Daniel Silva - The English Girl

“The tidal creek just west of Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer. There’s a small marina. I’ve used it before. It’s an excellent spot. Paul had obviously done his homework.”

Another glance at Keller. Another nod.

“Did you go straight across?”

“No,” Lacroix answered. “That would have brought us ashore in broad daylight. We spent the entire day at sea. Then we went in around eleven that night.”

“Paul kept the girl in the salon the entire time?”

“He took her to the head once, but otherwise …”

“Otherwise what?”

“She got the needle.”

“Ketamine?”

“I’m not a doctor.”

“Really.”

“You asked me a question, I gave you an answer.”

“Did he take her ashore in the dinghy?”

“No. I went straight into the marina. It’s the kind of place where you can park a car right next to your slip. Paul had one waiting. A black Mercedes.”

“What kind of Mercedes?”

“E-Class.”

“Registration?”

“French.”

“Unoccupied?”

“No. There were two men. One was leaning against the hood as we came in. The other one was behind the wheel.”

“Did you know the one leaning against the hood?”

“I’d never seen him before.”

“But that wasn’t true of the one behind the wheel, was it, Marcel?”

“No,” Lacroix answered. “The one behind the wheel was René Brossard.”

René Brossard was a foot soldier in an up-and-coming Marseilles crime family with international connections. He specialized in muscle work—debt collection, enforcement, security. In his spare time, he worked as a bouncer in a nightclub near the Old Port, mainly because he liked the girls who came there. Lacroix knew him from the neighborhood. He also knew his phone number.

“When did you call him?” asked Gabriel.

“A few days after I read the first story in the newspaper about the English girl who vanished while on holiday in Corsica. I put two and two together and realized she was the girl I’d dropped at the marina in Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer.”

“You’re something of a math genius?”

“I can add,” Lacroix quipped.

“You realized that Paul stood to get a lot of ransom money from someone, and you wanted a piece of the action.”

“He misled me about the kind of job it was,” said Lacroix. “I would have never agreed to take part in a high-profile kidnapping for a mere fifty thousand.”

“How much were you after?”

“I try not to make a habit of negotiating with myself.”

“Wise man,” said Gabriel. Then he asked Lacroix how long Brossard waited to return his call.

“Two days.”

“How much detail did you go into on the phone?”

“Enough to make it clear what I was after. Brossard called me back a few hours later and told me to come to Bar du Haut the next afternoon at four.”

“That was a very foolish thing to do, Marcel.”

“Why?”

“Because Paul might have been there instead of Brossard. And he might have put a bullet between your eyes for having the temerity to ask for more money.”

“I can look after myself.”

“If that were true,” said Gabriel, “you wouldn’t be taped to a chair on your own boat. But you were telling me about your conversation with René Brossard.”

“He told me Paul wanted to be reasonable. After that, we entered into a period of negotiations.”

“Negotiations?”

“Over the price of my settlement. Paul made an offer, I made a counteroffer. We went back and forth several times.”

“All by phone?”

Lacroix nodded.

“What’s Brossard’s role in the operation?”

“He’s staying in the house where they’re keeping the girl.”

“Is Paul there with him?”

“I never asked.”

“How many others are there?”

“I don’t know. All I know is that another woman is also staying there so they look like a family.”

“Has Brossard ever mentioned the English girl?”

“He said she’s alive.”

“That’s all?”

“That’s all.”

“What’s the current state of your negotiations with Paul and Brossard?”

“We reached an agreement this morning.”

“How much were you able to chisel out of them?”

“Another hundred thousand.”

“When are you supposed to take delivery of the money?”

“Tomorrow afternoon.”

“Where?”

“Aix.”

“Where in Aix?”

“A café near the Place du General de Gaulle.”

“What’s the place called?”

“Le Provence—what else?”

“How’s it supposed to go down?”

“Brossard is supposed to arrive first, at ten minutes past five. I’m supposed to join him at twenty past.”

“Where will he be sitting?”

“At a table outside.”

“And the money?”

“Brossard told me it would be in a metal attaché case.”

“How inconspicuous.”

“It was his choice, not mine.”

“Is there a fallback if either one of you fails to show?”

“Le Cézanne, just up the street.”

“How long will he wait there?”

“Ten minutes.”

“And if you don’t show?”

“The deal’s off.”

“Were there any other instructions?”

“No more phone calls,” said Lacroix. “Paul’s getting nervous about all the phone calls.”

“I’m sure he is.”

Gabriel looked up toward the flying bridge, but this time Keller was standing stock-still, a black figure against a black sky, a gun balanced in outstretched hands. The single shot, muted by a suppressor, opened a hole above Lacroix’s left eye. Gabriel held the Frenchman’s shoulders as he died. Then he spun around in a rage and leveled his own weapon at Keller.

“You’d better put that away before someone gets hurt,” the Englishman said calmly.

“Why the hell did you do that?”

“He got on my bad side. Besides,” Keller added as he slipped his gun into the waistband of his trousers, “we didn’t need him anymore.”

THEY SENT HIM to the bottom in the deep waters beyond the Golfe du Lion and then made for Marseilles. It was still dark when they drew into the Old Port; they slipped from Moondance a few minutes apart, climbed into their separate cars, and set out along the coast toward Toulon. Just before the town of Bandol, Gabriel pulled to the side of the road and loosened several engine cables. Then he telephoned the rental company and in the hysterical voice of Herr Klemp left a message saying where the “broken” car could be found. After wiping his fingerprints from the steering wheel and dashboard panel, he climbed into Keller’s Renault and together they drove eastward into the rising sun to Nice. On the rue Verdi was an old apartment building, white as bone, where the Office kept one of its many French safe flats. Gabriel entered the building alone and remained inside long enough to retrieve the post, which included the copy of Madeline Hart’s Party personnel file he had requested from Graham Seymour. He read it as Keller drove toward Aix along the A8 Autoroute.

“What does it say?” the Englishman asked after several minutes of silence.

“It says that Madeline Hart is perfect. But then we already knew that.”

“I was perfect once, too. And look how I turned out.”

“You were always a reprobate, Keller. You just didn’t realize it until that night in Iraq.”

“I lost eight of my comrades trying to protect your country from Saddam’s Scuds,” Keller said.

“And we are forever in your debt.”