The Family Hitchcock

by Mark Levin

  Even so, he wished there had been another way. . . . Roger reached into his pocket and took out a bottle of mouthwash and a small test tube that he had purchased at the drugstore. The mouthwash was light blue, the precise color of the MGF. Working carefully, Roger poured a bit of the mouthwash into the empty vial. Then he reached into his other pocket and pulled out the real vial of MGF. The similarity was remarkable. No one would be able to tell the difference. At least he hoped not. The lives of his family depended upon it.

  While the bus carrying Roger Hitchcock moved slowly away from Sofia, his children sat on the stone floor of an abandoned sanctuary inside the deserted monastery. Rows of empty pews filled the chapel. A large fresco of what looked like a saint was painted on the wall over an old church organ.

  Benji nodded up at his sister. “I wonder if that thing still plays.”

  Maddy shrugged. The last thing on her mind at the moment was music.

  “Who cares?”

  “I do. I bet Beethoven’s Pathétique would sound unreal in this place.” Benji took in the enormity of the old chapel. “The ceiling goes up forever. Killer acoustics.”

  Maddy didn’t answer. Across the way sat Veronique and Jean-Claude Vadim. On a pew in the second row, their parents were talking heatedly. Though their French was far too rapid for her to understand completely, from the few words she was able to catch—stupide, fiole, and incroyable—Maddy got the distinct impression that they were even more scared than she was. Xavier Vadim looked like a chemist, not a spy. And Beatrix Vadim’s concerned frowns reminded Maddy strongly of her mother. Though she knew she should be terrified, Maddy couldn’t imagine either Vadim parent actually harming her.

  Maddy tried to catch Veronique’s eye. The French girl looked away unhappily. Maddy sighed and stared at the ceiling. Benji was right—the acoustics were probably phenomenal. She was about to say something to him about it—just to make some conversation—when she heard a light thud. To her surprise, Benji and little Jean-Claude had started a game of catch with a rubber ball.

  Maddy looked back at Veronique. Again, the girl wouldn’t meet her eyes. Maybe she needed a friend. The few days in Paris had given Maddy a small degree of confidence about her French. If Benji could play catch with Jean-Claude, why couldn’t she try to strike up a conversation with Veronique? She thought a minute to make sure she got the grammar right, then cleared her throat.

  “Vous ne voulez pas aller à l’Argentine.”

  Veronique looked at her, betraying no emotion. To Maddy’s surprise, when she finally answered, it was in English.

  “How do you know I don’t want to go to Argentina?”

  “Not with Stephan back in Paris you don’t.”

  Maddy enjoyed the surprise that flashed over Veronique’s face.

  “How do you know about Stephan?”

  Maddy smiled.

  “In his apartment,” she said. “He painted you.”

  Veronique sat up. “Moi? Sérieusement?”

  “Yes, seriously.” All of a sudden she felt like Veronique was a kindred spirit. “It’s beautiful, too. Stephan’s crazy for you, Veronique.”

  “But how did you get in his apartment?”

  “Through the skylight. Really long story.”

  The girls were quiet for a moment. Maddy thought of the beautiful painting, then thought sadly of Noah Willis. Compared to a romantic Parisian painter, he seemed so ordinary. Even so, she couldn’t think of him without a distinct lump in her throat.

  “You know,” she said. “There’s a guy I like, too.”

  Veronique raised her eyebrows. “Oh?”

  Maddy nodded. “My best friend, Grace, is probably rubbing suntan lotion on his shoulders right now.”

  Veronique shuddered. “Oh, Mon Dieu! C’est terrible!”

  As Maddy laughed, Veronique’s parents got up from the pew. Apparently their discussion was over. Monsieur Vadim walked grimly up the aisle of the chapel, heading outside, while Madame Vadim approached the children.

  “Don’t worry,” she said. “Your parents are coming for you. It will be over soon.”

  Benji looked up from his game of catch with Jean-Claude.

  “You do realize that in our country, this is called kidnapping.”

  To Maddy’s surprise, Veronique’s mother shook her head sadly. “Oui. In our country, it is called kidnapping, too.”

  Ten miles away on a deserted airfield, Harry Huberman clutched Rebecca by the elbow, pushing her toward a military helicopter. His limo driver followed two paces behind, holding an AK-47.

  “Are you ever going to tell me who you are?” Rebecca asked Huberman. “Are you even American?”

  Harry flashed the winning smile that had charmed her when they first met. What had once seemed dashing now seemed strangely macabre. Rebecca shivered.

  “I’m as American as baseball, apple pie, and subprime mortgages,” Huberman said. “I’m just a businessman. A security consultant.”

  “What kind of security consultant?”

  The helicopter’s propellers began to spin. Huberman shouted over the roar. “I secure transactions, Mrs. Hitchcock. I’ve been contracted by a Chinese energy corporation to make sure a certain deal gets done.”

  “And even at the Eiffel Tower,” Rebecca said. “You were following us. Why?”

  “Because I never trusted Vadim. He promised to sell my client the MGF, then turned around and sold it to a higher bidder. Now I’m back to get my client what is rightfully his.”

  They reached the helicopter.

  “Inside!” Huberman shouted.

  With a bodyguard behind her, Rebecca had no choice. She climbed the ladder and took a seat in the back next to an elegantly dressed sixty-something Chinese man in a suit—clearly Huberman’s client.

  “Meet Mr. Chen,” Huberman said, following Rebecca into the copter.

  The man grunted; Rebecca nodded back. With the bodyguard and Huberman in the front seat, the pilot closed the door. As she felt the helicopter lift from the ground, Rebecca had never been more terrified.

  “You do realize that we have nothing to do with any of this!” she shouted.

  Huberman turned and met her eyes. There was no hint of a smile. “Unfortunately, you have everything to do with it, Mrs. Hitchcock. Your husband has the MGF. Let’s just hope he doesn’t try anything stupid.”

  Chapter Twenty

  For a brief, blissful second Roger was back in the hotel with Rebecca and the kids. Instead, he opened his eyes to the craggy face of a sixty-something bus driver with garlic breath.

  “Monastery,” the man grunted, then motioned to the door.

  Roger blinked. Had he really dozed off? Apparently. He looked out the window. The sun was just beginning to set behind the mountains, casting an eerie orange glow on a once grand but now decaying stone structure that rose as if from out of nowhere atop a cliff.

  “Out!” the man barked.

  Roger did as he was told. The moment Roger set his foot on the dirt road, the driver shut the doors and sped off. Roger was overcome with a feeling of deep dread. What had he been thinking? That he could outwit organized criminals on his own? Perched atop a bluff, the monastery looked like nothing less than a haunted castle—the type of place from which innocent people didn’t escape with their lives.

  Roger wheeled around and looked pleadingly down the road, almost as if willing the bus to return and take him back to Sofia or, better yet, transport him to an alternate reality where he and his family had never agreed to go on a house swap to Paris at all. A reality where he had let Maddy hang out by the pool to spend her summer engaged in such meaningful pursuits as drinking an excess of soda and drooling over Noah Willis’s triceps. A reality where he had happily paid for Benji to go to computer camp. But would that really have been better? Certainly, it would have been safer. But a bland, unadventurous summer held its own perils. Maddy would have graduated from her days at the pool with a great tan but an even worse attitude. Benji would have come home fr
om camp smarter but quite possibly even stranger. And how would he and Rebecca have fared all summer without the kids to keep them busy?

  Roger shuddered. No, the current situation was terrible—no question about it. But the family had benefited, hung together, been tested. Assuming he could get them home alive, the family Hitchcock would most certainly be the better for it. And so when Roger took another look up at the monastery, it was with a steely determination. Yes, it was scary. He might screw up even worse than he had at Yosemite. He might even die. But he had to give it his best shot—to prove, if not to the world, then at least to himself and Rebecca, Maddy, and Benji that nice guys could come out on top.

  “Bring it on, Harry Huberman!” he said to himself. “Come on, Xavier Vadim! You don’t scare Roger Hitchcock!”

  With those words, Roger started up the path, hiking steadfastly up a narrow trail that snaked along the side of the mountain by a fifty-foot drop-off and soon dead-ended at the edge of a sheer cliff. One hundred feet overhead stood the old monastery, still and deserted. To climb up was an impossibility. But to Roger’s right stood an old funicular, a small metal cabin that moved up and down the side of the cliff like an elevator. Roger looked inside and quickly discovered a lightly rusted control panel. Pressing a dull green button, he waited for the motor to catch. When it didn’t, he pressed the button again. Still nothing. Roger gave the funicular a light kick, stepped back outside, and looked again for a path up the cliff. For a brief second he imagined pulling himself up the side by one of the low-hanging vines. He even gave one of the vines a tug to see if it was secure.

  Then he heard it—the grinding of an old motor. A lone bulb atop the funicular lit up. So the old contraption worked after all. Roger smiled grimly. Obviously, someone up top was waiting for him. But who? In any case, this time when he pressed the green button the funicular began to rise. Hopping on, Roger watched the ground spread out beneath him as the monastery walls grew larger and larger above him until the funicular came to a sudden halt. A gate clanged open and Roger walked onto a lawn of uncut grass. To his left stood a chapel with a courtyard. To his right was what appeared to be an abandoned dining hall or theater.

  “Hello?” Roger called.

  His voice echoed back at him. Roger waited, willing himself to stay calm. But it was hard when everything was so still. Someone had started the funicular, but who? There was no sign of another soul—not the Vadims, Harry Huberman, or, most important, his family.

  “Hello?” Roger called again. “I’m here.”

  A shape moved out of the shadows. Roger instinctively took a step back as Xavier Vadim walked toward him across the courtyard.

  “Roger Hitchcock,” he said.

  Roger took a step toward his alter ego.

  “So we finally meet face-to-face, after all those emails this spring,” Roger called. He paused. “That was you I was emailing with, wasn’t it?”

  Xavier Vadim was in no mood for small talk. He stopped ten feet away.

  “Where is my MGF, Mr. Hitchcock?”

  Roger was determined to hang tough. “Where are my children?”

  Vadim took a step forward. Though Vadim was doing his best to appear threatening, Roger suspected that he was as uncomfortable playing the part of a heavy as Roger was himself.

  “Don’t mess around with me, Hitchcock,” he said. “I hold the cards here!”

  “No, Xavier,” Roger said. “I hold the cards! You don’t see your MGF until I see my children. Where are they?”

  “Nearby,” Vadim said. “And safe. Last I heard, our daughters were talking.” Vadim allowed himself a small smile. “About boys.”

  Roger grinned. Suddenly the two men weren’t adversaries but fathers, both doing their best to navigate the perilous waters of raising a teenage daughter.

  “Good,” he said. “Let’s make a deal and wrap this up.”

  Roger had been so focused on Xavier Vadim that he hadn’t heard the approaching helicopter—at least not at first. Now he and Vadim looked up at the same time. The large green machine was descending rapidly, kicking up wind and dust.

  “Who is that?” Vadim asked.

  Roger didn’t answer. Rather, he watched as the helicopter approached. Harry Huberman was next to the pilot and his limo driver. In the back was someone else—another man, Roger thought, possibly Asian—sitting next to his wife.

  “Rebecca!” Roger shouted.

  He didn’t think she heard him. But as the copter touched down, their eyes met. After years of marriage, Roger could read her face like a secret code. A single glance communicated love, pride, fear, and a healthy dose of “don’t do anything dumb.”

  “I thought I said to come alone,” Vadim said, walking to Roger’s side.

  “You’re a married man, Vadim,” Roger said. “You should understand. I didn’t have a choice.”

  The pilot cut the engines. As the propellers slowed, Huberman emerged from the helicopter, gripping Rebecca by the arm. Again, Roger caught her eye. Closer, she looked terrified. As for Harry Huberman, he looked furious.

  “What is he doing here, Hitchcock?” he shouted, pointing to Vadim.

  Roger drew in a deep breath. If there was ever a time to bring out his inner hero, this was it.

  “I figured it was time for a summit.”

  With that, the Asian man emerged from the helicopter, carrying a leather briefcase.

  “This is my business associate, Mr. Chen,” Huberman said. “I tracked down the MGF for him.”

  “Then everyone can leave here happy,” Roger said. “You and Mr. Chen will get your MGF and Vadim will get his money. All I’ll need is my family back and we’ll be on our way to Chicago like nothing ever happened.”

  Roger pulled out the test tube of MGF and held it up. Huberman nodded.

  “Very good, Mr. Hitchcock,” Huberman said. “You have a deal. Your wife for the MGF.”

  Vadim had different ideas. “No trades until I get my money! The MGF is mine!”

  Harry Huberman smiled. If Roger hadn’t known differently, he would have thought Huberman was the same charming man he had met atop the Eiffel Tower.

  “Circumstances have changed, Mr. Vadim. We don’t need to pay you anything at all. Hitchcock has the MGF, which he will trade for his wife, no money required.”

  Roger sucked in a sharp breath. Had he misplayed his cards?

  “Wait a second, Huberman. It’s more complicated than that. You see, Vadim has my kids.”

  At that, Vadim took a pistol out of his pocket. In a flash, the bodyguard had his AK-47 pointed at him. There was a deadly pause. No one moved.

  “Don’t do anything stupid, Xavier,” Huberman said finally.

  But Vadim was beyond acting rationally. Shaking with terror and frustration, he kept the gun poised straight at Huberman’s head. “I will get what was promised me!”

  For a moment no one moved.

  “Just give us the vial, Roger,” Huberman said slowly. “And no one gets hurt.”

  Roger was in too deep to take the easy way out now. Trembling, he held out the vial.

  “I have to know where my kids are or this thing shatters!”

  Which is where things stood for another second that felt like an hour when the bold opening chords of Beethoven’s Pathétique Sonata filled the courtyard. Stunned, Rebecca turned to face the chapel.

  “Benji!” she screamed.

  “It’s him!” Roger said. “He’s inside.”

  Vadim blinked, obviously as surprised as the Hitchcocks to be hearing the music. But the bodyguard was too professional to break his concentration. The very instant Vadim looked away, he shot. Vadim cried out, wounded in the arm.

  Now that he knew exactly where his children were being held, Roger had nothing more to gain where he was.

  “You want your MGF?” he shouted. “Take it!”

  He threw the vial into the air with all of his might. While it was still on the way up, he grabbed Rebecca’s hand.

  “Run!” he c
ried. “The chapel!”

  They took off at a mad sprint. Huberman dove for the falling vial and managed to bat it into the air before it hit the ground. Mr. Chen himself lurched to his left and caught it in his fingertips. The businessman rose quickly to his feet and nodded toward the Hitchcocks.

  “Let them go,” Huberman said. “We have what we came for. Let’s test the MGF.”

  Roger and Rebecca pushed through the door into the chapel. The powerful strains of the Beethoven sonata echoed off the walls, filling the space with beautiful overtones.

  “Benji!” Roger cried, and sprinted down the aisle toward the organ. Maddy jumped up from behind a pew.

  “Mom!”

  “Maddy!”

  Mother and daughter fell into each other’s arms.

  “They were holding us here.”

  “Did they hurt you?”

  “No, no. We’re fine.”

  Benji looked out from behind the organ.

  “Dad!” he called.

  “Wingman!”

  A moment later the whole family was hugging and kissing, reveling in each other’s company. Out of the corner of his eye, Roger saw an elegant woman step out of the shadows.

  “Wait! Who is this?”

  “It’s cool, Dad,” Maddy said. “This is Madame Vadim. Jean-Claude and Veronique are up front. We’ve been hanging together.”

  Rebecca looked at Madame Vadim.

  “Your husband is outside,” she said. “And hurry. He’s been shot in the arm.”

  Without another word, Madame Vadim sprinted for the back of the chapel. Once she was gone, Roger turned to his family.

  “OK, team Hitchcock. Time to move!”

  Maddy called down the aisle. “Au revoir, Veronique.”

  “Bon chance, Madeleine.”

  “Wait,” Rebecca said. “You two became . . . friends?”

  Maddy nodded. “I told her all about how Stephan is hot for her.”

  “That’s sweet,” Roger said. “But we’ve got to motor!”