Zenith took a table in an alcove under a low stone ceiling that was centuries old and blew out the large votive candle which was his only light.
He ordered his usual absinthe and from his cigarette case removed a slender oval, which he placed between his lips and lit. The rich sweetness of Kashmiri opium poured from his nostrils as he exhaled the smoke and his eyes became heavily lidded. Watching the dancers, all at once he became aware of a presence at his table and a slender woman, whose domino only enhanced her dark beauty, an oval face framed by a perfectly cut ‘page-boy’ style. She laid a hand lightly on his shoulder and smiled.
“Will you dance, old friend?” she asked.
Although she was known to the world as Una Persson, Countess von Beck, Zenith thought of her by another name. He rejoiced inwardly at his good fortune. She was exactly whom he had hoped to meet here. He rose and bowed, then gracefully escorted her to the door where they joined in the rhythms of The Entropy Tango, that strange composition actually written for one of Countess Una’s closest friends. In England, she had enjoyed a successful career on the music hall stage. Here, she was best known as a daring adventuress.
Arranging their wonderful bodies in the figures of the tango, the two carried on a murmured conversation. When the final chords rose to subtle crescendo, Zenith had the knowledge he had sought.
At his invitation, Countess Una joined him, the candle was relit and they ordered from the menu. This was to prove dangerous for, moments after they began to eat, a muffled shot stilled the orchestra and Zenith noted with some interest that a large calibre bullet had penetrated the plaster just behind his left shoulder. The bullet had flattened oddly, enough to tell him that it was made of an unusual alloy. Countess Una had recognised it, too. It was she who blew out the candle so that they no longer made an easy target.
They spoke almost in chorus.
“Vera Pym!”
Who else but that ruthless mistress of Paris’s most notorious gang would ignore Smith’s rules of sanctuary, respected even by the police?
But why had she suddenly determined to destroy the albino?
Zenith frowned. Could he know more than he realised?
IV
Commissaire Lapointe was unsurprised by Zenith’s information when they met at L’Albertine the next morning. Vera Pym (believed to be her real name) was the acknowledged leader of a gang which had in its time had several apparent leaders. Only Pym, however, had remained in control of the Vampyres throughout their long career. She was one of a small group capable (to one degree or another) of moving between the worlds and living for centuries. The rank and file of her gang, for all their sinister name, had no such qualities. Some did not even realise she was their leader, for she generally put her man of the moment in that position. Occasionally, she changed her name, though generally it remained a simple anagram of her gang’s. And she had many disguises. Few were absolutely sure what she looked like or, indeed, if she was always the same person. Several times she had been captured, yet she had always been able to escape.
“She has been a thorn in the side of the authorities for well over a century,” agreed Lapointe. “And, of course, she is one of the few we can suspect in this case.”
“What’s more,” added Zenith, “she has recently been seen in the company of a man of the cloth. An Abbe by all accounts.”
“My God!” Lapointe passed a photocopied picture across the table.
“Tell me what you make of that!”
Frowning, the albino examined the picture. “Not much, I’m afraid. Is she…?”
“The likeness is remarkably similar to our victim. Her name was Sarah Gobseck, a Jewess better known in her day as La Torpille.”
“A surprisingly unfeminine sobriquet.”
“I agree. But at that time a torpedo was something which lay in the water, half-hidden by the waves, until hit by a ship. Whereupon it would explode and as likely as not sink the ship. She is most famous from Balzac’s History of the Courtesans.”
“Ah!” Zenith sat back, drawing on his cigarette. “So that’s our Abbe!
Carlos Herrera!”
“Exactly. Vautrin himself. Which would explain the initials on the rosary. So he is here now with Madame Pym. Which also explains anomalies in his career as reported by Balzac. Vautrin is Jacques Collin, the master criminal, who vanished from the historical records at about the time our ‘Torpedo’ became an inconvenient embarrassment to more than one gentleman. Suicide was suspected, I know. But now we have the truth.”
“No doubt Collin also vanished into the 21st century, since Balzac becomes increasingly vague concerning his identity or his exploits and appears to have resorted to unlikely fictions to explain him. He knew nothing of La Pym, of course!”
“But this does nothing to tell us of their whereabouts,” mused Zenith.
“Nor,” added Lapointe, “how they can be brought to justice.”
For some moments, Zenith was lost in thought, then he glanced at his watch and frowned. “Perhaps you will permit me, Monsieur le Commissaire, to solve that particular problem.”
Lapointe became instantly uncomfortable. “I assure you, Monsieur Zenith, that while I appreciate all your help, this is ultimately a Police matter.
I would remind you that you are already risking your life. La Pym has marked you as her next victim.”
“A fact, Monsieur Lapointe, that I greatly resent. Because of a promise I made to a certain great Englishman, I regret to say I have been forced to live the life of a bourgeois professional, almost a tradesman, and no longer pursue the life I once relished. However, in this case a certain personal element has entered the equation. I feel obliged to satisfy my honour and perhaps avenge the death of that beautiful young creature who, through no fault of her own, was forced into a profession for which she had only abhorrence and which resulted, at least according to de Balzac’s history, in an unholy, early and wholly undeserved death.”
“My dear Monsieur Zenith, if I may make so bold, this remains a matter for the justice system.”
“But you are helpless, I think you will agree, certainly in the matter of Collin. He will evade you, as no doubt also will La Pym.”
“If so, then we will continue to hunt for them until we can arrest them and prove their guilt or innocence in a court of law.”
The albino bowed from where he sat. “So be it.” And with that he got to his feet and, making a polite gesture, bade the Policeman au revoir.
Commissaire Lapointe immediately made his way back to the Quay d’Orsay where LeBec awaited him. He read at once the concern in his superior’s face.
“What’s up, chief?”
Lapointe was in poor humour and in no mood to explain, but he knew he owed it to LeBec to say something. “I’m pretty sure that Zenith has an idea of our murderers’ whereabouts and intends to take the law into his own hands. He is convinced that he knows who they are and how to punish them. We must find him and follow him and do all we can to thwart him!”
“But, chief, if he can deliver justice where we cannot…?”
“Then all our civilisation stands for nothing, LeBec. Already the Americans and the English have adopted the language of the blood feud in their foreign affairs, demanding eyes for eyes and teeth for teeth-but that is nothing more or less than a reversion to the most primitive form of law available to our ancestors. France cannot follow the Anglo-Saxons down that road and I will do all in my power to make sure we do not!”