Son of Holmes

16

The next day I awoke early, had coffee alone in the arbor, then worked in the garden, weeding. At noon, I sent Danielle over to Tania’s to see if she’d returned, but she hadn’t. It was quite warm. At about two o’clock we took a sparse lunch of tomatoes, pâté, and bread, after which I napped while she did some laundry. Finally, when the sun had just set, she helped me load three cases of beer into the Ford, and I drove to La Couronne.

I entered via the front door and asked Charles if he’d help me unload my cargo. A few of the patrons looked up as we passed. It was certainly irregular to make deliveries through the dining room, but no one complained. I was evidently the first to arrive.

Lupa’s quarters had been rearranged to accommodate a crowd, with chairs brought down from above and set around the walls. Fritz was busy with dinners, and I watched him for a short time until I became restless and moved back to the apartment for a beer. Generally I waited until some of the group arrived before I drank, but tonight I made an exception.

The next to appear were Georges and Henri-together, as they usually were. Henri was more relaxed than I’d seen him in the past week. We shook hands, and his grip was dry and firm.

“Georges tells me they’ve arrested Lupa.”

“I think not yet,” I said.

“But he did it.”

“It appears so.”

He breathed out. “That’s a relief. I was sure they were going to arrest me because I was a foreigner-but then I forgot”-he smiled-“so are Lupa and Paul.”

Georges walked up and laid his arm across Henri’s shoulders. “I kept telling him last week not to worry. If he’d escaped the arrests last August, the authorities didn’t suspect him at all.” Georges was referring to the Carnet B arrests of suspected foreign agents, which took place upon mobilization. “The same went for Paul, but Lupa-aren’t I right, Jules?-came to Valence after August.”

I nodded. “That’s so. Why don’t you have a beer, Henri? And you, too, Georges? I’m sure it’s been a hard week for all of us.”

We sat, and they began to drink. Henri wiped the foam from his drooping mustache, letting only a few drops fall onto his old faded frock. Georges was dapper in a blue suit and tie. He drank neatly.

“Did Paul make it to the hotel yesterday?” I asked only to make conversation.

“Oh yes.” Georges smiled. “Tipsy but in fine spirits. Speaking of which…”

Outside, there was a slight hubbub, and in a moment, Paul entered, beaming. “A fine howdy-do this is!” he said. “Starting without me again.” He said his hellos all around and picked up a beer. “Good news, friends, my book is sold! Here’s to poetry!”

We drank the toast. He turned to me. “They took the new poems. Isn’t that great?”

We agreed it was, and he insisted we all open more beer. In the middle of passing them out, he stopped. “Hey, where’s the lady?”

I had been worrying about Tania since I’d arrived but was still hoping she would appear. “I don’t know,” I said, “but I’m sure she’ll be around.”

We pulled our chairs into a small circle and began to talk about Paul’s good fortune. No one seemed disposed to discuss Marcel’s death, and since I had no idea of Lupa’s intentions, I decided to wait. Finally, there was a knock on the doorjamb, and I turned to see Tania.

“Am I late?” she asked sweetly.

I walked over and embraced her. “Where have you been? I’ve been worried sick.”

She didn’t get a chance to answer me, because the other men had come over and bombarded her with their stories of Lupa’s guilt and Paul’s publishing. So I went and opened a beer for her while she removed her coat and made herself comfortable. When the din had subsided somewhat, she offered her own tidbit: “I’ve just come from St. Etienne.”

The news, of course, had been in the paper that day, and I’d been a bit surprised that no one had brought it up before, but each had had his own personal matters, which were of some importance.

She continued. “That’s why I was late, and I’m sorry, but there was much to do. I’d gone yesterday to have lunch with Maurice-he’s so lonely, I feel I owe him at least that, Jules-and afterward, planned to go shopping with a friend. It was horrible, really horrible. I’d like that beer, please.” I handed it to her.

“Do you know what happened?” asked Henri. “I was there yesterday morning.”

“Only what you’ve read, I presume. The ammunition room blew up. The guards were killed instantly, so they don’t know whether someone succeeded in getting in.”

“Grisly,” said Georges.

“Very,” she agreed. “I should have been back last night,” she said to me, “but I stayed behind to help with the nursing.”

Fritz came to the door, knocked, and entered, closing the door behind him. “Excuse me,” he said, “but would you all mind stepping into the office for a moment. Monsieur Giraud has arranged a surprise for you.” So saying, he crossed to the tapestry and removed it, showing the door. I felt to make sure my pistol was available and, reassured, sat back in the chair. I took Tania’s hand while the others watched and waited for Fritz to open the door. As they filed in, Fritz seated them, and I spoke to Tania.

“Where is Anna?”

“She went to St. Etienne with me. She was feeling much better.”

“Well, I don’t understand why you didn’t leave a note with Danielle. We were both very much concerned.”

“But, Jules,” she said, “I did leave a note. Out on the coffee table outside where she always serves me breakfast.” She smiled and patted my hand. “I know all about it. When we returned and discovered the house locked up, I went to your place and found Danielle, and she told me the whole story. It had been chilly yesterday morning, and she thought I’d rather take my coffee inside, so she never went out to the table. Come,” she said, standing, “the others are waiting. What’s the surprise?”

I shrugged nonchalantly. “If I tell you, it won’t be.”

Fritz had me seated to the left of Lupa’s desk, facing the others. Tania sat opposite me, and next to her, Paul, then Henri and Georges, with Henri on my far right. Fritz exited. No one spoke. In another moment, the door opened again, and Fritz asked me to help him bring in the cases of beer. I went back out to the apartment, and he closed the door behind me.

Lupa came out from down the hall and motioned me quiet with his finger to his lips. “The table?” he whispered.

“Only that small depression-looks like a spiderweb.”

He smiled. “Yes, I thought I remembered that. Satisfactory. It closes the circle. I’ll be right in.”

Fritz and I took the beer inside and set it behind the desk. I sat again and Fritz walked out, leaving the door ajar.

“What’s the surprise, Jules?” asked Paul. “The tension is killing me.”

“Tension rarely kills,” said Lupa, appearing in the doorway. “People kill.” He closed the door behind him. The lock clicked into place.

They were all on their feet. Lupa ignored the commotion, crossed to his desk, and sat. As he reached for a beer, the noise died down.

“What’s the meaning of this, Jules?” asked Georges, but they all shared the sentiment.

“Please, please,” Lupa admonished, opening his beer and pouring, “let us be civilized. I’ve arranged it, through Monsieur Giraud, that all of you would be here tonight. Last week, one of your friends was killed in our presence. The police have witlessly concluded that I am the guilty party, and this is not the case. The purpose of this little meeting will be to expose the killer, which is one of you.”

“But you’re the killer,” Henri exploded.

“No, sir,” Lupa replied. “I am not. Most assuredly.”

“I won’t stay,” said Paul.

“Oh, but you will. The door is locked. Besides, what have you to fear? If you are innocent, no harm will come to you. If not, well…”

“I’ll tell you what we have to fear,” said Georges. “We have you to fear. Last week you killed Marcel and that inspector. Tonight you might kill any one, or all, of us.”

“Oh, tut, sir.” He looked around. “Please, all of you, relax. Would any of you care for more beer? I nearly forgot to have it brought in.”

There were no takers.

He leaned back. “Now, then, where to begin? We may as well get at the facts.” He sighed, then drank, then began.

“The rumors you have heard about this case being an international affair are perfectly true. Since I will be long gone, and certainly in no danger from any of you, I can afford to tell you this. I am an Allied spy.”

He paused for the words to sink in. “Now, then. I was sent here just after the war broke out to try and learn the identity of one of Europe’s most dangerous minds and, having done so, to stop him.

“I’d been having no luck until last Wednesday, when Monsieur Giraud fortuitously invited me to your weekly gathering. The person I sought undoubtedly knew me, since I’d chased him through Eastern Europe for several months preceding my move here to Valence. He kept eluding me precisely because he knew who I was, though I changed my identity and papers in every location. Finally, when I learned that he’d come to Valence, I decided to come here as a worker, find a job, and stay hidden and anonymous until he acted or made a mistake. However, nothing happened for so long that I began to fear he’d left.

“In desperation, I accepted Monsieur Giraud’s offer to be seen in public. My luck was extraordinary. The man I was trailing was at that first gathering. Of course, not knowing him put me at a distinct disadvantage, which he decided to capitalize on immediately. He tried to kill me.”

He paused to look at the assemblage. “Of course, you’re probably wondering why he chose that drastic method when, in the past, he’d simply run.”

“I was wondering that,” said Paul, dryly.

“The answer is, as my father would say, elementary. He had to remain in Valence until some other job was completed. Last week I learned and yesterday it was verified that that job was the destruction of the St. Etienne Arsenal. So he had to stay, and he had to elude me. When, by mistake, he killed Monsieur Routier, he put me hot on his trail again, for the first time in nine months.

“I resolved not to lose him again, and I haven’t. Killing Routier was an act of panic, provoked by seeing me. If he’d kept calm and done nothing, he would have succeeded in his mission at no danger to himself. Monsieur Routier, by the way, since he is dead and the knowledge can do no harm, was himself an agent of the French government, seeking this same man.”

A murmur ran like a current through my friends-“What? Marcel? C’est impossible!”

Lupa continued, oblivious to their reactions. “I surmise that at the time of his death, Routier’s cover was still intact, which means that his espionage connections were still unknown, even to his murderer. That much by way of prologue. Are you sure none of you will have more beer?”

I looked at the faces of my friends. The men all were wary, and Tania was furious.

“I’d like another beer,” said Henri.

“What about Monsieur Giraud, here?” Tania said. “Why is he helping you? Is he a spy, too?”

Lupa looked at me. “Him? Don’t be silly.”

“Then why are you helping him?” Paul asked me.

“Marcel was my best friend,” I answered. “After he was killed last week, Monsieur Lupa took me into his confidence, and I believe him. I want to see Marcel’s killer punished, even if it is one of you.”

“It is,” interjected Lupa. “What you don’t seem to realize is that any of you could have sat in the seat I vacated last week. Whoever sat in that seat would have been poisoned.”

They eyed one another, a hint of suspicion finally creeping into an expression or two. Henri sipped his beer and wiped sweat from his brow; Paul leaned with his elbows on his knees; and Georges stiffly crossed one leg over the other. Tania was still angry.

“All right,” Lupa went on, “so my first problem was who to suspect, and at first that, too, seemed simple. Suspect Monsieur Lavoie, since he’s the only one who was not in Valence during the time I was chasing someone in the East. I saw the flaw in that almost immediately and cursed myself thoroughly, I assure you. The murderer, assassin-call him what you will-rarely did his own work. I hadn’t been chasing him all that time, but rather his agents. I checked with another of my contacts on that point, and he agreed. So I had two scores to settle with this man: he’d tried to kill me, and he’d made me look a fool.”

“Then how did he recognize you right away?” asked Paul again.

“Photographs.” He drank some beer. “You’re listening carefully. That’s a good sign.”

“You still look a fool to me,” said Henri.

Lupa nodded. “Perhaps, but let’s go on. I was left suspecting everyone, so I had to eliminate. Madame Chessal.” He looked at Tania and she met his gaze. “I’m sorry I suspected you for so long, but it began when I entered Monsieur Giraud’s house last week. I’m sure you didn’t realize it-indeed, you couldn’t have-but you, in your close observation of me, changed your position as I did all evening, even after the murder. If I crossed my legs, you crossed your legs, and so on. And so you gave away your interest in me. At the time, I had no idea what could cause that interest, except of course the obvious.”

He opened his desk drawer and pulled from it the photograph I had delivered earlier. “Only yesterday did I learn that I closely resemble your eldest son.”

“Damn,” I said, “he does.” Tania’s son had a mustache and was much smaller than Lupa, but the face was very similar.

“Where did you get that picture? Jules”-she turned to me, her mouth taut-“did you have anything to do with this?”

Lupa butted in before I could speak. “Monsieur Giraud is more your friend than you know, madame. The point is, do I or do I not remind you of your son?”

Tania, still fuming, lowered her eyes. “Yes,” she said coldly. “I saw it then.”

“Precisely. And you’ve been piqued at me ever since because your son is in the war, at the front, and I’m not.” He leaned slightly toward her. “Be assured, madame, that I too am fighting this war.” He continued. “Later, when you came to question me about missing the funeral, I was on my guard and so was perhaps unnecessarily abrupt. I now apologize. And I thank you for your help with Anna’s wounds.”

The others looked quizzically at us.

“Last Sunday,” Lupa went on, “another attempt was made on my life, this time wounding a woman I was with and barely missing an associate. I have been extremely fortunate, I admit. At the time, I thought it possible that my pursuer had hired an assassin and wanted to be sure he’d done his work. Shortly afterward, I realized that that was folly. A hired assassin would have killed me. No, my man was terrified, and was acting as his own agent. In the past, he’d avoided being the center of suspicion because he’d avoided direct action. Now, once he’d acted, the inexorable pull of events would lead to his downfall.

“So I finally rejected you as a suspect, and happily. Monsieur Giraud was most unwilling to believe you guilty.”

“Thank you for that,” she said to me.

“Monsieur Pulis,” he said, turning his gaze full upon Henri. “I’m surprised the police haven’t arrested you, since you’ve acted the most like a guilty man. When the police discovered cyanide in your house, you panicked, and have been on edge since that time. Monsieur Pulis’s son is a photographer,” he explained to the others, “and cyanide-Prussic acid-is used in the developing process.” He wagged a finger at Henri. “You should have immediately offered yourself for thorough investigation, but instead you were terrified that the police would arrest you because you are not French, and you tried to hide, distorting some facts, lying about others. You should never have lied about seeing Inspector Chatelet, for example. That made me suspicious of you, and it had nothing to do with your nationality. Last Wednesday, you were blatantly unhappy to see me. Actually, that worked in your favor, since the man I sought would never have shown himself so openly. I finally discounted you when I couldn’t see any possible way that you could bring destruction to St. Etienne, despite your deliveries there. Though it wasn’t crucial, I also found it difficult to believe that the man I sought had a high-strung wife and six children to support.

“That leaves the bachelors. To be fair, let’s start with Monsieur Giraud. He convinced me of his innocence by his actions late the night of the murder, and if that wasn’t enough, Routier’s recommendation was.”

This last, of course, was nonsense, but I kept my silence.

Lupa half turned in his seat and reached for another beer. After opening it, he stared at the two men sitting directly opposite him. Paul shifted nervously in his chair. Georges lit a cigarette.

“Mr. Anser. I was loath to suspect you originally because you share my country of citizenship. But consider these facts: you were sitting next to me last week, and were in the best position of anyone else in the room to simply switch glasses with me during the commotion over Monsieur Lavoie’s hand. You are an amateur geologist and as such have access to, or have had access to, cyanide. You are a crack shot, by your own admission. You are not French and you live in St. Etienne. The circumstantial evidence against you is, therefore, impressive. On the other hand, last week I sent one of my own men to try and ‘cross over’ with your help. He was most persuasive and most subtle, and came away convinced that you had no idea what he was hinting at.” Lupa turned to me. “That, Jules, was the mysterious man you saw with Mr. Anser when you went to St. Etienne.” He went on. “Still, that you refused my man by no means completely cleared you. You might have recognized my ploy and acted accordingly. No, it wasn’t until I discovered that Monsieur Lavoie was the man whom I sought, and that wasn’t until yesterday afternoon, that I listed those circumstantial facts concerning you as coincidental.”

All eyes were on Georges. He sat calmly, smoking.

“I take it,” he said to Lupa, “that you are accusing me?”

“Yes.”

Georges chuckled mirthlessly. “This is rather tedious, you know.”

Lupa shared the grim humor. “I don’t really find it so, but perhaps you would like another beer. It may be your last for a long time. Still no? Well. It was admirable the way you arranged to be out of town during most of this week. It did serve to divert attention from you for a time-long enough for you to go about your special tasks.

“Let’s begin with last Wednesday. By the way, consenting to be a regular guest was an admirable choice of covers. Whether it had begun by design or by coincidence, you wasted no time in recognizing the value of this particular group to your ends. They were a singularly respectable, though eccentric, group of citizens. Your presence among them established your bona fides in an especially effective manner. To the rest of the community, your status as newcomer-and hence a natural object of rumor and suspicion-was substantially mitigated. Then, too, among a group with so many foreign connections, you stand out as passably French. It was a fine decision on your part.”

“Thank you,” said Georges sarcastically.

“Don’t mention it. But to continue, when you saw me enter Monsieur Giraud’s sitting room last Wednesday, you immediately recognized me, as I’ve said. Perhaps my small deductions that evening were a misplaced show of bravado, but in any event you wasted no time, since an agent like yourself is always prepared. I am, too. While the others were preparing for their toast, you slipped from your pocket a mercury fulmonade cap which you’d earlier procured, no doubt, by prying it from the back of a bullet. Much smaller than a petite pois, it was an admirable weapon. You placed it on the table and brought your beer bottle down on it, causing it to explode and cutting yourself. The explosion, by the way, left a small but recognizable mark on the table.

“You then excused yourself to dress the wound and, passing my seat by the door, took advantage of everyone’s being grouped around the spilled beer, as you knew we would be, to drop the poison-stolen from Monsieur Pulis, I assume-into my glass. You didn’t even have to break your stride.

“When you returned and found that Routier had inadvertently returned to my seat and drunk the poison intended for me, your panic increased. Please correct me where I may be wrong.”

Georges sat quite still. “Every word is wrong.”

Lupa smiled. “Of course. I didn’t suppose I’d catch you with that. Still, there were other endeavors to which you were committed, and you had a timetable to follow, so the next day you had to go to St. Etienne and deliver an excessive amount of gauze to the arsenal. That you entered and met Monsieur Ponty was incidental. What was not incidental was his comment on learning of your trade. He said, ‘I hope we can keep your deliveries small.’ Monsieur Giraud, here, has an admirable memory and repeated back to me your conversation with Ponty. That comment aroused my suspicion, and I fell on it like a hungry dog.

“From that moment on, you were my prime suspect. But you had worked well and left few clues. When Chatelet was killed last Friday night, I was tempted to cross you off, but then my associate in St. Etienne had reported that he’d been followed back to Valence, and by his description, I assumed it had been you. The man who followed my agent, by the way, did not have a limp, but we’ll get to that. So, in fact, you hadn’t gone south on business, but had remained here, hoping to get a chance to kill me.

“Chatelet, with a bit of terrible luck for both of you, ran into you on the street as he interrogated Pulis Friday night. Worse yet, Pulis then introduced you to the inspector. Of course, between Henri’s being your friend and Pulis’s deep suspicion of me, it never crossed his mind that your presence was questionable.”

Henri, his face red now and dripping with sweat, looked wide-eyed from Georges to Lupa. Again and again he seemed to be trying to swallow, but the dryness of his mouth wouldn’t allow it. Remembering his beer, he sucked at it like a man dying of thirst.

Lupa pressed on. “Still, Chatelet presented you with an immediate danger. He wouldn’t even have to suspect you of anything. Merely his knowledge that you were in Valence would have condemned you.”

Georges still smirked. “Why, exactly, would that be?”

“Because in questioning the other suspects, possibly including myself, that fact would have come out. In other words, you were not in St. Etienne where you were believed to be. In fact, you had followed my man to Valence.”

“Fascinating,” Georges said.

“Not really,” Lupa answered. “So Chatelet presented too great a risk, and you did away with him.

“On Sunday, you followed me to the woods where I was to have had lunch. When you saw your opportunity, you fired three times but, luckily for me, you missed. That must have been particularly galling for you. When Monsieur Giraud and I gave chase, you ran, and you escaped.”

Lupa leaned back and pulled the bell for Fritz. “That,” he explained, “was my signal for Fritz to get Magiot and his men.”

“That’ll be the end of you, then,” said Georges levelly.

Lupa drank his beer. “We’ll see. Well, to get on with it, yesterday you succeeded in your primary mission, which was to blow up the arsenal. To do that, you used one of your agents-I’d be curious to know how you recruited the janitor, since all the employees there had ‘Top Secret’ clearance, but that’s another question. Reasoning told me what he had done. My man in St. Etienne, who’d been watching the place all day, noted that the smokestacks had stopped functioning about an hour before the explosion. Shortly afterward, the janitor had left the building.

“What he had done was to enter the boiler room in the fifteen or twenty minutes when, according to Ponty, everyone in the building, including the men stoking the boilers, was acting as a ‘pack mule.’ He opened the doors to the boilers and stuffed them with as much of your excess gauze as he could fit. The boilers are located, or were located, directly adjacent to the ammunition room, and an explosion of the boilers would of course set off the highly unstable dynamite in the next room. The gauze effectively stopped up the pipes, creating intolerable pressure within the boilers. It also stopped their smoking for at least a half hour before the pressure became critical.

“There was your flaw. There is no other explanation for the smoke stopping just prior to the explosion. You thought it would go unnoticed, and for the most part it did. Only my agent there noticed it. Otherwise, it was a brilliant plan. You were having lunch with Messieurs Anser and Giraud while the pressure was building in those boilers. But you should have stayed with directing your agents. When you act on your own, you make mistakes. My agent, you see, swears that he can identify the man who was following him. He didn’t know it was you, but now we’ll give him a chance to say if it was. Watkins!”

Watkins seemed to magically appear out of the wall as he pushed aside the tapestry and stepped out of the tunnel. Everyone gaped.

“How many secret entrances does this place have?” Tania asked.

“None anymore. You’ve seen them all.” He turned to Watkins. “Is he here?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Kindly point him out.”

He pointed at Lavoie. I reached inside my jacket to be near my pistol just in case it would be needed.

“That’s all very clever,” said Georges. “It’s a neat little theory, with the minor drawback of being completely false. You can’t prove a word of what you’ve said.”

Henri cleared his throat. “You were here… I mean we did meet you, the inspector and I…”

Georges smiled at his friend. “I never denied it, Henri. The point never came up, did it?”

Henri, confused, leaned back in his chair.

“Monsieur Lavoie is right,” Lupa said to the group. “I could have paid this man to come in here and identify him. There is no proof. And so, now, I’m going to ask him to do something which will undoubtedly demonstrate his innocence.”

“Certainly,” Georges said, his smile ice. “I’d be glad to end this farce.”

“Well, then. The man who trailed Monsieur Watkins, here, had no limp. I contend that you have no limp but rather a substantial lifter in your left shoe. You can easily demonstrate which of us is right by taking off your shoes.”

“This is ridiculous!”

Lupa shrugged, then leaned back in his chair. “Go on, Georges,” Paul urged. “Let’s get to the bottom of this.”

Georges looked around at each of the group, and the sentiment was unanimous. I saw his glance at the tapestry from behind which Watkins had entered, and my grip tightened on my pistol.

Finally, he came to some conclusion and reached down as if to undo his shoelaces. How he did it I don’t know, but by some sleight of hand, he reached into his jacket and came out with a pistol which he trained on Lupa, the hammer cocked.

“All right, now,” he said calmly, “no one is to move.” But I had already moved. My pistol was out. “Georges, drop it!”

He turned toward me and fired at the instant I did. I was hit under the left collarbone, and spun backward and to the floor. Tania screamed and crossed over to me. I felt her place my head in her lap.

“Jules, are you all right? Jules.”

I couldn’t speak, and the room began to spin before me. There was a pounding from outside, then the sound of a door opening and boots on a wooden floor. I opened my eyes and tried to focus them. It looked as though Magiot and his men had entered. They gathered around Georges, who lay prostrate on the floor.

Lupa spoke, the words coming to me as though through wads of cotton or gauze. “There’s your man, inspector. He’s dead.”

I passed out.