Cold Winter in Bordeaux (4 page)

When Georges had brought him his Armagnac and coffee that was more chicory than coffee, and had shuffled off on his waiter’s flat feet, Lannes took the note from his pocket and read it again. The reading wasn’t necessary, he knew just what it said, but now it occurred to him that the second ‘his’ – as in ‘his Jewish boy-friend’ – might be intended to refer to him rather than to Alain. It wasn’t improbable if the writer was, as he had first guessed, the advocate Labiche, who had once asked him in the rue des Remparts if he had been visiting his ‘pretty Jew boy’. Yet the more he thought about it, the less likely it seemed that it was Labiche who had sent Schnyder the note. He couldn’t say why. It wasn’t out of character, and yet it didn’t ring true. He wondered if Madame Peniel was indeed Jewish, and was disturbed that the thought had come to him. Miriam hadn’t recognised the name. It was Henri who had spoken of a Peniel, who might have been a Jew, the mysteriously disgraced acquaintance of his father’s. Nevertheless, the thought wouldn’t go away, even if it was probably this note and the Alsatian’s talk that had put it in his mind.

He made his way to Mériadeck. It was the Jewish quarter and the few people in the streets looked tired and pinched. The old tailor’s sign had been removed. He would have been forbidden to carry on his business, but, when Lannes rang the bell and was admitted, there was cloth on the table and it was evident that he was still working, if only perhaps for a few old customers who relied on him.

‘So, superintendent, and why do you come to see old Léopold? To check that I am still alive? Or to ask me questions? Of course you have come for that reason. So how can the old Jew help you?’

‘Have you had any trouble?’ Lannes said.

‘Trouble? Why would I have had trouble? But then why wouldn’t I? By the waters of Babylon we sat down and wept, when we remembered thee, O Jerusalem. You see, the old Communist can still quote scripture. Brandy or tea?’

‘You told me once you drink brandy only when you are afraid.’

‘So: tea then. What do I have to be afraid of? But for you, superintendent, I think brandy.’

There was mockery in his voice. There had been mockery in his voice each time Lannes had talked with him.

‘Peniel,’ Lannes said.

‘Peniel?’ the old Jew laughed. ‘My wife’s cousin. My very late wife’s cousin. Second cousin or third cousin, I don’t know. Is he dead that you come to me? Not that it matters. We shall all soon be dead. Isn’t that so?’

‘I don’t know if he’s dead or not.’

Léopold took a pinch of snuff and sneezed.

‘So you don’t know if he’s dead, but you still come to me, and I tell you that I know nothing about him. Ephraim he was called, but he left the synagogue a long time ago. I left the synagogue myself but I found another faith, as you know. And that faith too left me long ago. So there we are. Ephraim became Édouard. He had ambitions to become a gentile and a gentleman. So who is dead, superintendent?’

‘A woman who may have been his niece. She called herself Madame Peniel, but I suspect she was never married. She taught music.’

‘And now she has been murdered.’

‘Yes.’

‘And you come to me. But I can tell you nothing. Except this. Ephraim – Édouard – was no good. As for a niece, well, I can’t tell … I know nothing of any niece. Nothing.’

‘Miriam didn’t recognise the name.’

‘And why should she? We never spoke of Ephraim. Nobody did. We expunged him. He left the family, so the family chose to forget him. It was easy, he wasn’t memorable. So I can tell you nothing. Drink your brandy, superintendent, and tell me in turn if you have news of young Léon and your son?’

‘Sadly, I can’t.’ Lannes picked up his glass and said, ‘Your health.’

‘My health? That is good. In Spain they say “salud y pesetas!” That is better, yes? A good boy, Léon, but doomed. So: we are all doomed. He loves your son, I think, but your son doesn’t know that, does he?’

‘No, I don’t think he does,’ Lannes said.

VI

Lannes had had René collect the photographs of the dead woman. He spread them out on his desk. There were more than twenty of them. In most she was well, even stylishly, dressed. You might read a look of disdain on her face. Lannes was wary of such interpretation. He had known too many whose appearance and manner bore little relation to their character and behaviour. There were five portraits of her in the nude. Young René had found these in a locked drawer of her desk and had been embarrassed when he presented them to Lannes. The earliest showed her as a young girl; she was lying on her belly on a chaise-longue with her heels in the air and she was looking over her right shoulder at the camera; her lips were open but the expression on her face was grave rather than inviting. In another, taken perhaps in her twenties, she was sitting astride a chair and her chin was resting on its back as if the chair was a horse she was riding. The tip of her tongue protruded from the corner of her mouth. Two others showed her sitting on the floor with her arms wrapped round her knees. She was smiling in the first, looking fixedly at the camera in the other, taken some years later. In the fifth she was lying on a bed. Her hair had fallen over her eyes, a feather shawl was draped over her breasts and her hand lay between her legs.

‘She certainly fancied herself,’ Moncerre said. ‘Don’t know that I do.’

‘And there were no photographs of anyone else in the apartment?’

‘Not that we’ve found,’ René said.

‘Anything else of interest?’

‘Her bankbook. Regular sums paid in, some of them quite large. Always in cash. Music teaching must be more profitable than I’d have thought.’

‘Interesting. Either of you get anything from the pupils you’ve spoken to?’

‘Nothing at all,’ Moncerre said. ‘They say she was a good teacher, but strict. It doesn’t surprise me’ – he picked up a photograph – ‘that she was strict. Probably enjoyed rapping their knuckles with a ruler when they played a wrong note. She looks a proper bitch if you ask me.’

‘Two of the mothers wouldn’t let me speak to their daughters,’ René said. ‘It would upset them, apparently, because they had been so fond of Madame Peniel and were distressed by the news of her death. I must say’ – René pushed a lock of hair off his forehead – ‘that surprised me. None of the other girls claimed to like her, though they all said she was a good teacher and they had learnt a lot from her even if they didn’t enjoy their lessons.’

Lannes said, ‘I’ll speak myself to the mothers who wouldn’t let you question their daughters.’

He told them what Anne-Marie had said.

‘This is getting interesting,’ Moncerre said. ‘But the set-up, the champagne and the cigar smoke. You can’t wish away evidence like that.’

‘It’s evidence, certainly, but the importance of evidence depends on how you read it.’

‘If I understand you, chief,’ René said, ‘you suspect that she was procuring girls for perverts who like them young.’

‘I like that,’ Moncerre said, ‘and so one of the fathers knocks her off.’

Lannes said, ‘I’ve only one sentence to go on, and Anne-Marie’s reaction. It’s no more than a possibility that we’ll find that this is the explanation for the murder. As I said, we need to know much more about her. Meanwhile we need to get hold of the so-called uncle. Have another word with the concierge, will you? And, René, you might see if you can get anything more from the maid, Marie. She was frightened of me, as well as suffering from shock. She may be more forthcoming with you.’

* * *

He couldn’t get the photographs out of his head. Who took them and who were they taken for? Only the woman herself? How often did she look at the nude ones? And when, in what circumstances?

A maid admitted him to the apartment in the rue Michel-Montaigne and showed him into the salon. High ceilings, Second Empire furniture, paintings, mostly landscapes of no particular quality. The airlessness of a room in which the windows were never opened, Venetian blinds drawn, and vases of artificial flowers. ‘Madame will be with you in a moment,’ but it was at least a quarter of an hour till the door opened and a tall woman came in. She wore a brown velvet dress and her dark hair was pulled back in a bun.

‘I’m surprised to see you,’ she said. ‘I assume your visit is on account of the sad death of Madame Peniel, but I have already told your young officer that we have nothing to say. She taught our daughter the piano, very well too, but we had no other dealings with her and I cannot see that her death concerns us.’

‘I am sure it doesn’t,’ Lannes said. ‘Nevertheless, I should like to speak with your daughter. You told Inspector Martin that she was fond of Madame Peniel and is distressed by the news of her death. It’s possible that Madame Peniel may have said something to her which might help us find the killer.’

‘Impossible. It’s ridiculous to suppose that Charlotte can say anything that would help you. She knows nothing about that.’

She smoothed her dress over her bottom and sat down, quite heavily, in a high-backed chair. She sat very straight and sniffed, loudly, twice.

‘But I should like to speak with her, and I would rather do so here, in your presence if you prefer, than summon her formally to my office. You will understand, Madame Duvallier, that I have the authority to do so. However, I have no wish to exercise that authority.’

The fencing continued for several minutes. Then Lannes, who had not been invited to sit down, said, ‘I understand your reluctance, and this is indeed a delicate matter, no doubt upsetting for your daughter. Moreover I have no wish to report to the examining magistrate that you have been obstructing me in the performance of my duty, which is nevertheless what I may have to do. Now will you fetch your daughter, or shall I ask the magistrate for a warrant summoning her to a formal examination? It’s one or the other, and the choice is yours.’

She sniffed again and got up and left the room. Lannes waited. He wanted to smoke but hesitated to do so. If she isn’t back in five minutes, he thought, I’ll either light up or walk out and send them a summons. What a futile business it was. He was sure now the girl would tell him nothing. Her mother would be making certain that she didn’t. Well, he would see about that, if they came back. He felt very tired, extricated a Gauloise from the packet and tapped it on his thumbnail.

The door opened. Madame Duvallier resumed her seat, her back stiff with antagonism. The girl stood a little apart, twisting her handkerchief in her hands. Her mother told her to stop doing that and stand up straight. She was a plump girl with black hair, dark eyes and a big, full-lipped mouth.

‘Your mother will have told you why I’m here,’ Lannes said. ‘Did you like Madame Peniel?’

‘She was all right.’

‘A good teacher?’

‘All right, I suppose. I’m sorry she’s dead. At least I suppose I am.’

‘Charlotte!’

‘Well, I haven’t really thought about it, Maman. I mean, why should I? She was only my music teacher. Actually,’ she turned towards Lannes for the first time, ‘to be honest, I didn’t much like her.’

‘Why was that?’

‘Well, she was sarky, you know what I mean?’

‘Yes, I know what you mean. Now, Charlotte, I’ve an important question for you. I’m afraid it may embarrass you, but I hope you can bring yourself to answer it. One of her other pupils has told me she made unsuitable suggestions to her. Did she ever make any to you?’

‘Superintendent, I can’t allow you to put such questions to my daughter. She’s an innocent child. She doesn’t know what you mean.’

‘Did she?’ Lannes said.

The girl flushed. Her lower lip wobbled. She looked as if she was about to cry.

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘She put her hand into my blouse and felt my breast and said she knew men who would like to do that. It was disgusting. She was disgusting, I’m glad she’s dead, really glad, but it wasn’t me, really. It wasn’t my fault, Maman.’

She fell to her knees, clutching her mother and burying her face in her lap.

‘I hope you are happy, superintendent.’

‘Not happy. Not at all. But I am grateful. You’re a brave girl, Charlotte. Thank you.’

Well, it was perfectly clear, or at least partly clear. He had no doubt that other girls, if pressed, would confirm what Charlotte and Anne-Marie had told him. But would any go further? Would they admit to being introduced to ‘men who would like to do that’? Not when their mothers were present, surely, and it was unlikely that any had already confessed to their parents. But if they hadn’t, then the motive for murder which Moncerre had advanced evaporated. It was going to be a wearisome business, questioning all the pupils, and it was probable that such questioning wouldn’t take them further and might indeed give rise to complaints from the parents. It was more urgent to find the elderly man who used to call on Madame Peniel and whom the concierge suggested was her uncle. He knew that sort of uncle. And there was another possibility: that they were pursuing a scent that had never been laid, that she didn’t procure girls, and that when she thrust her hand into their breasts or up their skirts, she was doing no more than what pleased her, and that talk of the men who might enjoy it was a blind which also excited her. When he thought of the photographs this seemed quite likely. Nasty woman either way. Unhappy one too perhaps.

* * *

Clothilde and Michel were playing piquet. The boy rose at once to shake his hand. He was always polite but there was some reservation in his manner when he addressed Lannes. Probably Sigi had told him to be wary. Or perhaps he had spoken of Lannes with contempt. Now Michel pushed back his hair and said, ‘I hope you don’t object, sir. Madame Lannes has invited me to stay for supper and spend the night here.’

‘Why should I object? As Clothilde’s friend you are always welcome.’

Had he put that badly? Implying that in other circumstances he would have been quick to show him the door?

‘I take it you’ve told your grandfather,’ he said. ‘He worries about you young people, as we all do, and must, in these times.’

Marguerite didn’t look up from the sauce she was making when he came into the kitchen.

‘Are you happy about this?’ he said.