The Best British Mysteries 3 - [Anthology]

by Edited by Maxim Jakubowski

  ‘You don’t have them?’ He affected immense surprise.

  The man’s face darkened with anger and suspicion that he was being mocked.

  Carton stared back at him with wide innocence. He really had no idea where the cheeses were, and he had even more urgent reasons for wishing that he did.

  ‘No, we don’t,’ the man admitted in a growl.

  ‘That is very serious,‘ Carton said sympathetically. ‘Citizen...!’

  ‘Sabot,’ the man grunted.

  ‘Citizen Sabot.’ Carton nodded courteously. ‘We must do everything we can to find them. They are evidence. And apart from that, it is a crime to waste good food. There is certainly a deserving person somewhere to whom they should go.’ The place seemed even more airless than before, as if everything which came here, human or not, remained. The smell of fear was in the nose and throat, suffocating the breath.

  Along the corridor to the left, out of sight, someone shouted, there was laughter, a wail. Then the silence surged back like a returning wave.

  Carton found his voice shaking when he spoke again. ‘Citizen Sabot, you have been very fair to me. I will do everything I can to learn what happened to the cheeses and bring you the information.’ He saw the distrust naked in Sabot’s face, the sneer already forming on his lips. ‘You are a man of great influence,’ he went on truthfully, however much he might despise himself for it. ‘Apart from justice, it would be wise of me to assist you all that I can.’

  Sabot was mollified. ‘Yes, it would,’ he agreed. ‘I’ll give you two days. Today and tomorrow.’

  ‘I’ll report to you in two days,’ Carton hedged. ‘I might need longer to track them down. We are dealing with clever people here. If it were not so, your own men would have found them already, surely.’

  Sabot considered for a moment. Half a dozen Revolutionary Guards marched by with heavy tread. Someone sang a snatch of ‘The Marseillaise’, that song the rabble had adopted when they burst out of the gaols of Marseilles and the other sea ports of the Mediterranean, and marched all the way to Paris, killing and looting everything in their path. Carton found himself shaking uncontrollably, memory nauseating him.

  ‘Tomorrow night,’ Sabot conceded. ‘But if you find them and eat them yourself, I’ll have your head.’

  Carton gulped and steadied himself. ‘Naturally,’ he agreed. He almost added something else, then while he still retained some balance, he turned and left, trying not to run.

  * * * *

  Back in the room he rented, Carton sank down into his bed, his mind racing to make sense of what had happened, and his own wild promise to Sabot to find the cheeses. He had been granted barely two days. Where could he even begin?

  With Marie-Claire’s original plan. She had intended to have Philippe tell Fleuriot that he was going to post guards, so he had moved the cheeses and the bacon to a more accessible place. Only he had done it earlier than the time agreed with Marie-Claire. Presumably his plan had worked. Fleuriot had moved the cheeses, and Philippe had caught him in the act, and confiscated them. Fleuriot had said nothing, because he should not have had the cheeses in the first place. So much was clear.

  Marie-Claire had heard of it and attempted to accuse Philippe, but either she had not been listened to at all, or if she had, she had not been believed, and Philippe had silenced her before she could prove anything. According to Sabot, no one had found the cheeses, so Philippe must still have them.

  Maybe Carton should begin with Fleuriot. He at least would know when the cheeses had been taken, which - if it led to Philippe’s movements that day - might indicate where he could have hidden them. Carton got up and went out. This was all an infuriating waste of time. He should be working. His money was getting low. If it were not his own neck at risk, he would not do it. All the proof of innocence in the world would not save poor Marie-Claire now. And it would hardly help Jean-Jacques, either. No one cared because half the charges made were built on settling old scores anyway, or on profit of one sort or another. Those who had liked Marie-Claire would still like her just as much.

  He walked along the street briskly, head down, avoiding people’s eyes. There was a warm wind rising, and it smelled as if rain were coming. Old newspapers blew along the pavement, flapping like wounded birds. Two laundresses were arguing. It looked like the same ones as before.

  He went the long way around to the Rue St Honoré, in order to avoid passing the house where Marat lived and printed his papers. He had enough trouble without an encounter with the ‘Rage of the People’. A couple of questions elicited the information as to exactly which house Fleuriot lived in, next to the carpenter Duplay. But Fleuriot was an angry and frightened man. The loss of a few cheeses was nothing compared with the threatened loss of his head. He stood in the doorway, his spectacles balanced on his forehead, and stared fixedly at Carton.

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about, Citizen. There are always Revolutionary Guards about the place. How is one day different from another?’

  ‘Not Revolutionary Guards,’ Carton corrected patiently. ‘These would be from the local Committee, not in uniform, apart from the red bandanna.’

  ‘Red bandanna!’ Fleuriot threw his hands up in the air. ‘What does that mean? Nothing! Anyone can wear a red rag. They could be from the Faubourg St Antoine, for all I know. I mind my own business, Citizen, and you’d be best advised to mind yours! Good day.’ And without giving Carton a chance to say anything more, he retreated inside his house and slammed the door, leaving Carton alone in the yard just as it began to rain.

  He spent the rest of the afternoon and early evening getting thoroughly wet and learning very little of use. He asked all the neighbours whose apartments fronted onto the courtyard, and he even asked the apothecary in the house to the left, and the carpenter in the yard to the right. But Philippe was powerful and his temper vicious. If anyone knew anything about exactly when he came with his man, they were affecting ignorance. According to most of them, the place had been totally deserted on that particular late afternoon. One was queuing for candles, another for soap. One woman was visiting her sick sister, a girl was selling pamphlets, a youth was delivering a piece of furniture, another was too drunk to have known if his own mother had walked past him, and she had been dead for years. That at least was probably honest.

  Carton went home wet to the skin and thoroughly discouraged. He had two slices of bread, half a piece of sausage, and a bottle of wine. He took off his wet clothes and sat in his nightshirt, thinking. Tomorrow was July 13. If he did not report the day after, Sabot would come for him. He would be angry because he had failed twice, and been taken for a fool. And what was worse, by then Philippe himself would almost certainly be aware of Carton’s interest in the matter. He must succeed. The alternative would be disaster. He must find out more about Philippe himself, where he lived, what other places he might have access to, who were his friends. Even better would be to know who were his enemies!

  He finally went to sleep determined to start very early in the morning. He needed to succeed, and quickly, for his own survival, but he would also like to be revenged for Marie-Claire. She had not deserved this, and in spite of his better judgement he had liked her. It would be good to do something to warrant the friendship Jean-Jacques believed of him.

  In the morning he got up early and went out straight away. He bought a cup of coffee from a street vendor, drank it and handed back the mug to her, then walked on past the usual patient queues of women hoping for bread, or vegetables, or whatever it was. He passed the sellers of pamphlets and the tradesmen still trying to keep up some semblance of normality at what they did: millinery, barrel-making, engraving, hair-dressing, or whatever it was, and retraced his steps to the local committee headquarters. It was a considerable risk asking questions about Philippe Duclos, especially since he was already known and Philippe would be on his guard. He knew he had taken the cheeses and would see threat even where there was none. But Carton had to report to Sabot by
midnight tonight, and so far he had accomplished nothing. It was not impossible that in his fear of Philippe, Fleuriot had already warned him that Carton was asking questions.

  Affecting innocence and concern, Carton asked one of the guards where he might find Citizen Duclos, since he had a personal message for him.

  The man grunted. ‘Citizen Duclos is a busy man! Why should I keep watch on him? Who knows where he is?’

  Carton bit back his instinctive answer and smiled politely ‘You are very observant,’ he replied between his teeth. ‘I am sure you know who comes and goes, as a matter of habit.’

  The man grunted again, but the love of flattery was in his eyes, and Carton had asked for nothing but a little harmless information. ‘He is not in yet,’ he replied. ‘Come back in an hour or two.’

  ‘The message is urgent,’ Carton elaborated. ‘I would not wish to disturb him, but I could wait for him in the street near his lodgings, and as soon as he comes out, I could speak with him.’

  The man shrugged. ‘If you wake him you’ll pay for it!’ he warned.

  ‘Naturally. I am sure his work for liberty keeps him up till strange hours, as I imagine yours does, too.’

  ‘All hours!’ the man agreed. ‘Haven’t seen my bed long enough for a year or more!’

  ‘History will remember you,’ Carton said ambiguously. ‘Where should I wait for Citizen Duclos?’

  ‘Rue Mazarine,’ the man replied. ‘South side, near the apothecary’s shop.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Carton nodded to him and hurried away before he could become embroiled in any further conversation.

  He found the apothecary’s shop and stood outside it, apparently loitering like many others, occasioning no undue attention. People came and went, most of them grumbling about one thing or another. The pavements steamed from the night’s rain and already it was hot.

  Twenty minutes later a large man came out, bleary-eyed, unshaven, a red bandanna around his neck. There was a wine stain on the front of his shirt, and he belched as he passed Carton, barely noticing him.

  Carton waited until he had gone around the corner out of sight, and for another ten minutes after that, then he went under the archway into the courtyard and knocked on the first door.

  A woman opened it, her sleeves rolled up and a broom in her hand. He asked her for Philippe Duclos and was directed to the door opposite. Here he was fortunate at last. It was opened by a child of about eleven. She was curious and friendly. She told him Philippe lodged with her family and he had one room. Carton asked if Philippe were to be given a gift of wine, did he have a place where he could keep it.

  ‘He could put it in the cellar,’ she replied. ‘But if it is a good wine, then one of the other lodgers might drink it. It would not be safe.’ Was there not somewhere better, more private? No, unfortunately there was no such place. Might he have a friend? She giggled. The thought amused her. She did not imagine his trusting a friend, he was not that kind of man. He didn’t even trust her mother, who cooked and cleaned for him. He was always counting his shirts! As if anybody would want them.

  Carton thanked her and left, puzzled. Again he was at a dead end. He went back to the neighbours of Fleuriot to see if he could find anyone, even a child or a servant, who might have seen Philippe’s men moving the cheeses, or if not cheese, then at least the bacon. One cannot carry out a side of bacon in one’s pocket!

  He spoke to a dozen people, busy and idle, resident and passerby, but no one had seen people carrying goods that day, or since, with the exception of shopping going in. Even laundry had been done at the well in the centre of the yard, and the presence of the women would have been sufficient to deter anyone from carrying anything past with as distinctive a shape as a side of bacon, or odour as a ripe cheese.

  He saw only one rat, fat and sleek, running from the well across the stones and disappearing into a hole in the wall. Then he remembered that there was a timber yard next door, belonging to the carpenter Duplay. Shouldn’t there be plenty of rats around?

  What if no one had seen Philippe move the cheeses because he hadn’t? They were still here - the safest place for them! Fleuriot would guard them with his life, but if Sabot should find them, then Fleuriot would take the blame, and Philippe would affect total innocence. He would say he knew nothing of them at all, and Marie-Claire, the only person who knew he had, was dead and could say nothing. It made perfect sense. And above all it was safe! Philippe simply took a cheese whenever he wanted, and Fleuriot was too frightened of him to do anything about it. Certainly he would not dare eat one or sell one himself.

  Carton walked away quickly and went back to the Café Procope and ordered himself a slice of bread and sausage and a bottle of wine. He sat at his usual table. Every time the door swung open he looked up, half expecting to see Jean-Jacques, and felt an unreasonable surge of disappointment each time it was not. He had nothing in particular to say to him, apart from to forget his plan for revenge, whatever it was, but he missed his company, and he hurt for his grief. Perhaps he even would have liked to talk of Marie-Claire and share some of the pain within himself.

  If the cheeses were still in Fleuriot’s house, then it would take a number of men, with the authority of the Commune itself behind them to search. The local authority was no good, that was Philippe himself. How could Carton get past that? He stared into his glass and knew there was only one answer - the one he had been avoiding for the last half year - ask Marat! Marat was the Commune.

  There must be another way. He poured out the last of the wine and drank it slowly. It was sour, but it still hit his stomach with a certain warmth. So far he had avoided even passing the house in the Rue des Medicines where Marat lived. He had rather that Marat had never even heard of him. Now he was about to ruin it all by actually walking into the house and asking a favour! Never mind drunk, he must be mad! He up-ended the glass and drained the last mouthful. Well, if he were going to commit suicide, better get on with it rather than sit here feeling worse and worse, living it over in his imagination until he was actually sick.

  He went outside and walked quickly, as if he had purpose he was intent upon. Get it done. The fear of it was just as bad as the actuality. At least get this achieved.

  He was there before he expected. He must have been walking too rapidly. There was an archway on the corner leading into a cobbled yard with a well in the centre, just like any of a thousand others. At one side a flight of steps led up to an entrance, and even from where he stood Carton could see bales of paper piled up just inside the doorway, boxes beyond, and printed newspapers ready to deliver. There was no excuse for hesitation. It was obviously Marat’s house.

  He took a deep breath, let it out slowly, then walked across and up the steps. No one accosted him until he was inside and peering around, looking for someone to ask. A plain, rather ordinary woman approached him, her face mild, as if she expected a friend.

  ‘Citizeness,’ he said huskily. ‘I am sorry to interrupt your business. But I have a favour to ask which only Citizen Marat could grant me. Who may I approach in order to speak with him?’

  ‘I am Simone Evrard,’ she replied with a certain quiet confidence. ‘I will ask Citizen Marat if he can see you. Who are you, and what is it you wish?’

  Carton remembered with a jolt that Marat had some kind of common-law wife - Marat of all people! This was her, a soft-spoken woman with red hands and an apron tied around her waist. ‘Sydney Carton, Citizeness,’ he replied. ‘It is to do with a man hoarding food instead of making it available to all citizens, as it should be. Unfortunately he has a position in the local committee, so I cannot go to them.’

  ‘I see.’ She nodded. ‘I shall tell him. Please wait here.’

  She was gone for several minutes. He stood shifting his weight from foot to foot, trying to control the fear rising inside him. It even occurred to him to change his mind and leave. There was still time.

  And then there wasn’t. She was back again, beckoning him toward her and poi
nting to the doorway of another room. Like one in a dream he obeyed, his heart pounding in his chest.

  Inside, the room was unlike anything he could conceivably have expected. It was small, a sort of aqueous green, and the steam in it clung to his skin and choked his nose and his throat. The smell was ghastly, a mixture of vinegar and rotting human flesh. In the centre was a tin bath shaped like a boot, concealing the lower portion of the occupant’s body. A board was placed across it on which rested a pen, inkwell, and paper. Even through the heavy steam Carton could see Marat quite clearly. His toadlike face with its bulging eyes and slack mouth was almost bloodless with the exhaustion of pain. There was a wet towel wrapped around his head. His naked shoulders, arms, and upper chest were smooth and hairless.

  ‘What is it, Citizen Carton?’ he asked. His voice was rough and had a slight accent. Carton remembered he was not French at all, but half Swiss and half Sardinian. The stench caught in his throat and he thought he was going to gag.