Quest for Alexis by Nancy Buckingham Page B

see the clean, sharp angles of his face. His mouth was set hard.
    Something beyond his profile caught my eye, some thing in the black car. A cascade of gleaming copper-colored hair.
    The shock was like a blow in the chest. At that same moment the woman turned her head to glance out of the window, casually at first, then with an abrupt jerk. Our eyes met point-blank. There was no possible doubt left—it was Belle Forsyth.
    I caught my breath and clutched at Brett’s arm.
    “Look, there they are.”
    The lights changed to green, and the black car surged forward. Through its rear window I could see Alexis at the wheel, the pure white of his hair. And be side him, Belle had turned in her seat to look back at us.
    “Get after them, Brett. Please hurry.”
    He reacted at once, stamping down his foot so that I felt myself pressed back into the seat.
    “Are you really certain, Gail?”
    “Yes, I saw them. Belle was looking straight at me.”
    “Do you think she recognized you?”
    “I know she did. It was just as big a shock to her as it was to me.”
    “I’ll bet.”
    We were a hundred yards behind them, and Belle still seemed to be looking back at us. Surely she must have told Alexis that she’d seen me, yet there was no sign of his slowing down. In fact he was still accel erating.
    A coldness ran through my body at the thought that he might deliberately be evading me. How could Alexis do that after our closeness to each other?
    But had Belle told him that she’d seen me? She wouldn’t want Alexis to stop and talk to me, knowing that I would try my best to persuade him to come back to England, come back to Madeleine. If I believed that I stood a chance with Alexis, then perhaps Belle be lieved it, too. Perhaps she was not altogether confident of her hold on him.
    “Can’t you go any faster?” I urged Brett.
    “Have a heart. It’s a damn great Cadillac they’ve got. Our only hope is more traffic lights or some hold- up.”
    But our luck had run out. The Cadillac swept ahead of us unimpeded through the early-morning streets, until the buildings thinned out and we were beginning to climb.
    “We don’t stand a chance of catching them now, Gail. I reckon I know where they’re heading—up to the Grand Corniche road. They’ll just leave us stand ing.”
    “Don’t give up, Brett,” I begged. “Please.”
    The distant tail lights of the Cadillac seemed to blink, and then they were gone. We reached the bend ourselves, took it fast, and we could see the lights again, higher up, the gap between us wider. Brett coaxed our puny little car up the brutally steep gradi ent of the winding Corniche road. Occasionally, head lights of other cars rocketed toward us, half blinding us. And each time when they’d gone past and our eyes had recovered, the winking red lights of the Cadillac seemed a little farther away, until there was no sign of them at all in the darkness ahead.
    “Maybe they’ll stop for some reason or other,” I said without real hope. “There’s always a chance.”
    “Why in hell should they stop? Alexis’s one idea is to get away from you.”
    “No,” I protested. “I can’t believe that. I don’t be lieve Belle told him she’d seen us.”
    “Then why did he drive through Nice like a bat out of hell, trying to shake us off?”
    I needed an explanation of that myself. Eventually I hit on one that seemed plausible.
    “Belle might not have told him it was us on their tail. She might have said that we were reporters. She wouldn’t want Alexis to stop and give me a chance of talking to him.”
    “You’ve got a point there,” Brett acknowledged grudgingly.
    He continued driving, but I could tell it was only a token gesture, just to satisfy me that he was doing his best. After another ten minutes or so he drew onto the side and cut the engine.
    “We might as well face it—we’ve lost them. So we’d better decide what to do now. Give up, Gail, that’s my advice.”
    I didn’t answer him.