his
neighbourâs coat he had thought she was young. She wasnât moving. Her face,
pale like the manâs hand and the part
of
her thigh that it was exposing, remained turned to the screen.
âAhem!â the inspector coughed,
feeling uneasy. âAhem!â
The lovers paid him no attention. She must
be much the same age as Nouchi.
In fact, when Nouchi had seen Gérard
entering the Bourg-la-Reine apartment building at seven in the evening â or had she
really seen him? â she too had been with a lover, in the dark, no doubt up against a
wall.
He heard the whisper of a kiss close to him.
He had a taste like someone elseâs saliva in his mouth. He hunched even further
down into his overcoat.
Nouchi had been enticing him in the most
brazen way a little while ago. If he had wanted ⦠Were there many girls of that age who
threw themselves at mature men who could lay claim to some kind of celebrity, or merely
some social standing?
I wouldnât be surprised if her
companion is a good deal older than her, he thought, meaning the lover of the girl in
the seat beside him.
This was his way of thinking without really
thinking, in snatches of ideas that he didnât try to connect with each other.
Had the Hungarian girl been lying about
Monsieur Charles? Probably not. Dandurand was exactly the kind of man to leave his door
ajar, watching out for a young girl and offering to show her pornographic photographs.
Nouchi, for her part, was capable of doing everything in her power to keep him in
suspense, ready to call for help when â¦
What was disturbing was the fact that she
claimed to
have seen Gérard Pardon at seven in
the evening, exactly the time when Madame With-All-Due-Respect, on her way up to the
Deséglise apartment, was not keeping an eye on the stairs.
When her statement was official â¦
Well, then a perverse girlâs statement
would be enough to send a man to prison, and who knew â¦
He felt very ill at ease. It wasnât
just the idea of Gérard coming out of the Boulevard Arago gate of La Santé prison first
thing in the morning ⦠He was still looking at the screen, and he frowned. For a few
moments he felt that something wasnât natural, and then he realized what it was;
the lips of the characters in the film were moving, but not quite in time with their
words. In fact the people on screen were speaking English, but you heard French; it was
a dubbed soundtrack, and wasnât perfectly synchronized.
The behaviour of the couple beside him was
getting worse and worse, but the inspectorâs mind was elsewhere. What exactly was
it that had been throwing him off the track for the last three days? He hadnât
worked it out, but now he understood. Something basic was wrong. What was it? He
didnât know yet.
With his eyes half-closed he saw, more
clearly than if he had been there in front of it, the building like a slice of
Neapolitan ice cream on Route dâOrléans, the bicycle shop, the widow
Piéchaudâs grocery store. As he had known since the day before, she was not really
a widow; her husband had run off with a woman of ill repute, as she put it, and she was
so ashamed of it that she claimed to have been widowed.
But then there was
Madame With-All-Due-Respect, in her stuffy lodge, her head askew, her neck wrapped in
thermal wadding to keep it warm â¦
Because she hadnât pulled the cord to
let any stranger into the building, he had concluded over-hastily that no such person
had come in or gone out of it on the night in question.
However, he now knew that it was possible to
get in at seven in the evening without being seen by the concierge. What proof was there
that there werenât other such fixed moments during the day?
Up at the top of the building, that old
obsessive Juliette Boynet surrounded herself with mystery to
neighbourâs coat he had thought she was young. She wasnât moving. Her face,
pale like the manâs hand and the part
of
her thigh that it was exposing, remained turned to the screen.
âAhem!â the inspector coughed,
feeling uneasy. âAhem!â
The lovers paid him no attention. She must
be much the same age as Nouchi.
In fact, when Nouchi had seen Gérard
entering the Bourg-la-Reine apartment building at seven in the evening â or had she
really seen him? â she too had been with a lover, in the dark, no doubt up against a
wall.
He heard the whisper of a kiss close to him.
He had a taste like someone elseâs saliva in his mouth. He hunched even further
down into his overcoat.
Nouchi had been enticing him in the most
brazen way a little while ago. If he had wanted ⦠Were there many girls of that age who
threw themselves at mature men who could lay claim to some kind of celebrity, or merely
some social standing?
I wouldnât be surprised if her
companion is a good deal older than her, he thought, meaning the lover of the girl in
the seat beside him.
This was his way of thinking without really
thinking, in snatches of ideas that he didnât try to connect with each other.
Had the Hungarian girl been lying about
Monsieur Charles? Probably not. Dandurand was exactly the kind of man to leave his door
ajar, watching out for a young girl and offering to show her pornographic photographs.
Nouchi, for her part, was capable of doing everything in her power to keep him in
suspense, ready to call for help when â¦
What was disturbing was the fact that she
claimed to
have seen Gérard Pardon at seven in
the evening, exactly the time when Madame With-All-Due-Respect, on her way up to the
Deséglise apartment, was not keeping an eye on the stairs.
When her statement was official â¦
Well, then a perverse girlâs statement
would be enough to send a man to prison, and who knew â¦
He felt very ill at ease. It wasnât
just the idea of Gérard coming out of the Boulevard Arago gate of La Santé prison first
thing in the morning ⦠He was still looking at the screen, and he frowned. For a few
moments he felt that something wasnât natural, and then he realized what it was;
the lips of the characters in the film were moving, but not quite in time with their
words. In fact the people on screen were speaking English, but you heard French; it was
a dubbed soundtrack, and wasnât perfectly synchronized.
The behaviour of the couple beside him was
getting worse and worse, but the inspectorâs mind was elsewhere. What exactly was
it that had been throwing him off the track for the last three days? He hadnât
worked it out, but now he understood. Something basic was wrong. What was it? He
didnât know yet.
With his eyes half-closed he saw, more
clearly than if he had been there in front of it, the building like a slice of
Neapolitan ice cream on Route dâOrléans, the bicycle shop, the widow
Piéchaudâs grocery store. As he had known since the day before, she was not really
a widow; her husband had run off with a woman of ill repute, as she put it, and she was
so ashamed of it that she claimed to have been widowed.
But then there was
Madame With-All-Due-Respect, in her stuffy lodge, her head askew, her neck wrapped in
thermal wadding to keep it warm â¦
Because she hadnât pulled the cord to
let any stranger into the building, he had concluded over-hastily that no such person
had come in or gone out of it on the night in question.
However, he now knew that it was possible to
get in at seven in the evening without being seen by the concierge. What proof was there
that there werenât other such fixed moments during the day?
Up at the top of the building, that old
obsessive Juliette Boynet surrounded herself with mystery to
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