The Painted Face

by Jean Stubbs

  He trod gingerly over the little rugs, and settled himself on the extreme edge of an armchair.

  ‘That is good. Valentine! Coffee for m’sieu, and please to take his hat. Croissants? No? You have eaten? You are the early bird? You admire my room? Do not fear to look round you?’

  ‘Very pretty,’ said Lintott lamely.

  Natalie buttered her croissants with a generous hand, poured more cream into her coffee. In the soft light, filtered through pale amber flounces and hangings, she was the picture of opulent youth. He was relieved to see her fully, though seductively, clad in an embroidered satin bed-jacket. The length and richness of her unbound hair worried him slightly, but her perfect composure enabled him to concentrate on the job in hand.

  ‘I wouldn’t have bothered you madame,’ he began slowly, ‘but this is a matter of considerable importance.’

  ‘Here is your coffee. Please to enjoy it, and then tell me of the importance. You wish Valentine to stay, so that we are respectable?’

  ‘No, that’s all right,’ said Lintott, surveying the girl with compassion.

  Even the most masterly dreamer is hampered by pregnancy. Valentine’s distorted shape, the hopelessness in her bearing, saddened him. Again he imagined her as she might have been, in happier circumstances, in full possession of mind and body, and the resemblance was there.

  ‘She couldn’t help me, anyway,’ Lintott continued, as the door closed. He cleared his throat. ‘Mr Carradine told me that you found her in an orphanage. Would you mind telling me the name of it, madame?’ And as she frowned slightly, he guessed she feared some revelation perhaps unknown to him, and would evade the point.

  ‘Was it the Orphelinat Barnabas?’

  ‘But how clever. I have forgot.’

  ‘In a matter of six years, madame? How did you come to hear of this orphanage, and why choose Miss Valentine in particular?’

  ‘Somebody tells me. I forget. I go there, and I see her. I am sad for her. I give her a good home.’

  ‘Very charitable. What can you tell me about Miss Valentine? Who were her parents and so forth?’

  ‘You wish to know only of Valentine?’

  For the moment, Lintott thought, alerted by the word only, and nodded.

  ‘The nuns take her in. They are kind but dull. It is very dull at the orphelinat.’

  ‘Well, it’s a far cry from here and no mistake. Still, she didn’t get in the family way there — didn’t have a baby — did she? No babies, madame!’ As Natalie wrinkled her forehead in puzzlement.

  ‘Of course no baby, m’sieu. There are no men there.’

  ‘How old is Valentine, madame?’

  Natalie calculated, and exclaimed.

  ‘But I think of her as a child always. She is twenty-six years.’

  His throat was thick. ‘How old was she when the nuns took her in, do you know?’

  ‘I am not certain. Quite young. You do not ask how old I am — I shall not tell you, m’sieu,’ roguish, and yet wary.

  He changed the subject, resolving to return to it another way. He saw a long trek ahead of him to the orphanage, otherwise.

  ‘You seem to be the sort of lady that takes care of everybody, madame. Mr Carradine said your own parents had died early and you took care of your sister...’

  She was on him, framing her suspicions that were not his.

  ‘M. Carradine has ask you to say this to me, yes? I tell Claire a thousand times. He will not marry with her. He wishes an excuse not to marry.’

  Confounded, Lintott said soothingly, ‘Now why shouldn’t he, madame? He knows your situation, and that didn’t put him off.’ He decided this was hardly tactful, but she did not heed him, pursuing her own course.

  ‘Of course he must know, but not yet. I tell Claire not to say yet, to wait. But he is clever, our M. Carradine. He smells the mouse, and you, m’sieu, are the cat!’

  Lost but dogged, Lintott said, ‘We may as well straighten matters out, madame. He had to know anyway, as you say. Better now than later. When did your parents die? And how did you manage to look after yourselves?’

  I said that girl had been on the French merry-go-round. I said!

  ‘I wish Valentine to take my tray and brush my hair.’

  ‘Half a minute, my dear. Never mind the hairdressing. No cwoifewer!’ as she glared at him. She pouted, but complied. ‘Just you tell me about your parents. Where did you live?’

  ‘They die when we are very young. I forget.’

  ‘You’ve got a bad memory, haven’t you, my dear?’ said Lintott, enjoying himself. ‘You must have lived somewhere. You couldn’t have sprung up full-grown in Paris — six years ago.’

  ‘Who tell you six years? Please to give me my brush, m’sieu. I brush my hair myself.’

  Obdurate, he padded over to the dressing-table and back, watched her draw the bristles through that rich fall of black hair, expressionless. He knew a liar and a prevaricator when he met one, and had she been Helen of Troy he would have wrung the truth from her. ‘Please to pass me a ribbon, m’sieu. It is by the mirror.’ He switched a lilac ribbon from the crystal tray full of scent bottles and pots of cosmetics, handed it to her. Sat back in the armchair, planted a square hand on each knee. Coquetry never moved him an inch.

  ‘Now look’ee here, Mrs Picard. Let’s not play games. There might be money for somebody, somewhere in this, if I get the truth. Nothing but the truth will fetch you a brass farthing — franc. Understand?’ Instantly, she was ten years older, shrewder, wiser. The ribbon taut in her fingers. Then she smiled, and adopted an air of guileless intimacy.

  ‘We are batardes, m’sieu. You comprehend me?’

  ‘I see. That’s a bit of a facer, isn’t it? It will surprise Mr Carradine, I mean. So where were you brought up?’

  ‘In the Orphelinat Barnabas, with Valentine, m’sieu.’

  Damn me, thought Lintott. I’ll be forgetting my head next! Valentine.

  ‘About Miss Valentine, madame. You say she’s twenty-six years old? You’re sure of that? It’s important, mind! Now how old was she when she came to the orphanage? Or did she come later than you, and you can’t remember? I must have the truth — don’t tell me a story as you think might please me, because it won’t!’

  Natalie’s dignity was immense. ‘I remember perfect, m’sieu. She is already there. She is found on the door-stair when she is a little baby. The nuns take her in from pity. Yes, yes, yes, I swear it.’ Nodding emphatically. ‘I fetch her birth-paper if you please?’

  Such relief, and such a terrible question-mark. For he must now pursue the hunch to its source, and God knew what half-witted creature he might find at the end of it.

  ‘I tell you another truth,’ said Natalie, heady with honesty. ‘Claire is the sister of my heart, but not of my blood. We do not meet until I am at the orphelinat during four years. But we are batardes.’

  ‘Well never mind,’ said Lintott heartily. ‘I don’t expect Mr Carradine’ll take much notice. He’s a Bohemian sort of gentleman. Now can you help me out with another matter, madame? Where’s this here orphanage situated?’

  ‘Ah! How well I remember. I am a woman of passion, m’sieu. I was a child of passion also. I am a mad when they bring me to this place. I am ill. My head hangs, so. I cannot weep, but my heart weeps. I lie many many days and do not speak. I have no one. I, who have everything until they carry me here. M’sieu, you have a nature of tenderness,’ appealing to the embarrassed Inspector, ‘you will know how a child of six years is griefed!’

  His face changed.

  ‘You were six years old when you entered the orphanage, madame? And ill? When was this? Who were your parents? Can you remember them?’

  Oh my Gawd! This is worse than Miss Valentine. She’d milk him dry and penniless.

  Natalie was far away, recollecting a time when she had no need to claw for a living.

  ‘My Papa is a good man, rich and kind. My Maman is beautiful. We live in a grand house, a chateau. I have a bonne d’e
nfants, a nurse. We are parted. I do not know how or why. They bring me to the orphelinat. I am desolated.’

  Lintott leaned forward, ‘How old are you, madame?’

  She recovered immediately. ‘I do not tell you, m’sieu. Never!’

  Lintott’s heart hammered, but he controlled himself, managed a little jocularity.

  ‘Shall I tell you how old you look?’ he asked, persuasive. ‘Not a day over twenty!’ She smiled, suddenly young again. ‘But you’re a few years older than that, aren’t you, my dear? Not that anyone would guess, of course. How old might that be? Twenty-five? Twenty-six?’ No answer, eyelashes lowered. ‘Here,’ said Lintott, troubled but fatherly, ‘write down the year you were born, on this piece of paper, and I’ll crumple it up the minute I’ve read it, and we’ll forget all about it.’

  Her fingers touched his deliberately, as she took the paper, but without effect. She passed it back, sighing.

  His heart thundered, faltered, leaped.

  ‘I’d never have believed it!’ he cried.

  Thirty. Thank God. Well, I’m not all that surprised, come to think!

  ‘Never would have believed it — and I call myself a detective.’

  1872 disappeared into a small white ball and was deposited in her lap. She touched it tentatively, as though the scrap of paper were time itself.

  ‘How come you and Miss Claire are both called Picard, then?’ he asked.

  ‘It is the name of the people who look after me, when the Count, my father cannot admission to me. They are good people, but they die when I am six. I go to the orphanage. I am desolée!’

  ‘The Count wasn’t Miss Claire’s father, of course,’ said Lintott, amused, ‘but I dare say she was related to the aristocracy, too, wasn’t she?’

  Never. A couple of by-blows if ever I saw a pair!

  ‘Oh no, m’sieu. Claire is not of good family. She have no name! My name is Picard, because of the good people who adopt me. The nuns give her a name — Marie-Claire. I am sorry for her. I ask them that they call her Picard. We must have some name, m’sieu, to face the world. But you do not tell this to M. Roche? I say we are unlegitimated daughters of the Count. If he knows she is not my sister he is enraged. He have kept her for six years!’

  ‘Now, now, now,’ Lintott soothed. ‘I’ve never met the gentleman, and I’m not likely to, and it’s not my business. I shan’t breathe a word, madame.’ He set down his coffee cup and relieved her of the tray. ‘Now if you can tell me where this orphanage is, madame — because I’ll have to go there — I’ll be obliged.’

  ‘But why do you go?’ Fearing further revelations. ‘Have M. Carradine ask you?’

  ‘It ain’t very nice to play tricks,’ said Lintott honestly, ‘and I’m sorry it was the only way I could find out about Miss Valentine. Mr Carradine never said anything about Miss Claire, and I don’t think he’ll give a rap anyway — probably just give me a dirty look! So I don’t care fourpence about you and your sister, I’m on the track of a blooming ghost — a — a — phantom.’

  ‘Phantome? Pff! You are mad!’

  ‘Very likely. I’m looking for a little girl as might not exist. If she does exist, then she was probably travelling with Sister Bernadette on her way to your orphanage, in 1882. You remember Sister Bernadette, I expect?’

  ‘But yes!’ Slowly. ‘She is a good woman. Kind, even to me that they call the bad one! She dies. We have a service commemorative. I weep, m’sieu. Before, with the others, I do not weep.’ Suspicion again. ‘Why?’

  ‘Did they tell you how she died, madame?’

  ‘No. Just she dies. She is good, she goes to — to...’ Natalie pointed heavenwards. ‘But there is a child, m’sieu,’ warily, ‘and she is no phantome. Sister Bernadette goes to bring her, but does not return. Much more late they bring the child, and she is ill…’

  Lintott cried, in his excitement and apprehension, ‘Is she an orphan, a bit soft in the head, mad, deranged? About six years old? Lost her memory? Doesn’t know her name?’

  Natalie stared at him long and coolly.

  ‘She is not mad, m’sieu. She is shock. She have been treated bad. She does not lose her memory. She have no memory to lose. No name. She is call L’Inconnue — the one who is not known.’

  ‘Will she still be there, do you think?’ cried Lintott. ‘Will they be able to tell me where she is, if not?’

  He was half out of his chair, ready to leave at once. Natalie watched him bitterly. When she answered him her tone was hard and dry. She looked every day of her age.

  ‘I save you a long journey, m’sieu. The child is my Claire.’

  Lintott sat suddenly down again, cold.

  ‘I tell you, m’sieu, that she is une batarde, of no good family. I now save you and M. Carradine much time, much money. Do not trouble to ask of her Maman, her Papa. No person have heard of them. In the village they shout rude, they throw stones. She live with the priest until they say she is his child. Then he ask the orphelinat to have her, to make her happy. Do you suffer like this?’ she cried fiercely. She mistook his silence for shame and attacked him with words. ‘And Claire is not six years when she come, she is eight years. Addition that for your curious M. Carradine, Inspecteur! I say she is twenty-two years? Well, I lie! She is twenty-eight years. Ah! but how clever you are to discover these things of her, to pretend to talk of Valentine, of me. And so? Let M. Carradine discard her like a rubbish person. I take her back, m’sieu.’ Her eyes filled with tears that were both angry and honest. ‘I love her if he does not love her. She have her sister of the heart, for always. She find a man more better than your rubbish M. Carradine...’

  ‘Here, half a minute, madame. Let me get a word in ... will you please? ... shut up, will you?’ Lintott commanded.

  She was instantly quiet. She smoothed the coverlet, resigned.

  ‘Will you please listen to me, just for a bit, madame?’ he asked gently. ‘You’ve got hold of the wrong end of the stick. And the right end’s a damn sight worse!’ he added to himself. ‘Nobody cares about Miss Claire being an orphan, or anything else. What worries me is that she might be Mr Carradine’s sister. Now are you with me?’

  ‘Continuez, m’sieu.’ Immediately calm, intent.

  ‘Sister Bernadette was killed in the train accident that killed Mr Carradine’s sister. She was in the same carriage, and so was this orphan. You say Miss Claire was eight? Well, an under-nourished child of eight would be about the same size as a well-nourished child of six. Am I speaking plain enough? You understand what I’m driving at? Now the only means of identification was by a gold bracelet, on the right wrist ... on the right wrist,’ he said in a lower tone. ‘Now there’s just a chance that these two little girls got talking, and trying things on. The orphan was flung clear — anyway, she was saved. Now suppose it wasn’t the orphan, but Miss Odette — along of the orphan having her bracelet on?’

  Natalie considered. ‘Have you seen how an orphan is dress, m’sieu? Like to poverty? Your Miss Odette has fine clothes.’

  ‘Have you ever seen a bad railway accident, madame, and how folks look when they’re fetched out of it? There’s not tuppence to put between any of ’em!’

  ‘But you do not know, m’sieu? You guess clever, but you do not know?’

  Lintott spread his arms, and subsided. ‘No, I don’t know, madame. But my nose don’t half twitch.’

  ‘How shall you discover this?’

  Lintott said, ‘She might remember something as’d tie up with being Miss Odette.’

  Natalie laughed, but without her usual robustness, and shrugged.

  ‘We orphans can all remember a rich Papa, a beautiful Maman, a grand house, m’sieu. What else have we? We are nothing if we do not dream. I too,’ she admitted. ‘I am honest with you, m’sieu. The Count is not my father. I am not line batarde of good originations. I am the daughter of M. and Madame Picard. My father sells the fish. But I am rather the batarde noble than the fish-daughter!’

  Human nature, Lint
ott mused.

  ‘This is strictly between us, madame,’ he remarked with gallantry. ‘It won’t go any further, you may be sure.’

  ‘What shall you do, m’sieu? You shall break her heart?’

  ‘I’ll just have to find out what I can, as best I can. I don’t expect Mr Carradine will be exactly joyful, neither,’ he replied slowly. ‘He seemed to think quite a bit of Miss Picard. I’ll not be troubling you any further, madame. Thank you kindly.’ He drew a deep breath that was more a sigh. ‘I don’t always like what I have to do, but it’s my job, you see. It’s my job.’

  She surveyed him with understanding and some pity, but her real concern was for Claire. ‘And if she is his sister, m’sieu,’ and she crossed herself, for though she was an erring Catholic she was still a Catholic, and this was mortal sin, ‘what shall she do?’

  ‘Mr Carradine will see her right for money, of course,’ he offered. ‘She won’t go short of money.’

  ‘Oh m’sieu, m’sieu, m’sieu! Say such things of me — but not of her.’

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Lintott had telegraphed simply, I THINK MISS ODETTE MAY BE ALIVE, and with Natalie’s help reached London on the Friday evening. He took a cab straight to Carradine’s house. The peace of the London square made him feel doubly an intruder. He guessed that each of the two people he came to shatter thought they had reached the end of a long road. It was his duty to inform them of another turning.

  Carradine himself, hearing the engine throbbing as Lintott fumbled for change, flung open the door. Close behind him came Claire, anxious to miss nothing, and behind her hovered Mrs Tilling, intrigued and curious.

  ‘Welcome home, Inspector!’ cried Carradine heartily, running down the steps. His eyes searched Lintott’s keenly, his eyebrows registered a question.

  ‘I’d like a word privately, if you please, sir,’ said the Inspector, nodding at the ladies, and followed Carradine into the study. He stood at the window, hands clasped behind his back. ‘I’m afraid that what I’ve got to say will come as a shock to you, sir, and I’m sorry for it.’

  Carradine sat in his father’s swivel chair and surveyed the instrument of his destruction. ‘What’s wrong?’ he asked, colourless.