Murder at the Lanterne Rouge (7 page)

Aimée took in the recessed halogen lighting, felt the
warmth from the floor, surveyed the high-tech console of buttons labeled Heat 1, Hall, Boiler.

“Pascal did all this. You’ve noticed, eh?”

And lusted for a renovation like this for her own seventeenth-century flat. Right now Aimée would settle for consistent heat in their office.

“Beautiful and innovative,” Aimée said, noticing the high-tech chrome laptop, a model that their part-time hacker Saj kept mentioning. The woman was more tech-savvy than most people half her age. “I imagine, a small repayment for devoting yourself to his upbringing.”

She snorted. “Not so much. No one called me the nurturing type, but I provided. I managed stage sets at Théâtre de la Gaité Lyrique, the wardrobe. Pascal used to play back stage sometimes, but he grew up across the square in the Musée des Arts et Métiers. After school I’d find him there. The machines, gadgets stimulated his mind. Too much.”

Aimée turned this over. “By that you mean …?”

“He loved making ‘inventions.’ Obsessed.” The old woman rolled her eyes affectionately. “Following the beat of a different drummer, as they say. Never played in the park with the other boys. He told me, when he was still a boy, that one day he’d work at the Musée. Because the Musée still kept alive the spirit of science, art, and invention of the medieval guilds that built the cathedrals. Can you imagine a teenage boy saying that?”

Mademoiselle Samoukashian gave a little shrug, sipped her Turkish coffee.

“Yet as a youngster he wore the dunce hat in the corner of the classroom, a
tête de Turc
.”

Aimée nodded. “Me, too, for daydreaming.” She took another sip. But she wondered at the point of this fable. What agenda lay behind this, other than reminiscing about her murdered great-nephew? Maybe this woman just needed to vent.
“But what an accomplishment, that Pascal entered a
grande école
,” she said.

“
Mais oui
, but only after two years of competitive prep to pass the
mathématique supérieur
,” Mademoiselle Samoukashian said, a hint of pride in her voice. “Another exam with a technology component for Arts et Métiers. Of the two thousand who pass the test, they accept six hundred.”

“Sounds grueling.” She was painting a picture of Pascal, Aimée realized.

“It was only the beginning!” she scoffed. “Then, a
grande école
. Before his first year, their assignments included figuring out how to write verses of Gothic script on matchsticks with a Rotring pen nib. He needed a magnifying glass to even see what he was writing, never mind figure out how to write it.” She shook her head. “The
bizutage
, the ritual hazing, got worse in his first year. A strange group, if you ask me. Medieval.”

Aimée needed to steer this back to Meizi. “Mademoiselle, the investigating
flics
suspect Chinese in your nephew’s murder.”

“You’re the detective,” she said without skipping a beat. “You found his body. What do you think?”

Aimée had thought a lot of things, all related to Meizi. Hoped to God she wasn’t involved in his murder. Thoughts, like air, came cheap. “That’s not my job. I’m looking for Meizi.”

“Pascal never drank, hated gambling. He was so shy and awkward around women,” said Mademoiselle Samoukashian. “No Chinese would kill him. No one here, young or old, trusts the
flics. Alors
, he spent all his free time volunteering at the Musée.”

Whatever his involvement with Meizi, he had kept it from his great-aunt. Aimée had a thought. “Mademoiselle, with Pascal’s
grande école
credentials, I wouldn’t have thought he’d teach at an engineering trade school. Couldn’t he have had any job he wanted?”

Mademoiselle Samoukashian bristled, her eyes sparkling
with anger. “Aimed higher, you mean. Command a top salary. Serve and sup with the elite.”

Aimée wanted to kick herself. Tactless again. “
Desolée
, I didn’t mean that the way it sounded.”

“Of course you did.” She shrugged. “You’re not the first. Blame my Bolshie upbringing, but Pascal did me proud. He wanted everyone to benefit, not just a sliver of the top crust.”

Mademoiselle Samoukashian took Aimée’s demitasse, studied the dregs coating the sides. Nodded.

“I see a road. A long road. A wall, rounded like a tower. You are going to see a person. A place.”

Foreseeing such a vague future in coffee grinds, Aimée thought, was less than helpful.

“Weren’t you the one in the paper?” Mademoiselle Samoukashian said suddenly. “A kidnapping, murder case before Christmas?”

Aimée cringed at the memory—her godfather, Morbier, had been a suspect in his girlfriend’s murder; then there were the high-profile repercussions of recovering a Spanish princess who had been kidnapped by Basque terrorists. Aimée had hated the reporters besieging the office, the new flood of calls for help from distraught families of murder victims. She had promised herself all that was over. She’d never do criminal work again. And she’d kept that promise for all of a month.

“My firm does computer security,” she said.

“But you’re also a licensed private detective,” Mademoiselle said, looking at Aimée’s card. “According to this.”

Aimée could learn nothing else here. She stood, slid her arms in her coat sleeves, and took a step toward the old woman. “Wonderful café, Mademoiselle.”

“But this woman, this Meizi, you said there’s a connection to Pascal?”

Aimée nodded, hoping this had jogged her memory. “Maybe you remember something Pascal said?”

Mademoiselle Samoukashian clamped Aimée’s hand in an iron grip. “But you’re looking for her. You think she saw who murdered my Pascal.”

“I don’t know,” Aimée said.

“God shouldn’t let a child die before his parents,” Mademoiselle Samoukashian said, her voice small. “But I don’t qualify; I just raised him.”

Aimée leaned down and hugged her where she sat in her thatched chair, felt the thin shoulders, the heaving chest of this tough little old woman. Like her own grandfather, who’d stepped in to help raise her when her mother left. He’d pitched in when Aimée’s father was on a stakeout, taken her to piano lessons, the auction gallery, supervised her homework.

When Aimée looked up, she saw tears pooled in those dark brown eyes. A look of despair.

“I don’t trust the
flics
,” Mademoiselle Samoukashian said. “Won’t you help me?”

“I’d like to, but …”

“How much?” She reached under the piled napkins, pulled out a rubber-banded wad of francs. “Never mind, take it,” she said, and thrust it into Aimée’s hand.

“Mademoiselle, I can’t take your money.”

“My rainy-day money? What good’s it to me now? You’re already on the case.” She squeezed Aimée’s hand. “Find who murdered him.”

Aimée looked away, torn. How could she investigate the murder for this old woman when her best friend’s girlfriend might be the culprit? A bad feeling seeped in her bones. She was fraught with worry that she’d find Meizi involved.

“I can’t guarantee you satisfaction. Or that we’ll find his murderer. These cases … you don’t want to know.”

“Pascal was murdered behind a building, and I don’t want to know?” The old woman leaned toward her, her eyes sharp. “I want justice.”

“I’m truly sorry, but …” She paused. Pascal could have had a double life. Better to save his great-aunt from knowing. “Unless there’s something pointing to—”

“But he was afraid.”

Aimée blinked. “Afraid? You must tell the
flics
.”

“You think I didn’t? Did they want to listen to an old woman, clouded by grief, ranting about his project?”

“What project?”

“I don’t know, but he kept a safety deposit box. In the Crédit Mutuel on rue Réaumur.”

“I don’t understand.”

“A month ago, he told me if anything happened to him—his words—to open the safety deposit box.” Mademoiselle Samoukashian rose. “Of course, this Meizi’s hiding and scared. You find her, discover what she knows. I’ve got an appointment with the bank manager to open the safety deposit box today. Then I’ll show you.”

Aimée’s heart tugged. She felt for this old woman.

“Don’t do this for me, please. Do it for my Pascal.”

Aimée’s mind went back to the plastic-wrapped body dotted with snowflakes. That mouth opened in a silent scream. Those eyes frozen in terror.

She nodded. “No promises, Mademoiselle, but …” She hesitated. “Call me and we’ll meet.”

In the hallway, Aimée paused, loath to leave this grieving woman, her warm and inviting apartment.

Mademoiselle Samoukashian took her black purse from the coat rack by the door. She opened her wallet, a Fendi knockoff, and rifled through photos. “Here’s Pascal in the school play. Oh, here’s a science project based on a Knights Templar gadget. This one was taken at graduation.”

Saddened, Aimée glanced at the thumbed and faded schoolboy photos, the progression as Pascal grew up.

“The Arts et Métiers campus at Cluny,” Mademoiselle
Samoukashian said, flashing a photo of a group of young men on the ramparts of a castle. “Horrible place, in a medieval abbey. He hated it there,” she said. “Let me give you one. So much better to remember him by than …” Her voice trailed off and she handed Aimée a photo of Pascal, wearing glasses, standing in what appeared to be his office. The Pascal Aimée preferred to visualize: big eyes, wild red hair, smiling.

“
Oui, merci
.”

A green carry-all bag hung under a jacket from the coat rack. Faux reptile, just like one she’d seen in the luggage shop. Her heart skipped. Here was a connection to Meizi.

“Pascal’s bag?” Aimée asked.

Mademoiselle Samoukashian gave a tired shake of her head. “Force of habit.” Her gaze looked faraway.

What did that mean? But if this belonged to Pascal, she wanted to examine it.

“May I look?” she said, not waiting for a reply.

Aimée’s hand came back with a
carnet
of Métro tickets, a Eurostar ticket to London, a wad of francs. This put a new spin on Pascal’s murder, only she didn’t know how.

“Pascal planned a trip?” Maybe escape with Meizi?

Mademoiselle Samoukashian shrugged. “That’s my middle-of-the-night bag,” she said. “Pascal bought it for me. The ticket’s got my name on it, if you notice. Also shoes, a change of clothes. We always kept a bag ready. You never knew when they would come. If we’d be warned in time.”

Aimée stared at this little woman. “You prepared for roundups? But the Occupation’s over, Mademoiselle.”

“Not for some of us.”

Aimée’s heart churned. And it made sense.

Aimée kissed the woman’s paper-thin cheeks, a smell of Papier d’Arménie clinging to her. “No wonder Pascal loved you so much.”

“Y
OU’RE POPULAR
, C
LODO
,” said the volunteer at the Salvation Army shelter desk. “A
flic
left you a message. Someone else, too.”

Clodo stiffened. Already? January bit with cold teeth if the
flics
wanted to talk to him. He needed to get the hell out of here.

Clodo waved his blistered hand. “I’ll let my agent handle them.” His lungs burned, his eyes teared. He needed something warmer to wear.

He rooted in the clothes donations pile, grabbing a scarf. Pink and thick cashmere. He wrapped it around his neck.

“Hot enough water in the showers today, Clodo?”

Always a new volunteer. Kids who knew nothing about the streets. Or life.

“Not bad,” said Clodo.

Time to move. Once a week he came to this shelter in the east exit of the closed old Métro station. A shower, a meal, clothes, a warm place. But he hated the questions, the checking up. A few years ago, the city let the homeless sleep in alcoves on the platforms when the thermometer hit four degrees centigrade. Not anymore.

The volunteer refused to be put off. “The
flic
said it’s important, Clodo.”

As if he wanted to talk to a
flic
, after last night.

The
salauds
kicked him out from his spot on the stairs, which had been covered and dry. They’d questioned him about the
mec
the rats feasted on. Clodo, he minded his own business. Had to survive, didn’t he? He learned that in the war.

A racking cough overtook him. Damn lungs.

The kid pointed to the nursing station. “Get your cough checked out, Clodo.”

Like hell he would. He needed a drink. “Lend me some
fric
, eh. My cough syrup’s ready at the pharmacy.”

“You know we can’t do that.” The kid looked away. “But I can check on beds tonight in the Bastille shelter.”

Damn do-gooder. He needed a drink. He snorted and mounted the stairs to Boulevard Saint-Martin.

Later he’d sleep in the old ghost station. He knew the subterranean web of tunnels like the holes in his shoes. Had slept there during the air raids in the war, while the British bombed the train supply depots. People forgot that. They forgot how once neighbors, shopkeepers, postmen, and bourgeois families all huddled together in the deep stations—République, Temple, Arts et Métiers, and Saint-Martin, the ghost station. They forgot how the aerial bombing reverberations rained powder over their faces. The terror.

But he didn’t forget. He didn’t forget his parents, either. Communists, rounded up the day his Aunt Marguerite took him to the doctor for his seven-year-old checkup. They’ll come back, she’d said. But they didn’t. She worked nights playing the accordion and singing at the dance hall on the Grands Boulevards. He’d go to the shelter with Madame Tulette, the concierge.

“Watch where you’re walking, old man.” In the sea of passersby, a man in a suit jostled Clodo into a half-frozen puddle. The pavement rumbled and warm gusts shot up through the grill from the Métro running below. He leaned against the kiosk to catch his breath. Horns blared.

He remembered his aunt coming home at dawn with a tired smile and a package of butter, bread, a tied length of
saucisson
. The contents varied. Sometimes he’d meet a soldier in the bathroom on the landing. Green-gray uniforms with lightning bolts; then, after
la Libération
, the uniforms were blue with stars.