Passing her the clean handkerchief he always kept for such occasions and others, St-Cyr gave her a moment. He took out his pipe and tobacco pouch and began that pleasant task of preparing to settle down.
A spare few, careless crumbs of tobacco fell on her bare feet, a waste, a sacrifice he would normally never have made had he not wished to unsettle her—yes, yes. And she felt them as if they were grains of silicon carbide or the hot turnings of metal from a lathe in one of the factories, even to catching in her imagination the pungent odour of burnt cutting oil. ‘Inspector … Antoine just doesn’t understand children. He’s far too busy now, since the death of his brother. He’s been dragged in from semi-retirement and forced, yes forced, to work for a living. Children have their little games, isn’t that so? It was just a game, wasn’t it? But … but,’ she blurted in tears again, ‘it wasn’t a game! It wasn’t!’
Her feet began to leave his lap. He clamped a hand down on them and said, ‘No, we will stay. A child has been murdered, madame. Murdered.’ He softened his voice. ‘Now, please, what game?’
‘She … she had been following the killings. She was convinced the … the Sandman would strike again and … ah, may God forgive me, and in the Bois, in or near the Jardin d’Acclimatation.’
He gave her another moment and at last, when he made no comment, she said, ‘Antoine, he … he dominates everything. He issues directives as the Occupier does ordinances. He believes I talk nonsense when really I spoke the truth and warned him the child was on to something.’
Snow was brushed from the detective’s sleeve. A match was struck and then another and another. At last his pipe was lit and savoured in that first moment, and she knew then that he was delighting in the pause, that he was relishing the time to reflect on what she had said.
‘They … they went to Mass, Inspector. Liline and Nénette. Liline, she was like Antoine in that she didn’t believe the child either but would humour her all the same. They … I know they visited the belfries of the Notre-Dame. Nénette, she confided this desire to me the other day. She … she has said she had to see where one of the schoolgirls had been murdered.’
Again he waited. Again she saw his priestlike silhouette against the ghostly light of darkness and snow, the sharp angularity and curvature of box and yew. ‘Nénette was a pack rat, Inspector. A magpie. She was always picking things up—a button in the gutter or on the méto, a tooth-brush or pocket comb she would then sell on the black market, a pin, a badge, a medal, a toy … She had found something she said and was convinced the police, they were not looking hard enough.’
They always got it in the neck, the cops. The poor, the wealthy … all held the same antipathy, even children. But was it the fob of an ear-ring she had found? Had it belonged to the Notre-Dame victim, and had Madame Vernet yet to realize exactly where the rubbish in his pockets had come from?
She must have realized it by now, for both hands were deep in those pockets. ‘Had she any other friends?’ he asked cautiously.
‘Friends?’ she shrilled. ‘Only Andrée from school. Inseparable, those two, and both picking their noses at the same time at the dinner table! I caught them. The … the poor child’s mother is a disaster. Very wealthy, very pampered. The parents left her at the convent school for the holiday but … but at last reluctantly requested to see her. She took the train to Chamonix three days ago. Antoine had to help the child obtain a laissez-passer. Nénette was devastated when she discovered what he’d done, and cried for hours. “Right when we were so close to trapping the Sandman!” she said. She hated Antoine for doing it. Hated him who has done so much for her.’
The detective made no comment. He simply drew on that pipe of his, and when the bowl touched her left foot, she felt the warmth of it seep slowly into her.
‘The laissez-passer, madame?’ he asked quietly, and she knew then that she had best be careful with him, that too much said in a moment of grief could so easily be misunderstood.
‘Antoine meets regularly with the Kommandant von Gross-Paris, who is a frequent dinner guest. A call to General von Schaumburg was all that it took. Andrée got her pass and … and went off to see her parents.’
‘So it was only Mademoiselle Chambert who accompanied your niece to the Notre-Dame?’
‘Yes. Yes, of course. Why do you ask?’
Had there been alarm in her voice? he wondered. ‘Ah, no reason but clarity, madame. Things are always hazy. One always has to brush the snow or the cobwebs away. I take it they went on from there to the Jardin d’Acclimatation?’
‘Yes, to tea in the children’s restaurant. Tea!’
He waited. She said, ‘Forgive me. Nénette had forced herself into liking tea because it … it reminded her of her mother, not that the tea they serve in such places in any way resembles the real thing!’
The tears were interrupted. Having finished its nocturnal wanderings, the poodle, on seeing them, rejoiced. It tore across the fish-pond, slipped, went down hard, crashed into the edge, yelped, yapped and threw its dark shape at madame, who gathered it in and said ‘Darling!’ only to drop the creature in horror and kick at it. ‘Get away from me, you filthy little beast!’
The dog’s head was quizzically cocked to one side. The ears flopped. Pompon thought it a new game and dashed away, only to race back in and up again.
‘We’d best go in,’ she said, suffering the licking, the cold wet nose. ‘You can see how lonely he is, how he is missing her. He’ll have to be put down now. Maybe we can bury him with her—are such things possible?’
He really didn’t know if under-the-coffin money would help, but reached far back into himself for a suitable answer, and said at last, ‘Perhaps … but then … ah mais alors, alors, with murders, madame, the authorities can be so very difficult.’
One look at Antoine Vernet was enough to tell them they were dealing with fire. Tall and trim, he stood before them in the entrance hall with arms lightly folded across his chest, and the look he gave was not cold or angry at the flagrant intrusion upon his privacy but merely so calm he could just as well have been cutting throats at a board meeting.
The dark grey suit was immaculate. The black leather shoes, pale blue dress shirt and dark blue silk tie allowed nothing in excess. Even the gold signet ring on the little finger of the left hand and the wrist-watch dovetailed perfectly into the image of wealth and success.
The face was broad, the forehead high, the fine grey-white hair not parted but brushed straight back and perfectly trimmed. The burnish of a slight windburn suggested he had recently been outdoors on holiday—had he been skiing at Chamonix?
A banker, an industrialist—a man not just of money and power but one who, as with every new situation, had already assessed this one and leapt ahead to the successful conclusion he wanted.
The eyes were a North Sea blue, the lips compressed, the expression, though calm, the merest touch quizzical.
‘Gentlemen, I see you have met my wife. Bernadette, ma chére, give the inspector his coat and go upstairs. You will be freezing.’
He was leaning slightly back against a magnificently gilded ebony Boulle commode, and the Savonnerie carpet of the marble staircase swept upwards behind him beneath a gorgeous Flemish tapestry that must date from the twelfth century.
Dutifully she set the dog down and handed the leash to Kohler, who took Louis’s fedora as well, while the Sûreté politely removed the coat from her and shrugged himself back into it.
Her bare toes formed crimson islands in the tiny puddles the dog began voraciously to lick.
‘Bernadette,’ said Vernet, with a nod so slight she bowed her head and whispered, Yes, of course, Antoine. It’s … it’s only that my heart is broken. I … Pompon, don’t do that! Ah, you naughty boy. My legs, my snuffie, my little forest—’
‘My dear, we are waiting.’
‘Madame, a moment,’ cautioned the Sûreté, holding the flat of a restraining hand up at the industrialist. ‘Your face … the scratches.’ Hermann had
reined in the dog.
Hesitantly she touched the scratches. Inflamed, they ran from high on a prominent cheekbone right down the narrow face to the lower left jaw. There were four of them.
‘I … I did it in anguish. I tore my hair, I slapped myself, too.’ She turned her right cheek towards him. ‘As I said, Inspector, I am so distressed. Nénette was … was very dear to me.’
If Vernet thought anything of it, he gave no indication. Was he content to let her hang herself? wondered St-Cyr. Things were certainly not quite right. She was tall, a brunette with a fine, high chin, nice lips, a sharp and very aquiline nose, but eyes … eyes that pleaded for understanding and said, from the depths of their moist brown irises, You warmed my feet. You listened to me. Please remember what I said.
A woman of thirty-five, a man of sixty-four.
A maid came to take the dog away. Vernet didn’t even glance at her but the girl, pale and badly shaken by the death, instinctively felt the master was watching her and avoided looking up.
Bernadette Vernet took the stairs with dignity and only at the curve of the staircase let the peignoir fall to the carpet to expose bare arms and squared, fine shoulders, the nightdress of silk.
Hermann was impressed and St-Cyr could hear him giving her credit for a perfect exit. A handsome woman and proud of it, but not entirely a happy wife. Ah no.
‘Gentlemen, please state your business.’
‘Our business is murder, monsieur,’ said St-Cyr, swiftly turning towards him. ‘Perhaps you would be good enough to accompany me to the morgue. There is some question of identity. A simple glance from yourself should be enough.’
Not a flicker of unease registered. ‘What do you mean, some question …?’
Ah! was he a glacier? ‘Please, that is best settled with the victim before us.’
‘And your partner?’ asked Vernet, still unruffled and giving the tiniest glance at Hermann.
One must be affable. ‘Detective-Inspector Kohler will question the staff, with your permission. Nothing formal. There is the absence of Mademoiselle Chambert, you understand. We are concerned that …’
Still there was no sign of anything, not even the flash of a more quizzical smile as between men who know of such things as Vernet was now about to impart.
‘The girl had taken a lover, Inspector. A fellow student. She often stayed out beyond the curfew, and for her sake as well as ours, I had advised her to remain where she was. It’s normal, I understand, for people to do such things.’
Even the clubs and bars would close and lock their doors, keeping the patrons in until the curfew ended at 5.00 a.m. It was that or have them risk arrest with all its consequences.
‘A lover,’ said Kohler. The cap and wound badges in that kid’s pockets, eh? ‘Can you put a name to him?’
‘Alas, I considered the matter private.’
‘But she was the last to see the child alive, monsieur,’ urged Louis. ‘Surely you must realize how important it is for us to talk to her?’
General von Schaumburg had said nothing of these two detectives, nor had Gestapo Boemelburg. Had their silence been a warning in itself? wondered Vernet, and decided that it must have been. ‘My chauffeur will have the address and perhaps the name. Deloitte occasionally dropped the girl off on the way.’
‘I’ll ask him, then, shall I?’ shot Kohler.
‘Yes, of course, Inspector. Now if you will excuse me a moment, I will get my hat and coat.’
‘Ah, monsieur,’ interjected Louis, ‘could I ask that your driver take us to the morgue? Monsieur Deloitte can then fill me in on the way while Detective-Inspector Kohler talks to the rest of the staff.’
‘Very well, if that is what you wish, but I must caution your assistant to limit his activities to the kitchens.’
‘Sein Assistent …?’ blustered Kohler. ‘Ah Gott im Himmel, mein Herr, Gestapo Mueller ist mein Vetter!’ This was not true, of course.
‘Herr Mueller’s cousin or not,’ said Vernet in unruffled French, ‘you will confine yourself to the kitchens and leave the bedrooms of Mademoiselle Chambert and my niece alone until such time as the Kommandant von Gross-Paris decides a search warrant is necessary.’
Verdammt …!
‘Inspectors, my only wish is for you to find the killer swiftly, but because of my position, I must insist all formalities be observed.’
Left to himself, Kohler pointed a stiffened forefinger at the housekeeper to rivet her into silence, and went up the stairs like a rocket to open the first door on his right and catch a breath. Ah nom de Jésus-Christ, what was this? A flea market? A sorcerer’s enchantment?
Softly he closed the door behind him. The room was spacious but seemingly cluttered. It had been done in white, with white lace throws on the bed, but there was gold, too. Gold in gilt-framed mirrors and mirrored trumeaux that threw the winter’s-night light from the windows back and forth, laying detail upon detail until the whole was repetition of shape and form and it took the breath away.
‘Ah merde,’ he said. ‘This can’t be the child’s room. It must be Liline Chambert’s.’
Not a thing was out of place. All had been set exactly where it should be to ensure the total effect. Tall, branching, Gothic wrought-iron standards held candles on either side of a fireplace whose mantelpiece had been removed, though the curved supports remained and now held matching bronze sculptures with single candles in them. Roosters perhaps—very modern in any case, and with their beaks turned back to peck at their tails and one leg lifted straight overhead like ballet dancers.
Ivory candelabra were draped with beads of clear crystal. A sculptress’s three-legged stand held the curly-bearded, curly-headed grey plaster bust of an ancient seer who impassively looked on so that one saw his head from four or five angles and these views were superimposed on and mingled with those of a Greek torso, beautifully hung, the waist, the hips, the genitals complete, the candles, too, and the white, white of old lace and of chair and bed.
There wasn’t a sound. The staff downstairs would all be listening for him, yet he had not taken another step.
Draped across a beautifully carved walnut blanket box at the foot of the bed, there was a fine white woollen, short-sleeved dress, very Greek-looking, very stylish yet simple. Borders at the neck, hem and sleeves were of bands of grey-blue perhaps—the light wasn’t very good. A mid-calf-length thing, he thought, making no noise at all crossing the floor. It was not the sort of dress to wear in the dead of winter, not when most places these days weren’t heated.
Right below the neckline, caught in the light from the windows, there was a cheap brass curtain ring. Nothing else. Just that.
He paused. He picked the ring up and asked himself, Was she about to go off for a little tryst? Young couples did that sometimes, though there weren’t too many young Frenchmen around these days. They took the curtain rings and wore them, fooling no one, least of all the patron of some hide-away auberge in the countryside.
A photograph showed a haunting image of her in a moment of reflection, holding a teacup in both hands. The dark hair was worn loose, down over the front of the right shoulder of the dress, the wide-brimmed hat made the look in her eyes so very tragic.
A kid of eighteen or so. Nice … really nice-looking. Had she lighted the candles before getting into bed to sit watching their reflections and those of the torso and the head? Did she play games in here, was that it, and was Nénette Vernet now with her? Just what the hell had the three of them been up to, the two girls and this one?
Try as he might, he could not help but feel uneasy.
As the chauffeur drove through the darkness and the softly falling snow, St-Cyr sat in silence. All down the Champs-Élysées, and then along the rue de Rivoli, there didn’t appear to be another soul. The city’s streets revealed only blue-washed pinpricks of light from isolated lamp standards that seemed to cry out, See what you have done to me, messieurs. Ended freedom, instilled deceit and fear, made cheats and liars out of honest citize
ns.
Those who did not have some petty fiddle were desperate. With ten degrees of frost there was no coal except in those places the Germans and their friends occupied. Having even one roomer from among the Occupier guaranteed an element of supply but engendered suspicion, jealousy and hatred from one’s neighbours if they didn’t have the same or better.
In a land of officially-sanctioned favouritism, denunciations were rife. But slowly an opposition was growing from within. Brother now hated brother, children now told tales on their parents, and not to the Occupier, to the Resistance. The bloodbath of retribution was gathering day by day. When it came, it would be terrible.
They had arrived at Place Mazas. ‘The morgue is over there,’ he said gruffly to the chauffeur. ‘Near the river so that the drains can easily take the blood and things.’
‘Inspector, are you attempting to unsettle me further?’ asked Vernet who, having insisted upon it, had ridden alone in the back seat while he, a Chief Inspector of the Sûreté, had been told to sit up front.
‘Monsieur, I am merely commenting on the practicality of our city fathers. The old morgue on the Île de la Cité was also close to the river. Corpses are always hosed down and often opened.’
‘Surely my niece does not require an autopsy and an ice-cold douche?’
Ah, damn you, St-Cyr could hear him saying. ‘That is for the coroner to decide, monsieur. I have asked for Belligueux. He’s very reliable, exceedingly thorough, and always does exactly what he feels is needed, since he cannot possibly be bribed.’
Was it a warning? wondered Vernet and, giving an audible sigh, decided that it was but could not understand the reason for it. Not yet. Ah merde … ‘I really do wish you would try to realize I am entirely on your side.’
A dismissive hand was tossed. ‘Of course you are. You are her uncle, her guardian. You have taken over the business interests and fortune of her father.’
‘My brother, Inspector.’
‘Are you the older or the younger?’
‘Meaning that the oldest nearly always inherits the estate? How cheap and utterly mediocre of you. Henri-Claude was a brilliant designer. Not that it is any of your business, my talents lie in finance and in bringing the interested parties together. It was decided he should inherit and lead the company and I graciously acquiesced to our father’s wishes and agreed to remain its vice-chairman and chief adviser until my brother’s unfortunate and untimely death. He was nearly fifteen years my junior.’
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