The Châtelet Apprentice

by Jean-FranCois Parot

  Nicolas decided to interrupt this argument which was beyond him, although he dimly understood that Semacgus’s arguments bore the hallmark of common sense. This response was probably unfair because his judgement was clouded by his personal preference. But he was also embarrassed to see Semacgus fall for this game, reacting to Descart’s provocations and becoming involved in this ridiculous quarrel.

  ‘Gentlemen, that will do,’ he interjected. ‘You will debate this matter another time. Monsieur Descart, I am here on behalf of Monsieur de Sartine, the Lieutenant General of Police, from whom I have full powers to investigate Commissioner Guillaume Lardin’s disappearance. We know that you were among the last people to have seen him.’

  Descart took a few steps and poked the fire, which crackled and flared back to life.

  ‘Anything can happen in this sinful world,’ he sighed. ‘This young fellow …’

  ‘I await your answer, Monsieur.’

  ‘I did indeed dine at the Lardins’, ten days ago.’

  Semacgus made a movement but Nicolas held him back, putting a hand on his arm. He could sense the anger building up inside him.

  ‘And you haven’t seen him since?’

  ‘You have my answer. “You are my witnesses, oracle of God.”’

  ‘Have you met with Lardin since?’

  ‘Certainly not. What is the reason for this inquisition?’

  Semacgus could not stop himself speaking out, but his question was not the one that Nicolas feared.

  ‘Descart, what have you done with Saint-Louis?’

  ‘Nothing at all. Your negro is of no interest to me. He sullies the Lord’s earth.’

  ‘I’ve been told …’ Nicolas intervened.

  He was again surprised by Descart’s reply.

  ‘That I shot at him, on St John’s Day. The devil was stealing cherries from my garden. He got no more than he deserved – a dose of grapeshot.’

  ‘A dose that took me more than two hours to remove,’ said Semacgus angrily. ‘My servant did not steal from you, he was going past your house. Now he has disappeared. What have you done with him?’

  Nicolas was interested to note the turn in the confrontation. Hitting two flints together produces a spark. Let’s leave them to it, he thought to himself, and the truth might emerge.

  ‘Explain then to this young man what you do with the slave’s woman!’ sneered Descart. ‘“Their faces are darker than soot.” Everybody knows what filthy business you get up to with her. The jealous beast threatened you and you killed him. That’s all there is to it.’

  Semacgus stood up. Nicolas squeezed his arm hard; he sat down again.

  ‘It would seem that insolence and devoutness go hand in hand, Monsieur Ten Commandments. You may rest assured that I will not give you a moment’s peace until I find my servant, who incidentally is not a slave but a human being like me, like Monsieur Le Floch, and perhaps even like you, Monsieur Bleeder.’

  Descart was still obsessively gripping the lancet. The three men remained silent until Nicolas, in an icy voice and with an authority that took them by surprise, brought the curtain down on the scene.

  ‘Dr Descart, I have listened to you. Rest assured that your statements will be checked and that you will be summoned to appear before a magistrate who will question you not only about Commissioner Lardin’s disappearance, but also about that of Saint-Louis. Monsieur, I must bid you goodbye.’

  As he quickly led Semacgus away, he heard Descart proffer a final biblical quotation:

  ‘“I was a reproach among all mine enemies, but especially among my neighbours, and a fear to mine acquaintances.”’

  The cold air did them good. Semacgus’s naturally florid face was by now bright red and a purplish vein was throbbing hard at his temple.

  ‘Nicolas, I did not kill Saint-Louis. You believe me, don’t you?’

  ‘I do believe you. But I would also like to believe you about Lardin. You understand that you are among the suspects.’

  ‘Now you, too, are talking as if Lardin is dead.’

  ‘I didn’t mean to.’

  ‘But why did you stop me talking to him about the evening at La Paulet’s?’

  ‘You said it yourself: there’s nothing to indicate that anyone recognised him. It would be your word against his. I await further evidence from witnesses to corroborate your statement. But why does he hate you so much, apart from your disagreements about medicine?’

  ‘Don’t underestimate them, Nicolas. They play a part in the long-standing rivalry between doctors and surgeons. I treat some of the poor; he believes that I am trespassing on his territory and losing him custom.’

  ‘But you used to be friends, didn’t you?’

  ‘Acquaintances, at best. Because of Lardin.’

  ‘Answer me this, was there anything between Louise Lardin and yourself?’

  Semacgus gazed up at the brilliant blue sky. He blinked, looked at Nicolas’s tense face and, laying his hand on the young man’s shoulder, began to speak in a hushed voice.

  ‘Nicolas, you are very young, let me say it again. To tell the truth, I fear that Louise Lardin is a dangerous woman, of whom you, too, should beware.’

  ‘Is that an answer?’

  ‘The answer is that I yielded to her once.’

  ‘Did Lardin know?’

  ‘I don’t know, but Descart caught us.’

  ‘A long time ago?’

  ‘About a year.’

  ‘Why doesn’t Descart talk about it?’

  ‘Because he himself is in the same position. Were he to accuse me, this accusation could be turned against him.’

  ‘Who knows about this business with Descart?’

  ‘Ask Catherine, she knows everything. And if Catherine knows, Marie will find out very quickly; she hides nothing from her.’

  Nicolas held out his hand to Semacgus with a beaming smile.

  ‘We’re still friends, aren’t we?’

  ‘Of course, Nicolas. No one wants your investigation to succeed more than I do and for God’s sake don’t forget poor Saint-Louis.’

  Nicolas returned to Rue Neuve-Saint-Augustin, sobered by what he had just learnt but cheered to be friends once more with Semacgus. He was pleased to think that Monsieur de Sartine would be deprived of certain information and that he would only give him a report when he had matters of more substance to submit to him. He still harboured some resentment towards him from their last meeting.

  Bourdeau was waiting for him, looking busy and enigmatic. A report from the men of the watch had intrigued him. A certain Émilie, a soup seller, had been arrested on Saturday 3 February at about six o’clock in the morning by the toll-gate guards on their night rounds. When she was questioned at the police station of Le Temple, the details she had given were so extraordinary that they were taken to be fictitious and had been noted down only as a formality. The old woman had been released. Bourdeau had carried out his own investigation. She was known to the police for petty offences and as a former woman of easy virtue, who as she got older had descended into debauchery, then poverty. Bourdeau had jumped into a carriage, found old Émilie and had just questioned her at the Châtelet, where she was being held. He handed his report to Nicolas.

  Tuesday 6 February 1761

  Before us, Pierre Bourdeau, Inspector of Police at the Châtelet appeared one Jeanne Huppin, otherwise known as ‘old Émilie’, soup seller and garment mender, dwelling in lodgings in Rue du Faubourg-du-Temple, near La Courtille.

  On being questioned she said in these very words ‘Alas, my God, to think I am come to this. My sins are the cause of it all.’

  Asked as to whether she did go to the place known as ‘La Villette’, at the knacker’s yard in Montfaucon on the night of Friday 2 February, there to purloin the rotten meat found upon her, the which being illegal and contrary to regulations.

  Replied that in truth she had gone to Montfaucon, there to seek sustenance.

  Questioned as to whether this meat was intended for
her purveyal of soup.

  Replied that she had intended to use it for herself and that need and poverty had brought her to this pass.

  Said that she would reveal matters providing she be promised it be taken into account, not for the excusing of her conduct but for acting as the good Christian that she was and for the cleansing of her conscience of a dread secret.

  Said that being occupied in cutting with a great trencher a morsel of dead beast, she had heard a horse neighing and two men approaching. That she concealed herself from fright and fear of being surprised by what she took for a night round of the watch that surveys sometimes this place. Saw the aforesaid men empty by lantern light two casks of a matter that seemed to her bloody, all the which accompanied by garments. Added that she had heard a crack and seen something burn.

  Questioned as to whether she could tell that which had burnt.

  Replied that she was too afraid and that fright had taken away her senses. The cold having revived her, she had fled without seeking to examine anything whatsoever for fear of attracting towards her a pack of stray dogs that had gathered. She was crossing through the toll-gate of the city when the guards stopped and questioned her.

  Bourdeau suggested going to Montfaucon straight away, in order to see what the situation was. Old Émilie needed to go with them to verify at the scene the accuracy and consistency of what she had said. If her claims were true, this would at least prove that a bloody incident had taken place during the night that Lardin had disappeared. Nicolas objected that at night there were plenty of sinister goings-on in the capital, and that there was nothing to suggest a link between this case and their investigation. However, he agreed to accompany Bourdeau.

  Though generous by nature Nicolas was nonetheless thrifty with the funds entrusted to him, and he was reluctant to make a dent in Monsieur de Sartine’s finances by hiring a cab. Old Émilie was removed from her cell at the Châtelet but was not told the purpose of the journey. Nicolas was hoping that the agony of her uncertainty would make the destitute creature panic, and so undermine her defences. She was now sitting next to Bourdeau. Nicolas, seated opposite her, could observe this former woman of pleasure at his leisure. He had never seen a sorrier sight than this pathetic relic of past glories. The old woman was wearing a jumble of rags, one on top of the other. Did the poor creature fear being robbed or was she seeking to protect herself from the cold? This heap of torn and filthy clothes looked as if it were parcelled up in a sort of greatcoat made of some unknown material that might have been felt if the passage of time had not transformed it into a sort of fluffy blanket. The garment revealed in parts the splendid remnants of rich fabrics, bits of yellowed lace, of paste and embroidery in silver and gold thread. A whole past life was summed up in the layers covering this human wreck. Out of a shapeless bonnet tied with a ribbon peered a face at once narrow and bloated, in which two care-worn, mouse-grey eyes darted to and fro, unnaturally highlighted by a bluish black that reminded Nicolas of the moustaches he pencilled in with charcoal when he was a child. Her twisted mouth was half-open and revealed a few stumps of teeth and the tip of a tongue that was still surprisingly pink.

  After a while, the solemn way in which Nicolas was staring at her began to intrigue old Émilie. Out of habit she eyed him in a way that made him blush down to the roots of his hair. He was horrified at what her expression might mean. She immediately realised that she was on the wrong track, and resumed her slumped position. Then she rummaged around in a sort of green satin handbag, which had known better days, and spread out on her lap her remaining treasures: a hunk of black bread, a broken black onyx fan, a few sols, a small horn knife, a brass rouge box and a shard of mirror. She dipped a dirty finger into the rouge and, looking at herself in the triangular mirror, began to make up her cheeks. Gradually she rediscovered the customary and touching gestures of the woman she had once been. She blinked, moved her head back to take better stock of the result of her efforts, pursed her lips, smiled and tried to smooth her wrinkled brow. Instead of the beggar-woman opposite him, Nicolas thought he could see the silhouette of a charming, joyful young girl, who forty years earlier had enjoyed the company of the Regent every evening. Nicolas looked away, moved by this spectacle.

  Soon they were outside the city walls and old Émilie, who had for some time been observing the landscape through the carriage window, recognised the direction they had taken. Pitiful to behold in her anguish, she looked at each of them in turn. Nicolas immediately regretted not having drawn the leather curtains and swore that in future he would pay more attention to this type of detail. Thus he was creating his own method of investigation, as circumstances dictated; the unwritten rules of his profession were impressing themselves upon him day by day. He progressed in his understanding of criminal matters by bringing to them his sensitivity, his skills of observation, the wealth of his imagination and his instinctive responses, which were vindicated after the event. He was his own master, in charge of blaming or praising himself. Above all he had learnt that a flexible approach, based on experience, was the only way to get closer to the truth.

  The carriage stopped and Bourdeau got out to speak to some labourers who had approached them, intrigued by their arrival. On a nearby hill a lone horseman watched them from near a great oak tree, whose branches were heavy with a multitude of crows. Nicolas noted the fact without dwelling on it and helped the old woman down. Her hand was clammy and feverish; she could hardly stand and seemed terror-stricken.

  ‘My God, I can’t …’

  ‘Come, be brave, Madame. We are with you. You have nothing to fear. Show us the place where you hid.’

  ‘I recognise nothing with all this snow, good Monsieur.’

  The sky was clear but the cold here was keener than in Paris. The snow crackled underfoot. They edged their way forward and eventually came upon some shapeless heaps, from which emerged hooves covered in frost. Bourdeau questioned one of the knackers.

  ‘How long have these carcasses been here?’

  ‘Four days, at least. With Carnival we haven’t worked Saturday or Sunday. In any case the frost has set in in the meantime. Now we’ll have to wait for the thaw to be able to handle the dead meat.’

  Old Émilie held out her hand and pointed to one of the piles. Bourdeau swept away the snow covering it and revealed the body of a horse. One of its thighs had been cut into.

  ‘Is it that one? Incidentally, what did you do with your trencher?’

  ‘I can’t remember.’

  Bourdeau continued to work away, kneeling on the ground. A glint of blue flashed in the snow. He lifted up a butcher’s cleaver.

  ‘Would that be your implement by any chance?’

  She grabbed it and held it tight against her as if it were something precious.

  ‘Yes, yes, that’s my knife sure enough.’

  Bourdeau had to wrest it from her.

  ‘I can’t return it to you quite yet.’

  Nicolas intervened.

  ‘Don’t fret. You’ll get it back. Just tell me where you were watching from.’

  This calm voice reassured her. Automatically, she bent to the ground and huddled up to the carcass, peering towards the corner of a brick building situated a few yards away.

  ‘It’s over there,’ Nicolas said in a hushed voice, helping her to her feet and dusting the snow off her. ‘Don’t be afraid. The inspector and I will go on our own. Stay here and wait for us.’

  They soon came upon several heaps covered with snow. Nicolas stopped, thought for a moment and then asked Bourdeau to go and find an implement to clear away the snow. It was quite obvious that these were not animal carcasses. While he was waiting he poked around in one of the piles. His fingers touched something hard, broken into several pieces, like the teeth of a giant rake. He forced himself to grip it with both hands and pulled hard. A heavy object came away from the frozen ground, and to his horror he saw rising up before him a lump of flesh that he immediately recognised as the remains of a human thorax. B
y the time Bourdeau returned with a broom, Nicolas, pale as a ghost, was vigorously rubbing his hands with snow.

  A glance was enough for the inspector to grasp what the young man was feeling. Without exchanging a word they carefully cleared the ground all around, revealing a quantity of human remains mixed in with straw, and bones that were almost totally bare except for a few frozen and blackened scraps of clothing.

  They placed the remains alongside each other and little by little reconstructed what had been a body. The state of the skeleton with its coating of snow showed well enough how savagely the scavenging rats and beasts of prey had attacked it. One didn’t have to be a great anatomist to notice that many bones were missing, but the head was there, its jaw fractured. Near the spot where Nicolas had made his first discovery they found some clothes, a leather doublet and a blackish, torn shirt which appeared to be blood-soaked.

  Their last find confirmed Nicolas’s fears. Lardin’s cudgel was revealed, with its strange sculpted designs on the silver pommel and the snake-like creature curled around the stick. The inspector nodded; he, too, had understood. Other clues followed: a pair of grey calamanco breeches, some stockings, sticky with a black substance, and two shoes whose buckles had disappeared. Nicolas decided to add these items to everything else they had found, and to examine them in more detail later. He gave Bourdeau the task of finding something suitable in which they could carry away their macabre harvest. The inspector soon came back with an old wicker trunk bought from a knacker who had kept his apron and tools in it. They quickly filled it up, carefully wrapping the bones in the clothes.