Louis, Hoskins, and I exchanged glances. Someone with no fear of Pincus had tossed the cigarettes. Probably his killers.
Louis got out his iPhone and called up a picture of Henri Richard. He showed it to them. “Did you see him in the restaurant in the past six weeks or so?”
Remy Fontaine, the maître d’, took one look and said, “Bien sûr. He is the dead opera director. Monsieur Richard. He came here often.”
“Alone?” Hoskins asked.
“Never alone,” Fontaine said. “Always with a woman.”
“Same woman?” I asked.
The maître d’ and the sommelier glanced at each other before she said, “The last two or three times we think it was the same woman. Exotically beautiful, with perfect caramel-colored skin and big cat eyes. But she was different every time she came in. Hair color and cut.”
“And eye color,” the maître d’ said. “Twice they were dark brown, but the last time they were in, her hair had been hennaed red, and her eyes were, I don’t know, like a cat’s eyes?”
“So she’s wearing different-colored contacts,” I said.
“And more than that,” the maître d’ said. “She had-how do you say?-extensions in her hair, and her cheeks, the thickness, they seemed to change.”
Louis said, “Probably putting cotton high in her mouth.”
“You ever hear him use her name?”
“Mariama,” the headwaiter said. “No idea on her last name.”
“You’re positive?” Hoskins said.
“Definitely,” he replied. “I heard him call her Mariama several times.”
The name could be useful, I thought. But then again, this is a woman who changes her hair and eye color and used cotton to alter her looks. It wasn’t a stretch to see her using an alias.
“Did Chef Pincus know Henri Richard?”
The maître d’ nodded. “They were not close friends, but they knew each other. In fact, the last time Richard was in with Mariama, René came to their table and talked.”
“About what?” Hoskins asked.
Fontaine shrugged. “I don’t know, but the chef shook his hand and seemed very happy returning to the kitchen.”
The wine steward agreed. “He was whistling.”
“And when was this?” I asked.
“Last week.”
“Are there security cameras here?”
Investigateur Hoskins sobered, shook her head. “There are very few outside of government buildings. The French see it as an invasion of privacy.”
“Who was the last to see Chef Pincus alive?” Louis asked.
The maître d’ and the wine steward raised their hands. They gave us the timetable, and then described leaving the restaurant shortly after 1 a.m., and seeing a drunk passed out in the alley by the Dumpster.
“You rarely see that in this neighborhood,” Fontaine remarked. “But you could smell the alcohol all over him, even over the garbage.”
“What does it mean?” the steward asked. “The graffiti?”
“When we figure it out, we’ll let you know,” Hoskins said. “For now, I want to clear the restaurant and let the forensics team complete its work.”
Louis and I didn’t argue. We went back through the kitchen, where Chef Pincus’s body had been cut down and covered with a sheet. Out in the alley, we crossed to the Dumpster, finding a broken bottle of beer sitting upright beneath it. There was still two inches of booze in the intact bottom.
“Why didn’t he drink it?” Louis asked.
“What, from the broken part? There are glass shards in there. He’d have swallowed them.”
“A clever wino would strain them out with his shirt,” Louis said. “Maybe this bum just wanted to smell drunk.”
Chapter 37
8th Arrondissement
6:12 p.m.
I GOT OUT of a taxi in the twilight, and felt vindicated and excited as I bid good evening to the doorman at the Plaza Athénée. Earlier, Louis and I left Investigateur Hoskins to deal with the media mob gathered around Chez Pincus, and went back to the offices of Private Paris. We put together a priority list for the evidence our techs had gathered at the scene.
It was a big deal for a Private forensics team to be called in by a local police department, and especially by a renowned investigative operation like La Crim. The decision spoke to the level of training and adherence to state-of-the-art forensics methods that I’d insisted on after deciding to get my company into the crime analysis business. Our labs were certified in fifteen states in the U.S. We maintain Interpol standards throughout the rest of the world, and police agencies were starting to recognize us for our efforts.
That alone had put a positive spin on my day. But around 2 p.m., I’d gotten a call that put me in an even rosier state of mind. Michele Herbert asked if I would like to have dinner with her. Though I’d felt like doing a back handspring in response, I kept my cool, and we made a date for nine.
I moved through the lobby and through an arch. I glanced to my right and saw a gathering happy hour crowd milling in an interior loggia that abutted the dining room and the courtyard. Along the walls of the high, narrow space, groups of the beautiful, the wealthy, and the famous sat in fine furniture, sipped from thirty dollar cocktails, and nibbled at plates of foie gras and caviar tureens.
About halfway down, I spotted Randall Peaks by that gaggle of Saudi princesses, all of whom appeared to have changed dresses since the morning. Peaks looked at me and nodded. I nodded back, and then got on the elevator. As I did, my phone rang.
“Jack Morgan,” I answered.
“It’s me,” Justine said. “The swelling on Sherman Wilkerson’s brain has started to subside. The doctors think they’ll be able to bring him out of the coma tomorrow, or the day after at the latest.”
“Long-term prognosis?” I asked.
“Could take a year of therapy, but good, I think,” she replied.
“That’s excellent,” I said, and breathed a sigh of relief. Not only was Sherman Wilkerson one of my oldest clients, but he was a truly good man, someone who most certainly did not deserve to live out his days in a vegetative state.
“Anything on the granddaughter to report?” Justine asked. “I’m sure she’ll be the first thing on Sherman’s mind.”
“She’s gone to ground. I haven’t seen any new alerts that she’s used her card.”
“How’s Paris otherwise?”
“Still the most beautiful city in the world.”
“The most romantic too, I hear,” she said.
“I wouldn’t know about that,” I said. “Things are all business here.”
“Uh-huh,” she said as the elevator dinged open and I got out at the eighth floor. “That’s not what Louis just told me.”
“Don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said, digging for my key card.
“Gorgeous famous artist and graffiti expert?”
I used the key card and pushed the suite door open, saying, “Oh, her.”
“Yes, her,” Justine said. “Louis says you’re smitten.”
“Take that with a grain of salt. The man is smitten himself about six times a day.” I walked the short hallway into the suite’s living area and set the key card on the table.
“Jack, it’s okay to be smitten.”
“I’m well aware of that,” I replied. I entered the bedroom and headed toward the walk-in closet.
Before she could reply, I heard a squeak behind me before something hit me hard right between the shoulder blades, stunned me, blew the wind out of me, and drove me to my knees.
Chapter 38
THE SECOND BLOW between the shoulder blades caused me to drop the phone, and threw me forward on my stomach, grunting, trying to get my breath.
A black tactical boot appeared in my peripheral vision and crushed the phone while someone grabbed my wrists, pulled them behind my back, and locked them together with zip ties. Still gasping for air, I saw a gloved hand come forward, take my chin, and wrench it down. Another gloved hand stuffed fabric so far into my mouth that I gagged and choked.