by Claude Izner
THE steel structure framed patches of night sky, and hundreds of flickering lights pierced the darkness. In the middle of Les Halles, to the right of Église Saint-Eustache, the flower market was in full swing. Josette Fatou greeted Marinette, a porter with a pockmarked face. Marinette was over sixty but still able to carry her enormous baskets of berries. The daughter of a tightrope walker, she had started out as an acrobat and a bearded lady.
‘Hurry, my little bird of the islands, the flower auction’s starting,’ she called out to Josette. ‘What a face! Is anything the matter?’
‘No, everything’s fine,’ Josette replied, forcing a smile.
‘Hmm, not so sure about that,’ muttered Marinette, as she watched the girl weave her way between a pile of white lilacs and a mound of violets.
‘Sunshine in a bouquet, Mesdames, brought to you direct from the Côte d’Azur!’
One side was known as Nice and the other Paris, the latter stocked by gardeners coming from Ménilmontant, Montreuil, Vaugirard, Vanves and Charonne with their carefully packaged boxes.
Josette relaxed. Her inner turmoil subsided. At least there she was on home ground. Since the previous day, she had had the impression that some hidden force had sapped all her strength. Despite her exhaustion, she could not give up because no work meant no food. Once she had paid the weekly five-franc fee for the pushcart she used to wheel around her perfumed crop, and the four centimes for her street-trader’s licence, there was not much left in her purse. Every day, she looked for the best spot at the best time of day, watching out for and trying to attract customers. Selling at La Madeleine, where customers came to buy the more exotic blooms, was not the same as selling at La Nation, where workers hurrying to the factories had far too many cares to take an interest in such trifles.
The best bargains were to be found in Paris: roses, camellias, gardenias and snowballs sold like hotcakes. The thick southern accent mingled with the coarse language of the working classes from the faubourgs. Amid gesticulations and guttural cries, they haggled over bunches of mimosa or daffodils, jasmine or carnations. Josette Fatou made her purchases as if in a trance. The murder that had taken place before her very eyes three weeks ago had made her feel very isolated from the world, and nothing could erase that scene from her mind.
Grey dawn rose above the still-sleeping city. Gaunt-looking women searched among the slimy remains for rotten vegetables to make into soup. A haulier with a red belt swigged a bottle of wine. Next to a coach entrance, Mother Bidoche stirred her beef and bean stew, and ladled out helpings to fill the hungry bellies gathered around her brazier.
‘Get that down your throats – it’ll warm your insides – I can’t abide seeing famished folk.’
Josette returned to her cart. She stepped over a porter asleep on a sack and began arranging her flowers. The constant bustle and deafening row did not succeed in distracting her from her fears: she felt haunted by the man who had followed her the previous day. Of course, she had not realised at the time that he was watching her – he was just another early-morning passer-by, whose cap pulled down over his face had caught her eye for a split second.
Was he hiding somewhere in this crowd?
She trudged through the streets, shoulders hunched, her back stiff from the bumpy cobblestones, taking care not to let her cart slip or get knocked. She was an anonymous foot soldier among the six-thousand-strong army of street vendors, their customers made up of the privileged few who would think nothing of spending a hundred francs on flowers at the market, and the vast majority for whom five, ten, twenty francs of their daily budget represented an enormous sum.
At Place de la Bastille she overheard a conversation between two tramps.
‘Have you eaten?’
‘Yes, down at the mission, pea soup. Like bullets they were, with respect, fire ’em from a gun and you could kill a man.’
Her throat tightened with fear. A terrible thought had formed in her mind. Monsieur Grandjean’s killer! He’s coming for me. He won’t stop until he gets me!
In Rue du Faubourg-Saint-Antoine, a boy sobbing inconsolably over a broken bottle brought back visions of her own childhood. All she could remember was her mother and all the men hovering around her. They never stayed in the house for very long, but she was made to wait outside until they left, crouched in the stairwell, surrounded by silence, her eyes shut tight to ward off her fears. The local children shouted cruel names at her and the gossips called her piccaninny, and she resented her mother deeply for that. She quickened her pace, trying desperately to drive out these painful thoughts…Her mother, on her sickbed, her strength gone, abandoned by everyone, had revealed to her the truth about the gruelling work on the sugar plantations in Guadeloupe, the boat trip over to France, her employer coming to her room every night, her subsequent pregnancy and dismissal. She had had to survive on the pittance he had given her, as one would toss scraps to a dog. Josette had been born and her dream of returning to the sun-kissed isle had dissolved in the desolate squalor.
Josette shook her head. Who did she hate most of all, her mother or the father she’d never known? Her dark skin or men? Men, without a doubt.
Friday 14 July
Victor and Tasha were taking a stroll beside the river Seine. To the west, the sky was tinged with purple. A soft breeze had finally brought some respite from the heat. They watched the water lapping at the riverbank as a barge sailed by. Victor appeared to remember something.
‘Heavens, I almost forgot!’
He handed Tasha a little package. She tore off the wrapping paper. Inside was a small sketchbook with a worn cover, and a small box, which she opened. She looked up at him in amazement.
‘It’s wonderful, darling! Thank you!’
She was admiring a gold ring with a blue stone setting.
‘It’s an aquamarine. Do you like it?’
He watched her intently, his hands clasped behind his back. He looked like a little boy trying to sit up straight at the dinner table.
‘I love it! What’s the occasion?’
‘Well, I know we met on 22 June, but I wanted to celebrate our anniversary a little later this year. When I first saw you four years ago in the Anglo-American bar at the Eiffel Tower, you had your hair in a bun under your hat decorated with daisies and you were sitting between Isidore Gouvier and Fifi Bas-Rhin, and…I fell head over heels in love with you.’
‘That was when she was still Eudoxie Allard, before the demon cancan possessed her. And Antoine Clusel was there too, remember.’
‘I only had eyes for you.’
‘You bought me a vanilla ice cream and invented some excuse to accompany me back to Rue Notre-Dame-de-Lorette in a cab.’
‘You got out and left me in the middle of a traffic jam.’
‘You followed me.’
‘You knew I would!’
‘I dearly hoped you would.’
‘I thought: she is meant for me – she is so different from the women I know.’
‘What makes me so different?’
‘It’s hard to explain…You’re self-contained, often inaccessible, wrapped up in your own world – from which I feel excluded at times…’
There was a catch in his voice.
‘I’ve never felt this way about anybody else. You’re so unpredictable, I feel as though I’m on a tightrope when I’m with you, and yet I suppose that is what satisfies my need for change. If I asked you what makes me different from other men, would you be able to tell me?’
‘Yes,’ she replied, ‘I think so.’
They continued walking in the direction of Pont de Solférino.
‘So, you had my old sketchbook all along! I’ve been looking for that everywhere.’
‘It’s a precious object. I’m returning it to you to commemorate the beginning of our life together.’
She turned the pages and examined a sketch of a woman sprawled over a bench.
‘Eugénie Patinot,’ she breathed, ‘your first case. Victor, promise
me you’ll never…’
‘You must have liked me, too. Look, you sketched my face. Tasha…’
She could tell that he was dying to ask her to marry him. She headed him off.
‘I’m already yours!’
‘I know. Don’t worry I’m not planning to pop the question.’
‘Are you upset?’
‘No, but I won’t give up. If necessary, I’ll even swear before a notary never to try to stop you pursuing your career.’
‘Now you know what it is I love about you, darling. I’ve found in you a soulmate who communicates his energy, warmth and enthusiasm to me. You ask so much of life. It stimulates me.’
They sealed their silent agreement with a passionate embrace: there would be no more criminal investigations and no more talk of marriage.
‘I’ll take you out to dinner. Let’s go to the Eiffel Tower,’ he suggested.
‘But, Victor, you know you can’t stand going up there.’
‘In that case let’s go to La Concorde. The Venetian festival will be starting soon…’
‘Or we could just stay here. Look! What’s going on over there?’
A row of people were leaning over the guardrail of the bridge watching a dog groomer at work on Quai des Tuileries below, next to a cockleshell boat with a tiny cabin. An assistant held the customer, a black poodle, across his knees while the dog groomer began clipping off the black fur, leaving four pompoms on its legs, a girdle round its chest, breeches on its haunches. Once the effect of a pantomime lion had been achieved, the assistant loosened the piece of cord around the animal’s muzzle. The last customer of the day, looking sheepish, shook itself before being led away by a servant. The crowd of amused onlookers dispersed
‘To think there’s some folk that can waste ten francs on a stupid mutt while others have nothing to eat!’ hissed a toothless hag.
In response to this remark, the dog shearer’s assistant lit a spirit stove and began frying a panful of sausages. The delicious smell reached Tasha’s nostrils.
‘Do you think they’d sell us some?’
‘But that’s their supper…’
‘They’ve got more than enough for four! Go and ask!’
Victor hesitated then gave in. The fellow doing the frying listened to his request, reflected for a moment then called out, ‘Jean-Marie! There’s a pair of hungry punters here with an eye on our dinner!’
The dog groomer emerged from his boat and after a brief exchange with Victor agreed to let them have two sausages, half a baguette and a jug of wine. He also lent them a couple of glasses.
Tasha declared that she far preferred their impromptu picnic to a table on the first floor of the Eiffel Tower. As they stood eating near the river Seine, they heard a murmur like a tidal bore and a wave of revellers invaded Quai des Tuileries. Jean-Marie showered the revellers with insults as they began tossing bangers at the sides of his boat. Victor became alarmed. The firecrackers going off all around reawakened his fears of an anarchist outrage. And where was Tasha? He suddenly couldn’t see her! For a moment he thought she’d been swept away by the revellers. He stood on tiptoe and peered over the bobbing heads. He was already panicking when he felt himself being carried away. Just when he’d decided to give up trying to plug his ears and hold on to his wine glass at the same time, Tasha popped up and proposed a toast.
‘Here’s to us!’
The revellers finally moved on, leaving the way clear back up the bank. They returned the jug and glasses to their owner. Tasha began pushing a small cardboard tube around with her foot.
‘Are you playing hopscotch?’ Victor said.
She picked up the tube and began drawing a book with two arched eyebrows and a bushy moustache, and a paintbrush in a skirt and boots.
V and T, till death us do part, she wrote.
‘Is that supposed to be me? Those whiskers are worthy of a Gaul!’
‘It’s a caricature meant to show how unbearable I find that unspoken law which forces men to hide their upper lip.’
‘It’s supposed to affirm male virility in the face of female virtue.’
‘Is it really!…Shall we go?’
‘Don’t you want to see the fireworks?’
‘I’d rather you gave me a mouth-watering dessert at home. Come on.’
Night eclipsed the sun, which had easily pushed temperatures above thirty degrees in the shade. The smells emanating from the jubilant crowd combined with the aroma of fried food and the fragrant smell of peppermint rock. In the streets decked with tricoloured paper lanterns, shopkeepers, clerks and workers twirled to the rhythms of the accordion and the brass bands; couples danced with gay abandon. Chez Kiki was teeming. Madame Mathias looked on dotingly at the man helping Fernand.
Frédéric Daglan leant over the counter.
‘Three beers and two white wines!’ he cried, winking at the landlady.
Racing over to the smaller of the two rooms, tray aloft, he bumped into a dark-skinned girl. He moved out of her way then turned to look at her.
Josette Fatou stood motionless. Was he the man who had been following her for the past two days? Beads of sweat stood out on her upper lip in the heat. She felt that dreadful sense of danger again. What did he want from her? Who was he? She’d never seen him at Kiki’s before. What should she do? Suddenly overcome by a fit of trembling and giddiness, she made her way over to the bar.
‘What is it, Josette dear? Are you unwell?’
‘No, no, it’s just the noise, the crowds…’
‘Good for business, isn’t it? Here, have some lemonade – it’ll perk you up.’
‘Have you hired a new waiter?’
Had she sounded too urgent? Seemed overly surprised?
‘I should be so lucky,’ replied Madame Mathias, chuckling. ‘He’s a good friend of mine. Go and sit outside; it’s cooler under the trees.’
Saturday morning, 15 July
A cart carrying stone blocks to repair a building had blocked narrow Rue Visconti. Joseph went out to complain to the two stonemasons who were unloading the cart outside number 24, former abode of Jean Racine and Mademoiselle Clairon.
‘How long do we have to put up with this din?’
The builders, who were Italians, carried on working and singing a Neapolitan song at the tops of their voices.
‘Don’t waste your breath – they can’t understand a word you say,’ advised Père Huchet, the owner of a stall selling sparkling wine at ten centimes a glass.
Fuming, Joseph went back indoors and grabbed some bread from the kitchen to plug his ears with the soft part before returning to his study. He thanked his mother for having bought the fresh loaf before going to prepare lunch at Rue des Saints-Pères, where he didn’t have to begin work until midday. Chewing on the end of his fountain pen, the only gift from Iris to which he was still attached, he cursed the bad luck dogging his literary creation, and tried to gather his thoughts.
‘“Frida von Glockenspiel heard a creak and swung round brandishing a rolling pin like a club. Footsteps echoed at the back of the keep. Éleuthère bared his teeth. Who was approaching?…” That is the question,’ he murmured with a sigh.
He pushed away the notebook entitled Thules’s Golden Chalice and opened his scrapbook of news items, which he relied on for inspiration. The last two cuttings he’d added had come unstuck. He smoothed them out with his forefinger.
‘“There are still no clues in the case of the murder victim, Léopold Grandjean, stabbed on 21 June…‘Like amber, musk, benzoin and incense, May has made of ours a solitary pursuit,’”’ Joseph read out under his breath. ‘“‘Can an Ethiopian change the colour of his skin any more than a leopard his spots?’”’
He went on to read the death notice.
‘“Cousin Léopardus invites friends and customers of Monsieur Pierre Andrésy, bookbinder of Rue Monsieur-le-Prince, Paris, to attend his funeral at La Chapelle cemetery on 25 May. ‘For the blossom in May beckons us from the fields.’”’
He repeated, puzzled, ‘The blossom in May…Cousin Léopardus…Can an Ethiopian change his skin any more than a leopard his spots? Why the insistence on animals in these two seemingly unrelated texts? And May is also mentioned twice. A leopard in May. Something to do with the zodiac? May…that’s Taurus the bull and Gemini and the twins. A March hare or an April fool? I’ve no idea what this means, but I’m going to find out.’
Number 26 was an overly ornate building made of old grey stone on the corner of Rue Drouot and Rue de Provence in the heart of the boulevard district. In a niche above the entrance, a bronze statuette of Figaro from The Barber of Seville was exposed to the improprieties of the pigeons. Joseph nodded at him, and, to make himself feel braver, boosted his courage by recalling that he was a detective di qualita. He walked through the newsroom of the illustrious newspaper to where a dejected-looking secretary sat. Despite his slight hunch, Joseph was an attractive young man and brought out a protective instinct in the opposite sex. He put on his most forlorn look – tousled hair, doleful eyes – and sighed loudly.
‘Mademoiselle, you’ve no idea how wretched I feel…Outside people laugh and sing while I…While I’m mourning the passing of my beloved uncle, who was like a father to me. This I might be able to bear, but to think that some crank could find no better way of amusing himself than by giving you false information…!’
He whipped out the notice. The young girl, looking up, hurriedly straightened the satin-brimmed hat that covered her curls.
‘I just write out the text, count the words and direct the customers to the cashier. Once they’ve paid their one franc fifty centimes per line containing thirty-four words and shown me their receipt, I send their message on to the printer. I’m not expected to do any more than that, Monsieur.’
But if you’re nice to me there’s no knowing what I might do for you, her expression suggested.
‘Even so, Mademoiselle, giving notice of a funeral on 25 May for a fellow who breathed his last gasp on 5 July is no small blunder.’
‘Oh, I’ve seen worse. How about: “Generous reward for the finder of Trompette, a Brahmapoutra chicken recently gone missing in the vicinity of Sainte-Geneviève mountain.” In comparison to yours…’
