by Seth Lynch
Returning to the living room I take my place in the comfortable chair. I can feel all my muscles begin to relax. Suddenly, and without warning, I begin a sneezing fit. Four or five sneezes follow one after the other in quick succession. Must be all the dust in the chair.
I hope she's alone when she gets back. If she has a man with her there could be a fight. Unholstering my revolver I place it in my jacket pocket, and then I place my hand in the pocket too. If she's invited a crowd over for a party I'll be right up the creek. Actually, a crowd couldn't fit in here. I need a piss.
The light is starting to fade. Some of it came from other apartments and they have either closed their shutters or turned out their lights. She might have gone to someone else's place. I wonder if she has some rich elderly gent who pays court to her at the weekends. Perhaps she has gone to spend the weekend on his estate in the country. My head lolls to one side.
I wake with a start. The room is filling with the clean pale light of the very early morning. I look at my watch - five o'clock. The building is silent. Is she back? What if there is someone in the bed with her? I creep slowly to the bedroom and push the door open a fraction to listen. After a moment or two I can hear her breathing. I crawl inside the room, but there is only one head above the blankets.
What should I do now? My fingers close around the handle of the gun. Perhaps I'll have to rough her up a bit. Wait! I don't want to rough up a woman. Over on the sideboard her parents are smiling at their sleeping daughter.
The front door is unlocked. I slip out and down the stairs. Whatever she is or does isn't going to change who I am. I shall not become a man who terrorises women. By entering her apartment I degraded myself; I must never allow that to happen again. In an hour or two I'll knock on her door and question her. I won't use force, but I will use persistence.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
There are better ways to kill time than hanging about in a café, but they require a willing accomplice. At six-thirty I leave the cafe and walk back to Legrand's apartment. The streets are strewn with broken glass and rubbish. Some of this has been blown from overflowing bins, most has been dumped directly onto the street. There are a few patches of vomit and the occasional one of blood. Saturday morning in Montparnasse – slightly nicer than Sunday morning in Montparnasse.
The front door of the apartment block is still open. I climb the stairs to number six and knock on Legrand's door. No reply. My yawns are coming thick and fast. Three or four hours kip in a chair isn't enough for me anymore - I need a bed and at least eight hours straight. I knock louder. She calls out: 'I'm coming; give it a rest will you?' The door opens.
'Good-morning, mademoiselle. Salazar's the name; we met at the offices of the Lacman Brothers.'
Her face shows tiredness, surprise, and a touch of fear. She's done well to produce a combination like that at this hour.
'May I come in, mademoiselle?'
Without thinking she opens the door a little wider and I step through. She follows me to the living room, where, without invitation, I take up my seat in the dusty old chair - my chair.
'What do you want, monsieur Salazar?'
'Well, you're such a doll, I thought I'd pop over and invite you out to dinner.'
'At six-thirty in the morning!'
'It is early, isn't it? Too early for playing games. I want to know who you called and why.'
She ceases her pacing of the room to look at me. Our eyes lock for an instant before she turns away. She takes a step back and picks up a packet of cigarettes from the table. After lighting one she turns around to face me again.
'What are you talking about? I'm going to call the police.'
I doubt she will – unless she's had a telephone installed while she slept.
'Would you mind if I wait for them here? It's a bit chilly out this morning.'
I take one of my own cigarettes and light it. She moves towards the bedroom, stops, then takes a few steps towards the front door, and stops again. I feel guilty seeing her scared like this. I shan't leave though - her fear doesn't stem from my presence in the room; it comes from having been caught. She is an accessory to an attempted murder, and my murder at that.
Giving up trying to leave, she thumps down her cigarette in the ashtray before fumbling around for another. Her hand is shaking too much to light it. My body twitches but I resist the urge to stand up and light it for her.
'Someone beat me over the head and dumped me into the river to drown,' I say. 'I have a witness who names you as the instigator. The police could go through all the telephone records at the local exchange and find out who you called that day. It's all quite tedious and will involve a lot of time, lawyers, and jail. All for what? You end up doing a stretch and I don't get to question you.'
'If I talk I don't know what will happen to me.'
'We none of us know what will happen to us. Will it be worse than jail?'
'They may kill me.'
'They might - although they are a little slip-shod on that score. You talk to me and I may not let on where I heard it.'
So flow the tears - a ploy which doesn't work. I'm not interested in her tears any more than I seek out her smiles.
'Take a deep breath and let's get this over with. Then I can go home and you can go back to bed. Who did you call?'
'I don't know.'
'I don't know is so terribly vague. Try to be a little more precise. Which numbers did you dial?'
'It was 74 84, a Paris number,' she says.
'Who did you speak to?'
'I don't know.'
'Come, come, mademoiselle Legrand, you can do better than this I'm sure.' I frown at her and try to cast myself as a friendly but disappointed schoolmaster.
'I don't know their names. It was a man.'
'That's better. What did you say to the man?'
'I told them someone had been asking about Marty. Then I described you and read the particulars from your card. I told them you were going to mademoiselle Sordine's and gave them her address.'
'Have you made calls like this before?'
'Yes, twice.'
'So, one day, for no particular reason, you decided that if anyone came to the office and asked about Marty you would call 74 84 and tell them all about it.'
'No, he asked me to do it.'
'And who is he?'
'Marty, of course!'
'Ah, my old friend, Gustave Marty. Was he the one who answered the telephone?'
'No, it wasn't him. The person sounded Parisian, Marty has got a slight accent.'
'How long ago did he ask you to do this? And why?'
'Soon after he left Lacmans' a lot of people started turning up looking for him. Most of them ranted and raved then stormed off after kicking the furniture. Some had to be removed by the police. A few weeks later a private detective turned up. Not long after that Marty met me. Should any more detectives come asking about him I was to call that number. He gave me a thousand francs. A few weeks later another detective came by asking questions. I called that number and the detective fell under a train. I thought it was a coincidence but decided I wouldn't call again.
'It wasn't long before another detective came – from the same agency as the one who'd died. This time I didn't make the call. A week later this woman met me on the way home. She said I was in too far – I could either carry on helping, or they would fix me. Then she gave me two thousand francs. I've called the number twice since. One of those calls was for you.'
The big raindrop tears give way to the all-out remorse of someone who realises their actions have landed them in the shit. She sincerely regrets having been caught.
'When did you last meet Marty?'
'It was when he gave me the thousand. That was a little over a year ago now.'
'Where do you think he is now?'
'I have no idea. He made a lot of money at Lacmans'. I guess he has gone down south or back to Belgium.'
'South? Wh
ere? Why?'
'He told me once about a place down there. It's in the middle of nowhere but by train or automobile you can get to Toulouse in an hour or so, or the Riviera in a few hours. I reckon he might have other places but that's the one I'd go to if I was hiding and wanted to stay in France.'
'And what is this village called?'
'I don't know. I swear.'
I believe her. Perhaps I'm a sucker for those tears after all.
'Next time you have to call them I want you to call the number on my card instead. I'll come and keep you company until your telephone pal shows up with her threats and cash.'
I hand her a business card with my address and telephone number on it.
'I will have to call them too.'
'Up until today you could go into court and claim you were coerced. If you do it again, it will be for the money and for no other reason. They'll throw the book at you. They'll call you a siren and your photograph will appear in all the scandal sheets. The press will chew you up and spit you out. Your parents won't be able to look their neighbours in the eye again.'
'What about the person who hit you? What happens when they come looking for me?'
'You're a smart kid, figure that out for yourself. You may be better off going to the police. The flics might be able to round them up and you won't have to fear them anymore. Maybe you could move to Bordeaux or Marseille and get a job down there.'
If she's lucky I'll get to them first and they won't be going after anyone ever again. Now she's giving me a look as if I got her into this mess. I had better get out of here fast – I can feel myself getting angry. She can stand there giving me that accusing look, when it was her who signed my death warrant. I leave before I throw her out that closed bedroom window.
As I reach the hallway something she said strikes me as odd. 'One more question,' I say. 'When I called at your office, how did you know I was a detective?'
'You were asking after Marty and didn't look like you wanted to kill him,' she says.
I find an alley almost opposite the entrance to Legrand's apartment building. I wait in there and light a cigarette. She will spend a few minutes getting over the shock of my visit and a few more panicking. Her devious mind will eventually settle on the obvious solution – go and dial the number and give them the address from my business card. The second she makes the call I'll get back to my place and start preparing for visitors. I still entertain some half-baked ideas about people's inherent good so I wait; perhaps she won't make the call.
Fifteen minutes later I follow her to a café on the corner. I don't go in – I don't have to, it's the one I went in earlier. She heads straight for the telephone booth and I head straight for the Métro.
First things first, I fill in Filatre. He's been pottering around in his dressing gown and I don't want him about when my guests arrive. I arrange for Filatre to go to the nearest café and keep André company. If there's any news I will telephone him. Filatre calls his char lady and tells her to take the day off, with pay. He looks at me as he says this and I don't miss the point.
Now that I have the place to myself I set about making it welcoming. I'm hoping there is only one of them but I have to plan for more. Upstairs I get out my weaponry and then put on two pullovers as a protection against knives. Every detective should own a pair of hand-cuffs – I'll put that on my shopping list. In the meantime I have some rope which I leave on the filing cabinet. The rope is strong and thin so there'll be no chance of escape.
The window from my office provides a good view up and down the road. A thug who whacks you on the head may not fancy walking up to the front door and asking you to turn around for a moment. My guess is that he'll loiter around outside and wait for an opportunity. I could try the same thing I did with Stefan, although that is a risk. If I'm spotted lurking down the stairwell it will turn into a bloody fight. Or they will scarper and try their luck another day. There is nobody on the street at the moment.
I take some wire and start laying a few traps around the office and stairwell. If they aren't careful they might trip over one of these. For the hell of it I also put a few pans above the doors in true Billy Bunter fashion. They won't cause any harm but they will make a hell of a racket. I telephone Filatre at the café and warn him not to come up-stairs until I give him the all clear. I then tell him I'm going to be walking by in five minutes. He will sit on the terrace and if anybody is following me he will scratch his head. He may not notice anyone on the first sweep so I'll walk to the tobacconists at the end of the road then head back past the café. If he scratches his head this time I'll duck in for a quick coffee and he can pass André a message describing my pursuer.
Forewarned is forearmed. It's also rather scary. Somebody out there is going to try and kill me. Not only have they already done away with two of my kind but they nearly did for me. I walk with my hands in my jacket pockets. The left is clenching my revolver; the right is wearing a knuckle duster. Expressing nonchalance while holding a gun is harder than you'd think; the only way I can carry on the act is to whistle and the only tune which comes to mind: Louise. I hate that tune - it has burrowed into my brain like a well-trained maggot. I try to force it out by considering The Mooche. Just as I reach the wah-wah trumpets I find myself singing 'every little breeze seems to whisper Louise', as if whistling it wasn't bad enough.
Filatre has not had a sudden attack of head lice so I continue to the tobacconist. On a normal visit I'd equip myself with one or perhaps two packets of Gitanes. Imagining this could be my last tobacco purchase, I go for three packets and two packets of American Chesterfields for Megan. Feeling generous I buy Filatre a packet of Dutch shag.
There are plenty of people milling about at this end of town. The tobacconist is on the corner of the boulevard Saint Germain. If anyone coshed me here they'd be in cuffs before I hit the floor. I'd still be hitting the floor though.
I spot Filatre from a long way off. He is scratching his head like a bemused Orangutan. When I arranged these signals I should have worked out another one for 'message received and understood'. If we'd done that Filatre could have stopped scratching himself by now and those ladies passing by wouldn't be giving him such strange looks. He stops when he sees I'm entering the café. How is it I managed to pick up a tail without noticing? Perhaps, in my efforts to look casual, I didn't look about me as much as I usually do. André comes over to take my order.
'Monsieur Filatre has filled me in with what you two are up to. I wouldn't care if somebody did want to hit you on the head, but when you were laid up my takings went down.'
André leaves and returns with a hot cup of coffee.
'A man in a brown suit. He is hatless, with dark black hair. Around one metre sixty tall. Not thin, but not too fat either.'
André is shrewd enough to leave after giving me the information. It's difficult for me to scan the street from inside the café. Filatre is still out on the terrace; I may have to get a light off him. He pretends not to know me as I ask for a light.
'Where?'
'The vespasienne behind me, other side of road.'
Two can play at that game. I leave the café and retrace my route to the rue Challot. Then, instead of turning left and heading the office I turn into the neighbouring street and take refuge in the vespasienne there. I wonder what old emperor Vespasian would think if he knew the people of Paris named their pissoirs after him?
This lookout comes with the concentrated stench of urine. There are tiny ventilation holes in the metal screen which allow me to look down the road. If I stay here too long people will think I'm seeking a different kind of action. Who cares? This might save my life.
I see him! He knows I came up this street and I'm sure he knows I'm in here. Even so, he hasn't seen me so he can't be certain. He walks up the road, pausing now and then to look around. That's right, sunbeam, come and take a good look at Salazar in the toilet. I pull out my revolver in readiness and move around the central pillar.
The posters on this one warn of the dangers of venereal disease – I prefer the ones advertising Lux biscuits.
Before he has a chance to move his head around the metal screen I step out and cosh him with my gun. He goes down. If we were near the river I would be tempted to throw him in. Being a helpful fellow I pick him up and rest him over my shoulder. The walk to the office takes less than five minutes. One person spots me with my unlikely burden. I raise my hat and smile, then make a drinking gesture. They won't believe it but it gives them an excuse not to get involved.
I haul his body up to the office and tie him to a chair. I give Filatre a call to let him know I have caught my fish. I advise him to go and watch a Western or three before coming back.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
While my new friend is sleeping I go through the pockets of his jacket. His wallet is in there, with a few bits and pieces to identify him. In one of the pockets is an old fashioned blackjack – made of leather and, from the feel of it, filled with lead. I was lucky my skull wasn't crushed, assuming this is the same one he hit me with. The blackjack goes on my desk alongside my knuckle-duster and razor. There is nothing like a cut-throat razor when you're lost for words. During the war the Americans would boast about their safety razors – that's all very well if you only use them for shaving.
The man tied to the chair makes a few groaning noises. His head is beginning to move, although it's lolling, and he looks like he may go to sleep. I crouch down next to him.
'Wake up, pal. You've got a bit of explaining to do.'