Beekeeper

by J. Robert Janes

  ‘Your questions, mein Herr?’

  ‘May I?’ he asked, pointing to one of the Louis XIV sofas.

  ‘As you wish. For myself, I will remain on my feet.’

  Tough … by Christ, she was tough. ‘A drink would help – for the two of us, Frau Schlacht. You see, my partner and I have this theory, and evidence to back it up, that your beekeeper was murdered for one reason.’ This wasn’t exactly true, but what the hell …

  ‘Coffee will be ready in a few moments, Madame, should you wish it,’ sang out the kid in deutsch from the kitchen.

  No answer was given. The woman’s arms were folded tightly across her chest, her feet spread firmly for battle.

  ‘What reason?’ she demanded, her gaze fixed hatefully on him.

  ‘He got in the way. That husband of yours has been using relatives in the occupied territories to send him beeswax. The problem is, his collectors know nothing of honey-gathering or bees, and have been sending him squashed hives, buckets of mangled comb, and one hell of a lot of sick bees.’

  ‘Explain yourself.’

  ‘Acarine mites in Caucasian bees, some of whose honey may well have been used to augment the winter stores of Parisian bees.’

  ‘The sickness spreads …,’ she said and, losing herself to the thought, abstractedly added, ‘Candles. You mentioned a factory, but I do not know where it is.’

  ‘But did de Bonnevies ever mention it?’

  ‘Only to say that bundles of altar candles were being left regularly on the doorstep of a church. The one to which he belonged.’

  And Father Michel, the parish priest, hadn’t told Louis a thing about them!

  ‘Your husband controls a precious-metals foundry. What else does he do?’

  This one was not going to go away until he had something to chew on. ‘I’ve already told you Oskar is a businessman and that I know nothing of his affairs.’

  Nothing about the trips to Switzerland you make for him? wondered Kohler, but this couldn’t be asked – he had the girl’s safety to think of.

  ‘Is he into real estate, do you think?’

  ‘I wouldn’t know.’

  Maisons de passe? wondered Kohler, but he really couldn’t ask that one either. ‘The beekeeper had a son. Did he ever say anything of him?’

  ‘Lazy. Not like my Klaus. A coward who hid behind a Red Cross armband but was badly wounded by mistake, of course, during the blitzkrieg in the west. The boy was no good. An artist, a sculptor who made nude statues and drawings of his half-sister. Herr de Bonnevies said it wasn’t proper and that the girl should not have posed like that for the boy. Her one mistake, he said, was to trust her half-brother blindly and to encourage his every endeavour.’

  That was two mistakes, but no matter. ‘Trust?’

  ‘Be the best of Kameraden.’

  ‘And the son, where is he now? Two metres under?’

  ‘Really, mein lieber Detektiv, you must already know where he is. Why, then, ask it of me?’

  The woman hadn’t moved and still stood in exactly the same way. ‘Bitte, Frau Schlacht, just let me hear it from you.’

  ‘Oflag 17A, in what was formerly Austria,’ she said, gazing emptily at him.

  ‘And the boy’s mother? How does she feel about it?’

  ‘I wouldn’t know. He seldom spoke of the woman.’

  Except to tell you he thought she was having an affair with your husband, thought Kohler, but he couldn’t ask it. ‘There was a sister,’ he hazarded. ‘Now where did I write that down?’

  The Schweinebulle took time out to flip through the little black notebook he had been holding all this time. ‘Ja. Here it is,’ he said and showed her the entry. ‘The Salpêtrière, the house for the insane. Was he worried about this Angèle-Marie?’

  ‘I wouldn’t know, Inspector. Such family disgraces are best kept hidden, are they not?’

  That bit about her not knowing of the sister was another lie but he’d best say something. ‘You’re absolutely right, of course. A disgrace. It was dumb of me to have even asked.’

  ‘Then if there is nothing more, it is time for you to leave.’

  ‘There is just one other thing, Frau Schlacht. Minor, you understand – you must forgive the plodding mind of a Detektiv. Always there are these little details, but one never knows when something might turn out to be important.’

  ‘Why not just ask?’

  It would be best to give her a nod and to consult the notebook again. Any page would do. ‘Your husband is one of the Förderndes Mitglied, is he not?’

  ‘Verdammt! Just what the hell has the fucker done?’

  Schlacht’s infidelities had wounded her, all right. ‘Nothing but what we’ve discussed, unless there is something else you’d like to tell me.’

  You bastard, swore Uma silently.

  One had best leave her with a little something to worry over. ‘Apparently he lost what the Reichsführer and Reichsminister Himmler took great pains to present. It might well have fallen into one of those pot-furnaces of his – maybe he was checking the melt – but I still have to think that badge is a problem.’

  ‘What problem?’ she asked and swallowed, blanching.

  ‘You see my partner and I tend to believe he must have left it somewhere and we’d like to know where and with whom.’

  ‘Idiot! I know nothing of his affairs. Ass here, ass there,’ she said and flung an arm out to emphasize the sweep of territory Paris presented. ‘Certainly he has had many, but …’

  She actually managed to smile ingratiatingly.

  ‘But what is a forgotten wife to do, Herr Kohler? You’re married, aren’t you? You’ve left your wife at home, haven’t you? Well?’

  ‘My Gerda married an indentured French farm labourer after the divorce came through by special order, since a relative of hers had pull. But war’s like that in any case, Frau Schlacht. It splits couples apart and puts others together. German with French; French with German. Love – even carnal love – knows enough to find its greenest pastures in times of strife. I’ll be in touch if I need anything further.’

  At the door Mariette Durand showed him to, the girl smiled wanly and whispered, ‘Merci, monsieur.’

  ‘Did she go to that brasserie as usual last Thursday evening, or did she come home hungry?’

  ‘Hungry, but … but why do you ask?’

  Kohler put a finger to her lips and, giving her a fatherly kiss on the forehead, said softly, ‘Don’t worry, eh?’ and then sternly, and in deutsch Frau Schlacht would hear, ‘Remember what I said, eh, Fräulein? Behave yourself and do exactly as you’ve been told or I really will have to arrest you.’

  And then he was gone from her and Mariette could feel every muscle in her body weaken. I must escape, she said to herself, and he has let me know I have no other choice but to pick my time and go.

  The Brasserie Buerehiesel was full. There was hardly space to reach the bar. ‘A beer,’ shouted Kohler above the din. ‘Münchener Löwen, if you have it.’

  ‘We haven’t.’

  ‘Then give me another of what I had before.’

  ‘And here I thought you were a connoisseur.’

  ‘And you a barkeep with a memory? Merde! A Mortimer, Dumtnkopf!’

  ‘She tell you to keep your hands to yourself?’

  ‘Something like that, yes.’

  ‘She saves it for the husband she never sees. So, did she stick that steak knife into you?’

  Taking it out, Kohler set it on the zinc. ‘We were too busy, but I found it in her overcoat. The thing had cut a hole in her pocket. You’re lucky not to have lost it, and should be grateful.’

  ‘Then what can we do for you, Herr Hauptmann der Geheime Stattspolizist?’

  ‘A bottle of Amaretto for my partner.’

  ‘No one drinks that stuff in here.’

  ‘I didn’t think they did. I only ask because I want to keep him happy. Pastis and that almond crap, he loves them both!’

  ‘Then try the one who’s se
lling the condensed milk. Maybe he can help you.’

  It was now forbidden to even have condensed milk without a doctor’s certificate. Such as the supplies were, all of it had been confiscated during the past week. Laying five thousand francs on the bar, Kohler turned to fight his way through the crowd.

  On the passerelle Saint-Louis, and in pitch darkness, he caught up with the man simply by calling out, ‘Halt! Was wollen sie?’ as a sentry would. Halt! Who goes there?

  ‘Franzie Jünger, mein Kamerad.’

  ‘Unit?’

  Ach Schiesse, ein Offizier! ‘Attached to Wehrmacht Supply Depot Seven. I drive a lorry.’

  ‘Then you’re just the man I want.’

  ‘The lorry’s not with me.’

  ‘That’s no problem. I’ve got a car. The lorry will come later, eh? For now, we line things up.’

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘A customer for that milk.’

  ‘Can’t she breastfeed her brat?’

  ‘She hasn’t one. She uses it with honey, for facial masks. It cleans and moistens the skin, I guess.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘I need to find a bottle of Amaretto.’

  ‘What the hell is it?’

  ‘Drink.’

  ‘But for that, mein Kamerad, you don’t need a lorry.’

  ‘It’s for the frozen beehives and the buckets of honey and wax I’ve found. They’ve got to be moved or we’ll lose out on them.’

  ‘How many men will we need?’

  ‘Four, and yourself. Oh, and we’ll need a place to store the stuff.’

  ‘The honey.’

  ‘Yes, and the wax.’

  ‘Okay. Lead the way. Thirty for you, fifty for me, and twenty for the boys.’

  ‘Thirty-five for each of us, and thirty for the boys.’

  ‘Agreed.’

  6

  The rue Froideveaux ran alongside the southern wall of the Cimetière du Montparnasse, and here the quartier was perhaps at its quietest, thought St-Cyr. Distant were the hustle and bustle of the Carrefour Vavin, boulevard Raspail and avenues du Maine and du Montparnasse where flocks of servicemen and their girls crowded the cafés, cinemas, bars and legendary brasseries. The Club Mirage also. Its rue Delambre was just off the northern wall of the cemetery, Gabrielle really quite near, yet he mustn’t visit her. Things were far too close to the Occupier, though Hermann could well go there, thinking to meet up with him, and he might well need to do likewise.

  Number 53’s roof rose among the jumble across the street. Mansard windows haunted the steeply sloping slates. Wind stirred the barren branches of the chestnut trees. It was 11 p.m. and the métro’s lines would all have begun their final runs. Soon the streets would be cleared, the city dead quiet except for the sudden squeal of Gestapo tyres or the approaching tramp of a patrol.

  ‘And number 3 rue Laurence-Savart, in Belleville, is one hell of a walk,’ he sighed.

  The entrance was steep. Threadbare carpet exposed raised nails. The stairs, given off a small courtyard, rose to a cramped landing and a small window behind a grill.

  His fist hit the bell, though there was no need since he could see the concierge through the slot. ‘St-Cyr, Sûreté.’ How many times had he heard himself saying it like that? Mon Dieu, must he be so hard? ‘To see M. Jean-Claude Leroux, monsieur. Hurry, I haven’t time to waste.’

  The day’s Paris-Soir was carefully set aside. Thin pages, controlled reading …

  ‘Leroux … Leroux …’ came a voice thick with the gravel of disinterest and too much black-market tobacco. ‘Ah! Here we are, Inspector. That one has gone out again. Always when the moon is on the wane he gets anxious.’

  ‘Don’t give me an ulcer, monsieur. They bleed.’

  ‘Merde, all that is required is a little patience!’

  ‘That takes time, and as I have already indicated to your tender ears, I haven’t any. Now hurry, or I will call in reinforcements.’

  ‘The catacombs.’

  ‘They’re closed at this hour.’

  ‘Of course. But he’s one of the custodians and always, towards the end of the month, the complaining increases.’

  ‘What complaining?’

  ‘The Germans. He says they are always buggering off on him and he’s afraid one of them will get lost down there in those tunnels and go mad, and he’ll be held responsible.’

  ‘And madness, is that a fear he harbours?’ hazarded the Sûreté.

  Harbours … were they talking about ships? wondered Hervé Martin. ‘He gets his kicks out of recounting how, in 1848, some fool tore up the graves of our cemetery to uncover the bodies of recently buried females, the younger the better, I’m sure.’

  The Inspector said nothing, only waited for more of the meal. ‘They were laid out in less travelled places among the stones and undressed, or so it is maintained by those in authority, and then were mutilated savagely. The breasts, the womb, the private parts. One was shaved. A girl of …’

  ‘Yes, yes, I’ve heard it all and every time my ears are exposed to that canard, monsieur, it has been embellished by the fool who tells it! How long will M. Leroux be underground?’

  ‘Hours, perhaps. It really depends on how agitated he is and if he can calm himself.’

  ‘Let me have the rest of it. I’m listening.’

  They still hadn’t looked at each other, this Sûreté and himself. The wall was between them, the door closed but for its little window.

  ‘He’s like a woman, Inspector, only his time may differ from some, you understand. Every month, as I’ve said, when the moon is on the wane and down, he gets agitated. The constant pacing in his room at night – merde, the racket! The sounds of him … Well, you know, eh? A little relief, oh bien sûr, but with silence, if you please! It’s then that he has to check the catacombs more often than usual; it’s then that he finally leaves the quartier of a Sunday evening and returns much calmed.’

  A visit to the Chat qui crie, then, and Charlotte, and de Bonnevies must have known of it, but still something would have to be said. ‘A woman?’

  ‘The younger the better, Inspector, but not from around here, not with that one. Others would talk, isn’t that so?’

  ‘Returning when?’

  ‘Before curfew, of course. Inspector, this one spends much time with the dead and not just with their bones. On his day off, he often visits our cemetery or one of the others.’

  ‘The Père Lachaise?’

  ‘Perhaps.’

  ‘Any friends? Any visitors?’

  The Sûreté was anxious. ‘None that I know of. Not to see him here, in any case.’

  ‘And letters? Well, come on, eh?’

  ‘Seldom. But he did receive one this Tuesday after he returned from work. Yes, yes, from a woman, a Madame Héloïse Debré, number 7 rue Stendhal. Urgent, I think, since he immediately went outside to read it and stayed away for hours.’

  Héloïse Debré had been the ‘friend’ of Angèle-Marie de Bonnevies in the summer of 1912; the girl who had accompanied her to the Père Lachaise …

  ‘Then another today, Inspector, and from exactly the same source and urgent!’

  The grille shot aside, the grizzled moon face and large brown eyes of the concierge filling its slot with determined concern. ‘Inspector, it’s a good thing you people are finally taking an interest in him. My daughters are afraid and whisper bad things to each other when in their bed at night. They’re only fourteen and fifteen, and one can understand such innocence, but when left alone here on duty they shudder when he approaches and later tell my wife he looks at them in such a way they each feel violated.’

  Two letters … One before the poisoning and one afterwards.

  From the house at number 53, and eastward along the rue Froidevaux, it wasn’t far to place Denfert-Rochereau and the entrance to the catacombs. But everything was in darkness or its shades of grey, and memory struggled. Always there was this problem during the blackout, only the more so if in the car with Hermann at the
wheel.

  Something … something had to be seen with which to fix location and find direction. The silhouette of a building, statue, bridge or quai …

  ‘The twin pavilions,’ muttered St-Cyr. Neoclassical villas. Marvellous with their friezes and perfect lines, they’d been used as tollhouses in the early days and had been built in 1784.

  The entrance was in the west pavilion. The custodian would, of course, have locked the door after himself. One would have to beat a fist on solid oak; the sound would be certain to bring a flic or worse. The bell … you can ring the bell, he reminded himself and, feeling for it first, hesitated still as he gripped a wrought-iron ring that must have dated from when construction of the ossuary had begun in 1785.

  The bell’s jangling would reverberate within, the sound finding its way throughout the building and straight down the twenty-metre-deep spiralling stone staircase to where the accumulated bones of 500 years and more had been placed. Those of the Cimetière des Innocents, the main Paris cemetery, had filled only a portion of the designated abandoned and reinforced quarries. The contents of other cemeteries had joined them. The ground beneath him was honeycombed with quarries and the maze of tunnels that led to them. Even after individual houses and whole streets had vanished due to underground caving, the quarrying had gone on. Le vieux Paris had been built of the limestone, gypsum, clay and sand that had been removed. A city of moles even from years and years ago.

  In 1823 further excavations had been forbidden. Fully 325 hectares of openings riddled the bedrock upon which the city had been built. And in one small region of these openings, the bones of the centuries had been piled, arranged, festooned with rows of empty-eyed skulls and gaping jaws, crossed tibia and femurs, too, such artistic licence being variously attributed to Louis, Vicomte Héricart de Thury, Inspector General of Quarries in 1810, and to Frochot, the Préfet of the Seine, who had thought it best to cheer the place up!

  The entrance door was unlocked. Pushing it open, throwing a hesitant glance over a shoulder at the darkened place where the snow still fell softly and one single blue-washed streetlamp glowed, he stepped inside, said silently, I’m a fool to do this without backup. But Hermann had seen too much of death. The bones would only have driven him mad – who knows? They’d have brought back terrible memories of that other war, the trenches, the shelling and bayonet charges, the bloodied chunks of flesh, those of rotting corpses, too. The murders, yes, of millions of young men.