Murder in the Bastille

reputation.”

She mustered a small smile. After all, he was a paying client. “My connection at the Judiciare says a subpoena’s imminent,” she said. “Count on it. It would be better to give them your hard drive voluntarily.”

It wasn’t the first time she’d regretted her best friend Martine’s referral. Martine and Vincent were partners in Diva, a new magazine. Martine, former Madame Figaro editor, savvy and connected, did the work and Vincent was the financial backer. Martine had been crazed, getting ready for the launch this week.

The woman next to them ground out her cigarette. She drummed her long purple fingernails on the table, then lit another and set it in the ashtray.

Aimee recognized the nail color—Violet Vamp, advertised as urban armor for girls on the go—as one she’d been meaning to buy herself. She tried to ignore the curling smoke. She’d quit smoking four days ago.

Again.

Aimee’s chipped nails, Gigabyte Green, needed a manicure. At least her sun-streaked hair and tan, from a week in Sardinia, helped her fit in with the sophisticated crowd.

Had everyone found the same boutique on rue Charonne? And coughed up the equivalent of the boutique’s rent for the supposed “one-of-a-kind” clinging side-buttoned dress with matching jacket? Aimee had only been able to afford the jacket with mahjong buttons, unlike her neighbor who wore the knockout matching sheath as well.

Scents of fresh basil and roasted garlic drifted from the next table. When Aimee looked over again, the woman had propped her menu against an ashtray and disappeared.

Laughter erupted from the bar. Nearby, chairs scraped over the floor tiles. Time to work out this agreement, smooth Vincent’s feathers, and get him to cooperate, Aimee concluded. Then she could leave.

“Dragging in my firm will give rise to rumors,” said Vincent. “Damaging rumors.”

Mentally, she agreed. Why be an appetizer served up before the main course in a foreign arms investigation? But once la Procuratrice got something on her court docket, it stayed there.

“Vincent, be calm. We hand over the hard drive. . . . ”

“I’m paid to deal with my client’s information,” he interrupted. “Not you. Not the Judiciare. They have no right to see my records or client database.”

She wanted to deflect his anger, focus on the ongoing computer security issues. “Here’s good news. We set up new fire-walls so Hacktivistes pose no threat to Populax,” she said, pouring sparkling Badoit mineral water into his glass. He worried about hackers constantly.

“That’s what we pay you for at Leduc Detective.” He stood up. Short as he was, even in his rumpled seersucker blazer, he commanded attention. “My lawyer will stop this. Why can’t you encrypt the Incandescent file? It would save everyone needless trouble?”

“Too late. Look, Rene and I installed your system,” Aimee said, “but we’re following the law. Encryption is illegal. I know la Proc, she’s reasonable.”

He glared. “We paid you for security!” Vincent took the agency’s contract with Leduc Detective out of his attache case, tore it up, and sprinkled the pieces, like parmesan cheese, over her pasta.

He edged past the waiter holding the second course, artichauts aux citron. She got to her feet to stop him. But he’d darted out the door, disappearing into the warren of passages threading the Bastille quartier.

Aimee’s appetite vanished. Why had things gone so wrong? A multimillion franc corporation looked better volunteering its hard drive data to the Judiciare, not concealing it. No one would welcome being drawn into a money laundering case, but did Vincent, a self-made chef d’operations, have something to hide?

Beside her, the woman’s cigarette with the Violet Vamp lip imprint—matching her nail polish—smoldered in the ashtray. Instead of lighting a cigarette of her own from it, Aimee popped a piece of Nicorette gum.

She dreaded calling Rene, her partner, and telling him of Vincent’s outburst. Rene was better with difficult clients. As he often pointed out, her level of tact left something to be desired. But the bottom line was, if they didn’t furnish the subpoenaed e-mail and data, they’d be disobeying the law. Even if Vincent had torn up their contract.

And then she noticed the cell phone on the banquette table. The one the woman had been using. She must have forgotten it.

Losing a phone was a pain; she’d misplaced hers and had to replace it, only last month. On her way out, she’d leave the phone with the maitre d’.

The waiter slipped her the check. A perfect ending to a perfect meal! She’d deduct it from Populax’s retainer when she sent their bill.

Then the maitre d’ returned to the table and handed back her card with a shrug. “No credit cards, desole.” So she had to dredge up her last bit of cash. No taxi tonight. She was left with just enough change for the Metro.

While she was working out how to break the news of the failed meeting to Rene, waiting by the register for a few francs change, the cell phone rang.

She answered it automatically, cupping the phone between her chin and shoulder as she took her change, balancing her heavy bag.

“For the love of God . . . forget your pride,” said a male voice, barely audible over the hum of conversation and strains of accordion music in the background. “Meet me in Passage de la Boule Blanche, give me one more chance, listen to reason. . . .”

“But. . . .”

A familiar tune wafted over the line in the background. Like a song her grandmother had played on her accordion. But Aimee couldn’t quite place it.

“Don’t argue, I won’t listen to a refusal.”

The phone clicked off.

Aimee stared at it. The cover bore the initials J. D. She looked out the window and saw the woman disappearing into the square outside.

“This belongs to that woman, the one wearing the same jacket as mine. Do you know her name?”

The maitre d’ shrugged again. “I’m sorry, mademoiselle,” he said. “This is a busy night.”

“My receipt?” But the flustered maitre d’ had turned to seat a bevy of waiting customers.

Aimee grabbed her receipt which was by the register. She hit the phone’s callback button. A flat buzz. Odd. What should she do?

The corner resto faced the dark Place Trousseau. Turn-of-the-century baroque apartment buildings with filigree ironwork balconies bordered the quiet square. Leafy plane trees canopied the black iron fence that surrounded it. The woman had vanished.

She was familiar with the nearby Passage de la Boule Blanche; she often used it as a shortcut. The Cahiers du Cinema, a film journal whose office was located mid-passage off a leafy courtyard, had been a client last year. She’d also joined their film club. Since the passage was en route to the Metro, she decided to return the phone to the man who had called. . . . Let them work it out.

She dreaded the packing that still awaited her in her apartment on Ile St-Louis. And she still had to dig out the laptop cable adaptors. They were somewhere in the only closet, which was 20 feet high and full of rolled up, threadbare Savonnerie carpets.

Martine’s brother, in Shanghai on assignment, had sublet his apartment to her, until the remodeling—long overdue—of her own apartment’s bathroom and kitchen was finished.

At the passage entrance, streetlights from rue du Faubourg Saint Antoine illuminated peeling notices and a Meubles deco-ratifs sign affixed to the stone wall. A waist-high metal barricade, a Pietons barres notice, and construction materials blocked the way. Inhabitants must have ignored the sign, since it was pushed to the side and a path had been beaten through the rubble.

Further along, the flat roof of the covered passage opened to the sky. The threadlike passage lined with narrow, looming buildings seemed to end in distant mottled shadows.