Queen of the Hide Out

by Alice Quinn

  He’d pulled out a massive-ass gun on me.

  I didn’t even have time to think about it—instinct (and being scared shitless) guided me. I ran as fast as my ass would allow me with a six-year-old, a stroller, and heels down a street with a goddamn staircase. I was flying!

  I heard a piercing whistle right in my eardrum. A couple of yards away from me, a piece of concrete flew off a wall. Shards of cement and dust went whizzing past my face. It could only have been a bullet. Damn! This guy isn’t fooling around. What a maniac! Why does he want to kill me? What have I ever done to him? And who in the hell is he?

  He was chasing me and catching up much faster than I’d have liked! Of course he was! He was flying solo, had big muscles, was all FBI trained . . . and there I was with babies and stupid shoes. All this happened in a total of about ten seconds.

  The only advantage I had over him was that I know this town like the back of my hand. This was the trick up my sleeve. But I needed to use this trick within the next few seconds.

  OK! I was on it! I ran into the entrance hall of an old building. I’d had this exact place in mind since FBI man first started the chase. He was around fifty yards behind me now. I knew the building well. It had belonged to my grandmother way back when. The big problem was that she didn’t ever put her real name on anything. It was a habit she’d picked up when she was hiding from the Nazis. They’d have either gotten their hands on everything or found out about her Jewish origins. Or both. This meant that when she passed away, my mother didn’t inherit a dime. She’d had to start from scratch.

  Anyway, all the buildings that my grandmother had owned had an extra way in or out. It was like a secret thing she always did. It was a little eccentric, but she continued to do it with all the buildings she managed even way after the war had ended.

  Once we were inside, I ran down the hallway as fast as I could. Imagine the Road Runner. That was me.

  Luckily, we didn’t need to climb any stairs. My grandmother always made sure her escape routes were at ground level.

  I was dragging the stroller behind me by this point, so the twins were flying backward (which was giving them hysterical fits of giggles). I opened a door. It had a number on it, a name, a doorbell, the whole deal, but it was all fake. It wasn’t really an apartment.

  My grandmother’s system was always the same, and it had remained in place even after all these years. When I opened the door to what looked like someone’s home, we found ourselves in a short corridor with a metal emergency-exit door at the end of it.

  So the idea was that the guy would either wait out front for me to leave (unlikely!), or he would get in through the front door and look for me in the hallways and staircases. He would have no clue that what looked like an ordinary apartment door was actually an escape route to the back of the building.

  We were free. We ran without once looking behind us.

  It was around midday when we got back to our place. We didn’t see a single cop on the trip back. Good job. I made a quick omelet for everyone with what I could find in the fridge. The kids had just started eating when I heard some cars roll up . . . definitely more than one. I looked outside and could see three cop cars pulling up. Christ! What now?

  41

  Well, there was no way I was playing this game. I was getting the heck out of Dodge.

  I didn’t hang around. I grabbed my coat and my bag (into which I managed to throw some of the omelet and some aluminum foil that was balled up on the table). I didn’t have time to do up all the Velcro bits on my bag. We had to get out of there—and the only way out was through the back window.

  In record time (I really should have gotten a medal for it), I managed to get the twinnies, the stroller, my bag, Sabrina, and my own skinny ass out the window. I lifted my finger to my lips to let the babas know not to make a sound. Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn’t.

  This time it did. My lot are real little brain boxes. They know when things are heating up and when to listen to me and do as I ask. We took tiny silent baby steps as we crossed the rough grassland and the abandoned railway station at the other side of my trailer park.

  I imagined that as we were making our quiet getaway, the cops had probably just gotten out of their rides. And just to prove me right, I heard them slamming their car doors.

  So, quick calculation: By the time they ambled over to the trailer, waited for me to answer the door, and realized that I either wasn’t there or was choosing not to answer, I had approximately two minutes to get us out of there. If these cops weren’t the stupidest ones in France, they might guess we’d made a run for it and search the area around the trailer.

  I used to think France was full of nothing but stupid cops, but I’ve since had a change of heart. I’ve had more than my fair share of run-ins with them, and some of them are at the top of their game. So they’d maybe take an additional two minutes to comb the vicinity of my trailer. Between now and then, I needed to come up with a plan.

  I looked around. My eyes were drawn to the windows above the railway station. I remember one of the shutters up there was a death trap! It was hanging by a thread. Come to think of it, it was me who had damaged it the last time I’d climbed up, when I’d needed to hide my ass for a change.

  There’d be no climbing this time, though, not with three kids and a double stroller. And not in the megaheels I was wearing (again). And not if we only had thirty seconds. So we only had one option left: Run. I threw the twins into the stroller and that’s exactly what we did. We ran. Well, two of us did, the other two had wheels. And I have to say, the four of us were faster than I thought we’d be. It was like we were in training for the Côte d’Azur marathon.

  I was sad, though, and felt light-headed. I hadn’t had time to close the window to my trailer, and I was upset about leaving my Pastis behind. I had no clue when I’d see him again.

  The faster we ran, the farther away we were from town. It was starting to look a lot like the countryside even though we hadn’t covered a hell of a lot of ground. We ended up in a field.

  I did my usual act with the kids to keep them calm—I told them a story about witches. This always worked. Whenever we found ourselves in tricky sitches like this, I turned it all into a game. An adventure.

  There was no sign of the police. I felt more relaxed, and our run became a walk. I’d finally completely relaxed when I heard police sirens in the distance . . . moving away from us. The police had left my trailer. At least for now. Still, it was impossible to go back there. Maybe they’d left a lookout guy nearby.

  Just as all these thoughts were streaming through my mind, I heard a loud Meeeeooooowwww!

  “Pathtith!” shouted Sabrina, running toward a bush.

  And there he was! So proud of himself! He came bounding toward us at a full gallop. He’d understood that we’d left . . . and it wasn’t just on a little trip to the grocery store. He’d sensed it would be for longer! He jumped up into the stroller, scrambled under the protective cover, and settled down onto the twinnies’ knees. I was ecstatic that he’d had the intelligence to join up with us, especially since I was concerned it would be some time before we saw our beautiful Ambassador again. That was one less thing to worry about!

  It would only be a matter of hours before the cops worked out that I was on the run, and they’d put their big search-and-hunt scheme into operation, with traces and wires on the phone and all that jazz.

  Before we set off running again, I took a couple of seconds to do one last important thing: I closed my eyes and imagined my perfect little home-sweet-home. I visualized it in a white light completely covered in a crystal dome to protect it, and I whispered, “My house will be perfectly safe while we’re away.”

  This is the second-best thing you can do when leaving your home. The first is to lock it up properly. This little visualization magic trick of mine works with just about everything. It’s one of my best secrets. Only Véro knows about it. That’s why she gave me that weird book. She know
s I like all that hippy magic wizardy stuff.

  42

  Oh no! My cell phone! I had to get rid of it!

  I didn’t think I’d be able to handle life without my cricket! Was I just supposed to dump it? How would we manage? I’d heard some folks don’t even have cell phones. By choice. Insane. Absolutely cracked.

  I had another one of my famous lightbulb moments right then and there. I decided to go back to Max’s house and get Mademoiselle Kessler to pay me for the work I’d done. I mean, I’d worked at least a whole day after all. Plus, it had all been decided when I was hired. I was to be paid on Saturdays.

  The gang and I made our way across town with me checking the whole time that we weren’t being followed. At one point, I noticed an odd-looking guy limping behind us. I stopped and made out like I was looking into a store window. He continued right by without even glancing at us. False alarm.

  I needed to be on the lookout, though. I felt like we were all painted bright red and everyone was looking at us like we’d just escaped from the asylum. If I saw anyone speaking into their cell phone, I convinced myself they were calling the police and letting them know our whereabouts.

  It was still around lunchtime when we got there, even though we’d taken the long route. I put my finger to my lips again to signal to the kiddos that they were to hush up. I took a long hard look at the front of the house. I couldn’t spot any cops.

  I walked on tiptoe, followed by Sabrina copying my every move, with the twins and the cat up front in the stroller. When we got to the door, I slipped the key slowly into the lock, praying there wasn’t an officer waiting behind it ready to pounce on me.

  That simple gesture—twisting the key in the lock—gave me a funny rumbling feeling in the pit of my stomach. As soon as we were inside, I felt as if something wasn’t quite right. I didn’t want to go any farther.

  There was nobody there. Well, nobody behind the door and nobody in the hallway. But I could hear a whole hullabaloo going off not too far away. I couldn’t see a soul, but I guessed there were people in the big living room. There were some loud discussions going on.

  I left the twins and Pastis in the stroller in the middle of the hallway, and Sabrina and I headed for the living room. I put my head around the doorway and had a quick look.

  There was some sort of meeting taking place around a large table. A man—he looked like lawyer—was sitting at the head of the table with a huge pile of papers in front of him, giving everyone else the evil eye just like a spider (if you could see its eyes). I recognized the love of my life, Théodore Dumond de la Pinsonnière. There were a whole bunch of other people there. Some of them must have been Max’s kids (five men, two women . . . I was adding them all up), and the rest were maybe his grandchildren. There were quite a few young people, and some of them looked to be in their teens. The others could well have been wives and husbands. Basically, I think everyone who was related to the old man was in that room. They’d sure gotten there quick! But not Mademoiselle Kessler.

  I couldn’t stop staring at the gorgeous Théodore. It was next to impossible to look away. Oh hell! I was stuck! Pastis must have sensed there was danger about—he’s very possessive and protective of me like that. He jumped down from the stroller and came trotting over to rub himself against my leg and step on my shoes. He was doing everything he could to get my attention. It didn’t work, though, so he had to think on his feet. He decided to have a violent coughing fit.

  “Shh, Pastis! You’re making too much noise!”

  “Mommy,” whispered my eldest, “Pathtith hath been thick on the carpet! Oh! Thith carpet ith tho pretty!”

  That soon snapped me out of my ridiculous daydream. I took a few steps backward and turned to face the twins. Holding Sabrina by the hand, and followed by Pastis (who was looking all happy with himself), I pushed the stroller toward the kitchen. I was hoping to find Cruella Kessler, and hoping even more that I’d manage to get some money out of her.

  I was just about to open the kitchen door when I heard her voice. She was on the phone from what I could gather. She must have discreetly left the meeting so she could take a call. There was no way I was going to interrupt her, so I listened in instead.

  “No. I haven’t said anything yet, my angel. I don’t want to attract any unnecessary attention, do I? Now isn’t the right time. We need to push them in the right direction first. When everything has been sorted out on this side, I’ll get out the papers. It’ll hit them like a bomb, of course. I think it would be better to wait awhile. You know he loved you, don’t you? It’ll all work out well for you, I’m sure of it . . .”

  She lowered her voice and I didn’t hear the rest. Then the intercom buzzed loudly, and Mademoiselle Kessler said, “Someone’s calling me . . . Yes, yes . . . Agreed. I have to hang up now. I’ll call you again this evening.”

  Panic stricken, I looked from side to side. There was nowhere I could go. If she came through the kitchen door, she’d see me. There was no cover in the hallway. It was like being caught in a trap. She was going to know we’d been listening in. Me, Sabrina, the babies, the cat . . . I tried the handle on the nearest door. Thank God! It opened. We all stumbled inside and I shut it behind me, just as I heard Mademoiselle Kessler leave the kitchen and cross the hallway to the front door.

  I suddenly recognized Borelli’s voice. There were several other voices too . . . There must have been more police officers. I opened the door a crack so I could listen. Borelli greeted Mademoiselle Kessler and asked to see the rest of the family. They crossed the hall and, by the sound of it, were headed for the dining room. But it was impossible to know if everyone went. There could still be a cop in the middle of the hall or standing guard at the front door. I couldn’t see. The only thing I knew for sure was that I was going nowhere. I couldn’t leave the room. If I wanted to get out of that house, I’d have to find another way.

  Where was I? Some kind of pantry or cupboard? But it was too big for a cupboard. I don’t know the name you’d use. We were in a room as big as a big walk-in closet with a cement floor and a ton of shelves surrounding us with cans of food and cookware. Pots and pans, slow cookers, long oblong silver bowls for salmon, sacks of potatoes and apples, bags of sugar and flour, bottles of oil . . . It was all very well organized. There were whole hams strung up on the ceiling and giant boxes of mature cheese.

  The kids gawked at everything like they were in paradise. There was enough to feed an army in here. All that for one little old man? Pastis thought he’d died and gone to heaven too. There were so many amazing smells, he didn’t know which part of the room to explore first.

  On the far side wall, two giant refrigerators with glass doors held hundreds of bottles of vintage wines. They were those superclassy things you see in nice restaurants that keep them at exactly the right temperature.

  What amazed me the most about this place was that the door hadn’t been locked. I turned to look. There was a key in the lock, but on the inside. Instinct . . . I turned it. Unless Mademoiselle Kessler kept the key to every door in the house with her at all times, we’d just bought some time if she had to find the key to this magic supply closet.

  43

  I sauntered farther into the room and picked up an apple as I went. I rubbed it on my top to make it shine, then offered it to my Sabrina.

  The twins, not doubting for a second that they would get a treat too, looked at us sweetly. It was the way they almost always looked. So I hunted around the place for a knife. They couldn’t manage a whole apple each. It would need to be cut into bite-sized chunks.

  That’s when I saw it. A statuette a little bigger than a loaf of bread.

  It was of four young women (with not a stitch on) sitting in a circle. Maybe they were chatting? Oh! That was beside the point! On the base of the statue—and this was a big deal—was a blood stain next to a name, Camille Claudel. There was a sort of design engraved in it, like the ones outside pharmacies with the snake around a goblet. It was all sculpted in
bronze. Very heavy.

  I recognized it. I’d seen it in Max’s office on Wednesday. It was next to his computer, being used to weigh down a pile of papers. Now here it was, half wrapped in a tea towel and shoved behind a shelf.

  I got it. My good old intuition again. Was I psychic or what? I was so like that sometimes.

  This was what had been used to kill Max. The murder weapon. Two plus two makes four and all that. Now I had undeniable proof that the old guy hadn’t hit his head by accident or died of an overdose (self-administered or not), but that someone had done him in with this statue thing. I took a clean cloth and stuffed the nudey girls and the tea towel in a sturdy grocery bag.

  Then I got another apple and cut it into small pieces for the twinnies. When they’d all finished their snack, I continued to snoop around the room. I looked under the shelves, behind the fridges . . . and I noticed a large square plank of wood on the floor in the corner.

  It was a hatch! A hidey-hole! Like in Madame Rosa!

  I knew the movie well. My grandmother played it nonstop when I was a kid. It reminded her of her childhood, she said. Maybe that’s why she named my mother Rose.

  Well, I’d certainly found the ideal place for us to hide from the police until they left. I lifted the hatch. Incredible! There was a staircase.

  Pastis was the first one down. I took the twinnies out of their stroller. After a few acrobatics, I managed to get the whole family down the hole. The stairs were pretty scary, but we were all brave kids. Several stages were involved in getting us all down.

  Sabrina was the second to go after my superbrainy cat. I knew the twins would be too afraid to either go or stay up at the top on their own. Sabrina had to manage without me. I helped her by talking her through it the whole way.

  I asked her to sing a song to me while she waited at the bottom. Then I took both babies in my arms and scooched down backward. Once they were all safely at the bottom, I made another trip up to get some ham, cheese, water, and the stroller.