The Boy Who Followed Ripley Page 6

It was 10:30 when Tom rolled through the gates of Belle Ombre, and into the shade of the garage. He folded the newspaper, stuck it under his arm, and walked around the house to the left, past Mme. Annette’s door, which had prim pots of blossoming red geraniums, one on either side—a touch of pride, Tom thought, as she had bought them herself. He saw Frank at the far end of the garden, stooped and apparently pulling weeds. From the house, through the slightly opened French windows, he heard Heloise virtuously practicing Bach. After one half hour, Tom knew, she would either put on a record of someone playing the same thing, or something to change her mood entirely, such as rock music.

  “Bil-ly,” Tom called gently, trying to fix in his mind that he must call him Billy and not Frank.

  The boy stood up from the grass and smiled. “You delivered it? Did you see her?” he asked, just as gently, as if someone in the woods beyond might hear.

  Tom was also wary of the woods behind the garden—after ten yards of scrubby underbrush the trees became thicker. Tom had once been buried there, for maybe a quarter of an hour. One couldn’t see through the waist-high nettles, the wild and thorny blackberry vines three or four yards long that produced no fruit, not to mention the tall limes just beyond, so thick that their trunks could conceal a man who wished to hide behind one. Tom jerked his head, and the boy came closer to him. They moved toward the friendly structure of the greenhouse. “Something about you in the gossip rag,” Tom said, opening the newspaper. He had turned his back on the house, whence Heloise’s playing was still audible. “I thought you should see it.”

  Frank took the paper, and Tom saw his shock in the sudden twitch of his hands. “Damn,” he said softly. He read it with his jaw clenched.

  “Do you think your brother might come over?”

  “I think it’s—yes. But to say my family’s ‘desperate’—that’s absurd.”

  Tom said lightly, “What if Johnny were to turn up here today and say, ‘Well, here you are!’ ”

  “Why should he turn up here?” asked Frank.

  “Did you ever talk about me, mention me to your family? Or to Johnny?”

  “No.”

  Tom was whispering now. “What about the Derwatt painting? Weren’t there conversations about that? Do you remember? A year or so ago?”

  “I remember. My father mentioned it, because of what was in the newspapers. It wasn’t particularly about you, not at all.”

  “But when you—you said you read about me—in the newspapers.”

  “In the Public Library in New York. That was just a few weeks ago.”

  He meant the newspaper archives. “You didn’t mention me then to your family or to anybody?”

  “Oh, no.” Frank looked at Tom, then his eyes fixed on something behind Tom, and his anxious frown came back.

  Tom turned around, and what should he see but the Old Bear Henri ambling toward them, looking big and tall as something out of a kid’s fairy tale. “Our part-time gardener. Don’t run and don’t worry. Mess your hair up a little. And let it grow—for future use. Don’t talk, just say ‘Bonjour.’ He’ll quit at noon.”

  By this time the French giant was almost within hearing, and Henri’s own booming voice, deep and loud, called out, “’Jour, Monsieur Reeply!”

  “’Jour,” Tom replied. “François,” Tom said, gesturing toward Frank. “Cleaning out some weeds.”

  “Bonjour,” Frank said. He had mussed his hair by scratching the top of his head, and now he assumed a slouch, and went off to where he had been pulling horsetail weeds and convolvulus at the back edge of the lawn.

  Tom was pleased by Frank’s performance. In his scruffy blue jacket, he might have been a local boy who had asked to do a couple of hours’ work at the Ripley house, and God knew Henri couldn’t be depended on, so Henri could hardly complain about competition. Henri could not tell the difference between Tuesday and Thursday, it seemed. Any day he set for himself was never the day he appeared. Henri didn’t show surprise now at the sight of the boy, but kept his absentminded smile, visible in encircling brown mustache and untrimmed beard. He wore baggy blue work trousers, a checked lumberjack shirt and a pale blue-and-white striped cotton cap with a bill, like an American railwayman’s cap. Henri had blue eyes. He gave the impression of being slightly fuzzy with drink always, but was never very drunk as far as Tom could see, and Tom thought perhaps that drink had done its damage at some period in the past. Henri was about forty. Tom paid him fifteen francs an hour, whatever he did, even if they just stood around and discussed potting soil or the methods of storing dahlia tubers over the winter.

  Now Tom suggested that they make another attack on the hundred-meter-long back edge of the garden, where Frank was still working, but Frank was far on their left near the little road which went into the woods there. Tom handed Henri the secateurs, and himself took the fork and rake, a strong metal rake.

  “Build a low stone wall here, and you won’t have this trouble,” Henri murmured cheerfully, taking the spade. He had made the remark many times before, and Tom did not mean to compound its boredom by repeating that he and his wife preferred the garden to appear to blend into the woods. Henri would have then told Tom that the woods were blending into the garden.

  They both worked, and when Tom looked over his shoulder some fifteen minutes later, Frank was not in sight. Good, Tom thought. If Henri asked what had happened to the boy, Tom would say that he had probably drifted off, not really wanting to work. But Henri said nothing; all the better. Tom went into the kitchen via the service door. Mme. Annette was washing something at the sink.

  “Madame Annette, a small request.”

  “Oui, Monsieur Tome!”

  “The young man with us—he has just had an unhappy experience with his girlfriend from America. He was with a few young Americans in France. So he wants to stay quiet and with us for a few days, I think. It is best if you don’t tell anyone in the village that Billy is staying with us. He doesn’t want his friends to look him up here, you see?”

  “Ah-h.” Mme. Annette understood. Affairs of the heart were personal, dramatic, wounding, and the boy was so young, her face seemed to say.

  “You haven’t mentioned Billy to anyone, have you?” Mme. Annette often visited Georges’ bar-café for a cup of tea, sitting down at a little table, Tom knew. So did other housekeepers.

  “Certainly not, monsieur.”

  “Good.” Tom went out to the garden again.

  It was nearly noon when Henri showed signs of slowing his already slow work, and remarked that it was warm. It was not warm, but Tom didn’t mind stopping his raking. They went into the greenhouse, where Tom kept a reserve of six or more bottles of Heineken lager in a square cement recess in the floor which was for drainage. Tom hauled up two bottles and opened them with a rusty bottle opener.

  The next few minutes passed vaguely for Tom, because he was thinking about Frank, wondering where he was. Henri kept up his murmuring about the meager crop of raspberries this summer, as he stalked about with his little beer bottle, bending to look at this and that plant on Tom’s shelves. Henri wore old laced boots that came high above his ankles, thick mushy soles on them, the picture of comfort though not of chic. He had the biggest feet Tom could remember having seen on any man. Did Henri’s feet really fill those boots? But judging from his hands, they might.

  “Non, trente,” Henri said. “Don’t you remember the last time? You were short fifteen.”

  Tom didn’t, but gave Henri thirty francs anyway rather than argue.

  Then Henri pushed off, promising to return next Tuesday or Thursday. It was all the same to Tom. Henri was on “permanent retirement” or “repos,” due to an injury on some job years ago. He had an easy, anxiety-free life, and in many ways was to be envied, Tom thought, as he watched his great figure stalk off and pass the beige turreted corner of Belle Ombre. Tom rinsed his hands at the greenhouse sink.

  A few minutes later, Tom entered his house by the front door. A Brahms quartet was playing on the st
ereo in the living room, and perhaps Heloise was there. Tom went upstairs, looking for Frank. Frank’s room door was closed, and Tom knocked on it.

  “Come in?” said Frank’s voice in the questioning tone Tom had heard before.

  Tom went in and saw that Frank had packed his suitcase, removed sheets and blanket from his bed, and folded them neatly. He had also changed out of his work clothes. And he also saw that Frank was near breaking, or near tears, though the boy held himself straight. “Well,” Tom said softly, and closed the door. “What’s up?— Worried about Henri?” Tom knew it wasn’t Henri, but he had to lead the boy to talk. The newspaper still poked from a back pocket of Tom’s trousers.

  “If it isn’t Henri, it’ll be somebody else,” Frank said in a shaky but rather deep voice.

  “Now what’s wrong—up to now?” Johnny was coming, with a private detective, and the game might soon be up, Tom thought. But what game? “Why don’t you want to go back home?”

  “I killed my father,” Frank said in a whisper. “Yes, I pushed him over that—” The boy gave up, his mouth seemed to crumple like that of an old man, and he lowered his head.

  A murderer, Tom thought. And why? Tom had never seen such a gentle murderer. “Does Johnny know?”

  Frank shook his head. “No. Nobody saw me.” His brown eyes glistened with tears, but there were not enough tears to fall.

  Tom understood, or was beginning to. The boy’s conscience had driven him away. Or somebody’s words. “Did anybody say anything? Your mother?”

  “Not my mother. Susie—the housekeeper. But she didn’t see me. She couldn’t have. She was in the house. Anyway, she’s shortsighted and the cliff isn’t even visible from the house.”

  “She said something to you or somebody else?”

  “Both. The police—didn’t believe her. She’s old. A little cracked.” Frank moved his head like someone under torture, and sought his suitcase on the floor. “I’ve told you—okay. You’re the only person in the world I’d tell, and I don’t care what you say. I mean, to the police or anyone. But I’d better take off.”

  “Come on now, take off to where?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Tom knew. He couldn’t get out of France even with his brother’s passport. He had nowhere to hide except in fields. “You’re not going to be able to go anywhere outside of France and not far inside it. Look, Frank, we’ll talk about this after lunch. We have all the—”

  “Lunch?” Frank’s tone sounded as if he were affronted by the word.

  Tom advanced toward him. “I’m giving you orders now. It’s lunchtime. You can’t just disappear now, it’d look strange. Now you pull yourself together, eat a good lunch, and we’ll talk afterward.” Tom reached out to shake the boy’s hand, but Frank edged back.

  “I’ll go while I can!”

  Tom grabbed the boy’s shoulder with his left hand, his throat with his right. “You will not. You will not!” Tom gave his throat a shake, then released him.

  The boy’s eyes were wide and thoroughly shocked. That was what Tom wanted. “Come on with me. Downstairs.” Tom gestured, and the boy preceded him toward the door. Tom went into his own room for a minute to get rid of the France-Dimanche. For good measure, he stuck it in a back corner of his closet among shoes. He did not want Mme. Annette to find it even in the wastebasket.

  5

  Downstairs, Heloise was arranging orange and white gladioli—Tom knew she disliked them and that Mme. Annette must have cut them—in a tall vase on the coffee table. She looked up and smiled at Tom and Frank. To relax himself, Tom deliberately shrugged as if he were adjusting a jacket on his shoulders: he meant to be calm and cool.

  “Nice morning?” Tom asked Heloise in English.

  “Yes. I see that Henri decided to appear.”

  “Doing the minimum as usual. Billy’s better.” Tom motioned for Frank to follow him into the kitchen, whence Tom could smell—he thought—broiling lamb chops. “Madame Annette—excusez-nous. I would like a small aperitif before lunch.”

  She was indeed inspecting lamb chops in the over-the-stove grill. “But Monsieur Tome, you should have told me! Bonjour, monsieur!” she said to Frank.

  Frank replied politely.

  Tom went to the bar cart, which was now in the kitchen, and poured a scotch, not too big or too small, into a glass and poked it into Frank’s hand. “Water?”

  “A little.”

  Tom added some water from the sink tap, and handed the glass back to Frank. “This will loosen you up, not necessarily your tongue,” Tom murmured. Tom made himself a gin and tonic without ice, though Mme. Annette wanted at once to get some out of the refrigerator. “Let’s go back,” Tom said to Frank, nodding toward the living room.

  They went back, took their places at the table with their drinks, and Mme. Annette almost at once brought the first course of her homemade jellied consommé. Heloise chattered away about her Adventure Cruise for late September. Noëlle had rung her that morning with some more details.

  “The Antarctic,” said Heloise with joy. “We may need—oh—just imagine the kind of clothes! Two pairs of gloves at once!”

  Longjohns, Tom was thinking. “Or do they turn on central heating somewhere at that price?”

  “O-oh, Tome!” Heloise said with good humor.

  She knew he didn’t give a damn about the cost. Jacques Plisson was probably making Heloise a present of the trip, since he knew Tom was not going.

  Frank asked how long the cruise would last, and how many people would be on the boat—this from Frank in French—and Tom found himself appreciative of the boy’s upbringing, those old customs of writing thank-you letters three days after receiving a present, whether one liked the present or the aunt who had given it, or not. The average American boy aged sixteen would not have been able to keep such cool, Tom thought, under the circumstances. When Mme. Annette passed the lamb chop platter for the second helping—four remained on the platter and Heloise had eaten only one—Tom served Frank with a third chop.

  Then the telephone rang.

  “I’ll get it,” Tom said. “Excuse me.” Odd to have a phone call in the sacred French lunch hour, and Tom was not expecting a call. “Hello,” Tom said.

  “Hello, Tom! It’s Reeves.”

  “Hang on, would you?” Tom laid the telephone down on the table and said to Heloise, “Long distance. I’ll take it upstairs so I don’t shout.” Tom ran up the stairs, lifted the telephone in his room, and told Reeves to hang on again. Tom went down and hung up the downstairs telephone. Meanwhile he was thinking that it was a piece of luck that Reeves had rung, because a new passport for Frank might well be in order, and Reeves was just the man for that. “Back again,” said Tom. “What’s new, my friend?”

  “Oh, not too much,” Reeves Minot said in his hoarse, naïve-sounding American voice. “Just a little—uh—well, that’s why I’m calling. Can you put a friend up—for one night?”

  Tom did not like the idea just now. “When?”

  “Tomorrow night. His name is Eric Lanz. Coming from here. He can make it to Moret, so you won’t have to pick him up at the airport, but—best if he doesn’t stay at a hotel in Paris overnight.”

  Tom squeezed the telephone nervously. The man was carrying something, of course. Reeves was a fence, mainly. “Sure. Yes, sure,” Tom said, thinking if he demurred, Reeves would not be so forthcoming when Tom put in his own request. “For one night only?”

  “Yes, that’s all. Then he’s going to Paris. You’ll see. Can’t explain more.”

  “I’m to meet him at Moret? What does he look like?”

  “He’ll know you. He’s in his late thirties, not very tall, black hair. Got the timetable here, Tom, and Eric can make the eight-nineteen tomorrow night. Arrival time, that is.”

  “Very—good,” said Tom.

  “You don’t sound very keen. But it’s sort of important, Tom, and I’d be—”

  “Of course I’ll do it, Reeves old boy! While you’re h
ere—on the line—I’m going to need an American passport. I’ll send a photo to you express Monday and you ought to have it by Wednesday latest. I assume you’re in Hamburg?”

  “Sure, same place,” said Reeves cozily, as if he were running a teashop, but Reeves’s apartment house on the Alster—Reeves’s apartment specifically—had been bombed once. “For yourself?” asked Reeves.

  “No, someone younger. Not over twenty-one, Reeves, so not an old well-used passport. Can you do that?— You’ll hear from me.”

  Tom hung up and went downstairs again. Raspberry ice had been served. “Sorry,” Tom said. “Nothing important.” He noticed that Frank looked better, that some color had returned to his face.

  “Who was that?” Heloise asked.

  Seldom did she ask him who rang, and Tom knew she mistrusted Reeves Minot, or at least didn’t much like him, but Tom said, “Reeves from Hamburg.”

  “He’s going to come here?”

  “Oh, no, just wanted to say hello,” Tom replied. “Want coffee, Billy?”

  “No, thank you.”

  Heloise did not usually take coffee at lunch, and she didn’t now. Tom said that Billy wanted to look at his Jane’s Fighting Ships books, so the three left the table, and Tom and the boy went up to Tom’s room.

  “Damned annoying phone call,” Tom said. “Friend of mine in Hamburg wants me to put up a friend of his tomorrow night. Just for the night. I couldn’t say no, because he’s very helpful—Reeves.”

  Frank nodded. “Would you like me to go to a hotel or something—near here?—Or just go?”

  Tom shook his head. He was lying on his bed, propped on an elbow. “I’ll give him your room, you’ll take mine—and I’ll sleep in Heloise’s room. So this room will remain closed and—I’ll tell our guest we’re fumigating the carpenter ants and the door can’t be opened.” Tom laughed. “Don’t worry. I’m pretty sure he’ll leave Monday morning. I’ve had overnight guests of Reeves’s before.”

  Frank had sat down on the wooden chair that Tom used at his desk. “Is the fellow coming one of your—interesting friends?”