Death in Bordeaux

by Allan Massie

  ‘What now? We know where he is at least.’

  ‘Yes, but . . . this way.’

  He turned and slipped into a narrow street, no more than a lane, which ran behind the houses. He opened a garden gate and descended a flight of six or seven steps which took them to a basement door. It wasn’t locked and they went in. Maurice opened the door which led off the stone-flagged passage and they were in a kitchen. An old woman stood bent over the range on which a pot simmered.

  ‘Marthe.’

  ‘What in the name of the saints are you doing here, child? This is no place for you. I’ve told you that, and still less now.’

  All the same she allowed Maurice to give her a hug before she pushed him away.

  ‘What’s happening?’ he said.

  ‘What should be happening? We’ve got German officers lodged here, that’s what, and your uncle’s still at the brandy.’

  ‘Who was that tall man with a moustache who’s just entered by the street door?’

  ‘And what’s that to you, little one?’

  ‘Marthe, I’m not a child. I have to know.’

  ‘Have to know, you say? And I say there are things better not known. In any case I don’t know who you’re talking about. People come and go here, and nowadays it’s none of my business. That’s been made clear to me and I’m glad of it. I cook and clean and ask no questions. Now, be off with you, child.’

  Maurice hesitated as if he was about to obey this old woman whose authority seemed to Alain so strangely compelling. But, instead, he repeated, ‘I have to know, Marthe. It’s important, it really is.’

  ‘Important, is it? Well, I’m no judge of that. I don’t set myself up to decide such matters. We’ve four German officers landed on us, which has at least meant that the rest of the furniture hasn’t had to be sold, and that’s all I know. I don’t ask questions about them, none of my business. Then there’s your uncle and your aunt, Amélie-Marie, who’s having the time of her life, the old bitch. And that’s enough, more than. Your other aunts have retired to a convent, I’m glad to say. There’s nothing for them here anymore than there is for you, my lad. As for “having to know”, take it from old Marthe who nursed you when you were a little boy, the less you know about anything here, the better. So, you and your friend, whoever he is, be off with you, and let me get on with my work.’

  ‘Marthe absolutely refused to tell me anything more,’ Maurice said, ‘She just clammed up like an oyster. All the same, sir, I’m absolutely certain that he was one of the two men I met going up to Gaston’s apartment. Should we have waited in the street to see if he came out and followed him again, since I don’t think he’s actually living there?’

  ‘I’m very glad you didn’t,’ Lannes said.

  Especially, he thought, if he is indeed the man who shot me, as seems likely.

  ‘So: do we act on this information?’

  Schnyder leafed through the papers on his desk.

  ‘Vichy is proving even worse than Paris,’ he said. ‘All this bumpf. Depresses me. You’ve only one witness, you say, and though you’re sure he’s reliable, you also tell me he can’t be produced, and you’d rather not even tell me who he is. It’s not satisfactory. You must see that. In any event it relates to a case we’ve been ordered to file away.’

  ‘Gaston’s murder, yes. The attempt on me, that might be a different matter, don’t you think?’

  ‘It should be. It bloody well should be. On the other hand you admit that you have nothing but supposition to connect your man with that.’

  ‘Sufficient to justify questioning, however.’

  ‘So you say, so you say.’

  Schnyder shuffled his papers again and didn’t look at Lannes who, watching his boss, thought, ‘He’s a weak man after all’.

  ‘I’ve got responsibilities,’ Schnyder said. ‘We all have, naturally, goes without saying, but mine are peculiar. The first of them is to secure our independence, to safeguard our ability to keep functioning as we should. But in the circumstances this comes with strings attached. It’s conditional, has to be.’

  At last he looked up, then put a match to his cigar which had been lying forgotten in the ashtray.

  ‘It may be a long war and, certainly, however long it lasts, and maybe for some time after, so will the Occupation. That’s how it is. I want to keep us as free as possible from interference by the Boches. You can’t disagree with that. Now this type you want to question obviously has relations with them. So straightaway they are involved. He’s in a special category. Straightaway you yourself become an object of suspicion. That’s bad, and no good to me either. “Not reliable” – that’ll be the note on your dossier. On mine too. We can’t have that. So the answer to your request for the time being – note, I say, for the time being – must be no. Your man will keep. We won’t forget him, Jean. Be sure of that. As I’ve said, I don’t approve of people shooting at my men, and you’re the chief of them. Nor of murder. You understand?’

  ‘I understand, Naturally I understand. But, if I may say so, sir, I don’t approve. In fact, to be honest and blunt, I deplore your decision.’

  ‘Which you will nevertheless obey. For Christ’s sake, man, do you think I don’t deplore the position we’re in. It stinks, stinks like rotten fish, but we have to live with the stench. And in it. For now. For God knows how long. Clear?’

  Lannes felt dirty, humiliated, nevertheless reported the conversation more or less word for word to Moncerre and young René Martin.

  ‘So it’s still hands off,’ Moncerre said. ‘Fuck them. And this time the order isn’t coming from an old woman like Rougerie but from our own boss. It makes me sick.’

  ‘I see his point of course,’ Lannes said.

  ‘You do?’

  ‘Reluctantly.’

  ‘He’s running scared, that’s what I see,’ Moncerre said. ‘He’s shitting himself.’

  ‘What about the priest?’ René said. ‘We’ve a description, don’t we? He could be questioned, unofficially if you like, just in the way of gathering information.’

  ‘Leave him to me,’ Moncerre said. ‘I’ve a way with priests.’

  The boy Léon was already in the back room of the tabac when Lannes arrived. He had come straight from his work at the bank and wore a thin black suit. He had loosened his tie and undone the collar button of his shirt, as a mark perhaps of release from bondage. His hair was now cut short, lying close to his scalp, and in profile he looked Jewish as he hadn’t at their first meeting when his hair was long. Lannes wasn’t pleased to find himself thinking this.

  ‘My aunt says you want to speak to me.’

  ‘She tells me you’ve been talking wildly, foolishly even.’

  ‘That’s as may be. What’s foolishness to one is good sense to another. It’s a matter of opinion.’

  ‘It’s a matter of fact,’ Lannes said. ‘There’s talk now which is foolish that would have made good sense a few months ago. That’s not an opinion, Léon. As I say, it’s fact. How it is, how things are. Harsh fact certainly, just as the German Occupation is a matter of harsh reality, something we have to live with. Here, read this.’

  He took a paper from the inside breast pocket of his coat and handed it to the boy.

  ‘It’s a copy of a notice which will be published tomorrow. Read it.’

  He watched the boy as he read the words which he himself already knew by bitter heart.

  ‘Two days ago, when the Guard of Honour was about to raise the flag, near the Gare St-Jean, the Jew Israel Karp, of Polish extraction, threw himself forward brandishing a stick at the drum-major and musicians of the German band. By decree of the military tribunal, he was condemned to death for an act of violence against members of the German Army. In accordance with this judgment, the condemned man was executed this morning.’

  ‘What do you make of that, Léon?’

  The boy’s face was in shadow, but it seemed to Lannes that the colour drained from it, and his voice was unsteady when he l
ooked up and said, ‘It’s monstrous, horrible, beyond belief.’

  ‘Agreed. It’s also how it is.’

  ‘For brandishing a stick . . . Only that. It doesn’t even say he struck anyone.’

  ‘He didn’t. He was prevented. Overpowered before he could do so. Now do you understand why your aunt is worried. Keep your sentiments – and your opinions – to yourself, Léon. And forget you are Jewish, for as long as you can.’

  ‘You think that’s easy. It’s not even possible, superintendent. I’ve just been given notice by the bank, not because of anything I’ve done wrong, but because of what I am. And by that I mean because I’m a Jew, not the other thing. It’s to be a good Jew-free bank. What do you make of that? So I’m out of work, as from next week. What should I do? Go on the streets, offer myself for rent? That too’ll be easy, won’t it, once they make us wear the yellow star, like in Germany.’

  III

  Lassitude, indifference, depression: Lannes knew them all these next weeks, as the glorious summer collapsed into autumn rains and in the morning a chill wind blew up from the Garonne. Alain and Clothilde had returned, reluctantly, to school. Maurice received an imperative summons from his father: he was to go to Vichy where plans had been made for his future. He left unwillingly; there were tears in his eyes as he looked out of the train and waved to Lannes. Marguerite spent more hours on her knees in the church of Sainte Eulalie than in the kitchen.

  In October the Marshal met Hitler at Montoire-sur-le-Loir and affirmed the intention of France to pursue ‘the path of collaboration.’ ‘It is with honour,’ he said, ‘and in order to maintain French unity, a unity ten centuries old, in the framework of a constructive activity of the new European order that I have today entered the way of collaboration.’ Schussmann, calling on Lannes the following morning, expressed warm approval. ‘It’s a decisive step, a decisive step, I assure you,’ he said. ‘Believe me, the Fuehrer has a great respect for the Marshal. Together, the Reich and the État Français will create that New Order of which the Marshal spoke so warmly. It’s a historic day in the long and often unhappy saga of Franco-German relations. We are at last in a position to put these divisions and that long miserable conflict behind us. A new dawn is breaking over Europe.’

  ‘We’ll see,’ Lannes said.

  Schnyder reproached him for making his lack of enthusiasm evident.

  ‘It serves no purpose. You might at least put on a show. For the moment all we can do is keep our seat in the saddle.’

  Lannes called on Miriam in the tabac a couple of afternoons a week, ostensibly just to reassure himself that all was well with her. In reality? He preferred not to dwell on that. How would she respond if he expressed a desire to make love? He couldn’t tell. In any case, he held off, said nothing. It was better that way.

  In one spark of activity he arranged for Léon to take over Bloch’s job as Henri’s assistant in the bookshop.

  ‘So long as his presence doesn’t embarrass you,’ he said. ‘I’ll be grateful. It may help to keep the boy out of trouble.’

  ‘I suppose it’s a small act of resistance,’ Henri said, ‘replacing one Jew with another. And he’ll be a link with poor Gaston, even if also one that saddens me.’

  Miriam was also grateful.

  ‘But I wish I could get him out of the country,’ she said. ‘I’m so afraid he will do something rash. He’s become so bitter, even savage, in his talk.’

  As for the boy himself, he blamed Lannes for the failure to bring Gaston’s murderers to justice, ‘since I’ve no doubt you know who they are.’

  ‘Justice?’ Lannes said.’ My poor boy, Justice is asleep.’

  There were days when he thought of handing in his resignation from the force. But if he did so, what would they live on? And wouldn’t the very act of resigning immediately render him politically suspect, mark him down as a subversive?

  At last came good news: a letter from Dominique, itself delayed for weeks, in which he reported that he was a prisoner-of-war, held at Stalag IXA. The letter was short, lacking detail, presumably also censored. He assured them he was well and had recovered from his wound – of which they had of course been ignorant. That evening Marguerite sang as she prepared a stew of river fish; her prayers had been answered.

  ‘He’ll soon be home, won’t he? That’ll be arranged, won’t it, now that the war is over? There’s no call for them not to send all the prisoners home. Surely that’s so.’

  ‘We must hope it is,’ Lannes said, unwilling to disillusion her when for the first time in months there was a smile on her face and she looked like the girl he had fallen in love with.

  But he knew better. The war wasn’t over while England still resisted Hitler and the POWs would be put to work in Germany, as was permitted, except in the case of officers, by the Geneva Convention.

  Nevertheless the boy was alive and their worst fears allayed.

  His mother-in-law and Albert were invited to supper to share the good news. Albert was in expansive mood; he had just been promoted. He assured his sister that he would do all in his power to secure Dominique’s speedy repatriation.

  ‘There are strings that a man in my position can pull,’ he said.

  Madame Panard nodded in agreement.

  ‘You can rely on your brother,’ she told Marguerite. ‘You see now he was quite right when he said this war was a mistake. But it’s all over now and things will soon return to normal.’

  Lannes gestured to Alain, who was on the point of saying this was all nonsense. He took the message, obeyed, but looked mutinous.

  Later, alone, he said to his father: ‘It’s all lies, isn’t it?’

  ‘You’re right of course. But there’s nothing to be gained by saying so.’

  ‘Talking of that, I don’t see what’s to be gained by my remaining at school. We none of us do, none of my mates, that is. I mean, what’s it for?’

  ‘The war isn’t over. I agree with you there. But it won’t last forever, and, when it does end, then you will need to have passed your exams, if you are to have the career you’re capable of. In any case, for the time being, it’s the best place for you. You’re safe there and kept busy,’ he said, avoiding the word “occupied” which had first come to mind. ‘As long as you don’t do anything foolish. And you won’t, will you?’

  ‘As to that – being foolish – only this afternoon I saw the man Maurice and I followed – which you said we were foolish to do. He was with a German officer and another man, French, I think, in civilian clothes anyway. It’s all right, I only looked, from a distance. They were sitting outside a café in the Place de l’Ancienne Comédie, drinking champagne. Then they were joined by the priest, the same one, you remember we told you about him too?’

  ‘I remember.’

  Lannes had prevented Moncerre from questioning the priest as he had proposed. Hearing what Alain said, he was surer than ever that he had been right.

  Nevertheless . . .

  ‘Can you describe the other man?’

  ‘Oh yes. I watched them for some time, you know, from across the square. I’m sure they didn’t take any notice of me, if that’s what’s worrying you. I mean, why should they? He was short, solid, like a front-row forward, his hair which was thick and fair cut en brosse. He wore a double-breasted grey suit and looked smart and well-fed. Prosperous. He smiled a lot. Of course I couldn’t hear him speak, but I’m sure he was French, though I don’t know why, just something about him. I had the impression he was formidable.’

  Marcel – Sigi – whatever. Lannes had no doubt. Formidable indeed, the boy was right.

  ‘Does my description help?’

  ‘Help? I don’t know. Perhaps.’

  ‘But do you recognize him from it?’

  ‘I think so. Probably. If you see him another time, keep well clear. If he’s the man I think he is, he’s dangerous. Bear that in mind, Alain.’

  It infuriated him to think that Sigi was back in Bordeaux, if indeed he had ever left �
�� and that he was happy to be seen taking his ease in public, confident that he was protected. He hoped that they hadn’t indeed taken note of Alain. But he couldn’t be sure and felt a stab of fear.

  ‘Are you playing rugby this week-end?’ he said, to divert them both.

  ‘Yes, if I’m picked as I’m confident I will be. “The image of war, without the guilt”, didn’t you once say?’

  IV

  It was his birthday. Forty-five. An age by which a man should know himself, know his qualities and defects, how far he can go, his ability to persevere, know what he is and accept that, for better or worse. Know too when to wear a mask, and not forget that it is only that, something that denies and can be denied.

  Lannes pushed the papers on his desk aside; nothing there to demand his attention. He stretched himself, lay back and lit a cigarette. There was no sound from the world beyond. Little traffic except the transport of German troops moved in Bordeaux now.

  That morning Marguerite had said: ‘Do you think my brother can really arrange to get Dominique home?’

  ‘He says he can.’

  Did she hear the scepticism, distrust, even malice, in his voice?

  ‘It would have been a wonderful birthday present for you.’

  ‘The best. Perhaps by Christmas.’

  There was a knock on his door. He called out and young René came in, light-footed, eager, his face flushed.

  ‘Chief, I don’t know, can’t be certain, but we may have a breakthrough.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘You remember Cortin, the little clerk whose car was stolen, the one you were shot from. Well, they’ve just fished him out from the Garonne. Just under the Pont de Saint-Jean. They were able to identify him so quickly because he had a pass from the Mayor’s office excusing him the curfew, carried his papers in a sealed packet, it seems, which is unusual in itself. But that’s not all. It seems that though he was found in the river – early this morning by a fisherman – he wasn’t drowned. He was strangled or, to be more precise, garrotted. What do you make of that? It opens the case up. There must be some connection, surely?’