“It’s possible,” said St. Jacques. “Because of you my sister’s alive.”
“Because of me, young man, she might have died.”
“Would you have killed me?” asked Marie, studying the old Frenchman.
“Certainly not after I saw what Carlos had planned for me and my woman. He had broken the contract, not I.”
“Before then.”
“When I had not yet seen the needles, understood what was all too obvious?”
“Yes.”
“That’s difficult to answer; a contract’s a contract. Still, my woman was dead, and a part of her dying was because she sensed that a terrible thing had been demanded of me. To go through with that demand would deny that aspect of her death, don’t you see? Yet again, even in her death, the monseigneur could not be totally denied—he had made possible years of relative happiness that would have been impossible without him. … I simply don’t know. I might have reasoned that I owed him your life—your death—but certainly not the children’s … and most certainly not the rest of it.”
“Rest of what?” asked St. Jacques.
“It’s best not to inquire.”
“I think you would have killed me,” said Marie.
“I tell you, I simply don’t know. There was nothing personal. You were not a person to me, you were simply an event that was part of a business arrangement. … Still, as I say, my woman was gone, and I’m an old man with limited time before me. Perhaps a look in your eyes or a plea for your children—who knows, I might have turned the pistol on myself. Then again, I might not have.”
“Jesus, you are a killer,” said the brother quietly.
“I am many things, monsieur. I don’t ask forgiveness in this world; the other’s another question. There were always circumstances—”
“Gallic logic,” remarked Brendan Patrick Pierre Prefontaine, former judge of the first circuit court in Boston, as he absently touched the raw tender skin of his neck below his singed white hair. “Thank heavens I never had to argue before les tribunals; neither side is ever actually wrong.” The disbarred attorney chuckled. “You see before you a felon, justly tried and justly convicted. The only exculpatory aspect of my crimes is that I was caught and so many others were not and are not.”
“Perhaps we are related, after all, Monsieur le Juge.”
“By comparison, sir, my life is far closer to that of St. Thomas Aquinas—”
“Blackmail,” interrupted Marie.
“No, actually the charge was malfeasance. Accepting remunerations for favorable decisions, that sort of thing. … My God, we’re hound’s-tooth Boston! In New York City it’s standard procedure: Leave your money with the bailiff, enough for everyone.”
“I’m not referring to Boston, I’m talking about why you’re here. It’s blackmail.”
“That’s an oversimplification but essentially correct. As I told you, the man who paid me to find out where you’d gone also paid me an additional large sum of money to keep the information to myself. Under the circumstances, and because I have no pressing schedule of appointments, I thought it logical to pursue the inquiry. After all, if the little I knew brought so much, how much more might come to me if I learned a little more?”
“You talk of Gallic logic, monsieur?” inserted the Frenchman.
“It’s simple interrogatory progression,” replied the former judge, briefly glancing at Jean Pierre before turning back to Marie. “However, my dear, I may have glossed over an item that was extremely helpful in negotiations with my client. To put it plainly, your identity was being withheld and protected by the government. It was a strong point that frightened a very strong and influential man.”
“I want his name,” said Marie.
“Then I must have protection, too,” rejoined Prefontaine.
“You’ll have it—”
“And perhaps something more,” continued the old disbarred attorney. “My client has no idea I came here, no knowledge of what’s happened, all of which might fuel the fires of his largess if I described what I’ve experienced and observed. He’d be frightened out of his mind even to be associated with such events. Also, considering the fact that I was nearly killed by that Teutonic Amazon, I really deserve more.”
“Am I then to be rewarded for saving your life, monsieur?”
“If I had anything of value—other than my legal expertise, which is yours—I’d happily share it. If I’m given anything, that still holds, Cousin.”
“Merci bien, Cousin.”
“D’accord, mon ami, but never let the Irish nuns hear us.”
“You don’t look like a poor man, Judge,” said John St. Jacques.
“Then appearances are as deceiving as a long-forgotten title you so generously use. … I should add that my wants are not extravagant, for there’s no one but myself, and my creature comforts do not require luxury.”
“You’ve lost your woman, too, then?”
“Not that it’s any of your damn business, but my wife left me twenty-nine years ago, and my thirty-eight-year-old son, now a successful attorney on Wall Street, uses her name and when questioned by curious people tells them he never knew me. I haven’t seen him since he was ten; it was not in his interest, you understand.”
“Quelle tristesse.”
“Quel bullshit, Cousin. That boy got his brains from me, not from the airhead who bore him. … However, we stray. My French pureblood here has his own reasons—obviously based on betrayal—for cooperating with you. I have equally strong reasons for wanting to help you, too, but I must also consider myself. My aged new friend can go back and live what’s left of his life in Paris, whereas I have no place to go but Boston and the few opportunities I’ve developed over the years to eke out a living. Therefore my deep-seated motives for wanting to help must themselves take a backseat. With what I know now I wouldn’t last five minutes in the streets of Boston.”
“Breakthrough,” said John St. Jacques, staring at Prefontaine. “I’m sorry, Judge, we don’t need you.”
“What?” Marie sat forward in her chair. “Please, Bro, we need all the help we can get!”
“Not in this case. We know who hired him.”
“We do?”
“Conklin knows; he called it a ‘breakthrough.’ He told me that the man who traced you and the children here used a judge to find you.” The brother nodded across the table at the Bostonian. “Him. It’s why I smashed up a hundred-thousand-dollar boat to get back over here. Conklin knows who his client is.”
Prefontaine again glanced at the old Frenchman. “Now is the time for ‘Quelle tristesse,’ Sir Hero. I’m left with nothing. My persistence brought me only a sore throat and a burned scalp.”
“Not necessarily,” interrupted Marie. “You’re the attorney, so I shouldn’t have to tell you. Corroboration is cooperation. We may want you to tell everything you know to certain people in Washington.”
“Corroboration can be obtained with a subpoena, my dear. Under oath in a courtroom, take my personal as well as my professional word for it.”
“We won’t be going to court. Ever.”
“Oh? … I see.”
“You couldn’t possibly, Judge, not at this juncture. However, if you agree to help us you’ll be well paid. … A moment ago you said that you had strong reasons for wanting to help, reasons that had to be secondary to your own well-being—”
“Are you by any chance a lawyer, my dear?”
“No, an economist.”
“Holy Mary, that’s worse. … About my reasons?”
“Do they concern your client, the man who hired you to trace us?”
“They do. His august persona—as in Caesar Augustus—should be trashed. Slippery, intellectuality aside, he’s a whore. He had promise once, more than I let him know, but he let it all go by the boards in a flamboyant quest for his own personal grail.”
“What the hell’s he talking about, Mare?”
“A man with a great deal of influence or power, neither of which he should have, I think. Our convicted felon here has come to grips with personal morality.”
“Is that an economist speaking?” asked Prefontaine, once more absently touching the blistered flesh of his neck. “An economist reflecting on her last inaccurate projection that caused in appropriate buying or selling on the stock exchanges, resulting in losses many could afford and many more could not?”
“My voice was never that important, but I’ll grant you it’s the reflection of a great many others whose projections were, because they never risked, they only theorized. It’s a safe position. … Yours isn’t, Judge. You may need the protection we can provide. What’s your answer?”
“Jesus, Mary and Joseph, you’re a cold one—”
“I have to be,” said Marie, her eyes leveled on the man from Boston. “I want you with us, but I won’t beg, I’ll simply leave you with nothing and you can go back to the streets in Boston.”
“Are you sure you’re not a lawyer—or perhaps a lord high executioner?”
“Take your choice. Just give me your answer.”
“Will somebody tell me what the hell is going on here!” yelled John St. Jacques.