The Book of Secrets

XXXVII

Paris

‘Could they have followed me?’

It had taken Emily three hours to get back. She’d changed trains, jumped indiscriminately on and off buses, browsed in the reflections of shop windows, made sudden detours – all the while looking over her shoulder for any sign of pursuit. Darkness had fallen by the time she sneaked back into the hotel. She’d shaken Nick awake from his jet-lagged sleep and dragged him to a café in a quiet backstreet near Montparnasse. She still didn’t feel safe.

‘If they’d followed you, they’d have come back to the hotel.’ Nick sipped his beer and looked around the café for the dozenth time. He couldn’t sit still. ‘It was lucky you had that pepper spray.’

‘I had a bad experience once.’ Emily barely moved. Shock gripped her like stone. ‘It must have been the book. It must have triggered some kind of alarm somewhere. A tripwire.’

Not so long ago it would have sounded ludicrously paranoid. Now, Nick just nodded. ‘Maybe that’s how they found Gillian. That’s why she left her library card in the bank vault.’ The cards Gillian had left them were beginning to look more like a box of sharpened knives than a treasure trove. ‘If only we could find her that easily.’

Emily cupped her palms around her mug of coffee in silence. Twice she looked as if she was going to say something, but held back. Nick could guess what it was.

‘If you want to go home, I understand.’ He said it quickly, knowing he’d regret it if he gave himself time to think about it. ‘God knows what those guys would have done to you if you hadn’t escaped. There’s no reason for you to risk it for Gillian.’

Emily seemed to flinch. ‘I’m not…’ She trailed off, paused, began again. ‘I’m not going home.’

He knew he ought to argue but he didn’t have the will. She flicked him a tentative look and he held it, trying to reassure her. It was hard when he had so little to give.

‘At least I got something for my troubles.’ Warmth returned to Emily’s face. ‘Gillian was reading up on a physiologus – a book of beasts. I’ll bet that was the book she found the card in. There must have been one in the chateau’s library.’

Nick thought about it for a second.

‘I know the man who’d know.’

‘Atheldene.’

The familiar voice, so intimidating in its studied neutrality. ‘It’s Nick.’

A taxi drove past the phone box. The noise of its wheels on the slick cobbled street drowned out Atheldene’s surprised silence. As it died away, Nick heard, ‘Any news of our mutual friend?’

‘Maybe – we’re not sure. We need to check the list of books she recovered from the chateau. Can you do that?’

‘Perhaps with a good enough reason.’

‘Gillian’s missing. Emily went to the Bibliothèque Nationale today and almost ended up the same way. How’s that for a reason?’

‘I’m very sorry to hear it.’

Nick glanced at Emily, watching through the phone-box door. She nodded.

‘Gillian found a card. An old one.’

‘The Master of the Playing Cards, I presume.’ Atheldene didn’t sound surprised. ‘Have you got it?’

‘We think she may have found it in some sort of bestiary, or…’ Nick stumbled over the word. ‘Physiologus.’

‘Really?’

Nick could almost imagine the raised eyebrow, the searching stare. He was glad of the phone line between them. He waited out the silence.

‘I’ll check the inventory from Rambouillet. Can I call you back on this number?’

‘It’s a payphone.’

‘I’ll be quick.’

Atheldene hung up. Nick waited in the phone box, scanning the road through the cracked glass. A little way down the street, a homeless man sat hunched under a filthy quilt on a raft of cardboard boxes. Nick was amazed he hadn’t already frozen. His hand dipped to his pocket to find some euros, but fear restrained him. What if the old man wasn’t what he seemed? He was sure he’d read books where spies dressed as bums to conduct surveillance. Was the man looking at him? Nick watched him carefully and kept his hand in his pocket.

A shadow crossed his line of sight. He jumped, but it was only Emily. She walked across the empty street and crouched beside the homeless man. She dropped some coins into his styrofoam cup and exchanged a few words, then hurried back. Nick felt ashamed.

‘What did he say?’

‘He said you should stop staring at him.’

Before Nick could feel even more guilty, the phone rang. He seized the receiver gratefully.

‘Yes?’

‘Good news. There was a bestiary in the old man’s collection. Just the one. Gillian catalogued it. Date, mid to late fifteenth century. Remarks: some stylistic similarities with the workshop of the Bedford Hours Master.’

‘The who?’

‘I’ll tell you later. You’ll like it.’

‘When can we see the book?’

A dry laugh. ‘I’m afraid it’s not quite so straightforward.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Well for one thing, the book’s not in Paris any more. Remember it had been soaked through? The conservators took it away to their controlled storage facility.’

‘Where’s that?’

‘Brussels.’

Nick swore. ‘Can we get in there?’

‘I could get you in there.’ There was an implicit offer in the sentence, a stress that opened a negotiation. Nick’s mind raced. He looked down the street and saw that the beggar had gone. Had he used Emily’s gift to find a warm bed for the night – or was he even now telling a man with a broken nose where to find Nick and Emily?

‘How soon can we leave?’

‘Straight away, if you like. It’s only about three hours’ drive. But there’s another problem.’

Nick waited.

‘The book’s frozen solid.’