He found himself feeling a little like a chess piece: some pawn caught within a pitiless artist’s ongoing project of creation.
Hector often felt he wasn’t really living in his own life in the sense of being entirely present…never fully in the moment. He always found himself a little outside himself when life became intense. A part of himself was always standing back, reflecting on things as they unfolded, gauging his own reaction to a dangerous situation, to an argument, or to a particularly passionate moment in bed. The writer in him was always a little apart from Hector, watching. Sometimes, Hector thought that made him a monster. It hadn’t occurred to him that anyone else could be like him in that sense. And it had also never occurred to Hector that someone with his own traits might endeavor to shape their own life and the lives of those around them toward a particular artistic end.
The more he reflected on all of it, the more Brinke’s manuscript chilled him.
At the same time, Hector grudgingly admired Brinke’s audacity. And more importantly — most importantly of all — Brinke was succeeding in her experiment to stretch herself as a writer. She was convincingly putting across a male voice and attitude, catching Hector’s own cadences and much of his swagger.
But the shadow play of Brinke’s crime novel and her love affair with Hector —and now, Molly, too — rattled him.
Hector kept trying to chicken-and-egg it all. He tried to settle in his own mind whether Brinke’s life informed her fiction, or instead whether she was presently living her life — driving Molly’s and his own life — as fodder for Brinke’s new creation.
And he couldn’t decide which was the more unsettling prospect.
Hector’s mind wouldn’t let it go…dropping it for a time, then circling back to gnaw at it again.
Then life intruded.
Three men were following him. Hector saw them reflected in the angled glass of a storefront’s display window. The three men wore black suits. They had glum demeanors. Hector sized them up: aesthetes.
Hector veered into a café, hat pulled low so nobody could describe him well later. In profile, he ordered a whisky, neat, then watched in the mirror behind the bar as the three men picked a table nearby him. Hector slammed back his whisky, then asked for directions to the restroom.
He picked up his cane and walked along the bar to a narrow corridor leading to the restrooms. Across from the men’s room, there was a door opening onto an alley. Hector tried the door, found it unlocked, and stepped out into the cold. He dropped his swordcane on the ground across the door’s threshold, blocking the door from closing. Hector made his way down the alley and back around to the front of the café. Through the café’s front window, he watched the men inside confer. One checked his pocket watch. He nodded at the other two. The man’s two companions rose and walked back toward the restrooms. Hector saw them veer through the open door into the alley.
Hector slipped back into the café and walked briskly up behind the remaining black-clad man. The man seemed to Hector vaguely Asian. Hector was carrying his leather jacket over one arm. He walked up behind the man, leaned into his ear and said, “Stand up and walk out with me. I’ve got a gun pressed to your spine. Come now.”
Hector got a handful of the man’s collar in his hand and walked him out of the café. They moved several doors down and turned a corner…walked a ways and then turned one more corner. Hector stopped at a café with some chairs and tables still set out front in spite of the weather. He said, “Sit.”
Hector spun around a chair across from the stranger and plopped down, his left arm draped across the back of the cane chair, his right arm under the table. “Now sit still,” Hector said, “or I’ll shoot and leave you here with the same predicament as your guru, Victor Leek. You know — all yearning and no plumbing.”
The man looked over Hector’s shoulder. Hector could see behind himself in the reflection of the café’s window. There was nobody behind him. Hector said, “Don’t look so hopeful. Your friends don’t look too sharp. They could be hours finding you. It’s just us now, pal. What’s your handle, Ace?”
Confusion: “‘Handle’?”
“Your name, what is it? Comment vous appelez-vous?”
“I don’t want to tell you.”
“You don’t have that option. I have a gun pointed at your crotch. That means I get my way.”
“You’ve outsmarted yourself, Monsieur Lassiter. You won’t shoot me here in the streets. Not with so many passing by.”
“Don’t be so sure. And either way, you’re my prisoner short of instigating a footrace, and then you’d just piss me off. I’d likely shoot you in the legs or ass to drop you. That would be the first shot. And let’s be realistic. This is Paris. We’re surrounded by Frenchmen who are going to blanch at the prospect of engaging a tall crazy American waving around a very big gun. Now, what’s your name, slick?”
“Ravel….” Hesitation. “Jacques Ravel.”
Hector sighed. “Ravel? Like Maurice Ravel? And Jacques, like the name of this joint here?” Hector inclined his head at the café’s stenciled window. “Pretty lame lying, Jacques. But the phony moniker will do for now.”
A waiter, bald, round, and annoyed, ducked his head out. “Come inside you two, yes? It’s warm. Come inside and I’ll take your order.”
Hector smiled. “Pardon, non. My friend is claustrophobic. Now, what’ll it be, J?” While he waited, to the waiter Hector said, “Une bière, s’il vous plaît.” Hector smiled at his prisoner. “C’mon, for you, Jacques?”
Silence.
“Jacques…drink with me. If I start thinking of us as mates, I’m less likely to do something you’ll hate. You know…like sending you off somewhere. You know — aller simple.
The man said, “Une bière.”
“Make it two each,” Hector said to the perturbed waiter. “We’re parched and it’ll save you another trip out into this barbarous cold.”
Hector smiled at his captive. “Now, no more sorry lies. You’re what, a poet? A painter?”
Silence.
With his left hand, Hector pulled out his cigarettes, shook the pack, and pulled one out with this teeth. He struck a match on the underside of the table. “I’m beginning to think I kidnapped the wrong nihilist.”
Hector tossed a cigarette and a match to the man. “Smoke it. Smoke it like it’s your last. Because you keep foot-dragging like this and that’s how things are apt to go. You need to modulate your attitude, pronto.”
The stranger lit his cigarette. Hector said, “Look, pal — Jacques — whatever. I just want to know where to find Victor Leek…Oswald Rook. Just give me the name your goddamn guru is employing today and where he can be found. Simple, n’est–ce pas?”
The man blew smoke through both nostrils. “You’re a fool. Do you know how many of us there are?” He blew a little smoke at Hector’s face, but the wind blew it back in his own.
Hector smiled and said, “Keep stonewalling and your club is going to be smaller by at least one.” Hector looked at the man sitting across from him…a small man smoking his cigarette and trying to look insolent.
Hector wondered what Horace Lester would do if confronted with the nihilist. Probably shoot the bastard in cold blood. Horace didn’t seem to fuck around.
Then Hector was seized by another option. He dipped his left hand into his jacket’s pocket, emptying the paper envelope of pain pills given him by Dr. Williams. Hector counted out four capsules, cupping them in his hand.
Their waiter returned. Hector lined the amber bottles up in a row, one behind the other from his prisoner’s perspective. As he arrayed the bottles of beer, Hector dropped the pain tablets in the rearmost bottle. He gave them a second to dissolve, then scooted the rear two bottles around and pushed them across the table. “Drink up, J.”
Fifty-fifty the man would drain the tainted bottle of beer first. Hector suppressed a smile as the man picked up the drugged beer. Hector raised his own bottle, said, “Shall we drink to nothing?�
�� They sipped. Hector said, “‘Hail nada, full of nada…nada is with thee.’ Who came up with that ditty?”
The stranger shrugged. With a shaking hand, he dragged his sleeve across his mouth, wiping off a drool trail. Hector figured he badly misjudged how long it would take the pills to affect the nihilist. The man was much smaller than Hector…and he’d been dosed with twice as many hits of morphine than Hem had administered to Hector.
Their waiter, still palpably annoyed, leaned out again. “All is all right?”
Hector winked. “Great. Les toilettes?”
The waiter pointed behind himself.
Counting out francs, Hector said, “You don’t look so well, Jacques. C’mon.” He hauled the stranger to his feet and half-carrying him walked the man to the restroom. “WC time,” he said. Jacques could barely support himself now. One man was in the tiny restroom — standing at a urinal. Hector figured he didn’t have much time left before his captive fell into full swoon…maybe even lapsed into a coma. His arm around Jacques, one hand working at the nihilist’s belt buckle, Hector, with what he hoped sounded like carnal urgency, said to the man at the urinal, “Bonjour. You won’t be much longer will you?”
The stranger looked at Hector, looked at Jacques, then quickly buttoned his own pants and left the restroom.
Hector opened the stall door and wedged Jacques inside, pushing him back onto the toilet seat. Hector unbuttoned the man’s pants and unstrapped his belt. Hector pulled the man’s pants and underwear down around his ankles. Then Hector backed out and closed the stall door. He climbed atop the radiator. He leaned over the partition until he could reach the lock on the inside of Jacques’s compartment. Hector threw the bolt, locking the nihilist within the stall.
Hector stepped down off the radiator, went to the sink, and washed his hands. As Hector dried his hands, he called back to the man he’d locked in the stall: “Sweet dreams, J…until we meet again.”
***
Hector hadn’t forgotten Brinke’s plan for visiting funerals to gather information. François Laurencin was to be buried at noon at Cimetière St-Vincent. Mueller Hawkins was to be interred at two at Cimetière du Montparnasse. Hector returned to his apartment to change into something mourning-appropriate. He checked his dark suit in the mirror. He figured he looked like quite the nihilist, once he put on his black fedora.
Germaine, watching him plod down the steps said, “You look as though you’re dressed for a funeral.”
“Deux.”
She looked sad. “Not friends I hope? How are you bearing up?”
“Comme ci, comme ça.”
“You look very tired.”
“It’s been a trying few days.” He kissed her hand. “I’ll see you later.”
“Have you and your fiancée set a date, yet?”
“Non. But you’ll be the first invited.”
“She is very smart. Very beautiful.”
Hector nodded. “Isn’t she?”
***
As he stepped out into the cold, he ran into a blond, violet-eyed young man of about his own age. Hector said, “Pardon,” then, scowling, “Philippe?”
Molly’s boyfriend, the painter, nodded, without saying hello. “I’m looking for Molly…have you seen her?” He sounded a little drunk
“Not recently, no,” Hector said. He figured if he wasn’t asked to define “recently” his lie would stand well enough. Philippe looked a bit haggard. Hector had never really studied the young painter before, though he’d known Philippe for perhaps two or three months longer than he’d known Molly. There was a shiny small scar on Philippe’s cheek, and another under his left ear, disappearing down into the collar of his shirt. His eyes were close in hue to Molly’s unusual shade of violet. Hector figured it might be the only thing the two had in common.
Philippe said, “Where are you going, Hector? I could walk along…talk.”
“Sure, Phil, for a few minutes.”
“What’s the rush?”
“I’ve got a friend to bury.”
“Oh. I’m sorry.” Phillip seemed to hesitate, then said, “About Molly…I’m not sure we’re going to make it, Hector.”
“What do you mean?”
“I think we’re growing apart.”
Hector nodded slowly. “Don’t you love Molly anymore, Phil?”
“I love her very much, Hector. She’s my life.” Hector sensed he meant it. Philippe said, “But her mind is…elsewhere. Surely you must see it, must have sensed it these past few months. She’s in love with you, Hector. I want her to be happy. No hard feelings, n’est-ce pas? If you can make her happy, then you two must be together.”
Hector stopped walking, turned to face the painter.
“You must be mistaken, you must—”
“Please,” Philippe said. “Don’t do that. I know you know what I’ve said is true. You’re too smart, too insightful to miss the looks she gives you. What, you’re not attracted to her?”
“She’s very attractive.”
“But you still think of her as…a sister?”
Hector didn’t think he could lie outright, and given the previous day’s and night’s events, he wasn’t sure he should. “Less all the time.”
“Good. Then I’m going to break it off with her, Hector. Clear the path for you.”
“Slow down, Phil. And I’m not sure that’s the best idea, Philippe, even if I maybe welcome that ‘clear path’ you’re offering.” Hector checked his watch. He was in danger of being late.
Philippe said, “You have someplace to be?”
“I told you, Phil, a funeral. Look, please don’t do anything rash. Let’s try and get a drink. I’ll drop by the Rotonde later today or tomorrow. We’ll talk more about this.” Hector bustled off, not waiting for a reply, whistling for a cab, showing the painter his back.
***
Another gray day in another cemetery. Hector sat in a taxi, watching the mourners. He saw no woman in white on a hill, this time.
The widow Laurencin was being comforted by another woman in black. The second woman looked familiar to Hector. Something about her black dress, something in her posture. Then he remembered the widow from the previous day’s funeral, the woman whom had thrown herself across her husband’s coffin. Hector nodded slowly — one newly widowed woman consoling another. As the wives of little magazine editors, it made sense they’d be acquainted.
A quartet of black-clad men stood off a ways from the other mourners. One of them was playing an accordion. Hector scanned more mourners’ faces. He thought perhaps he’d spot Brinke or maybe even Molly, but apart from Lloyd Blake’s widow, Hector saw nobody he could identify.
He felt under his coat and patted the butt of his Colt. He made up his mind. Hector said to his driver, “Wait here, please.”
He set off toward the four black-clad men. As he approached them, the one playing accordion stopped, then pointed at Hector. The four men began walking away, turning and stalking off, hands thrust deep into the pockets of their black coats, the one swinging his accordion at his side.
Hector picked up the pace. As he drew closer, he said, “One of you boys wouldn’t be Victor Leek, would you?”
The men were walking faster now.
Hector called, “No? How’s about Oswald Rook?”
One of the men looked back over his shoulder, saw Hector was closing on them — that man began jogging. The three men with him also shifted to a trot. “What, you boys like to kill folks, then come and fuck up their funerals?” Hector looked back over his shoulder. They were out of sight of the mourners. His ankle was starting to hurt from fast-walking. Hector pulled out his Colt and called, “Next man takes a step gets shot in the back of the knees.”
The four men stutter-stepped, exchanged looks, then bolted.
Hector knew he couldn’t give chase. Cursing, he holstered his Colt. He limped back toward the funeral site. A woman in black was walking to meet him — Lloyd Blake’s widow. “Thank you,” she said. “Thank you for
chasing them off, the cretins. I wish you had been around yesterday. They made a mockery of my husband’s funeral.”
He took her hand. “My name is Hector Lassiter, Mrs. Blake. All condolences. I was present yesterday, but in a coach. I injured my leg.”
“Yes, you’re still limping. Here, take my arm.”
Hector slipped his arm through the widow’s. “You knew my husband then, Monsieur Lassiter?”
“Non, but I know people who knew him. And there have been so many killed like Monsieur Laurencin, and your husband. All these magazine editors attacked. I’ve been working a bit with the police. These men I chased away, do you know who they are?”
Mrs. Blake shook her head. “No. Agents provacoteurs? Dadaists, perhaps?”
“You’re asking me, Madame?”
Mrs. Blake said, “I thought perhaps you would know — since you saw them yesterday, and chased them away today.”
“Actually, I thought they might be people interested in buying your husband’s magazine. I’m told the magazine is for sale.”
“It’s not. And I haven’t decided what I’ll do with it now. The magazine was his great passion. I hate to end it, if for that reason alone. And who told you it was for sale?”
“A woman I met yesterday at your husband’s graveside service.” Hector bit his lip and decided to risk it. “A young woman named Kitty Pike told me that. She said she was a kind of, well, employee of your husband’s. An artist and ad designer.”
“Oh.” The widow scowled. “Granted, I was in a state, but I didn’t see Kitty. I’m very surprised she made the effort. I wonder how I missed her?”
Hector was confused. There was no tone of anger or jealousy that he could detect in the widow Blake’s voice. He said, “Well, she was hanging on the fringes, a good deal off from the other mourners. I saw her there, by herself, and I was intrigued enough to seek her out. To chat for a while.”
“You sign, then?”
“I beg your pardon?”
“You sign? You communicate through sign language? You know, on account of Kitty’s condition?”
One True Sentence: A Hector Lassiter novel (Hector Lassiter series Book 1) Page 17