by J. G. Sandom
Koster nodded. “Go on.”
“Then something happened. He and Tellier had a falling-out. I don’t know what started it. Maurice suspected Tellier was cheating him, I know that. One night Maurice came over while Guy was out. He told me that he’d had it with his father and the company. He’d been drinking. I tried to calm him down but it was like the world was riding on his heels. He started complaining about Tellier again, about the money.” She took a final drag off her cigarette and stamped it out.
“Even now, after all this time, I don’t know what I said. It’s funny, but I just can’t remember. I’m sure it was about Tellier. I’m sure I asked him to forget about the money, the abraxas. I’m sure I did.” She looked at Koster and he felt his ribs give way. “I never saw him again,” she said.
“What happened to him?” asked Lyman.
“He went to Charles-Philip’s and took some money, some checks out of the safe. Not very much.” She shrugged. “Enough to get him out of town, I guess.”
“What kind of safe?” said Lyman.
“I’m sorry?”
“Was it a combination safe, or did it require a key?”
“I don’t know. Key, I think. Why?”
“Was anything else taken?”
“No, that was it. Except for his passport of course. I didn’t hear from him for months. Not a word. Then I got a telegram from Kitzbühel, in Austria. Actually it was sent to Charles-Philip, his father, but all it said was ‘I’m sorry. All is well.’ He never wrote to me.” She lifted the abraxas and fastened it about her neck. “The Amiens police were the ones who told us about the accident. It was in March, earlier this year. It happened in a town called Lech. He was hit by a car. The report said he’d been drinking.” Another laugh slipped out, brittle. “I suppose that you could say he liked to drink. It helped him relax. But he was never nasty to anyone. And he loved my brother. He really did. He was always kind to Guy.”
Koster nodded and took her by the hand.
“They sent his body back, what was left of it. We buried him at the chapel of St. Roch. It was really a very nice service.” She looked up. Her eyes were filled with tears. “You’re not going to talk about this to anyone, are you? I promised Charles-Philip. He was always so afraid of a scandal, of people talking.” She laughed. “Isn’t that funny? The real scandal was that they never did. Just a few of the right words and Maurice might have never left.”
“I’m sure it wasn’t your fault,” Koster said.
Lyman coughed. “Were you the last to see him before he left Amiens?”
“No, I don’t think so. Charles-Philip said he stopped off at the Bishop’s Palace. The night watchman saw him leave.”
“What does that have to do with anything?” Koster said.
Lyman shrugged. “I don’t know. Perhaps nothing.” Then he added, “Let me fetch you a glass of water, Mariane?” He leaned forward and a white handkerchief appeared, like a prop in a magic trick.
She took it reluctantly from his fingers. “I’ll be all right,” she said.
Lyman frowned. “Oh, one more thing, before I forget. Do the initials G.L.F. mean anything to you?”
“G.L.F.? I don’t think so.”
“Are you sure?”
“Nothing special.”
“Well, in that case, I think I’ll be on my way. I’m sure you two would rather be alone anyway.” He stood awkwardly. “I’m sorry if I said anything to offend you, Mariane. Really. I didn’t mean to.”
She did not answer. She did not even look at him.
Koster shrugged. “Good luck getting through,” he said.
“Through where?”
“Didn’t you see the boy scouts in the square?”
“I didn’t come that way.”
“I think it’s some kind of pilgrimage. There were thousands of them on the train.”
“Thanks for the tip. I guess I’ll see you back at the hotel.” Lyman hesitated at the table for a moment more and then started down the stairs.
As soon as he had disappeared, Koster turned to Mariane and kissed her gently on the cheek. She only pulled away. He started to say something but she hushed him with a glance and Koster realized she was watching Lyman as he crossed the floor below and headed out the door.
“Why did you do that?” she said, finally.
“Do what?”
“Force me to tell you all of that in front of him.”
“What do you mean?”
“About Maurice.”
“I didn’t force you. I was just curious. It could be useful for the book. What’s the big deal, anyway. It’s only Nigel.”
“Only Nigel!” She shook her head. “You don’t understand, do you? You didn’t let me finish. I just got a call from Charles-Philip. He told me some Englishman came by his office this morning to ask about a building project.”
“So?”
“That’s what I said. But Charles-Philip was worried he would find me. You know, upset me by dredging up the past, by asking a lot of questions about Maurice. So I asked him what the stranger looked like, and well,” she said, “it was Lyman. I’m sure of it. He was even wearing the same green coat and everything.”
“Maybe he was just trying to get some information for the book.”
“Joseph, he was using a false name. He said he worked for a hotel chain.”
“Oh.” Koster slumped against the table.
“And another thing. Since when do shop owners carry guns about, especially when they’re on vacation? And why did he want to know about Maurice in the first place? Maybe he’s one of Tellier’s friends. Or a treasure hunter.”
“Oh, come on, Mariane. I’m sure there’s a perfectly logical explanation. The guy saved my life.”
“Of course he did. You couldn’t help him find the gospel if you were dead. I’m telling you, Joseph. That man is lying to you. He’s hiding something.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“I can feel it.”
“Feel it. With what? Your feminine intuition?”
“Don’t patronize me, Joseph.”
“I’m not. I just find it hard to believe.”
“Why? Because it doesn’t fit your formula of Nigel Lyman, because it isn’t laid out in front of you like a column of numbers? You can’t prove I love you either. Does that mean I don’t?”
“Of course not. That’s completely different.”
“Is it?” She leaned forward suddenly and kissed him forcefully on the lips. “You were jealous, weren’t you?”
“Jealous?”
“About Maurice. Don’t lie to me. That’s why you wanted me to talk about him, isn’t it?” She slipped a hand behind his neck and drew him close to her. “You don’t have to be jealous,” she said. “That was a long, long time ago. And I never loved him like I love you.”
Koster did not answer her. She was right. He did feel jealous of Maurice, of all the time they’d spent together, of all the memories she kept of him within her.
They kissed again, and he felt her words undo him.
But he could not prove she loved him.
Lyman ducked into the twilight, weaving through the wayward crowd, trailing after the day. It was almost half past five. There was a line outside the bakery. A pair of boys took up the rear. They were wearing brown uniforms, well-pressed and striped with ensigns, like miniature soldiers out on leave. Koster’s boy scouts, Lyman thought. One of them was holding a piece of waxed paper covered in red preserves. They were going back for seconds.
The street unfurled and there was the cathedral. Lines of buses leaned against the pavement. Lyman pushed on and as he walked the scouts became more frequent. First another pair. Then a group of five or six. A few flashed golden braids or colorful insignias. Some looked to be nine or ten years old, while others seemed too big to wear their uniforms, too much like the real thing. He turned the corner and the main square of the cathedral stretched before him. Koster had been right. There must have been at least two thousand
scouts, talking, running, jabbering in groups. Each one appeared the replica of yet another still, the same cut of clothes and color, like the reflections of a single schoolboy in a fun-house hall of mirrors. Lyman moved between them feeling much too tall, too broad, too old.
The Bishop’s Palace was connected by a low iron fence to the Winter Chapel, which in turn jutted like a crooked thumb directly from the northern flank of the cathedral. The walls of the palace were spattered with graffiti. One scrawl read Vicious Drugs, another Indochine. Someone had even drawn a swastika on a shutter. The shape was identical to the ones scored by the flagstones on the floor of the cathedral itself. And yet the symbols were an age apart. Lyman turned his back on the crowd and started toward the gate between the palace and the Winter Chapel.
The palace was U-shaped, with off-white window frames and a gray slate roof. A square of lawn lined with giant oak trees stretched from the main entrance to a distant wall. There was an old red Ford parked beside the steps leading up into the palace. A bell chimed suddenly, followed by a great cheer from across the palace walls. Lyman looked up. The scouts were on the move. He could hear the sound of feet slapping on stone.
He mounted the steps of the palace. As he entered the main door, it became clear that the building was still in the process of being renovated. The vestibule was empty. The rooms he passed along the way were devoid of furniture, covered in plaster dust, made various only by the odd wood box or pile of lumber.
He reached the main hall of the palace and spied an old man wearing a pair of baggy trousers and a blue cap sitting on the central stairs. The man was asleep, his cap drawn low across his eyes.
Lyman started toward him up the stairs. The old man stirred without waking. There was a bottle of Fanta by his feet but it was filled with a liquid that was clear instead of the normal orange color. Lyman bent down and picked it up. It smelled of raspberries. Probably homemade, he thought. He replaced the bottle on the stair. “Excuse me,” Lyman said. “Hello.”
The man shuddered to his senses. “Yes, I saw you,” he said blearily. “Don’t worry about that. This is state property. What do you want?”
Lyman smiled. “Just a curious tourist,” he replied. He looked around. “A bit cold, isn’t it?” he said.
“The cathedral’s next door.” The old man pointed over Lyman’s shoulder. Lyman turned around and noticed a window that overlooked the square. The crowd of boy scouts was beginning to thin out. They were entering the cathedral for the twilight Mass.
“I know,” said Lyman. “And this is the Bishop’s Palace.”
“Sounds like you don’t need a guide.”
“And you’re the night watchman.”
The old man leaned forward. His eyes were glazed a royal blue, his thick skin chapped and red. His broken frown caught Lyman by surprise. It was such a pale mask of hostility. It looked so tired, so artificial, so damned familiar.
“That’s right,” the old man said. “What’s it to you?”
“I just want to ask you a few questions.”
“What kind of questions?”
“Questions about Maurice Duval, about the abraxas.”
“You’re a cop, aren’t you?”
Lyman sat down on the step next to the old man. “That’s right,” he said. Then he leaned over and picked up the soda bottle. “May I?”
The night watchman started to reach for the bottle himself, but then thought better of it. He folded his arms and shrugged. “Help yourself.”
Lyman sniffed the bottle. “Smells good,” he said. “Make it yourself?”
“My sister does. Look,” he added, “I’ve never seen you around here before. You’re no French policeman, if you’re a policeman at all.”
“Well,” Lyman said, as he sniffed the bottle again. “I suppose we could walk over to Captain Musel’s house and ask him, couldn’t we? And then we could visit Monsieur Duval, and I could tell him what a nasty disposition you have right after you just wake up.” Lyman smiled. “I bet the liquor helps. Against the cold, I mean.”
“Yeah, I guess so.” The night watchman glared at Lyman without speaking.
Lyman ignored his frank appraisal. He didn’t care. He had all the time in the world.
“So what do you want to know?” the old man said at last.
Lyman considered the question carefully, like an unopened present. “Tell me about the last time you saw Maurice Duval.”
“It was the night he left town.”
“What happened?”
“That was a long time ago. It’s hard to remember.” He pursed his lips. “I think I came on about seven o’clock. Maybe later. Anyway, I must have been on my rounds because I didn’t hear him drive in. Usually I could hear his car on the gravel.” He drifted on the memory. “But I saw it when I got back. It was parked near the south wing.”
“The blue Peugeot.”
“Right. So I went outside but Maurice wasn’t there. The car was empty.”
“Was it usual for Maurice to come by so late at night?”
The old man shrugged. “Once in a while. We’d had some things stolen. Tools. You know.”
“I see.” Lyman paused. “So you noticed the car was empty. Then what?”
“I checked the outer door to the basement of the south wing. The lock had been jammed open with a piece of paper.”
“Maurice had the key though.”
“Of course. He had the master key.”
“Go on.”
“I checked the basement but it was empty. So I decided to go back and wait for Maurice inside.”
“Here, you mean?”
“Yeah, here. But he never showed up. I waited and waited and then I went to the window upstairs to see if the car was still there. That’s when I saw him.”
“Would you mind showing me exactly?”
The old man scowled. “I knew you’d ask me that.” He tipped slowly to his feet and started up the stairs. Lyman followed. They made their way to the second landing where the night watchman paused beside a window. “There,” he said, pointing.
The window faced the front court of the palace and Lyman could see the lawn which stretched out eastward to the rue Dupuis, the great cathedral to his right, and below it the south wing of the palace. “What do you mean?” said Lyman. “Where?”
“There. I saw a light go on in the basement. Then it moved to the outside door. It was Maurice.”
“You’re sure of that? It’s a long way off.”
“Of course I’m sure. He was wearing his porkpie hat and everything. Then he got into his car and drove away.”
“Where exactly did you first see the light?”
“Right over there,” he answered, pointing once again. “Through that second window. I was watching and it just came on.”
“Like a torch, a flashlight?”
“Right. The room wasn’t wired yet.”
“I don’t understand. Why would someone turn a torch on in the middle of a room? Why not at the entrance?”
“Don’t ask me. Look, is that it?” the old man said impatiently. “I’ve got to make my rounds.” He turned and started down the stairs. Lyman shuffled after him until they reached the step where the night watchman had been sleeping earlier.
“You never saw him after that?” Lyman insisted.
“Look, I told you. I was the last one to see him before he disappeared. At least according to Charles-Philip.” He reached down for the soda bottle.
Lyman watched him unscrew the cap carefully. He watched the way he pursed his lips around the opening, the way his Adam’s apple bobbed as he drank.
When he was finished, the night watchman wiped his mouth and offered the bottle to Lyman.
“Thanks,” said Lyman. He clasped it in his hand, feeling the shape, the hardness of the glass. He lifted it to his mouth. The raspberry smell blossomed about his face. He turned his wrist to drink, and as he did so his eyes focused for a moment on the window overlooking the cathedral square. The crowd of scou
ts had grown smaller. Only a few hundred remained. Lyman leaned against the banister. He craned his neck. He strained his eyes, and in a rush the words returned. The bloke in the shadows did all the talking back. He had a deep voice, I remember. The voice of a big man. Lyman moved swiftly down the steps. His hand reached out to keep him from the window. All I can say is that he wore a long black coat, and a white shirt. The boy scouts fell away. A hole appeared within the crowd. Lyman felt himself drawn into it, enveloped, and at the center there he was: a lone black shape against the uniforms; a rose on his lapel, staring at the Bishop’s Palace; balding, and with his Father Christmas eyes—Scarcella.
Lyman was down the hall and out the door before he even realized that he was still carrying the soda bottle. He placed it gently on the cobblestones but it tipped over anyway, the liquor spilling out, breaking his heart. He rounded the iron gate, his footsteps slapping on the cobblestones, clapping up against the wall of the cathedral. Suddenly the square appeared before him. A few scouts dawdled here and there, but most had finally entered the cathedral for the service, the culmination of their pilgrimage. Lyman turned around and around, panting, sweating at the neck. Scarcella was gone. He felt the shadow of the night descend. The wind lashed at his face. He turned once more and saw the tail end of a black coat scurrying down the hill.
Lyman ran after him. The street curved down along the edge of the cathedral grounds. On one side stretched a park, and on the other a parking lot for tourists. The figure vanished between two cars. Lyman stopped to catch his breath. He was too old for this, he thought. Too tired. He straightened up and there he was again, the man in the black coat, struggling across a narrow bridge where the cobbled street crossed over a canal beyond the parking lot. Lyman cursed and started after him.
Though no more than ten feet across, the water of the canal looked swift and deep. Lyman bolted across the bridge. He had lost the figure once again. The street curved sharply and continued down one side of the canal. On the left, a line of brick row houses stretched as far as the eye could see. And on the right, across the cobbled street and the canal, another row of battered houses stood right on the water’s edge.