Cezanne's Quarry

by Barbara Corrado Pope

  Clarie? Could Franc have gotten to Clarie somehow and threatened her?

  “Show her in immediately.” Martin rose, ready to sweep her into his arms, comfort her, and take her to Paris if necessary. He was more disappointed than relieved to see that the woman in question was Hortense Fiquet. He retreated as she rushed toward him.

  “Monsieur le juge, you must see this. You must do something. We can’t deal with it any more. Cézanne is innocent.”

  Martin signaled to the gendarme to leave and close the door, then he asked Hortense Fiquet to try to calm herself. One of the buttons on the front of her dress was undone, and strands of straight dark hair were falling around her plain, frightened face.

  “I cannot calm down. You must stop this Professor Westerbury. He won’t leave us alone.” She was clutching a small, white folded piece of paper to her chest.

  “Let me see what you have there.” He held out his hand.

  She gave him the note. When he unfolded it, he almost gasped. It contained only two lines. The first from the letter that Solange Vernet had written to Westerbury, repeating the accusation she had made against her brutal tormentor; the second from the message carried to the Vernet apartment by the dead boy. “I know who you are. Please meet me at the quarry. C.”

  “Who brought this to you?” he asked sharply.

  “Their maid. I mean, his maid.”

  Arlette LaFarge. “When?”

  “Just minutes ago.”

  She wanted to say more, but he would not let her until he had the answers he needed.

  “Where is Cézanne now?” He did not want another murder on his head.

  “Somewhere off the Le Tholonet road. He hired a donkey early this morning and went to paint the mountain.”

  “Then he has not seen this.”

  “No, I told you, he left hours ago and won’t be back until dark.” She kept twisting her hands together in anxious little circles.

  “You got this just minutes ago? And the maid brought it to you?”

  She nodded, keeping her eyes on his face, waiting for his reaction.

  “You did the right thing in coming to me, “ he assured her. “Did the maid say anything else? Did she say when Westerbury wrote this?”

  “She told me he said to wait an hour before she made her deliveries. That’s all.”

  Deliveries? More than one? And why an hour? What was the madman up to?

  “Did she say where else she was going? This is very important.” The urgency in his voice made Hortense Fiquet take two steps back, away from him.

  “Yes, I was furious. I wanted to talk to her. I wanted to go see the Englishman myself. But she told me that he had already gone and that she had promised to deliver the two notes within fifteen minutes of each other.”

  “Did the maid tell you where else?” He controlled himself enough to keep from shouting.

  She shook her head, eyes agape with fear. “All I could get out of her is that she was going to the jail or to the courthouse. Wherever she could find him.”

  “Who?”

  “I don’t know. She just said it was a secret, and she promised her M. Westerbury that she would find him.”

  Martin very well knew who—Franc. Westerbury had somehow figured it out too. Or only half of it, for the Englishman was still deciding between two potential murderers. And he was waiting at the quarry for the one who took the bait. Martin pressed his eyes closed, trying to remember if there had been anything that Westerbury had said or done that afternoon which should have warned him. The only clue had been the Englishman’s uncharacteristic self-control. Obviously he had decided to keep his own counsel and take things into his own hand. To become the hero of his own tragedy. What a fool.

  “Well, what are you going to do about it? This must stop. I can’t—” Hortense Fiquet had gotten her nerve back.

  “Thank you.” Martin interrupted her in mid-sentence. “You don’t need to worry. I will deal with this immediately. Westerbury will not bother you again.”

  “Yes, but you do see, don’t you that—”

  “Please, Madame Fiquet, you were right to come to me. Now I have to do my part. A man’s life may be in danger.”

  She would have said more if Martin had not taken her gently by the arm and escorted her into the hallway. “Do you want a gendarme to walk you home? Do you feel unsafe?” he asked.

  She smiled. It did not take a great deal of concern or attention to please her. She shook her head. “I’m all right. But I will expect to hear from you.” Her gray eyes were searching his, begging him to take her seriously.

  “Yes, yes,” he said as he moved her toward the staircase. Where was Jacques? The idiot disappeared on the one occasion when he could have been of use. As soon as Hortense Fiquet started down the stairs, Martin leaned over the railing and called out for the gendarme. Jacques’s name echoed throughout the empty courthouse, to no avail.

  Martin went back to lock the door to his chambers before hurrying down the staircase, overtaking Hortense Fiquet, who let him pass without a word. He rushed out the back door of the courthouse, where Jacques stood guard, and hurried to the prison yard, where the veteran François and two other men were playing cards.

  “Is Franc around?”

  “No.” François took a cigarette out of his mouth and stood up at attention. “Some woman gave him a note and he rushed off, even took one of the horses.”

  “Do you know where he went? Do you know what the note said?”

  “No, he put it in his pocket.”

  To be destroyed later, no doubt. “Fetch me a horse,” Martin commanded. “And saddle two for yourselves. We have to go to the quarry immediately. Franc’s life may be in danger.” He only said this to rally the troops. It was the Englishman, the gallant fool, that he was actually worried about.

  “Why do you say that?” one of them said stupidly, still not budging.

  “The murderer may be waiting in the quarry for Franc.” They still did not move. Martin could only imagine what Franc, their leader and comrade, had been saying about him. “You and you,” he pointed at the tall veteran François and a burly gendarme, who was still sitting by the pile of cards. “Go! Now!” he yelled.

  He was wondering what he would have to do to get them to obey, when François waved to his comrade. “Come on, Jean. If what he says is true, we’d better help Franc.”

  If what he says is true. Martin had not time to deal with their insubordination. He needed their help to pull Westerbury and Franc apart.

  “I’m going up to my chambers to get my hat,” he announced, as he started back to the courthouse.

  When Martin reached the grand atrium, he slowed down. How many more times would he run his hands along the polished wood railing, ascending this staircase to his chambers? He took in the main hall bordered by the courtrooms. This had all lain before him, with the promise of a calling that he had tried so hard to live up to. If Franc killed Westerbury, what would happen to Martin? At the very least, his career would be over. And Franc would surely get away with everything. This outrage propelled Martin onward. He unlocked his chambers, slipped inside, and grabbed his hat.

  By the time Martin returned to the prison, the horses were ready. With Jacques’s help, he mounted one and told the men to follow him. Martin was not a good rider, but he rode as fast as he could, urging his horse in the direction of the quarry. At this very moment Westerbury might be dying. At this very moment Franc might be killing again. Martin beat the animal as he never had beat any horse before. Still the gendarmes easily kept up with him. When they were halfway up the Bibémus road, they heard two shots ring out in quick succession. Martin’s horse reared up, and, as he tried to regain control, he shouted to the men to go on ahead of him.

  A moment later, Martin dismounted where he and Franc had left the gray, splintering wagon less than a fortnight ago. He tethered his horse to a tall pine tree and raced to the top of the quarry. Below him François was kneeling beside Franc. Not far away, Je
an was kicking Westerbury.

  “Stop!” Martin shouted as he scrambled down toward them. “Leave that man alone!”

  “He shot the inspector!” The burly gendarme looked stupider than ever.

  “Stop now, or I will see you in court!” Unless they were going to kill him, Jean had no choice but to obey Martin’s order.

  Martin crouched down near Franc’s body.

  “Look. Look what that bastard did,” François cried out. “He shot him twice.”

  The side of Franc’s head and his chest were soaked with blood. His hand was still wrapped around a bloody knife. Martin guessed that Franc had been shot at close range, his body propelled backwards by the force of the bullets. In spite of his mortal wounds, the inspector kept trying to talk. Martin thought he heard the word “whore.”

  “Whore,” he repeated to François. “Did he say anything else?” Martin asked, as he frantically divided his attention between Franc and Westerbury, whom he needed to protect from the gendarmes’ fury. “What else?” he demanded again.

  François kept staring down at his dying friend and protector.

  “This is important,” Martin insisted again. “It could be evidence in the murder trial.” Evidence that he hoped to use against Franc, evidence that he wanted to engrave in the gendarme’s memory.

  “I think he said, ‘I made her a whore.’ I don’t know what that means.”

  “And?”

  “And! What else do you want. Can’t you see he’s dying!”

  Franc’s muttering had become an unintelligible rasp, as his face contorted into a grimace of pain. He was leaving the world in a fit of rage.

  Martin got up and patted François on the back. “Do what you can for him,” Martin said before going over to the foolhardy Englishman. As soon as Martin saw him, he knew that Westerbury would not survive his own rash acts. His chest was also covered with blood, and he was breathing in short labored gulps. In his left hand, he was clutching a pistol. Another lay beside him.

  “Leave me alone with him,” Martin told the gendarme. “I need to ask him some questions. Go see about Franc.” As soon as Jean left, Martin knelt down beside Westerbury. “What happened?” Martin said the words softly and distinctly. He needed to penetrate through Westerbury’s pain before death overtook him.

  Westerbury’s eyes flickered open. “I shot him, old boy. I shot him. He killed my Solange and I. . . .”

  “How did you know?” Martin asked, as he placed his arm under the dying man’s head.

  “The gloves,” Westerbury made an effort to raise his right hand. “The stains, his hair, on the gloves.” He let out a moan that was almost a shout. “I was going to duel for her. Her honor. Like a man. But he kept . . . coming at me. . . .” Westerbury panted for breath in little whimpers. “He said she was a whore . . . always had been . . . I think he was. . . .” Again he stopped, and his back arched in pain.

  “The constable at Bennecourt. Yes, I know.”

  “If you knew. . . .” Westerbury whispered. There was little time left.

  “I just found out myself. I am going to Paris to look up his records.”

  “Then this, this was all in—”

  “No, no, not in vain,” Martin spoke louder. He could not let the Englishman die believing that he had died for nothing. “I would not have gotten as far as I have without your help. And I am not sure that I could have found enough proof to prosecute him. He was a powerful man.”

  “Was?”

  “He’s dead.”

  “I did it, then. For. . . .”

  “I know.” Martin said, as Westerbury grimaced in agony. He lifted the Englishman’s head closer to his own. “You did it for Solange. For her honor. She deserved such a gallant defender.” This was all puerile. But he did not know what else to say. And somehow it felt right.

  Westerbury slowly raised his eyes. They stopped flickering. Had Westerbury heard him? Had he been able to offer any comfort?

  Then he heard the words, “for Solange,” and he felt the weight of the Englishman’s head on his arm, as it rolled to the side. The blood dripping from his mouth was the sign that he, too, was dead.

  Martin waited until he was sure he could speak with a steady voice before standing up. “Dead. Both of them,” he pronounced. “The Englishman waited for Franc with a pistol. Even so, Franc was strong enough to attack with his knife.”

  “Good. Good,” said Jean. “At least he got the bastard back.”

  “Yes, he did,” Martin responded quietly. “Yes, he did.”

  “So the Englishman was the killer after all, just like Franc said,” François chimed in.

  “No, no, he wasn’t.” Martin was not going to lie to them.

  “Then who?” Jean approached Martin with fists clenched.

  “Let’s worry about that later. For now, we must get Franc and the Englishman back to Aix. You two go back and get a wagon. Remember to bring blankets to wrap the bodies, and have someone go find Dr. Riquel. I’ll stay here and watch over them.” The two gendarmes hesitated for a moment, as if they wanted to continue defending Franc’s honor. “Go,” Martin insisted. “We need to be back in town before dark. You are much better riders than I am.”

  The admission satisfied Franc’s loyal comrades enough to send them on their way. They prided themselves on being men of action, ready to kill if necessary. Yet it was Martin, the man of reason, who was in command. And, now, he realized, a man of feeling as well. At the moment, too much feeling. He needed to be alone.

  After the men left, Martin climbed up on a boulder. He did not have the stomach to stay close to the two dead bodies. To smell their remains. To shoo away the flies. It would be better to look ahead, he told himself. Now that he had a future.

  When he raised his eyes, Martin was surprised to discover that he could see Mont Sainte-Victoire, rising above the reddening boulders and the mournful parasol pines. The sun was only beginning its long, slow, summer descent behind him. Its waning rays covered the mountain with pale, radiant colors: pinks and blues, yellows and greens, oranges and white. Somewhere near the foot of the mountain, Cézanne was rolling up his canvas and tying his easel to a donkey, oblivious to the fact that he had won. He, not Westerbury, would be left to conquer the mountain.

  Tomorrow, Martin would catch the train to Paris to find the evidence to prove Franc’s guilt and Westerbury’s innocence. He’d leave a note for Hortense Fiquet, assuring her that she and Cézanne would be left in peace. Above all, and before everything else, he would go in search of Clarie Falchetti. To tell her he was leaving for a while. And to beg her forgiveness.

  Postscript

  March 1886

  Zola publishes L’Oeuvre, his novel about an artist.

  4 April 1886

  Cézanne sends Zola a curt thank-you for his copy. They never speak again.

  28 April 1886

  Cézanne marries Hortense Fiquet in a civil ceremony witnessed by his parents.

  29 April 1886

  The couple marries in a religious ceremony witnessed by Marie Cézanne and Maxim Conil.

  The newlyweds will soon start to live apart, Hortense spending as much time in Paris as possible.

  23 October 1886

  Louis-Auguste Cézanne dies, leaving his son an income of about 25,000 francs a year.

  November 1895

  Ambroise Vollard mounts an exhibit of Cézanne’s paintings in Paris, arousing interest and some favorable reviews.

  29 September 1902

  Zola dies under mysterious circumstances. Cézanne weeps bitterly when he hears the news of his oldest friend’s death.

  Zola was a legend in his own time.

  Cézanne is the father of modern art.

  Bernard Martin, Albert Franc, Clarie Falchetti, Solange Vernet, and Charles Westerbury are fictional characters.

  Source of Quotations

  1. John Rewald, Cézanne: A Biography (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1986), p. 156.

  2. Nicolas Freelin
g, Flanders Sky (New York: Mysterious Press, 1992), p. 162.

  3. Sidney Geist, Interpreting Cézanne (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1988), p. 99.

  4. Cited in Alan B. Spitzer, The Revolutionary Theories of Louis Auguste Blanqui (New York: Columbia University Press, 1957).

  5. Royer quoted in Pnina Abir-Am and Dorinda Outram, Uneasy Careers and Intimate Lives: Women in Science 1789-1979 (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1987), p. 147.

  6. Michelet excerpted in Susan G. Bell and Karen M. Offen, eds. Women, the Family, and Freedom. Vol. I: 1750-1880 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1983), p. 171.

  7. Ronald Meek, ed. Marx and Engels on Malthus (New York: International Publishers, 1954), p. 186.

  8. Benjamin F. Martin, Crime and Criminal Justice Under the Third Republic: The Shame of Marianne (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1990), p. 2.

  9. Sholem Asch, The Nazarene, trans. Maurice Samuel (New York: Putnam’s Sons, 1939), p. 3.

  10. Françoise Cachin et al., Cézanne (Philadelphia: Philadelphia Art Museum, 1996), p. 274.

  11. Alexandre Dumas quoted by Lawrence Durrell in his Provence (New York: Arcade, 1990), p. 89.

  12. Joachim Gasquet’s Cézanne: A Memoir with Conversations. Trans. Christopher Pemberton (New York: Thames and Hudson, 1991), p. 224.

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