27

LOUISA LAY VERY still. The bitter taste of chloroform soured her lips and a thick, musky odour clung to the stuffy night air. All that covered her was a thin, soiled sheet bunched over her thighs and sluggish blue rays of moonlight seeping in through the grimy, barred window. Her wrists were bound to the iron bed. Her arms were numb, her heart was aching with terror.

The mewling cries that rang with an almost human despair had stopped now, but the charged silence was even more terrible. Her eyes stole warily through the darkness waiting for something to move. Nothing did. With a desperation bordering on madness she longed to bury her face in the pillow and scrunch herself into a ball, for lying as she was, naked and helpless, she had never felt more vulnerable nor more afraid in her life.

Earlier, when she’d dragged herself listlessly from the depths of a druggish sleep, she’d still had her clothes and had been free to move about the cluttered, cobwebby attic. Now all she could do was lie there, trapped in the gaze of wildly staring eyes that gleamed with demented humanity in the cracked, shadowy faces of long-neglected dolls. Even the broken chests and torn, scratched armchairs seemed to breathe a slow, watchful menace.

She longed for the anger of earlier that had kept her fear in check, when she hadn’t allowed herself to lie there like some limp, tragic heroine waiting to be rescued. She’d been determined then to get out of there before they did to her what they’d done to Marianne. She hadn’t seen the shooting, but she’d heard it and though a nauseating panic was swelling like a tide inside her, she had pushed it aside, using the thought of Jake to give her strength. She had no idea what had happened in Mexico, all she knew was that Consuela had lied. The fury she felt at herself for doubting him was as bitter and torturous as the guilt. But there would be time later to deal with that, what she had to concentrate on was getting out of there.

From the window she had seen tall, shuttered windows across what appeared to be a narrow alleyway. Pots of wilting geraniums were hooked over the sills, old laundry dangled in the heat. The air of normalcy was as ominous as the charged, motionless silence. Moving to one side she’d peered down the street. She saw red-tiled rooftops, more tightly shuttered windows and the stark rectangle of a church tower glinting in the sunlight. There was no sound of footsteps, no car engines, no dogs barking, birds singing or children playing. Her heart had given a sickening twist. It was impossible to say for sure, but she thought she was in the sinister village where she had once met Jake and where the only signs of life were empty cars, closed shops and a newly painted Mairie with firmly locked doors.

As fear pulsed adrenalin into her veins she had turned back into the slanted room. It was crammed full of things. Bureaux, chests, tattered armchairs, chipped porcelain, a broken doll’s house, a rusty birdcage, faded pictures in thick, ornate frames, old, discarded knitting, tapestry-covered journals with corroded brass locks. There was hardly an inch of surface or wall that wasn’t bearing a relic or a cobweb. Dust motes danced frantically in the sunlight that was streaming through the window.

To her horror she’d found the only door led into a bathroom, yellowed with age and corroded beyond use. That was when panic had devoured her anger, making her heart thump with the crazy fear that there was no other door. But there had to be, how else could they have got her in here? She searched the walls with her hands, knocking aside pictures, feeling for cracks, trying to find a hidden panel that would make something in the room move.

Dropping to her hands and knees she’d thrown aside rugs and furniture, desperate to reassure herself that she hadn’t been walled up in this forgotten mausoleum. Martina’s three-year kidnap was tightening her throat with panic. The floorboards were warped and cracked. Long, thin crevices snaked between them, but there was no sign of a trapdoor. Tears of frustration burned her eyes as she cast herself from side to side, overturning chairs, knocking over boxes, hunting furiously for something she was becoming increasingly terrified wasn’t there. But it had to be. There had to be a way into this place and therefore a way out. But there wasn’t and as the insanity of it reached her, sliding into her senses with the same inane menace of the wide-eyed dolls and empty clock faces she began beating her fists on the floor and screaming out for help.

She knew now that the door was behind the tall, heavy dresser, but even had she been able to get up from the bed there was no way of opening the door from the inside. The dresser was part of the door, it couldn’t be moved aside.

Tears trickled from the corners of her eyes as hopelessness and despair weighted her. Her swollen face throbbed with pain.

When he’d come, the man who looked so appallingly like Jake, but older, he’d stood staring at her, his chilling eyes surveying her as she’d backed into a corner. When he told her to take off her clothes she refused until he smashed an iron fist in her face. With blood pouring from her nose and mouth and sobbing with terror she had removed her clothes. He shoved her down on the bed and made her open her legs. Then taking a thin wire from his pocket he had jerked her arms over her head and tied her wrists to each side of the iron frame.

He hadn’t raped her, as she’d thought he was going to, instead he’d jammed the barrel of his gun into her and warned her if she screamed again he’d blow out her brains through her cunt. Then delivering a second, dizzying blow to her face he’d left.

That had been just before five o’clock – she knew because the church clock had chimed the hour minutes after he’d gone. Now it was sometime between eleven and midnight and the terror inside her was as consuming as the helplessness. She knew there was no one in the room with her, if there were she’d have heard them come in, but someone was breathing, a thin, nasal wheeze and the old chair beneath the window kept rocking.

Suddenly the chair began to pitch wildly as though someone had left it and a strange, descending chill congealed the air. Stifling a scream Louisa jerked her knees to her chest in a vain effort to protect herself. There was someone standing beside her, someone looking down at her, she could feel them, sense them. She heard a gentle rustle, then the creak of floorboards as though someone were walking away. She lay rigid with terror, not daring to breathe. There was a thud on the floor over by the dresser that masked the door, then a faint scratching she’d thought earlier was mice, began again.

‘Au secours!’ The plaintive cry drifted like a mist, turning Louisa to ice.

The scratching became louder and faster. ‘À l’aide. À l’aide.’ The voice was tortured with despair. ‘S’il vous plaît. À l’aide.’ The pathetic cries became fraught with panic, the clawing and scraping took on the desperation of madness. Suddenly things were falling to the floor, furniture was moving, a doll flew across the room and smashed against the wall. Louisa cried out. Her voice was drowned by the tortured groans of hysteria. Had Consuela been there she could have told her about Marie-Thérèse, the poor, demented girl who had been kept locked up in this room until she had eventually died of hunger and despair. But Consuela wasn’t there and as the tormented cries for help grew ever more frantic and the scraping and banging jarred like physical blows on Louisa’s nerves she started to scream and cry out to God in terror.

Two floors below in the shabby, stone wall kitchen, Consuela’s eyes darkened. The neighbours were well used to screams from this house for everyone knew the story of Marie-Thérèse. But Louisa’s screams were different.

She looked across the long wooden table to the man sitting opposite her, the man who had for the past three weeks gone under the name of David Mallory. His real name was Oscar Delacroix, or so he claimed. Consuela didn’t care what his real name was, all that concerned her was his fortunate likeness to Jake Mallory. Surgery had helped of course, for the right price men like Delacroix were prepared to do anything. And for some things they didn’t require paying at all.

‘Go and shut her up,’ Consuela snapped. ‘And make sure you do it this time.’

When Delacroix had gone Consuela turned her eyes to Frederico. He was fiddling nervously with a saucer, spinning it, rolling it and catching it. Sensing Consuela’s irritation he stopped. Her normal serenity was spiked through with fury. Her eyes were glacial, her beautiful lips pressed harshly together.

She wasn’t fool enough to imagine Jake wouldn’t get himself out of that jail, but she was afraid he was going to manage it much sooner than she’d bargained for. It didn’t bother her that he would come for her, she expected it, it was why she had Louisa, but with the police searching for her here in France she couldn’t move from this house. Neither could Delacroix. Someone had seen him dumping Marianne’s car. It wouldn’t matter that they had to stay holed up here were it not for the fact that they’d left Marianne where someone was going to find her sooner than Consuela wanted them to.

With time no longer on her side she knew how grave an error it would be to make any panic decisions. She wasn’t sure if Jake knew about this house, tucked away in a dark, cobbled, back street of Chateauneuf. If he didn’t she’d have to find a way to let him know. She was relying on the fact that when he came he wouldn’t bring the police with him. If he really meant to kill her, he wouldn’t. But of course he meant to kill her, after what she’d done to Martina she’d be a fool to doubt it.

She looked again at Frederico’s young, frightened face. She should never have got him involved in this. He couldn’t handle it. Getting him to masquerade as Danny in order to convince Louisa she was insane had worked so far, and with Marie-Thérèse for company upstairs it would have continued to work, but they could go no further with it. There wasn’t the time. So what did she do with Frederico? One word to Delacroix was all it would take to erase the problem.

She got abruptly to her feet and walked to the narrow staircase beside the hearth. When she reached the room above she sat in front of the mirror and looked at herself. She saw what the rest of the world saw, a beautiful, elegant woman in late middle age. The casing was perfect, but the inside was eaten away with a rage and a bitterness so profound it was as though every organ of her body had been affected by it.

She started to laugh. The mirth welled up from deep inside her, vibrating her body, issuing from her lips, pealing through the silence and causing tears to flow from her eyes. What a performance she had given all these years, what fools she had made of them all, for none of them had ever guessed that beneath her delicate, pampered skin and saintly smile beat a heart of such festering malice it was destroying them all. Except Jake, of course. He knew, but he’d never been able to tell. What joy it had given her to see his impotence, what pleasure she had gained from his torment.

She’d told him three years ago that he would never have the woman he loved and now he could be in no doubt that she’d meant it. She had vowed to destroy him and that was exactly what she was doing. He would live out his life in misery, knowing that the two women he had loved had died for that very reason. Her teeth gritted with the thrill of the power she had over him, the power he handed her just by loving. Had he left Martina alone, had he never tried to find her then Martina would still be alive. He would know that by now and no matter that she had paid the man who had shot Martina, Jake, being the man he was, would always blame himself. He was a victim of his own conscience, something she would never be. She’d kissed goodbye to her conscience a long time ago, she’d had no further use for it. What the hell did she care about anyone? Who the hell had ever cared about her?

A lifetime’s resentment glittered in her eyes as she put a hand to her head and peeled away the sleek, blonde wig. She was an old woman now, old beyond her years. What hair she had was grey and wiry, her scalp was dry, the skin cracked and flaking. It was a grotesque cap around a face that had clung desperately, defiantly to its beauty. But what good had beauty ever done her? Where were her joyful memories? What had happened to the love? Who had taken her share of life’s pleasures? What right had they to those pleasures when they should have been hers? She’d watched the burgeoning joy around her, she’d seen the light of love in eyes that had blinded themselves to her pain. She’d lived the lie, she’d hidden the misery and buried the resentment. She’d played her part, suffering silently and alone, watching the years pass, seeing no end to her hell and knowing that no one, not even those she had once trusted and loved, cared what was happening to her.

The betrayal had been so bitter, the hurt so deep and the pain and humiliation so severe that the only way she could bear it was to pretend. What an actress she had become, as accomplished as any Hollywood star or any whore. She had performed so convincingly, had enacted an existence of such blissful contentment and wifely adoration that in the end it was she, the helpless victim of a cruel and vindictive fate, who had crushed all the beauty and goodness from her soul. What need did she have of such things when they had been so treacherously and unforgivably abused? She had sacrificed her youth and her innocence, all her hopes and dreams, for a family who had cared more for their good name and the rebuilding of their fortune than they had for the plight of their own daughter.

That daughter no longer existed. Consuela de Santiago, whose Spanish blood was as blue as any royal’s, whose nature was as wayward and flirtatious as the sun that had sparkled over her charmed and happy life, had died forty years ago the day she married Carmelo Santini. Now she was no more than a shell, a beautifully sculpted frame that like a coffin contained the long-decayed ruins of her dreams, the ashes of her hopes and veins that seethed with hatred and vengeance. After her parents had turned away, refusing to incur the wrath of the mighty and powerful Santini, she had never again told a living soul of the pain and degradation, imprisonments and penury he made her suffer. She had watched her friends feign ignorance and carried her burden alone. She had played her role, kept up appearances, maintained her dignity while all the time nurturing the hatred that would one day ruin them all.

Now the pretence was over. The curtain had fallen with Martina’s death. Martina, the fruit of Santini’s loins, the only truly precious gift he had ever given her. Were it not for Martina then maybe she would have tried to take back something of her life. Maybe she would have gone away somewhere and started again. Poverty would have been no hardship when compared with the violence and oppression of her marriage. Anonymity would have been a blessed release from the pretence and the fear. But that was before Santini had given her his bastard daughter, the child of a whore, the one weapon with which she could get back at him. So she stayed, for what would Martina’s life be without a mother to love and protect her? What chance would she stand with a father who behind his public facade of Christian righteousness and human compassion was nothing more than a sadist and a gangster who, like so many others in their godforsaken land, had connived and cheated, corrupted and extorted his way into the corridors of power? She couldn’t leave an innocent child to the mercy of a man she knew to be a monster, now could she?

She had dedicated thirty years of her life to Martina and as far as she was able had come to love the child. But no emotion flourished in her with the same might as her hatred for Carmelo Santini. Publicly they were a golden couple blessed with beauty and riches, privately he took his pleasure inflicting misery and humiliation on his high-born wife. Words of criticism or complaint were repaid by months of confinement in this very house so far from her homeland – and the breakdowns that had very nearly annihilated her sanity were treated by those whose silence could be bought. Never was a word either printed or spoken against her feared and revered husband whose concern for his wife’s health was as false as his tears. He was the son of Italian peasants with no breeding and no morals. Being the head of a frigorifico was just a cover for his racketeering, drug-running, pimping and gambling. His rivals never survived the contest, his wife never gave him a son.

But Martina had everything, Consuela saw to that. She raised her to be the fine, spirited and noble young lady she herself had once been. Nothing of her father’s atrocities ever reached her ears, neither did the truth of her birth. As soon as Consuela learned what Santini and countless others were doing to an entire generation of Argentinians, dragging them from their homes, imprisoning them and even killing them, she had begged him to send Martina to the States, wanting to preserve the love and respect Martina had for her father.

She gave a sudden, shrill laugh. Why had she done that? Why had she cared what Martina thought of her father when Santini had never given a damn about anyone but himself? Why hadn’t she let his precious daughter see him for the depraved and sadistic monster he was?

Consuela’s mouth was trembling. Her nostrils flared as she struggled for breath. She knew why, but in the end Santini had cheated her even of that. All their married life he had sworn that when he died his fortune would be hers. It was his Christian duty, he’d insisted in his deep, sarcastic drawl, to make amends for all the pain he had caused her and to repay her for the love she had given Martina. She would be a wealthy woman with the freedom she had always craved. She hadn’t believed him until he’d shown her his will and sworn before God and a priest that he would remain true to his word. But of course he’d lied and as they’d closed the lid of his coffin she had heard his laughter rumbling through the bowels of hell. He’d left her with nothing. Nothing, unless she left Argentina and lived the rest of her life in a luxurious villa she had no means of maintaining, or a house – this house – where so many of her worst nightmares had taken place.

Then, just a few short months later Martina, ungrateful bitch that she was, had thrown her out of her life, refusing to see Jake Mallory for the adulterous, deceiving bastard that he was – that all men were.

Consuela choked and spluttered as a great heaving sensation welled from the depths of her. Hatred and fury were spewing their poison into her veins. She wanted no more of this charade, she was done with the shackles of pretence, she was rotten right through to her soul and had no more reason to hide it. Consuela de Santiago had avenged herself on all who had betrayed her. She, the greatest actress of them all, had seen the friends who had spurned her pay with their dignity and their fortunes. She, the dazzling, faithful and noble Spanish wife of an Italian mafioso, had taken his spoiled and haughty daughter’s freedom and bestowed a punishment on her and her fornicating husband that he would never forget. Now he knew the price of turning Martina against the mother who had sacrificed her life for a daughter who wasn’t even her own. Now he knew what it was to suffer as she had suffered.

As she looked in the mirror she saw the light of dementia gleaming in her eyes. She’d seen it so many times before. Her lips were cracked, her skin was sallow, her face was gaunt and old. Her beauty was being erased by the unleashing of her venom, the perfect casing was crumbling beneath the seething might of her hatred. There had been no justice for her in this life, she expected none in the next. Her faith had been eroded by the years of abuse, her belief in salvation she had buried along with her conscience. Her only joy now was to see those who’d wronged her grovel for her mercy, to see the man who had taken Martina and her fortune pay for the way he had cast her aside. She had shown him what it was to lose someone he loved, not once but twice. She had let him know the indignity of prison, the way she had known it, then she had drawn out his suffering with the uncertainty of Martina’s death. She laughed, loudly. He would be in no doubt now.

Delacroix was behind her, holding her steady as the breath heaved in her chest and the malice twisted her face. Their reflections were blurred in the dwindling light, his eyes, so like Jake’s, gazed down at her with indifferent confusion. She had tried once to put out Jake’s eyes so he would never look at another woman, he would surely be praying now that she had succeeded. Danielle Spencer had paid with her life for their one night of passion. Did he know yet, she wondered, that she had Louisa Kramer? If he did, had he guessed where she was? She hoped so for when he came she knew there was every chance he would kill her on sight. It was what she wanted, that he didn’t stop to ask questions, that he gave her no chance to beg for mercy, for once he’d done it, the very instant he’d fired the bullet, he would realize what a terrible, irreversible mistake he had made. And if he didn’t kill her right away, well then he would realize what a terrible mistake that was too.

‘You see, Jake,’ she rasped on a laboured, choking breath, ‘either way, you can’t win. Dead or alive I have more power over you than God Almighty Himself.’

Marianne had been waiting a long time now. Though night had long since stolen the light from the room it was still suffocatingly hot and the stench of her own bodily waste was making her retch. Her cheeks were wet with tears, her heart ached with the pain of Consuela’s betrayal and the fear she might never be found.

She’d regained consciousness early that morning, had heard Erik downstairs, ranting at the lifeless telephone, banging around in the kitchen, then finally she had heard him leave. There had been nothing she could do. Her arms and legs were bound so tightly that her circulation had all but ceased. The gag cut agonizingly across her mouth, the rag in her throat was impairing her breathing. Her head throbbed so relentlessly she could barely open her eyes.

The king-size bed on which she lay was hard up against the wall. When she’d come round she was scrunched into the furthest corner facing the wall, her hands and feet tied tightly to each other behind her back. The stiffness in her limbs and the weakness of hunger had made it hard for her to move, but gradually, inch by inch, while praying desperately for Erik’s return, she had finally managed to manoeuvre herself to the edge of the bed. When he came, if he came, she would let herself fall to the floor and pray that he heard.

Thanking God for blessed mercies Erik tore open the door to Jake’s house – the telephone was ringing! As he ran for it he tripped in the darkness, falling against a chest and sending the nearest lamp crashing to the floor. He swore and grabbed for the phone.

Upstairs Marianne’s bound and twisted body lay on the floor, sobs silently racking her. She had lost her balance and the crash downstairs had masked the sound of her fall.

‘Erik? Erik, is that you, son?’

‘David!’ Erik cried. ‘Thank Jesus Christ. I’ve been trying to get you …’

‘Erik, listen to me,’ Jake’s father interrupted over the crackling line. ‘They released Jake late last night …’

‘Can I talk to him? I’ve got to talk to him, David. Can you put him on?’

‘He’s not here, son.’ David Mallory’s tone told Erik all he needed to know. Jake had paid off lawyers and the police to keep his release from David as long as they could, then had got himself to the nearest airport and had very likely called David when he was already out of Mexico.

‘I don’t know what route he’s taking to Europe,’ David Mallory went on, ‘but that sure as hell’ll be where he’s heading. I haven’t been able to find out how he got out of Mexico yet, but I’m working on it, it might give us some clue as to where he’ll make his connection before Nice. Meantime, it’s over to you, Erik. You’ve got to stop him. Don’t for God’s sake let him get to that woman or he’ll kill her.’

‘I’ll do my best,’ Erik answered, at last finding a light switch. ‘But as far as I know he’s the only one who might know where she is.’

Marianne was inching painfully, desperately towards the door. She could hear every word Erik was saying.

‘Are you coming over?’ Erik asked David.

‘No. I’ve got his little girl. I’m taking her home.’

‘Of course,’ Erik said. ‘How is she?’

‘Afraid. She wants her mommy.’ David paused. ‘Do your best for Jake, son. He’s in a bad way. He’s as mad as hell and there’s no telling what he might do to get to that bitch. Personally I’d like to see her dead, but I don’t want Jake spending the next twenty years in jail. He’s got a child here that needs him. Remind him of that.’

‘I will. And David, should he get in touch with you before I find him you’ve got to make him tell you where Consuela could be. Tell him she’s got Louisa.’

Marianne’s eyes were fixed on the sliver of light coming in through the door. It wasn’t quite closed. She had to get to it, she had to knock it closed so Erik would hear. She knew where Louisa was. She could tell him. She could help him stop Jake if only she could make him hear.

‘… you’ve got to find that girl, Erik,’ David Mallory was saying. ‘You’ve got to stop him getting anywhere near Consuela, because if he does …’

‘I know, I know. You don’t have to spell it out,’ Erik interrupted, frowning up at the gallery. ‘Take down this number.’ He reeled off Jean-Claude’s number and went on, ‘If you find out anything call. I’m going to the police now, let’s just hope they don’t take it into their heads to arrest me, but we’re going to need their help on this. Will they know about Jake’s release yet?’

‘I’ll see they do by the time you get there.’

‘Great. And who knows, by some miracle they might find Marianne, the girl who worked for Jake. She’ll know where Consuela is. But for all we know she could be in on it all, or worse, she could be dead.’

Oh Erik! Erik! Marianne cried inwardly. I’m here. Please God, tell him I’m here!

Erik slammed down the phone.

Marianne was almost there. Her chest was burning with pain as she struggled to make a sound.

Erik snatched up his keys and started for the door. He paused, looked up at the gallery again, then moved on.

No! No! Don’t go! Marianne silently screamed.

As Erik reached the door a car skidded to a stop beside his own and Bob, the first mate on the Valhalla, leapt out.

Marianne inhaled a breath of relief then pushed on.

‘Is he here?’ Bob shouted.

‘You mean he’s already in France?’ Erik cried in disbelief.

‘I saw him taking off in the Mercedes from the port.’

‘You didn’t get to speak to him?’

‘Not a chance. He was gone before I could get ashore.’

‘Jesus Christ!’ Erik seethed. ‘There’s no time to go to the police, we’ll have to call them. Do you have his licence number?’

‘Sure.’

Marianne thrust herself frantically forward. She was so close now, so very close. She could hear Erik speaking to the police. He was shouting, making too much noise. He’d never hear the door close. She must wait. She positioned herself precariously on her side, praying she wouldn’t roll before she was ready. At last she heard the phone go down. She jerked her shoulder and fell back instead of forwards.

Bob and Erik raced out of the house. Erik stopped to lock up. Marianne shoved her hips against the upstairs door, barely grazing it, but it clicked shut.

Erik turned the key in the lock downstairs, pocketed it and turned to his car.

‘Where are we going?’ Bob cried, jumping into the passenger seat.

‘I wish the hell I knew,’ Erik answered, looking briefly at one of the upstairs windows. Then flooding the drive with his headlights, he slammed the car into reverse, turned and sped off into the night.

Marianne rocked from side to side, weeping and sobbing and begging hopelessly for them to come back.