Night Rounds (9 page)

Je suis seul

ce soir

avec ma peine…..

Avenue Kléber, my heart beat a little faster. The front of the Baltimore Hotel. Cimarosa Square. Codébo and Robert le Pale were standing guard in front of No.
3
bis
. Codébo gave me a smile that displayed his gold teeth. I walked up one Right and opened the living-room door. The Khedive, in a dusty-pink silk brocade dressing gown, motioned to me. Mr. Philibert was checking file cards: "How's the R.K.S. doing, Swing Troubadour?" The Khedive gave me a sharp rap on the shoulder and a cognac: "Very scarce. Three hundred thousand francs a bottle. Don't worry. There are no shortages at Cimarosa Square. And the R.K.S.? What's new there?" No, I still hadn't obtained the addresses of the "Knights of the Shadows." By the end of the week, for sure. "Supposing we set our roundup on the Rue Boisrobert for some afternoon when
all the R.K.S. members are there? What do you say to that, Troubadour?" I discouraged this plan. It would be better to arrest them individually. "We've no time to lose, Troubadour." I calmed their impatience, promising again to come up with some definite information. Sooner or later they'd press me so hard that to get them off my back I'd have to keep my promises. The "haul" would take place. I would finally earn that epithet "stool pigeon" the one that made my heart skip, my head reel, every time I heard it.
STOOL PIGEON
. Still, I tried to postpone the deadline by assuring my two bosses that the R.K.S. group was innocuous. Dreamy-eyed kids. Full of ideals, nothing more. Why not let the blessed idiots be? They had a particular disease: youth, which you get over pretty fast. In a few months they'd be much more tractable. Even the Lieutenant would abandon the struggle. And anyway, was there any struggle other than a heated debate with constantly recurring words like Justice, Progress, Truth, Democracy, Freedom, Revolution, Honor, and Patriotism? The whole thing struck me as completely harmless. As I saw it, the only dangerous man was
LAM-BALLE
, whom I'd not yet identified. Invisible. Elusive. The real brains behind the R.K.S. He would act, indeed, and with the utmost brutality. The very mention of his name at the Rue Boisrobert evoked murmurs of awe and admiration.
LAM-BALLE
! Who was he? When I put this question to the Lieutenant, he evaded it. "
LAMBALLE
will take care of the gangsters and traitors who have the upper hand
just now.
LAMBALLE
strikes swiftly and surely. We shall obey
LAMBALLE
blindly.
LAMBALLE
is never wrong.
LAMBALLE
is a tremendous person.
LAMBALLE
, our only hope …" I couldn't get any more definite information. With a little patience we'd unmask the mystery man. I kept telling the Khedive and Philibert that capturing Lamballe ought to be our sole target.
LAM-BALLE
! The others weren't important. A nice bunch of babblers. I asked that they be spared. "We'll see. First get details on this Lamballe person. Understand?" The Khedive's mouth curled up in a menacing leer. Philibert, looking pensive, stroked his mustache and murmured:
"
LAM-BALLE, LAM-BALLE
.
"
"I'll settle this
LAMBALLE
'
s hash," the Khedive concluded, "and neither London, Vichy, nor the Americans will be able to save him. Cognac? Craven? Help yourself, my boy." "We've just made a deal for the Sebastiana del Piombo," announced Philibert. "Here's your
10
per cent commission." He handed me a pale-green envelope. "Get me some Asian bronzes for tomorrow. We've got a client." I rather enjoyed these sideline jobs they gave me: locating works of art and delivering them straight to Cimarosa Square. In the morning I'd enter the homes of the wealthy who'd left Paris on the heels of events. All I had to do was pick a lock or get a key from the caretaker by showing my police card. I searched abandoned houses from cellar to attic. The owners had left numerous unimportant items behind: pastels, vases, tapestries, books, illuminated manuscripts. That wasn't enough. I looked for
storerooms, vaults, places where, in periods of uncertainty, extremely valuable collections might be hidden. An attic in the suburbs rewarded me with Gobelin tapestries and Persian carpets, a musty garage at Porte Champferret was crammed with old masters. In a cellar in Auteuil, a foot locker containing antique and Renaissance jewelry. I went about my looting cheerfully and even with a sense of pleasure that I would regret – later on – in court. We were living in extraordinary times. Stolen objects and black-marketeering converted into ready cash, and the Khedive, justly appraising my talents, used me for tracking down works of art rather than precious objects of nonferrous metal. I was grateful for this. I experienced great esthetic pleasures. For example, standing before a Goya depicting the assassination of the Princess de Lamballe. The owner had tried to save it by hiding it in a vault at the Franco-Serbian Bank at
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Rue Helder. All I had to do was show my police card and they turned over this masterpiece to me. We sold all the looted property. A strange time. It will turn me into a rather "unsavory" character. Finger man, looter, murderer perhaps. I was no worse than the next man. I followed the trend, simple as that. I'm not unduly attracted to evil. One day I met an old gentleman covered with rings and laces. He told me in his quavering voice that he clipped out pictures of criminals from
Detective
magazine, for he found a "savage" and "malevolent" beauty in their faces. He admired their "unalterable" and "lofty" solitude and mentioned one of them, Eugene Weidmann, calling him the "angel of the shadows." This old fellow was a literary man. I told him that on the day of Weidmann's execution he wore crepe-soled shoes. His mother had bought them for him in Frankfort some time back. And that if you really cared for people, humble details of this sort deserve your attention. The rest was unimportant. Poor Weidmann! At this very moment Hitler has gone to sleep sucking his thumb, and I glance pityingly at him. He yelps, like a dreaming dog. He curls up, shrivels steadily, inch by inch; he would fit in the palm of my hand. "What are you thinking about, Swing Troubadour?" "About our Führer, Mr. Philibert." "We're going to sell the Frans Hals very shortly. You get a
15
per cent commission for your trouble. If you help us capture Lamballe, I'll give you a five hundred thousand franc bonus. Enough to set you up royally. Have a cognac?" My head is reeling. Probably the scent of the flowers. The living room was buried under the dahlias and the orchids. A colossal rosebush between the two windows partly hid the self-portrait of M. de Bel-Respiro. Ten in the evening. One after another they poured into the room. The Khedive greeted them in a plum-colored tuxedo flecked with green. Mr. Philibert gave them a slight nod and returned to his files. Now and then he would walk up to one of them, exchange a few words, make some notes. The Khedive was passing around drinks, cigarettes, and petits fours. M. and Mme de Bel-Respiro would have been amazed to find
such a gathering in their living room: there was the "Marquis" Lionel de Zieff, convicted of larceny, breach of trust, receiving stolen property, and illegal possession of decorations; Costachesco, a Roumanian banker, stock market manipulations and fraudulent bankruptcies; "Baron" Gaétan de Lussatz, society gigolo, holder of both French and Monegasque passports; Pols de Helder, gentleman-burglar; Rachid von Rosenheim, Mr. Germany of
1938
, professional sharper; Jean-Farouk de Méthode, owner of the Cirque d'Automne and L'Heure Mauve, procurer, outlawed throughout the British Commonwealth; Ferdinand Poupet, alias "Paulo Hayakawa," insurance broker, ex-convict, forgery and use of forged documents; Otto da Silva, "The Rich Planter," part-time spy; "Count" Baruzzi, art expert and drug addict; Darquier, alias "de Pellepoix," bogus lawyer; I van off the Oracle, Bulgarian phony, "official tattooist for the Coptic Church"; Odicharvi, police spy in White Russian circles; Mickey de Voisins, "
La Soubrette
," homosexual prostitute; Costantini, former air force commandant; Jean Le Houleux, journalist, ex-treasurer of the Club du Pavois, and blackmailer; the Chapochnikoff brothers, the exact number of whom or what they did for a living I never knew. Several women: Lucie Onstein, alias "Frau Sultana," strip-teaser at Rigolett's; Magda d'Andurian, who ran a high-class "hotel" in Palmyra, Syria; Violette Morris, weight-lifting champion, always dressed like a man; Emprosine Marousi, Byzantine princess, drug addict and lesbian; Simone Bouquereau and Irène de Tranzé, permanently on call at the One-Two-Two Club; "Baroness" Lydia Stahl, who adored champagne and fresh flowers. All these people were regular visitors to No.
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bis
. They had sprung up in the blackout, in an era of despair and want, through a phenomenon much like spontaneous generation. Most of them had key jobs with the "Paris-Berlin-Monte
Carlo lntercommercial Company." Zieff, Méthode, and Helder were in charge of the leather department. Through clever agents they obtained carloads of calfskin which the P.B.M.C.I. Co. resold at twelve times the market price. Costachesco, Hayakawa, and Rosenheim specialized in metals, fats, and mineral oils. Ex-Commandant Costantini operated in a narrower but still lucrative sector: glassware, perfumes, chamois, biscuits, screws, and bolts. The others were singled out by the Khedive for the more sensitive jobs. Lussatz had custody of the funds which arrived in great quantity each morning at Cimarosa Square. Da Silva and Odicharvi tracked down gold and foreign currency. Mickey de Voisins, Baruzzi, and "Baroness" Lydia Stahl catalogued the contents of private houses where there were works of art for me to seize. Hayakawa and Jean Le Houleux took care of the office accounts. Darquier served as counsel. As for the Chapochnikoff brothers, they had no definite function and simply fluttered around. Simone Bouquereau and Irène de Tranzé were the Khedive's official secretaries. Princess Marousi arranged useful little matters for
us in social and banking circles. Frau Sultana and Violette Morris made a great deal of money as informers. Magda d'Andurian, an aggressive, hardheaded woman, canvassed the North of France and would come up with quantities of tarpaulin and woolens. And finally, let's not overlook the staff members who confined themselves solely to police work: Tony Breton, a fop, noncom in the Foreign Legion, and veteran extortionist; Jo Reocreux, who ran a bordello; Vital-Léca, known as "Golden Throat," hired killer; Armand le Fou: "I'll tear 'em apart, every last one of 'em"; Codébo and Robert le Pâle, up for deportation, working as porters and bodyguards; Danos "the Mammoth," otherwise known as "Big Bill"; Gouari, "the American," gunman for hire by the hour. The Khedive ruled over this cheerful little community which subsequent annals of the law will designate as "the Cimarosa Square Gang." Meanwhile, business was in full swing. Zieff was toying with plans to take over the Victorine, Eldorado, and Folies-Wagram studios; Helder was organizing a "stock company" to control every hotel along the Riviera; Costachesco bought up real estate by the block; Rosenheim announced that "the whole of France will soon be ours for the asking, to resell to the highest bidder." I watched and listened to these lunatics. Their faces, under the light from the chandeliers, were dripping sweat. Their talk grew staccato. Rebates, brokerage fees, commissions, supplies on hand, carloads, profit margins. The Chapochnikoff brothers, in ever-growing numbers, were tirelessly refilling champagne glasses. Frau Sultana cranked the victrola. Johnny Hess:

Get into the mood,

Forget your worries …..

She unbuttoned her blouse, broke into a jazz step. The others followed suit. Codébo, Danos, and Robert le Pale entered the living room. They wove their way among the dancers, reached Mr. Philibert, and whispered a few words in his ear. I was looking out the window. An auto with no lights in front of No.
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. Vital-Léca held
a
flashlight, Reocreux opened the car door. A man, in handcuffs. Gouari shoved him brutally toward the entrance. I thought of the Lieutenant, the boys of Vaugirard. Some night I'd see them all in chains like this one. Breton would give them the shock treatment. After that … Can I go on living with this remorse? Pernety and his black leather shoes. Picpus and his girl's letters. The periwinkleblue eyes of Saint-Georges. Their dreams, all their wonderful fantasies would come to an end between the blood-spattered cellar walls of No.
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bis
. Because of me. And don't think I use these terms lightly: "shock treatment," "blackout," "finger man," "hired killer." I'm reporting what I've seen, what I've lived through. With no embellishments. I'm not inventing a thing. Every single person I mention has existed. I'm even going so far as to give their actual names. As for my own tastes, I rather like
hollyhocks, moonlit gardens, the tango of happier days. A shopgirl's heart. I've been unlucky. You could hear their groans rising from the basement, stifled at last by the music. Johnny Hess:

Now I'm here

Now there's rhythm

To wing you away…..

Frau Sultana was enticing them with shrill cries. Ivanoff waved his "lighter-than-iron rod." They jostled each other, gasped for breath, their dancing grew spasmodic, they upset a vase of dahlias in their path, resumed their wild gesticulating.

Music is

the magic potion …..

The door was flung open. Codébo and Danos held him up by the armpits. The handcuffs were still on him. His face dripped blood. He staggered, collapsed in the middle of the living room. The others remained motionless, waiting. Only the Chapochnikoff brothers moved about, as if nothing was happening, gathering up the fragments of a vase, straightening the flowers. One of them stole toward Baroness Lydia with an offering of orchids.