‘Associates.’
‘Those who might offer help in exchange for a little something.’
‘Enemies too.’
And then from Hermann also, as they got out of the lorry, ‘Frau Weidling, Louis?’
It was one of those times when the soul had to be searched. The Suretes little Frog cast a doubtful glance up to that God of his for assistance, only to see that the sky was grey and threatening snow.
‘Yes. Ah yes, Hermann, the Salamander could well have called Frau Weidling to him since she did not die in the cinema fire as planned.’
‘Locked in the toilets?’
‘Yes!’
Above the constant murmur of the crowd came the shouts of the various vendors. Above these, the sounds of an accordion, a child who played a tambourine and another, the violin. Then in the distance somewhere there was a steam calliope.
It was a madhouse. No one would understand the urgency because they were all here to enjoy themselves and it was the holiday.
There were wicker baskets of used cutlery, stacks of old china-cups, saucers, tureens and platters in some of the booths, old glass, old pots, butter churns no one could possibly want these days, bits of tinware … ah, so many things. The images flashed by as Louis shouldered through the crowd and finally shouted, ‘Surete, Surete!’ and blew his whistle-stopped suddenly right in the middle of the Alley of the Old Maid’s Most Precious Possessions and gave it another blast.
The shrill sound of the police whistle was met with a stunned silence that gradually extended outwards from them as each person halted to look apprehensively his way.
‘Good! Now step aside,’ he shouted.
Ah, Gott im Himmel, another Bismarck! ‘Louis, why not ask where the Alley of the Caesars is?’
‘Because I already know where it is. On the other side of that.’
The main building.
The warehouses were down along the canal. They were not big. Indeed, they varied in size according to the needs of their owners, yet before each of them was a scavenged marble statue, a bust, a headless figure, all Roman, all of Caesars perhaps, it was hard to tell.
‘They remind me of Provence, Louis, of walking through the ruins of that hill fort,’ grumbled Kohler uncomfortably.
‘There were no statues that I recall. The Saracens must have taken care of them.’
Louis would toss in a bit of history! ‘There wasn’t anyone else around but our archer and here there isn’t anyone either!’
Ah yes, it was quite quiet. All the activity was behind them.
Henri Masson had accepted stone busts that could seldom find a buyer. They were of the kings and queens of France and their children, of generals and politicians, great thinkers and great artists, musicians and writers. And he had gathered them on tiers of benches in a separate chamber that was lined with stone beyond the stacks of old furniture, paintings, packing cases and other things. It was cold and there was a smell that was most distinct. Ah no …
Hanging from a string, attached to the lamp high in the arch of the vault, were the collapsed remains of at least three scorched condoms.
‘Louis …’
As yet they could not see much else. Only those stone faces that sat as in final judgement, silent and all staring down at the person on the floor between them.
A bare foot, a cast-off shoe … some scattered female clothing and, in a heap, the sky-blue dress with all its underthings.
Ange-Marie Rachline was huddled in an armchair, off to one side of them. Hermann threw an anxious glance her way. The woman wasn’t moving. She was just staring at them as those busts were staring at someone else.
He stepped away. ‘Ah merde, Louis, look.’
Leiter Weidling’s wife was naked and lying face up-spread-eagled beneath the condoms with her wrists and ankles securely tied to the stone legs of the benches. And the water that had dripped out of the condoms above had fallen on her skin to remind her of the phosphorus, and when this had burned its way through the thin rubber, it, too, had fallen on her.
She’d been gagged and must have arched her back as she stiffened. The burns were horrible. The flesh had been eaten away until the blood had finally put out the flames or the phosphorus had been consumed. There was little left but a cavity between her breasts, nothing but entrails where her navel had been …
‘Cover her, Hermann. There are some rugs. Let me have a moment with Madame Rachline.’
‘That one didn’t get here soon enough, Louis. The shears are still in her hands. He must have done it late last night or early this morning.’
She’d have killed Charlebois if she could have. The childhood friend from the seaside at Concarneau was bitter.
‘Look, Inspector, I really didn’t think he had had anything to do with the fires. That was all past. Martine … ah, that one detested me. I thought she was crazy saying the things she did. Dragging it all up. I … Would I honestly have helped him in the slightest, knowing I had two children to care for?’
‘You knew Frau Weidling had been with Claudine at La Belle Epoque not once but several times since coming to Lyon.’
‘Yes, I knew.’
‘You knew that Henri Charlebois secretly watched them. Come, come, madame, you could not have been unaware of this.’
Vomit rose in her throat, and she turned away suddenly as she swallowed hard. Burning, it made her eyes smart. ‘I swear I didn’t, Inspector. Henri … he has always had his own set of keys. I … I never thought of his doing this. Surely one of the others would have seen him?’
‘A Salamander, madame? A man who could stand over you while you slept?’
Dear Jesus forgive her. Henri in the house, Henri with the children …
‘Madame, what has happened to your husband, please?’
‘Emile? What … what the hell has he to do with this?’
St-Cyr gave her a moment. He would draw up an armchair, a thing with the stuffing sticking out of it. ‘The past always preconditions the present, madame. Your husband left you destitute. Henri Charlebois remembered his childhood friend.’
‘Henri was never my lover, Inspector. He could not possibly be the father of my children.’
He tossed the hand of dismissal. ‘Ah no, of course not, but he knew who the father was, madame, and on the death of his grandfather, he imparted this little bit of knowledge to your husband.’
Ah damn him! ‘Henri … Henri Masson …’
‘Did not just take advantage of Claudine, but yourself also.’
She did not look away but into the past so deeply he could hear the sound of the waves on the beach of memory. ‘Claudine was the youngest, Henri the oldest. She was anxious to be friends, so submitted to things she might not otherwise have done. We … we discovered that fire sexually aroused her and that Henri liked to watch her. He would … would bring the flame up to her skin again and again as he … he brought her to orgasm. It became a compulsion with him-she was only nine when it started, twelve when it ended and it … it was a sickness in which I shared in the desperation of my own loneliness, but … but I could not stand to be burned. For me, the nearness of the flame only made me scream.’
‘But when brought close to another, madame, did it sexually excite you also?’
Vehemently she shook her head-could not help but look toward the alcove of the stone busts. ‘It fascinated me to watch them both! That’s why I let him do it to her!’
‘When … when, exactly, was it that Henri Masson, Senior, discovered his grandson playing with matches?’
The children would have to be told. They’d hear things-the girls at La Belle Epoque would be bound to say something. ‘After … after several fires had been mysteriously lit. A pavilion, a boatshed, a trawler, a barn, a house in the country in which five people perished. Monsieur Henri, Senior, found us among the dunes. They were not big dunes. They were just little hills and we ought to have known better. Claudine was lying on the ground and I was letting her hold me by the hands while Henri … Henri caressed her naked body with the flame.’