But the only conclusion he’d reached was that he was unhappy.
After eight years with the State Department, Nick O’Hara was fed up with his job. He was headed in circles, a ship without a rudder. His career was at a standstill, but the fault was not entirely his. Bit by bit he’d lost his patience for political games of state—he wasn’t in the mood to play. He’d hung in there, though, because he’d believed in his job, in its intrinsic worth. From peace marches in his youth to peace tables in his prime.
But ideals, he had discovered, got people nowhere. Hell, diplomacy didn’t run on ideals. It ran, like everything else, on protocol and party-line politics. While he’d perfected his protocol, he hadn’t gotten the politics quite right. It wasn’t that he couldn’t. He wouldn’t.
In that regard Nick knew he was a lousy diplomat. Unfortunately those in authority apparently agreed with him. So he had been banished to this bottom-of-the-barrel consular post in D.C., calling bad news to new widows. It was a not-so-subtle slap in the face. Sure, he could have refused the assignment. He could’ve gone back to teaching, to his comfortable old niche at American University. He had needed to think about it. Yes, he’d needed those two weeks alone in the Bahamas.
What he didn’t need was to come home to this.
With a sigh, he flipped open the file labeled Fontaine, Geoffrey H. One small item had bothered him all morning. Since 1:00 a.m. he’d been staring at a computer terminal, digging out everything he could get from the vast government files. He’d also spent half an hour on the phone with his buddy Wes Corrigan in the Berlin consulate. In frustration he’d finally turned to a few unusual sources. What had started off as a routine call to the widow to give her his regrets was turning into something a bit more complicated, a puzzle for which Nick didn’t have all the pieces.
In fact, except for the well-established details of Geoffrey Fontaine’s death, there were hardly any pieces at all to play with. Nick didn’t like incomplete puzzles. They drove him crazy. When it came to poking around for more information, more facts, he could be insatiable. But now, as he lifted the thin Fontaine file, he felt as if he were holding a bagful of air: nothing of substance but a name.
And a death.
Nick’s eyes were burning; he leaned back in his chair and yawned. When he was twenty and in college, staying up half the night used to give him a high. Now that he was thirty-eight, it only made him crotchety. And hungry. At 6:00 a.m. he’d wolfed down three doughnuts. The surge of sugar into his system, plus the coffee, had been enough to keep him going. And now he was too curious to stop. Puzzles always did that to him. He wasn’t sure he liked it.
He looked up as the door opened. His pal Tim Greenstein strode in.
“Bingo! I found it!” said Tim. He dropped a file on the desk and gave Nick one of those big, dumb grins he was so famous for. Most of the time, that grin was directed at a computer screen. Tim was a troubleshooter, the man everyone called when the data weren’t where they should be. Heavy glasses distorted his eyes, the consequence of infantile cataracts. A bushy black beard obscured much of the rest of his face, except for a pale forehead and nose.
“Told you I’d get it,” said Tim, plopping into the leather chair across from Nick. “I had my buddy at the FBI do a little fishing. He came up with zilch, so I did a little poking around on my own. Not easy, I’ll tell ya, getting this out of classified. They’ve got some new idiot up there who insists on doing his job.”
Nick frowned. “You had to get this through security?”
“Yep. There’s more, but I couldn’t access it. Found out central intelligence has a file on your man.”
Nick flipped the folder open and stared in amazement. What he saw raised more questions than ever, questions for which there seemed to be no answers. “What the hell does this mean?” he muttered.
“That’s why you couldn’t find anything about Geoffrey H. Fontaine,” said Tim. “Until a year ago, the guy didn’t exist.”
Nick’s jaw snapped up. “Can you get me more?”
“Hey, Nick, I think we’re trespassing on someone else’s turf. Those Company boys might get hot under the collar.”
“So let ’em sue me.” Nick wasn’t in the least intimidated by the CIA. Not after all the incompetent Company men he’d met. “Anyway,” he said with a shrug, “I’m just doing my job. I’ve got a grieving widow, remember?”
“But this Fontaine stuff goes pretty deep.”
“So do you, Tim.”
Tim grinned. “What is it, Nick? Turning detective?”
“No. Just curious.” He scowled at the day’s pile of work on his desk. It was all bureaucratic crap—the bane of his existence—but it had to be done. This Fontaine case was distracting him. He should just give the grieving widow a pat on the shoulder, murmur a kind word and send her out the door. Then he should forget the whole thing. Geoffrey Fontaine, whatever his real name, was dead.
But Tim had set Nick’s curiosity on fire. He glanced at his friend. “Say, how about hunting up a few things about the guy’s wife? Sarah Fontaine. That might get us somewhere.”
“Why don’t you get it yourself?”
“You’re the one with all that hot computer access.”
“Yeah, but you’ve got the woman herself.” Tim nodded toward the door. “I heard the secretary take down her name. Sarah Fontaine’s sitting in your waiting room right now.”
* * *
THE SECRETARY WAS a graying, middle-aged woman with china-blue eyes and a mouth that seemed permanently etched in two straight lines. She glanced up from her typewriter just long enough to take Sarah’s name and direct her toward a nearby couch.
Stacked neatly on a coffee table by the couch were the usual waiting room magazines, as well as a few issues of Foreign Affairs and World Press Review, to which the address labels were still attached: Dr. Nicholas O’Hara.
As the secretary turned back to her typewriter, Sarah sank into the cushions of the couch and stared dully at her hands, which were now folded in her lap. She hadn’t yet shaken the flu, and she was still cold and miserable. But in the past ten hours, a layer of numbness had built up around her, a protective shell that made sights and sounds seem distant. Even physical pain bore a strange dullness. When she’d stubbed her toe in the shower this morning, she’d felt the throb, but somehow she hadn’t cared.
Last night, after the phone call, the pain had overwhelmed her. Now she was only numb. Gazing down, she saw for the first time what a mess she’d made of getting dressed. None of her clothes quite matched. Yet on a subconscious level, she’d chosen to wear things that gave her solace: a favorite gray wool skirt, an old pullover, brown walking shoes. Life had suddenly turned frightening for Sarah; she needed to be comforted by the familiar.
The secretary’s intercom buzzed, and a voice said, “Angie? Can you send Mrs. Fontaine in?”
“Yes, Mr. O’Hara.” Angie nodded at Sarah. “You can go in now,” she said.
Sarah slipped on her glasses, rose to her feet and entered the office marked N. O’Hara. Just inside the door, she paused on the thick carpet and looked calmly at the man on the other side of the desk.
He stood before the window. The sun shone in through pencil-sketch trees, blinding her. At first she saw only the man’s silhouette. He was tall and slender, and his shoulders slouched a little—he looked tired. Moving from the window, he came around the desk to meet her. His blue shirt was wrinkled; a nondescript tie hung loosely around his neck, as if he’d been tugging at it.
“Mrs. Fontaine,” he said, “I’m Nick O’Hara.” Instantly she recognized the voice from the telephone, the same voice that had shattered her world just ten hours earlier.
He held his hand out to her, a gesture that struck Sarah as too automatic, a mere formality that he no doubt extended to all widows. But his grip was firm. As he shifted toward the window, the light fell fully on his face. She saw long, thin features, an angular jaw, a sober mouth. She judged him to be in his late thirties, perha
ps older. His dark brown hair was woven with gray at the temples. Beneath the slate-colored eyes were dark circles.
He motioned her to a chair. As she sat down, she noticed for the first time that a third person was in the room, a man with glasses and a bushy black beard who was sitting quietly in a corner chair. She’d seen him when he’d passed through the reception room earlier.
Nick settled on the edge of the desk and looked at her. “I’m very sorry about your husband, Mrs. Fontaine,” he said gently. “It’s a terrible shock, I know. Most people don’t want to believe us when they get that phone call. I felt I had to meet you face-to-face. I have questions. I’m sure you have, too.” He nodded at the man with the beard. “You don’t mind Mr. Greenstein listening in, do you?”
She shrugged, wondering vaguely why Mr. Greenstein was there.
“We’re both with state,” Nick continued. “I’m with consular affairs in the foreign service. Mr. Greenstein’s with our technical support division.”
“I see.” Shivering, she pulled her sweater tighter. The chills were starting again, and her throat was sore. Why were government offices always so cold? she wondered.
“Are you all right, Mrs. Fontaine?” Nick asked.
She looked up miserably at him. “Your office is chilly.”
“Can I get you a cup of coffee?”
“No, thank you. Please, I just want to know about my husband. I still can’t believe it, Mr. O’Hara. I keep thinking something’s wrong. That there’s been a mistake.”
He nodded sympathetically. “That’s a common reaction, to think it’s all a mistake.”
“Is it?”
“Denial. Everyone goes through it. That’s what you’re feeling now.”
“But you don’t ask every widow to your office, do you? There must be something different about Geoffrey.”
“Yes,” he admitted. “There is.”
He turned and swept up a file folder from his desk. After flipping through it, he pulled out a page covered with notes. The handwriting was an illegible scrawl; it had to be his writing, she thought. No one but the writer himself would ever be able to decipher it.
“After I called you, Mrs. Fontaine, I got in touch with our consulate in Berlin. What you said last night bothered me. Enough to make me recheck the facts.” His pause made her gaze up at him expectantly. She found two steady eyes, tired and troubled, watching her. “I talked to Wes Corrigan, our consul in Berlin. Here’s what he told me.” He glanced down at his notes. “Yesterday, about 8:00 p.m. Berlin time, a man named Geoffrey Fontaine checked into Hotel Regina. He paid with a traveler’s check. The signature matched. For identification he used his passport. About four hours later, at midnight, the fire department answered a call at the hotel. Your husband’s room was in flames. By the time they got it under control, the room was totally destroyed. The official explanation was that he’d fallen asleep while smoking in bed. Your husband, I’m afraid, was burned beyond recognition.”
“Then how can they be sure it was him?” Sarah blurted. Until that instant she’d been listening with growing despair. But Nick O’Hara had just introduced too many other possibilities. “Someone could have stolen his passport,” she pointed out.
“Mrs. Fontaine, let me finish.”
“But you just said they couldn’t even identify the body.”
“Let’s try and be logical, here.”
“I am being logical!”
“You’re being emotional. Look, it’s normal for widows to clutch at straws like this, but—”
“I’m not yet convinced I am a widow.”
He held up his hands in frustration. “Okay, okay, look at the evidence, then. The hard evidence. First, they found his briefcase in the room. It was aluminum, fire resistant.”
“Geoffrey never owned anything like that.”
“The contents survived the fire. Your husband’s passport was inside.”
“But—”
“Then there’s the coroner’s report. A Berlin pathologist briefly examined the body—what was left of it. While there weren’t any dental records for comparison, the body’s height was the same as your husband’s.”
“That doesn’t mean a thing.”
“Finally—”
“Mr. O’Hara—”
“Finally,” he said with sudden force, “we have one last bit of evidence, something found on the body itself. I’m sorry, Mrs. Fontaine, but I think it’ll convince you.”
All at once she wanted to clap her hands over her ears, to shout at him to stop. Until now she’d withstood the evidence. But she couldn’t listen any longer. She couldn’t stand having all her hopes collapse.
“It was a wedding ring. The inscription was still readable. Sarah. 2-14.” He looked up from his notes. “That is your wedding date, isn’t it?”
Everything blurred as her eyes filled with tears. In silence she bowed her head. The glasses slipped off her nose and fell to her lap. Blindly she hunted in her purse for a tissue, only to find that Nick O’Hara had somehow produced a whole box of Kleenex out of thin air.
“Take what you need,” he said softly.
He watched as she wiped away her tears and tried, somehow, to blow her nose gracefully. Under his scrutiny she felt so clumsy and stupid. Even her fingers refused to work properly. Her glasses slid from her lap to the floor. Her purse wouldn’t snap shut. Desperate to leave, she fumbled for her things and rose from the chair.
“Please, Mrs. Fontaine, sit down. I’m not quite finished,” he said.
As if she were an obedient child, Sarah returned to her seat and stared at the floor. “If it’s about the burial arrangements…”
“No, you can take care of that later, after we fly the body back. There’s something else I need to ask you. It’s about your husband’s trip. Why was he in Europe?”
“Business.”
“What kind of business?”
“He was a—a representative for the Bank of London.”
“So he traveled a lot?”
“Yes. Every month or so he was in London.”
“Only London?”
“Yes.”
“Tell me why he was in Germany, Mrs. Fontaine.”
“I don’t know.”
“You must have an idea.”
“I don’t know.”
“Was it his habit not to tell you where he was going?”
“No.”
“Then why was he in Germany? There must have been a reason. Other business, perhaps? Other…”
She looked up sharply. “Other women? That’s what you want to ask, isn’t it?”
He didn’t answer.
“Isn’t it?”
“It’s a reasonable suspicion.”
“Not about Geoffrey!”
“About anyone.” His eyes met hers head-on. She refused to turn away. “You were married a total of two months,” he said. “How well did you know your husband?”
“Know him? I loved him, Mr. O’Hara.”
“I’m not talking about love, whatever that means. I’m asking how well you knew the man. Who he was, what he did. How long ago did you meet?”
“It was…I guess six months ago. I met him at a coffee shop, near where I work.”
“Where do you work?”
“NIH. I’m a research microbiologist.”
His eyes narrowed. “What kind of research?”
“Bacterial genomes…. We splice DNA…. Why are you asking these questions?”
“Is it classified research?”
“I still don’t understand why—”
“Is it classified, Mrs. Fontaine?”
She stared at him, shocked into silence by the sharp tone of his voice. Softly she said, “Yes. Some of it.”
He nodded and pulled another sheet from the folder. Calmly he continued. “I had Mr. Corrigan in Berlin check your husband’s passport. Whenever you fly into a new country, a page is stamped with an entry date. Your husband’s passport had several stamps. London. Schiphol, near Am
sterdam. And last, Berlin. All were dated within the last week. Any explanation why he’d visit those particular cities?”
She shook her head, bewildered.
“When did he call you last?”
“A week ago. From London.”
“Can you be sure he was in London?”
“No. It was direct dial. There was no operator involved.”
“Did your husband have a life-insurance policy?”
“No. I mean, I don’t know. He never mentioned it.”
“Did anyone stand to benefit from his death? Financially, I mean.”
“I don’t think so.”
He took this in with a frown. Settling back onto the desk, he crossed his arms and looked away for a moment. She could almost see his mind churning over the facts, juggling the puzzle pieces. She was just as confused as he was. None of this made sense; none of it seemed possible. Geoffrey had been her husband, and now she was beginning to wonder if Nick O’Hara was right. That she’d never really known him. That all she and Geoffrey had shared was a bed and a home, but never their hearts.
No, this was all wrong; it was a betrayal of his memory. She believed in Geoffrey. Why should she believe this stranger? Why was this man telling her these things? Was there another purpose to all this? Suddenly she disliked Nick O’Hara. Intensely. He was flinging these questions at her for some unspoken reason.
“If you’re finished…” she said, starting to rise again.
He glanced at her with a start, as if he’d forgotten she was still there. “No. I’m not.”
“I’m not feeling well. I’d like to go home.”
“Do you have a picture of your husband?” he asked abruptly.
Taken aback by his sudden request, Sarah opened her purse and pulled a photograph from her wallet. It was a good likeness of Geoffrey, taken on a Florida beach during their three-day honeymoon. His brilliant blue eyes stared directly at the camera. His hair was bright gold, and the sunlight fell at an angle across his face, throwing shadows on his uncommonly handsome features. He was smiling. From the start she’d been drawn to that face—not by just the good looks, but by the strength and intelligence she’d seen in the eyes.