Night Sky

by Clare Francis

  Birelli was watching Vasson’s reaction with satisfaction, and Vasson realised the little man knew exactly what was going through his mind.

  Birelli drew breath and said, ‘Furthermore, while we’re on the subject of you and your incompetence, I’m tired of hearing about your grandiose ideas. They are idiotic rubbish; they’re not worth anything. You have no idea what makes a club go. You can spend money, oh yes! But you have no idea what makes money. You think your ideas are so much better than anyone else’s. Well, if you’re so brilliant why aren’t you a tycoon, eh? Why don’t you own all the clubs in the area? Eh?’

  Vasson gripped the side of the bar and waited. He wanted the heat to go out of his anger so that he could think clearly. He needed to be calm when he decided what to do next.

  The coolness came over his body and then he knew.

  Very slowly he reached forward. At first Birelli looked bemused, then realisation dawned and he turned white. As Vasson’s hands closed round his neck, he screamed and tried to step backwards.

  Vasson’s hands closed rapidly round the fat neck and he began to shake the man, slowly at first, then rapidly so that the head snapped backwards and forwards like a puppet’s. Then he lifted him by the neck, thrust him against a wall and started to smash his head against the hard surface of the red flock wallpaper.

  Birelli had been screaming but now, as his head thudded dully into the wall, his breath came in long gasps. Blood began to smear the red flock and his eyes were round and staring like little white eggs.

  Vasson found the movement of the head hypnotic as it snapped backwards and forwards; he wondered what it would take to make the head snap right off. He had got into a rhythm now and it was strangely satisfying. He wanted the rhythm and the feeling of satisfaction to continue.

  Suddenly an arm encircled Vasson’s neck and forced him to let go. Vasson felt an overwhelming disappointment and then, almost immediately, relief. He was sorry that the disgusting little man was going to escape lightly. On the other hand, he was glad he had been stopped. He had forgotten himself, and he didn’t like doing that.

  The armhold was vice-like and Vasson felt a moment of panic. He should have remembered about the barman. The man was large and powerful: he could hurt people.

  Vasson tried to think. It would be a mistake to struggle; better to play dead. He made himself go limp and heard the barman grunt as his arm took the additional weight.

  For a second Vasson thought nothing would happen, then there was a sickening blow to his kidney and he screamed.

  After what seemed a long time the barman finally loosened his grip and let Vasson slide to the floor.

  Vasson lay still for a moment then slid quickly under a table, out of reach. God, the pain! It was terrible, a great stabbing ache in his side. He felt sick.

  He heard a sound and looked round. He could see the barman’s feet advancing towards the table.

  Vasson crouched lower and shouted, ‘I’ve no argument with you, friend. How about laying off, eh?’

  There was silence. Vasson crawled out on the other side of the table and got cautiously to his feet.

  The barman was hovering, fists clenched. Vasson panted desperately, ‘Look, be a good bloke and lay off. You’ve done me in the back and I’m in bloody agony. You’ve done your bit, for Christ’s sake.’

  For a moment the barman stared at him, then he hissed, ‘Coward!’

  Vasson didn’t care what the man thought, just as long as there was no more fighting.

  The barman advanced again. Vasson retreated quickly towards a wall.

  Suddenly there was a loud groan. Both men stopped and looked across at the proprietor. He was slumped untidily on the floor, blood pouring from his head, his face sheet white. Vasson thought with satisfaction: Perhaps I did the sod some real damage after all.

  The barman murmured angrily, ‘You’ve half killed him!’

  ‘No!’ Vasson said hastily. ‘He’ll be all right. It’s only superficial. Looks worse than it is. Really—’ He let out a great moan of pain and clutched his back. The barman stared in surprise. Vasson groaned and started panting. ‘God, my back! The pain!’ The barman was impressed, just as Vasson had intended him to be.

  The barman lowered his arms. He was still unhappy but it was obvious the fight was over. Vasson almost smiled with relief.

  Birelli was groaning again and the barman shuffled over to take a look at him. Quickly Vasson straightened his jacket and tie and smoothed down his hair. He moved rapidly away from the barman, round the room to the stairway.

  The barman spotted him and said, ‘Oi! Hold on!’

  Vasson poised himself on the bottom step and snapped, ‘Just tell the ugly bastard that if he has any silly ideas about getting his own back, I’ll tell the cops about the extra activities upstairs! Okay?’

  The barman looked angry again and started to move towards him. Vasson sprinted up, three steps at a time, and ran into the street. He didn’t stop running until he was across Pigalle and into Montmartre.

  ‘Bastard! Bastard!’ He kicked a wall angrily. He wished he’d finished Birelli off, squeezed his neck tight until he’d bloody choked! At the same time he hated himself for having lost control.

  ‘God damn it!’ He roared on up the street, bumping into people and forcing a woman off the pavement.

  He came to a pavement café and threw himself disgustedly on to a chair. He stared blindly across the street still shaking with rage and humiliation.

  Later, when the rage had subsided, he walked on, more slowly this time, wondering what the hell he’d done to deserve his luck.

  It had been four years now. Four years since the disaster.

  Even now he could hardly bear to think about it. He could hardly bear to remember the smell of that lovely, sweet money.

  Paris was just as he imagined it would be, except better.

  For the first few days he stayed at a good hotel and strolled around, eating at different restaurants and watching the smart ice-cool Parisians as they ate and talked and did their business. He was cautious: he wanted to get a feel for the latest fashions before buying any clothes; and he wanted to be sure that he had found the right neighbourhood in which to rent an apartment. For the moment he was happy to watch and listen and relax; to savour the freedom that money brought. The money: it was like the feeling of hot sunshine on your skin, warm, sensuous, intoxicating.

  When he felt ready he slowly began to acquire the trappings of a successful man. First he bought a few really good clothes and some gold cufflinks. Then he began to look for an apartment. It had to be fairly near Pigalle where the club would be, but not too near. Montmartre was impossibly vulgar, so it would have to be the neuvième.

  It took several days to find what he wanted. The apartment was in a purpose-built block in a quiet street off the Rue de Clichy. It was in need of decoration, but it would do until he was properly established, and then he would go to an even better place in the huitième, somewhere off the Champs Elysées.

  The only luxury he would allow himself at this stage was the car. He had wanted it so long that he couldn’t bear the idea of waiting any longer. He decided, rashly, to have a new one after all. There was a showroom on the Champs Elysées which had Delages and Bugattis in the window. It gave him a curious thrill to walk in and ask for a D8SS, for immediate delivery. The manager himself came out of his office and showed him a car with Falaschi bodywork in green. He liked the body – very much. It was open, with sleek wings which flowed into the running boards and a long, long bonnet.

  Perfect – except for the colour. He wanted red, ruby red, with black leather upholstery. The manager was downcast. That could take weeks, maybe months.

  Vasson said he would wait for it.

  The manager went to the telephone. He returned smiling. It would be only two weeks, after all.

  Two weeks. Vasson rather enjoyed the idea of waiting. It would be a sort of sweet agony. It appealed to his sense of Christian guilt. Yes, he would
wait for the red one.

  He paid a deposit, in cash as usual.

  The money was lasting well; the hotel, the month’s advance rent for the apartment, the new clothes and the cufflinks had hardly made a dent in it. But the car would, of course. For the deposit he had to dip into the crisp new notes for the first time.

  The two weeks passed surprisingly quickly. He busied himself looking at premises around Pigalle. It would take quite a while to set up the club: there were difficulties – permits, licences, access and so on. And he had to be careful; his new identity wouldn’t bear detailed examination by the police. Everything must be in order; none of the paperwork must be forgotten. If anything the difficulties made him more determined.

  Then at last the two weeks were up and he telephoned the showroom. Yes, the car was there, ready.

  It was like Christmas, or a birthday except he’d never known what it was like to get presents before. His heart started to hammer with excitement as he walked along the Champs Elysées. He approached from the opposite side of the avenue, under the trees, and stopped at an intersection to cross the wide boulevard. He looked across at the showroom and frowned. He couldn’t see a ruby red car anywhere, either in the window or on the wide pavement outside. He thought: Damn, it hasn’t arrived after all.

  He was just about to cross when he saw something that made him freeze. A man leaning against a tree pretending to read a newspaper, but actually watching the showroom.

  There was another further up the avenue, standing in a shop doorway, smoking a cigarette.

  Oh God.

  They were waiting for him.

  Sweat started from his forehead and he went quite cold. For several moments he stood absolutely still.

  The man in the doorway threw his cigarette away and looked up and down the avenue. Vasson turned quickly away and walked rapidly towards the Etoile. He came to one of the large pavement cafés and, going to the bar, asked to use the phone. He called the showroom and said he was delayed. Were they certain the car was absolutely ready? There was a slight hesitation, then they had assured him it was ready, there and waiting. He told them he wanted to drive it straight off and did they have it parked right outside? There was a moment’s silence, then they told him yes, it was just outside, ready to go.

  Vasson watched the showroom for ten minutes. There was no red Delage outside and none arrived while he waited. Instead there was plenty of activity among the men staked outside. A man came out of the showroom and spoke first to the man under the tree and then to the one in the doorway. There was a third Vasson hadn’t spotted before, in another doorway on the other side of the showroom. After their discussions they looked more relaxed as if they had been told that the action was off for the moment.

  Vasson turned away, sick at heart.

  It must have been the money, it could only have been the money.

  The money must stink to high heaven.

  He walked a long way, then went into a café and had a drink. It made him light-headed and he felt slightly hysterical. He had the dreadful desire to cry.

  Later he sat in a daze, thinking, thinking hard. At last, late in the evening, he left the café and walked slowly towards the apartment.

  He stayed in the apartment for three days, lying on the bed smoking or sometimes pacing up and down, thinking of a way to utilise the money.

  There was no way. He had known that straight away, but it took him three days to face it. Then he wept.

  He had been so naive it was incredible. How the Algerian must have laughed! How they all must have laughed! They’d probably been wondering how to get rid of that rotten money for years. The Algerian wouldn’t have printed it himself, it wasn’t his style, but he’d probably bought it cheap for an occasion like this …

  At one point he thought of revenge, he thought of nailing the Algerian with the money, of doing a deal for perhaps half the two hundred thousand.

  But he was frightened. If he went to Marseilles he knew the Algerian would kill him. He wouldn’t get within a mile.

  He tried to remember how lucky he was not to have been caught. And there was still some money from the down-payment: clean money. But it didn’t help. He had been robbed and cheated, and it hurt like hell.

  A week later he tried to shift some of the bad money with a bullion dealer. The dealer got the scent of the money even as it came out of the briefcase: Vasson saw it in his face. He made a quick exit before the dealer reached a telephone. It was no better at a small pawnbrokers: the old Jew handed the money back and yelled, ‘Get this rubbish out of here!’

  Vasson realised the money was well known. It must have been around for years.

  Eventually, in desperation, Vasson sold the lot for three thousand francs to a pied-noir who hoped to offload it in Tangiers.

  The good money lasted a year, spent carefully. There was no club, no car, no security.

  He was back where he’d started.

  Vasson strode up the steps and steeply-climbing streets that lead into the heart of Montmartre, and felt the sweat soaking his back. He walked faster again, pushing his body harder and harder to ease the pain in his kidney and the bitterness in his mouth.

  Finally he turned into a small dark café and sat near the window. The group of men sitting at the counter glanced at him and resumed their conversation. They knew he never said hello. The waiter brought him a coffee.

  He considered ordering a pastis; it might just revive him. He’d drunk enough the night before. He couldn’t remember exactly how many. Twenty or more. The memory sickened him, not only because of the hangover but because the evening had cost him at least a hundred francs.

  Raoul had talked him into going. Well, Raoul could damn well buy him a pastis.

  He closed his eyes and tried to remember what it was like to feel well. It had been a long time since he’d felt really well; there had been too much drink and too many cigarettes. And now the kidney, which was still aching viciously.

  Someone sat down at the table. Vasson opened half an eye and saw that it was Raoul. Vasson said, ‘Buy me a drink, you tête de con.’

  ‘Have you read the news? Have you read the news?’ Raoul unfolded his newspaper and started to read avidly.

  Vasson waited for a moment, then leant forward and took Raoul’s wrist. ‘Look, after last night you owe me a goddam drink!’

  Raoul looked up impatiently. ‘Oh for Christ’s sake shut up, will you? I’m reading this.’ He flicked his hand across the newspaper. ‘This Polish thing … it means war, do you realise? We will be at war by the end of the week!’

  Vasson controlled his annoyance. Raoul thought he knew so much about world affairs, but he couldn’t even run a couple of girls at a profit. ‘War? So, maybe there’ll be a war. But it’s not going to affect us.’

  Raoul slowly lowered the newspaper and stared across the table. ‘Listen, big-time operator, this is the end of it, as far as I’m concerned. If France is going to war, then I will be there fighting, and you can rot here, hatching your grand plans. Alone.’

  Vasson regarded him with contempt. ‘Then I’m sorry for you, because I’ll be the richer.’

  ‘That’s what you’ve been saying for the last three years – and I’m still counting my sous’ Raoul stabbed a finger across the table. ‘And so, for that matter, are you!’

  Vasson flushed. They’d had an idea to open a club, but it had failed for the usual reason: lack of money. They’d tried to borrow some, even tried to extort some, but it had all come to nothing.

  Vasson retorted, ‘At least I try, which is more than you do.’ Raoul was a lazy swine who’d be quite happy to sit around for ever, earning nothing and drinking himself stupid. Vasson added, ‘None of your ideas are worth a sou.’

  Raoul shrugged; he’d heard it all before. ‘There’s nothing wrong with my ideas. It’s you! You just find problems that aren’t there.’

  Vasson gave a short laugh. He knew Raoul’s ideas all right: bank robbery. The quickest way to get inside
, short of stabbing a flic and waiting to be arrested. God!

  Raoul bought two pastis and plonked them on the table. ‘Look, the idea of setting up your stupid club would never have worked anyway. We’re small-fry. We could never have set up a big place like that. Hundreds of women indeed! High-class décor!’ He shook his head. ‘Look, for a start our police contacts just weren’t good enough. And then do you think the existing businesses would have made room for you without a fuss? I tell you it would never have worked.’

  Vasson watched him coldly. He decided Raoul was simply a very stupid man.

  Raoul said tolerantly, ‘You know, you should use that learning of yours, and get a good job with prospects. You do have an education, don’t you, eh? I mean you read books and all that. It’s obvious that someone stuffed the knowledge in somewhere. Well, you should use it!’

  Vasson stared out of the window. He loathed people referring to his past.

  Raoul went on, ‘Was it the priests? That gave you the learning, I mean? I knew a lad once who’d started life with nothing – on the scrapheap at five years old, he was – and the priests took him in and stuffed his head full of books and Latin and he ended up a professor, a professor! The nephew of my mum’s best friend, he was. Very proud, his family, very proud.’ He turned to Vasson. ‘Was it the priests, then?’

  ‘Shut up,’ Vasson snapped.

  He downed his pastis and stood up. Raoul looked up in surprise. ‘Where are you off to?’

  ‘Away. Somewhere. So I’ll say goodbye. I hope you enjoy the army and getting killed. Should be fun.’

  ‘Don’t be like that.’

  Vasson leant over the table. ‘We’ll see who’s the clever one, and I tell you, it isn’t going to be you!’

  He strode out of the café and up the street, swearing under his breath. So Raoul wanted out. Fine! Let them all go to hell. He could manage very well on his own.