CHAPTER 21
PARIS
Hundreds of miles to the north, Paris was becalmed. After the bustle of a busy morning of commerce, the afternoon air was choked with dust and the smells of rotten fruit and vegetables. The ostlers, the traders of the 8th arrondissement had gone. The milk carts, the barrows and the beggars had moved on, leaving behind the detritus, the dregs of another day.
The apartment of the Vernier family in the rue de Berlin was silent in the blue light of the fading afternoon. The furniture was shrouded in white dustsheets. The long windows of the drawing room that overlooked the street were closed. The curtains of yellow chintz had been drawn. The floral wallpaper, once of good quality, looked faded where the daily passage of the sun had stripped the colour away. Particles of dust hung suspended above the few sticks of furniture left uncovered.
On the table, forgotten roses in a glass bowl hung their heads, almost without scent. There was another smell, barely discernible, a sour smell that did not belong. A hint of the souk, Turkish tobacco, and a stranger aroma this far inland, that of the sea, carried in upon the grey clothes of the man who stood silently between the two windows in front of the fireplace, obscuring the porcelain face of the Sèvres clock on the mantel.
He was of strong and powerful build, with broad shoulders and a high forehead, the body of an adventurer rather than an aesthete. Dark clipped eyebrows sat above sharp blue eyes with pupils as black as coal.
Marguerite was sitting upright on one of the mahogany dining chairs. Her rose-coloured negligée, tied at the neck with a yellow silk bow, lay draped across perfect white shoulders. The material fell, exquisitely, over the yellow cushioned seat and the fabric arms of the chair, as if for an artist’s still life. It was only the alarm in her eyes that told a different story. That, and the fact that her arms were pulled awkwardly behind her, bound tightly by picture wire.
A second man, his shaved scalp covered in an angry rash of spots and blisters, stood on guard behind the chair, waiting for his master’s instructions.
‘So where is he?’ he said in a cold voice.
Marguerite looked at him. She remembered the flush of attraction that had come over her in his presence before and hated him for it. Of all the men she had known, only one other, her husband Leo Vernier, had possessed the power to stir her emotions so instantly, and in such a way.
‘You were at the restaurant,’ she said. ‘Chez Voisin.’
He ignored her. ‘Where is Vernier?’
‘I do not know,’ said Marguerite again. ‘I give you my word. He keeps his own hours. Often he is gone for days without a word.’
‘Your son, yes. But your daughter does not come and go as she pleases unchaperoned. She keeps regular hours. And yet she too is absent.’
‘She is with friends.’
‘Is Vernier with her?’
‘I . . .’
He sent his cold eyes sweeping over the sheets and empty cupboards.
‘How long is the apartment to be empty?’ he said.
‘Some four weeks. Indeed, I am expecting General Du Pont,’ she said, struggling to keep her voice level. ‘At any moment he will be here to collect me, and—’
The words were lost in her scream, as the manservant grabbed her by the hair and jerked back her head.
‘No!’
The tip of the knife pressed cold against her skin.
‘If you leave now,’ she said, struggling to keep her voice steady, ‘I will say nothing, I give you my word. Leave me, go.’
The man stroked the side of her face with the back of his gloved hand.
‘Marguerite, no one will come. The piano downstairs is silent. The neighbours upstairs are in the country for the weekend. And as for your maid and cook, I watched them leave. They too believe that you have already departed with Du Pont.’
Fear flashed in her eyes as she realised how well-informed he was.
Victor Constant pulled up a chair, so close that Marguerite could feel his breath upon her face. Beneath the neat moustache, she could see full lips, red in his pale face. It was the face of a predator, a wolf. And a blemish, too. Behind his left ear, a small swelling.
‘My friend . . .’
‘The esteemed General is already in receipt of a note postponing your liaison until half past eight this evening.’ He glanced at the clock on the mantelshelf. ‘Some five hours and more away. So, you see, we have no need to hurry. And what he discovers when he does arrive is entirely up to you. Alive, dead. It matters little to me.’
‘No!’
The point of his knife was now pressing beneath her eye.
‘I fear, chère Marguerite, that you would fare ill in the world without your looks.’
‘What is it you want? Money? Does Anatole owe you money? I can settle his debts.’
He laughed. ‘If only it were that simple. Besides, your financial situation is, shall we say, perilous. And generous as I am certain your lover can be, I do not think General Du Pont would pay to keep your son from the bankruptcy courts.’
With the lightest of touches, Constant pressed the tip of the blade a little harder against her pale skin, his head shaking slightly as if in regret for what he was obliged to do. ‘In any case, it is not a question of money. Vernier has taken something that belongs to me.’
Marguerite heard the change in his voice and began to struggle. She tried to pull her arms free, but succeeded only in causing her bonds to tighten. The wire cut sharply, slicing into the skin of her bare wrists. Blood began to drip, bead by red bead, on to the blue carpet.
‘I beg you,’ she cried, trying to keep her voice steady. ‘Let me speak with him. I will persuade him to give back to you whatever it was he took. I give you my word.’
‘Ah, but it is too late for that,’ he said softly, running his fingers down her cheek. ‘I wonder if you even presented my card to your son, chère Marguerite?’ His black hand came to rest on her white throat. He increased the pressure. Marguerite began to choke as she flailed and struggled beneath his tightening grip, desperately stretching her neck up and away from his strong grasp. The look in his eyes, pleasure and conquest in equal measure, terrified her as much as the suffocating violence of his grip.
Without warning, suddenly he released her.
She fell back against the chair, gulping for air, gasping. Her eyes were red and her throat was bruised with ugly crimson marks.
‘Start with Vernier’s room,’ he instructed his man. ‘Look for his journal.’ He made a shape with his hands. ‘About so large.’
The servant withdrew.
‘Now,’ he said, as if in the midst of a perfectly normal conversation. ‘Where is your son?’
Marguerite met his eye. Her heart was thudding with dread at what punishment he might inflict upon her. But she had endured ill treatment at the hands of others, and survived it. She could do so again.
‘I do not know,’ she said.
This time, he struck her. Hard, and with his fist, sending her head snapping back. Marguerite gasped as her cheek cracked. Blood welled in her mouth. She dropped her chin and spat into her lap. She flinched as she felt the tug of silk at her neck and the rasp of his leather gloves untying the yellow bow. His breath was coming faster. She could feel the heat of him.
With his other hand, she felt him pushing up the folds of material above her knees, above her thighs, higher.
‘Please, no,’ she whispered.
‘It is barely shy of three,’ he said, tucking a curl of hair behind her ear, in a parody of tenderness. ‘We have more than enough time for me to persuade you to talk. And think of Léonie, Marguerite. Such a pretty girl. A little high-spirited for my tastes, but I am sure I could learn to make an exception.’
He pushed the silk from her shoulders.
Marguerite became calm, vanishing into herself as she had been forced to do many times before. She cleared her mind, wiping out the image of him. Even now, her strongest emotion was shame at the way her heart had lurched when she had first opened the door and allowed him into the apartment.
Sex and violence, the old alliance. She had seen it countless times. On the barricades in the Commune, in the back streets, hidden beneath the respectable veneer of the society salons through which latterly she had moved. So many men driven by hate, not desire. Marguerite had made good use of it. She had exploited her looks, her charms, so that her daughter would never have to live the life she had.
‘Where is Vernier?’
He untied her and dragged her from the chair to the floor.
‘Where is Vernier?’
‘I do not—’
Holding her down, he struck her again. Then again.
‘Where is your son?’ he demanded.
As Marguerite slipped from consciousness, her only thought was how to protect her children. How not to betray them to this man. She must give him something.
‘Rouen,’ she lied through her bloodied lips. ‘They have gone to Rouen.’
