Murder on the Left Bank

by Cara Black

  She popped two Doliprane for her shoulder and sat down, putting the ice on her swelling ankle. She felt the cold and numbness taking over.

  René was typing angrily. “Can you believe Éric could make up that whole story, pull you into it to disguise the fact that he murdered his nephew?”

  She couldn’t.

  “This poor Karine.” He sighed. “It doesn’t make sense. Too convoluted.”

  She agreed. It didn’t add up. “I don’t think Éric killed her. Lili said Karine was being followed.”

  “Okay,” René said, “so what? A serial killer with scissors?”

  She pulled out her phone. “Let’s ask Éric.”

  The call went to voice mail.

  She was tired, and her shoulder throbbed. She couldn’t lift her arm. Impossible to ignore the signs of a dislocated shoulder anymore—or to ignore the pain. She poured herself a double shot of her grandfather’s old brandy. Knew that she had to pop her shoulder back in. “René, can you help me? Please?”

  Alarmed, he looked up from his laptop.

  “Stand on the sofa, René.”

  “I hate this,” he said, making a face.

  “Not more than I do,” she said, gritting her teeth as she lay on the floor. “Take my wrist, support my elbow, and lift it vertically toward the ceiling. Keep the upward traction and gently rotate, okay?”

  René did as she’d instructed.

  “Ow . . . Wait, my muscles need to relax.”

  René took a deep breath. Waited.

  “Now, again.”

  She fought through the searing pain. “Once more, René.”

  She almost passed out from the white-hot pain, and it felt as if her arm were being wrenched off. Pop.

  The shooting sparks of heat subsided; her shoulder slumped. After several minutes she felt some relief, thank God. She put the ice pack on her shoulder, hoping tomorrow it would hold.

  René took a slug of brandy. “I can’t believe what I just did. Or that I ran away from a murder scene.”

  As the pain cleared, Aimée’s mind returned to the sight of the scissors sticking out of Karine’s neck. A horrifying image. And behind it, something was niggling at the back of Aimée’s mind. She sat up.

  Papa.

  “René, I remember Papa telling me about a case from the seventies, a woman murdered in a Marais sewing factory with scissors in her neck.”

  “You’re saying . . . a copycat?” René put his drink down and picked up his laptop again, tapping away furiously at the keyboard.

  “The flics suspected one of the factory workers. Or maybe a jealous husband.”

  “Voilà.” René’s voice rose in excitement. “I found it—1975. It was her lover—killed her over some jewelry he wanted for his new mistress. He escaped to Venezuela, no extradition.”

  She remembered now. “My father said the killer threw suspicion on the victim’s husband. Some rivalry in the factory. The flics took the bait, and the murderer got away.”

  She pushed the ice up higher on her shoulder.

  René stroked Miles Davis, who’d rolled on his back. “So twenty years later he’s back? Grabs the artist’s scissors from the atelier?”

  Far-fetched, but she considered it for a minute. “But that has nothing to do with Marcus’s murder.”

  Her phone trilled.

  Éric Besson’s number showed.

  Aimée answered. “Where are you, Éric?”

  “Leaving. You must listen.” In the background she could hear announcements on a loudspeaker.

  “Did you set me up?”

  “Quoi? I found that poor girl . . . dead. Horrible.” His voice dropped. “He saw me.”

  “Who?”

  “I couldn’t see his face. He said, ‘You’re next,’ and was gone over the wall.”

  “Rows thirteen through twenty-four boarding now,” Aimée heard. Éric was at the airport. Escaping again.

  “I’m afraid, Aimée.”

  “You’re an attorney. You must know someone who can help.”

  “Find Léo’s notebook.”

  “Moi? Two people have already been killed for this notebook. Even Karine didn’t know where it was.”

  “We’re boarding now, monsieur . . .” a voice said.

  Aimée heard Besson suck in his breath. “I’m going dark. You won’t hear from me for a while. If the notebook still exists, no one’s safe until you find it. Including you.”

  Wednesday Morning

  Ochre light streamed on the kitchen floor tiles, promising a mixed weather day—rain and sun. René was perched next to Chloé’s high chair, shuffling flash cards in his lap, while Babette finished up the laundry. René, nervous to go out in the street in case the police were still looking for them, had slept on the recamier.

  Benoît hadn’t returned Aimée’s call. Was it over between them? Had she misread his signals? She couldn’t worry about that now.

  “How are you feeling, Aimée?” René asked.

  “I’m all right.”

  The swelling of her shoulder had gone down, leaving a blue-purple bruise. The good news was she had the full, extended range of motion of her arm. Her ankle was another story. Forget her black-tipped Chanel sling backs. Her red Converse high-tops, which hurt to lace up, at least gave her ankle support.

  Chloé gurgled, intent on licking her fingers, which were sticky with mashed pear.

  “We’re off to the park,” said Babette. “Give Maman a bisou.”

  Chloé offered Aimée a pear-scented cheek.

  “Later, ma puce,” she said.

  René slipped the flash cards into his pocket and opened his briefcase.

  “Alors, René, enough with the flash cards,” Aimée said. “Chloé doesn’t need to learn quantum physics right now.”

  René started to protest.

  “Or Cantonese or colors.”

  She opened her laptop on the table. “I did some thinking last night.” Her fingers clicked over the keyboard as she pulled up flight information. “Regardes, René. Last night Éric was either at Orly boarding the AF to Toulouse or Brussels, or if he had his passport on him, he might have boarded the Morocco flight at CDG.”

  René looked up, his green eyes big. “There’s nothing else to do here, Aimée. Leave it alone.”

  “Poor Karine . . .” Her insides churned. “How can I? I have to find that notebook.”

  “The notebook’s gone.”

  She popped more Doliprane. “There’s one person who knows about the Hand.”

  “Then isn’t it time you ask him and be done with this?”

  Wednesday, Noon

  Aimée could do this. She really could. Suck up her pride and see if her suspicions panned out. Beg her godfather, the ex-commissaire, for help.

  Put aside her guilt for getting him shot.

  Her thoughts looped, like a stuck record, replaying last night over and over: Karine’s open, vacant eyes; the scissors’ worn handle protruding from her neck; the rustling, wet leaves; Éric’s phone ringing.

  She had to find this notebook.

  Weaving her scooter along the boulevard, she made her way past the police hospital that was treating her godfather, Morbier. Not five minutes before she was threading her way into a narrow winding warren, once part of the village Saint-Marcel, which had become part of Paris in 1860. Finally into a slanting cobbled lane lined by two- and three-story houses and metal-scrollwork fences, up which climbed the last roses of the season. These petite maisons on Square des Peupliers had been gentrified by bobos eager to live as close as possible to the center of Paris. Until earlier in the century, these houses had belonged to factory workers. Before them, Aimée could imagine tanners and dyers living here near rue du Moulin des Prés, where a long-gone mill once stood on la Bièvre, the ancient and underground still-
flowing river. By 1912, it had become so polluted that it was covered over.

  Reminders of its rural past dotted the thirteenth arrondissement: artist ateliers in small lanes, steep cobbled streets, ivy and flowering creepers adding charm to even the old factories and warehouses. Approaching postcard pretty. Yet time marched on in the thirteenth, and only a few blocks away from this pocket, developers were building new commercial zones.

  Number 37 was a little jewel of a maison. Morbier, a dyed-in-the-wool Socialist, here?

  She parked her scooter. Took a deep breath.

  She opened the scraping gate, buzzed. No answer. Dumb. Why hadn’t she called first?

  A slate-grey cat slinked around her legs, rubbing its velvet fur against her shin, then nudged the front door open.

  Since when did a flic keep a door unlocked?

  The house was full of the scent of baking apples. Delicious. Her eyes became accustomed to the bright light from overhead skylights, revealing an open floor plan and graphite Scandi-style furniture. What she imagined had once been a configuration of tiny rooms had been opened up. Très à la mode in a minimalist modern way.

  Morbier’s temporary new digs—a friend’s sublet with no stairs. The proximity to the police hospital made it ideal.

  A spoon clattered on the polished toffee wood floor in the kitchen area. “Merde!”

  “Someone’s in a good mood,” she said.

  Morbier, ex–police commissaire, sat in a wheelchair, his legs covered by a mohair blanket, old plaid wool charentaise slippers peeking out beneath. The dark circles under his basset hound eyes were even more pronounced than when she’d last seen him; stone-white hair curled thick and long over his collar.

  She bit her lip, suppressing a gasp. How he’d aged since her hospital visit two months ago, after she’d gotten him shot. The awkward visit had been an attempt at reconciliation and had left so much unsaid.

  “So look what the cat dragged in,” he said. If he was surprised to see her, he didn’t show it. “Took your time, Leduc.”

  Before him stood a bowl on a wood chopping block. Above it hung copper lights strung through a wire sculpture that resembled the mobile over Chloé’s crib. No doubt this one qualified as l’art abstrait.

  “Bonjour to you, too, Morbier,” Aimée said.

  “Where’s Chloé?”

  “Enjoying the park with Babette, then bébé swim,” she said, noting the slump of disappointment in his shoulders.

  “Jeanne said she ran into you at the pool, and you said you’d drop by.”

  But not today. Jeanne, his squeeze, meant well, but Aimée hadn’t been ready for that yet. She fought down her guilt. Should she keep this visit light, pretend it was just social? Work up the courage to ask the hard questions later?

  “How do you feel?” she said.

  “I know you’re not here to visit,” he said, reading her face. “Word gets around, eh?”

  Ashamed and unsure of what he meant, she sucked in her breath. He shot her a knowing look. She couldn’t tell if it was sadness or resignation in his sharp brown eyes. Or both.

  “You’re looking for Léo Solomon’s missing notebook, Leduc,” said Morbier.

  This poor me charade—of course he knew about the notebook. Was he behind this somehow? The snake.

  She picked up the enamel spoon from the floor, wishing it were a knife she could stab into the chopping block. Instead she slammed it in the stainless-steel sink. He started. Good. It felt good to put him off-balance for once. But she regretted it right away—so childish.

  “How would you know about the notebook,” she said, “unless you’re involved, too?”

  “That weak-chinned lawyer Besson called me. I told him to leave you out of it.” A sigh. “Et alors, he didn’t. Knowing you, you can’t leave it alone.”

  If Besson had called Morbier, it was because his name was in the notebook . . . wasn’t it? From the blue bowl on the chopping block, she plucked a leftover apple slice, popped it in her mouth. Chewed furiously at the tangy sweetness.

  “And you, Morbier? I doubt you’re leaving it alone.”

  A snort. “Look at me. What can I do? A discredited old invalid.”

  Liar. She could sense that his nerves were taut as a wire. His razor-sharp mind was intact and scheming.

  “Quit playing sorry for yourself, Morbier. Sounds like your kind of party; get the balloons and show up. Confront your old cronies.”

  “Get real, Leduc. They’re all gone.”

  “Not from what I heard,” she said, guessing.

  Morbier handed her ground coffee beans. “Make us espresso.”

  “Attends. Caffeine with your heart condition?”

  “Décaféiné’s all I drink, on the Nazi’s orders.” He noticed her blink. “The German doctor who installed my defibrillator. Now I’m bionique.”

  The stainless-steel Italian espresso maker steamed on the cooktop. Buttery aromas drifted from the state-of-the-art oven, which had no visible dials and was almost invisible among the cabinets. “Take the tart out before it burns, Leduc.”

  Clenching mitts, Aimée withdrew a bubbling tarte tatin from the oven. She salivated. She was reminded of her grandfather Claude’s Sunday desserts, how her grinning father would wipe the sticky bits from the corner of her mouth.

  Morbier poured the espresso into two cups, then pulled a laptop from under his mohair blanket. “Let the tart cool.”

  Morbier with a laptop? Baking? Wonders never ceased. “Gone tech savvy in your retirement, eh? Next you’ll be writing your memoir.”

  “You overestimate me, Leduc. What else can I do with a useless body?”

  He wouldn’t pull her in with that one.

  “That notebook’s history. Gone,” said Morbier. “No doubt it was nothing but chicken scratch anyway, with the old man’s Alzheimer’s.”

  “Morbier, Besson didn’t say anything about Alzheimer’s—just the man’s guilty confession as he was dying. And he read the entries. Wouldn’t have taken it seriously otherwise.” She paused, trying to banish the image of Karine’s staring eyes and bloody neck, another innocent life lost over whatever was in this notebook. “I have to find it.”

  Morbier’s hand stilled on the handle of his demitasse.

  “Aimée, look at me.” His eyes bored into hers. “It’s better you leave this alone.”

  “Not after last night.” Her ankle hurt. To relieve the pressure, she leaned on the kitchen island. “First we strike a deal—you tell me about Pierre Espinasse, the flic who saved Léo Solomon’s life in the POW camp and what he had to do with the Hand. Then—”

  “Who?”

  Was he playing dumb? She doubted that. Was this too-ancient history?

  But she didn’t have time to waste. Had a meeting in an hour, then had to pick Chloé up at the pool. She’d give him something and get something in return. It always worked like that with Morbier.

  “Bon, I’ll tell you the little I know,” she said. “Then it’s your turn. I need your insight.”

  “That’s what you’re calling it now?”

  “Please, Morbier. We share, okay? Deal?”

  Morbier sipped his espresso. The mobile-like sculpture rotated in the warm wind, making a soft shushing sound. Greenish light slanted in from the windows on to the garden.

  He excelled at the waiting game. But she had places to go.

  When he didn’t answer, she swallowed. Hard.

  She noticed the old cookbook open on the counter, notes in the margins with dates and comments—burnt, undercooked. Had he been testing this recipe every day in hopes that she’d . . . ?

  “And I’ll bring Chloé by after bébé swim tomorrow for a slice,” she said.

  He blinked.

  “I’ll take that as a yes, we have a deal,” she said. “Last night, Besson’s nephew’s girlfr
iend was murdered in Cité fleurie.”

  “And you know this how?”

  She told him; spared no horrific details, outlined her speculations.

  “So the murderer forced the information about the notebook out of her, then shut her up.” Morbier’s thick brows knit. “Or the girl knew nothing, but the murderer tied up loose ends and is still on the hunt for the notebook?”

  Aimée nodded. She didn’t think Karine had been lying to her about not knowing where the notebook was. But who could say what information the killer might have extracted with threat of violence? “She said she had something to tell me, Morbier.”

  “Either way, right now you’ve got rien.”

  He may have retired his uniform, but he was all flic.

  “Besson’s terrified,” Aimée said. “Called from the airport—chances are he skipped the country.”

  “But you don’t think he stabbed the girl, do you?”

  She shook her head. “Your turn, Morbier.”

  “Moi? You’ve just gotten the benefit of my ‘insight.’”

  “I want to know about this Pierre whom Léo owed.” A knot formed in her stomach. She had to hear the truth. Part of her wanted to know, and another part didn’t. “All those things you’ve never told me about your colleagues in the Hand.”

  A pause. “Get me a coffee.”

  “Or maybe I should throw it in your face.”

  Had she really said that?

  “Wouldn’t be the first time,” said Morbier. A long, drawn-out sigh. “How many times have I pulled your ass out of the fire, Leduc?”

  “And demanded payback each time.”

  She hated herself for reverting to her childhood, to her ten-year-old self. Her neck flushed. She had almost stamped her foot. Why couldn’t she act grown-up for once?

  “You’re right.” Morbier’s voice came out a whisper.

  If she hadn’t been paying attention, she would have missed the muscle twitching in his neck. The spasm in his fingers.

  Guilt flooded her. She’d put a bullet in his chest. Landed him in this wheelchair.