements because I never could figure out where there were seven turns on that map.”
“It’s not that there are always exactly seven turns, Anna. It can be seven twists, or seven circles, or seven changes of direction or, as in the case of Paris, it could even be seven roundabouts or squares. The important thing is to reach the prize or discovery.”
“Oddly, I told that waiter that I was looking for someone. C-C, actually.” Anna paused as a feeling of overwhelming emptiness temporarily overtook her. Elise looked back at her sympathetically. “Do you think that the waiter could have been Corsican then?”
“Quite possible. There are thousands of Corsicans who live and work in Paris.”
“At least he seemed to be aware of the expression, but why would he have warned me? He said something to the effect that I would find what I am searching for, but to be forewarned that it may not be what I hope for.”
“It is because it can be a very macabre game. Between my brothers and me, it was to see who could surprise or, in André’s case, horrify, the finder of the prize. I dreaded playing when André won the opportunity to draw the map, because every so often I knew that he would kill or maim something. You asked how he became a killer. I think the instinct came to him early. Once Ferdinand and I found a dead rabbit; another time a strangled baby bird; yet another time a puppy with a broken leg, which Ferdinand and I nursed back to health. When I found our beloved family cat, skinned, at the end of one game, I ran to our mother, but André lied and told her that I was the one who had killed the cat. We were only about seven or eight years old.
“He was evil from as far back as I can remember, my half brother André. He and I were not quite a year apart in age—eleven months, to be exact. Ferdinand was the eldest by two years. Our father, Jean-Pierre Dante Loupré, was killed by robbers in the interior while on his way home to Castagglione from Ajaccio. That was just before I was born. Our mother was young, beautiful, and unable to support herself and two young children. There was a wealthy landowner by the name of Narbon who had taken a fancy to her before my father won her away. She didn’t love him, but she had no recourse. She married him two months after my birth, and André was born nine months later.
“André Narbon and I grew up hating each other. He was the rich one, athletic, wiry, and quick, always plotting. He beat me up a few times, but I became tough and learned to fight him back. His father, old Narbon, sent him away to a fancy prep school in France when he was thirteen. He learned languages, was well educated, and had money. Ferdinand and I, on the other hand, were very poor, uneducated, and extremely unhappy. No one, except for our mother, cared what happened to us, but she was helpless. Her husband abused her.”
Diamanté looked over at Elise. “Ferdinand left home first. Ambitious, he was a hero to me, and I loved him. I couldn’t stand it after he left. When I was fifteen, I too decided to leave Castagglione for good. I kissed my mother good-bye and took the ferry to Marseilles, where I lied about my age and got a job working at a metallurgical plant. It was hard work, and the workers were brut
al. I became hardened during those years. Then the war broke out. I was only eighteen.”
Diamanté fell silent, remembering.
Anna said, “Guy told me about your being captured and tortured during the war.”
“Yes, well, I was glad when those terrible years were over.” He smiled gently toward Elise. “The only good thing was that I met Elise during the war years.” He looked at Anna in the rearview mirror and added, “And good friends like Stu Ellis. Did Guy tell you the story of how I added Tigre to my name, Anna?”
She shook her head.
“A close friend of mine from Marseilles joined the army and was killed in the early combat. He called himself Le Tigre. I took his name as my nom de guerre. I became Loupré-Tigre.
“It was during the war that André and I saw each other again. By then he was wearing those thick, square, dark-rimmed glasses because his eyesight had been partially destroyed from a grenade attack. We were both members of the maquis. He was the one who did the killing. He enjoyed it; he even laughed as he blew the enemy’s brains out. There was no remorse, no feelings, in André. He was just as he had been when we were children and he had skinned our cat. I hated him. Then he wanted Elise.” Diamanté looked at his wife tenderly. “You see, Anna, André became interested in Elise when he learned that I was in love with her.” He reached over and pulled Elise’s hand to his lips. She smiled and wrinkled her nose. “He and I fought bitterly, as we did about everything, but in the end she chose Ferdinand.”
“What happened to Ferdinand?”
Elise answered Anna’s question. “Ferdinand was a hero,” she said simply. “He died saving many lives, including that of my Lobo.”
Diamanté continued, “After Ferdinand was killed, I didn’t see André again for a long time, but I knew what he was up to. You see, after the war ended, I was recruited by Interpol to keep an eye on him.”
Anna gasped. “You mean spy?”
He nodded. “During the years following the war, there were many assassinations in Europe—collaborators, in particular, and political figures who had carried out Nazi orders. The violence was incredible. In Corsica, there was an upsurge in vendetta-style feuds. And André was in the middle of it all, but we could never pin anything directly on him. Until recently…”
Diamanté stopped speaking and slowed the car. They had reached the point along the route where C-C had driven off the cliff.
A great sob rose in Anna’s chest. She willed it away and closed her eyes. The area, once so breathtakingly beautiful, was now too achingly painful to look at.
When they had passed the site, Diamanté went on, “In February of this year, I knew for certain that André was a terrorist and an assassin. I was working with the British on another secret project when Interpol alerted me that the prefect and de facto governor of Corsica had been shot dead on the streets of Ajaccio. I had last seen André in December when he passed through here at the same time Charlie arrived. I learned he went to Ajaccio after that and was involved with a terrorist group, the very one suspected of killing the prefect. No one took responsibility, but I knew it was André who had done it. Interpol has had him on its ‘Red Notice’ wanted list for months. He as much as admitted to the deed last night, boasted about it even.”
Diamanté was driving very fast now.
Elise cried out, “Please, Lobo. These are dangerous curves.”
“Pardon, ma chère. Corsican drivers,” he reminded her as he slowed the car a bit, “tend to treat all roads as if they were a Le Mans qualifying event.”
A sudden thought occurred to Anna. She asked, “Do you think your half brother was involved somehow in the Princess Diana accident?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “André appeared in Rouen within hours of the accident in Paris. It did seem suspicious to me at the time. When we arrived in Le Havre, the Brits recognized him. The only way for me to keep my cover was to flee with him.”
“That’s when I saw you.”
“And I you. André got away from me, but I knew he would surface, and he did, once Charlie was back. I did my best to protect Charlie—but in the end, he screwed up.”
“Do you think he really fell asleep at the wheel?”
“André was tailing him, but he said last night that he didn’t force him off the road. His exact words were: ‘It wasn’t the seventh turn.’”
“What was the seventh turn, then?”
Diamanté considered his answer for a moment. “André had likely contracted for an assassination job in August, but the target had switched places at the last moment. Somehow, I don’t know from what source, he learned I was the one who had been contacted. He knew to head to Rouen because I would most certainly involve Les Amis. Jacques said André just appeared out of the blue that morning in the wine cellar of the café. It was perfect, you see, from André’s standpoint. I was in the way. André had his opportunity to do what he had always intended to do—get rid of me, and get even with Elise for rejecting him. The game was over, and I was to be the surprise, the dead surprise.”
Diamanté pulled up to the arrivals gate at Nice Airport. He helped Anna out of the car and pressed his son’s Algerian War journal into her hands.
“Your father would want you to have this,” he said. “When we see you again, Anna, I will tell you some stories about him. You must come visit us. Corsica is a most beautiful island, amazingly varied and constantly surprising.”
“I promise to do that. Take care of yourselves,” Anna said tearfully as she embraced her grandfather. They held each other tightly for a long while. In time, Anna stepped away and walked to the terminal. Before entering, she looked back. Diamanté held a handkerchief to his eyes. Elise waved. Anna turned and entered the building.
CHAPTER 72
Monique was waiting for Anna when she walked through the airy, open doors of the terminal. The two women embraced. “I’m so glad you were able to meet me here, Monique,” Anna said, her eyes still moist. Then, with a halfhearted smile, she handed her friend the wrapped pitcher and said, “This is for you…from a potter with an attitude in Castagniers.”
Monique looked worried for her friend. “I think you should have come to Grasse for at least a couple of days. It would have been good for you after all you’ve been through.”
“Oh,” Anna sighed, “I’ll see the bastide some other trip. I just want to get home.”
“I couldn’t believe that C-C died like that. I’m so sorry, chérie. How horrible it must have been for you.”
Anna’s eyes watered. “He’s gone, Monique. I’ll never forget him. He’ll always have a place in my heart.” With the heel of her hand, she quickly wiped a tear from spilling down her cheek.
They took a seat in the waiting area.
“What would you have decided had C-C lived? Would you have stayed in France?”
“That’s a difficult question. I was definitely having my doubts about the future, and I was claustrophobic in that little village, pretty as it is, even though I had only been there a few days. I don’t know whether I could have stayed permanently. And I’m certain he would never have left France to live with me in Los Angeles.” She paused as loudspeakers announced the departure of an Air Inter flight.
“A man who loves a woman would go anywhere she wanted, it seems to me, chérie. If he loved you…”
“Diamanté and Elise believe that he loved me,” Anna said, thinking about the huge personal dilemma leaving Castagniers would have caused C-C. “I don’t know…will never know for certain what C-C had in mind on the day he died. In reality, he might never have been able to fit into my world, and there was a strong possibility that I could never have fit into his. Maybe that’s the conclusion he had come to.”
“And so…what were you, are you, going to do about Mark?”
Anna frowned. “Mark has been pretty clear about his intentions.”
“He somehow got Georges’ cell phone number and left an urgent message wanting to know how to reach you.”
“He did?”
“Georges didn’t return the call, not knowing what to tell him. So we decided to wait until I talked to you.”
“I’ll call him.”
Before she boarded her flight, Anna called Mark’s office, knowing that it was too early for him or Jacks to be there.
“Hi, Mark,” she hesitated. “Anna. I’m arriving early afternoon at Tom Bradley: Air France Flight 62 from Paris. I know it’s a few days earlier than I originally anticipated. Don’t worry about picking me up. I’ll catch a shuttle. See you soon. Bye.” She paused and then finally hung up. What she wanted to say to him she couldn’t put in a voice message.
CHAPTER 73
The gleaming, white Air France 747 made its approach into Los Angeles International Airport. Anna, gazing through the small window, caught a glimpse of the white block letters of the famed Hollywood sign streaming past the window. She was almost home. It had been only a week since she had arrived in Castagniers. Only a week since her reunion with C-C. Five days since Diamanté’s wedding. Three days since C-C’s death. A fresh wave of sorrow washed over her. It seemed a lifetime had passed in those few days.
As the plane touched down and taxied to the gate, the passengers were given the usual instructions in French and English about passing through U.S. Customs. Anna gathered her things, exited the plane, and followed the swarm of new arrivals through the long corridor that led to the baggage claim. She had been through customs many times. The agents routinely waved her through. This time, it was no different. She slowly pushed her baggage cart up the ramp to the passenger welcoming area where a small crowd watched eagerly for familiar faces among the arriving passengers. She stopped, glanced halfheartedly through the throng. No Mark.
“Oh, well,” she mumbled aloud as she focused her eyes on the soiled carpeting at her feet. “He’s probably not certain how I’d treat him either. Can’t blame him.” Turning on her cell phone, she pushed her way through the mass of bodies to the main lobby, noticing as she did the newspapers in the vending machines. Diana’s picture was on the front page of all of them. The headlines were mostly a version of the same wording: “A Year Later, Mystery Still Surrounds the Tragic Death of Princess Diana.” She bought one copy of each, placed them in the outer pocket of her carry-on, and headed for the doors. A warm breeze brushed her cheeks as she stepped out onto the sidewalk in front of the terminal. Just then, her cell phone rang. The display showed Mark’s number.