Janice Nagourney - A Forgery in Paris

Castle Bridge Media

Denver, Colorado

Cover photo by Digital Asset Art/Shutterstock

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, business, events, and incidents are the products of the authors imaginations. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead or actual events is purely coincidental.

FRENCH DECEPTION: A FORGERY IN PARIS

2023 Janice Nagourney

All rights reserved.

ISBN: 979-8-9872083-0-4

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the author, except as provided by U.S.A. copyright law.

One meteorologist remarked that if the theory was correct, one flap of a seagulls wings would be enough to alter the course of the weather forever. The controversy has not yet been settled, but the most recent evidence seems to favor the seagulls. (1)

The mistral has been blowing for two days. Howling, whining, rattling the shutters, whipping plastic bags into the trees, depositing a fine layer of dust everywhere. Usually, the wind ends after three days, so by tomorrow morning, there will be the welcome sound of silence.

Last night I was curled up on the living room sofa, reading a history of Marseilles, imagining the wonder that the ancient Greeks must have felt when they first saw the calanques: the rugged, majestic limestone cliffs, like white lava frozen as it plunges into the sea. Its early autumn, the days are still warm, but theres a chill in the air at night and I had a blue and white fouta towel covering my legs. I thought I heard a noise. Not the mistral, but more like someone knocking at the door on the terrace overlooking the sea. The louvres were closed against the wind and I was afraid to open them to see who might be there. I went upstairs and cracked open a shutter but I saw no one. Had they gone away or had they gone around to the back of the house? I looked out a rear window that gives onto a narrow street. It was deserted. No footsteps, no moving shadows. There are houses along the street, lined up cheek to cheek, but most are closed up now that the summer is over. Im used to being alone, yet the silence in the house is like a chill cloud, and I wrapped the fouta tightly around my shoulders.

Perhaps I only imagined that I heard someone knocking. I know it couldnt have been Jacques or Bruno, and yet nothing would surprise me any longer. I wish Eugene were here. He would know what to do.

Its daybreak and the wind has subsided. The gentle sunlight bathes the trees and the water in a soft glow. How silly I was to be uneasy last night. I make a pot of coffee and take my mug out to the terrace. A cool breeze comes off the sea, and even before I see them, I hear the seagulls. Their squawks sound like the barking of dogs or cats meowing. Are they arguing or discussing todays weather? Vaguely menacing, intently picking through the open garbage bins, making graceful arcs through the sky.

The noise is a reminder of how many random events led to my being here, with the sea right at my front doorit can be deep sapphire or pale aquamarine or slate grey. The sky is every color blue, it is white, it is grey. I sip my coffee and stare out at the four islands of the Frioul Archipelago, stretching like brown beads along the horizon.

Theres a little beach below my house. It gets the sun in the morning, so thats when I climb down to swim. Outside of July and August, the beach is empty. When I go down there today, Ill be on the lookout for any boats that come close to the inlet thats cordoned off for swimmers. The scar on my shoulder reminds me to beware.

Was it the flaps of the seagulls wings that brought me here? If I think about itas Ive often donethere is one event, one metaphorical flap of the wings, which started me on the trajectory that brought me to this house.

In the middle of 2008, the month of August, I flew up to New York to see the lawyer handling my parents estate. They had died within two months of each other the previous year and I had to sign some papers. Sitting in the lawyers office, the thought crossed my mind that the only family I had now was in France, but I pushed that thought back down and managed not to tear up. I planned to spend the night in the city with a college girlfriend, but we finished early and I decided to take the train back to DC.

By the time I got home, it was almost midnight. The light was on in the living room and I felt a moment of irritation that Peter had forgotten to turn the lights off, but that was how I came to notice a womans coat lying on the sofa. What the fuck? My stomach clenched, and I felt my heart thumping. The fatigue of the trip and thinking about my parents jumbled my thoughtsI hadnt quite connected the dots until I climbed the stairs and walked into our bedroom and turned on the light (he had remembered to turn that one off), to find Peter in bed with one of the women who worked for his advertising agency.

For a moment, all the breath had been sucked out of my lungs. A hot flush spread from my back to my neck and my face.

Peter actually said, Its not what you think, Alex.

The woman in bed with himI later learned that her name was Susanne Higginspulled the sheets up to her chin and sat there, frozen. My breath returned. I pulled my cell phone out of my coat pocket and took a few pictures.

I looked at the woman. You have five minutes to get out of my house before I throw you out. Then to Peter, You had better leave as well.

Susanne left; Peter went to sleep in the den. I stripped the bed and stretched out fully clothed on the bedspread. I didnt get much sleep, but I had plenty of time to think. Once the initial shock had worn off, I realized that I didnt love Peter anymore and had not for some time. Id always had a weakness for bad boysintelligent men but with a dangerous edge, mysterious possibilities smoldering behind their eyes, short bursts of passion before the flame dieduntil I met Peter. No bad boy he, and I thought Id be safe marrying him. But we were both so busy with our careersmine in fashion, his in advertisingthat we lived our lives on two parallel paths, never intersecting.

Now that I think about it, I wonder if I ever loved Peter at all. Maybe it was more the idea of being married to him that I loved. In any event, we had an amicable divorce and I got our house in Georgetown. Today, I can hardly remember what he looked like back then. Okay, tall, dark hair, even features, not gorgeous, but nice-looking enough. I ran into him when I was passing through DC a few months ago. He had more grey hair and he looked tired.

Anyway, that was my seagulls wing-flap moment. It was time to change, to do something completely different. I had spent my childhood in France, and I wanted to return to that country. Immediately.

Of course I started in Parisdoesnt everyone?and then I went to our chteau at Trubenne. Chteau is a grand word for what those old stones looked like on my first visit. Only a few rooms were heated, the plumbing was rudimentary, but of course, it didnt matter because of Charlotte.

Random eventsmore wings flappingtook me to other cities: Lyon, Marseilles, and Toulouse. And then it all came to a head in Montenegro.

Looking back on everything that has happened, I realize that random events is not a correct description. Rather, as you will see, they are all inextricably connected, and things had to take place as they did.

Ive written my story in the third person, as its not just about me. In fact, my story does not begin with me; it begins with a forgery. Sometimes Ive had to use my imagination to fill in certain blanks, but as I know how things turned out, Im pretty sure that Im not too far off the mark.