Murder at the Lanterne Rouge

Mademoiselle Samoukashian shrugged. “But some of us paid.”

Was another old war story coming? Aimee crossed her legs on the small, creaking chair.

“My cousin Manouchian, a poet. And the man I loved, a Jew. Others. But I missed the bus and was too late to warn them,” she said, her voice trailing off. “Alors, all that’s left now is the plaque on the building, a mass grave.”

An almost palpable sadness radiated from this little woman.

She pointed to a sealed manila envelope on the table with the words: “to be opened in case of my death only by one whom my great-aunt trusts.” “I’m late again,” she said. “But please read what’s inside, Mademoiselle. I haven’t opened it.”

Aimee’s brow lifted. She was intrigued. “Why?”

“Pascal made me promise,” she said. “If you don’t help me, no one will. His project will be ruined.”

Aimee stiffened. “A project? You think it connects to his murder?”

“I want you to find out.”

Pause.

“The museum fascinated him,” the old woman said. “I told you. He’d volunteered the past two years, cataloging their holdings during their renovation. He was so excited last week about some discovery there. Alors, won’t you respect his wishes?”

Aimee stalled, uneasy. “First tell me why he gave Meizi a recommendation for a job there.”

“This Chinese girl?” Madame Samoukashian shrugged. “Bien sur, the Chinese are immigrants like us. I raised Pascal to think of others, not just himself. But look what it got him.”

What did that mean? “I don’t understand, Mademoiselle.”

“Non, I shouldn’t say that. Who knows? Find this girl and ask her.”

“I did.”

“And?” Mademoiselle Samoukashian leaned forward, expectant.

“She heard noises and ran away. At least, that’s what I’ve learned so far.” And she believed Meizi.

“Of course, she had no papers,” Mademoiselle Samoukashian said. “I told you. Who’d stick around?”

Aimee took the manila envelope off the table. “Shouldn’t you give this to the flics? ”

“Like I trust them?” A bitter laugh. “Now it’s the Chinese. Before it was the Jews, Eastern Europeans, and us Armenians. But it hasn’t changed. They don’t like people to know they held deportees here, downstairs at the old commissariat. My father and mother were in a cell until they had enough to fill a train for Drancy. Next stop the ovens.” The anguish hardened in Mademoiselle Samoukashian’s brown eyes. “But we’re not here to talk about that.”

Aimee slit the sealed flap open. Inside she found a note, dated two weeks earlier:

Whatever you do, smile at my great-aunt, tell her I meant to fix the loose tiles in the kitchen. At my Conservatoire office ask Coulade for the green dossier. You’ll find keys for my flat under the geranium pot on the 3rd floor of 19 rue Beranger. Give Becquerel the 14th-century diagram you find. He’ll tell you what to do next. Say nothing to my great-aunt, for her safety. No matter how she grills you. Now hug her for me. Pascal.

Aimee’s hand shook. Under the envelope lay a check for five thousand francs made out to Leduc Detective.

“You know what to do?” Mademoiselle Samoukashian’s voice quavered. “But you can’t tell me, n’est-ce pas?”

Aimee nodded. “For your safety, Mademoiselle.” She averted her eyes. “Who’s Becquerel?”

Mademoiselle Samoukashian shook her head. “Professor Becquerel? But he passed away last week. He was ninety. Pascal’s last professor.”

Too late. Aimee felt a cold pit in her stomach. Becquerel led nowhere.

She leaned down to hug the old woman, again felt her thin shoulders. “Pascal said he meant to fix the loose tiles in the kitchen,” she said, trying to smile. “May I take you home?”

Mademoiselle Samoukashian shook her head. And when she spoke, Aimee heard the grit in her voice. “You’ve got more important things to do, Mademoiselle.”

Saturday, 4 P.M.

THE FIRST FORTY-EIGHT hours of an investigation were crucial. After that the trail iced up, the odds lowered for tracking down a witness, a name, an accurate memory. As time passed, leads dropped to zero. Almost twenty-four hours had passed since Pascal’s murder.

Aimee pulled out her cell phone and made two calls. Both went to voice mail. Frustrated, she left messages as she skirted past the old covered market, the Carreau du Temple.

A homeless man—or SDF, sans domicile fixe, the politically correct term—camped on a ventilation grate. Most people still referred to the homeless as clochards. This man held a cracked transistor radio to his ear. The radio weather report cackled in the afternoon air.

“Clear afternoon skies, crisp, and ten degrees warmer tomorrow, ma chere.” He winked at Aimee. “Plan ahead.”

She was trying to. “I’ll get out my beach umbrella,” she said, reaching in her pocket and handing him change.

“Me too. Merci, ma chere.” He grinned, a weathered look on a youngish face. Fallen on rough times, as so many had these days.

And then she got an idea.

“Haven’t I seen you over there?” Aimee asked, gesturing back across the park of Square du Temple.

“Dry and warmer here,” he said.

“And no problems, eh, like last night? The murder.”

He shrugged. Turned the radio volume down. After all, she’d paid—the unspoken rule—and it was time to deliver. “I heard about it.”

She crouched down, careful to keep her stilettos out of the grate holes. “What did you hear?”

“The regulars scattered. Won’t go back.”

“Like Clodo?”

“Clodo? We’re all Clodo to the flics.” His mouth turned down in a frown. “Tell me you’re not a flic, ma chere.”

“Moi? You’re joking.” She took more change from her pocket. “I mean the mec sleeping on the steps behind the building near rue au Maire. Fur coat, pink scarf.”

“The crazy one?”

Weren’t half the ragged men on the street crazy? Shuffling and mumbling to themselves? But then sometimes she did too.

“Angels worried about devils?”

“C’est lui,” she said. “I’d like to talk to him.”

“Usually goes underground at the Fantome. Most do.”

Some code? “Where’s that?”

“Metro at Saint-Martin.”

She thought. “But there’s no station there.”

“Closed in 1939. A shelter in the war. Abandoned now, but they know ways in.” He shook his head. “Not your type of place, ma chere.”

She grinned. “But I’m a Parisian rat.”

He shrugged. “Up to you.”

“So how can I talk to Clodo?”

“The Metro opens at five thirty A.M.”

“But why don’t you go to the Fantome?”

The crow’s feet in his weather-beaten face deepened. He pointed to a window of the third-floor apartment