New Venice 02 - Luminous Chaos

by Jean-Christophe Valtat

  Tripotte, however, did not give them much time to think. He hurried them through the wooden barrier that separated the lobby from the display hall. Once in the hall, they faced a tall window split in three by two black columns, dividing the view of a dozen sluice tables with bodies on them, each naked except for a small loincloth. People passed in front of the glass for a few moments of half-shocked, half-voyeuristic staring, exchanging comments in voices that might have been lower while the guard urged them to move along. It took a while for Brentford to understand that this ghastly take on the Grévin had actually been devised as a means of identifying anonymous bodies. He lowered his eyes for fear of recognizing one of them himself, even though he felt quite sure now that it would indeed come to that, and he tried to block the names that sprang into his mind.

  After exchanging a few words with a clerk from the registry, Tripotte turned towards Brentford and Gabriel and said, “Now, step up and tell me if you identify this bit-player here. Actually, he’s quite the leading man today.”

  Brentford took a long, reluctant walk to the window, then, finally, looked up. There, where Tripotte pointed his stubby index like a typographic hand, lay a muscular body, its neatly decapitated head resting near its shoulder, the forehead bashed to a pulp. Even though it was the first time Brentford had ever seen his face, he had not a doubt that it was Blankbate.

  He shook and felt the tears well up in his eyes.

  “So?” Tripotte asked.

  Brentford mastered his nerves and managed to say, “What makes you think I know him?”

  “I had some doubt … but I no longer do. All I know is that this man lived in the same hotel as you do.”

  “Alan Blankbate is his name,” Brentford admitted. He felt his sadness charging with anger. “What happened?”

  “Some rare domestic accident, I would say,” Tripotte replied. “He was found in a wicker trunk in the middle of the Seine, his head in his hands, with tinted glasses on.”

  “Was he … beaten?”

  Tripotte shrugged his shoulders. “I doubt he did all that to himself,” he said. “Come with me for a minute.”

  He led them to a smaller room where some coroners and policemen were writing and filing reports.

  “Docteur Demain?” Tripotte called out.

  The doctor, a young but already balding man with a head like a lightbulb, got up and shook their hands.

  “These gentlemen here are very curious about our latest finding,” Tripotte told him.

  Demain glanced at the paper he had in his hand. “I’ve just finished the report,” he said, and read aloud, “The victim was about thirty-eight, tall and vigorous and in overall good condition, with a tattoo on his back showing a skull over crossed hooks that look like those used by ragpickers, and a motto in English: ‘Dust to Dust.’ Another tattoo on the right forearm simply says—in neat cursive letters—Legio Patria Nostra.”

  “That’s the motto of the French Foreign Legion,” Tripotte observed. “A man with a past.”

  “I never knew he was in the Foreign Legion,” Brentford whispered to Gabriel.

  “Rigor mortis is observable,” Demain went on, “but difficult to distinguish from the effects of freezing. In any case, death was fairly recent, less than twelve hours ago, I would say. The wrists show rope marks. Longitudinal traces on both temporal zones may mean that the subject was tightly blindfolded. Both arms reveal pressure bruises—probably from a tight grasp while the subject was resisiting—and so does the back. There are traces of four blows to the scalp and the temples, coming from blunt objects—bull’s pizzles probably. The malar region and the upper lip show some traces of glue, and there are skin blotches—as if a false beard had been ripped off.”

  “Did you know he had a false beard?” Tripotte asked point-blank to Brentford.

  Brentford sensed the danger behind Tripotte’s question, and changed his shiver of disgust to a shrug. “If he had one, no one was meant to know, I suppose.”

  The doctor, who observed them beyond the rim of his glasses, hemmed and resumed his gruesome reading.

  “Now, on the frontal bone we have a deep, intrusive wound two inches in diameter roughly in the shape of an O, but with the edges quite dented where the skull has caved in. The blow evidently comes from a heavy, pointed object.”

  “A pickaxe?” suggested Tripotte, staring straight at Demain.

  The coroner hesitated but finally nodded. “Well, almost surely, yes.”

  “With all the icepicks around, nowadays, it’s not going to be easy to find this one,” Tripotte sighed, as if to himself.

  “The angle of the blow suggests that the victim was somehow looking up. Which leads to the other cause of death: decapitation. The cut is very neat, like that of a guillotine, although slightly oblique at the nape, as if the victim had raised his head at the last moment.”

  “Guillotine?” Brentford muttered, stunned.

  “Like a guillotine is what I said,” the doctor insisted under Tripotte’s severe stare. “It is the same kind of wound—it’s just that the pressure exerted on the blade was much, much more powerful than a normal guillotine. The cervical area of the body is crushed to splinters. I’ve never seen a guillotine powerful enough do that. However, there’s no other explanation.”

  “A guillotine’s a guillotine,” Tripotte said impatiently. “What did he die from—the blow or the blade?”

  “Judging by the two haemorrhages, I would say that they happened almost simultaneously, and it’s difficult to say which came first—except of course that it does not seem very logical to stun a beheaded man.”

  “Would it be more logical to behead a man whose skull you have just broken?” Brentford inquired.

  “It would not be more logical to me, but I have observed that criminals tend to have a logic of their own,” Demain answered perfunctorily. “There’s nothing more I can tell without an autopsy.”

  Tripotte sighed. “Well, that means asking for permission from the Canadian Commission. I’ll get in touch with you about it, Doctor. Meanwhile, you should start charging entry. This is a very popular corpse that you’ve got on your hands.”

  “We certainly should, yes. That might help us pay for a better laboratory.”

  Tripotte ignored him. “Now, Mr. Orsini, would you care to join me with your friend at the Pointy Tower for a few questions?”

  “The Pointy Tower?”

  “That’s what we call the Police Prefecture,” he explained, leading them out without waiting for a reply.

  The questions had been basic enough. How long had they known Blankbate, and where did they know him from? What was his occupation? What had they talked about these past few days? A few ameliorations of the truth later—since they met on the ferry from Jersey a few days ago, he introduced himself as a collector, but he wasn’t talkative and seldom appeared in the hotel—they were free to go, as long as they remained in Paris. But it was clear to them that Tripotte was less interested in solving Blankbate’s murder than he was in cornering Brentford and Co.

  Once outside, Brentford leaned disconsolately on the parapet that overlooked the frozen Seine.

  “Listen,” Gabriel said. “If you’re busy finding reasons to blame yourself, I’m not going to help.” Gabriel was having one of his brief spells of behaving like the older, wiser brother. He was a few months older, actually.

  “All right,” Brentford conceded. “It’s not my fault. Except I brought him here and I wanted to take him back.”

  “Peterswarden—and, I suspect, a bit of ill-luck—are responsible for us being here, not you. And Blankbate was big enough to take care of himself anyway. Holy Cod, Brentford, he didn’t even tell you what he was looking for.”

  “He may have been close to finding it, though. A little too close, perhaps.”

  “Do you think this Dr. Demain might have an idea of what really happened?”

  “Why are you asking?”

  “I don’t know. I watched him closely and felt him hesit
ate—taking his cue from Tripotte, but, you know, slightly embarrassed to be doing so.”

  “Perhaps. But what is he going to tell us? That it was the Wolves of the Wood of Justice? We already suspect as much. And he if is in league with Tripotte, questioning him would bring us more trouble than answers.”

  “As you wish. It would be foolish to get into trouble when everything else is just dandy.”

  Brentford looked at Gabriel. “Maybe what Blankbate was looking for has nothing to do with our situation.”

  “It’s not so much what Blankbate was looking for as who was looking for him. Who knows which one of us is next? If we’re to go back to the morgue, I’d rather walk there than be rolled in.”

  Brentford gave it some thought. “Well, Gabriel,” he finally said. “I’ll walk with you, then, and we’ll speak to Dr. Demain. But let’s call Jean-Klein first and explain the situation to him. He’ll know what questions to ask.”

  They had to queue for a good half hour before being admitted again, which gave Lavis time to come down and meet them during his lunch break. For reasons he couldn’t explain to himself, he felt a tremendous sympathy for this group of Canadian expatriates, and, learning of their loss, he had quickly agreed to consult with them. As he happened to know Demain from his student years, he felt calling at the morgue might make things easier for everyone.

  “I’m afraid I can’t stay very long,” Lavis explained. He was elegantly dressed as a sportsman, Brentford noted as he watched him bang a pair of skis to get rid of the sticky snow. Skis were very rare in Paris, Brentford had noticed, but he had also noticed that Lavis was one step ahead when it came to fashions. “Tourette has really tormented me for leaving yesterday afternoon,” he told them.

  “Sorry to hear that.” Gabriel said.

  “It is nothing. I was glad to see d’Arsonval.”

  By chance the registry clerk remembered them and fetched Dr. Demain for them, before being entrusted, much to his dismay, with a pair of skis. One could not say that the coroner was overjoyed at seeing them again, but neither did he seem much surprised. That Lavis accompanied them somehow reassured him. He warmly saluted his colleague and took them all not into the tiny cabinet but into the dismal autopsy room itself, mercifully empty for the moment and more suitable for a quiet discussion.

  Brentford had regained his drive. “Sorry to disturb you again, but there’s something that we forgot to ask you.”

  “Please,” the doctor said. “I’ll be glad to help if I can.”

  “Would it be possible to have a look at the retina of the victim?” Jean-Klein intervened.

  The doctor made a face. “You mean you want to make an optogram?”

  “Yes. Mr. Orsini told me on the telephone that the victim was looking up. That may leave us a chance. I have all the necessary equipment at the Salpêtrière.”

  “It may be too late. And you know that our master Brouardel is really sceptical about the process.”

  “But he mentions it,” Jean-Klein answered. “As far as we know, only two optograms were ever made. A rabbit and a German convict. Both of them decapitated.”

  “But the conditions were very special. The rabbit was kept in the darkness for a long while before it was beheaded.”

  “You told us that Mr. Blankbate was blindfolded,” Brentford interjected, despite being rather uncertain as to what the argument was about. “He may have had only a few minutes of exposure to light.”

  “But the death happened hours ago. I doubt the victim’s retinas will be in good shape.”

  “The rhodopsin can last as long as forty-eight hours, and the effects of the frost may help us too,” Jean-Klein countered.

  “Not to mention that afterwards he was in the trunk with his tinted glasses on his eyes, if our information is correct,” Gabriel added.

  “You see,” Jean-Klein insisted. “We lose nothing by trying.”

  Demain shook his head. “On a strictly professional level, I would be the first to try. It’s not that I’m afraid it won’t work, you understand. It’s more what will happen if it does that worries me.”

  “You have my word of honour that it will stay strictly between us,” Brentford reassured him. “And if I have yours that you won’t speak of it to anyone, I’ll be perfectly satisfied.”

  “Not even to the police?” the doctor wondered.

  “And would the police be helpful in this matter?” Gabriel asked him in return.

  “Perhaps not,” Demain sighed. “For the love of science, then. And for the love of justice, if there is such a thing. Let me turn on the sodium light and bring the body here. Jean-Klein, if you would prepare a six-thousandths solution of saltwater. It will take us a few minutes, and then you’d better run back to your lab.”

  II

  The Demigod of Les Halles

  Lilian was surprised when, coming straight from Morgane’s enchanted bed, she knocked on Brentford’s door and found herself facing Pirouette.

  “Lilian!” the child exclaimed, hugging her. “I missed you so much.”

  Lilian knew little French beside what she had picked up in New Venice and a few recent acquisitions from Morgane’s pillow, but she knew enough to be moved.

  “Okay,” she finally murmured. “Let me go now. Is Brentford here?”

  “No. He left this morning.”

  Lilian entered the room and noticed the notes and drawings Brentford had left behind on his desk—maps of New Venice that were full of blank zones, sketches of buildings whose perspectives vanished in the fog of the white page, names of places crossed out or followed by question marks … She smiled at them sadly and not without tenderness. Was her love for Morgane softening her?

  “It’s a pity you don’t like him,” Pirouette was saying. She was sitting on the bed swinging her legs and watching them as if they were a puppet show.

  “What?”

  “Mr. Orsini. I find him very nice, and very handsome.”

  Lilian let out a small puff of laughter. “Yes. He is all that, I guess.” She caught a glance of herself in the mirror and saw that, behind her back, Pirouette was watching her intently.

  “I know only”—she pretended to count on her fingers—“one man who is more handsome. And then, he is not as nice.”

  “Who would that be?” Lilian asked politely, still gazing into the mirror and smoothing the skin around her eyes. She could do with a beauty sleep, she thought. Morgane had revealed herself to be an enthusiastic somnambulist, and Lilian had spent half the night trying to coo and coax her into going back to bed. And the other half had been even less restful, she thought, with a blush she hoped Pirouette wouldn’t notice.

  But no. The child kept on prattling.

  “You don’t know him. He’s called Swell-in-the-Sack. And you know what? He has a tattoo, down there, you know, that says Au Bonheur des Dames. And when I say down there, I should say “up there.”

  Pirouette rolled back on the bed, laughing at this fine morsel of French wit.

  Lilian turned back, her hands on her hips. “Pirouette! Who tells you things like that?”

  “My mother,” the child answered honestly.

  “She takes your education to heart, doesn’t she?”

  Pirouette was not laughing anymore, and she sat at the edge of the bed, staring in front of her. “I wish you were my mother,” she finally said with a pout.

  “I am glad I’m not.” The corners of Pirouette’s mouth turned down as if she were going to cry. Lilian sighed and went to her, hugging her. “Okay, I’m sorry. I’d like to be your mother. I truly would.”

  Then she realized that the tears were not real. Pirouette gave a yelp of mirth and bounced on the bed. Lively child, thought Lilian.

  “And then Mr. Orsini could be my father? If I were your age, I would marry him,” Pirouette declared, nodding to herself with great conviction.

  “If I were your age, I would mind my own own business,” Lilian told her curtly, although she was more amused than angry. Still, it
occurred to her that, perhaps without realizing it himself, Brentford had brought the child here to foster exactly that suggestion. She felt faintly flattered, but the shortest jokes were the best, and this one was well past its prime.

  “But I know that you like girls better,” the little girl went on, devilishly, primly pointing her chin, as if to defy her.

  Once again, Lilian was taken aback. “How do you know that?”

  “It’s easy. Your clothes smell of a perfume that is not yours. And this is a cloakroom ticket from Le Rat Mort. Everyone knows what kind of women go there. Don’t look so shocked. I play games with my friends, too, but …”

  “Pirouette. Please. That’s enough. You’re a nice little girl, but I’m sure your mother must be very worried about you. Shouldn’t we go and reassure her? You don’t want her to call the police and get Bren—I mean Mr. Orsini—in trouble, do you?”

  Pirouette looked gloomily at the tips of her new shoes. She had known this would happen sooner or later.

  “She’ll beat me.”

  Lilian paused, then leaned over to gently pat her head. She felt sorry for Pirouette, but she couldn’t let her—nor Brentford, for that matter—pretend they really were a family.

  “There, there … I’ll go with you, okay? I’ll give her some money and make it all right, okay?”

  Pirouette nodded sadly and looked off. It was her lot in life, after all, not to have much of a choice. These people had been nice to her, but she had always supposed it wouldn’t last forever. She got down from the bed, trying not to cry.

  As they passed his doorway a few minutes later, the Colonel’s voice called from inside his room.

  Lilian sighed and went in.

  “Ah, Miss Lake—err, Tuluk, can you leave us alone?”

  “Of course,” Tuluk said amenably, and headed towards the door, leaving on the bedside table the oil-bulb syringe that he used for the maintenance of the Colonel’s gears.