Murder in Montparnasse (31 page)

Mrs Robinson, sitting beside her husband, was enthralled. Phryne thought she was a very nice woman.

The band struck up again. Where were they hidden? The sound was close but she could see no musicians. They played ‘Moonlight on the Ganges’ and Lin held out his hand.

‘May I have this dance?’ he asked.

Phryne joined him on the floor. Dancing with Lin Chung was always a pleasure. He moved like a dream and he never, never trod on toes. If he found that his partner was absentmindedly leading, edging them across the floor, he obligingly fell into the female role and followed like a lamb.

The foxtrot was an ideal dance if one wanted to cover the floor unobtrusively. Yes, there were the musicians. It was essential to provoke René into taking some action soon, preferably tonight. If he got frightened and lay low, he would have more chance of finding Véronique and retrieving her, and more chance of murdering another soldier. One could not stay all one’s life on guard against assassins.

They were the usual dance band in the usual aged-in-the-wool musicians’ performance evening dress, shirts with the frayed bits trimmed off, faded patches dyed with ink. Piano, drum, guitar, trombone, trumpet, clarinet. The saxophone player must be sick. And, yes, there was René Dubois, accordion laid aside for the moment, playing a not very good double bass accompaniment. He never had trusted strings.

Phryne danced Lin Chung closer and waited to be seen. The dance was ending. She was standing right in front of the man who had broken her heart and she found that it had quite healed. He was an ordinary man. Not very tall, his dark hair pepper-and-salt now, his face as brown as a walnut and almost as wrinkled. Not an attractive proposition.

Then he glanced up and saw Phryne. For a moment he was taken aback, then he scowled with such malignancy that Lin missed a step.

Phryne stared straight into his face and then blew him a kiss. The band started on the next dance, a waltz to ‘Mignonette’, and Phryne floated away.

‘That ought to do it,’ she said. Lin swung her around.

‘That was him?’

‘Yes,’ said Phryne. She loved waltzing.

‘And you just provoked him,’ said Lin.

‘Yes,’ said Phryne.

‘Ah,’ said Lin.

When they danced past again at the start of the foxtrot ‘Crying for the Moon’, René wasn’t there. Phryne appeared unperturbed. So Lin kept dancing.

It was past ten when Molly, who had been quietly lying on Madame Dubois’ feet, raised her head, pricked her ears, and gave a small, sharp bark. Hugh waved and the girls went to the front door and the back, listening. Jane at the front heard nothing. Ruth at the back heard a faint scratching at the lock. She signalled to Hugh and returned to Madame Dubois, grabbing Molly by the collar and holding her mouth shut.

‘It’s him, isn’t it?’ asked Madame through a closed throat.

‘Maybe,’ said Ruth. ‘But he won’t get in.’

‘If he does, Mademoiselle,’ Madame Dubois appealed to Dot, ‘and if for some reason you can’t shoot him, then make sure you shoot me. I’m not going back to him.’

‘I don’t think I’ll have to shoot anyone,’ said Dot calmly.

The back door slammed open. Hugh reached, grabbed, and struck. There was a yelp and someone struggled out of his grip and scrambled away over the fence. Hugh closed the door again.

‘Show’s over,’ he said, coming back inside and sucking his knuckles.

‘You ’it ’im?’ asked Madame Dubois, astonished.

‘A juicy one,’ replied Hugh. ‘And he was off like a rabbit. He’ll have a black eye tomorrow. Let go of Molly, Ruth. She’ll know if he’s still hanging around like a bad smell. And if so, I propose to go and punch his head again,’ said Hugh comfortably. Madame Dubois could not follow all the words but she knew that tone of voice.

Molly, released, wuffed a little, smelt around the door, wagged her tail and came back into the dining room. There she collapsed onto Madame Dubois’ feet again and fell asleep.

‘Ah, quelle mignonne!’ cried Madame Dubois, stroking Molly’s silky black ears. Dot poured Hugh a congratulatory glass of beer. The enemy had been driven off. With a black eye. And Dot hadn’t had to use that gun, which frightened the life out of her.

She poured herself a small sherry and Madame a glass of that harsh red wine. The disturbance had not even elicited a query from the Butler and Tobias Sole conclave, which was still going on in the Butlers’ sitting room. Phryne had ordered that they be left alone until they either came out of their own will or elected Daniel Mannix Pope.

The drawing lesson resumed. Madame Dubois was really very good. Dot wondered how Phryne was doing with her evening.

Phryne was sitting the next dance out. Lin Chung had procured her an ice and she was eating it with small neat licks of her red tongue in front of his fascinated gaze.

‘Why did you provoke that man?’ he asked quietly.

‘He’s just got time to try and get into my house,’ she replied, putting the spoon back into the white glass dish. ‘Thank you for the ice, Lin dear. He will be repelled from there by Dot and Hugh. He hasn’t got time for another try, and that will make him furious.’

‘How do you know he hasn’t got time for another try?’ asked Lin.

Phryne produced her dance card.

‘Because he has to play ‘Sam, the Accordion Man’ in about ten minutes, and René never missed a cue in his life. It will take about five minutes to bicycle to my house—Madame says he still bicycles—and then he only has five minutes there before he has to cycle back. He had to give his borrowed car back to his landlord. Hugh could hold him off for five minutes with one hand tied behind his back and Dot has my gun. So he will be driven away and come back here, snarling and chewing his moustache and saying, “Curses, foiled again!” In French, of course.’

‘Phryne,’ ventured Lin Chung.

‘Mmm?’ She picked a fleck of petal—the decorations were shedding—from the smooth linen over her knee.

‘Remind me never, never, to make you this angry.’

‘I can’t imagine how you could,’ she smiled. ‘But I’ll remind you.’

Ten minutes later a dishevelled accordionist fingered his way through ‘Sam, the Accordion Man’ in double time, so that the dancing crowd hurried and stumbled. Phryne smiled into René’s face. It was decorated with a very impressive red patch which would be a shiner tomorrow. Someone seemed to have rubbed leaves and twigs into his thinning hair and his suit was torn across the shoulder.

But he could still play the accordion like a master. Phryne danced away, presenting him with an infuriating view of her smooth white back. She could feel his eyes boring into it. Most gratifying.

She danced a circular waltz to ‘The Song Has Ended’ with Robinson, who was very sure on his feet, if a little pedestrian. ‘Are you having an agreeable evening?’ she asked into his ear.

‘The wife’s real pleased,’ he said, not answering the question. ‘She’s danced every dance. When’s supper?’

‘This is the last waltz,’ Phryne told him. ‘Soon, the hoi polloi depart, the select few move into the supper room, you get to nibble dainty things in the company of our politicians and luminaries, and then you are allowed to go home. Not too long, Jack dear. You’ll be home before you turn into a pumpkin.’

‘What do you . . . oh, I see. Midnight. Good. There’s Rosie,’ he said. ‘I’ll go tell her.’

The dance ended. Phryne found herself near the musicians. A voice snarled, ‘You! It is you, Phryne! What have you to do with Véronique? She is mine.’

‘No, she’s hers,’ said Phryne. ‘And look what happens when you try to get into my house. Give her up, René.’

‘Never,’ hissed the voice. He must be standing behind a pillar, Phryne thought. ‘But you, are you not tired of your Chinese? Come back to me. You always loved me. I always loved you. Véronique was just a substitute.’

One thing you could say of René Dubois, he had the sort of cheek which would stagger nations. Phryne fanned herself with her hand.

‘You’re an assassin,’ she said calmly. ‘You’re a thief. And oddly enough—I know you will find it hard to believe, René— I am completely and entirely uninterested in you. Goodbye,’ she said, and walked away, calmly, through the crowd until she found Lin Chung talking to a large gentleman about silk.

‘Hard to find a reliable supplier, now things in China are so bad,’ the large gentleman was complaining. ‘And the Indian just ain’t the same.’

Lin gave him a card. ‘I’m sure you will find that our silk is superior,’ he said. ‘And we are known for our reliability.’

‘I’ll call on you next week,’ promised the large gentleman, searching all his pockets until he found his card. Lin accepted it with the suspicion of a bow.

‘Supper,’ said Phryne. ‘I could eat a horse.’

Lin took her arm. ‘You seem very pleased,’ he observed.

‘Call it relieved,’ she answered, as the crowd began to stream out and the select few made their way to the supper room. ‘I have just let go of a long-ingrained sorrow.’

‘Ah,’ said Lin.

‘Do you always almost bow to new customers?’ she asked curiously.

‘They expect a Chinese to be exotic,’ he said. ‘But not too exotic. Too exotic is threatening. A sketch of a bow fits the bill. Now, we have chicken vol-au-vents, little sausagey things and more ices. Let me fetch you an assortment,’ he offered.

Phryne sat down next to Mrs Robinson, whose husband was on the same errand.

‘Have you had a nice time, Miss Fisher?’ asked Rosie, mopping her brow.

‘Yes, indeed,’ Phryne replied. ‘I think the Mayor is trying to catch your eye,’ she told Mrs Robinson, who fluttered off to talk to His Worship. He was an affable man and liked women to be substantial and womanly. Mrs Robinson’s honest pleasure in the ball had tickled him.

Supper over, the select few went to the doors to find their cars. Robinson shook Phryne’s hand and Mrs Robinson kissed her. It was like being kissed by a paeony. Goodbyes were being said. Finally, only Phryne and Lin stood at the top of the marble staircase.

They walked down into the hot darkness. The wind had dropped. Lin’s car stood ready at the end of the path.

Then there were voices. Sharp statements, clipped off, meant to be heard only by the destined auditor. ‘Here,’ said one.

‘Yes,’ said another.

‘Here,’ a third voice.

‘No, you don’t,’ a fourth voice.

Someone—at a dig in Abbeville, was it?—had told Phryne about primitive men and their method of hunting mammoths, which were too big and dangerous to hunt up close. They had herded the huge animals to the edge of a cliff and frightened them off. That was what the soldiers were doing to René Dubois.

As arranged, Phryne had stood in the light for long enough. René had seen her and had begun to stalk her, meaning to catch and kill when she reached the bushes next to the gate. Now he was being driven like a beast. It was working. He fired a shot which chipped a piece off the Town Hall facade.

‘Lin, we must get to your car,’ said Phryne. ‘And get out of their way.’

‘Run?’ he suggested.

‘Run,’ she agreed.

She hauled up the Egyptian gown and raced down the footpath in a flash of bare thighs, leaping past the astounded chauffeur and into the Silver Ghost. A shot pinged past. Lin dived in beside her, and yelled to the chauffeur to drive on. The car, which he had been warming all night, started without a sound and they were off before the next shot, which whistled past and broke the decorative ball off a fence. The chauffeur took the car around in a wide circle. Phryne needed to see what happened next.

‘Six shots,’ said Phryne. ‘He has six shots in that gun. That was the third.’

‘What are they going to do?’ asked Lin, who did not like being shot at.

‘I don’t know,’ said Phryne. ‘But as soon as he runs out of ammunition, I wouldn’t be René for a thousand pounds.’

Two more shots in quick succession. Then one which drew forth a cry of ‘Bugger!’ from the darkness.

‘That’s six,’ said Phryne.

Then they saw him, a staggering, goaded creature, half insane with rage, his coat hanging in ribbons, his useless gun thrown down. Surrounded by harassers, he stood at bay in the middle of the empty, dark road.

Then a speeding car collected him, threw him high into the air and down again, and hammered and crushed all the life out of him. He lay on the road like a broken puppet, skull cracked, pouring blood. His attackers came out of the dark, eyes still alight with purpose, shouldering each other like hunting wolves.

‘Into the car,’ ordered Phryne. ‘Wrap something round your arm, Mr Gavin. You don’t want to bleed on the new upholstery, do you? I’ll be back in a tick.’

She watched them climb into Lin Chung’s car. She knelt next to the fallen man and felt for his heart. It was still. He would never torture anyone again.

She turned on her heel and walked away, for the last time, from René Dubois.

CHAPTER TWENTY

There is never any ending to Paris and the
memory of each person who has lived in it differs
from that of any other . . . Paris was always
worth it . . .

Ernest Hemingway,
A Moveable Feast

The morning after the Lord Mayor’s Ball, Phryne was consulting with her lawyer about a missing Mildura will and certain action to be taken in the civil court against a crooked letting agent when a policeman was shown in.

The parlour showed no signs of the hasty, joyful, strange party it had hosted the night before. The beer glasses had been cleared away, the bottles discreetly housed in the yard, the ashtrays emptied, a bloody towel soaking in salt water, the bloody bandages burned. The farewells from Johnnie Bedlow, William Gavin, Thomas Guilfoyle and Bert and Cec had not remained on the air. Neither had Madame Dubois’ cry of mixed relief and horror when she heard that her husband was definitely and totally dead, though the expression on Cec’s face when Véronique had kissed his hand would linger with Phryne for some time.

The taxi which had slain René was in a repair shop belonging to Johnnie Bedlow, the mechanic. The girls were at church with Dot, who felt that she had a candle to light for a departing soul and a prayer to say for a man dead in a moment. She was also terribly relieved that she had not been required to shoot him. Madame Dubois had gone too, in one of Phryne’s more subdued, veiled hats.