The Girl Who Remembered the Snow (9 page)

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Authors: Charles Mathes

BOOK: The Girl Who Remembered the Snow
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So she had been right about Henri-Pierre's extending his stay, Emma realized.
“Unfortunately,” Poteet went on, “at the same time that Mr. Caraignac was letting everyone know what a big tipper he was, the man who mugged your grandpa—or the punk who found the gun when the first guy threw it away—was out looking for somebody else with money. And what better place to find such a party than a fancy hotel?”
“You still think that Henri-Pierre's murder with the same gun that killed my grandfather was just a coincidence?”
“We haven't found any evidence to the contrary,” said Poteet. “Somebody here might have even tipped the killer off, some waiter or clerk tired of seeing up close how the other half lives. In any event, the man surprises Caraignac in his room, holds a gun to his head and demands to know where the cash is. Caraignac tells him. The scum shoots him anyway and takes the money, which is
why we didn't find any in his room. End of story. Now, give me one more minute to digest my little snack here, and I'll be lettin' you get back to your exercise program.”
“Don't you want to know what I've found out?”
“Oh, I know you ain't found out nothin', Miz Passant. Nothin' we don't know, at any rate.”
“He was standing by that window over there when he was killed,” said Emma.
“Like I said, nothin' that we don't already know.”
“He took all his meals alone. He checked in with only one suitcase.
“We know that, too. Luggage is the bell captain's life. Caraignac even went out and bought himself a whole load of new clothes while he was here. We found the receipts in his effects. Shirts, suits, ties—plus a suitcase to take everything home in.”
“Maybe it was about a piece of furniture,” said Emma.
“What was?”
“The murders. Pépé moved pieces of furniture occasionally. Maybe he had picked up an expensive antique. Somebody shot him for it, and dumped his body in the park. Then the killer tried to sell it to Henri-Pierre, who got suspicious and the man killed him, too.”
“That's pretty good,” said Poteet. “Anyone ever tell you you got a good imagination?”
“What's that got to do with anything?” said Emma. “My theory makes just as much sense as yours.”
“Only we haven't got any reports of any missing antiques, and your grandpa's body showed no signs of being moved.”
“Maybe the piece was already stolen, so the owner couldn't report its disappearance. Maybe the killer took my grandfather to the park and shot him there.
“You know for a fact that your grandpa was hired to move any antiques lately?”
“He didn't tell me much about his work.”
“You have evidence that Mr. Caraignac attempted to buy stolen property?”
“No, but I think this is a lead you should take seriously.”
“Ever study geometry, Miz Passant?” said Poteet with a grunt, rising to his feet.
“A little, I guess,” said Emma. “Why?”
“My daughter all's growed up now, two kids of her own, but I used to help her with her lessons. I always liked that geometry stuff best. If you got one point, you got a point. If you got two points, you can connect them and you got a line. If you got three points, you got a plane.”
“Well, obviously you must have some point here, too,” said Emma. “I just don't see it.”
“The point is, Miz Passant,” said Poteet, “that a human bein' ain't a point or a line or a plane. A human being is a complex, multidimensional organism, and what happens to him is the result of all manner of events and circumstances. That's why we professionals take weeks and months collecting evidence before we even think about what it all means. And when we do go connectin' points, we pay attention to geometry and look for straight lines to do it with, not go to hypothetical antique furnitureville and back. It just doesn't work that way, I'm afraid. Now we've had a pleasant chat today, Miz Passant, and you know I'm your friend. I'm tellin' you as a friend that you're wasting your time here, messin' around in this business. Why don't you just try to forget what happened and get on with your life?”
“I can't. My grandfather was killed. I've got to do something.”
“Your name Po-lice Department?” said Poteet, staring sternfaced from the door.
“Am I breaking any law?”
“It ain't against the law to try to make yourself feel better, Miz Passant. I understand, believe me, I do. This is a senseless thing, these deaths, and you're just tryin' to make them fit into some pattern. Human bein's love patterns. That's why they always
makin' ‘em. Makin' patterns is what you call art. Finding patterns, on the other hand, is what you call science. That's what we do, but we ain't finding any patterns here.”
“Maybe you're not looking in the right places.”
“We're lookin' where we need to look,” said Poteet. “And we know what we're doing. You don't.”
“I'm not breaking any law, you said so yourself.”
“God damn a duck, woman, what do I got to say to get through to you?” snapped Poteet, showing anger for the first time. “How you think you're gonna feel sometime down the road when something you've said or done this week gets the case against your grandpa's killer thrown out of court? Or worse, what are you gonna say if you have the bad luck actually to stumble on the person or persons responsible for this situation? We are dealing with killin's here, you understand what I'm saying?”
“I hear you,” whispered Emma.
“Thank you, Miz Passant,” said the portly detective, recovering his composure and bowing slightly. “It's not like I don't appreciate your concern. I do. But you're gonna have to leave the detectin' 'round here to us. At least you're gonna have some money from your grandfather to help get you through all this. Quite a bit of money, I understand.”
“How do you know about that?”
Poteet already had the door open, but he turned and smiled his sad smile.
“You really think we wouldn't look into your grandfather's finances, Miz Passant? It's not every carpenter who leaves an estate of a million dollars. Some of the boys even think it gives you a motive for murder yourself.”
“I don't care about money,” gasped Emma. “I adored my grandfather. I'd give anything in the world to have him back.”
“I know that, Miz Passant. I also know you been under a lot of stress. Like I say, the best thing you can do is just put all this behind you. Take a vacation or something, get away. You hear?”
“You mean I'm actually allowed to leave town?”
“You can afford to now, can't you?”
 
“One margarita, and here's the glass of water you wanted,” said the cocktail waitress, bending down and giving Emma a peek of cleavage.
The girl's tan, flattened breasts were a good three inches apart and covered with goose bumps. Her naked legs were protected by only a black spiderweb of stockings. According to the brushed copper nameplate on her shoulder strap, her name was Sheila.
“Thanks,” said Emma. She had worn similar outfits herself working in restaurants and bars over the years, which was why she refused to do so onstage. “Do you have some pretzels or something?”
“You don't like the crûdités?”
Emma eyed the raw broccoli and vegetable dip on the table. In the dim light of the cocktail lounge they looked about as appealing as broccoli and vegetable dip.
“I've been eating a lot of sophisticated food lately. I think I need something more basic.”
“I'll see what I can do.” Sheila grinned and hustled off to a table in the corner, where two men in suits were waving empty glasses.
Emma was still a little shaken from her conversation with Benno Poteet, but she was hardly going to let that stop her from talking to Sheila. Sheila was the cocktail waitress who had been off since last week, the one whom the detective had been talking about. Emma knew because she had already spoken to all the other waitresses. She wasn't ready to give up trying to learn what had really happened to Pépé and Henri-Pierre Caraignac just because the San Francisco Police Department had run out of ideas.
The tanned waitress with the goose-bumped chest returned in a few minutes with a black enamel bowl far too elegant for its contents.
“Will you settle for corn chips?” she asked in a husky voice.
“Even better,” said Emma, taking the proffered bowl. “Did you talk to those cops this afternoon?”
“Yeah. How did you know?”
“I was Mr. Caraignac's … friend,” said Emma truthfully, hoping the waitress would leap to the wrong conclusion.
“You poor kid,” said Sheila, her eyes growing wide. “Hey, I'm really sorry about what happened.”
“Thanks.”
“My sister just had a baby and I went up to Petaluma to be with her. I didn't hear until I got back today. I couldn't believe it. I went to the bathroom and I cried. I just cried. He was such a nice man, Mr. Caraignac. I'm really sorry.”
“Were you able to tell the police anything that would help them?”
“Not really. Hey, now I get it. You're that girl's been asking about him, huh? Ray Anthony the manager has been trying to shut everybody up.”
“I don't want to get you in trouble,” said Emma. “But it would mean a lot to me if you would tell me about Mr. Caraignac. Anything you can remember. Please?”
“Don't worry, honey,” said Sheila. “I don't give a shit about Ray Anthony. I'm not one of his little robots.”
Sheila looked to her right and left. The lounge wasn't busy and there were no other waitress within earshot.
“Mr. Caraignac came in here practically every night,” she said, sitting down on the edge of the chair next to Emma. “Always around eight o'clock. He would nurse a Pernod for a while, then leave. That's this funny French drink, Pernod. We hardly ever serve it, so I noticed him right away. Actually how could you not notice him with those eyes and that face? Hey, look, I didn't mean that. Maybe I'd better go. You must've enough on your mind without me making cracks.”
“No, please,” said Emma, touching Sheila's arm, preventing her from getting up. “I want to know. Was he ever with anyone?”
“No. Always by himself, like I told the cops.”
Somehow Henri-Pierre's eating and drinking alone for the whole of his two-week stay in San Francisco just didn't jibe with the way he had come on to Emma last Friday.
“There were never any girls with him?”
“Look, honey, I can see why you would be worried,” said Sheila, blinking her mascaraed eyes earnestly. “The man was gorgeous. But like I said, he was always in here by himself. Not that they didn't try. Plenty of ladies went over to strike up conversations. One of the girls who works here even asked him straight out for a date. But he just wasn't interested, you know? A few of us figured he was gay, which would have been such a waste. Look, like I said, I'm really sorry about what happened. Your drink's on the house.”
“Thanks. That's very nice of you. Did he ever say anything about what he was doing in San Francisco? I guess the police asked you that.”
“Yeah, but I couldn't help them. You mean you didn't even know he was here?”
“We had had sort of a misunderstanding.”
“Gee, that's tough, kid.”
“Anything he said to you, I'd like to know.”
“Sure, I got ya. But the only thing we ever talked about—beyond the usual ‘hi, how are you, what'll it be tonight?' kind of stuff—was France. I always kinda wanted to go to France when I was kid, so I asked him a few times what it was like, and he would talk in that sexy accent he had about the way the light looks different in Paris and how food smells and tastes better and how everybody sits around in cafés, drinking espresso and watching the world go by. He was always real nice, real patient-like. Maybe he came here because he needed to get away, think things over,
you know? I have to do that with my boyfriend sometimes. It's not like Mr. Caraignac was out having a good time or anything, believe me.”
“What do you mean?”
“Oh, you could tell he had a lot on his mind, the way he just sat there, not talking with anyone. He just nursed the one drink and looked sad. Yeah, it makes sense that you two had a fight. That last night … No, forget it. Never mind.”
“Please, Sheila. It's very important to me.”
“I just don't want to hurt your feelings or anything.”
“You won't. I promise.”
“All right. Maybe you'll be okay with it, I don't know. It didn't mean anything. Anyways, this past Saturday was the last time I worked and the night when he … you know. So, like I told you, Mr. Caraignac usually came in around eight, but that night it was closer to six. He ordered his usual Pernod, but he didn't drink any. He just sat there. But he didn't look so miserable anymore. He looked like he had come to terms with something, you know? When I gave him his check, he signed for it like always. Then he kissed me on the cheek and gave me a hundred-dollar bill, like he knew he wouldn't be seeing me again.”

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