Page 26 of If Looks Could Kill

The steamship La Bretagne slips through the long jetties reaching their arms out into Le Havre bay toward the English Channel. They feel like pincers, like the long arms of a pair of tongs trying to pluck him out of the water before he makes good his escape.

La Bretagne ’s mighty engines chug. Its twin black smokestacks belch puffs into the morning sky as the jetties recede from view.

The ship plows into the rugged crests of the Channel, southward and westward toward the open ocean and the transatlantic voyage that will carry him home to New York, to the city that will absorb him into its beautiful anonymity.

Only the seagulls cleaving through the coastal sky, circling for darting fish, now connect him to the shore.

Even so, he can’t stop himself from feeling twitchy, scanning the coastline for a police boat surging over the waves toward him, blowing whistles and honking horns.

It’s only his imagination. No such boat pursues him.

But he’s not alone.

Just a few days ago, he had posted his bail in London and boarded a train for Dover.

There he booked a single night at a hotel and bought passage upon a Channel-crossing vessel leaving the next morning.

By then, he had spotted his silent companion.

He’d seen him too many times to hope it was coincidence.

By afternoon, he took shore in France and made his way to Boulogne to lie low.

He rented a room for a few nights, thinking to find some peace, but his shadow found him.

He slipped away once more, traveling this time to Le Havre, where he bought passage on the New York–bound La Bretagne , but still his flight was discovered.

In Le Havre, as in Boulogne, whenever he left his landlord’s home, there was the paunchy, yellow-mustached Englishman strolling a street corner, badly pretending to read a French newspaper.

The man is now on board the ship, the treacherous snake. He sits in a deck chair some twenty yards away, again feigning reading a paper, despite frigid November winds that rattle it illegible. Just a little message from the London police: Don’t go far. We’re watching you.

Ordinarily, embarking on a voyage, Jack would stand here at the ship’s railing, just as now, with the salty breeze ruffling his hair, feeling the old, familiar seafaring thrill.

Another adventure, with sights, meals, and shows to look forward to, entertainments and conquests awaiting him in a distant land.

Another market to exploit commercially. And in other, more private ways.

He was born to travel. Never one for sitting still.

After some time surveying the shrinking shoreline, usually he would find his stateroom and arrange his belongings to his liking, make his way to the dining room to see about a meal, and then locate the gentlemen’s lounge and find a worthy opponent at billiards.

But he can’t relax. Can’t settle down with a newspaper and a cigar. Can’t stomach the thought of food. Can’t look forward to the comfortable boredom of a week at sea. Not with a bloodhound at his heels aboard this very ship.

What exactly do they know?

And if they know it, why let him get away? A trifling charge, a perfunctory bail—and then setting a private detective upon his trail?

They know, or suspect, enough to follow him all the way across the sea. Surely he can shake off this blond dope. But what’s their game? He can’t see how it all adds up.

Once he reaches the old U.S. of A., he’ll be free. America won’t extradite him back to Britain on an indecency charge.

A murder charge, on the other hand… Five murder charges…

But if they have any evidence, any at all, why did they let him go ?

They have none. He’d left none. Mostly none. He needs to stop his mind from spinning.

He consults the billet and the key in the pocket of his ulster and finds his stateroom number. A-413. He might as well go see where he’ll spend the next week.

He strolls about the deck, reading signs and door numbers until he finds the A-block of rooms and locates his number.

He fits the key into the hole and enters the suite.

It’s richly appointed in dark wood, black leather, brass fittings, and deep green brocade.

Quite acceptable. It smells clean, too, fresh with hints of brass polish, linseed oil, and carbolic.

He opens the narrow door to the private washroom and collides with a white-aproned maid, just coming out with an armful of folded towels.

Her eyes are wide with embarrassment. “Pardon, monsieur,” she says quickly. “Excusez ma maladresse.”

He holds up both hands as if to say, I didn’t mean to bump into you. I don’t intend to accost you further. Please leave.

“English?” she inquires. She has a round face and straight, drab hair pulled back and tucked into her frilly cap, escaping at odd places.

“Oui,” he tells her. “Au revoir. Merci.” To cement the deal, he pulls a coin from his pocket and offers it to her.

She protests that there is no need, but extends her hand to receive it anyway.

His fingers brush her sweaty palm, and he suppresses a shudder of revulsion.

As soon as she’s gone, he tears open the wrapped soap medallion next to the washbasin—a seashell, how quaint—and scrubs his hands in the water until he’s sure he’s washed her off completely.

A wave of fatigue hits him. He’d had to rise at an unseasonable hour this morning, after a night of little rest. Sleep is definitely preferable to any amusements that might place him where the spy can stare at him.

He tosses his coat on a chair and unlaces his boots, then removes his trousers and climbs between the starched sheets.

He can’t sleep the whole week away, but at least he doesn’t need to think about anything for now.

He wakes to a knock at the door. The sky outside his porthole window is gray with evening. He’s slept through the entire afternoon. He stumbles back into his trousers, smooths his hair, strikes a match to light his bedside lamp, and opens the door.

It’s the chambermaid, carrying a tray with a steaming teapot and cup on a saucer.

“Votre thé,” she says. Your tea.

It’s easier to take it than to explain that he doesn’t want it. He plans to go in search of a proper meal. He watches as she places the tray on a table. He stands aside to let her leave.

Instead of exiting through the door, she closes it, locks it, and turns to face him.

The lock unnerves him. “What do you want?”

“Pourquoi?” she whispers.

“Good night ,” he says through gritted teeth. “ Bonne soirée. Au re voir.”

“Pourquoi?” She takes a step closer.

He has enough tourist’s French to understand. “Why?” he barks. “Why what?”

Her eyes beam like searchlights, probing his. Gold-spattered hazel pools of fearlessness.

His bowels tilt. His equilibrium buckles. The floor seems to plummet beneath him, while around him the air wavers like a mirage of summer heat.

She reaches up and pulls off her frilly cap. Her hair, unbound, slides down her shoulders.

But this is no seduction. No amorous French maid, she.

He clamps his eyes shut. It’s happening again. The illness. The brain fever. He needs the recipe, the philosopher’s stone. Until then, these nightmarish horrors will keep happening.

He can smell the pulse at her throat beating out waves of her warm, young scent.

“Pourquoi avez-vous tué notre soeur?” Why have you killed our sister?

“Regardez-nous,” she demands. “Regardez.”

Look at… us ?

They slither, rustling. Like oiled leather, with flicking tongues and…

Copper-colored eyes.

He’s fallen for it. He opens his eyes against his will, against his better judgment.

Dozens of copper eyes.

Fear seizes his brain. A rabbit trapped in the glare of a viper in the grass.

He topples backward as the paralysis strikes, landing with his head hitting the mattress, but awkwardly; the rest of him crashes onto the floor. His tailbone stings, as does his neck. His mind, it seems, is slower to succumb.

Gorgons of legend could turn you to stone. Gorgons today aren’t what they used to be.

Or maybe he’s more than they knew how to handle.

He will keep his eyes closed next time.

She doesn’t know what he’s famous for. He can murder as well in the dark as in the light.