‘Did he tie the woman to her bed? Is that what you’re wondering?’
‘Or did he know the Salamander would strike and is that why he was in the cinema?’
There were so many questions, so little time in which to get things done. At the top of the montée they began yet another steep climb, the switchbacks of the Sacré Coeur snaking through scant woods where the nubby branches of the trees reminded Kohler of battlefields long passed and of sanctuary woods after weeks of constant shelling.
The French always pruned their trees too much. They liked them wounded into stumps and fingerless fists.
‘That priest was going to sodomize the woman, Louis. Guilt stopped him and he went downstairs into the cinema only to find the flames of hell had descended upon him.’
‘We’ll ask the bishop. We’ll tell him the Church’s secret is safe with us.’
For some time now the litany of the Mass had had a lulling effect. There was far less coughing and clearing of the throat or blowing of the nose. More rhythm to the responses, more unity of intonation and automatic signing of the Cross.
Prayers were offered for the victims of the fire, pleas for the arsonist or arsonists to give up and come forth to receive God’s forgiveness. Prayers for those who had been badly burned and disfigured—somehow they must find it in their hearts to forgive. So, too, all those who had lost their loved ones.
Yet had it been wise to hold the Mass? If ever an opportunity for disaster presented itself, it was in this packed congregation. Each person’s shoulders touched at least one other’s. It was now so hot and stuffy in the unheated church, overcoats had been unbuttoned, mittens, gloves and scarves removed to cushion bended knees. A simple cry of Fire would cause untold panic and the Salamander, if he or she or they were bent on another disaster, would know this.
St-Cyr sat nearest the right aisle, about a quarter of the way from the altar and beside one of the blue-grey marble columns that rose to the vaulted ceiling high above where gorgeous frescos were sumptuously gilded. Consecrated in 1896, the Basilica exemplified the very soul of the merchants and bankers who had built it. Gold was everywhere, so, too, polished semiprecious stones. Its altar was immense and resplendent with silk and silver and gold. There were paintings and mosaics, beautiful stained-glass windows. Everywhere there was candlelight or the warm glow of scented oil lamps.
Clearly the Bishop of Lyon had spared nothing on this eve of eves. In defiance of the black-out, the Basilica must glow like a beacon. Not content, he had insisted on holding the Mass at midnight as had been the Church’s custom for centuries.
With the curfew at midnight, and all tram-cars and autobuses stopped at 11 p.m., he had forced each and every person before him to break the law, which would drive the German authorities half crazy trying to arrest them all should they so choose.
Resplendent in his finery, Bishop Frédéric Dufour was a man to be reckoned with. His wrists were strong and bony, the hands big, shoulders wide and square, the feet always braced as if God were up there some place on the mountain and he but a humble shepherd. The short, wavy hair was iron-grey, his brow and face wide as if cut from granite, but he was still a man who could enjoy a good time among simple people, a man much accustomed to circulating in the world of salons but one who always remembered his roots. No fool, he must have gauged the metal of the Nazi High Command and gambled they’d say nothing beyond a mild rebuke to himself.
But, again, one had to wonder if it had been wise to hold the Mass? All eyes would be closed in prayer or on the hymnal or the Bishop and his assistants, the altar boys, the swinging censers, the choir that sat among stupendous columns of rose-red marble, the Cross above the altar, the Virgin to one side.
All but Hermann’s. Hermann would be busy in the wings looking for possible arson or scanning the crowd for a chance sight of that girl they had seen on the bicycle.
Two women … Had she been one of them and why, please, had she dropped the yellow work card of a prostitute?
A priest, but no ordinary cleric. Were the two connected? Could that be possible?
And were they to have another fire so soon? Ah merde, Hermann. Be careful.
The smell of gasoline was strongest here, high above the altar in one of the four octagonal towers that formed the corners of the Basilica and rose to belfries more Gothic than Byzantine. Stealthily Kohler crouched in the pitch darkness and ran anxious fingertips over the cold marble floor. Gingerly he brought them to his nose, each microsecond frozen in time, his mind and body functioning too slowly—he knew this now. The floor was awash.
Stairs … there would be stairs to the belfry but surely they would not have started pouring the gasoline from up there? Surely those two women would be below him among the congregation, waiting … waiting for the right moment?
When he came across a jerry can lying flat at the top of the stone steps, he ran a hesitant finger around inside its open neck, felt the threaded metal, each groove sharp and precise. Saw at once the four towers in flames; saw the panic inside the church, the trampled; heard the terrified screams.
Verdammt! He shut his eyes and tried to calm himself. He thought to ring the bells—knew that this would only warn the arsonist or arsonists.
A door would be opened into the tower, a lighted candle would be dropped on the way out.
When he came to a narrow gallery, he stood in shadow looking down the length of the crowded nave. He searched, he asked, Where are you? He wanted to shout, Rans! Raus! Get out! before it was too late.
Prayers came up to him and he hesitated. Satisfied that all heads would be bowed and he wouldn’t be seen, he stepped quickly through to the railing to look down at the seats nearest the door to the tower. Two women … What would they be wearing? Would they sit side by side? Had they even had anything to do with the cinema fire? Had they really?
It all looked so ordinary. Where …? Where the hell are you? he wanted to shout.
Four belfries … four of them.
Slowly he retraced his steps. Again he looked uncertainly up through the darkness to the belfry, again he felt the gasoline on the floor. Had it only just been dumped? Had they heard him in the tower? Were they still waiting in the darkness at the top of those stairs?
He began to climb, and when he reached the top, eight tall and narrow arches gave out on to the night, the darkness there a little less. Freezing, a breeze came softly. It did not stir the heavy bronze bells. He must go around the bells. He must make no sound, give no sign of himself. They mustn’t know he’d come back. She mustn’t know. She? he asked.
Two women … a strong smell of perfume close, so close and layered over that of the gasoline because of the breeze. He waited. Silently he asked, Well, what’s it to be, eh?
She’d have the matches ready. She wouldn’t care if she or they died in the fire. Perhaps that’s what she wanted. He crouched and ran his fingers lightly over the floor.
When he touched a woman’s high-heeled shoe, he leapt inwardly but found himself asking, How could she wear such things on a night like this?
She didn’t move. She did not even know he was here.
The fucking shoes were empty! She’d left them side by side and had splashed perfume on the stone sill to fool him!
Ah Gott im Himmel, Louis … Louis, where the hell are you when needed most? Down on your knees praying to that God of yours? Asking why He has to mock his little detective, eh?
Waiting … waiting just like everyone else.
* * *
The Mass was taking forever. Why had they simply not sent a messenger to the bishop with a note, wondered St-Cyr? Urgent consultations. A cross … an exquisite masterpiece of mid-to-late Renaissance art. Four square, blood-red rubies at its ends, four magnificent square-tabled sapphires at the crossroads and well-faceted, round Jager diamonds, each of at least three carats, the stones all set in raised collets on chased quatrefoils whose four-leafed petals were filigreed in dark blue and gold enamel.
The rope of
gold was with rubies and enamelled cushions between the links. The bishop could well have refused to see Hermann and himself. Made excuses, sought to divert the inquiry … ah, so many things might well have happened. There was also Dufour’s reaction to the shock of being confronted so unexpectedly. Ah yes.
At a nudge, St-Cyr awoke from the turmoil of his thoughts to join the shuffling line in the aisle. The bread, the wine, the blessings and genuflections came as each parishioner received the Blessed Sacrament, none now asking why that fire had had to happen, none worrying that it could just as suddenly happen here. Hermann … where was Hermann?
‘My son, that cross …?’
Doubt and fear, then realization and sadness swiftly entered the dark grey eyes of the shepherd whose cheeks were rugged. ‘Jean-Louis St-Cyr of the Sûreté Nationale, Bishop. Please forgive the inconvenience, but it is imperative that we talk.’
‘Here? Now? But … but …” Ah damn! ‘Yes, yes of course. One of the confessionals.’ Dufour indicated the ornately carved boxes on the far side of the church and said, ‘Follow, please.’
There was no time. Clearly that was evident; so, too, that the bishop wanted the least possible notice taken of them.
No sooner were they inside and seated, when he hissed, ‘Why have you come here like this with that in your hands? Have you no sense of decency? Father Adrian had nothing to do with that fire. Nothing! How could he have?’
‘Then why was he in that cinema, Bishop? Why was he on his knees facing the worst of the flames?’
‘Facing the flames?’
‘Yes. The others had blocked the only exits. Some had tried to run into the foyer but had collapsed in their panic or from the smoke and flames. The others then fell on top of them.’
‘He must have known he could not escape.’
‘But to exhibit such calmness and strength of will is quite remarkable, is it not? Why was he a martyr?’
Dufour considered this. When he asked to see the cross, St-Cyr handed it to him, and for a moment their fingers touched. He felt the trembling in the bishop and knew Dufour was either frightened of the outcome or deeply grieving over the loss of his priest.
They could not see each other’s expressions. Had he suggested the confessional for this very reason? Had he?
Indeed, the confessional had always seemed to single out the confessor, using that same remoteness to pigeon-hole the sinner’s soul. Uncomfortable … it had always made St-Cyr feel uncomfortable, the mind flitting back to boyhood days and things like cakes and pies best left unstolen.
When the bishop spoke again it was as if to God, humbly begging His forgiveness. ‘This cross was far too ostentatious, Inspector. For quite obvious reasons I forbade Father Beaumont to wear it except on very special occasions. Adrian … Adrian was my personal secretary. We’d been together for years. When that happens, the right hand usually knows what the left hand is about, isn’t that so? He understood he was not to wear this outside the Basilica. I could not have him causing envy among my other priests or with the cardinals and other bishops, could I? Father Beaumont agreed—he was that kind of man. Honest, diligent, absolutely trustworthy, and my humble servant at all times, be it night or day. I kept the cross in the safe in my office, and I know for a fact that he has left it to me in his will.’
Ah nom de Dieu, a will … ‘Why was he there, Bishop? By rights he ought to have been busy. The sick, the wounded, the old, the poor …’
Something would have to be said. Dufour sighed heavily. ‘Our housekeeper will tell you Father Beaumont received an urgent telephone call, Inspector. Mademoiselle Madeleine Aurelle. Yes, yes, I had already anticipated a visit from such as yourself. The Préfet … Ah, of course he has telephoned to warn me of you. News gets around quickly, does it not? So many people, so many deaths … My housekeeper, Mademoiselle Beatrice told me the details of the telephone call. Mademoiselle Aurelle is in her middle years, you understand. Father Beaumont was her confessor—that is to say, Inspector, that one was fond of him. As the men of my village used to say, she had hoarded her little capital for far too long and had not bought any gold with it.’
Her virginity … Her ‘little capital …’ and this from a bishop!
‘The silly woman was always after Adrian, Inspector. She badgered him constantly. The crisis of the heart, the chest, the ear-ache, the back, the rent. He suffered her constant need for attention and quite often … Oh, bien sûr I myself have heard him calming her fears many times over the telephone. Always a kind word, a promise to talk to the owner of that building, to call in at the pharmacy for some little thing, the greengrocer’s, the tea-shop or send someone round to the flat, himself most often. He had the heart and patience of a saint. He understood her and forgave her always.’
‘Then why was he not with her? Why was he in the cinema on his knees, holding that cross before him?’
‘I don’t know, Inspector. La Bête humaine … it’s an excellent film. Perhaps, after he had attended to Mademoiselle Aurelle, he …’
‘She was naked, Bishop. She was tied face down to her bed. A rag had been stuffed in her mouth.’
‘Then why did you not say so at once?’ Angrily Dufour thrust the cross back only to find his hand gripped tightly. Ah damn the Sûreté and their filthy minds! Always against the Church! Always looking for dirt! ‘Had she been violated?’ he asked, hating himself for having said it.
St-Cyr savoured the moment, having obtained the answer he most wanted without having to ask for it. Violation had been entirely possible. ‘Could the call have been made or prompted by someone else, someone known to them both?’
‘The arsonist or arsonists?’
It was a plea to God for help. One could not have that woman violated by a priest, particularly not by a bishop’s secretary, a saint! Ah no, of course not.
‘The cross, Bishop? He should not have worn it to the cinema or to visit this … this nuisance who had not had the wisdom to spend her little capital much earlier in life.’
‘God ought to guard my tongue, Inspector, particularly as in regards to my humble past. The cross was given to Father Beaumont some years ago. It can have no bearing on the fire.’
‘Then why did he wear it? Come, come, Bishop Dufour. There has to be a reason for everything.’
‘Ah, do not be so difficult! You people from Paris … For most things there is often no reason other than impulse.’
‘Then how did he come by it, eh? A wealthy parishioner—a gift like this? Did he save some family from scandal? Did he get the unmarried daughter into a convent so that she could have her child in secret, eh? In each house there is always a closet, Bishop, even in God’s house.’
‘Especially so, is that what you’re implying, eh?’ It was. Ah damn. ‘Monsieur Henri Masson gave that cross to Father Beaumont, Inspector, but he’s been dead for several years. Ten, I believe, or is it twelve? Now, please, I must return to my duties. Father Beaumont would not have harmed Mademoiselle Aurelle. It was just not in his nature to harm anyone, least of all myself and the Mother Church.’
Kohler touched his lips in doubt and fear. Gott im Himmel, with what were they dealing? The bitches were still playing with him. The wash of gasoline was all around him now in the store-room below the belfry. And God damn the Führer and his invincible Reich. The fucking torch in his hand was useless!
He knew the arsonists were close to him—closer than they’d ever been. The place reeked of gasoline. His shoes, leaking at the best of times, had let in the gasoline. The turn-ups of his trousers, would they be wet too?
They were. Ah nom de Dieu, Louis, why can’t you come and find me? Two women … Two, Louis!
Not liking things, he got down on his hands and knees and crept forward. The room, off to one side of the tower, seemed full of paintings in richly carved and probably gilded frames that only brought memories of that last case, of Provence and an antique shop, of a dealer who had complained about the French using such priceless pieces for firewood. Firewood,
verdammt!
There were canvases—far too many of them. And he knew then that some of the wealthy, thinking their paintings safer with the bishop, had brought them here rather than let the Occupying Forces steal them.
Cautiously sweeping the floor with wide motions of his hand, Kohler touched excelsior—fine wood shavings, a wren’s nest of them. He found the candle stub in its middle, fixed to the floor—no more than one-and-a-half centimentres of that—found seven wooden matches, their heads arranged in a ring, all close to the candle so as to speed the instant of ignition, not that they would have been needed.
Trembling, he dropped the matches and had to pick them up. He put them and the candle stub and the excelsior into a pocket and stood up slowly. The message was all too clear: See what we can do to you or to anyone at any time.
Two women … had there been two of them? Had he frightened them off?
Clearly they were dealing with a case of madness.
Shadows flew about or were pinned to the walls. Robichaud, the fire chief, looked up into the belfry timbers and sharply drew in a breath. The beam of his torch faltered, then came back to settle on the jerry cans. Dull brown and pale green with their camouflage, each was still slowly dripping a trickle of gasoline. Stolen … they must have been stolen.
‘Regulation issue,’ he grunted. ‘The fuel depot at Delfosse or one of the others over in Croix Rousse, the Fort Saint-Jean or the Saint Vincent along the quai.’
All fuel was under German control. The two jerry cans had been lashed to timbers that ran above the bells. Each would have weighed a good twenty kilograms. Who could have done such a thing? ‘Ah mon Dieu, Bishop, this … this …’ He swung his light down to indicate the trail of gasoline that crossed the belfry floor and ran to the empty can Herr Kohler had found at the top of the steps. ‘This is the trailer from the storeroom downstairs. Light the lower one, Bishop, and the flames, they race along this trail and right up to those.’
Stains from the dripping cans high above them had spread down other timbers to the floor. ‘It’s a miracle the Salamander didn’t set it off,’ said Guillemette, the Préfet of Lyon.
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