Page 25 of A Mother’s Love

“We have cameras in Paris, surveillance cameras, to detect criminal acts. I think we have one in that location,” he said to Halley in English.

He looked at a list on his computer, and nodded.

“There are two outside the restaurant. We catch people who steal from luxury stores in that neighborhood.” He entered a code, and a minute later there were images on the screen.

He hit play, and there from two different angles they saw an even more precise account of the theft, and in one of them, you could see that the man in the black suit had some kind of large, cumbersome object under the coat over his arm.

“We’ll put his face into the computer and see if he’s wanted for any other crimes.

Some of these guys make a very good living stealing and selling high-priced items like that.

And they know where to sell them. There’s a booming market for stolen goods.

Particularly Hermès. You won’t see that bag again,” he said with utter conviction.

She felt stupid because it was just an object and she had bought it for herself.

But she loved the bag, and all the more because there was only one of them in the world.

It made her really sad that he had taken it.

She was overcome with a feeling of loss and sorrow as she sat there. She felt defeated.

The officer had noted the license plate on the cab the thief took, but that wasn’t enough of a clue to catch him.

But he explained that they would call the cab company to find out where the driver had taken him.

They needed to know where he lived, or where he hung out in order to find him and arrest him.

Every minute or so, she remembered something else that was in the missing bag, and felt a little worse.

The young officer printed the report and had Halley sign it, and then she and the waiter were free to go.

Nothing the officer had said to her gave Halley the faintest hope that they would find her bag or even try very hard.

It was a very banal crime, except for the value of the bag.

He accepted it as a fact that the bag was gone forever, and that they’d never find it, although he said they would try through resale sources, dealers they knew of stolen goods, and online.

She was sure they wouldn’t find it, though, and the waiter who had accompanied her confirmed it, when they thanked the officer, picked up her shopping bags, and went back to the street.

“It happens so much in Paris, and big cities all over Europe, that it’s a common occurrence to them,” the waiter said softly.

He felt sorry for her. She looked devastated.

“Like cell phones. Hundreds get stolen every day. They sell those too.” Halley asked to borrow his phone then and called the car service.

She got the number from information, and they promised to send a car and driver for her within twenty minutes, so she told the waiter he could leave her.

He hesitated, it didn’t seem right to him.

He felt bad for her, and she looked very pale and sad.

“Don’t worry, Francois. I’m fine, a car is coming for me now.

Thank you for being such a big help. I would have been lost here without you.

” She wanted to give him a big tip to thank him, but couldn’t even do that.

She was planning to go back to the restaurant as soon as she had some cash again, to pay for her lunch.

She wanted to tip the ma?tre d’ too. They had all been very kind.

Francois left her to take the metro back to the restaurant, and ten minutes later a car showed up for her, with a different driver from the one who had picked her up at the airport the day before.

It felt like a lifetime ago now. It was hard to believe she had been in Paris for less than two days.

It felt more like weeks or years after the day she’d just had.

When she got in the car, she asked the driver to take her to the nearest store where she could buy a phone. He said there was one nearby, and she looked profoundly embarrassed when she asked him if he could buy it with a company credit card, and put it on her bill, along with a big tip for him.

“I lost all my credit cards and money, and my phone. My purse was stolen today. I can wait for everything else, but not my phone. My children will try to call me, and they’ll worry if I don’t answer.

” He smiled at her. She looked as though she had been through the wringer, and she felt as though she had.

“I’ll explain it to the owner,” he said gently, and handed her his gas card that belonged to the company. She looked like a decent person, and he could see how upset she was. Her hand was shaking when she took the card.

She disappeared into the phone store and was gone for half an hour. They deactivated her old phone, listed it as stolen, and activated her new phone, with her same number. Almost the instant she turned it on, it rang. It was Millie.

“What happened? I got your text. I canceled all your cards and ordered new ones, and reported your checkbook, driver’s license, and passport stolen. You’ll have to go to the embassy yourself tomorrow for a new passport. Have you reported it to the police?”

“I’ve been there for hours. I just left. They say the bag will be sold in Europe or Asia. It’s gone forever.” She felt even sadder as she said it. Telling Millie made it even more real.

“That’s so awful,” she said sympathetically, “I’m really sorry, Halley.”

“Yeah, me too.” She felt stupid admitting it, and it was just a bag, but she felt so depressed over it.

It didn’t make sense, but she felt as though a scab had been ripped off an old wound.

She felt vulnerable and sad. On the way back to the house in the car, she remembered an incident at the orphanage that she had long forgotten.

A new girl who had been a runaway on the streets had jimmied her way into Halley’s locker with a screwdriver.

She was only eleven, but she’d had more experience of a bad life than most adults.

She had stolen Halley’s only good sweater, some money she had saved up from doing extra chores, and a charm bracelet Halley loved with Disney characters on it.

The bracelet wasn’t real gold but Halley had saved for it for months, and had been so proud of it.

They caught the girl red-handed, stealing from someone else, and she went to juvenile hall, but she must have taken the bracelet with her, or sold it, because they never found it.

Halley had so little of her own then, and the girl had taken her most treasured possessions, and showed no remorse when they caught her.

Halley wondered if the bag thief was like that, unremorseful and indifferent to the pain he had caused.

For him, it was just business. For Halley, it was deep and personal, leaving her feeling violated and awakening the ghosts of the past that had been dormant for years.

She was an abuse victim again. You couldn’t kill those ghosts or excise them entirely.

You could only hope they would remain dormant forever.

Hers were waking up from the theft of her bag. It was traumatic for her.

The driver took Halley home after she got her phone, and with some trepidation, she rang the guardian’s doorbell, to ask him for a spare set of keys.

He took forever to answer, and she could hear him rustling around inside and banging things.

He finally came to the door, yanked it open, and glared at her, his evil-looking dog at his side.

“What do you want?” he asked her, instantly surly. She felt like a naughty child, having to tell him she had lost the keys, though through no fault of her own. She was a grown woman and suddenly felt like a bad child, just as she had always been told she was. It was familiar to her.

“Sorry, Henri,” she said politely, “my bag was stolen, I need another set of keys, and the police said we have to change the locks.” She was apologetic and polite, intimidated by him, and trying not to be.

She had to remind herself that he was not her parent.

And she was not a child. She was an adult, and he was an employee.

“How could you be so careless? You’ve been here for two days, and you’re already causing trouble.

Do you have any idea how expensive it is to change the locks?

And no one will come to change them now until after the New Year.

It will serve you right if the thief comes and ties you up like a sausage and steals everything you brought in all those suitcases.

I told the owners that renters would be a headache!

” He left her standing in the doorway then, and went to get another set of keys.

He was back with them a minute later, and handed them to her with utter disgust. She made an effort not to react to what he said and ignore it.

“Will you keep an ear out at night, in case someone does show up? That wouldn’t be fun for either of us.” She gave him a pointed look.

“Just keep the door locked and the alarm on,” he said. The locked door would make no difference since the bag thief had the keys, but the alarm would.

“I will, thank you,” she said, still jangled by everything that had happened, and he added to it.