The Coral Thief (11 page)

“Do you want to come in?” I asked.

“You will come with me a little way, perhaps,” he said, opening the
door to the fiacre. The driver looked down at me, his eyes blank. I climbed in reluctantly, fearful for my safety. Jagot took the seat next to me, closed the door, and pulled the blinds halfway down. The fiacre smelled of oranges, stale coffee, and sweat. Jagot picked up a pile of papers and a notebook inside his pocket. As the carriage lurched into movement, he pulled up the blind at the back of the fiacre and adjusted a small mirror that was fixed to the side so that he could see through into the street more easily. He thumped the roof once, and we slowed to a walking pace. He had someone in his sights, it seemed.

“You are in Paris for three weeks now, M. Connor. You see many interesting things. You talk to many people. You move in interesting circles. Have you seen Mme. Bernard again?” He looked closely at me as I answered.

“No, monsieur, I have not,” I said, determined not to confess seeing something I may only have imagined.

“You have heard the name Silveira spoken by any of your new friends?”

“Silveira? No, monsieur. I have never heard them use that name.”

“It seems,” Jagot said slowly, “that he too is back in Paris.”

“With respect, M. Jagot, what has this Silveira to do with me?”

“M. Silveira is a very dangerous man. He is the banker for the Society of Ten Thousand. I had him in my hand five years ago, but he disappeared from Paris. I sent one of my men to look for him in Leghorn and Marseilles, where he has other houses. I paid that agent to look for Silveira for three months, but he didn’t find him. But now Silveira is back in Paris, my men say. None of them has seen him yet, but he is here somewhere. And I will find him.”

“Society of ten thousand?” I asked.

“The Society of Ten Thousand is the thief aristocracy of Paris, M. Connor. These rich men and women take on a job only if it is worth more than ten thousand francs. Silveira is a
Portugais
. A Jew. A dealer in diamonds. They call him
‘Trompe-la-Mort
’. The man who cheats death.”

“It sounds like you need more men,” I said.

“Yes, monsieur. I need more men. But first I must catch Silveira. Then they will give me more men.”

“I still don’t understand why this has anything to do with me,” I said.

“Davide Silveira, M. Connor, is a friend of Lucienne Bernard. Lucienne Bernard is a friend of Davide Silveira. If I have one, I have both. You understand? And Lucienne Bernard is a friend of Daniel Connor. Or perhaps Daniel Connor is the accomplice of Lucienne Bernard. You see how one thing leads to another.”

“Accomplice?” I protested. “That woman
stole
from me. How can you possibly think I am her accomplice?”

He smiled as if he were testing me, scrutinizing my reactions. I had a headache.

“I did not say you
were
an accomplice, M. Connor. I said
perhaps
. I must consider all the possibilities. Mme. Bernard is looking for you and I don’t know what she wants. Victim? Accomplice? Innocent, guilty? Who can be sure?”

Jagot thumped on the roof of the fiacre twice, and we came to a stop.

“In Paris everyone is someone else,” he continued, his eyes bright. “You see that man there?” He put his finger on the mirror and beckoned for me to look closer.

“The one in black? The one we’ve been following?”

“Oui
. That is Pierre Coignard, jewel thief. I shared a cell with him in the prison at Toulon in ’88. He escaped into Spain and became head of the Catalan bandits. Then he meets a woman in a bar called Maria-Rosa. She steals her master’s papers when he dies, and so Coignard and Maria-Rosa became the Comte and Comtesse Sainte-Hélène. Coignard even fought as the comte in Napoleon’s armies in Spain. The king received him at court only a few weeks ago. He has done very well for himself.”

“Why are you following him?”

“Someone he knew in Toulon recognized him. Blackmail. Coignard refused to pay and yesterday we found the dead body of Coignard’s valet in the quarries. Now, of course, Coignard wants revenge. One thing follows another unless we put a stop to it. And now with Silveira back, things will grow worse. In Paris you stop one thing and another opens up.”

He was climbing out of the fiacre. “Excuse me, M. Connor,” he said, “I must speak with M. Coignard. The driver will take you back. Keep listening, M. Connor, and if you hear the name of Silveira spoken, or if you see or speak to the woman Bernard, you come and tell me. You will be Jagot’s eyes.”

He closed the door and disappeared almost instantly into the street, camouflaged like a leopard in dappled light.

But Lucienne Bernard did not appear and I came to detest my own languor. Five days later, August 20, upon waking after a troubled night, my money almost gone, time disappearing, a career lost, almost a month since I had arrived in Paris, I resolved to go to see Jagot, plead for the restitution of my passport, and return home. Paris had already changed me. Soon I would become like one of those half-human creatures in Ovid, I thought, human skin transmuting into leather or claw or hoof. I would no longer know myself.

I packed my bags carefully, leaving them stacked near the door, gathered what money I had left, and went to find Fin at the Palais Royal. I walked past the guards at the entrance, their muskets cocked, through the arcade of shops selling jewels, china, prints, books, flowers, and ribbons, through the hazard and billiard tables, the restaurants and taverns. I climbed the dusty staircase to the second floor, walking past the apartments advertising lectures on every branch of science and philosophy on the hour every hour.

Babylon, I thought. It was time to redeem myself.

Walking there, through the aisles of expensive trinkets and
drunken gamblers, I felt things begin to take shape again. Evil on one side. Good on the other. True. False. Now that I could see again, I thought, everything would be all right.

I found Fin on the outer row of a crowd of fifty or sixty people who were watching a card game. Keeping to the edge of the room, I moved closer, avoiding the light of the chandeliers. Smoke from the candles, oil lamps, and cigars thickened the air, interspersed by shafts of light. I thought of Coignard, the comte, and his comtesse, and wondered how many others in the Palais Royal were dissembling, living someone else’s life.

“Just in time, my friend,” Fin said without taking his eyes from the table. “This is a very good game. Very good indeed. Watch and learn.”

“Fin,” I said, “I need to speak to you.”

“Later …just let me watch this.”

Through the thicket of standing figures I could see only fragments of the card players’ hands: white fingers, rings, a bony, yellowed, crablike hand stretching out to clutch a heap of coins. Then a face or two: the large, gaunt face of a man with deep-set eyes and grizzled eyebrows; a dry-lipped woman prematurely old, withered like her artificial flowers; a man who resembled a respectable Edinburgh tradesman I had once known, blond and soft-handed, his sleek hair neatly parted. And then a face I recognized. A half profile.

It was her, Lucienne Bernard, but not her, for
she
was now a
he
, sitting at a table playing cards only a few feet away from me. Her face but not her body. It was Lucienne, but it wasn’t.

I pushed through the spectators to get closer. Yes, it was her, seated at a card table, dressed as a man: green silk frock coat, silver waistcoat, neckerchief arranged artfully around her throat. And no one seemed to notice. It was like a tableau, frozen in time, a tableau of a card game in the Palais Royal. I was in it too, reflected in the mirrors behind her.

She was winning magnificently and, judging from the gasps of the crowd that had gathered in the smoky candlelight, unexpectedly. As her fingers, delicately gloved in pale gray, adjusted the coins that had been pushed toward her in order to pass them back again to the winning point, she looked up. Her black eyes met mine, and she smiled suddenly with what seemed to me a flush of unguarded pleasure—even relief—before she dropped her gaze to the cards in her hand and continued to play. Each time her stake was swept off the table she doubled it. Many people were watching her now, but I felt certain that the only eyes she was conscious of were mine. When she looked at me again as the crowd applauded her final hand—a full house, fanned out in triumph across the green baize—she appeared to be amused.

“A striking man, don’t you think?” Fin said. “All that green and silver. Good facial structure.”

“Very.”

“You’re in a strange mood today. What’s wrong with you?”

“His mouth …”

“The mouth?” he said.
Did he not see? Did he really not see?
Her lips were a smoky crimson, rich, full, and slightly parted. She was beautiful. Not a man at all.

“A touch too complacent, perhaps?” Fin said. “Is that what you mean?”

“Arrogant.”

“Good card player, though. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone win so much in a single afternoon. And he’s not short of money, I’d guess. From his clothes I mean.”

As the game finished, I watched her stand and look for me, preparing, I imagined, yet another escape. I clenched my fists, feeling the nails dig sharply into my skin.

Fin turned. “You said you wanted to speak to me?”

“No. It doesn’t matter now,” I said. “I’ll find you at home later. There’s something I have to do first.”

Suddenly the desire to return to Edinburgh receded; there was
hope, if only I could stop her from disappearing again. One last chance, I thought, making my way as stealthily as I could toward the patch of sea-green silk that was being swallowed up by a crowd of congratulatory admirers. This time, I determined, I would take her to the Bureau, whatever the outcome, however much she protested. This time I would not be afraid of making a scene. Then at least I would know I had
acted
. I would have some measure of self-respect to return with even if the manuscript and specimens were irrecoverable.

But then, as the crowd fell away and she walked slowly but directly toward me, looking slightly nervous, her brow furrowed. “Don’t give me away,” she whispered. “Jagot’s man is here, I’ve seen him, but he hasn’t recognized me.”

I was silent. I could scarcely breathe.

“Where have you been?” I muttered. “You promised. Everything is much worse for me now.”

“Where have
you
been?” she said, virtually dragging me into a window seat in an alcove and drawing a red velvet curtain across to shield us a little. “I sent letters; I called, but the concierge, she said you had left the hotel. I looked for you in the Jardin, at the lectures. But then things were dangerous … I had to leave Paris for a while. Where did
you
go?”

“I moved out of the hotel and into lodgings with a friend,” I said. “It’s cheaper. I left word.”

“Of course. So the concierge,” she said, “thinking I looked disreputable, wouldn’t give me your forwarding address. Of course.
Quelle idiote
. I should have known.”

“But,” I said, “you were at the Fantasmagorie that night. You saw me. You could have spoken to me then.”

“Jagot’s man was sitting right behind you. I saw him the moment you saw me. I had to take the back staircase out through the crypt. Listen, Daniel,” she said, her voice barely audible. “I want to give you back your things. Taking them was a stupid idea. I regretted it as soon as I thought about the price you would have to pay for losing them.
Two hours,” she said. “I need just two hours. Meet me in the alley that runs off the passage des Petits-Pères at seven o’clock. Under the third lamp from the east. Exactly seven o’clock, you understand? And when I leave here, you mustn’t follow me, because Jagot’s man will follow you. Do you understand? You
must not
follow me.”

She pushed me hard, as if shaking me from some state of stupefaction. I wanted to embrace her. Her promise to return my belongings, the turning back of time, the prospect of starting again, acted like a strong draft of laudanum. I didn’t think about Jagot or about how I was going to account for the recovery of the stolen goods. It didn’t even matter if her story was true or not. I was light-headed with expectation and relief.

“Thank you. Yes, I understand,” I said. “Seven o’clock. Passage des Petits-Pères. Third streetlamp from the east.”

“Now let me buy you a drink,” she said. “I need to steady my nerves, and it will throw Jagot’s man off the scent. He doesn’t recognize me dressed like this.”

I followed her to the bar, watching her broad stride, her slight swagger, marveling at the woman’s body moving in the man’s clothes. Lucienne ordered two glasses of champagne and took a seat on a high stool at the bar next to a man with white hair who was smoking a cigar. I sat to her left. The white-haired man had cast down a calfskin copy of Byron’s
Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage
and was slumped across the bar, intent on maintaining his flirtation with the barmaid. He seemed to have drunk rather too much brandy. Lucienne leaned toward him.
“Bonjour
, Alain,” she said.

The man stiffened and, putting out his cigar, turned to look at her. “Excuse me, monsieur, but you are mistaken,” he said, looking ashen and disoriented. “My name is Thomas. Thomas Gutell. This young lady here will tell you. It’s Thomas Gutell.”

“Forgive me, M. Gutell. You look remarkably like an old friend of mine, Citoyen Alain Saint-Vincent. He reads poetry too.” She picked up his book and opened it, running her eyes over the words. “Yes,” she
said, “Byron. Yes. I like this. My friend Saint-Vincent would like this too. But, sadly, he is no longer in Paris. He was exiled for speaking out against the king. He has left the country, they say. Perhaps I should send him a copy of this book.”

“Please, I assure you, it’s not a problem. It was an easy mistake to make.” The man who called himself M. Gutell took another gulp of his brandy. Lucienne stood up and passed a few coins to the barmaid, preparing to leave.

“You have had good luck today, monsieur, at the card table?” Gutell seemed to want to keep the conversation going a little longer.