In the Shadows of Paris (The Predator Of Batignolles) (11 page)

‘Cross the ramparts and go up Rue de la Chapelle then turn off when you reach Chemin des Poissonniers. You’ll find your city of the dead at Saint-Ouen!’

Joseph wandered through a maze of rusty sooty railway tracks, lost his way, then reached Rue du Pré-Maudit,
²⁹
which he left as fast as he could. He walked back past buildings covered in obscene graffiti, seedy hotels and vacant lots overgrown with wild oats, where circus strongmen were rehearsing. Behind the Ceinture line station stood the grim bulk of a railway arch. He passed some alarming figures: ragged girls on their way to buy groceries; pimps wearing espadrilles, a cigarette hanging out of their mouths; a group of vagrants, shivering after a night spent under the stars, heading for the slopes of the old ramparts.

Beyond this Wall of China, he found himself surrounded by a patchwork of factories and kitchen gardens. The gardens were so verdant and filled with flowers that, had it not been for the tall factory chimneys marking out the road, he would have believed himself transported to the countryside. Butterflies danced above the cabbages and buttercups, and a few cows stood in a meadow.

A funeral procession jolted down the avenues of the cemetery, the hangings on the hearse covered in a film of grey dust. The coffin was lowered, the family dispersed, the gravediggers filled in the hole.

Joseph decided that rather than search for a hypothetical grave, he would ask the keeper. The man consulted a register: there was no Pierre Andrésy buried there.

Joseph turned on his heel, muttering to himself.

‘This needs investigating, there’s definitely something fishy going on here. That was no typo. I’m going to pop in to
Le Figaro,
if only to annoy the boss.’

Caught up in his reflections, he walked past a small drinking fountain where a man who looked a little too smartly dressed for the neighbourhood had stopped to quench his thirst. A few small children holding jugs waited their turn.

Frédéric Daglan wiped his moustache, and walked over to a bistro where he sat down at an outside table and ordered a coffee. He pulled three newspapers from his pocket and began reading one of them. As he perused the second, he nearly sent his cup flying. Between a domestic incident and a drowning was a report about the disappearance of a printer named Paul Theneuil. His book-keeper had found a mysterious message in his business correspondence that mentioned a leopard.

A panting dog stopped to lap at the water running along the gutter. The whole world was thirsty.

Victor skimmed a pebble across the lake, disturbing the smooth surface of the water and scattering the ducks, which quacked furiously. He didn’t pause to admire the reproduction of the Temple of the Sybil at Tivoli perched on the summit of an artificial cliff, but walked on towards the exit from Buttes-Chaumont. Joseph had had the nerve to return to the shop late in the afternoon with a smirk on his face. That lad was becoming a nuisance, and the prospect of having him as a brother-in-law was exasperating. Although nothing seemed less sure than that union. In two minds as to whether he should bring about its definitive end or restore his sister’s happiness, Victor turned into Rue des Dunes.

The studio and living quarters he’d helped Djina Kherson rent were situated on the first floor of a plush apartment building. When he rang the bell Tasha’s mother came to the door; she’d dispensed with a maid in order to save money. It was a point of honour with her to do her own housework, which in a cramped three-room apartment was quickly accomplished in any case. As for the studio, a functional room containing a few chairs and easels, it was accessible from the hallway.

Victor was surprised to find not only Tasha but also Iris and Kenji sitting around a samovar in the living room. Djina, who looked scarcely older than her daughter, was wearing a gathered skirt and a blouse decorated with Russian embroidery.

Despite his show of polite disinterest, Kenji did not fool Victor, who could see the unsettling effect their hostess had on him. For her part, Djina paid him scant attention. She filled Victor’s glass.

‘I only have black tea,’ she said.

Then she resumed her conversation with Tasha and Iris.

‘I’m glad he’s keeping busy. He needs to be active or he loses his will to live.’

She had a soft voice, with only a hint of an accent.

‘Who are you talking about?’ asked Victor.

‘Pinkus. He’s sent us a letter – he’s going to pay you back,’ replied Tasha.

‘There’s no hurry.’

‘It’s a matter of pride,’ said Djina.

She picked up the letter and translated a passage:

‘…
In the end life here in America is not so very different from in Vilna: the poor die of poverty and the rich get richer, but I’m not complaining. I live in a two-roomed apartment on the Lower East Side. No more sewing on a machine fourteen hours a day in a garret in the Bronx. I’ve fallen on my feet…’

‘He’s gone into business with an Irishman who owns a gaming parlour. Imagine!’ exclaimed Tasha.

‘Do you mean he takes bets?’ asked Kenji, with a sidelong glance at Djina.

‘He would never stoop so low,’ she replied curtly.

‘They’re planning to invest in a new type of camera that uses twenty-four photographic images to give the illusion of movement. It’s on display at the Chicago World’s Fair,’ Tasha explained.

Djina consulted the letter, trying to decipher the word. ‘An electric ta-chys-cope.
³⁰
Do you know what that is, Monsieur Legris?’

‘It must be a perfected version of the praxinoscope.’
³¹

Djina went on:

‘…
the models we’ll be offering the public are marvellous pieces of machinery and I’m sure they’ll bring in a good revenue…

‘Your father, the revolutionary, managing a bar!’

‘That’s unfair, Mother. What’s wrong with him earning his living? It’s not as if he’s exploiting anyone. He hasn’t renounced his ideals.’

‘I’d love to see some of those moving pictures,’ said Iris.

Delighted that she’d finally expressed an interest in something, Victor suggested, ‘I’ll take you to Théâtre Robert-Houdin. Are you intending to take up your watercolour classes again?’

‘We’ve just agreed on a day,’ said Djina. ‘Come with me, my dears. The new paints I ordered arrived this morning.’

As they left the room, Kenji drew his chair alongside Victor’s.

‘An Oriental manuscript was sold at auction last week to the Bibliothèque Nationale. A friend from the Booksellers Circle told me. It almost certainly isn’t ours, but…’

‘You suspect Pierre Andrésy of having sold
Touty Namèh
before he died?’

‘Of course not! It never even occurred to me.’

‘Exactly when was it auctioned?’

‘That’s what I’m going to find out.’

What’s come over these two? First Joseph, now Kenji. It must be catching! thought Victor as the women filed back in.

He remembered his vow to Tasha and felt suddenly annoyed; he’d promised to keep his word, yet he felt painfully like a bird which had had its wings clipped. Why couldn’t she accept his need for freedom? He was mortified to think that he behaved the same way with her, but the difference was that he was motivated not by jealousy but by fear for her safety.

He glanced up. This time there was no mistaking it: Kenji looked positively bewitched at the sight of Djina.

If he fell in love with her, the family portrait would be complete.

Chapter Five

Thursday 13 July

T
HE
steel structure framed patches of night sky, and hundreds of flickering lights pierced the darkness. In the middle of Les Halles, to the right of Église Saint-Eustache, the flower market was in full swing. Josette Fatou greeted Marinette, a porter with a pockmarked face. Marinette was over sixty but still able to carry her enormous baskets of berries. The daughter of a tightrope walker, she had started out as an acrobat and a bearded lady.

‘Hurry, my little bird of the islands, the flower auction’s starting,’ she called out to Josette. ‘What a face! Is anything the matter?’

‘No, everything’s fine,’ Josette replied, forcing a smile.

‘Hmm, not so sure about that,’ muttered Marinette, as she watched the girl weave her way between a pile of white lilacs and a mound of violets.

‘Sunshine in a bouquet, Mesdames, brought to you direct from the Côte d’Azur!’

One side was known as Nice and the other Paris, the latter stocked by gardeners coming from Ménilmontant, Montreuil, Vaugirard, Vanves and Charonne with their carefully packaged boxes.

Josette relaxed. Her inner turmoil subsided. At least there she was on home ground. Since the previous day, she had had the impression that some hidden force had sapped all her strength. Despite her exhaustion, she could not give up because no work meant no food. Once she had paid the weekly five-franc fee for the pushcart she used to wheel around her perfumed crop, and the four centimes for her street-trader’s licence, there was not much left in her purse. Every day, she looked for the best spot at the best time of day, watching out for and trying to attract customers. Selling at La Madeleine, where customers came to buy the more exotic blooms, was not the same as selling at La Nation, where workers hurrying to the factories had far too many cares to take an interest in such trifles.

The best bargains were to be found in Paris: roses, camellias, gardenias and snowballs sold like hotcakes. The thick southern accent mingled with the coarse language of the working classes from the
faubourgs
. Amid gesticulations and guttural cries, they haggled over bunches of mimosa or daffodils, jasmine or carnations. Josette Fatou made her purchases as if in a trance. The murder that had taken place before her very eyes three weeks ago had made her feel very isolated from the world, and nothing could erase that scene from her mind.

Grey dawn rose above the still-sleeping city. Gaunt-looking women searched among the slimy remains for rotten vegetables to make into soup. A haulier with a red belt swigged a bottle of wine. Next to a coach entrance, Mother Bidoche stirred her beef and bean stew, and ladled out helpings to fill the hungry bellies gathered around her brazier.

‘Get that down your throats – it’ll warm your insides – I can’t abide seeing famished folk.’

Josette returned to her cart. She stepped over a porter asleep on a sack and began arranging her flowers. The constant bustle and deafening row did not succeed in distracting her from her fears: she felt haunted by the man who had followed her the previous day. Of course, she had not realised at the time that he was watching her – he was just another early-morning passer-by, whose cap pulled down over his face had caught her eye for a split second.

Was he hiding somewhere in this crowd?

She trudged through the streets, shoulders hunched, her back stiff from the bumpy cobblestones, taking care not to let her cart slip or get knocked. She was an anonymous foot soldier among the six-thousand-strong army of street vendors, their customers made up of the privileged few who would think nothing of spending a hundred francs on flowers at the market, and the vast majority for whom five, ten, twenty francs of their daily budget represented an enormous sum.

At Place de la Bastille she overheard a conversation between two tramps.

‘Have you eaten?’

‘Yes, down at the mission, pea soup. Like bullets they were, with respect, fire ’em from a gun and you could kill a man.’

Her throat tightened with fear. A terrible thought had formed in her mind. Monsieur Grandjean’s killer! He’s coming for me. He won’t stop until he gets me!

In Rue du Faubourg-Saint-Antoine, a boy sobbing inconsolably over a broken bottle brought back visions of her own childhood. All she could remember was her mother and all the men hovering around her. They never stayed in the house for very long, but she was made to wait outside until they left, crouched in the stairwell, surrounded by silence, her eyes shut tight to ward off her fears. The local children shouted cruel names at her and the gossips called her
piccaninny,
and she resented her mother deeply for that. She quickened her pace, trying desperately to drive out these painful thoughts…Her mother, on her sickbed, her strength gone, abandoned by everyone, had revealed to her the truth about the gruelling work on the sugar plantations in Guadeloupe, the boat trip over to France, her employer coming to her room every night, her subsequent pregnancy and dismissal. She had had to survive on the pittance he had given her, as one would toss scraps to a dog. Josette had been born and her dream of returning to the sun-kissed isle had dissolved in the desolate squalor.

Josette shook her head. Who did she hate most of all, her mother or the father she’d never known? Her dark skin or men? Men, without a doubt.

Friday 14 July

Victor and Tasha were taking a stroll beside the river Seine. To the west, the sky was tinged with purple. A soft breeze had finally brought some respite from the heat. They watched the water lapping at the riverbank as a barge sailed by. Victor appeared to remember something.

‘Heavens, I almost forgot!’

He handed Tasha a little package. She tore off the wrapping paper. Inside was a small sketchbook with a worn cover, and a small box, which she opened. She looked up at him in amazement.

‘It’s wonderful, darling! Thank you!’

She was admiring a gold ring with a blue stone setting.

‘It’s an aquamarine. Do you like it?’

He watched her intently, his hands clasped behind his back. He looked like a little boy trying to sit up straight at the dinner table.

‘I love it! What’s the occasion?’

‘Well, I know we met on 22 June, but I wanted to celebrate our anniversary a little later this year. When I first saw you four years ago in the Anglo-American bar at the Eiffel Tower, you had your hair in a bun under your hat decorated with daisies and you were sitting between Isidore Gouvier and Fifi Bas-Rhin, and…I fell head over heels in love with you.’