Murder in the Rue De Paradis (15 page)

The woman hesitated, her foot on the bottom step, unsure. Her watch alarm beeped. “I’d like to help, but I’m due back at work.”

Aimée noticed her calloused work-reddened hands. Wariness battling something else, from her expression. For a moment, Aimée thought the woman would talk. But she continued down the wooden steps, her clogs echoing.

No luck. The woman was scared. Undeterred, Aimée knew that even if the office was a front, someone paid the rent.

Downstairs, she knocked on the lace-curtained concierge’s door. A young woman holding a baby on her hip answered.

“Oui?”

“
Bonjour
, I’m looking for the landlord.”

“No vacancies,
desolée
.”

“I’m dropping off the rent check.”

“You’re early. But I’ll take it. Which unit?”

“Third floor, the iKK party office.”

The baby whimpered, applesauce on her mouth.

“Already paid through September.”

Curiouser and curiouser, Aimée thought.

“That’s impossible.”

The young concierge rocked the child on her hip.

“There’s a mistake,” Aimée said.

“Mistake? I just told you it’s paid. The landlord collects the checks from me.”

“I’ll get in trouble if I don’t pay you this rent.”

The baby’s whimper escalated. “She’s hungry, if you’ll excuse me.”

“Look, I’m not going until I pay—”

“You want to pay the rent twice?” The young concierge reached for some papers by the door. “Up to you. But I don’t want the landlord on my back saying I didn’t tell you. This gentleman paid.”

“Maybe I should confirm it with him before I pay.”

“Good idea. Take it up with him.” The young concierge thrust an empty, torn envelope with the return address Tamin Ansary, Ansary Ltd, 2 Boulevard de Strasbourg at Aimée and shut the door.

At last, Aimée thought, with relief.

AIMÉE APPROACHED THE Porte Saint-Martin arch, scanning the building numbers for Ansary’s office. Pigeons fed on crumbs in the arch’s shadow, a smaller sandstone version of the arc de Triomphe. Then a horn blared and the pigeons fluttered away.

Bands of heat wavered and her dress stuck damply to her thighs. She wanted Ansary to illuminate the iKK party’s background and Yves’s connections to them, if any. If only she got Ansary to talk. Since they were described in the press as “Kurd terrorists,” iKK party members had more than one reason to keep quiet. If the Kurds had engineered Yves’s murder, no Kurd would talk. Yet right now, with nothing else to go on, he was her only shot. She stifled her unease and kept looking for the right address. Then she felt her cell phone vibrating in her pocket.

“Oui?”

“Aimée,” Langois said in a whisper. “I couldn’t sleep last night, I can’t focus. Something Yves said kept going through my head.”

“What was it?”

She heard voices in the background.

“Can we meet?” he said. “I can’t talk now. And I need the draft of Yves’s article back.”

“Meet me at noon at the Eurostar exit in Gare du Nord,” she said.

“Yves helped me more than I can say. I owe him a lot.” Langois’s voice was choked with grief. “Noon. Gare du Nord.”

He hung up before she could ask him if he’d spoken with Rouffillac.

She hesitated in front of the building. Langois had information; she could walk away. She didn’t relish questioning a supposed Kurd radical. Yet, like her father always said, leave a stone unturned and you’ll trip over it later. Determined, after coming this far, she pressed the buzzer of Ansary Ltd. No answer. Several theatrical agents’ offices were listed. She put her hand out to press another buzzer.

The glass door flew open and two men rushed out. She ducked inside, hoping in their haste they hadn’t seen her. Old wooden stairs lead to a series of offices. A sign with an arrow pointed across a wooden landing to another series of stairs. It’s like a musty labyrinth, she thought. She mounted the creaking stairs and found herself at a dark wood-framed door with a frosted glass upper panel. The letters on the panel said ANSARY LTD. The door stood ajar, but she knocked.

“Monsieur Ansary?” she called.

No answer. She peeked inside to see a dark nineteenth-century wood-paneled waiting room. Probably still had gas fixtures instead of electricity. Not the way she imagined the office of the financial mastermind of the radical iKK workers party would look. And it was empty.

She turned to leave and heard voices from the hall. She walked on. A small sign read MUSÉE DE L’EVENTAIL, OPEN BY APPOINTMENT AND FROM 14:00–18:00, MON-WED, EXCEPT HOLIDAYS AND IN AUGUST.

Talk about hard to find and exclusive hours. But here it was August and the tiny third floor fan museum door stood open.

“They robbed the museum, Monsieur Ansary!” a woman’s raised voice met her as she walked inside. Aimée picked up a brochure. The fan museum also doubled as an atelier for the last fan maker in Paris.

“The till’s empty.”

Aimée peered around the hall door to see a woman, her white floss hair arranged in a chignon, fluttering her hands. The woman lifted a small green and white factures’ books of receipts. “The proof’s in these receipts. I know how much the hoodlums took.”

“
Tiens,
Madame Lange,” a man said, concerned. “You’re safe, that’s the most important thing. With your blood pressure,
alors,
please sit down until the owner comes.”

“No, we must check to see if they’ve taken anything else.”

If the men she’d passed had robbed this museum, she’d be of no help; she’d never seen their faces. Better to keep that to herself, Aimée reflected. The floor creaked under her feet, and the woman looked up, fearful. Noting the brochure in Aimée’s hand, her expression turned to annoyance.

“Mademoiselle, the museum’s closed,” she said.

“
Excusez-moi,
but I’m looking for Monsieur Ansary.”

The man turned. Thick black hair, big-boned, wide-shouldered. Surprise was painted on his full face. He wore a tan suit, Hugo Boss by the look of it, and an open-collared white shirt. “Am I expecting you, Mademoiselle?”

“If you’ll give me a moment? The iKK worker’s party. . . .”

“I don’t understand,” he interrupted. “Madame’s upset; I’m busy.” He took the old woman’s arm.

“But go ahead, Monsieur Ansary,” Madame Lange began.

“
Non
, Madame,”

“I can wait, Monsieur,” Aimée said. “It’s important.”

His mouth narrowed. “Over there.”

She nodded and brushed by a wooden-wheeled machine labeled
tabletier
for mounting the finished fan. Above her, wall photos illustrated ancient fan-making techniques. Judging by the contemporary photos, the same intricate process was used today.

“Now, Madame,” Ansary said, guiding the old woman. “Walk me through so I can make sure you’re safe.”

Aimée peered around the small room under its coffered ceiling. Her gaze took in a display of seventeenth-century fans composed of swan skin, gauze-like silk, and lace. Some were painted, others needlepointed, gold-leafed or studded with pearl nacre. And their holders were equally embellished. Exquisite, of another age, a time when women powdered and dressed up in this district full of theaters.

Madame Lange strode over the creaking floorboards, waving him off.

“You’re too kind, Monsieur Ansary,” she said. “I’m fine,
merci.
”

“WHO ARE YOU?”

Ansary stood glaring at Aimée in front of his closed office door, blocking her way out. The kind streak she’d seen in him had evaporated.

Not a smart move, to have entered his office first and let herself be cornered. A quick scan of the office revealed a solid walnut desk, heavy wood straight-backed chairs from the nineteenth century, an old oil landscape painting on the wall. And nothing to defend herself with.

“Florence Raymonde, a journalist,” she said, with more confidence than she felt. She handed him a card from the collection in her bag.

“How did you get my name?”

“I’m with Reporters Without Borders. We believe Yves Robert, the investigative journalist murdered in the rue de Paradis, had contacted the iKK. Can you corroborate . . . ?”

“I asked who sent you here.” He reached for the cell phone in his pocket and punched in a number on his speed dial.

“There are allegations that the iKK party was involved in this murder. Any comment?”

“You’re asking me? There’s a mistake, I’m a restaurateur.” He gestured to the photos of Andiamo, an Italian restaurant on one of the
grands boulevards
.

“That’s not what Yves’s notes said. I’m now finishing what he started.”

Ansary paused a nanosecond. “You don’t seem to understand, Mademoiselle Raymonde; this has nothing to do with me. Now if you’ll tell me how you got this idea. . . .”

He said something she couldn’t catch and snapped the phone shut. Great . . . calling for backup? Uneasy now, she wanted to get some answers, then get the hell out.

“Monsieur Ansary,” she said, improvising as she went along. “These police allegations are confusing since Yves Robert wrote favorable articles supporting the Kurds’ struggle in Turkey. Yet he was critical of the Kurds’ methods. Can you comment on that?”

“Once again, I’m a restaurant owner—”

“
Mais non,
Monsieur, you’re a very successful businessman who helps your fellow Kurds. You’re paying the party’s office rent. No law against that.”

A muscle in his jaw twitched. “You’ve been following me.”

“
Non
, it’s called investigation,” she said. “Reporters Without Borders’s mission is to shed light on the cases of journalists who’ve been tortured, kidnapped, or silenced. Yves was murdered while investigating the iKK, so we’re now investigating.”

He stared at her.

“This won’t go away, Monsieur Ansary,” she said.
“Le Figaro
’s interested in your comments, in exploring the Kurds’ position; but if you don’t want to talk to me. . . .”

His shoulders sagged. “You put me in a difficult position. I’m a businessman. And a Kurd patriot. I don’t speak for the iKK. I support the cause. But I do it the only way I can. Financially.”

At least he’d admitted it. “Yet don’t you want to clear up these allegations against the iKK party? You did speak with Yves?”

Silence.

“Did the iKK take offense at his articles criticizing their methods?

“Everyone criticizes the iKK’s methods, Mademoiselle,” Ansary said and sighed. “He’s not the first, nor the last. You think the party would murder a journalist sympathetic to the Kurds’ plight even though he disapproved of ‘certain’ methods?” Ansary didn’t wait for an answer. “Every time an article accuses us of brutality, why, fifty young men line up to join the party, wanting to further the cause. We disabuse them of violent ideas right away. But it helps us more than it hurts us. Ironic, eh?”

“What about the death threat to Jalenka Malat?” she said, taking a chance. “Any truth to the rumor that the local iKK party disagrees with her stance? She has said publicly that she, too, opposes the iKK’s methods to obtain an autonomous Kurdistan within Turkey’s borders.”

“Does it make sense that we’d want her dead?” His thick eyebrows raised in his forehead. “I ask you. The first Kurd elected to Parliament? Why would the party threaten her? You’ve got it wrong. Jalenka lives with death threats. She’s made Kurdish women restive. They now meet at community washbasins and talk about their rights . . . at last.” He paused as he considered an afterthought. “Regarding the journalist, you’re looking in the wrong place.”

“What do you mean?”

“The Turkish military.”

Of course, he’d blame the Turks.

“What’s their motive, Monsieur Ansary?”

“Let’s say they disapprove of Kurd sympathizers.”

“That’s no reason to kill him.”

“Then, Mademoiselle, I don’t know.”

Footsteps sounded on the landing.

The phone call he’d made . . . his backup. Forget his speech about Kurds. Her shoulders tensed and she stepped back. Looked again for something with which to defend herself.

Ansary opened the door to reveal a
flic
in a blue uniform standing, notebook in hand. “Monsieur Ansary, a few questions in the museum, if you don’t mind.”

“Of course, Officer. I’ll join you.”

And the successful businessman reappeared.

On her way out, she noticed the bowl of tamarinds, labeled “monkey fruit” in the Asian markets. Pod-like and the color of shoe leather. Soft but once crackled open, revealing a hard stone pit. Like Ansary.

Out on the scorching pavement, she shouldered her bag. She felt sure that Ansary had spoken with Yves. And for the rest, she counted on Langois to supply answers.

SHE PARKED AT Hôpital Lariboisière, the old cholera hospital abutting the Gare du Nord rail lines. Its courtyard held cars now, not the wagons that had once brought the infected and carried away the corpses. In the distance, gray poles and wires supported gray canopies of glass, draped umbrella-like over the nineteenth-century rail station. Gray and more gray. Several carved heads of statues poked over the glass roof, somber and vacant-eyed guardians.

Léon-Paul Fargue’s ode to his neighborhood came to her: “A bustling and noisy circus where iron mingles with men, trains with taxis, cattle with soldiers: a country rather than an arrondissement made up of canals, factories . . . a neighborhood of poets and locomotives.”

Locomotives, all right, but the poets she didn’t see.

On her right lay the rambling headquarters of the French National Railroads, an old-fashioned monument to bureaucracy.

She glanced at her Tintin watch and ran. Inside the Gare du Nord, crowded at noontime and all the time, the crackling loudspeaker and the old metal clock brought back memories of school field trips and harried teachers.

One could set one’s clock by the Gare du Nord’s arriving morning commuters, her father said once after a stakeout. Five to six A.M., the African workers with their lunch pails from the suburbs; seven to eight A.M., local secretaries and receptionists reading
Femme Actuelle
; nine to ten A.M., the executives carrying briefcases arriving from the rapid RER lines.