Helen’s ears were ringing, a high-pitched whine like the wail of an inner alarm. Only as she emerged back onto Avenue de Flandre, one block up from her hotel’s cross street, did the noise begin to subside. She still wasn’t quite sure what had just happened. All she knew for certain was that she was back on the run, and that Claire had dropped a message into her bag.
It had to be Gilley’s people, but how had they found her? Had she made a mistake? Lowered her guard? Whatever the case, thank God for Claire. She slowed her pace. Walking faster than everyone else was a sure way to draw attention. Deep breath. Think. Don’t look over your shoulder. She glanced into a storefront window, but the reflection was a wavering riot of colors with a bus, children, their moms. A shriek of laughter to her right startled her, but was harmless.
Fortunately, she was in the very block where she had plotted her course of escape and evasion that morning, seemingly ages ago. She put her plan into motion, heading into a corner dress shop she’d already scouted. Two changing rooms were in the back, obscured from view by a long rack of clothes. She ducked into one and got to work, pulling off her jeans and slipping on a beige skirt from the tote bag. She took out a handbag. Then she put on the sunglasses, discarded the jeans, folded the tote bag, and tucked it under her arm as she exited the store from a side door and then walked down the cross street.
Rounding the next corner, and still walking at a normal pace, she made a beeline for another shop at the end of the block. This time she accomplished her quick-change on the move behind a rack of clothing, pulling up her hair under a green scarf that she tied beneath her chin. She pulled out the red cardigan from her purse and slipped it on as she exited by a rear door.
Two blocks later she reached the tree-lined Rue de Crimée, which also had plenty of shops and pedestrians. She walked against the flow of the one-way traffic until she spotted a bus rolling to a halt just ahead. She hopped aboard, using the transit pass she’d bought earlier. Only two other persons boarded with her, both of them women who had already been waiting at the stop. She sat in an aisle seat, away from the window, where she pulled off the scarf and sunglasses, lowered her head, and slipped on the auburn wig. Then she took off the red cardigan. She stayed aboard until the bus had crossed the canal that ran near her hotel. Only then did she feel secure enough to check the message in her bag.
Helen unfolded the tote bag and dug out the sheet of paper. The first line was typed: 18:00, the vista, Parc de Belleville, the bench.
Below, in handwriting that must have been Claire’s: Do not return to hotel! Call our first number at 4 tomorrow.
So, then. Marina had been in touch, and a rendezvous was set for an hour from now. Helen got out her tourist map and found the park, a few miles to the south of where she was now, in the upper reaches of the 20th arrondissement. But there was no marking for anything called “the vista.” She took out the Fodor’s guidebook, looked up the park, and read about its “spectacular view from the end of Rue Piat.”
Helen began moving toward the meeting point, via bus and Metro. She changed her appearance one more time as she gradually closed in on her destination. Finally, with seven minutes to spare, she reached the northeast side of the park, strolling down the narrow, one-way Rue Piat and then entering the park at the upper end of a sloping series of wooded hill and dale, with lush arbors and even a few waterways tucked into the creases of the park. Spreading out below was the grandeur of Paris, with the Eiffel Tower spiking the horizon to the southwest. It was only a few minutes after sunset, and everything was bathed in amber and russet, a beauty that calmed her as she stepped deeper into the park.
She looked for the nearest bench, but there wasn’t one in view. A group of tourists had gathered earlier to photograph the sunset, but they were all standing. She headed down a walkway to her left. Ahead were espaliered grape vines, but no bench. To her right, a set of steps led downhill to a parallel path, maybe fifteen yards below, where she now saw a single bench.
She took a seat. No one was in sight except the tourists, who all had their cameras out. She was watching them when she sensed someone approaching on the path to her left, an older woman, shuffling heavily, in a worn gray overcoat. Carrying a shopping bag, she heaved herself onto the other end of the bench and sighed, as if in exhaustion. Her coat smelled like mothballs.
Helen looked straight ahead. She waited through a few tense moments of silence and, finally, the woman spoke under her breath in heavily accented English.
“Take the taxi that stops on the street behind us, Rue Piat. Ask the driver for number four. In a moment I will walk there, and you will follow.”
Helen nodded.
The woman took a few more seconds to catch her breath and then stood, scattering a few pigeons that had assembled on the path. Helen fell in behind her, a few yards back. They ascended the sidewalk toward the tourists. Right on cue, a taxi glided to the curb as Helen reached the street. The rear door opened. As she climbed in she saw a man was hunched down on the other side of the backseat, staying out of sight. He nodded as if to reassure her.
“Number four,” she told the driver, who pulled away from the curb.
There was a sudden commotion to their rear, and Helen looked out the back window to see that the older women had fallen to the ground on the narrow street. At first she was alarmed, but then realized what was happening. A second taxi had wheeled into view but was now blocked on the narrow street as several of the tourists rushed to the aid of the fallen woman.
The rear door of the other taxi opened. Was that Claire getting out? If so, then Helen had just lost her escort, her backup, her safety valve.
“Here,” the man to her left said. He was sitting up straight now and he handed her a black piece of cloth. She took it, not knowing what she was supposed to do next. He mimed pulling it over his head. A hood, then, to keep her from seeing where they were going. When she hesitated, he sighed and snatched it back, and roughly pulled it down over her face. It smelled of sweat and cigarettes.
“Down!” he ordered.
“It is down,” she said.
“No, you. You down!”
She lowered herself out of sight.
“Yes. Good,” he said, although she could no longer see him. She no longer saw anything—not the city nor the streets, and certainly not Claire.