‘I’m sorry, M. Siméonidis,’ said the policeman, ‘but I can’t allow you to let any persons into your property without telling me their names and addresses and the reason for their visit. Those are orders and you’ve been told about them.’
Siméonidis gave a fleeting malicious smile. ‘This isn’t my property, it’s my house,’ he said in a resounding voice, ‘and these are not persons, they are my friends. And let me tell you that a Greek born in Delphi, half a mile from the Oracle, doesn’t take orders from anyone. So put that in your pipe and smoke it.’
‘Nobody is above the law, monsieur,’ replied the policeman.
‘You know where you can put your law,’ said Siméonidis evenly.
Lucien was delighted. Exactly the kind of cussed old bugger with whom they could have had a good laugh, if only circumstances hadn’t left him so unhappy.
The palaver went on for a few more minutes, while the policeman took down their names and quickly identified them from his notebook as neighbours of Sophia’s. But since there was no rule to stop them going to look at someone’s papers, if he was prepared to give them permission, he had to let them pass, not without informing them that he would have to search them when they left. No document was to be taken out of the house for the time being. Lucien shrugged and followed Siméonidis. Suddenly, in a moment of fury, the old Greek turned back and gripped the flic by his lapels. Marc thought he was going to punch him, and that that would be interesting, but the old man hesitated.
‘No,’ said Siméonidis after a moment. ‘It’s not worth it.’
Letting go of the policeman, as if he were some grubby object, he left the room to join Marc and Lucien. They went upstairs, along a corridor, and the old man used a key hanging from his belt to unlock the door to a poorly lit room, with bookshelves full of files.
‘Sophia’s room,’ he said quietly. ‘I presume that’s what interests you?’
Marc and Lucien nodded.
‘Do you think you’re going to find anything?’ asked Siméonidis. ‘You really think so?’
He was looking at them intently, with pursed lips and sadness in his eyes.
‘What if we don’t?’ asked Lucien.
Siméonidis banged his fist on the table. ‘You’d better find something!’ he ordered. ‘I’m eighty-one years old, I can’t get about as well as I could, and I can’t always get the hang of things these days either. You might be able to. I want this killer caught. We Greeks never give up, that’s what my dear old Andromache used to say. Leguennec is blinkered by his job. I need someone else to work on it, someone with an open mind. I don’t care whether or not Sophia really asked you to carry out any “mission”. Whether that’s true or false-I think maybe it’s false?’
‘Well, yes, it’s not quite true,’ Lucien admitted.
‘That’s better,’ said Siméonidis. ‘Now we know where we stand. But why have you come poking about?’
‘It’s our job,’ said Lucien.
‘Why, are you detectives?’ said Siméonidis.
‘No, historians,’ said Lucien.
‘I don’t see what that has to do with Sophia.’
Lucien gestured towards Marc. ‘It’s because of him. He doesn’t want your granddaughter Alexandra Haufman to be charged with this murder. He’s prepared to point the finger at anyone else, even an innocent party, rather than at her.’
‘Excellent,’ said Siméonidis. ‘If it helps, Dompierre didn’t stay long. I think he only looked at one file, and he knew exactly where to go. You can see, the files are arranged by year.’
‘Do you know which one he looked at?’ asked Marc. ‘Did you stay in the room with him?’
‘No, he was anxious to be left alone. I brought him a cup of coffee. I think he was looking around the year 1982, but I’m not sure. I’ll leave you. You haven’t much time to lose.’
‘One more thing,’ said Marc. ‘How has your wife taken all this business?’
‘Jacqueline didn’t shed any tears. It’s not that she’s hard-hearted, but she always wants to “face up to things”. “Facing up to things” for her is a great sign of character. And it’s become such a habit with her, you can’t get round it. Above all, she’s concerned to protect her son.’
‘And what about him?’
‘Julien? He’s not up to much. A murder would be way beyond him. Especially since Sophia was kind to him and helped him when he didn’t know what to do with himself. She got him a few walk-on parts. He never made anything of them. He did shed a few tears over Sophia. He used to like her a lot back then. He had photos of her in his room when he was younger and used to listen to her records. But not these days.’ Siméonidis was getting tired. ‘I’ll leave you,’ he said again. A little siesta before dinner is no disgrace at my age. And my wife rather likes to see me give in to it. Go on, you don’t have much time. It’s quite possible that flatfoot downstairs will find some way to stop me letting anyone consult my archives.’
He went away and they heard him open a door further along the corridor.
‘What d’you think of him?’ asked Marc.
‘He’s got a good voice, must have passed it on to his daughter. He’s argumentative, bossy, intelligent, entertaining and dangerous.’
‘And his wife?’
‘Just a stupid woman,’ said Lucien.
‘You’re ruling her out pretty quickly.’
‘Stupid people can kill, there’s no rule against it. Especially people like her, putting on some kind of silly show of being strong. I was listening to her when she was talking to the policeman. She’s so sure of everything she says, and she’s very pleased with her own performance. Self-satisfied idiots are quite capable of killing.’
Marc nodded and walked round the room. He came to a box-file labelled 1982, looked at it without touching, and went on examining the shelves.
Lucien was fumbling inside his bag. ‘Get down the box for 1982,’ he said. ‘The old man’s right. Maybe we don’t have much time before the law puts a stop to us.’
‘It wasn’t 1982 that Dompierre consulted. Either the old man made a mistake, or else he wasn’t telling the truth. It was 1978.’
‘The dust has been disturbed in front of that one, is that it?’ asked Lucien.
‘Yes. None of the others has been moved for ages. The flics haven’t had time to come nosing round here.’
He took down the file for 1978 and carefully spread the contents onto the table. Lucien leafed through it quickly.
‘It’s all about one opera,’ he said. ‘“Elektra”, in Toulouse. Doesn’t mean anything to us. But Dompierre must have been looking for something there.’
‘Let’s get on with it, then,’ said Marc, who was a little discouraged by the mass of old newpaper cuttings, some with handwritten commentaries probably by Siméonidis, photographs and interviews. The press cuttings were carefully held together with paperclips.
‘Look for any paperclips that have been moved,’ said Lucien. ‘This room’s a bit damp. They’ve probably left rust-marks. It might help us see which articles Dompierre looked at in this pile.’
‘Yes, that’s what I’m doing,’ said Marc. ‘These reviews are all favourable. Sophia was good. She said she was only so-so, but she was better than that. Mathias was right. What are you doing, come on, help me!’
Lucien was putting something back into his bag.