Murder Misstery Melange

It was late morning when I pulled off the expressway and motored into Lille. I had two objectives: a beauty salon, and a passport photo shop. It took me a while to find a salon where someone spoke English – any mistake in translation could be a calamity. Finally a girl understood when I told her the look I wanted, and I surrendered myself to her care. After my sleepless night, I dozed off in her chair as she expertly shampooed, cut, died and dried my hair into a perky blonde wedge that made me look like Ashley once again. I was very relieved when I woke up – it made me look so cute! I tipped her generously, and she pointed me towards a photo shop on the way out.

After a quick bite to eat at a local café, I was back on the motorway, heading north once again. The Belgian border presented no obstacle, and I was able to make it over the border into The Netherlands before dark. I pulled off the expressway in Utrecht, where I settled on an obscure hotel – all I requested was a room with a bath! I soaked forever, washing away my memories of the dismal night on the train, then put on a dress, heels and stockings to dine alone in the stuffy restaurant. I didn't mind getting dressed up: it felt wonderful to be a wealthy woman again, and I couldn't help but notice how much more attention I got as a blonde.

I was up early the next morning, feeling thoroughly refreshed. My new hairdo was a breeze to style, and I thoroughly loved my new look. I wore the same dress to the breakfast room, turning the heads of the same men who had ogled me the night before, but none of them were as brash as Jacques. Soon I was back in his wife's Mercedes for the short drive to Amsterdam. It was just after nine o'clock when I knocked on the door of my forger friend.

He greeted me with the same suspicion, and he didn't know who I was until I asked him if he remembered Madison Monroe. He recognized me at once, and soon we were negotiating the terms of our next transaction. "I need a French passport this time." I gave him my new photos, and a sheet of paper with a new name and address. Once again, I offered to pay a premium for same day service, and once again he didn't disappoint me. I killed a few hours at the Van Gogh museum, treated myself to another Indonesian lunch, and collected my new passport in time to beat the traffic out of Amsterdam.

My spirits were soaring during the drive back to Paris. It was very late when I finally pulled up to my apartment building. I left the keys with the doorman, rode the lift up to my floor, and collapsed into bed as soon as I took off my dress and put on my nightgown.

I slept until almost noon. It was a crisp sunny day, and I felt safe laying out a Burberry's skirt and cashmere sweater to wear for the day. I tossed a bra, panties, and tights on the bed and returned the remaining contents of my suitcase to my dresser drawers and closet, After a long, luxurious bubble bath, I put a robe over my bra and panties and went to the kitchen to fix myself breakfast. I was just ladling some scrambled eggs onto my plate when the telephone rang. It was Jacques.

"Maddy, I'm so glad you are back. Madame Bochy is returning this evening, and I would have had to invent a clever excuse about her Mercedes."

"Well, you're in the clear. I guess this means you won't be coming over for dinner tonight," I said peevishly.

"I'm afraid not." He seemed preoccupied, and I sensed that something was seriously wrong. "Maddy, I have a waiting room full of patients. I'll call you tonight."

Maybe he was pulling back because of my reluctance to take the next step? "Before you go, can you give me Dr. Villier's number?" I asked impulsively. I jotted it down in my now girlish handwriting, and after a moment's hesitation, I called the number. The surgeon would know me as Maddy Monroe, so I used that name when I called his office. I was in luck: he'd just had a cancellation, if I could come to his office immediately, he could squeeze me in.

There wasn't time to think about the enormity of what I was doing. Still dressed in my Burberry's ensemble, I went downstairs and the doorman hailed me a taxi to Dr. Villier's office. When I presented myself to the receptionist, I was asked for my French national insurance card. I explained in broken French that I would be paying in cash and that I'd been referred by Dr. Bochy, which did the trick.

After I was ushered into an examination room, a nurse instructed me to strip down to my bra and panties, and she returned a few minutes later to take a blood and urine sample. After she left, I sat awkwardly on an examination table for a long time until a kindly looking man with gray hair and stooped shoulders entered the room. He introduced himself as Dr. Villiers, and his physical examination was quite complete. He lingered over my breasts before he poked and prodded my pitiful privates. He read my chart carefully before clearing his voice. "Your health is excellent," he began, "although your hormone levels show an elevated level of testosterone in your blood, which is perfectly normal at this stage. Even though your testicles have atrophied considerably, they are still impeding your development into a woman."

"Could I ever go back to being a man?"

"Highly doubtful," he said dismissively. "Chemically speaking, your body is much like that of my female patients who wish to change their sex. If Dr. Bochy were to put you an aggressive program of testosterone therapy, you might regain some of the secondary sex characteristics of a man, and of course we could always remove your breasts." I suppose I wasn't surprised, but each word was like a nail in the coffin of Matt McCoy. "Is that what you want?" Dr. Villiers asked impatiently.

"No," I heard myself say.

"It's too soon for us to perform sexual reassignment surgery. As Dr. Bcchy has doubtless explained, there is a mandatory waiting period. However, if you wish, I can make sure that your testicles stop interfering with your continued development into a woman."

"How would you do that?"

"By removing them. There is a routine out-patient procedure called a bilateral orchidectomy, which I can perform here in my office."

My head was spinning. Once my balls were gone, there would be no turning back...but according to the doctor, I was too far gone already. Maybe if I took the plunge, I could hold onto Jacques. "How soon can you do it?"

"We can do it today," Dr. Villiers said.

The rest of that day is a blur. I remember a nurse prepping me, and the doctor administering a local anesthesia. After I was numb, he made a single incision in my scrotum and pushed my shrunken balls through the opening. When I heard two distinct snips, Matt McCoy's manhood was medical waste. Tears were running down my cheeks as Dr. Villiers stitched me up. When it was over, I looked down with dread, but all I remember seeing was my empty sac with a bandage on it. Other than a dull ache from where my balls used to be, there was no pain, only a profound sense of loss and despair. Somehow I managed to dress myself, and climb into a waiting taxi. I went to bed as soon as I got back to the apartment, and cried myself to sleep.

I was feeling almost normal the next morning, a little stiff and sore but there was no pain to speak of. I was famished after skipping dinner, my emotions were a mess, and I didn't seem to have any energy. It was an effort just to sit down at the computer and boot it up. I was about to get on the Internet to do some research on the after-effects of castration when the telephone rang. It was Jacques.

"Maddy, how are you? I spoke to Dr. Villiers this morning, and he told me what he'd done. How are you feeling?"

"Okay, I guess." Maybe it was my highly emotional state, but I could tell that there was still something wrong. What had I done?

"Maddy, I need to see you, today. It's rather important." My heart sank – how could he dump me after what I'd just been through?

Reluctantly, I agreed to meet him at Le Relais at noon, and spent the rest of the morning moping around the apartment. When I finally got myself dressed, my panties fit a little better, although I was still stiff and sore, and it was an effort to bend over to ease up my stockings. What had I done?

After I was finished dressing, I took a long look at myself in the full length mirror on the back of the closet door. From my blonde head to my silky toes, I was a beautiful woman. All for nothing! With a sigh, I stepped into my heels, wrapped a gold chain around my waspish waist, and went off to face my fate.

As always, Jacques was waiting for me in the same romantic booth. He did a double take when he saw my hair. "Stunning!" he exclaimed. "It reminds me of the magical night when we met."

That didn't sound like someone who was about to dump me. Still, my heart was beating hard beneath my breasts, and I waited cautiously for him to open up to me.

"You should have called me before you went into surgery," he said. "I would have been there for you."

"You sounded very busy."

He sensed my discomfort, and went straight to the point. "Last night when you called, I was in the middle of a very awkward conversation. Two gentlemen whom I believe you Americans refer to as 'the feds' came to my home, asking some very direct questions. About you."

I felt sick to my stomach. God, please don't let me throw up in front of Jacques again! He motioned to the waiter for a glass of water, and waited until I gulped it down before continuing. "First, let me ask you a direct question: that second prescription that I gave you in Monte Carlo last week...did you ever fill it?"

"No. After our night together in the Plaza Athenee, I flushed it down the toilet."

"Thank God!" he sighed with relief.

"Why is that so important?"

"Because of what I told the agents last night. They'd come to ask me about a prescription I wrote for a...person using the name Madison Monroe back in February."

"What did you tell them?"

"That I write hundreds of prescriptions every month, and I have no recollection of anyone using that name. They showed me a crude sketch, obviously drawn by a police artist, that was actually quite a charming likeness of you, although as a brunette with long hair. Still, I was of no help to them, and of course there are no records of a patient by that name in my files."

"Why did you ask me about the new prescription?"

"Isn't it obvious? They were able to trace you back to me from the prescription I wrote for you in February. By lying to them, I set myself up for perjury if they could show that I wrote another prescription to the same person a few days ago."

"Jacques, I owe you an explanation...." He tried to cut me off, but I wouldn't let him. My words tumbling together, I told him everything about myself. He seemed intrigued by my account of my unwanted transformation, and if my halting description of Norman Wolf's murder bothered him, he didn't show it. When I told him about my escape to Amsterdam, and my subsequent efforts to cover my tracks, he was genuinely impressed.

"You fascinate me," he said when I was finished. "What is your new name?"

"Madeline Moreau," I said shyly.

"Enchanteurs! It all reminds me of the story of the Chevalier D'Eon, a French nobleman who disguised himself as a woman to spy for the king. Eventually, his treachery was unmasked, and he was compelled to spend the rest of his life as a woman."

"I didn't do this for king and country, Jacques. I did it for you." After the emotional roller coaster I'd just been on, it wasn't surprising when I totally lost it, bawling like a baby while he held me in his arms.

"Really, Madeline," Jacques said as he dabbed my tears once again, "I'm going to have to stop taking you to Le Relais before the staff has me arrested for abusing a woman."

"Nothing doing, Monsieur," I said through my tears. "What can I do to save your reputation? How about a blow job under the table?" At that moment I might have done it, I was so in love with this wonderful man who had risked everything to save me.

"I'm afraid that would be a blow to both of our reputations," he laughed. We bantered back and forth like two lovesick teenagers, sharing a bottle of wine and each others' entrees, both of us wanting the moment to last forever. Finally, with a glance at his watch, he told me it was past time for him to return to his office.

"Madeline," he said seriously while we waited for the check, "it would probably be wise for us to lie low for the next few weeks. I'm not sure those fellows from the FBI bought my story, and I could never live with myself if I helped them find you."

I knew he was right, but my heart ached at the prospect. Now that my manhood was gone forever, I was ready to embrace my life as a woman, as his woman. "I understand, Jacques. Do you think I should leave Paris?"

"That would probably be a good idea. Depending on how thorough these people are, if they trace my calls it could lead them to the apartment." I nodded in agreement, already thinking ahead to my next moves.

By the author of The Jessica Project