by Vargas, Fred
He stopped and pulled a face. A dog had made a mess on his territory. Right there, on the metal grid round the base of a plane tree, alongside the bench. Louis Kehlweiler didn’t like his lookout posts to be fouled up. He almost turned on his heel. But the world was full of horrors and bloodshed, he wasn’t going to give up just because some passing dog had dumped its wretched excrement there.
At midday, everything had been OK, he had eaten his lunch sitting on this selfsame bench: the surroundings were perfectly clean. And tonight, a woman had walked out on him, a pathetic note had been left on the bed, he’d only managed a moderate score on the pinball machine, and his territory had been crapped on, a vague despair was setting in.
Too much beer this evening, perhaps that was true, he wasn’t going to claim the contrary. And there was nobody on the streets, with this drenching rain coming down, which would at least wash the pavements, the metal grid and lookout post 102. It might wash his troubles out of his head as well. If Vincent had been correct, the politician’s nephew had been receiving at his house an obscure person who interested Louis. He wanted to take a look. But this evening, there was no light in the windows, no sign of life.
He sheltered himself with his jacket, and wrote a few lines in his notebook. Marthe really ought to get rid of her book. It would be doing her a favour to take it away from her by force. Marthe, although you wouldn’t think it now, had once been the most beautiful taxi girl on the Left Bank, according to what he’d been told. Kehlweiler glanced at the grid again. He wanted to go home. Not that he was giving up, but this was enough for tonight. He was sleepy. Of course, he could say he’d be there tomorrow morning at dawn. People were always telling him how beautiful the dawn was, but Kehlweiler liked his sleep. And when he was sleepy, there were very few pressures that could prevail against it. Sometimes, even if the world was full of horrors and bloodshed, he was still sleepy. That was how it was, he was neither proud nor ashamed of it, although, well, that wasn’t quite true, he couldn’t help it, indeed it had got him into quite a lot of trouble, and even some massive failures. He had paid a price for his beauty sleep. The future belongs to those who get up early, he’d been told. Stupid, because the future is also watched over by those who get up late. He could be back here by eleven in the morning.
II
KILLING LIKE THAT, not many people could have done it. Watch out, though. Now’s the time when it’s important to be clever, precise, excellent indeed, for the next stage of the operation. The secret is to be discreet while being excellent. You wouldn’t believe how pathetic people can be. Georges is a good example, well, I say Georges, there are others. Still, what a waste of space!
But as I say, just an example.
Careful, don’t smile more than usual, practise, pay attention to detail. The method worked fine before, all you have to do is apply it strictly. Relax the jaw, let your cheeks go slack, eyes blank. Perfect detachment from ordinary life, under cover of being normal but a bit tired. Not so easy when you’re feeling pleased with yourself. And last night, it was more than feeling pleased, it was close to ecstasy – and quite right too. Pity not to be able to enjoy it, don’t get that many chances. But no, absolutely not, not that stupid. When some halfwit’s in love, you can tell at once, and when a murderer is satisfied, you can see it from their body language. Next day the police notice, and it’s all over. To kill, you’ve got to be the opposite of a halfwit, that’s the secret. Training, attention to detail, discipline, and people won’t notice a thing. You’ll get the right to celebrate, take advantage of it later, but a year from now, and discreetly.
You’ve just got to cultivate detachment, hide the pleasure. Killing someone like that, on the rocks, quick as a flash, no witnesses, how many people could have done that? The old woman never knew what hit her. Excellent in its simplicity. People will tell you murderers want everyone to know that it’s them. ‘They can’t help making themselves known, that’s how they get their kicks.’ And it’s supposed to make them feel worse, if someone else gets arrested instead of them, an old trick to tempt them out of their hole. ‘They can’t bear anyone else to steal the credit for their murder.’ That’s what people say! Bollocks! Maybe there are some pathetic losers like that. But not this one, oh no, not that stupid. You could arrest twenty other people, and it wouldn’t make this one lift an eyebrow. That’s the secret. But they won’t arrest anybody, they won’t even think it was a murder!
Feel the need to smile, enjoy the benefit? Yes, quite legitimate. But no, stop, absolutely not! Be clever. Relax the jaw, look calm. That’s the long and short of it. Think about the sea, for instance. One wave, another wave, tide comes in, goes out, and so on. Very soothing the sea, very regular. Much better than counting sheep to relax, that’s just for morons without a thought in their heads. Sheep number one, OK, jumps the gate and goes off to the left of your head. And where does the stupid creature go? Just hides in the left of your head, above your ear. And by the time the second sheep comes along, the game’s spoilt because there’s less room for it. You soon get the sheep piling up on the left of the gate, the later ones can’t jump it at all and the whole herd crashes, bleating away, might as well slaughter the lot to start with. The sea’s much better. In and out, never stops and all for nothing. Bloody stupid, the sea, actually. In the end, the sea’s irritating too, because it’s huge but useless. Pulled in and out by the moon, can’t even make its own mind up. Best of all would be to think about the murder. Just going back over it again in your head makes you laugh, and laughing’s good for everything. But no, not so stupid, big effort to forget, don’t think about the murder.
Work it out. They’ll start looking for the old woman tomorrow. By the time they find her body on the rocks, where nobody goes in November, that will probably give another day, perhaps two. By then they won’t be able to fix the time of death with any certainty. What with the wind, the rain, the tide coming in, not to mention the seagulls: perfect. Still smiling? Just don’t! And stop your hands clenching and unclenching, always that way after a murder. Murder’s got to come out through the fingers for, oh, about five or six weeks. So relax the hands too, as well as the jaw, no detail uncontrolled, discipline in all things. All those pathetic half-witted killers who give themselves away by nerves, tics, looking too pleased with themselves, being exhibitionist or too nonchalant, just weaklings, not even capable of self-control. Not so stupid. When they tell you about it, seem interested, even concerned. Let your arms swing naturally when you walk, act calmly. Let’s work it out. The gendarmes will start looking tomorrow, and volunteers will help them. Join the volunteers. No, not so stupid. Murderers join the volunteers all too often! Everyone knows that, even the most bone-headed gendarme knows that, they make lists of the volunteers.
Work hard at being excellent. Work as normal, smile as normal, keep your hands relaxed and ask what’s the news, that’s all. Correct that clenching of the fingers, it’s no time to get uncontrolled spasms, no, no, no, and anyway not your style, certainly not. Keep a watch on lips and hands, that’s the secret. Hands in pockets, or fold your arms, loosely. But not more than normal.
Watch what’s going on, watch other people, but look normal, not like those murderers who imagine every little thing is about them. But pay attention to little things all the same. Every precaution was taken, but there are always nosy parkers to reckon with. Always. Be aware that some damn nosy parker might have noticed something. Be prepared, that’s the secret. If someone takes it into their head to poke their nose into this business, they’ve had it. The fewer pathetic losers there are on this earth, the better it would be. Finito. Like the others. Think about that now.
III
LOUIS KEHLWEILER SAT down on bench 102 at eleven in the morning.
Vincent was already there, leafing through a newspaper.
‘Nothing better to do today?’ Louis asked him.
‘Couple of articles on the way. If anything happens in there,’ Vincent said, without looking up at the buildi
ng opposite, ‘can you let me report on it?’
‘Of course. But keep me posted.’
‘Of course.’
Kehlweiler took a book and some paper from a plastic carrier bag. The weather hadn’t been warm this autumn, and it was hard to find a comfortable position to work on the bench, still damp from the overnight rain.
‘What are you translating?’ Vincent asked.
‘Book on the Third Reich.’
‘Which way?’
‘German to French.’
‘That pay well?’
‘Not too bad. Will it bother you if I put Bufo on the bench?’
‘No, go ahead,’ said Vincent.
‘But don’t disturb him, he’s asleep.’
‘I’m not daft enough to start a conversation with a toad.’
‘People say that and then they do.’
‘You talk to him much yourself?’
‘All the time. Bufo knows everything, he’s a safe-deposit box, a living scandal. Tell me, have you seen anyone come to this bench this morning?’
‘Are you talking to me or your toad?’
‘My toad wasn’t here before me. So I’m talking to you.’
‘Right. No, haven’t seen anyone round here at all. Well, not since seven thirty. Except old Marthe, we exchanged a word or two, and she went off again.’
Vincent had taken out a small pair of scissors and was cutting articles out of his pile of newspapers.
‘You doing like I do now? Collecting press cuttings?’
‘The pupil has to copy the master till the master gets fed up and boots him out, and that’s the sign that the pupil’s ready to become a master in turn, yeah? Am I bothering you?’
‘Not at all. But you’re not paying enough attention to the provinces,’ said Kehlweiler, shuffling through the pile of newspapers Vincent had collected. ‘This stuff’s too Parisian.’
‘Haven’t got time. I’m not like you, I don’t have people sending me their discoveries from all over France, I’m not a veteran chief. One day, I’ll have my own secret squad. So who are the people in your grand army?’
‘Guys like you, or women like you, journalists, activists, the unemployed, troublemakers, whistle-blowers, judges, cafe owners, philosophers, cops, newspaper vendors, chestnut sellers, er . . .’
‘OK, I get the picture,’ said Vincent.
Kehlweiler looked quickly at the iron grid round the foot of the tree, then at Vincent, then around them.
‘Have you lost something?’ Vincent asked.
‘In a way. And what I’ve lost on the one hand I get the feeling I’ve found on the other. You’re sure nobody else has been sitting here this morning? You haven’t nodded off to sleep over the stuff you’re reading?’
‘After seven in the morning, I never go back to sleep.’
‘Good for you.’
‘The provincial press,’ Vincent went on obstinately, ‘is full of common or garden crime, going nowhere, just small-town incidents, time after time, and it doesn’t interest me.’
‘And you’re wrong. A premeditated crime, a private slander, an arbitrary denunciation, they all go somewhere, to a big dunghill where bigger things are fermenting, large-scale crime, collective operations. Better look at it all, without weeding it. I’m a generalist.’
Vincent muttered something, while Kehlweiler got up to go and stare at the flat metal grid round the base of the tree. Vincent knew Kehlweiler’s theories by heart, including the story of the left hand and the right hand. The left hand, Louis would announce, lifting his arms and spreading his fingers, is imperfect, clumsy and hesitant, and therefore a salutary source of muddle and doubt. The right hand, firm, assured, competent, is the driver of human genius. Mastery, method and logic all proceed from it. But look out now, Vincent, this is where you have to follow me carefully: lean just a little too far to the right, a couple of steps further, and you see discipline and certainty looming up, yes? Go further still, three steps, say, and it’s the tragic plunge into perfectionism, the impeccable, then the infallible and the pitiless. Then you’re only half a man walking, leaning over to your extreme right, unheeding the great value of muddle, a cruel imbecile closed to the virtues of doubt: it can creep up on you more sneakily than you imagine, you think you’re safe, but you have to watch it, you have two hands, we’re not like dogs. Vincent smiled and flexed his hands. He had learned to watch out for men who walked leaning one way, but he wanted to concern himself entirely with politics, whereas Louis always wanted to have a finger in every pie. But now, Louis was still standing with his back against the tree, looking down at the grid.
‘What the heck are you doing?’ asked Vincent.
‘That little white thing on the grid round the tree – see it?’
‘Sort of.’
‘I’d like it if you could pick it up for me. With my knee, I can’t crouch down.’
Vincent got up with a sigh. He had never challenged any suggestion by Kehlweiler, the high priest of muddle, and he wasn’t about to start now.
‘Use a handkerchief, I think it’ll be smelly.’
Vincent shook his head, and handed Kehlweiler the small object in a piece of newspaper because he didn’t have a handkerchief. He sat back down on the bench, picked up his scissors and seemingly paid no further attention to Kehlweiler: there are limits to one’s tolerance. But out of the corner of his eye, he observed him looking at the little object from every angle, in the piece of newspaper.
‘Vincent?’
‘Yes.’
‘It didn’t rain early this morning?’
‘No, not since two in the morning.’
Vincent had started doing the weather report for a local paper and he kept an eye on it every day. He knew a lot about the reasons why water sometimes falls from the sky and sometimes stays up there.
‘And this morning, nobody’s been here? You’re sure? Not even someone walking their dog and letting it piss against the tree?’
‘You keep making me say the same thing ten times over. The only human being who came near was Marthe. Did you notice anything about Marthe, by the way?’ Vincent added, bending over the paper, and cleaning his nails with the tip of the scissors. ‘Seems you saw her yesterday.’
‘Yes, I went to catechism class in the cafe.’
‘And you saw her home?’
‘Yes,’ said Kehlweiler, sitting down again and still contemplating the small object wrapped in newspaper.
‘And you didn’t notice anything?’ asked Vincent with an edge of aggression.
‘Well. Let’s say she wasn’t on top form.’
‘And that’s all?’
‘Yes.’
‘That’s all!’ cried Vincent brusquely. ‘You spout lectures about the planetary importance of small-town murders, you look after your toad, you spend a quarter of an hour fiddling with some bit of rubbish from under the tree, but about Marthe, whom you’ve known for twenty years, you didn’t notice anything. Bravo, Louis, bravo, well done!’
Kehlweiler looked at him sharply. Too late, said Vincent to himself, and anyway, what the hell. Kehlweiler’s eyes, green with long dark lashes that looked as if he was wearing too much mascara, could move from dreamy vagueness to painfully incisive intensity. His lips became a straight line, all his habitual mildness disappeared like a flock of sparrows. Kehlweiler’s face looked then like those majestic profiles carved on to cold medals, no fun at all. Vincent shook his head as if chasing away a wasp.
‘Tell,’ said Kehlweiler simply.
‘Well, Marthe has been on the streets for a week now. They took over all those attics to make them into fancy apartments. The new landlord has chucked everyone out.’
‘Why didn’t she tell me? They must have been given notice ahead of time. Stop that, you’ll hurt yourself with those scissors.’
‘The tenants campaigned to keep their lodgings, and they were all chucked out.’
‘But why didn’t she tell me?’ repeated Louis, louder.
‘Beca
use she’s proud, because she’s ashamed, because she’s frightened of you.’
‘The bloody idiot! And what about you? Couldn’t you have told me? For God’s sake, stop it with the scissors, your nails are quite clean enough, aren’t they?!’
‘I only found out the day before yesterday. And no one knew where you were.’
Kehlweiler stared again at the object wrapped in newspaper. Vincent gave him a sidelong glance. Louis was good-looking, except when he was irritated like this, with his hawklike nose and jutting chin. Irritation didn’t improve anyone’s looks, but with Louis it was worse: his three-day stubble and his staring eyes with their heavy lashes could be scary. Vincent waited.
‘Know what this is?’ Kehlweiler asked finally, passing him the bit of newspaper.
Louis’s face was getting back to normal, emotion was returning under his brows and life to his lips. Vincent examined the object. He couldn’t concentrate. He had just shouted at Louis and that didn’t often happen.
‘I’ve no idea what this piece of shit is,’ he said.
‘Getting warm. Carry on.’
‘It’s unrecognisable, funny shape . . . oh hell, Louis, I couldn’t give a toss what it is . . .’
‘Go on, try harder.’
‘If I make a big effort, it might remind me of what was left on my plate after my gran cooked pigs’ trotters for me. I hated them, she thought it was my favourite food. Grans are funny sometimes.’
‘Wouldn’t know,’ commented Kehlweiler, ‘never knew my grandmother.’
He bundled his book and papers back into the plastic bag, pocketed the object still wrapped in newspaper, and slid the toad into the opposite pocket.
‘You’re keeping the pig’s trotter?’ asked Vincent.
‘Why not? Now, where can I find Marthe?’
‘The last few days she’s been sheltering under the awning by tree 16,’ Vincent muttered.
