by Tom Savage
In the third photograph, the man sat in a chair at an outdoor café on the waterfront, wearing the same dark coat as in the others. He was propped on his elbows, a cup and saucer between his hands, talking to another man who sat with his back to the camera. This picture was sharper than the other two, probably because the subject wasn’t moving. It was a zoom-in close-up. Nora leaned forward, staring.
Ellie came back into the room, pulling on a gray jacket over her gray slacks and white blouse. Nora knew the jacket was to conceal a shoulder holster; that was obviously what Jeff had been discussing with her. Ellie took one look at the expression on Nora’s face and stopped short.
“What?” she said. “What’s the matter?”
Nora held up the photo in her hand and waved to indicate the two on the board. “These pictures—is this the man Ken Nelson is trying to find?”
Ellie nodded. “Yes, that’s the guy.”
“Do you know when and where he took them?”
“Last week, here in Fort-de-France. Why?”
Nora said, “Do you have the originals?”
Ellie frowned, then moved over to the computer on the desk and worked on the keyboard. “Yes, here they are.”
“Send all three of them to my husband, Mr. Green, and Ralph Johnson, please. I’ll dictate the message to go with them.”
Ellie fiddled with the computer a bit, then said, “Okay, shoot.” She typed as Nora spoke.
Nora said, “ ‘KN took these pix here last week. Is this who I think it is?’ Sign it, ‘Mrs. John Doe.’ ”
Ellie sent the message. “Okay, I have about a million questions, but I’ll save them for later. Let’s go.” She switched off the computer and moved, but she didn’t head for the front door. Instead, she led Nora through the archway toward Ken Nelson’s apartment.
Chapter 23
The building that now housed the dress shop and the detective agency had originally been a residence, which explained the interior staircase in the back hallway. Nora followed Ellie down the stairs to a door that opened into the stockroom behind the dress shop. They continued through the long racks of dresses and stacks of lacquered boxes and shopping bags to the back door, then out into the bright daylight. The door behind them shut with a distinct click.
The alley behind the buildings was lined with plastic trash receptacles. The back door of the building on the next street stood a few feet in front of them. A high chain-link fence ran beside the dress shop and the building behind it, effectively cutting off any escape through the alleyway. Ellie walked directly up to the door facing them and knocked. The door was opened by a smiling young woman, who beckoned them inside.
As they trooped through the new building—a furniture store—Ellie placed a call to someone named Lester, explaining in French that she was being stalked by an ex-boyfriend who was waiting for her outside the agency, and could he bring her car around the corner to the next street? “Oui? Merci!” Then she high-fived her friend the furniture saleswoman and led Nora out through the front door to the next street over from the avenue where Gangsta Guy was stationed.
They walked up the hill to the next corner. As they arrived there, the red Audi roared around the corner from the avenue and screeched to a stop beside them. The driver’s door opened and a tall young man with impressively beaded, shoulder-length cornrows unfolded himself from the interior. He rose up to his full, seven-foot height and grinned down at Ellie.
“Merci, Les,” Ellie said with a heart-stopping smile for him.
Les launched into an animated speech in what was apparently a mix of French and the local Creole. Nora didn’t understand a word, but his tone and body language gave her the gist of it: “Please allow me to go down the hill and rearrange Gangsta Guy’s teeth and limbs for you.” Ellie replied in the same odd-sounding pidgin amalgam: Thanks for your kind offer, but no, you mustn’t, because he’s crazier than a snakebit dog and he has a really big gun. Les shrugged his massive shoulders, conceding to her wisdom, and folded himself down to plant a kiss on her cheek. He gave Nora a little salute and strode away to his parking lot, his beaded braids flashing in the sunshine.
As they got in the car and buckled up, Nora said, “You have a lot of nice friends.”
“Yes, the people here are lovely. I like island life.”
Ellie turned at the corner and drove down the hill, past the furniture store to the next corner. As they crossed the intersection, they both looked over to see Gangsta Guy standing on the corner beside the pink guesthouse, gazing steadily up the street toward the detective agency. Ellie drove them down three more blocks, hung a right, drove west to the avenue, and swung into the hotel entranceway. The valet handed her a ticket, and they went inside.
When they entered the freezing lobby, Nora glanced at her watch. “It’s almost eleven o’clock. Would you like a massage, or maybe a facial?”
Ellie grinned. “I could use a manicure.”
“Excellent,” Nora said. “The Company will pay for it. Charge it to my room—which is where I’ll be while you’re at the spa. Then we can have lunch. Not the fancy dining room, though—how’s that coffee shop over there?” She pointed to the room across the lobby from the Gril de Port. The gold lettering above the archway read CAFÉ AMERICAIN, and she could see a long lunch counter and booths.
“It’s a New York Greek diner, French-style,” Ellie said. “Ken says the club sandwich there is outstanding.”
Ken, Nora thought. She hoped Ken Nelson was okay…
“Perfect,” she said. “I’ll meet you there. Call me when you’re ready.”
They entered an elevator. Nora got out on the third floor, and Ellie continued up to the top floor, where the spa, gym, and hotel swimming pool were located. As soon as Nora was in her room, she called Jeff.
“Holy cow!” was her husband’s greeting the moment he answered the phone. “I’ve been staring at these pictures ever since you sent them. Good work, Pal!”
“It was Ken Nelson who took them, Jeff, and I’m worried about him.” She told him about Mr. Nelson’s actions following his taking the photos last week. “Ellie hasn’t heard from him since, and neither has his girlfriend, Gabrielle. What do you think?”
“I think it doesn’t sound good,” he said. “What does Ellie think?”
“Oh, Jeff, she doesn’t even know! She thinks he’s off hunting down a missing person. She didn’t recognize the man in the photos when she saw them. I don’t think she’s ever heard of Diablo.”
Jeff sighed at the other end of the line, and Nora knew the sound: It was his frustration sigh. “Sheesh! I think you should bring her up to speed.”
“Okay, I will, but I don’t know how she’s going to take it. You just be sure you capture Diablo tonight.”
“I’ll try, Pal. How’s your tail—if you’ll forgive me the crude question.”
Nora would usually laugh at her husband’s corny humor, but not today; she was too worried about Ken Nelson. “My tail is right where he should be, standing out in the rain.”
“Is it raining there?” he asked.
“No, dear; it’s a metaphor, like ‘twiddling your thumbs’ or ‘pounding sand.’ He’s on the corner near the detective agency, waiting for me to come out, and he’s gonna have a nice long wait.” She lowered her voice. “Jeff, who sent him?”
Her husband lowered his voice, too. “I don’t know, but if I ever find out, they’re gonna be singing soprano from now on—that’s another metaphor. Don’t try to detain him, and don’t call the cops. Leave him alone, or whoever hired him will know you’re onto them. You stick with Ellie today, okay?”
“Okay. What’s Claude Lamont up to this morning?”
“Well, he hasn’t made an appearance yet; he’s probably sleeping in. His friend Melanie and her husband had breakfast in the café, two tables away from me. They’re going ashore soon, a
beach picnic or something. You should see Barbados, Pal—it’s even prettier than the other islands so far!”
“Don’t rub it in. Martinique is beautiful, too, but all I’m seeing of it is this damn hotel, and it’s like the North Pole in here. Ellie is getting her nails done—well, actually, she’s watching Carmen, who’s getting her nails done. And Ellie’s armed now. I assume that’s what you told her to do on the phone. You could have said that in front of me, Jeff—I’m not a porcelain doll. Never mind; I’m not really mad at you. But now that we’re back at the hotel, what do we do? What if Gangsta Guy shows up again?”
Jeff grunted. Then he repeated, “You stick with Ellie today. I love you, Pal.”
“I love you more.” Nora had just put down the phone when it buzzed again. She snatched it up, thinking that Jeff was calling back, but it was Ralph Johnson. “Hi, Ralph.”
“Hello, Mrs. Baron. Um, I have some intel for you, but it’s kind of weird.”
Nora sat on the edge of the bed. She could hear the tension in his voice. “Is this about the photos Ken Nelson took? Is it Diablo?”
“Um, I don’t know about that—we’ve sent them to our analysts. They should have a report soon, but they just called with an update about the woman you’ve seen with Carmen Lamont. They were looking around the Caribbean area—you know, local records and voting rosters and so forth—but they finally opened up the search to include South America and Europe. This is really weird…”
“What?” Nora said. “What did they find?”
“Well, they found two women who matched the photos you sent, one in Spain and one in Colombia.”
“Wait—what?” Nora said. “Carmen is from Spain, but how can the other woman live in two places?”
“Hold on,” Ralph said. “You don’t understand. The photos you sent us from Puerto Rico had two women in them. According to our analysis, they’re both named Carmen Mendoza.”
Nora exhaled. “Oh. So they’re cousins, maybe, both named after the same grandmother or something…”
“Maybe,” Ralph said, “but that’s not the weird part. I’m sending you pictures of both women so you can see for yourself. These are driver’s licenses from Spain and Colombia issued about ten years ago, with addresses, dates of birth—and photos. I’m also sending you one of your pictures, a blown-up detail of the two women’s hands when they greeted each other at El Morro. The analyst noticed a flash of something white in their clasped hands—it’s a small envelope that the other woman is passing to Carmen Lamont. I’m sending them now. Have a look.”
Nora put him on hold and opened the email. The top photo was the blowup of the hands from her own photo, and when she enlarged it on the screen she could see the white paper between their fingers. It looked like one of those little enclosure envelopes that come with cards on bouquets from a florist, only this one was bulky; it clearly contained something thicker than a card. But the envelope wasn’t the big surprise—the other two pictures were downright bizarre. Nora glanced at them, then looked again. She stared.
There, side by side, were two driver’s licenses—all in Spanish, but it didn’t matter that she couldn’t read them. Nora could see the dates from ten years ago, and she could see what Ralph meant. It was definitely weird.
Two attractive young women with the same name, Mendoza, Carmen. Dark hair and eyes. Close to the same age. But there was one problem: The photo on the Spain driver’s license was the woman from Puerto Rico, and the photo from Colombia was the woman Nora knew as Mrs. Claude Lamont.
Chapter 24
“I don’t understand,” Ellie Singer said.
Nora shrugged. “Neither do I. This soap opera is becoming very complicated.”
“Two women with the same name—that I can understand,” Ellie said, “especially since we can both see a clear family resemblance. I’m guessing cousins, right? But your cousin, the one who’s married to the French tycoon, is supposed to be from Spain, right? So how can she be the one from South America? And what does all this have to do with your mission on the Tropic Star?”
Nora shrugged again. “They’re looking into it.”
She glanced around Café Americain from their booth near the entrance. Wood-grain-patterned vinyl floor tiles, red Naugahyde banquettes, wood-grain-patterned Formica counters and tabletops: The displaced New York City diner wasn’t very busy, but she didn’t want anyone overhearing their business. Thankfully, nobody was paying the slightest attention to them, and she hadn’t seen any suspicious types around the room or in the hotel lobby beyond the archway. She was keeping a sharp eye out for Gangsta Guy.
“About my mission, Ellie—I have some things to tell you. Let’s go for a walk after lunch. But first, what’s your update on Madame Lamont?”
“Okay,” Ellie said as their club sandwiches with fries and Diet Cokes were lowered before them. “She was close enough for me to hear her in the nail salon. She made two calls, one to the other Carmen and one to the main dining room.” She jerked a thumb toward the Gril de Port. “I didn’t understand why she said ‘Hola, Carmen’ then—I thought she meant ‘Hello, this is Carmen’—but now I get it. She spoke to Other Carmen in Spanish, and I’m not great at the language, so I didn’t get everything, except that they were talking about food. Then she called the Gril de Port and made a reservation for four at nine o’clock tonight. She also ordered lunch to be served in her room at two o’clock, an omelet and a pot of Darjeeling tea. That call was in French, so I got it all.”
“A reservation for four,” Nora said. “Hmm.” She ate two garlic-tinged pommes frites and picked up her sandwich, which was a single-decker on a baguette instead of the usual double-decker on white toast. French-style, apparently. She wondered who was joining the two Carmens for dinner tonight…
Ellie said, “Those pictures this morning, the ones from Ken’s bulletin board—that’s the man he’s looking for. But you totally freaked when you saw them, and you sent them to Mr. Baron. Does Ken’s missing-persons case have something to do with your mission?”
“Eat,” Nora said. “Then we’ll talk. Thanks to your legwork—or should I say nail work?—we now know that we have the afternoon free. Madame Lamont is in the hotel for the day, and she’s safe while she’s here—nobody would try a hit on her inside a secure hotel; they’d wait until she’s out in the open, like in Guadeloupe. I want to get out of here for a while. Your nails look great, by the way.”
Ellie grinned and held up her hands, splaying her fingers for Nora’s inspection. “This shade is called Femme Fatale—I couldn’t resist that!” She lowered her hands, and her grin vanished. “Carmen Lamont chose the same shade.”
Nora thought about that.
When lunch was over, they walked down to the harbor. The bright morning had become a distinctly overcast afternoon; dark clouds had rolled quietly in on the trade winds. The humidity in the air had thickened, brushing against Nora’s skin as she walked. They strolled east along the waterfront esplanade, looking out at the boats bobbing in the choppy water. Fort St-Louis stood before them in the far distance, sprawled atop the city’s easternmost headland. Ellie pointed to it.
“Mr. Baron was on a tour of the fort yesterday, and his tour group had to be scanned and cleared before they could go up there, which is a recent rule. It’s an active military garrison again, for the first time in many years. The new wave of terrorism has affected many countries, of course, but France has been particularly victimized. They’ve reactivated a lot of the old French forts around the world. There’s a fair-size army stationed up there now.”
Nora nodded. “Yes, I was in Besançon on France’s eastern border two years ago, and the old Citadel at Mont St-Etienne there has been restarted as well. It’s scary, all these defunct fortresses being brought back to life.” She looked up at the distant stronghold, thinking of her own current business. She wondered if there was an active British garrison
in Barbados—Jeff might need their help tonight. This reminded her of her reason for bringing Ellie Singer on this walk.
“Ellie,” Nora said now, “I’ve been instructed to brief you on our mission, and I’m afraid it might upset you. It concerns Ken Nelson and the man in the photos.”
“So, they are related,” Ellie said. “I thought so.” She stopped walking, so Nora stopped as well. Ellie looked away from her, out over the water. “Ken’s dead, isn’t he?”
Nora grasped the young woman’s arm, forcing her to turn and face her. Looking directly into Ellie’s eyes, she said, “We don’t know. There’s no way to know at this time. Let me tell you everything I’ve learned so far. That way, you’ll be better prepared for—for whatever happens.”
Ellie nodded once, and a single tear ran down the side of her face. “Tell me.”
Nora got them moving again. She had no personal ties to the people in her operation, but this young woman’s colleague and friend was involved. His long silence didn’t bode well for his safe return, and Ellie was worried. Nora was familiar with the effects of anxiety, so she knew that walking was better for the subject than standing still. The brisk wind from the sea would help, too. The temperature in Martinique had dropped noticeably since this morning, and the heavy clouds looming over the harbor promised rain by nightfall.
Nora chose her words carefully as they walked along the quay. “It all started a few months ago in Miami, with a young woman named Mary Ross…”
Chapter 25
The rain began just as Nora and Ellie were returning to the hotel. They ran the final two blocks up the hill from the harbor, but Nora slowed as they approached the main entrance. Ellie saw this and immediately understood. While Nora waited outside, Ellie slipped in through the glass doors to look around. She came back out moments later.
“All clear,” she said, and she and Nora went inside. Even so, Nora scanned the lobby and restaurants, making sure that Gangsta Guy or some new equivalent of him was nowhere in sight.
