Pel And The Touch Of Pitch

by Mark Hebden

  The case was coming together very nicely, thank you, Pel decided, and a list of names of businessmen – pharmaceutical suppliers and suppliers of food, furniture and linen – had been made, together with the names of a variety of hospital officials, fund raisers and the administrators of orphanages and the homes for disabled ex-servicemen and children in care. Quite a lot of people were busy biting their nails and trying to explain to their wives why they looked worried.

  It seemed to be time to put it all before the Chief.

  ‘There’s no doubt at all,’ Pel said. ‘The woman, Dominique Danton-Criot, known as Dédé, is the girl, Denise Darnand, whom Barclay knew in Marseilles while he was at university. Dédé’s short for Denise, not Dominique, and there seems little doubt that it’s an old name which has stuck. She clearly knew Barclay and, with Rykx – and possibly a few others we don’t know yet – she set up this business at the Manoir de Varas.

  ‘It has splendid kitchens, and magnificent bathrooms and bedrooms. The sitting rooms aren’t much but I suspect that sitting isn’t something they went in for a lot. As far as I can make out from the man, Journais, he, Arri, and one or two others we’ve found, acted as guards – and bouncers, when necessary. This, of course, was the job Barclay found for Arri. He knew he could trust him to keep his mouth shut and Arri seems to have done just that. Whether he enjoyed the job or not is a different matter but he was loyal enough not to ask questions.’

  The Chief listened quietly, studying Pel as he talked. There was a lot about Pel that irritated him – above all, his gift for always being right – but the Chief was glad he had him and was prepared to back him up all the way.

  ‘Barclay’s a public figure,’ he pointed out. ‘Do we bring it all to the surface?’

  ‘Why not?’ Pel said shortly. ‘A shit’s a shit, even if he’s a politician.’

  ‘In that case,’ the Chief decided, ‘since both cases are the same, they’d better be handed over to Judge Polverari who’s handling the kidnapping. I’ll fix it with the Procureur. So long as you’re sure.’

  ‘I’m sure. There are no terrorists and never have been, and there’ll be no demand for a ransom. Perhaps we should rely on our own resources in future.’

  The Chief glared. It was typical of Pel, he thought, to read him a lecture. ‘What about Barclay? What’s going to happen to him?’

  Pel sniffed. ‘I think it’s already happened.’

  ‘I suppose you know where they’ve got him.’

  ‘Oh, yes, I know. They started building a new swimming pool but they suddenly changed their minds and filled it in again. He’s underneath. I noticed, by the way, that it was surrounded by beech trees, so we’ll probably find that’s where they did for Arri, too.’

  The Chief seemed to need to reassure himself. ‘But Barclay was kidnapped,’ he said. ‘There’s no doubt about that.’

  ‘Oh, no,’ Pel agreed. ‘None at all. He was kidnapped all right.’

  ‘By at least five men. Where did they come from?’

  ‘Journais was one. The rest were thugs hired for the job. Rykx would know where to find them. We know he was connected with the gangs.’

  ‘How do you know he was connected with the gangs?’

  ‘I got it from Pépé le Cornet.’

  The Chief gaped. ‘You’ve been getting information from him?’

  ‘I also got information from a Madame Bernadette Ké-Ath. In Marseilles. Known in the town as La Dette.’

  The Chief’s jaw dropped another notch. ‘Who’s she? Some woman from the streets?’

  ‘She runs a house. A clean house. A respectable house. A house the police know about.’

  ‘A brothel?’

  ‘I believe that’s what they’re called.’

  The Chief went red. ‘You were taken off this case because Lamiel thought you’d been touching pitch,’ he snorted. ‘It strikes me you’ve been wallowing in it.’

  Pel shrugged. It had not been an unpleasant experience. La Dette was a woman of the world who knew how to charm men and Pel was not immune to charm. As they had talked in a small, very feminine pink and gold salon, she had even opened a bottle of champagne.

  ‘Champagne’, she had pointed out, ‘can be drunk at any time of the day and it’s much better at this time of the afternoon than that awful tea the English drink.’ All very proper and as respectable as a Sunday visit to Mother.

  She knew Rykx all right and had filled in a lot of gaps. She even remembered Barclay and Denise Darnand. ‘A very beautiful girl,’ she had said. ‘Très bien élevée. Very well brought up and very well educated. Unfortunately, she had no heart, and in this trade a girl needs a heart if she’s to succeed. If she doesn’t have one, an intelligent man can always tell. Some of them, Monsieur, don’t just come to climb into bed. They’re having trouble at home and they want kind words, a little warmheartedness, a little comfort. Some of my girls have married very well.’

  It had seemed to make sense.

  ‘It was necessary,’ Pel said.

  The Chief eyed him for a while, realising there were hidden depths to him.

  ‘Does your wife know?’ he asked.

  Pel sniffed. ‘Of course not.’

  The Chief grinned. ‘If I were you,’ he said. ‘I shouldn’t tell her.’

  Twenty

  Darcy was delighted to be back on Pel’s team and running its affairs. ‘Right,’ he said as they got down to making plans. ‘What’s the next move?’

  Pel shrugged. ‘We pick up Rykx.’

  ‘Do we know where he is?’

  ‘He’s in Brussels. He has a house there. It’s being watched. I’ve arranged it with the Brussels police.’

  The Chief glanced quickly at him. The little bugger never missed a trick, he thought.

  ‘And the woman?’ he asked.

  ‘St Trop’. She has a villa there. She’s also under surveillance.’

  ‘We’d better arrange to have her picked up, too.’

  As they talked, Claudie appeared. ‘Patron,’ she said, ‘I think something’s moving.’

  ‘Such as what?’

  ‘I went to the Relais de Chanzy. Nenette’s disappeared. I asked where she’d gone and they said she’d given up the job. Then I wondered if any of the others had gone, too. They have. Francie, the one at the Collège de l’Est has also left. They said she’d got a job in the south. The employment exchange’s being run again by the old woman who said she was running it all the time, anyway, and the estate agent’s back under the old management. The girls have gone. I drove out to Vallefrie to see why and there were two cars outside the Manoir de Varas. I could see them from the road. One was the big Jag we saw outside the Relais de Chanzy – Nenette’s car. The other was the red Porsche that Francie from the Collège de l’Est drove. There were others, too. I think the girls are all back there.’

  ‘Why?’ Pel asked. ‘Because they’ve got the wind up and been told to vanish? They’re probably collecting money and personal belongings. We’d better find out what Rykx and Madame Danton are up to.’

  It didn’t take long. Rykx had thrown off his tail in Brussels and disappeared. But the Brussels police had questioned the servants at the house he owned and been told he was due to catch the late afternoon train to Paris.

  ‘We’ll have him picked up as he arrives,’ Darcy said.

  ‘And in the meantime,’ Pel reminded, ‘let’s have the woman picked up, too.’

  But here again, they were just too late.

  ‘She’s not at the villa in St Trop’,’ Claudie reported. ‘She’s dodged them. There’s nobody there.’

  Pel frowned. ‘Then they are up to something. I expect Rykx has a car waiting for him in Paris so he can drive to Vallefrie to collect what he wants. Negotiable bonds, I expect, originally belonging to Barclay. Money – probably also originally belonging to Barclay. The Danton woman’s jewels and a few other things they’ve doubtless got locked up in the safe. Let’s have Lagé out at the Manoir to let us know if anyone arri
ves.’

  As Lagé vanished, they tried to contain their impatience, knowing there was little they could do until they were certain of the whereabouts of Rykx and the woman. Pel had no doubt they would find them, but it would be an odd experience arresting a man they’d never seen for conspiracy to murder. But that was how it was going to work out. The men who had taken part in the kidnapping would turn up, too, he knew. Someone – probably Journais, the security man, who was already in the cells at 72, Rue d’Auxonne – would talk and, if they kept quiet about the arrests they were expecting to make, they would doubtless find the kidnappers all snugly at home enjoying the money they’d received for pulling off the job.

  Feeling it was necessary to keep his cool and that sitting in the office watching the clock wasn’t the way to do it, Pel headed for the Bar Transvaal for a beer, leaving instructions with Cadet Darras that he was to be called back if anything happened.

  He was barely half-way down the glass when the telephone went. It was Darcy.

  ‘Paris, Patron,’ he rapped. ‘They report Rykx wasn’t on the train from Brussels. They’ve decided he must have arrived by air. In which case, he must have turned up at the Manoir de Varas long since.’

  When Pel reached the Hôtel de Police, Lagé had reported in.

  ‘A car’s just arrived,’ Darcy said. ‘Fast. From Lagé’s description, Claudie says it’s the Danton woman’s. Nosjean’s here. So’s De Troq’ and Aimedieu. I can get hold of Brochard.’

  ‘We’ll need Claudie, too, because of the Danton woman and the girls. Have everybody else called in, too, and inform the police at Vallefrie and Arbaçay to meet us at Arbaçay. We may need them.’

  Five minutes later three cars were heading out of the city towards Arbaçay. The police from Arbaçay and Vallefrie were waiting in their little Renault vans, openly disliking each other but all hoping that after the fiasco when they’d been sent on a wild goose chase to a raid at the Chateau de Chameroi-Fontaine at Praislay that wasn’t taking place, there might this time be something to do that would make it worth giving up an evening of Dallas on the television.

  After the police had received their instructions, the two Renaults, each containing three men, began to head for the boundaries of the Manoir de Varas under the command of Nosjean, who could safely be trusted to use his head and take care of any attempts to escape in any direction but towards the front gate.

  Not unexpectedly, the gates of the house were wide open and they could see all the lights were on. Lagé appeared out of the shadows.

  ‘There’s something going on, Patron,’ he said. ‘There are eight or nine cars there now.’

  ‘Right. Take Brochard and go up there. Ask to see Rykx and Madame Danton. I think you’ll find them there. You won’t catch them, of course, but you should flush them out. Close the gates, Aimedieu.’

  The police cars moved off the gravelled surface and nosed under the trees that lined the long drive. Lagé and Brochard had been gone only a matter of a minute or two when they heard shouting and screams from the house, then they heard a car start and an engine roar. Darcy fished out his gun.

  ‘No shooting,’ Pel rapped. ‘Unless they start it.’

  Car doors slammed and the policemen tensed. Almost at once, the beams of a set of headlights swung away from the house and into the drive, then a large Citroën appeared, black and highly polished. It was hurtling towards the road at full speed when the driver realised the gates had been closed and they saw him wrench at the wheel. The car slewed round off the gravel, the stones hissing from the tyres, the front wheels bouncing on the uneven turf at the side of the road as it ploughed through a line of saplings that twanged and thwacked against the metalwork, then there was a screech of brakes and, with a crunch, the front of the car struck one of the police cars in the shadows, rocking it on its springs and sending sparks flying from torn metal. Finally the Citroën plunged into the undergrowth, bounced off a tree and came to a full stop with steam escaping from under the bonnet.

  Immediately, the driver’s door flew open and a dark-haired square man they could only assume was Rykx leapt out and was about to run. As Darcy appeared, a gun was flourished but Darcy brought his own gun down across the man’s wrist and, as the weapon whirled away, Darcy swung its owner round to face the car and wrenched his arms behind him to slam on the handcuffs. As he did so, the other door opened and Madame Danton-Criot appeared, shuddering with shock, to be grabbed by Claudie. Peering inside the car, Pel saw a whole pile of briefcases and suitcases.

  When they reached the house, Lagé and Aimedieu had mustered the remainder of its occupants in the hall. They were sitting on settees, the girl, Domino, distinctly aggressive, the others either arrogant or nervous, one of them openly weeping. Aimedieu was staring at them in amazement.

  ‘Who’re we arresting, Patron?’ he asked. ‘The chorus line from the Folies Bergère?’

  It was over and Lamiel had finally disappeared back to Paris, riding off into the sunset with Thomas and all his other minions. The Chief wasn’t sorry to see them go.

  There had been no explanations. Lamiel had simply been withdrawn and the same day a message arrived to say so. Now the Chief was busy calling in his men from the outlying districts where they had been sent by Lamiel or Thomas.

  While feeling a measure of sympathy for a man who had always been driven by the need to take no chances and obviously had to work under tremendous pressure, Pel nevertheless felt satisfied as he got down to preparing the paperwork for Judge Polverari who was now handling both the Arri and the Barclay cases. The art thing had been cleared up and Barclay’s body had been found exactly where Pel had said it would be found and was at that moment in the city mortuary awaiting the attentions of Leguyader and Doc Minet. As they expected, the briefcases taken from Rykx’s car had contained negotiable bonds and a considerable amount of cash, most of it originally belonging to Barclay – or, to be more precise, to the hospitals, colleges, homes and other charities he had manipulated for his own ends. There had been evidence of other high-class brothels like the Manoir de Varas – one at St Trop’, one, for God’s sake, in the States! – and Rykx and Madame Danton were also now in Number 72, Rue d’Auxonne with Journais and five other men, all Belgians he had named, who had been rounded up in Brussels, Ghent and Liege with the aid of the Belgian police. There were also a varied collection of artists and dealers, and eight girls, Aimedieu’s chorus line from the Folies Bergère – the beautiful Domino, Francie, Din-Din, Reggie and the others. The girls had been released until it could be decided whether they were to be included in the charges or not. With one or two exceptions who might have been in the conspiracy – Domino, for instance, who seemed to have been privy to all Madame Danton’s secrets – Pel suspected they would eventually all go free, because they seemed to be unaware of what Rykx and Madame Danton had been up to with Barclay and were only guilty of plying their profession, the oldest in the world. Having formally arrested them, Aimedieu had managed to get the job of interviewing them with Lagé and, since Lagé was a well-married man with a wife with sharp eyes, Aimedieu was doing most of the work and thoroughly enjoying himself.

  ‘It’s like questioning a harem,’ he said gleefully.

  In the meantime, Pel, Claudie and Didier Darras were hard at it, putting the reports in order.

  As he worked, Pel’s door opened and Judge Brisard appeared. He looked pale and angry.

  ‘I see Polverari’s taken everything over,’ he said. ‘Both cases.’

  ‘There’s only one case,’ Pel pointed out flatly. ‘There always was only one case and Polverari is handling it.’

  ‘Without doubt’, Brisard snapped, ‘with more help from you than I ever receive. Make no mistake, though, I still haven’t forgotten that you failed to inform me when Arri was found. It’s not the first time and my report has gone into the Chief and the Procureur, and the Association of Advocates and Jurists.’

  Pel said nothing. Opening a drawer, he removed a slip of paper and plac
ed it on the desk. Slowly and deliberately, he placed two fingers on it and turned it round to face Brisard.

  ‘It’s a parking ticket,’ he explained. ‘Issued on the late afternoon of Sunday, the 26th of last month, the day Arri’s body was found at Suchey, the day you say you were not informed. It was issued in Beaune. Your name’s on it.’

  Brisard stared at him for a moment, then he snatched up the ticket and studied it as if he had suddenly become myopic.

  ‘Where did you get this?’

  ‘Where do you think? Traffic. It was among many others that found its way to Inspector Pomereu’s department.’

  Pel lit a cigarette, feeling the occasion merited one, even if it was the last straw and finally did for him. ‘Pomereu heard you were making a lot of song and dance about not being informed about the discovery of Arri’s body and thought I might need it. It seems to indicate that, although the message was passed to your department, you didn’t pick it up because you weren’t where you should have been. You were forty kilometres away down the motorway. You were with a woman. I can even give you her name.’

  Slowly Pel picked up the slip of paper and put it back in the drawer. ‘Now, if you please, Maître,’ he said, ‘I have things to do.’

  As the door closed behind the shaken Brisard, Pel sat back, satisfied. That, he thought, seemed to have disposed of the last of his enemies. He could now get on with his work.

  Note on Chief Inspector Pel Series

  Chief Inspector Evariste Clovis Désiré Pel, of the Brigade Criminelle of the Police Judiciaire, in Burgundy, France is, according to the New York Times, in ‘his professional work, a complete paragon.‘He is sharp, incisive, honest, and a leader of men and everything else a successful cop should be.‘

  Outside of work, however, ‘he is a milquetoast, scared of his gorgon of a housekeeper, frightened of women, doubtful of his own capabilities.’

  It should be noted, though, things do change to some degree, and in the course of the series he marries - but readers are left to judge that and the events surrounding it for themselves.