“Bof. I’ve been up in Larrau with the widow, helping her put out the fire in her belly.” Le Cagot was uneasy, his badinage mechanical and flat.

“One day, Beñat, that widow will have you in the trap, and you’ll be… What is it? What’s wrong?”

Le Cagot put his hands on Hel’s shoulders. “I have hard news for you, friend. A terrible thing has happened. That girl with the plump breasts? Your guest?…”

Hel closed his eyes and turned his head to the side. After a silence he said quietly, “Dead?”

“I’m afraid so. A contrabandier heard the shots. By the time he got to your lodge, she was dead. They had shot her… many, many times.”

Hel took a long, slow breath and held it for a moment; then he let it out completely, as he absorbed the first shock and avoided the flash of mind-fogging fury. Keeping his mind empty, he walked back toward the château, while Le Cagot followed, respecting his friend’s armor of silence.

Hel had sat for ten minutes at the threshold of the tatami ’d room, staring out over the garden, while Le Cagot slumped beside him. He refocused his eyes and said in a monotone, “All right. How did they get into the lodge?”

“They didn’t have to. She was found in the meadow below the ravine. Evidently she was picking wildflowers. There was a large bunch found in her hand.”

“Silly twit,” Hel said in a tone that might have been affectionate. “Do we know who shot her?”

“Yes. Early this morning, down in the village of Lescun, two outlanders were seen. Their descriptions are those of the Amérlo from Texas I met here and that little Arab snot.”

“But how did they know where she was? Only our people knew that.”

“There is only one way. Someone must have informed.”

“One of our people?”

“I know. I know!” Le Cagot spoke between his teeth. “I have asked around. Sooner or later, I shall find out who it was. And when I do, by the Prophetic Balls of Joseph in Egypt, I swear that the blade of my makila will puncture his black heart!” Le Cagot was ashamed and furious that one of his own, a mountain Basque, had disgraced the race in this way. “What do you say, Niko? Shall we go get them, the Amérlo and the Arab?”

Hel shook his head. “By now they are on a plane bound for the United States. Their time will come.”

Le Cagot smashed his fists together, breaking the skin over a knuckle. “But why, Niko! Why kill such a morsel? What harm could she do, the poor muffin?”

“They wanted to prevent me from doing something. They thought they could erase my debt to the uncle by killing the niece.”

“They are mistaken, of course.”

“Of course.” Hel sat up straight as his mind began to function in a different timbre. “Will you help me, Beñat?”

“Will I help you? Does asparagus make your piss stink?”

“They have French Internal Security forces all over this part of the country with orders to put me away if I attempt to leave the area.”

“Bof! The only charm of the Security Force is its epic incompetence.”

“Still, they will be a nuisance. And they might get lucky. We’ll have to neutralize them. Do you remember Maurice de Lhandes?”

“The man they call the Gnome? Yes, of course.”

“I have to get in touch with him, I’ll need his help to get safely into Britain. We’ll go through the mountains tonight, into Spain to San Sebastian. I need a fishing boat to take me along the coast to St. Jean de Luz. Would you arrange that?”

“Would a cow lick Lot’s wife?”

“Day after tomorrow, I’ll be flying out from Biarritz to London. They’ll be watching the airports. But they’re spread thin, and that’s to our advantage. Starting about noon that day, I want reports leaked to the authorities that I have appeared in Oloron, Pau, Bayonne, Bilbao, Mauléon, St. Jean Pied de Port, Bordeaux, Ste. Engrace, and Dax—all at the same time. I want their crosscommunications confused, so that the report from Biarritz will be just one drop in a torrent of information. Can that be arranged?”

“Can it be arranged? Do… I can’t think of an old saying for it just now. Yes, it can be arranged. This is like the old days, eh?”

“I’m afraid so.”

“You’re taking me with you, of course.”

“No. It’s not your kind of thing.”

“Holà! Don’t let the gray in my beard fool you. A boy lives inside this body! A very mean boy!”

“It’s not that. If this were breaking into a prison or blowing away a guardpost, there is no one I’d rather have with me. But this won’t be a matter of courage. It must be done by craft.”

As was his custom when in the open air, Le Cagot had turned aside and unbuttoned his trousers to relieve himself as he talked. “You don’t think I am capable of craft? I am subtlety itself! Like the chameleon, I blend with all backgrounds!”

Hel could not help smiling. This self-created folk myth standing before him, resplendent in rumpled fin-de-siècle evening clothes, the rhinestone buttons of his brocade waistcoat sparkling in the sun, his beret tugged low over his sunglasses, his rust-and-steel beard covering a silk cravat, the battered old makila under his arm as he held his penis in one hand and sprayed urine back and forth like a schoolboy—this man was laying claim to being subtle and inconspicuous.

“No, I don’t want you to come with me, Beñat. You can help most by making the arrangements I asked for.”

“And after that? What do I do while you are off amusing yourself? Pray and twiddle my thumbs?”

“I’ll tell you what. While I’m gone, you can press on with preparations for the exploration of your cave. Get the rest of the gear we need down into the hole. Wet suits. Air tanks. When I get back, we’ll take a shot at exploring it from light to light. How’s that?”

“It’s better than nothing. But not much.”

A serving girl came from the house to tell Hel that he was wanted in the château.

He found Hana standing with the telephone in the butler’s pantry, blocking the mouthpiece with her palm. “It is Mr. Diamond returning your call to the United States.”

Hel looked at the phone, then glanced down to the floor. “Tell him I’ll get back to him soon.”

They had finished supper in the tatami ’d room, and now they were watching the evening permutations of shifting shadow through the garden. He had told her that he would be away for about a week.

“Does this have to do with Hannah?”

“Yes.” He saw no reason to tell her the girl was dead.

After a silence, she said, “When you get back, it will be close to the end of my stay with you.”

“I know. By then you’ll have to decide if you’re interested in continuing our life together.”

“I know.” She lowered her eyes and, for the first time he could remember, her cheeks colored with the hint of a blush. “Nikko? Would it be too silly for us to consider becoming married?”

“Married?”

“Never mind. Just a silly thought that wandered through my mind. I don’t believe I would want it anyway.” She had touched on the idea gingerly and had fled instantly from his first reaction.

For several minutes, he was deep in thought. “No, it’s not all that silly. If you decide to give me years of your life, then of course we should do something to assure your economic future. Let’s talk about it when I return.”

“I could never mention it again.”

“I realize that, Hana. But I could.”