The Dancer at the Gai-Moulin (4 page)

The Georgian gave her a doubtful look
and went back upstairs, muttering to himself in his own language. Jean had
recognized the man with broad shoulders.

‘You, come
and eat something. Stop fussing, or it's off to bed with you, and the
doctor'll be round.'

Monsieur Chabot did not usually come
home for lunch. They ate in the kitchen, where Madame Chabot never sat down, coming
and going between table and stove all the time. While Jean, head bent, tried to
swallow a few mouthfuls, she observed him, and suddenly noticed something about his
appearance.

‘Now, where did you get that
tie?'

‘I … er, René gave it
me.'

‘René, always blessed René! And
you don't have enough self-respect to …? I'm ashamed for you. These
people may have plenty of money, but that doesn't make them respectable. His
parents aren't even married!'

‘Maman!'

He usually called her
‘Mother', but he wanted to try to win her over. He was desperate; all he
wanted was a bit of peace for the few hours he had to spend at home. He imagined the
unknown man pacing the street, just in front of the school he had attended as a
child.

‘No, son! You're going off
the rails, let me tell you! It's time for it to stop, if you don't want
to turn out like your Uncle Henri.'

That was the nightmare prospect, the
uncle you sometimes encountered, either reeling drunk or else up a ladder, working
as a house painter.

‘And he'd had an education!
He could have been anything.'

Jean stood up, his mouth full, literally
snatched his hat from the hallstand and fled.

In Liège, some
newspapers have a morning edition, but the version most people read comes out at two
p.m. Chabot walked to the centre of town in a sort of daze, the bright sunshine
almost blinding him, and only came to when he was across the Meuse and heard a
newsboy shouting:

‘Read all about it!
Gazette de
Liège
! Latest edition. Corpse found in laundry basket! Horrible details!
Gazette de Liège
!'

Only about two metres away from him, the
broad-shouldered stranger was buying a paper and waiting for his change. Jean felt
in his pocket and found the banknotes he had shoved there hastily, but no coins. So
he went on and was soon pushing open the door of his office, where the other staff
had already arrived.

‘Five minutes late, Monsieur
Chabot!' noted the senior clerk. ‘It may not be much, but it happens too
often.'

‘I'm sorry. The
tram … I've brought the petty cash.'

He knew that he was not looking himself.
His cheeks were burning and sparks seemed to flash before his
eyes … Monsieur Hosay glanced through the notebook, checking the totals at
the bottom of the pages.

‘A hundred and eighteen francs
fifty. That's what you should have left.'

Jean regretted not having thought of
changing the large notes. He could hear the second clerk and the typist discussing
the body in the laundry basket.

‘Graphopoulos. Is that a Turkish
name?'

‘No, Greek, apparently he was
Greek.'

Jean's ears were buzzing. He took
two hundred-franc notes from his pocket. Monsieur Hosay coldly pointed out
something that had fallen to the ground:
a third note.

‘You seem to be treating your
money very casually. Don't you have a wallet?'

‘I'm sorry.'

‘If the boss saw you putting
banknotes straight into your pockets like that … Well, I don't have
any change. You'd better carry over the hundred and eighteen francs fifty. And
when that's all gone, ask for more. This afternoon, you're to go round
the newspaper offices to put in the legal announcements. It's urgent, they
have to be published tomorrow.'

The Turk, the Turk, the Turk!

Once outside, Jean bought a newspaper
and stood for a while in the centre of a circle of bystanders since the vendor had
to find him some change. He read as he walked along, bumping into other people.

MYSTERY OF CORPSE IN LAUNDRY
BASKET!

This morning at about nine o'clock, as he unlocked the gates to the
Botanical Gardens, the keeper noticed a large laundry basket in the middle
of a lawn. He tried to open it, without success. The basket was fastened
with an iron bar attached to a heavy padlock.

He called Officer Leroy, who called in turn on the Chief Inspector of the
4th district. It was ten o'clock before the padlock was finally opened
by a locksmith. And then, what a sight greeted their eyes! Inside was a
corpse, bent double, and in order to cram it into the space, several
vertebrae of the neck had been broken.

The deceased was a man aged about forty, of foreign aspect: his wallet was
missing but in his waistcoat pocket was a business card in the name of
Ephraim Graphopoulos.

The dead man must have arrived only recently in Liège, since he was not
listed on the register of foreign visitors nor on any of the police forms
submitted by hoteliers.

The pathologist will carry out a post-mortem this afternoon, but it is
thought the man must have been attacked during the night with a heavy blunt
instrument, such as a truncheon, iron bar, sandbag or weighted walking
stick.

Further details on this affair, which bids fair to cause a sensation, will
appear in our next edition.

Newspaper in hand, Jean arrived at the
front desk of
La Meuse
, dropped off his legal notices and waited for his
receipt.

In the sunshine the town was busy. These
were the last fine days of autumn, and stands were being erected on the boulevards
for the big October festival.

He looked behind him for the man who had
followed him that morning, but saw no one. As he went past the Pélican, he checked
that Delfosse, who had no afternoon lectures, was not there. He made a detour by the
nightclub, Rue du Pot-d'Or. The doors of the Gai-Moulin stood open. The
dance-floor was in darkness, and it was hard to see the crimson plush seating.
Victor was cleaning the windows with a bucket of water and Chabot hurried past to
avoid being spotted. His errand took him on to the
Express
and the
Journal de Liège.

Adèle's balcony fascinated him. He
hesitated. He had
visited her once before,
a month earlier. Delfosse had sworn to him that he had been the dancer's
lover. So Jean had knocked at her door at midday, on some flimsy pretext. She had
received him in a grubby peignoir, and had carried on with her toilette in front of
him, chatting away as if they were old friends.

He hadn't tried anything. But he
had rather enjoyed this moment of intimacy.

Now he pushed open the door next to the
grocer's shop, went up the dark stairs and knocked.

No reply. But presently he heard
shuffling steps on the wooden floorboards, and the door opened, letting out a strong
smell of methylated spirits.

‘Oh it's you! I thought it
was your pal.'

‘Why?'

Adèle was already turning back to the
little burner on which some curling tongs were placed.

‘Oh, I don't know, just an
idea. Shut the door, will you, there's a draught.'

At that moment, Chabot felt overcome by
a desire to confide in her, to tell her everything, and in any case to be comforted
by this woman with the tired eyes, the worn but still-tempting flesh beneath the
peignoir, and the red satin slippers in which she tripped round the cluttered
bedroom.

On the unmade bed, he saw a copy of the
Gazette de Liège
.

Adèle had just got out of bed, and a
tin of condensed milk had leaked near the burner.

‘So your friend isn't with
you?' she insisted.

Chabot frowned, as he answered in a
sulky voice:

‘No, why would he be with
me?'

She paid no attention and opened a
wardrobe, fetching out a pink silk underslip.

‘Is it true his father's
this rich factory owner?'

Jean had not taken a seat, nor even put
his hat down. He watched her coming and going, with a troubled mixture of feelings,
part melancholy, part desire, instinctive respect for a woman, and despair.

She wasn't beautiful, especially
now, lounging about in her mules and shabby peignoir. But perhaps, in the
familiarity of this intimacy, she held even more allure for him.

How old was she, twenty-five, thirty?
She'd certainly seen life. She often talked about Paris, Berlin, Ostend. She
mentioned the names of famous nightclubs.

But without any excitement or pride,
without showing off. On the contrary. Her main characteristic seemed to be
weariness, as could be guessed from the expression in her green eyes, from the
casual way she held a cigarette in her mouth, from all her movements and smiles.
Weariness with a smile.

‘What does
his factory make?'

‘Bikes.'

‘That's funny, I once knew a
bicycle manufacturer in Saint-Étienne. How old is he?'

‘Who, the father?'

‘No, René.'

He frowned even more on hearing his
friend's first name on her lips.

‘Eighteen.'

‘Bet he's a bad
boy.'

Their familiarity was complete: she was
treating Jean Chabot as an equal. By contrast when she talked about René Delfosse,
there was a hint of respect in her voice.

Had she guessed that Chabot wasn't
rich, that he came from a family probably no better than her own?

‘Sit down. You don't mind if
I get dressed? Pass me the cigarettes.'

He looked around.

‘On the bedside table,
that's right.'

Pale-faced, Jean scarcely dared touch
the cigarette-case, which he had seen the night before in the hands of the stranger.
He looked across at Adèle, whose gown had fallen open to reveal her naked body, and
who was now putting on her stockings.

This was even more troubling than
before. He blushed deeply, perhaps because of the cigarette-case, perhaps because of
the nudity, or more likely a combination of the two. Adèle wasn't only a
woman, she was a woman mixed up in a drama, a woman who no doubt had a secret.

‘Well?'

He held out the
case.

‘Got a light?'

His hand shook as he proffered a lighted
match. Then she burst out laughing.

‘I'll bet you haven't
seen all that many women in your life, have you!'

‘Oh, of course, I've had
women …'

She laughed harder. And looked him in
the face, half closing her eyes.

‘You're a funny fellow. An
oddball. Pass me my girdle.'

‘Did you get back late last
night?'

She looked at him with a hint of
seriousness.

‘What's this? Are you in
love, by any chance? And jealous, what's more! Now I see why you looked so
cross when I mentioned René. Come on, turn to the wall.'

‘You haven't read the
papers?'

‘I just looked at the
serial.'

‘That man from last night,
he's been killed.'

‘You're kidding!'

She didn't seem very bothered.
Just curious.

‘Who by?'

‘They don't know. They found
his body in a laundry basket.'

The peignoir was thrown on the bed. Jean
turned round as she was pulling down her slip and taking a dress from the
cupboard.

‘Ah well, that'll cause some
trouble for me.'

‘When you left the Gai-Moulin, did
he come with you?'

‘No, I left on my own.'

‘Ah!'

‘Anyone
would think you don't believe me! Do you really imagine I bring all the
customers home with me? I'm a dancer, kid. My job is to try and get them to
buy a lot of drinks. But once the doors are closed, that's it.'

‘Still, with
René …'

He realized that he had put his foot in
it.

‘What about René?'

‘Nothing. He told me—'

‘You idiot! Hand on heart, all he
did was give me a kiss. Pass me another cigarette.'

And, as she put on her hat:

‘Off with you now! I'm going
shopping. Come on, shut the door.'

They went down the dark stairs, one
after the other.

‘Which way are you
going?'

‘Back to the office.'

‘Will you be along
tonight?'

The pavement was crowded. They separated
and a few minutes later, Jean was sitting at his desk, faced with a pile of
envelopes to frank. Without knowing exactly why, it was sadness, rather than fear,
that he felt most strongly. He looked round at the office papered with legal notices
and felt disgust.

‘Have you got the receipts?'
asked the senior clerk.