As soon as Martin began to turn the crank, the eyes, which were indeed bells, began to clang until he heard a voice asking him whom he wanted. Holding one horn to his ear and shouting into the phone’s mouth, he told the exchange to connect him to the Singers.
The maid answered and agreed to get Madame.
Noémie Singer’s voice was tentative, worried. She had not expected anyone to call at this time of day.
Martin explained that he telephoned instead of visiting in order not to disturb her more than necessary.
At first he feared that he had been cut off, but he persisted, shouting her name into the horn, until she finally responded. “How can I help you?”
“It’s about the tinker, Jacob.”
Again no response.
“Did he ever tell you the name of the village where he lives?”
“No, Monsieur Martin, no.”
“Did he ever talk about his stepmother?”
Martin imagined her biting her lower lip, hesitating. So he asked the central question before she could put him off. “Do you know if she is well or ill?”
Her answer did not surprise him. “Monsieur Martin, Jacob’s mother is dead.”
“When did she die?” he asked eagerly.
“I really don’t know.” He could imagine her arching her eyebrows with impatience, perhaps even anger.
“Recently?”
“I believe, a few weeks before my own dear uncle.” Even through the static he heard the ice in her voice.
“Do you know—”
“Monsieur Martin, I understand your Republic believes in the freedom of religion. I do not have to speak to you about these things, and I do not want to.”
Martin wondered if “his” Republic included her husband. He did not press.
“Thank you, Madame Singer. Sorry, again, to disturb you.”
He heard the phone on the other end of the exchange click.
It was time to talk to David Singer.
Passing the guard at the entrance to the Palais with barely a greeting, Martin galloped up the stairs two at a time, warding off the loss of his nerve. He had not seen Singer since his interview with Noémie the week before and had no idea what she might have told him. Martin knocked, and entered Singer’s chambers to a decidedly chilly reception. After exchanging perfunctory greetings they stood, arms stiffly at their sides, until Singer’s greffier, with the kind of discretion that Charpentier seldom showed, got up and left the room without being asked. Then they sat: Singer behind his desk, Martin in front of it, lowering themselves with watchful care, like two cats, nosing each other out.
“You have something to tell me?” Singer asked, his lips between the perfectly fashioned black mustache and beard barely moving.
“I wanted to talk to you about this tinker, this Jacob.”
Singer took in a deep hissing breath. “Yes, so I’ve heard, and I also understand that you have no compunction about coming between a man and his wife.”
“That certainly was not my intention, I was only—” Martin stopped himself just in time. He realized that Singer wanted to say more, and he wanted to hear it.
“Only what? Prying? I suppose she told you what a holy man this Jacob is, how gentle, how good.”
“Yes.” Martin nodded, the hair on the back of his neck bristling ever so slightly.
Yes. And you. What do you think?
“She undoubtedly did not tell you about the time he shouted at her, told her our kitchen was unclean, told her that she was breaking all the old laws, and how she and Béatrice then turned the house inside out, as if that’s what defined us as Jews, obeying archaic laws that make no sense in the modern world.”
As he listened to these complaints, what Martin really wanted to know was how Singer defined himself as a Jew. But, at that moment and with what was to come, he dare not ask.
“You can see how upset all this makes me. Did you really have to dig into our affairs?” Singer continued, evidently taking Martin’s silence as a kind of contrition.
“Yes, I did.” Martin’s response was quiet and insistent. “This is why I have come to see you first, before Didier. To tell you of my suspicion that this Jacob may be the murderer of Ullmann and your uncle.”
“That’s ridiculous.” Singer slapped his hand on the desk, before getting up and moving away from Martin, who understood very well that his colleague did not want to face the possibility that one Jew had killed another. Certainly Singer realized, or should have, that Martin would prefer to accuse any anti-Semite of the crimes, if for nothing else than the irrational hatred he spawned. But despite what Didier or Singer wanted, suppressing the anti-Israelites was not Martin’s most urgent duty. He had to find the killer before he killed again.
Martin got up and went around the desk to face his friend. “Do you believe this Jacob is some kind of fanatic?”
Singer stared at the floor, twisting his mouth in distaste. “He’s just a fool.”
For a long, tense moment, Martin resisted the temptation to take Singer by the arms and force him to meet his eyes. Finally, Singer did, in anger. “Do you even read your local Catholic press, see some of the hate columns, the vile accusations?”
“More than you know.” Although he was shaking inside, hurt and resentful that Singer did not trust in his good faith, Martin had to persist, logically and calmly. It could be crucial. “Do you know if Jacob made it a habit to come to your uncle’s house? Did he talk to the housekeeper?”
“How would I know?”
“Is it possible that Erlanger threatened him in any way?”
Singer opened his arms in exasperation. “Do you have any idea what you are talking about? Noémie’s uncle using threats? He was kind to a fault. Charitable to everyone, Christian or Jew. He gave coins to any poor person he met, patted them on the head, and talked to them.”
“About what?” Martin asked eagerly. Singer, the most polished of interrogators, may have slipped into the very trap he was trying to avoid: a connection between his uncle and the tinker.
“About how to improve their lives. Urging urchins to get an education, beggars to find useful professions. And, through the Consistory, providing the means for them to do so.”
“Urging immigrants, then?”
“Of course, immigrants. They can’t remain as they are, beggars, peddlers. They have to come into the modern world. Do something for their families, for themselves, for this country, if they want to live here. Be men.” Singer’s spoke so vehemently that he sprayed specks of spittle on his precise black beard.
Martin understood from this that above all Singer, and perhaps the kindly Erlanger, did not want these eastern Jews to become an embarrassment. “And Jacob is not a man?” he asked.
Like you. Like me. Even though he doesn’t want to be like either one of us?
“I told you, he is a fool. Which is not yet a crime. So I hope you will not bandy this preposterous story around the courthouse.” Singer sat down again at his desk and crossed his arms. They were at an impasse.
Martin walked back to his chair, picked up his hat, and said, “I won’t say anything until I have more proof,” knowing full well there was only one way to get it: find the tinker. Jacquette’s men were already on alert, and they would be out in full force on Thursday.
Thursday, December 20
M
ARTIN CURSED HIMSELF FOR COMING
in early. Tuesday and Wednesday had been bad enough. But today, Thursday, he could not possibly sit at his desk and write reports when out there, somewhere in the city, the endgame was in play. Martin threw down his pen and began to pace. He scratched at his beard in frustration. He should be with Jacquette and the others. Doing…what exactly? The question deflated him, giving him pause. He’d be useless. He could not see himself wrestling a weapon from a suspect or shooting a revolver at him. Martin’s duty was obvious and galling: he had to stay put, wait, and hope he was right.
Martin went over to the potbellied stove and poked at the sparking bits of wood with unwarranted fervor. He slammed the door of the stove shut and walked to the map that Charpentier had pinned to the wall on Monday. Martin had ordered two gendarmes to start searching through the depopulated hamlets once inhabited by Israelites. He let his fingers trace the distance from the Palais de Justice to each of the six villages identified by the departmental surveyor. So far, Martin had reports on three of them. Could the tinker just be starting out from one of the others? Or was Jacob the Wanderer in the midst of making his weekly rounds, going from town to town, like the peddlers of old? Or had he set out stealthily in the dark of night to take up a hiding position from which to stalk his next victim?
The map told Martin nothing. All he could do was march back and forth until Charpentier pranced in, his long red scarf flowing behind him. The young man’s obligatory, cheery “Bonjour, Monsieur le juge,” was Martin’s signal to settle down and look judicial. He had no desire to share his excitement, or his anxieties, with his clerk. Martin flipped through the papers on his desk until he heard Charpentier’s pen scratching out a summary of their interrogations. Then he quietly opened his top drawer and took out the watch that his father had made for him decades ago. He wound it up and set it on his desk far enough away so that its ticking did not pluck at his already taut nerves, but near enough so that he could keep track of how long it was taking.
After an hour had passed, Martin slouched forward, mesmerized by the minute hand’s excruciatingly slow march from one number to the next. By ten o’clock, he was convinced that one of his men must have spotted the tinker. Five minutes later, he could almost see Jacquette tramping into his office, dragging the Israelite by the collar of his long, filthy black coat. In the next ten minutes, as the second hand relentlessly ticked one tock at a time, Martin had created two opposing scenarios in his mind. Jacquette would arrive in a jolly mood, murderer in hand, eager to congratulate Martin on his perspicacious investigative powers. Or, standing in front of Martin’s desk, the inspector would be shifting uneasily from one foot to another, attempting to explain away his superior’s folly and pointing out that, because of it, they were back where they had started.
Ever the realist, Martin knew that neither one’s longings nor one’s fears ever materialized full-blown. But nothing could have prepared him for what took place at exactly 10:33 when the door to his chambers flew open.
A ghostly, pallid David Singer staggered in with blood running across his chest. Martin’s heart leapt to his throat. The worst had happened. Singer was dying.
Yet the specter kept marching toward him and was not gasping or groaning. It began to speak. “Jacquette’s been wounded. I heard yelling just as I was leaving my house. Someone put a knife in him.”
Martin jumped out of his seat and bounded over to Singer.
Jacquette
. This wasn’t possible. Martin’s mind raced back to the scene in the quarry near Aix-en-Provence, where another gallant man lay with a knife in him. But Jacquette was not foolish like Westerbury had been. Only overconfident, almost cocky. Had his inspector not taken precautions before approaching the peddler? Or had he been assaulted by someone else entirely, someone they hadn’t even suspected?
Was Jacquette, his good and faithful comrade, dying?
Martin’s mind overflowed with questions and bloody images.
“Jacquette, is he all right? Where is he?” Martin shouted. Ignoring him, Singer stared down at his coat with a horrified look on his face. Charpentier, who had also leapt out of his seat, offered to take it. Singer nodded and hastily unbuttoned his bloody vestment, allowing Martin’s clerk to slip it off this arms. Then Singer examined his suit coat and pants for stains. He held up both hands and scrutinized the thin, rippled red lines on his shirt cuffs. “I left my gloves at the Faculté,” he murmured. “They’re covered in blood.” Martin watched all this with growing concern and impatience.
“Is Jacquette alive? Where is he?” Martin repeated as he helped Singer into a chair.
“Yes, of course he’s alive. That’s why I’m here. He told me to get you.” Singer talked as if he were making all the sense in the world.
“Where is he?”
“At the Faculté de Médicine, with my gloves. I told you.”
The Faculté? Singer’s gloves?
Martin realized that his friend was in a state of shock. He forced himself to breathe slowly and calm down, even though all he could think about was whether his inspector was dead or alive.
Singer sat docilely in the chair for an instant, and then shot out of it. “I must get to my family. Charpentier! Give me back my coat!” Singer’s attempt to give an authoritative order came out in a strangled rasp. “The carriage is outside,” he continued, explaining to everyone and no one.
Charpentier stood nearby, gingerly holding Singer’s coat by the collar. His eagerness to help had been replaced by startled apprehension. He looked to Martin for direction. Martin motioned with his head, indicating that Charpentier should help Singer put his coat back on.
“David,” Martin asked, “do you want to see a doctor? Are you cold? Are you hot? Are you dizzy?” He clenched his teeth, in order not to ask again about Jacquette.
“No, no, no. I need to get home. To protect my wife and children from a murderer.”
Martin nodded. “We’ll go together,” he declared. It was useless to argue with anyone in Singer’s condition. Once he got Singer tucked into the back seat of the carriage under a blanket, he’d find out more.
Singer calmed down in the carriage and was even somewhat abashed by his behavior. “Jacquette wants to talk to you as soon as possible,” he explained. “He’s got the weapon.”
Jacquette can talk, and he’s making sense.
At first that was all Martin could take in. But the questions swarmed back. How badly was Jacquette injured? Had they captured the assailant? What had Jacquette told Singer? He glanced at Singer. He’d have to go easy.
During the short carriage ride, Martin did manage to draw out the essential sequence of events from Singer’s jumbled brain. He had heard the first cry just as he was getting ready to leave for the Palais. He ran out of the foyer, but not in time to see the struggle or the assailant. The cut on Jacquette’s left arm was so deep, it looked like someone had tried to slice it off. Singer’s face took on a greenish cast as he described how he pressed his gloved hands against the wound, trying to stem the blood. Fortunately, his maid, Béatrice, was more quick-witted. She grabbed Singer’s scarf from his neck and tied it tight high on the injured man’s arm. All this time, despite his distress, Jacquette begged to be taken to the Faculté de Médicine, so that Fauvet could sew him up and examine the weapon at the same time. He also asked Singer to get Martin right away.
“And the assailant?” Martin sat straight up, staring at his friend, willing him to have an answer.
Singer gave Martin an apologetic half-smile as he placed a friendly hand on his arm. “He said to tell you it was the ‘damned tinker.’”
Martin hunched back, relieved. He had been right. But there was no time for triumph or vindication. The man was still out there somewhere. Martin had to find him. The blood drained from his own face as he calculated, once again, the dangers and complications of that hunt.
“I’m getting out here,” Singer said, pulling Martin back into the present. “I’ve got to be with Noémie and the children.” Then he did a wonderful thing. He broke out in a scornful laugh, revealing the ironic sense of humor that had not been evident for weeks, as he shook his head and added, “Although I don’t know what good I would do, after that performance.”
Singer was back. Their friendship was possible. That was the thought that cheered Martin as he watched his fellow judge descend from the carriage. “We’ll protect you,” he called out to Singer. “That’s why Jacquette was there. When I get back to the courthouse, I’ll send two policemen, one to stand outside your door, and one to escort you to the courthouse. I may need your help.”
Singer waved his assent, and Martin waited until he got inside before urging the driver to go as fast as he could to the Faculté de Médicine. As soon as they got there, Martin leapt out of the carriage, paid the driver, and ran downstairs to the morgue, praying that he would find Jacquette alive and alert.
The first thing he saw when he pulled open the door was the back of Dr. Fauvet’s pudgy, white-coated body.
Martin called out for Jacquette
“He’s right here,” Fauvet turned in a cloud of pipe smoke and patted a blanket-covered leg, “ornery as ever.”
Jacquette lay on an iron table, his head on a folded sheet. His heavily bandaged left arm was tied high up on the back of a wooden chair. Someone, probably Fauvet, had nested several chairs together as a way of keeping the inspector’s arm lofted above his head and heart. As Martin approached, he saw that Jacquette’s mustache was dripping with sweat, and his ashen face was damp and creased with grimaces. He was alive, going to live, but in obvious pain. In a flash, Martin’s relief turned to anger at the madman who had done this to his friend.
The inspector managed a smile. “I hope Fauvet’s as good at sewing up bodies as he is at cutting them,” he said before wincing again. “
Merde
! I want to be there when you catch that bastard.”
“We’ll catch him,” Martin assured his wounded inspector, as he stepped up to the table. He prickled with a desire to start asking questions, but Fauvet had moved between him and Jacquette’s face.
“I think we can take this down now,” Fauvet remarked calmly, as he began to untie Jacquette’s hanging arm. The young doctor seemed to bring the same imperturbable delight to treating the gruesome wounds of live victims as he did to examining those inflicted on the dead. “Your man here wouldn’t go to the hospital. Lucky they only nicked the belly, didn’t penetrate.”
“And the arm?” Martin asked, irritated at Fauvet’s unhurried demeanor.
“That will take a while, got some muscle,” the doctor pronounced through the clenched teeth that gripped his pipe as he worked.
“
Merde
!” Jacquette yelped, when Fauvet gently placed his left arm at his side.
“He tells me he has a fine wife,” Fauvet said removing his pipe from his mouth. “Take him home and make sure she keeps him in bed for a while, will you? But first, you’ll have to listen. He’s eager to talk.”
“I don’t need a nursemaid,” Jacquette barked, although his grimaces and sickly pallor suggested otherwise.
Fauvet stood over him, puffing out his sweet-smelling tobacco, while shaking his head. “Rest,” he repeated to Jacquette. “And get him to drink some water,” the doctor told Martin, pointing to a pitcher and cup on a nearby table. Then he lifted up and separated the three piled chairs, placing one on the floor near Martin and inviting him to sit in it. After shaking hands, he finally took his leave.
As soon as the door closed, Martin asked, “So, it was him?”
“Yes, your damned tinker.” Jacquette gritted his teeth in pain.
“What was he doing, how did he—”
“I was a fool. I didn’t take him seriously. He looked like an old man, but he’s stronger and younger than he looks. I marched up to him, asked if his name was Jacob and before I knew it, he had a butcher knife aimed straight at my heart. When I put my arm up, he took a big slice instead. I managed to grab his wrist with my right hand and wring the knife from him. When it fell on the ground, he took off, pushing that damned cart of his. By that time, I was kneeling on the ground, trying to stop the blood. Thank God Singer came running out.”
Jacquette’s chest was pumping hard up and down by the time he had finished his story.
Martin poured some water into the cup and lifted Jacquette’s head. “Drink, and then we’ll get you home.”
“No, no.” Jacquette managed to raise his right arm a few centimeters between swallows. When Martin placed his head back on the folded sheet, he continued. “You have to know what’s out there. I have two men at the homes of the Consistory members and two at the rabbi’s.” Jacquette grimaced in self-disgust. “I thought I could take care of the Singers myself.”
“You did,” Martin said, trying to figure out how to get Jacquette to see that he needed quiet and rest.
“Now you might have to go to those old villages. You have to root him out.” Jacquette’s labored breaths were coming closer and closer together.
“As soon as I get you home, I’m going to Didier and ask for more men. We’ll find him.”
“Fauvet has the knife.”
“Fine. Now be quiet. That’s an order. And I’ll go find two strong medical students to carry you out.”
Jacquette’s head lolled to one side as he closed his eyes and crunched his face in pain and frustration. He had miscalculated, almost fatally. Now it was up to Martin.
Didier was not happy. Glaring at Martin, the lanky, clean-shaven prosecutor leaned across his desk and shouted, “And what exactly are we supposed to tell the press? That one Israelite is killing other Israelites?”
This time Martin did not cringe, equivocate or apologize. He stood with his hands comfortably entwined behind his back and tried not to smile at the obvious discomfort of his arrogant colleague. If Martin had ever hoped to derive one moment of pleasure from the difficult and drawn-out investigation, this was it.
Didier tapped a long tallow-like finger on the desk. “You do know, don’t you, that Alfred Dreyfus is on trial this very minute in Paris, that there are some who are insinuating that all Israelites born in our region may be traitors.”