Greg Iles - Dead Sleep

“I’m not sure I understand the question.”

“Morally, I mean. How do you feel about the fact that young women may be dying to produce these paintings?”

De Becque gives Kaiser a look of distaste. “Is that a serious question, mon ami?”

“Yes.”

“Such an American question. You fought in a war that cost fifty-eight thousand of your countrymen’s lives. A million Asian lives beyond that. What did those deaths buy, other than misery?”

“That’s a separate discussion.”

“You’re wrong. If nineteen women die to produce eternal art, then in the historical sense, the price was cheap. Laughable, really.”

“Unless you loved one of those women,” I say quietly.

“Quite so,” concedes de Becque. “That’s another matter entirely. I merely point out to Monsieur Kaiser that many human endeavors are begun with the knowledge that they will cost human lives. Bridges, tunnels, pharmaceutical trials, geographic exploration, and of course wars. None of these goals even approaches the importance of art.”

Kaiser’s face is reddening. “If you knew for a fact that women were being murdered to produce these paintings, and you knew the identity of the murderer, would you report him to the authorities?”

“Happily, I do not find myself in that dilemma.”

Kaiser sighs and puts down his wine. “Why wouldn’t you send your paintings to Washington for study?”

“I am a fugitive. I don’t trust governments, particularly the American government. I had many dealings with it in Indochina, and I was always disappointed. I found American officials naive, sentimental, hypocritical, and stupid.”

“That’s something, coming from a black marketeer.”

De Becque laughs. “You hate me, young soldier? For the black market? You might as well hate rainfall or cockroaches.”

“I’m no fan of the French, that’s for sure. I saw what you did in Vietnam. You were a lot worse there than we ever were.”

“We were brutal, yes, but on a small scale. The American infantry handed out chocolate bars while their air force killed civilians by the tens of thousands.”

“You were glad enough when we did it in Germany.”

“This isn’t getting us anywhere,” I cut in, giving Kaiser a sharp look. After years of traveling the world, I’ve learned to avoid conversations like this one. Most Europeans will never understand the American point of view, and even when they do, they’ll loudly condemn it. At the bottom of their fervor, I believe, lies jealousy, but there’s nothing to be gained by arguing with them. I would have thought Kaiser knew that.

“You’ve seen me in the flesh now,” I tell de Becque. “What do you think?”

His blue eyes twinkle like Maurice Chevalier’s. “I would love to see you au naturel, cherie. You’re a work of art.”

“Would naked be enough? Or would naked and dead be better?”

“Don’t be ridiculous. I am a libertine. I celebrate life. But” – he holds up his glass in a silent toast – “death is always with us.”

“Did you commission the painting of my sister?”

His humor vanishes. “No.”

“Did you try to buy it?”

“I never had the chance. I never saw it.”

“Would you have known who she was?”

“I would have thought she was you.”

Kaiser says, “When did you first become aware of Ms. Glass’s existence?”

“When I saw her name beneath a photo in the International Herald Tribune. The early 1980s, it would have been.” De Becque chuckles. “I nearly jumped out of my skin. The credit read ‘J. Glass,’ same as her father’s.”

“I did that as an homage to him.”

“And a fine one it was. But a bit of a shock to those who knew him.”

“That happened to a lot of people. After a few years, I started using my full name.” Unable to focus on the task at hand, I steel myself and ask de Becque the question foremost in my mind. “What kind of man was my father?”

“In the beginning? A wide-eyed American, like a thousand others. But he had eyes to see. You only had to tell him a thing once. He had tasted little of Asia, but he was open to it all. And the Vietnamese loved him.”

“I presume that included women.”

Another Gallic gesture, this one I translate as Men will be men.

“Was there one woman in particular?”

“Isn’t there always? But in Jon’s case, I don’t really know.”

“Don’t you? Did he have a family over there, Monsieur de Becque? A Vietnamese family?”

“How would you feel if he did?”

“I’m not sure. I just want to know the truth.”

“You saw Li?”

“Yes.”

“She’s French-Vietnamese. They’re the most beautiful women in the world.”

“Did my father have a woman like her?”

“He was certainly exposed to them.”

“At your plantation?”

“Of course.”

De Becque is a man who speaks between the lines. I’m normally good at reading such men, but in this case I’m lost. If my father had a Vietnamese family there, why not tell me outright?

“Have you considered this?” asks de Becque. “The year your father disappeared, Look and Life folded.”

“And?”

“They were the great picture magazines. That was the end of an era. Jonathan never had to live through shrinking markets, the dominance of television, the humiliating transformation of the industry in which he made his name.”

“Are you saying he had nothing to come back to?”

“I merely point out that, professionally speaking, the best years of photojournalism were in the past. Jon had won all the awards there were to win. He had experienced life on the razor’s edge, with a rebel band of brothers. They photographed the horrors of the century, then moved on to the next before the last could crush their spirits. They were glorious in their way. They owned nothing, yet they owned the world. They were a cross between young Hemingways and rock-and-roll stars.”

“But their day was over. That’s what you’re telling me?”

“The world changed after Vietnam. America changed. France, too.”

Kaiser puts down his wine and says, “I’d like to return to Ms. Glass’s sister.”

“I would, as well,” says de Becque, his eyes on me. “What exactly do you hope to gain by being part of this investigation, Jordan? Do you have some fantasy of justice?”

“I don’t think justice is a fantasy.”

“What would justice be in this case? To punish the man who has painted these women? The man who stole them from their homes to immortalize them?”

“Is he one and the same?” I ask. “Is the kidnapper the painter?”

“I have no idea. But is that your desire, to punish him?”

“I’d rather stop him than punish him.”

De Becque nods thoughtfully. “And your sister? What are your hopes along that line?”

“I’m not sure.”

“Do you think she might be alive somewhere?”

“I didn’t until I saw her painting in Hong Kong. Now… I’m not sure.”

When de Becque makes no comment, I ask, “Do you think the women are alive or dead?”

The Frenchman sighs. “Dead, I would say.”

For some reason, his opinion depresses me far more than that of someone like Lenz.

“But,” he adds, “I would not assume all these women share the same fate.”

“Why not?” asks Kaiser.

“Things happen. No plan is perfect. I wouldn’t think it absurd to hope one or more out of nineteen is alive somewhere.”

“Is it nineteen women?” Kaiser asks. “We’ve been trying to match the paintings to the victims, but we’re having trouble. There are only eleven victims in New Orleans. If each painting is of a different woman, then there are eight victims we don’t know about.”