‘And this farmhouse and farm, where are they?’ he asked.
‘In the hills behind Saint-Michel-de-Frigolet,’ said Sister Agnes, glaring defiantly at her companion who gazed right back at her with the sympathy of one who was trying to understand and to forgive such venom.
‘Fifteen or so kilometres to the south of Avignon, Inspector,’ said Sister Marie-Madeleine. ‘Mireille lived here in the Balance Quartier which is just below the Palais.’
‘A place of slums and gypsy hovels,’ seethed the older nun.
‘Rooms of her own, Sister,’ entreated the younger of them, ‘whose rent was paid each week and always on time.’
‘You know it was sinful of her to live in that house. You know the Holy Father wanted her to move out of that quartier and had arranged far better lodgings.’
‘But she had refused his offer?’ hazarded the Sûreté, startling them both and causing the younger one to blurt, ‘Forgive me, Sister,’ and to silence her tongue.
‘There are no more gypsies. It’s all over with those people,’ said Sister Agnès. ‘They’ve been sent away just like the Jews.’
To camps in Eastern Europe and in the Reich, said St-Cyr sadly to himself, he, too, falling into silence but adding, Hermann, I don’t like this. The younger one knows too much, and the older one is now only too aware of it and will be certain to inform the bishop.
Kohler let the concierge continue ahead of him. They were upstairs again, on the first floor, and had passed through and beyond the room where the girl had been killed. The chamber they were now in, the Grand Tinel, was huge. Light from the still-smoking lantern made a feeble pool about Biron but seldom touched the walls and not the vault of the ceiling above.
‘What is it?’ asked the concierge uneasily as he sensed he was no longer being followed and turned to look back.
‘Just keep going. Don’t stop until you get to the end.’
‘A fire here in 1413 destroyed the magnificent frescoes with which Giovanetti decorated the walls. The ceiling also.’
‘I’m not interested in the past, not yet.’
Had the detective cared nothing for the palace’s history he’d been given? Nothing for the painstaking details of the restorations whose work had ceased because of the Occupation? ‘We are now once again in the “old palace” Inspector. By “old” I mean the Palais of Bénédict the Twelfth, which was built between 1334 and 1342 and well illustrates the austerity of the Cistercians, whereas in the “new palace” there are the pointed arches of the Renaissance Gothic, the splendid frescoes and magnificence of Clément the Sixth, who was a Bénédictine and therefore far more worldly.’
‘He built his palace on to the other one between 1342 and 1352. Keep talking.’
Their voices easily filled the hall – superb acoustics, an ideal setting for a concert … The grey overcoat and black beret of the grand mutilé receded, the concierge lopsidedly rocking as his weight fell on the prosthesis that had replaced his right fore-leg.
When he reached a canopied fireplace at the far end of the hall, Biron, dwarfed by the size of the room, held the lantern above himself as he turned to face the Inspector who had remained at the other end. ‘It is forty-eight metres long by ten and a quarter wide but is not nearly so wide as la chambre de la grande audience.’
The Great Audience Chamber was on the ground floor of the new palace, recalled Kohler, and, to let Biron know he’d been paying attention, said, ‘That one’s length is about the same as this but the width is nearly fifty-two metres and it has fantastic arches in the ceiling. Can you sing?’
‘With the voice of an étourneau?’ A starling. ‘Inspector, what is it you really want of me?’
‘Answers, mon fin. Answers.’
It would have to be said. ‘The madrigal singers use this chamber as their practice hall.’
‘For auditions too?’ hazarded Kohler, the rich baritone of his voice filling the hall and startling the concierge who uneasily muttered, ‘Those also but … but none was scheduled. I would have been informed.’
‘So she wasn’t here to audition and yet was dressed like that?’
No answer was forthcoming. ‘Who judges the auditions?’
Biron hesitated. ‘The singing master, Monsieur Simondi and …’
‘The bishop?’
‘Yes.’
‘Who else?’
Ah merde alors! ‘One other. Always there are three, and always the third person’s identity is kept secret so as to make the audition entirely fair.’
‘Kept secret by whom?’
‘The bishop and Monsieur Simondi. Well before each audition they always discuss this and then … then agree upon who to ask.’
‘If she had come here for an audition …’
‘She couldn’t have.’
‘But if she had …’
‘She didn’t! I’m always informed of them beforehand. The candles, the black-out curtains over the windows, the chairs …’
Finally they were getting somewhere. ‘Where would the chairs have been placed?’
Must the Inspector pry into everything? ‘Two metres from the wall nearest yourself. The singer then enters from the doorway in the far left corner here behind me and comes to stand an equal distance from this wall. Here the floor is marked with a cross for just such a purpose.’
She’d have been all keyed up. ‘Would she have recognized the third judge if there had been an audition?’
Biron gave an exasperated sigh. ‘Avignon is a large town, Inspector. Some who fled here during the Defeat have been allowed to remain. The contestant might realize the judge was new to us citizens but wouldn’t likely know who he was.’
‘Or her – could it have been a woman?’
Ah damn this one and his questions! ‘Sometimes but … but not often and then only after a first refusal.’
‘Stay there. I might need you to.’ Switching on his torch, Kohler shone it along the wall but, search as he did, he couldn’t find the chairs.
‘Inspector, they are kept in the stairwell to my right. This area by the fireplace was once a pantry and separated from the hall to hide the dressoir upon which the Pontiff’s meals, brought from the Kitchens Tower to my left, were placed so that after rewarming them at the fire, they could be properly served on the finest pewter and then taken to his table and to those of his distinguished guests, the lords and ladies of the …’
‘Ja, ja, skip the details, will you?’ Was Biron always such a windbag? If so, it was no wonder the troops threw stones at the statues and yelled their lungs out during his guided tours. ‘Get the chairs. Bring them out here and set them up.’
‘Of course. But please forgive the wounds I received at the hand of my own grenade. They will cause me to drag the chairs across the floor.’
Kohler let him be and shone his torch up over the outer wall. There were windows inset into tall, arched alcoves. The leaded glass wore the Occupation’s coat of laundry blueing. Heavy black curtains had been installed but had been flung open here and there, the irregularity of their openings causing him to wonder if the girl had waited in any of the alcoves, listening for the slightest sound. Ah yes, after the rustling of her skirts had first been silenced and the sounds of the tiny silver bells, the trinkets, the scissors and the coins had been finally quietened by her.
Right in the middle of the outer wall there was the entrance to a square stone tower with a staircase. Perfect ease of access and departure, then, and with heavy curtains to seal it off.
‘That is the Saint John’s Tower,’ sang out Biron. ‘There are two lovely chapels. The one you’re facing is above the other. Giovanetti painted the frescoes. If you would care to …’
Ignored, or so it seemed, Biron carried on with the chairs. They were old, of darkly stained wood, and they folded outwards to form gracefully curved Xs with no backs, but with plain, straight armrests.
He lined them up. Under the light from the lantern they threw the shadows of their slats on the floor behind.
Three chairs, side by side and sitting as if in judgement in the flickering light of a smoky lantern, thought Kohler. Had they been there on the night of the murder? Had they been used during the Renaissance – were they that old?
The thought was eerie and unpleasant, for the length and size of the hall made one automatically focus on them. Brutally Kohler rang the clochette. Instantly Biron was alerted and never mind his having a deaf ear.
‘Inspector, where did you get that?’ he shrilled.
It was rung again and then again – clear, sharp, musical tinkles – and when they were back in the Chambre du cerf, light from Herr Kohler’s torch fled over the frescoed wall down which her blood had run. The hare they’d seen before must have been chased by hounds towards the monk, the Pontiff Clement VI, some said, upon whose gloved fist a hawk waited to make the kill but—
‘Inspector, what is it you wish me to see?’
‘The monk … He’s distracted and is looking the other way, even though the hounds are driving that hare towards him and he has yet to release the hawk.’
Six hundred years ago each of the hounds would have worn a clochette similar to the one the Inspector was holding but why had he to notice this? wondered Biron. It could only mean trouble.
‘The monk, the pontiff or whatever, should have heard those dogs,’ breathed Kohler.
One would have to try to divert him. ‘Perhaps he did. Perhaps one of his hounds had wandered off and he heard its clochette against those of the others and wondered what it was driving towards him.’
‘A hound that likes to wander, eh, and a wild boar after truffles and disturbed at its repast?’
‘Inspector, the maquis of our hills, the garrigue, is very rough. The little bells make it possible for the hunters to know where each of their dogs is as the game is driven towards them.’
‘But this hound couldn’t have been running with the pack, could it?’
‘I … I wouldn’t really know. I’m just a simple man.’
‘Then tell me, mon fin, if the girl knew the dog that wore this bell and if that dog would have come to her as a friend?’
Ah merde alors! ‘I have nothing to do with the bishop’s dogs, Inspector, and couldn’t even keep one as a pet. Indeed, they are each served more meat in a day than I, or most of my fellow citizens, taste in six months.’
Apart from the meatless days, the adult ration, if one could get it, had been pared from 184 grams per week in September 1940 to 100 grams with bones, 75 without.
‘Then the dog wouldn’t have been hungry?’
‘Inspector, dogs are always hungry, some more than others, and the bishop always oversees their feeding so as to make certain nothing is wasted or inadvertently taken, but they are kept in the stables at his residence. They don’t come here.’
‘Then you tell me why there’s a bird’s nest over in the window alcove closest to that fireplace?’
Ah nom de Jésus-Christ, what was this? ‘The mistral, Inspector. From time to time things are blown in from the battlements. There are pigeons … Traps have been set. The birds are always causing a problem. The Kommandant has seen the need and … and allows them to be taken.’
There, he had said it, thought Biron, and the detective knew he was sweating.
‘Tasty are they? Hey, that’s no pigeon’s nest, mon fin. It’s a reed warbler’s, and you’re talking to an ex-farm boy who loved dogs and always had one or two.’
They went to look at it and all the grand mutilé could find to say was, ‘So it is.’
‘Then if the mistral didn’t carry it in here through closed windows, what did?’
A bird’s nest … who would have thought of such a thing happening? ‘I can’t possibly say, Inspector. One of your soldiers perhaps. They often go for walks along the river. They are always exploring the countryside and picking things up they then tire of.’
‘But you just said you couldn’t possibly say?’
Sainte Mère, what have I done but make matters worse, thought Biron ruefully. ‘You must ask Xavier or Brother Matthieu. Reed warblers … pigeons … I have nothing to do with the dogs. Nothing, do you understand?’
Piece by piece, garment by garment, the body of Mireille de Sinéty had been stripped of its finery in the morgue and each item noted, tagged and described as to its nature and position, once by Jean-Louis and once by himself, thought Ovid Peretti. He let his sad grey eyes pass down over her. The breasts sagged sideways, the skin had begun to blotch and discolour. She’d soon begin to stink. A waste, a tragedy – a danger. Why had he been so stupid as to have agreed to take on this task? Was he bent on self-destruction? he asked himself.
The elder of the two nuns stood grimly on guard at the head of the corpse, refusing to budge.
‘Sister,’ he said, ‘I won’t molest her. I’ll be as kind and gentle as possible.’
‘With forceps?’ shrilled the younger nun. ‘With bone-cutters?’
‘Jean-Louis, get those two out of here at once!’
‘Sister Agnès, it’s illegal for you and Sister Marie-Madeleine to be here,’ said St-Cyr. ‘With the clothing, the jewellery and other things we could make allowances, but with what’s about to happen you will understand Coroner Peretti can’t possibly continue in your presence. Now come away.’
‘The clothes … We must dress her in them after it’s done.’
‘For burial?’
‘Yes! The casket is to be open.’
‘With a neck wound like that?’ stormed Peretti, towering over the corpse.
She gave him a cold look. ‘Such things can be hidden. There are ways and we will use them.’
‘Then leave us, Sister,’ said St-Cyr gently. ‘I’ll join you shortly for a quiet word. A few small questions, nothing difficult, I assure you. The preliminary autopsy will take several hours and I can’t remain here either as I’ve other things I must do. You can come back after the midday meal.’
‘We don’t eat lunch. Not in these troubled times.’
‘Merde alors, foutez-moi la paix!’ shouted Peretti. Bugger off.
He turned the body over and, shaking a thermometer to get its mercury down, eased it into the girl’s rectum. ‘Sister, I told you to leave. I might break the glass.’
The nuns fled, with the Sûreré driving them, and when Jean-Louis returned, his cheeks blown out in exasperation, he, too, swore, then said, ‘The bishop …’
Peretti recorded the body’s temperature. ‘You want to watch your back with him, Jean-Louis. There are whispers.’
‘Whispers?’
Bon, the point had been taken. ‘Power. The bishop yearns for the old days, covets the Palais and thinks our friends from beyond the Rhine can be convinced to give it to him if Il Duce fails and Italy falls to the invader when that one makes up his mind to invade.’
Ah nom de Dieu …‘The Papacy?’
‘He dreams of its return to Avignon and is convinced of the possibility. The Kommandant lets him since it costs nothing, except, perhaps, the life of this one.’
They were alone, thank God. ‘How sure are you of this? The Papacy …?’
There was a shrug. The thermometer was cleaned off and sterilized. ‘There are always whispers, some more prevalent than others. Here in Avignon is God not held in contempt while everything breathes a lie?’
Petrarch had said as much. ‘But the Vatican …? Surely they must have something to say in the matter?’
‘Rivaille keeps up a continuous correspondence which His Holiness answers, of course, for, like the Kommandant, what is there to lose? The Church always dabbles and hedges its bets, so why not with this?’
‘But …’
‘Look, all I’m saying is let’s not fool ourselves. Let’s find out the truth but keep as much of it as we can to ourselves. Oh by the way, she was still a virgin.’
‘A virgin … The Papacy? Does he want to become the Pope?’
‘A cardinal perhaps. I really don’t know, but you’re in Avignon, remembe
r? Six hundred years ago or today, it’s exactly the same. Whereas the Occupier uses guns, the citizens still prefer poison, the garrotting wire or the knife.’
‘It was a sickle. I’m all but certain of it.’
‘Bend, gather, pull and then reap, eh? We shall see.’
Still upstairs in the Palais, Kohler was lost in thought. A chamber separated the Grand Tinel from the Kitchens Tower and in it the girl could have waited out of sight until the judges had been seated. But had she taken off her overcoat, her winter boots, hat and mittens? ‘She couldn’t have walked through the streets dressed in costume, not even after dark,’ he said to the concierge. There’d have been the chance of a spot check or control – a rafle, maybe.’ A raid, a house-to-house search or roundup. ‘She’d have had a handbag.’
Her identity papers …‘There was nothing here, Inspector. Nothing in the Palais to suggest …’
‘Nothing but a bird’s nest.’
Kohler shone his torch around the barren floor and up over walls that had once held frescoes whose patchy remains revealed the faint grid lines in reddish ochre that had allowed the artist to easily transfer his drawings. Together, he and Biron went into the Kitchens Tower. It, too, was barren.
‘The chimney is huge, Inspector. A pyramid in the octagonal shape.’
Nothing remained of the bake ovens and yet one could sense the constant comings and goings. Well over four hundred retainers, cooks, scullions, guards and porters – thirty chaplains alone and all of their servants – would have occupied the Palais, in addition to the guests and the family of the pontiff. The spongers.
‘There are pantries and storerooms in this tower,’ said Biron. ‘Other kitchens below us, all of whose flues go up and into the central chimney, which is unique for these parts and for such times.’
Again Kohler used his torch. The mistral played fitfully with the flame of the lantern. The downdraught carried a trail of smoke towards the open entrance where tall wooden doors would once have stood.
‘The Revolution destroyed them,’ said Biron of the doors. ‘The pots, pans and stone or clay crocks – everything was smashed, burned or stolen. One can but regret the loss, the pages of history which are gone from us for ever, the …’
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