Pel and the Prowler

by Mark Hebden

  ‘Think he’ll be able to identify her?’ Darcy asked, jerking his head at the door of the doctors’ room where they could still hear Bréhard’s sobs.

  Padiou shook his head. ‘I think he’ll take some time to get over it.’ He held up two fingers alongside each other. ‘They were like that. Would you like me to do it?’

  ‘It would be a help.’

  From Padiou they learned that Doctor Bréhard had been in his room asleep at the time of the crime. Or at least, that was what Padiou supposed. ‘Like all housemen in hospitals,’ he said, ‘we work overlong hours. When he finished he staggered off to his room and, I suppose, went straight to sleep. It’s the sort of thing that happens. I can vouch for that. It’s the sort of thing I do – regularly.’

  ‘The date 1940 mean anything to him, do you think?’

  Padiou looked puzzled. ‘Shouldn’t think so. He wasn’t even a gleam in his mother’s eye at that time. In fact, I’d imagine even she was still at school. Is it significant?’

  ‘It might be.’ Pel looked about him. ‘They were thinking of getting married, I understand. Had they lived together?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Slept together?’

  Padiou hesitated. ‘Well, you know how it is.’

  ‘No, I don’t. Inform me.

  ‘Well, since the Pill, nobody worries much about that sort of thing. A lot of girls sleep around. Some sleep with their boyfriends when they feel like it. Some couples don’t really sleep together, but occasionally they slip. There aren’t many who never do.’

  ‘And these two?’

  ‘Occasionally they slipped.’

  ‘How do you know about this? Did Bréhard boast about it?’

  ‘Name of God, no! As a matter of fact, I don’t really know. I’m just assuming from the way they occasionally disappeared at parties. The way they went off together. That sort of thing. I may be quite wrong, of course.’

  ‘Why might you be quite wrong?’

  Padiou shrugged. ‘Well, Bernadette always had plenty of spirit.’

  ‘What sort of spirit?’

  ‘Well, she wasn’t cheap. Don’t get me wrong. But she liked to laugh, and why not? If there was a party, you could rely on her to make it go. But that’s all. She enjoyed company.’

  ‘Men’s company?’

  ‘Of course. And again, why not? But after she met René Bréhard, she belonged to him. It was clear to everybody. It didn’t change her but it was obvious she wasn’t interested in any other man.’

  ‘Before this meeting of her and Bréhard, had you ever – ?’

  ‘With Bernadette?’ Padiou looked shocked. ‘Never.’

  ‘Did you try?’

  Padiou smiled. ‘You’re not accusing me, are you?’

  ‘I’m merely trying to find out.’

  ‘Then, yes, I tried. A long time ago. But she wasn’t having any and I didn’t push the matter. If I’m given a firm no, that’s it. Most men are the same.’

  Returning to the office, Darcy produced the report on the De Wibaux killing.

  ‘She was found by a German student who has a room in the same house. Name of Wolfgang Schwendermann. He’s here on some sort of scholarship. He got up early to go jogging and when he came back he went to the broom cupboard because it was his day to sweep the stairs – they take turns, it seems – and found her there. We decided she’d been placed there after she’d been killed. Schwendermann called the Police straight away.’

  ‘Time?’

  ‘Doc Minet thinks she was killed somewhere between 11 p.m. and 1 a.m. but he can’t be more exact. The girl who shared a flat with her says she hadn’t arrived home when she herself fell asleep and the next morning she was awakened by the noise in the hall when the body was found.’ Darcy frowned. ‘There’s one curious thing, Patron. It isn’t in the report because it doesn’t seem to have any connection, but you ought to know. At five minutes after midnight someone rang the Hôtel de Police. The man on the switchboard logged the message so the time’s exact. There was some muttering he couldn’t distinguish, then the words “Les Français maudits”. Then he rang off.’

  ‘“The cursed French?” That all?’

  ‘That’s all, Patron. It might not mean a damn’ thing, of course, because there are always nutters ringing up and abusing us. Types we’ve sent down. Types we’ve leaned on. Relations of types we’ve sent down or leaned on. It happens all the time. But it seemed curious that it should happen around the time when the De Wibaux girl was killed, so I haven’t forgotten it.’

  ‘Nothing to identify the caller?’

  ‘Nothing. The words were just distinguishable. But it was from a callbox, the man on the board said. We can’t tell which, of course, but he did hear a church bell chime just before the call ended. The clock must have been wrong, though, because he had the time exactly. Midnight plus five minutes.’

  Darcy laid an extra folder down – ‘It’s all in there, Patron, just in case’ – and produced the belongings of the dead girl. They seemed almost identical to those of Bernadette Hamon. A little make-up. A few paper handkerchieves. A crumpled pack of cigarettes and a lighter. A paperback. Rather more money – two hundred and twenty francs, fifty-seven centimes. The rest might almost have come from Bernadette Hamon’s handbag. The only difference was that this time there was a letter. It was addressed to Marguerite de Wibaux and was clearly a love letter. Or at least, it was a suggestive letter masquerading as a love letter. It was signed with a single initial, F.

  ‘Who’s this F?’ Pel asked.

  ‘Guy who claims to be her fiancé,’ Darcy said. ‘Name of Frédéric Hélin. Another student. Postgraduate this time. Big guy. Studying European languages. Penniless and on a grant like the rest of them.’

  ‘Seen him?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What do you think?’

  ‘Wouldn’t trust him as far as I could throw a grand piano.’

  ‘Could he have done it?’

  ‘He has an alibi. He was out drinking with his pals. All postgraduates. All on grants. There are three of them to swear for him. Names: Aloïs Hayn, Jean-Pierre Jenet, Hubert Detoc.’

  ‘Can we believe them?’

  ‘I think we’ve got to believe three of them, Patron.’

  ‘We’d better go and see him. But first let’s have a look at the girl herself.’

  On the dead cheek were the same deep cuts, though this time the uprights were not parallel but drew together at the bottom and the cross stroke was uneven.

  ‘What’s he up to?’ Pel asked.

  ‘Branding them? Showing his mark? Didn’t the Ripper in London at the end of the last century do that?’

  ‘His brand mark was more grisly than this. And they were all prostitutes. This one looks like a W and her name’s De Wibaux.’

  ‘If he was indicating her name,’ Darcy pointed out, ‘then he must have known her. And if the other was an H then it means he knew the Hamon girl too.’

  ‘We’d better look for mutual acquaintances. Has she been formally identified?’

  ‘Yes. The parents are asking for the body. She seems to have been popular but that might be because she had a car and more money than most students. Father’s a successful doctor, which was why she was studying medicine, I suppose. I gather she was also due to inherit money from an aunt. She shared a flat with another girl. In that house in the Rue Devoin with the mansard roof that looks a bit like a Chinese pagoda. The rooms have been made into bed-sitters. She was surrounded by students. They had occasional parties and drinks. I expect they slipped into bed together occasionally – but no worse and no better than any others. If anything, better because I gather this one didn’t. Hélin – a Belgian from Chimay, just over the border from Mezières, by the way, which is probably how they came together – admits he was keen but she wouldn’t hear of it. I think it annoyed him.’

  ‘Is he available?’

  Darcy looked at his watch. ‘He’ll be in the Sputnik Bar near the Faculté des La
ngues about now. He seems to go there most days.’

  ‘How about this type who found her? Wolfgang Schwendermann, the German. Is it possible to speak to him?’

  ‘Oh, yes. He speaks French quite well. I’ve seen him twice already. Seems straightforward. Doesn’t drink. Very earnest. Hard worker. Doesn’t go around with other students much. Prefers to study. Locks himself in so he can’t be disturbed. He has a flat on the top floor of 69, Rue Devoin. The De Wibaux girl shared one on the ground floor.’

  ‘Right.’ Pel tossed away his cigarette and tried to fight off the need to light a fresh one. ‘While everybody’s busy here, let’s have a look at this place in the Rue Devoin. If the two murders are connected – and it seems they might be – we’ll tackle the De Wibaux one first. It might produce pointers leading to this new one.’

  As Darcy had said, Number 69, Rue Devoin did look a little like a Chinese pagoda. It had a mansard roof into which windows had been set, and the ground floor was wider than the rest of the building so that a small slate roof jutted out above it on either side. The first-floor windows lay just above them and the whole building had the look of a rather battered two-tiered wedding cake. It had been built at the turn of the century when the district had been more genteel, but now it had a shabby cramped look with a narrow driveway leading to a yard at the back where what had probably been a coach-house and stable alongside a low rear wall had been changed into a garage and a shelter for two or three mopeds.

  ‘The De Wibaux girl kept her car there,’ Darcy said. ‘Yellow Dyane. We’ve got it down at the back of headquarters. The Fingerprint and Lab. boys have been over it. We have their report.’

  There was also a lock-up brick-built shed which, judging by the pots of colour wash, paint, stepladders and the drum of white spirit that they could see through the window, had been let to a painter and decorator for the storage of his equipment.

  ‘Who does this stuff belong to?’ Pel asked.

  ‘Type called Roussel,’ Darcy said. ‘Self-employed. Does odd jobs. Pays rent to the owner of the house.’

  ‘And his name?’

  ‘Normand. Lucien Normand. The students pay for their rooms through the university and the university pays Normand. The university’s responsible for damage, repairs and so on. We checked both Normand and Roussel and we’ve had a man watching the place ever since De Wibaux was killed.’

  Wolfgang Schwendermann’s rooms were on the top floor. There was no concierge and the stairs had an unswept neglected look. Schwendermann was out and they found themselves enquiring at the room directly below. The door carried a chalked sign ‘Save the franc. Burn a bank for Christmas’, and the occupant was a dark-skinned strong-looking youngster whom they found clad in tracksuit trousers and a blue T-shirt bearing the deathless phrase, Le Jogging. He was sweating to a blaring radio over a set of weight-lifter’s weights and seemed to have recovered remarkably well from having a flatmate murdered on his doorstep.

  ‘Just getting a bit trimmed up,’ he explained. ‘Have to keep in shape. It’s every man’s duty to keep himself looking his best for the girls. It’s worth it, too, I find. I don’t have much trouble.’

  Darcy and Pel exchanged glances.

  ‘Moussia’s the name,’ the boy went on. ‘Nöel Moussia. Expect you’ll want to know all about me in view of what happened to Marguerite. Father’s an Algerian. Mother born there, too. The Old Man had to bolt from Algiers when De Gaulle and the army made a mess of things there and we became settlers here. Pieds noirs. Second-class citizens. After the Old Man served with the North African troops in Italy in 1944, too. He and my mother separated soon after I arrived on the scene. Makes you bitter.’ He grinned to indicate how little bitter he was. ‘I visited Algeria once to see what I was missing. I decided it wasn’t much.’

  ‘Wolfgang Schwendermann,’ Pel prompted.

  ‘Wolfi? Never in at this time of day. Have to come at night to catch him. Great worker, Wolfi. Doing European languages. Attends all lectures. Never misses one. Always got his head in a book. If it’s not languages, it’s architecture. He’s nuts about architecture. Wants to be a diplomat. He ought to get a girlfriend, I reckon. They always say you learn a language best in bed.’

  ‘Did you know Marguerite de Wibaux?’

  ‘Of course. We all did.’ Moussia was on the floor now, face down, doing press-ups in a way that made Pel feel ill at the amount of energy they used. ‘She was all right. Father has plenty of money. Makes a difference, because most of us haven’t.’

  ‘How many of you live here?’

  ‘Eight most of the time. Two of the rooms are doubles and shared. The other four are singles. Two boys on each of the two top floors. Four girls on the ground floor. We all have kitchens – at least that’s what they’re called but they’re more like cupboards – and there’s a big kitchen at the back of the ground floor we can use if we have a party. Mostly we stack things we don’t want in there. Bathroom on each floor, and usually the boys’ bathrooms are full of girl because it’s obvious one bathroom between four dames isn’t half enough. Not bad rooms, though. Some better, but plenty worse. Fireplaces on the first two floors and stoves in the rooms up top. Sometimes we share for studying to save fuel bills.’

  ‘What about the other occupants? Exactly which rooms do they occupy?’

  Moussia was now resting on his right hand, his arm and body stiff, and was lifting his left leg up and down. ‘Up top, above me,’ he said, ‘Wolfi Schwendermann. Other side, Louis Sergent. This floor, me and Antonio Aduraz – known as Tonino. He’s Spanish. Ground floor, four girls. Below me, Marguerite and the girl she shared with, Annie Joulier, who’s Swiss. Across the landing, under Aduraz, Teresa Sangalli, who’s Italian, and Marina Lorans. That’s the lot.’

  ‘There are a lot of foreigners.’

  ‘This is a good university for languages. Easy to get by train to Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Luxembourg and the Low Countries and with cheap student travel we take full advantage of it. They call this house the United Nations. We like it and we get on.’

  Pel had listened quietly without interrupting. Finally he spoke.

  ‘Marguerite de Wibaux was killed in the entrance hall of this house at around 11.30 on the night of the 3rd. Were you in your room at the time?’

  ‘Yes, I was. I hadn’t any money so I had to be.’

  ‘Any proof?’

  ‘You can ask Schwendermann. He banged on the floor around that time. He complains about the noise I make exercising.’

  ‘So he was in his room, too.’

  ‘Upstairs the whole time. Heard him moving about and heard his record player belting out. He likes to play Beethoven while he’s studying. We all have our methods. I do press-ups with the radio going and the book under my nose.’

  ‘Did you hear anyone come in?’

  ‘No. Though sometimes this place’s like the Place de la Concorde with the traffic. People visiting. That sort of thing. We have parties from time to time.’

  ‘At which everybody in the building appears?’

  ‘Not Wolfi.’

  ‘Why not him?’

  ‘Always too busy. Came once but it got a bit lively and one of the girls got sloshed and started taking off her clothes and making a set at him. Some type had spiked her glass of wine. It was a riot. Talk about laugh. Old Wolfi left in a hurry. Embarrassed. An innocent, that one. Told me next day he had too much to do to get involved with that sort of thing. No father. Mother starving. Has to get a good job to support her. Always telling us. You know the song and dance. Mother always telling him never to bring trouble home so he tries not to.’

  ‘How about you?’

  Moussia stopped dead. He looked surprised. ‘How about me what?’

  ‘Have you ever brought trouble home?’

  Moussia turned on to his back and tried to touch the floor beyond his head with his toes. His face red, he looked up at Pel from beneath his knees.

  ‘No, I haven’t. I’m a good boy. Like Wolfi. Only
more intelligent. We didn’t do it. He heard me and I heard him. Moving about. Radio going. Besides, if he’d gone out I’d have heard him on the stairs. This is an old house and, like the floorboards, they squeak like banshees. No secrets from each other here.’ Moussia grinned. ‘For instance, I know – and I expect everybody else does – that Annie Joulier sneaks occasionally up to Tonino Aduraz’s room. We can tell from the stairs. Mind, they creak less for a girl. He also sometimes slipped down to share her bed when Marguerite was away, and she often was because she could afford it.’ The grin came again. ‘Some of us are living in sin, though most of us are too tired with studying to get much fun out of it.’

  With a last contortion, he climbed to his feet and, looking at his watch, began to fish into a drawer for the blouse of his tracksuit.

  ‘Ever heard the name Bernadette Hamon?’ Pel asked.

  Moussia stopped dead and his head jerked up quickly. ‘Who’s she?’

  ‘A girl.’

  ‘Student?’

  ‘A nurse.’

  ‘Where does she come into it?’

  Pel didn’t answer and Moussia began struggling into the blouse. ‘If you want Wolfi,’ he said, ‘you’ll find him eating in the Amphitryon. Corner table by the door. Like clockwork. Same time, same place every day. Very organised. As for me, must dash. Due to play netball and I’m late.’

  Shooting out of the room, he left them feeling as if they’d just come in out of a high wind.

  Darcy looked at Pel. ‘Think he was involved?’ he asked.

  Pel drew a deep breath. It felt like the first since they’d met Moussia. ‘I shouldn’t think he ever had time,’ he said.

  Four

  As they’d been told, they found Schwendermann in the Amphitryon, a small restaurant in the Rue Ecaries, frequented by students and university staff. Taking no chances, they had recruited De Troq’, who spoke German fluently, but it turned out that he wasn’t needed because Schwendermann spoke reasonable French. As Moussia had said he would be, he was sitting at a corner table, a large fat boy with a volume of Racine propped up in front of him. He had finished his meal and was drinking coffee, and he looked up through thick glasses as they stopped at his table.