Fred Vargas - The Chalk Circle Man

‘On Monday?’ suggested Adamsberg.

‘Yes, all right, Monday. I suppose, as well, that there’s nothing I can do for Delphie now? You’re holding her.’

‘I’m afraid so, monsieur. Sorry.’

‘Will there be a post-mortem?’

‘Yes, I’m afraid so.’

Danglard let a minute pass. He always let a minute pass after any reference to a post-mortem.

‘For Monday,’ he went on, ‘please think about what you were doing on Wednesday 19 and Thursday 27 June. Those were the nights of the two previous murders. You’ll be asked that. Unless you can tell us now.’

‘No need to think,’ said Le Nermord. ‘It’s quite simple and sad. I don’t go out at night. I spend every evening writing. Nobody lives with me to confirm that, and I don’t see much of my neighbours.’

They all sat nodding, without knowing why. There are moments when everyone just sits nodding.

There was no more to be done that night. Adamsberg, seeing the weariness in the eyes of the scholar of Byzantium, gave the sign that the interview was over, getting up quietly.

DANGLARD LEFT HOME NEXT MORNING WITH A BOOK BY Le Nermord under his arm: Ideology and Society under Justinian , published eleven years earlier. It was the only one he could find on his shelves. On the back cover there was a short and flattering biography of the author, accompanied by a photograph. A younger Le Nermord was smiling at the camera. He was no better-looking than at present, without any particularly remarkable features – unless you counted regular teeth. The day before, Danglard had noticed that like most pipe-smokers Le Nermord had a tic of tapping the stem against his teeth. A banal remark, as Charles Reyer would have said.

Adamsberg wasn’t there. He must already have gone to interview Delphie’s lover. Danglard put the book on the commissaire ‘s desk, conscious that he was hoping to impress his boss with the contents of his personal bookshelves. Pointlessly, since he now knew that very few things impressed Adamsberg. Too bad.

Danglard had one aim in his head this morning: to find out what had happened at Mathilde’s house during the night. Margellon, who was good at surviving night watches, was waiting for him, ready with his report before going home to bed.

‘There were a few comings and goings,’ Margellon said. ‘I stayed opposite the house until seven-thirty this morning as agreed. The Fish Lady didn’t go out. She put the lights off in her sitting room at about half past midnight and her bedroom light about half an hour after that. But that old Valmont creature came staggering in at five past three. She reeked of drink, the works. When I asked what had happened, she started snivelling. Pathetic old bag, isn’t she? Anyway, I gathered she’d been waiting all evening for her date – well, she called him her fiancé – to turn up in some bar. He didn’t come, so she drank to cheer herself up and passed out at the table. The barman woke her up to chuck her out at closing time. I think she was ashamed, but she was too drunk to stop talking. I couldn’t get the name of the bar. It was hard enough getting any sense out of her. And anyway, she gives me the creeps. I helped her as far as the door and left her to sort herself out. Then this morning, out she trots with her little suitcase. She recognised me right away, didn’t seem surprised, and told me she was “fed up with trying newspaper ads” and was going off for a few days in the country with some pal of hers, a dressmaker in the Berry. Dressmaking, that’s a safer bet, she said.’

‘What about Reyer? Did he go out?’

‘Yes, he did. He went out dressed up to the nines at about eleven, and came back looking just as spruce, tapping his stick, at one-thirty. I could talk to Clémence because she doesn’t know me, but that’s not on with Reyer, because he knows my voice. So I stayed undercover and just noted the times. In any case, no way he’d have spotted me, would he?’

Margellon laughed. Yes, he was silly, Danglard thought.

‘Call him on the phone for me, Margellon.’

‘Who, Reyer?’

‘Yes, of course Reyer.’

Charles chuckled when he heard Danglard’s voice, though Danglard failed to see why.

‘Ha, well now,’ said Charles, ‘the radio says you’ve got another problem on your hands, Inspecteur Danglard. Brilliant! And you’re still harassing me? No other leads in the case?’

‘Where did you go last night, Reyer?’

‘I went out to see if I could pick up a girl, inspecteur .’

‘Where?’

‘At the Nouveau Palais .’

‘Can anyone back that up for you?’

‘Nope! Too many people in these nightclubs for anyone to remember faces, you must know that.’

‘What’s so funny, Reyer?’

‘You! Your phone call. Makes me laugh. My dear Mathilde, who can’t keep her mouth shut, informed me that your commissaire told her to be sure and stay in last night. I guessed from that that you thought something might happen. So I decided it was an excellent moment to go out.’

‘Why the hell did you have to do that? Do you think it makes my life any easier?’

‘That wasn’t what I had in mind at all, inspecteur . You’ve been buggering me about since the start of this business. I thought it was my turn to have a go.’

‘Right. So in fact you went out just to bugger us up?’

‘Pretty much, yes, because I didn’t manage to pick up any girls. But I’m glad to learn you’re buggered up. Very glad – got that?’

‘But why?’ Danglard asked once more.

‘Because it’s being so cheerful that keeps me going.’

Danglard hung up, feeling furious. Apart from Mathilde Forestier, nobody had stayed put in the house in the rue des Patriarches the previous night. He sent Margellon home and tackled Delphine Le Nermord’s will. He wanted to check what she had left her sister. Two hours later, he had learned that there didn’t seem to be a will, at least not in writing. There are days like that when you can’t pin anything down.

Danglard paced up and down in his office and thought once more about how the fucking sun was going to explode in four or five billion years, and he didn’t know why but that always depressed him. He would have given his life to be sure that the sun would still be shining in five billion years.

Adamsberg returned at about midday and suggested going out for lunch. This didn’t happen often.

‘Well, it’s not looking at all good for our Byzantine expert,’ Danglard said. ‘He was wrong about the inheritance, or else he was lying. There’s no written will. So it all goes to the husband. There are some shares, some forest land, and four houses in Paris, besides the one he lives in. He doesn’t have any capital, just his professor’s salary and royalties from his books. So if the wife was thinking of divorcing him, all that property would go to someone else.’

‘Yes, that’s right, she was, Danglard. I met the lover. He’s the guy in the photo, all right. It’s true that he’s built like Tarzan, but he doesn’t have an awful lot upstairs. He’s a herbivore, what’s more, and proud of it.’

‘Vegetarian, I suppose you mean,’ suggested Danglard.

‘All right, yes, vegetarian. He runs an advertising agency with his brother, he’s a vegetarian too. They were working together last night until two in the morning, round at the brother’s. The brother confirms it. So the lover’s in the clear – unless of course the brother’s lying. But the lover does seem very upset at Delphine’s death. He was pressing her to divorce, not that Le Nermord bothered him , but to rescue Delphine from what he called her husband’s tyranny. Apparently Augustin-Louis was still getting her to work for him, typing and proof-reading his manuscripts, and filing his notes, and she didn’t dare say no. She claimed that she didn’t mind, because “it gave her brain a bit of exercise,” but the lover thinks it wasn’t really what she wanted, and that she was scared stiff of her husband. But Delphine had practically decided to ask for a divorce. At least, she wanted to discuss it with Augustin-Louis. We don’t know whether she did or not. Well, it’s clear enough that the two men hate each other. The lover would like to see Le Nermord come a cropper.’