Deceptions Anna Porter (top 100 books to read .TXT) 📖

pocket had the name of its manufacturer or tailor — Vargas — in black italics sewn into the flap. A black line over the second a. That, too, was neatly sewn. Either a very exacting machine or a steady hand. In either case, expensive. As was the lining and the cologne she smelled when she patted the coat. Hugo Boss? Mont Blanc?

She called Louise and asked her to personally bring her the stylish plastic container from the office safe. Louise would know what she meant, and she would also know that something had gone wrong, or at least not as she had expected, in a routine appraisal. Could she also check for men’s wear manufacturers and bespoke tailors with the name Vargas?

The TGV from Paris took three hours if there were no delays. Even if she managed to catch the next train, Louise would not arrive until seven o’clock that evening.

It was getting to be time to visit Madame Vaszary. Helena changed into a pair of black slacks, a brown sweater, a jacket with a turned-up collar, and a brown scarf with a blue cathedral on it that she had purchased in the gift kiosk outside the hotel. She replenished her stock of tissues from the bathroom, wrapped the scarf loosely around her neck so that it covered her chin, and hid her hair in the baseball cap she used for her morning runs. Then she took the stairs to the lobby. She coughed and spluttered, blowing her nose among the nearby outdoor restaurant tables, and jogged along Rue Gutenberg, then up Rue des Francs-Bourgeois across the river from where the Batorama’s boats were at a standstill.

She blew her nose through the railway station to exit with a gaggle of newly arrived tourists. Much to the amusement of the cab driver, she gave the address of the Council of Europe, Avenue de l’Europe. “Everyone here knows that address, madame.” She apologized for her terrible cold. The driver expressed his deep regrets and gave her his card in case she needed a cab again during her stay in Strasbourg. He offered a tour of the Château du Haut-Koenigsbourg at an excellent rate once she felt better and then suggested that he could wait till her meeting was over. She declined gratefully, tipped generously, but not too generously, and walked slowly to the entrance. She walked up the steps, looked at all the flags as if she were searching for a particular one, then turned to gaze at the field of well-cut grass.

As the cab left, she looked up at the façade, then examined the huge sign for the Palais de l’Europe, blew her nose, and sauntered slowly down to the pedestrian walkway along the river. No one followed. She joined a group of surgical mask–wearing Japanese tourists, all gazing at the massive structure. Behind them, she could see a slowly trawling police boat with four police officers scanning the entrances to the council buildings.

She crossed the river, marched along the quay, and rounded the corner onto Rue Humann where she could check her route, making sure that she was still not being followed and that no one was taking an interest in her progress. She jogged along the Avenue de l’Europe to the Boulevard Tauler and onto Rue Geiler. Number 300 was much like the other large mansions along a street, where there was nothing smaller than a three-storey French provincial, with a garden that had been fussed over and trimmed within an inch of its life. There were four security cameras pointing at different parts of the garden and the flagstone driveway. There was no police vehicle and no police officer. The only car on the street was a large SUV, comfortably far away.

She rang the bell, a commodious sound that reminded her of an orchestra’s timpani, which was followed by furious barking as something solid thumped against the door. A woman in black with a white apron and a practised smile opened the door, her left hand on the chain around the rottweiler’s neck. “Semmi baj, Lucy,” she said to the dog. “You must be Ms. Marsh,” she said to Helena. “We have been expecting you.” Lucy, who was still grumbling under her breath, clearly didn’t share the woman’s polite anticipation of Helena’s visit, but she backed up to leave room for Helena to enter. “Mrs. Vaszary is in the living room.”

All the walls were white, the furniture was white, and there were no pictures, no decoration, no books, no potted plants, no personal touches, as if the place had been staged for a prospective buyer. Some frames wrapped in brown paper sat near the windows, suggesting the tenants were new. They hadn’t had time to hang their pictures. Or, since they were divorcing, there was no point in hanging pictures.

The white curtains were open, allowing the afternoon light to fall directly onto the startlingly lifelike painting that dominated the room. At first glance, it seemed as if it were the light from the window that lit up the face of the young woman in the painting, but as Helena drew closer, she could see that the light emanated from the picture, a theatrical trick of accentuating light and dark tones to heighten dramatic tension and movement as figures emerged from the shadows. It made the young woman’s round, fleshy face shine and her half-closed eyes appear to recoil from the brightness. She wore a draped blue-and-yellow dress that revealed the rise of her breasts. In her lap, there was what looked to be a human head, swarthy, bearded, mouth set in a rictus of agony, with dishevelled hair and a bloody gash where it had been severed from its body. In contrast, the woman seemed composed, at rest, her dark brown curls cascading over her shoulders, fingers of one hand entwined in the man’s hair, the other hand holding a long-bladed sword, the blade bright red all the way to the hilt. Her fingers dripped blood.

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