Tempting Fate (88 page)

“Where?” His hands dropped from her arms.

“I’ve never seen this apartment. Show it to me. Talk to me.” She sighed. “Why must you make this so difficult?”

“You came to me, Madelaine,” he reminded her. “That was a cheap shot. I’m sorry.”

“At least you admit it,” she said, and made herself smile at him. “Where’s your sitting room? If we’re going to straighten things out, we might as well do it in comfort.”

“In the sitting room?” He brushed her cheek with the back of his hand. “Not the bedroom?”

Madelaine bit her lower lip. “If you knew how much I want to lie in your arms, you wouldn’t ask that.” She read a kind of shock in the back of his eyes. “I’m not supposed to say such things, am I? I should wait and simper and pant until you’re convinced I can be told of your desire without swooning. Or am I supposed to tear off my clothes now, overwhelmed at the opportunity? James, have you forgot what it was like together?”

He looked away from her. “I guess I have. It’s been more than a year, and there were just the two letters…” He broke off. “I thought you didn’t want to see me again, or had found someone you wanted more.”

“You should have had five letters,” she said gently. “I had only one from you, and you mentioned an earlier one which I never received. When I’m on a dig, this can happen. We employ special couriers for the photographs and notes.” She took a step away from him. “Which is the sitting room?”

He gave in. “First door on the left. It isn’t very big.”

She entered the room and looked around, nodding her approval. “You have been reading a great deal,” she remarked with a wave at the overflowing bookcases.

“Yes. I want to keep my European assignment, and that means learning a lot more.” He indicated one of two shabby armchairs. “Tell me what’s on your mind.”

Madelaine draped her coat over the back of the chair, then sat down, unmindful of the room’s chill. “I have to locate someone.”

“Oh? Who?” James took the other chair after lighting the small gas heater under the grimy window. “It’ll be warmer in a minute.”

“N’importe.” She leaned back, hoping to appear more at ease than she was.

“Where is this person? Do you have any idea?” In spite of himself, he was intrigued.

“He was in Munich for a time, but I understand he has left there. Perhaps Vienna now, or Switzerland or Italy.” As she said this, she realized how vast the search might be, and it distressed her.

“Any idea how he’s—I assume it is a he?—traveling?” The gas meter made a bubbling sound, and he turned to adjust it.

“By train, I think.” She put her hand to her forehead. “I know it is probably ridiculous to try, but I must make the attempt.”

James felt his hands turn cold, and he stared at her through narrowed eyes. “Saint-Germain?”

“Yes.”

He lurched out of his chair and began to pace the crowded, messy room. “Him! By damn, I should have known. You’d offer to sleep with half the devils in hell for him, wouldn’t you? And in my case, it isn’t all that painful. You have the advantage of being able to like it.” His voice rose savagely as he came up behind her. “Doesn’t it bother you at all?”

“Yes, it does,” she whispered. “But I must do something.”

“And you figure I’m enough of a sucker for you that I’ll be willing to go along with whatever you ask as long as I get to lay you every night.” He was not aware of how wounded he sounded, and so her reaction disarmed him.

“If it were you, and he were in your position, I would do the same thing. How could I come to you, asking for your love, if I deserted him? He’s no threat to you. We are no longer lovers, he and I.” She twisted in the chair so that she would be able to take his hands in hers.

“Oh, that’s right; I forgot. He’s a vampire, just like you.” His sarcasm was bitter, and he broke away from her, fearing that she would overcome him with her presence.

“He is.” Her protest was futile; she knew it.

“Naturally. And you have a blood oath to take care of him.” Anger gave his cognac-colored eyes a sulfurous tinge. “What kind of an idiot do you think I am?”

“I don’t think you’re an idiot at all. I think you are my friend.” She smiled blindly, miserably. “There was no one else I wanted to turn to but you. No one else, James.”

“To help you find out if—that’s the right word, isn’t it:
if
—your onetime vampire lover is in Austria or Switzerland or Italy. Well, now, Madelaine, that’s a pretty tall order for a country boy like me.” He choked suddenly and spun away from her. “God, Madelaine, I didn’t mean it. Why do I do this to you?”

She got up slowly and went toward him. “Why do you do this to yourself, James? You hurt yourself as badly as you hurt me.” She slipped under his arm and pulled his face down to her. “You think I’m trying to use you. That’s a very small part of it.”

“I wish I could believe you,” he muttered, ignoring the irrational hope that fluttered through him.

“I’m asking you to trust me, as I am trusting you,” she told him. “You know what I am, and you are not repulsed.” She lifted her shoulder. “It doesn’t matter to me that you do not believe me”—this was not entirely accurate, but she did not want to quibble about it now—“but neither do you shun me.”

“Shun you? How could I?” It was terrible to feel such desire and such jealousy at the same time. James grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her. “I wish I
could
shun you, for my own peace of mind, but I can’t. I don’t want to. And if you are using me just to get back to your real lover, I don’t want to know about it. All I want is to keep you near me until the end of my life.”

“That’s not possible, James,” Madelaine said gently.

“So you’ve told me. And you promise me life after death that will not include you. Why would I want to live after death if you will go on to someone else?” Abruptly he pulled her to him, holding her tightly, his features contorted, his heart full of love and anguish. How much he wanted to love her! There was no way to be free of his need for her, but he did not accept his desire, not yet.

For Madelaine there was no refuge in tears, but she trembled with the strength of her dismay and her passion. “James. Please, James, forgive me. I wanted you to understand, and to welcome the only thing I can give you with my love.”

He made a sound between a cough and a sob. “What a botched job I’ve made of this,” he said, reluctantly letting her go. “I’ve been dreaming for months that you’d come back, just like this, just showing up one day, and I’d tell you all the right things. Then, when you do, I muck it up.”

“Don’t,” Madelaine whispered, her fingers against his lips.

“Look, I’ll help you as much as I can with finding Saint-Germain. That’ll even things up a little. But I can’t go into Germany with you.” This last was grudging.

“Why not? Saint-Germain would not … be rude to you.” She could promise that easily, but did not want to say more.

“Who are you worried about, him or me?” He rapped the question out and wished he had bitten off his tongue.

“You,” she whispered. “You don’t know Saint-Germain.”

“As jealous as I am?” He let his hands drop again. “I don’t want to talk to you this way. But I can’t stop it.”

“It’s all right,” she said, having no idea what she could do to lessen his chagrin.

“It’s not,” he corrected her sadly. “It’s not at all.” Then he put one arm around her shoulder. “About Germany,” he said, making a determined effort now to speak to her without rancor.

“Yes. There is some difficulty?”

He nodded. “They kicked me out the last time I went there, and told me not to come back.” He hitched up his shoulders. “I have contacts there still, but it wouldn’t be a good idea for me to go there. For one thing, if you want to do anything that might be … private, you couldn’t with me around. If I managed to get into the country, you can bet every cop around would be keeping an eye on me. They’re afraid of something, but I didn’t find out what. I’ve kept up on what’s going on through other newsmen, but it’s not the same thing as seeing it for myself.”

“I don’t want you to expose yourself to any danger,” Madelaine said at once, but recalled Saint-Germain’s quick, reckless action that had saved her life. This was an entirely different situation, she insisted in her thoughts, and knew that this was so, but could not dismiss the comparison.

“I wouldn’t mind, if it would accomplish anything useful, but it would only slow you down. If you find out the man’s in Poland or Scandinavia or Italy, then I can do some good, I think, but Germany, and Austria, for that matter, are too risky.” He pulled her around to face him. “I’ll give you a couple of names, and I’ll send wires for you, Madelaine. But you’ve got to promise me that you won’t spend time in futile searching. If my contacts can’t turn the man up, it’s because he either isn’t there or has gone so far underground they’d have to dig a trench to find him.” He saw the horror in her eyes, and quickly added, “I didn’t mean that the way it sounded. Look, if he has to make an escape, it might be best to let him do it on his own. Trying to help might draw too much attention to what he’s doing—do you see that?”

“Yes. You’re right.” She tried to brighten her outlook. “Well, we don’t know for sure that he is in Germany or that he is in trouble. We’ll have to wait awhile to find out what your contacts have to say. I’ve got a few people I can contact as well, professors and other academic colleagues. I’ve already sent a couple telegrams into Greece. He isn’t likely to be there, but there is a chance. He used to have … an associate there, and some of Niklos Aulirios’ ventures are still going on.” Niklos himself had met death uncompromisingly at the hands of a Napoleonic firing squad more than a century ago.

James weighed his next words with care. “If it turns out that your precious Saint-Germain is someplace I can go, I’ll go with you.”

At last Madelaine’s smile was wholly genuine. “Oh, James, thank you, thank you!” She put her arms around his neck and reached up to kiss him, standing on tiptoe, for he was more than a head taller than she.

“How could I refuse you?” The question was addressed to himself as much as to her, and her light laughter showed how much she understood.

She let her hands slide down his lapels, but she did not move back from him. “I don’t want you to think that I say this because I want to give you a reward. I’m afraid you won’t believe me, but I must tell you, for myself. I want to love you. I want to feel you on me, within me. Does that make me a hussy?”

“If it does, then I adore hussies,” James said, his hands pressing her buttocks through the heavy folds of her woolen dress. “There’s no one like you, Madelaine. No one in the world.”

It was not in her nature to be coy, and she sought the culmination of passion as ardently as he did, and for a time the doubts were banished and the only thing between them was their winter clothing, which was wonderfully easy to discard.

Text of a letter from Moritz Eis to Hermann Göring.

NSDAP Headquarters

Dresden

January 14, 1927

Herr Göring:

We have heard that you will soon return from Sweden, which fills all of those of us in the SA with joy. Two years is a long time to be away from our important work, put those of us who have had the honor to work directly under your command know how much of your time has been devoted to our concerns and the work of the Vaterland, though you were enduring the rigors of hospitalization. It has been an inspiration to me and to the men I have assigned to the Ragoczy matter to see the extent of your devotion to the SA, the NSDAP, and Deutschland. When you have announced that you are receiving your men, I will take that opportunity to be among the first to visit you, not only to report our progress, great or small, but to extend my heartfelt congratulations at your recovery and return to health.

I have put a total of five men on the Ragoczy investigation, and this report should bring our activities up to the present day, so that you will discover, all that we have done, and therefore will be able to advise what you wish us to do next. Your personal concern in this matter has shown us all that this is a man of singular importance, and for that reason I have ordered the men assigned to watch Ragoczy to be particularly diligent in their duties so that nothing we do will disappoint you.

You were informed of the departure from München, of course, and we provided details on his travels to Wien. He was able to elude two of my men in Wien, and they have surmised that he was aware he was being followed. The men spoke with the staff at his house in Wien and have learned that he has visited the house rarely, even for the weeks he stayed there, in that he did not entertain at all and spent most of his evenings at the opera or attending concerts. He also gambled and sought the company of many of the disreputable women there. As you are aware, there is a great variety of whores to be had in Wien, of all nationalities, and many of them the most degraded sorts of women. Two of these women were closely questioned by my men there, and their comments are not particularly surprising. The first woman, a Swiss woman of about twenty-five, said that she passed two evenings in Ragoczy’s company, meeting him both evenings in the casino attached to the brothel where she is employed. She said that Ragoczy played negligently and won without much interest. His stakes were high enough and his bearing attractive enough for her to make an effort to attract his attention. He found her curiosity amusing, and agreed to pass the better part of the night in her company. They gambled until some time after three, at which time she invited him to join her in her chambers, where, she says, he proved himself an adept lover with a bit more exotic bent than some she had known. My men claim that she would not be more specific, saying that a woman of her profession must not reveal the natures of her clients unless they are dangerous, because it is not the way a prostitute gets ahead in the world. The second evening was not unlike the first, except that she says they were longer at the gaming tables and that Ragoczy won a fair amount of money, most of which he gave to her. She claims it was her superior performance, but as Ragoczy’s wealth would appear to be extensive, it might have been nothing more than a gesture to demonstrate his superior position. The Ragoczy family has always had a touch of caprice in them that is demonstrated in just such actions.