Flykiller

‘Prior to 9 December, Inspector. I didn’t kill her. I swear it!’ said Madame Richard.

Elisabeth de Fleury quickly took her by the hands to anxiously say, ‘We’re in the restaurant. Others will hear you!’

‘The 9th of September,’ he said. ‘One always has to jot these little details down.’

‘The 10th,’ grated Madame Petain. Others were trying hard to listen but not let on! ‘Thursday afternoons are always our times at the thermal palace. First the steam and then the baths, the hot and then the cold, and then the douche to tighten up the pores. Mademoiselle Mailloux really did want to embarrass Sandrine in front of us, Inspector. That tart was shameful and totally without conscience.’

‘And like Noelle Olivier, Madame la Marechale?’

To say, How. dare you, would be of little use. ‘Eventually you had to get at that, didn’t you, Inspector? The knife, the earrings – even the perfume that bitch wore? Well, listen closely then, mon pauvre Surete. The Marechal and I have always had two places of residence. His and mine. It’s very discreet and convenient, and he has always made certain of this. In Paris, after our marriage in September of 1920, he rented and furnished two flats at 6 and 8 square de Latour-Maubourg – you know the Left Bank well, I’m sure – and then … then in the house at numero 8 when a suitable one became available for me. Here, too, in the Hotel du Parc, myself in the Majestic. Bien sur, in our marriage we live apart and together, my being invited only to some of the many dinner parties and functions he attends; he and his current mistress, if he has one, to others. That’s how it has always been with us.’

‘Madame, I merely …’

‘Did you think to insult me so as to let my anger give you an advantage? Did you think I wasn’t aware of Madame Olivier’s infatuation or that of the countless others Henri Philippe has had? In June 1920, not three months before our wedding – the banns had been announced well ahead of time, let me assure you! – he took up with Marie-Louise Regad, an old flame who had recently been made a widow. Then just a few months after our wedding, it was Madame Jacqueline de Castex, another widow and old flame whose daughter and her husband now live in the Hotel du Parc to constantly remind me of that affair and to whom he regularly makes visits, not me. Never me! The Marechal has a reputation for going after the married ones, hasn’t he, even to chasing myself, and widows especially! But … but I must tell you.’ She would pause now to catch a breath and hold it, Eugenie said to herself. ‘No other woman in France can lick the back of her husband’s head every time she mails a postcard to the north, or a letter in the south. Moi-meme, seulement, Inspector.’

Only myself. ‘Did all, or any of you, pay to have those girls killed?’

‘And not kill them ourselves – is this the reason you sigh? Really, Inspector, that is so typically male-chauvinistic of you! Not capable of killing to save our marriages? Not able to vote, of course, nor to open a bank account without one’s husband’s or father’s permission? That, too, is only understandable in such a male-dominated society, though one has to wonder about it when so many of our men are either dead or in prisoner-of-war camps. But women are allowed to go out to work and each day eight million of us do. More than in any other country in Europe, even now during this dreadful conflict. And of course, when they get home, there are always the meals, the washing, the cleaning, the children, the endless queues for food …’

‘Madame, please just answer the question!’

‘And not complain about the disgraceful conditions in this and the other hotels to which we have been assigned? Cooking on a single hotplate? Washing the clothes, the sheets and blankets in a hand sink if one is lucky? The tisane of linden blossom here, an occasional meal, but endless days of drudgery in overcrowded quarters, and on top of all of this, we are expected to ignore the philandering!’

‘Madame, the question.’

‘First, the billets doux that old fool wrote to Celine Dupuis.’ Her fingers snapped!

‘There were others he wrote to Noelle Olivier,’ cautioned St-Cyr.

Her eyebrows shot up. ‘Is it that you wish to strike a bargain?’

‘It could be arranged. A small fire.’

‘Then listen closely once again. Menetrel found out those girls were informants for les Allemands. Though he has swelled far beyond the mediocre capacity of his head, even I would never underestimate his loyalty to my husband. He’d have definitely had those girls singled out and killed, both to teach them a lesson and to set one for others, and to remove the breach of security they represented.’

‘And even though you must hate him for what he did to you with Noelle, Charles-Frederic Hebert would have been the one to do it for him?’

‘Yes!’

‘The Hotel Ruhl, then. Would the doctor have been aware of Room 3-17?’