Monsieur Pamplemousse Hits the Headlines

by Michael Bond

  ‘Do you remember this one you took of me on the Pont Neuf?’ she said. ‘It was just after you kissed me for the first time. On the back of the neck!’

  ‘But you liked it!’

  ‘I thought you were very forward. You had a moustache and it tickled. For a moment I thought it was a mouche.’

  ‘In those days,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse, ‘a moustache was considered to be a symbol of virility.’

  ‘As I recall, Aristide,’ said Doucette coyly, ‘you had other ways of proving that. Shaving it off didn’t seem to make a lot of difference.’

  It wasn’t until some years later that he had discovered Doucette classed men with moustaches as being in much the same category as those with beards; they were not to be trusted. The truth was more prosaic. At the time he had grown it more as a symbol of authority following early promotion. He had shaved it off straight away, of course, but it had been a salutary lesson in how two people could live together for years and still not reveal their innermost likes and dislikes to each other.

  Doucette turned a page. ‘Do you remember our first holiday in Nice? We stayed in a hotel near the flower market. You wouldn’t go in the water because you said the pebbles hurt your feet.’

  Monsieur Pamplemousse decided it was time to change the subject. He reached into his pocket. ‘I have brought you a present, Couscous.’

  ‘It isn’t just for you,’ he added, glancing down at Pommes Frites, who was hard at work removing the dust from his person following the encounter in the place.

  ‘What a strange thing to buy,’ said Doucette, taking the bottle from him. ‘There are those amongst us,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse, ‘mentioning no names, who seem to have got themselves hooked on the smell of almonds.’

  ‘There are worse things,’ said Doucette. She picked out another photograph. ‘Remember when you smoked cigars?’

  Monsieur Pamplemousse took himself into the kitchen before the conversation turned into a catalogue of his early imperfections. He returned a moment later with a small bottle of their own essence. Unscrewing the cap he placed it on the carpet.

  Pommes Frites hardly bothered to look up from his ablutions.

  ‘Perhaps he has gone off it,’ said Doucette. ‘You can have too much of a good thing. Besides, he looks as if he has more important things on his mind.’

  ‘Talking of which…’ Monsieur Pamplemousse glanced at his watch. ‘I need to go out again. Pommes Frites can stay and look after you in case those men come back.’

  Doucette knew better than to ask, but her normal bonne journée was tempered with a quizzical look as she saw him off at the door.

  Pommes Frites looked even more worried, and he went out onto to the balcony to make sure the coast was clear, keeping watch until long after his master had disappeared from view along the Avenue Junot.

  It was some while since Monsieur Pamplemousse had last seen Eddie Malfiltre and clearly life had been kind to him during the intervening years. Greying at the temples, casually dressed in immaculately pressed slacks and black polo-neck sweater, he could have passed for a business executive who had made his money and opted for early retirement. The tan hadn’t come from a sun lamp, that was for sure, and when he moved he walked on the balls of his feet like an athlete.

  Following a reasonably straight and narrow path obviously paid dividends. Knowing exactly where he stood, he didn’t beat about the bush. Apart from there being no paperwork involved, Monsieur Pamplemousse might have been making arrangements to have an interior decorator pay a call or be seeking an accountant’s advice on his pension arrangements.

  ‘Jacques has given me the address and the time available.’

  ‘Will it be enough?’

  ‘What has been put together can be taken apart again. I have a map of the camp and I know what to look for, but it will need as much time as I can get. Rather more than I have been given if that is possible. If you could win me, say, another twenty minutes it would be a plus. You know what the 7th is like; crawling with flics on the look-out for anything unusual. I need to know exactly what you are looking for, and ideally where it might be located.’

  Monsieur Pamplemousse filled him in on the former. There was no reaction.

  ‘As for where you will find them… I strongly suspect they are in a safe hidden behind a picture of Chavignol in the main bedroom.’

  ‘And you can guarantee there will be no one at home?’

  ‘I am not in a position to guarantee anything,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse. ‘But I will do the best I can, you have my word on that. It would not be in my interests to act otherwise. Give me your mobile number and I will let you know immediately if there are any changes.’

  And that was it. Both sides had to take the other on trust.

  On his way home Monsieur Pamplemousse phoned Jacques to tell him the meeting had taken place and it was all systems go.

  ‘One thing, can you tell me which division of the cemetery is earmarked for the actual burial?’

  Jacques consulted his file. ‘The 17th… that’s just inside the main gate. He’ll be in good company, along with a lot of actors and writers. Why do you ask?’

  ‘Because Malfiltre could do with more time. Somewhere further away from the entrance would be better.’

  ‘In that case,’ said Jacques, ‘do you want the good news first or the bad?’

  ‘Give me the bad,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse. ‘It’s nice being able to look forward to seeing light at the end of the tunnel.’

  ‘Whoever said Chavignol is being buried was speaking figuratively. He’s being cremated at Père Lachaise.’

  ‘What!’

  Monsieur Pamplemousse mulled it over for a moment. ‘In that case we have more time than we thought.’

  ‘Wrong. Père Lachaise happens to be the only place in Paris where you can be cremated. The ashes will be delivered to his wife immediately afterwards and she will take them on to Montmartre cemetery for the actual burial.’

  ‘Why can’t he be buried at Père Lachaise?’ asked Monsieur Pamplemousse. ‘It would make life a lot easier.’

  ‘Because that’s what everybody expects will happen. It was Chavignol’s express wish that it should be a quiet affair.

  ‘Dead men can’t be choosers. He’s lucky to get in anywhere at short notice. Someone must be pulling strings as it is. Death isn’t the great leveller it once was. Space is at a premium and it costs. Since local councils lost their monopoly on the ownership of the land, cemeteries have become big business. I doubt if Montmartre is in quite the same league, but the last I heard Père Lachaise were charging Fr100,000 for a 15 year lease on a 2m square plot. If they took that route think what a burden it will be on Chavignol’s nearest and dearest when the lease comes up for renewal.’

  ‘That’s a load of conneries and you know it,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse. ‘There’s enough money there to buy a dozen plots. The whole thing stinks.’

  ‘Am I saying it doesn’t?’ said Jacques. ‘Why do you think I spend so much time knocking pedestrians down? If I didn’t have my computer I might run amok and do it for real.’

  ‘There must be something we can do to slow things up,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse. ‘Are you sure you can’t drop a hint to the press. That would bring in the crowds…’

  ‘Nyet, Nein, No…Impossible!’ said Jacques. ‘When I say word has come down from on high, I do mean from on high. Life wouldn’t be worth living if it got back that I had tipped the media off. They would be there like vultures with their cameras and their notebooks. Madame Chavignol is regarded as a loose cannon. There is no knowing how she will react if she is crossed. Short of phoning rent-a-crowd to foul up the proceedings, there is nothing I can do. I would if I could, but I can’t.’

  Monsieur Pamplemousse was listening with only half an ear, his mind going back over the day’s events. Jacques’ words had triggered off a thought. It was a wild one, but it might work.

  ‘You couldn’t rustle up fifty or so out of
work Japanese actors could you?’

  ‘It’s funny you should say that,’ replied Jacques. ‘I have so many out of work Japanese actors on my books I don’t know what to do with them. They’re getting in my hair, which isn’t easy as there’s not much left…Look, I don’t run a theatrical agency.’

  ‘I am being serious.’

  ‘Tell me why and I’ll see what I can do.’

  Monsieur Pamplemousse told him.

  ‘Leave it to me.’ Jacques suddenly perked up. ‘I’ll do better than that. I’ll see if I can do something about the real thing. It’s time the cemetery was on the tour circuit. Think of all the famous people buried there…Sacha Guitry, Emile Zola, Hector Berlioz, Francois Truffaut, Edgar Degas, Delibes, Offenbach, Nijinsky, Alexandre Dumas. Edmond and Jules de Goncourt, Stendhal…now Chavignol…’

  Monsieur Pamplemousse cut him short. Jacques was a typical Aries; full of enthusiasms. He thought on his feet. In the old days they had worked well together. Formidable as some of their colleagues had it. But he needed to be kept in check.

  ‘How about the Centre de Télévision?’ he asked. ‘Have they been warned to steer clear of the press?’

  ‘They’re as anxious as anyone not to rock the boat,’ said Jacques. ‘The last thing they want is to have Chavignol’s death turned into a national day of mourning. It will only draw attention to their loss, so the less said about that the better as far as they are concerned.’

  ‘There will be sunny spells today,’ called Doucette as Monsieur Pamplemousse arrived home next morning with the croissants. ‘That is if the sun is patient enough to wait until it can find a gap in the clouds.’

  Monsieur Pamplemousse gave an answering grunt. Quite frankly, as long as the rain held off he didn’t mind what the weather did.

  ‘A man in Toulouse has murdered his wife after being happily married for over 29 years,’ said Doucette. ‘No one knows why.’

  ‘Perhaps it was because she kept reading bits of the newspaper out to him when he had his mind on other things,’ muttered Monsieur Pamplemousse.

  ‘Speak up, Aristide,’ called Doucette. ‘I can’t hear you.’

  ‘Life is full of strange happenings,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse. ‘There is no accounting for some of them.’

  Doucette looked up from her copy of the Le Parisien as he entered the kitchen. ‘Aristide!’ she exclaimed. ‘Don’t tell me you’ve been to the boulangerie looking like that. You haven’t even bothered to shave. What must they have thought? As for that old suit … you look like a clochard!’

  ‘Good,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse. ‘That, Coucous, is exactly how I want it to be.’

  Doucette gave a sigh. ‘I know there is no point in my asking, but I do hope whatever the problem is, it will soon be over.’

  ‘I hope so too,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse fervently. ‘For the moment, it is like today’s sky, a grey area. We must hope the forecast is correct and the sun will eventually break through.’

  It was shortly before 14.30 when Monsieur Pamplemousse and Pommes Frites found themselves a suitable vantage point on the narrow flight of steps leading down from the Rue Caulaincourt to join the tiny Avenue Rachel at a point just outside the entrance to the Cimetière Montmartre.

  Initially, the fact that animals were forbidden entry had been a bit of a setback, but on second thoughts it struck Monsieur Pamplemousse that perhaps it was just as well. Apart from the fact that Pommes Frites was hard to disguise, the cemetery was a noted haven for stray cats, which wouldn’t go down well. In any case, from where they were sitting he had a clear view of any traffic entering or leaving.

  Impervious to looks of disapproval from others using the passage as a short cut, Monsieur Pamplemousse unfolded a car rug and spread it out – the steps were in almost permanent shadow and he had enough problems as it was without getting piles. Placing his hat inside uppermost to mark the boundary of the rug, he carefully left room for Pommes Frites, set the Kyocera in readiness in case it was needed, and made himself comfortable.

  They hadn’t long to wait. At 14.55 exactly the funeral cortège arrived; a black Citroen, presumably carrying the remains of the deceased, followed by a second with the lone figure of Madame Chavignol.

  Monsieur Pamplemousse reached for his camera. Despite everything, he couldn’t help feeling touched when he zoomed in and saw her dabbing at her eyes with a handkerchief as the car went past.

  A third car carried her servant, Yin, and another Asian he took to be the chef. Both looked suitably inscrutable. He swapped the camera for his mobile and dialled a number. It was answered almost immediately.

  ‘She’s arrived.’

  While he was on the phone another car appeared; a large Renault, driven by Julian House. Next to him was the director of Chavignol’s programme. The studio manager was visible through the back window; probably still in his combat trousers if the top half was anything to go by. There was no sign of Pascal, which was surprising, but as the car disappeared through the arch he glimpsed a shock of red hair rising above the rear window. He wandered what pearls of wisdom Mademoiselle Katz was throwing up on the subject of funerals, or was she for once holding her counsel?

  He would dearly love to know what had caused her to issue her word of warning. Perhaps, fate having dealt her a whole handful of losing cards, she viewed everything else in life with the utmost suspicion. And who could blame her?

  The thought so occupied his mind he nearly missed seeing a coach enter Avenue Rachel from the Boulevard de Clichy and head towards the entrance to the cemetery. It was followed by three more. They came to a halt just below him as the driver of the leading one found his way barred by a portable HALT sign that had been put back into place.

  The man slid open his window and called to the gatekeeper, clearly asking for the sign to be removed.

  Equally clearly the gatekeeper was having none of it. An argument broke out.

  One by one, Tour Leaders climbed out of the other three coaches and began remonstrating, but the man was adamant. He pointed to a closely printed list of rules and regulations pasted up outside his office. There was enough reading matter to last the rest of the afternoon if that was the way they wanted to play it.

  Faced with such an impossible task, those in charge bowed to the inevitable.

  In a matter of moments the end of the street was full to overflowing as some two hundred or more passengers alighted and fanned into separate groups.

  Flags held high they set off, first of all laying siege to the lodge just inside the gate in order to claim their free maps. Honour satisfied, they then headed off into the cemetery itself, reassembling almost immediately opposite the first gravestone on their right. Tour Leaders launched into their respective spiels on the family Guitry. Cameras clicked.

  Having recorded the scene for posterity, Monsieur Pamplemousse pocketed his own camera. At this rate it would take them all the afternoon to do the Grand Tour. The chances of anyone making a prompt getaway from the cemetery were minimal.

  Pushing their way through the crowd of tourists would be difficult enough. Getting past the parked coaches near to impossible, and backing the four of them out into the busy Boulevard de Clichy could take forever, particularly as the police were conspicuous by their absence. Malfiltre would have more than his twenty minutes worth.

  Jacques had done him proud. Once he got the bit between his teeth there was no holding him. Monsieur Pamplemousse could picture the moment when he phoned the tour company; smooth but implacable.

  ‘I know where you normally park is a designated area. Certainly you may continue parking there. There is nothing whatsoever to stop you. You will get a ticket, of course…

  ‘I know there are signs up, but you shouldn’t believe all you read…it is only for the one day…

  ‘Now, for the sake of peace all round, I have a suggestion to make…’

  It wouldn’t surprise him to find Jacques had managed to persuade the Montmartre train to follow in the wake of the
coaches as well. That would really set the seal on things; all those old age pensioners swarming everywhere in search of free kicks among the gravestones.

  Monsieur Pamplemousse didn’t wait to find out. Gathering his belongings, he made himself scarce. A few minutes later, ignoring the surprised glances of passers by, he climbed into his car which he had left parked on the central reservation of the Boulevard de Clichy, waited until Pommes Frites had settled himself in the passenger seat, then headed for home.

  He had barely travelled a hundred metres when his phone rang. It was Malfiltre. The message was short and to the point.

  ‘Complications. I think you should come. You will find me in a white van just around the corner from the house.’

  Clearly, since he was avoiding specifics, Malfiltre wasn’t running the risk of being overheard; an admirable precaution in the circumstances. Monsieur Pamplemousse responded in like fashion.

  ‘D’accord. I’m on my way.’

  The van was where he had been told it would be; parked alongside an area of pavement where there was an open man-hole surrounded by a portable barrier.

  Having first peered down the hole, Monsieur Pamplemousse tapped on the rear door of the van. A moment or two passed before it opened a crack.

  Malfiltre’s working clothes were considerably nattier than his own. Dark blue cotton overalls, soft soled shoes, baseball cap, and thin cotton gloves.

  It occurred to Monsieur Pamplemousse that he was like an actor who was blessed with the sort of face that could play a thousand parts. Being able to submerge himself into the surroundings whatever they happened to be was part of Malfiltre’s stock in trade.

  He gazed around the inside of the van. There was hardly a square inch that wasn’t covered by racks of equipment.

  ‘Tell me the worst.’

  ‘I drew a blank on the safe.’

  Monsieur Pamplemousse’s face fell. ‘You are sure?’

  Malfiltre looked pained. ‘It is so full of jewellery there isn’t room for anything else. So… I put plan B into action.