He asked Semacgus for his spectacles. The doctor handed them to him, annoyed at having to put on public display a resource that had become indispensable to him. Nicolas folded them to use as a magnifying glass. He turned the sweet box, now this way, now that. At last, with a sigh of pleasure, he made out a hallmark depicting the head of a pointer. He opened the box.
‘My friends,’ he said, ‘this is, in fact, a pill box …’ When he saw the contents, he exclaimed in surprise, ‘Cantharides! What are these stimulants doing on the body of a young girl?’
‘Or a prostitute,’ said Semacgus. ‘The less robust of them use it as an aid. It also helps to release a reproductive frenzy in the most barren of women.’
In this field, thought Nicolas, Semacgus’s experience was unequalled, although he was never sure if it was his experience as a doctor or as a former libertine. The other thing that occurred to him was that this was the second time this particular aphrodisiac had made an appearance in the investigation.
Pursuing his thoughts, Nicolas turned to Rabouine. ‘Do you have any idea how these workers managed to see this object? In any case, I think we should thank them for their honesty.’
‘It must have slipped out of the pocket of her undershirt … There’s a gusset.’
Nicolas was musing over these various pieces of information, trying to pull them all together. There was one element missing.
‘I need to know the exact route followed by this wagon, as well as its timetable, if that’s possible. Bring me the driver.’
The fat man with the bulging eyes stepped forward. ‘You need to understand, Commissioner, that this transport goes on without interruption throughout the day. The last wagon arrives here at about three in the morning, and the driver comes and picks it up, empty, at about seven. Today he never turned up …’
‘That’s an interesting point, and it limits the period of time during which the murder may have been committed. If Semacgus can narrow it down even more, we won’t be far from the truth.’
‘Quite right, Pierre,’ said Nicolas. ‘Let’s draw up a plan of campaign. The body needs to be taken to the Basse-Geôle, where Monsieur Semacgus will give it a closer examination. If he agrees.’
The surgeon nodded his consent.
‘Pierre and Rabouine, I have two missions for you,’ the commissioner went on. ‘Find me the driver of this wagon. I want to question him. As for this sweet box or pill box, try to find an expert who can determine its origin. It’s an expensive item and I have no doubt we will find its maker. And when we do …’ He consulted his watch. ‘Let’s meet again at the Grand Châtelet on the stroke of six to see where we’ve got to. Bourdeau, anything new on the second victim?’ His mind was racing. ‘Unfortunately, we only have the doctor’s carriage at our disposal.’
‘No,’ said Bourdeau, ‘I arranged for another one to follow us in case we needed it. As for the second victim, fate has smiled on me. My spies have been concentrating on the world of prostitutes. It’s a world where everyone knows everyone else and the slightest absence, however short, or a change in habits, gets noticed.’
He tapped out his pipe, put it away, took out his glasses and a piece of paper, and started reading.
‘Mademoiselle Julie Jeanne Marot, born in Suzonnecourt, Champagne, aged nineteen. Lost both her father and mother, vineyard owners of that locality, and came to Paris a year ago to enter service. Was picked up by Madame Larue, a midwife of Rue Bourg-l’Abbé, well known as a brothel-keeper. She immediately procured her to a young man of her acquaintance, an old customer, who, despite the girl’s screams, deflowered her. Later, the girl, realising that the old woman was prostituting her without paying her anything, left her and went and joined La Hilaire, in Cul-de-sac Saint-Fiacre. Her new mistress thought she was the perfect addition to her stable and took better care of her. She renamed her L’Étoile and introduced her to everyone as the new star. Now completely adapted to the life, she participated in parties and dinners of extreme debauchery.’
‘Congratulations! We must go further into this. Who was keeping her? Were there several men? Apart from servicing casual customers, these girls usually combine business and pleasure and latch on to some good-looking beau. What were her haunts? Make the usual enquiries. You know what to do, and you do it much better than I could.’
The corpse was placed on a wagon belonging to the watch and covered with a tarpaulin. The cortege set off towards Paris. Nicolas, looking out through the lowered window, noticed a street at right angles to the one they were on.
‘Let’s not forget the Invalides slaughterhouse, it’s quite close to here. We mustn’t forget to check if the wagon from Île des Cygnes stops there.’
He was thinking aloud, and Semacgus, who was listening, did not think he had to answer.
‘It’s vitally important that we determine when and where the body was dumped on the wagon. Either to be discovered, or to disappear without a trace in the incinerator on Île des Cygnes.’
‘And the sweet box?’ said Semacgus. ‘Valuable items like that often bear the name either of the donor or of the person who receives it.’
‘There’s the rub! Nothing, silence. Just the hallmark. Why abandon such a treasure? Was it simply forgotten? I don’t think so, the girl was half naked. I suspect that it was put there on purpose, to arouse our curiosity.’
‘That answers your previous questions. In that case, the body was meant to be found.’
‘It seems like it. Let’s sum up. The murderer dumps the body on the wagon. For some reason, the sweet box is with it. It’s assumed, even hoped, that it will be discovered.’
‘Perhaps. But there’s no name on the box.’
‘Precisely, precisely!’ He gave a disconcerted Semacgus a friendly tap on the shoulder. ‘Isn’t it the subtlest thing to pretend to fall into traps which are set for us?’
‘I don’t quite know what you mean.’
‘Could we be dealing with someone really clever? This sweet box is urging us to wager on our own intelligence.’
Semacgus was starting to be worried. Was this some kind of attack, a result of last night’s wound? Nicolas certainly appeared feverish.
‘I’m finding it increasingly hard to follow you.’
‘Just think! If this sweet box, being such an obvious clue, led us directly to its owner or to the person who received it and made him or her a suspect, we would be within our rights to doubt the genuineness of the clue and we would be led to assume that someone was trying to force our hand.’
‘Instead of which …’
‘Without direct clues, we’re faced with a difficult task, which may present us with more genuine discoveries. Let me remind you that the Duc de La Vrillière remains the prime suspect, because of the very nature of the murder weapon. That this weapon has disappeared without his being able to account for that disappearance. That his whereabouts at the time of the first murder do not appear to give him an alibi. That we need to determine his whereabouts for the two other murders, once we’ve narrowed down the exact time of the latest one.’
‘If I understand correctly, you fear there will be no alibi for any of the three crimes?’
‘I do indeed fear so, for, if our hypothesis is correct, we are dealing with a tough adversary.’
A long silence fell. Semacgus did not like to see Nicolas looking so feverish. He also knew how stupid it would be to try to calm him down. Like a hunting dog, when he was on the trail he would not give up.
‘Are you feeling all right?’ he asked, to set his mind at rest.
Nicolas did not reply. There was a fleeting thought at the back of his mind, something he could not at the moment pin down, but something he was convinced was important. He was still searching for it when they were in the main hall of the Basse-Geôle. Pressed for time, he had given up the idea of sending for Sanson. He needed a rapid result to give the investigation a new impetus. Semacgus had had to borrow some instruments from the local doctor at the Châtelet, who had only agreed on the express ord
ers of the commissioner. A few days earlier, thought Nicolas, there was no doubt that he would have been refused, considered by that mediocre little world as being on the sidelines, discredited, in virtual exile. The news of his return to favour had spread like wildfire, and everything had returned to normal.
Nicolas looked closely at the undershirt the surgeon had just taken off the corpse. Something was nagging at him. He cursed his own forgetfulness. It drove out any good ideas he had and, in his job, that was tantamount to a sin. He felt in the bottom of his pocket for his little black notebook, pulled it out, and looked through it with a kind of rage. Why hadn’t he thought of this earlier? When Lenoir had burdened him with all those assignments to such a point that it had even occurred to him that it was a deliberate attempt to thwart his investigation, one of them had been to track down two young girls who had run away from Brussels. He looked at the page where he had noted their descriptions. ‘The first … smallpox … blue eyes, black eyebrows.’ And further on – and this was what had unconsciously stirred his memory – ‘Undershirt … blue and grey striped satin.’ He glanced at the soiled, bloodstained garment. It exactly matched the description he had written down.
‘Guillaume,’ he said, ‘do you see any marks of smallpox on the face?’
‘Of course,’ replied Semacgus. ‘I told you that back on the island. Blue eyes, black eyebrows and marks of smallpox. For the rest …’ He poured water over his arms and hands from an earthenware jug. ‘The poor girl wasn’t a courtesan. She hadn’t even been a woman for long … I mean she’d recently been deflowered, and probably raped several times, from the front and the rear. A sad business!’
‘Are you sure?’
‘I’d swear it before a judge, without any qualms.’
‘Time of death?’
‘That’s harder to establish. Taking a number of factors into account – the night temperature, the heat given off by a heap of decomposing animal flesh – I estimate the probable time of death at about two in the morning. Let’s say between one and two.’
‘We know that the wagon arrived on Île des Cygnes at about three … We need to know where it was about two, or even a little earlier.’
He was thinking hard, but Semacgus, with an expression of barely suppressed jubilation on his broad, ruddy face, interrupted this exercise.
‘That’s not all, Nicolas. There’s another observation I’ve made, I don’t know how important it is, but I’m sure you’ll find it intriguing. Before she died, the victim was immersed in a soapy solution, which dried as it evaporated. You just have to wet the skin to notice it. You can still smell the scent a bit.’
‘You’ll need to be a little clearer than that, Guillaume. Don’t forget you’re talking to someone who’s had a bit of a shock and spent last night …’
He broke off, noticing Semacgus’s mocking look. He felt his face go red.
‘The girl took a bath,’ said the surgeon. ‘A scented bath, to boot!’
‘I’ll refrain from drawing any conclusion from that for the time being. I’ll just remark that, at every stage in this case, water is never very far away. The Saint-Florentin mansion, close to the Seine. Rue de Glatigny, on the banks of the Cité. And, finally, Île des Cygnes. We’re never far from the river!’
‘Which makes it all the more interesting to find out where the wagon gained its deadly load.’
‘Any other observations?’
‘One last one. I found a fragment of nail with some skin attached. The attacker must have grabbed hold of the victim’s garment during the struggle. Here it is, for what it’s worth. I don’t suppose it’ll help you find the person it belongs to, but who knows? It’s just possible it may be of use to you …’
Nicolas put the item inside a folded sheet of his black notebook. ‘You haven’t mentioned this,’ he said, ‘but I assume that the murder weapon—’
‘Is indeed the artificial hand. At least, the plaster cast fits the wound. There’s no doubt about it. What are you going to do now?’
‘I’ve put off meeting the major-domo’s in-laws for too long. After that, I’m going to Bicêtre to see what I can find out about the rejected suitor of the first victim, Marguerite Pindron.’
Deep in thought, they went back up to the duty office, where they were greeted by Old Marie, the usher, who, having followed Nicolas’s career from the beginning, was delighted that things were getting back to normal for him. He handed him a small folded note on which he immediately recognised the three sardines of Monsieur de Sartine’s coat of arms. The message was a brief one: ‘Monsieur Bourdier, the man I spoke to you about, is living with his family in a furnished room in Rue Galante.’
Nicolas, who always kept spare clothes and clean linen in a cubbyhole, changed and asked Old Marie to take his fine grey coat to the cleaner.
‘Marie,’ he said, ‘I’m a bit short of men. Could you do me a service? I know you’re perfectly capable.’
‘By God, I’d jump out of the window for you! Problem is, with my damned aches and pains, I’d find it hard to climb up onto the sill!’
‘I’m not asking that much,’ said Nicolas with a laugh. ‘I’ll send you a box of camphorated beaver fat that Monsieur de Noblecourt swears by. Aren’t you bored in your cage?’
‘Of course, Monsieur Nicolas! At least I have my pipe and my cordial. Apart from that, I’m bored stiff.’
‘All right, then. What would you say to searching in the register of foreigners for a middle-aged Englishman, of medium height and with a definite paunch? He’s wearing tinted folding glasses and speaks quite good French. I’d also quite like to have a list of foreigners staying in furnished hotels in Paris and Versailles.’
‘It would be very careless of him to always frequent such conspicuous establishments,’ said Semacgus.
‘Lodging with the locals would be even more so. It’s possible he’s staying with the British ambassador. Lord Ashbury is a clever man. We’ll see … So, Marie, is that all right with you?’
‘I’ll go and look at the registers straight away.’
Nicolas handed him a few louis.
‘That’s far too much,’ said the usher, stunned.
‘It’s to pay the cleaner. Keep the change for tobacco and cordial.’
He set off at top speed.
‘You’re good, I’ll give you that,’ said Semacgus. ‘Always a promise of scraps from the table.’
‘I don’t have to try too hard. He’s a good man, and a Breton, to boot. Evit ur baoninqenn, kant modigenn! “For a little pain, a hundred pleasures,” as they say where we come from. I’m going to visit the Duchamplans in Rue Christine. Will you come with me? I don’t have much time, so we’ll have to skip lunch. We can dine together this evening, we’ll have plenty of time then …’
Semacgus was grimacing at the thought of this sacrifice.
‘Would you dare to abandon a patient?’ joked Nicolas. ‘Imagine if I failed in my duty—’
‘You’re beating down my defences. All right then, I’ll fast in your honour. This evening, you’ll all be my guests.’
The surgeon’s carriage was waiting for them at the entrance. Nicolas suddenly remembered to thank the coachman, who, by his presence of mind, had probably saved his life. The man in question, blushing with emotion, told them that he had taken advantage of their absence to buy, from one of those stalls which cluttered the square all the way to the Apport-Paris, a basket of little hot pies from Champagne and two bottles of simple wine. He had guessed that the gentlemen, too absorbed in their affairs, were going to have to tighten their belts. Both congratulated him on his initiative, and Nicolas again got rid of a few extra écus.
Assuaging their raging hunger, they crossed the Seine and soon reached Rue Christine, which was situated between Rue des Grands-Augustins and Rue Dauphine. This tranquil street was full of large bourgeois houses. The Duchamplan house was not out of place here, with its austere facade devoid of excessive decoration, apart from a mascaron depicting the face of a ch
ubby Triton. Six floors including the attic, noted Nicolas. The three upper floors appeared, from certain aspects, to be given over to furnished rooms. They went through the carriage entrance. The caretaker was sitting on a stool with the straw removed, shelling beans. He told them that Monsieur Duchamplan the elder lived on the first and second floors, and Monsieur Duchamplan the younger on the mezzanine. But the latter was not in at the moment; in fact, he had not been in for several days. There was nothing to explain this absence, which appeared to worry his brother greatly. To the left of the courtyard was an impressive flight of stairs, the state of which indicated that it was for the exclusive use of the owner, while everyone else used a more modest staircase, as did the servants, the suppliers, the carriers of water and wood …
Nicolas remarked to Semacgus that chance remained the most constant element in investigations, and that you often discovered things when you were least expecting to. It would be useful to speak a bit more to such a talkative character as that caretaker. Having rung the bell-pull, they waited until a middle-aged manservant opened the door. Nicolas asked to see the master of the house. A few minutes later, the man himself appeared.
From the first, Nicolas found it hard to define his appearance. He was neither tall nor short, neither fat nor thin, and wore a black, rather old-fashioned coat. He was pale, with washed-out eyes, and resembled his sister the nun, although his face was puffier. His hands, hidden beneath wide cuffs, were clasped together, as if he were trying to overcome a degree of nervousness.
‘Nicolas Le Floch, commissioner at the Châtelet. Dr Guillaume Semacgus.’
He stopped there. It was the best way to force the witness to make the next move.
‘Please come in, gentlemen.’
He admitted them into a large, richly furnished drawing room. The curtains at the windows looking out on the street were half drawn, plunging the room into relative darkness. He motioned them to take their seats in large high-backed armchairs from the previous century.
‘I’m listening, Monsieur,’ said Nicolas.
The Saint-Florentin Murders Page 24