Fred Vargas: This Night’s Foul Work

‘Yes, I see,’ said Adamsberg, mixing his cement quietly.

‘Because the spider’s bite hadn’t finished its life – do you understand what I’m saying? It wants its dues, it’s taking its revenge. Does that remind you of anything?’

‘The stars,’ Adamsberg suggested. ‘They go on shining long after they’re dead.’

‘All right, yes,’ admitted the old man, surprised. ‘Or feelings. If a fellow goes on loving a girl, or the other way round, when it’s all over, see what I mean?’

‘Yes.’

‘But why does he go on loving the girl, or the other way round? What explains it?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Adamsberg patiently.

Between gusts of wind, the hesitant March sunshine was warming his back, and he was quite happy to be there, building his wall in this overgrown garden. Lucio Velasco Paz could go on talking all he wanted, it wouldn’t bother Adamsberg.

‘It’s quite simple. It’s because the feeling hasn’t run its course. It’s beyond our control, that kind of thing. You have to wait for it to finish, go on scratching till the end. And if you die before you’ve run your life’s course, same thing. People who’ve been murdered, they go on hanging about, their presence makes you itch non-stop.’

‘Like spider bites,’ said Adamsberg, bringing the conversation back full circle.

‘Like ghosts,’ said the old man, seriously. ‘Now do you understand why nobody wanted your house? Because it’s haunted, hombre.’

Adamsberg finished cleaning his cement board and wiped his hands.

‘Well, why not?’ he said. ‘Doesn’t bother me. I’m used to things that pass my understanding.’

Lucio tilted his chin and looked at Adamsberg sadly. ‘It’s you, hombre , who won’t get past her, if you try to be clever. What is it with you? You reckon you’re stronger than her?’

‘Her? You’re talking about a woman, then?’

‘Yes, a ghostly woman from the century before the one before, the time before the Revolution. Ancient wickedness, a shade from the past.’

The commissaire ran his hand slowly over the rough surface of the breeze-blocks.

‘Indeed,’ he said, suddenly pensive. ‘A shade, you said?’

ADAMSBERG WAS MAKING COFFEE IN THE LARGE KITCHEN-LIVING ROOM OF his new house, still feeling unaccustomed to the space. The light glanced in through the small window-panes, and shone on the ancient red floor-tiles dating from the century before the one before. The room smelled of damp, of woodsmoke, of the new oilcloth on the table, an atmosphere that reminded him of his childhood home in the mountains, when he thought about it. He put two cups without saucers on the table, in a rectangular patch of sunlight. His neighbour was sitting bolt upright, clasping his knee with his good hand. That hand was large enough to strangle an ox between its thumb and index finger, having apparently doubled in size to compensate for the absence of the other.

‘You wouldn’t have anything to pep up the coffee, by any chance? If that’s not too much trouble.’

Lucio looked suspiciously at the garden, while Adamsberg searched for something alcoholic in the cases he had not yet unpacked.

‘Your daughter wouldn’t like a drink, would she?’ asked the commissaire .

‘She doesn’t encourage me.’

‘Now what’s this one?’ asked Adamsberg, pulling out a bottle from a tea chest.

‘A Sauternes, I’d say,’ was the opinion of the old man, screwing up his eyes like an ornithologist identifying a bird from a distance. ‘It’s a bit early in the day for a Sauternes.’

‘Doesn’t seem to be anything else here.’

‘We’ll settle for that, then,’ decreed the old man.

Adamsberg poured him a glass and sat down alongside, letting his back feel the patch of sunlight.

‘How much do you know about the house?’ Lucio asked.

‘That the last owner hanged herself in the upstairs room,’ said Adamsberg, pointing at the ceiling. ‘And that’s why nobody wanted the house. But that doesn’t worry me.’

‘Because you’ve seen plenty of hanged people?’

‘I’ve seen a few. But it’s not the dead who’ve ever troubled me. It’s their killers.’

‘We’re not talking about the real dead here, hombre , we’re talking about the others, the ones who won’t go away. And she’s never gone away.’

‘The one who hanged herself?’

‘No, the one who hanged herself did go away,’ explained Lucio, swallowing a gulp of wine, as if to recognise the event. ‘Do you know why she hanged herself?’

‘No.’

‘It was the house that made her go mad. All the women who’ve lived here have been troubled by the ghost. And then they die.’

‘What ghost?’

‘The convent ghost. A silent one. That’s why the street is called the rue des Mouettes.’

‘I don’t follow,’ said Adamsberg, pouring out coffee.

‘There used to be a convent here, in the century before the one before. Nuns who were forbidden to speak.’

‘A silent order.’

‘Right. It used to be called the rue des Muettes, the Street of Silent Women, but as people forgot the real name, and said it wrong, they started to call it the rue des Mouettes, which just means the Street of Seagulls.’

‘Nothing to do with birds, then,’ said Adamsberg, disappointed.

‘No, they were nuns, but the old name was harder to pronounce. Anyway, one of these silent sisters dishonoured the house. With the devil, they say. Well, I have to admit, there isn’t any evidence for that bit.’

‘So what do you have evidence of, Monsieur Velasco?’ asked Adamsberg, smiling.

‘You can call me Lucio. Oh yes, there’s evidence all right. There was a trial at the time, in 1771. The convent was closed and the house had to be purified. The wicked Silent Sister had managed to get herself called Saint Clarisse. She promised any women prepared to come up with a sum of money and go through a ceremony that they would have a place in paradise. What these poor women didn’t know was that they were going straight there. When they turned up with their purses full of cash, she cut their throats. Seven of them she killed. Seven, hombre . But one night, she got her come-uppance.’

Lucio laughed like a boy, then gathered himself once more.

‘We shouldn’t laugh at anyone so wicked,’ he said. ‘The spider bite’s itching again, that’s my punishment.’

Adamsberg watched as Lucio scratched in the air with his left hand, waiting placidly for the rest of the story.

‘Does it help when you scratch it?’

‘Just for a moment, then it starts up again. Well, on the night of 3 January 1771, one more old woman turned up to see Saint Clarisse, hoping to buy her way into paradise. But this time the woman’s son, who was suspicious, and mean, came along with her. He was a tanner. And he killed the so-called saint. Like that,’ said Lucio, crashing his fist down in the table. ‘He beat her to pulp with his huge hands. Are you with me so far?’

‘Yes.’

‘Because if not, I can start again.’

‘No, no, Lucio, carry on.’

‘Only the thing was, this wicked Sister Clarisse never really went away. Because she was only twenty-six, do you see? And since then, every woman who’s ever lived here after her has left the house feet first, after meeting a violent death. Before Madeleine, that’s the one who hanged herself, there was a Madame Jeunet in the 1960s. She fell out of a top-floor window. No reason. Before Madame Jeunet, there was a Marie-Louise who put her head in the oven during the war. My father knew them both. Nothing but tragedy.’

The two men nodded simultaneously. Lucio Velasco with gravity, Adamsberg with a certain pleasure. The commissaire didn’t want to offend the old man. And to tell the truth, this satisfying ghost story suited both of them, so they savoured it, making it last as long as the sugar took to dissolve in their coffee. The horrors of Saint Clarisse made Lucio’s life more exciting, and the tale diverted Adamsberg momentarily from the mundane murders he was investigating at the time. This female phantom was more poetic than the two petty criminals who had been slashed to death the previous week at Porte de la Chapelle. He almost decided to tell Lucio about the case, since the old Spaniard seemed to have a definite view about everything. He warmed to this one-armed humorist, though he could have done without the radio buzzing away uninterruptedly in his trouser pocket. At a sign from Lucio, he filled his glass again.