And while we are on the subject of the dead, let us mention too that a year earlier, in the summer of 1941, the prince slipped away at Beirut. That enigmatic figure simply stopped breathing one night. At dawn his secretary/chauffeur/right-hand man, Salah, bent over him to wake him up. He lightly touched the hand that lay on the sheet, and it was cold. The prince was a wax statue, his papery yellow skin stretched over a bony mask. He was buried according to the rites of his religion, and that afternoon friends gathered at Geneviève’s. She displayed impressive dignity. Perhaps she was already aware of what the prince’s will contained. She had inherited a substantial fortune, but not its management. Salah with his dark complexion was stepping into the light, and there were those who murmured spitefully, in Beirut as in Alexandria, that he was now more than merely Geneviève’s legal representative, which was untrue. And she herself was at risk. Lebanon’s climate did not suit her. She felt she needed to get to Switzerland, which, despite her possessing influential contacts, looked to be almost impossible, and it took her until December 1941 to make it happen and find her way to a small village in Valais, hidden away in the mountains, called Gstaad, where she rented the first floor of a modest country hotel.
As for the famous letter given to Jean by the prince before the outbreak of war, it remains unopened. To be honest, Jean attaches no importance to it, and the only person to suspect its true value is Palfy. Which is, one imagines, why his first question when he arrives in Paris on Christmas Eve of 1940 is, ‘Have you still got the letter?’
Jean is no longer even very sure where he has put it, and it has to be said that at that moment it is the least of his worries. Claude left him the day before, and he has not yet got over this latest sudden twist of fate. During the night Jesús and he have polished off a bottle of calvados between them, a present in a parcel from Antoinette. Waking up has been exceptionally painful and there is no respite: here is Constantin Palfy, knocking at the door in an elegant grey flannel suit.
‘You’re my first port of call,’ he says. ‘You look like death warmed up. I bring you “real” coffee and “real” croissants. Everything is real!’
‘Even me, who’s a real idiot.’
‘Ah, delectatio morosa … that is you all over, my dear Jean.’
Jesús was no more awake than Jean but glimpsed, standing behind Palfy on the landing, the girl who had come to pose for him. She was called Josette and had generous breasts, and portraits of her in outrageous style already furnished the rooms of several German officers and their most bountiful dreams.
‘Not today, Josette! Is the wrong time …’
She cried and he pressed a note into her hand, a remedy he considered, not without justification, to work very effectively whenever disappointment manifested itself. Once Josette was gone, they boiled water for ‘real’ coffee, which they drank with ‘real’ warm croissants. Palfy, finding it hard to sit still, went to the window. Paris was enveloped in a purifying cold, its roofs covered in frost in the clear light of the end of December. A city unlike all others, whose gentle blue and pink breath misted the windows and broke up the sun’s rays.
‘You’re not about to say, “It’s between you and me now!” are you?’ Jean said.
‘Don’t worry. Not a bad idea, though.’
‘Is it all thanks to Madeleine that you got your permit to cross the demarcation line?’
‘Of course! The dear girl. She’s complaining that she never sees you. We saw her last night. Marceline’s very impressed with her.’
‘Marceline?’
‘Ah yes, you didn’t know … Marceline Michette.’
‘The patronne at the Sirène?’
‘So what?’
‘You’re not going to tell me you’re shacking up with the patronne of a brothel now?’
‘No, you ninny! Zizi’s the one I’m after …’
Jean tried to remember the foxy, mocking features of the redheaded Zizi at the Sirène, apparently Palfy’s sort of girl.
‘What about … Marceline’s husband?’
‘Taken prisoner, dear boy! Bravely falling back to Perpignan, his regiment left him behind. There are, sadly, some colonels not worthy of being called the father of their regiment. Now our dear sergeant-major is atoning for France’s sins. Let us salute a warrior and a gentleman. Monsieur Michette! A hero! Not to mention his wife, who yearns to serve her country. Her talents cannot be allowed to lie fallow. In Paris there’ll be no stopping her.’
Jesús poured himself more coffee.
‘The best I ’ave ever drunk!’ he said. ‘This war ’as got to be made to las’.’
‘We’re working on it in high places,’ Palfy assured him. ‘And what about dear Claude? Are you still seeing her?’
‘Every day,’ Jean said, ‘but yesterday she had to go away for a few days …’
‘So everything going all right there then. Good!’
Jean and Jesús looked at each other. Why say more? If Claude returned, her sudden departure — once explained — would be no more than a moment’s upset that was swiftly forgotten, and if she failed to return Palfy would not even notice. Jean’s affairs of the heart had always seemed to him to be pointless aberrations, weaknesses unworthy of a young man destined for a great future. So Jean said nothing: Jesús knew what had happened, and that was enough. In any case Palfy had already moved on, asking Jesús to recount in detail La Garenne’s rackets. The scale of the gallery owner’s hoaxes thrilled him. He immediately wanted to meet this master swindler and have lunch with him.
‘He doesn’t have lunch with anyone,’ Jean said. ‘He’d be too afraid he’d be left with the bill.’
‘I’ll take him out!’
‘You haven’t got any money!’
‘I’ll borrow some from him.’
They burst out laughing.
‘Even supposing you succeed,’ Jean said, ‘which, just between ourselves, would be a stroke of genius, I ought to warn you that as soon as he opens his mouth to speak he’ll start spitting into your food.’
‘I’ll buy him some new dentures.’
‘He’ll resell them as a Surrealist sculpture.’
‘You won’t stop me, you’ll see.’
Jean believed him. His friend had spotted an opportunity and was already plotting to join forces with La Garenne. After all, yes, why not? Jesús was delighted by Palfy.
‘This La Garenne ’e’s a slob. ’E put everyzin’ in iz own pocket. What I like ’e’s that ’e’s connin’ the Boches. For that you need a hombre with big cojones.’
‘No hurry. Let’s give it some thought. I have a few ideas. Today I’m having lunch with Madeleine and her Julius, at Maxim’s, where else?’
‘It’s their local,’ Jean said.
‘I saw this Julius fellow yesterday for the first time. Not uncongenial. A great music lover.’
‘Like that SS officer Karl Schmidt, the one who wanted to shoot us to the strains of his violin?’
‘No grudges, Jean. Very unbecoming. The SS and Wehrmacht are worlds apart. One day the Wehrmacht will wipe out the SS. Julius may not be a Prussian nob but he’s a solid businessman. One of his daughters is married to an English banker in London and one of his sons is at Bern, as an attaché at the embassy. All doors open for him — and he can’t live without Madeleine. You should see her, dear boy. Your attitude upsets her.’