“There’s room in the thickness then, for concealment,” Agnes said.
Julien Vallotton slipped behind her and held the light while she ran her hands along the wood surface. She found a ring latch flush with the wood. She pulled and turned the ring, but it was locked. She pulled again and tried to rattle it loose, but the door was solid and the lock held.
“There’s no key. Mimi?” she called out, pressing her mouth to the juncture of door and wall. Nothing. She called out again.
Vallotton joined her. “Mimi!”
“She can’t hear us even if she’s there,” said Agnes, ducking from beneath the tapestry. She motioned to Marie-Chantal.
“Watch your head,” Daniel Vallotton hollered to his brother.
Mulholland joined the women and together they yanked. The rod holding the tapestry pulled from the wall and a thousand pounds of cloth crashed to the ground in a thunder of dust. The iron rod and brackets slipped past Julien Vallotton’s head and landed on top of the heap of fabric. They stood still for a moment, stunned.
“More notice next time,” Julien Vallotton said before turning to pound on the door.
Agnes grabbed an iron fire poker from a cold hearth, then leapt over the pile of cloth. Julien stepped sideways. She judged the heft of the poker then swung. It crashed into the metal fitting of the old lock. She struck again but the iron pieces wouldn’t dislodge.
“Mimi?” she called out again, swinging violently. Winston waited until the poker was lowered, then pressed his nose to the door and sniffed loudly.
“Wait,” said Julien. “Listen.”
They held their ears to the wood. There was a muffled cry.
“It’s her,” he said.
“Someone get the doctor,” Agnes called over her shoulder.
Marie-Chantal and Mulholland ran for help and Agnes wiped perspiration from her brow. Julien took the poker. On the third strike, the lock dislodged and he wrenched it from the casing. The door fell open. Agnes swung her flashlight beam into the darkness and followed him down the steep irregular stairs, nearly pushing him over in her hurry. It was a small slice of dungeon, unchanged since ancient times, isolated from the larger sections by modifications long forgotten. It was very dark and the air was moist and stale. It felt like fear.
Agnes moved her light back and forth and cried out when she saw Mimi’s slight form lying on the bare rock. The little girl looked up, her face swollen with tears. Winston reached her first, leaping down the stairs in his excitement. Mimi clutched his furry sides and Agnes ran her light up and down them both, hoping the girl wasn’t injured.
“Where’s Elie?” were Mimi’s first coherent words and Agnes wanted to cry with relief.
Marie-Chantal and Doctor Blanchard arrived at a run and Julien held Winston back; the animal clearly felt that a thorough licking was all that Mimi needed. Agnes trusted the dog’s instincts and felt a great lightness. The girl would recover.
They draped a blanket over Mimi and Julien gathered her in his arms and carefully climbed the steep stone stairs.
“He shouldn’t have put me there. I was hungry and cold.”
Agnes backed away. The girl was safe but the man was still out there. Angry. Desperate. And if she was right about this, she was right about everything.
Thirty-three
Agnes didn’t pause to ring the doorbell. She shoved the heavy double doors of the mansion open, surprised they were unlocked. The household was strangely silent. She wondered if Petit had them corralled together in the salon, his idea of a subtle guard. Pausing in the marble entry hall, she reminded herself not to frighten a sick old man with her concern. Mimi was safe and there was no reason to think anything had happened at the Arsov mansion.
A glance down the long corridor confirmed she was wrong. Arsov’s butler lay partially concealed behind one of the tall porcelain urns, legs askew, head tilted unnaturally against the marble baseboard, a smear of blood on the cream-colored surface. His chest rose and fell evenly and Agnes ran past him, afraid for Petit, now certain that she was right and that there was no more time. Veering toward Arsov’s bedroom she broke into a sprint, scanning each room as she passed, hoping to find an ally. But dawn was just breaking and the household was asleep.
She reached the open door to the bedroom and stopped to listen. Silence. She crept forward, hidden by the large tri-fold screen, not wanting to lose the advantage of surprise. Across the room, in her line of sight, André Petit lay on his back, skin scraped off the side of his head. She nearly cried out. A small marble bust lay nearby on the floor. She narrowed her eyes and studied his chest. He was breathing. She thought of his two-day-old son and hoped beyond all hope that he was not critically injured.
Beyond her line of sight, she heard a man’s voice followed by a faint cry.