Murder in the Bastille

Thursday Afternoon

AIMÉE SAT back on her bed in the residence, frustrated.

“Searching database for requested information. Five minutes remaining,” said the computer’s robotic voice. René had tried for Yves Montand’s silky tone. She hadn’t had the heart to tell him, Not even close.

Aimée lifted her fingers from the keyboard, felt her way across the cotton duvet, and found the rumpled Nicorette gum package. She rifled inside. Each tin foil pocket punctured and empty. All gone.

Her fingers scrabbled over the duvet, found the bedside table and the plastic bottle of lemon-scented nail polish remover she’d requested that René bring her. She uncrossed her black silk Chinese pajama pant-clad legs and felt around.

Where were the cotton pads? She felt something small, square, rough on one side. A box. A matchbox. Who’d been smoking . . . Morbier, Non, he’d quit. Bellan?

A few matchsticks rattled. She slid one out and chewed the matchhead, enjoying the gritty tang of sulphur on her tongue. Like pepper, without the kick. If only she had a cigarette to go with it.

And then she’d win the Lotto, fill every hungry stomach with food, and discover a cure for blindness.

Dream on.

There were knocks on the door. “Delivery for Mademoiselle Leduc.”

She reached for the security chain and unhooked it, then for the door knob.

“Sign please,” the voice said.

But she couldn’t. “Guide my hand to make an X.”

He did.

“Please, what does it say?”

“Package from Samaritaine from Martine Sitbon, and four orchid plants,” he said. “The card says ‘When in trouble, do the frivolous.’ ”

How sweet!

After she opened the box she found it filled with what felt like sunglasses, in assorted shapes: round, 70s rectangular, and cat-eye shaped with bumps . . . rhinestones?

She left the orchids for Sylvaine to help her with, then tried on each pair of sunglasses. Wondered what they looked like, kept on the ones she imagined were like Audrey Hepburn’s in Breakfast at Tiffany’s. All she needed were the rope of pearls and cigarette holder.

Then her palm touched something on the bedside table . . . a crumpled cellophane packet. Too thick for Nicorette . . . dare she hope? She put it to her nose, smelled the paper . . . an acrid blond tobacco . . . Gauloise Blond? Her favorite brand?

Her fingers found them . . . two filtered cigarettes. She wanted to shout Thank you God except for the nagging thought: Who would have forgotten them . . . or left them for her? A sympathy gesture from Bellan? But he’d visited her in the hospital, not here. Was it a forgetful janitor’s?

Would he want them back?

Never mind. And this wasn’t a hospital, surely people could smoke in their rooms. She hadn’t seen any sign forbidding it. And if some dragon complained, she’d get a kick out of saying just that.

Logistics . . . she had to plan her actions. How to smoke and not set the place on fire.

Stupid . . . such a simple thing. How could lighting and smoking a cigarette be such a big deal? But of course it was.

The matchbox fell from her hand. She heard it strike somewhere on the linoleum below her feet. Fighting a desire to burst into tears of frustration, she took a deep breath. Forced herself to look on the good side. Nom de Dieu, she was about to enjoy a coffin nail!

First she needed something for an ashtray. By the time she found the espresso cup and saucer and knocked it over, spilling the dregs over her sleeve, she’d located the matchbox with her toes. With a nimbleness she didn’t know she had, she clamped her toes around the matchbox, then hoisted it onto the mound of the piled duvet.

Had she closed the door to her room? If it weren’t so irritating, she’d find her predicament silly. But she imagined she would appear ridiculous to a sighted person looking in her room.

Sighted . . . when had she begun referring to others as sighted? She’d been around Chantal too much.

With everything in position, including bottled water, just in case of fire, she stood by the window. Lifting the smooth handle, she opened the double window a crack, then pushed it all the way open. She felt vents or narrow slats. Of course, a shutter; she pushed it aside, too. Then a metal bar, with ornamental grille below, like every apartment in Paris built in the Haussman era.

A brisk autumn gust from the Seine scented with chalky soil accompanied the whirr of machinery nearby. From below came the scrape of a bulldozer. She recognized the unmistakeable grating of an earth mover in the distance.

Urban renewal in the Bastille: the thought left a bad taste in her mouth. It was worse for those displaced by it. Whole courtyards of artisan workshops were being demolished by the high-profile Mirador construction company.

Now came the hard part, lighting the match. Only three left.

The filter tip sat in her mouth. The cigarette jutted straight out. Her hands were held close to her body. She took the match from the matchbox, positioned the nubby part between her forefinger and middle finger, set the match close, and struck it. A long slow sizzle and thupt, it lit on the first swipe. Heat came from her fingertips.

She moved the match to where she thought the cigarette tip was and inhaled. Her fingertip burned. But had she found the tip first?

And then she felt the rush of tobacco as it caught and burned. She inhaled, the jolt from the nicotine making her head spin. The smoke rushed to her lungs. Lightheaded, she fanned the match in big arcs until sure it had gone out.

Sipping an espresso would make it perfect.

Almost.

Back at the laptop, crosslegged, taking deep drags on the cigarette, she dug deeper into the Populax database. Her fingers flew over the keys, guided by the robotic voice. The impressive client dossiers revealed lucrative campaigns, especially the one for the Bastille Opéra. The Opéra’s exchange with St. Petersburg, a brainchild of glasnost, now a struggle for the St. Petersburg opera house, was being promoted by the Opéra board. Layer by layer, she checked the files. She found using extra keystrokes slowed her down, but not by much.

Nothing unusual.

Just to make sure, she ran a virus scan. The semi-silky voice informed her, “Scanning time remaining ten minutes.”

She sat back, grinding the cigarette out in the saucer positioned by her elbow. Trucks bleeped and the whine of the bulldozer came from below. She figured if she could see, the back of the Opéra would be on the other side of the Hospital.

The day before the assault, she’d used René’s car, adjusting his customized controls to fit her height. Finding taxis on a rainy Paris night had required more good taxi karma than she’d been willing to bank on.

Running late for the impromptu meeting called by Vincent just an hour earlier, she’d dented René’s Citroën in the tight first-floor Opéra parking lot. Carrying two laptops, graphs, rolled-up flowcharts, and the thick Populax file slowed her progress. She’d asked the gaunt-faced parking attendant for help. He’d given her a big smile and showed her a shortcut. He lisped and walked with a rolling gait, favoring a shortened leg. Yet he’d gone out of his way to guide her to an unmarked blue door that led to the back of the Quinze-Vingts hôpital, with the Opéra backstage loading dock on her left, and what she recognized now was the résidence St. Louis on her right. Vincent’s office on rue Charenton stood directly opposite. She’d felt about in her raincoat pocket, and come up with a damp fifty franc note.

“You’re a prince!” She’d meant it, looking at the downpour. “Got any idea when they close this exit?”

“Make it back before the guardien locks it at eight,” he said, smiling that warm smile again. “Although sometimes he forgets.”

All this had happened less than a week ago. But now she couldn’t see, didn’t know if she ever would, and her whole world had careened out of control. Even the satisfying smoke only blunted her anxiety.

Pangs of “what if’s” hit her until the semi-sexy velvet voice told her she had to make a choice between continuing the download or pausing. She snapped out of her mood of worry and self-pity. Time to work.

Loud pounding on the wall startled her. Aimée hit SAVE. Was the computer voice bothering her next door neighbor? Sharp raps at her door.

She switched off the laptop. Stood and counted her steps to the door.

“Oui?”

The knocking continued.

Aimée reached again for the security chain and unhooked it, then reached for the handle, a metal hook with padded grips and opened it.

“Who’s there?”

“Don’t torture me. Either close the window or give me a cigarette,” said a quavering voice.

“Forgive me, but I didn’t know,” she said, wishing she could see who this poor woman was. “I have one more . . . share?”

“Merci. ”

Something furry and soft feathered her arm as the woman passed. Like her grandmother’s fox collar. The same mothball musky smell. Aimée remembered the fox wrap draped around her grandmother’s neck. The two beady glass eyes, the sharp claws, and how she loved to touch them. “For special occasions,” her grandmother said, “baptisms, weddings, funerals, and when you graduate from the Sorbonne.”

But she hadn’t, and her grandmother passed away soon after.

“I’m your neighbor. Let me see you,” said the demanding voice.

Aimée felt hands, wrinkled and dry, outlining her cheeks, neck, and hairline. Fingers with short nails and a clinging chocolate aroma explored her.

“Nice earrings . . . pearl studs?” she was asked.

“I’m impressed,” she said. “Call me Aimée.”

“Madame Toile, but you can call me Mimi. Just don’t call me late to dinner.”

Old joke. Something metallic jingled.

“What’s that . . . your key?” Aimée asked.

It felt like a flattened serving utensil beneath Aimée’s hand. “Eh? My absinthe spoon . . . I need it. Must do it properly, you know.”

Aimée knew that absinthe had been outlawed for years, but figured the old biddy had her own source. Or inhabited her own world.

“Hold the sugar lump just right and sip the absinthe through it,” she said, her voice misting with anticipation. “Every afternoon, Rico pours me a few drops. He’s Pierre’s grandson, so I know it’s right.”

The old woodworm liquor rotted the brain. Had it damaged Mimi’s?

“Pierre supplied the maison,” Mimi said. “Such a well-connected man. Even when they shut us down in forty-eight.” She made a snorting noise. “We moved across Marché d’Aligre. All the girls came. What else would they do?”

Was Mimi the absinthe-drinking ex-madam of a bordello?

“They called us an institution,” she said. “Now where’s that Gauloise?”

She felt Mimi’s dry hand leading her to the bed. Using the same maneuver, Aimée lit the final cigarette and passed it to her. Mimi inhaled a long drag, then slowly exhaled. “Reminds me of the first time. He did it like a soccer player, no hands and straight for the goal.”

Aimée laughed. Her first time, with her cousin’s friend, had been similar.

“So why were brothels closed in nineteen forty-eight?”

“Now who cared about us, eh? Except the government! They needed the buildings. The housing shortage after the war. . .incroyable! So they took over the houses . . . even the Sphinx in Montparnasse, where the ministers went. Well, what went on at the Sphinx was no enigma, if you get my drift.”

Aimée didn’t know if she wanted to.

Madame exhaled a long smoky breath, felt for Aimée’s hand, and slid it between her fingers. “Reminds me of the blackouts. We’d share fags then, too. Never light three on a match, or a sniper will get you, they said. None of us went to the Métro during air raids. We took our chances: after all, we were getting paid, weren’t we?”

A nicotine-induced wave of dizziness came over Aimée. Was it a sign of recovery, small though it might be?

“Clothilde was the smart one. Shrewd. She still runs her bar,” she said. “Right down there on the corner of rue Moreau. Banked her sous and bought the place. Clotilde knew how to judge the tide and still does. After all, the tide only goes two ways, in and out. The difference after forty-eight was that the girls stood out front on the cobblestones. That and not getting checked every week by the médecin. Stupid, I call it . . . with so many diseases nowadays, eh?”

“What happened to your eyes, Mimi?”

“Something I can’t pronounce, but I like it when that young doctor tells me about it.” Her laughter sounded more like a cackle. The bed rocked. Aimée felt a sharp nudge in her ribs. “He wears good cologne and drinks Sumatra blend espresso. Know the one?”

Dr. Lambert. Mimi’s sense of smell wasn’t the only sharp thing about her.

“He’s the department head, Mimi.”

“If I wasn’t so old, he’d head my department. Like him?”

“Well, he’s . . .”

Another sharp nudge in her ribs. “Good salary, secure job and what a pension! A girl’s got to think of these things, non? Looks only take you so far.”

And Aimée wondered if Mimi was thinking of herself as she spoke.

“He’s married, most likely.”

“And when has that ever stopped anything?”

After Mimi left, Aimée ran a standard virus check on her laptop, figuring she might as well finish the tedious job before tackling the password encryption.

The slow whirr of the zip disk and then the announcement “Zip disk cleaning time remaining twelve minutes” caused her to reach for the nail polish remover bottle. She uncapped it, swished the nail polish remover onto a cotton square and rubbed away what she hoped was the chipped Gigabyte Green. The lemony acetone smell cleared her sinuses.

More loud knocking on her door.

“Oui?”

Perhaps Mimi wanted a manicure, too? Well why not, Aimée had time. She lifted the laptop, unplugged the external Zip Drive, and set them in the drawer.

She heard a muffled voice, hard to distinguish from the increasing loud gnawing of the bulldozer and pealing church bells somewhere. Was it night . . . was it dark? No . . . the men were still working. Or were they working late on the new Métro line?

She opened the door partway and undid the chain. Her foot stuck behind the doorframe and she stumbled.

Clumsy . . . still so awkward!

A breeze sliced by her face and a splintering, cracking noise accompanied it. Her body trembled.

“Salope!” said a man with an accent she couldn’t place. His sour breath hit her in the face. Then a sharp, stinging slap knocked her against the wall.

She tossed the open nail varnish remover at the man and ducked. And then she remembered the match . . . had she put it out? A fire hazard. Stupid.

From somewhere on her right came a yelp of pain.

Her arms were grabbed, then she felt a sharp shove in her back. Hard. She was airborne. Flying across the room. Good thing she’d flung her arms out to break her fall. Instead, they caught on a cold metal grille over cool fresh air.

The window was open.

She screamed. Panic overwhelmed her. A hand covered her mouth, then another big push shoved her hips over the grille. She tried to hook her legs onto the smooth metal, to cling to the bars. The next push and her legs went over. Blood rushed to her head. Good God . . . couldn’t someone see her from the street?

She screamed again. And again. The air was chilly. Dank with humidity. Was it night?

The scraping of the bulldozer in the street sounded close. Too close. She was hanging halfway out the window.

Why didn’t anyone see her or hear her? Was it dark? Or the bulldozer too loud?

Terror flooded her. Her fingernails scratched wood and she dug in, hugging what had to be the outside shutter. Clinging for dear life, her feet scrabbled, slipping and scraping the stone.

She had to hold on. Her fingers burned from the abrading stone. Her silk pajamas flapped in the wind. She couldn’t climb back into the room. She would have to take her chance with the concrete below. How far below?

“Help me!” she yelled once more.

Couldn’t anyone hear her? Each time she scrabbled her legs for purchase, her knees hit something hard. Somehow she found a toehold with her bare feet in the metal grille guard.

She kept screaming for help. Why didn’t anyone notice?

And then she became aware of gray fog, like a steamy vapor, crossing before her. And it felt so natural . . . because it was. She saw the fog from the Seine.

Her pulse leaped!

She blinked over and over. She could see. Furred yellow globes appeared and she realized they must be streetlamps. A foggy, grainy quality overlay what seemed a dark hulk of trees and what had to be car headlights on the street below. Dots of red and orange lights bordered the bulldozer.

And then darkness descended. It was gone.

She swung her leg on top of what felt like a stone ledge, reached out, and pulled herself up. Was this another window? Powderlike soot and crumbling concrete bits came back in her hand. What felt like a tin gutter was below her feet. She stepped onto it. It skidded and came loose. She grabbed at the nearest thing, some kind of rough weatherbeaten molding, and held on, trying to find the windowsill. Somewhere, a window slammed shut. She heard smashing and a crashing noise.

She felt a thick rock slab and then an indentation, like a little vest-pocket balcony. Nothing more. Merde. On her knees crawling now, and nowhere to go. Except to back up. Scarier than inching forward. Her hands, bloodied or wet from the moist railing, slipped. She smacked into a stone wall and clutched a shutter. A creaking and a ripping noise came and she clung for dear life.

Her hands slipped . . . how far were the cobblestones below? She’d never know because she wouldn’t be able to see the ground rushing up at her. Her heart hammered. She didn’t want to die.

Where was Mimi’s room? There had to be a ledge. All buildings had ledges under the windows. Didn’t they?

Wind whipped around her legs. Her fingers throbbed. If the building was as old as the Quinze-Vingts there’d be stone cornices. Where were they?

She felt rusted pipes, grabbed them and hugged the façade. Wires snapped off in her hand and she lost her balance. Her leg slid, then her foot jammed against sharp roof tiles. Fear flared up in her. She couldn’t hold on any longer.

“Somebody help!”

She heard a voice.

Raising her leg, she kicked as hard as she could. A wooden shutter banged away and glass splintered. Fine slivers beaded her calf.

“Don’t move, I’ve got a socket wrench aimed at your head,” she heard Mimi threaten.

“Mimi! Help me. Someone’s trying to kill me,” she screamed. “Let me in!”

“But . . .”

“Hurry up, it’s cold out here and I can’t hold on much longer!” Fear clutched her as her fingers loosened. Slipped. This was it. Her life was over. Then a hand pulled hers and her knees scraped over the shutters. By the time she was inside Mimi’s room, she knew what she had to do.

“I must have scared him away,” Mimi said.

“Call building security.”

“Be my guest.”

“Er, how do I do it?”

“The only security we can call is that loafer in the front gate. Try 37 on the wall phone.”

* * *

AIMÉE WAS perched on Mimi’s bed, with a blanket over her feet, when footsteps sounded in the hall. Stopped. Then came a pounding on Mimi’s door.

“Nom de Dieu,” said a high-pitched voice. “Quelle catastrophe!”

Aimée opened the door. “Someone broke down my door and attacked me!”

“But property can’t be destroyed like this.”

Aimée choked.

“Where’s security?” she asked. “Who are you?”

“The Matron, I’m responsible here,” said the woman. “The hospital administration only gives us conditional use. You’ve had some party going on with your hall neighbor, eh? But now you’ve ruined it for us.”

“Don’t you understand? Someone attacked me in my room and could still be there, although he’s probably gotten away by now.”

Aimée knew there were kilometers of corridors, underground links to the hospital, the Chapel and several administration buildings. With people all dressed in scrubs and walking around wearing masks, it would have been easy for her attacker to avoid detection.

“Smashed chairs, broken windows . . .” the matron’s voice trailed off. “Who gave you permission to have a room on this floor?”

“Chantal brought me here. But you don’t understand . . .”

“She has no authority,” said the matron. “I did not authorize you to sign in. We have strict rules. Our funding and insurance depend on upholding them.”

“I heard Aimée screaming and someone thrashing around next door, breaking things,” said Mimi.

“The attacker might still be here,” said Aimée.

“All I see is a mess you created,” the matron said. Aimée heard her sniffing. “What’s that smell? Drugs. . .?”

Did she mean the acetone smell of the lemon nail polish?

“Where’s security?”

“Allez-y, you’re out of here!” the matron said.

Wasn’t she the victim here? But it was hard to argue with an irate woman she couldn’t see. More footsteps came down the hall.

A shiver passed through her.

“What have you done now?” Dr. Lambert’s voice asked.

Where had he come from?

“Luckily I trip a lot, since I can’t see. That’s what saved me or the damage to my door would have happened to my face.”

“Matron, the door’s obviously been forced,” Dr. Lambert said. “Let’s make sure security’s on the way.”

“Of course, Doctor,” she said, her tone completely altered.

“I heard him bashing things,” said Mimi, “I turned on my Books on Tape, hit the wall, then yelled. I must have scared him away.”

“But I want it known this woman was in residence without my knowledge, much less my authority or consent,” said the matron. “Someone’s got to pay for the damages. I won’t take the blame. Why should my competence be put in question?”

“Please understand, this TGV accident threw everything into chaos . . . a huge overload of cases, not enough beds,” he said, trying to soothe her. “We’ve bent the rules a bit, but no one will point any fingers, I assure you.”

Aimée couldn’t believe his reaction. “I’d call this a police matter. Don’t you have security cameras here?”

“At the hospital entrance, so I’m told,” Mimi said. “Not here. Look, Aimée’s been attacked. Why blame her!”

But the matron must have already bustled out of the room.

“Where are my things?” Aimée asked. What if the attacker got her laptop and phone! “I have to check. Please help me.”

“Someone’s got to clean you up,” he said, “again!”

Her fingers throbbed where she had scraped them. She prayed she could still use a keyboard.

Dr. Lambert called for a nurse to medicate and bandage her hands. Then he left the room, but Aimée heard him talking with the matron in the hallway and greeting security when it arrived.

As soon as the nurse arrived, Aimée had her search the room. “Tell me what you find.”

“Well, the mattress is turned over, sheets and pillows everywhere, chairs upside down.”

“Please look in the closet.”

“Leather jacket, shoes all tumbled about. A mess.”

“Can you look in the drawer?”

“There’s a laptop computer,” said the nurse.

Thank God.

“Tubes of Ultralash mascara, a Chanel red lipstick, lipliner, powder, and perfume bottle on the floor. A black silk teddy mixed up with what looks like red and white wires.”

Her phone-line splicer cables. “What about my cell phone?”

“No sign,” the nurse said. “Not even under the bed.”

Great. Now they could get to her another way. Nothing remained private anymore. France Télécom held a wealth of information, if one knew how to crack the database. She’d done it often enough herself.

Still, she’d had Josiane’s phone in her pajama pocket. That at least was safe. And she guessed that the assailant had wanted it. That’s what this was about. And he’d find out soon enough he’d taken the wrong one.

She called the Commissariat and asked for Sergeant Bellan.

“Not here. What’s this about?”

By the time she recounted the circumstances and been transferred to the correct department, her lip trembled nonstop. She was afraid her words were no longer clear enough to be understood.

“We’ll send someone over,” a policewoman said. “but it could take a while. A big rig overturned on the Périphérique and it’s a mess.”

She asked the nurse to help her cancel her cell phone service.

“I’m sorry this happened, but you can’t stay here,” Dr. Lambert was saying. “Normally it wouldn’t matter. But with the property damage and matron upset . . .”

“I don’t care if she is. I’ve called the flics.”

She felt a finger on her lips. Nice and warm. His?

“I understand. Our reaction may seem callous but I’ll try and explain. The Ministry of Health’s threatened to close some hospitals. Our funding’s under review, so we all feel stretched right now. Services are tight, and the proposal to expand the day clinic’s outreach for the quartier’s underserved residents is crucial. We’d rather not make waves right now.” She felt Dr. Lambert’s arm around her shoulder.

“I think the attacker came back looking for . . .”

“Accommodating you here was my idea,” Dr. Lambert interrupted. “A bad one. But from now on, we’ll keep you safe. Forgive me, but you need to be checked often. The timing’s critical . . . we must monitor you closely until we know the extent of your vision loss.”

Despite his irritating stupidity, she liked how his warm hand felt on her shoulder, his lingering Vetiver scent, even his starched cardboardlike lab coat. How smart would it be to jeopardize any chance of regaining her vision?

And then she remembered. “But Doctor, I forgot. For an instant I could see. I saw gray fog, streetlights shining, and cars. It was so wonderful.”

Silence. “Just don’t hope for too much. Be thankful for what little you get.”

“But I saw again! Even if just for a few seconds . . . so it means I’m getting better . . . non? ”

“Often that happens . . . a gray cottony film or fog?” She nodded.

“That could be flottes, random detached tissue. Or it could be due to the easing of the pressure. Whether full vision will return permanently . . . that’s a hard call.”

Crushed, she turned away. She didn’t want him to see her in tears. Or shaking from fear. She had to find her phone, get out of here, find a place to stay.

“We’ll locate a bed for you in the hospital. It might be in the hallway but . . .”

“In case you forgot, if the attacker found me here, he’d find me there. No thanks, I’ll stay with friends.”

But who? René’s tiny studio brimmed with computers. Too small. Especially for her and Miles Davis. And too far away, as well. Martine’s boyfriend’s place, in the ultra bourgeois 16th arrondissement, wouldn’t be comfortable, now that all his children were living with them.

Live in her office? She’d done it before, but it wouldn’t be safe to stay there.

Martine’s cousin’s Bastille apartment was nearby, but having only been there once, she’d have to become better at navigating before she could get there, much less live in a strange place.

Outside she heard the bleating siren of a police van. She imagined the white police car, the flashing blue lights and red arrows striping the side. Was she nostalgic for the flics now? Pathetic.

“It’s imperative that you stay nearby,” Dr. Lambert said. “The way things look right now, it’s difficult to schedule another MRI, which you need. I’ll have to try to fit you in when there’s an opening. Can you pay rent?”

“If need be. Why?”

She heard him tapping on a cell phone. Then his voice.

“Madame Danoux, ça va? Still need a boarder? Bon . . . one of my patients. . . . You are a lifesaver, merci!”

* * *

AIMÉE, HER laptop and bag hanging heavily from her shoulder, walked with Chantal to the rear entrance of the rési-dence. They caught a taxi which dropped them off on rue Charenton, just a block away. But she’d had the taxi circle the area several times until she felt safe. Chantal helped her count out the francs for the fare. Each bill was folded differently, so she could distinguish its denomination.

“You’ve got more to learn, Aimée,” Chantal said. “We’ve got to get your orientation scheduled. But luckily you didn’t end up on the cobblestones. Things could have been a lot worse, eh?”

True. But her lip hadn’t stopped trembling. Thank God Chantal couldn’t see that.

“Chin up.” And with that Chantal left her on the second floor landing of a building that smelt of old cooking oil and musty corners.

“Crap!” seethed a soprano voice.

“But Madame Danoux, you mustn’t sell the lace panels,” said a middle-aged woman’s voice. “Such intricate work, remnants of a past time. Nostalgia passes over me when I think . . .”

“Nostalgia for what?” Madame Danoux’s voice interrupted. “Nostalgia is when you want things to stay as they were. I know so many people who stay in the same place. And I think, my God, look at them! They’re dead before they die. Living is risking.”

A complete contrast to Mimi, Aimée thought. She had lifted her bandaged hand to knock when the half-ajar door swung open.

“Who’s there?”

The woman must be looking Aimée over, deciding whether to let her in . . . despite Dr. Lambert’s introduction.

Aimée took a deep breath, wishing she could see who and where she was. “Aimée Leduc, Dr. Lambert’s patient.”

Aimée wondered if her hair stuck out, if her black boots were scuffed, if the seam of her leather miniskirt was misaligned, or if the bag of salvaged belongings on her arm bulged open. “May I come in?”

“We’ll talk later, Madame Danoux,” said the middle-aged woman. A chair scraped over wood. Footsteps clicked away.

“Of course, I need a tenant,” Madame Danoux said, her words measured and careful. “Such a saint, that man, Doctor Lambert. I help him whenever he asks. You know, he saved my husband’s eyesight after that amateur botched a simple cataract operation.”

Unsure, Aimée remained in the doorway. Where was that chair . . . was there a rug to trip on . . . tables to run into?

“Thank you, if you could tell me . . .”

“Come inside, make yourself comfortable,” Madame Danoux said, her voice edging away. “I’ll just see to some tea. You take tea, of course . . . I require it for my throat, must have it.”

And then she’d gone. For a moment, Aimée wondered if the woman knew she couldn’t see. . . . Wouldn’t she have guessed from the doctor’s call?

She reached behind her, closed the heavy door, then played back in her mind the conversation she’d overheard, the chair scraping and the direction in which Madame Danoux’s voice disappeared.

Cautiously Aimée edged forward, her arm outstretched. Dr. Lambert had given her a cane but she refused to use it. A lingering scent of roses wafted from her right; dribbling hot air warmed her wrist. She figured the purring cat signaled a chair by a window with a southern exposure, still containing the heat of the day.

Hammering came from below, the whine of a saw and then a soaring contralto voice.

“No, no, no! The emphasis falls on the half-note!” A piano key was pounded repeatedly. “Zut! Go home and practice. That’s all for today.”

Then she heard the flipping of a radio channel, quick and impatient, then what sounded like a grainy radio interview. The tinny sound came from the AM radio:

“Joining us this evening on Talk to the People is Michel Albin, sociologist and author of The New Violence: France in the 90’s.”

Just what she wanted to hear, a paperback sociologist spouting his theory and hawking his book!

“Monsieur Albin, since the early nineties the crime rate has soared. What’s happened?” “Let’s give it a historical perspective,” Albin said. “The fifties and sixties were a time of social reform and recovery from the war. The seventies were political, going into the eighties brought drugs and drug trafficking. Digicode security replaced front doorbells and concierges and Parisiens pushed minorities into the suburbs. We’re living with the results today.” “But monsieur, violence isn’t a new phenomenon.” “Violence constantly evolves, mirroring Society and depending on the period.”

The windows slammed shut. “Blah, blah, blah, talk is cheap. That and six francs gets you an espresso,” said Madame Danoux. “We need him to tell us the country’s going to the dogs? Have some tea and I’ll show you to your room.”

“Merci, madame,” Aimée said. “Picture the face of a clock. Can you tell me at what time the tea cup is?”

“Three o’clock,” she said. “Sad, to lose your sight so young. Need treatment, do you?”

Aimée nodded. Sad wasn’t the half of it. She’d been attacked now for the second time. What would the radio sociologist theorize about that?

Somehow, she’d fathom a way out of her predicament. But right now, she didn’t know how.

“Do you sing in the Opéra, Madame?”

“Nodules grew on my vocal chords,” said Madame. “Otherwise . . .” she trailed off. All the what ifs in life were encompassed in that long pause. “This Bastille Opéra house was an architectural disaster. Can you believe it? The building tiles fall off. They’re keeping them in place with cargo nets in the back! The dressing rooms are notorious for being filthy. Mulitiple shows go on, so someone else has used it the night before you go in. At least, the costumes are put in place every night by staff, the makeup person comes to your room. And the acoustics are marvelous. I preferred Châtelet—more beautiful, great backstage crew and the sets: huge. But at least I’ve got my health.”

Despite Madame Danoux’s words, Aimée felt she did miss her former profession.

“Mademoiselle, did you know Cyrano de Bergerac lived nearby?”

What a shift! Aimée’s brows creased in surprise. Madame Danoux was giving her an overview of the neighborhood.

Meanwhile, where were the flics? Chantal had promised to send them over.

Several shrill rings came from the front of the apartment.

Aimée heard a rustling and footsteps on parquet. “So much coming and going, busier than the Galeries Lafayette!” said Madame Danoux. “Excuse me.”

“Mademoiselle Leduc?” asked a deep voice. “I’m Officer Nord from the Commissariat. You reported an attack.”

“Bon!” she said, turning in the direction of the voice. She wished she could see him. He sounded young. “Madame Danoux, may I impose, some tea for the officer and use of this . . .” she stumbled . . . and gestured with her arm . . . what kind of room was this?

“Parlor,” Nord finished for her.

“Bien sûr,” Madame Danoux said.

Officer Nord showed her to a seat. The low hard divan cut into her back. Aimée fidgeted. She tried to concentrate. The better she explained and painted a picture for him, the more clues he’d have. What he did with them depended on how well he’d been trained.

Aimée heard the hissing of hot water being poured as Madame Danoux served him tea, then left.

“Why don’t you tell me what happened,” he said.

She started with the attack in the passage. Then she described the assault in the residence.

“You know the flics treated the first attack on me as the work of the Beast of Bastille,” she said.

“Now we’re treating it as an isolated assault,” he said.

Good. She realized something new must have taken place.

“Why?”

“I’m not at liberty to discuss that,” said the young flic, clearing his throat.

“You’ve found the Beast of Bastille, haven’t you?”

No answer. Had her message reached Morbier? And she thought about that night. She remembered who’d been brought into custody.

“You’re charging Mathieu Cavour, the ébéniste?”

Silence.

“But why . . . what evidence did you find?” she asked.

She figured he must be searching for a way to answer this. He couldn’t have been out of the police academy for long.

“Look, my father was a flic. I know the score,” she said. “Give me the truth.”

“They said you were a troublemaker.”

“I am. But tell me anyway.”

“Sergeant Bellan’s my superior,” he said.

Merde! Bellan had it in for her. No wonder he’d sent a trained lackey. A nice way to show how low she rated on the totem pole.

“. . . and Sergant Bellan’s a good one,” she said, gritting her teeth.

It stung to say that. Especially after the way he’d badmouthed her father. But it was best for her to compliment Bellan if she wanted to learn more. When Bellan stayed off the liquor, kept his rage under control, and didn’t take things personally as he did with her, he scored high marks in the Commissariat. Word had gotten around he was up for promotion. “Of course Bellan’s good, my father trained him.”

She hoped that sank in.

“Would you say,” he asked, “robbery was the motive for the first attack?”

Robbery?

“Does it make sense for Mathieu to attack and rob someone in front of his atelier?”

Had Bellan been saddled with a new recruit he had no time to work with? Silence.

“I’m the one asking questions here,” he said. “Let’s move on. Could robbery be the motive for this incident?”

“Not in the way you think,” she said. “My laptop and things were left. Only my phone was taken.”

“Mathieu Cavour was released. This morning.”

So they’d let him go? At least she’d learned that. She wanted to stand up, get the kinks out of her neck, feel the warmth from the heater. Her thoughts flowed better that way.

If only she could see his face, read his movements. But she couldn’t. All she had were intuition, some sensory antennae and whatever she could glean from his words. She had to get him on her side. Get him to cough up more of the latest info.

“Let’s assume, after luring out Josiane Dolet, the attacker got me by mistake,” she said. “I’d picked up her phone. We were wearing the same jacket. He realizes his mistake too late, after he’s bashed in my head. People come down the passage, frightening him away. But he finds Josiane in the next passage. He kills her, the most important part, but we don’t know why, then wraps her in an old carpet which isn’t discovered until later the next day. Meanwhile I’m blind, out of commission, but Josiane’s phone is nowhere to be found and eventually he realizes I must have it. He figures his number’s on the speed dial or it incriminates him some way, so he discovers where I am and breaks into the room . . . but he gets my phone . . . not hers. Thwarted again.”

“So Mademoiselle Leduc, why not give me the phone,” said Officer Nord.

He’d learned something from Bellan after all, how to listen. Josiane’s phone was her face card . . . the only one. The murderer wanted it. So did the flics.

“Tell me how you’re investigating the attack on me,” she said. “If you’ve found any suspects, and what’s happened to Vaduz, the Beast of Bastille.”

“If you’re trying to negotiate by withholding evidence needed in a homicide case, mademoiselle. . . .”

“Negotiate? Someone attacked me. So viciously, Officer Nord, that it blinded me. The doctor doubts I’ll ever see again.”

Silence.

She wouldn’t give in unless he met her halfway. “I want to discuss this with Bellan.”

“That’s impossible.”

No warmth in his voice. Was he writing this down? He sounded far away . . . had he moved?

“No more until I talk to him.”

“Sergeant Bellan’s away.”

“Away? A workaholic like him?”

“Family problems. The baby’s sick,” he said.

For the first time, the flic sounded human.

“Aaah, sorry to hear that.” Her back felt stiff from sitting on the hard divan. “Then to Commissaire Morbier.”

“He’s assigned to another case. The Beast of Bastille won’t strike again. That’s the official story, anyway,” he said, his voice faltering. “I didn’t know you’d lost your sight. Sorry.”

He grew more human every minute.

“Has Vaduz confessed?”

“As far as the Prefet’s concerned, as good as.”

“So where is he?”

“After a rampage outside Porte de la Chapelle, he crashed the car he stole. We’re not supposed to reveal this yet, especially to the media, but whatever they found was sent to the morgue.”

“You mean . . . Vaduz is dead. . . . When?” Why hadn’t Morbier told her?

“No announcements. No details released to our unit, anyway. So please keep it to yourself.”

“I want to, but if Vaduz died before I was attacked in the residence, that’s important.”

“How?”

“It could mean that someone else attacked me in the passage and killed Josiane, the same one who later came to the residence. That’s why I have to talk to Morbier.”

“Sergeant Bellan‘s handling the case. Everything goes through him. Of course, you’ll mention Josiane Dolet’s phone and reveal its whereabouts when I pass on the message to call you, won’t you?”

She nodded. “So they said I was trouble?”

“I made that up,” he said, “but looks like I got it right.”