Belle - Lesley Pearse [206]
‘He never stays overnight. There isn’t any furniture in the upstairs rooms, only in the drawing room. Madame Florette had so many lovely things and she left those to her friends and relatives. But for some reason she left the drawing room intact for that odious man. We had all the relatives calling on us after she died to collect things – we held the keys, you see – and they were very upset that she’d left the house to this ignorant undertaker. But there was nothing anyone could do.’
‘On that night of the eleventh, he didn’t bring a young lady here, did he?’
The older man frowned. ‘He arrived alone, that’s why I went out to see him. But he may have had someone there later on, I did hear a fiacre stop. But I can’t be sure it was someone for him.’
Etienne felt the time had come to be more truthful. ‘To be honest, sir, I’m not interested in renting that house. I am trying to find a young lady who has disappeared. I am certain Monsieur Pascal had a hand in that disappearance.’
The older man looked hard at Etienne, perhaps feeling it might have been unwise to say so much to a stranger. But then he sniffed. ‘Well, he’s certainly shady enough. But are you suggesting she might be in the house now?’
‘It’s possible. She disappeared the night of the eleventh, and he did send a cab to take her to Montmartre, I have a note in his handwriting to that effect. Have you heard any noise coming from his house?’
The man shook his head. ‘But then, the walls are thick.’
‘Would it be too much of an imposition to ask if I could get over into his garden from yours?’
The man hesitated. ‘How do I know you aren’t planning to rob my neighbour?’
‘Would you care if I did?’
The older man smirked. ‘No, but I don’t like being fooled.’
‘You’ll be a hero if the girl is in there,’ Etienne said. ‘Take a risk with me? Please! He could have hurt her.’
‘Then it’s my duty to assist you. Come in.’
Etienne followed the man through a wide hall with two doors opening on to it, then on into a narrower passage which led to the kitchen, beyond which was a scullery. The man opened a door on to the yard. ‘I shall deny knowing how you gained access to his garden if you are caught,’ he said, but then smiled. ‘Good luck. You will tell me if you find the girl?’
‘You and the whole neighbourhood will know,’ Etienne said. ‘I am indebted to you.’
Etienne could see immediately why Pascal’s neighbour was so rattled, for in the light coming from his scullery he could see the bushes and brambles on the other side of the six-foot wall dividing the two houses were thick and tall. Though not yet in full leaf, by summer they would be rambling over on to the small, neat yard.
He climbed the wall as effortlessly as a cat and chose a spot to get down to the other side where the brambles were less thick. Even in the dark he could see that the whole garden was totally overgrown. Here and there he could see almost luminous white blossom and smell a sweet, musky scent, which told him it had once been a much loved garden. He waited among the bushes until his eyes grew used to the dark, and then went down to the end of the garden where there was a large tree. He turned and looked back at the house. The three-quarter moon was bright, hanging right above the house, and he could see that it was taller than both its neighbours. There were no lights except a faint glow in a narrow window on the first floor, by which he assumed that it was the window on the stairs, and the light was coming up from the hall.
Going back to the house, he tried the back door, which he found was locked and bolted. Locks were no deterrent to him, but bolts were, so he looked around for an easier way in. The small window beside the back door looked good. He always carried a thin, sharp knife in a leather sheath attached to his belt and he took it out and slid the blade between the window and the frame. He could feel the metal of the catch and it was stiff, but it lifted after a couple of seconds of working on it, and the window opened.
He climbed in to find he was above