The Marais Assassin E-Book

Claude Izner

• Herausgeber: Pushkin Vertigo
• Kategorie: Krimi
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 436

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2025

Beschreibung

Parisian bookseller, Victor Legris, finds a new case to investigate very close to home, when his business partner's apartment is burgled. Curiously, the only item stolen is a decorative goblet of little value. But on learning that two people with connections to the goblet have been murdered, Victor becomes convinced of its secret significance. How quickly can he bring the killing spree to an end, in a city beset by terrorist activity?

Leseprobe

THE MARAIS ASSASSIN

CLAUDE IZNER

Translated by Lorenza Garcia and Isabel Reid

To Emmanuelle Heurtebize

To our nearest and dearest, with special mention of B and J, our American expert and our Moscow expert

To Anna, Valentina and Enrico

Et tu coules toujours, Seine, et tout en rampant,

Tu traînes dans Paris ton corps de vieux serpent,

De vieux serpent boueux, emportant vers tes havres

Tes cargaisons de bois, de houille et de cadavers!

Paul Verlaine

(Poèmes saturniens, ‘Caprices’)

And the Seine flows, crawls, drags itself

Always the muddy serpent of Paris

Bearing towards Le Havre its cargoes

Of wood, of coal – and corpses

Translated by C.K. Stead

Le Marché des Enfants-Rouges was to be found behind a gate at 39 Rue de Bretagne. It opened in 1628 and took its name from the children’s home nearby, which was founded by Marguerite de Navarre, housing orphans who wore red uniforms.

All the characters in The Marais Assassin are imaginary with the exception of Paul Verlaine, Paul Fort, Jean Moréas, Albert Gaudry, Eugène Dubois, Ravachol, Alphonse Bertillon, Trimouillat, Ma Gueule, Cazals, Caubel de la Ville Ingan and, of course, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec.

We would like to thank all the team at 10/18 for their kindness and support. 

CONTENTS

Title Page 

Dedication

Epigraph

Plan of Victor Legris’s Paris

The Marais Assassin

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

CHAPTER 5

CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 7

CHAPTER 8

CHAPTER 9

CHAPTER 10

CHAPTER 11

CHAPTER 12

CHAPTER 13

CHAPTER 14

CHAPTER 15

CHAPTER 16

EPILOGUE

Some Historical Context to The Marais Assassin

Notes

About the Authors

Also by Claude Izner:

Copyright  

PROLOGUE

Paris, 27 March 1892

THE clock of the Église Trinité had just struck eight o’clock in the morning when, without warning, an ear-splitting explosion ripped through the district. A building on Rue de Clichy rocked on its foundations, and within seconds its staircase had collapsed from top to bottom and its windows had shattered.

His body vibrated with the shock of the blast and he thought only: Apocalypse. The street began to dance before his eyes. The dust pricked his nostrils, but what invaded him was something other than its bitter odour, something that seemed to emerge as a long-suppressed memory of a past experience. It was the echo of what had happened long ago. A sign.

His ardent belief in the existence of Divine decision, his respect for the Scriptures and his terror of the sacraments all stirred in him the memory of his guardian pointing rigidly towards the dark sky. It had returned, his voice growled. Always the same words:

‘And there was a great trembling of the earth, the sun darkened like sackcloth, the moon turned blood red … Wallowing in heresy leads to damnation. You shall be punished! Punished!’

Glass fragments littered the roads. An old man sat on the edge of the pavement, trembling all over. A woman, her clothes torn and her hair covered in plaster, was screaming. Help was already arriving.

The bedroom was a refuge in the dead of night, reassuring, comfortable, protected by its wood-panelled walls. On the desk, the pale pink lampshade created rainbows on the side of a carafe of water. A hand picked up the inkwell. The only thing to break the silence was the scratching of the pen as it conscientiously traced upstrokes and down strokes on a piece of squared paper.

This morning, the wrath of God resonated once more, piercing my eardrums and shaking my bones to the marrow. The cohort of wolves in sheep’s clothing spread lies and uncertainty amongst the flock. I was there. My gorge rose; I thought my brain was exploding. I was blinded by the dazzling light. The sky beat down on us. A thousand hammers shattered my head. God reminded me what I must accomplish. I felt triumphant, for God created man in his own image bearing his likeness, and he created all things on earth and he has placed his confidence in me. As I have discovered what is being plotted, it is my duty to act. I am the arm of God. I will achieve my end; no one will take possession of that abomination. I will use extreme means. Humanity has taken a wrong turn. I must separate the wheat from the chaff; that is my solemn oath. Oh, Lord, arm your emissary.

CHAPTER 1

The Highlands of Scotland, 5 April 1892

STATIONED on the low branch of a beech tree, a Siamese cat, muscles tensed, claws at the ready, kept a close watch on a bush where a field mouse had taken refuge. White storm clouds scudded across the sky, blown by the north wind that battered the trees in the park. A red moon, alternately veiled then unveiled, feebly lit the countryside. The cat could barely make out the heather shrouded in mist where his victim was hiding. Beyond a clump of maple trees the outline of Brougham House could be seen, sitting on the hill like a sentry surveying the road that snaked up from the foot of glen.

The cat passed a wet paw over the dark patch on his face and flattened himself against the bark of the tree. Down below, a dark shape burst out from behind a fan of bracken. The cat pounced. Just as his mouth was closing around the frail creature, a muted trembling shook the ground. The vibration surprised the cat, and he hesitated for a moment, long enough for his prey to disappear between two rocks. Disappointed, the cat abandoned the chase. Rising up full length on his hind legs, he sharpened his claws against the tree trunk and went back over to the drive, moving nonchalantly like an old gentleman taking his postprandial stroll. Suddenly a furious mass, dragged by the combined effort of horses with mad eyes, erupted before him. Panic-stricken, the cat scuttled to the top of a scrub oak, from where he observed the four-wheeled monster rolling towards the gates of Brougham House.

The cat waited with trembling ears, his nostrils filled with the odour of horse, until his heart had regained its normal rhythm. When he thought it was safe to do so, he cautiously left his refuge. Then a new fear rooted him to the spot. Something else was coming up the glen: horse and rider emerged round the bend. The cat hissed, puffing himself up, and the horse swerved. A whip cracked, nearly taking out the eye of the Siamese, who fled deep into the shrubbery.

Jennings had forgotten to stoke up the fire. Seated near the window, Lady Frances Stone was about to pull the servant’s bell when the sight of a Victoria coming up the central drive stayed her hand. Who could be visiting at such a late hour? Since the death of Lord Stone, the only visitors she received were Dr Barley and Reverend Anthony, and they always came in the morning. Lady Stone drew the edges of her shawl together over her thin chest and resolved to throw some logs on the fire. A feeble mewing caught her attention. That rascal of a cat! Clamped against the window, he looked like a gargoyle, with his phosphorescent pupils and his triangular face split in a rictus. Lady Stone had scarcely opened the window when the Siamese leapt on to her knee, causing her to cry out as he drew his paws across her skirt.

‘What are you purring like that for? You sound like a little motor. It’s not like you to be so affectionate – have you had a brush with the poacher’s dogs? Shh! Be quiet so that I can hear … Jennings has let someone in.’

Jennings, in light blue livery, with breeches, white stockings and buckled shoes, his powdered hair knotted on the nape of his neck with a wide black ribbon, was straight out of a Hogarth painting. Astonished by this garb, Antoine du Houssoye followed him as far as a drawing room filled with dusty furniture, massive bookcases and armour. Jennings turned on his heel without a word.

‘Charming welcome,’ muttered Antoine du Houssoye. ‘It’s freezing in here. Who was singing the praises of Scottish hospitality? In any case their thrift is not a myth! No fire even though it’s so cold …’

In the faint light of the candelabrum left by the manservant, he made out the titles of the books lining the shelves: bibles, missals and theological treatises. He shrugged his shoulders and, taking a notebook from the pocket of his frock coat, scribbled a few lines.

I’m actually here, I will finally know if the trail indicated by the Emperor of Surabaya is the correct one. Is it possible that I will succeed in catching up with D? If I do, I will be the first to prove the existence of that…

He interrupted himself, struck by the thought that had taken root the previous evening in the Balmoral Hotel: where was his precious file of notes that he had gathered in Java? Had he mislaid them?

No, they must be at the bottom of one of the drawers of his trunk, or in his bag of …

A concealed door opened and a tiny woman in a pink muslin dress and an old-fashioned frilled bonnet entered. Antoine felt as if he had gone back in time; surely this fragile little person had been born during the reign of George III? In a voice like a hissing kettle, she informed him that Lady Stone was ready to receive him. She seized the candelabrum and without looking back trotted along a dark corridor in which he glimpsed a series of forbidding portraits. Looking up, he discovered an imposing gallery accessed by a grand staircase that the little person in the bonnet was climbing as nimbly as a squirrel. Antoine, disorientated by the gloom, his eyes riveted to the pink dress, scrambled up the steps trying desperately not to stumble, and found himself before double doors that had just opened.

A boudoir dominated by Chippendale and old porcelain and lit by the dancing flames of a blazing fire was the backdrop for a wheelchair in which a lady sat, stroking the Siamese cat ensconced on her lap. An oil lamp glowed on a pedestal table beside a pile of journals and books. The lady dismissed the wizened centenarian and slowly swivelled her chair round. Antoine was disconcerted by the sight of the pallid, angular face, all its energy concentrated in the blazing eyes, which locked on his, giving him the impression that they saw into the depths of his soul. After studying him for a long moment, she blinked and the crumpled mouth stretched into a smile. She motioned him towards her. Her emaciated body was wrapped in black lace, with a flower-patterned shawl and a wool skirt. An openwork mantilla with a garland of flowers covered her hair and a large pearl on a velvet band hung between her eyebrows. Her fingers caressed the cat’s fur. She looked like one of the bas-reliefs on the Buddhist temple of Borobudur.

Lady Stone looked appraisingly at the wiry, tanned man before her. His short beard and pointed moustache were worthy of the hero of one of her childhood novels, the musketeer D’Artagnan. She pictured herself young, beautiful and eligible on the arm of this seductive individual, but his image was immediately replaced in her mind by the stout silhouette of Lord Stone.

How ridiculous I’m being. He’s forty and I’m sixty-five. He could be my son. I’m acting like a young shop girl, when actually I’m an over-the-hill …

‘I rarely receive visitors,’ she said. ‘I agreed to honour your request in memory of my deceased brother. Please be brief.’

She addressed him composedly in good French. She did not invite him to sit down and he shifted from one foot to another.

‘As I indicated in my letter, I have come to …’

‘In that case, alas, I very much fear that I must disappoint you. That object is no longer in my possession. As sole beneficiary, I respected the wishes of my brother and distributed his legacies to museums …’

She broke off and addressed the cat. ‘What is it now?’

Suddenly rigid, the cat was staring at the window. A gust of wind had brought a scent to his nostrils, unexpected and hostile. He jumped on to the window sill and froze, confused by the shadows. He listened, trying to locate the intruder, and eventually made out a tall, thin figure hanging on to some toothing at the edge of the wall. Terrified, the cat ran to hide near the hearth. Lady Stone concluded that the rats must have returned and made a mental note to tell Jennings to have them exterminated.

‘Where was I?’

‘You made gifts to museums ….’

‘Oh yes, museums, and the numerous accounts written by my brother and his collection of herbariums were given to scientific institutions. As for the private pieces, I bequeathed them to his closest friends.’

‘Do you have the name of the friend who received the item mentioned in my letter? It’s extremely important,’ insisted Antoine.

‘Assuredly I know the identity of the beneficiary. He lives in Paris; you can try to contact him. I’ve written down his address for you.’

She held out an envelope and pulled the bell.

‘And now, dear Monsieur, my maid will show you out.’

He took his leave, torn between jubilation at the idea that his quest might be nearly at an end and disappointment. He had hoped to spend the night at Brougham House and now he would have to make his way back to Edinburgh on those impossible roads!

Adieu, handsome D’Artagnan, thought Lady Stone, moving to the fireplace. What can you want with that ugly object? Johnny warned me that it brought misfortune, even though he didn’t believe in such superstitions. Poor Johnny, his life cut off in its prime …

She lost herself in contemplation of the flames, in which strange shapes danced. The cat, his fur on end, his eyes gleaming, watched a hazy apparition slip through the window, first black-gloved hands, then a foot, legs, a torso … Noiselessly, it landed on the carpet and approached Lady Stone from behind. The cat saw the pearly flash of the handle of a revolver and a gunshot rent the silence. Mewing raucously, he shot under a chest of drawers.

London, Thursday, 7 April

Iris had sore feet, but dared not tell Kenji. They had been wandering for half an hour among the graves of Highgate Cemetery, swept by an icy breeze. They finally halted before a pink marble tombstone engraved in gold lettering with a simple inscription:

DAPHNÉ LEGRIS

1839–1878

Rest in Peace

Kenji was unprepared for the emotion that overcame him. His eyes filled with tears, his shoulders trembled. He turned quickly away and removed the top hat that he forced himself to wear during his trips to London. He pictured Daphné’s graceful form in the bookshop in Sloane Square when he was still only her husband’s shop assistant. He recalled their platonic passion, the furtive smiles, the rare moments when their hands touched. Six or seven months after the death of Monsieur Legris, Daphné had given herself to him. Their secret liaison, crowned by the birth of Iris, had lasted ten years.

He surreptitiously wiped away his tears and looked proudly at his daughter, wrapped up warmly in her cloak, as she scattered rose petals over the grave. He reflected that her atypical beauty perpetuated the union between him and Daphné: East and west are fused in her. I want her to be happy and to have a glittering future.

Had he been aware that at precisely that moment Iris was thinking of a certain blond, slightly hunchbacked young man, employed in his own bookshop in Paris, Kenji would not only have been disappointed, he would have been furious.

‘Why was my mother not buried at Kensal Green with her family?’

‘We were very fond of Highgate. We dreamed of buying a house here, because of the purity of the air and the view of London. Daphné worshipped Coleridge, who is buried in a school chapel nearby. One day we were walking here and she made me promise that if she died first I would accommodate her – that was her expression, accommodate – in the east cemetery.’

The Egyptian-style tombs, watched over by the dark flame of the cypress trees, were vaguely reminiscent of the Père-Lachaise Cemetery in Paris. They paused in front of the last resting place of the chemist Faraday, then at the grave of Mary Ann Evans, better known as George Eliot.

‘You must read The Mill on the Floss,’ said Kenji.

‘You know I’m not very keen on reading,’ retorted Iris.

Except Joseph’s serial, she thought to herself.

Bother! Her father was stopping again. She read out:

KARL MARX

1818–1883

‘The son of a lawyer who converted to Protestantism since it wasn’t wise to be Jewish in the Prussia of Frederick William III.’

‘A friend of yours?’ she asked, stifling a laugh.

Kenji started. She had Daphné’s laugh.

‘No, a friend of the working classes. The stone he threw into the political pond has not yet finished making ripples. I find him particularly sympathetic because of the answers he gave to a questionnaire put to him by his daughters:

‘“What is your favourite saying?”

‘“Question everything.”

‘“What is your favourite occupation?”

‘“Reading.”’

Reading! That’s all they talk about! Iris said to herself in exasperation as she stood on the terrace and looked out at the magnificent view. The dome of St Paul’s Cathedral resembled a gigantic mushroom. She imagined it transformed into a hot-air balloon, floating over fields sewn together like a green and yellow chessboard. Kenji interrupted her reverie by declaring in a learned tone: ‘Fourteen miles from east to west, eight from north to south. London is home to more Catholics than Rome, more Irish than Dublin and more Scots than Edinburgh …’

‘You’re better than Baedeker! Last one to the Archway tavern pays a forfeit!’ she cried, speeding off, holding her hat on with one hand.

‘No! Iris, wait!’

He joined her, out of breath and fractious, as she hailed an omnibus.

‘I want to take the tube … Let’s go to Islington!’

It was a command.

Resignedly Kenji slumped against the window of the onmibus, trying to forget his age and his fatigue.

They took a lift down to the platform, in which Iris imagined herself plunging to the bottom of a mine. Pink with pleasure she all but burst out laughing in the coach of the City and South London Railway, where she attracted the admiring glances of the male passengers. Kenji’s pride in his daughter was mixed with tenderness – she was full of youthful exuberance.

I’m in love, Iris thought as the carriage rumbled along. I’m a woman now. He kissed me four times the day I left. By now he will have received the letter I posted at Victoria station. I wonder if he blushed. When I told him I found him attractive, he turned bright red!

‘Let’s get out at London Bridge – we can catch a cab from there.’

She hailed one of the new hansom cabs, with its carriage suspended between two huge wheels and the driver seated at the back. Aghast at this new caprice, Kenji shouted, ‘Sloane Square!’ through the opening in the hood.

As they strolled round Sloane Square, the sight of the bookshop stirred up painful memories. An image rose up before him: the extremely corpulent Monsieur Legris, stick in hand, threatening Victor as he hid behind his mother. What minor misdemeanour had the boy committed? Only Kenji had not feared the bookseller. He knew how to calm him by coolly reeling off one of his made-up proverbs; he had probably declared something like, ‘Of the Great Fire of London not a single cinder remains,’ and Monsieur Legris would have retreated from the charge and lowered his stick.

‘Has the shop changed?’ asked Iris.

‘It’s been repainted and the windows …’

He stopped to listen to a newspaper seller yelling out the headlines:

‘Scotland Yard still questioning staff of the murdered Lady Frances …’

The surname was drowned by the noise of a passing carriage.

‘… in her home, Brougham House. Police seek identity of visitor on the evening of her murder!’

‘The windows have smaller panes now,’ finished Kenji.

‘Shall we go in?’

‘No need to stir up ghosts.’

‘I like Chelsea. If I had to live in London, it would be here … Or else Westminster or Regent’s Park.’

‘Your mother and I liked to meet under the cedar tree in the Chelsea Physic Garden. We also liked the Reading Room in Cromwell Road. Shall we go there?’

‘I would rather finish my purchases. I promised Tasha I’d go to Twinings on the Strand to get her some tea. And Victor would like catalogues from Quaritch the bookseller and Eastman the photographic shop. That will take me as far as Oxford Street and I’d like to see the ladies’ rooms at DH Evans. Father, could I have some money?’

Kenji sighed. Iris would be the ruin of him. And if she were not, Eudoxie Allard, alias Fifi Bas-Rhin, would be. Eudoxie had tired of her Russian Archduke and had taken up with Kenji again the month before. He was planning to buy her something in one of the jewellers in New Bond Street.

Kenji enjoyed his encounters with Eudoxie, which provided agreeable interludes and satisfied his virile needs. They were careful not to introduce any elements of their day-to-day lives into their relationship, offering each other only the best of themselves. Their relationship, limited to eroticism, remained casual, because Kenji’s heart would always belong to Daphné.

‘We’re dining at seven thirty in the hotel restaurant and I’ve reserved a box at the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden. I think I’ll stay here for a while. Don’t be late now!’

Iris nodded politely, although she detested opera and knew she would be bored to tears. I’ll think about Joseph, she decided, climbing up to the upper deck of a brown omnibus. In the meantime I’ll buy him a tiepin.

Paris, Friday 8 April, five o’clock in the morning

It had become a routine. He would get up quietly, listening for Gabrielle’s regular breathing, grab the clothes discarded the night before from the chair and dress in the adjoining bathroom. He would light an oil lamp so that he could see his way down the hall, at the end of which he would quickly duck into the pantry, just long enough to drink a glass of water and cut himself a slice of bread. He would creep down the stairs, grateful that the old man’s ancient dog had finally kicked the bucket and would not give him away by barking. Then he would go carefully down the stone steps, snuff out the lamp and leave it outside the concierge’s lodge.

He opened the door slowly so that it would not creak and crossed the courtyard, taking care that his boots did not clatter on the cobblestones. With four strides he was out in the street, filled with the intoxicating sense of freedom he felt each time he escaped the family circle.

At first he had disliked his bouts of insomnia, but he had cultivated the affliction until gradually it became chronic. Night was his kingdom. When he could not sleep, he had the time to write up notes on his conferences and plan the quest that would culminate in his magnum opus. But normally what happened, as this morning, was that after three or four hours of restless sleep, he would awake at dawn and take advantage of the early hour to wander along the slumbering narrow streets, before joining Boulevard de Sébastopol, where he would sip coffee at the counter of a bar, among the market gardeners who brought their produce to Les Halles. Then he would head for the museum.

The inhabitants of the Enfants-Rouges quarter were sleeping, shut away from the biting cold. His breath turned to vapour in the dim light of the street-lamps. He made his way into the gloom, along the wet pavements of the narrow Rue Pastourelle, then through the milky gap of Rue du Temple, which he left reluctantly, slipping quietly long Rue des Gravilliers. The game of hide-and-seek between shadow and light reminded him of his escapades in the equatorial rainforest long ago, where sun and stars were hidden by the thick mass of vegetation. The river of Rue de Turbigo flowed peacefully; the door of the Église Saint-Nicolas-des-Champs was like a rock stemming the tide. In the square, workmen in blue smocks and cotton caps accompanied by their wives in knotted headscarves were returning from Les Halles, where they had delivered their vegetables. Once the horses were unhitched they went off to put their carts back in Rue Greneta, where glorious chaos reigned under the flickering light of the street-lamps.

As the man walked past the vast hangar of a toy factory, the entrance to which was blocked off by carts, he heard someone call his name. He stopped, trying to make out where the voice had come from – it seemed to reverberate from beyond the greyish mass of a dray. A sharp crack rang out. The man made a vague gesture towards his chest, a fleeting expression of bemusement crossed his face, his legs gave way and he toppled over some bundles of wadding.

By the time he had been dragged behind a pile of crates and a hand had patted his frock coat in search of his wallet, he was dead.

Paris, same day, seven o’clock in the morning.

A pale light filtered between the curtains and the murmurings of the city could be heard in the distance. The fingers holding the pen moved rapidly across the paper:

The seven thunders have made their voices heard. I am the emissary. I have eliminated the two witnesses. Now I must destroy the abomination before false prophets get hold of it and seduce those who bear the mark of the beast and worship his image.

The emissary put down his pen, closed his notebook and went to bury it in the depths of his wardrobe. The carafe of water on the desk acted like a prism, multiplying the pinkish light of the lamp many times over in miniature.

CHAPTER 2

Friday, 8 April, nine o’clock in the morning

WHEN Tasha was asleep, the pillow squashed beneath her cheek, Victor was free from anxiety. Even though her dreams carried her out of reach, she was his. No matter how much he reproached himself for and tried to suppress his possessiveness, it always crept insidiously back. For several months he had believed that he had conquered it, but recently it had reappeared. Tasha seemed to be hiding something from him and was often preoccupied. Moreover, he had caught her one evening reading a letter that she had hastily whisked out of sight when she saw him. Since then he had been eaten up by doubt.

He snuggled up against her, fitting himself to the outline of her naked form, but still he could not relax. His mind was like an attic in which a jumble of experiences, anxieties and hopes was piled high. It was impossible to get a wink of sleep. One thought led to another … He was obsessed with the temptation of finding that letter; he had to know what was in it. Unable to bear it any more, he got up and began methodically going through her drawing boxes, drawers and pockets. Finally, finding nothing, he went back to bed and lay still, eyes open, staring at the window.

Where was the fulfilment and harmony he had assumed would characterise living as a couple? Could they be called a couple? Two apartments on either side of a courtyard, two careers …

‘We’ve loved each other for almost three years, and we’ve hardly progressed … And you’ve hardly progressed …’ he said to himself, flattening a tuft of hair.

He sat up and kissed her on the forehead, neck and throat. Languorously she touched his chest and her leg slid between his. They let themselves go until they had passed the point of no return.

‘Young man, you have an annoying habit of procrastinating!’ barked the Comtesse de Salignac.

‘What on earth? Why is the battleaxe talking to me about procreation?’ wondered Joseph, engaged in tying up the parcel for the Comtesse, his first customer of the morning.

‘You’ve been promising me George de Peyrebrune’s1Dairy of a Blue-stocking from Ollendorf for an eternity. Some hope! How much do I owe you?’

The Comtesse de Salignac glared at Joseph from behind her lorgnette. She leant forward a little to study the book that he was trying to hide under his newspaper.

‘Fenimore Cooper … The young today simply revel in violence! And people wonder at the rising tide of crime!’ she exclaimed, her mouth formed in the disapproving shape of a parrot’s beak.

She paid for the Jules Mary,2 with which she had had to make do, as furious as a victim of the rabies that the newspapers indicated had returned to Paris.

‘Good riddance,’ snarled Joseph, unfolding Iris’s letter again.

My dearest Joseph,

Dare I say ‘my beloved’? Yes, your kisses permit me to. Consider this letter a pledge by which I promise myself to you. I will be yours when you have succeeded in convincing my father and in demonstrating the brilliance of your talent. Until then I swear fidelity to you …

‘Fidelity,’ he murmured. ‘That’s beautiful. A little chaste, but beautiful. She’s shy … As for convincing her father …’

Kenji’s stern face superimposed itself on the figure of the Red Indian brandishing a tomahawk on the colourful jacket of The Last of the Mohicans.

Surprised by the jangling of the door bell, Joseph tucked the letter in his pocket and donned his bookseller’s smile.

‘I’d like to see the bookshop owner, Monsieur Kenji Mori.’

The man, who had tinted glasses and wore a black wool double-breasted overcoat and a dented bowler hat, made his request calmly yet forcefully. Alarmed, Joseph imagined that the man was an officer of the moral police, come to warn Kenji that his assistant was compromising the virtue of his daughter.

‘One of the owners,’ he corrected. ‘His associate, Monsieur Legris, won’t be long. He’ll be here at about ten o’clock. I’m the one who …’

‘In that case, I’ll go and see Monsieur Mori at home – where does he live?’

‘He lives in the adjoining building, number 18, but he’s travelling at the moment. Can I take a message?’

The man adjusted his bowler hat with a nonchalant gesture that was belied by his frown.

‘That’s most unfortunate. Here’s my address. Please give it to him and ask him to contact me. When will he be back?’

‘Tomorrow.’

The man scribbled rapidly on the back of his visiting card, put it on the counter and made for the door without saying goodbye.

‘What does he think I am, that fellow?’ muttered Joseph. ‘Part of the furniture? I’ll show them all, when I’m as famous as Émile Gaboriau!’

He had been disappointed that the publication of his serial ‘The Strange Affair at Colombines’3 had brought him neither fame nor fortune, although thanks to him the circulation of Le Passe-partout had increased. According to Antonin Clusel, the editor of the newspaper, he would have to publish one or two more novels of the same sort before he could expect any recognition. ‘So better get writing, old chap, and make it good!’

‘I’d like to see him at it. I’m as dry of ideas as a squeezed lemon!’

Frozen in the middle of the courtyard of 18 Rue des Saints-Pères, the man with the tinted glasses stared first at the concierge, who was wielding her broom, then up at the closed shutters of the first floor of the four-storey building, before turning on his heel and leaving. He strode off down Rue des Saints-Pères.

On Quai Malaquais, a woman seated on the terrace of the Temps Perdu café lowered the menu she had been pretending to study and joined him near the cab rank.

Resisting the urge to re-read Iris’s letter, Joseph picked up the notebook in which he stuck newspaper articles about crimes or unusual occurrences. He did not notice the visiting card left by the man in the bowler hat flutter down to the bottom of the umbrella stand. The last pages of his notebook were exclusively devoted to the anarchist bombings the previous month and the arrest on the 30 March, at the Restaurant Véry,4 of their perpetrator, one Ravachol.

‘Illustrious dynamiter, furtive and calamitous …’5 Joseph started to sing, but he broke off at the sight of his mother, laden with provisions.

Too late, she had heard, and she went upstairs grumbling, ‘There he goes again with his flights of fancy. Those thugs are threatening to blow up the capital. They wouldn’t care if we all went up in smoke.’

Joseph let out a weary sigh. ‘Maman, I’ve told you a hundred times. Monsieur Legris would prefer you not to traipse through the bookshop with the groceries. You can easily go through the courtyard – it’s not that much of a detour!’

‘But the concierge will hold me up! That Madame Ballu, she could talk the hind leg off a donkey. She gets on my nerves!’

‘That’s not a good enough reason. We’re working here and the customers …’

‘Oh, the customers? I see. Monsieur is ashamed of his mother; Monsieur would like to see the back of her! Well, don’t worry, I’ll soon be joining your poor father, and then you’ll be happy.’

‘I didn’t say that! Do you want me to help you?’

‘Don’t trouble yourself. You obviously have much more important things to see to. Oh the cross I have to bear!’ she groaned, climbing the stairs.

Since Christmas Day 1891, when Germaine had solemnly hung up her apron because Mademoiselle Iris balked at eating the turkey, Euphrosine had been preparing meals for Kenji and his daughter, cleaning their apartment and then going each afternoon to Rue Fontaine to cook and dust for Victor and Tasha. For the first few weeks, overjoyed at no longer having to pull her costermonger’s cart, she had found her duties light, especially since she went to and fro on the omnibus. But, in spite of these benefits, she had started to complain about her rheumatism, about the demands of Iris’s vegetarianism and the weight of her domestic responsibilities, even though she skimped on the housework.

For his part, Joseph, while taking advantage of his mother’s absence to meet Iris secretly at their apartment, found it hard to bear being under her eye all morning in the Elzévir bookshop.

He unfolded La Vie Populaire and continued to read out loud to himself from Émile Zola’s latest novel, The Debacle.6

‘Those white sheets! How he had longed for sheets! Jean could not take his eyes off them. He had not undressed, had not slept in a bed for six weeks …’

‘Of course, it would be paradise after the butchery of the battlefields,’ Joseph murmured.

*

Tasha woke Victor gently by hugging him tenderly, then bounded out of bed, ran to set the water to boil and snatched up a coffee grinder that she placed between his thighs.

‘Get up and start cranking. I could eat a horse! Shall I make you some bread and butter?’

‘What time is it?’

‘Eleven o’clock. Joseph is going to grumble.’

Barefoot and munching, her slice of bread in hand, she went to study the canvas she was working on, a modern version of Poussin’s EliezerandRebecca. A group of women, seated in a cabaret, were laughingly observing a rather self-conscious young man as he offered one of them some flowers, while a waitress filled an overflowing glass.

In the version of Moses Saved from the Waters she had just finished, and in which she had represented a mother bathing her baby in a basin in a wash-house, she had striven to mix realism and symbolism. She had been satisfied with Moses, but she could not stop retouching this second composition. In order to be less financially dependant upon Victor, she had undertaken to illustrate an edition of Edgar Alan Poe’s Extraordinary Stories, and as a result she was suffering from having less time to devote to her painting.

There was a knock at the door. Victor, who was sitting in his underwear, the coffee grinder between his knees, was dismayed to see Maurice Laumier hove into view. That ambitious, daubing charlatan had been hanging around Tasha again for several weeks now. He was trying to persuade her to paint theatre scenery.

‘Greetings and prosperity,’ he brayed, tossing his top hat on the bed. ‘Don’t worry about me – I’ve already had breakfast! Dearest, I just bumped into the young Paul Fort. He has grandiose plans for his Théâtre d’Art. Let’s have a go at the trompe-l’oeils!’

‘You’re obsessed,’ groaned Victor.

‘My dear chap, you are totally incapable of grasping our precept, which can be expressed in ten words: “Scenery is as much created by speech as anything else.” Edgar Alan Poe’s The Crow was performed before a simple backdrop of brown paper.’

Not wanting to hear any more, Victor dressed hastily and was preparing to leave. He would have liked to kiss Tasha, but could not bring himself to under the sarcastic gaze of Laumier.

‘What about your coffee?’ she cried.

‘I’m late for a meeting, then I have to go to Rue des Saints-Pères. I’ll be back this afternoon.’

‘I’m not sure I’ll be here …’

‘Too bad,’ he murmured.

Just as he was about to grasp its handle, the door opened, revealing a small man in bowler hat and pince-nez, smoking a cigar.

‘Lautrec! What a coincidence! I went to the Indépendants,’ bellowed Laumier. ‘It’s superbly laid out. I adore your La Goulue Entering Le Moulin-Rouge. It’s a riot!’

Really, this was too much. Victor strode the short distance to his apartment and went to shut himself in his darkroom. He didn’t care that Tasha would reproach him for being surly; he absolutely could not bear to know she was surrounded by those men, each as vulgar as the other. Creative, Tasha called them. And what about his talent, did she not value that?

‘Painting, painting, always painting! And what of photography?’

Victor had studied the work of the Scottish photographer John Thomson closely, especially his photographic account The Illustration of China and its People. He hoped to do for the people of the streets of Paris what Thomson had done for London, but without falling into pathos and the stereotypical images of misery. He would position his work somewhere between Charles Nègre and Charles Marville.7

He looked at his photographs of children at work, taken on Faubourg Saint-Antoine and Rue des Immeubles-Industriels: a girl embroidering cloth with gold, a boy busy sawing wood for veneer, the pupil of a rhinestone cutter, the apprentice of a wallpaper maker. These portraits, taken in apartments converted into studios, had demanded enormous care; he had put as much sensibility as technique into them, seeking to ensure that the subjects stayed natural in front of the camera.

He shrugged on his frock coat, crammed on his felt hat and snatched up his gloves and cane. Since he could not eat with Tasha, he would go and find sustenance on Boulevard des Capucines, at Café Napolitain, and hard luck, Joseph!

Madame Ballu, the concierge of 18 Rue des Saints-Pères, had risen grumbling at dawn, and had been scrubbing the courtyard and staircase of the building ever since. Now she judged that she had earned a little relaxation, and planned to tuck into a plate of cabbage with chopped bacon in her lodge. Then she would allow herself a mouthful of the vintage port with which her late husband, Onésime Ballu, had kept the sideboard stocked. After that she would take advantage of the bright spell to pull up a chair on the pavement and watch the world go by.

This programme was disturbed by the arrival of a woman in a veiled toque and an Orloff overcoat revealing a hobble skirt. The outfit was banded with astrakhan and the woman appeared to be hesitating.

‘Who are you looking for?’ barked the concierge, eyeing the hatbox the woman was clutching to her chest.

‘The people who live on the fourth floor – they’re expecting me. I’ve come for a fitting.’

‘The Primolins? Well, make sure you wipe your feet. The mat’s not there for decoration, you know.’

The woman had barely entered the hall when she stopped.

‘Is the flat on the first floor for rent, by any chance? The shutters are closed … I’m just thinking it would be perfect for my elderly aunt, who can’t manage more than one flight of stairs. It would be a blessing for her.’

‘Sorry to disappoint you, m’dear, you’ll have to look elsewhere. The shutters aren’t closed because the flat is empty. Monsieur Mori and his companion are abroad. They’re coming home tomorrow.’

Madame Ballu, hands on hips, watched the stranger disappear up the stairs.

‘It doesn’t surprise me that those old skinflints on the fourth floor associate with people who covet other people’s homes! Well, am I finally going to be able to tuck in?’

She took the precaution of hanging her The Concierge is in Town sign on the door, before closing it firmly.

The visitor, who was standing listening on the third floor landing, heard the door shut. She leant over the banister to make sure she was on her own and then crept downstairs and pressed the bell of the first-floor flat. She counted up to thirty, rang again, waited, then went down to the ground floor and headed for Rue Jacob.

‘I’m feeling a little peckish,’ hinted Joseph as Euphrosine buzzed around him.

He hoped that would send her off to the kitchen.

‘You’re a bottomless pit! If you’re hungry, chew your fist, or have an apple. And leave me to think about the delicious meal I’m going to prepare for Monsieur and Mademoiselle Mori. Oh, there you are, M’sieur Legris. Just the man I need – what do you think of this? For the entrée, tongue in piquant sauce, followed by lamb croquettes with artichokes, veal pie with fried salsify and braised celery with parmesan. For dessert, a lovely vanilla soufflé. Mademoiselle Iris will have to make do with gratin dauphinois. And what do you think for wine?’

Not bothering to reply, Victor placed a pile of catalogues given to him by a fellow bookseller at the Booksellers’ Circle on Kenji’s desk.

‘Any customers?’ he asked Joseph.

‘Slim pickings.’

‘Well, I’m obviously wasting my breath – I might as well be talking to the sheep on Rue Fontaine. I’ll go and put your grub in the bain-marie. Don’t bother to thank me.’

As Euphrosine went up, invoking Jesus, Mary and Joseph, two women entered the shop. One was rigged out in a woollen suit and a Tyrolean hat, the other was drowning in a voluminous purple coat and her ridiculous hat was adorned with symmetrical green feathers like the antennae of a giant praying mantis.

‘Fräulein Becker, Madame de Flavignol!’ exclaimed Victor, strenuously fighting an impulse to laugh.

Joseph had taken refuge behind the counter.

‘We’ve come to see you specially, my dear. Helga has finally found the brochure on the new Papillon cycles, and didn’t you say you wanted to buy a bicycle?’ simpered Mathilde de Flavignol, who had a secret crush on Victor.

‘Das ist wirklich,’ confirmed Mademoiselle Becker. ‘Here you are. You can keep it as long as you like. The choice of a velocipede is as fraught as the choice of a domestic animal. One is destined to spend a good many years together.’

‘Oh, dear heart, have you seen the dog Raphaëlle de Gouveline has bought to fill the gap left by her Maltese lap dog? It’s a hideous black fur ball with no tail. That’s too much mourning for my liking, but what can you expect; it’s the Prince of Wales who started the fashion for schipperkes …’

Just then Euphrosine came into view, descending the stairs with a heavy tread, overburdened with baskets containing her feather dusters and cloths. She was muttering that the lunch was ready and she was going to Rue Fontaine even though her feet were absolutely killing her. ‘And of course I don’t even have time to apply my Russian corn cream. Ah, now Russia, there’s a sympathetic country, not like some I could mention,’ she grumbled, jostling Helga Becker.

‘Joseph,’ murmured Victor, ‘please tell your mother that from now on she is not to go to and fro through the shop.’

‘Why don’t you tell her yourself?’ returned Joseph out of the corner of his mouth.

‘Do you like animals, Monsieur Legris?’ enquired Mathilde de Flavignol. ‘You do? In that case, may I suggest you go and see the baby orang-utans adopted by the Botanical Gardens? They come from Borneo – Paul and Virginie are their names, and they are fed exclusively on …’

‘M’sieur Legris,’ Joseph interrupted, ‘talking of Paul and Virginie, we have a commission from Monsieur Hilaire de Kermarec. He’s looking for a copy of the edition published by Curmer in 1838, the illustrations are protected by tissue paper and it has a Simier morocco-leather binding.’

‘These gentlemen have started to use jargon, so we should make a move. I’m dying to know the results of the bicycle paper chase8 that was run on Sunday at La Concorde. Come, my dear,’ commanded Helga Becker, in a tone that brooked no refusal.

Mathilde de Flavignol took her leave reluctantly, but not before she had cast a languorous eye over Victor.

As soon as they had gone, the latter turned to Joseph. ‘If it hadn’t been for your presence of mind, we would still be hearing about the monkeys.’

‘Oh, before I forget, some fellow came in to see Monsieur Mori, and also a woman telephoned. She wanted to sell her collection of seventeenth-century books. She insisted she had to speak to Monsieur Mori, but I told her he was away and that you would be able to do the valuation. If you want to take the business, you’ll have to go there early this evening because you won’t be the only one interested. I wrote the name and address down for you – 4 Rue des Hortensias, in Neuilly. She’s expecting you at seven o’clock.’

‘I’d planned to have dinner with Mademoiselle Tasha.’

‘Monsieur Mori is complaining that we haven’t bought many books since Christmas. Anyway, that’s just my opinion …’ muttered Joseph, his nose already buried in La Vie Populaire.

‘Now I can get on with it; old Zola knows how to spin a good yarn. Thanks to him, the afternoon is going to fly by.’

It was freezing and Joseph was hastening to shut up shop so that he could get home to Rue Visconti and enjoy the soup he was certain his mother would have prepared. He had the key in the bookshop lock and was about to close the final shutter when a cry drew his attention. A few yards away, a woman had slipped on the deserted pavement. She lay spread-eagled and was trying to get up. He hurried over to help her.

‘Are you hurt?’

‘More shaken than hurt. I’ll be all right, thank you.’

‘Would you like me to call you a cab?’

‘No need, I can walk.’

Muffled by a veil, her voice was expressionless. Joseph watched the figure moving off in the direction of the Seine and turned back to deal with the shutter. He went to lock the door, and to his surprise saw that his keys were lying on the ground.

‘What on earth? My keys are imitating the bells of Rome – they have wings … I’m seeing things, which just proves I’m desperately in need of some nosh.’

Saturday morning, 9 April

The emissary turned his head and looked at the wooden cross hanging above the bed. For a moment it was as if the bedroom had disappeared; only the rays of golden dust that fell from the heavens across the slats of the closed shutters existed. Gradually his eyes grew accustomed to the gloom. His hand struck a match and lit the wick of a lamp. The pinkish light quivered above the white page of his notebook.

Lord, I am witness to your glory. I, your emissary, have faithfully followed the mission you have conferred on me. The mark of infamy is hidden. I must prepare to be patient, and to wait for the right moment to annihilate it. No trace of it will remain, and false prophets will be unable to use it to assault your work, and humanity will no longer incur your wrath.

Notes

1. French writer (1848–1917) Mathilde Georgina Élisabeth de Peyrebrune.

2. French author (1851–1922).

3. See The Montmartre Investigation, Gallic Books.

4. At 22 Boulevard Magenta.

5. ‘Ravachol’s Ballad’ by Jules Jouy.

6. Serialised from 20 February to 21 July 1892.

7. Charles Nègre, 1820–1880, French photographer known for his architectural photographs of French cities; Charles Marville, 1816–1879, official photographer for Paris in 1862.

8. An event in which cyclists had to catch up or overtake an opponent, following a trail of papers dropped by them.

CHAPTER 3

Saturday, 9 April

JOSEPH loved to polish the leather-bound books. Delicately buffing the vellum, morocco-leather and cowhide gave him sensual pleasure. He felt particular joy if he managed to revive the sheen of the gold lettering on the spines and front covers. He was interrupted in this work, which had put him in an excellent mood, by Victor’s morning arrival. Joseph greeted him with a smile, a magnificent ‘fanfare’ binding in his hands. Victor, however, wore a glowering expression.

‘I should have realised – it’s a ridiculous name!’ he burst out.

‘What name, Boss?’

‘Hortensias. You sent me to Neuilly yesterday evening on a wild goose chase. That street of yours was completely made up!’

Offended, Joseph put the book down on the counter.

‘Excuse me, it wasn’t my street. It was the name the woman gave me on the telephone.’

‘You must have misheard, and it wouldn’t be the first time!’

‘Why don’t you say straight out that I’m as deaf as a post or have bats in the belfry? Maybe she’s the one who muddled up her flowers. Perhaps it should be dahlias, or zinnias, or magnolias. How should I know?’

Joseph rose suddenly and went out on to the pavement. The boss had succeeded in spoiling his good humour and he felt the need to stretch his legs. A woman, hunched over and wearing a voluminous cape, which made her look like a little barrel, was going into the adjoining building. He recognised his mother and was about to call out to her but held back at the last minute – she was not speaking to him.

Her arms rigidly extended by two baskets overflowing with victuals, Euphrosine ducked under the porch, where she almost stepped on Madame Ballu. The concierge was on her knees, furiously scrubbing the first step of the stairs with a stiff brush.

‘Damned floor, it absorbs and absorbs, it eats your soap like a drunkard drinks his spirits and gives you nothing in return! I’ll have to scrape that with a knife,’ she murmured.

‘Madame Ballu, you sound as if you’d like to murder someone!’