House of Cards Page 9
“How do you know it isn’t the Vosiers who do the dropping? Maybe Madame de Villemont is just along for laughs.”
“Well, if she is,” said Bernard, “she certainly likes to pay plenty for them. After all, Reno, I’m the one who brings her the checks to sign. Do you know how much they add up to every month?”
“How much?”
“Oh, only about a hundred thousand francs or so, give or take a few thousand. Not bad, eh? And that’s been going on a couple of years now. Georges says that when they come rolling up in the car Spinosi does everything but stand on his hands for Madame. Smart boy, that one. He can tell you how to handle the goose that lays the golden eggs.”
From the house’s point of view that wasn’t a bad description of a customer who gambled away what amounted to twenty thousand dollars every month. My father had made his living running crap tables for the house. I had absorbed his cynical contempt for the compulsive high-stakes gambler very young.
“What’s your other message?” I said to Bernard.
“An invitation from Monsieur Claude to be his guest at dinner next Friday. Charles Leschenhaut will be there and wants to meet you.” Bernard winked at me. “Dinner, no less. You are coming up in the world, aren’t you?”
“Maybe I am. Thank Monsieur Claude for me and tell him I’ll be present.”
“Of course,” said Bernard. “And remember, my dear Reno, my own door is always open to you. Really, it’s time we came to know each other a little better, isn’t it? So if you find yourself fed up with dominoes in the kitchen sometimes, it’s only a few steps down this hall, and there I am.”
Afterward, when I should have been rejoicing at the news that at last I was going to meet Leschenhaut, I found myself brooding over the disclosure of Madame de Villemont’s gambling fever. Fever? There was never an eager expectancy about her when she left the house with the Vosiers. Only a sort of unhappy resignation, as if she were prepared for an expected and necessary punishment at the hands of fortune.
But a punishment for what?
7
Before going upstairs to look over the police report on Sidney Scott’s death in the privacy of Louis’ room, I placed Paul in Madame Olympe’s charge and left him being stuffed with café crème and pastries. Not only did Madame Olympe have a soft spot for cats and small children as long as they were well behaved, but here in the flesh was the scion of one of those rich and powerful families she was always reading about in Paris Match with such avid interest When I introduced them to each other, she cooed over the scion like a pouter pigeon and bore him off to his refreshments with a tender respect no tenant had ever earned from her.
Upstairs, I found Léon Becque with Louis, arranging a double date for the evening. Becque seemed abashed to see me, and when he departed soon after I walked into the room, gave me an awkward good-bye.
“What have I done to him?” I asked Louis.
“It’s what he’s doing to you. You know who he’s taking on that date tonight? Eliane Tissou. You know who he’s been seeing almost every night? Eliane Tissou. But that’s your fault, pal. The way you’ve been neglecting her lately, you can’t blame her for making eyes at Becque. Or blame him for liking it.”
“I don’t blame them. Maybe he’s the right man for her. She ought to know by now that I’m not.”
“She does,” said Louis.
The police report Véronique had obtained for me was in a folder sealed in a large envelope, and Louis had scrupulously left the seal unbroken. I tore the envelope open and invited Louis to sit down beside me on the bed so that we could read the contents together.
The cover of the folder was marked Confidential in bold red letters. Under this warning was a sticker addressed to Monsieur Adrian Driot-Steiner, Ministry of Commerce, and since Véronique had a few times described her boss as a mean-tempered, pompous little bureaucrat, I could only hope for her sake that word of this escapade never reached him.
I opened the report. The first page was a copy of the requisition for it which Driot-Steiner had unwittingly signed. Attached to this was a note on police stationery saying, “In answer to your request we enclose—” and concluding with flowery regards to Monsieur Driot-Steiner.
After that came a police surgeon’s report dated February twelfth two years previously, describing in scientific lingo the cadaver of Sidney Scott. The gist of it was that the deceased had expired from an excess of water in the lungs, and that there were no marks of violence on the body or any of its organs.
Some photos of Scott shown gruesomely dead did not invite closer study. There was also a police form setting forth the information that Sidney Scott had been born in Upper Letcham, Kent, England, and had died at age twenty-five, a baccalaureate of Cambridge University, a poet by profession, and without any criminal record.
All this was only a preface to the interview of Madame de Villemont by Inspector of the Police Toucart. It surprised me to see that the interview was dated March fifteenth, more than a month after Scott’s death, but this oddity was immediately cleared up by the interview itself.
Question (by Inspector Toucart): Madame, you do not mind having it entered in this record that for the past month you have been confined as a patient in the sanitarium of Dr. Felix Lander at Issy, a sanitarium for the treatment of emotional disorders?
(“ ‘Madame, you do not mind—’ ” Louis said admiringly. “Ah, but it’s great to be rich and beautiful. You can almost hear those violins playing in the background.”)
Answer (by Madame de Villemont): No, it’s all right.
Q: And you are now sufficiently well to discuss the events of February twelfth?
A: Yes.
Q: Very well. Then please describe those events, starting with the telephone call you received at about eleven o’clock that night.
A: Yes. Madame de Gonde called from Île Saint-Louis to say that her mother—my mother-in-law—had suddenly suffered a heart attack. She asked would I please come to her bedside as quickly as possible and bring my son with me.
Q: Again for the record, madame: your mother-in-law is Madame Cesira de Villemont, widow of the general?
A: Yes.
Q: And at the news of this sudden illness, what did you do? Please be specific.
A: I was reading in bed. I got up and dressed. Then I woke my son and dressed him, too. Then I went upstairs to the servants’ quarters. Monsieur Scott was asleep in his room there. I woke him and asked him to drive me to Île Saint-Louis.
Q: Why? Were you afraid to drive by yourself at that hour?
A: I don’t drive. My husband was killed in a car, and I’ve had a deathly fear of driving since then.
Q: I see. And this Monsieur Scott was your son’s tutor?
A: Yes.
Q: How long had he held the position?
A: I don’t quite remember. Only a few weeks at most.
Q: So Monsieur Scott then drove you to Île Saint-Louis. I have been informed that others in your household had already been driven there by your regular chauffeur, Georges Devesoul.
A: Yes, they had.
Q: And when you arrived there where your limousine and chauffeur were at hand, did you tell Monsieur Scott he was now free to return to the rue de Courcelles?
A: No. I had my son with me. It was Monsieur Scott’s duty to look after him.
Q: Was it? But, madame, soon after you entered the apartment of Madame Cesira, you put your son to sleep in her maid’s room while the maid herself remained with him. So it would appear that Monsieur Scott had little to do with looking after the child that night. And still you did not tell him to leave?
A: I suppose I didn’t think of it. There was so much excitement.
Q: I see. The crisis soon passed, did it not?
A: Yes. After Dr. Linder made his examination, he said that Madame Cesira had not suffered a heart attack but only a digestive trouble.
Q: The best of news. This is the same doctor who directs the sanitarium at which you were a patient?
Q: A psychiatrist called in to attend a heart case?
A: He’s also a medical doctor. My mother-in-law has a great deal of faith in him.
Q: Apparently she has. Can you recall who else was present during the crisis?
A: Monsieur and Madame de Gonde, Monsieur and Madame Vosiers, and some others
Q: Dr. Hubert Morillon?
A: Yes, he’s an old friend of the family.
Q: And Monsieur Charles Leschenhaut?
A: If you know all this—
Q: I must verify certain statements made by others, madame. Please continue.
A: Well, Charles Leschenhaut was there because when my mother-in-law was told a priest should be called, she asked for him.
Q: Although she must have known he is not a priest? That he was unfrocked many years ago?
A: She would not be bothered by that, Inspector. She is intensely devoted to Charles Leschenhaut and his works.
Q: But still—well, never mind. Can you recall anyone else being present at the time?
A: No.
Q: The chauffeur, Georges Devesoul?
A: He was waiting in the limousine in front of the house. At least, that’s where he was when Monsieur Scott and I left the apartment.
Q: You were the first to leave?
A: Yes.
Q: Leaving your son asleep in the maid’s room?
A: Yes. The maid said she’d be up all night anyhow, attending to Madame Cesira, so it was no bother for her. Once that was settled, I asked Monsieur Scott to drive me home.
Q: And then?
A: Then we went downstairs to the car. But we didn’t get into it. It was parked across the street—on the embankment side—and Monsieur Scott took my arm and led me away from it. He said he had something desperately important to discuss with me.
Q: What did he tell you?
A: That he was—that he had conceived a passion for me.
Q: You were surprised by this?
A: Very much so. Until then I had no idea he saw me as anything but his employer. Now he told me he had been struggling against his feelings for some time and couldn’t keep them a secret from me any longer. While he was saying this, we reached the stairs that led down to the water’s edge. He started down them. I asked where he was going, and he said I’d find out soon enough. I went after him and caught hold of his shoulder, but he pulled away.
Q: You suspected his intentions?
A: I don’t know. I suppose I did, but at the same time I didn’t really believe he’d throw himself in the river. It seemed just too ridiculous, the whole scene. At the foot of the steps I told him so. I said there was no reason we couldn’t go home and discuss the matter sensibly. That wasn’t what he wanted. He said I was to tell him straight out whether I thought he and I could make a life together. He said everything depended on my answer.
Q: And how did you answer?
A: I didn’t. I wanted to lie to him about it, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. And I didn’t dare tell him the truth. Suddenly he walked to the river. The next moment—
Q: You saw him leap in?
A: Yes. Then I screamed for help.
Q: Are you sure of that, madame? No one seems to have heard you, and this area is very quiet, especially at such an hour.
A: But I wasn’t up on the embankment; I was below it. I assure you I did call for help.
Q: And when no one responded?
A: I ran up the stairs to the embankment and down the street to where Georges was waiting in the limousine. I told him what had happened, and he left me there and went down to the river to see what he could do. It was too late to do anything. He couldn’t even see Monsieur Scott. He came back and helped me into the house, where someone called the police. That’s all I remember clearly. When Dr. Linder saw the state I was in he gave me a sedative.
Q: That was his privilege. Well, you have been most cooperative, madame. I trust you will not object to signing a transcript of this interview?
A: No, but I’ve been advised by my lawyer to let him see the transcript before I sign it.
Q: And he is—?
A: Monsieur Max Marchat, Place Vendôme.
Q: I’ll have a copy sent to him. Meanwhile, madame, you have my sympathy for the ordeal you have undergone. Thank you again for your co-operation.
“And thank you, dear Inspector Toucart, you poor fish,” jeered Louis as I closed the report and thrust it back into its envelope. He cocked his head at me. “Did you notice what was missing from that song and dance?”
“The same thing you did. Madame Vosiers knew what Scott really was when it came to women, and the kid in the garage knew. That means everybody in the house knew, from top to bottom. And there’s not a word about it here.”
“Not a word,” said Louis. “Not a whisper. Which proves I was right from the beginning. Madame de Villemont shoved this guy into the drink, and that whole bunch went to work covering up for her. And what a job they did! The sweetest part was getting this Dr. Linder to keep the police away from her until the alibi was all polished up.”
“I’m not so sure about that part of it. She might have had a breakdown after what happened, no matter how it happened. But there are plenty of holes in her story without that. And there must have been plenty of holes in what everybody else had to say. I have a feeling Toucart suspected that, too.”
“So do I, poor bastard,” said Louis. “But what could he do when he’s dealing with the uppercrust? Take them all into the back room and beat the truth out of them?”
“They’re not all uppercrust,” I said. “And there are other ways of getting the truth—”
With that in mind, when Paul and I got home I sent him off to make his way upstairs by himself, and then dallied in the garage for a few words with my admirer, Pascal.
All the cars were in place now, the big Mercedes, the white Ferrari which was Madame Matilde’s pet, the red Renault which was mine, a couple of commonplace Fiats, and a battered Citroën which had been converted into a pick-up truck. Pascal wasn’t in sight, but after a few minutes he appeared through a small door in the rear of the garage, a box of scrap metal in his arms. I helped him heave the box into the truck, and when he could draw breath he said, “There were a couple of guys working on the boiler, and that’s the giblets.” He mopped sweat off his face with the back of his hand. “What can I do for you, champ? You want to take the Renault out again? Need some fresh gas?”
“No, just taking a breather before I start chasing after the kid again.” I looked down the line of cars and shook my head. “You’ve got a big job all right. It takes a good man to keep six wagons like this in top shape.”
While Pascal didn’t actually do it, he gave the impression of shyly scuffing his toe in the ground.
“Oh, I guess I can handle the job,” he said. “I’ve been around it long enough.”
“You mean, working for the family here?”
“And in North Africa. That’s where I’m from. Couldn’t you tell from the way I talked?”
I shook my head admiringly. “From the way you sound, you could have been born and raised in Paris.”
“Not me,” he said, much pleased. “I’m a colon same as everybody else around here. Jeanne-Marie and Monsieur Bernard and I were all together in the same orphanage in Oran when Monsieur Claude signed us on. We were all snotty-nosed kids then, but you learn your way around, working for a family like this.”
“Good people to work for,” I agreed. “I guess the only one you wouldn’t know too well is Madame de Villemont. After all, if she never did any driving for herself, she wouldn’t have been down here very often.”
Pascal gaped at me. “Never did any driving? Now where would you get that idea? Until that night when she had the big trouble with Monsieur Sidney she did all her own driving!”
8
I had expected the dinner at which I was to meet Charles Leschenhaut to be an informal little affair probably held in the de Gonde apart
ment. As I visualized it, there would be an excellent meal, impeccably served, and there would be considerable talk, especially, if I gauged my man properly, from Leschenhaut himself.
I had primed myself for the occasion by reading all the recent issues of La Foudre. It wasn’t easy to nail down an exact definition of the theory Leschenhaut promulgated in his magazine—la méthode—but what I could make of it suggested he was all for turning France into a gigantic beehive where everyone was a busy little bee toiling away at a task set him by a wise and truly patriotic leadership.
Here, said La Foudre, was the answer to our present crazy social structure, this anarchistic shambles where every man selfishly goes his own way, where the cultivated minority must bow before the ignorant majority, where the state itself is left defenseless against the barbarians outside its gates and the sub-verters inside. Change this, apply la méthode Leschenhaut, and all would be well.
However, what really concerned me were the stories Leschenhaut published, because here were the clues to his literary tastes. It was encouraging to see that he was not an editor who demanded that fiction be propaganda for his cause. Obviously, one did not have to preach la méthode in a story to win publication in the magazine. This was a great relief to me. I had half a dozen manuscripts ready to offer Leschenhaut, but none of them sang the delights of life in a glorified beehive.
So, primed as it were for an informal little dinner with the maestro where Claude de Gonde and Madame Gabrielle would be on hand to keep the conversational ball rolling, I was taken aback when Paul remarked the day before the dinner, “Djilana says you’re going to Uncle Claude’s grand party. How can I watch with you, if you’re going to be there?”
“What grand party?”
“The one tomorrow night for Monsieur Leschenhaut. Mama’s going to be there, too, and even Grandmother. Everybody will be there.”
Two or three times before, Paul’s bedtime had been delayed so that he and I could covertly watch from the balustrade of the second-floor landing as the family entertained in style. Our view, of course, was restricted to the rotunda where the guests entered and briefly circulated before making their way off to the Grand Salon, but it still provided a good picture of unlimited décolletage, bemedaled uniforms, and Legion of Honor ribbons. Anne de Villemont, down below among the company, knew we were there and had no objection to it. In fact, she would now and then glance up at us as if to inquire how we were enjoying the show; and once, in a rare, light-hearted mood, while a stout little dignitary with a vast, snowy-white beard and totally bald head was in the very act of solemnly kissing her hand, she tipped Paul a broad wink which sent him into a fit of giggles.