An Uncertain Place

II

‘YOU GET SOME WEIRD GOINGS-ON IN FRANCE TOO, DON’T you?’ remarked Detective Chief Inspector Radstock, in English, to his Parisian colleagues.

‘What did he say?’ asked Adamsberg.

‘He said we get weird things happening back home as well,’ Danglard translated.

‘Very true,’ said Adamsberg, without taking much interest in the conversation.

What concerned him just now was the possibility of taking a stroll. He was in London, it was a fine evening in June, and he wanted to walk about a bit. The two days of conference he had sat through were beginning to get on his nerves. Staying seated for hours on end was one of the rare experiences that disrupted his habitual calm, and made him undergo the strange state other people called ‘impatience’ or ‘feverishness’, usually foreign to his nature. The previous day he had managed to escape three times, and had explored the surrounding district, after a fashion, committing to memory the brick housefronts, the white columns, the black-and-gold lamp posts. He had taken a few steps into a little street called St John’s Mews, though heaven only knew how you were meant to pronounce ‘Mews’. A flock of seagulls had flown up in the air, calling (mewing indeed) in English. But his absences had been noticed. So today he had had to stay the course, sitting in his place, unresponsive to the speeches of his colleagues and unable to keep up with the rapid translation by a simultaneous interpreter. The hall was crammed full of police officers, all of whom were displaying much ingenuity in devising a grid intended to ‘harmonise the flow of migrants’, and to cover Europe with a net through whose meshes it would be impossible to slip. Since he had always preferred fluids to solids, the flexible to the rigid, Adamsberg naturally identified with the movements of the ‘flow’ and was inventing ways of outflanking the fortifications which were being perfected under his very eyes.

This colleague from New Scotland Yard, DCI Radstock, seemed to know all about nets, but did not seem to be fanatical about their efficiency. He would be retiring in under a year, and cherished the very British notion of spending his time fishing in some northern loch, according to Danglard, who understood everything and translated everything, including things that Adamsberg had no wish to know. He would have liked to tell his deputy not to bother with these superfluous translations, but Danglard had so few treats and he seemed so happy revelling in the English language, rather like a wild boar wallowing in a favoured spot of mud, that Adamsberg hadn’t the heart to deprive him of the least scrap of enjoyment. At this point, the commandant seemed to have attained a state of bliss, almost to have taken wing, his usually shambling body gaining stature, his drooping shoulders squared, displaying a posture which almost made him impressive. Perhaps he was nursing a plan to retire one day with this new-found friend, and go fishing for something or other in the northern loch.

Radstock was taking advantage of Danglard’s bonhomie to describe to him what it was like working in Scotland Yard, but he was also regaling him with a string of the kind of ‘spicy’ stories he thought suitable for his French guests. Danglard had listened to him throughout their lunch without any sign of boredom, while making sure to check the quality of the wine. Radstock called him ‘Donglarde’, and the two policemen were matching each other anecdote for anecdote, drink for drink, leaving Adamsberg far behind. Of all the hundred officers at the conference, Adamsberg was the only one who didn’t have even the slightest grasp of the English language. So he was following along in a marginal way, exactly as he had hoped, and few people had gathered quite who he was. At his side was the young junior officer, brigadier Estalère, with his wide-open green eyes, which made him look perpetually surprised. Adamsberg had insisted on taking him along on the mission. He maintained that Estalère would wise up one of these days, and from time to time he expended some energy trying to bring this about.

Hands in pockets and for once smartly turned out, Adamsberg was taking full advantage of this long stroll, as Radstock paraded them round the streets to show them the oddities of London by night. Such as a woman sleeping under a canopy of umbrellas sewn together, and clutching in her arms a three-foot-high object described as a ‘teddy bear’. ‘It’s a toy bear,’ Danglard had translated. ‘Yes, I did gather that,’ said Adamsberg.

‘And here,’ said Radstock, pointing down a long, straight avenue, ‘we have Lord Clyde-Fox. He’s an example of what you might call an eccentric English aristocrat. Not many left. They don’t make ’em like this any more. Quite a young specimen.’

Radstock stopped to allow them time to observe this individual, with the satisfaction of someone showing off a rather unusual phenomenon to his guests. Adamsberg and Danglard obediently observed him. Tall and thin, Lord Clyde-Fox was hopping clumsily about on the spot, first on one foot then on the other, barely avoiding falling over. Another man was smoking a cigar about ten feet away, swaying slightly and contemplating his companion’s trouble.

‘Er, interesting,’ said Danglard politely.

‘He’s quite often around here, but not every evening,’ said Radstock, as if his colleagues were benefiting from a rare sighting. ‘We get on all right. He’s very amiable, always a friendly word. He’s a sort of fixture, a familiar figure of the night. Seeing the time it is, he’s probably had an evening out and is trying to get home.’

‘He’s drunk?’ queried Danglard.

‘Not quite. He makes it a point of honour to see how far he can go, finds his limit, and then hangs on there. He says that if he walks along a ridge, balancing between one slope and another, he may suffer but he will never be bored. Everything all right, sir?’

‘Everything all right with you, Radstock?’ rejoined the man, waving a hand.

‘A joker,’ the chief inspector confided. ‘Well, if he wants to be. When his mother died, two years ago, he tried to eat a whole box of photos of her. His sister barged in to stop him, and it turned nasty. She finished up in hospital and him down at the station. The noble lord was absolutely furious because he had been prevented from eating the photos.’

‘Really, really eating them?’ asked Estalère.

‘Yes, really. But what are a few photos? I think, in Paris one time, some chap tried to eat a wardrobe, didn’t he?’

‘What did he say?’ asked Adamsberg, seeing Radstock’s frown.

‘He says there was some Frenchman once who tried to eat a wardrobe. Actually there was. He managed it over a few months, with the help of some friends.’

‘Weird, eh, Donglarde?’

‘You’re quite right, it was in the early twentieth century.’

‘Ah, that’s normal,’ said Estalère, who often chose exactly the wrong expression. ‘There was this man I heard about, he ate an aeroplane, and it took him a year. Just a year. A small plane.’

Radstock nodded gravely. Adamsberg had noticed that he liked to make solemn pronouncements. He sometimes came out with long sentences which – from their tone – were passing judgement on the whole of humanity and its probable nature, good or bad, angelic or devilish.

‘There are some things,’ Radstock began – Danglard providing a simultaneous translation – ‘that people can’t imagine themselves doing until some crazy individual has tried it. But once something’s been done for the first time, good or bad, it goes into the inheritance of the human race. It can be used, it can be copied, and people will even try to go one better. The chap who ate the wardrobe made it easier for that other chap to eat the aeroplane. And that’s how the vast dark continent of madness opens up, like a map, as people explore unknown regions. We’re going forward in the gloom, with nothing but experience to guide us, that’s what I tell my men. So Lord Clyde-Fox over there is taking his shoes off, and putting them back on, over and over again. Goodness knows why. When we do know, someone else will be able to do the same thing.’

‘Greetings, sir,’ said the chief inspector now, going closer. ‘Is there a problem?’

‘Greetings, Radstock,’ said Clyde-Fox mildly.

The two men made signs of recognition to each other, two nightbirds, familiars who had no secrets. Clyde-Fox put one stockinged foot on the pavement, holding his shoe in his hand and looking intently inside it.

‘A problem?’ Radstock repeated.

‘I should say so. Perhaps you should go and take a look – if you’ve the stomach for it.’

‘Where?’

‘At the entrance to Highgate Cemetery.’

‘It’s not a good idea to go poking around in a place like that,’ said Radstock in disapproving tones. ‘What were you doing there?’

‘Beating the bounds with a few chosen friends,’ the noble lord explained, gesturing with his thumb towards his cigar-smoking companion. ‘The boundary between fear and common sense. Well, I know the place like the back of my hand, but he wanted to take a look. Be careful, chief inspector,’ said Clyde-Fox lowering his voice. ‘My pal over there’s as tight as a tick, and he’s as fast as lightning. He’s already taken out a couple of fellers in the pub. Teaches Cuban dance. Highly strung. Not from here.’

Lord Clyde-Fox shook his shoe in the air again, put it back on and took off the other.

‘Right, sir. But your shoes – is there something inside them?’

‘No, Radstock, I’m just checking them.’

The Cuban said something in Spanish which seemed to indicate that he had had enough and that he was off. The lord gave him a casual wave of the hand.

‘In your view, officer,’ Clyde-Fox said, ‘what should there be inside a shoe?’

‘A foot,’ Estalère intervened to say.

‘Exactly so,’ said Clyde-Fox, nodding approvingly at the young Frenchman. ‘And it’s just as well to check that the feet in your shoes are your own, eh? Radstock, if you had such a thing as a torch, you might help me clear this up.’

‘What do you want me to do?’

‘See if there’s anything inside these.’

As Clyde-Fox held up both shoes, Radstock methodically looked inside them. Adamsberg, completely forgotten, was pacing around slowly. He was thinking about the man who had chewed up his wardrobe, month after month, splinter after splinter. He wondered which he would prefer to eat, a wardrobe or an aeroplane – or photos of his mother. Or anything else – was there some other exploit that might reveal a new section of the dark continent of madness that DCI Radstock had referred to?

‘Nothing there,’ concluded Radstock.

‘You’re quite sure?’

‘Absolutely.’

‘That’s good,’ said Clyde-Fox, putting the shoes back on. ‘Nasty business. Go on Radstock, old chap, it’s your department. Go and look. Just at the gates. A load of old shoes on the pavement. But steel yourself. About twenty of ’em, you can’t miss ’em.’

‘That sort of thing’s not my department, Your Lordship.’

‘Oh yes it is. They’re lined up carefully, all the toes pointing to the cemetery as if they wanted to walk in. I’m talking about the old main gate now.’

‘But the old cemetery has nightwatchmen. It’s closed to the public after dark, and it’s closed to their shoes too.’

‘Well, the shoes want to go in all the same, and their whole attitude is most unpleasant. Go on, go and look, do your job.’

‘I’m afraid, sir, that I have better things to do than inspect a load of old shoes.’

‘Wrong, Radstock! Wrong! Because there are feet inside them.’

There was a sudden silence, a ghastly shock wave. A small whimper came from Estalère’s throat. Danglard tensed his arms. Adamsberg stopped pacing and looked up.

‘Bloody hell,’ whispered Danglard.

‘What did he say?’ Adamsberg asked.

‘He says there are some old shoes, looking as though they want to walk into the cemetery, and he says Radstock is wrong not to go and take a look, because they’ve got feet inside them.’

‘Take no notice, Donglarde,’ Radstock interrupted. ‘He’s had too much to drink. You’ve had a drop too much, sir, you ought to go home.’

‘There. Are. Feet. Inside. Them,’ enunciated Lord Clyde-Fox, clearly and calmly, to indicate that he was walking with perfect assurance along the ridge. ‘Cut off at the ankles. And the feet are trying to get into the cemetery.’

‘As you say, sir, and they’re, er, trying to get in, are they?’

Lord Clyde-Fox was carefully combing his hair, a sign that his departure was imminent. Now that he had the problem off his chest, he seemed to have returned to normal.

‘Pretty ancient shoes,’ he added, ‘about fifteen or twenty years old, I’d say. Men’s and women’s, both.’

‘But the feet?’ asked Danglard discreetly. ‘Are the feet just bones now?’

‘Leave it, Donglarde, he’s been seeing things.’

‘No,’ said Clyde-Fox, tucking away his comb and ignoring Radstock. ‘The feet are almost intact.’

‘And they’re trying to get into the cemetery?’

‘Precisely, old man.’