The Companion Series

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER FIVE

Rachel locked her studio door and walked across the internal courtyard of Le Château du Châtelard toward the portico leading to the Terrasse d’Honneur. The building was massive when viewed from such close quarters, rising several stories above the manicured and graveled grounds. Its opulent suites and apartments were all very grand compared to her humble but comfortable studio in the outbuildings. One of the papers at Chillon indicated Mary had visited the château, but it was unclear why. Rachel made a mental note to check if the château maintained its own records of visitors and events.

The view from the Terrasse was stunning. Though Rachel’s private studio terrace had a similar orientation, it couldn’t compare to the broad vista commanded by this flag-stoned space. Vineyards toppled down the hillside from it. The lake spread before it. The snow-covered Alps surrounded it. The very air, fresh and vital, emanated from this magnificent point of view. Rachel walked over the cobbles, past the ancient ivy-covered pergola to the metal balustraded stair that led to the lower gardens.

During her first months at Châtelard, she would walk the two and a half kilometers down to Montreux via the main route. Now, however, having made acquaintance with many of the locals, she felt accepted enough to take the shortcuts across private land, down through the vineyards and cow-filled pastures, amongst the ornate headstones of the Cimetiere de Clarens.

She followed a track that led almost directly to the cafe Rue du Sacre du Printemps, where she sat and leisured over her muesli and latte before resuming her walk through the cemetery toward town.

The streets and alleys of Montreux were bustling by the time she reached the town center. The ornate trunk key was secure in her pocket, and she hoped to come across a locksmith who could assist her. By one o’clock she’d shown the key to several smiths, but none were of any help.

“Why don’t you ask the owners of the trunk?” one obliging smith suggested. He was young, with a clipped beard—well versed in modern deadbolts and electronic locks but not in two-hundred-year-old trunks and their skeleton keys. Rachel had, of course, already contacted the owners, but they didn’t know how to open the trunk and that was why it hadn’t been opened in generations. All they had was rumor of its contents from the long-dead matriarch of their family. She’d been certain it contained papers and drawings by Lord Byron himself, and perhaps by those who accompanied him on his self-imposed exile to Lake Geneva. The matriarch had seen them herself when she was a child. She’d never been allowed to touch them—only look. They were too fragile and important; her father had said.

Rachel stood despondent in the locksmith shop, running her fingernail along the grooved design of the key’s shaft. She held it up close to her eye to study the intricate motif and turned it in the light, wondering if it offered a solution to its workings. There was no way she was going to force or break the trunk, its hinges, or its latch, as it was without doubt a historic relic. If it contained what she hoped it contained, then it was even more important to keep intact and in original condition. She may need to ship it to Geneva or London to have it opened.

Placing the key into her pocket, she turned to leave.

He was at the door.

His fingers gripped the handle, but his face was turned to stare along the street, as if he were going to enter but had changed his mind.

Less than a foot away, separated only by a corroded metal grille securing scratched, beveled glass, Rachel was struck by how tall and massive he was. His structure filled the entire doorframe—he would need to duck if he were to enter. His hair was a glossy black and flowed about his shoulders, and the skin of his face was very white, etched by thick, dark eyebrows and stubble that accentuated his defined jawline. Again he wore black—cotton and denim—just as he had that night at the marina. She couldn’t tell through the mottled glass whether his clothing was dirty or just very, very dull.

He looked into the shop, into Rachel’s eyes.

Rachel held his gaze for an instant, wondering if the minor flick of his eyelids determined recognition, and noting the slightest of sneers by his upturned lip before he turned to walk off into the crowded backstreet. She looked over her shoulder at the locksmith who held his head low over his key-lathe, unaware she was even still there, his key sparking as it was worked.

She pulled at the door and its bell clattered above her head as she opened and rushed out onto the sidewalk. She caught a glimpse of him turning right on Rue d’Etraz. Walking as fast as she was able, Rachel pushed through the crowd that hovered at the patisserie—their arms full of baguettes and tarts—and stepped into the gutter to bypass an elderly man distracted by puff pastry and sugar. Hurrying into the rue, she saw him turn into Sentier d’Etraz. She could have sworn he’d waited on the corner for a moment until she saw his broad shoulders and swaggering gait, but of course that was nonsense. His route led under the railway line. Grand shopping streets full of people and commerce gave way to deserted lanes and alleys as he strode toward his own unknown destination. BMWs and Mercedes-Benzes gave way to Skodas and rusty bicycles. Warehouses and garages yawned to expose gaping black interiors better left unexplored.

And then she lost him.

Rachel stopped a block from the train station and dropped onto the grassy curb that sloped up to the raised railway line. She felt stupid for the way she’d reacted. It wasn’t like her at all—following a stranger just because he looked at her through the door of a shop, just because he might have been the silhouette on a rainy night that had scared her, just because his sheer size intrigued her, made her wonder.

Stupid.

And yet she couldn’t erase the image of his face from her mind: the way his lashes brushed against the top of his stark white cheeks, the impossible straightness of his nose, the gentle upturning curl of his lips—had it been a sneer or an attempt to smile?

She imagined his lips parting to reveal strong white teeth.

She pondered him for many minutes before realizing she was sitting opposite another locksmith shop. She stood from the grass and made her way across the road, careful of a Skoda that chugged and smoked along the asphalt and a gang of corroded bicycles that chimed and honked as they skidded past. She stepped up onto the sidewalk in front of the shop, zipping her jacket against a chill that had crept along the avenue.

The building was of soot-blackened stone, with a roof shingled by immense shards of flat rock. A wooden key hung swinging from the eave, notwithstanding the lack of any real breeze. The windows had gone uncleaned for many decades, conceivably longer. Indeed, it was impossible for Rachel to see through them even with her nose pressed up against the brittle glass. A sign by the door said Sonnerie sonnette—“ring the bell,” Rachel guessed with her college French, but she knocked on the glass anyway. When there was no response, she reached for the chain above the sign and gave it a tug.

A bell tinkled inside the door, no louder than her knock. The latch clicked and the door swung ajar, scraping against the floor as Rachel pushed it further open to gain entrance. The walls of the shop were covered with thousands of keys of different dimensions and metals, from ancient skeleton keys to modern plastic key cards, all tacked onto the wooden planks that lined the space from floor to ceiling. Shelves held boxes filled with key blanks and what looked like machinery parts: large cogs, saw-toothed wheels, pistons, and metal and wooden blocks of various shapes and sizes. Every ledge, every key, everything appeared covered in a dark, greasy soot. Little appeared to have been touched or disturbed for a very long time. A slice of quiche sat on a cracked plate. It, too, had been there a very long time.

“Bonjour.” A thin, bespectacled man stood behind the counter. He definitely belonged here.

“Bonjour.” The smell of metal shavings and oil crept into Rachel’s nose. “Pourriez-vous aider . . . Could you help me with this key? It’s supposed to open a trunk . . . un tronc . . . but I can’t make it work.”

The locksmith took the key and studied it. He scratched at his scalp, and his entire head of hair moved as one from left to right and back. Slipping his monocle magnifier from his forehead onto his left eye, he considered the fine filigree work of the bow and the engraving of leaves and lightning—or was it electricity?—down the shaft. He turned to the shelf behind him and extracted a large, well-worn book. He flipped through the pages, then back one, two, three. He stared at the page in silence for several moments then thrust his finger against it with a thud.

“Non . . . no . . . I am afraid I am unable to assist you, mademoiselle.”

Rachel peered at his book. His sooty finger left a mark on the parchment.

“Are you certain?”

The reflection of her own face in the lens of his monocle distracted her.

“Absolutely, mademoiselle. This key was made for a specific trunk that is no longer manufactured. It is useless unless you already have the trunk it was made for. No other key will fit the trunk and no other trunk will fit the key.”

His words seemed naïve, as if Rachel missed something in the translation from French to English.

“But I do have the trunk. It is just that the key won’t unlock it”

“Ah . . .” The smith nodded. He shuffled his book around on the counter so she could see the engraving in the center of the page. “That, mademoiselle, is because this key does not unlock the trunk. The trunk unlocks this key.”

Rachel stared at the engraving, bewildered.