CHAPTER ONE
Three years later
‘Right, listen up, everyone!’ The tour guide clapped her hands a few times above the excited rumble of conversation and then seized the microphone to get their attention, booming out, ‘Your final session of free time in Paris begins now!’ Her fanatical gaze roved across their faces, studying each one in turn. ‘Hello, people… Are you listening?’
Three rows back, sitting bolt-upright, Maeve gave the tour guide an encouraging smile. She was listening. Pen poised above her notebook, she was also ready to take copious notes, as she always did.
Better safe than sorry.
‘From here, you can explore the Louvre museum and galleries, take a cruise on the River Seine, relax in the lovely Tuileries Gardens, or even treat yourself to a slap-up meal at the exclusive Paris Ritz. The choice is up to you. But please remember, people, you only have six hours. We meet back here at five o’clock sharp.’ Betsy paused. ‘Any questions before I let you go?’
Maeve stuck her hand in the air.
A collective groan went up from her fellow travellers, and she glanced about at them, unable to suppress an inner flicker of annoyance.
Perhaps she had asked rather a lot of questions on this tour. But it wasn’t her fault that so much was left unexplained. Besides, the coach tour was almost over now. Tonight they would be heading back to the ferry and the white cliffs of Dover. So one more itty bitty question could surely not hurt…
Betsy pursed her lips. ‘Yes, Maeve?’ Her eyes had narrowed, and her tone was distinctly unfriendly. Which was unfair, given that she hadn’t even heard Maeve’s query yet.
‘When you say five o’clock sharp –’
‘I mean, not five past five. Or ten past five. And definitely not half past five.’ Betsy glanced at Petunia, who had proved herself notorious as a latecomer when returning from other so-called ‘free time’ excursions, which simply meant times when they could explore alone rather than with the tour guide in charge. ‘Our sailing back to Dover is fixed in stone, I’m afraid. So please note, we won’t be waiting for anyone who misses the 5pm rollcall. Don’t say I didn’t warn you…’
5pm rendezvous at the coach. DO NOT BE LATE!
Maeve scribbled those last four words in large block capitals in her large, leather-bound travel notebook, which also usefully accommodated her passport, travel documents, and even her mobile phone in a handy pocket.
As she fastened the clasp on her notebook and thrust the whole thing safely down into her backpack, she caught sight of her reflection in the window next to her seat. Her blonde hair looked neat and unfussy, a shoulder-length bob that made blow-drying quick and simple in the mornings before she had to dash out to school. She rarely wore make-up, except for a little flattering foundation when term had dragged on too long, and had not even bothered with lipstick that morning, feeling confident enough to go au naturel for the last day of this wonderful short break. She could have wished her eyes were a little brighter or more vivid; her particular shade of blue had always struck her as insipid. But she looked ready for anything, and Maeve took that as a win.
Sliding out of her seat, she met Petunia’s hard gaze and felt a sudden urge to reassure her less well-organised fellow traveller.
‘Plenty of time before five o’clock,’ she said encouragingly, pulling on her jacket. ‘I’ll aim to be back here half an hour early though, just to be sure.’
‘Of course you will, Little Miss Perfect,’ Petunia muttered and pushed past her down the coach steps.
Taken aback, Maeve stared after the other woman in surprise.
That was rather uncalled-for, she thought, blinking. She was certainly not perfect. Far from it, in fact. She hoped she hadn’t been giving off that impression, though she also knew from experience that her insistence on dotting every i and crossing every t could be irritating to less-organized people. Most people managed not to be mean to her about it though.
Still, maybe Petunia was just having another of her ‘dodgy tummy” episodes; these had been a feature of their tour, even causing unpleasant odour issues when the onboard toilet began to malfunction. Not that anyone would have said anything to Petunia’s face, of course. But Maeve had spotted a few hankies clasped to noses and requests to turn up the air con.
She’d never been on a coach tour before, and it had been a revelation. On a whim, desperate for a break from her usual ‘stay home and vegetate’ summer holiday, she had paid for this five-day sightseeing and shopping trip to Paris. And it had been wonderful so far, despite a demanding itinerary.
They had spent a whole day exploring the vast, imposing palace and formal gardens at Versailles; climbed hundreds of steps up to the famous white basilica of Sacré Coeur; taken in dinner and a show at the exotic Moulin Rouge; and even spent a leisurely afternoon wandering around the fascinating Latin Quarter on the Rive Gauche.
Today was their final day though, and she was very much looking forward to a more artistic day visiting the Louvre and viewing its priceless paintings and objets d’art.
Maeve taught Maths in a North London secondary school. She was not particularly artistic, knew next to nothing about art and paintings, but had always been in awe of creative people like her best friend Sally, who taught art in the classroom opposite hers. She might be at home discussing symmetry and mathematical shapes with her school students, but she had no idea how people managed to make beautiful works of art.
Artists were such curious and fascinating creatures. Where did all their ideas come from? How did they learn their craft? Was it natural or did it involve hard work too? Could anyone become an artist?
How marvellous it must be, Maeve thought, jumping down from the air-conditioned coach into hot sunshine and slinging her trusty rucksack over one shoulder, to be talented and skilled enough to create a work of art. To draw or paint a picture worthy of exhibition and then have people stand and admire it.
There was a family legend that her maternal grandmother had been a Parisian artist, or perhaps an artist”s model, she wasn”t sure which. But since her mum had abandoned Maeve when she was a toddler, she knew next to nothing about that side of the family, except a few hazy details that her dad had reluctantly provided. Hence the alluring shroud of mystery around this French grandmother, whose name she didn’t even know.
One day, she had resolved, she would investigate her family tree. She had even brought her grandmother’s last known address with her on this trip, thinking perhaps…
But it would have been ludicrous to turn up on some unknown and possibly long-gone Frenchwoman’s doorstep, wouldn’t it? So she had not acted on that impulse, burying it deeper with every day that passed.
‘Maeve will know the answer,’ someone said close by, and she turned, instantly eager to help.
‘Yes?’
‘Which way is the River Seine?’ Mr Endersley asked in his thick Yorkshire accent.
His dainty wife added with a smile, ‘We fancy the idea of a boat trip down to the cathedral of Notre Dame and back. Such lovely weather for going on the river, isn’t it?’
‘What a good idea. Though don’t forget the sunscreen this time,’ Maeve said, glancing at Mr Endersley’s reddened forehead. ‘Those open-top boats are suntraps.’ She paused, biting her lip as their query sunk in. ‘Actually, I’m sorry, but I don’t know how to get to the river from here,’ she admitted. ‘We’d better ask Betsy. Or look at a map. I’ve got one in my rucksack.’
Mr Endersley frowned. ‘Eh? But we heard you telling someone you was born right here in Paris.’
Oh dear, Maeve thought, seeing a few interested glances turning their way.
‘I was born here, yes,’ she agreed hurriedly. ‘But my parents took me to live in the UK as a baby and I’ve never been back to France since. Until now, that is.’ She flushed, catching Mrs Endersley’s look of disbelief. ‘So my birthplace is purely a technicality, I’m afraid.’
Betsy came bustling past, intent on some errand of her own, and the Endersleys turned to ask her for directions to the river.
Without waiting to make sure everyone got to where they wanted to go, Maeve slipped away towards the Louvre, which was thankfully so famous and well-signposted she couldn’t possibly miss it.
A group of giggling French girls swarmed past her and she stood aside for them, listening with a stab of curiosity to their swift rattling French.
French. Her mother’s native tongue.
Not having known her mother beyond the age of three, her grasp on that language had grown sadly more tenuous as the years passed. Of course she had taken French at school, but only to age sixteen, and had forgotten much of it since then, having concentrated on her favourite maths and science subjects after that.
Maybe after this holiday she could sign up for a French evening class. There had been some embarrassing moments over the past few days, struggling with a language she really ought to know better. Though her work at the school was so demanding, she didn’t have much free time for leisure pursuits. Perhaps after this trip, she could forget her obsession with her French legacy and focus on improving her teaching skills instead.
Still, she had enjoyed being on a coach tour with other people who were equally interested in Paris and its history. Much of her time at home was spent alone. But exploring the city on her own was also pleasurable.
The amazement on Mrs Endersley’s face came back to her as she joined the long, snaking queue for entrance to the Louvre.
Perhaps it was strange that she’d never visited France before, considering that Paris had been her birthplace. But her life was so busy…
And she had intended to visit the Parisian building where, according to a scribble on the back of a photograph, she had been born.
She’d found the photo in a dusty old album left behind by her mother and studied the smiling, fair-haired young woman cradling a baby – Maeve herself, her dad had confirmed – standing in front of a very French-looking apartment building. Her grandmother’s residence, apparently. She’d even managed to locate the address on a map of Paris. But she hadn’t plucked up courage to go there during this tour, and now it was too late…
Anyway, her mother had abandoned her and Dad to run off with another man. They had never heard from her again, and her father had raised her alone in London. So she didn’t owe her mother’s family anything.
Besides, she didn’t know if her grandmother was still in residence in that tall building with its white shutters and balconies with terracotta pots of colourful geraniums. She might have moved home or even died by now. People didn’t live forever. There might be strangers living at that address. It would have been too horribly embarrassing to knock at the door and be confronted with an uncomprehending French stranger.
This last-minute Paris coach tour had been an attempt to get back in touch with her roots, she suspected. But that side of it had been a bit half-hearted, which was unlike her. So she’d stuck to the itinerary like everyone else and tried to push those ideas of reconnecting aside.
It had been a silly notion anyway, looking up her long-lost French relatives, and she wasn’t generally given to frivolous ideas.
So that was that.
End of.
Maeve spent an exhausting but utterly marvellous few hours traipsing around the vast, echoing galleries of the Louvre, wandering beneath gloriously decorative ceilings that gave her a crick in the neck just staring up at them. She stood motionless for some time, ignoring the buffeting crowds all around her, to admire the Winged Victory of Samothrace on the Daru staircase and the beautiful, smooth-marbled Venus de Milo, apparently dating from one-hundred-and-fifty-years BCE. She studied the imposing Coronation of Napoleon with polite interest and bit her lip at Psyche Revived By Cupid’s Kiss, which made her feel very far from sensible for a moment.
And, of course, she diligently waited her turn to stand for a few dizzying seconds in front of the Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci.
That beguiling smile…
After all the hype and dramatic build-up, she’d half-expected to find the world-famous painting ordinary. Too much of a fuss made about nothing. It was only a bit of paint daubed on a canvas, after all.
Instead, she was bowled over by the painting’s subtle, mysterious beauty and its air of undisclosed secrets. She came away from viewing the Mona Lisa with a sense of having had her world enlarged, even though she couldn’t say exactly how or why. But she was glad she’d taken the time to queue up and view da Vinci’s masterpiece.
She took lunch in one of the swish Louvre bistros, despite needing to use her credit card for the bill once again. This was what she’d been saving for, surely? The chance to treat herself after years of careful parsimony, mending rather than replacing, eating and living simply. Maeve wasn’t sure she believed in astrology one hundred percent, but she was a Virgo, and her general star sign description did tally with the way she preferred to live. Clean, careful, simple, thrifty. She wasn’t so keen on the idea of Virgos as fussy, nit-picking perfectionists. Yet, with a grin, she had to accept it wouldn’t be a totally unfounded accusation…
Lingering over coffee, since she still had a good hour before the coach was due to leave, she wrote a few chatty postcards to colleagues at the school – though to their home addresses, as school was out for summer. Finally, to her best friend Sally, she wrote more candidly of her odd reaction to the Mona Lisa portrait, and ended with a smiley face icon, finishing, Wish you were here!
Though she was rather enjoying being on her own, in fact.
School was a madly busy environment, and although she lived alone now that her father had passed away, the building that housed her small North London apartment was often noisy, with slamming doors and echoing footsteps in the stairwell, and always a child somewhere either shouting, laughing or crying. Every other flat in the building seem to house a family with children, many of them quite young. It was nice to be surrounded by so much vibrant life. But sometimes she longed for peace and quiet, and dreamed of a little cottage somewhere in the country, with a walled garden and perhaps a stream running through it. Ridiculous, really, as she knew it would never happen. Not on her salary as a teacher!
Finishing her postcards, she stuck a French stamp onto each one, double-checked the addresses, and then hurried round to a post box near the Louvre. She had politely enquired from a passer-by where she could post her letters and postcards, and marked the place on her little map. The road was busy but the pavement was thronging with tourists. She found herself constantly sidestepping or bumping into people, and was glad to turn a corner into a side street where it was relatively quiet.
The late afternoon sun beat down on her shoulders as she swung her rucksack off her back, rummaged inside for the postcards before slipping them into the postbox in the wall.
The sound of muted sobbing made her turn in surprise. An elderly lady, possibly in her late seventies and very elegantly dressed, was seated on the kerb a few feet away, clutching her ankle. Tourists will walking around her, paying no attention.
Still zipping up her rucksack, Maeve hurried over. ‘Excusez-moi, Madame… Est-ce que je peux vous aider?’ she stammered in her rusty French, though her language skills had much improved even on this short trip to France, words coming back to her that she hadn’t even realised she knew.
As the woman lifted a tear-stained face towards her, frowning into the sunshine without a word, Maeve tried again in English. ‘Erm, have you fallen? Can I help you?’
‘Oh, you are kind, Mademoiselle,’ the lady said in good English, but with a charming French accent. She lifted a shaking hand to shield her eyes from the sun. ‘Yes, I took a bad step and twisted my ankle. I’ve been here some minutes… Nobody else has stopped to help me.’
‘How horrid.’ Maeve felt awful for her. ‘Can you stand?’
‘I’m not sure.’
‘Here, take my hand and we’ll find out.’ Maeve helped the old lady to her foot to her feet and supported her, one arm around her shoulders. ‘How’s that?’
‘Bien, let me try a step or two… Ah, non!’ The lady winced, unsteady on her feet and unable to do much more than hop. It was clear her ankle was badly twisted.
‘Oh dear. Can I fetch someone for you?’
‘Merci, oui. My grandson has a car. He’s meant to be meeting me soon, in the next street along, but I’ll never get there in this state.’
‘I could go and find him for you.’ Maeve didn’t much like the idea of leaving her alone though. ‘I know… Do you have a mobile phone? Perhaps in your handbag? You could call and let him know what’s happened. Then he could come and collect you.’
‘How silly of me. Yes, of course.’ She bit her lip. ‘My phone, it’s in, erm… ma poche.’ The lady had reverted to French, clearly in too much agony over her twisted ankle to find the English words. With a pained frown, she fumbled in her jacket pocket, finding the phone and calling the number. ‘Will you wait with me until he arrives, mademoiselle? I’m sorry to be such a nuisance.’
‘No, of course I’ll wait,’ she said, then muttered, ‘If he’s not too long.’ She was feeling slightly anxious and wished she could check the time on her phone. But the phone was in her rucksack, and it would look rude to stop and rummage about for it. She’d noted the time as she left the museum to post her letters though and knew that she’d need to be back at the coach quite soon or face ridicule from her fellow travellers. Especially after being so stern with Petunia about not turning up late again.
Though she could hardly leave this unfortunate lady hobbling along the street alone, could she? And there would still be time to make the deadline if she walked briskly.
The lady was speaking rapidly into her phone in French, presumably to her grandson. There was a pause, then she tutted loudly and spoke in a more agitated fashion, spitting out words that Maeve couldn’t quite follow, but they sounded almost angry.
Perhaps her grandson couldn’t pick her up immediately.
Worried again about the deadline approaching, Maeve felt a flicker of dread and hoped he wouldn’t keep them waiting too long. She strongly disliked being late for anything. Besides, it would be too awful if she missed the coach leaving and had to make her own way home. Apart from anything else, her suitcase was already stowed on the coach, ready for the usual Customs inspection at Calais, so she would have no clean clothes until she got home.
‘He’s on his way,’ the old lady said, putting away her phone. She was looking relieved. ‘But how rude of me. I’m Madame Rémy.’ She held out a hand, and Maeve shook it. ‘Might I know my rescuer’s name?’
‘I’m Maeve Eden,’ she said, smiling. ‘Enchantée, Madame.’
The noisy racket of a motorbike approaching didn’t attract her attention until it slowed and abruptly swerved her way. Then, out of the corner of her eye, she caught a leather-clad arm reaching down to grab her rucksack, sitting beside her on the pavement.
‘Hey!’ she shouted in panic, making a grab for the bag as she suddenly realised what was happening. But she was still shaking Madame Rémy’s hand, and in the precious seconds that it took to gently disentangle herself, the bag had been stolen and the motorcyclist was revving away.
‘Thief! Voleur!’ Incensed, Maeve dashed after the motorcyclist, who had mercifully been forced to slow as a car swerved in front of him. ‘Come back here!’
To her relief, her rucksack was still dangling from the rider’s hand. As the rider struggled to negotiate the blockage, she lurched forward, making a grab for it. At that moment though, he lifted it away from her and simultaneously opened up the throttle. In the next few seconds, he sped away down the street, the roar of the engine deafening.
Maeve, who had thrown herself headlong after the biker in one last desperate attempt to retrieve her property, lost her footing on a loose grating.
With a despairing cry, she tumbled forward, cracking her head on hot dirty tarmac…