“Everyone has a job to do.” He leaned back as the waiter slid two tiny cups of espresso onto the Formica table. “Merci.”
“And you are very good at yours. So give me a little something, not secret information, just …”
“A head start?” He raised an eyebrow.
“Exactement.”
“You have a car nearby?”
“I do.”
“Good.” He picked up the miniature cup and threw it back. “Never seen the point in paying for such tiny drinks. Ready?”
“Where are we going?”
“To the scene of a crime. Père Lachaise.”
“Already been there,” she said. “Nothing to see.”
“Lots of dead people.”
“Lots of stones on top of dead people.”
“My sentiments exactly.”
“Seriously, Hugo, why are we going there?”
They headed for her car and as they walked he told her what little he knew, partly because there was no reason not to and partly because he suspected he’d need a friendly reporter, a favor, in the coming days. And he trusted her. They’d almost been in love, or as close as jaded grown-ups get to love, sharing the highs of the first encounters and then the lows of her father’s violent death. It was their work, and a reluctance to rely too heavily on each other, that pried them apart but they’d never stopped being friends and, a few times, lovers.
“So who is she?” she asked.
“Jane Avril.”
“The dancer? I wonder why.”
“Me too,” Hugo said.
“Are they related, these … incidents?” she asked. “Doesn’t seem like they would be.”
“Same cemetery, within a couple of days of each other. Be a hell of a coincidence. But you’re right, so far that’s it.”
She drove quickly across the river, zipping in and out of the midday traffic, heading northeast to the cemetery, where they found Capitaine Garcia watching his men as they directed the tourists away from the yellow police tape.
“We must stop meeting like this,” Garcia said. “Seriously.” He saw Claudia hovering behind Hugo and gave him a look.
“Non,” said Hugo. “She’s here as a reporter.”
“Most beautiful reporter in Paris,” he said, welcoming her inside the tape with open arms and a kiss on each cheek. “Ma chérie. Nice to see you in each other’s company, you two should really—”
“It’s getting warm, Capitaine,” Hugo interrupted. “Perhaps you could fill me in.”
“Come,” Garcia said, “have a look.”
They stood at the foot of the grave site, silent, inspecting the damage for themselves.
“How did he do it?” Hugo asked.
“Some sort of explosive, we think. It looks like he drilled into the stone cover and put explosives in the holes. A few small charges and the thing cracks into a dozen moveable pieces.”
“That would take some expertise. And organization.”
“Exactement,” nodded Garcia. “And all for some bones.”
“Can I take photos?” Claudia asked, her voice quiet, respectful.
Garcia glanced at the ring of watchers behind the police tape. “Everyone else is. Sure.” He turned to Hugo. “My thinking is this: either this site was selected for the person who lay inside, or for some external reason.”
“Then it’s the person inside,” said Hugo, looking around. There was nothing to set this site apart from the thousands of others. The grave itself was protected by an iron fence two feet high, brown with rust. The headstone sat high on its base and gave the impression of being slimmer than its neighbors, either because of its rounded top or the glossy sheen that made up its front surface. The inscription, small lettering in the middle of the tablet, read:
Jeanne Biais
Connue Comme—“Jane Avril”
1868–1943
“I agree. No reason to think buried treasure lies in this one,” Garcia said. “Born Jeanne Beaudon. Biais was her married name, I think, and Jane Avril was her stage name. Know anything about her?”
“Not really,” said Hugo. “A dancer, had something to do with Toulouse-Lautrec. That’s about it.”
“Right. She was quite the star in her day. Didn’t start off that way, though. Her father was disinterested, mother a highly abusive alcoholic. Poor girl ran away and when they found her, she was committed to an insane asylum.”
“Charming,” said Hugo. He looked over his shoulder and saw Claudia on her cell phone, no doubt calling in the story, wiping someone else’s off the front page, at least for a while.
“Life got better, though,” Garcia went on. “She worked as a dancer at clubs in Paris, then got hired at the Moulin Rouge. Became a star, partly thanks to Toulouse-Lautrec, who painted her image onto posters that were used to advertise her shows. You can still buy copies of them. Anyway, in 1895, the owners of the Moulin Rouge paid her a lot to replace Louise Weber, the most famous dancer in Paris.”
“Was that ‘La Goulue’?” Hugo asked.
“Oui, I’m impressed,” Garcia said. “What is that in English?”
“The Greedy One.”
“Exactement. Our Jane Avril was a different kind of dancer so it was something of a risk making her the lead. La Goulue was bawdy, a little vulgar; Avril was graceful, serene, demure.” A little smile. “More my kind of woman. And it worked, the patrons fell in love with her and she became famous, for many years.”
“What happened after those many years?”
“Like La Belle France herself, a German was her undoing. The faded name on her gravestone, Maurice Biais. He was an artist and they fell deeply in love but as time went by …” He shrugged. “En effet, he abandoned her at his home outside Paris, left her for days at a time to play in Paris with other girls. A tragedy.”
“How did she die?”
“He died first, as you can see. 1926. She ended up in a home for old people. Lived in poverty for a long time, thanks to Monsieur Biais. He’d spent all his money chasing women, left her nothing.”
“I hear that’s a common affliction for French men.”
“Not all of us, mon ami. I do not have the face or the figure to be a lothario.” Garcia frowned but his eyes twinkled. “Anyway, she has no living relatives that we know of, though we’ve not had much time to check.”
Hugo felt a hand on his arm. “I have to run,” said Claudia. “Can I call and get some details later?”
Garcia bowed. “You may call me any time, ma chérie. But I suspect your request was aimed at Monsieur Marston?” Again the twinkle.
“Mais non,” she smiled, stepping forward to kiss Garcia’s cheek. “Why would I restrict myself to just one handsome man?”
“Call,” said Hugo. “Either of us. We both know how to avoid answering questions from journalists.”
“Then I’ll call you both.”
Hugo watched her leave, then looked around the cemetery, bringing himself back to the task at hand. “So, why Jane Avril?”
“Like I said, she was a star in her time. Maybe some sick souvenir collector?”
“Maybe.”
“The break-in over the weekend was near Jim Morrison’s grave.” Garcia rubbed a hand over his chin. “It’s possible our man was trying to do the same thing there, but got interrupted, n’est pas?”
“Looking to steal bones? I don’t know, a couple of things tell me that’s not right. First, souvenir hunters don’t usually carry weapons. And look around, if famous old bones were all he’s after, when he saw those two kids he could have easily hidden. Easily. I’m not convinced he had to confront them.”
“Perhaps, but perhaps they saw him before he saw them. What else?”