Belle

by Lesley Pearse

  ‘It was because of him that I haven’t seen Belle since.’ Le Brun’s face darkened at the mention of his name. ‘The man is a snake. I wish I had never been foolish enough to go to him. You see, I first saw Belle in the restaurant at the Ritz. She was with an elderly man and I sensed by their manner that it was their first meeting. No one would think Belle was a fille de joie, she dressed so well, acted like a lady, but as they left the restaurant I saw Pascal go up to the man. There was something between them, and that’s when I realized.’

  ‘You liked the look of Belle and approached him?’

  Le Brun sighed. ‘Yes, for my sins. He wanted four hundred francs for an introduction as he called it. I should have walked away, but we men can be weak when we want a woman.’

  Noah remembered how he’d been about Millie – he would have paid anything to be with her. ‘So what else do you know about the man? Could he be involved with whatever’s happened to Belle?’

  Le Brun shrugged. ‘He’s not the kind of man you’d spend a minute longer talking to than you have to, so I know nothing about his personal life. But he’s greedy, and if he told her she was meeting me he was up to no good. We could hire some muscle to beat it out of him!’

  Noah smirked at that suggestion. ‘I’ve got help from someone who could do that. But I’d be scared to do it in case he’s in this with others. They might just kill her if they hear we’re after them.’

  Le Brun looked alarmed. ‘Surely it won’t come to that? What can I do to help?’

  ‘You’ve done so much already by being honest,’ Noah said. ‘I can’t thank you enough.’

  ‘The only thanks I want is to hear she’s safe and unhurt,’ Le Brun said with complete sincerity. ‘Keep in touch.’ He took a card from his pocket. ‘You can contact me there. Come for me if you need any help at all.’

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Belle shuffled over to the window and picked up a broken hairpin with which she continued trying to make the small hole in the board larger. She couldn’t stand for long, she felt too weak and dizzy, but she had succeeded in making the tiny hole into one just large enough to put her little finger in. She still couldn’t see much, just a tiled roof about twenty or thirty yards away. But when the sun was on the window a rod of light came into the room and she could lie on the bed watching the dust particles dancing in it, imagining it was fairies.

  Mog had always made her say her prayers, something she’d abandoned a long while ago. But she prayed a great deal now, promising God she would never sin again if He’d just send someone to rescue her.

  Hunger wasn’t her only problem now. She’d run out of water, and hour by hour she felt herself growing weaker. Aside from brief spells making the hole bigger, she spent the rest of the time lying on the bed to conserve her strength. She just wished her mind would slow down the way her body was doing, for she was tortured by going over and over the events of the last two years, and blaming herself for her own part in most of them.

  She thought of Mog, her mother and Jimmy a lot too, especially Mog. She imagined her in the kitchen, rolling out pastry, or wringing out wet washing in the scullery. Sometimes she woke from a dream where Mog was holding her in her arms the way she had when Belle was a little girl, and for a second or two she’d think Mog had been there.

  She tried not to think about Pascal, or to guess what he had planned for her. She couldn’t really believe anyone would intentionally leave someone to die of thirst and starvation, and mostly she told herself he must be sick or had had an accident that prevented him from coming back. She no longer had any idea of how long she’d been here for when she fell asleep she didn’t know how long it was for. But it seemed as though she’d been here for weeks, not just days.

  The pin fell out of her fingers and she was too weak to pick it up so she shuffled back to the bed. She wondered what dying of starvation was like. Did you just become unconscious so you wouldn’t feel anything? She hoped that was how it was.

  Etienne listened attentively to what Noah had to tell him about Philippe Le Brun. ‘Let’s go to the Ritz and have it out with Pascal,’ Noah suggested.

  ‘I’d like to go there and kick it out of him,’ Etienne said grimly as they walked down the street. ‘But we don’t know if he’s working alone or with others. We need to know more about him, where he lives and who with, what hours he works and if he goes anywhere after he leaves the hotel. But I agree we should go over there now and see if we can find out anything.’

  Etienne was growing on Noah. He liked his tough, uncompromising attitude, and was intrigued by his obviously colourful past. He wasn’t boastful, he had a tender side too, especially about Belle, and he made Noah feel braver just by being beside him. So brave in fact that he decided to admit to his feelings for Lisette, and asked if Etienne thought he had a chance with her.

  ‘I’ve never met her, all I know about her is what Belle told me,’ Etienne said. ‘She sounded like a good woman. But if you want my real opinion, once we’ve got Belle back, you should return to England and find yourself a girl from a background like your own. You’ll be much happier.’

  That wasn’t what Noah wanted to hear. ‘But I’m committed to exposing the trade in young girls,’ he said heatedly. ‘Finding Belle is my priority but I’m intending to write articles for the press to get all those involved stopped and punished.’

  ‘That’s a very laudable ambition, and I’ll be right behind you with it. Just don’t imagine you can stop it completely, there’s too much money to be made from it. The men who pay for young girls are often those in positions of power – judges, lawyers, politicians and the like. As long as they demand young flesh, someone will provide it. Write your article, campaign if you must, but leave it at that. And don’t be tempted to want a one-time whore for a wife; she’ll never be socially acceptable and in the end you’ll regret it.’

  ‘Harsh words!’ Noah retorted. ‘Does that mean Belle is never going to be socially acceptable either?’

  Etienne grimaced. ‘Almost certainly. She may also be so damaged that she’ll never want a husband or children. No woman could go through what she has and remain untouched by it. You say Jimmy loves her, but love is not always enough.’

  Etienne hailed a fiacre then, signalling that was the end of the conversation.

  ‘Shall I go in and engage Pascal in conversation?’ Noah suggested when the fiacre dropped them close to Place Vendôme. ‘I play the simple Englishman abroad quite well.’

  Etienne smiled. He knew Noah was annoyed with him for what he’d said about Lisette earlier, but he had to admire him for not continuing to sulk. ‘That sounds like a good plan. Ask him about cancan dancing, anything to do with girls. Hint you are eager for company. I’ll stay outside; I’m going to follow him later, so I don’t want him to recognize me.’

  Etienne walked across the Place Vendôme and found a bench to sit on while he waited for Noah. His mind was whirling with fragments of information that he felt he ought to be able to put together to make a whole, but a vital chunk was missing. He didn’t know anything about Pascal’s domestic life, not where he lived or if he was married. Why would an undertaker leave such a potentially lucrative career and become a concierge? The two jobs were so different.

  He turned to look at the hotel, wondering if there was a link he hadn’t thought of, and noticed a couple getting out of a fiacre. There were four other cabs waiting in line to pick up passengers too.

  ‘That’s it! Find the driver who took Belle that night,’ he murmured to himself. He knew it was a tall order, but it was worth a try. If Pascal did order the cab, the chances were that the driver regularly picked up fares here from the hotel.

  Noah didn’t emerge from the Ritz for some thirty minutes. He spotted Etienne and hurried over to him.

  ‘He really is a snake,’ he said. ‘I watched him with other people for a little while, and though I couldn’t understand what was being said, twice I saw him get what looked like a back-hander. He speaks good Engl
ish though; when it was my turn he got out various pamphlets about shows, and pointed out they were all sold out for tonight, but he had a contact who could get me tickets for “a bit extra”! When I asked him about girls he was cautious. Said he knew someone who might be able to do something. I got the impression he was waiting for a big note to be passed over.’

  ‘Did he ask where you were staying?’

  ‘No, but I had a moment of inspiration and told him I was in Paris to arrange my aunt’s funeral, and said I hardly knew where to begin to find an undertaker. Quick as a flash, he wrote a name down. Here it is.’

  Noah gave the paper to Etienne. ‘Arnaud Garrow, Directeur de Services Funèbres,’ he read aloud. ‘Rue Custine, that’s close to Montmartre. I wonder if it’s the one he used to work for?’

  ‘It struck me as very odd, a concierge handing out an address for an undertaker,’ Noah said. ‘Has he got a finger in every pie in town?’

  ‘We’ll go there later and check,’ said Etienne, and went on to tell Noah about finding the driver who was paid to pick up a young woman from the Mirabeau in Rue St-Vincent de Paul on Thursday, 11 April. ‘Let’s go along and speak to them now, and then we’ll hop in one to take us over to rue Custine.’

  Noah waited as Etienne had a last word with their cab driver. He couldn’t understand what he was saying, but he assumed he was asking the man to pass the word around other cab drivers about Belle’s ride to Montmartre on the 11th, and telling him they were to come to Gabrielle’s with the information where they would receive a reward.

  ‘What if that gets back to Pascal?’ Noah asked when the cab driver flicked his whip and the horse moved off.

  ‘I had to take that risk. We need the information if we’re to find her.’

  Arnaud Garrow’s business premises looked very shabby: a small shop with an arrangement of dusty wax flowers sitting on some faded purple satin material in the window. The two men looked at each other in surprise.

  ‘Hardly in keeping with the splendour of the Ritz,’ Noah said with a smirk.

  ‘I’d better come in and do the talking,’ Etienne said. ‘I doubt they’ll speak English. I’ll just say who we were recommended by and see what reaction we get. It’s bound to be some chum or relative of his. You must’ve played the simple Englishman well.’

  A thin man with dark, oily hair arranged over a large bald patch came through from the back as they entered the shop. He had his shirt sleeves rolled up and wore a dark green apron which had sawdust attached to it. Noah asked if he spoke English and the man shook his head. Etienne took over then and Noah heard the name Pascal amidst the stream of French.

  The undertaker nodded and appeared to be speaking about Pascal. Etienne then introduced Noah under the fictitious name of John Marshall, and continued to speak on his behalf. The conversation between the two men went on for some five or six minutes, Etienne doing most of the talking. Then he shook the man’s hand before turning to Noah and telling him he’d said they would come back the next morning to make the arrangements when they’d discussed it with other family members.

  Noah shook the undertaker’s hand and said goodbye, and he and Etienne left the shop.

  ‘Pascal is his wife’s brother,’ Etienne said once they were away from the shop. ‘I think he must still be a partner because Garrow mentioned having one, then stopped himself. I suppose Pascal thinks he’s moved up in the world and doesn’t want it known he’s still involved in a seedy back-street undertaker’s.’

  ‘I’m not surprised. I wouldn’t want anyone knowing I was a partner in that place!’

  ‘I’d bet he makes good money out of it. Poor people would go there; they tend to take pride in spending money on giving their loved ones a good send off, even if they can’t afford it.’

  Noah knew that was true. In his time as an insurance investigator he’d observed how the poor always seemed to spend far more than they could really afford on quite lavish funerals, and he’d wondered at the logic of it. ‘You didn’t find out where Pascal lived, I suppose?’

  ‘It must be nearby. I asked Garrow casually if he saw much of Pascal, and he said he dropped in on his way home from work sometimes. But I got the impression there’s a lot of bitterness there. Probably doesn’t feel Pascal pulls his weight. Then he went on to say he had a selection of fine coffins to show us, and he can give us a good price.’

  The two men had lunch in a small café, and discussed the fact that they didn’t seem to be making any real headway. Noah said he thought he would go to Le Petit Journal, where he had been given an introduction from his own newspaper back in England.

  ‘I’ll talk to the editor, he already knows a bit about why I’m here. I’ll ask him if he remembers any stories involving Pascal or Garrow. He’ll probably get someone to trawl through some old papers for me. They should be keen to cooperate if they think there’s likely to be something juicy for them later.’

  ‘Good plan,’ Etienne said. ‘Just don’t mention me! I’ll go back to the Ritz later and wait for Pascal to leave, then I’ll follow him.’

  ‘He said he was on duty till eight when I asked him about tickets,’ Noah said. ‘Could I meet you there then?’

  Etienne shook his head. ‘That’s not advisable. Pascal knows your face. You wait back at the Mirabeau, I’ll follow him.’

  ‘But what if you need help?’Noah looked alarmed. ‘I won’t know where you are.’

  Etienne looked hard at Noah. ‘I’ve spent most of my adult life tracking down thugs and gangsters. I know what to expect from them and I can handle it. But Pascal is an unknown quantity, we don’t know who is in this with him, or how he’ll react if cornered.’

  ‘All the more reason for me to come with you,’ Noah protested.

  ‘No, I don’t want to put you at risk. You’re the only one with the right influence to get the child traffickers behind bars. If I don’t come back for you tonight, you go straight to the gendarmes and tell them everything we know.’

  ‘But …’

  Etienne stopped Noah’s protest with a firm hand on his shoulder. ‘I will not be responsible for endangering your life. Now, go to the newspaper and find out what you can. Leave me to do what I do best.’

  At seven-thirty that evening Etienne had taken up a position in rue Gambon, close enough to the back door of the Ritz to be able to monitor anyone who left. Earlier he’d gone into the hotel to ask about room rates, and surreptitiously glanced towards the concierge’s desk to look at Pascal so he would recognize him later.

  Now, as he waited for the man to appear through the back door, his heart kept telling him just to pull him into a back alley, stick a knife at his throat and demand to know where Belle was. But his head told him that wasn’t a good idea.

  For one thing, Pascal might not know, if there were others involved, and as Etienne’s name was known to the gendarmes, he might find himself locked up and Belle would be lost for good.

  He’d been busy all day talking to fiacre drivers, old friends who might know something about Pascal, and he’d been over to introduce himself to Philippe Le Brun at the address Philippe had given Noah earlier in the day. He liked Philippe, he sensed he’d come up the hard way too as he hadn’t got a snobbish bone in his body, and he’d willingly agreed to contact Pascal again to get him to make another appointment with Belle. Etienne had left him saying that unless something else cropped up now when Pascal left the hotel, they would meet up later that evening at his restaurant in the Pigalle to discuss things further.

  But for now Etienne just had to wait.

  A flurry of women came out of the hotel back door at a few minutes past eight. Etienne assumed they were chambermaids. A couple of men came out too, waiters maybe or maintenance men. Then, just when he was beginning to think Pascal had left by the front entrance, he appeared too.

  He had changed his smart livery for a dark suit, and he stopped by the door to light up a cigarette. Etienne felt his blood rising, for everything about the man, his thin, bony f
ace, the carefully trimmed moustache, goatee beard and oiled hair, reminded him of other weasel-like characters he’d met in the past. He knew that if he got real proof this man had hurt Belle, he would want to tear him apart, limb by limb.

  Pascal threw the cigarette butt down and stamped on it, then walked up the street towards the Boulevard des Capucines. He was moving at a brisk pace, and it looked as if he was going to catch a bus.

  Etienne stayed well back, and when he saw Pascal join others waiting at a bus stop, he hailed a fiacre and told the driver to wait until the bus came, then follow it until he told him to stop.

  It was a fine, mild evening, the roads were busy with traffic and there were moments when Etienne feared the cab driver would lose the bus for carts and carriages kept getting in the way. But as they approached the Gare du Nord, he saw Pascal get off the bus. For a moment he thought he was going into the station to catch a train, and cursed, for that would make it hard to follow him, but as Etienne stopped the cab and paid the driver, he saw Pascal was walking up Boulevard Magenta in the direction of Garrow’s, the undertaker.

  He didn’t go that far though. Instead he turned into a left-hand side street, then turned right again. Etienne stayed just twenty yards behind him and fortunately there were enough people out and about for Pascal not to notice he was being followed. They were in a narrow street of tall houses which were probably all apartments, and Pascal went right to the end before disappearing into one.

  Etienne waited a moment or two, then slipped into the hallway. It was like a thousand other apartment houses in Paris, gloomy, reeking of stale cooking smells, with a tiled floor, grubby-looking walls, and a winding staircase going up the six floors at the back. Beneath the staircase there were a couple of bicycles.

  Twelve post boxes hung in the hall, and Pascal’s name was on number four, proof that this was where he lived. Etienne supposed that as there were two apartments on each floor Pascal’s was on the first.