Tsing-Boum (13 page)

Had he found anything out? Was he being told what was good for him to know? How was it that Monsieur Marie – who ‘knew everybody' – could recall with such clarity and precision an ordinary little girl in a gaggle of others, a young officer in a thousand more? Other girls had been gay and pretty, other young men good-looking, brave, dashing – others were now dead. Was he being manoeuvred? No, that was nonsense. Jean-Michel had thought of the old boy. Who was
simply a local bigwig of purely local importance, an ex-intelligence officer with a talent for municipal politics, a good memory for faces, who had been clever enough to get out of the army before the Algerian affair. He might, of course, be by pure coincidence something to do with DST. Van der Valk considered this, shrugged, and burst out laughing, causing a glass-polishing barman to ask whether he would like another drink. Yes, he said gaily; he would. He didn't give a damn for DST. This might all be some small but complicated intrigue – for all he knew Esther Marx might be DST herself! – and he just didn't care. He was going to go ahead and find out who killed her, even if it took him six months and then he found she had been killed by something out of Len Deighton.

Still, he did rather wish someone would suddenly say ‘Mind if I share your table' and leave a lump of sugar behind with ‘Room 405' written on it. And in room four-oh-five he would find an exquisite ravishing creature with tumbled silky hair and a slow smile. Then he would be contented. Damn it, his glass was empty and he was sitting here having dirty daydreams. He asked for another rum and the phone book.

He meditated on the subject of Lieutenant Laforêt, whom Monsieur Marie rather thought was dead. How would one find out? Easy enough, one rang the Military District, or Les Anciens Combattants, or one could panic about the corridors of the Préfecture, or one could phone the talking clock. If there was an agreement to observe a gentlemanly reticence about Esther Marx in the good old official sources, did that extend to a former boyfriend, who wrote poetry, and was a bit of a visionary? Some of those visionaries had got peculiar ideas in Algeria.

One could go and get a train and buy a bottle of champagne for a friendly policeman who hadn't wanted to see one made a fool of, the honest man. And one could go back to Toulon and have some more of Claudine's amusing food.

He stood up, and swayed slightly. He had had three large rums in quick succession, on an empty stomach, before midday. He decided he was a bit pissed. He had thought of Monsieur Marie's little aphorism: ‘Always go to the top'. The barman gave him a telephone
jeton
.

‘I want the Toulouse telephone exchange – the
chef de service
. Police!'

‘Hold the line, please. Your number is?' There was hardly any wait at all: magic.

‘Good morning. Police Judiciaire!' It must have been the three rums. ‘I want a military establishment, Army Group Seven. I don't know the number, the address or anything else. I want a personal call to the Commanding General. I don't want any secretaries. I'm at a private number in Marseilles; will you have the kindness to clear me a direct line – I will hold on.'

Down the line he could hear a functionary struggling with the military administration. Gabbles, protests, the words ‘Police Judiciaire Marseilles' – he almost believed in it himself by now. The gibbering stopped, there was a dead silence. He thought the line was broken when suddenly a dry booming voice said in his ear:

‘Colonel Cassagnac,
deuxième bureau,'
very close and clear.

‘Mon colonel
, I regret that you have been called by error. This call is to the General in person.'

A ferocious grunt, a series of clanks. A light crisp voice, very clear, very superior.

‘Captain Lemercier.' Bloody aide de camp.

‘Mon capitaine
, I have said and I have the honour to repeat – a personal call.'

‘State your business please.'

‘Is the General there or not there?'

‘He is here, but I regret I must insist – your name and rank please.'

‘Van der Valk, Divisional Commissaire, criminal brigade, city of Amsterdam.'

‘I was told Marseilles.'

‘I am calling from Marseilles – an error of no importance.'

He had as much right to say Marseilles as he did Amsterdam! But it was a place they would have heard of. He was gripping the phone so hard his hand hurt; he took a deep breath, flexed his fingers, and thought: feet first, boy – shit or bust.

A voice said a name, softly, but recognizable even on a telephone.

‘Mon Général,'
said Van der Valk and swallowed hard.

‘Well?' The voice had long been known for impatience with cretins, but had learned never to show anger, even with imbeciles on telephones.

‘You have my credentials.' Suddenly, he couldn't think what to say: damn that rum.

‘I suppose it's a matter of life and death.' He sounded as though hysterical little men from Amsterdam were a daily occurrence.

‘Just a question of death.'

‘I am listening.'

‘I have no doubt that you know the officers who are or have been under your command.'

‘I have no doubt either. Well?'

‘Lieutenant Laforêt, Operational Group North-west, Hanoi, March nineteen fifty-four.'

There was a brief, icy silence.

‘Laforêt, I think you said.'

‘Yes.' The pause was not longer than two seconds, which to a skier going downhill is a hell of a long time.

‘I regret: I cannot help you.'

Van der Valk clenched his hand again upon the telephone.

‘Yes,
mon Général
, you can.'

‘By what right do you challenge my word?'

‘By right of a woman called Esther Marx, found shot three days ago, whose death this department is investigating.'

‘Put your request in writing; I will examine it personally.'

‘No,
mon Général;
requests in writing are never examined, especially this one.'

‘You have tried it?' flatly.

‘I have,' flatly.

‘Listen,' said the voice, very slow and very cold. ‘I cannot speak with you – do you understand that?'

‘Yes I do.'

This time the silence lasted fully fifteen seconds, while fifteen litres of sweat crawled slowly from Van der Valk's shoulder-blades to his belt.

‘Where are you calling from?'

‘Marseilles.'

‘Very well. Listen carefully. You will go to the Legal Department. You will ask for Colonel Voisin. You will be given a form to fill in. On this you will write your name and function, which will be checked. You will write, further, that I have spoken to you. That is all. Do not come here. I will not receive you.' The phone went dead and he was left shaking.

‘Are you finished, Marseilles?' asked an indifferent voice.

‘Yes, thank you,' he said and staggered out into fresh air.

‘You had a long-distance?' asked the barman chattily. ‘Have to wait a bit, before we know the price. Another of the same?'

‘You drink it,' said Van der Valk, mopping a pale and sweaty brow, ‘but give me a couple more
jetons
; I've a local call.'

The Military District in Marseilles was peopled with the regulation strength of Ostrogoths.

‘Legal Department? What legal department?'

‘The one that will shortly be preparing your court-martial.'

‘Oh, you mean the Legal Department? It's in Clermont-Ferrand.'

‘Thanks. Just tell me how I go about joining the Foreign Legion.'

‘Well you can do it in Clermont-Ferrand. Or here, of course,' helpfully.

‘This is the police,' bellowed Van der Valk. ‘Be funny with the girls back home in the village.'

‘No no it really is in Clermont-Ferrand. The whole South-western Command.'

At first he could not remember Jean-Michel's number, although he knew it by heart.

‘Hallo.'

‘Hallo there.'

‘Things are moving fast. Too fast. I'm a tired old man.'

‘That old pest Marie help you at all?'

‘Too much. I made a dive for sixpence and found a sunken Roman galley – or some damn sunken thing anyway that's about eighty metres long and full of corpses.'

‘You sound as though you were a bit pissed.'

‘I'm more than a bit pissed – I'm stocious as a tourist.'

‘Lovely,' said Jean-Michel sympathetically. ‘What are you doing about it?'

‘Going to Clermont-Ferrand.'

‘Dites, are you all right?'

‘No, I'm perfectly serious. On second thoughts can I get there overnight?'

‘I should think so. You want your case? No strain, I can get it sent over. Leave it for you in the luggage office.'

‘But you must make my apologies to Claudine.'

‘No no, she'll be delighted about the sunken galley. But let me get this straight – you're going off into the jungle tonight but what are you doing now?'

‘Going to have a bloody big lunch. After which I'll probably go to the cinema. Raining like hell. After which I reel into one of these half-hour hotels and have an unaccompanied sleep.'

‘After which a bloody big dinner. Listen, Claudine and I will come in, and we'll have dinner together, and you tell about the galley unless it's a state secret – I'm curious about that old Marie; he's sly as a lynx – and we'll take you to a train and tuck you in. And we'll bring your case.'

‘For God's sake don't let me forget to buy a smoked goose.'

‘Meet you seven o'clock at the Surcouf – get the brothel-keeper to wake you up.'

‘Understood.'

And now for a bloody big lunch.

‘Is there a place around here where I can have a sleep for a few hours, or do the whores take up all the space?'

‘Thank you,' said the barman pocketing a lot of change. ‘I'll fix the whores. You an American? I know, you're a journalist.'

He had a big lunch. He had a red mullet, with its liver taken out and spread on a piece of toast, and then he had a bass grilled in flames – altogether a very fishy performance but well, one was in Marseilles. It cost a fortune and he put it all on the expense account.

Feeling a great deal better he wanted a big cigar. They didn't have any big enough and the piccolo was sent to buy a Big Cuban Cigar. What a loss of dignity, he thought, contemplating a massive Punch locked in a nasty aluminium coffin, just like himself in an aeroplane. He extracted it out of a sense of pity rather than hedonism.

‘Not good?' asked the head waiter anxiously. But he didn't want to hurt their feelings.

With the cigar came contemplation. He was certain now that drawn inevitably by some magnetic field, he was approaching a tragedy. No dramas, there wasn't anything dramatic. Esther Marx had been involved with a soldier, and he knew the name, and knew there was something about this soldier that made generals freeze in their tracks. He himself – he was the smallest of bit players, with an unimportant role in the last act. For the first act, surely, had been played at Dien Bien Phu. The second act had culminated in Esther's death. He was only on in the last act, but it was possible that he had been picked as the small unimportant bearing upon which wheels turned massively, and that without his being able to do a damn thing about it a tragedy was in the offing.

He took his cigar back to where a hotel had been found, for now he had nothing but a crushing need for sleep. The whores were all just out of bed, fresh and skittish.

‘Get a load of him,' they giggled when they saw the huge cigar.

‘Later, girls, later.' He felt like Baron Ochs looking over the
latest batch of kitchenmaids. Dear dear – putting half-hour hotels on the expense account – the Comptroller would take a very dim view.

He woke up as it was getting dark; the Marseillais were going home, all the drivers making an infernal din with the forbidden tooter and leaning out of the window to yell at one another. The French! What was it the Minister had said? – ‘the best and the worst' – something like that. Not far wrong, and in war the same, their most showy and theatrical victories alternating with disasters so extravagant as to be unthinkable anywhere else. The French made a cult of such, quite indifferent to battles that could as easily be a defeat as a victory – Wagram or Waterloo, who cared. But they cherished their calamities; Agincourt or Pavia. Dien Bien Phu combined the lustre of a superb feat of arms under impossible conditions – like the passage of the Beresina – with a horrible great defeat. What had happened there to the dashing young Lieutenant Laforêt, who wrote poetry? Was he going to learn the truth from Colonel Voisin? Some military hairsplitter, no doubt, a uniformed and bemedalled attorney who could reduce any drama to orderly patterns of dusty yellowed paper? It was, he reflected a little sadly, only too likely.

In Clermont-Ferrand it was snowing, though it was not yet December. Van der Valk had never been in Auvergne. High plateau, he said vaguely to himself, thanking God and Arlette for solid shoes and an extra pullover. Massif Central, big ancient block of extinct volcanoes, bare conical peaks, fiercely hot in summer, full of wolves in winter. He would be learning it all with Ruth, no doubt.

It was not inappropriate to his task, this oppressed yellow sky and the dark grey slush in the streets. Some detective work was needed to run the Legal Department to earth – as in all French provincial towns there were narrow alleyways lined with high blank walls, close-shuttered grey façades, enormous buildings in the really blood-boltered bad taste of the mid nineteenth century. The Legal Department, full no doubt of Provost Marshals and Judge-Advocates and lord knew what military vultures, was housed in one of these, a building that
could as easily have been a lycée from the eighteen-eighties named after Alphonse Daudet or Prosper Mérimée. But the concierge had the unexpected, charming courtesy that is also to be found in France.