Memory of Flames

CHAPTER 16

AS Margont knocked on the door, he had still not worked out a plausible reason for his visit. Unusually for him, normally so methodical and careful, he was improvising. A woman of about fifty answered the door. She smiled in a friendly manner. There was no doubt that here was the woman Michel had described. She invited him in, without asking any questions as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

The living space was cramped but very clean and tidy. Margont was intrigued by the way it was laid out. The room they were in seemed to serve as kitchen and bedroom, with an impeccably made and tucked in bed. But a closed door indicated that there was another room. The premises were like the woman who lived in them: pleasant and welcoming. She offered Margont a seat. Why is she at such pains to make me feel at home? he wondered. The chair she had proposed for him was arranged in such a way that he was not looking directly at the door of the other room. But nor

was the woman hiding it, it was simply discreetly out of sight. Margont guessed that this was no coincidence. Everything here was carefully worked out. The clue to the mystery lay behind that door.

‘May I know who recommended me?’ asked the woman. She was smiling at him, but her question was pointed.

‘A woman friend of mine ...’

‘It’s always “a friend” who recommends me. But I need to know who exactly. Otherwise I won’t be able to help you.’

Firm but kind. A rather extraordinary person. Had she been a man, Margont would have assumed she had been a soldier. She was used to dealing with awkward situations. And the way she had invited him in - he could have been a burglar. She must know how to defend herself. Or else what she did forced her to act in this open way. If she had tried to seduce him he would have concluded that she was a prostitute. Perhaps she was a go-between? Had Catherine de Saltonges come here to prostitute herself in a room behind that mysterious door? But that hypothesis ran counter to

everything he felt he knew about her! Had her husband corrupted her into behaving as he behaved? Margont blushed at the thought and his discomfort reassured the woman.

‘Don’t be embarrassed, Monsieur. It’s quite normal, but rest assured I won’t say a thing.’

That was just the problem ... She was waiting for a response. I’d better just bluff, like Charles de Varencourt, Margont said to himself. ‘It was Mademoiselle Catherine de Saltonges who recommended you.’

That reply put the woman completely at ease. ‘Is she all right? I was worried about her.’

‘She’s still crying a great deal ...’

‘That’s understandable. When you discover you’re having a child, you worry and panic and wish that it didn’t exist, but once it’s gone, you wonder if you’ve made the right decision ...’

An abortionist! Catherine de Saltonges had come to have an abortion. Who was the father? Why had she not kept the child? Margont was bursting with questions.

‘She was very unsure ...’ the woman said.

Her sentence ended in an uncertain silence. She wondered if she were not giving too much away. Margont reflected that she might know who the father was.

He ventured: ‘Um ... the father ... I don’t know if she told you a bit about him ...’

‘Yes, she did confide in me, she had to tell someone. I do feel she should have told him about the child - he had a right to know. If he had supported her, I’m certain she would have kept the child. At the beginning she told me he couldn’t be there because he had business to attend to, but later she admitted that he was not aware of the child’s existence. She felt that he had suffered enough and that he would neither be able to welcome the child, nor to take responsibility for the decision not to keep it. She was distraught that she had fallen pregnant so quickly, when she had previously been married for four and a half years without it ever happening. She said that despite her age, she hoped one day to have another child with her lover, but that next time they would be able to keep

it and bring it up. Together. What a tragedy! The father must have been through terrible times.’

She was eaten up with curiosity and hoped to get him to tell her more. Margont looked worried.

‘We are very concerned about him. Did she explain why?’

‘No, she told me almost nothing about him. Not even his name. When she came the second time, when I performed the procedure, I said to her, “Another married man who makes fine promises and then decides he doesn’t want to leave his wife.” She laughed bitterly and replied, “Exactly right! Except that his wife is dead! And how do you leave a dead person?”’

‘It’s a very sad story ...’ He was trying to be as evasive as possible. Burning to know more, she said: All she would say is, “He’s already lost so many of his family and now he’s about to lose someone else without even knowing they exist. Fate is conspiring to kill his children before they are born.” Isn’t it awful?’

She leant forward so as not to lose a single word of the confidences she thought he was about to whisper to her.

‘Yes. But just now it’s Mademoiselle de Saltonges I’m worried about. She’s so pale and weak ... Did she bleed much?’

‘Inevitably, since the pregnancy was more than two months advanced ...’

Finally, regretfully realising that he was not going to reveal anything further, she decided to change the subject. ‘But what about your case, Monsieur?’

Margont floundered for a moment, then pulled himself together. ‘No, in the case of my lady friend, she’s only in her first month.’

‘In that case it’s possible that a concoction of plant extracts and a massage of the stomach will be all that’s necessary. If that doesn’t work, or if you leave it too late, I’ll use a needle. But I’m experienced. If your friend decides to use my services she will have to give me her name. Her real name, because I will check ... I need to know. It’s my way of ensuring that there’s no trickery, that you’re not a policeman ... Also, sometimes when I discover the identity of the person I choose to withhold my services. You would be astonished to know the celebrated and powerful people who contact me. Even the wife of a marshal ... In those cases, I always refuse, whatever price they offer me. But you can count on my complete discretion.’

The room behind the door made its presence felt more than ever. Catherine de Saltonges had been there, eaten up by doubt; the odour of her blood still impregnated the air; women had died in there ...

‘I’ll think about it,’ he announced. He rose, adopting the air of a man who had been reassured and who was going to confer the life of his loved one to a woman he barely knew. They said goodbye to each other cordially and Margont took his leave. He had not even revealed his name. As he crossed the threshold he shivered under the glacial caress of those who had died in the house.