§ § § -- December 23, 2004

In the study Christian was minutely examining the label on the bottle, frowning at it. He looked up when Roarke and Leslie came back in. "I can't read this," he said, "it's in French. I recognize only Solange's name on the label. But the medication inside looks very strange to me. I realize not all pills are white, but these are of a color I've never seen on pills before." He handed the bottle to Roarke, who gave the label a cursory look and then removed the top, shaking a few of the pills into one palm.

"How weird," Leslie said, a little repulsed. "They're gray."

"Almost black," Christian agreed.

Roarke stared fixedly at the pills in his palm, handed the bottle back to Christian and overturned one of the pills once or twice. It was plain, with no markings on either side. "I have a very bad feeling about this," he said as if to himself. He sniffed at them a few times, and his dark eyes seemed to grow even darker. He looked up abruptly. "Christian, if you will, please run a search connecting LeNoir's name with amakarna."

He and Leslie saw Christian's jaw clench briefly before the prince gave a short nod and went to the computer to carry out the request. Leslie stared at her father in disbelief. "Are you saying there's amakarna in those tablets?"

Roarke nodded. "I am afraid so," he said. "It would account for the unusual color, and I can detect a particular sweet odor characteristic of the spice."

Christian, having begun the internet search, twisted in the chair to address Roarke. "This raises a whole raft of questions. Where would LeNoir get access to amakarna, unless he knows that damnable LiSciola? Why would he give it to Solange? And even more, why hasn't it killed her outright? It quite nearly did me!"

Roarke crossed the room to him and glanced at the computer screen before laying a hand on the prince's shoulder. "Calm yourself, Christian. I can't answer the first two questions immediately; but there are two possible solutions for your third. Either amakarna is only one of a number of ingredients in these tablets—which is the likely case no matter the scenario—or Solange is one of those rare terrestrial humans who have a tolerance for the spice. You were given pure amakarna, Christian, which, combined with your lack of tolerance, contributed to your nearly fatal episode." He took a closer look at the computer monitor while Christian and Leslie absorbed his words. "Aha. Christian, please click on the third link in the list."

Christian squinted at it, still a little impatient and annoyed, and Leslie bent down to kiss the top of his head while he clicked on the link Roarke had indicated. "I'm sorry, my Rose," he said with a quick smile for her while the site came up. "You know what happens to me when I hear the word 'amakarna'."

"Oh yes," Leslie said with a grin, and he chuckled softly, shook his head and returned his attention to the computer.

"There's a good bit more information on amakarna now than there was when I first learned Arnulf and his daughters were using the spice," Christian observed. "The only other time I ever did a search, it was frustrating to note that the one really good link I got dealt almost exclusively with black lightning."

"The drug has nearly disappeared from existence," Roarke noted. "Once Count LiSciola's older daughter, Paola, died, its production dropped off steeply, almost to the point of null distribution. It's entirely possible that the count has continued producing it to some extent, for occasionally I hear of it from one or another source. Ah—look here." He pointed to a paragraph of text on the screen, and both Christian and Leslie leaned forward to see it better. "A small French pharmaceuticals company was cited this summer for importing amakarna without the proper licenses from the national government. Since you two were married and new information came to light about the spice, regulations have been enacted in a great many countries—mostly European and North American, along with Japan, Australia and New Zealand. It's created such an ocean of red tape that those who do import it tend to do so illegally. That appears to have been the case with this pharmaceuticals company. It was forced to cease operations and destroy its entire stock of amakarna."

"And look—it was owned by a family named LeNoir!" Leslie exclaimed, reading ahead of him. "If this leech Solange is being conned by does belong to this family, he could be right about having money, anyway. He just lied about where it came from."

"If he has money, my Rose," Christian argued, "then why would he find it necessary to take more of it from the children's trust funds?"

Roarke said, "There could be several reasons. The shutdown occurred some twenty months ago, as you'll notice, and whatever fortune the family may have had is quite likely to have been eroded by such things as legal fees and cleanup costs. Since that time, unless the LeNoirs found, or already had, an alternate source of income, the fortune would have been significantly depleted by the aforementioned expenses and the simple cost of living. And then, of course, there is always mere greed. For some people that's reason enough."

"True," Christian muttered. "I may be able to narrow it down to mentions of anyone in the family named Georges. One moment…" He typed and entered a few things, then sat back and watched along with Roarke and Leslie while several small yellow boxes popped up within the text. "Of course, we don't know if this is Solange's would-be husband, but I'd say there's a substantial chance of it, now that we've found those strange pills."

"You said they were told to destroy their full stock of amakarna," said Leslie. "Why would LeNoir have pills now that contain amakarna? Do you think he secreted some and held it back?"

"That's possible," said Roarke, "and it's also possible that the LeNoirs interpreted the order somewhat loosely. That is, they decided that they were ordered to destroy the pure amakarna, but not the medicines that contained it. Amakarna has a long shelf life, so that even if the company was no longer manufacturing medications containing it, they could very well have stored away the stock they had at the time the court order was issued." He paused for a moment, then requested, "If you would, Christian, please find out what French pharmaceuticals manufacturers are legally allowed to import amakarna."

Christian typed in another search and watched three or four links pop up. He murmured something to himself in jordiska, clicked on one of them and scanned the text that came up. "Only two as of earlier this month," he said. "Both of them are located in Paris, whereas I recall seeing that the LeNoirs' company had its headquarters in Rouen."

Roarke nodded, silent for the moment. Leslie picked up the prescription bottle that Christian had set aside, peering at the label; as Christian had said, it was in French, but she did notice Solange's name on it. "Father," she said, "this looks like a legitimate prescription label. Would a pharmaceuticals company have the equipment needed to make something like this look legal?"

"No, that's a pharmacist's domain," Roarke told her. "The companies only manufacture the medicines; they do not prescribe them, nor do they have the authority to do so. It's my guess that LeNoir simply appropriated an old prescription bottle of Solange's and replaced whatever medication may have been left in it with these pills."

"So what Solange thinks are pain pills may well be no such thing," said Christian.

"Indeed," Roarke agreed, taking the bottle from Leslie and slipping the pills back into it. "Leslie, please go into town and give these to the pharmacist there, and ask her to find out what is in these pills, if she possibly can. She is familiar with amakarna, and quite a few of the substances I require for use in my business are available only through her. She will know what else the tablets are made of."

Christian pushed off with his foot so that the computer chair swiveled around, and asked, "If we don't give these back to Solange, won't she suffer some sort of withdrawal, as with black lightning?"

"Not necessarily," Roarke said. "In those who have the perfect balance of tolerance, the spice will pass from the system normally without side effects and without creating a dependence. I don't know if Solange is one of those fortunate ones."

"Is there a way to find out?" Leslie asked.

"Only a detailed blood-sample analysis will reveal the factor that proves such tolerance," said Roarke. "However, if she does have some manner of reaction after a certain length of time, I have ways of counteracting it. At this point I want merely to know how much amakarna those pills contain. Go ahead and make the run into town, Leslie."

Leslie dropped off the bottle at the pharmacy, then acted on an idea and drove over to the Latignon children's bungalow. They were all there, and when Antoinette let Leslie in, they bombarded her with questions. She had to raise her hands to quiet them, and when they finally subsided, she looked a little sternly at them. "Yes, we saw your mother, and Georges too," she said. "Why didn't you tell us Solange was injured the last summer she tried to go on tour?"

Patrick and Antoinette turned bright red and looked guiltily at each other. After a moment Patrick reluctantly admitted, "We were so upset with Maman, we…we focused only on her involvement with Georges, and what she was doing with Papa's things…and we just forgot to mention it. I know it sounds ridiculous, but…"

"It does sound ridiculous," Leslie agreed. "I guess I can understand your being upset with her, but not to the point that you'd forget something so pivotal."

"We've grown used to it," Antoinette said weakly. "It happened a year and a half ago, and after her second fracture and the doctor's announcement that she would never dance anymore, we knew it would be a factor in Maman's life forever. We're so accustomed to it by now, we forgot you didn't know about it."

Leslie thought about that for a moment or two, studied their faces, and sighed. Their anxiety was genuine, and they were still young. "Okay, okay," she said. "We'll let that go. Now let me ask you something else. How long after Solange's injury did she meet LeNoir?"

"Only this past August," said Patrick, "not long before my birthday. I took her to her doctor, and he was there, and recognized her from her dance career. It was disgusting the way he got her to put her full trust in him so quickly."

Leslie made a small acknowledging noise and frowned to herself, then asked, "Do you happen to know what kind of pills she's been taking? Is it just pain medication, or something else? And who refills her prescriptions for her?"

Patrick and Antoinette looked blank, but Mireille spoke up, "It was always just pills for her pain, cousine. The doctor told her to take them only when she really, really needed them. We would go in together usually, Maman and I, to get more…till after Georges came. And then she would ask him to do it."

"Why?" Leslie wanted to know.

"His family has a well-known pharmaceutical company," said Patrick with a shrug. "I think they supply Maman's doctor, as a matter of fact."

"Not anymore," Leslie said, scowling. "They were shut down several months ago for importing amakarna without the proper licenses. And if your mother's been allowing him to handle prescription refills, that just makes it all the easier for him to substitute something else for the legitimate medication. Do you ever see her after she's taken one of these so-called pain pills?"

"I do," said Mireille. "It used to help her. Now it makes her really sleepy. It's why I have to see Georges so much…Maman's leg hurts her more than it used to do, and she takes those pills more than usual, and they always make her go to sleep. So of course Georges is there when I come back from school…"

Leslie nodded. "I see," she said. "Well, we're having those pills analyzed, and I have a sneaking feeling the main ingredient will turn out to be amakarna. And not only that, he's fed your mother a huge pack of lies. He claims to have an uncle, a baron supposedly, from whom he inherited a lot of money. As far as we can figure out, he isn't related to any nobility at all. Father and Christian are doing some more research, but I expect we're going to be able to build a case against the guy solely for giving your mother amakarna."

"We read a little bit about it when you and Prince Christian were married," said Patrick. "What exactly is this stuff?"

"Come back to the main house with me," Leslie said, "and I'll tell you on the way." She led the Latignons out and explained the basics about the spice, adding, "Father knows more than I do, but evidently the spice acts differently in every person who takes it. So that means it's totally unpredictable as to what it does to a certain person."

"Oh, no," groaned Antoinette. "We never knew Georges was doing that to Maman. If we had…well, maybe we wouldn't have been so hard on her."

Leslie glanced at her in the rearview mirror. "Well, you can't change that now, but I know what you can do. You can have a good long talk with your mother—without LeNoir around, I might add. Before you do, though, I expect Father will want to gather evidence against LeNoir first, starting with these amakarna pills he's giving your mother."

§ § § -- December 24, 2004

Leslie was awakened by the jostling of the mattress and opened her eyes to see Christian slipping out of bed and venturing over to the window. He pushed aside the curtain, gazed out for a moment or two, then shrugged, mumbled something in his own tongue and turned away, letting the curtain fall.

"What was that all about?" Leslie murmured in sleepy amusement.

Christian stopped, looked at her in surprise, then laughed at himself and climbed back into bed beside her. "It has to be a lifetime of Scandinavian Christmases. Every year I get out of bed and half expect to see snow on the ground when I look out the window, and every year I don't see it. I spent enough Christmas Eves and Christmas Days watching huge storms rolling in off the North Sea that it still seems a little odd to me to see it so warm and tranquil here."

Leslie grinned. "I get it. Sometimes I get nostalgic for a good old-fashioned white Christmas myself, but at this latitude them's the breaks." They snuggled together and smiled at each other. "How's the weather look?"

"Like its usual sunny, tropical self," Christian replied, his voice half lost in her hair as he began to nuzzle her. "The sun hasn't risen yet, though, so…" He lifted his head and kissed her, and in seconds they'd sunk into a world of their own.

They had enough time to make love at a fairly leisurely pace, to enjoy each other and savor their moments together, before their light doze in the aftermath was broken by the call of a baby. They looked at each other and grinned, and Christian commented, "It must be breakfast time." He lifted his head again and cast a quick glance at the clock. "They're doing a little better…it's almost six."

Laughing softly, Leslie sat up and smoothed his hair before sliding out of bed long enough to grab a few cloths for them to use in burping babies. Ingrid brought Susanna in, and Christian and Leslie talked to their baby for a minute or two, making her giggle and coo, while the young servant toted in Tobias and then Karina. Once she came back with a bottle for Tobias, who had it this time around, they started feeding the babies, sitting in bed feeling a little lazy and a lot contented, with each other and with their family.

"So," Christian mused, "what's on today's agenda?"

"With luck, finding out what those pills actually contain," Leslie said, "and then Father pressing charges against Georges. I told Patrick and Antoinette and Mireille yesterday that just his having possession of anything containing amakarna is enough to arrest him. I think they'd like to give him what-for about stealing money from their trust funds, but that isn't as easy to prove."

"I'm not sure it matters," Christian remarked. "If the amakarna alone is enough to put him away, then there's little point in looking a gift horse in the mouth. I think the biggest problem will be convincing Solange he's looking out for his own interests, not hers."

They brought the triplets to the main house around nine or so, and the adults had breakfast with the triplets watching drowsily from their stroller. "I've found out," Roarke said in the middle of the meal, "what we suspected. Those pills do indeed contain amakarna, and at quite a high concentration. That lends a higher likelihood to my suspicion that Solange is one of the few who can tolerate the spice with no ill effects. Unfortunately, it seems to have a soporific effect on her, perhaps to the point of confusion. LeNoir must have found some way to infiltrate the pills into her supply of legitimate pain medication from an early point in their relationship."

"That would explain her sudden and peculiar trust in him," Leslie mused. "But as Christian said earlier at home, the biggest problem is going to be convincing her that he's only looking out for number one."

Roarke nodded. "Indeed. I've asked all five of them—Ms. Latignon and her children, and Monsieur LeNoir—to come here at ten, so that I can present them with our findings and clear up this mystery."

"Just in time for them to have a good Christmas after all, let's hope," said Christian.

Once the full party had been assembled in Roarke's study—with Christian at the computer, Leslie behind the desk with Roarke, Solange and LeNoir each in a chair, and the children clustered on the side of the desk farthest away from LeNoir—Roarke wordlessly displayed the now-empty prescription bottle at LeNoir and Solange. "We found this here in the study yesterday," he said.

"Oh, so that's where it went," Solange exclaimed.

"We appreciate your finding it, m'sieur Roarke," LeNoir said, reaching out for it.

Roarke drew his hand back. "Not so quickly, Monsieur LeNoir. You may notice that the bottle is empty—and for a very good reason."

"How can you have a good reason for disposing of Solange's medication?" snapped LeNoir. "This could produce very serious problems for her."

"More serious than those created by the fact that she has been taking amakarna in her medication?" Roarke returned without missing a beat.

LeNoir stared at him for a few seconds too long before asking, "Where do you get that idea? You have no proof!"

"I have all the proof I need," Roarke said. "I had the tablets analyzed by our island pharmacist, and I am told—in a written report of which several copies exist—that they are composed of the minimal effective dosage of actual painkiller, several inert ingredients, and sixty percent amakarna. On this island, that is more than enough to have you locked up for a significant period."

Solange had been gaping back and forth between Roarke and LeNoir, and now she gave the latter a stunned, betrayed look. "Georges…?"

"Mon coeur…I never meant…" he began weakly.

"Oh yes you did," Patrick broke in, glaring at him. "We knew you were a monster from the start, only you had Maman so drugged up that she wouldn't listen to us."

"Mr. Roarke, will you please explain to me what's going on?" Solange asked. "I know what amakarna can do—I read enough about it after the news about Leslie's wedding to Prince Christian came out—but I've never seen the stuff, or I might have suspected something long before this. How can you accuse Georges of substituting amakarna for my pain medication?"

"He is a member of the family that owned a pharmaceuticals concern in France until a few months ago," Roarke told her and explained what had happened to the company and the deductive reasoning and research that had led him to this conclusion. "There are no barons in his family; whatever money he claimed to have had when you and he first met would have come from the company, not a fictitious rich uncle. Of course," he went on, glancing at a sickly-looking LeNoir, "after a certain time the money would have begun to run out, and he would have needed more."

"So," Leslie put in, "he dipped into the stock of amakarna-laced medicines that had been left over after the company shutdown, switched it for your original painkiller and got you so addled on the stuff that you never bothered questioning him."

"I never meant to harm her!" LeNoir shouted.

"Maybe you didn't," Leslie retorted, "but it seems pretty clear to me that you didn't take as much care as you think you did. Amakarna is lethal to most people. The only reason you don't have a murder charge over your head is that there's a small percentage of people who can tolerate it, and Father suspects Solange is one of them. You got undeservedly lucky on that score. Once you got Solange confused enough with that stuff, you obviously felt free to start helping yourself to the Latignons' money."

"That's why you wanted me to sell the house," Solange said, looking betrayed. "My accounts must have been running low and you wanted more money."

"Not to mention stealing from our trust funds!" Patrick added heatedly.

With all the censorious, accusing eyes on him, LeNoir cracked. "I needed capital to reopen my family's company!" he cried, eyes darting from one to another in fruitless appeal. "We have been desperate ever since the government shut us down. But no one has been willing to help us, and I had to do something. Meeting Solange in the office of her doctor—a good friend of mine—was a perfect opportunity." He stared pleadingly at Solange. "Another few weeks, mon coeur, and the company would have been able to go back into operation and pay all the necessary fees and other expenses to erase the court trouble. When the company was producing again, I would have restored all the money I took."

"Promises, promises," Patrick sneered. "If you could stoop low enough to drug Maman and sneak behind her back instead of simply asking her, you'd certainly throw out a bone like that and then renege on it when we agreed."

"And not just that," Solange added, her eyes frosting over, "but to steal from my children as well! A person who steals from children would do any cruel thing he could think of and never have a speck of remorse over it."

"Solange, please," LeNoir begged.

But she shook her head. "You owe us a lot of money, I'm sure of that. My son is going to help me find out exactly how much. And you're going to pay back every last cent of every last euro you stole from us. If you try to welch out on that, I'll bring this whole scheme of yours to the attention of the authorities, and if they're skeptical, all I have to do is tell them to contact Mr. Roarke. That's all they'll need to make sure you atone for what you've done. The money my husband left us was meant for us to live on, Georges, not for you to drain away so you could reopen a company that you probably meant to use to illegally import that spice all over again. Those trust funds are for my children to get a proper start in life, not for you to go out and buy fancy things for yourself."

"What about the way he kept looking at me, Maman?" Antoinette asked, and Solange turned to stare at her. "He always looked as if he wanted to undress me…"

"Sometimes me too," said Mireille. "Or else he hit me."

"Don't you dare…" LeNoir began.

"Why shouldn't we?" Antoinette shot out at him. "You did it, you can't deny it, and Patrick saw it, so we have witnesses. If we get to take you to court, I'll make sure everyone knows you wouldn't have minded raping underage girls."

LeNoir's face grew red. "How dare you accuse me! Do you believe them, Solange?"

"Yes, I do," Solange said flatly. "I can't believe I got so suckered in." She gave Roarke a defeated look, then stared disgustedly at LeNoir. "Except for your repayments to us, I never want to see nor hear from you again. You took advantage of my injury and my worry and my children, and you had no conscience about it. Get out of my sight, Georges."

"You will have to prove I took any money before you can act," LeNoir taunted and bolted from his chair, rushing out the door.

"You have to stop him!" Antoinette cried.

Roarke chuckled. "He is being stopped as we speak," he assured her. "I have police constables ringing the house, so he won't get very far at all. They will hold him until the departure of the next charter, at which time he will be deported to France and turned over to the authorities there. I notified them late last evening, and they will be awaiting him at Orly Airport. When you return to Paris, Ms. Latignon, you and the children can press charges and arrange for his repayment of the money he took from you."

"What made you trust a guy like that in the first place, Solange?" Leslie asked.

Solange sighed deeply. "My injury," she said. "After I fractured my leg the second time and had the door slammed permanently on my dance career, I started to worry about money and couldn't seem to stop. Even after Patrick began to oversee Tattoo's art gallery the next month, I couldn't stop worrying. He kept telling me it was doing well, but I always had the rising cost of living on my mind. I started to wish Tattoo were back, and I used to put myself to sleep each night by lying in bed in the dark and talking to him, telling him everything that was on my mind, as if he could somehow hear me. I needed someone badly, I thought…maybe too badly. I let myself begin to wallow in my loneliness and my worry, and Georges took advantage." She closed her eyes and shook her head at herself. "What a fool I was."

"You certainly wouldn't be the first, nor the last, person such a thing has happened to," Roarke said sympathetically. "What worked in your favor was the fact that your children were very worried for you. While they neglected to tell us a few pertinent details—" he cast an exaggeratedly reproving glance at Patrick, Antoinette and Mireille, all of whom went scarlet and hung their heads, making him and Leslie chuckle softly— "they gave us enough incentive to investigate the problem. And while they were here, they had a chance to make a connection with their father's memory."

Solange smiled a little at that. "Maybe I should do that myself," she said softly. "It seems only fair that I do, especially since you helped us yet again. I remember all the stories Tattoo told me and the children about you and how you helped him get a decent start in life when he was very young and had no one to turn to. You helped him then, you helped us when he died by agreeing to his wishes that this island be his final resting place, and now you've helped us again by exposing a chiseler."

"Ms. Latignon, Tattoo was a very dear friend, one of an extreme few I've been that close to in my lifetime," Roarke said gently. "I was always grateful for his companionship in what might otherwise have been a surprisingly lonely existence. And it was Tattoo who helped Leslie and me, when she first came here and we were still learning to know each other. Had it not been for Tattoo, it's quite possible that Leslie wouldn't regard me as the father she should have had in her biological parent; and I would not have grown so fond of the young lady as to adopt her. Tattoo taught us both certain fundamental lessons, in his own unique and subtle way. How could I do any less than help his family in their time of need?" He smiled at them. "Why don't you remain here on the island throughout the New Year's celebration? All your expenses will be on the house, and you'll have the run of the island attractions. And, as you mentioned, Ms. Latignon, you'll have an opportunity to make a new connection with Tattoo's memory."

Solange smiled a bit tremulously and nodded. "Thank you, Mr. Roarke, from all of us." She turned to her offspring. "You can stop feeling guilty, you three. I think Mr. Roarke was just teasing you a minute ago. Although…Patrick, I think you, and you alone, should be in charge of rewrapping your father's paintings that you shipped here and sending them home, so that we can put them back on our walls where they belong."

"I don't mind that a bit, Maman," Patrick assured her, grinning. "I'll be glad to."