by Mark Hebden
At the Quai des Orfèvres, they consulted with the inspector in charge of the narcotics squad. He studied the tin and looked at a report in his hand.
‘He’s not known to be part of the drugs scene here,’ he said cautiously.
‘But he obviously was, wasn’t he?’ Polverari said.
The inspector shrugged. ‘He must have been involved with some Marseilles crowd smuggling from Italy or somewhere, and broke his contract by taking the money but keeping some of the stuff back to sell himself. We know most of them and suspect a lot more, but Miollis is a new name.’
‘What about Treguy?’
‘He’s a heavy. Not too bright. He runs with Pépé le Cornet’s gang. He leans on people for them. He’s got a record of violence. Robbery, threats, assault with a deadly weapon. One suspected murder. He came here from Marseilles.’
‘Was he ever part of the set-up run by a Maurice Tagliacci?’
The inspector pulled a face. ‘He might have been. Tagliacci’s a new one. Up and coming. Beginning to worry the usual lot. The police, too. Would you like us to hold Treguy? We can. On suspicion.’
Pel gestured. ‘I think you’ll have to let them both go,’ he said. ‘But perhaps you’d better keep an eye on them just in case.’
That night, Polverari insisted they should celebrate the excitement of the day by dining in the city. Since he’d married a wealthy wife, he was never afraid to spend, and eating was one of his delights. He knew a restaurant beyond St Germain des Prés where you could eat roast sucking pig. It was a drab place with bare brick walls and the pig was greasy and overcooked, but Polverari loved it and thought a show would be a good idea to follow. Pel, whose idea of a good time was fishing or a fierce game of boules, was not so keen.
The show turned out to be a place near the Place Pigalle. It was full of tourists and was colourful, noisy and melodious, and contained more girls without clothes than Pel had dreamed existed. Polverari thoroughly enjoyed himself. He was a man who enjoyed every virtue in life but made no bones about enjoying its vices, too.
Back in his room, his stomach queasy from the pork, the wine, the cream that had been poured on the English strawberries, and finally the champagne they’d swallowed at the night club, Pel found he couldn’t sleep. Tossing and turning for a while, certain he was going to have a bad night – Pel was always certain he was going to have a bad night – in the end, he sat up and started going through the papers in his briefcase that he’d brought from Miollis’ flat. Most of it was gibberish about insurances – Miollis seemed to have been taking care of his old age – rent accounts and little additions and subtractions on deals he appeared to have done. His total profits seemed low. The papers seemed to lead nowhere until Pel noticed a number written in pencil on the corner of one of them – 80-35-01-601. He might not have noticed it but for finding Miollis’ body where they had; now he recognised it as a St Seine l’Abbaye number, and St Seine l’Abbaye was in the Côte d’Or area of Burgundy.
He decided to try it, and picked up the telephone. He was answered by a speaking machine. ‘This is Archavannes’, Hauliers. The office is now closed but if you will please leave a message and your telephone number you will be contacted as soon as the office reopens. Please speak as soon as this message ends.’
As the tape stopped, Pel glared at the telephone in disgust. He hated conducting conversations with machines and for a moment felt like answering with ‘And this, if you please, is Evariste Clovis Désiré Pel, Inspector, Police Judiciaire. I will now give you a selection of songs from my extensive repertoire.’ Instead he dialled Directory Enquiries.
The operator seemed to be out making himself a cup of coffee, and when eventually he deigned to answer, Pel was in a bad temper.
‘Archavannes’,’ he snarled. ‘Hauliers. Telephone number, St Seine l’Abbaye – 35-01-601. Can you give me the full address?’
‘One moment.’ There was a pause and the voice came back full of enthusiasm. ‘Archavannes’. Haulage contractors. St Peuple.’
Pel lit a cigarette and gulped at the smoke as if he had died and the smoke could bring him back to life. St Peuple was twenty kilometres from St Seine l’Abbaye and forty from his office in the Hôtel de Police. He had struck lucky.
He was just about to place the sheet of paper back in his briefcase to be filed, when he decided not to waste time. Glancing at his watch he saw it had not long gone midnight and, if he knew Darcy, he wouldn’t be asleep yet. He might be in bed. But he wouldn’t be asleep.
He was dead right. Darcy was in bed and he wasn’t asleep. His voice was brisk as he answered the telephone and Pel could tell there was someone with him. He could hear movements, then there was a crash as if something had been knocked over and a soft voice said ‘Merde!’
‘What was that?’ Pel asked.
‘Just me,’ Darcy said cheerfully. ‘I knocked a glass over. I was in bed with a whisky and – er – a book.’
Pel didn’t argue. Darcy was far too good a sergeant for him to question what he got up to in his spare time.
‘Archavannes’,’ he said. ‘Hauliers, at St Peuple. Check up on them.’
‘Now?’ Darcy sounded alarmed.
‘Before I get back tomorrow. I wouldn’t wish to take you from your book.’
Darcy laughed. ‘Right, Patron! I’ll do that. What have they been up to?’
‘I don’t know,’ Pel said. ‘Probably nothing. But it might be a good idea to pay them a visit.’
Seven
Pel wasn’t sorry to be back in Burgundy. Paris gave him a bad stomach and pains in the head.
He had visited relations there as a boy, but that had been in the days when every corner was a famous picture that filled you with a warm flooding affection. The streets had still glowed in those days as Utrillo had painted them, and the misty water had shimmered as Corot had seen it, and he had thought then that he might like to work in Paris, feasting his eyes for the rest of his life on its steeples, domes and cupolas, on its centuries of life and architecture. It was different now. The crowded world demanded space and Paris, like everywhere else, had gone upwards. Skyscrapers spoiled the view from Sacré Coeur and vast new blocks lined the motorway out of the city to the south.
As he stepped off the train that brought him home, he drew a deep breath as though he had just returned to the surface after being at the bottom of the sea. This, he thought, despite the ancient Peugeot he drove, despite the badly painted house that looked as though it were about to fall down, despite Madame Routy and the television that drove him demented, despite the job he considered sadly underpaid and grossly over-demanding, was where he belonged. He could easily leave Paris to the Americans.
Darcy was sitting at his desk writing in his notebook when he arrived at the Hôtel de Police. He looked up and grinned.
‘Enjoy yourself, Patron?’ he asked.
‘I didn’t go for a holiday,’ Pel said stiffly.
‘There’s still no need to waste the place, Patron. Seen the paper?’ He tossed across France Soir. There was a picture of Pel looking as if he’d been struck by lightning, and a great deal of the usual speculation. The hints of a great love affair between Miollis and his wife made Pel want to vomit.
GILLES ET ERNESTINE: LE TERRIBLE SILENCE.
Judging by the headlines and the heavily-posed picture of Madame Miollis gazing sadly but with little regard for the truth at a photograph of her husband, they could have been Héloïse and Abelard, instead of a small-time crook and his moll.
Pel glared at the story and tossed the paper back. ‘Did you find out about Archavannes’?’ he asked sourly.
Darcy nodded. ‘Yes, Patron. Run by a guy called Louis-Arnold Archavanne. He’s in his forties. His father started it in a small way after the war but he died eight years ago, and this Archavanne started to expand about three years ago. New lorries. New buildings. More staff. It’s a thriving concern.’
Pel took out a cigarette, eyed it warily, hesitated, then shoved it between his lips with a desp
airing gesture. Lighting it, he dragged the smoke down to his socks, coughed a few times, and looked up with a flushed face.
‘Let’s go and see him,’ he said.
‘We can’t, Patron,’ Darcy pointed out. ‘He’s away today. I enquired. In case you hadn’t noticed, it’s Saturday.’
‘I work on Saturday.’
‘He doesn’t. I fixed it for Monday. At his home. It’s just down the road from the business.’
‘Right. Send Nosjean in.’
Nosjean appeared cheerfully. He was in good form. He’d spent the evening before at Odile Chenandier’s flat. It always did Nosjean good to see Odile Chenandier because to Nosjean she seemed the only person in the world more retiring than he was.
‘That enquiry you’re on,’ Pel said. ‘How’s it going?’
‘Not much so far, Patron,’ Nosjean admitted. ‘But it’s moving ahead. I picked up three names: Lorre, Hertot and Ramou. All students. All different faculties. All different subjects. They were friends of Cortot’s. They’ve used drugs. I brought them in and questioned them.’
Pel frowned. ‘We could pull in a dozen a day if we tried,’ he said. ‘There’s not much future in that. The man we want’s the man who’s pushing it. Do they still use drugs?’
‘They say not and they say they were soft drugs, anyway.’
‘Soft or hard, they’re all drugs. One leads to another. Did they know Cortot was on heroin?’
‘They thought so. They didn’t know who was supplying him, but they mentioned a man called Nino.’
‘Italian?’
‘They didn’t know. They say they’ve never seen him and never spoken to him. They got their stuff – mostly pot – from other students. No heroin. They swore no heroin. They only knew Cortot because they went to the parties he went to.’
‘Drug parties?’
‘Yes.’
‘Did they know anything else about this Nino?’
‘They thought he came from Auxonne. I went back to Mortier. He said he often lent Cortot money. He supposed he used it to buy drugs.’
‘Can Professor Foussier help? He’s supposed to head this anti-drug committee at the University.’
Nosjean pulled a face. ‘Patron, he talks a lot and likes to think he’s living dangerously, and he’s always on the telephone with new information. But it always seems to be information we’ve already got. I don’t think he’s even penetrated the fringe.’
Pel frowned. He’d had occasion to contact Professor Foussier himself. A fussy, handsome forty-year-old with long stork-like legs, he was too overblown for Pel and far too fond of himself. Every woman in the city seemed to belong to his fan club and many of them would happily have climbed into bed with him. The committees he served on always had a plethora of women from the expensive avenues of the city and he’d noticed there were a few more from Paris, even a few titles. Not just Second Empire titles, either, which didn’t even impress the servants.
‘How about that rope trick of Cortot’s?’ he asked. ‘Was it a student lark? Because if it was, we’ll want to know who did it. Did these students you mention have anything to do with it?’
‘They say they never saw him at all that day. They attended all their classes and in the evening they drank together in the Bar Mistral, ate in a restaurant near the University, then went to Hertot’s rooms. They were all a little drunk and they spent the night there together. They each confirm for the others.’
‘They could all be lying. I’ll want to know who this Nino is. Find out. And we’ll have this lot in and talk to them. Send Misset in as you go out.’
Misset’s first words were to ask for the night off.
Pel glared. ‘Why?’
‘My wife needs me.’
‘I expect Krauss’ wife needs him,’ Pel snapped. ‘And Lagé’s needs him. Why do you expect special treatment?’
‘I’ve got more children than they have.’
‘You can hardly make that an excuse. Because they’re more careful, you can hardly expect to collect the rewards.’
Misset’s face went stiff. ‘The Church’s views on birth control are well known, Patron.’
Pel waved his objections aside. ‘What about this Baranquin character?’ he asked. ‘The break-ins.’
‘He must have had an accomplice, Patron. I’ve worked it out.’
Pel glared. ‘Is that all you’ve worked out?’
‘We’ve been occupied with this Miollis thing, Patron.’
Pel grunted. ‘Bend your mind to it, Misset,’ he said. He spoke softly but he managed to inject a great deal of menace into his words. ‘And as you go out, send Lagé in.’
Lagé was cheerful. He was snowed under with reports and his fingers ached with typing. He wasn’t the brightest of detectives but he was willing.
‘Your hit-and-run?’ Pel said.
‘Progressing, Patron. I think that’s how it’s going to turn out. Not murder. Judge Brisard’s handling it.’
‘Stay with it,’ Pel said. ‘Let’s see Krauss now.’
I might as well make myself thoroughly depressed, he thought, and Krauss ought to provide the grande finale.
At midday Pel went to see Judge Polverari, who was still in a glow of pleasure after his visit to Paris and in no mood to worry. He insisted on taking Pel out for a beer at the Bar du Destin.
‘Archavanne will wait,’ he said.
Pel went home gloomily, wondering what sort of horror the weekend would produce. Madame Routy was growing more indifferent to his wishes with every week that passed. Food was bad, the house was not much cared for, and Pel felt as if he’d been orphaned. What he needed, as Darcy had told him many times, was a good woman to love and cherish him, to iron his shirts, to provide good food, to get up when he was called out in the middle of the night so as to offer a cup of hot coffee before he plunged into the bitter air, and to welcome him back with more coffee, perhaps even a brandy, and above all a warm bed.
Somewhere in his life, Pel felt, he had missed out. There had been a time when he’d thought he might marry a girl from Vieilly, the village where he’d lived as a boy. She’d been slim and laughing and in her way elegant. Hardly a Madame Faivre-Perret, who looked so well dressed she seemed to have just been taken out of a box for display, but prettily clothed in a rustic sort of way. He had spent half his youth gazing at her, trying to decide whether he was suffering from love or just plain lust, and devising schemes to get her in dark corners that had never seemed to come to anything. Once, when he’d made sergeant, he had gone back full of nostalgia to look her up, but she’d married a butcher, had four children and grown fat. Life was full of nasty knocks.
When he opened the door, the television was going full blast and sounded like a pile-up on the N74. There was, however, a vast bonus in the presence of Didier Darras. Didier Darras was twelve years old and Madame Routy’s nephew; and from time to time, when Madame Routy’s sister had to disappear to look after her sick father-in-law, Didier Darras came to stay with Madame Routy. Pel could think of nothing more likely to make the evening worth while.
The meal was a veal stew, so bland it was tasteless, and the wine was leftovers from the previous day, sour enough, Pel decided, to give him indigestion for a week. But afterwards, they played boules in the lane behind the house and on the Sunday went fishing at St Broing.
‘Why didn’t you ever get married, Monsieur Pel?’ Didier asked as they sat watching their rods.
‘Nobody ever asked me,’ Pel said.
‘I thought the man asked the woman.’
‘Just a joke,’ Pel said feebly.
‘I’m going to marry Louise Blay. She lives next door. I used to pull the legs off her dolls.’
‘And now?’
‘She doesn’t want to play with dolls any more. She’s different.’
‘It’s surprising,’ Pel agreed. ‘But this, I hope, isn’t the only reason why you intend to marry her.’
‘Oh, no. I like her. There’s only one trouble. She sends letter
s to me. She’s always writing letters. Not love letters you understand–’
‘I trust not, mon brave.’
‘ – but letters, all the same. Telling me what she’s doing, where she’s going. I don’t write back. I don’t like letters. They give too much away, don’t they? My father laughs. He says “Say it with flowers, say it with drink, say it with chocolates, but never with ink.” What does he mean?’
Pel smiled. ‘The same as you, I imagine, mon brave. Never put it in writing. He’s probably wise.’
They found a restaurant at Dinot. It was nothing to write home about, but the soup was good and they served trout. When they got home, Madame Routy, who had prepared a casserole, was speechless with fury. It fell off Pel like water off a duck’s back.
The following morning while he was eating his breakfast Nosjean telephoned. ‘I’ve found out who Nino is, Patron,’ he said. ‘He’s a chap called Fran Nincic. I got the name from a girl friend of that student, Ramou. Ramou swears he doesn’t know him, but I’m not sure I believe him. I’ve checked the telephone directory but there’s nobody of that name.
Pel wrote the name down on a piece of paper and went back to his breakfast. Didier was sitting alongside him and he glanced at what Pel had written down.
‘What’s that?’ he asked.
‘It’s a name,’ Pel said.
Didier stared at it. ‘I’ve never heard anybody called that before,’ he said. ‘Fran Nincic. That’s a funny name.’
Pel stared at what he’d written. Since you mentioned it, he thought, it was a funny name.
It was funny enough, in fact, to try on Darcy when he got to the office.
‘It isn’t French,’ Darcy said. ‘But what is these days? Negebauer. Niekreszewicz. Mamedoff, Abu Alir, Han Sung. I’ve come across them all in the last year or so. The country’s full of the fag-ends of pogroms, the old colonial empire and everybody else’s cast-offs.’
‘Let’s find out, shall we?’ Pel suggested. ‘Who’s the expert?’
‘How about the University, Patron? There must be a faculty that deals with ethnics.’