Murder in Belleville

The hammam’piscine turned out to be a bland, renovated eighteenth-century building with popcorn stucco facing the street. She handed the driver a hundred-franc bill and told him to keep the change, grinning at his comment on how well her business must be doing.

If only he knew.

She gave a small smile, bidding him adieu when he began offering to drop clients her way.

By the time she entered the courtyard of the hamman-piscine, she’d taken Morbier’s suggestion to heart. Right now Samia was her entree to the plastique and the Maghrebins, her only source other than Gaston in Cafe Tlemcen. Slim at best, but a start, she reminded herself. And more of a lead than she’d had a bit earlier when her only view had been seeing les barbes in front of the mosque.

A tatouage parlor stood next to a shop with dusty windows and a faded red sign with BOUCHERIE-VOLAILLE still visible. Besides the hammam-piscine in the cow, they were the only other occupants. There was something appealing about the quiet air of neglect, she thought. As if the buildings held together almost from force of habit.

Inside the unrenovated interior, the walls were covered with rainbow-colored graffiti of Nique le flic—screw the cops. Colored handprints were imprinted over doorways, in the Muslim style, to guard dwellings. A narrow winding staircase, the steps grooved and worn, mounted upward. She wondered what it would be like to live here. Or to grow up looking at this graffiti every day.

Samia Fouaz lived above the tiled rex de chaussee, on the first floor. A stroller, string shopping bag, and a shiny four-wheeled cart filled the landing. Once polished and exquisite, Aimee- imagined.

After several bouts of knocking, the door opened to a curvaceous figure in a peach lace teddy unself- consciously scratching her rear. Samia’s light-honey-colored face was puffy, her eyes bleary, and she yawned loudly.

“Sorry to disturb you, Samia—”

“Pas de probleme,” Samia said, eying her up and down.

Samia took a breath, pursed her mouth, then seemed to come to a decision. “Let’s make this quick.”

Nonplussed, Aimee recovered quickly. “Sounds good,” she said, aiming for casual.

Inside, trying to bury her nervousness, Aimee followed Samia’s sashaying down the yellowed hallway, its walls littered with calendars from local Arabic butchers on boulevard Menilmontant. Samia’s scent, a mixture of musk oil, sweat, and something by Nina Ricci, trailed in her wake.

Rai music pounded from a room in the rear. At the far end of the apartment Aimee saw violet gauze billowing from the ceiling, bordered by curtains embroidered with tiny mirrors.

Samia gestured to a chrome metal stool fronting a counter. A galley-style kitchen lay behind that, small, scrubbed, and spotless. On an upper shelf sat a glazed earthenware dish covered with a pointed lid, a tajine. Above that stood a qettara, a copper still for distilling rose- and orange-blossom water. Aromatics with rosewater, Aimee knew, drove away the dj’inn, protected against the evil eye, and attracted good spirits. Aimee hoped the good spirits were with her—she needed all the help she could get.

Against the gray linoleum, Aimee noticed Samia’s bare feet hennaed with intricate swirling patterns.

Aimee wondered about Samia’s connection to Morbier. Samia looked young and tired, like a housewife who’d tarted up for a husband with little result. She gestured again for Aimee to sit down.

“Tea?” She smiled, her face opening up like a flower.

“Merci,” Aimee said, accepting the de rigeur small glass of steaming mint tea, sweet and fragrant. Acustom, she knew, observed even among enemies at the Mideast peace talks.

The fading afternoon sun shone into an open window overlooking the courtyard. Several women, their Arabic conversation echoing off the stone walls, entered the hammam door below.

“You mentioned Khalil when you called,” Samia said. She looked even younger in the kitchen’s light.

“True. And Eugenie, part of Khalil’s—”

“Tell him this for me,” Samia interrupted, turning and pounding her fist into her palm. Her gold bracelets jangled. “Zdanine’s doing all he can, eh? Compris?”

Surprised at Samia’s change of manner, Aimee stopped short, her mind racing. She hoped Samia couldn’t check with Khalil about her. Why had she accepted Morbier’s story that he’d “fed Samia information?”

“I’m not sure what you mean.” Aimee barely kept her voice steady.

“Last month was the last time,” Samia said, determined. “No more. Lay off!”

For a vulnerable-looking thing she packed a punch, Aimee thought. Her friendly demeanor had vanished.

“Tiens, Samia,” she said, trying what she hoped was a winning grin. “I’m just the messenger. Don’t shoot me.”

Samia expelled a whoof! of air in disgust. She talked tough for eighteen, Aimee thought, or however old she was.

“Khalil isn’t patient,” Aimee said, improvising as she went along. “Poor mec, he’s stuck in Algiers.”

She had to persuade Samia to talk, pass on her plastique connection.

“Not my concern,” Samia said, a petulant edge to her voice. But her quick anger had deflated. “You tell Khalil to deal with me himself,” she said. “I’ll get word to Zdanine.”

“Khalil said to tell you I speak for him.”

Samia half smiled, showing the edges of little white teeth. One of them was gold-capped and caught the light. “I mean no disrespect to a fellow sister, bien stir, but business is business,” she said. “And time for me to get dressed.” She was about to usher Aimee to the door.

I’m blowing this, Aimee thought. Time to forget subtlety when the opportunity is walking out the door. “Samia, let me speak for Khalil and you for Zdanine,” she said. “I need to arrange more plastique. Eugenie was supposed to help.”

Samia’s eyes widened; her round shoulders tensed. “I don’t like this.”

“Who does?” Aimee made her tone businesslike and shrugged. “The last delivery man blew himself to Mecca before his ticket was punched.”

“That’s history. Zdanine was only a distributor,” Samia said, shifting from one bare foot to the other as she scratched a calf with the opposite big toe. “He’s washed his hands of it now,” she said, her eyes level as she sipped tea. “Where it goes and to whom…” She let that hang in the musk-scented air of her kitchen.

“From what I hear,” Aimee said, leaning closer, “this is the beginning.”

Samia shook her head. “My clients are waiting. I’ve got to go-”

Aimee wondered what kind of clients.

She lowered her voice to a whisper and brushed her arm against Samia’s. “Wholesale,” she said, nodding her head. “Khalil understands profit margins. Do you?”

Samia’s gaze wavered.

“Wholesale,” Aimee said, growing more confident at Samia’s reaction. She drew out the word to underscore the importance. “No dropoffs. No francs and centimes. Just thousand-franc notes and bank accounts. Big ones. That’s wholesale.”

“Zdanine deals with this, not me,” Samia said, but her dark brows wrinkled—unsure.

“Sounds like you’re not equipped to handle orders,” Aimee said, pulling back, glancing again at her watch. “Khalil misinformed me. Forget I came. I’ll outsource this.”

Aimee shouldered her bag and stood up. She’d put the offer out there, sweetened it, and waited expectantly.

Samia’s full lips tightened.

“Outsource?” she said, pronouncing the word slowly.

“Khalil prefers to work with family, of course. However, it looks like I’ve no choice,” Aimee said and sighed. “Other roads lead to phstique. He assumed Zdanine’s linked to the supplier.”

Samia’s eyes narrowed. “He doesn’t tell me about business.”