‘Suppose I don’t want anything to do with it?’
Loiseau splayed out his hands. ‘One,’ he said, grabbing one pudgy finger, ‘you are already involved. Two,’ he grabbed the next finger, ‘you are employed by some sort of British government department from what I can understand. They will be very angry if you turn down this chance of seeing the outcome of this affair.’
I suppose my expression changed.
‘Oh, it’s my business to know these things,’ said Loiseau. ‘Three. Maria has decided that you are trustworthy and in spite of her occasional lapses I have great regard for her judgement. She is, after all, an employee of the Sûreté.’
Loiseau grabbed his fourth digit but said nothing. He smiled. In most people a smile or a laugh can be a sign of embarrassment, a plea to break the tension. Loiseau’s smile was a calm, deliberate smile. ‘You are waiting for me to threaten you with what will happen if you don’t help me.’ He shrugged and smiled again. ‘Then you would turn my previous words about blackmail upon me and feel at ease in declining to help. But I won’t. You are free to do as you wish in this matter. I am a very unthreatening type.’
‘For a cop,’ I said.
‘Yes,’ agreed Loiseau, ‘a very unthreatening type for a cop.’ It was true.
‘Okay,’ I said after a long pause. ‘But don’t mistake my motives. Just to keep the record straight, I’m very fond of Maria.’
‘Can you really believe that would annoy me? You are so incredibly Victorian in these matters: so determined to play the game and keep a stiff upper lip and have the record straight. We do not do things that way in France; another man’s wife is fair game for all. Smoothness of tongue and nimbleness of foot are the trump cards; nobleness of mind is the joker.’
‘I prefer my way.’
Loiseau looked at me and smiled his slow, nerveless smile. ‘So do I,’ he said.
‘Loiseau,’ I said, watching him carefully, ‘this clinic of Datt’s: is it run by your Ministry?’
‘Don’t you start that too. He’s got half Paris thinking he’s running that place for us.’ The coffee was still hot. Loiseau got a bowl out of the cupboard and poured himself some. ‘He’s not connected with us,’ said Loiseau. ‘He’s a criminal, a criminal with good connections but still just a criminal.’
‘Loiseau,’ I said, ‘you can’t hold Byrd for the murder of the girl.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because he didn’t do it, that’s why not. I was at the clinic that day. I stood in the hall and watched the girl run through and die. I heard Datt say, “Get Byrd here.” It was a frame-up.’
Loiseau reached for his hat. ‘Good coffee,’ he said.
‘It was a frame-up. Byrd is innocent.’
‘So you say. But suppose Byrd had done the murder and Datt said that just for you to overhear? Suppose I told you that we know that Byrd was there? That would put this fellow Kuang in the clear, eh?’
‘It might,’ I said, ‘if I heard Byrd admit it. Will you arrange for me to see Byrd? That’s my condition for helping you.’ I expected Loiseau to protest but he nodded. ‘Agreed,’ he said. ‘I don’t know why you worry about him. He’s a criminal type if ever I saw one.’ I didn’t answer because I had a nasty idea that Loiseau was right.
‘Very well,’ said Loiseau. ‘The bird market at eleven A.M. tomorrow.’
‘It’s Sunday tomorrow,’ I said.
‘All the better, the Palais de Justice is quieter on Sunday.’ He smiled again. ‘Good coffee.’
‘That’s what they all say,’ I said.
22
A considerable portion of that large island in the Seine is occupied by the law in one shape or another. There’s the Prefecture and the courts, Municipal and Judicial police offices, cells for remand prisoners and a police canteen. On a weekday the stairs are crammed with black-gowned lawyers clutching plastic briefcases and scurrying like disturbed cockroaches. But on Sunday the Palais de Justice is silent. The prisoners sleep late and the offices are empty. The only movement is the thin stream of tourists who respectfully peer at the high vaulting of the Sainte Chapelle, clicking and wondering at its unparalleled beauty. Outside in the Place Louis Lépine a few hundred caged birds twitter in the sunshine and in the trees are wild birds attracted by the spilled seed and commotion. There are sprigs of millet, cuttlebone and bright new wooden cages, bells to ring, swings to swing on and mirrors to peck at. Old men run their shrivelled hands through the seeds, sniff them, discuss them and hold them up to the light as though they were fine vintage Burgundies.
The bird market was busy by the time I got there to meet Loiseau. I parked the car opposite the gates of the Palais de Justice and strolled through the market. The clock was striking eleven with a dull dented sound. Loiseau was standing in front of some cages marked ‘Caille reproductrice’. He waved as he saw me. ‘Just a moment,’ he said. He picked up a box marked ‘vitamine phospate’. He read the label: ‘Biscuits pour oiseaux’. ‘I’ll have that too,’ said Loiseau.
The woman behind the table said, ‘The mélange saxon is very good, it’s the most expensive, but it’s the best.’
‘Just half a litre,’ said Loiseau.
She weighed the seed, wrapped it carefully and tied the package. Loiseau said, ‘I didn’t see him.’
‘Why?’ I walked with him through the market.
‘He’s been moved. I can’t find out who authorized the move or where he’s gone to. The clerk in the records office said Lyon but that can’t be true.’ Loiseau stopped in front of an old pram full of green millet.
‘Why?’
Loiseau didn’t answer immediately. He picked up a sprig of millet and sniffed at it. ‘He’s been moved. Some top-level instructions. Perhaps they intend to bring him before some juge d’instruction who will do as he’s told. Or maybe they’ll keep him out of the way while they finish the enquêtes officieuses.’10
‘You don’t think they’ve moved him away to get him quietly sentenced?’
Loiseau waved to the old woman behind the stall. She shuffled slowly towards us.
‘I talk to you like an adult,’ Loiseau said. ‘You don’t really expect me to answer that, do you? A sprig.’ He turned and stared at me. ‘Better make it two sprigs,’ he said to the woman. ‘My friend’s canary wasn’t looking so healthy last time I saw it.’
‘Joe’s all right,’ I said. ‘You leave him alone.’
‘Suit yourself,’ said Loiseau. ‘But if he gets much thinner he’ll be climbing out between the bars of that cage.’
I let him have the last word. He paid for the millet and walked between the cliffs of new empty cages, trying the bars and tapping the wooden panels. There were caged birds of all kinds in the market. They were given seed, millet, water and cuttlefish bone for their beaks. Their claws were kept trimmed and they were safe from all birds of prey. But it was the birds in the trees that were singing.
23
I got back to my apartment about twelve o’clock. At twelve thirty-five the phone rang. It was Monique, Annie’s neighbour. ‘You’d better come quickly,’ she said.
‘Why?’