Murder on French Leave Read online

  ‘That’s true.’

  ‘If you ask me, the big mistake was making all that secrecy about Robin’s job.’

  ‘You mean, if this man was a crook it would have scared him off? You may be right, but we can soon rectify that, you know. How’s this: red crocodile dressing case. Gold initials T.P. Air France Flight Eight Two Nine from Heathrow. Please return to Detective Inspector Price, Eighth Floor, 201 avenue de Suffren, Paris 7.’

  She nodded approvingly and I handed the page to Mr Carlsen, watching him through narrowed eyes as he skimmed through the message. But he was either a very cool, confident criminal, or a very innocent good Samaritan, for there were no flinches or guilty looks.

  ‘Dandy!’ he said. ‘Couldn’t be better, and I’ll get moving on it right away. You’ll probably have it back by tomorrow, at the latest. So your husband is in the police force, is he? I must ask him if he’s ever come across an old buddy of mine, Roger McMahon, who used to work at the Yard.’

  ‘I think most people there know him. He was Assistant Commissioner.’

  ‘That’s the one! Well, I think you can take your long-suffering porter away now, and I’ll get busy. Fingers crossed!’

  We found Robin waiting in the main hall, although there was no shabby luggage to identify him by.

  ‘What’s this?’ I asked. ‘Have we been duped, after all? Where’s the female accomplice?’

  ‘Mrs Carlsen? She came and went. Our driver carried the luggage out to their car. His name is Pierre, by the way, which is an easy one. He is now waiting for us outside, so if you haven’t managed to dream up some fresh drama in the interval, perhaps we could be on our way?’

  ‘What’s she like?’ I asked, as the car swept heedlessly into the terrors of the Auto-Route du Sud. ‘Does she speak just as good English as her husband?’

  ‘Almost. She’s American.’

  ‘Attractive?’

  ‘Terrific.’

  ‘Young?’

  ‘I wouldn’t have said so.’

  ‘Then what would you say? You’re being very cagey.’

  ‘I know,’ he said, sounding a trifle surprised all the same. ‘And I can’t explain it, but I didn’t take to either of them madly. It’s ungracious of me because she was radiant and he could hardly have been kinder. Perhaps that’s at the bottom of it. People don’t normally go so far out of their way to help perfect strangers.’

  ‘You have put your finger on it,’ I told him, ‘and I am so relieved to be given a rational explanation for all my nasty prejudices and to know they’re not just the aftermath of Coca-Cola.’

  ‘I expect we do them an injustice, though. It’s an occupational hazard to suspect innocent people of nameless crimes but we’ll both feel much more charitable after a good night’s sleep. And if the suitcase should turn up you can get their address from the telephone directory and send a polite note of thanks, to close the chapter. We must be nearly there, thank God! There’s the Invalides.’

  I ignored this historic landmark, however, for my attention had been caught by an elegant, galleon-shaped building away over to the right, which, unlike the Invalides, was ablaze with lights.

  ‘What is it?’ I asked.

  ‘The IDEAS building,’ Ellen replied, ‘I’ve seen it on the postcards. And that’s where Mr Carlsen works. What a coincidence! Just around the corner from our flat!’

  (iii)

  We were on the top floor of a shiny black apartment block, resembling a giant slab of liquorice, about two hundred yards from the Hilton Hotel.

  It was too up-to-date to include a concierge among the amenities, which I regretted both for sentimental and practical reasons, and this feature had been replaced by rows of impersonal letter-boxes, with a door beside them labelled ‘Bureau’, although neither then nor at any time during our stay did we find anyone in occupation. Luckily, I had had the foresight to give Robin the keys and he needed every one of them, including two for the front door. This opened into a tiny hall and there were two bedrooms, with a bathroom leading out of the larger one, and a combined salon and dining-room. Every single room and cupboard was locked and so was the refrigerator. In view of this, it was rather disappointing to find that it was also empty.

  Since it was past seven o’clock, Robin said he would take us out to dinner, provided we didn’t expect the Hilton, and Ellen informed us that she had noticed plenty of shops still open, wherein to procure a few essentials for the morning. Robin handed her the bunch of keys, but she had already found a Judas peephole in the front door and said it would be much more fun to ring the bell, so that I could spy at her from within.

  It was, too. From my side of the tiny glass disc, I had a clear view of the landing and part of the staircase, as well as of Ellen capering about and acting the part of a burglar.

  Besides the morning’s rations, which included several yards of loaf, she had acquired a very chic peaked cap in brilliant tartan, which I afterwards learnt she had bought for prix choc at the local supermarket. For the purposes of this charade, she had pulled it over her eyes and tied a handkerchief round the lower half of her face.

  ‘Super miming,’ I said, pulling open the door, as she raised her arm to cosh me with the loaf, ‘and I can’t wait to get one of these gadgets installed in our door in London.’

  I referred to this again during dinner and Robin said:

  ‘I thought we had agreed to keep off the subject of crime this weekend?’

  ‘Oh, I wasn’t thinking of criminals. I don’t imagine that many burglars would dress themselves up like Ellen did and then ring the bell to be let in.’

  ‘I expect Tessa thought it would be fun to spy on all your friends.’

  ‘What a poisonous idea!’

  ‘Useful, though. But still, let’s not argue about that. I want to make some plans for tomorrow. Here we are in Paris, with four lovely, idle days ahead! How shall we spend them?’

  ‘Nosing round the boutiques in Saint-Germain,’ Ellen suggested.

  ‘You can do that kind of thing just as well in London. I should have thought it might be more beneficial to nose round the Louvre, just for once. I want to go and see a lot of movies, too. I’m dead keen to polish up my French a bit, before I start work.’

  ‘Well, here’s the programme, then,’ Robin said. ‘You can both go shopping in the morning and I’ll meet you for lunch and take you to the Louvre, or whatever, and we’ll pack in a movie in the evening. That should satisfy all parties.’

  ‘Particularly you,’ I said, ‘carving out a nice late morning in bed for yourself.’

  ‘However, there’s one little chore to be done first,’ he told me.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘To make a list of the jewellery in the red case and write to the insurance company. It may not be needed, but it wouldn’t do to bank on it.’

  ‘Altogether, it sounds an exhausting programme,’ I sighed. ‘At this rate, I shall be worn out before work even starts.’

  Two

  (i)

  Unfortunately, events have a way of rearranging themselves to suit their own ends, even when Robin is in charge, and on Saturday morning his guiding hand was not even present. My base suspicions about his motives for sending us out shopping proved to be unfounded, for he was up and dressed and out of the flat before either of us had stirred.

  ‘Tell me something, Ellen,’ I said, as we drank our coffee and hacked our way through the loaf, which now had the substance of lead piping. ‘Do you suppose they work on Saturdays at the Sûreté?’

  ‘I should hope so. Don’t they at Scotland Yard? And why do you want to know?’

  ‘It’s just that I was wondering what Robin could be up to. The only people he knows in Paris are policemen, and yet he was the one who was so keen to make this a real holiday, with no shop. Which reminds me that you and I had better get a move on, if we’re going to get anything done this morning.’

  The doorbell rang while I was in the bath, but Ellen was still on her own when I em
erged a few minutes later. She was striking attitudes in front of my long mirror, and so far it hadn’t cracked from side to side. Besides the peaked tartan cap, which was now on back to front, she was wearing jeans tucked into yellow suede boots, a Tibetan smock and a necklace made from dried beans.

  ‘Very fetching,’ I said.

  ‘Do you think these jade ear-rings would be overdoing it a bit?’

  ‘Oh, surely not? One would hardly notice them.’

  ‘Unless there’s another pair I could borrow in your red case? It’s back, by the way.’

  ‘No!’

  ‘In the hall. I’ve just let it in.’

  ‘How do you mean you let it in? Did it walk here on its own?’

  ‘We may have been meant to think so. It didn’t work out, actually.’

  ‘Could you stop being cryptic, Ellen?’

  ‘Well, I heard the lift come up, you see. When it gets as high as this floor, it must either be for us or the people next door, so I buzzed out to the spy-hole.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘And there was Mr Carlsen on the landing. He’d propped the lift door open with his brief-case and he plopped your red one down on the mat, rang the bell and nipped back into the lift again.’

  ‘How extraordinary! There doesn’t seem to be anything missing, though,’ I said, turning over the contents one by one. ‘So he’s not a jewel thief, whatever else. Unless all these are glass copies, but I suppose even you would agree that he’d need to be a pretty fast operator to have got them made in the time? You realise what this means?’

  ‘No, what?’

  ‘I now have to tear up that carefully worded letter to the insurance company and begin carefully wording my note of thanks to Mr Carlsen. In the circumstances, it’s going to be quite hard to phrase it.’

  ‘Why not telephone?’

  ‘That might get us even more involved. You know how weak-minded I am?’

  As I spoke, the telephone rang and more involved is what we instantly became.

  ‘Hallo! Mrs Price?’

  ‘Yes, is that Mr Carlsen?’

  ‘Clever you! I was wondering if you’d had any news of your suitcase?’

  ‘The best. It’s come back.’

  ‘Gosh! That didn’t take long, did it?’

  ‘No, and thank you so much for all you’ve done. I gather you were entirely responsible.’

  This put a finger in his dyke for a moment and during the ensuing pause I winked at Ellen. She had found another lovely French gadget, an extra earpiece clamped to the back of the telephone, and was making full use of it.

  ‘One did one’s tiny best,’ Mr Carlsen said, rallying again, ‘and there’s nothing missing, I hope?’

  ‘Not a thing. I’m really most grateful.’

  ‘Don’t mensh. I’ve only one teeny favour to ask in return.’

  ‘Here we go!’ I murmured, covering the mouthpiece. ‘Oh yes?’

  ‘I was wondering if I might have the pleasure of showing you around this little building of ours? It has some quite interesting features, if you happen to like modern architecture.’

  ‘It’s very kind of you; not the sort of favour I’m often asked for, I must say. The only snag is that I doubt if we’ll have time. Robin has to leave on Tuesday and I start work the day after.’

  ‘In that case, how about Monday morning? It doesn’t take more than an hour to go round.’

  ‘Well, I don’t know . . . I’ll have to ask Robin. He’s not here at the moment, and he may have fixed something.’

  ‘Well, do try to persuade him. And I hope you’ll all have lunch with me afterwards. The restaurant isn’t quite up to Grand Vefour standards, but they do you moderately well, with a fabulous view of Paris thrown in.’

  ‘It sounds lovely, but the thing is we haven’t got an awful lot of time.’

  ‘Still you must eat. Come on, be a sport! Think of the thrill you’ll be giving all those poor tired international workers!’

  ‘You’re very kind and we’ll certainly do our best.’

  ‘What else could I say?’ I asked Ellen, as we both hung up. ‘He appealed to my worse nature.’

  ‘You could have said you were on a diet.’

  ‘It wouldn’t be true. Another breakfast like we’ve just had and I’ll be ready to go anywhere for a square meal. Now let’s concentrate for a moment and try to sort this out. Are we agreed that Mr Carlsen pinched the case, himself?’

  ‘It looks like it.’

  ‘But how? And how did he manage to conceal it about his person? It was too big to hide under his overcoat, and he certainly didn’t have it with the rest of his luggage, otherwise Robin would have seen it.’

  ‘All the same, there are a thousand ways it could have been worked.’

  ‘Name them. Not all of them,’ I added hastily, as she drew a deep breath, ‘one good one will do.’

  ‘I’ll give you two. They’re both good, but in one he’s got Mrs as an accomplice and in the other he plays a lone hand.’

  I considered this and then said: ‘Yes, I suppose she could have taken it to their car before Robin arrived on the scene, but he wouldn’t have had much time to make up a plausible excuse for having somebody else’s luggage. Let’s hear your other good one.’

  ‘Okay, how’s this? He knew that we were right at the back of the queue and had to keep stopping every five seconds to pick up something you’d dropped, so that gave him at least ten minutes to work in. So he picked up your red case and marched through the customs barrier. You remember how the man there was waving everyone through, so it was a million to one that he’d be asked to open it.’

  ‘Then what?’

  ‘Why, then he just nipped off to the consigne. All he had to do was shove it in a locker, pocket the key and go back to fetch it the next morning.’

  ‘Yes, I’ll accept that. It was rather clever of you to think of it, but it does mean that we’re dealing with a raving lunatic. What possible reason could there be for doing such a thing? I thought at first that he was pestering us just to scrape acquaintance, but no sane person would go to such lengths as that. And consider the risk! If we had happened to catch him making off with the case, it would hardly have started the friendship on a very beautiful footing.’

  ‘No, what I think is this, Tessa. It was the suitcase he was after all the time. I expect he heard you say it had your jewellery in it and he marked it down before we even left Heathrow. Then he discovered Robin was a policeman and he got the wind up. But he’d done the deed by then, so the only hope was to undo it as quickly as possible.’

  I had already noticed Ellen’s predisposition for a criminal explanation wherever she could find one and was about to point out that an organisation such as IDEAS was unlikely to number professional thieves among its personnel, when the doorbell rang again.

  ‘There’s a sort of gypsy outside,’ Ellen informed me, returning from her spy-hole. ‘Shall I let her in?’

  ‘Oh dear! Has she come to sell us something?’

  ‘Could be. She’s got a whopping great carrier bag with her.’

  ‘Oh, let her in, then. I expect we could do with some clothes-pegs.’

  She told us that her name was Lupe and, having shaken hands with great formality, strode off to the kitchen. She then removed her coat, shoes and watch, thrust them into the carrier bag, from which she had already taken an apron and some carpet slippers, and pitched into the washing-up with the enthusiasm of one who had been anticipating this particular treat all her life.

  ‘I remember now,’ I said, when we had jerked ourselves out of a stunned silence, ‘There’s a femme de ménage who goes with the flat. That’s a break, isn’t it? I imagine she’s Spanish.’

  My own Spanish was even weaker than my French, but Ellen had once spent a few months with me on location near Barcelona and she sped back to the kitchen for a brief refresher course, while I finished dressing.

  ‘She’s okay,’ she informed me ten minutes later. ‘She has four children
and her sister has eight children. Or it could be the other way round. I’m not absolutely certain.’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ I told her, ‘it’s not vital.’

  ‘She also has a key to let herself in with. She didn’t use it this morning because she was afraid of scaring you; or of you scaring her. I’m not sure which. They have this fantastic way of putting sentences back to front.’

  ‘Never mind, you’ll soon pick it up again. And just think what a linguist you’re going to be. Lupe in the morning, French movies in the evening. It should do much to reconcile your father.’

  ‘I know. I thought of that, too; but what I need most is some Paris clothes. Aren’t you ready yet?’

  ‘I’m so sorry, Ellen, but I honestly don’t think I’ll have time for it this morning. So many delays and we have to meet Robin at twelve. Why don’t you go off on your own for a bit and join us at the café when you’re through? You know where the Deux Magots is, or are?’

  ‘Yah. It’s that place just across from Le Drug Store,’ she replied, making me feel my age.

  (ii)

  It was crowded, inside and out, with colourful left-bank characters, but not an English-type Detective Inspector in sight. It was a fine September morning and I took the last empty table on the pavement, the better to watch for his arrival. It was slightly disappointing to discover that half the vie de bohème around me was speaking English, but at least the pattern of behaviour was authentically foreign. The clientèle were nearly all young and most were in groups of eight or ten. Every two seconds one or other member of a group would bound to his feet, shake hands with everyone at the table and walk briskly away, in the manner of one who had just downed the last farewell drink before emigrating to Australia. Five minutes later, to the apparent surprise of no one, he would return, often with a fresh contingent of friends, for whom places were immediately found at the table. This was invariably the signal for another member of the group to jump up and repeat the entire performance. It reminded me of an elaborate game of postman’s knock, or, come to that, of a second-rate film, where the director has nothing of significance to say but is determined to keep everyone on the move while he says it.