by Tom Savage
Nora nodded. “That sounds wonderful.”
Ellie ordered from the waiter in perfect French, and he went away. Nora looked out at the many lights scattered across the waterfront view. “Those bright lights in the distance, on the other side of the harbor—what are they?”
“That’s Les Trois Îlets—the Three Cays, a local tourist mecca. If you’re a gambler, it’s where you’ll find the casinos.” She pointed to their left. “There’s the Tropic Star.”
Nora looked over at the ship in the harbor at the end of the long dock. Jeff was there now, probably dining alone while he watched Claude Lamont across the Starlight Room, and she wished she could be with him in these last hours before he sailed. To distract herself from this, she turned to her companion and said, “How much do you know about my mission?”
“Nothing, really,” Ellie said. “Mr. Green simply told me to follow your instructions. Can you read me in on any of it, or is it need-to-know?”
Nora waited as the wine was served before replying. “What we’re doing here is not the main mission—Jeff is handling that on the ship with Claude Lamont. We’re working on a sidebar, if you will: watching and possibly protecting his wife.”
“Protecting? From what?”
Nora explained. She stopped just short of accusing Claude Lamont and Melanie Dunstan of attempted murder, but the man in Guadeloupe was probably working for someone, and under the circumstances they were the likeliest suspects.
When Nora was finished, Ellie said, “I had an aunt back in D.C.—that’s where I’m from—who was in an abusive relationship. My mother’s sister, Aunt Wilma. Momma and all her friends told her to get away from the guy, but she wouldn’t, and it ended badly. One night, he got drunk as usual and beat her up, and this time he killed her. He went away for life, but it doesn’t bring her back. I was twelve when it happened. It was Aunt Wilma who made me decide on a career in law enforcement.”
“You were a cop?” Nora asked.
Ellie nodded. “A D.C. cop—detective, second grade.”
“Wow! How did you get from there to the Company?”
“They approached me for an undercover job. They needed an attractive young black woman who spoke French for a sting, so they borrowed me from DCPD—there still aren’t a lot of women of color in the CIA, you know. I helped them catch an international smuggler right here in Martinique. I liked the people I was working for, and I loved the island, so I went back to Washington and trained at CIAU. I qualified three years ago, and they sent me here to work with Ken—Mr. Nelson.”
Nora was fascinated. “From Washington, D.C., to a tropical island where everybody’s French? How did you adjust to that? Isn’t it awfully—I don’t know—lonely?”
“Not really. Poppa’s gone, Momma’s remarried. My brother is an Army sergeant; he and his family are on a base in Indiana. I lived with a guy in D.C., my longest relationship. We almost got married, but he wasn’t ready to settle down. And I wasn’t going to be promoted anytime soon. I wasn’t leaving much behind there; I needed something new. I speak French, and—”
She stopped mid-sentence, staring over Nora’s shoulder.
“Don’t turn around,” Ellie said quickly. “Mrs. Lamont is here. They’re seating her at a table across the terrace, behind you on your left. Do you want to leave?”
“Yes,” Nora whispered, and she began to rise.
At that moment, the waiter arrived with their appetizers.
Chapter 19
Nora sank back down into her chair.
“Okay, we’re stuck here,” she said to Ellie Singer. “If we try to move now, it’ll cause no end of a fuss. I’ll just keep my back to her—besides, I don’t think she’s ever noticed me. And she has no way of knowing who you are, so we should be okay. Let’s just continue as we were.”
They smiled up at the waiter as he lowered their plates before them and refilled their wineglasses from the ice bucket beside the table. As soon as he was gone, Nora whispered, “How far away is she?”
“Oh, thirty feet. There are three tables between us, and one of them is occupied by what can only be a honeymoon couple—they’re practically doing it at the table, so that’s good…”
Nora risked a swift glance behind her, then turned back to Ellie with a grin. “Hello, young lovers! They’re blocking her view of me, and she’s reading her menu, anyway. Now, where were we?”
“Talking about me,” Ellie said, “but let’s talk about her. She’s expecting company for dinner. Her waiter just started to take away the other place setting at her table, and she stopped him.”
Nora nodded and picked up a fork. “Let’s eat while we can. We might have to follow her later.”
The langouste was delicious. The waiter had just arrived to take away the empty plates when Ellie held up her phone and snapped a photo. She showed it to Nora. “Her dinner date just joined her.”
Nora looked at the screen. “That’s the woman I saw her with in Puerto Rico.” Carmen had risen to greet the woman, and they stood face-to-face in the picture. “Now that I see them up close, they could almost be sisters, couldn’t they? But Carmen is an only child.”
Ellie looked past Nora’s shoulder. “They might be related. A cousin, maybe?”
Nora thought about this as their main courses arrived. The Chardonnay was replaced by Burgundy for the beef with mushrooms, which was every bit as delicious as the shellfish. She glanced at her watch: 9:40—it was the same in New York, she reminded herself. Ham Green and Ralph Johnson would be home now, and she didn’t want to bother them after hours unless there was an emergency. A CIA night crew could start research into any possible family connection between these two women, but Nora wasn’t sure there was one. She decided it could wait until tomorrow.
When the main course was cleared, Ellie produced a sleek new gray cellphone from her purse.
“Fully loaded, as Mr. Baron requested. I put Ken’s and my numbers in, and you can add anything else you need—your email and so forth. Here’s the Company app Mr. Baron sent us to track the trackers. This screen is the plant on her luggage, and if you touch here, you get the second screen with the second plant, the one I put on her rental car in the hotel parking lot. You need two passwords, so enter the passwords of your choice and remember them. I’m afraid you can’t keep it—it’s our backup phone here—but it’s yours for the duration.” She shut it down and handed it to Nora.
“Thank you,” Nora said.
The banana tarts arrived. The banana crème was laced with chunks of coconut and ribbons of dark chocolate in a crunchy pie-shell crust, and Nora could taste something else: rum, the island’s specialty. When after-dinner coffee was served, Ellie asked for the check and gave the waiter a credit card.
“Oh, I was going to get this,” Nora said. “I don’t think we should stick the taxpayers with this extravagant meal—”
“We didn’t.” Ellie smiled. “That’s Ken’s business credit card—Mr. Nelson’s, I mean. Our station is also his private office. He told me to use this card for Company things if the expense isn’t warranted. You being here is my excuse for dinner in my favorite place, so thank you.”
“Oh,” Nora said. “In that case, thank you. Mr. Nelson sounds like an honest man. What is his private business?”
“He’s a detective—a private eye. I guess you could call it his cover job. There isn’t usually much Company work here, so he takes private cases as well. I’m his assistant in both capacities, federal and private.”
Nora regarded the young woman for a moment. “Ellie, you’ve mentioned Ken Nelson several times now, and every time you look away from me. You even stammer his name. This is none of my business, but are you two an item?”
Ellie’s eyes widened in surprise. “Oh, no! No, nothing like that. For one thing, I just hit my thirties and he’s, like, sixty. He’s a nice old guy, in a fatherly
sort of way. He’s from New York, divorced, with a bitch of an ex and two grown kids who never get in touch. He smokes like a chimney, and he’s definitely overweight. He has a lady friend, a French widow who’s lived here forever.” She paused before continuing, “I probably look nervous when I mention him because I’ve been covering for him for nearly a week now. The truth is, I don’t know where he is.”
“I see,” Nora said. “Do you have reasons to be concerned about him?”
Ellie thought about that. “When I last saw him six days ago, he told me he was looking for someone, a missing person in a case he was working on. He was unusually secretive about it. I’m not sure which client he’s working for; I wasn’t aware of any missing-persons cases. But he said he’d seen a man downtown, a man he was looking for, and now he was going to track him. He said he might have to leave the island for a while, and it could take as long as a week. I didn’t think much of it until yesterday.
“Yesterday, Gabrielle—his French lady friend—called the office looking for him. He’d missed two dates with her, and she hasn’t heard from him. I haven’t heard from him, either, and I can’t get him on the phone; it just goes to voice mail. And then, today, Mr. Green called from the New York station and told me to help you while you were here. I said Ken was on vacation. I lied to Mr. Green, and I lied to you. I’m sorry.”
“It’s no matter,” Nora assured her. “Could he have left the island?”
Ellie shook her head. “I don’t think so. I checked the airport, ferries, and water taxis, and nobody’s seen him. I even checked all the cruise lines. I suppose he could have rented a boat or a plane, but I’m getting worried. He’s never done anything like this before. He said a week, and it’ll be a week tomorrow. After that, I’ll have to report it to Langley—” For the second time tonight, she abruptly stopped speaking. She looked past Nora and said, “Okay, Mrs. Lamont and her friend are on the move. What should we do?”
Nora turned around to see the two women walking away, toward the lobby.
“We follow them,” she said.
By the time Nora and Ellie reached the lobby, Carmen and the other woman were walking out through the glass entrance doors. They watched as the younger woman handed over her ticket, then the two women chatted until the car arrived. Carmen embraced the young woman, who got into her car and drove away. Carmen came back inside and headed for the elevators.
“Okay,” Nora said. “I think we can assume she’s retiring for the night. You go home and get some sleep. Thank you again for that wonderful meal, Ellie. Call me in the morning.”
“All right. Good night, Mrs. Baron.”
“Nora,” Nora said.
Ellie smiled. “Good night, Nora,” she said, and left the hotel.
Nora walked toward the elevators. Carmen Lamont was standing before a little table near the elevator bank, her back to Nora, perusing one of several brochures for local attractions on display there. As Nora approached the doors, one of them opened and two men emerged. Nora moved past them into the elevator and pressed the indicator for the third floor. Just as the door was sliding shut, Carmen Lamont stepped inside the cab.
“Bonsoir,” Carmen said, glancing briefly at Nora as she pushed the button for the second floor.
Nora forced a smile to her lips. “Bonsoir.”
The two women stood side by side, facing the door, as the cab ascended. A moment later, the door opened and Carmen stepped out. The door slid shut behind her.
Nora exhaled. She’d been holding her breath throughout the brief ride, willing herself not to speak to the woman. She’d wanted to reveal herself, to warn Carmen that she was in danger. But she hadn’t said a word, and now the chance was gone. She hoped she wouldn’t ever have to regret it.
When the door opened on the third floor, Nora fairly ran all the way down the corridor to her room.
Chapter 20
Nora was a list maker. She’d acquired the habit at an early age, thanks to the nuns in her parochial grammar school, and she’d continued throughout her adulthood. Whenever she was working on a complex problem, or had a decision to make, she found it helpful to write down all her options in an orderly, concise way. The practice had always worked for her through the years—first as a student, then as an actor, then as an acting teacher—but never as much as now, in her assignments with the CIA. Listing her observations and conclusions during a mission was an excellent way to bring all the details together in her mind.
In her hotel room, she raised the temperature of the air conditioner ten degrees, got out of her navy blue linen pants suit and into her bedtime T-shirt and running shorts, heated a carafe of water in the room’s coffeemaker, and made a cup of chamomile tea with honey. She fished in her shoulder bag for her two phones, a notepad, and a pen. Then she slipped between the sheets of the king-size bed and propped herself up against the headboard with pillows.
She started with the new phone. Two passwords: The first one was easy—it was the all-purpose one she and her husband always used, their daughter’s first and middle names. She entered DanaLee, then searched her mind for a second password that she’d be sure to remember. She was just old enough to resent all the passwords that now ruled her life, but there was nothing to be done about it. Like it or lump it, as they said when she was young. A mix of letters and numbers was a good idea, she’d been told, so…her favorite stage role, and…her age when she’d played it. She entered BlancheDubois36, and she was in.
She found her own account and added it. She checked the tracker app; Carmen’s vanity case and car were still in place. Then she called Jeff and got a busy signal. The reason for this became apparent a moment later, when her old Company phone began to buzz. She dropped the new one on the bed and picked up the old one.
“Hi,” she said. “I was just calling you on my new phone. Let me give you the number.” She recited it. “So, what’s up with you?”
“I’m ready for bed,” Jeff said. “It’s been a long day, with the walking tour and all. He had dinner with the Dunstans. I don’t get it—either Brian Dunstan is really obtuse, or Claude and Melanie are really good at hiding their affair. Anyway, they were all being friendly tonight. I guess the Dunstans are cheering him up now that his wife has left him.”
“I’m not so sure she’s left him,” Nora said. She filled him in on the dinner with the woman from Puerto Rico. “Maybe she’s just visiting her friend or relative, or whatever that woman is. Carmen leaving the cruise here could have been planned that way all along.”
Jeff was silent for a moment. Then he said, “Maybe Claude is clearing the decks—so to speak—for Diablo. He could have all sorts of reasons for not wanting people around tomorrow night, especially his wife.”
“Exactly,” Nora said. “Still, there was something secret, something furtive about her meeting with the woman at El Morro. She’s definitely hiding something from Claude. Then again, he’s definitely hiding something from her—or so he thinks. I’m sure she saw him by the pool with Melanie from her balcony the other night.”
“You stick with her,” Jeff said. “Carmen isn’t aware that you stopped a man from killing her yesterday. If Claude and Melanie were behind it, they could try again.”
Nora groaned. “I know. I just had a close encounter with her in the elevator, and it was all I could do to hold my tongue. I wanted to tell her everything. This mission is really complicated.”
“No more than most,” her husband said. “Welcome to the Company, Pal. You’re doing fine, and with any luck, we could wrap this up at nine o’clock tomorrow night.”
“Yeah, in Barbados,” Nora pointed out. “Meanwhile, I’m the babysitter in Martinique!”
“But you’re such a cute babysitter!” he said. Before she could react with a tirade, he added, “I’ll call you tomorrow—we’re sailing in a few minutes, and I have to get some sleep.”
“Okay, goo
d night, darling. I love you.”
“I love you more, Pal.” It was their usual sign-off.
Nora was about to call her daughter when she remembered that Dana was currently in rehearsals for a summer stock play in Connecticut. Dana would be in an evening rehearsal now, or else she’d be in the nearest diner for a postrehearsal meal with her fellow actors before returning to the crowded boardinghouse she shared with the summer company. Nobody goes straight home after a rehearsal; Nora knew this from her own experience. She’d served time in four—five?—summer stock companies early in her acting career, and she was secretly proud that her daughter had chosen to follow in her footsteps.
She dropped the phone on the bed and thought about Cecile Lanier’s phone call this afternoon. Cecile had described Yvette Marchand as an attractive, fortyish businesswoman, expensively dressed and coiffed, with a brisk, no-nonsense attitude despite her heavy drinking. Her story had been a revelation.
Cecile had presented herself to the woman as a freelance journalist writing a series of articles about France’s most successful executives, and this had opened up the floodgates in Claude Lamont’s ex-wife at the café. Yvette had insisted that it was she, not Claude, who’d kept the books for Compagnie Mistral over the years, nudging their bottom line out of the red and well into the black, for which he took all the credit. According to her, Claude was a surprisingly unintelligent man who knew as much about budgeting and marketing as her two poodles, Pierrot and Pierette. At this point, she’d shown Cecile several cellphone photos of the dogs.
When Cecile had asked her how Claude had managed to rise through the ranks if Yvette had been doing all the actual work, she’d shrugged, ordered another martini, and loudly announced that this was how Claude Lamont made his way through life: He attached himself to smart people and used them to create the illusion that he was le gros légume. He had only one goal, as far as Yvette knew, and that was to be stupendously, mindlessly rich, to wash away the stench of his father the day laborer, his mother the secretary, and the three-room flat above a dockside bar in Marseille that had been his home for the first eighteen years of his life. But he didn’t have the brains for it, which is where Yvette had come in.
