“I don’t laugh, unless I am really amused.”
“Then I will take your laugh as a compliment—assuming that you are laughing with me, rather than at me.”
“An interesting distinction,” she said. “When I was at school in England I learned, with some difficulty, when Englishmen were being funny. I have had much less experience with Americans.”
“Anything I can do to help,” Stone said.
“Was that an offer of or a request for sex?”
“Not necessarily.”
“You see! I think maybe that was meant to be funny, but I’m not sure. What does ‘not necessarily’ mean?”
“Not in every instance. It’s best to go back a couple of sentences to my offer of help.”
“What sort of help?”
“Almost anything you need.”
“Almost?”
“It’s best to reserve a little wiggle room.”
“Wiggle? Is that like wriggle?”
“The same, only more colloquial.”
She laughed again. “You are fun to talk with.”
“I’m so glad, I would not like to bore you.”
“I will let you know when you are boring me.” She looked at her wristwatch.
“Ah, already,” Stone said.
“No, no, I just have an appointment in twenty minutes, and there is the rush-hour traffic.”
“Then you had better finish your eggs.”
She pushed back from the table. “No, only half my eggs are on my diet. I must continue to be able to wear my own designs.”
“Would you like to have dinner this evening?”
“Just the two of us?”
“I prefer conducting business during the daylight hours, reserving the evening for more intimate occasions.”
“When and where?”
“Eight o’clock? At your favorite restaurant.”
“Eight is good. I don’t have a favorite, there are too many in Paris.”
“Your favorite today.”
“All right. Do you know Brasserie Lipp? In Saint-Germain-des-Prés?”
“I do.”
“Eight o’clock then.”
They rose, bussed, and she departed.
Stone sat down and finished his eggs.
7
The new black Mercedes supervan was indeed waiting for him in l’Arrington’s courtyard at the appointed hour, and it got through the midday Paris traffic with few delays. Stone noted the second man up front, and he could see the short barrel of an automatic weapon protruding from the man’s cradled arms. He found that reassuring but unsatisfying, since it apparently indicated that Rick believed any opposition would be similarly armed. If bullets started flying, he would prefer single squirts to spraying, even if the vehicle was armored.
The van was stopped at an archway for a security check, then allowed to drive into a courtyard, much like that at l’Arrington, but smaller. There were three large trees in pots arrayed against the walls, and next to each stood a man in black body armor, booted and helmeted, with an automatic weapon slung from a shoulder. The concrete tree pots would provide cover, he assumed.
Inside the front door of the office building of, perhaps, fifteen floors, he was stopped at a desk and required to place his right thumb on a sensor while gazing into a lens with his right eye. The equipment indicated its assent by displaying two photographs of him on a screen: one taken the year before and one taken just now. “Good morning, Mr. Barrington,” a female voice said from the speaker. “M’sieur duBois is expecting you. Please take the elevator at your left to the top floor.”
“Thank you,” Stone replied to the mass of electronic equipment. Stone knew the building housed Marcel’s business operations and that he lived on the top two floors. As the car rose a piece of music, a particular favorite of his, began to play: the Dave McKenna Quartet with Zoot Sims, playing “Limehouse Blues.” The car reached the top floor before McKenna’s piano solo was over, but as he stepped off the elevator, the music continued from unseen speakers. By the time Zoot began his soprano saxophone solo, he was seated in a comfortable chair, a perfect Bloody Mary in his hand, being told by a minion that M’sieur duBois would be with him shortly. He sat back and luxuriated in the wonder of Zoot Sims. Superb. The vodka didn’t hurt, either.
Marcel tapped him on a knee as “Limehouse Blues” died. “Bonjour, Stone. Do not rise.”
The Frenchman sat down beside him. Their view through a floor-to-ceiling glass wall was of treetops and a view across the city.
“Good morning, Marcel,” Stone finally managed. “I am very impressed by the new wrinkles in your security system. I assume the police-like costumes and weapons of the men downstairs were chosen for a reason?”
“Ah, yes. After our difficulties of last year, your good friend Michael Freeman suggested that the presence of security be overt, rather than the subtlety of men dressed in blue suits with bulges under their arms.”
“An economical and, no doubt, effective change. What about my thumbprint, my cornea, and my taste in music? Where did they come from?”
“The prints were unobtrusively harvested from your person last year,” Marcel replied. “And the music was read from the albums stored on the iPhone in your pocket. Imelda—the name given to her voice—deduced which was the most-played track among them and played it for you. I rather liked it. Are the artists popular in the States?”
“The artists, unfortunately, are all dead, as are most of my favorites—Count Basie, Artie Shaw, Erroll Garner, Duke Ellington, Ella Fitzgerald, et alia. Fortunately, their work survived them.”
“Ah, yes, the same with me. Did you and Mirabelle enjoy your breakfast together?”
“Once again, Marcel, you are well ahead of me. Yes, we did.”
“And have you been enjoying your Blaise?”
“I drive it to my house in Connecticut on a road ideal for it. I think it goes too fast for the police to see.”
“Ah, good.”
“I have also enjoyed the performance of Frederick Flicker, and he and I have come to a more permanent arrangement. I’m grateful for your realization that I needed him.”
“Every gentleman of any substance needs a gentleman’s gentleman to take care of him. I have so much substance myself that I need three, in shifts.”
“I can manage very nicely with the one,” Stone said.
There was the tinkle of silverware from behind them. “And now, shall we have some lunch?” Marcel asked.
They rose and went to the table that had been set for them. Instead of courses, a small smorgasbord was wheeled out on a cart, and they chose what they liked from a dozen dishes.
“So much food,” Stone said. “I hope what we don’t eat will not go to waste.”
“Don’t worry, the kitchen staff are anxiously awaiting the return of the cart. By the end of their lunch hour, it will be empty.”
Champagne was poured for them. Marcel raised his glass. “A Krug ’55,” he said. “I hope you enjoy it.”
Stone enjoyed it.
—
WHEN THE TABLE had been cleared they returned to their seats before the huge window.
“Now,” Marcel said, “I must tell you that I have had an offer for my stock in the Arrington Group.”
“Is it from a Russian source?”
“It is from a corporation, benignly named. No name was attached to it.”
“Then I think we will have to assume that the source is Russian, and that the name is Yevgeny Majorov.”
“It was a more reasonable offer than I would have thought that gentleman would come up with, but I have the same suspicions as you. Should I explore it further?”
“Marcel, should you ever wish to dispose of your Arrington stock, I or my other investors will buy it from you for a better price than the Russians would give you.”
“Oh, no, Stone, I don’t want out,” Marcel said. “I just wondered if we should toy with them a bit.”
“Marcel, these ‘gentlemen’ would regard anything beyond a simple no as an encouragement, and they would become even more of a nuisance than they already are. My advice would be to have your secretary, on your behalf, write a short, blunt refusal to the corporation. Don’t even sign it yourself.”
“All right, I’ll do that.”
“It has been my experience in dealing with criminal elements who seek to disguise themselves in legitimacy, that if you give them so much as a bite, they will want the steak, and the bone, too, on unacceptable terms. They have already accompanied your offer with a violent attack: the CIA van that I and my party rode in to your dinner last night was destroyed while we dined. This is what they like to think of as the carrot and the stick.”