77 Rue Paradis (13 page)

CHAPTER 15

Baron grabbed his wadded robe from the foot of the bed. He whirled toward the door, slipping the robe on, and now the door opened. He was covered with sweat, his heart slamming in his chest, and he knew he would look anything but composed. He glanced quickly toward the closet. The door was closed, not tightly, but partially, and the closet was in shadow. He could not think straight, and as the huge hulk of Gorssmann came through the door, he slumped to the bed.

“Well, Baron,” Gorssmann said. “Sorry to disturb you.”

Baron looked up at the man. Gorssmann stood beside the door, a smirk on his lips, his eyes faintly sneering. He wore a dark blue suit today, with a white checked vest. He carried a derby and a white stick. “Sleeping?” he asked.

Baron said nothing. Sitting there, he tried to keep his breathing level, seeking to calm it down slowly. With the tail of his robe he mopped the sweat from his face. He wanted to say, The hell with Gorssmann. But he knew he couldn’t. He still could not be sure of Lili, God bless her. He did not know what to do about Lili.

Gorssmann turned beside the door and, watching Baron from the corner of his eye, spoke toward the hallway.

“You wait there, Arnold.”

Baron heard Arnold mumble something. There was disagreement in the tone, but he couldn’t make out the words.

“Kindly refrain from speaking to me that way,” Gorssmann said.

Arnold said something again, snapping it at the man.

Baron watched. He saw Gorssmann’s hand come up suddenly. The stick lashed out. He heard the smack, the cry, the rapid steps as Arnold scurried from the doorway. Gorssmann thrust his head forward and spat past the door into the hall. Then he closed the door and looked at Baron. He was smiling politely.

“Well?” he said. “What is the good news, Baron?”

“How?”

Gorssmann rapped his stick on the floor.

“You know precisely what I mean, thanks.”

“What’s the idea, barging in this way?”

Gorssmann stepped over to the window and looked out. Then he turned and blinked at Baron. He hung the derby on the back of the chair by the window, but held onto the cane. He glanced toward the hall door and pursed his lips, and Baron heard the dry whistling hiss of his breathing.

“I knew very well where you were this morning. Also of your—shall we say—picnic last night. Poor Joseph is so drunk I’ve had to confine him to his bed. He was appointed your shadow last night. You didn’t know that, did you? Joseph is silent in more ways than one.” Gorssmann paused, paced over by the dresser, and stood there.

Baron noticed something and his energy began to pick up again. Gorssmann’s hand was not a half inch from Lili’s package of paints, there on the dresser. Gorssmann had laid his hand on the dresser top. He twiddled his pinky, close to the packaged paints.

“How is your friend Monsieur Chevard? He is well, eh? He took great pleasure in seeing you?” Gorssmann chuckled, panted, blinked slowly at Baron with his head thrust slightly forward. “Come, come, Baron—loose the tongue. A close-mouthed habit does not become you. Please relieve my anxiety.”

Baron knew he would have to talk. There was no point in holding back. He wanted to get everything over with as quickly as possible. He knew he had to, and the hate inside him seemed to grow with this thought. Hate for everything—hate for himself. And looking at Gorssmann, he recalled something else. If Joseph, the deaf-mute, was in bed recovering from too much drink, and Arnold was in the hall, and possibly the chauffeur outside in Gorssmann’s car, then that left but two persons who might be relegated to keep tabs on him today: the man who had originally been in the rear seat of the Opel that first night, and Lili.

It was an evil thought after what had happened between them, and what he had discovered about her. But suppose she were here under Gorssmann’s orders? Suppose Gorssmann even knew about that package on the dresser, knew what had happened, perhaps? It ate down into him like a frothing acid. Lili, standing inside the closet, there behind him, perhaps smiling and giggling to herself about this. And Gorssmann brooding quietly as he stared at the bed, knowing possibly what had happened there. He could even imagine Gorssmann giving her the order: Keep him happy. Sleep with him—it’s high time you slept with somebody, thanks.

He wanted to rise, go over there, and fling the closet door open.

But he didn’t.

“Yes,” he said instead. “Everything is well with Paul Chevard.”

Gorssmann waited and Baron saw the impatience, the dim light in the huge man’s squinting eyes. Gorssmann licked his narrow lips, and his hand moved out and he clutched the package of paints unconsciously. He did not look at what he had in his hand.

“I went out to the plant. I think I spotted where what we want is,” Baron said. “I can’t be sure, because Chevard said nothing. But I’m pretty certain.”

“Good. Good.” Gorssmann’s tone was throaty, yet high-pitched with excitement. He was holding himself down tightly.

“That’s all there is,” Baron said. “I’m free to come and go as I wish. Frankly, he trusts me too well.”

“No, no. He is your friend. He trusts you, that is all. Don’t you comprehend human nature? You say he has not told you of the breather?”

“Never mentioned it.” Baron felt truly bad now that he had spoken. It hit him all at once, hard, knowing what he had done. He had betrayed the last confidence he would ever be likely to get in this world. He stared down at the floor between his feet, thinking about it, and wondering almost frantically if Lili were in it with Gorssmann. If so, all right—then it wouldn’t matter.

But it would. That was the trouble. Having her had settled nothing. He realized he wanted more from her than just that. He wanted her. He sensed something in her he had never before found in a woman. Elene had been fine, and true, and she had given her life, yes. It hurt to know this. But nevertheless, he had never felt with Elene what he did with this little sly one. And this had been only the third time he’d seen her. When he came through the door, he had wanted her, and now that he’d had her, he still wanted her, more than ever.

“You are very silent,” Gorssmann said. “I should think you would be happy.”

“Yes.”

Gorssmann chuckled again. He picked up the package of paints, glanced at it, dropped it back atop the dresser, went over and sat heavily in the chair by the window. He sort of backed into the chair, and he had to jam himself between the arms. He was obviously uncomfortable and Baron liked knowing this.

Gorssmann said, “You have discovered something else, I see.”

He’s wise, Baron thought. He’s wise about Lili!

But it wasn’t that. “You have discovered hate regarding your friend Chevard already. So soon, Baron? It takes the best of us a little while. Even I. Here nor there.” He waved his hand, tried to settle himself more comfortably in the chair. He hissed short laughter. “Perhaps we should keep you in my employ. Would you like that? I have a little enterprise in South America. We will take that up as soon as this is off the hooks, eh? Baron, what do you say?”

“Go to hell.”

Gorssmann leaned forward in the chair, the arms creaking with his weighted pressure, and he blinked solemnly.

“Very well,” he said. His voice was sad with concern. “Alors, tell me everything—everything, Baron!”

Baron did not want to. He felt that if he retained some small part of what he had seen out there at the plant today, it would boost his morale. But as he looked at Gorssmann, he knew the man would know if he lied. So he told it, and hated himself some more. He rose from the bed and went over to the dresser, unconsciously hiding the package of paints now, because it had been on his mind.

Gorssmann sat there, gloating.

“I want to know about Bette now,” Baron said. “All about her. And I’ll tell you this,” he said, looking into Gorssmann’s glistening eyes. “You harm one hair of her head, or let her get hurt in any way, and I’ll blow this whole thing sky-high.”

Gorssmann laid his head back in the chair and hissed quiet laughter at the dingy ceiling.

“You forget,” Gorssmann said. “We have her. As to your question, Baron, Bette is fine. Yes. I took her shopping yesterday, we bought all sorts of pretty things.” Gorssmann’s eyes turned inward with remembering and Baron began to feel ill. “She is a beautiful girl, very beautiful,” Gorssmann said. “Young and coltish, and gorgeous. A body that would destroy—” He glanced up, caught Baron’s look, waved his arm. “Here nor there.” He smiled, trying to smile away remembering. Baron saw that Gorssmann wished he had not spoken as he had.

“Just remember what I said,” Baron told him.

Gorssmann raised his hand. “I shall treat her like my own daughter, never fear. Just as I have treated Lili. Lili has been like my daughter, Baron. Don’t you think she’s a sweet one, though?”

“Very nice.”

“Yes. Bette is getting the best care.” Gorssmann looked up quietly at Baron. “I heard, through Joseph, about something,” he said. “Ah, my taste, as it were, in women. Baron, is it true about this girl—this one with the goat?”

Baron continued to feel more and more ill. Bette was in this man’s hands and he could see a dry evil flame in Gorssmann’s eyes now.

“I should much like to meet this woman,” Gorssmann said. “You might say I collect such creatures. They interest me.” Gorssmann writhed slightly in the chair, the arms creaking against his weight.

Baron was close to exploding now. It was all he could do to stand there and know the man Gorssmann was.

Gorssmann shrugged, rose to his feet. The chair rose with him. He wriggled his hips and the chair clattered to the floor. Gorssmann’s derby bounced to the floor and rolled over by the bed.

“Would you kindly pick it up for me?” Gorssmann said.

“No.”

The big man loomed beside Baron. He stepped over, fished for the hat with his cane. He had no success.

“I will ask you again. Please. I cannot. Would you hand me my hat?”

“You will leave then?”

Gorssmann waited. Baron went over and picked up the hat, flipped it to Gorssmann, waited. Gorssmann passed him a slow tight look, turned, and walked out through the door. Baron waited. The door opened and Gorssmann stepped back inside.  

“Please act immediately. As soon as you can, Baron. I will keep in touch.” He turned and the door closed. Baron heard him speak to Arnold, then the slow descent of the stairs began, and he thought how good it would be to push Gorssmann down those stairs, to see his huge body tumbling end over end with the high song of fear bubbling on his lips.

He knew what he had to do.

* * * *

She stood stiffly in the shadows of the closet and stared at him.

“Come on out,” he said. “I’m in a hurry, Lili.”’

She reached for him, her fine body beginning to tremble again, and Baron did not know what to do.

“Darling,” she said. “Darling.”

He left her there, hurried across the room to the front window. He heard her padding along after him, her bare feet whispering on the worn carpet.

If he could follow Gorssmann…. He looked down and the big man and Arnold were standing by the gray Opel, parked behind the Fiat. Gorssmann brandished the cane, pointed across the street. Arnold said something.

“Please,” Lili said. She held to him, gripping him and pressing her warm soft body against his back. “Please, Frank!” He felt her breath against his neck and her thighs tightened on him, her body moving against him. He wanted her, but he had to try to follow Gorssmann. He did not exactly know what was in the back of his mind.

“I did not know,” Lili said, holding to him. “Frank, I love you. I love you, chéri! It is magnificent and I never knew. I love you. Come to the bed again, Frank. Please, darling!”

He pulled her around and held her against him. The smell of her hair was like heady musk in his nostrils and he held her there against him, looking down to the street.

Gorssmann whipped the cane against Arnold again. Arnold shrugged his shoulders and the two men crossed the street in front of the Opel and entered a café. Baron saw them sit at a table near the door.

“I am a grown woman and I never knew!” Lili said. She whispered it against his throat, pressing herself against him, whispering again and again that she loved him.