Murder On The Rue Cassette (A Serafina Florio Mystery) (15 page)

Chapter
18: A Visit from Valois

The hospital retrieved the book
and papers found in Serafina’s pockets, bloody but readable. They were written
in the bitten-off Italian they spoke in Oltramari, she told him. She doubted
that Valois’ translators would make sense of it, but she promised to share any
useful information.

Gesuzza rouged and powdered
Serafina’s face and combed out her knots while Rosa threatened her if she made
a fuss during the ordeal. When she looked in the glass, she saw a remarkable
transformation, her complexion not quite so pale, her coiffure not exactly in
the latest French style, but presentable, and she was released from the
hospital, expressing her gratitude to the staff for their care. She arrived at
the hotel in time to see the sun bathe Paris in crimson and gold.

After the evening meal, waiters
set up a large round table in Serafina’s suite. A chambermaid fluffed the
pillows, lit the jets and lamps, and opened some of the windows leading out to
the balcony. The staff seemed glad she had returned, sound and in good spirits.

“Here I sit in Paris and I’m too
ill or too busy to enjoy its magnificence.”

“You sound like Nicchia,” Rosa
said. “Your disposition is a horror when you’re well, even worse when you’re
sick. No one feels sorry for you. You’ve brought this on yourself, so grow up.”
The madam patted her black curls.

Serafina smiled.

“Who is Nicchia?” Teo asked.

“The Countess of Castiglione,
mistress to many, including Napoleon III. A beauty in her day, but she lost her
looks by debauching herself all over Europe. Now she sits alone in her
apartment off the Place Vendôme like spoiled fruit. She’s draped all the
mirrors in black and admits no one except for photographers, of course.”

Carmela played with a pencil.
“Sounds like Elena. I wouldn’t be surprised if she arranged her own death.”

“It fits,” Serafina said. She
glared at Rosa. “She could have hired the shadows who follow us. She could have
arranged for her reticule to be stolen and the woman shot.”

“How does one arrange for a
purse to be stolen?” Rosa asked.

“I wouldn’t know for sure. The
wealthy have their ways.”

“Your fantasy runs away with
you,” Rosa said.

“Perhaps, but let’s not reject
it out of hand.”

“The most plausible explanation
is that Elena was the woman in the Rue Cassette,” Rosa said.

Serafina’s shoulder throbbed.
“Not true. We have it from her latest lover’s lips—Elena was not the dead
woman in the Rue Cassette.” She must keep an open mind, she told herself.

“No, really. I know you’ve
doubted her death from the beginning. Tell me why,” Rosa said, turning to face
Serafina. “Truly. Let’s think it through to the end and slay this dragon.” The
madam looked like a stuffed owl. “Is it that you don’t believe in the God of
happy endings?”

“Don’t be silly.”

“Or do you think she planned it?
So here it is, Elena disappears by staging her death as a murder so that the
main suspect is Loffredo, a coup de grâce to undo the fetters from her past and
at the same time get rid of her husband to say nothing of squelching your love
affair with him since he’ll either be guillotined or languish in prison.”

Serafina’s shoulder had stopped
its drumming. Teo’s face was red. Arcangelo pulled at his sleeves and Carmela
hid a smile. Gesuzza looked down at her sewing and Tessa looked at them all, a
thick blush on her cheeks.

Rosa continued. “It’s
balderdash, this theory of yours that Elena contrived her own death. If so, to
what end? How long do you think she can stay away from the Paris she loves? And
if the case comes to court, as eventually it must, the details of her sordid
life will be aired in public to the delight of the press.”

“You’ve got a point,” Carmela
said.

“And who helped her—the
aging Sophie who can barely move? Her nephews?”

Serafina shook her head.
“Perhaps, but not Ricci.”

“Because you fancy him?”

“Nonsense!”

The madam continued with her
theory. “And as for Loffredo languishing in prison, we’re working on his
release.”

Arcangelo and Teo nodded.

“So there goes part of your
theory,” the madam persisted. “Face it, Elena’s dead. She was
slumming—always a danger, even in the respectable part of Paris—and
someone killed her.”

“What’s slumming?” Teo asked.

“I knew it,” Serafina said.
“Explain yourself.”

While Rosa talked, Serafina half
listened. She didn’t have the strength to stop her. But she was beginning to
get a sense of the real instigator. She was about to offer another explanation
when a knock interrupted them.

Valois entered, dapper as ever
and with a sharpened glint in his eye. Probably had his ear to the door for the
last five minutes.

After they greeted him, Rosa
pulled the cord and ordered more coffee and sweets.

Serafina opened her notebook and
began. “Let’s start with what we know.”

Everyone was silent until Teo
spoke. “Two men have been following Donna Fina ever since she met with Levi
Busacca in Oltramari. They followed us to Marseille and they follow us in Paris.
When we corner them, they tell us it’s for our own good—they protect us.”

Valois wrote in his notebook.
“They agreed to speak with you? How so?”

They told Valois about the
incident in front of the Gare-St. Charles in Marseille, describing the men’s
appearance and speech.

“This afternoon we talked to
them on the Boulevard des Capucines,” Tessa said. “Again they refused to tell
us why they follow us, only that it’s for our protection.”

“What else do we know about
them?” Serafina asked, her shoulder beginning to feel like the raw meat it was.
Shooting stars appeared in her vision. She had refused all palliatives at the
hospital, afraid of their addictive nature ever since Loffredo had explained
the danger of opium and its derivatives to her.

“I think I may have recognized
one today. He works for the don in Oltramari.”

Valois frowned, but said
nothing.

“They stole the photos from
Inspector Valois and shot Donna Fina,” Arcangelo said.

“Careful,” Valois said and shook
his head. “We know photos and plates are missing. We don’t know who stole them.
But there probably is a connection between the theft, the shooting of the woman
in the Rue Cassette, and the shooting in Elena’s apartment, and these two men
might be responsible. At least it’s worth questioning them.” He scribbled in
his black book.

Serafina listened, but made no
comment.

Valois continued. “We found a
cartridge a few meters from the body on the Rue Cassette. A careful killer
would have destroyed it, however we believe this killer was smart but inexperienced.
He had enough cunning to place the gun in the slain woman’s hand, but not
enough wit to know that she was right-handed and would not have attempted to
shoot herself in the left temple with her left hand.”

“But we can speculate that the
thefts and shootings are connected,” Arcangelo said.

“Precisely. Right now, we are
dealing only with the knowns, but since you drew it to my attention,
questioning these men is something I’ve added to my list,” Valois said, writing
in his book. “Good work.”

Serafina saw the satisfaction on
Arcangelo’s face. Alphonse Valois had taken both young men under his wing. She
nodded slowly to herself, wondering what had caused the inspector to change.

Their meeting went on like this,
labored, slow. Her body was stiff. Her temples throbbed, but she sat
expressionless and still during the exercise, uncomplaining, writing in and
consulting her notebook. She made a list of all the knowns surrounding the
murder in the Rue Cassette. The murder itself, the attack in Elena’s apartment,
being followed, and the theft of the photos and plates. More important,
Serafina and Valois together would decide the course of action they’d take in
order to solve the mystery of the woman’s death and bring whoever was
responsible to justice.

Once again they covered what
they knew of the murder, autopsy, and burial.

“Is there a way to determine the
dead woman’s identity, other than through exhumation?” Serafina said. Before
Valois replied, Carmela asked, “Was the dead woman with child?” She explained
the reason for her question.

“The doctor said nothing to me
about the condition of the body’s internal organs, but I have re-opened the
case based on the attempt to kill Madame Florio two nights ago.”

“Why did her friends say she was
pregnant?” Rosa asked.

“Elena told her so.”

“Could be Elena’s fantasy,
nothing more.”

Serafina said nothing.

“We know the woman, given to
fabrication.”

Valois seemed uncomfortable. “If
and when I feel it necessary to request an order of exhumation, I will tell
you.”

“But we’d like to work with
you,” Serafina said.

He nodded. “Of course.”

She doubted it. “I know you
think we’re a nuisance.”

Valois stroked his lapel. “Not
at all. But we’re not finished with the knowns, are we?”

“Almost finished. Just the
attack in Elena’s apartment the other night. We’ve covered the theft of the
photographs and plates.”

There was a knock on the door
and waiters brought two carts, one with tea and coffee, the other with a tray
of profiteroles, a silver bowl of lemon sorbet, individual apple tarts,
marron glacé
, and
gateau chocolat
, and a bowl of
crème fraîche
.

Rosa served while Serafina
talked. “I’ll have the marron glacé with crème fraîche, a profiterole, and a
latté, please.”

“Feeling better?”

Serafina nodded.

“Someone summarize the attack?”
Valois asked.

“I was shot two nights ago in
Elena’s apartment. Approximate time, eleven-thirty. It was dark, one or two gas
jets on low. I had taken an address book and some envelopes from the middle
drawer of the desk in the ladies’ parlor. The bullet, lodged in my trapezius,
was recovered during the operation.”

Arcangelo handed Tessa a tart
and smiled. He took three profiteroles for himself. Teo chose some of
everything, and Carmela declined dessert, but accepted a latté.

Valois held up a piece of metal.
“The surgeon gave me this bullet from Madame Florio’s shoulder. Please observe,
it is similar to the one found in the dead woman’s mouth.”

“Shot from the same gun?” Teo
asked. His mouth was ringed with chocolate cake and crème fraîche.

Valois shook his head, taking
the last bite of sorbet and swallowing his tea. “Our expert in firearms
compared the two. He said they came from the same type of gun, perhaps from a
matched pair although he couldn’t say for sure, just that the markings on the
two bullets are similar and definitely from the same model, a Remington 95.
It’s a Derringer double-barreled pistol, small enough to be concealed in a
man’s pocket. Might I try the gateau?” he asked.

“Or in a woman’s purse,” Rosa
said, cutting a piece of cake for the inspector.

Serafina felt privileged to be
working with the French. They were experts in ballistic investigation going
back to the beginning of the century

“That reminds me,” she said,
turning to Valois, “I didn’t tell you about my visit to the Rue Cassette late
Wednesday afternoon.” She told him about meeting the policeman who found the
dead woman. “And I spent an hour interviewing Elena’s latest lover, Étienne
Gaston.” She gave Valois his address and related Étienne’s account of the
evening he and Elena spent together after the opening April 15, telling Valois
that Gaston saw the dead woman in the street shortly after she was shot and
claimed she had a much smaller frame than Elena. “He said it most certainly was
not Elena.”

“Here we go again,” Rosa said.
“Tell him about the revolver.”

“Revolver?”

“Forgotten that part, have we?
No matter, I remember.” And Rosa told Valois about the French revolver missing
from Gaston’s apartment.

All this talk of murder and
Serafina thought too late of Teo. He was red-faced and looking down, although
he too was making notes. Serafina reached over and touched his hand,
remembering the tragedy surrounding
his parents
.

“It was long ago.” He managed a
smile, and took another forkful of cake. But Serafina knew better. Once it
happened, sudden devastation never quit the soul, not for long.

The inspector took a bite of
cake. “During our initial investigation, we found blood on a carpet in the
ladies’ parlor, a few clothes in Elena’s bedroom closet, no sign that the
apartment had been used recently, except for one bedroom, and you’ve explained
about helping the maid give birth. Daily newspapers from April 16 to the
present were found in the hall, unread. But so far, we haven’t been able to
find the cartridge in Elena Busacca’s apartment. It would help us to identify
the exact gun, should it be recovered.”