All along the Champs-Élysées, right to the Arc de Triomphe, the last rays of the sun were caught among the naked branches of the chestnut trees. Kohler eased off on the accelerator. Hadn’t Louis marched down this avenue in the Armistice Day parade of 1919 and in every one of them since until the Defeat? Didn’t he love the view?
‘Hermann, hurry up!’
And never satisfied! ‘I thought you might need to see it.’
‘A last time? Don’t taunt a patriot. You know the view’s been spoiled.’
They passed the Hôtel Claridge whose belle-époque façade welcomed generals and holders of the Knight’s Cross, especially its U-boat captains. Vélos and vélos-taxis were everywhere, but there were more cars here, of course, for hadn’t the Occupier a love of the avenue too?
‘We’ll hit the Arcade together, Hermann. You into the Lido after those who try to avoid us, myself into the office.’
And so much for his having backup. He was out the door before the engine could be switched off. He was into the Arcade, moving through the foot-traffic. ‘Louis …’
‘Quit dawdling. This is Sûreté business.’
And hadn’t one of those been impersonated?
A café, a sugar-cake from that same belle époque, formed an island in the Arcade and even though this partner of his knew of it, Louis jabbed a finger that way and said, ‘An entrance to the Lido is in there,’ as he hit a glass-and-oak-panelled door with gilded lettering, went in and momentarily disappeared from view.
The Agence Vidocq.
‘St-Cyr, Sûreté, mademoiselle. Your director first and then a Monsieur … Come, come, Herr Hauptmann Detektiv Aufsichtsbeamter, since you don’t obey orders, what the hell was the bastard’s name?’
‘M. Flavien Garnier, Monsieur l’Inspecteur Principal.’
And given like a parrot or a mouse. ‘Well, mademoiselle?’
The girl at the desk behind the stand-up counter with its little bell in brass had wet herself. Embarrassment flushed the peaches-and-cream complexion under a delightfully made-up pair of the bluest eyes Kohler had ever seen.
‘Find your voice, mademoiselle, or I’ll find it for you.’
‘Louis …’
‘Colonel … Colonel Delaroche has gone to pick up Petit Bob. Monsieur Garnier is out on an investigation and not expected back until Monday at the earliest. Noontime, I think.’
A lie of course. Sweet of her though, to have tried, thought Kohler.
‘Messieurs Raymond and Quevillon are … are busy elsewhere.’
Another lie.
‘I’ll bet they are,’ breathed Louis. ‘I’ll just have a look around and then you can tell me everything I need to know. Hermann, put the lock on before going to find … What was his name, mademoiselle?’
‘Colonel Delaroche.’
‘Ah, bon, she’s recovered her voice, but before you go, I’d better ask her where this Petit Bob is?’
Blue eyes looked at what she’d been typing. She thought to take it out and hide it, then thought better of doing so. ‘The … the toilette pour chiens. Madame Mailloux. Chez Bénédicte. It’s …’
‘Just up the avenue, Hermann. It’s been years since I last had to stop in there. Say hello for me. If that doesn’t open that one’s trap, use your Gestapo clout.’
‘Giselle, Louis.’
‘We’ll find her. Don’t worry. Just be yourself. That’s what we need.’
Petit Bob was magnificent. Though gentle, he made some of the other dogs nervous. He didn’t like having his nails clipped in front of them but understood that it was required. Dutifully he held the left forepaw absolutely motionless. Gazing up at his master who stood by but didn’t have a hand on him, he gave that one such a sorrowful look, another half carrot stick was warranted.
Tall, suave, handsome, fifty-five to sixty, with deep brown eyes and immaculately trimmed silvery-grey hair and sideburns that served to emphasize the burnished, cleanly shaven cheeks and aristocratic countenance, Colonel Delaroche wore a knotted, mustard-yellow scarf and charcoal-black woollen cloak with the air and confidence of a thirty-year-old on the hustle circa the seventeenth siècle, but his words when they came were something else again. ‘It’s all right, Bob,’ he said, the tone carefully modulated. ‘There’s my soldier. The hind paws will soon be done and then we’ll go for a walk and when we come back, I’ll take you in and you can say hello to all the girls. Bénédicte loves you like I do. We’ll only be a moment more. Good, Bob. Brave, Bob. We can’t have nails curling in on themselves, now can we?’
The voice, definitely of the upper crust, patently ignored the fact they’d a visitor.
The ears were lovingly caressed, the jowls touched. Bag-drooped eyes, of exactly the same shade as his master’s, engendered an ever-mournful look. The short-haired coat, of black and tan, gleamed. The fine touches of white on Bob’s forepaws, chest and tip of the tail were the marks of an aristocrat. Four years old, maybe five, and absolutely b-e-a-utiful.
Hair dryers of the kind used by coiffeurs et coiffeuses were going full blast as two Schnauzers basked in post-bath warmth but eyed Bob with what could only be a cruel intent. A terrier, though being stripped and plucked, felt no differently. The poodle that was being given a designer hairdo watched them all, as girls in blue sarraux dutifully clipped, brushed, groomed and swept up the hair that even from here would have a market.
The blanket of a heavy cologne dampened everything but the sounds. ‘Kohler, Madame Mailloux. Kripo, Paris-Central.’
Copies of Pour Elle and L’Illustration were lowered out in the waiting room, for this … this Gestapo had deliberately left the curtained doorway open. ‘I’m too busy. Even such as yourself could not help but see this.’
The hair, dyed a wicked blonde, was piled in curls that might last the week out under the bedtime net if one didn’t toss and turn too much. The cheeks were of high colour under their rouge and powder, the lips vermillion, the eyes made up and of the swiftest, darkest grey.
‘Well?’ she demanded, tightening her grip on the clippers, a nail flying off.
‘Of course, but like yourself, time is short and the work just keeps piling up. We’ve another rape and murder to deal with.’
‘We?’ snapped Madame la patronne, heaving rounded shoulders as she gestured with both hands to indicate the crowd and stood as tall as himself and Delaroche. ‘Is it that you don’t know why there’s such a rush at this hour, Inspector? No girl or woman dares be out after dark, my clients, my girls and especially myself!’
‘Herr …’ began Delaroche only to think better of it as Bob questioningly lifted eyes to this intruder.
‘It’s Inspector.’
‘Certainly, but could you not hold off for a moment? Petit Bob is almost done.’
‘WE?’ demanded Madame Mailloux again while taking off a nail.
Empty Kripo eyes met hers. ‘My partner, Jean-Louis …’
‘St-Cyr.’ She let a breath escape. Had her number come up again? wondered Bénédicte. The years had slipped by, as they will. The winter of 1937 had been and gone, with him barging in here just like this ‘partner’ of his to demand answers to his infernal questions, but that had been after too many other years had passed, the salaud having arrested her for not having had a licence to walk the streets. ‘I heard he was in Lyon,’ she said.
‘A case of arson.’
‘And then in Vichy, was it?’ she hazarded. Everyone was listening, of course.
‘We get all the easy ones but that was later.’
‘And Alsace?’ she asked, pleasantly enough. ‘Colmar, was it not?’
The gossip had reached here. ‘That too.’
‘What is it you want?’ Even Miya Sama, the Pekingese warlord in Madame Jeséquel’s lap was listening.
‘A few small questions. Nothing difficult,’ said Kohler blithely. He’d fish about in his pockets and finally pull out the notebook detectives, Gestapo and otherwise, were supposed to fill with all those things that meant so much. ‘Ah, here it is. Registration number 375614.’
‘Lulu.’
The tears that welled up were genuine.
‘Madame de Brisac’s Lulu, Inspector. Have you found her? Never have I seen one so distressed. Every day the questions. Constant telephone calls to the Société Protectrice des Animaux to beg them not to put any Irish terriers down, especially since it is now long past the one-week period of grace. The Cimetière des Chiens has been contacted, a mausoleum designed by Lenoir, descendant of the architect Le Roman himself, the one who did the reconstructions at the Royal Abbey of Saint-Antoine-des-Champs in 1770. The stones have already been carved, the inscription done by a poet—I can’t remember which, but …’
‘No remains having been found, she waits in hope,’ said Herr Kohler. Petit Bob, Delaroche knew, was watching this Kripo with interest, having got his scent while licking detective fingers. Sugar … Had Kohler slipped Bob a few loose grains?
‘Oui, oui, it’s a tragedy,’ said Bénédicte. ‘Bedridden, Madame de Brisac depended on Lulu to brighten each day. Denise Rouget and Germaine de Brisac, Madame’s daughter, are constantly on the lookout, but each day brings only its new disappointments and what is one to do when a love such as that is so deep no other dog could ever take her place?’
‘Bedridden?’
‘Cancer. The lungs. The cigarettes. Have you found … ?’
‘Rouget … ? Haven’t I heard that name before?’
‘You must have.’
‘And Germaine de Brisac? Is she also a social worker?’
‘That I wouldn’t know, Inspector.’
‘But you’re sure of it?’
No answer was needed and none would be given!
‘Then just tell me from where Lulu was snatched and when.’
‘Kohler, if you don’t mind, I’ll take Bob and leave.’
‘I do mind, Colonel. Stay put. When I’m finished with this one, I’ll deal with you.’
The Cimetière des Chiens, that private last stamping ground of dogs and other pets, was on the Île de la Recette (the “takings”) in the Seine. Tombs and mausoleums, rows of little headstones, wreaths of artificial flowers in winter and more than twenty thousand graves at last count**** but formerly the island home of those who had been paid a pittance to drag corpses from the river.
‘Lulu had just been given a tidy up, Inspector. Three times a week. The Monday, after her walk in the park …’
‘Which park?’
‘The Monceau, of course, so that Madame de Brisac might hear her cries of joy and catch glimpses of her from the bedroom window.’
‘Continue.’
‘Then Thursday, the school holiday—that is when the Mademoiselle de Brisac’s children are home and could play longer in the park with Lulu, sometimes even letting her have a run.’
The park warden and his underwardens wouldn’t have liked that, French parks being what they were. ‘Not married?’
‘The husband was killed during the invasion.’
‘The daughter taking back her maiden name?’
‘They were to have been divorced.’
‘Wasn’t divorce almost as hard to come by under the Third Republic?’
This one was like a barracuda after its dinner! ‘There were family problems. Perhaps the husband wasn’t suitable. Who am I to …’
‘Husband fooling around on her?’
‘I didn’t say that, Inspector.’
‘Kohler …’
‘Be quiet, Colonel. And on Saturday?’
‘Lulu came for the bath and the grooming so as to look her best for Mass, and then …’
‘Her Sunday run in the park.’
‘Oui.’ He would tell her nothing of Lulu.
‘And on which Saturday was she snatched from the park?’
It would have to be said. ‘She wasn’t. Mademoiselle Germaine de Brisac, coming straight from work, had the car, of course, and had put Lulu safely into the backseat. Mademoiselle Rouget had gone into the Lido to see if her dear papa was spending the evening at home and would like a lift.’
And nicely put. ‘Time five twenty or six?’
‘Six thirty.’
‘And Lulu was taken from the car when Germaine de Brisac went to find Denise Rouget in the Lido?’
Dieu merci, he hadn’t asked her the reason for such a delay, which could only mean that he’d find out elsewhere. ‘That … that is correct. Monday, the eleventh of January. It was bitterly cold. I … I went out with my torch to wrap the shawl I always wear at such times around Lulu so that she wouldn’t catch a chill.’
‘Shawl taken?’
‘I had clients to attend to. Lulu was safe. I swear it. I shut the car door and checked to see that it was secure as always.’
‘Describe the shawl. One never knows.’
Must he sigh like that? she wondered.
‘Kohler …’
‘Be patient, Colonel. Take a leaf from Petit Bob. Listen, since it can’t be helped, but don’t make a sound. Have a half a carrot stick and give him the other half. He’s earned it.’
‘I can’t. They make his stools loose.’
‘And that troubles him, doesn’t it?’
‘As much as it does those who might inadvertently step in them.’
Petit Bob looked questioningly from one to the other but grâce à Dieu, he hadn’t let out a moan. ‘Inspector, the shawl was of hand-woven wool. Russet, crimson and gold, the colours of a Canadian autumn, for the man who gave it to me when I was a girl of seventeen, was one of those and French too. There was a brooch of my mother’s, a shield in silver with the cabochons of banded ironstone like one of my rings. This one.’
A real knuckle-duster. ‘Louis and I’ll see what we can do. Dog snatching at about six thirty, Monday, January eleventh. That right?’
Serpent! she said silently, sucking in a breath as he wrote it all down. ‘Oui, c’est correct.’
‘And Denise Rouget and Germaine de Brisac went to school together?’
Why could he not understand that one had to be so careful these days, that everyone was listening as they watched and that among them were those who would quite willingly, if encouraged, write damning letters to the authorities while hiding behind the innocence of anonymity? ‘I did not say that, Inspector. It’s not my practice, or that of any of my girls, to divulge information of any kind about my clients even to such as yourself, but since you demand it before reliable witnesses, then, yes, they did.’
‘The bac and after that the Sorbonne or whatever?’
‘Those, too, of course.’
‘Kohler …’
‘Now it’s your turn, Colonel, but let’s go into the Lido so that Petit Bob can say hello to all the girls and you can buy me an apéritif.’
* * *
To the muted sounds from the Arcade came the urgency of someone’s trying the door to the Agence Vidocq. Was it Monsieur Raymond or Monsieur Quevillon? wondered Suzette Dunand. Chief Inspector St-Cyr was still perusing the papers in his hand. Monsieur Garnier would have shaken the doorknob and then banged a fist against the door. He would have silently cursed her, thinking that she had left before the 7.00 p.m. closing, a thing she had never done but now that door was no longer being tried, now the steps were receding, and why was it, please, that Colonel Delaroche wouldn’t allow any of his agents privés to have a key, even the most trusted of them?
Monsieur Raymond had tried that door—it must have been him, she decided: M. Jeannot Raymond who had been with the colonel since the very beginning and well before the Defeat. Though he seldom smiled, M. Raymond always saved the best of those for her but never tried to get too close. Not once. He wasn’t like M. Hubert Quevillon who always knew the nearness of himself filled her with revulsion but that she would have to tolerate it in silence.
M. Quevillon enjoyed her despair. Secretly he laughed at her—she knew he did, whereas M. Flavien Garnier could as easily have had one of his ‘fifty-year-old boots’ behind this machine for all the attention he paid to her.
‘Inspector …’
‘A moment, Mademoiselle Dunand.’
‘Have you the magistrate’s order?’
‘At your age it’s hard to put force into such words. I wouldn’t try, if I were you.’
She coloured—could feel her cheeks getting hot again. ‘I HAVE A RIGHT TO DEMAND THAT YOU SHOW ME THE SEARCH WARRANT! I MUST GO AND CLEAN MYSELF UP!’
‘In a moment.’
Salaud, she winced. Tears would streak her mascara—Well, let them! He knew she had peed herself. He must know she was but the latest of the secretaries the colonel had employed, the fifth in the past two-and-a-half years of this Occupation, and that she desperately needed to keep the job or else the STO would come and take her away to Germany to work in a munitions factory and she’d be blasted to pieces by the bombs of the British RAF. Hadn’t that been what M. Hubert Quevillon had whispered into her ear the last time he had caught her alone and found her cringing at the nearness of him? Wasn’t that why so many other girls had left the agency?
Or was it, perhaps, that Colonel Abélard-Armand Delaroche had let each one go before she had found out too much?
‘This statement of invoice, mademoiselle.’
He had yanked it from the machine. Stricken, she had stiffened and he had noticed this, as he did everything.
‘It … it is simply Madame de Roussy’s account. On the fifteenth of every month she is …’
‘Oui, oui, but …’
‘But what, Inspector?’
‘Twenty-five thousand francs? For what, please?’
‘I only do as I’m told. Here … here is the invoice in pencil, as Colonel Delaroche has written it for me to type up.’
‘The investigation is continuing?’
‘I … I think so, yes. I …’
He’d say nothing of the rue La Boétie killing, decided St-Cyr. He’d try to calm her but only a little. ‘You really don’t know what it’s all about, do you? Ah, bon, relax. Forgive me, too. You see, my partner and myself are desperately trying to put an end to this plague of blackout crime but now have yet another savage killing to deal with—the passage de l’Hirondelle, mademoiselle. A girl a little older than yourself whose face was kicked in and trod on so hard all the bones were smashed, both eyes as well. Bruises … never have I seen such bruises.’
He would give her a moment to digest this. He would watch her like God did a sinner. When he said, ‘The passage de la Trinité’s victim is still in hospital,’ he let the words sink in and only then added, ‘That one is not expected to live.’
‘La toilette, s’il vous plaît, Inspector. I know nothing of these. NOTHING, DO YOU UNDERSTAND?’
A handkerchief was found and pressed into her hand. ‘The De Roussy investigation, mademoiselle?’
‘A … a round-the-clock.’
‘On Monsieur de Roussy?’
‘Oui.’
‘The file, then. Where is it? Which drawer?’
There were banks and banks of oak filing cabinets, most of which were empty and only for show and not like those the colonel kept locked up in his office, but if the inspector should look, he’d find this out. ‘There … there isn’t one. The investigation’s progress reports are given by …’
‘Word of mouth,’ came the sigh. ‘It’s a puzzle, though, that there’s even an invoice.’
‘Taxes must be paid; income must be reported.’
‘Sometimes.’
Again he gave that sigh. Undoing the shabby overcoat with its buttons that hung by their threads and understandably gave no evidence of a woman’s touch—what woman would ever put up with such a one?—the chief inspector dumped his fedora on to her desk and took off his coat, preparing to stay for as long as he wished.
‘We’ll see that you get home safely,’ he said, the trace of fatherly concern bringing a sickness of its own, for he’d soon add, and he did, ‘Where is that?’
‘A flat. It’s not far. I’ll be perfectly safe so you don’t have to worry.’
And given bravely, but a flat, not a room. Had Colonel Delaroche set her up or had someone else since the rents in this quartier were prohibitive? Probably one or the other but best to leave it for now. ‘Madame de Roussy’s husband, mademoiselle. Bien sûr, Alexandre de Roussy is on the board of directors of the Renault car company and important, since they supply the Occupier with all sorts of things, but …’
Again there was that pause!
‘But it always takes two to commit adultery, doesn’t it?’
‘The wife of another, yes.’
‘That of a prisoner of war?’
The girl bowed her head and crushed the handkerchief. Tears were splashed on the desk, her voice like that of France on the day of Defeat. ‘Oui, the … the mother of three young children. Monsieur de Roussy sees her twice a week, sometimes more if … if necessary.’
‘And pays her how much a visit?’
‘Five hundred. I … I really don’t know. It’s …’
‘Only a rumour, that five hundred, isn’t it?’
‘Oui.’
Steep, dark and narrow, the side staircase from the Lido’s stage plunged to the dressing rooms, bare flesh and bare of privacy, the girls fabulous, thought Kohler. Gott sei Dank, the colonel had hustled him right past the Agence Vidocq, right into the restaurant and down the stairs to the club.
Gold and tinsel were everywhere, see-through pearly water wings on some. High heels, of course, headbands or tiaras, bracelets and earrings, and there was the toddler of one sucking on his soother and looking up at his dear maman who was changing too and just as naked as he. Joy in her heavily made-up eyes, ostrich plumes still on her head and Bob having a hell of a time resisting the impulse.
Background noise from the club above them filtered down. The colonel didn’t say a thing. Bob waited, watching the girls and hearing the babble of them as, in single file, a robe or some other flimsy bit of costume tossed over a shoulder, they came down the stairs ready to change for the next act but were momentarily more worried about taking a tumble and crashing into the others. Legs … beautiful legs …
Pungent on the air came the scent of talcum powder and cigarette smoke, eau de Javel and chlorine, too, for didn’t the Lido have a bathing pool up there? Of course it did, with nymphs en costume d’Ève who swung back and forth on swings above the audience before throwing their arms straight out or up to take the plunge.
Perfume, the cheap and the expensive, was on the air with body odours of all kinds, those of clogged drains, too, and of blocks of limestone, for these last made up the cellar walls. Garlic, Louis would have said. Onions, mon vieux, and the vin d’ordinaire, the rouge, n’est-ce pas? The sulphur of freshly struck matches as cigarettes are lit and quick drags taken.
‘Bob!’ shouted one. ‘Ah, mon Dieu, mon petit brave, you’ve come back to see us again.’
‘No more worries, eh, Bob?’ shouted another. ‘No more thoughts of Lulu?’
Bob didn’t bark. Bob didn’t wag his tail. Bob waited.
‘Come to Martine,’ urged one with open arms, bare breasts, bare everything. ‘Colonel, let him come. You know how he likes to see us. You’ve been keeping him away too long.’
A smile was given, not a grin, for a man like Delaroche never grinned. Bob’s lead was unclipped but still he stayed until the colonel softly said, ‘All right. Go and say hello.’
Still he didn’t bark or bay. Nose to the floor, he went into the lights, to mirrors upon mirrors and gowns and scattered or unscattered female underthings and lots and lots of loving.
Bob said hello to every one of the thirty or more that were crowded into the two long rooms. He didn’t play favourites. They laughed, whistled, clapped, called, cuddled, told each other not to be greedy and urged him to come to them, competing totally for his affection.
He didn’t run and knock the children over. He was careful. The baby, nestled in its bassinet and asleep after a quick snack, was given but the gentlest touch of his muzzle, not even a lick; the four-year-old who had constantly sucked her thumb, had to pull it out to timidly pet and then hug him dearly. A hero.
But then, puzzled, he looked around for someone else and couldn’t understand why they weren’t also present. He started to hunt, and no amount of the colonel’s calling him back, not even a muted curse, could stop him. He went out into the foyer at the base of that staircase. He sniffed at two or three of the steps, went right up them and came back. Satisfied, he hurried along the dimly lit corridor that led, probably, to one of the club’s many storage rooms, only to stop when he reached the wall telephone. Standing, he got a whiff of that too, then headed right back and into the dressing rooms to look about and try to decide what was still missing.
Under the chintz skirt of one of the dressing tables—bare knees had to be quickly swung aside—he worried over something, gave a throaty growl, angry at first, the hindquarters up and tail ready.
‘Lulu’s b …’ said one, only to stop herself as Bob dragged it out, worried at it with a paw, then laid it at his master’s feet.
An India rubber bone. Well chewed by the look and a constant comfort, but no comfort at all? wondered Kohler. Delaroche had thought it best to distract this Kripo with female flesh and keep him from going to the agence but was now thinking better of it.
Back Bob went for more, and when he had that item, he dragged it out by its handle and the one who had swung her legs aside blurted, ‘Élène’s case.’
No one moved. Not Bob, not any of the girls.
‘Where is she, Colonel?’ asked another. ‘What’s happened to her?’
Merde, something would have to be said, thought Delaroche. ‘We’re working on it.’
‘That makes two of us, Colonel.’
‘Kohler, we’ll discuss it later.’
‘Of course, but I’m glad to know the agence is involved.’
All thirty-two or -six of them stopped whatever they’d been doing. They waited for answers. They damned well wanted them. ‘Well?’ said a forty-year-old with the stretch marks big babies invariably leave for one to hide.
Bob nudged the fitted case, pushing it across the cracked linoleum until it rested not at the colonel’s feet, but at those of this Kripo. Sorrowfully he looked up and waited, too, for an answer. A missing dog and a missing showgirl.
That answer was not long in coming. It couldn’t be, if only partially given. Reaching into a jacket pocket, Kohler took out the girl’s wedding ring—Ach, he’d wrapped it in a pair of white pongee step-ins he must have taken from the judge’s flat, but had no memory of having done or even of where, precisely, among those rooms he’d found them, but … ‘This is it, eh, Bob?’ he heard himself asking, heard the collective gasp, saw lips part, despair enter the gazes of some, tears those of others.
‘Élène’s,’ said one. ‘I knew she was for it. I had a feeling.’
‘Kohler, where the hell did you find that?’ hissed Delaroche.
‘Maybe Bob had best tell us, Colonel, or is it that you already know?’
Not a feather moved. Cigarette smoke trailed.
‘Would I even be asking if I did?’ asked Delaroche.
‘Lulu’s gone and Bob’s no longer worried about her, Colonel,’ said one to break the impasse.
‘They had a fight. Bob’s ear was badly torn,’ said another.
They looked at each other, these girls, and nodded at one of their number.
‘Élène took her, Colonel,’ said the forty-year-old den mother. ‘We knew Madame de Brisac had hired you to find Lulu. We weren’t going to tell you but now … now that Élène hasn’t come to work, we’d best, since that one has her ring.’
‘Lulu was causing Élène lots and lots of trouble,’ said another. ‘Madame Rouget would insist on bringing that damned dog of her friend’s down here to see us.’
‘And do the same when we were up onstage.’
‘Now wait a minute,’ said Kohler. ‘Was Madame Rouget asked to do this by Madame de Brisac?’
The girls threw glances at one another. ‘It’s possible,’ said one, ‘but not likely.’
‘It wasn’t Élène’s fault, Inspector. You are a cop, aren’t you?’
‘I am.’
‘I thought so.’
‘I did too.’ ‘So did I …’ ‘Et moi aussi,’ came the chorus. ‘One can always tell with those.’
Heads were nodded.
‘Lulu wasn’t a regular like Bob, Inspector. Oh for sure, she was friendly enough but she hated Monsieur le Juge who had savagely kicked her in the park last October.’
‘The Parc Monceau?’
‘How is it that you know this, please?’ asked the den mother suspiciously.
‘Never mind, but why did Élène Artur ask to meet the judge there? That’s not the usual sort of place for a girl like that, is it?’
They all shrugged. Some looked away, others stared right back at him. Pregnant, wasn’t she? he wanted to ask but didn’t need to and had best not since the colonel was taking a decided interest in things. ‘Continue.’
‘Ah, bon, since you ask it of me. Lulu could be very friendly with Élène, too, you understand, but hated Monsieur le Juge, and when Lulu smelled him on the girl after those two had been together during the cinq à sept or even earlier in the day, she just went crazy even though the judge was no longer present.’
‘Angry,’ said one.
‘A real hothead,’ yet another.
‘Would bite and bark and sometimes even tear at Élène’s coat or dress when she came in.’
‘Irish terriers are good with most people but can be …’
‘Bitchy,’ said another, ‘especially with big dogs like Bob who was only trying to defend Élène from attack.’
‘Madame Rouget also had her daughter Denise bring Lulu in to see us, Inspector. Twice, I think, or was it three times?’
‘Four. Poor Élène didn’t know what to do.’
But she did.
It wasn’t wise of her to leave the chief inspector alone in the outer office, Suzette told herself, but she absolutely had to get cleaned up. He would go through the papers on her desk. He’d see beyond a shadow of doubt that Madame Henriette Morel was being billed ten thousand francs each this month for the Barrault and Guillaumet investigations, as she’d been billed last month. He’d find M. Garnier’s files on Madame Barrault and Madame Guillaumet, files that were to have been locked up in the colonel’s office had that one come back from Chez Bénédicte’s or not have left the door to his office locked as always when he was away, and sometimes even when he was here and in there with a particularly beautiful client.
The inspector would see that on her desk there was also the invoice she had typed for the parents of Captain Jean-Matthieu Guillaumet, who was in the officers’ POW camp at Elsterhorst. Twenty thousand francs they’d been billed this month alone for the agence’s finding ‘conclusive evidence’ of Madame Guillaumet’s plans to commit adultery. The Ritz, no less!
‘And then?’ whispered Suzette to herself. ‘Then he will discover that the Scapini Commission in Berlin, the Service diplomatique de prisonniers de guerre, have requested an estimate of the cost of just such a “conclusive” investigation of her and that this estimate has been placed at between forty thousand and fifty thousand francs.’
It would do no good for her to stand here stupidly and cry. She must get back, but he would also find that that same commission, at the insistence of Madame Marie-Léon Barrault’s husband, who was in the camp for common soldiers at Stablack in Poland, had demanded that such an investigation of his wife be done. Cost: ten thousand francs a month, but that since Corporal René-Claude Barrault had no money of his own, Madame Henriette Morel had willingly volunteered to cover that cost as well. Thirty thousand francs then, this month alone to Madame Morel: ten for Madame Barrault, ten for Madame Guillaumet and ten for the Scapini’s request.
‘Un gogo,’ M. Hubert Quevillon had said of the woman. He had flashed some of the photos he used from time to time to convince prospective customers that their husbands were indeed fooling around behind their backs. Totally naked girls.
‘A sucker,’ she swallowed, glancing accusingly at herself in the mirror that was above the washbasin. Madame Morel was being billed twice for the Barrault investigation and once for the Guillaumet, whose in-laws were also forking over twenty thousand francs for that one, and soon it would be the Scapini Commission also, whose cost those same in-laws would gladly pay since the Scapini could recommend to the courts that charges be laid and a divorce granted.
A racket, that’s what it was. She knew the chief inspector would find out all of this from her desk alone—Madame de Brisac’s invoice was there too, the search for Lulu, a lost dog: no charge at all. Nothing. Absolument rien simply because that one was not only an old friend but had recommended the firm to Madame Rouget who in turn had recommended it to her daughter Denise and to Germaine de Brisac, the daughter of the other one. The things one did for business. But having scratched the surface, would the inspector not want more?
Hurriedly she took off her slip and underpants and, rolling them into a tight ball, tucked them into her bag. She would put on her overcoat to hide the skirt’s dampness, had best get ready to go home—oui, oui, that is what she’d do. Lock the door and lock him out of the office.
‘Inspector, I must close up now. Grand-mère, she will worry. Always it’s the same with her, you understand. She watches the clock, poor thing, and worries especially now with … with all of these terrible attacks.’
A lie, of course, but had he believed her? He gave no indication, hadn’t been standing anywhere near her desk, had been sitting—yes, sitting patiently by the door—and said, ‘Ah, bon, mademoiselle. It’s best my partner and I come back in the morning.’
‘Sunday … It will be Sunday, Inspector. The agence will be closed.’
‘Ah! I’ve completely lost track of the days. Always the work, never the rest. Monday, then.’
Throwing on that overcoat, he took that fedora of his from her desk and said, ‘Aprèz vous, mademoiselle.’
‘I … I must switch off the lights, then put the lock on.’
‘Of course.’
As she did so, he didn’t take that gaze of his from her, but held the door, then watched as she pushed the little button in and let her go first, he pulling the door tightly closed behind them and testing it to make certain it was, indeed, locked.
‘Perfect,’ he said. ‘You needn’t worry.’
No one was taking any notice of them. No one! Not M. Raymond and not M. Garnier … ‘Merci,’ she heard herself saying.
‘I’ll just walk you to the entrance of the métro. That way I’ll not worry either.’
Ah, merde! ‘There … there’s no need, Inspector. The flat’s just along the way.’
They reached the avenue, which was now in total darkness. The glow from occasional cigarettes was as if that from fireflies in the night and not yet a moon. ‘Bonne nuit, mademoiselle.’
And never trust a police officer, said St-Cyr silently as he gave her time to lose herself in the crowd. That pin tumbler, mortised lock of the colonel’s, with its bevelled bolt and dead bolt above, allows you to ‘put the lock on’ the former but not the latter, which needs its key. Delaroche must always come by to put the dead bolt on, but with the other there are two little buttons mounted on the lock face just below the bolts. Pushing in the one as you did, activates the bevelled bolt, pushing in the other as I did, deactivates it.
The colonel, like any détective privé worth his salt, felt Kohler, had a table exactly where it should have been. Right at the back, tucked into a corner in full view of the coat check and entrance and with the whole club spread before him, including its tobacco-fogged horizon.
Bob sat on two of the chairs nearest to that master of his and watched the girls from this distance. He didn’t bark, seemed oblivious to the brassy racket from the orchestra and that from the crowd, was mesmerized apparently by the lights and the action.
Wehrmacht boys were everywhere, several with their petites amies. BOFs, too, and other black marketeers and collabos. Maybe a ratio of eight from home to two of the French, the club filling up fast and no different than any other in this regard.
‘Bob has impressive control, Colonel. You’ve trained him superbly.’
Just what was Kohler after and where the hell was that partner of his? wondered Delaroche, though he’d have to smile and affably say, ‘You’ve no idea how good Bob is for business. Prospective clients, especially the women, take one look at him and are not only reassured but convinced. The younger they are, the harder they fall—isn’t that right, mon vieux?’
Bob agreed. Husbands would fool around; wives would demand answers, or vice versa. ‘A fortune, that it, Colonel?’
‘Hardly. A good living, though. Surely you must have thought of going into business for yourself?’ Delaroche turned to a waitress. ‘Angèle, ma belle, would you be so good as to bring Herr Kohler a little something from Munich? The Spaten Dunkel. It’s fresh in today, Kohler.’
‘Et pour vous, mon cher colonel?’ brown eyes asked.
‘The usual.’
‘Un double de Byrrh. Is that not correct?’
Jésus, merde alors, those bedroom eyes of hers would have melted butter.
‘Bob, give Angèle her little gift. Now don’t be stingy.’
A five-hundred-franc bill was gently teased from a bankroll that would have impressed even the wealthiest, the girl taking it between her teeth, too, as she set her tray down to mother Bob, modestly tidy her halter straps and tuck the bill between her breasts.
‘It pays to keep them happy, Kohler. You’ve no idea the things girls like that can tell you.’
Cigarettes were offered and why not accept a couple? A light too.
Kohler blew smoke towards the ceiling and sat back to enjoy the show as if a regular without a care in the world but surely Boemelburg had let him know the Gestapo and the SS employed the agence from time to time and had been very satisfied with the results?
Oberg must have told the agency to work with Sonja Remer and to tail Giselle, thought Kohler, but had they found her, or had this one simply vented his rage in the passage de l’Hirondelle because they hadn’t? ‘Tell me about Lulu, Colonel.’
There was still no sign of St-Cyr. ‘Catherine-Élizabeth de Brisac is an old and much valued friend. Her husband, Paul, and I were at Gallipoli. The Corps expéditionnaire d’Orient. Kum Kale on the Asian shore, April twenty-fifth, 1915, a diversion that, though the only successful venture of that whole campaign, fooled no one. We then withdrew and went to assist the Australians and New Zealanders on the Peninsula. Brave boys, all of them, but a debacle. An absolute cockup. The damned British High Command let us down as they then did in 1940. One simply can’t trust the bastards. Pigheaded, incompetent, arrogant and dishonest. Undermanned and under-supplied, the Turks were savage, Mustapha Kemal Pasha absolutely brilliant. Paul de Brisac didn’t come home. I caught him as he fell.’
Their drinks came. ‘Salut,’ said Delaroche, raising his glass. ‘Byrrh had become our national apéritif even before that other war, Kohler, but do you know why?’
‘The colonies. The malaria and a need for quinine to be sweetened, else it wouldn’t be taken. Hence a dry, vermouth-style drink that caught on. Let’s cut the crap and the old soldier bit, Colonel. Élène Artur kidnapped Lulu.’
‘Such things happen all the time these days, don’t they? Leave one’s pet off the lead for a moment, or let the cat out, and voilà, it has vanished into the oven or the stew pot of another.’
‘Or the soup pot, given her indochinoise background and that of her mother, Colonel, but didn’t you realize Élène had taken her?’
Kohler had yet to mention the judge. ‘I didn’t. I did know of the trouble Lulu had been causing. Bob wasn’t the only dog to have suffered defending that girl and certainly Lulu could have benefitted a great deal from further training. Spoiled, oh là, là, but … Ah! what is one to do when asked by a friend of long standing who is in great distress? I immediately offered help. The Agence Vidocq was, as I have already stated, working on it.’
‘But not too hard. Élène must have kept Lulu alive until very recently. Maybe a guilty conscience, maybe she sincerely felt the dog was desperately needed by its owner.’
‘We haven’t charged Madame de Brissac a sou, nor will we. I had kept Bob away from the girls because of the fight he’d had down there with Lulu. Damn it, Kohler, Lulu had challenged Élène and had bitten the girl twice at least. Bob simply leaped in to defend her as he would have done for any of them.’
A real ladies’ dog but at other times, at least some of them, Élène, must have got on quite well with Lulu. ‘Now what are you going to tell Madame de Brissac?’
‘Nothing until it is absolutely clear to me.’
‘Lulu hated Judge Rouget, Colonel. Vivienne Rouget hired you to tail that husband of hers and not only find out who her Hercule was fucking but how serious things were.’
‘Where did you find that girl’s wedding ring?’
It couldn’t hurt to tell him, might even help to shake the son of a bitch. ‘Under a radiator.’
Out in the Arcade de Champs-Élysées the shoppers took their time, as Germans on leave would, while others hurried homeward, using the arcade as a short cut. Alone in the agence, St-Cyr waited beside Suzette Dunand’s desk. He had been about to switch on her lamp, had heard something against the foot traffic …
Ah! there it was again. Ever so gently the door was being tried. The bevelled bolt had come free … yes, yes, that lock had been successfully picked but now … now whoever it was discovered that the dead bolt had been engaged and since Colonel Delaroche had not returned to lock up, that could only mean the agence’s security was in the act of being breached.
There wouldn’t be time to do what had to be done, but there had to be something more than the agence just sharking the clients. Whoever it was might leave. There’d been no cries for a flic to come running, no pronouncements of a robbery in progress, simply a waiting for himself to try to slip away, but was there more than one of them out there?
Retreating, he felt his way through the pitch-darkness until he got to the corridor the girl had taken to the washroom, was hurrying now, found gold-rimmed porcelain cups and saucers and a coffeepot—Sèvres? he wondered—under the light switch. Everywhere he looked in this room he’d entered, there was a tidiness that troubled, a décor that didn’t fit the usual image of détectives privés but was clean of line, the furnishings very of the nouveau riche. A large desk with Lalique pen-and-ink stand, bronze figurines from the twenties. Several oil paintings hung on the walls—landscapes but also family portraits, some dating back more than a century. Surely these weren’t of relatives of M. Flavien Garnier or of M. Hubert Quevillon, whose names in bronze were apparent?
Everything spoke of money. There was none of what one would have expected, none of the stale tobacco smoke from endless Gauloises bleues, none of the sweat of the unwashed, the garlic, the cheap toilet water or cologne such individuals were wont to splash on themselves when in the urgency of plotting to seduce some suspecting or unsuspecting female client.
Conclusion: The office was seldom used and then but briefly and really for show, since those passing by on the way to the washroom would be bound to notice, especially if this one’s door was left open. Messieurs Garnier and Quevillon were foot soldiers kept on the move by the colonel.
Garnier was also a veteran of that other war, a member of the sometimes ultraconservative UNC, the Union Nationale des Combattants. A former sergeant, wounded at Verdun, but one with ties or leanings to Action française? he had to ask. Fascist anyway, and definitely pro-German and collabo.
The in-tray held requests, notes, thin file folders on investigations one of the others must have handed over to Garnier but not yet collected to be stuffed into jacket pockets on the run; the out-tray, the dossiers of Adrienne Guillaumet and Marie-Léon Barrault.
Suzette Dunand had typed up the following for the Scapini Commission and must surely have been worried this Sûreté would find it:
Madame Adrienne Guillaumet, wife of prisoner-of-war Captain Jean-Matthieu … et cetera.
Thursday, 11 February 1943: Subject leaves residence at 131 rue Saint-Dominique on foot at 1410 hours. Couple’s children are left alone, but Concierge Ouellette reluctantly reveals that she checks on them from time to time and that this is not the only such occasion but one of many.
Proof positive of marital infidelity, eh?
Subject walks to the Deutsche Institut on the rue Talleyrand, entering it at 1430 hours.
And not far from the flat.
Subject pleads for an advance on part-time wages. Said advance denied. In distress, subject hurries from the building and makes her way on foot to bathhouse on the rue Las Cases but decides at last moment to go into the Église de Sainte-Clotilde.
Behind which the bathhouse, serving the bourgeoisie of the quartier des Invalides, was located, but why the need to pray, why the douche chaude?
Subject is forced to wait for shower bath and doesn’t leave until 1610 hours.
And always the delays in such establishments. Though her flat, unlike so many, had had a bathtub, there’d been no provision for hot water since the Defeat. She had obviously wanted to be as presentable as possible, even though it must have cost her a good fifty francs she didn’t have. Five it would have cost before this lousy war. Five and no more!
Subject takes métro to place de l’Opéra and enters Café de la Paix at 1655 hours where she meets and conspires—Why not confers?—with subject Marie-Léon Barrault and that one’s daughter Annette. On recommendation of the Barrault subject, Madame Guillaumet hires vélo-taxi Prenez-moi. Je suis à vous, which is to pick her up outside the École Centrale after classes at 2115 hours and drive her to the Hôtel Ritz, there to wait until again needed. Wait estimated at from two to four hours. ‘As long as is necessary,’ subject stated to driver.
A half-hour to three-quarters becomes such a different length of time?
Subject then leaves Café de la Paix at 1756 hours, catching the métro to the École Centrale where she arrives at 1827 hours in time for her classes to begin.
There was nothing else. It was as if the rape, the vicious assault on her person, the savage beating had never happened.
The signature was firm but hasty. Salauds, that is what this gang were. Shark to the woman’s in-laws, shark to the husband and the Scapini, shark to Madame Henriette Morel, too, and the ‘subject’ no matter what but he was racing now. Marie-Léon’s ‘dossier’ was thicker and there were photos. One of Gaston Morel and the ‘subject’ at a table in the Café de la Paix, his expression one of deep concern or, as implied, one of, Don’t worry, chérie. Go on up to the room. No one will ever know we’ve been together.
Another of the photos revealed her waiting for the lift at the Hôtel Grand.
There was a shot of the manager of the Cinéma Impérial who grinned, leered and sucked on a damp fag end: ‘Of course I took what she offered. When it is presented in such a package, one cannot be impolite. Pay … ? What is this you’re saying? She came to me often.’
How much had Garnier bribed him? Five hundred?
A copy of Father Marescot’s damning letter to the Scapini Commission was enclosed, even a photo of the priest, and one of the ‘subject’ entering the confessional at the Église de Notre-Dame de Lorette, and another of those who were waiting to do exactly the same thing, including Annette Barrault, who looked to be all but in tears.
Still it wasn’t enough to link the agence to any of the attacks and if he heard about the break-in here, as he well might, Boemelburg would hit the roof, as would Oberg. Where was what was needed? Something … there had to be something more than these.
‘Forged tobacco cards?’ blurted St-Cyr, having opened the desk’s central drawer, that catchall of things detective and otherwise. ‘Fifty of them at least. Evidence … I’d best take a few.
‘A tube of Veronal … ?’ Now why would Garnier have such a thing? Old wounds? A girl, a woman he used regularly? So many filles de joie would use drugs of one kind or another if they could get them to dampen the discomfort of too much sex, but …
‘Noëlle Jourdan,’ the whisper came. ‘Sergeant Jourdan of the Fifty-Sixth Chasseurs à pied, and from one old soldier to another.’
To compound their troubles, beneath the desk’s green blotting pad there was a list, in pencil, of names with lines through some to indicate that they had already been executed at the Fort du Mont-Valérien or sent east to camps. Beside these, and still others, though, there were also ticks. M. Flavien Garnier had been busy nailing résistants at one hundred thousand francs apiece, the going rate as advertised by the Occupier, but was there still more?
Ignoring the lights, the girls and the action, Bob laid his chin on the table’s edge, his mournful gaze on this Kripo as the wedding ring spun itself to silence. ‘ “Louis-Maurice Artur, Colonel and Élène Nadine Lemaire.” ’ Two hearts cut in gold to overlap till death do us part. ‘ “Paris, 27 September 1939.” ’
Kohler had found her. There was even the mist of sentiment in his eyes, or was that merely the effects of too much Benzedrine? wondered Delaroche. Too little sleep in any case, or simply those beers from home and a clap-sized dose of nostalgia.
‘She would have been sixteen,’ Kohler went on as if lost to it. ‘Probably didn’t know her mind or heart—a shop girl most likely, and feeling damned desperate, wouldn’t you say; the boy eighteen, who knows? Off to war in a hurry anyway and maybe glad to be avoiding the financial responsibilities of a pregnant wife, but as one old soldier to another, Colonel, it wouldn’t have been the first time for that to have happened, would it? Must have lied about his age, though, since twenty-one was usual for France then and now two metres down or in one of the POW camps. Which is it?’
The mist was gone. There was nothing but an emptiness in that gaze, but why hadn’t St-Cyr shown up? Why hadn’t Jeannot or one of the others sent someone to the table to warn him? Were they all after St-Cyr? ‘I know nothing of this, Kohler.’
‘Then how is it you knew of the ring?’
‘I didn’t. Not really. I only assumed.’
‘A connection with the other killings and rapes? The beatings and handbag snatches—the mugging of men like Gaston Morel?’
‘Now look here …’
‘No, you look. You’re a regular at the Lido. You’ve seen that girl with Judge Rouget plenty of times, have sat at his table, had him to this one. A beauty, wasn’t she? Très charmante and with all that it takes, eh? Places like this don’t hire girls unless they have it.’
But were Kohler and St-Cyr looking for veterans of that other war?
‘A pillar of the establishment runs around with a racially tainted chorus girl, Colonel, when everyone these days had better be more careful, but mein Gott, you don’t even notice? The lonely wife of a POW—wasn’t that what she was?—and there’s Judge Rouget going on and on about how Vichy has toughened the adultery laws and that such women … Ach, let me find it for you.’
The Gestapo’s little black notebook was hauled out, its pages thumbed.
‘Ah, here we are. That those errant POW wives “need a damned good lesson in morals and should have their heads shorn and their breasts bared in public.” ’
Hercule … how could he have said such a thing in front of Kohler?
‘And this from a man who has definitely been breaking those laws.’ Kohler found another page. ‘ “Time and again it’s the POW wives who are conducting themselves in such a shameful and disgustingly unclean manner.” ’
Vivienne had said that. Kohler had been to the house. Merde, why had Hercule not stopped him? ‘Kohler, where did you find …’
‘The judge. Let’s stick to him for a moment, eh? A fellow member of the Cercle Européen that meets here at least once a week over dinner …’
‘I’m not a member. That’s only for …’
‘Of course you aren’t. You don’t need to be. It’s for businessmen, bankers and others of the establishment whose private lives you and that agency are paid to pry into and they know it, too, some of them, probably. Hey, it’s good for business to sit here, especially over the cinq à sept. Don’t try to tell me it isn’t. While you’ve been keeping an eye on me and another on Bob, you’ve been nodding to friends and acquaintances, male or female, and worrying over what they might be thinking or might have overheard. You’ve been taking in the whole of this place, especially its entrance and coat check. Who’s with who, who’s leaving a little early or hasn’t yet shown up, who’s staying a little longer than usual and not with you-know-who. That’s an art, my friend, and as a detective of long standing, I have to admire it. Now give. I want some answers.’
Had Gestapo Boemelburg not warned Kohler to leave the Agence Vidocq out of things even if he and that partner of his did happen to stumble on to something—had they?
‘You live with two women, Kohler. Surely you are concerned about them?’
‘Is that a threat?’
‘Not at all. It’s merely a statement of fact.’
Giselle … Delaroche hadn’t touched his apéritif. One of the girls came with cigars and automatically he started to make a selection only to think better of it.
‘You and Judge Rouget are members of the Cercle de l’Union Interaliée, Colonel.’ This wasn’t known for certain but …
‘That’s no concern of yours. Surely you’re not so stupid as to suspect anyone who belongs to the Interaliée?’
‘We’ll get to it, won’t we? Vivienne Rouget hired you to watch over her Hercule. If you ask me, I think that woman knew all about his philandering but things had gotten out of hand. He was spending far too many evenings and nights away from home and not just with Élène Artur. The Folies-Bergère, the Casino de Paris, the Apollo, the Naturiste and Chez Éve—it’s interesting that bare breasts keep cropping up, isn’t it? Especially at La Source de Joie in Pigalle.’
The bordel of Régine Trudel. How had Kohler found out so much in such a short time? ‘Hercule is under a great deal of stress.’
‘Président du Tribunal spécial …’
‘Résistants, Terroristen. Their sentencing. Vivienne …’
‘Was it that Élène reminded him of a petite amie he’d once had?’
The framed poster above the mantelpiece, the constant reminder of a stunning conquest and possession: Une nuit à Chang-Rai, 7 March 1926, at the Magic City. Kohler had definitely been to the flat.
‘Hercule is at that age,’ said Delaroche. ‘The libido doesn’t fade, n’est-ce pas, but as one grows older, one can no longer command that same stiffness nor does the érection last. A remedy is needed. That’s all that girl ever was. A reminder of how things once were.’
‘That other showgirl. The one in that poster.’
‘Oui, oui. What has happened to Madame Artur, Kohler? Come, come, don’t be so free with the insinuations and the veiled threats. Karl Oberg is a member of the Interaliée, Walter Boemelburg not quite yet, but on the list and likely to be voted in at …’
‘Ja. Ja, mein lieber französischer Privatdetektiv, the avenue Foch and the rue des Saussaies are using that agency of yours and Louis and me have been told to go carefully. Point is, you’d best help us out, or is it that you want us to go right back to Boemelburg and dump the lot of what we now know into his lap?’
Kohler would do it too. Boemelburg would then have to go to Oberg and hadn’t that one insisted that Hercule be totally above all such extramarital activities and hadn’t Vivienne, foolish as her little outburst had been in front of this one, been only too aware of what the Höherer SS und Polizeiführer expected of Hercule and desperately afraid of what must happen should he not see the error of his ways and fall from favour?
Élène Artur’s fitted case was set on the table, Kohler gripping its edges before springing the catches—why hadn’t it been taken? Why had it been left for this one to find? ‘Bob, stay. STAY, Bob. There’s my soldier.’
The half of a carrot stick was found. To be fair, what with all the other smells of pâté, et cetera, around them, Bob couldn’t be blamed for not refusing it and was one damn fine dog. ‘Was Élène really the wife of a POW, Colonel? Let’s get that straight, just for the record.’
Had the salaud not even known? ‘Oui, I … I believe she was. Did she suffer?’
No answer was given. The case was opened, Bob watching closely. A hand mirror and comb and brush were deliberately set to one side, Kohler watching, Kohler knowing that they couldn’t see what was still in the case unless they got up and came round the table.
Beneath these items and such others, there would be the felt-covered pasteboard tray to which they’d been fastened. This tray was hinged and Kohler now lifted it up and out of the way.
‘Judge Rouget knew that wife of his was having him followed, Colonel. Maybe it had happened before, maybe someone was kind enough to have told him. Point is, he backed off and left that girl alone. Élène didn’t know what the trouble was. She knew, though, that she had done something that must have upset him, but didn’t know how he could possibly have found out about it.’
‘Go on. Please continue, since you seem to know everything.’
‘He’d taken to giving her his little gift beforehand in the Lido here and then not showing up at that flat of his. Kept her waiting night after night. That’s not good for a girl, is it?’
‘Get to the point.’
‘Certainly. When Lulu was taken, that daughter of his had come down here to ask if he would like a lift home, which he damned well should have done had he any sense. They argued—they must have. Maybe Élène caught sight of them and put two and two together, maybe Denise Rouget stormed the dressing room to confront the girl first. Something delayed Denise and gave Élène time to move. Germaine de Brisac got impatient and left the car running and Lulu alone in the backseat while she came here to find out what was the matter.’
‘And Élène knew where that dog would be because she had seen it often enough. You should be working with us, Kohler, but I won’t try to buy you off, since there is no need.’
‘You let the judge know that wife of his had hired you to follow him.’
Must Kohler continue to look for trouble? ‘Once I knew the extent of the problem, I felt it my duty as a friend and fellow member of the Interaliée to inform him of Vivienne’s concerns. Life with Hercule hasn’t been easy. That girl was but one of many.’
‘But he agreed to back off?’
‘For the time being, yes.’
‘Are you familiar with that flat of his on the rue La Boétie?’
There must be no hesitation. ‘Certainly, but are you aware that Judge Rouget has put it on the block and offered it also to our friends—your fellow countrymen? I, myself, was with him when he handed a set of keys to the estate agent.’
Louis would have appreciated the attempt. ‘Which one?’
‘I’ll have to ask our secretary. She’ll have gone home by now, but you can have it first thing on Monday.’
And no problem. ‘That’s good of you. I’ll keep it in mind.’
A change of blouse and slip, still neatly folded and beautifully laundered by the girl’s mother, were taken out of the case, a change of underwear and pair of white woollen socks, slippers, too, that Élène Artur had sometimes worn between sets and sometimes even in that flat, but had Kohler found the two thousand francs Hercule would have given her? Had the girl put it there and trusted that the others wouldn’t steal it? Had she done so in haste, realizing that it had to be saved and would be taken from her?
A candy-striped tricolour leg warmer with laddered runs and holes at the heel and toe, was dragged out—something she had been too ashamed to take home to that mother of hers to mend. Bob fidgeted. Others noticed the stocking. Eyebrows were raised …
‘It’s odd, isn’t it?’ said Kohler. ‘Detectives like Louis and myself are always searching for the little things and when we find them, we not only ask ourselves about them, but begin to look beyond the obvious. One stocking but two legs. Where’s the other one?’
‘Ah, mon Dieu, I have absolutely no idea. Stockings? How could I have?’
Louis had better not be in trouble. Louis had better be finding out all he could. ‘That dressing room, Colonel. Stockings like these are always chucked out of the way when a girl’s hurrying to get dressed. Frequent visitors like yourself must have seen the girls wearing them between sets if time allowed or at dance rehearsals. Bob even recognizes it, don’t you, Bob?’
The head was immediately lifted. From deep within him the answer came and with it a long and mournful baying that was as much of grief as it was of anything. ‘There, you see, Colonel. Bob loved her, didn’t he?’
‘Idiot, he’s friendly with all of them. She was just one of many.’
‘Ach, then let’s use him, eh? Let’s let Bob to find her other leg warmer.’