Grimly, the one from the Kripo filled the one from the Sûreté in on things, then listened impatiently for the other side of the affair, observed Godonov, silently watching them from a distance. Both anxious and worried, they shared a cigarette as was their custom perhaps on such occasions, or when short of tobacco. ‘They are like comrades in the trenches, Babushka,’ he confided to the old woman beside him. ‘Those two understand each other so well, one will go for a piss when the other needs to.’
‘Passing water does not repair the damage life in this place has done to my ears. I would like to hear what they are discussing.’
‘A murder, Grandmother. A case of poisoning, but much more.’
‘Fornication? Was money involved or simply penetration?’
‘Both, I think, but trouble. Much trouble, although I’m no detective, just a worker of small miracles.’
Left to themselves, the detectives soon became calmer, conversing earnestly and quietly, the Sûreté spreading a few handfuls of foundry sand on the floor between them before taking two candles from a pocket.
He set them upright and lit them.
‘Made from the wax of hives that were loaded with Russian honey and bees that had suffered from acarine mites, Hermann. Our big shot supplies the catacombs with candles.’
‘And that village priest of yours, finds bundle after bundle of them left by an anonymous donor on the steps of his church.’
‘Madame de Bonnevies …’
‘Or Danielle, eh? Danielle, Louis.’
‘I didn’t find any among the items she brought back from her foraging.’
‘Because she’d already left them, Dummkopf. Ride by the church on the way home, eh? Walk the bike up the steps beside it and on the way, drop the bundle.’
‘Could the donor be helping Schlacht with his factory?’
‘We’ll have to ask her. One thing’s for certain. That factory must be a hell of a lot bigger than the wax we’ve so far found suggests.’
‘Much bigger. Perhaps Herr Schlacht will enlighten us.’
‘That wife of his really did mean to kill him, Louis. The poison in that bottle wasn’t meant for anyone else — well, maybe Madame de Bonnevies, too, but primarily for our Oskar.’
This was not good. Indeed, it was terrible. ‘Please go carefully over things again, Hermann. Leave nothing out.’
‘She makes four trips a year to Switzerland and must have the keys and account numbers to the fortune he’s had her salt away for him and for others of the avenue Foch, namely Oberg, Louis. He fools around, so much so, she’s finally had enough of her Oskar and plans to escape.’
‘So she badgers our beekeeper about his weekly visits …’
‘And gets him to tell her of his sister and the stepson he can’t tolerate — here, take two drags. You’re going to need them. She finds out everything she can about his little life because she’s convinced her Oskar’s banging the hell out of Mme de Bonnevies. She even gets her maid to confirm this by staking out that fleabag Hotel Titania, then demands de Bonnevies admit it’s happening.’
The cigarette was handed back.
‘Frau Schlacht buys the bottle on Tuesday, Louis. Knowing that de Bonnevies always visits his sister on Thursday afternoons, she takes it to the Salpêtrière and slips it to Angèle-Marie.’
‘Whom the brother then caught drinking from it, so the oil of mirabane had yet to be added … But why leave the bottle with her, Hermann? Why not simply take it to de Bonnevies that evening?’
‘You’re too innocent. Have you learned nothing from the years with me? She did so because our beekeeper was proving difficult.’
‘He had refused to have anything to do with poisoning her husband,’ sighed St-Cyr heavily. ‘He was terrified of reprisals and knew he’d be arrested.’
‘And that has to be why she visited the house on Thursday evening.’
‘To collect the bottle after he’d added the poison.’
‘He’d shaved, had got himself spruced up but …’
‘Was very nervous about his visitor and with good reason!’
‘And Madame de Bonnevies knew at least something of what was going on, Louis, and was afraid you’d discover Frau Schlacht’s name in that little book of her husband’s.’
Another cigarette was found but ignored, so lost in thought had Louis become. ‘But when Frau Schlacht arrives, our beekeeper was either in the throes of death or dead,’ he muttered. ‘Yet when you confronted her in the brasserie, she showed no fear of being questioned.’
‘Because she’s as hard as they come and would have done that husband of hers in if she could have, and the beekeeper’s wife, and then … And this is where it’s perfect, Louis. She would have pointed the finger at de Bonnevies and put paid to him, too, and Danielle and Madame and the stepson!’
Death to one of the Occupier only brought more of it. ‘But … Ah mais alors, alors, Hermann, there is just one little problem with what you say.’
‘Go on, tell me, damn it!’
‘There was another visitor to the Salpêtrière that afternoon. A man, since Angèle-Marie, for all the “voices” she hears and the worries she has about being poisoned herself, maintained that it was a “he” who had given her a taste of honey on this little dipper.’
‘A man …’ croaked Kohler.
‘Someone who knew exactly how she would react to the taste, as she did, but before she’d received the bottle. Someone who didn’t want her coming home and wanted to demonstrate to de Bonnevies and her doctors that she wasn’t capable.’
Someone from the quartier Charonne, a member of one of the four families … ‘The custodian, Louis?’
‘His day off doesn’t coincide with Thursdays but it could have been switched, yet he made no mention of it in the catacombs.’
‘He was too busy with other matters!’ snorted Kohler. ‘The son, Louis. Could it have been Étienne?’
‘Did Schlacht pay the first half of the one hundred thousand francs at Maxim’s — is this what you’re now saying? Well, is it?’
‘You’re right, of course,’ sighed Kohler. ‘Schlacht wouldn’t have paid it. He’d simply have used the offer to nail Juliette’s underpants more firmly down around her ankles.’
‘Danielle … Could Danielle have made a deal with him to buy her half-brother’s freedom?’
They were desperate. They were trying to think of every possibility. ‘That priest,’ said Kohler, finally lighting the cigarette. ‘Father Michel …’
‘Would have known exactly how Angèle-Marie would react to a taste of honey and may well not have wanted her to return to the fold.’
‘Yet he opened the past when he could just as easily have left it closed.’
‘He’s hiding something, Hermann. Merde, these village intrigues, these domestic quarrels. Severed heads of wife-beaters, blackmail and rape. A legacy of hatred and a determination for vengeance that reaches back more than thirty years.’
‘That bottle, Louis. It must have been left unattended on the beekeeper’s desk for a few hours. From when he came home from the Salpêtrière and until he returned from Le Chat qui cue and his little cemetery.’
‘But were the gates unlocked then?’ sighed St-Cyr and said firmly, ‘Not likely. Keys would most probably have been needed. Keys, Hermann.’
De Bonnevies had seen his sister drink from the bottle and had thought it okay. Later, he’d had a quick shot, only to discover otherwise.
‘Several would have known where he kept the nitrobenzene, Louis. Danielle …’
‘Yes, yes. How many times must I say I can’t see that girl poisoning her father?’
‘The wife did it, then.’
‘Or Héloïse Debré? Or Father Michel — we can’t discount him yet!’
‘Someone who knew it was there, Louis, and had had enough of our beekeeper who was far from being the saint that daughter of his thought, and far worse than the lousy son of a bitch his wife considered him to be.’