AL05 - Murder in Clichy

Madame Daudet said, a trace of hauteur in her voice.

To Aimee it sounded sad, so long ago and so far away.

“Was the old man a jade collector?”

“He loved everything native, including his mistress,” she said. “Life seemed perfect until the guerillas bombed the cafe. As far as I’m concerned, it ended then. All the guerilla warfare that followed, attacks on us by the Hoa- Hoa and Cao Dai.”

“Cao Dai? But it’s a religious sect.”

“Religion cloaks many things.” Madame Daudet shrugged. “A political vehicle for les asiatiques. Paul always said that. The Cao Dai had an army. At first, I didn’t blame them. Starving on the streets, well, we could see that. With all those green shoots in the rice paddies, I wondered where the rice went but the guerillas took it. They brainwashed the peasants. Our servants, too. Imagine, after all those years, and how generous we were! Those betrayals hurt. But I prefer to think, well, not everyone.”

A true colonial childhood, Aimee thought. And now she had come to this. Aimee noticed the small armoire, the door ajar, which held only a few housedresses on hangers.

“When my old nanny died, a devout Buddhist, they laid a banana on her stomach, as a guarantee of an afterlife. Imagine!” she said, sighing. “The Cao Dai bury their dead sitting up.”

“With jade?” Aimee asked.

“Wouldn’t surprise me,” she said.

Outside the weak sunshine slanted on the wall. The voices of children and the bouncing of a ball echoed from the recesses of the courtyard.

“How can I get in touch with Picq and Gassot?”

“Bad lot,” she said. “I always said it. They proved me right, the flics did.”

Frustrated, Aimee wished the woman would give her facts, not hints. Gassot might have the clue to the jade she needed. “What do you mean?”

“They were arrested for possession of explosives,” she said. “Last I heard, they were in jail due to their crazy scheme.”

“Gassot, too?”

“Seems he can move fast despite his peg-leg.”

“So he escaped. Where could I find him?”

Madame Daudet pulled back.

“I think he knows why your husband was killed,” Aimee said. “Please, tell me how to find him.”

Madame Daudet blessed herself and kissed the gold cross around her neck. She pointed across the narrow yard to a five-story hotel with peeling shutters, that displayed the sign HOTEL, and a phone number with the old- fashioned prefix BAT 4275. There was a shuttered cafe below it.

“Are they ever open?”

Madame Daudet rolled her eyes. “A money-laundering front for some gang. At least that’s what Albert said. No wonder Gassot lives there cheap.”

And then Aimee remembered the address she’d gotten from the police. The building Thadee owned in the back of the gallery courtyard: What had the faded old blue sign said? A warehouse or manufacturer?

“Either your husband, Picq, or Gassot left a contact phone number at the anciens combattants. Was it the telephone number of the tire warehouse?”

Madame Daudet nodded.

“Were there other men from the Sixth Battalion in their group?”

“Nemours. He’s a gourmand who loves food more than life itself. We all thought he’d go first, with his cholesterol!”

“But your husband was the first. And someone’s after his remaining comrades, aren’t they?”

Madame Dinard looked down. “I don’t know.”

Aimee tapped her heels on the wooden floor wanting to steer the conversation back on track.

“What about Nemours?”

“He follows Picq. They’d meet with Albert at the tire warehouse. When Albert retired, he became a part-time custodian. After work, they’d go to play belote upstairs in the cafe on rue des Moines.”

Now it made sense. She’d met them already. The day she confronted Pleyet in the upstairs room of the cafe, the day after Thadee was killed. She shivered with fear.

Could she have it wrong? Had they killed Thadee, then their comrade Albert, out of greed?

“Did Albert ever mention Thadee Baret? He was related by marriage to the de Lussignys.”

“Mais bien sur, all the time!” she said. “Albert loved talking to Thadee about Indochina. Thadee ran the gallery. He received it in the divorce settlement. Once the de Lussignys owned the tire factory. They were rubber barons who intermarried with the natives,” said Madame Daudet, her mouth crinkled in a moue of disgust.

“May I keep the autopsy report?” she asked.

Aimee nodded, wondering if it would wind up on the shelf next to Bernadette of Lourdes. She thanked Madame Daudet and left. But now she’d learned of the old men’s connection to Thadee and where Gassot lived.

Outside on the street, she ducked into a doorway and checked her cell phone. Two messages.

The first was from Pleyet, finally returning her call.

“We need to talk,” he said. “Call me back.”

She’d call him after she found Gassot. If she worked it right, she’d have information to barter with Pleyet.

The next was from Martine.

“Allo, Martine. How’s Sophie?”

She heard Martine inhale on her cigarette.

“Safe in her room. The valium helped,” Martine said. Her husky voice rose. “Interesting news, Aimee,” she said. “The Brits dropped out of the oil rights bidding. And seems the Chinese have transported impressive drilling rigs to the bay off Dingfang, on Hainan Island. They’re raising territorial issues. But right now it looks like Olf and the Chinese are neck in neck.”

“Great, keep going, Martine.”

“There’s a rumor of fat ‘commissions’ for the inside track to the oil rights. I’m still on it.”

AIMEE ENTERED the narrow corridor of Gassot’s hotel, her shoulders brushing against the peeling, fawn- colored walls. A single bulb lit the hall. But she imagined that the pensioners who lived here appreciated it. Better than a cardboard box over their heads in an abandoned lot.

The smell of grease from a nearby kitchen hovered. Chirping came from the reception booth, a particle board structure, under a Art Deco sign advising NO EVENING VISI-TORS ALLOWED AFTER DARK. FULL AND DEMI- PENSION WITH CAFE MEALS AVAILABLE.

Judging by the grease smell, she doubted the inhabitants chose full pension if they could afford to dine elsewhere. A tall man wearing a raincoat and holding a watering can stood in the doorway leading to a concrete rear yard.

“Looking for someone?” he asked, in a hoarse voice, the guttural roll of consonants betraying his Russian origin. His eyes took in her legs and he grinned. “I’m available.”

A stab at Slavic humor?

She gave him a big smile.

“Which room is Monsieur Gassot’s?”

“Eh? What’s that?” he said, blocking the doorframe in a swift movement.

“You heard me,” she said, keeping the smile on her face.

“Which room does he stay in, Monsieur?”

“Spell that name for me, eh. My hearing’s gone. Everything else works fine.”

She reached for the cell phone in her pocket. As he set down the watering can, she punched in the hotel’s