Paris Requiem

by Lisa Appignanesi

  ‘I used to know quite a few of those personally,’ Raf laughed.

  Adam gave him a sceptical look. ‘Is it true that they can eat more than their own weight in twenty-four hours?’

  ‘That’s what they say. And at the start of summer they bury themselves and an apple-sized ball of dung that they’ve made and feed on that.’

  ‘Raf here used to have a beetle collection,’ James offered. ‘I can’t say it altogether pleased our sister.’ He stopped himself as the thought of Ellie plunged into his mind. Ellie feeding on her own accumulated thoughts, like some shiny Egyptian scarab.

  The arrival of two of Marguerite’s maids bearing trays replete with cold meats, fruit and patisserie caught the children’s attention.

  ‘I hope you’re hungry.’

  Juliette nodded while her brother simply stared as the food was spread out on the side table.

  Raf poured brandy for the men. He urged Arnhem to drink and then to eat.

  ‘You must eat, Papa,’ Juliette chided. ‘We need you to be strong.’

  There was a stunned expression on Arnhem’s face. It didn’t disappear with the jolt of alcohol, but the sallowness of his skin took on a tinge of colour.

  ‘May I have two, Papa?’ Adam asked still staring at the pastry. ‘I can’t make up my mind.’

  ‘Three,’ Raf replied for him. ‘Make a feast of it. But don’t get yourself sick. There’ll be more in the morning.’

  ‘Are we staying here tonight?’

  ‘You certainly may, if you wish. If your father agrees. Personally I think it would be a good idea. What do you say, Arnhem? Then the little ones can get some sleep as soon as they’ve had a bite.’

  ‘I’ll only stay if Papa is staying.’ Juliette was shyly determined. ‘I don’t like to leave him when he’s so sad.’ She turned to whisper to James as if she were his own age. ‘He’s been very sad, you know. We’ve all been.’ She pushed her plate away. ‘Did you know my sister Rachel?’

  ‘I knew her well,’ Raf answered for him. ‘I miss her very much.’

  Juliette’s eyes filled with tears.

  Raf ruffled her hair. ‘I’ll convince your father that you’re all to stay.’

  ‘Well, this is a surprise.’

  None of them had seen Marguerite come in and now they all stood, even Arnhem. She was at her grandest in a dress of deep, shimmering blue, an ornate necklace at her throat, the encrusted lapis less luminous than her bared shoulders. Her hair was swept up in smooth coils which accentuated the fine structure of her face. She gave them all a dazzling smile, though she refused James’s eyes. She focused in particular on the children. ‘I am so pleased to meet you both properly at last. Juliette, I believe. And you’re Adam. Good evening, Monsieur Arnhem.’ She paused as she took in his demeanour. ‘Has something happened?’

  Raf took her arm and led her to the far end of the room while James occupied the children. Juliette’s attention, however, kept returning to Marguerite in an open fascination which held not a little trace of fear.

  When they returned, Marguerite was distinctly in charge. ‘Now, Monsieur Arnhem. I won’t take no for an answer. I have kept you waiting too long. And now the children are tired and undoubtedly more than ready for bed. Pierre will have two rooms ready for you in no time and once they’ve been tucked in, we’ll have our little talk. Yes. That’s all arranged then. Tell me, Juliette. Do you prefer a white nightie or pink.’

  ‘I don’t mind,’ the little girl stammered.

  ‘Your sister preferred white. Oh yes, she used to stay here too from time to time. When she didn’t feel like making the drive home. It’s quite nice, really. You’ll see. And if you like, you can take some cherries up with you. And a drink, of course. You, too, Adam.’

  ‘Adam’s been enjoying your insect book.’

  ‘Really. My father drew those. He’d be pleased that you liked them. We can look at them again in the morning.’

  A half-hour later, the children had been whisked off to bed and the four adults sat in the library and nursed a fresh round of drinks. Marguerite’s face had taken on an edge of grimness. As she got up to pace, James had a vision of a female warrior, a Joan of Arc girding her strength for battle. The image merged into that of the trousered Marcel Bonnefoi and he felt himself grow hot with embarrassment.

  Marguerite still hadn’t acknowledged him directly. Her confession stood between them like a barricade, too high with spikes to be tackled. He sensed that she must be wondering if he had yet told Raf of her collusion with Olympe in the blackmailing of her husband. He hadn’t, of course, and part of him hoped that the need to would never arise. He didn’t want to be thrust into the punishing role again, the elder brother who inevitably punctured ideals and sent them hurtling into the mud.

  Watching Marguerite now, he also felt a new kind of admiration for her, as if the taint of experience had given her a greater depth; as if tawdry truths augmented mystery, rather than dispelling it. The fascination she held for him had grown despite his earlier disapproval of her treacherous behaviour.

  ‘Do we know if anyone came to visit Judith in the days before her death?’

  James forced himself to focus on Marguerite’s question. Raf exchanged a glance with Arnhem, then answered. ‘The Chief Inspector did put that to the nurse. She said she thought there had been someone yesterday, when Judith was still in the main ward. She didn’t know his name. All she said was that he was dark and black-hatted.

  ‘It was Bernfeld.’ Arnhem’s voice was barely audible.

  ‘Bernfeld?’

  ‘Yes.’ The man’s eyes were as sombre as a tomb. ‘He more or less told me he was going to see her when he came by the other day.’

  ‘What passed between you?’

  ‘Family matters.’ Arnhem was curt.

  ‘Look here, Arnhem. There’s no reason to be difficult,’ Raf burst out. ‘We’re trying to help.’

  A tense silence settled on the room. His back to them, Arnhem stared at the massed ranks of books. When his voice came at last, it felt too sudden.

  ‘Bernfeld bears me a grudge. Rightly. Quite rightly. I owe him a debt I still can’t repay.’ The features he turned on them were desolate.

  ‘When Bernfeld came by, I railed at him. I asked him how a man of honour could go and vent his rage on an innocent woman, torture her with a debt she didn’t even know about. Why hadn’t he come to me for repayment? Why go to Rachel? He railed right back. He accused me of setting the police on him.’ Arnhem threw James a hostile look.

  ‘But strangely it was against Rachel that his principal ire was directed. After all these years he still hadn’t been able to swallow her dismissal of him. His pride had been shattered. Only she could make that good. And he had initially wanted vengeance as much as money. He told me so bluntly.

  ‘So he wanted her dead, I shouted at him. No, no, not dead, he replied. Certainly not dead. Because now he was doubly lost. Through his own fault. Now no one could make good the wound or the debt. He might as well be dead too.’ Arnhem emptied his glass.

  ‘But what about Judith?’ James asked.

  ‘I’m coming to that. I’m coming to that.’ Arnhem ran his hand through his tangled mane. ‘We screamed at each other. We said things we shouldn’t have said. You know, once Bernfeld used to respect me, honour me. When my wife was still alive. We were an example to him. That’s why …’ He paused, then raced on. ‘We were like two madmen that night. And then in the midst of the recriminations and the insults, he suddenly asked me with a kind of tortured sadness whether Rachel had ever talked about him in all those years.

  ‘It was as if he was begging for some form of recognition. But I couldn’t give it to him. I told him that Rachel didn’t talk to me about such things. They were women’s matters. If she talked to anyone, maybe she talked to Judith. He remembered Judith. He started to ask me all kinds of questions about her and I told him honestly that she was ill by turns, but often quite sensible. He grew strangely quiet then and the id
ea lodged itself in his mind … maybe it came from me … that perhaps he and Judith could live together. Perhaps they could do each other good. Judith used to be pretty, you know. She was the beauty. Anyhow the idea came. Like a joint fantasy. Which is why I suspect it was Bernfeld who went to see her.’

  Arnhem looked at them each in turn, as if waiting for judgement.

  ‘What are you saying, Arnhem? We have to alert the Inspector. Bernfeld needs locking up. You’re telling us that the man was a twice rejected suitor, who took out his viciousness first on Olympe and then on your poor mad daughter.’

  Raf didn’t pull his punches. Marguerite shushed him with a look and James muttered that Durand had already put a man on Bernfeld’s tail.

  ‘No. No. You misunderstand,’ Arnhem wailed. ‘It’s my fault. All my fault. What I’m saying is that Bernfeld upset Judith with his proposals, which were also mine. Upset, she was often wild, so they put her in isolation. And that’s what facilitated her death.’

  ‘Yet Raf said earlier you had discounted suicide.’ Marguerite spoke softly.

  Arnhem stiffened. ‘I don’t know. From what I’ve said … maybe. But I still don’t think so. That hook was so high. How could little Judith, a Judith who was sleepy from all the chloroform they give her to quieten her down, have managed it?’ He shook his head. ‘No, no. I feel there must have been something else. Someone else.’ His shoulders suddenly slumped, his tone grew raw. ‘Though I agree that poor Judith had little left to live for. Very little.’

  His face told them he felt much the same about himself.

  They all fell into a heavy silence. James broke it by addressing a direct question to Marguerite for the first time. ‘Have you learned anything, Marguerite? Anything from that intern you spoke of? Anything from Dr Vaillant?’

  She didn’t answer him. She was staring at Arnhem. ‘Monsieur Arnhem, may I remind you that Dreyfus struggled through all those years on Devil’s Island, struggled while much of France turned its back on him. Take him as your example.’ Her voice was terse.

  ‘He didn’t lose his children. Only his public honour. That is perhaps expendable.’

  ‘You still have two. That’s two more than many of the rest of us. You must garner your strength for them. Remember, Monsieur Arnhem, suicide is ruthless. It murders us all. That’s why we find it so hard to accept, why we refuse to believe that either Olympe or even Judith wished that for us. Your remaining little ones could not bear that legacy from you. I suggest you go to them now. If I remember my own childhood correctly, I suspect that Juliette is lying awake in bed waiting to sleep until she has made sure of your presence.’

  Arnhem rose slowly. ‘You are probably right, Madame.’

  ‘She is right,’ James underlined. He was once again struck by Marguerite’s depths. He wished that everything about her demeanour didn’t suggest that she now considered him an enemy.

  ‘Pierre will show you to your room. Try to sleep well, despite your grief, Monsieur Arnhem. We all need your wits and your fitness.’

  No sooner had Arnhem left them, than Marguerite turned the full force of her gaze on James. She didn’t speak for a moment. She was reading his features as if they were runes replete with secret significance. At last she shook her head slightly, like an animal emerging from the sea.

  ‘To answer your question, James, I don’t know. Yes, my friend’s son has reported back to me, but his researches are still cursory. He doesn’t have much time to go through files, and can only do so when it seems appropriate to the business he’s conducting. I asked him to check not only Dr Vaillant’s wards for the last two years, but another comparable one. Otherwise we have no way of knowing whether the deaths in one are out of proportion with the ordinary course of things. People die in hospitals. That is a given.’

  ‘What did he find?’

  ‘So far he found that there were five more deaths in Vaillant’s wards than in the other one. But that is not a significant enough number, I think, to make a difference.’

  ‘Was there a discrepancy in ages?’

  ‘Not a significant one according to my intern. The deaths are largely of people over fifty, though there are a few in their twenties and thirties – all women.’ She shifted her position, re-arranged her skirts reflectively.

  ‘And what about the proportion of Jews?’

  ‘Again, in percentage terms these tally with the numbers of inmates.’

  ‘So Judith was wrong.’

  Marguerite shifted again, her agitation now more evident. ‘I’m not sure. Not now. Not in the light of her own death.’

  ‘Out with it, Marguerite.’ Raf’s impatience hovered on impoliteness.

  ‘I’m just trying to put it all together. It’s all happened in the last four months. Three young women, two of them self-confessedly Jewish, have died. Two of them had only recently been admitted, the third had been there longer. She wasn’t in Vaillant’s ward. In any event, all three were listed as suicides. Two had hung themselves. One had somehow self-administered a killing dose of morphine.’ Marguerite paused. ‘One was named in the files as a prostitute; the other two as milliners, which could be a euphemism.’

  Raf bolted from his chair. ‘Come on, Jim. There’s no time to lose. We can just about make that appointment.’

  ‘What appointment?’ Marguerite, too, rose.

  ‘Nothing. Nothing. We have to meet Touquet. He has some information. We need to move quickly.’

  ‘Hold on, Raf. I want to hear Marguerite’s impression of Dr Vaillant. We have to think this through.’

  Marguerite had put a staying hand on Raf’s arm. Like a nervous colt, he shook her off. She surveyed him for a moment then turned to James. ‘Dr Vaillant is a gentleman. His views may not be mine, but I don’t really believe he would do anything underhand. Not deliberately. Coincidentally, since before you came that wasn’t the first thing on my mind, I asked him about suicides at the Salpêtrière and he shook his head in something like mourning and echoed Monsieur Arnhem. Many of these people haven’t much to live for, he said. And he added that their minds are confused. Noisy. They want to shut out the noise. The description made me feel rather sympathetic towards him.’

  ‘Come on, Jim. It’s not Vaillant we’re interested in. It’s that bastard Comte. That’s who Olympe went to see. She must have been on to him. Maybe she even knew the girls.’

  ‘What are you talking about, Raf?’

  ‘I can’t explain now, Marguerite. Can we borrow Martin?’

  She shook her head.

  ‘Why not? Oh no. No, you can’t. Not this time. It’s too dangerous. And you have the children here. It’s absolutely forbidden.’ He threw James an apprehensive glance and James suddenly understood. Raf had inferred that Marguerite was about to don one of her male disguises and follow them.

  ‘Let’s go, Jim.’

  ‘Come back. Come back as soon as you’ve done,’ Marguerite called after them as they raced down the silent hall.

  TWENTY-TWO

  Heavy rain had turned to persistent drizzle. Mist drifted from the pavements, curled from the corners of the streets, hovered yellow round lamp posts. The weather and the lateness of the hour had all but emptied the city of life. Like luminous disembodied parts, the gloves and batons of two uniformed gendarmes rose from the dark before their strolling owners.

  The carriage moved swiftly, bumping and tossing them so that the glistening dome of the Opera tumbled askew as they took a sharp turn into the boulevards where late-night revellers still gathered despite the weather. Here the lamps of the music halls were alight and the garish colour of the posters leapt and danced. A woman laughed, flashing brilliant teeth as she lowered her umbrella and climbed into a cab.

  His thoughts clotted with everything that had occurred in these last hours, James prodded himself from reverie. ‘I still don’t know what this mysterious rendezvous with Touquet is about.’

  Raf flinched. He, too, had been immersed in his private world. ‘It’s not exactly a rend
ezvous. Touquet may not be there. But he’s had information that Caro will definitely be and perhaps Dr Comte. Apparently both frequent the place on a fairly regular basis.’

  ‘Where is there?’

  ‘It’s known as the “Jaune”. It’s a brothel. They specialise in foreign women. Touquet reckons at least four of the girls belong to Caro. Maybe more. And Saturday is the big night.’

  ‘Why may Touquet not be there?’

  ‘Well he may be. But we’re not supposed to recognise each other. Caro has found out who he is and he doesn’t like it.’

  ‘Judging from the other night, he doesn’t like me much either.’ James fingered his jaw.

  ‘But you have the advantage of being a paying client. Not to mention an American one.’ Raf winked.

  ‘I’m not in the mood for …’ James couldn’t bring the word out.

  ‘You don’t have to. It’s probably best if we go in separately and just hang around downstairs, keep our ears peeled. And then when Caro leaves, we follow him and corner him alone. Two of us should be able to beat some information out of him.’

  ‘What information exactly are we looking for?’

  ‘Come on, Jim. Wake up. We’re going to ask him about Olympe.’

  ‘And you think he’s just going to tell us. Say, “Hello friends, it was me. I did it.” Just like that.’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous, Jim.’ Raf shook his fist. ‘We’re going to persuade him.’

  ‘And then what?’

  ‘Let’s see how it goes. We’ll play it by ear. If we get what I think we’re going to get, we drag him kicking and screaming to the nearest Commissariat.’

  ‘I don’t know, Raf. The man’s not exactly a midget, nor compliant. I think we listen and report back to Durand.’

  ‘Who’ll procrastinate and procrastinate until the villain moves down to Marseilles and out of his jurisdiction.’

  ‘And what if he’s with someone? What if he’s with Comte, who knows us well enough?’

  ‘We’ll play it by ear. Just keep yours attuned.’

  They had entered a warren of streets so narrow that the houses seemed to tilt and meet overhead, blocking the sky. The carriage inched along, as if the cobbles themselves had grown precarious. A woman with a mass of blonde curls stepped out from the darkened recess of a door. Her tongue played over scarlet lips. She beckoned with a salacious gesture. A few moments later, the mime was repeated, though this time, the woman lifted her skirts to reveal a swathe of leg. A man emerged to drag her into the shadows.