For the King Read online

  “Did the man tell you his name, Citizen Lambel?”

  “I asked him, but he pretended like he didn’t hear me, and I didn’t press him. I didn’t want him to change his mind about buying the horse, specially for 200 francs. Still, I’m curious. Always poking your nose in other people’s business, like my wife says. So I was itching to know more ’bout that man. After he’d drunk his fill at the tavern, I asked him, innocent like, where he lived, and he said he stayed with his sister.”

  “Did he tell you his sister’s name, or her address?”

  “I asked, of course. But he looked like he felt a bit silly for telling me about his sister. Like he’d sobered up all of a sudden. So he wouldn’t tell me no more about her after that.”

  “And what was the man like?”

  “Oh, he was no beauty, that’s for sure. Short, fat. With a big round face.” Citizen Lambel pulled his arms away from his slender body and puffed his usually hollow cheeks to mimic the man’s appearance. “And a flat nose, like he’d run into a wall. And a scar that pulled on his eyelid, the left one. Around forty years of age, I’d say. He had curly hair, and he wore it powdered, which I found mighty odd for a stallholder. And he wasn’t dressed like one either, at least the firs’ time I saw him. He had a dark blue coat, and yellow breeches, tied around the knees with ribbons. And stockings that had stripes that went up and down, and he wore laced shoes and a round hat. Fancy, he looked, but vulgar at the same time, if you catch my meaning. To tell you the truth, Citizen Chief Inspector, I wouldn’t have liked him half as much if he hadn’t been so fond of parting with his money.”

  This seemed to fit the description of François Carbon, alias Short Francis, in the Minister’s note. “You are very observant, Citizen Lambel,” said Roch. “I am sure this is not all you have noticed about that man.”

  “True, I don’t keep my eyes inside my pockets, so to speak. I can tell you the man snuffed tobacco. From a small wooden snuffbox. Round, it was. There was a fine picture of a horseman on it, with a sword at his side. My wife said it looked like the King of England, but I asked her: How d ’you know, woman? You clapped your eyes on the King of England yet? You see, I don’t like telling things when I ain’t sure.”

  Lambel paused to catch his breath. “But when the short man came back the next day, he was dressed like a stallholder that time, in a blue jacket. He even told my wife that he’d paid ten francs for it. A vas’ deal of money it is for a jacket like that, if you want my opinion, Citizen Chief Inspector. But I kept mum ’bout it, ’cause he didn’t ask my opinion, did he? And I reckoned it’d be foolish of me to give him ideas like he was paying too much for things. Then he said he wanted to buy a bushel of peas and another one of lentils, and he needed a barrel as well to keep them. I charged him twice the price for the whole thing, but he didn’t say nothing ’bout it. If a man likes to spend his money freely, it’s his business, eh, Citizen Chief Inspector?”

  “Exactly, Citizen Lambel. I don’t see that you did anything wrong.”

  The man shook his head with satisfaction. “Aye, that’s the way me and my wife see it too. I asked the man if he had any place to keep the horse and cart, ’cause I could rent him my own shed, where I’d kept them. I liked his custom, see. But when he took a look at my shed, he said it wouldn’t do ’cause it didn’t lock. He said you don’t feel at home in a place that hasn’t a good lock. Then he said he needed to get a cover for the cart. I told him Brunet could make one. I owed Brunet a good turn, see, for bringing me such a fine customer.”

  “And Citizen Brunet made this cover?”

  “Oh, yes, but he told me later that the man wasn’t happy ’cause it was too short. Brunet’d made it like usual, but the man wanted it to go down to the hubs of the cart, or else his wares’d be spoiled by the rain. Brunet’d never heard of a cover needing to go down so low, and me neither, but he didn’t say nothing ’bout it, and he made the cover fit the way the man liked.”

  “What kind of cover was it?”

  “A tarpaulin. A plain gray tarpaulin.”

  “Was it the last you saw of the short man?”

  Lambel sighed. “Yes. A pity, ’cause I wish I’d more customers like that.”

  “So where did he take the horse and cart?”

  “That I don’t know. Some place with a good lock, I reckon.”

  Roch ordered the guard to replace the oilcloth onto the carcass. Lambel cast a last look at the horse. “When you think he’d promised to take good care of her!” Squinting, he turned to Roch. “Say, Citizen Chief Inspector, about that reward of 2,000 louis that’s posted all over town?”

  “Well, Citizen Lambel, you have provided very helpful information. Once the guilty parties are brought to justice and convicted, I encourage you to apply for the reward. You certainly deserve it.”

  Roch grinned happily at Lambel. Things were taking a hopeful turn. Fouché, in his note, had pointed Roch in the correct direction: the man nicknamed Short Francis was indeed involved in the Rue Nicaise attack. And he was a Chouan. This meant that Roch, whatever the Prefect said or thought, had been right to suspect the Royalists. Now he was vindicated. But what a pity the grain merchant’s shed did not lock!

  Now the carcass of the horse had run its course. Roch was not sorry to have it leave the Prefecture for one of the veterinary pits outside the city limits. There stood the shops of the boyautiers, the men who skinned the carcasses and sold the bowels to makers of musical instruments. But the belly of the little mare had been blown away by the explosion days before it reached the pit. Her innards had been denied the ultimate grace of finishing as the strings of a fiddle.

  15

  Roch felt that he deserved the luxury of a lunch with someone who was not a fellow policeman or a witness. He decided to call on his friend Mulard, a painter and for many years a faithful patron of the Mighty Barrel. Old Miquel liked the fellow and regularly forgave his debt to the tavern.

  Now Roch crossed over to the Right Bank by way of the Pont-Neuf and turned in the direction of the Louvre. It was now called a museum, and the King’s collections had been opened to the public after the fall of the Monarchy. The inner courtyard was occupied by temporary constructions where painters’ studios were housed. Roch winced at the smell of urine as he walked by the latrines that had been built against the blackened walls of the former palace.

  Roch pushed the door to the construction occupied by the studio of the famous painter Jacques-Louis David, under whose direction Mulard practiced his art. Two of the master’s best-known works, The Oath of the Horatii and Brutus, each occupied one of the walls. A male model, clothed in an antique drapery, was seated on a sort of dais, his eyes raised to the heavens. Spare furniture and plaster mannequins were stored in a corner of the room, painted a drab greenish gray. A dozen young men and a woman were gathered there. A male student suddenly burst into song: The insane fanaticism,

  Sworn enemy of our liberties,

  Has expired.

  It had been written as a war song for the Republic’s armies in the fight against the Chouans. Apparently diverse political opinions were represented in David’s studio, for some students joined in heartily, while others greeted the song by jeers and whistles.

  Roch spotted Mulard in his threadbare coat. The painter cut a conspicuous figure, with his fiery beard that contrasted with his darker, unkempt locks. Not many people in Paris, save a few artistic types, wore facial hair. Apparently oblivious to the uproar, Mulard was applying touches of his brush to two life-size figures, outlined in chalk and already partially painted against a blank background divided into a grid. Next to him sat a young woman in a black bonnet and an elegant pelisse lined with sable. She too seemed unfazed by the song. She was drawing on a sheet of paper resting on a portfolio on her lap.

  “Ah, Miquel,” cried Mulard. The commotion died down, allowing conversations to resume. He turned to the young woman. “Please, Madame de Nallet, allow me introduce my friend Roch Miquel. I say friend, in spite of his
rather unfortunate profession. He is Chief Inspector at the Police Prefecture.”

  Roch bowed slightly. He knew Madame de Nallet by name. A ci-devant noblewoman, a society lady. Blanche had on occasion mentioned her in connection with various parties. Though her features were not regular, Madame de Nallet had a small, delicate figure and fine brown eyes. She smiled pleasantly and inclined her head.

  “Madame de Nallet has been my pupil for over a month now,” continued Mulard. “She wishes to improve her skills at painting flowers, and already shows much talent for it.”

  Roch pursed his lips. Flowers, of all things! This woman was not there to learn history painting, or to become a portraitist. Of course she was rich, she did not need the money. Her artistic ambitions must be limited to painting fans, screens and knickknacks to decorate her salon and display to rapturous friends. But Roch understood that Mulard was poor, and needed the fee this fair student could afford to pay.

  “No disrespect to my friend Mulard,” Roch asked Madame de Nallet, “but why did you not seek Citizen David himself as an instructor?”

  “Oh, he was the one who referred me to Monsieur Mulard. Monsieur David, much to my regret, does not take any students who wish to specialize in light subjects. I am nevertheless fortunate, for he visits here every day and kindly offers me his guidance.” She smiled at Mulard. “It is already a great honor to be allowed to work in the Master’s studio, under the direction of one of his pupils.”

  “The honor is all mine, Madame,” said Mulard. “And, if I may be so bold, the pleasure as well. Madame de Nallet’s company and conversation are a welcome change here. Before you arrived, Miquel, she was telling me of her brother. His name has just been removed from the list of the émigrés.”

  Roch inclined his head slightly. “My congratulations, Citizen Nallet.”

  “Thank you, Sir.” The young woman was flushed with evident pleasure. “My brother left France in 1792. He used to fight in the army of the Princes, but now he can return safely to Paris. I expect him any day. Can you imagine that it has been eight years since I saw him? I have missed him so!”

  Roch’s disdain for the young woman gave way to a warmer feeling. “I do wish you and your brother joy, Citizen.”

  “Indeed, Sir, it is time for those who lost entire fortunes, and sometimes family members, to the horrors of the Revolution to receive justice at last.”

  Roch frowned. In his opinion, the laws that made it a crime for an émigré to return without prior permission were still justified. Many of those men and women came back to France with the sole purpose of stoking the unrest in the West, spying for the benefit of England or brewing trouble of some kind or other. His dislike for Madame de Nallet returned in full force.

  “What returning émigrés are receiving,” he said dryly, “and it is already a great deal, is a pardon. They should expect no more. I, for one, am all in favor of national reconciliation. It behooves France to be generous in victory and open its doors to its misguided citizens, provided that they agree at last to abide by the laws of their country.”

  Madame de Nallet’s smile had frozen on her lips. Roch turned his attention to the figures on Mulard’s canvas.

  “So, Mulard, what is your subject?” he asked.

  “Virginius Showing Appius The Dagger With Which He Just Killed His Daughter.”

  “Daggers, blood, killings . . . You like the same subjects as David.”

  “Oh, these days David has no time for history painting. He is busy finishing his portrait of General Bonaparte Crossing the Alps, and I spend much of my time upstairs, assisting him. Believe me, it will be a masterpiece. Madame de Nallet can tell you about it: David showed it to her the other day.”

  Roch felt a great desire to escape the young woman’s company. “Is that so? Would you mind showing it to me?”

  “Let’s go then.”

  Roch bowed rather stiffly to Madame de Nallet and followed his friend up a flight of stairs to a brighter room, better lit and painted white. In the far corner stood a wooden horse, on which sat a mannequin dressed in a blue uniform coat, its arm extended. A matching hat, trimmed in gold braid, covered the blank head. The next thing Roch noticed, resting on an easel, was a life-size portrait of the First Consul on horseback.

  Roch drew closer and gazed at the image of Bonaparte, riding a prancing black-and-white horse and pointing to distant snowy summits. A column of soldiers pulling a cannon climbed a mountain pass in the background. They seemed minuscule under the horse’s hooves. That gave Bonaparte’s figure a gigantic, heroic dimension. The horse’s nostrils flared, the veins of its belly seemed to throb with the contained emotion of the scene. Roch remained motionless, fascinated by the power of the painting.

  “Bonaparte looks dashing here,” he said, now gazing at the face of the portrait. David had given the First Consul angular, handsome features, and dark hair that was blown into his face by the wind. Roch had seen the First Consul from afar on the occasion of military reviews, and he remembered him as a man of average height, thin to the point of emaciation.

  “I am not struck by the likeness,” said Roch. “Does Bonaparte come here to sit for David?”

  Mulard laughed. “Bonaparte, come here? No, he has neither the time nor the patience to sit for anyone. That’s why he invites David to the Tuileries almost every day. In that fashion David has become familiar with his features and can paint them from memory. Frankly, I don’t think Bonaparte cares much about the likeness. But, as for the clothes,” said Mulard, nodding at the mannequin, “you are looking at the very uniform he wore on the battlefield of Marengo.”

  Roch grinned. “So the uniform might be truer to the original than the face.”

  Mulard nudged Roch’s elbow. “Don’t repeat it, but I tried the hat the other day, when David was gone to lunch at the Tuileries. It is so large that it came down to my eyes. Bonaparte has a huge head!”

  “Your secret is safe with me. Speaking of lunch, I am hungry. Let’s go to the nearest tavern. My treat.”

  Mulard’s face brightened. “Thank you, Miquel, you are a true friend. Madame de Nallet brings a lunch basket every day, and she insists on sharing with me her cold meats, fine pastries and hot-house fruit. It embarrasses me not to be able to return the favor.”

  After the two men sat down to a dish of salt cod and potatoes, Mulard asked, “So how is your father?”

  “Very well, as usual, thank you. Still managing the Mighty Barrel with an iron fist. But tell me more about this new student of yours.”

  “Madame de Nallet? She is charming, isn’t she?”

  “Yes, she seems pleasant enough. Did you hear her talk about her brother receiving justice? Does it not strike you as an odd coincidence, this Nallet woman trying to become David’s student, coming to his studio daily, and doing everything to ingratiate herself with him, just at the time when she is seeking permission for her brother to return to France?”

  “You always see suspicious motives behind everything, Miquel. That’s a bad habit you’ve acquired in your line of work. All I can tell you is that she is a very assiduous student. She arrives at the studio without fault every day at eight, quite a feat for a fine lady like her. If she tries by the same token to help her brother by currying favor with David, so what?”

  “Bonaparte, from what you say, seems quite enamored of David.”

  “The feeling is mutual. David admires Bonaparte, sincerely so. He can’t help it: he has always been in thrall to power. Before Bonaparte, at the height of the Revolution, it was Robespierre. But David, in spite of his faults, is generous and does not forget less prosperous friends, like Topino or me. He pays us handsomely whenever we assist him, and he sends us students of our own. But then he hardly needs the money these days.”

  Roch easily believed it. A few months earlier, Mulard, who had received free tickets, had taken him to the exhibition of David’s giant painting, The Sabine Women, at the Louvre. It was the first time an artist dared charge a fee to display his
work to the public, and yet all of Paris was still flocking there to admire the masterpiece.

  “Say, Miquel,” asked Mulard in a lowered voice, “speaking of Topino, what is happening to him? You know as well as I do that he had nothing to do with that Conspiracy of Daggers nonsense. When is he going to get out of jail?”

  Roch had met Topino on occasion, when Mulard had brought his fellow painter to the Mighty Barrel.

  “Frankly, Mulard, I can’t tell. After that Rue Nicaise business, the government is in no hurry to release men linked, however tenuously, to any plan to assassinate the First Consul.”

  “Well, I will tell you why Topino was arrested. He was arrested for his political opinions. He is a Jacobin, and he used to be a juror of the Revolutionary Tribunal. Mark my words, those are the only true charges against him. I worry for him, Miquel.”

  “I understand, Mulard, but things are moving in the right direction. We are making progress on the Rue Nicaise investigation. When the bastards responsible for this atrocity are arrested, and they will be soon, the situation will return to normal. Men like Topino will be cleared of any suspicions and released. All in due time.”

  Roch paid for the meals and rose. He slapped Mulard on the back and returned to the Prefecture. Whatever he did, he could not escape the investigation.

  16

  Roch had ordered a thorough search of every courtyard and shed within five hundred yards of the shop of the grain merchant Lambel. The little mare, according to Dr. Huzard, was old and tired, and Roch could not picture Short Francis taking her very far.

  That afternoon, he repressed a cry of triumph upon hearing Inspector Alain’s report. Alain had just spoken to a woman, Citizen Roger, who had rented a shed to a short, squat man on Rue de Paradis, three hundred yards from Lambel’s shop.