The Corsican Caper (10 page)

Philippe had reserved a table in the upstairs dining room, with its hand-lettered frieze repeated around the room urging everyone to
buvez, riez, chantez
—drink, laugh, sing. It was still a little early for the singing, but the other two suggestions were being followed with great enthusiasm.

“Now,” said Sam, “this is a working lunch, OK? Let’s start with what we know, and then we can figure out what to
do. First, we know that Vronsky badly wants Le Pharo. Second, we know that he has a record of getting what he wants, often by arranging for obstacles, even human obstacles, to disappear. Third, he’s always somewhere else when anything messy happens. That’s about it, and it’s not enough.” He paused to sample his wine. “Every man has his weakness, something that makes him vulnerable, and that’s what I’d love to find out.” He nodded toward Philippe. “And our best chance of doing that is you.”

Before Philippe had time to reply, the
tapas
arrived, an entire landscape of
tapas
that took up most of the table, and thoughts of Vronsky were put aside while due respect was paid to the chef.

“That was perfect,” said Elena, as she wiped the final traces of honey and dill from her plate with a scrap of bread. “I’m so glad we didn’t order a main course. Did you see they have
churros
and chocolate sauce for dessert?”

It was Sam’s turn to roll his eyes. How Elena ate what she ate without any visible weight gain was a mystery to him. “Let’s get back to it. Philippe, what do you think? You must have interviewed a few captains of industry in your time. They like to talk, don’t they?”

“Try to stop them.” Philippe took a long pull at his wine. “As long as you stick to their favorite subject.”

“Which is themselves, right?”

“Right. Getting him to talk shouldn’t be difficult.”

Elena put her hand on Philippe’s arm. “We must do something,” she said. “All this is getting to Francis. I hate to see him so worried.”

Philippe nodded. “Let me work on it. For me, it depends on how much he wants to be a big shot in Marseille. If he does—and I think he does—we shouldn’t have a problem.”

Elena squeezed his arm. “For that, you can have one of my
churros
.”

Sam raised his glass to Philippe. “Over to you,
jeune homme
.”

Meanwhile, the phone lines between Cap d’Antibes and Corsica had been busy, with the Oblomovs putting out feelers among their contacts in Calvi and Ajaccio. But in such a small and tight-knit community it was almost impossible for even a single feeler to go unnoticed, particularly where murder and money were concerned. Ears were always cocked for careless remarks, and it wasn’t long before hints that there was something in the wind reached Flo and Jo, the Figatelli brothers.

Moving as they frequently did in some of the less conventional circles of Corsican society, they often heard gossip and news that were not for public consumption, and so it was this time. Their friend and occasional business colleague Maurice, a professional barfly, had overheard snatches of a conversation which suggested that some Riviera Russians
were offering a truckload of money to make someone disappear. The Figatellis, ever alert to rumors of this sort, asked Maurice to continue his researches and report back, with a bonus if he could identify the target.

The Oblomovs were beginning to feel quite at home on
The Caspian Queen
. Once again they were in the luxurious cocoon of Vronsky’s stateroom, cigars and cognac to hand, to present a progress report. It started on an encouraging note.

“You tell us you want good news,” said Sasha Oblomov. “We bring you good news. There is a man in Calvi, Nino Zonza, who we have worked with on one or two projects. He says he can help us.”

“In what way?” asked Vronsky.

“In every way.” Oblomov took a swig of cognac and shuddered with pleasure. “He’ll even arrange the burial, if that’s what you want.”

Vronsky nodded his approval. He liked dealing with full-service professionals. “But don’t forget,” he said, “there must be no possibility of my being implicated.”

“Zonza can guarantee that, as long as the job is done in Corsica.” He leaned forward, tapping the side of his nose with an index finger. “Where certain things can be arranged without bothering the French authorities.”

“Now,” said Vronsky, “what would induce Reboul to take
a trip to Corsica? Think about that. Meanwhile, we need to find out more about him—not just his movements, but his habits. And this time, I don’t want any amateurs chasing after his car. So find me someone serious.”

Oblomov scratched the stubble on his skull. “Let’s see—we want someone with the experience and the contacts to uncover all the nasty little details.” His expression brightened. “Someone, for instance, like my divorce lawyer in Nice. He has informers all along the coast, and he found out stuff about my ex-wife she even didn’t know. And he keeps his mouth shut.”

Vronsky, a survivor of uncomfortably thorough divorce proceedings himself, liked the idea. And so investigations were set in place by both sides, with neither side being aware of being investigated.

Vronsky had been pleased and even a little flattered to receive Philippe’s invitation to be the first subject in an important series of interviews. He felt at ease with the young journalist, and he saw this as an opportunity to establish himself as one of the more important benefactors of what he now thought of as his adopted city. And so he was happy to agree that the first session should take place on board
The Caspian Queen
, where, incidentally, his toys and his retinue would be on display.

For Philippe, the interview began in promising fashion with a short but luxurious trip in a chauffeur-driven Riva. His host was waiting to greet him at the top of the gangplank, wreathed in welcoming smiles, and Philippe recognized at once that he was going to be given the treatment. There would be flattery and ego massage, and Vronsky would
behave as though this was the high spot of his day. Philippe had seen it all many times before, usually from minor public officials hoping that a favorable interview would propel them into the giddy heights of becoming major public officials. But, familiar though he was with the routine, Philippe had to admit that Vronsky was starting to put on an impressive performance.

The first act was a short guided tour of the more obvious attractions of a simple life at sea—the Rivas, the helicopters, the freshwater pool (Vronsky had found that salt water made him itch), the sundeck, the cocktail deck, and the bridge, with its battery of the latest electronic marvels. Philippe did his best to appear impressed by it all, although his overriding impression, which of course he kept to himself, was that the money spent on this floating extravagance would have been far better spent buying a magnificent house in Marseille, an apartment in Paris, and two or three choice vineyards in Cassis.

Moving inside, Philippe was taken through the vast sitting room and into the guest quarters: five suites, each with its own jacuzzi and, as Vronsky said with a modest smile, each with its own sea view. From there, they inspected a kitchen that would have made a three-star chef feel at home, a wine cellar fit for a château, and a cold room with separate sections devoted to foie gras and caviar. As Vronsky said, it was little details like this that made
The Caspian Queen
such a comfortable home away from home.

“And, if I may ask, where is home?” said Philippe.

“The world,” said Vronsky. “The world is my home. Now let me show you my office, and then we can get down to work.”

The office was large and modern, decorated with tributes to Oleg Vronsky. The enormous head of a bear shot in Siberia shared space on one wall with a giant black-and-white photograph of Vronsky, in tails, whirling around a ballroom with a pretty girl in his arms. Other, smaller photographs showed Vronsky with various celebrities of the kind that rich men attract, and there were several framed letters, most of them in Russian, that Vronsky described as coming from “friends in high places.”

Champagne was served, and cigars were offered. Philippe took out his list of questions and a tape recorder, and the interview began.

A couple of hours away, in a smaller and less elaborate office just off the Promenade des Anglais in Nice, the divorce lawyer Antoine Prat was bent over a notepad, toying with zeros, trying to estimate how much his latest assignment might be worth. His most recent client, Sasha Oblomov, had instructed him to spare nothing in his efforts to uncover every detail of Francis Reboul’s life and movements. The investigation would be long and complex and, if Prat had anything to do with it, ferociously expensive.
He congratulated himself, as
he frequently did, on having chosen an occupation that feeds off human weakness, fallibility, and greed, three qualities that had helped to reward him so generously over the years. Tucking his scribbled calculations away in a drawer, he summoned his secretary, the nubile Nicole, and started to plan his first steps.

That evening, Reboul had decided to put aside the cares of the day and introduce Elena to one of his favorite Provençal wines, the pale and elegant
rosé
of Château la Canorgue, a
vin bio
made without the addition of extra sulfites. This, so Reboul claimed, made the wine not only delicious but also good for you, a theory that Elena was testing with enthusiasm. She was delighted that Reboul seemed more like his old lighthearted self; she had become very fond of him, and she was quick to encourage any distraction, liquid or otherwise, that might cheer him up.

The first glass was going down surprisingly quickly, as first glasses often do. “It’s working,” said Elena. “I’m feeling better already.” Reboul smiled, topped up her glass, and was about to explain the connection between sulfites and hangovers when Sam joined them, exchanging the phone in his hand for a glass as he sat down.

“That was Philippe,” he said, “who has just had his ass kissed from one end of Vronsky’s boat to the other.”

Reboul winced at the thought. “So I gather it went well.”

“It could hardly have gone better. If Vronsky hadn’t had a dinner date, Philippe would still be on the boat.”

“Did he get anything interesting?” asked Elena.

“Nothing dramatic,” said Sam. “It’s probably too soon to expect any of the indiscreet stuff. But Vronsky wants another session, this time with a photographer, so it looks promising.”

Reboul put down his glass and leaned forward. “Look,” he said, “Vronsky wants Le Pharo—God knows he’s made that obvious enough. And if what we hear is true, he’ll do whatever it takes to get it. But what is that, and how does he plan to do it? I’m sorry, but he’s not going to tell a journalist, is he?”

Sam held up his hand. “You can never tell what he might let slip. Once he gets really comfortable with Philippe—and it seems to be headed in that direction—he’ll let his guard down. He’ll start saying things to show how smart he is. It happens all the time. Besides, at the moment, Philippe is our only contact with Vronsky. I know it’s frustrating, but I think our best bet is to be patient and wait for him to make his move. And, while we’re waiting, to be careful. Very careful.”

Over dinner, at Sam’s suggestion, they started to put together a list of subjects and questions for Philippe to put to Vronsky during the next session. Patience, however, was going to be difficult.

It was a fine soft Corsican evening, and the Figatelli brothers were waiting, as agreed, outside the entrance to their bar in Calvi, nor far from the site of the house where Christopher Columbus was born. It had been several days before they had managed to secure an audience with the man they were about to see, and they had only succeeded in this because of a small service they had been able to carry out for him the previous year. They had suggested meeting in the back room of the bar. But their contact, a cautious man, preferred to avoid the risk of being seen with them in public. He would send a car to pick them up and take them somewhere more discreet.