“No, Maria, I’m still in Paris. Is Gary there? I’ve got some good news for him.”
“He’s in the middle of the Darien Province, south of El Real,” Maria Barber said with a trace of hostility. She did not share her husband’s interest. “Fooling around in that damned river again. I haven’t seen him in weeks.”
“Can you contact him?” Gary had shown Mercer a picture of his much younger wife the last time they’d gotten together. She was a pretty, raven-haired woman, not yet thirty, but her eyes were sullen. She cast a sober look in the photo, as if she’d fit more life into her years than she should have. Gary explained her melancholy by telling him that she’d been raised in the slums of Panama City’s Casco Viego district.
“Sí, we speak on the radio yesterday. I am calling him in an hour.”
“When you do, tell him I’ve got the Lepinay journal and I’ll be in Panama the day after tomorrow.”
“He will be pleased,” she said with little enthusiasm. “Am I to still pick you up at the airport?”
“Yes, my flight connects through from Martinique.” The clothes in his luggage, once laundered, would serve him well enough in the tropical sauna of Panama. “I arrive at about ten in the morning on the seventeenth.”
“The last time Gary and I talked, he said that he had something very important to show you. He wanted me to make sure you will be here for a week at least.”
“Tell him that we’ll see,” Mercer hedged. He hadn’t been home in nearly a month and wasn’t planning on more than a few days in Panama. He was looking forward to a quiet couple of weeks before reporting to the White House for long rounds of tedious briefings and staff meetings.
“I will tell him,” Maria Barber replied. “And I will see you at Tocumen Airport in the morning of the seventeenth. Then I will take you to where Gary is working. And, ah ...”
“What is it?”
“It is just that increased antidrug efforts in Colombia have forced many rebel soldiers into the southern Darien Province. I thought you should know.”
“Thanks for the warning,” Mercer answered, but she had already clicked off.
He returned to the main auction gallery. Jean-Paul was just about to announce the next item. Back in his seat, Mercer listened idly as the sale continued around him, only showing interest when something pertaining to the Panama Canal came up. Like before, bidder 127 bought everything, often paying double what the material was worth. He knew that such buyers sometimes sent silent proxies to an auction to report on who they were bidding against. From his vantage at the back of the room, Mercer surveyed the well-dressed crowd but saw no Asians; not that one of the Europeans couldn’t be in the enigmatic Chinese’s employ.
It was nearing 6:00 P.M. when the auction wound down for the day. Mercer’s internal clock said it was 10:00 in the morning, but he was tired enough to only think about getting to his hotel. He’d been awake for twenty hours and had a morning meeting at the Ecole des Mines on boulevard St. Michel near the Luxembourg Gardens.
He found Jean-Paul again at the center of a group of people in the reception room outside the salon. Because of bidder 127 and an excessive price paid for a Gustave Eiffel drawing, Derosier had made a small fortune today and was beaming.
“Mercer, what a day. I think this is a record for me and the big stuff isn’t being sold until tomorrow.” He turned to introduce the man next to him. “Oh, this is my chief of security, Rene Bruneseau.”
Bruneseau had a compact build and the bearing of an army drill instructor. His receding hair was cropped short and made the heavy brows over his dark eyes more prominent. His head was blocky, more Slovak than French, with chiseled features blurred by excessive stubble. He wore an ill-fitted suit dusted with cigarette ash and his teeth were stained a coffee brown.
“Pleasure to meet you,” Mercer said, then addressed Jean-Paul. “Looks like bidder 127 is going to keep you in frog legs, snails, and other garden pests you French insist on eating.”
“Speaking of which, we must go out for dinner, or at least a drink.”
“Sorry, not this time. I’m going to my hotel and crashing.”
“Staying at the Crillon, as usual?”
“No. My travel agent had a client cancel a reservation at a hotel on the Left Bank near the Montparnasse Tower.” The 690-foot-tall office building was considered a blight on the city that photographers deftly avoided when shooting Paris. “She conned me into taking it over so her client wouldn’t lose his deposit.”
“Slumming?” Jean-Paul teased.
“She guaranteed it was four stars, or was it four cockroaches?”
“Mr. Derosier,” Bruneseau interrupted, his voice rumbling from deep within his barrel chest, “I will get the Lepinay journal for Dr. Mercer and then I must see to that problem we talked about before.”
Jean-Paul’s urbane veneer cracked for a second before a smooth recovery. “Oh, yes, right. The Lepinay journal.”
There were forty or fifty auction-goers still milling around the reception room. It was odd that Jean-Paul would mention the book after telling them it wasn’t for sale. “Sure you guys want to be blurting out that you were selling it after all?” Mercer asked.
“Oh, merde. I forgot.” Derosier looked around to make sure no one overheard. “My mind’s elsewhere.”
“Thinking about those frog legs already?” Mercer joked. Jean-Paul didn’t respond for a moment. “Are you okay?”
“Yes, I’m sorry. Ah, here comes Rene.” The security chief had the journal wrapped in brown paper.
Mercer caught the eye of one of the tuxedoed attendants and asked him to get his steel sample case from the cloakroom. He’d left all his luggage at the reception desk when he’d arrived. While he waited, he pulled out one of the blank checks he kept in his wallet and filled in the information, including the four-thousand-dollar price. He handed it over with an exaggerated flourish. “With my thanks from the Bouncing Check National Bank.”
Once he had his case, Mercer slit the book’s paper wrapper with a pocketknife. He studied the scuffed leather cover for a moment, feeling a tingle of excitement. He didn’t consider Gary’s “final puzzle piece.” What filled him with anticipation was the opportunity to gain some insight on a brilliant engineer who was decades ahead of his time. Slowly, he opened the diary. The journal was handwritten in faded black ink on heavy rag bond that felt as thick as a wallpaper sample. Godin de Lepinay had written in a confident, looping script. Mercer read just a couple of lines, translating in his head as best he could, and knew that he needed to pick up a French-English dictionary before his flight. He slid the journal into the case and snapped the lid closed.
“Can’t wait to start reading it, eh?” Jean-Paul said, correctly reading Mercer’s rapt expression.
“I think you two should go get a drink together,” Rene Bruneseau suggested.
“Come on, Mercer, what do you say?”
Mercer shook his head. “I’ve got a suite at the Victoria Palace Hotel with a bed they promise me is big enough to play soccer on. I’m meeting another old friend in the morning and then I leave for Panama in the afternoon. You’ll be coming to the States when Sotheby’s has that big auction in December. We’ll have time then, I promise.”
“I understand.” Jean-Paul stuck out his hand just as a customer approached. Before he was engaged in this next conversation he called out Mercer’s name once again. “Just watch yourself.”
It was such an odd thing for him to say that Mercer asked him for what.
“Oh, with the rain we’ve had for the past few days, the sanitation department’s been dropping the ball all over the city. Traffic is a nightmare and your cab driver’s going to try to rip you off on the ride to your hotel.”