The Paris Vendetta Read Online Free PDF Page A

cockpit door, which was why she’d attended to the meal. In the galley, she stored the dirty plates and found their dessert in a small refrigerator. Two luscious chocolate tarts. Mastroianni’s favorite, she’d been told, bought from the Manhattan restaurant they’d visited last evening.
    His countenance changed when she laid the treat before him.
    She sat across from him.
    “Whether you like me or my companies, Robert, is irrelevant to our discussion. This is a business proposition. One that I thought you would be interested in entertaining. I have taken great care in making my selections. Five people have already been chosen. I’m the sixth. You would be the seventh.”
    He pointed to the tart. “I wondered what you and the garçon were discussing before we left last night.”
    He was ignoring her, playing a game of his own.
    “I saw how much you enjoyed the dessert.”
    He grabbed a sterling-silver fork. Apparently his personal dislike of her did not extend to her food, or her jet, or the possibility of the money to be made.
    “Might I tell you a story?” she asked. “About Egypt. When then-Général Napoleon Bonaparte invaded in 1798.”
    He nodded as he savored the rich chocolate. “I doubt you would accept a no. So, by all means.”
       Napoleon personally led the column of French soldiers on the second day of their march south. They were near El Beydah, only a few hours away from the next village. The day was hot and sunny, just like all of the others before it. Yesterday Arabs had viciously attacked his advance guard. Général Desaix had nearly been captured, but a captain was killed and another adjutant général taken prisoner. A ransom was demanded, but the Arabs disputed the booty and eventually shot the captive in the head. Egypt was proving a treacherous land—easy to conquer, difficult to hold—and resistance seemed to be growing .
    Ahead, on the side of the dusty road, he spotted a woman with a bloody face. In one arm she cradled a baby, but her other arm was extended, as if in self defense, testing the air before her. What was she doing here, in the scorching desert?
    He approached and, through an interpreter, learned that her husband had pierced both her eyes. He was mortified. Why? She dared not complain and simply pleaded for someone to care for her child, who seemed near death. Napoleon ordered that both her and the baby be given water and bread .
    That done, a man suddenly appeared from beyond a nearby dune, enraged and full of hate .
    Soldiers came alert .
    The man ran forward and snatched the bread and water from the woman .
    “Forbear,” he screamed. “She has forfeited her honor and tarnished mine. That infant is my disgrace. It is an offspring of her guilt.”
    Napoleon dismounted and said, “You are mad, monsieur. Insane.”
    “I am her husband and have the right to do as I please.”
    Before Napoleon could respond, a dagger appeared from beneath the man’s cloak and he inflicted a mortal wound to his wife .
    Confusion ensued as the man seized the baby, held it in the air, then dashed it to the ground .
    A shot cracked and the man’s chest exploded, his body thudding to the dry earth. Captain Le Mireur, riding behind Napoleon, had ended the spectacle .
    Every soldier seemed shocked by what they’d seen .
    Napoleon himself was having trouble concealing his dismay. After a few tense moments he ordered the column ahead but before remounting his horse, he noticed that something had fallen from beneath the dead man’s cloak .
    A roll of papyri held tight by a string .
    He retrieved it from the sand .
       Napoleon commandeered quarters for the night in the pleasure house of one of his most resolute opponents, an Egyptian who’d fled into the desert with his Mameluke army months ago, leaving all of his possessions to be enjoyed by the French. Stretched out on downy carpets strewn with velvet cushions, the général was still troubled by the appalling show of inhumanity he’d