Léonie rubbed at the steamy glass and watched, half horrified, half exhilarated, as the elements raged about them. The train continued on its laborious way. Several times they were obliged to stop between halts while the rails were cleared of fallen branches and even small trees, loosened from the steep slopes of the gorges by the pummelling rain.
At every station, more and more people seemed to board the train, replacing twice over those who were alighting. Hats were pulled low over brows, collars turned up to provide protection against the rain that was driving into the thin glass of the carriage windows. The period of delay at each station became more and more interminable, the carriages increasingly crowded with refugees from the storm.
Some hours later, they arrived in Couiza. The weather was less ferocious in the valleys, but still there was no cab for hire and the courrier publique had long departed. Anatole was obliged to knock up one of the shopkeepers to send his boy by mule up the valley to fetch Pascal to bring the gig to collect them.
While they waited, they took shelter in a miserable restaurant building adjoining the gare. It was too late for dinner, even had the conditions not been so dreadful. But on seeing Isolde’s ghostly complexion and Anatole’s undisguised anguish, the owner’s wife took pity on their bedraggled party and provided cups of steaming oxtail soup and chunks of dry black bread, together with a bottle of strong Tarascon wine.
Two men joined them, also seeking refuge from the storm, bringing with them news that the River Aude was close to bursting its banks in Carcassonne. There were already pockets of flooding in the quartiers Trivalle and Barbacane.
Léonie went pale, picturing the black water lapping at the steps of the église de Saint-Gimer. How easily she could have been trapped. The streets through which she had walked were now, if the accounts were to be believed, submerged. Then another thought shot into her mind. Was Victor Constant safe?
The torment of imagining him in danger played on her nerves all the way back to the Domaine de la Cade, making her oblivious to the rigours of the journey and the struggle of the weary horses along the slippery and perilous roads leading home.
By the time they drove up the long gravelled drive, the wheels sticking on the wet stones and mud, Isolde was all but insensible. Her eyelids fluttered as she struggled to stay conscious. Her skin was cold to the touch.
Anatole charged into the house, shouting instructions. Marieta was sent to mix a powder to help her mistress sleep, another maid to fetch the moine, the bedwarmer and frame, to take the chill from Isolde’s sheets, a third to stoke the fire already burning in the grate. Then, seeing Isolde was too weak to walk, Anatole swept her up in his arms and carried her up the stairs. Strands of her blond hair, trailing loose now down her back, hung like pale silk against his black jacket sleeves.
Astounded, Léonie watched them go. By the time she had rallied her thoughts, everyone had disappeared, leaving her to fend for herself.
Frozen to her bones and out of sorts, she followed them up to the first floor. She undressed and climbed into her bed. The covers seemed damp. No fire burned in her grate. The room was unwelcoming and cheerless.
She attempted to sleep, but all the time she was aware of Anatole pacing the corridors. Later, she heard the clip of his boots on the tiles of the hall below, marching up and down like a soldier on the nightwatch, and the sound of the front door opening.
Then silence.
At last, Léonie fell into a restless half-sleep, dreaming of Victor Constant.
PART VIII
Hôtel de la Cade October 2007
CHAPTER 63
TUESDAY 30TH OCTOBER 2007
Meredith saw Hal before he saw her. Her heart skipped a beat at the look of him. He was sprawled in one of three low armchairs set around a small table, wearing much the same clothes he’d had on earlier, blue jeans and white T-SHIRT, but had swapped his blue sweater for a pale brown one. As she watched, he lifted his hand and pushed his unruly hair off his face.
Meredith smiled at the already familiar gesture. Letting the door swing shut behind her, she walked across the room towards him.
He stood up as she drew close.
‘Hi,’ she said, putting her hand on his shoulder. ‘Tough afternoon?’
‘I’ve had better,’ he said, kissing her on the cheek, then turning round to summon the waiter. ‘What can I get you?’
‘The wine you recommended last night was pretty good.’
Hal ordered. ‘Une bouteille du Domaine Begude, s’il vous plaît, Georges. Et trois verres.’
‘Three glasses?’ Meredith queried.
Hal’s face clouded over. ‘I bumped into my uncle coming in. He seemed to think you wouldn’t mind. Said you were talking earlier. When I said we were meeting for a drink, he invited himself.’
‘No way,’ she said, keen to counteract the impression Hal had got. ‘He asked me if I knew where you had gone after you dropped me back here. I said I wasn’t sure. That was the extent of it.’
‘Right.’
‘Not what you’d call a conversation,’ she said, driving the point home. She leant forward, hands on her knees. ‘What happened this afternoon?’
Hal glanced at the door, then back to her.
‘I tell you what, why don’t I reserve us a table for dinner? I don’t want to start, then have to break off in a few minutes when my uncle gets here. It brings things to a natural close without being too obvious about it. How does that sound?’
Meredith grinned. ‘Dinner sounds great,’ she said. ‘I skipped lunch. I’m ravenous.’
Looking pleased, Hal stood up. ‘Be back in a moment.’
Meredith watched him walk across the room to the door, liking the way he seemed to fill the space with his broad shoulders. She saw him hesitate, then turn, as if he could feel her gaze on his back. Their eyes collided mid-air, held for a moment. Then Hal gave a slow half-smile and disappeared into the corridor.
It was Meredith’s turn to push her black bangs off her face. She felt her skin flush hot in the hollow of her throat, her palms grow damp, and shook her head at such schoolgirl silliness.
Georges brought the wine in an ice bucket on a stand and poured her a large, tulip-shaped glass. Meredith drank several mouthfuls in one go, like it was soda, and fanned herself with the cocktail list on the table.
She cast her eyes around the bar at the floor-to-ceiling shelves of books, wondering if Hal knew which - if any - had survived the fire and were part of the original library. It occurred to her that there might be some kind of link involving the Lascombe family and the Verniers, especially given the connection with printing through the Bousquet family. On the other hand, all the books could be from the vide-grenier sale.
She looked out of the window to the darkness beyond. On the furthest edges of the lawns she could see the shapes of the trees, swaying, moving, like an army of shadows. She felt eyes upon her, fleetingly, as if someone had passed just in front of the window and was looking in. Meredith narrowed her gaze, but couldn’t see anything.
Then she became aware that someone was in fact coming up behind her. She could hear footsteps. A trickle of anticipation slithered down her spine. She smiled, then turned, her eyes bright.
She found herself looking up not at Hal, but into the face of his uncle, Julian Lawrence. There was a faint smell of whisky on his breath. Embarrassed, she adjusted the expression on her face and started to get to her feet.
‘Ms Martin,’ he said, lightly putting his hand on her shoulder. ‘Please, don’t get up.’
Julian threw himself into the leather armchair to Meredith’s right, leaned forward, poured himself some wine and sat back, before she had the chance to tell him he was in Hal’s chair.
‘Santé,’ he said, raising his glass. ‘My nephew’s done another vanishing act?’
‘He’s gone to get us a reservation for dinner,’ she replied.
Polite, to the point, but nothing more.
Julian just smiled. He was dressed in a
pale linen suit and blue shirt, open at the neck. As every time she’d seen him, he looked comfortable and in control, although he was a little flushed. Meredith found her eyes drawn to his left hand resting on the arm of the chair. It betrayed his age, late fifties rather than the mid-forties she would have given him, but his skin was tanned and his grip looked strong against the red leather. He wore no ring.
Feeling the silence pressing on her, Meredith looked back up to his face. He was still staring right at her in the same direct manner.
Like Hal’s eyes.
She pushed the comparison from her mind.
Julian put his glass back on the table. ‘What do you know about Tarot cards, Ms Martin?’
His question took her totally by surprise. Taken aback, she stared dumbly at him, wondering how the hell he’d struck upon that subject in particular. Her thoughts flew to the photograph she’d stolen from the wall of the lobby, the deck of cards, the tagged sites on her laptop, the musical notes overlapping. He couldn’t know about it, any of it, but she felt herself colouring up with embarrassment at having been caught out, all the same. Worse, she could see he was enjoying her discomfort.
‘Jane Seymour in the movie Live and Let Die,’ she said, trying to make a joke of it. ‘That’s about it.’
‘Ah, the beautiful Solitaire,’ he said, raising his eyebrows.
Meredith met his gaze and said nothing.
‘Personally,’ he continued, ‘I find myself attracted by the history of the Tarot, although I do not for a moment believe that fortune-telling is any sort of way to plan one’s life.’
Meredith realised how similar his voice was to Hal’s. They had the same habit of rolling their words as if every one was special. But the key difference was that Hal wore his heart on his sleeve, every emotion laid bare. Julian, on the other hand, always sounded faintly mocking. Sarcastic. She glanced at the door, but it remained resolutely shut.
‘Are you aware of the principles behind the interpretation of Tarot cards, Ms Martin?’
‘It’s not something I know much about,’ she said, wishing he’d get off the subject.
‘Really? My nephew gave me the impression that it was an interest of yours. He said Tarot cards had come up when you were walking around Rennes-le-Château this morning. ’ He shrugged. ‘Perhaps I misunderstood.’
Meredith racked her brains. Tarot had never been far from her mind, sure, but she didn’t remember actually discussing it with Hal. Julian was still staring right at her, a hint of challenge in his unwavering scrutiny.
In the end, Meredith found herself responding, just to cover the awkward silence. ‘I think the idea is that although it seems as if the cards are laid at random, in fact the process of shuffling is merely a way of allowing invisible connections to be made visible.’
He raised his eyebrows. ‘Well put.’ He kept staring. ‘Have you ever had your cards read, Ms Martin?’
A strangled laugh escaped out of her. ‘Why do you ask?’
He raised his eyebrows. ‘Just interested.’
Meredith glared at him, mad at him for making her feel so uncomfortable, and at herself for letting him do it.
At that instant, a hand fell on her shoulder. She jumped, looked round with alarm, this time to see Hal smiling down at her.
‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘I didn’t mean to surprise you.’
Hal nodded at his uncle, then sat down in the vacant seat opposite Meredith. He took the bottle from the ice bucket and poured himself some wine.
‘We were just talking about Tarot cards,’ Julian said.
‘Really?’ said Hal, glancing from one to the other. ‘What were you saying?’
Meredith looked into his eyes, and read the message in them. Her heart sank. She did not want to get caught up in a discussion about Tarot, but she could see Hal saw it as a good way of keeping his uncle off the subject of his visit to the police commissariat.
‘I was just asking Ms Martin if she had ever been to a Tarot reading,’ Julian said. ‘She was about to answer.’
She looked at him, then to Hal, and realised that unless she could think of an alternative topic of conversation in the next couple of seconds, she was going to have to go with it.
‘Actually, I did have a reading,’ she said in the end, trying to make it sound as dull as possible. ‘In Paris, in fact, a couple of days ago. First - and last - time.’
‘And was it a pleasurable experience, Ms Martin?’
‘It was interesting, certainly. What about you, Mr Lawrence? Have you ever had your cards read?’
‘Julian, please,’ he said. Meredith caught a look of amusement flicker across his face, amusement mixed with something else. A sharpening of interest?
‘But, no,’ he said. ‘Not my kind of thing, although I confess I am interested in some of the symbolism associated with Tarot cards.’
Meredith felt her nerves tighten at having her suspicions confirmed. This wasn’t small talk. He was after something specific. She took another mouthful of wine and fixed a bland expression on her face. ‘Is that right?’
‘The symbolism of numbers, for example,’ he continued.
‘Like I said, it’s not something I know much about.’
Julian reached into his pocket. Meredith tensed. It would be too appalling if he produced a deck of Tarot cards, cheap. He held her gaze a moment, as if he knew exactly what was going through her mind, then pulled a packet of Gauloise and a Zippo from his pocket.
‘Cigarette, Ms Martin?’ he said, offering her the packet. ‘Although it will have to be outside, I’m afraid.’
Mad that she was making such a fool of herself - worse, that she was letting it show - she shook her head. ‘I don’t smoke.’
‘Very wise.’ Julian placed the packet, the lighter on top, on the table between them, then carried on talking. ‘The number symbolism in the church at Rennes-le-Château, for example, is quite fascinating.’
Meredith glanced over at Hal, willing him to say something, but he was sitting looking resolutely into the middle distance.
‘I didn’t notice.’
‘Did you not?’ he said. ‘The number twenty-two, in particular, comes up surprisingly often.’
Despite the antipathy she felt for Hal’s uncle, Meredith found herself being drawn in. She wanted to hear what Julian had to say. She just didn’t want to give the impression she was interested.
‘In what form?’ The words slipped out, a little abrupt. Julian smiled.
‘The baptismal font in the entrance, the statue of the devil Asmodeus. You must have seen it?’
Meredith nodded.
‘Asmodeus was supposed to be one of the guardians of the Temple of Solomon. The Temple was destroyed in 598 BCE. If you add each digit to the next - five plus nine plus eight - you get twenty-two. You know, I presume, Ms Martin, that there are twenty-two cards in the major arcana?’
‘I do.’
Julian shrugged. ‘Well then.’
‘I presume there are other occurrences of the number?’
‘The twenty-second of July is the feast day of St Mary Magdalene, to whom the church is dedicated. There is a statue of her between paintings thirteen and fourteen of the Stations of the Cross; she is also depicted in two of the three stained-glass windows behind the altar. Another link is with Jacques de Molay, the last leader of the Templars - there are supposed to be Templar links at Bézu, across the valley. He was the twenty-second Grand Master of the Poor Knights of the Temple, to give the outfit its full name. Then the French transliteration of Christ’s cry from the cross: “Elie, Elie, lamah sabactani” - my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me - has twenty-two letters. It’s also the opening verse of Psalm 22.’
This was all interesting, in a kind of abstract way, although Meredith couldn’t figure out why he was telling her. Just to see her reaction? To find out how much she did know about Tarot?
And, more to the point, why?
‘Finally, the priest of Rennes-le-Château, Bérenger Saunièr
e, died on the twenty-second of January 1917. An odd story attached to his death. Allegedly, his body was placed on a throne on the belvedere of his estate, and the villagers filed past and each plucked a tassel from the hem of his robe. Much like the image of the King of Pentacles in the Waite Tarot, in fact.’ He shrugged. ‘Or, if you add two plus two, plus the year of his death, you end up with—’
Meredith’s patience ran out. ‘I can do the math,’ she muttered under her breath, then turned to Hal. ‘What time is our reservation for dinner?’ she said pointedly.