Deadly Pedigree - By Jimmy Fox Page 0,72

question of money, I could deal with him. He chose to dwell on…certain other themes.”

“Such as your daughter’s real parentage?”

She hesitated a moment, obviously caught off guard, weighing her next words carefully.

“Knowing your adversary’s weakness can sometimes be your own undoing,” she said. “You may awaken the dragon that will burn and devour you. Attack calls for counterattack. You have just brought our little game to a new level.” She studied him.

How much do I know? That’s the big question, isn’t it, Natalie?

“Very well, then,” she resumed. “Yes, Max knew about the tragedy of Zola’s parents, as you do, also, it would seem. A tragedy I relive daily. I was very young and immature when it happened. Something of an anti-Semite myself, I suppose, which was very much in vogue in polite society. My own parents had just died, leaving me sole guardian of the family’s wealth and social position. You see, I was a Fulke-Bruine.”

Nick heard the pride as she uttered her maiden name; he now recalled that it was chiseled over the portals of several buildings on the campus of Freret University. She was a Balazar, too, he wanted to remind her. But she had selected her own myth of ancestry. He’d seen it many times. Genealogy, for all its hard facts and systematic rules, is finally a subjective study, a handy tool to create a past that fills some present need. The difference in her case was that she was taking away the choice of others who would follow her.

She went on to say that her Balazar cousins continued to write to her over the next decade or so. She never responded. But when she learned of their murders, and of Zola’s survival, something new and wonderful was born in her soul that could not form in her womb.

Listening to her, Nick could feel some of the transforming power of the sudden compassion for the orphaned child. He wondered: was this the only time she’d ever allowed love to disrupt her life?

“In some way,” she said, “Max obtained a great deal of information that I had been assured would be kept confidential forever. Can you blame me for trusting those international organizations, which seemed better than the rest of humanity at the time? In those days, adopted children rarely went looking for their birth parents. Personally, I think it is a regrettable practice today. But that is beside the point.

“The amnesia of a few key officials at state and federal agencies was easy to purchase. Some records merely vanished; others, like a birth certificate, came into being. My husband and I faked a short pregnancy and a premature birth for my daughter. Our friends were completely taken in. Therefore, I had never concerned myself with the question until Max began his threats. Soon, I found that there was nothing I could propose to satisfy him. Only bringing back the dead would have done that.”

Nick said, “You need me to ensure no one can make the jump to the line that leads to Zola’s real parents. This had nothing to do with any fear of anti-Jewish hatred, did it? You knew it was a hot-button issue for me. You reeled me in with that bait.”

“The revelation of–how shall I put it–my interesting family background, could have been put to rest eventually. The Jewish question, shall we say? The public has a very short memory. And, of course, I don’t need to tell you that if one goes back far enough, everyone is related. Back to our ancient mother, Lucy, or beyond, to a bubbling primitive pool of amino acids.”

“A subversive thought, Mrs. Armiger.”

“Perhaps. Surely you understand. Zola would never forgive me–what I did, or didn’t do, about her real parents when I had the chance to make a difference. I know her so well, Nick. Oh, she would pretend nothing had changed, but she would freeze me out of her life. Forever.” Armiger swallowed a few times before continuing, as if her throat were dry. “She believes such moral issues are black and white; she can be quite ruthless, in her doctrinaire way.”

“With Corban dead, you think the story of the adoption will submerge once again.”

“I will see that it does, whatever the cost, your relationship with my daughter notwithstanding.”

Nick got the creepy feeling that Armiger had a camera in Zola’s bedroom, that she knew every whispered intimacy her daughter and he had shared.

“What are your intentions toward my daughter?” she asked. He knew this was a little