Chapter 20
Twenty
Isabelle gazed unseeingly out of the car window as Alex expertly navigated through Toulouse’s complicated one-way system.
The auction house was deep in the medieval centre of the city, with its narrow streets and tall pale red-brick buildings which had, along with its traditionally left-wing politics, earned Toulouse the nickname of La Ville Rose, the pink city.
She had been here a few times in the past, on the brocante trail, and had always liked it, but today, Toulouse’s attractions were far from her mind.
How could she have been so stupid? She hadn’t let that letter out of her sight for days, and then that man had turned on the charm, and she’d actually left the letter on the table and entirely forgotten about it till the next morning.
And then, despite knowing just how passionate he was about Fontaine’s story, how excited he’d been by the letter, she hadn’t thought it odd that he’d vanished and hadn’t answered her calls.
The others hadn’t commented on any of that, but they didn’t need to.
Isabelle was annoyed enough with herself.
She could have pretended that the pain she’d been in that fateful evening and the combination of wine and strong anti-inflammatories were completely to blame for blurring her judgement and making her vulnerable, but she knew that wasn’t the full story.
She had allowed herself to trust the wrong man, once again. My God, when would she ever learn?
Although her friends seemed to be looking forward to the coming showdown, Isabelle was dreading it.
And it wasn’t because she was afraid that Romy’s plan wouldn’t work.
It wasn’t even because of confronting Cazenave.
It was because Carlos knew now that she hadn’t trusted him enough to tell him of her discovery, but had not been so reticent with strangers, no matter how right she’d been about them, in Romy’s and Audrey’s case, or wrong, in Pierre’s.
And it wasn’t just that, she thought, wincing.
When Adeline had told her that Carlos had rung her because he was concerned, she’d reacted as if he’d overstepped some boundary, one that she had imposed without even telling him.
And try as she might to remind herself that she had never promised Carlos eternal love or unconditional trust, it still made her feel bad.
Because what had he done to deserve to be treated like that? Nothing.
‘We’re almost there,’ Alex said. ‘I’ll drop you three off here and I’ll go park the car.’ It had just gone 2.15 pm by then. ‘It’s two minutes’ walk away, near the covered market. Find a café nearby—not in sight of the building—and wait. I’ll text you, Romy, as soon as our thief arrives.’
They scrambled out of the hire car, watching as it silently disappeared around the corner. Romy said, ‘Here we go then,’ while Audrey gave a small sigh, saying, ‘I hope there’s no last-minute change.’ Both women looked at Isabelle, but she said nothing.
They made their way through a network of pedestrianised streets, and within a short time they found themselves looking at the building where a discreet golden plaque indicated the presence of the auction house on the first floor.
As Alex had said, it was close to the busy covered market named after the district it was in, les Carmes.
The market had just closed for the day but there was still a lot of activity around it, and the nearby cafés were busy.
But they managed to find a table, out of sight of the auction house windows.
The other two women ordered coffee and slices of quiche, but Isabelle couldn’t stomach anything other than a glass of sparkling water.
She tried to join in the conversation but couldn’t help glancing at Romy’s phone as it lay on the table, silent and still as the minutes ticked by.
The coffees and quiches arrived, and still Alex hadn’t texted.
Two-thirty. A quarter to three. The quiches were finished, the coffees and water too, but still they waited.
Ten to three. Five to three. And then, quite suddenly, Isabelle saw him, on the other side of the street, strolling towards the auction house building, a leather satchel slung nonchalantly over one shoulder.
In that moment, he looked so sure of himself in his elegant grey suit, his face untroubled by any hint of guilt or any sense of being watched, that a red mist rose in front of her eyes and she instantly forgot the careful plan they’d devised, getting up so quickly she almost knocked her chair over.
‘Wait,’ Romy called, but Isabelle ignored her, apprehension and shame replaced by a wild anger as she launched herself across the street.
All she wanted was to see the look on that bastard’s face when he realised he’d been rumbled.
He heard her. Turned. For a fraction of an instant, he just stared at her, disbelieving, his face losing all colour, and she’d almost reached him when he took to his heels, clutching the satchel tightly.
She ran after him, shouting for him to stop, to face her, to give her back the letter, but on the uneven cobblestones he was much faster in his flat shoes than she was in the pretty but impractical wedge heels she was wearing.
The wrong move and she’d twist her ankle, yet she kept grimly on anyway.
But in that maze of streets, it was all too easy for him to shake her off.
Finally, she had to stop, panting and sick at heart.
She was only dimly aware of the stares of people around her who had seen her headlong rush and heard her shouting, only dimly aware of Romy and Audrey hurrying towards her, only half-listening to their reassuring voices as they led her back to the auction house building.
Romy told her that she would alert Alex and Carlos by text about what had happened.
The adrenaline of the chase, the surge of her anger was ebbing away, and now she felt utterly deflated.
She’d been such an idiot. Not only had she failed to catch him, but she’d made everything worse.
That moment of pure, blind rage when she’d spotted him had spoiled their only chance of getting the letter back.
Inside the auction house, Alex and Carlos were waiting. When the women came in, Isabelle saw Carlos’s eyes widen as he took in the sling on her arm. ‘Are you all right, Isa? Did he hurt you?’
A pang went through Isabelle. No reproach from him, no irritation, just kindness and concern she didn’t deserve.
‘No,’ she said, her voice shaky. ‘I mean, the arm isn’t his fault it was just a stupid mishap on a train.
’ She swallowed. ‘I’m so sorry, everyone.
I—I completely screwed things up, the whole way through.
The letter’s gone and I doubt we’ll ever get it back, because it really is my word against his, isn’t it?
He’s going to be the one to find out who Mademoiselle Houssaye was, where those copies of the sketches might be, whether they still exist—and we can’t stop him.
But I’m truly sorry to have let you down, to have been so foolish, so blind, so—’
‘Oh, stop it, Isa.’ Carlos’s tone held something that made her startle into silence.
‘I know you love your dramatic moments, but giving up really isn’t something you’re good at.
’ He smiled properly for the first time.
‘The thieving prof has vanished with the letter for the moment, yes, but he will never know what our graphologist has to say. And I think it’s something you will all want to hear. ’