“You’re lucky,” he said. “When they start singing, it’s impossible to hear.”
Someone pressed a paper into her hand. “That’s sheet music.”
Sheet music? As though she could read.
“Sorry, my bus broke down. I got here late Monday,” the bartender said. “Anyone see who used the phone on Monday? Help this lady?”
“How about Lucas?” said someone at the counter. “He sees everything!”
The remark, greeted with laughter, made her want to slink away, fly a million miles off. Blindness felt like being naked in a world of clothed people. All her expressions were read, but she could decipher none.
“Give me a break, eh!”
She recognized Lucas’s voice. But he was laughing.
“Aimée Leduc? Pay no attention to these old men,” he said, clutching her elbow. “I know all the songs by heart. You don’t need to read. They’re jealous.”
“Lucas, do you know if Clothilde’s still busy?” she said, glad the dark glasses masked her eyes. Milky opaqueness crackled in the corners of her vision. Veins of shooting dull lights throbbed at the edges. Like slowly flowing lava.
Merde. It was if the earth shifted and gravity pulled her sideways.
She clutched the rounded zinc counter, her fingers on the filature, trying to concentrate.
“Clothilde?” Lucas said, stools scraping beside him. “You give me too much credit; peripheral vision isn’t all it’s made out to be.”
This time his voice boomed over the accordion, tinkling glasses and conversation. “Clothilde!”
“J’arrive!”
The eruptions taking place in her eyes made her dizzy. Blinks of light, a lessening of the pressure on the optic nerve . . . hadn’t the retinologist said that? Maybe those pills had already reduced the swelling.
It made her yearn to see more. But deep down she feared it wouldn’t happen. Face it. She was afraid to hope.
“Lucas, your women get younger and younger!” said Clothilde.
Aimée heard what sounded like a slap on his rear. And felt the presence of a towering, perfumed woman.
“Clothilde, you broke my heart,” he said, “Now I have to go for the young ones.”
“Bonsoir, Clothilde, I know you’re busy,” Aimée said. “But Mimi is my neighbor.”
“Mimi . . . of course!” she said.
“She mentioned you might help. Someone using your phone called me Monday night about eleven. Remember?”
“Monday, never,” she said. “I opened at midnight.”
Aimée’s heart sank. The counter jumped as a bottle landed by her.
“Mais non . . . what am I saying? Monday night my accordionist started at ten p.m. He left early for an accordion slam . . . whatever that is!”
“Do you remember who was here at the counter?”
“My habitués, the regulars.”
“Do you know who used the phone?”
“Chérie, for one franc, anyone uses the phone,” she said.
Aimée expected that. And it could be true. But she suspected Clothilde ran a tight ship and had eyes in the back of her head, like any good owner would. She’d know who drank what, how to keep the regulars happy, when to talk and when to listen.
It was hard to trawl for information and remain casual. Clothilde had been around before Aimée was born. How could she get her to reveal the truth or to let something slip?
“Clothilde, you’re right. But today so many use cell phones. Mimi said your memory’s sharper than a razor. You see,” she leaned toward where she suspected Clotilde to be. “It’s a bit private. Wouldn’t want the world to know. Or the doctor.”
“My ear’s right here, cherie,” she said. “Turn away, Lucas!”
Aimée had to think fast. Faster than she ever had. And make it work.
“Alors, he invested in a project. But he thinks I owe him money . . .” she said, her voice low. Then she paused for dramatic effect. “Call it an investment, I told him. No guarantees, eh? At first it was a gift, then he called it a loan. I don’t want to bring it all up again if he’s let it pass! But I have to know if he called. Then we’ll settle this. Do you understand, Clothilde?”
“What’s his name?”
Great . . . how could she get out of this now?
“I can’t say, it’s not right, if . . . well you know, he’s not the one or doesn’t . . .”
“But why . . .”
“He called me from here. I remember Nini peau de chien in the background.”
A perfumed sigh tinged by garlic wafted toward her.
“No wonder. One comes to mind.”
Say his name, she prayed.
“Alors, he’s a bit old for you. Dull, too. But it wouldn’t be him, eh?”
Say it, she wanted to yell. Say it.
“Age doesn’t matter.”
Clothilde sighed. “Men continue to surprise me.”
Aimée took a deep drag. Clenched her fist, willing her to talk. “He certainly surprised me.”
“Mathieu uses the phone. Doesn’t believe in cell phones, he tells me. He was here tonight,” she said. “Maybe half an hour ago. Hard to believe it was him.”
Mathieu?
How could it be Mathieu? Yet thinking back, Chantal had told her the flics brought him in for questioning. But attacking her and killing Josiane . . . ?
Aimée felt a garlic-scented breath on her face. “But everyone’s taste is different.”
“Well, I thought . . .”
“Now that I think about it, Mathieu’s father,” said Clothilde, “invested in girls. He made everyone turn a blind eye to the women he supplied from our place. In turn, he got favors.”
“Mathieu’s father? Wasn’t he a craftsman?”
“Ask Mimi. The high-ranking SS loved it . . . earthy Parisian girls from Marché d’Aligre. They liked peasant costumes.” Clothilde blew a breath of smoke in the air. “Go figure.”
“But I thought Mathieu’s family were respected ébénistes.”
“Eh chérie, who was acquiring works of art during the Occupation? ‘Buying’ is a polite term. ‘Appropriating’ says it better. Who better to take a wealthy deportee’s furniture and make money from it?”
Did that have anything to do with the old woman she’d seen coming out of Mathieu’s with the silvery hair?
“Clothilde!”
Voices had risen, singing along with the accordion. Old songs, like her grandmother had played.
“Excuse me, time to close the doors.”
“Lucas, mind helping me back?” asked Aimée.
She heard him gulp his wine.
“We’ll never get out if we don’t leave now.”
“D’accord,” he agreed.
Out on the street, the only sounds were their footsteps and the click of Lucas’s cane on the rain-dampened cobbles. The music had faded into the night. Rain-freshened air scented the stone-walled street.
“How well do you know Mathieu?”
“Listen, that Clothilde talks a blue streak,” said Lucas. “She wasn’t so clean herself in the war. I heard stories. But people did what they had to. And it’s over.”
“Do you think Mathieu’s hiding something?” she said. “Was he afraid Josiane would find out?”
“Zut!” he said. “We all hide things.”
“I have to talk with Mathieu,” she said. “Take me there.”
“Why would I do that?” he said. “I’m tired. Leave all this alone.”
She felt inside her bag, found the Beretta.
“Here,” she said, taking the cane from him and putting the Beretta in his hand. “Didn’t you want to try this?”