“Then you must have known my brother,” the girl said.
“Alas, no. I am in Belgium, on business, when I read ze newspaper. It is ze first I ’ear of you bose since ze war. I mean to look for ’im, of course. But as soon as I return, before I can look, I read in ze newspaper about ’im again, and ’e is dead.” Olivant allowed an expression of grief to dwell on his face for a measured period of time, and then bravely set it aside. “’Owever, I come to place myself at your service. For finding ze murderers, we can only ’ope ze police ’ave success. But anysing else I can do... You will, per’aps, ’ave lunch wiz me?”
The girl’s eyes went to the Saint, and Simon made a faint negative movement with his head.
“I’m sorry,” she said, “but I’ve already promised... May I introduce Mr—”
“Tombs,” said the Saint promptly, holding out his hand.
The same kind of impulse that had made him introduce himself with complete candor to Valerie North now made him duck behind the alias which often afforded him a morbid private amusement, but this time his inward smile vanished abruptly as Olivant shook hands. From a man who looked like Olivant, he had expected a fleshy and probably moist and limp contact, but the palm that touched his own was hard and rough like a laborer’s.
Deep in the Saint’s brain a little premonitory pulse began to beat, like the signal of some psychic Geiger counter, but his face was a mask of conventional amiability.
“Mr Tombs,” Olivant repeated, like a man who made a practise of memorizing names. “Zen per’aps bose of you—”
“I don’t want to be rude,” said the Saint firmly, “but my job depends on this exclusive interview. You know how newspapers are.”
M Olivant made a visible effort to look like a man who knew how newspapers are.
“I am desolate.” He turned back to the girl. “For cocktails, zen, per’aps? I ’ave look forward so much to zis meeting—”
“Excuse me,” said the Saint.
He strolled across the lobby to the little newsstand and glanced quickly over its wares. A guidebook with a shiny stiff paper cover caught his eye, and he bought it, and wiped the cover briskly with his handkerchief while he waited for his change. He walked back, holding the book by one corner, to where M Olivant was taking his talkative leave of Valerie North.
“I come ’ere, zen, at five o’clock. I ’ave so much to tell you about your poor fahzer, and what ’e does for us in ze Resistance before ze Gestapo take ’im... To sink I ’ave not see you since you were such a leetle girl!”
“I’ll look forward to it,” said the girl, self-consciously letting her hand be kissed, and looked at the Saint. “May I run upstairs just for a minute and see my room before we go?”
“Sure.”
As she left, Simon showed M Olivant his book, holding it in such a way that the other was practically forced to take it.
“M Olivant, would you say this was any good?”
Olivant took the book and thumbed perfunctorily through a few pages.
“Eet is probably quite ’elpful, Mr Tombs. So you don’t work ’ere all ze time?”
“No, this is a special assignment”
“Ah. I ’ope you make a good story.”
“At least it’s a chance to travel,” said the Saint conversationally. “But I don’t suppose that means much to you. From what you were saying, it sounds as if you spent most of your time doing it. What sort of business are you in?”
“I ’ave many affairs,” Olivant said impressively, and seemed to think that was an adequate answer.
He held out the book, and Simon took it back again by the corner.
“Maybe you’d let me talk to you later, Monsieur Olivant. You should have some interesting things to tell about Miss North’s family.”
“Ah, yes, eet is a most interesting story.” Olivant seemed curiously uninterested. He extended his hand briskly. “Now, I ’ave anozzer appointment. Eet ’as been a pleasure to meet you. Au revoir, Mr Tombs.”
The Saint watched him go, with the sensation of that inappropriately calloused hand lingering on his fingers, and then he turned to the concierge and asked for a large envelope, into which he slid his newly acquired guidebook, being careful not to touch the book again except by the one corner he was holding it by.
4
“Tell me,” said the Saint, “as the most ignorant reporter in this town, what put you in the news. I mean, even before anything happened to your brother.”
They sat in opposite armchairs across a table in the tiny downstairs room of the Restaurant Châtaignier, sniffing the savory bouquet of its incomparable homard au beurre blanc rising from the plates in front of them, while the chef and proprietor himself uncorked a bottle of cool rosé.
“It sounds silly,” said Valerie North, “but I was on one of those radio quiz programs. I happened to know the answer to who was the painter of the Mona Lisa, and the prize I won was a free trip to Europe. They asked me what I planned to do with it and I said it’d give me the chance I’ve always hoped for to get to know my brother.”
“It does sound a little unusual,” Simon admitted. “Hadn’t you ever met?”
“Not since we were kids. We were born and lived here, till 1940, when the Germans were advancing on Paris. I was too young to remember much about it, but everyone was very frightened, and my father said we must go away. He wouldn’t go himself, but he sent us with the wife of a neighbor — my mother died when we were very young. Somewhere on the road we were strafed by a plane, and the woman was killed. Charles and I went on alone.”
“Was he older or younger than you?”
“Two years older. But we were both children. Somehow, presently we got separated. I just went on, helplessly I guess, with the stream of refugees who were trudging away to the southwest. Somewhere, after that — it all seems so far away and confused — I was picked up by an American couple who’d also been caught in the blitz. They took me to Bordeaux, and then afterwards to America. They were sweet people — they still are — and they hadn’t any children, and they treated me like their own. Later on, they were able to find out somehow that my father had died in a concentration camp. They adopted me legally, and I took their name.”
“So for all practical purposes, you really are an American.”
“I went to school in Chicago — Mr North is an accountant there — and now I’m a secretary in a mail-order house. And the only French I know is from high school.”
“Who was your father?”
“All I know about him is his name, Eli Rosepierre. And he was some sort of working jeweler.”
The Saint paused with his wine-glass half-way to his lips.
“Was he Jewish?”
“I think so.”
“I told Quercy there might be something in the name,” he observed. “Of course, the name Eli fixes it. Now I get the Rosepierre. A literal translation of Rosenstein. I wonder... He must have been very brave or very foolish to stay here, with the Nazis coming.”
“Perhaps he was only too optimistic,” she said. “You know, I’d never thought of that, about the name.”
“Was he rich?”
“I don’t think so. He worked very hard. But he may have been thrifty. I don’t really know. As far as I can remember we lived in an ordinary decent way, not poverty-stricken and not specially luxurious.”
“But it’s at least a possibility.”
“What difference does it make? Whatever he had the Nazis must have confiscated.”