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I WAS ABLE TO GET OUT of bed the next day and put away some solid food, but I was broody and impossible to please. Probably another case of my mood going along with my physical state.
Samantha was not to blame for my temperament. I felt we had come out fairly even, or as even as I cared to get. Memories of those special moments of closeness had become a dull ache in a place I could not reach, the inconsolable sorrow after something lovely has been destroyed. In a sense my loss was no different from Henri's.
I tried reading the newspaper with my breakfast coffee, but it was only more of the same, the George Wrexhams of the world preying on Hugh Marsfords and Tom Martins who had let their guards down. Nothing new, but still depressing. The idea that I saved Marsford’s chateau from a thieving rat helped. It was a shame nobody had been able to protect the man himself, or Lily.
The scene outside my hospital window was maddeningly ordinary. People scurried about on insignificant weekday business like citizens who had missed some earth-shaking newscast. But, of course, nothing that had happened to me or Tom or Samantha mattered to any of them.
I got to thinking maybe Hugh Marsford had dealt with human nature better than I ever would. Why else would he build a stairway mocking man’s ambition? Why promise a limit to the faithfulness of an attractive young wife unless he fully appreciated the difficulties their marriage placed on her? Perhaps Marsford even suspected his hidden inheritance would be his offspring's undoing. And his own. Maybe the wise old kook had known what he was doing all along.
Since the hospital in Mont Madelaine had a decent library, I was content to linger in my sanitary white cubicle insulated from the world until the doctors finally pronounced me fit. Even the bruise from my mugging had completely healed by the time I paid my bill.
That was early Friday morning, and Tom and Marie were expected back the next afternoon at three. There was something I needed to do before I left Saturday evening, but I felt it could wait another day. Instead I gathered my belongings together so packing would be no chore. Pascaline had tidied up in my absence. The wine-soaked T-shirt was predictably missing, and the stain on the floor had been scrubbed clean. It would take only a few moments to erase my presence from the Turkish den.
By eleven thirty I was free to take a leisurely tour of the property. I felt like a tourist with no responsibilities to dampen my appreciation of Marsford’s work. I lingered lazily over the pieces I particularly admired and skipped certain areas of the garden, such as the gravesite, altogether.
Henri was watering bushes again beside the vandalized gardening shed. It was just a shed now with nothing concealed except shovels and rakes. He and I nodded curtly to each other, our relationship unaltered from the moment we had met. His brief glance seemed to indicate he wanted to forget I had been there as soon as possible.
Pascaline supplied me with enough lunch for two lumberjacks, her method of making peace between us. I ate what I could and gave her a thank-you kiss. Before she turned her head away, I saw tears forming in her eyes, so I squeezed her hands, and she hugged me.
Afterwards, I phoned for an airline reservation to Switzerland and wired Alan Katz that I would return home in a week or ten days. He would have to settle for a scenic oil of a late summer mountain instead of the nude bathers he’d requested. I intended to keep the watercolor of the garden and the courtyard’s winged god.
When I finally returned to my favorite corner overlooking the sea, an opened bottle of cold white wine and a glass waited on the tile table. Pascaline was really a remarkable old girl.
I settled into the lounge chair and drank until the students’ bright sailboats were towed home in a string and the sharp Mediterranean colors had become bubblegum pastels to my blurry eyes.
I vaguely remember Pascaline tucking me into bed while I sang every bawdy French song in my repertoire. If she was offended by the lyrics or my newly revealed French, she never mentioned it in the morning.
By the time Tom and Marie arrived, I had worked the sour mood out of my system. I helped with their luggage and told Marie she looked wonderful, which she did.
"I'm taking a bath and a nap, and I'll see you gentlemen later," she announced, then added, "Richard, you look thin and pale. What have you been doing for two weeks?"
"I've had a very exciting night life," I told her. But Tom would not let it go so easily. After Marie disappeared inside the gatehouse, he walked me into the courtyard.
"Did anything...happen?" he asked.
"I'll tell you over a quick beer–my plane leaves in three hours. But first I have a surprise for you. At least I think I have a surprise for you."
He followed me as obediently as a lamb, but boyish impatience soon consumed him. "What are you doing, Richie? Have you come unhinged?" he badgered as I set about my business. I had stopped at the studio to pick up a three-pound mallet. Then I started climbing the stairs to the roof.
"Come on, open up. Why are you being so damn mysterious?"
I told him to humor me a few more minutes.
"Oh no. Not one step further until you’ve explained yourself."
He stood adamant on the intermediate rooftop, so I stepped down from the iron ladder to face him.
"You know your financial problems?" I asked.
"Please. Don’t remind me."
"How would you like it if I told you Marsford had an underground fund he meant for his heirs to find?"
Tom’s jaw dropped. "You mean cash?"
"Not cash–gold coins. I found a purchase receipt for some in the Roman tower."
A vein in Tom’s temple throbbed as understanding began to register on his face. He grabbed the ladder to steady himself. "The mountain! My God! If what you say is true...the price of gold these days...it staggers the imagination! But where...?"
"That’s what the mallet’s for."
Tom shoved me back to the ladder with a sequence of obscenities.
A minute later we stood inside the tower room where Hugh Marsford had intended to die surrounded by furniture his parents had owned when he was born. “From birth to death to birth” had been the artist’s romantic design, but his own son's greed and impatience had left him to die in the wrong bed. And now Tom and I were seeking the wealth Silas had killed for as had his son, George, after him. My skin prickled with anticipation.
Tom watched me silently now, his arms hanging uselessly at his sides, his breathing short huffs of emotion.
I scanned the room a last time to reassure myself my conclusion was right. Gold coins “hidden like jewels in the bowels of the earth” could be only one place in the stark round room–inside the clay base of the crude wash stand. I lifted the wooden hammer to swing at the solid barrel-shaped object, and Tom made no move to stop me. With all my strength I slammed the head of the mallet into the clay.
Even I was unprepared for the shower of glittering coins that sprayed in the wake of my blow. Hitting the clay the second time split the wash stand open like a coconut and paid off with a spillage of coins that would have staggered Las Vegas.
"Millions, Richard! Millions!” Tom babbled. "We can pay off everything. Everything! We can reinstate the family allowances, fix the bloody toilets...” He slumped down onto the bed.
"You'll be rewarded, Richard, I swear. Grab a handful now. Go ahead."
I knew Tom, and I knew he meant what he said. I scooped a handful of coins off the floor and gazed at them. Estimating the weight roughly, I judged the value of my handful to be several thousand dollars. One coin was certainly worth several hundred at the currently inflated prices.
I let all but one piece clatter onto the floor. A gold coin might make a nice good luck charm. It shone temptingly from my hand.
It also glimmered as it flew through the air propelled by my thumb. Tom caught it and began to hand it back.
"No thanks," I told him. "I've already had a paid, two-week vacation on the Riviera."
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DEAR READER—Pretty please! If you enjoyed DYING FOR A VACATION, a brief review on the product page of whichever online bookseller you prefer would be enormously helpful. Fellow readers will greatly appreciate your advice, and it’s the easiest way to make an author very, very happy. Begin: HERE
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PS: Since DYING FOR A VACATION, I’ve written a cozy series and a mystery/crime series. I’ve had lots of fun with an eclectic range of topics, so I suggest glancing over the brief descriptions on my “Book” page to choose whatever sounds like fun to you. Each mystery can stand alone, or read them in order if you prefer. All are in paperback and eBook worldwide. For a quick look, start HERE.
Many thanks!
Donna
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Acknowledgements
MY THANKS AND LOVE to Donald S. Murray, who had the foresight to take his family to this marvelous chateau while its care was in his hands on behalf of the University of Pennsylvania.
Donna
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DONNA HUSTON MURRAY’S cozy mystery series features an amateur sleuth much like herself, a DIY headmaster's wife with a troubling interest in crime. Both novels in her new mystery/crime series won Honorable Mention in genre fiction from Writer’s Digest. FOR BETTER OR WORSE was a Finalist for the National Indie Excellence Award in Mystery.
In real life Donna assumes she can fix anything until proven wrong, calls trash-picking recycling, and although she should probably know better by now, adores Irish setters.
Donna and husband, Hench, live in the greater Philadelphia, PA, USA.