by Anna Lord
“Not if Monsieur Davidov has anything to do with it.”
“You think he is in love with her too?”
“I think he will not like losing his star performer.”
“In light of that it would be just the trick to pose a dead body outside Café Bistro to frame the brothers as the inspector suggested earlier? I suspect Davidov harbours a violent streak that erupts when his wishes go unmet.”
“That’s an interesting theory, mon ami. And although he’s not strong enough to have hoisted a dead body up to a lamp-post or a tree or over a balcony railing or heaved one onto a grave or dragged one from an alleyway onto a café stool, if he had help...”
He was nodding in the dark. “Yes, yes, I see what you’re getting at. If he had a strong man to help him...”
“And perhaps another who was adept with a knife…”
“Plus a clown to add some grotesque theatricality to the scene.”
She tried to picture the temperamental director and the three circassiens in the act of mutilating corpses. “No, no, all that brutality just to stop Mademoiselle Kiki marrying? It is too far-fetched. There have been five murders not just one. We cannot ignore the first four. Why commit such vicious crimes against four elderly and respectable men and a helpless old lady? And the tags have to mean something. Fact must fit theory.”
“What if the three circus men don’t want the Grand Guignol to fold either,” he persisted, unwilling to let go of his pet theory now that he had hit on a likely set of murderers so early in the piece. “The show has only been running for a month and it is wildly popular and Mademoiselle Kiki seems to be the draw-card. And with the Paris Fair next year the sky is the limit as far as world-wide fame is concerned, not to mention financial success. Davidov would be furious if it folded now. He would probably lose a fortune. We should mention his name to Inspector de Guise at the first opportunity.”
“You’re right,” she conceded reluctantly. “If we could link him to something tangible it would be better, but at least he’s Slavic. Your mingling paid off, mon ami. You have done well.”
He was grateful she could not see his modest cheeks immodestly glowing in the dark. “There’s one more thing but it no longer seems important. I met the elusive playwright on the balcony when I stepped out for a cigarette.”
“Raoul?”
“Yes, Raoul Crespigny. He was hiding from Davidov.”
“Because the director wants him to do a re-write? What’s so bad about that?”
“Nothing that I can see. Every writer worth his salt does re-writes. And since he is churning out three horror plays and five comedy sketches every week there is every possibility of needing to revise first drafts. I cannot understand his reluctance and yet he seemed terrified. Although,” he paused and checked himself, “although, I got the distinct impression he has noticed the link between the murder that happened on the third of November and the fact his first play was staged on the same date.”
“That brings us back to Davidov. I wonder if the director forced Raoul to do a re-write that then played into his own murderous Russian hands? I wonder if that has been the pattern all along? I must speak to Raoul to confirm Davidov’s part in this. What does Raoul look like?”
“It was dark on the balcony so it was hard to tell but put it this way – if Davidov is a Russian bear then Raoul is a raffish kitten. He is lean and wiry and as nervy as a cat. He wears glasses with round metal frames.”
“Is he still on the balcony?”
“Well, that’s the thing. I turned my back and he disappeared. I think he might have leapt onto a parapet when he heard someone coming out to join us. I think he might be hiding in one of the bedrooms.” He turned his face to the door. “What’s that noise?”
“La Noire has started singing. You go out first. I will follow in few moments. I want a moment to order my thoughts.”
Alone with her thoughts in the quiet dark, trying to make sense of senseless death, the Countess suddenly sensed she was not alone. The sensation came gradually. Perhaps a barely-there breath, perhaps a gentle rustle, perhaps a subtle shift, but she was certain there was someone else in the cloak room. They had been there all along. Listening to every word. She struck a lucifer and lit two cigarettes from the same match.
“Would you care for a cigarette, Monsieur Crespigny?”
Chapter 6 - Anonymous
Two kittenish eyes glowed red as a raffish wraith emerged from the back of the closet and reluctantly accepted the cigarette. Confusion echoed in the shaky voice. “Who are you?”
“Countess Volodymyrovna.”
“Russian? Are you related to Davidov?”
“Ukrainian. I’m not related to anyone you know.”
The nervy young man continued to shake his head. “I don’t understand. What are you doing here? Why are you discussing the murders, the theatre…What has it got to do with you?”
“I’m helping Inspector de Guise of the Sûreté Nationale.”
“And your friend – Dr Watson?”
“He is helping too. Let’s go someplace else to talk. Guests might start collecting their mantles shortly and we don’t want to be interrupted. Do you know what the next room along is?”
“It’s Casimir’s private study.”
“Casimir?”
“The librarian – Monsieur Radzival.”
“Suivez-moi.”
The private study of Monsieur Casimir Radzival was an irregular shaped room dominated by a large secretaire built like a bookcase with plentiful drawers for storage and an overhead cupboard fronted by two mirror-glass doors. A small window reflected in the mirrored panels would have provided a view over the tops of some trees in the daytime. Numerous armoires of varying sizes ranged around the perimeter but there was only one chair for sitting. Visitors were not invited into this private study. It was a busy room but not untidy, a place for reading, writing, cataloguing information, and doing research. Books were stacked up straight like sentries on duty. A novel by Zola lay on the turned-down lid of the secretaire. On it stood a heavy glass paperweight of the Eiffel Tower.
The Countess waited until the door was fully closed before instructing the playwright to adjust the gasolier so that she could better observe the young man who held the key to the macabre murders that had convinced them to detour to Paris.
Confirmation that Davidov forced the playwright to alter his scripts would be all the evidence they needed. A charge accusing Davidov of personally changing the scripts each month would be enough to incarcerate the Russian. Monsieur Crespigny was clearly nervous, his hands were trembling. He adjusted the little flame on the gasolier up and down several times until he steadied and felt satisfied it was neither too bright nor too gloomy. Did he already comprehend the seriousness of events or was his fear indicative of his involvement in the nefarious business?
She indicated for him to sit down on the chair lest his legs give way while she perched herself lightly on a corner of the secretaire.
“Your first three plays for le Cirque du Grand Guignol were staged on the third of November?”
Agitated and helpless, he looked around the room for an ashtray, as if stalling for time. She located one nestling in a boxy compartment of the secretaire. It was as clean as a whistle and so was the paper bin.
“Why should I answer your question?”
She intuited the worm had grown a backbone and got her back up too. “Because if you choose not to I will summon Inspector de Guise and you can answer my question plus several others at the Quai des Orfevres.”
“Since when did the Sûreté employ women?”
“I am a consulting detective.”
“Like Vidocq?”
“More like Sherlock Holmes but prettier.”
Despite his anxiety, he burst out laughing and it lightened the tension. “Very well, in answer to your question – yes.”
“You wrote all three plays?”
Not entirely sure if he should answer or not, he nodded as he i
nhaled and continued nodding until he exhaled; he looked like an automaton; his head attached to a spring.
“And the comedy sketches?”
Again like an automaton, he shook his head. “They are done by Felix, Hilaire and Vincent. I don’t have anything to do with those.”
“On your opening night there was a murder in Montmartre. Are you aware of that?”
“I wasn’t aware at the time but I have since learned of it.”
“Who told you?”
“I read it in Le Libre Parole.”
“Did the murder strike you as unusual in any way?”
“If you mean by that did I notice it was similar to my play the answer is yes. In my play an abbess who is a nymphomaniac is gloriously violated by a group of bishops and then strung up on a lamp-post with a tag around her neck saying ‘rape me’. A rag and bone man obliges and then chops off her hands as she clasps them in prayer. The real murder took place on rue des Abbesses and though it was man who was strung up the matching details made me wonder.”
“Wonder?”
“I thought someone had been to the show and then committed the crime but that particular play was the last one for the night. It finished around midnight. The murder was committed earlier, sometime during the early part of the show.”
“How do you know?”
“I read it in Le Temps. They were asking for witnesses and listed the approximate time of the murder.”
“Are you anti-Semite?”
“What?”
“You read Le Libre Parole.”
He gave a careless dismissive shrug as he flicked ash into the ashtray. “Everyone reads that rag. It doesn’t mean anything. The caricatures are cruel but funny, though not as cruel or funny as the ones drawn by the Brotherhood of the Boldt.”
“They publish a newspaper?”
“Pamphlet - weekly.”
“Have you ever been to Café Bistro?”
“Of course I have been! The coffee is shit and the homemade vodka is like piss-on-fire but the conversation is grist to the mill for an avant-garde auteur.”
“Tell me about your second show on the tenth of November.”
“If you mean did I notice there was another murder that night the answer is yes, but again not straight away. I only realized it today when I read the newspaper this morning and then checked back copies of Le Temps. It didn’t take much to realize there was a murder each time we staged a new show. The tenth, seventeenth, twenty-fourth, and the premier day of December - last night.” He ignored the ashtray and flicked ash into the paper bin.
“You realized each murder was similar to one of your plays?”
“Yes, of course, a man strung up on a tree – ears hacked off, a woman dangling over her balcony - scalped, a man with his eyes gouged out and left on a grave, and last night a corpse sitting outside a café with his tongue cut out. That’s why you asked me if I had been to Café Bistro.”
“Yes.”
“Everyone in the show goes there. Kiki practically lives there. The Humboldts are in love with her.”
“Is she in love with them?”
“The cocotte is in love with love. She enjoys adulation and applause and all the attention.”
The Countess paused to draw breath, extinguishing her cigarette slowly, painstakingly, though it was only half burnt down. “Now, this is important. Who reads the scripts before the play is staged?”
He hesitated a moment. “Serge Davidov.”
“Anyone else?”
“No,” he said without hesitation. “I keep my room at the theatre locked. I had an ivory dip pen stolen when we first set up in rue Ballu. Since that time I have always locked my door.”
“And Monsieur Davidov?”
“He keeps the door to his little sitting room locked too. Plus he keeps the scripts in a locked chest. He doesn’t want anyone to see them or know what we will be performing until the night. We rehearse on what is called a closed set. Anticipation builds because of the secrecy. It is all part of the mystique and horror of le Cirque du Grand Guignol. Not knowing what will be performed is more shocking than knowing in advance and bracing for it.”
“What about costumes and props?”
“Everyone in the show decides for him or herself. They are all old hands. They have all been performing since they were children. They don’t have costumiers and such. They can order what they like as far as costumes and wigs go. Davidov doesn’t quibble about expenses. He wants to be more famous than the rue Chaptal gang. That’s another reason he is fanatical about secrecy. If our rivals got hold of a script and staged one of our plays before us there would be all hell to pay.”
“Our plays?”
“What?”
“You said our plays – as if it is a collective effort.”
He shifted uncomfortably and stared at his cigarette. “Well, it is collective. We all have a stake in the success of it. The scripts are just an outline. Davidov encourages everyone to ad lib. It makes it more real. That’s why the shows are so successful and audiences can come again and again to see the same show. No two shows are ever word for word identical. Just the general plot is followed.”
“I see. But do you see?”
“What?”
“If no one sees the script but Davidov, the five cast members and you, then one of you must be passing the information to the murderer.”
He leapt out of the chair, aghast; ash fell on the Turkey rug. “No! No!” he denied strenuously, using his shoe to obliterate the ash out of existence.
“You cannot destroy a fact simply by denying it.”
Weakly, he fell back into the chair and ground the butt of his cigarette into the ashtray before letting his head fall into his hands. “Do you think someone is passing the scripts onto our rivals so that they can ruin us?”
Again, she noticed he didn’t refer to the scripts as: my scripts. “To implicate you in murder?”
“Yes - oh, my God!”
He sounded like a man who had just experienced a shocking epiphany.
“What is it?” she pressed before he had time to collect himself.
He looked up slowly. The blood had drained from his face. The eyes seemed magnified behind the round glasses. “Our rivals are famous for staging crimes taken from police files, actual crimes that have happened. It just occurred to me, we are staging plays that will become crimes. Don’t you see,” he cried, horrified, “they are staging crimes; we are creating them! Don’t you see?” he implored desperately.
Struck by his damning summation, she began nodding in earnest. “It is the difference between Art imitating Life and Life imitating Art.”
“Yes, yes,” he groaned unhappily. “That’s it exactly.”
With her brain whirring, she began to pace the little room. “If what you have told me is true then it is unlikely to be Serge Davidov passing on the scripts. He would not wish to destroy his own theatre company. He would not wish to bring ruin upon himself. He has too much at stake. And I no longer suspect you, Monsieur Crespigny.”
“Oh, thank you very much,” he managed to croak miserably.
“That leaves the five cast members. It must be one of them, or perhaps several of them acting in concert.”
She caught his wretched reflection in the mirror of the desk door as she reached the end of the room and whirled round. He was raking his hands through his unkempt hair and his face looked even more bloodless than before, like a ghoul or vampire, one of the living dead. Rather than having more sympathy for him, however, it made her think he was hiding something.
“Is there something else you are not telling me? Whatever you are holding back will eventually come out and I guarantee Inspector de Guise will be merciless. These murders are heinous and the Sûreté will not rest until the killer is caught. If you attempt to withhold evidence things may go badly for you.”
Nervously, he glanced toward the door and swallowed hard. “Lock the door.”
She did as instructed and waited patien
tly for him to muster the courage to speak.
“I don’t write the scripts,” he said in a low dry voice.
She thought she might have misheard him. “Say that again.”
“I don’t actually write the scripts.”
“Who, then? Serge Davidov?”
The playwright shook his head, slowly at first and then emphatically. “No, no, at least I don’t think so. He thinks I write them because he is always on at me to make changes here and there. If he wrote them he would not be demanding alterations all the time. So it cannot be him. It is someone, well, someone anonymous.”
“Anonymous!”
She almost laughed out loud at the stunning revelation. Inspector de Guise was never going to believe this. The killer was writing his own script and handing it to le Cirque du Grand Guignol to be performed at exactly the same time as the crime was being committed. This was not merely a case of Art imitating Life or Life imitating Art. This was theatre dictating reality; the artist as master manipulator.
“Tell me what you know,” she said urgently, checking the small carriage clock on the desk. It was getting on for two o’clock in the morning. Voices and footsteps could be heard in the corridor. Guests were gathering their cloaks and saying their goodbyes. Dr Watson would be looking for her. He would soon grow worried.
Suddenly the door handle rattled.
“Who’s in there? Open up!”
The Countess lowered her voice to an imperative whisper. “We will have to continue this conversation tomorrow. Come to Des Ballerines on rue Bonaparte. Midday. Don’t be late.”
Fists pounded on the door. “Open up I say!”
Raoul Crespigny stood up, swayed lightly then fell back into the chair. He looked scared and sickly. The Countess unlocked the door and in burst Monsieur Radzival.
“What’s going on? This is my private study. You have no right to be in here. What are you doing?”
The Countess, thinking on her feet as usual, schooled her face into an image of grave concern. She glanced worriedly from the red-faced librarian to the white-faced playwright and back again. “I came across Monsieur Crespigny outside the cloak room. He was looking pale and unwell. I thought he might faint at any moment. Without ado, I naturally ushered him in here and was about to summon Dr Watson when you banged on the door.”
