by Pryor, Mark
The bathroom was next, surprisingly large given the size of the rest of the apartment. A walk-in shower lay to his left, a concrete trough sink to his right. Ahead was a washer–dryer, tucked under shelves that held towels and wash cloths.
Hugo did the usual check, noting one toothbrush, one hairbrush, and no obvious missing, or masculine, cosmetics. Hugo rifled through the linens and grunted with satisfaction when his hand bumped into something solid.
“What is it?” Tom asked.
Hugo pulled out a dark wooden jewelry box that had been hidden between layers of sheets and blankets. “I guess she doesn’t have a safe here.” He opened the lid and Tom peered over his shoulder. “Earrings, couple of antique looking rings, bracelets . . . Nice stuff, but I don’t think these are from the murder scene. I’ll have Lerens check to be sure, though.”
“That they’re not from the crime scene, that means something to you?” Tom asked.
“You know it does,” Hugo said.
“But you won’t tell me until you’re sure.”
“Right. On to the main living area?”
“Asshole.” Tom let Hugo lead them out of the bathroom and the two steps into the narrow living area. “Just so you know, it means something to me, too. Huge clue. Massive. But I’m not telling you.”
“Of course not.” Hugo looked into the room, getting a feel for the place before invading it fully. The kitchen sat to his left, a few cupboards over a small stove, microwave oven, and minimal counter space that contained a small and an almost-empty refrigerator.
A breakfast bar marked the beginning of the living room, which wasn’t much more than a narrow strip of hardwood floor with enough space for a sofa and armchair on one side, a low table with a television on the other, and a thin coffee table in between. Hugo imagined many clipped shins as Natalia and guests navigated their way around. The best feature, and one worth dodging furniture to get to, was an iron balcony overlooking the street, a delicate table and two chairs making a picture postcard impression.
Their search was quick but thorough. Hugo knew he wasn’t supposed to be disturbing anything and after a few minutes it was clear he didn’t need to. The place was small and tidy enough that stolen property, or anything else worth noting, would have stood out almost immediately. As it was, Hugo headed back to the front door with a fairly complete impression of Natalia’s apartment; it was a typically compact but functional city flat, a home kept neat and tidy by someone who didn’t spend a whole lot of time there.
The only oddity was the shoes but as Hugo had discovered over the years, an obsession for buying shoes was about as mild a foible as you’d discover when poking around a stranger’s house.
Out in the hallway, two more policemen had joined Lerens. One held a camera and a clipboard, no doubt to log the whereabouts of items they found and draw an overall floor plan.
“Check the towels in the bathroom, there’s a jewelry box in there,” Hugo told Lerens.
“Oh?” Hope rose in her eyes.
“No, I don’t think so. Make sure, of course, but I don’t think any of it comes from our murder scene.”
“Could still be stolen,” Lerens said.
“True.” He turned to Alexandra. “And now, if it’s OK, you and I can go down to the lobby and have a chat while these people do their job.”
“Bien.” Alexandra turned to Lerens. “Please, be respectful of her things. She was my friend as well as my employee.”
“We will,” Lerens assured her. “I promise.”
“Merci bien.” Alexandra turned to Hugo. “Yes, we should talk. There are some things you need to know about Natalia. Some things she would have preferred to keep secret.”
Hugo pulled together three armchairs, and as they sat he pulled a notebook from his jacket.
“Do you mind if I take notes?” he asked. “My memory isn’t what it used to be.”
“Please, whatever you need.”
“Thank you. Now, you said something upstairs about Natalia having a secret.”
“Yes. Actually, she had two secrets. Poor girl, she tried to . . .” Alexandra bit her lip, fighting back tears for a moment before she could steady herself. “She had two compulsions. One was for shopping, for buying shoes.”
“We saw those, in her closet.”
“The second compulsion was a little worse, I’m afraid,” Alexandra said. “She would steal. Not a lot, but . . . well, most people don’t steal at all.”
“Did she steal from you?”
“Yes. Small things, mostly, little pieces of jewelry, cash. And I saw her once stealing from a store. It was a watch, not even fifty Euros, and I made her put it back. She was embarrassed about it, ashamed, and I even offered to pay for her to get help. She refused, of course, said she didn’t do it all the time, just sometimes had an urge that she couldn’t control.”
“Did she steal shoes from you? There were two different sizes in the closet.”
“Yes, I’m missing at least three pairs. We have a lot of people coming through the chateau so it was hard for me to accuse her. Plus,” she shrugged, a wistful look on her face, “I really didn’t care about shoes as much as she did. If taking from me stopped her stealing from stores, where she’d go to jail, then after my initial annoyance I didn’t mind so much.”
“How long had she worked for you?” Hugo asked.
“Two years, maybe a little longer. It took a year for me to realize she had a problem. She hid it well.”
“Madam Tourville—”
“Alexandra, please.”
“Of course. Alexandra, did you know that Natalia was in possession of a necklace that was stolen during a robbery near Troyes? A woman was killed during that robbery.”
“Mais non.” Alexandra put a hand over her mouth in surprise, then shook her head. “She stole small things, from me and from stores. She wouldn’t do something like that. Would she?” There was, Hugo thought, uncertainty in her voice.
“Did she have many friends here in Paris?”
“No, not really. I mean, not that I know of. Most of the time she was with me and so, out of necessity, my friends became hers. I suppose a few times a month she might come here for a night or two. I don’t know what she did when she was in Paris by herself, if she knew anyone, but she didn’t tell me about it.”
“Did she have a boyfriend?”
“I think she had someone back home in Saint Petersburg, at least that’s what she told me. Honestly, neither men nor women seemed to interest her, I never saw anyone catch her eye.”
“And no one pursued her?”
She laughed gently. “Only Felix.”
“Felix Vibert?”
“Yes. People think he’s gay, but he’s not. Bisexual possibly, but he definitely likes women. He has a weakness for them the way Natalia had a weakness for shoes.”
“I hope he doesn’t keep them stacked in his closet,” Tom said. Hugo smiled, but Alexandra didn’t seem to hear it.
“He was interested in Natalia?” Hugo pressed.
“At first, very. He fawned over her like you wouldn’t believe. It was embarrassing. I told him to back off, even my brother did after a while.”
“And did he?”
“Yes. I think he realized she wasn’t interested and, in fact, they became good friends. I felt like she confided in him, but I couldn’t really give specifics.”
Hugo shifted gears a little. “You were talking about your money situation earlier. Do you live off the income from these apartments?”
She stiffened, just a fraction. “I don’t know why I mentioned that, and I don’t really see how it’s relevant.”
“I promise I’m not being nosy,” Hugo said. “And most of the time I have no idea what’s relevant until it hits me in the face.” He gestured to his notebook. “I’m not recording this and I won’t even write the information down, so if it turns out to be irrelevant I’ll keep it to myself. I promise.”
That was one of Hugo’s strengths, getting people
to reveal personal information they’d rather keep hidden. Not through tricks or mind games, but because they felt they could trust him with it.
“D’accord. I have the income from the apartments, yes, and what I make myself.”
“From teaching.”
“That’s right.”
“Anything else?”
She bristled. “Non. And I still don’t see . . .”
Hugo waved a hand dismissively. “I don’t either. We can leave it alone.” He picked up the pen and tapped his notebook, then looked up at her. “Oh, last question on that topic. Sorry, I forgot, but you had mentioned working in the genealogy field?”
“A little. Some private clients, but it doesn’t pay much.”
“I see.” Hugo fished his phone from his pocket as it buzzed. “Excuse me, it’s Lieutenant Lerens upstairs.” He moved away from the chairs and answered. “This is Hugo.”
“You’re still with Madam Tourville?”
“Yes. What’s up?”
“A thought. Would you please ask her if she’d provide her prints? For elimination purposes, of course.”
“Of course. The same thought had already occurred to me.”
He rang off and ignored Tom’s questioning look. “Before I forget, Alexandra, would you mind letting us take a sample of your fingerprints. It’ll make life so much easier when we can eliminate you entirely.”
She cocked her head. “You mean I’m a suspect of some kind?”
“No, no, I’m just saying—”
“I know exactly what you’re saying. You don’t ask him—” she jerked a thumb at Tom, “—for his prints. Why? Because he’s not a suspect. Do you have any evidence linking me to any crime?”
“No, we don’t, and if we can compare your prints to one found at—”
“Absolutely not. I will not be treated like a criminal. I talked to my brother about this and we agreed that for you to be hounding us and our friends is insulting. It’s not even like fingerprinting is an exact science.”
“Well, I don’t want to argue the science, Alexandra, but it’s been pretty exact since the early 1900s.”
“Not at all. My brother told me about a study. He said they tested 150 fingerprint examiners in the mid-1990s, a test conducted with the approval of whatever governing body is over fingerprinting. My brother said that one in five examiners made at least one false positive identification.” She held his eye, a challenge. “One in five linked a fake crime-scene print to the wrong person. I don’t call that science, and I don’t like those odds.”
“I don’t know anything about that,” Hugo said, “but I can assure you the way we do it—”
“That’s not even the point, for me. These things, science and studies, they matter more to my brother than to me,” Alexandra insisted. “Look, I’m aware you’re not from here, Monsieur Marston, but in France, in the circles we move, appearances matter. I’ve had one very heavy and unpleasant crash from grace, so to speak, and I don’t plan on letting you orchestrate another.”
“But this might eliminate you from the investigation completely.”
She leaned forward, her voice low but intense. “I shouldn’t be a part of your investigation. I’ve done nothing wrong, nothing at all. And you say ‘might.’ You still suspect Natalia of being involved in a crime, and do you have her print from the crime scene?”
“I can’t tell you what we have and don’t have.”
“C’est des conneries!” Bullshit! “If you did, you wouldn’t be asking for mine. Her print isn’t there, I can tell from your reaction, yet you’re still investigating her as a criminal. And, my God, she’s dead! Do you really expect me to believe that this would eliminate me?”
Hugo sat back, suddenly exhausted. She was right, of course. If comparison showed the print from the crime scenes to be someone other than Alexandra’s, she might move to the back of the line, but she’d still be in it.
“We’re doing the best we can, Alexandra. We’re not trying to cause trouble for you or your brother, we’re just trying to find out why Natalia died.”
“Suicide. She was stealing and either couldn’t live with herself, or maybe . . .”
“Or maybe she stole from the wrong person,” Hugo said. “Which is what we want to know. Like I said, we’re not trying to drag anyone’s name through the mud, not hers, and certainly not yours.”
“I know you don’t intend to do that.” Alexandra shook her head sadly. “But you still don’t understand. My name, my reputation, they are so fragile. And maybe it’s my fault that they are, but I have to protect them. To protect myself even if it means being unhelpful to you.”
“No one even has to know,” Hugo insisted.
“People always know. And if someone asks, am I to lie?” She shook her head, adamant. “No, I’m very sorry. If the people around me knew you’d taken my prints in connection with a murder, merde, two murders, then it’d be all over. I’ve worked so hard to restore my place in the world, to improve my life, I have no reason to risk it all, especially when I know what the result would be. No reason in the world, and I won’t do it.” She reached down and picked up her handbag, clutching it to her chest as she rose awkwardly to her feet from the low chair. “If you have any other questions, contact my brother and he will refer you to our family attorney. I hope what I’ve told you this morning is helpful, but I won’t become the subject of any witch hunt.” Her voice became almost a whisper. “I’m sorry, but I can’t afford any more disgrace.”
They watched her walk out of the building, waiting by the clear glass door until the officer stationed there opened it for her. Once she was outside, Hugo called Lieutenant Lerens.
“Was she cooperative?” Lerens asked.
“Yes and no. Mostly no. But do me a favor and have a fingerprint guy come to the lobby.”
“She agreed to give prints at least?”
“No, she declined and left the building. But she spent the last fifteen minutes sitting in a plastic chair, and while I’m no furniture expert I’m pretty sure it’s the kind of plastic chair that would hold fingerprints quite nicely.”
“Ah, you are a genius, Hugo. I knew I hired you for a reason. And I have a little discovery of my own to share with you.”
Hugo pressed a button on his phone so Tom could hear. “You’re on speaker. You were saying, a discovery . . .”
“Oui. There’s a little crawl space you can access through a panel in the bathroom, leads to some electric stuff. Some sort of maintenance thing.”
“Something was up there?”
“You want to play a guessing game, Hugo?”
He thought for a moment, then it hit him: something too big to hide in the apartment itself, but small enough to fit in a crawl space.
“The chest!” Hugo said, springing out of his chair. “Tell me you found the sailor’s chest.”
Lieutenant Lerens chuckled down the phone at them. “Why don’t you come up and have a look for yourselves?”
Camille Lerens and two colleagues, a uniformed officer and an elderly forensic technician, had moved out of Natalia Khlapina’s apartment and commandeered a common seating area that held a sofa, two chairs, and large square coffee table. The chest sat on a plastic sheet on the table. Hugo and Tom nodded at Lerens and stood with her, impatient but quiet as the forensic tech dusted it for prints.
“He’s almost done,” Lerens said. The old man glanced up, frowned, then turned back to his work, lips pursed as he finished up.
“Anything in it?” Hugo asked.
“Non. Monsieur Delacroix here searched it, found all the little compartments, but they were empty.” Something in her voice told Hugo there was tension between the two.
Delacroix snapped off his latex gloves and shook his head at the lieutenant. “Rien.”
“Nothing?” she repeated. “How is that possible?”
The old man straightened, his hands on his hips. “I trust you are not questioning my work,” he paused before emphasizing the last word, �
��Madam?”
Hugo felt his color rise and he shifted, ready to snap the tech down a peg or two. But Lerens had it covered.
“It was a question, not a criticism,” she said mildly. “I apologize if I hurt your feelings, I didn’t know you were so sensitive.”
The technician clenched his jaw, his eyes flicking over Hugo and Tom looking for support, but Hugo knew he saw something very different. The old man muttered something to himself and turned to the chest, starting to swathe it in the plastic sheeting.
“Hold on,” Hugo said. He turned to Lerens. “I’d like to look inside. Make sure it’s empty.”
“Absolutely not.” Delacroix glared at Hugo. “I am responsible for this and I will not allow some foreigner to paw through a piece of evidence that I have already examined thoroughly.” He turned to Lerens. “Unless the lieutenant specifically orders me to do so, in which case I will request another technician be brought in to supervise this . . . superfluous search.”
“Non, non.” Lerens waved her hand. “You looked inside, it’s empty. You’re finished here, Monsieur Delacroix, thank you.” She gave Hugo a sly wink and mouthed, later.
Hugo took out his phone. “I’ll just take a few pictures, then.”
He walked around the chest, taking photos from every angle. Then he used his sleeve to open the lid, making Delacroix quiver with anxiety. Hugo snapped shots of the inside of the lid and then the interior. He stooped low over the catch. “You saw this, right?”
“What?” Delacroix said impatiently.
“The catch here, like a button. Disguised as a knot of wood. I’m sure you did, I just wanted to . . .”
“Knot of wood? What are you talking about?”
Hugo picked up a discarded latex glove and used it to push the release. Lerens moved closer, too, as Hugo grunted with satisfaction and Delacroix breathed in sharply.
