The Curse of the Grand Guignol

by Anna Lord

  But no, Raoul Crespingy was nursing a cup of black coffee and a throbbing head. The moment he spotted the Countess he recalled the midday appointment and groaned. Dr Watson feigned interest in the man’s health, then knowing the Countess would need time alone with the playwright in order to question him, suggested he and Monsieur Radzival take a stroll along the Quai de Jemmapes and look at the dead body. He hoped the corpse would not resemble a marionette – but then he realised the date was wrong. It had not yet been a week and if the killer stayed true to form the next murder would not take place until the eighth of December.

  “Anonymous?” said the Countess bluntly.

  It all came back to the playwright and he groaned again.

  “Let’s go up on deck,” she suggested, though it was more like a command. “I am warmly rugged up and you look as if you could do with a lungful of fresh air. Is Kiki on board?”

  “Kiki? No, she’s gone to rehearsals with the troupe from Le Cirque.”

  “Good, then we won’t be interrupted when you explain to me how you get hold of scripts that are linked to the murders plaguing Paris.”

  He wrapped his hands around his coffee cup and groaned again. They settled on empty wooden crates. The sky looked like it had been streaked with turpentine and stripped of colour.

  “You may begin,” she instructed sternly.

  He had had a chance to order his thoughts and did not quibble. “When I took up the job at le Cirque du Grand Guignol I was already suffering from writer’s block. I hadn’t been able to write anything new for more than a year. I had penned a few things on Dreyfus and managed to get them published in rags like Le Libre Parole and rubbish pamphlets published by the Brotherhood of the Boldt. I was trading on that to keep my reputation afloat until the muse returned. How hard could it be write three short plays that appealed to degenerates, I asked myself. Unfortunately, it was harder than I imagined. Davidov scorned everything I showed him. Then, when I was about to give up hope and confess to being a failure I found an envelope waiting for me here on Bobo. It contained three short plays written by Anonymous. Hilariously cruel, vile and risqué! Davidov loved them. They were a huge success. All that week, as the plays were being lauded, I suffered in secret, wondering how I would replicate such success when, voila, another envelope appeared.”

  “When you say ‘appeared’ – what do you mean?”

  “I mean exactly that. I returned to the peniche late one night and there was this envelope on the table addressed to me. I was not about to look a gift horse in the mouth.”

  “You made no enquiries?”

  “No, why should I? Whoever was writing them knew their plays were being performed on rue Ballu. They knew I was passing them off as my own work. One does not toss away a gift from the gods. Who knows! They may even have come from the gods!”

  He gave a cynical self-mocking laugh.

  “More like a gift from the devil,” reminded the Countess archly. “I presume you still have the original copy of each play that came from Anonymous?”

  He shook his head. “I made copies in my own hand and destroyed the originals for reasons that are obvious.”

  “I suppose it is too much to ask if you recognized the penmanship?”

  “They were written in pencil. It was a childish scrawl. I presumed that was to disguise the identity of the writer?”

  “Hmm, what about the paper?”

  “Cheap, poor quality.”

  “Envelope?”

  “Expensive, good quality.”

  “You kept the envelopes?”

  “No, I destroyed them too.”

  Neither said anything after that. They lit up cigarettes and gazed at the fast-moving current that started one hundred miles away at the Ourcq River and eventually ebbed into the Seine. Flecks of winter sun were reflected on the surface of the inky water like bits of broken glass. The constantly shifting patterns provided a mesmerizing son-et-lumière lightshow.

  “There’s a man in a black cloak standing on the opposite bank - don’t look now,” she warned. “Wait until you toss your cigarette into the water and then look.”

  He took one last drag, tossed his cigarette into the swift-flowing canal and looked over to the Quai de Valmy. “What about him?”

  “Have you seen him before?”

  “No.”

  “What about at the theatre?”

  “A lot of people wear black cloaks, especially the ones who take private booths. They don’t want to be recognized. There’s no crime against it. If you are thinking that man might be Anonymous, well, so he might, but so might it be anyone in Paris.”

  Yes, Anonymous could be anyone in Paris. No! That was wrong! It couldn’t! Whoever delivered the envelopes knew where Raoul Crespingy lived. They knew his early playwriting attempts had been rejected by Davidov. They knew when he would be away from the peniche and when he would return. They were talented and shrewd and secretive. They were clever and cunning and capable of cold-blooded murder.

  “What time do rehearsals finish?” she asked suddenly, pushing to her feet.

  “They go all afternoon. Why? Are you planning to ruin my life by telling Davidov what I just revealed to you in confidence?”

  “No, I am planning to pay a visit to Le Cirque while there is no one at home. Will I find the peniche locked?”

  “No one locks their peniche around here. The people who live on the canal do not steal from each other. They already know there’s nothing worth stealing. Are you going to search for paper and envelopes?”

  “Amongst other things,” she said cagily. “But first I’m going to search Kiki’s room. By the way, as soon as you receive the next gift from the gods I want to know. And do not destroy any part of it. When are you expecting it to arrive?”

  “It arrived this morning, as I had hoped. That’s why I left the Hotel de Merimont early and why I forgot the midday rendezvous. I have already copied it and destroyed the evidence.”

  She blasphemed under her breath. “Next time you do that I will have you arrested.”

  He was about to remind her she had no authority in France but then thought better of it. “This way to Kiki’s room,” he said.

  The peniche was larger than it looked. It was built in the style of a miniature Noah’s Ark, and being a floating zoo, it came with all the accompanying ripe smells of a barn. One would have thought that having a woman aboard would have mitigated the stench of unwashed clothes and a stinking piss-pot, alas, it was made all the more nauseating by the liberal drenching of eau de toilette.

  Kiki had numerous chests of fancy clothes, some expensive baubles – presumably gifts from her trio of lovers - costumes from her circus days, but no paper, pencils or envelopes.

  “She’s illiterate,” said the playwright matter-of-factly when the Countess commented on the dearth of paper and books.

  “How long have you been living together here on the peniche?”

  “Three months. Kiki moved in two months before the first show. Davidov insisted she move in here with me when he discovered her spending more and more time at Café Bistro. He organized for Felix, Hilaire and Vincent to move into the peniche next door at the same time. They christened it Le Cirque. Presumably, the idea was to help keep an eye on her. Not that he had anything to worry about from my end. He knows my preferences don’t run to the Kiki’s of this world. The four of them had been living in a slum near the Trocadero but it was being demolished to make way for the Paris Fair. They were living hand to mouth after their circus folded. Circuses cannot compete with the Grand Guignol, the Moulin Rouge, the dance halls, the cinématographes, and so on. Fortunately, Davidov had seen one of their shows and recognized their talent. He snapped them up. He pays them a pittance. Like all those who have tasted true poverty, they are grateful for the work, but one day they will turn and bite the hand that feeds them.”

  Dr Watson and Monsieur Radzival were nowhere to be seen. They were neither gawping at the corpse on the grassy embankment, nor strolli
ng along the quai, nor crossing the iron bridge to the other side of the canal. The man in the black cloak was still watching the peniche.

  Le Cirque was surprisingly tidy and odour free. The three circus performers were clearly disciplined and self-respecting men. They lived by the adage: a place for everything and everything in its place. It made the job of searching for evidence easy. But the Countess was not merely searching for pencils and paper here she was searching for a possible murder weapon (something with a deadly spike), small pieces of wood, string, cardboard, a hatchet, and a sharp knife able to cut through cartilage. She found none of these items. But what she found made her breath catch.

  “What’s that?”

  Raoul Crespigny was leaning negligently against the door jamb. He had followed her without her knowledge, creeping up on her on quiet cat feet.

  “A puppet,” she said, trying not to betray her startlement.

  “Let’s see it.”

  She lifted it up for him to view, because to do otherwise would have made him even more curious. It was old and battered and unpleasant to look at.

  “Sacre bleu!” he exclaimed, sounding surprised. “Bigger than a puppet! I remember when I was a boy there was a vagabond who came to our village every summer. He was probably nothing more than a tramp, but being wide-eyed, I regarded him like a ballant cascadeur, an acrobatic stuntman. He dangled an ugly doll like that with a gaudy red mouth and bright red cheeks and he entertained the kids with impromptu shows and amazing feats. One summer he just stopped coming. I remember waiting and waiting for him to show up. I looked out for him every day. When the leaves started to fall and the days grew shorter I realized he wasn’t coming back again. I wondered for a long time what happened to him.”

  “Did you ever find out?”

  “No,” he said thoughtfully. “Sometimes I still wonder.”

  Carefully, she replaced the marionette back in the old leather trunk plastered with travel posters from Toulon, Toulouse, Nice and Sarlat. “Nothing in here. Whose room is next door?”

  “Vincent.”

  “Whose room was this?”

  “Hilaire.”

  “Not Felix?”

  “No, why?”

  “No reason.”

  An hour later, when she emerged from the pristine belly of the houseboat, Raoul was waiting for her on the deck of Le Cirque.

  “He’s gone,” he said. “The man in the black cloak disappeared about ten minutes ago. He was definitely watching us, or more to the point, watching you. Did you find anything?”

  “No,” she lied, endeavouring to sound bitterly disappointed. “Nothing at all interesting.”

  “What about that giant puppet?”

  Careful not to look at him, she took the hand he offered as she clambered down the gangway onto the quai. “That is hardly the evidence of murder I was looking for.”

  “True,” he shrugged as he leapt down beside her, “but it looked a bit grotesque. I might find my muse and work it into a play for le Grand Guignol. What do you think?”

  “I think you would need to find your muse first.”

  He laughed at her quip. “Hey! Where do you think your friend, Dr Watson, got to with that weird librarian?”

  “Monsieur Radzival – what makes you call him weird?”

  “Well, he is weird. He reminds me of a salamander. He’s got a slender body, short arms and a blunt head. His legs are the right length for his torso, but the rest is weirdly proportioned. I bet he’s able to grow a body part if you chop it off.”

  “Does he go often to the theatre?”

  “Never.”

  “He doesn’t accompany la marquise on occasion?”

  “Never.”

  “She goes regularly?”

  “Of course.”

  “On her own?”

  “Always. She is a major benefactress and keeps a private booth. She always comes back-stage after a show to congratulate everyone on their performance. She doesn’t mind being seen. She is not a hypocrite.”

  “Does la marquise have any say in the show?”

  “If you mean does she tell Davidov how to do his job – no! Oh, there’s your friend now, crossing the bridge with the librarian. I don’t how la marquise can stand that slimy salamander slinking around Hotel de Merimont day and night. He gives Kiki the creeps.”

  The Marais started life as a marshy bog outside the walls of Paris where the Knights Templar chose to build their place of worship. Other religious buildings such as churches, abbeys and convents quickly followed suit and before long the nobility were erecting their private palaces in the shadows of God’s many houses. The unwholesome marsh soon boasted the greatest number of hotels particulier of any arrondissement.

  Renaissance palaces that resembled miniature versions of Versailles had sprung up everywhere: Hotel de Sully, de Beauvais, de Soubise, de Guenegaud and Carnavalet gave the marsh panache. The odd one out was Hotel de Sens which stayed true to the medieval castle vernacular. It was from this latter particulier that Hotel de Merimont took its cue. It was built like an urban fortress situated within its own stone walls, centred in its own country garden, clos de Millefleurs. Enclosure of a thousand flowers.

  After the landau had deposited Monsieur Radzival back at Hotel de Merimont, the Countess and Dr Watson were at last free to talk. She began by recounting Raoul Crespigny’s story about the anonymous envelopes and finished with the marionette in the travel trunk.

  “Whose room was it?” quizzed the doctor, alert to the coincidence of such a find.

  “Hilaire Dupont’s.”

  “Not Felix Frey’s?”

  “No, I thought the same thing myself. I thought it might belong to the clown. I double-checked to make sure.”

  “You didn’t give the game away?”

  “Mais non, mon ami, I was careful not to show interest in the marionette in front of Monsieur Crespigny.”

  “Which reminds me, did we mention anything about marionettes whilst having that discussion in the cloak room, the one he was privy to without our knowledge?”

  “I wondered about that too. The thought of it kept me awake for several hours. I don’t believe we let anything slip. We discussed clowns and red lipstick but I do not recall that we used the word marionette or puppet.”

  “That’s a relief. Describe the marionette you found in the trunk.”

  She closed her eyes to better visualize it. “It was made of wood with movable parts. It looked not just old but a genuine antique. The paint on the face was chipped and the vestments were faded and worn. Each item of clothing was well made yet appeared not to belong to any period of history. It was as if the maker had borrowed something from each period. Did I mention it was male? Well, it was. It was scary but not in the same way that Punch is scary. It made my blood run cold to look at it, but I did not feel afraid. I felt a bit sorry for it actually. It was quite ugly yet I couldn’t look at it without feeling pity, the way you do for someone who is appallingly ugly or badly disfigured. The physical proportions were out of kilter. Big head, long arms, short legs. There was a bell on his velvet hat and a bow on each of his wooden clogs. The bell recalled jesters and troubadours but not in a good way. The bell on his hat made him look silly. I remembered a circus freak I’d seen once, a dwarf, who had been dressed in a silly costume with bells. Everyone laughed at him but not in a good way. Most of all, probably because of his huge size, he reminded me not of a marionette but a ventriloquist’s doll.”

  “You went from saying ‘it’ to ‘him’ when describing the marionette as if you started off picturing a puppet and ended up picturing a real person.”

  She opened her eyes with a start. “Did I?”

  A pitter-patter noise forced him to look out of the window of the landau. “Oh, bother! It’s just started raining and I left my bedroom window open.”

  “Mahmoud will close it.”

  He shook his head as he studied the gouache of thick clouds. “He won’t be able to. I keep my door locked.�
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  “Oh, don’t worry. He will have a master key.”

  The doctor tried not to squirm. Just thinking about snakes had him picturing a venomous adder in the landau curling around his ankles. He checked the floor then immediately castigated himself. “I say, isn’t that the Pont Neuf we just passed. This coachman is hopeless!”

  “We’re not returning to rue Bonaparte just yet. While you were busy staring after Monsieur Radzival I directed the coachman to take us to Montmartre.”

  “I was not staring after him,” he denied indignantly. “I was trying to figure out where the man in the black cloak was standing last night.”

  “What man?”

  “While I was conversing with Monsieur Crespigny on the balcony last night I noticed a man wearing a black cloak looking up at us from the courtyard. I think he was standing in the shadow of the arched gate. I don’t think he was one of the guests.”

  “Why didn’t you mention this earlier?”

  “I didn’t think it was important. Why?”

  “Today, there was a man in a black cloak watching us from the opposite bank of the Canal Saint-Martin. I asked Monsieur Crespigny if he had ever seen him before and he replied in the negative. I wondered if it might be Anonymous. Later, I discounted that theory because Monsieur Crespigny had already received the plays for next week. They were delivered early this morning while he was at the Hotel de Merimont. That’s what caused him to forget his midday appointment at rue Bonaparte. He was busy copying the plays out in his own hand and destroying the originals.”

  Dr Watson stroked his moustache thoughtfully. “Do you think the man was watching the peniche or watching you?”

  “Monsieur Crespigny was of the opinion the man was watching me. I didn’t say anything but I agreed with him because this morning Xenia informed me that she overheard our coachman recounting to the servants that a hansom cab without a passenger had followed him all the way from Hotel de Merimont to rue Bonaparte and then turned into a mews.”

  “I’ll question the coachman later. The man I saw was above average height and build.”