Judith Rock - The Eloquence of Blood

Charles smiled affably. La Reynie was not the only one who could play verbal games. “Certainly not more money, monsieur, since we take a vow of poverty.”

La Reynie gave him a small ironic bow and presented his sergent, the man in brown breeches and coat, lean and hard bitten. Charles, in turn, presented Morel, who eyed La Reynie warily. The four of them turned their attention to the most recent dead creature to be thrown into the ditch.

Charles crossed himself and the others followed suit. Henri Brion’s frost-glazed dark eyes stared past them at the sky. Charles looked at his dead face, recalling that although he had heard the man’s voice, he had never seen him until now. He was somehow surprised to see how much Brion looked like his daughter, robust and wide-faced, and how little he resembled the small frail Gilles.

“I have heard that our corpse was a notary and had worked for your college,” La Reynie said.

“Yes. And you no doubt also know that he was Mademoiselle Mynette’s notary. And her guardian. I know his family slightly, but I had never met him. How was he killed?” Charles asked.

“Stabbed in the back. To the heart. We found him lying on his face and turned him to have a look at his other side. There’s little blood on the ground around him, because his clothes are good thick cloth and his shirt and coat soaked up most of it.”

Morel flinched. Charles said nothing, again seeing Martine Mynette lying in a sea of red. But that blood was let by a little blade, not the long knife needed to pierce a heart.

Charles said, “Then you don’t think he was killed elsewhere and moved here?”

La Reynie shook his head. “I see no reason yet to think so. Though I wonder how he ended in this ditch.”

“He must have been on his way home.” Morel swallowed hard. “He lives in the rue Perdue, very near here.”

“Ah.” La Reynie nodded consideringly.

“Do you have any thought about how long he’s been dead?” Charles said. “I know that in cold like this, it’s very hard to tell. But it may help you to know that his family has not seen him since at least Thursday evening.”

“That may help indeed.” La Reynie eyed the body. “And there was snow off and on yesterday and through the night, and snow mostly covered the body when we found it. And that bush screens it. The body wasn’t immediately obvious.”

In silence, they looked down at the dead man. A sense of futility assailed Charles. Brion had been described to him as greedy and unsuccessful at his work. He’d seemed somehow negligible, even in his own household. Unfortunately, he had not seemed negligible to his killer. If he had, murder would not have been necessary. But no human soul was negligible. Charles began the prayers for the dead, and the other men bowed their heads.

When the prayers were finished, there was a moment of sober quiet and then the sergent folded his arms over his chest and said, as though continuing an argument Charles had interrupted, “I still say the beggars would have found him yesterday, if he’d been here.” Seeing Charles’s questioning look, he explained, “Beggars search the ditches for anything usable. They would have had that cloak and everything else off him and he’d be mother naked.”

Charles frowned. “They’d search even a midden like this?”

The sergent’s eyes widened in disbelief at the naive question. “Beggars would search your chamber pot and lick your empty plate, mon pere, if they thought there might be anything they could sell.”

Charles took the rebuke to his naivete in silence, wondering why he’d asked such a stupid question when he’d seen firsthand the half-ruined part of the old Louvre palace, which destitute Parisians had made into a warren of fetid living quarters.

La Reynie nodded toward the muddy path. “The woman with the load of wood there met a beggar, a woman called Reine, coming out of the alley this morning with a good beaver hat. Reine told her she’d found it on a dead man in the ditch and named him as Henri Brion.”

“Could she have killed him?” Charles said.

“No. The sergent just told you beggars scour all the ditches. But Reine told the other woman that she didn’t go on her rounds yesterday because she wasn’t well. And Reine’s scavenging places aren’t often bothered by other beggars. After Reine found the body, the woman selling wood sent one of her friends to the police post and the sergent came. And he sent for me.” Police posts, called barrieres, were scattered across the city and were usually the fastest way of appealing to the law.

The sergent said, “We both know old Reine. She begs outside coffeehouses, and says she often saw this Henri Brion at Procope’s.”

“But she didn’t see him there or at any of the other coffeehouses on Friday,” La Reynie added. “Which is another reason why I think he was already dead and lying here yesterday.”

“Messieurs! A small word!” A canvas-aproned man came slithering into the ditch, pulling a sullen, white-faced boy of thirteen or so after him. “This parsnip-brained apprentice of mine has something to tell you that may be about your body here.”

La Reynie scrutinized them both. “And who are you, monsieur?”

“I am Michel Bernard, mon lieutenant-general. Oh, yes, I know you, all Paris knows you. I am a carpenter.” Raising a work-hardened hand in a fingerless glove, the man pointed at an old house backing on the ditch. “We’re working on that house there. My wife just inherited it and she wants to rent it out for good money.” He rubbed his hands together and blew on his exposed fingers. “I’ll start after the Epiphany, I told her, but no, I must start now, why should we lose money, she says, so here I am freezing my”-he suddenly registered Charles’s presence-“my immortal soul off while she sits by the fire at home. But you may be sure that body’s been there awhile.”

“And why is that?”

“Go on, tell him!” The carpenter pulled his apprentice forward. “I’ve been leaving him in the house at night to keep out the beggars while it’s empty.” He poked the boy hard in the ribs. “Talk!”

“I heard people running,” the boy mumbled, staring wide-eyed at the body. “On Friday morning before light. I heard one of them yell out.” He shut his mouth, and his lips trembled.

His master prodded him again. “Well, go on! Tell the rest.”

“Then, when I came down here to piss after I got up-Friday morning, I mean-he-it-was here. But I was afraid to say anything. I thought if I did, you’d think I killed him. I didn’t, I don’t know him, I never saw him before, as the bon Dieu sees me!”

Everyone gazed speculatively at the boy. Tears began to trickle down his cheeks and he fell on his knees in the snow.

“I swear it, messieurs!”

La Reynie sighed. “Unfortunately, I believe you. But the next time you find a body, for God’s sake tell someone if you don’t want to be suspected. Where can I find you both if I need you again?” he asked the carpenter.

“My workshop’s at the sign of the Magdalene, rue Clopin, mon lieutenant-general.”

“Thank you. You may go. Both of you.” La Reynie dismissed them. When they had clambered out of the ditch, the boy still crying and his master berating him, La Reynie turned to Charles and the sergent. “Well. If the apprentice is telling the truth, we have good reason to think that Monsieur Brion was killed before dawn on Friday morning and has lain here ever since. A popular time for murder in this quartier, it seems. Your Mademoiselle Martine Mynette and her notary, both murdered on the same day.”

Charles said, “You think the two are related?”

“A child would think they are related.” La Reynie walked over to Morel, who was still staring disconsolately at Henri Brion’s body. “May I ask why you are here, monsieur?” he said pleasantly.