Fred Vargas - The Chalk Circle Man

‘I’m not coming with you, Danglard. Take the statement from the vinegar witness without me – I feel like hearing what Mathilde Forestier’s “philosopher friend” has to say.’

‘I thought you weren’t interested in Madame Forestier’s case.’

‘No, correction, she does interest me, Danglard. I agree with you. She’s blocking our path here. But she doesn’t seriously bother me.’

In any case, thought Danglard, so few things did seriously bother his commissaire that he wasn’t going to hang about thinking of them. Wait a minute, though. Yes, the story of the stupid dog that drooled and all the rest of it, that had seriously bothered him, and still did. And there were other things of the same order, as he would one day discover, perhaps. It was true, this irritated him. And the better he got to know Adamsberg, the more mysterious his boss became, as unpredictable as a night creature whose heavy, bumbling but effective flight wears out anyone trying to catch it. But he would have liked to borrow some of Adamsberg’s vagueness and uncertainty, the times when his gaze seemed to be dying or burning by turns, making you want either to get away from him or to get closer to him. He thought that if he had Adamsberg’s gaze, he might see things start to wobble, to lose their clear reasonable contours, like trees shimmering in a summer heat haze. Then the world would seem less implacable to him, he would stop wanting to understand every tiny little detail about everything, exploring the remotest areas of the heavens. He would feel less exhausted as a result. But as it was, only white wine enabled him to take his distance, for a brief and, as he knew, artificial moment.

AS ADAMSBERG HAD BEEN HOPING, MATHILDE WAS NOT AT HOME. He found her elderly assistant, Clémence, leaning over a table covered with photographic slides. On a chair alongside her lay a newspaper, open at the personal ads.

Clémence was too chatty to be intimidated by him. She wore several layers of nylon overalls, one on top of the other, like onion skins. A black beret was perched on her head, and she was smoking a military-strength Gauloise. She hardly opened her mouth when she spoke, so it was hard to get a glimpse of the famous pointed teeth for which Mathilde liked to provide zoological comparisons. She wasn’t timid, she wasn’t vulnerable, she wasn’t bossy, yet her manner wasn’t exactly affable either. Clémence was such an odd individual that one couldn’t help wanting to listen to her for a while, to find out what it was, underneath all the banal trappings behind which she barricaded herself, that fuelled her energy.

‘How were the small ads today?’ Adamsberg asked.

Clémence shook her head doubtfully.

‘Not up to much, monsieur. See this one: “Male, retired, fond of quiet life, own maisonette, seeks female companion, under 55, with taste for eighteenth-century engravings.” Engravings? Not my cup of tea. Or this one: “Pensioner, ex-retail trade, seeks attractive woman, nature lover, for friendship, more if we click.” Nature lover? No, I don’t think so. They all write the same thing, never the truth. What they really should say is: “Self-centred old creep, running to seed, seeks young woman for sex.” Why don’t people say what they mean? Makes you waste a lot of time. Yesterday, now, I tried three of these, none of them any good. What it is, though, the minute they see what I look like they lose interest. So it’s pointless, really. But, my sakes, what else can I do , I ask you?’

‘You’re asking me ? But why are you so keen to find a husband, Clémence?’

‘That’s a question I don’t ask, monsieur. You’re probably thinking, poor old Clémence, she’s a bit funny in the head because her fiancé disappeared long ago, leaving her a note. Ah, but you’d be wrong, because I didn’t care then, when I was twenty, and I don’t care now. Tell you the truth, monsieur, I’m not so keen on men. No, it must be for a bit of excitement in life. Can’t think of anything else to do, that’s the long and short of it. Plenty of women are like that, you want my opinion. I’m not so keen on women either, tell you the truth. They all think, like me, you get married, that’s it, it’ll give you a purpose in life. And you know what, I go to church as well. But if I didn’t keep doing all this, what would I do? I’d probably be out shoplifting, pinching things, spitting at people in the street. Well, there we are, Mathilde thinks I’ve got saving graces. Better to be nice in this world, isn’t it? Less trouble.’

‘What about Mathilde?’

‘If it wasn’t for Mathilde, monsieur, I’d still be waiting for a miracle down at the metro station. It’s lovely being here with her. I’d do anything to help Mathilde.’

Adamsberg didn’t try to disentangle all the contradictory messages he was getting. Mathilde had told him that Clémence could call something blue for an hour and red for the next hour, and made up stories about her life depending on who she was talking to. You would need to listen to Clémence for months before you could work out what it all meant. You’d need to be determined. Or a psychiatrist, some would say. But even that would be too late. Everything seemed to be too late for Clémence, that was clear enough, but somehow Adamsberg couldn’t feel sorry for her. Maybe Clémence did have some saving graces, give her the benefit of the doubt, but she wasn’t very appealing, so he wondered why Mathilde had felt like giving her lodgings in the first place, up there in the Stickleback, and then hiring her as an assistant. Now if there was a good person in the basic sense of the word, it was Mathilde. Haughty and sarcastic, but courteous and consumed with generosity. It struck you with violence in Mathilde, and more tenderly in Camille. Danglard, however, didn’t agree about Mathilde.

‘Does Mathilde have any children?’

‘A daughter, monsieur. Very beautiful. Would you like to see a photo?’

Suddenly Clémence had become genteel and respectful. It was perhaps time to take what he had come for, before her mood changed again.

‘No, no photos, please,’ said Adamsberg. ‘What about her friend, the philosopher, do you know him?’

‘You’re asking a lot of questions, monsieur. This isn’t getting Mathilde into trouble, is it?’

‘Not at all – on the contrary, so long as we can keep this confidential.’

This was the kind of police trick that Adamsberg disliked, but how else was he to answer questions like that? So he brought out his formulae like his multiplication tables, to move things on.

‘I’ve seen him twice,’ said Clémence with a touch of pride, dragging on her cigarette. ‘He wrote this.’

She spat out a few shreds of tobacco, reached over to the bookshelf and held out a thick book towards Adamsberg: The Subjective Zones of Consciousness by Réal Louvenel. Réal, that was a French-Canadian name. Adamsberg allowed a few recollections evoked by the name to swim up in his memory. None of them was very distinct.

‘He used to be a doctor,’ Clémence was saying in her distinctive closed-mouth way of speaking. ‘Supposed to be a great genius, I warn you. I don’t know if you’d be able to keep up with his talk. Not wanting to give offence, but you’ve got to be on the right wavelength to understand a word he says. Mathilde seems to know what he’s on about. What I can tell you is that he lives on his own with twelve Labradors. Imagine! Phew, his place must stink!’

Clémence had switched out of genteel mode. It hadn’t lasted. Now she was being the village idiot again. Then, suddenly, she came out with:

‘And what about you, anyway? This circle man, is that interesting? What do you want out of life? Are you in a mess, like everyone else?’