The House of Special Purpose

1922

MY PARISIAN EMPLOYER, Monsieur Ferré, was not pleased with my continued absences from work, but he waited until the last customer had left the shop before taking me aside to make his displeasure clear. He had been behaving in a disgruntled fashion throughout the day, offering a series of sarcastic comments about my time-keeping and refusing to allow me my regular afternoon break on the grounds that he had been too lenient with me as it was. I tried to engage him in conversation in the late afternoon, but he brushed me aside with the ease that one swats a fly hovering around one’s head and stated quite flatly that he had no time for me at that moment, that he was completing his monthly accounts and would speak with me later in the evening, when the store was closed. Not looking forward to our conversation, I busied myself in the history section of the bookshop at the appointed time and pretended to be so engrossed in my work as not to hear him when he called my name. Finally, he marched around the corner, discovered me shelving a series of volumes on the history of French military costume, and practically spat on the ground in irritation.

‘Jachmenev,’ he said, ‘didn’t you hear me calling for you?’

‘My apologies, sir,’ I replied, standing up and brushing the dust of the books off my trousers; my knees buckled slightly beneath me as I tried to right myself, for the gaps between the stacks were astonishingly narrow. Monsieur Ferré made a point of keeping as much stock as possible on the premises, but the result of this was that the books were crammed too tightly together upon the shelves, and the proximity of the bookcases made it almost impossible for more than one person to inspect them at any one time. ‘I was absorbed in what I was doing,’ I added, ‘but there was—’

‘And if I had been a customer, what then?’ he asked in a belligerent tone. ‘If you had been alone in the shop, hidden away like a teenage boy perusing a volume of Bellocq, then any petty thief might have run away with the day’s takings, simply because you find yourself unable to concentrate on more than one task at a time.’

I knew from experience that it was pointless to argue with him, that it would be better if I simply allowed him to express his anger and rid himself of it before mounting my defence. ‘I’m very sorry, sir,’ I said finally, attempting to sound contrite. ‘I’ll try to pay more attention in future.’

‘It’s not just about paying attention, Jachmenev,’ he said irritably, shaking his head. ‘This is exactly what I wished to talk to you about. You will admit, will you not, that I have been more than fair in my dealings with you during these last few weeks?’

‘You’ve been extremely generous, sir, and I’m very grateful for it. As is my wife.’

‘I’ve allowed you to take as much time away from your duties as you needed to get over your…’ He hesitated, unsure how to phrase this correctly; I could tell that he was uncomfortable at even being drawn into such a conversation. ‘Over your recent difficulties,’ he said finally. ‘But I am not a charitable organization, Jachmenev, you must understand that. I cannot afford to maintain an employee who comes and goes at the drop of a hat, who does not fulfil his hours as contracted, who leaves me alone in the shop when I have so many other matters to attend to—’

‘Sir,’ I said quickly, stepping forward a little, anxious that he should not dismiss me from my position, which would have been one further blow during an already difficult time. ‘Sir, all I can do is apologize for how unreliable I have been of late, but I really do think that the worst is over now. Zoya is back on her feet, she’s returning to work herself on Monday. If you could see your way to giving me another chance, I promise that I will give you no cause to reprimand me again.’

He glared at me and looked away for a moment, nibbling at his lower lip with his front teeth, a habit he always indulged in when faced with a difficult decision. I could tell that his instinct was to fire me, that it had even been his intention to do so, but my words were winning him over and he was wavering in his final judgement.

‘You will agree, sir,’ I added, ‘that I have been entirely reliable to you over the last three years of my employment?’

‘You’ve been an excellent assistant, Jachmenev,’ he replied in frustration. ‘That’s why this whole matter has been so disappointing to me. I’ve spoken very highly of you to friends of mine, you know, other businessmen here in Paris. Men who have a very low opinion of Russian émigrés in general, I might add. Men who see the lot of you as revolutionaries and trouble-makers. I’ve told them that you have proved yourself to be one of the most reliable workers I have ever had the good fortune to employ. I don’t want to let you go, young man, but if I am to keep you on—’

‘Then you will have my absolute assurance, sir,’ I said, ‘that I will be here on time every morning and will remain at my post throughout the day. One more chance, Monsieur Ferré, that’s all I ask. I promise you will have no cause to regret your decision.’

He thought about it a little more, before wagging his fat little finger at me. ‘One more chance, Jachmenev, that is all. You understand me?’

‘I do, sir.’

‘I have every sympathy for you and your wife, it’s a terrible thing you’ve been through, but that’s neither here nor there. If you give me any reason to speak to you like this again, then that will be the end of things between us. In the meantime, you can work a few extra hours tonight to make up the time. Some of these shelves are a disgrace. I walked around earlier and noticed the alphabetical system has collapsed almost entirely. I could find nothing I was looking for.’

‘Yes, sir,’ I said, bowing my head slightly, an old habit which I had yet to lose when faced with a figure of authority. ‘I’ll be happy to sort things out. And thank you. For the second chance, I mean.’

He nodded and I turned back to my work in relief, for the job at the bookshop was an enjoyable one and I found it stimulating to be surrounded by so much scholarship and erudition. More importantly, however, I could not afford to lose the small income that it provided us with. What little savings we had built up since our arrival in Paris more than three years before had been reduced considerably by medical expenses over the previous five weeks, since Zoya’s miscarriage, not to mention the temporary loss of our second income, and I dreaded to think what might become of us if I was dismissed from my position. I resolved to give Monsieur Ferré no further cause to think badly of me.

The first I knew of Leo’s arrest was when Zoya appeared, ashen-faced, in the bookshop late one afternoon in November, when the weather had turned bracingly cold and the trees were already denuded of their leaves. I was standing behind the counter, examining a series of anatomical textbooks that Monsieur Ferré had inexplicably purchased at auction a few days before, when the small bell above the door rang and I instinctively shuddered, waiting for the icy breeze to blow through the shop and nip at my ears and nose. Looking up, I was surprised to see my wife stepping towards me, her coat wrapped tightly around her body, a scarf she had knitted herself hanging loosely around her neck.

‘Zoya,’ I said, relieved that my employer had gone home for the day, for he would not have been happy to see me receiving personal visitors. ‘What’s the matter? You’re as white as a ghost.’

She shook her head, hesitating for a moment as she recovered her breath, and my mind swam with the possibilities of what could be wrong. It was almost three months now since she had lost the baby and although her spirits were still low, she had started to find happiness in our daily lives once again. Only a few nights earlier, we had made love for the first time since our loss; it had been gentle and affectionate and I had held her in my arms afterwards, where she had remained perfectly still, looking up to kiss me tenderly from time to time, the tears finally coming to an end, replaced by the promise of hope. I dreaded to think that she had become ill once more, but seeing me staring at her in increasing panic she dismissed my worries quickly.

‘It’s not me,’ she said. ‘I’m fine.’

‘Thank God,’ I replied. ‘But you look so distressed. What can have—?’

‘It’s Leo,’ she said. ‘He’s been arrested.’

I opened my eyes wide in surprise but couldn’t prevent a smile from passing across my face, wondering what fresh trouble our dear friend had managed to involve himself in now, for he was no stranger to drama or excitement. ‘Arrested?’ I asked. ‘But why? What on earth has he done?’

‘It’s beyond belief,’ she said, and I could tell by the look on her face that this was a much more serious matter than I had originally thought. ‘Georgy, he has killed a gendarme.’

My mouth fell open and I felt my head grow a little dizzy at the words. Leo and his girlfriend Sophie were our two closest friends in Paris, the first companions we had found there. We had shared countless dinners with them, got drunk on too many occasions, laughed and joked and, above all, argued about politics. Leo was a dreamer, an idealist, a romantic, a revolutionary; he could be witty and frustrating, passionate and irritable, flirtatious and generous. There was no end of adjectives to describe this extraordinary man, no shortage of occasions when Zoya and I had left his company half in love with him or swearing that we would never see him again. He was everything that youth was about: a man of poetry, art, ambition and determination. But he was not a murderer. He had not a single strain of violence in him whatsoever.

‘But it’s not possible,’ I said, staring at her in amazement. ‘There must be some mistake.’

‘There are witnesses,’ she said, sitting down now and burying her face in her hands. ‘Quite a few, it would seem. I don’t know exactly what happened. Only that he is being held in the gendarmerie and there is no possibility of his being released.’

I steadied myself against the counter and considered this quietly for a few moments. It was almost impossible to believe. The idea of such violence was repugnant to me and, I was sure, to him also. He preached a gospel of pacifism and understanding, even if his revolutionary ideas sometimes allowed him to get carried away with historical precedents of proletarian savagery. I was sure that I had left such things behind me in another place, another country.

‘Tell me what happened,’ I said. ‘Tell me everything you know.’

‘I know very little,’ she replied, the catch in her voice implying that she too had hoped that events like this would no longer be part of our lives. ‘It was only an hour ago. Sophie and I were at work as usual, we were completing two dresses that needed to be ready by the end of the day, stitching a lace trim to attach to the collars, when a man entered the shop, very tall, very serious. I didn’t know what to think when I saw him first. We can go a whole month sometimes, Georgy, and never see a man walk through our doors at all. I’m ashamed to admit it, but when I saw him, when I noticed the seriousness of his expression, the determination of his glance, I thought… I thought for a moment…’

‘That we had been discovered?’

She nodded, but said nothing more of this for now. ’I stared at him in surprise, and started to ask whether we could help him with something, but he simply pointed a finger at my face, so high that it reminded me of a gun, and I thought for a moment that I was going to faint.

’“Sophie Tambleau?” he asked, looking across at me, and I said nothing for a moment, so unnerved was I by the situation. “Are you Sophie Tambleau?” he repeated, and before I could say anything, Sophie herself came forward, a blend of curiosity and concern upon her face.

’“I’m Sophie Tambleau,” she said. “How can I help you?”

’“You can’t,” he replied. “I’ve been sent with a message for you, that’s all.”

’“A message?” she asked, laughing a little and looking at me. I started to smile too in relief, but the situation was extraordinary. Who ever sent messages to us?

’“You are the common-law wife of Leo Raymer?” Sophie shrugged. Of course the phrase was farcical, but she nodded and admitted that she was. “Monsieur Raymer is being held at the gendarmerie on the Rue de Clignancourt. He has been arrested.”

‘ “Arrested?” she cried and the man said yes, that he had killed a gendarme earlier that afternoon and that he had been taken into custody awaiting trial and had asked that someone get a message to Sophie to tell her of what had taken place.’

‘But Leo!’ I asked, amazed by what she was telling me. ‘Our Leo? How on earth could he have killed someone? Why would he do such a thing?’

‘I don’t know, Georgy,’ she said, standing up now and pacing the floor in frustration. ‘I don’t know anything other than what I’ve just told you. Sophie’s gone directly to see him. I said that I would come and find you and that we would follow her there. That was all right, wasn’t it?’

‘Of course,’ I said, reaching for the shop keys, ignoring the fact that I was not due to close the store for another hour at least. ‘Of course we must go, our friends are in trouble.’

We stepped out into the street and I locked the door behind me, cursing myself for forgetting my gloves that morning as the wind was so strong that I could feel my cheeks growing pink with the cold after only a few moments. As we made our way quickly down the street, my thoughts were almost entirely with my dear friend, locked in a cell somewhere for a horrible crime; but still, I could not help but feel as relieved as Zoya had been that it was Sophie whom the gentleman had come looking for, and not us.

It had only been four years since we had left Russia. I still believed that one day, they would catch up with us.

We were not allowed to visit Leo, nor would any of the gendarmes tell us anything about the circumstances which had led to his incarceration. The elderly desk sergeant looked at me with utter disdain when he heard my accent and seemed loath to answer any of my questions, simply grunting and shrugging his shoulders at every enquiry I made, as if it was beneath his dignity to answer me. It was rare for either Zoya or me to encounter any racially motivated hostility within the city – after all, the war had seen to it that Paris was filled with people of all nationalities – but from time to time a certain resentment was evident in those elderly French citizens who did not like the fact that their capital had been invaded by so many exiled Europeans and Russians.

‘You’re not family,’ the sergeant said, barely glancing up at me as he spoke, but continuing to fill in the letters of his crossword. ‘I can tell you nothing.’

‘But we are friends,’ I protested. ‘Monsieur Raymer was a witness at my wedding. Our wives work together. Surely you can—’ At that moment, a door opened to my left and Sophie emerged, white-faced, desperately trying to stem her tears, followed by another gendarme. She seemed surprised to see us waiting for her, but grateful, and attempted a brief smile before walking towards the door.

‘Sophie,’ said Zoya, following her as she stepped outside into the darkness; night had fallen and mercifully the wind had diminished. ‘Sophie, what’s going on? What’s happened? Where is Leo?’

She shook her head as if she could scarcely find the words to explain what had taken place, so we led her across the street to a nearby café, where we ordered three coffees and she finally summoned the strength to recount what she had been told.

‘It’s the most ridiculous thing,’ she said. ‘An accident, that’s all. A stupid accident. But they say that because it was a gendarme who was killed—’

‘Killed?’ I asked, struck by the brutality of the word, its sharp unpleasant sound. ‘By Leo? But it’s impossible! Tell me what happened exactly.’

‘He went out this morning as usual,’ she began with a sigh, as if she could not believe that a day that had begun in so banal a fashion could end so dramatically. ‘He left the flat early, hoping to get a good position for his easel. With this terrible weather, there have been fewer opportunities for portrait painters. Most people don’t want to sit on a chair in a windy street for thirty minutes while he captures their likeness. He went towards Sacré-Coeur, where there were sure to be many tourists. We have been struggling a little for money lately,’ she admitted. ‘Not enough to worry unnecessarily, you understand, but we couldn’t afford to lose a day’s pay. It’s been difficult.’

‘It’s difficult for everyone,’ I said quietly. ‘But you could have always come to us if you needed help, you know that, don’t you?’ It was wrong of me to say this. The truth was that if Leo or Sophie had asked Zoya or me for assistance, we would not have been in a position to offer any. Suggesting otherwise was an arrogance that was unworthy of me. Zoya knew as much and glanced in my direction, frowning a little, and I bowed my head, embarrassed by my bravado.

‘It’s kind of you to say that, Georgy,’ said Sophie, who most likely knew very well that our financial position mirrored their own almost exactly. ‘But we hadn’t quite got to the point where we needed to rely on the charity of our friends.’

‘Leo,’ said Zoya softly, reaching across and placing her hand flat on Sophie’s own hand, which had begun to tremble slightly even as we sat there. ‘Tell us about Leo.’

‘There were more people at Sacré-Coeur than he might have expected,’ she continued. ‘Quite a few of the artists had set up their easels and everyone was trying to persuade a tourist into sitting for them. There was an old lady sitting on the grass, feeding the birds—’

‘In this weather?’ I asked, surprised. ‘She would freeze to death.’

‘You know how resilient these old crones are,’ she replied with a shrug. ‘They sit there, summer and winter, rain or shine. They don’t care about the weather.’

It was true. I had observed on more than one occasion the number of elderly Parisians who spent their mornings and afternoons sitting along the grassy banks in front of the Basilica, scattering stale bread for the birds to eat. It was as if they believed that without their help, the avian world would face extinction. On one occasion not three weeks before, I had watched a man of perhaps eighty years of age, a wizened old creature whose face was a patchwork of lines and wrinkles and creases, sitting with his arms outstretched while a group of birds settled upon him. I sat there, staring at him for almost an hour, and during all that time he remained utterly motionless; had his arms not been extended as they were, I would have taken him for a corpse.

‘Another artist,’ continued Sophie, ‘somebody new to Paris, someone Leo had never met before, arrived and decided that he wanted to position himself exactly where this old woman was seated. He asked her to move; she said no. He told her he wanted to paint there; she told him to go and soak his head. There were harsh words, I think, and then this man reached down and attempted to lift the woman from her rightful place, dragging her to her feet, ignoring her cries of protest.’

‘Where was he from?’ asked Zoya, and I looked at her, surprised by the question. I suspect she was hoping that he did not hail from our own country.

‘Spain, Leo thinks,’ she replied. ‘Or Portugal, perhaps. Anyway, he saw this sacrilege taking place and you know what Leo is like, he cannot bear to witness such a lack of courtesy.’

It was true. Leo was notorious for tipping his cap at elderly women on the street, charming them with his wide smile and friendly airs. He held out seats for them at cafés and assisted them with their bags when they were walking in the same direction as he was. He saw himself as a representative of the ancient order of chivalry, one of the last men in 1920s Paris who subscribed to that antique society.

’He went over and grabbed the Spaniard, twisting him around and remonstrating with him for his treatment of the woman. A fight broke out, of course. There was pushing and shoving and name-calling – who knows what level of childishness. And they were very loud. Leo was shouting at the top of his voice, calling his opponent every name that he could think of, and from what I am told, the Spaniard gave as good as he got. Things were about to turn even nastier when they were interrupted by a gendarme, who separated them, an action which caused Leo to grow even angrier.

He accused the young policeman of siding with a foreigner against one of his own countrymen and a dispute broke out over that remark. And you know what he’s like when he’s confronted by authority. I daresay he lashed out, started spouting his opinions about les gardiens de la paix, and before anyone could take control of the situation, Leo had punched both the Spaniard in the nose and the gendarme in the face, one after the other.’

‘Good God,’ I said, trying to imagine his clenched fist smashing into the snout of one man and then pulling back, preparing to strike the other. Leo was a strong fellow; I would not have wanted to be the recipient of either of those blows.

‘Of course, after he did that,’ said Sophie, ‘the gendarme had no choice but to arrest him, but Leo tried to get away from him, perhaps to make a run for it, by pushing him to one side. Unfortunately, the young policeman slipped as he was pushed and lost his footing on the steps. A moment later he had tumbled down fifteen, twenty steps to the next break in the staircase, and he landed heavily, cracking his skull against the stone. By the time Leo ran down to assist him, his eyes were already focussed on the heavens. He was dead.’

We sat in silence and I looked across at Zoya, whose face was pale, her jaw set tightly as if she was afraid of how she might react to this if she allowed her emotions to be displayed. Any thought of violence, of death, of the moment when a life came to its end was enough to disturb her emotions and unsettle her, to drag the terrible memories back to the forefront of her mind. Neither of us spoke. Instead we waited for Sophie, who appeared more calm now that she was laying out the story for us, to continue.

‘He tried to run away,’ she said finally. ‘And of course that only made things worse. He got quite far, too, I think. He ran along the Rue de la Bonne and across into St Vincent, then turned back on himself, heading towards the St Pierre de Montmartre—’

I drew a breath at this; my first home in Paris had been there, and the flat that Zoya and I had shared since our wedding was on the Rue Cortot, not far from the St Pierre; I wondered whether Leo had been hoping to find a safe haven with us.

‘—but by then there were six, perhaps seven gendarmes in pursuit of him, whistles blowing on every street, and they tackled him down, knocking him off his feet and sending him to the ground. Oh, Zoya,’ she cried, reaching out to her friend. ‘They beat him badly, too. One of his eyes is sealed shut and his cheek is almost purple with bruising. You would hardly recognize him if you saw him. They say it was necessary to restrain him, but it can’t have been.’

‘It was a terrible accident,’ said Zoya firmly. ‘Surely they can recognize that? And over something so trivial, too. The Spaniard, he was as much to blame.’

‘They don’t see it like that,’ Sophie said, shaking her head as the tears began again, a great depth of sobbing emerging from her very heart, her previously stilled emotions vanquished at last by the realization of what had taken place. ‘They see it as murder. He is to stand trial for it. He could be jailed for years – for his entire life, perhaps. Certainly his youth will be gone if he is ever released. And I cannot live without him, do you see that?’ she added, raising her voice hysterically. ‘I will not live without him.’

I could see the café owner looking at us suspiciously, hoping that we would leave soon. He cleared his throat audibly and I nodded at him, threw a few francs on the table and stood up.

Zoya and I took Sophie back to our flat, where we gave her two large draughts of brandy and sent her to our bedroom to rest. She went without protest and fell asleep quickly, although we could hear her tossing restlessly in the bed.

‘He can’t go to jail,’ said Zoya, when there were just the two of us together again. We were sitting at our small kitchen table, trying to think of a way to help them both. ‘It’s unthinkable. Surely there must be some way to save him?’

I nodded, but said nothing. I was concerned for Leo, of course I was, but it was not the prospect of his being sent to jail that worried me. It was something worse than that. He was responsible for the death of an officer of the French police force, after all. Accident or not, such matters were not taken lightly. The punishment could be more severe than either my wife or Leo’s were currently willing to consider.

The trial of Leo Raymer began three weeks later, in the second week of December, and lasted a mere thirty-six hours. It began on a Tuesday morning and by Wednesday lunchtime the jury had returned their verdict.

Sophie had stayed in our apartment for a few days after the incident took place, but she went home after that, saying that it was pointless to sleep on our couch and be under our feet every evening when she had a perfectly good, if lonely, bed not four streets away. We allowed her to leave with minimal protest, but spent every evening with her nevertheless, either in her flat or ours, or, if we could afford it, in one of the cafés that were dotted around the nearby streets.

Initially, she appeared to be close to hysteria about the sequence of events which had taken place; then she grew stronger and more optimistic, determined to do everything she could to secure Leo’s release. Soon after that, she grew depressed, and then angry at her boyfriend for causing all of this trouble in the first place. By the time the trial began, she was exhausted by her emotions, and had grown dark-eyed from lack of sleep. I became concerned as to how she would react if the trial did not have a happy resolution.

I begged Monsieur Ferré for a day off on the Tuesday that the trial began and was unfortunate in that I appeared to have caught him at a bad moment, for he threw his pen down on the table, a splash of ink bouncing in my direction that caused me to jump back, and stared at me, breathing heavily through his nose.

‘A day off during the week, Jachmenev?’ he asked me. ‘Another day off? I thought that we had reached an understanding, you and I.’

‘We have, sir,’ I replied, not expecting him to react so violently to my simple request. I had been a model employee since my reprimand and thought that he would happily allow me to be absent from work for a single day. ‘I’m sorry to ask for it, only—’

’Your wife must realize that the world does not—’

‘This is not about my wife, Monsieur Ferré,’ I said quickly, growing angry that he would have the audacity to criticize Zoya. ‘This has nothing to do with what happened all those months ago. I think I told you about my friend? Monsieur Raymer?’

‘Ah, the murderer,’ he said with a half-smile. ‘Yes, I remember. And of course I’ve read about the case in the papers.’

‘Leo is no murderer,’ I replied. ‘It was a terrible accident.’

‘In which a man died.’

‘Just so.’

‘And not just a man, but a man whose responsibility it was to protect the citizenry. Your friend will find it difficult to secure his release, I imagine. Popular opinion is against it.’

I nodded and tried to control my emotions; he was only repeating what I already knew. ‘May I take the day off or not?’ I asked, looking up and fixing my gaze to his, holding it there for as long as I dared, until finally he broke away and threw his hands in the air in a gesture of surrender.

‘Fine, fine,’ he said. ‘You may take one day off. Unpaid, of course. And if there are reporters at the courthouse, as there will no doubt be, do not tell them that you work in this establishment. I don’t want my bookshop associated with such a sordid business.’

I agreed to his terms, and on the morning that the trial began accompanied Zoya and Sophie to the courthouse, where we took our seats in the gallery, aware that every eye was turned in our direction. I could tell that it made Zoya uncomfortable and I took her hand in mine, squeezing it twice for luck.

‘I don’t like all this attention,’ she said quietly. ‘A reporter asked me on the way in to identify myself.’

‘You’re not obliged to tell them anything,’ I replied. ‘Neither of us is. And remember, they’re really not interested in us at all. It’s Sophie they want.’

I felt callous making such a remark, but it was the truth, and I wanted to reassure my wife that we were safe. Perhaps if she believed it, then I would believe it too.

The courtroom was full of interested spectators and it was not long before there was an audible intake of breath around the pews, as a door opened and Leo was led in, surrounded by several gendarmes. He scanned the room quickly in search of us, and when he found us, he offered a brave smile which I was certain masked the anxiety he felt inside. He looked more pale and thin than the last time I had seen him – the night before the incident, when we had sat in a bar together, just the two of us, drinking too much red wine; the night he had told me that he planned to ask Sophie to marry him on Christmas Day, a fact that she was still unaware of – but he held himself bravely, looking straight ahead when the charge was read and answering in a clear voice when he asserted his plea of ‘not guilty’.

The morning was filled with a series of tedious legal discussions between the judge, the prosecutor and the court-appointed lawyer who was representing our friend. In the late afternoon, however, it grew more interesting as several witnesses were called to the stand, including the elderly woman whom the Spaniard had tried to remove from her place. She sang the praises of Leo, of course, and blamed the gendarme for the accident – as well as the Spaniard himself, who was unnecessarily harsh in his condemnation of Leo, perhaps on account of his wounded ego. A few others made an appearance, men and women who had been on the steps of Sacré-Coeur at the time of the incident and had given their names to the investigators. A lady who had been only inches from the dead man when he fell. The doctor who had first examined him. The coroner.

‘It went well, don’t you think?’ Sophie asked me that night and I nodded my head, believing there was nothing to be lost with this supportive lie.

‘Some of the testimony was helpful,’ I admitted, stopping short of adding that most of it portrayed Leo as being impetuous and bullying in the way that he had behaved, his impulsive conduct leading to the death of an honest and innocent young man.

‘It will all go well tomorrow,’ said Zoya, hugging her as we parted that night. ‘I am sure of it.’

We fought later, the first time that Zoya and I had ever raised our voices to each other. Although I had every intention of going to the courthouse, I made the mistake of mentioning that Monsieur Ferré would likely be very angry with me for taking a second day away from the bookshop, and she misinterpreted my concern for our future as selfishness and a lack of consideration for our friends, a charge that upset and wounded me.

Later that night, having made up after our fight – so strange to remember, we both shed tears, so unaccustomed to argument were we – we lay in bed together and I urged Zoya to prepare herself for what was to come, that this matter might not end as we would wish it.

She said nothing in reply, simply turned over to sleep, but I knew that she was not so naive as to fail to recognize the truth in my warning.

We sat in the same seats the next day and on this occasion the courtroom was at full capacity to hear Leo’s testimony. He began nervously, but soon his familiar strength returned to him and he gave a performance of remarkable oratorical prowess that made me wonder for a moment whether in fact he might yet save himself. He portrayed himself as a hero of the people, a young man who could not stand by and watch an elderly woman – an elderly Frenchwoman, he pointed out – insulted and mistreated by a guest of his country. He spoke of how much he admired the work of the gendarmes, and said that he had seen the young man lose his footing and had in fact reached out a hand to save him, not push him, but it was too late. He had fallen. The courthouse sat in absolute silence as he spoke, and when he descended the stand he glanced towards Sophie, who smiled at him anxiously; he smiled back, before resuming his seat between the officers sent to guard him.

The last witness, however, was the young policeman’s mother, who told the court of his movements that morning and portrayed her son – quite properly, perhaps – as a saint in waiting. She spoke proudly and with dignity, giving in to tears only once, and by the end of her testimony I knew that there was little hope.

An hour later, the jury returned, announced a verdict of guilty to murder, and as the court broke into spontaneous applause, Sophie jumped to her feet and immediately fainted, leaving Zoya and me to carry her out into the hallway.

‘It can’t be, it can’t be,’ she said in a daze as she came back to consciousness on one of the cold stone benches that lined the exterior walls. ‘He is innocent. They can’t take him from me.’

Zoya was in tears now too and the two women hugged each other, trembling violently. I could feel a spring rising behind my own eyes too. It was too much for me. I stood up, unwilling to allow them to see me break down.

‘I’ll go back inside,’ I said quickly, turning my back on them. ‘I’ll find out what happens next.’

Stepping back into the courtroom, I had to fight my way through to a position where I could see for myself what was taking place. Leo was on his feet, a gendarme on either side of him, white-faced, looking for all the world as if he could not believe what had happened, certain that he would be released at any moment with the apologies of the court. But that was not to be.

The judge banged his gavel on the bench for silence and proceeded with the sentencing.

When I emerged from the courtroom a few moments later, I was sure for a moment that I was going to be sick. I ran quickly outside to gather as much air into my lungs as possible, and as I did so, the full horror of what I had just heard came home to me and I had to place my hand against the wall to steady myself, lest I collapse entirely and disgrace myself.

Zoya and Sophie, a few feet away from me, turned and stopped crying for a moment, staring at me.

‘What is it?’ asked Sophie, running towards me. ‘Georgy, tell me! What has happened?’

I shook my head. ‘I can’t,’ I said.

‘Tell me!’ she repeated, shouting now. ‘Tell me, Georgy!’ She slapped my face, once, twice, three times, hard. She clenched her hands into fists and pummelled my shoulders, and I felt nothing, just stood there as Zoya pulled her away. ‘Tell me,’ she was continuing to scream, but the words were lost in such misery and sobbing that they were all but unintelligible.

‘Georgy?’ asked Zoya, looking towards me and swallowing nervously. ‘Georgy, what is it? We have to know. You have to tell her.’

I nodded and looked at her, unsure how to put such a thing, such an unspeakable thing, into words.

The execution took place early the following morning. Neither Zoya nor I was there to witness it, but Sophie was permitted to spend thirty minutes with her lover before he was brought to the courtyard and guillotined. I was shocked – beyond shocked – to learn that this was to be his punishment, that an instrument of death that I associated with the French Revolution was still in use, more than a century later, for those sentenced to death. It seemed barbaric. None of the three of us was able to believe that such a punishment could be meted out to our young, handsome, funny, vibrant, impossible friend. But there was no escaping it. The sentence was handed down and carried out within twenty-four hours.

Paris held no more beauty for us after that. I offered my resignation in writing to Monsieur Ferré, who tore up my letter without reading it and told me that it did not matter what it said, I was dismissed anyway.

It didn’t matter.

Sophie came to see us only once before she left the country, thanking us for what we had done to help her, promising to write when she arrived at wherever it was that she was going.

And Zoya and I decided to leave Paris for good. It was her decision, but I was happy to acquiesce.

On our last night in the city, we sat in our empty flat, staring out of the window towards the spires of the many churches that littered the streets.

‘It was my fault,’ she said.