Murder in the Bastille

Sunday Afternoon

BELLAN EMPTIED THE WHISKEY flask down the toilet, pulled his jacket off the hook in the dormitory, and left. In the Métro, he fingered the folded pamphlet for parents he’d picked up at the Mairie. He climbed the Montgallet Métro stairs and almost turned back. Non, keep going, he told himself.

Place de Fontenay, in the shadowed twilight, was crowded with children returning home from lessons and couples going out. Clusters of discount computer shops in nineteenth-century storefronts lined the street. The old, faded lettering tapisserie was visible under a sign reading TEKNOWARE. Bells pealed from a distant church.

Bellan saw the Jardin de Reuilly, a vast open green space with its state-of-the-art covered indoor pool. The girls would love it; Monique could start swimming lessons.

Bellan paused at the door of 11, rue Montgallet, under the sign Services Sociaux Assoc de parents d’enfants déficients men-taux. Three cigarettes later, he still paced in the doorway.

Would it matter to Marie if he went in? Would she believe him? And what would a meeting of blathering, self-involved parents with Down syndrome children tell him that he didn’t know? That he didn’t feel already? Who needed a moan and groan session . . . he got enough of that at the Commissairiat with all the staff cuts.

He turned to leave and bumped into a middle-aged man, out of breath, who held the hand of a young girl. A Down syndrome girl who was laughing.

“Excuse us, we’re late,” he said. “The soccer game ran into overtime.”

Bellan noticed the girl’s striped jersey, black shorts, muddy soccer cleats, and socks. And her flushed face, wreathed in smiles.

“Who won?”

“My daughter Arlette’s team. She’s the goalie,” he said, beaming. “On to the quarterfinals!’

Arlette hugged her father, then reached out her mud-spattered palm to Bellan.

“Well done,” he said, shaking her hand.

“After you, monsieur,” the man said, reaching for the door. “We don’t want to make you late, too.”

Bellan’s hand twisted in his pocket. He couldn’t do what Marie or anyone wanted him to. Only what his heart told him to. And for that he had to take the first step.

“I’m already late. Merci,” Bellan said. “But I’m here.” He took a deep breath and went in.