I got out of the car, and when I’d taken a few steps, I heard a click and the gate swung open. The unfamiliar key on the ring was obviously an electronic smart key. As I walked up the flagstone driveway, I heard rushing water. It was not a distant murmur; it sounded as though the river was flowing beneath my feet. I flicked the outdoor switch, and the garden and terraces were instantly flooded with light. Walking around the house, I realized that, like Frank Lloyd Wright’s masterpiece Fallingwater, the villa was built over a river.

A slick, contemporary building with no trace of Provence or the Mediterranean, it reminded me of mid-century American architecture. Two cantilevered stories of glass, pale limestone, and reinforced concrete, it was perfectly in harmony with the vegetation and the rocky outcropping on which it was built.

The digital lock opened as I came to the door. I was worried about setting off the alarm system—there was a sign on the wall outside—but nothing happened. As in the garden, there was a single button to activate all the lights. I pushed it and discovered an interior as elegant as it was spectacular.

The ground floor comprised a living room, a dining room, and a kitchen. The style was Japanese, everything open plan, with various living areas separated only by lattice screens that allowed light to stream through.

I stepped into the space and gazed around. I had never imagined Francis’s bachelor pad would look like this. Everything was warm and sophisticated—the vast limestone hearth, the pale oak beams, the smooth curves of the walnut furniture. A half-finished bottle of Corona stood on the cocktail bar, indicating that someone had been here recently. Next to the beer lay a pack of cigarettes and a lighter with a carved lacquer case.

Maxime’s Zippo.

Of course. He had come straight here after our conversation at my mother’s house, and what he had discovered had been so upsetting that he had rushed out, leaving his cigarettes and his lighter.

Standing next to the large sliding glass doors, I realized that it was the spot where Francis had been murdered. He had been tortured next to the fireplace and left for dead but had managed to drag himself across the parquet floor to the wall of glass overlooking the river. It was from here that he had phoned my mother. But I didn’t know whether she had answered that call.

3.

My mother…

I could feel her presence everywhere in this house. I sensed her guiding hand behind every piece of furniture, every element of the design. This was her home too. Startled by a creaking floorboard, I spun around and found myself face-to-face with my mother.