by Elaine Young
Chapter 9
Faron
August 1974
The day after his return to Paris Ari had a visitor. It was Raoul Faron.
‘My brother said to tell you that he would like to see you again. He has more to say about the labour camp. Can you come now, today?’
Ari got his panama hat and they walked out into the warmth of the late August morning. The heat radiated from the baking pavements in stifling waves. Holiday-makers out in their droves thronged the streets; some were even cooling their aching feet in the fountains.
Ari loved Paris in the summer. His heart lifted as they headed for the metro. It was a long trip out to the suburbs with a couple of transfers and he made no attempt to engage Raoul in conversation, bar asking him about his brother’s condition. There did not seem to be anything more to say. When he commiserated with him about his brother who was dying, the man just shrugged.
‘We are not close. He is my half-brother and much older than me and the war separated us even more. When he came back, he was different from the big brother who went away.’ After that they sat in silence. Ari thought that he could easily have gone by himself, but he realised Raoul probably had nothing else to do and needed the company.
When they got to the clinic, they went straight to the ward. The faded blue curtain was pulled back and Eduard’s bed was empty. They stood there uncertainly. Suddenly the hard-faced nurse emerged from the office at the end of the ward and almost bumped into the two waiting men.
‘You are looking for Monsieur Eduard? He was moved to the small room over there.’ She gestured with her chin.
‘Why?’
‘He was making too much noise and disturbing the other patients,’ she said acidly.
Raoul knocked on the door. There was no answer. Slowly he turned the handle and opened the door to peep around at the bed. Immediately he slammed the door and stood with his back to it, his face drained of colour.
‘What is it, Raoul?’
The man just shook his head, his eyes staring wildly. The look on his face made the hair of the back of Ari’s neck stand on end. He took Raoul by the shoulders, moved him out of the way and opened the door. A grisly sight met his horrified gaze. Eduard’s badly beaten body lay awkwardly half on, half off the bed. The room was in disarray. But the real horror was the bloated livid face, the protruding tongue above the tightly-pulled bell-cord around the neck. The eyes bulged hideously. The hands were still, frozen as they had attempted to claw the thin cord away from the throat. Eduard Faron had not died of cancer.
Gagging, Ari turned and slammed the door. Ignoring Raoul, who was still standing there rigidly, he raced to the nurses’ office. ‘This One’ was busy writing at the desk.
‘Fetch the doctor! Eduard Faron . . . something terrible has happened! He’s dead . . .’
‘Dead! How can that be? I took him his medication a little while ago. He was fine then!’
‘Just get the doctor, woman!’
She shrugged and called the doctor’s name over the intercom. Then she ambled slowly towards the side ward. She put her head round the door, then quickly withdrew it and slammed the door, before running down the corridor.
Within moments the doctor came at the trot, followed by the nurse. No-one seemed to remember who the last visitor had been; the nurse said she had not taken notice. Ari knew she was lying although he could tell she was frightened, but he couldn’t say anything. After that, the two traumatized visitors were instructed not to go near the room; not that either of them wanted to go there again. Ari, his gorge rising every time his mind turned back to that terrible scene, could scarcely control the shaking of his whole frame. Someone came and led them to the nurses’ station and there they sat, dazed and bewildered, as police came and went.
Finally the doctor fetched Raoul to his office. Ari trailed after them, not knowing what else to do. He stood un-acknowledged in the doorway, as the doctor apologised for the fact that Raoul’s brother had been attacked in this dreadful way in what should have been a secure place. ‘I have no explanation! It is an inconceivable thing that has happened. I have never heard of a thing like this. However, the police are investigating and will contact you when they are ready to release the body for burial,’ he pushed some forms across the desk for Raoul to fill in. ‘we require your contact details please, and the names of his next of kin,’ he was embarrassed and Ari could see that he didn’t care as much for Raoul as he cared that this frightful thing had happened on his shift. Finally the doctor stood up.
‘If you would like to sit for a little while longer, I will get someone to bring you some coffee. We can arrange a social worker for counselling, perhaps?’
Raoul lifted his shoulders in a defeated gesture. He had not said a word to the doctor who had done all the talking. Ari had merely been an observer. The doctor shook Raoul’s hand and then hurried away, anxious to return to some normality.
Ari sat down slowly on the other chair and leaned his forehead on the desk. The awful vision of the dead man replayed itself in his mind and he could not stop shuddering. Clutching at his gut was the awareness that Eduard had been silenced. Anxiety rose up into his mouth like a bitter flood.
It was pointless bothering Raoul with what he thought. Ari could not help but believe that the victim had been prevented from speaking further. Had Eduard been right? Had the nurse been party to the murder? Was the doctor also part of a plot? Had Eduard Faron been moved to the small ward so that the murderer would have easy, private access to his victim? He remembered how Eduard had drawn his finger across his throat at the mention of Pantin. He turned his head at Raoul’s touch on his shoulder.
‘Are you alright, mon vieux?’
Ari, surprised by the question, sat up and shrugged, letting his breath out in a sigh. ‘I’m just shocked about this appalling thing. But never mind about me. You must feel dreadful. I am so sorry. Is there something I can do?’ he mumbled almost inaudibly, hoping that his offer would be turned down. ‘You have arrangements to make. Did he have a wife? Children?’ He stood up.
‘No, he had a woman who lived with him for many years, but she left him when he became ill. No children. I suppose I am the only one he had,’ he groaned loudly.
‘Do you want me to stay with you, Raoul?’
The other man shook his head as if in a trance, ‘No, thank you; just ask Rose if she would tell Pantin and the others about this. I suppose the funeral will have to take place soon,’ he murmured, rubbing his bristly cheek with nicotine-stained fingers. He seemed at a loss, unable to move from the scene of this deplorable tragedy.
‘If you are sure . . .’ Ari’s voice trailed away. He wanted to get as far away from the clinic as possible. He could not really help, he rationalised, as he hardly knew either of the brothers but if Eduard had been killed, it was because of what he knew about Dubois, of that Ari was now certain. And that made him want to run. If they knew about Eduard they would know about him and he could be next on their list. He realised in a flash that the nurse could well be part of a wider net. It would have been simple for that nurse ‘This one,’ as Eduard had called her, to have listened at the curtain and have heard Eduard talking about Dubois. In fact, the sick man had been shouting before the nurse had interrupted him on the previous visit. Ari bade Raoul a hasty goodbye and he ran all the way to the bus that would take him to Porte de la Villette and the metro.
On the walk home from the metro at St Germaine de Pré he looked around. Looking, but not seeing that the sun was still shining, yellow butterflies were scribbling a frenetic pattern over the colourful flowerbeds, people were strolling around about their business, laughing and eating and feeding pigeons. But Ari felt as though he was an alien stumbling through a grey and featureless waste land.
The first thing he did when he arrived wearily at his flat was to call Lefevre. ‘I think we had better meet tonight. I have something to tell you . . . yes, same place . . . eight o’clock? Fine.’ He replaced the receiver as if in a stupor and went
and lay on his bed until it was time to go.
He was in a very sombre mood by the time the newspaper man arrived at the brasserie on the Isle St Louis. The place was quite full, but they were able to find a table in a secluded corner. It was all Lefevre could do to get him to recount the events of the morning. He scrawled shorthand notes as Ari spoke rapidly in a monotone.
‘But this is bad news,’ the newsman said, when Ari paused to take a shuddering breath. ‘If, as you say, he was silenced because of his knowing about Dubois’ past we must be very careful, Mayer. Have you got anything else for me? Anything else I can follow up?’ Ari shook his head. Lefevre stood up and went over to the bar and ordered some more coffee. As he sat down again Ari said,
‘While I was in Venice with Bragadin, I made contact with a French lawyer called Michel Gaillard. Have you heard of him? He is going to help me.’
‘Gaillard? Yes I know the man,’ he said in an offhand way, ‘If I were you, I would be wary of him, my friend. Be very wary of him.’ Lefevre’s eyes then met Ari’s in an open gaze for a long moment, but then slid away as he fiddled with a packet of cigarettes.
‘But, why . . . he . . .’ Ari stopped; he trusted Gaillard implicitly and Ari knew that Michel Gaillard had as much reason to see Dubois in jail as he had himself. Why did Lefevre not trust Gaillard? Perhaps he had a sinister reason for not trusting the lawyer. Maybe Lefevre had been in some legal difficulty at some time, or had been on the wrong side of the law . . . ? Ari sensed a prickle in the backs of his hands, as sudden alarm clutched at him. He blinked. Until now, the man before him had given him no reason for unease. He had been helpful and friendly, but did he have an agenda of his own after all?
‘OK. I will be careful,’ was all he said as he finished his coffee and gathered up his things. ‘I have to go. I’ll be in touch if I have anything else,’ he shook hands with the man opposite, who suddenly seemed a stranger, ‘Au revoir.’
