The Remaining Voice (9 page)

“I came for a torch,” I said, by way of explanation. “I’ll… I’ll go wait outside.”

“No. No, come here. Sit. Sit with me. I do not get visitors that often.
Armand, Qu'est-ce que tu fais?”

I cleared the bedside chair of dirty clothes and sat down.

“I think you have heard her,” Michel crooked a finger at the ceiling. I gave him a wide-eyed look. “She has a beautiful voice, no?”

I bit my lip. “Yes,” I replied.

“I have never seen her. No one has ever seen her. Have you?”

I did not know how to answer. I shrugged.

“I think you have,” Michel said, shaking a cigarette from a crumpled packet. His fingers were gnarled with arthritis and when he went to light up, he could not stop his hand from shaking. Gently, I took the lighter from him.

“Here, let me.”

He craned forward to reach the flame, the cigarette between his thin cracked lips. He sucked the smoke in deeply and fell back onto his pillow.

“You do not have to worry. She means no harm,” he said. “Especially to you. You are like her in many ways. It was a long time ago, but I remember as if it was yesterday.” He leaned forward, conspiratorially. “My wife worked for her you know?”

“Your wife?” Of course he’d had a wife. It was just not something I had given much thought.

“
Oui
. She was a good woman, but stubborn you know? She thought she was better than all of this.” He waved a hand.

“You said she worked for Berthe? Doing what?” My mind raced.

“She took care of her. She looked after the apartment when Berthe was not there. Armand will tell you. Berthe gave him piano lessons. Of course they stopped when…”

“Wait. Your wife… was her name Racine?”

“Why yes. But they all leave in the end. Her and the diva… they left together.”

“Berthe took Racine with her when she went to England? Is that what you are telling me?” Things were beginning to fall into place.

“
Oui
. I thought you knew this.”

“No. I know nothing about it. I didn’t even know she had a maid until… well yesterday.” I could not bring myself to tell the old man about the ghostly sighting.

“Ah well. It was a long time ago. All you need to know is she left me.”

“But the singing… the singing has been going on for a while?”

“
Oui
. Years and years. You get used to it.” He broke into a volley of coughs. They brought Armand to the door.

“What are you doing in here?” he asked me. He waved a large torch at me. “Bring it back when you have finished.”

“Sure,” I said, standing up. The old man gave me a sly smile.

“She has seen her,” he said, winking at me.

“Who?” replied Armand.

“Who do you think?” The old man muttered.

Armand pulled a face and waved the torch at me again. “Here, take it.”

“Thanks. I’ll have it back in five minutes.” I took the torch from him.

“Huh….” Armand wiped his nose on the back of his sleeve and stood aside to let me pass. He followed me to his front door.

“My mother never loved me,” he said.  “If she had, why would she leave me to the imbecile? Why did she not take me with her?”

“You could have left your father. You didn’t need to stay here.”

“You know nothing of my life,” he muttered, angrily.

“Did you never hear from her again?” I thought of birthdays and Christmases and hoped that Armand may have received cards from his mother.

“
Non. Jamais
. Is that all?” He stuck his chin out, his bottom lip jutting.

I sighed. He was right. I knew nothing of his life.

Chapter 12

I left the landing light on and the door wide open so I could see as far as the drawing room without too much bother. Then I turned on the torch  and negotiated my way across the room. I played the beam over the painting of Berthe. She looked rather defiant in her impressionistic pink gown. There was no sign of any damage. I still didn’t know how that could be, but I did not want to dwell on it for now.

In the inner hall the torch flickered and I shook it hard. It gave a burst of light and then nothing. Outside, the sky had cleared and a waning moon shone dimly through the windows. Apart from water dripping from a broken gutter, I heard nothing. I moved slowly, feeling my way through the gloom to the bedroom. As I crossed the threshold I heard whispering like threads of conversation teased out and tangled over and over. I almost ran right back out, but I reminded myself of what Jacques had said: Berthe was dead and could not harm me. Nothing could harm me. I passed into the room and held my breath. The air was icy cold, the light blue-grey. Nothing had an edge. Nothing looked solid. I had the feeling that if I reached out for the box containing the letters and diary my hand would pass straight through it. It was like a dream where you do not know whether you are awake or asleep – and you open your eyes only to discover you have gone even deeper. I fully expected to wake with a jolt, my senses jarred, my nerves stretched to breaking point and be back in my room at the hotel.

The box was where I had left it on the dressing table. I picked it up slowly, grateful that it was real; that it was solid. Yet in that moment, the room twisted away from me like a photograph gone wrong. I thought I was going to fall and I steadied myself against the wall, thankful too for its realness. My vision settled and quite unexpectedly it was daytime. Light streamed through the cream curtains. I heard someone call out: “
Madame,
il est important de se reposer
”
and Racine rushed into the room. She was dressed in brown, her hair neatly pinned up in a bun. She stopped abruptly, and for a moment, I thought she had seen me, but her attention was on the bed. I followed her gaze. Berthe lay in crumpled and bloodied sheets. One hand had flopped over the side of the bed, and on the floor a small bottle spilled pills onto the rug.

I almost started forward but the image cracked, like a mirror splintered by a stone.  I put a hand up to protect my face from the shards and darkness descended. I held the box tight to my chest and felt along the wall - seeing nothing, hearing nothing but the dripping gutter and my insistent heartbeat. What did it mean? What did she want of me?

In the hall I fell against the window, pressed my palm to the glass, felt its hard cool surface. I wrenched it open and sucked in the air. The moon silvered the rooftops of the building opposite, and a light went on. It was quite possible I had gone insane, but I was not ready to commit myself to the asylum just yet. I pulled the window shut and without stopping walked fast through the drawing room. I slammed the door behind me and locked it with hands shaking and tears streaming down my face. I had never been so completely afraid.

*

Back in my hotel room, I turned on the overhead light, the bedside lamp and the bathroom light. Then I rang down for room service and ordered sandwiches and a pot of coffee. I would not sleep, but then I had to go through the contents of the box. I left it on the table while I took a bath, after which I laid out my photographs on the bed, searched for the one Berthe’s Hampstead neighbour had given me, and for that which had belonged to Michel Pascal. I found the former tucked into the inside pocket of my suitcase, and the latter in a book I had left on the bedside table. I took some time studying the photographs, and wished I’d had the presence of mind to gather up those in the music room and bring them with me. I had only one shot of the table on which they stood, and could not really make any of them out clearly. One thing struck me though – Berthe had put on weight in London. The coronation picture of her in the garden showed a plump woman, not dissimilar in likeness to Racine. I wondered if it was her. After all, old man Pascal had told me she had left with Berthe. That might mean that one of the other women in the grainy snapshot was Berthe. I could not tell. I felt sure though that the neighbour would have said. She had been keen to help, and after all, she had been at the party. I wished I had known enough to ask her.

Mystified, I took the letters out of the box and arranged them in date order. Most were written by Truffaut, but there were others in differing hands, and these I set to one side. I felt better for being organised. I took out my notebook and started a new page headed: Investigation. Underneath I wrote the start date of the letters: October 1906. I opened the diary and checked the date on the first page: November 1905. I thought it possible that there were earlier diaries elsewhere in the apartment. I wanted to know about Berthe’s Russian husband, the Prince, but what I had to hand would have to suffice for now.

I read until I could no longer keep my eyes open. It was around two in the morning. I fell asleep in the chair with the diary in my lap. When I woke it was dawn. The birds were singing and I had a crick in my neck and a metallic taste in my mouth. The diary was open on a page that read: “I am heartbroken. Inconsolable. Nicholai’s death was easier to bear than this. Robert is to marry his Marseillaise fancy. He has used me to gain entry into Paris society. He has been seen with
her
. She puts herself about as a very great beauty. Oh but I would see her guillotined like her namesake if I could. I must find a husband. I cannot have the child born out of wedlock.”

I was astounded. She had been pregnant? Why did no one know about this? What of her family? Her parents? And my grandfather? Why had she told no one about it? But of course, it would have been difficult for her. One does not give birth to an illegitimate child without having to answer questions and Berthe had her reputation to think about. It would explain why she left Paris in such a hurry. To my knowledge no child had been born, although it might be possible that she put it up for adoption – or perhaps she had a miscarriage.

The blood. Of course. There was blood on the sheets -  and the pills. Had she taken something to bring about a miscarriage? I skimmed the last few pages of the diary. There was no further mention of the pregnancy. I needed to talk to my grandfather. I checked the time. It was six-thirty in the morning. Gramps would be in bed. It was twelve-thirty in New York. I set the diary aside and cleared the bed of photographs. My father might still be up. It was worth a try.

I had reception place the call for me. They put it straight through to my room without question. Briefly, I wondered how much this new-fangled transatlantic call would cost.

“Dad? It’s me. Can I talk to you a moment?”

“Oh, Sophie. You’re late. What time is it?”

“It’s morning here. I’m sorry. Were you asleep?”

“No,” he replied, but I could hear it thick in his voice. Probably, he had been napping on the sofa. “What is it? Are you still in Paris?”

“Yeah Dad, I am. I need to ask you something. Did you ever hear of Great Aunt Berthe having a child?”

For a moment I thought the connection had been broken. I heard a hiss and crackle on the line. My father coughed and said: “Uhuh.”

“Is that a yes?” I said. My father was not usually obtuse.

“Yes, it’s a yes.”

“Why did no one tell me? Did she… he… survive?”

“Yes. Yes of course.”

It was like prising precious metal from deep inside the ground.

“So, what? Adoption? What?”

“Why is this important Sophie? I need to get to bed.”

“Dad, it’s seriously weird here. I mean, I can’t begin to tell you what’s been going on. I found all this stuff she wrote and it’s so sad…”

“You found a diary?”

“Not page for page like a diary. But yeah.” I fell silent. I wanted him to fill in the gaps.

“Sophie, this is difficult for me.”

“Difficult how?”

“That baby? The one she had?”

“Yes,” I was frustrated. Why did he not just get to the point?

“That baby was me.”

The world dropped away from me.

“Say again,” I said.

“She gave me up to her brother, your grandfather. It was why he visited her in London. He was young but had recently married your grandmother. Berthe told him to raise me as his own and that she did not want to see nor hear from him again.”

“But why didn’t Gramps say anything to me? I had a whole conversation with him about his visit to her… and you? Surely you could have told me?”

“It’s not something I think about too often. I’ve never known any other mother or father than ones I was brought up with, and I suppose even after all this time, he was protecting Berthe.”

I did not know what to say. I was Berthe’s grandchild? And my grandfather? My real grandfather? That was Truffaut? Oh boy.

“Dad. He’s still alive,” I said.

“Who?” Dad replied.

“Your real father.”

“I was never told who he was,” said Dad.

Something told me he was lying. He knew. He had always known. What I was not sure of was whether he knew his father was a hoodlum from the crime capital of France.

“His name is Robert Truffaut. I’m going to see him tomorrow – no today. I’m going to see him today. The lawyer is arranging it.”

“No. Sophie no. I forbid it.”

“You can’t Dad. I’m too old to be forbidden to do anything.”

“Then wait until I get there.” He sounded angry. I supposed he had good reason. I had not stopped to think about his feelings. Not really. I had just blurted it out in the vague hope that he had known all along.

“Dad. I’m sorry. I didn’t think. You don’t need to come. Get some sleep. I’ll call again later.”

He let out a disgruntled sigh. “It is late. In the morning I will review the situation. Then I may or may not get a flight to Paris.”

The phone went dead.

*

The sun offered a brief ray of hope during my ride with Laurent to meet Truffaut. It was still windy but at least the clouds had blown away. The late blooming daffodils were struggling to open and the flowering cherries promised a profusion of blossom. I had dressed demurely. My camel coat was buttoned to my neck and I wore a silk scarf and carried gloves and matching handbag. I wanted to appear professional and organised.

Laurent, by comparison, was very casually dressed for a lawyer (no tie), and lounged on the back seat of his car as the driver took us down the wide Parisian boulevards, and out into the countryside. For a long time neither of us said anything and I watched the landscape change and tried to gain some perspective on what had happened.

Eventually, I said: “I spoke with my father this morning.”

“That is good,” was all Laurent said. Perhaps he had decided that discretion was the better part of valour as far as I was concerned.

“I guess,” I replied. I had always thought I was close to my father; that we could talk. Now it seemed like he had shut me out from the truth my entire life. I was not sure what to make of it. The car crested the brow of a low hill and a small town came into view in the valley below us.

“He wants to come to Paris. I think I’ve managed to put him off, but I have to call him later.”

“Aha.”

“I read the rest of the diary, and all of the letters,” I said.

“You did?”

“She was in love with Truffaut like no other. She would have done anything for him. She brought him to Paris and introduced him to everyone who was anyone. I have no doubt he cashed in on her fame. She lavished gifts on him; bought him a car. Can you imagine, in those days, a car! Barely anyone had a car. She even allowed him free reign over her career. Her manager wrote complaining she should not allow Truffaut to dictate what she sang and where, but you know, she just told him that Truffaut was the best thing that had ever happened to her and that he should go find some other poor canary to bother.” I sighed. The things you do when you are in love.

“It is interesting,” said Laurent. “Go on. What else?”

“Truffaut proposed and Berthe accepted. Everything seemed to be going well between them. She started to plan the wedding – had a dress fitting. She and her maid Racine talked about it at length. Did I tell you that Racine was the wife of the building manager Michel Pascal?”

Laurent shook his head. “
Non
.”

“Well she was, and she did not approve of Truffaut. It seems her intuition was right because in the winter of 1906, he was in Marseille and he picked up a new girlfriend.”

“Marianne Cloutel?”

“The same. They came to Paris just after Christmas. By this time Berthe was pregnant with his child.”

Laurent cocked his head. “Pregnant?”

“Yes, and guess what?”

Laurent twisted in his seat, and stared at me.

“
Pour quoi
?”

“That child?” I glanced at the driver. Did it matter if he knew? Probably not. He had listened to everything else I had said.

“Yes?”

“It was my father.”

Laurent frowned. He did not understand. I looked out of the window. A line of trees graced the horizon.