by Daniel Kalla
“I don’t think…I cannot…” Avril choked and gurgled.
“Maman, it’s our best hope,” Frédéric encouraged her, bloody spittle flying from his freshly lacerated lips.
“We’ll carry you,” Noah said.
Noah glanced urgently in all directions, hoping to spot a sign of where Duncan and Elise had run, but saw nothing. Deeper in the woods, the last glow of the house lights faded and they now moved through the trees in near darkness. Branches scratched at their faces. The snow-covered ground was scattered with unexpected dips, and taller bushes poked through the snow. Noah stumbled as often as Frédéric did, but the counterbalance of propping up Avril kept them on their feet.
Noah was adjusting to the darkness. He grew more sure-footed with each step, though his sense of orientation was rapidly fading in the abyss of the lightless forest. He hesitated a moment, and then turned to his left. “This way,” he whispered.
“You sure?” Frédéric asked.
“Yes.” But Noah was moving purely on instinct now.
They took four or five steps and then stumbled into a thicket of hip-high shrubs. Shuffling carefully, they had barely cleared the bushes when a flashlight’s beam cut across the trees a few feet in front of them.
They stopped dead. “Down!” Noah growled.
As soon as they released their grip, Avril collapsed to the ground. Frédéric and Noah dove down beside her. The beam swung directly over their heads again, focusing on the area around them. “The bushes!” Noah whispered.
His bare hands breaking through the crisp snow, Noah crawled on his stomach back toward the shrubs. He stopped every couple of feet to help Frédéric pull his mother along. She was wheezing audibly when they reached the thicket. “In here,” Noah said.
With shallow and rattling respirations, Avril became a deadweight as Noah and Frédéric dragged her deeper into the bushes. Behind the tallest of the shrubs, Noah flopped back down with his chest to the ground just as the flashlight’s beam swept above them.
Cheek to the ground, he did not breathe until the shaft of light moved on. He knew that between their snowy footprints and Avril’s noisy breathing, the bushes would provide only temporary cover at best. “One of us has to get to the road,” he whispered to Frédéric.
“I’ll stay with Maman,” he said.
“She will die without medical help,” Noah said bluntly. “You’re faster. My French is terrible. It has to be you.”
“Go…Freddie,” Avril gasped.
Frédéric wavered a moment and then said, “How?”
“I will draw them away, toward the lake.” Noah pointed to the ground ahead of them, hoping his orientation was right. “You run for the road.”
“All right.”
Noah felt Frédéric’s hand groping for his. Then Noah touched the cold handle of the switchblade that Frédéric had passed him. He wrapped his hand tightly around it.
Noah looked up. The light was moving closer, though the beam was directed up and toward the road. “Wait until she comes after me,” he said to Frédéric. “Then run.”
Noah took a deep breath. He rose to a crouch, counted to three, and took off with hands out in front of him, feeling for obstacles and deliberately snapping tree branches to draw attention. The beam cut across him twice before finding him. Noah could suddenly see his way lit in front of him, but that brought no comfort. He was lethally exposed now.
Two gunshots rang in his ears. He dodged to his left and right, slipping on the snow, as he ran for the nearest cluster of trees. Three more shots erupted. Louder this time. Noah felt a sting at his neck. An anxious moment passed before he realized the scratch came from a tree branch, not a bullet.
Noah tripped over a hole and fell to the ground, landing painfully on his right wrist. He scrambled on hands and knees toward the big pine tree in front of him. He found the trunk of the tree with his hand and scurried around behind it. He hopped to his feet. The pine tree was only wide enough for him to tuck completely behind in profile, so he turned to his right and leaned sideways into its base.
His hollow eardrum continued to whistle like a kettle. He pressed up so hard against the tree that the bark dug into his skin.
The light grew brighter as it swung back and forth across the tree, alternately illuminating the bushes and trees on either side of him. The pursuer was moving more slowly now. The beam dropped closer to the ground, and Noah assumed that the person was following his snowy footprints.
The shuffling feet grew louder and the noise was joined by the faint sounds of someone else’s respiration. Noah held his own breath and clutched the knife tightly to his chest. The snow crunched louder. Noah had no idea on which side of the tree she would appear, but he dared not move a muscle.
The light stopped swinging. From the sound of her steady breathing, Noah guessed she was no more than five feet from him.
A moment passed, then a footstep through the snow. Noah tightened. He waited but saw nothing.
Too long!
Sensing a presence behind him, he pivoted a half turn and saw a shadowy arm rising. Noah lunged without hesitation, catching her arm just before it leveled. He knocked the gun free of her hand. Before he could move again, he felt a crushing pain in his scalp as the flashlight smashed down on his head like a club. Stunned, he fell to the ground and lost his grip on the knife. It disappeared into the snow by the base of the tree.
Blows from the heavy flashlight rained down on him. He raised his arms to protect his head and face. The flashlight cracked across his left forearm. Searing pain jolted through his entire limb. Groaning, he dropped to his hands and rolled away from the beating.
Something hard pressed into his left shoulder. My knife! He frantically dug it out from underneath him.
Beside him, the flashlight dropped nose down into the snow. In its faint illumination, Noah recognized the Dutch woman’s contorted face and saw her hand pull the gun out of the snow.
She swept the weapon toward him.
Numb to the pain, he launched himself up and toward her with his left hand while he drove his right arm forward as hard as he could. The knife struck DeGroot in the lower abdomen. The blade tore through her belly, buried up to the handle.
DeGroot shrieked in surprise. Shocked, Noah released the knife. DeGroot stumbled back and, for a moment, stood motionless like one of the neighboring trees. Then she crumpled to the ground beside him.
Before Noah could digest any of it, a beam of light from the opposite direction locked onto him.
“Martine, no!”
Three shots followed Sylvie’s shrill cry. Snow flew from nearby branches and sprayed around Noah’s head. He tried to scramble for the protection of another tree but, thrown off balance, his feet slithered and he fell backward awkwardly, landing on his seat.
Helpless and exposed, a sudden calm sense of finality overwhelmed him. He remembered holding the newborn Chloe in his arms. He had a vision of a sandy white beach in Mexico. Gwen’s laughter rang in his ears. He braced himself for death.
At that moment, the second flashlight’s beam fell away and he heard a dull thud.
Everything went dark and still. All Noah heard was the whistling in his ear. He wondered if he had lost consciousness. Then a voice called to him. “Noah? Are you all right?”
Elise?
Noah groped with his good hand for the upturned flashlight. As soon as his fingers found it, he swung its beam in the direction of her voice.
A few feet away, Elise was gaping at him. To her right, Duncan brandished a thick tree branch in his hand as if holding a bat. He stared down at the ground where Sylvie Manet lay at his feet. She clutched her head and rolled from side to side.
55
Lac Noir, France. January 21
Of all the crime scenes Avril had attended, she had never before heard so many sirens or seen so many flashing lights. Lying on the stretcher, she noticed that all the lights were encircled with a bluish or red halo. Despite her blankets, she shook i
nvoluntarily, and her back was drenched with the stickiness of her own blood. Someone had told her that the posterior chest wound had stopped bleeding. With the oxygen mask on, she breathed slightly easier. The medication that ran through the two intravenous lines into her arm was helping, too. She was uncertain whether it was her critical injury, the painkillers, or her immense relief at knowing that Frédéric was safe, but for the first time in what felt like years, she craved sleep.
Her eyes drifted shut, but someone shook her left arm urgently. She opened the lids a crack to see her son hovering beside her.
“Maman, are you all right?” he asked.
She mustered a smile. “Just tired…so tired.” She looked at his swirling face. Fresh blood still dripped from his nose and oozed from his lips. “Your face…” She tried to extend a hand to him but was too weak to overcome the tug of the intravenous line.
“It’s nothing.” He grinned, and she could have been looking at Antoine. “It will get me plenty of sympathy from the girls at school.”
“Go easy on them,” Avril murmured.
On her right, the female paramedic inflated the blood pressure cuff. “Mme. Avars, how is your breathing?” she asked.
“Fine,” Avril said, though she was still hungry for air.
Two paramedics continued to swarm around the stretcher in a flurry of activity, checking lines, listening to her chest, and tightening and clicking straps and belts into place. Over Frédéric’s shoulder, Avril spotted Duncan, Noah, and Elise as they viewed the proceedings with concern. She saw the bandages on Noah’s arm. “Are you hurt?” she asked.
“I’m fine,” Noah said with a grin. “Beaten with a flashlight. Doesn’t exactly compare to being shot in the chest.”
“I win,” Avril mumbled groggily.
“If this is your idea of winning, then we best check you for mad cow disease,” Duncan said.
“I did win, Dr. McLeod.” Avril squeezed her son’s arm. She turned back to Noah. “What of the Lake?”
Noah smiled. “We have sounded the alarm.”
“We’re not going to let a single bottle make it to market,” Elise emphasized.
“Good.” Avril eyed Noah. “And Simon?”
The doctor shook his head.
Avril felt a pang of sorrow, though in her heart she knew it was for the best: Valmont would never have tolerated the public shame of the aftermath and trial. In Avril’s eyes, he died reclaiming his honor. She would mourn her friend. “And the two women?” Avril asked.
“Martine DeGroot is dead,” Elise said.
“And as soon as they sew up the gash in her head, Sylvie Manet will be heading off with your colleagues,” Noah said.
“They were blinded by greed,” Frédéric said, almost sympathetically.
Avril smiled again at the boy. “Your father would have been so proud of you,” she said in French.
The paramedics finished strapping Avril in. “It’s time, Mme. Avars,” the female attendant said, as she hurried to the head of the gurney. Her partner arrived at Avril’s feet.
Frédéric walked alongside the stretcher as the attendants began to wheel it toward the open door of the back of the rig. “Take care of yourself,” Noah called after Avril. Duncan and Elise added words of encouragement, too, but they melted into the white noise and commotion enveloping her.
“Au revoir,” she called out to them and waved weakly with a hand that never left the stretcher. Her eyes were exceptionally heavy now. She stole one more look at Frédéric before they shut again.
Avril knew that she required surgery. She expected to face a long and challenging recovery. She was not even sure if she was out of the woods. But none of that mattered. Avril felt at peace. Frédéric was safe now.
I did all right, Antoine, she thought as she drifted out of consciousness.
56
Limoges, France. January 22
The two policemen dropped Noah, Duncan, and Elise outside the Grand Hotel Doré at 3:35 A.M. They could have come back sooner, but none of them wanted to miss hearing from the detectives who interrogated Sylvie Manet inside her heavily guarded hospital room. Elise translated the report for Duncan and Noah. According to the officers, Sylvie had spoken freely, welcoming the opportunity to unload her secrets.
As soon as Noah reached his hotel room, he picked up the phone and called Washington, where it was already after nine P.M. Anna answered on the second ring. Her tone bordered on frantic. “Noah, are you all right?” she asked.
Noah’s eardrum still whistled and his arm throbbed where he’d been hit with the flashlight, but he had flatly refused to seek medical attention. “I’m good, thanks,” he said as he rubbed his arm.
“It’s all over the news!” she cried. “The contaminated lake water. The conspiracy. The kidnapping and murders. A hostage! You must have been terrified. How did you cope?”
“It’s over, Anna.” Though grateful for her concern, Noah was too tired and emotionally drained to relive the experience in its retelling.
“You want to talk to Chloe, I bet,” Anna said understandingly.
“I’d love to,” Noah said. “I don’t suppose she’s still awake?”
“I just put her to bed, but I happen to know from the singing upstairs that she’s still awake.”
Fifteen seconds passed before he heard the excited voice of his daughter. “Daddy!” she shrieked.
His heart soared. Earlier, in the Manet cellar, he had convinced himself that he would never hear her beautiful voice again. “Sweetie! Guess what? I’m coming home tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow? Tomorrow! That’s awesome, Daddy-o!” Then she added coyly, “With a present?”
“Of course!” Noah laughed. “Now tell me about the rest of your trip.”
Chloe spoke expansively of the last few days spent at her grandparents’ retreat in South Carolina, most of her description focusing on the tricks learned and games played in the swimming pool. Noah took it all in, reveling in his daughter’s enthusiasm and happy to have his thoughts pulled thousands of miles away from the Manets and the carnage in rural France.
“Chloe, I can’t wait for tomorrow,” he said.
“Me either, Daddy. Even if you don’t bring a present.” She paused and then added, as if only out of idle curiosity, “Can you buy Barbies in France, Daddy?”
Noah was still chuckling when he hung up. Checking his cell phone’s screen, he saw that Gwen had left two messages. He retrieved both voicemails. In a calm voice that brimmed with concern, she ended her second message by saying, “Noah, I know how swamped you must be, but please let me know that you are okay as soon you possibly can.”
Noah picked up the phone and dialed Gwen’s cell number, but he hung up before he reached the final digit. He was desperate to vent the frustrations, confusion, and angst of the past weeks. She would understand better than anyone. But selfishly, he decided he would rather do it in person when he would have the chance to see those intelligent sexy eyes light up with empathy. He reached for his open laptop and typed out an e-mail: “Everything okay now. Hell of a story to tell you. Save some time for dinner the day after tomorrow, okay? I love you.” He sent it without rereading it.
He shut his laptop and practically dove into bed, expecting sleep to come quickly. But he tossed and turned for the next few hours. He knew he should have felt proud and relieved at having helped prevent the Lake from reaching the market, but he was distressed at how easily the world had slipped to the brink of catastrophe. And he could still practically feel the pop from the knife as it plunged into Martine DeGroot’s gut. The memory haunted him. Regardless of his justification, he was trained to save lives, not take them.
At 7:13 A.M., deciding to use the flight home to catch up on sleep, he rose wearily from the bed. He showered, changed, and then hurried down to the lobby. He didn’t want to miss Duncan, who planned to catch the earliest flight home to Glasgow.
His bag slung over his shoulder, Duncan walked across the lobby toward Noah. “Le
t me guess,” he bellowed. “You just heard from Nantal that we’re needed in Belarus. Some daft farmer is shipping his milk inside abandoned warheads of old Soviet smallpox missiles!”
Noah smiled. “I’m not taking Jean’s calls anymore.”
“Finally, a few sensible words out of you.” Duncan roughly scratched his beard. “Still, no regrets about coming back. It was right that we finished this.”
“Agreed.” They shook hands warmly. “Any word on Maggie today?”
“She seems okay…this morning, anyway.” Duncan shrugged. “Hasn’t lost her sense of humor. She told me she is desperately proud of her husband for sneaking up behind a woman and clubbing her with a branch.”
Noah grinned. “I can’t think of anyone who deserved a clubbing more than Sylvie Manet. I meant to ask, how did you and Elise manage to surprise Sylvie like that?”
“You.”
“Me?”
“She chased us through the woods,” Duncan said. “But when the other flashlight went down, Sylvie rushed over to help her lovable Dutch friend. We knew you were involved, so we followed. With you finally useful—as a decoy, mind you—I was able to surprise her with a pine tree to the noggin.”
“You saved my hide.”
Duncan waved Noah’s gratitude away. “It’s the least I could do for you after all the biblical predicaments you’ve dragged me into.”
“What’s next for you, Duncan?”
The playfulness deserted the Scot’s face. “Now that her arm is on the mend, I am going to take Maggie home,” he said.
“And then?”
“They’re giving her a break before more chemo.” His shoulders sagged. “We honeymooned in the Canary Islands. In spite of that, she’s always loved the place. I think I might take her back there for some sunshine and knock-off British food.”
