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which Jordan had just vanished. “I should talk to them, tell them the whole story.”
    “I think that’s their uncle’s responsibility. Don’t you?
    He’s the one who kept it from them all these years. Let him do the explaining.”
    After a pause, Richard nodded. “You’re right. Of course you’re right. Maybe I’ll just go and strangle Nina Sutherland instead.”
    “Strangle my husband while you’re at it. You have my permission.”
    Richard turned and spotted Hugh Tavistock reentering the ballroom. “Now what?” he muttered as the man hurried toward them.
    “Where’s Philippe?” snapped Hugh.
    “I believe he was headed out to the garden,” said Helena. “Is something wrong?”

    In Their Footsteps
    45
    “This whole evening’s turned into a disaster,” muttered Hugh. “I just got a call from Paris. A bomb’s gone off in Philippe’s flat.”
    Richard and Helena stared at him in horror.
    “Oh, my God,” whispered Helena. “Is Marie—”
    “She’s all right. A few minor injuries, but nothing serious. She’s in hospital now.”
    “Assassination attempt?” Richard queried.
    Hugh nodded. “So it would seem.”
    It was long past midnight when Jordan and Uncle Hugh finally found Beryl. She was in her mother’s old room, huddled beside Madeline’s steamer trunk. The lid had been thrown open, and Madeline’s belongings were spilled out across the bed and the floor: silky summer dresses, flowery hats, a beaded evening purse. And there were silly things, too: a branch of sea coral, a pebble, a china frog—items of significance known only to Madeline. Beryl had removed all of these things from the trunk, and now she sat surrounded by them, trying to absorb, through these inanimate objects, the warmth and spirit that had once been Madeline Tavistock.
    Uncle Hugh came into the bedroom and sat down in a chair beside her. “Beryl,” he said gently, “it’s time…it’s time I told you the truth.”
    “The time for the truth was years ago,” she said, staring down at the china frog in her hand.
    “But you were both so very young. You were only eight, and Jordan was ten. You wouldn’t have understood—”
    “We could’ve dealt with the facts! Instead you hid them from us!”
    “The facts were painful. The French police concluded—”

    46
    Tess Gerritsen
    “Dad would never have hurt her,” said Beryl. She looked up at him with a ferocity that made Hugh draw back in surprise. “Don’t you remember how they were together, Uncle Hugh? How much in love they were? I remember!”
    “So do I,” said Jordan.
    Uncle Hugh took off his spectacles and wearily rubbed his eyes. “The truth,” he said, “is even worse than that.” Beryl stared at him incredulously. “How could it be any worse than murder and suicide?”
    “Perhaps…perhaps you should see the file.” He rose to his feet. “It’s upstairs. In my office.” They followed their uncle to the third floor, to a room they seldom visited, a room he always kept locked. He opened the cabinet and pulled a folder from the drawer. It was a classified MI6 file labeled Tavistock, Bernard and Madeline.
    “I suppose I…I’d hoped to protect you from this,” said Hugh. “The truth is, I myself don’t believe it. Bernard didn’t have a traitorous bone in his body. But the evidence was there. And I don’t know any other way to explain it.” He handed the file to Beryl.
    In silence she opened the folder. Together she and Jordan paged through the contents. Inside were copies of the Paris police report, including witness statements and photographs of the murder scene. The conclusions were as Nina Sutherland had told them. Bernard had shot his wife three times at close range and had then put the gun to his own head and pulled the trigger. The crime photos were too horrible to dwell on; Beryl flipped quickly past those and found herself staring at another report, this one filed by French Intelligence. In disbelief, she read and reread the