Castang’s City

by Nicolas Freeling

  "I’ll have to check on a lot of things, but rest assured I’ll be discreet. How often did you see him?"

  "Fairly irregularly. Once a week, once a fortnight – a month sometimes. Nearly three years now. I have my income. I supplement that by part-time work, I can tell you my employer, but if this comes out I’ll get the sack. Perhaps I’ll go anyway: it would be best; I’ve been thinking about it. If you let me, now." A little bitterness: resignation. "You’ll ask when I saw him last: exactly a week ago this evening. Whether he behaved as usual: yes, precisely. Whether he said or did anything to lead one to believe he was menaced, or had enemies, or was engaged in anything unusual or dangerous or – I don’t know, anything to interest you, that might suggest or explain the reasons for his being assassinated – no, no, and no. A bolt from the blue, totally. I know nothing whatsoever. I didn’t look for confidences or get any. He’d talk about anything and everything, but he didn’t gossip. Either about his affairs or his home. I know something of both, inevitably, but quite certainly a great deal less than you. I was just – a woman, whom he felt he could talk to freely. Who would make no exaggerated demand on him, wouldn’t have an eye – I think this is it – to her advantage all the time, seeking all the time to turn the relationship to profit. Which is what pretty nearly everyone wanted of him in the long or short run, and that’s just what he’d got sick of."

  He’d got her moving now: question of keeping the flow up till he was fairly sure there was nothing left.

  He was a cop of some seniority by now; with considerable experience: had learned to be wary.

  It rang true. He had however known other women who rang true. She looked, felt, tasted good. Her atmosphere, her surroundings felt right.

  He had, too, taken her by surprise, at night, in her own home. He had, however, in the past come near being stung. Did one ever know? And if she thought that she had him in her pocket… A woman of experience, skill, a clever woman. And brighter than she looked. She acted stupid. Women act…and he, undoubtedly, was vulnerable. He could see Richard’s face. Richard would not say much. He had said it already. ‘You realise, Castang, in an affair like this, just how vulnerable we are.’ The Mayor, the Prefect, the Minister of the goddam Interior. Talk about being inside nutcrackers…

  He felt ashamed of his own cynicism, and found himself thinking of Vera. This was not, repeat not, the moment for any of the little armoury of tricks – they are all dirty tricks – a cop can reach for. But boy, you better be sure what ground you’re on.

  "Well – Madame Touchet – we can probably manage to be pretty discreet about all this. There’s a good way of making sure – mm?"

  "I don’t quite grasp."

  "You’re an attractive woman, you know." Perfectly true; she was.

  She said nothing, looked at him awhile with a meaningless, expressionless face. She got up and went over to where a drinks tray stood on a side table. She poured herself a glass of something, added nothing to it, drank it off in one, stood looking at her reflection in a round glass that distorted. Her body looked suddenly too heavy for her: the long arms and bony hands hung limp and numb. "Inevitably," she said in a dull limp voice. She moved over towards the fireplace and put her elbows on the chimney piece.

  "Do you want me to undress?" she asked without looking at him, "or will it be enough if I lift my skirt?" Without bitterness; as though she were exhausted.

  "Neither," said Castang without budging. "I wanted to see what you would do. I haven’t any intention of breaking my word."

  "Ah, I see… A sort of test. Yes. I deserved that. The police… I can’t blame you." She turned round to face him, propping her elbows behind her, as though she still needed the support to hold her up. "There isn’t any truth or honour anywhere." No, alas. Save in Vera.

  It was too late now. She would not trust him, really, again. But how does one tell? He thought bitterly. You follow your instinct, but the cop in you tells you it’s not always to be relied upon. That is one of the things that is vile about this job. The inability ever to trust anyone.

  "I beg your pardon," he said formally.

  "I’m just so damned accustomed," wearily, "to having advantage taken of me."

  TWELVE

  AGAINST BAD FORTUNE, A GOOD HEART

  Richard put down the local paper, which said, ‘Tragedy strikes again at bereaved family’ and said nothing. The face was of bronze too. It wasn’t, thought Castang, the face of the Commander come to dinner, about to tip Don Juan down the trapdoor. There was a silence. Castang knew better than to break it. Maryvonne fidgeted slightly with her skirt.

  "The one thing," said Richard," that we know for sure, concerning the death of Etienne Marcel, in the present state of the inquiry, is that it was a homicide. If, Maryvonne, please do not scratch your stockings, you fall out of a high window, which if we all fail to control ourselves will be a distinct possibility, what would one do about that?"

  "I suppose probably one would start talking about vertigo so as not to upset the relatives. I haven’t looked at the statistics about high windows. I suppose there are some somewhere. I’d suspect I think a lot more suicides than were in the book. I wouldn’t believe a great many people fell out of windows by accident. I dare say too there are quite a few homicides that aren’t on the book because they could never be adequately proved."

  "Exactly, and in particular if it were a Czech Prime Minister. If you’ve finished making faces, Castang, we might have your opinion?"

  "What you’re saying, at least I suppose so, is that shooting people in the street isn’t just homicide, it’s a loud noisy proclamation that it’s homicide, meant to be, and can’t possibly be mistaken for anything else."

  "Precisely so. A point that seems to be getting itself underlined. Would you like to go on?"

  "If this next death were a homicide it isn’t underlined, is that what you’re getting at? That if the deaths were linked they’re not so by method and the break in the pattern is arresting, but I don’t know where the hell I go to next."

  "A sadly confused mind: can you do better, Maryvonne?"

  "Well, falling out of a window might be anything, but the likelihood would be a suicide. Getting shot is labouring the obvious; there isn’t any possibility of anything but homicide. And getting electrocuted in the bath is again on the strong balance of probability an accident: leastways I would suppose so. Has anybody ever committed suicide by such a weird complicated manner? I might wonder, I think, whether a person wanted to mask a suicide, to avoid the stigma, maybe spare pain to the relatives. And, oh yes, I’d look at his life insurance, to see if there was a catch because of them not paying out."

  "Now you’re beginning to use the brains God gave you. The hypothesis of a homicide did, I presume, cross your mind."

  "Well, in general sort of terms. Isn’t it a very complicated and elaborate sort of method? Like an English detective story?"

  "Particularly if you’re in the habit of straightforward simple procedure like shooting people with a huge big pistol?"

  "Yes, it isn’t a way terrorists would choose, is it?"

  "Welcome back, terrorists," said Richard pleasantly, "haven’t heard from you in some time. Now, Castang, you’re an investigating officer of experience, it says on your dossier. I realise you’ve been jolted in your domestic tranquility and are vexed about that, but I presume you’ve given this matter some thought."

  "A homicide would depend on two things. Since you’re being sarcastic we’ll leave out the death-trap mechanisms, the thread attached to the soap dish and so on. A fellow has to be there to heave the electric thing into the bath. Answer, yes, a fellow could have been there; the door was only a spring lock. Firemen didn’t break in any bolts or stuff. That is, a fellow could go out, shut the door after him, walk out unobserved onto the street and be in Marseille, probably, before the water leaking alerted the people downstairs. If the judge or someone wants it to be a homicide there’s nothing to stop him. I’d think a suicide, masked or n
ot, a hopelessly strained interpretation and if Maryvonne hadn’t had the bad luck to leave a card on the bugger the same day nobody would have such a silly idea. Man threatened with police inquiry takes the short way out – it could make tomorrow’s headlines if that’s what you want."

  "And the second thing you forgot to mention while carried along by this tide of eloquence?"

  "A homicide in the bath – I’d have to postulate somebody who knew him pretty well. I don’t know whether any judge would like the idea of dotting the chap with a soda siphon in the living room, dragging him into the bathroom and happening to notice there was an electric fan on a shelf."

  "Go on with that, Castang."

  "Because of condensation, I think he was in the habit of leaving the bathroom door open. Postulate a person present who knew him well and was familiar with that bathroom. He was divorced from his wife: as I gather he wasn’t living with anyone but he had friends. Maryvonne didn’t get any further, I think."

  "He didn’t make any secret of it," she said. "I asked in the usual colourless way what about his domestic arrangements, and he grinned amiably and said he led a bachelor existence in the little flat next door to his office. I asked did he object to my drawing conclusions about that phrase and he said he couldn’t stop me speculating but he’d object to me prying into his privacy and would make a complaint if he had reason to suppose, blahblah. I left it at that."

  "And now he’s dead," said Richard with the air of one making a discovery. "You see, Maryvonne, we, or rather the judge, can in this instance make a feint of believing anything we please. Like the next Czech Prime Minister said, maybe the man was on LSD and thought he could fly. Anything would do to keep the press quiet, and the Mayor, rather naturally, wants to see me this morning. But in reality… Accident in bath, as the Mayor feels, comes a bit pat. As you justly remark, a fellow is not going to commit suicide simply because a police officer walks in and presents a card. Is there even any sign of family upheavals or tensions? – you both say no, and we’re left high and dry with terrorists.

  "Postulate one or more persons who’d like it to be thought they go shooting people. That they, in secret conclave, decide to make another hit – yes, it’s supposed to sound ridiculous. That they would decide to make the next hit Marcel’s son – declared the vendetta, what. They then adopt this exceedingly weird way of terrorising the populace – you’re quite right; even the Mayor won’t swallow that, even if he’s careful not to tread on any soap these coming days.

  "But there’s one thing, my dear, that I never like to hear in these domestic affairs, of people who fall off stepladders while hanging pictures and so on. That’s the glancing blow upon the head so dear to the story-writers. One may get glancing blows on the head of course; I get them myself from time to time. But if, Maryvonne, you are standing in the bath. Or getting into the bath. You slip, very well. Now whereabouts would you expect to get a nasty rap?"

  "Funnybone. Hip, knee, hand. Maybe shoulder."

  "That’s right; your head is the last thing that’s going to collide with a surface, am I right?"

  "I did think perhaps that shelf – the one the fan stood on – because it’s about the right height."

  "How sharp is its edge?"

  "There’s that."

  "I think in your shoes I’d cultivate Professor Deutz at the Pathology Department. Now there’s been a seal put on that door, and the judge as you’d expect wants a complement of information. You’ll take the technical squad, I’ll say a word to Lasserre, and let them do what they can with that flat. Fingertips tell one nothing, whereas the absence of them in a place like that might? This will upset the family – yet another funeral, but this one, I imagine, strictly in private. Your bad luck as well as theirs. Slings and arrows. Against the outrageous fortune, a stout heart.

  "I think it as well, Castang, to be quite firm with them about the accident. You don’t want them getting hysterical. Maryvonne, you’d better see the secretary or whoever looked after the business in his office, and get what line you can on his playmates. If he was as secretive as his pa…if the phone numbers are all in the little book then count yourself lucky.

  "Apropos, Castang, this Pony Club idyll you have uncovered…" Richard made a coarse joke about Castang’s attractions for horsy ladies. Everyone was fond of picturing him with a straw in his mouth and dung-fork at the ready. Lasserre, who disliked him, talked about the bullet-headed little bugger mucking out the stable. Maryvonne, who liked him, laughed a little because he was given to waistcoats and caps, and words like natty and dapper did spring to mind a bit. Castang, who’d never been near a horse in his life and didn’t intend to try, was used to it.

  "I don’t think there’s anything in it at all. Another of Marcel’s private compartments. But just what she said it was, a place where he could forget his large and at times troublesome family, and all his elaborate systems and personae, and be uncomplicated. She’s naturally a gay cheerful person. Likes to laugh, is excellent company, has always a new funny story: I think she suited him very well. Better than a safety valve. If one wanted a generous, open, attractive and kindhearted mistress – I think she deserves to be left in peace, and I should hope Delavigne will agree."

  "He didn’t have any private papers or stuff out there, Castang, did he?"

  "I never thought of looking. Or even asking, I’m sorry."

  "I think I’d better make a visit out there in your company. I’ve had Massip on of course about safe-deposit boxes and the like, and I had an exceedingly boring time with his notary. Several tangled skeins, but no thread of Ariadne. He was given to hidey-holes though, and this might be one. What’s her name?"

  " Clothilde."

  "Why is everyone’s mistress always called Clothilde?" enquired Richard.

  Castang felt there were enough questions as it was.

  THIRTEEN

  HARD DAY’S NIGHT

  Everything had been leisurely and orderly and really rather cosy, and there you were again working like a dog and nothing to show for it. The whole morning was just what you’d expect…he was late getting in to see Vera.

  "She’s got to feed the baby," said a nurse severely. "Don’t you go exciting or upsetting her now: a child has to be quiet and undisturbed."

  Having the Police Judiciaire come heaving up over the horizon, flying a Jolly Roger, always does turn the milk sour: he didn’t need nurses to tell him how that went.

  "Come and sit down," said Vera cheerfully, unperturbed by his being late. Routine. "I’m in fine form. You don’t have to work at amusing me. I’ve lots of everything, books, chockies; stuff away all day. How’s it all going? – tell me what it’s been like, without wifey there darning the socks."

  "Much as usual. Boringly. Picking up a foot and putting it down again. Boots, boots, boots…"

  "A soldier musn’t ask, must he, what all those pointless manoeuvres are about. Trained not to think about it. He’s there for the Defence of the Realm and that’s it. Never seek to know who you’re defending, or what against."

  "Yes; the point about a disciplined body is that it should be disciplined."

  "This Marcel… I’ve read the paper of course. The nurses talk about it a lot. I maintain a discreet and disciplined silence. They look at you and simply burst with curiosity."

  "Marcel… Well, he enjoyed power."

  "Power," said Vera, who was decidedly over the hibernating period and wanting again to sharpen her wits, "means having a lot of people anxious to do you a favour."

  "Yes. I haven’t had much to do with all that. Richard’s doing all that in person, having been instructed by the Mayor that the fewer people there are knowing about the corridors of power the better. And thinking likely enough that Castang’s a pretty shaky defender of society and had better be protected from nasty surprises. So I got the family enquiry. Which is in a way quite complicated and troublesome enough. That said Marcel was a complex person, who kept things separate. The general idea has been to build up
a synthesis of these elaborately arranged personalities in the hope that it will shed light upon persons with an interest in attacking and demolishing him. This side of him shows up well, I’m bound to say. Good to his family, and generous."

  "So, or so it’s always said, are Mafiosi. Send their beloved daughters to expensive convents, show the utmost faith and devotion to their wives, and cherish their old ancestors. I can’t see any difference."

  He recognised with pleasure his sharp and sceptical Vera, who had the ferocity of all very gentle people and who generally managed to sharpen his wits while busy sharpening her own. This particular point hadn’t occurred to him before. But it didn’t do to get excited about it.

  "He had a mistress too," lazily. "Quiet, respectable bourgeois woman; she’s rather nice."