The Three Evangelists

VII

FEELING AWKWARD, SOPHIA SAT BOLT UPRIGHT ON THE CHAIR THEY had offered her. After leaving Greece, her life had accustomed her either to receive or to refuse entrance to journalists and fans, but not to go knocking on doors. It must have been twenty years since she last went to call on someone, like this, without notice. And now that she was sitting in this room, with the three men around her, she wondered what they must think of this tedious visit from a neighbour coming to call. People don’t do that these days. So she was tempted to begin by explaining herself. Were they the kind of persons one could explain things to, as she had come to believe from her second-floor look-out? Sometimes it’s different when you see people close to. There was Marc, half sitting, half standing at the big wooden table, crossing his lanky legs: an attractive pose, and an attractive face, looking at her without impatience. Opposite her sat Mathias, with handsome features too, a little heavy in the jaw, but with limpid blue eyes, straightforward and calm. Lucien, who was busying himself with glasses and bottles, tossing his hair back from time to time, had the face of a child and the collar and tie of a man. She felt reassured. Why else had she come after all, except that she was already frightened?

‘Look,’ she said, taking the glass which Lucien had offered her with a smile. ‘I’m so sorry to bother you, but I’ve come to ask a favour.’

Two faces waited for her to go on. It was time to explain, but how was she going to broach such a ridiculous subject? Lucien wasn’t listening. He was coming and going, the complicated dish he was cooking requiring all his attention.

‘It’s a really silly thing. But I need to ask a favour,’ Sophia said again.

‘What sort of favour?’ Marc asked gently, encouraging her.

‘It’s hard to ask, and I know you have been working very hard these last weeks. But I need someone to dig a hole in my garden.’

‘Major offensive on the Western Front,’ murmured Lucien.

‘Of course,’ Sophia was hurrying on, ‘I would be prepared to pay, if we could agree. Should we say… three thousand francs, for the three of you?’

‘Three thousand francs, for digging a hole?’ Marc murmured.

‘Attempt at subornation by enemy forces,’ muttered Lucien under his breath.

Sophia was uncomfortable. And yet she thought she had come to the right place, and that she should press on.

‘Yes, three thousand francs, for digging a hole. And for saying nothing about it.’

‘But,’ Marc started to say,‘- Madame…?’

‘Relivaux, Sophia Relivaux. I’m your neighbour, from next door, on the right.’

‘No,’ Mathias said quietly, ‘you’re not.’

‘Yes I am,’ said Sophia. ‘I’m your next-door neighbour.’

‘Very true,’ Mathias replied, still speaking softly. ‘But you aren’t Sophia Relivaux. You are the wife of Monsieur Relivaux. But you are Sophia Siméonidis.’

Marc and Lucien were staring at Mathias, astonished. Sophia smiled.

‘Lyric soprano,’ said Mathias. ‘Manon Lescaut”, “Madame Butterfly”, “Aïda”, Desdemona, “La Bohème”, “Elektra”… and you haven’t sung now for six years. Allow me to say how honoured I am to have you as a neighbour.’

With this, Mathias bowed his head as if in homage. Sophia looked at him and thought, yes, this was indeed the right house to have come to. She gave a happy sigh, as she looked round the large room, now with its tiled floor and plastered walls, every noise echoing since there was very little furniture. The three tall windows overlooking the garden were mullioned. It was a little like the refectory of a monastery. Through a low door, also arched, Lucien was appearing from time to time, holding a wooden spoon. In a monastery one says everything, especially in the refectory, in a low voice.

‘Since he has told you, I don’t need to introduce myself,’ said Sophia.

‘Well, we should introduce ourselves though,’ said Marc, who was rather impressed. ‘This is Mathias Delamarre, and…’

‘That’s alright,’ Sophia cut him short. ‘It’s a bit embarrassing to say so, but I know who you are. You overhear a lot without meaning to between these two gardens.’

‘Without meaning to?’ asked Lucien.

‘Well, sometimes on purpose, it’s true. I have looked and listened, quite deliberately at times, I will admit.’

She stopped. She wondered whether Mathias would understand that she had seen him from her little window.

‘I wasn’t spying on you. You just interested me. I thought I might be able to call on your help. What would you say if, one morning, a tree was planted in your garden, and you had had nothing to do with it?’

‘Frankly,’ said Lucien, ‘the state our garden is in, I doubt if we would notice.’

‘That’s not the point,’ said Marc. ‘You’re talking about that little beech tree, aren’t you?’

‘That’s right,’ said Sophia. ‘It just appeared one morning. Without a word from anyone. I don’t know who planted it. It wasn’t a present, so far as I can tell. And it wasn’t my gardener, because I haven’t got one at the moment.’

‘What does your husband have to say about it?’ asked Marc.

‘He’s not bothered about it. He’s a busy man.’

‘You mean he couldn’t give a damn?’ said Lucien.

‘Worse than that. He doesn’t want to hear me talk about it even. It irritates him.’

‘That’s odd,’ said Marc.

Lucien and Mathias nodded their agreement.

‘You think that’s odd? Really?’ asked Sophia.

‘Yes, really,’ said Marc.

‘Me too,’ said Sophia softly.

‘Forgive my ignorance,’ said Marc, ‘but were you a very famous singer?’

‘No. Not in the top class. I had some success, but I was never known as La Siméonidis. No, if you think this was some kind of eccentric fan-mail, as my husband suggested, you are mistaken. I have had admirers, but I didn’t provoke any extravagant worshippers. Ask your friend Mathias, since he seems to know about it.’

Mathias waved his hand vaguely. ‘You were more admired than you say, all the same,’ he said quietly.

There was a silence. Lucien turned host and filled up the glasses.

‘The fact is,’ he said, pointing his spoon at Sophia, ‘you are scared. You’re not accusing your husband, you’re not accusing anyone, you don’t want even to think about it, but you are scared.’

‘I am certainly worried,’ Sophia said in a low voice.

‘Because a tree being planted,’ Lucien went on, ‘means earth. Earth underneath it. Earth that nobody will disturb because it has a tree growing out of it. It’s sealed-in earth. In other words, a grave. The problem is potentially interesting.’

Lucien was not one to mince words; he spoke as he found. In this case, he had hit home.

‘Without going as far as that,’ said Sophia, still quietly, ‘let’s say, I would rather set my mind at rest about it. I’d rather know, if there is anything beneath the tree.’

‘Anything, or anyone,’ said Lucien. ‘Have you reason to suspect anyone? Your husband? Any dark doings? An importunate mistress?’

‘Lucien, that will do,’ said Marc. ‘No-one’s asking you to charge ahead like that. Madame Siméonidis came here to ask us about digging a hole, full stop. Let’s stick with her request, if you don’t mind. No need to stir up trouble without cause. For now it’s just a matter of digging up the tree – is that right?’

‘Yes,’ said Sophia, ‘for three thousand francs.’

‘Why are you offering so much money? It’s tempting, of course, because we haven’t a bean.’

‘I realised that,’ said Sophia.

‘But that’s no reason to take that kind of money from you, just to dig a hole in your garden.’

‘Well, that depends,’ said Sophia. ‘If, after the hole, there are… well, consequences, I might prefer to keep them quiet. And that would be worth a lot of money.’

‘OK, we understand,’ said Mathias. ‘But is everyone agreed about the digging, consequences or no consequences?’

There was an awkward silence. The answer was not straightforward. The money was very attractive, given their circumstances. But on the other hand, becoming accomplices in something, just for money-and accomplices in what, exactly?

‘You’ll do it, of course,’ said a gentle voice.

Everyone turned. Marc’s godfather walked in, coolly poured himself a drink and greeted Madame Siméonidis. Sophia, on seeing him nearer to, decided that he wasn’t exactly Alexander the Great. He was very thin and held himself erect, so he looked taller than he really was. But then there was his face. A weathered kind of beauty that could still make an impression. There was no hardness in it, but chiselled outlines, an arched nose, irregular lips, hooded eyes and a direct gaze, everything required to seduce someone at first sight. Sophia looked at it with a connoisseur’s eye, mentally judging that face: intelligent, brilliant, gentle, perhaps treacherous. The older man ran his hand through his hair which was not grey, but black sprinkled with white and which he wore rather long so that it curled on his neck. He sat down. He had spoken. They would dig the hole. No-one thought to challenge him.

‘I’ve been listening at doors,’ he remarked. ‘Madame has been watching from windows. In my case it’s a reflex, and an old habit. It doesn’t bother me at all.’

‘Charming,’ said Lucien.

‘Madame is right on every point,’ Marc’s godfather went on. ‘You will have to dig.’

Marc stood up, embarrassed.

‘This is my uncle,’ he said, as if that could excuse the indiscretion. ‘My godfather. Armand Vandoosler. He lives here.’

‘And he likes to put his oar in everywhere,’ muttered Lucien.

‘Drop it, Lucien,’ said Marc. ‘It was in the contract: no comment.’

Vandoosler senior waved this away with a smile.

‘No need to get upset,’ he said. ‘Lucien isn’t wrong. I do like to put my oar in, as he puts it. Especially when I’m right. He does the same thing himself, even when he’s wrong.’

Marc, still standing, indicated with a look to his godfather that it might be a good idea if he absented himself, and that this conversation was none of his business.

‘No,’ said Vandoosler, looking at his nephew. ‘I have my reasons for staying.’

He looked from Lucien to Mathias, to Sophia and back to Marc.

‘It would be better if you told them the truth, Marc,’ he said, smiling.

‘This isn’t the moment. You really are winding me up,’ said Marc in a low voice.

‘It never will be the moment for you,’ said his uncle.

‘Alright, tell them yourself, if you’re so keen. It’s your dirty linen, not mine.’

‘Oh, for heaven’s sake,’ said Lucien, waving his wooden spoon again. ‘Marc’s uncle is an ex-policeman, that’s all. That’s not going to keep us awake at night.’

‘And how do you know that?’ said Marc, wheeling round to face Lucien.

‘Oh, just a few little things I noticed when I was fixing the attics.’

‘Well, I see that everybody here goes prying into everyone else’s affairs,’ said Vandoosler.

‘You aren’t a proper historian if you don’t pry into people’s affairs,’ said Lucien with a shrug.

Marc was beside himself with irritation. Sophia was listening attentively and calmly, as was Mathias. They waited.

‘Contemporary history is so dignified,’ said Marc in acid tones. ‘And what else did you manage to find out?’

‘This and that. Your godfather has been in the drugs squad, the gambling squad…’

‘… and seventeen years a commissaire in criminal justice,’ the old man calmly finished the sentence. ‘A position from which I was dismissed with dishonour. Chucked out without my service medal after twenty-eight years. With a reprimand, disgrace and public ignominy.’

‘A fair summary,’ said Lucien, nodding.

‘Terrific,’ said Marc through clenched teeth, glaring at Lucien. ‘If you knew, why didn’t you say anything?’

‘Because to me it’s wholly unimportant,’ said Lucien.

‘Great,’ said Marc. ‘Uncle, nobody asked you to do anything, not to come downstairs, or to listen at doors, and as for you, Lucien, nobody asked you to go peeping into papers and then open your big mouth. That could have waited, couldn’t it?’

‘No, as a matter of fact it couldn’t,’ said the older Vandoosler. ‘Madame Siméonidis needs your help in a delicate matter, so it’s best she should know that there’s an ex-policeman in the attic next door. Better that she has the means to decide whether to withdraw her request or not. It’s more honest this way.’

Marc looked defiantly at Mathias and Lucien.

‘OK, if that’s the way you want it,’ he said, even more vehemently. ‘Armand Vandoosler is an ex-flic, true enough. And he has been disgraced. But he’s still a flic and he’s still bent, believe me. And he still takes liberties with the law, and with life in general. And those liberties may or may not come back to haunt him.’

‘As a rule they do,’ Vandoosler confirmed.

‘And that’s not all,’ Marc went on. ‘You can please yourselves what you do about it. But I’m warning you, he’s my godfather and my uncle. My mother’s brother. So, it’s not negotiable. That’s how it is, full stop. Now, if that means you don’t want to stay any more in this patched-up house…’

‘“The disgrace”’,’ said Sophia. ‘That’s what the neighbours call it.’

‘OK, “the disgrace”. Well, if you want to leave because my godfather was a policeman in his own special way, it’s up to you. We’ll manage somehow, me and him.’

‘Why on earth is he getting so worked up?’ said Mathias, looking mildly around with his clear blue eyes.

‘I’ve no idea,’ said Lucien. ‘He’s highly strung. They were like that in the Middle Ages, you know. My great-aunt used to work in the slaughterhouse, but I don’t go round boasting about it.’

Marc looked down, and folded his arms, suddenly calm again. He glanced at the opera singer from the Western Front. What would she say, now she knew about the disgraced policeman living next door, in the house that the neighbours called ‘the disgrace’?

Sophia guessed what he was thinking. ‘It doesn’t bother me at all that he’s here,’ she said.

‘For reliability,’ said Vandoosler, ‘a disgraced policeman is actually a good bet. He’ll listen and try to find out answers, but he’s obliged to keep his mouth shut. The ideal confidant in fact.’

‘He may have had his faults,’ said Marc in a quieter voice, ‘but my godfather was a pretty good investigator. He might be able to help.’

‘Don’t worry,’ said Vandoosler, looking at Sophia. ‘Madame Siméonidis will make up her own mind. If there is a problem, that is. As for these three,’ he said, pointing to the young men, ‘they’re not entirely half-witted. They may be able to help too.’

‘Who said they were half-witted?’ said Sophia.

‘Well, it’s sometimes best to make things clear,’ said Vandoosler. ‘My nephew Marc now… I know a thing or two about him. I looked after him in Paris when he was twelve, that is, almost grown up. He was already vague, pig-headed, on a high, off-balance, but too clever to sit still. I never was able to do much with him, except to impress on him a few sound principles about the disturbances one must constantly bring to bear on the world. And he picked that up. As for the others, I’ve only known them a week, and they look OK so far. They’re a strange combination, each one with his great work he’s writing. Funny lot. Anyway, I have never heard of a case like yours before. It’s high time to do something about the tree.’

‘But what could I do?’ Sophia asked. ‘The police would have laughed at me.’

‘Very true,’ said Vandoosler.

‘And I didn’t want to alarm my husband.’

‘Quite right.’

‘So I was waiting until… I knew these young people better.’

‘But how can we help, without arousing your husband’s suspicions?’ asked Marc.

‘What I was thinking,’ said Sophia, ‘was that you might pretend to be workmen. Checking on buried electricity cables or something. Anything that would explain digging a trench, one that runs under the tree, of course. I’d pay you extra for some overalls, and to hire a van and tools.’

‘I’m on,’ said Marc.

‘Sounds do-able,’ said Mathias.

‘Well, if it’s about digging trenches,’ said Lucien, ‘I’m all for it. I’ll send a sick note to the school. It’ll take a couple of days.’

‘Can you face watching your husband’s reaction when they turn up proposing to dig their trench?’ asked Vandoosler.

‘I’ll do my best,’ said Sophia.

‘Won’t he recognise them?’

‘No, I’m sure he won’t. He’s taken absolutely no interest in them’.

‘Perfect,’ said Marc. ‘It’s Thursday today. We need a bit of time to organise the details. We’ll be knocking at your door on Monday morning, first thing.’

‘Thank you,’ said Sophia. ‘It’s funny. Now we’ve arranged all this, I’m sure there’s nothing under the tree.’

She opened her handbag. ‘Here’s the money,’ she said. ‘It’s all there.’

‘What, already?’ said Marc.

Vandoosler senior smiled. Sophia Siméonidis was an unusual woman. She was timid and hesitant in manner, but she had brought the money with her. Was she so sure of persuading them? He found that interesting.