The Red Notebook (3 page)

The first thing he had found was a black glass bottle of perfume – Habanita by Molinard. He pressed once on the spray, releasing the powdery scent of ylang-ylang and jasmine. Then came a bunch of keys on a decorative key ring with a gilt cartouche
covered in hieroglyphics. Next a little diary with appointment times circled on the appropriate day, with first names, sometimes full names noted. No addresses or telephone numbers. For this month, January, it was filled halfway through. Laurent recognised the make of diary; Le Cahier Rouge sold similar ones in their stationery section. Its owner had not bothered to write her own details on the page at the front that was intended for that purpose. The last event listed was for the previous evening: 8 p.m., dinner Jacques and Sophie + Virginie. No address for that entry either. Just one entry for the coming week, on Thursday: 6 p.m., dry-cleaner’s (strappy dress). Next he took out a little fawn and violet leather bag containing make-up and accessories, including a large brush whose softness he tested against his cheek. A gold lighter, a black Montblanc ballpoint (perhaps the one used to jot down her thoughts in the notebook), a packet of liquorice sweets – he took one and it immediately added an interesting woody flavour to the taste of the Fixin – a small bottle of Evian, a hair clip with a blue flower on it, and a pair of red plastic dice. Laurent picked them up and rolled them on the floor. Five and six. Good throw. A recipe for
ris de veau
torn from a women’s magazine,
Elle
probably. A packet of tissues. A telephone charger, but of course, no phone or wallet. And nothing with her name or address on it.

There were four colour photographs in a folded envelope. One of a middle-aged man with grey-white hair, dressed in a red polo shirt and beige trousers. He was standing against a backdrop of pine trees, smiling. Next to him, a woman of similar age in a lilac dress, blonde with dark glasses, held her hand out to the person taking the photograph. It looked as if it had been taken more than twenty years ago, thirty maybe. The next photo showed a much younger man with short brown hair standing with his arms crossed in front of an apple tree. In the third one there was a
house and garden with a large tree. There was nothing to indicate the location of the house and none of the photographs were annotated. Here were memories and loved ones that revealed nothing and which only the owner of the handbag would be able to identify.

There seemed to be no end to the items in the bag. Laurent decided to take several out at once. He thrust his hand into the left side pocket and pulled out a jumble of things. A copy of
Pariscope
, lip balm, Nurofen, a hairgrip and a book.
Accident Nocturne
by Patrick Modiano. Laurent paused for a moment. So the bag’s owner read Modiano, a novelist whose favourite themes were mystery, memory and the search for identity. It was as if Modiano was sending him a message. When had he written that book? Laurent couldn’t quite remember, but he thought it was around 2000. He opened the book to find the year it was originally published. ‘Gallimard 2003’ was printed at the bottom of the left-hand page and there was something else visible on the other side of the page. Some handwriting showed through. Laurent turned the page back and read the two lines written in pen beneath the title: ‘For Laure, in memory of our meeting in the rain. Patrick Modiano.’ The writing blurred before his eyes. Modiano, the most elusive of French authors. Who hadn’t done any book signings for years and only rarely gave interviews. Whose hesitant diction, full of pauses, had become legendary and who was himself a legend. An enigma that his readers had followed from book to book for forty years. To have a book signed by him seemed highly improbable. And yet here was his signature in black and white.

The author of
Rue des Boutiques Obscures
had just provided him with the first name of the woman with the mauve bag.

I’m scared of red ants.

And of logging on to my bank account and clicking ‘current balance’.

I’m scared when the telephone rings first thing in the morning.

And of getting on the Métro when it’s packed.

I’m scared of time passing.

I’m scared of electric fans, but I know why.

It was time to stop reading Laure’s red notebook and get on with emptying the bag to look for any clue, however tiny, that might provide him with the owner’s name or address. He still had more pockets to look in, some zipped and some not. Laurent would never have imagined that a woman’s bag could have so many nooks and crannies. It was even more complicated than dissecting an octopus on a kitchen table. Several times he thought he had emptied a pocket only to find a lump at the bottom which turned out to be a stone, no doubt picked up at some meaningful moment. He had found three of them in all, in different parts of the bag. And a conker, probably picked up in a park.

He paused in his task, and got up to open the window, letting in the cold night air. The square was deserted. His head was spinning – was it because of the wine and lack of dinner or because of the accumulation of objects he had unearthed? He wasn’t really sure. Laurent was about to go back to his inventory
when his phone beeped. He had completely forgotten about Dominique. Her text read, ‘Be with you in five minutes, hope you haven’t gone to bed yet.’ He had not finished with the bag but immediately began to put everything back inside, not without feeling a certain resentment towards Dominique who was forcing him to interrupt his investigation just as it was beginning. Then he shoved the bag regretfully into his wardrobe.

As he combed his hair in front of the mirror, he reflected that he could easily have left all the items on the floor and explained the story to Dominique. But he hadn’t wanted to. Dominique would have been jealous and suspicious, and Laurent did not want to share his discovery. For the moment, Modiano’s Laure was a mystery he would keep to himself.

‘You’ve had a woman here …’

‘I beg your pardon?’ replied Laurent.

Dominique’s dark eyes bored into his, and her short haircut, which suited her fine features so well, now seemed to make her look like a bird of prey.

‘There’s been no woman here,’ said Laurent with as much assurance as he could muster at that hour. How on earth could Dominique divine the presence of a woman’s belongings in the room twenty minutes earlier? It was commonly said that women had a sixth sense. But this was surely a case of witchcraft.

Dominique twisted her wine glass in her hand and tapped her cigarette ash into the crystal ashtray.

‘A woman has been here – I can smell her perfume,’ she said with a knowing look.

The black bottle in the bag. It had been a bad idea to try out the spray; the smell of Habanita must still be in the air. Yet it had only been one quick spray and more than two hours had passed.
Like a bloodhound Dominique had picked up the scent in a way that Laurent was certain no other woman could have done.

‘There have been no women here. I swear to you … on my daughter’s life, on my bookshop, that if a woman has been in this room, I will be ruined in a matter of months.’

Laurent had chosen his words carefully. He could swear on anything he liked because he had spoken the truth: no woman had been in his apartment. It was only her bag that had taken up residence.

The speech appeared to pacify Dominique. ‘I believe you,’ she said. ‘You’re too superstitious to lie about something like that.’ She then went on to tell him how she had had to spend her evening watching screens recording the latest tumbles of stock markets around the world and the final million-dollar transactions, in order to write her column for the famous newspaper where she was economics editor. Dominique also had a radio slot and sometimes appeared on television for TF1. It was always strange to see the woman he shared his nights with on the small screen chatting with other journalists and sometimes even with big names in broadcasting.

They had met when Laurent had been invited on to TF1 to talk about a high-profile book and Dominique had been waiting to go on to do her economics broadcast. She had read the book he had talked about and told him how much she liked it. The author was doing a signing the following week at Le Cahier Rouge and Laurent had invited her along. She was still there at closing time. Their eyes had met for that fraction of a second during which, without saying a word, a man and a woman who don’t know each other signal that the night is not yet over.

‘Well, anyway, it’s late,’ she said, leading the way to the bedroom.

As he embraced her on the bed, Laurent could not help turning his head towards the wardrobe where he had hidden the bag, and, as Dominique kissed him, the phrase ‘I’m scared of red ants’ seemed to take root permanently in his brain.

Laurent turned over in bed and realised he was alone. He looked at the clock: it was six in the morning. Even when Dominique got up early, she never left before seven, and not without saying goodbye. Laurent got up and found her fully dressed in the hall, about to leave.

‘You’re going?’

‘That’s right. I’m leaving.’

‘Why are you looking at me like that?’

‘I’ve left you a note on the coffee table,’ Dominique replied coldly, doing up the belt on her coat.

Laurent,

As you were so keen to swear on them, I would keep an eye on your daughter and the finances of your bookshop. I got up early this morning and went to lie down for a moment on the sofa. This is what I found on your carpet. Perhaps we can discuss it one day. Or perhaps not. That’s up to you. I won’t be the one making the first move, I can assure you.

Dominique

Under her signature, Dominique had conspicuously placed the hairgrip from the bag. Laurent must have dropped it as he was hurriedly putting everything back in the bag.

‘You’re not going to tell me it’s your daughter’s.’

‘No, it’s not my daughter’s. I can explain, if you wait a moment.’ He fetched the bag from his wardrobe and set it on the coffee table.

‘It just gets better,’ murmured Dominique, amazed by Laurent’s brazen gesture. ‘She actually leaves her things here.’

‘No, it’s not that at all! You’ll laugh when I tell you the truth.’

‘Go on then, Laurent, make me laugh.’

‘I found the bag in the street.’

‘You must think I’m an idiot.’ Dominique’s face was suddenly impassive and Laurent experienced the vertigo of the falsely accused who finds that absolutely no one believes him, not even his own lawyer.

‘No,’ stammered Laurent, ‘I don’t think you’re an idiot. I found it yesterday in the street. In Rue du Passe-Musette to be precise.’

Dominique nodded slowly, but her expression was getting colder and colder.

‘A full bag, in the street …’

‘Yes, a stolen bag; it had been stolen,’ replied Laurent.

‘And what was it doing in your cupboard, this stolen bag?’

Laurent opened his mouth to reply but he didn’t get the chance.

‘Why didn’t you tell me this fanciful tale last night?’

‘Well, because—’

‘Because I wasn’t supposed to find the hairgrip on the carpet!’ Dominique cut him off heatedly.

Laurent was speechless.

‘The first thing I could smell here was her perfume,’ went on Dominique, walking unseeingly round the room. ‘I should have suspected something, you were being weird …’

‘It wasn’t her perfume. Well, yes, it was, but it was me who sprayed it,’ he said, rummaging around in the bag. ‘Where’s the
bottle got to? I’ll show you; it’s here somewhere. Why can you never find anything in a handbag?’ Laurent was getting annoyed. ‘Here it is,’ he exclaimed triumphantly. He pressed the nozzle and a light spray fanned out in the morning light.

‘I’m impressed,’ commented Dominique soberly. ‘You can tell her that I don’t like her perfume.’

Laurent heard the door slam. He was left standing stock still in the middle of the sitting room, the black bottle of Habanita in his hand.

He hastily pulled on his clothes so that he could run after her, but Dominique had already found a taxi, which was disappearing round a corner of the square. Her phone went straight to voicemail. Laurent didn’t bother to leave a message. Instead he sank down onto a stool at the counter of the Jean-Bart, where Jean Martel had just returned from some early morning antique hunting. The antique dealer had laid out several snuff boxes and was examining them with a pocket magnifying glass.

‘It’s like an investigation,’ said the old trader; ‘you have to choose a clue and see where it leads.’

‘And what is the clue?’ Laurent asked him wearily.

‘There’s a partially erased coat of arms on this one – I think it’s a count’s. If I can identify him, perhaps I can find out where it came from.’

Laurent nodded, paid for his coffee then went back up to his flat. The bag was on the table beside the note.
Perhaps we can discuss it one day. Or perhaps not. That’s up to you
. He would call her later in the day. It was very unfair – it certainly looked as if he had done something wrong, but he had the right to defend himself, to explain properly. Although that was what he had done and Dominique hadn’t believed him.

After another cup of coffee, he looked at his emails. More spam including the dog umbrellas – they were certainly persistent.