Cezanne's Quarry (25 page)

Until Darwin, what was stressed by his present adherents was precisely the harmonious co-operative working of organic nature, how the plant kingdom supplies animals with nourishment and oxygen, and animals supply plants with manure, ammonia, and carbonic acids. Hardly was Darwin recognized before the same people saw everywhere nothing but
struggle.

—Friedrich Engels,
Dialectics of Nature
, 1872-82
⁷

T
HE NEWS SHOULD HAVE BEEN GOOD,
but it could not have been worse. Martin was at the back door of the courthouse ordering a gendarme to fetch Old Joseph, when Franc interrupted them.

“I just spoke with the Englishman. He said he’d tell you everything you need to know. But he insists that you come to him, in his cell, alone.”

“That’s odd. I was planning on interrogating him in chambers—all day if necessary,” Martin said with an ironic grin. Franc did not return his smile. Was his intrepid inspector upset that Martin might be the one to break the case?

“He says he won’t talk there. Only in the cell.”

Martin thought for moment, then shrugged. If Westerbury was really going to tell the truth, then Martin was ready to meet him anywhere.

“I—” Martin was about to agree when he realized that Franc was scrutinizing him, watching his every reaction.

Franc took hold of Martin’s arm. “Before you do anything else this morning, you need to come downstairs to identify a body.”

The blow struck Martin hard in the chest. Another murder victim? Or, was it the unthinkable: they had found Merckx.

“He was wearing your jacket.”

If his life had not depended on his staying on his feet, Martin might have fainted. His ears began to ring. He could not move, he could not breathe, he could not speak. It was as if he were drowning. Merckx. Or maybe—this was a crazy hope, he knew, but it was his only hope—maybe it was someone else, someone who had waylaid Merckx or taken the jacket from under his head while he was sleeping in the woods. Maybe it was a poacher, a prankster, or a common thief. But every rational bone in his being told him there was no hope.

“Sir?”

“I’m just confused about how someone could have gotten my jacket.” A feeble lie if there ever was one. “Did you find any identification on him?”

“Only a passport, obviously false. I suspect he was a deserter.”

By now the fear had coalesced in Martin’s chest, weighing him down. Soon he would be gasping for air. But he had to breathe, move his legs, and think. Most of all, at this moment, he had to show a willingness to go the morgue.

Suddenly he felt Franc’s heavy hand on his shoulder. “Come on now. Remember, we are a team. We’re in this together.” This gesture only told Martin that his fright was all too evident. It did not tell him whether Franc intended to be an accuser or a friend. Nor did it tell him how much Franc knew or suspected. And if Franc knew or suspected anything, how could Martin ever be sure that his ambitious, ever-vigilant inspector would keep his silence?

Afraid that any of the questions whirling around in his head might tumble out, Martin said nothing. He nodded his assent, pulled away from Franc, and crossed the street to the prison. As he descended into the basement, he kept reminding himself not to hang on to the railing for support. Franc was two steps behind him.

Dr. Riquel was waiting by the covered corpse. Despite a numbing sensation in his chest and limbs, which made it almost impossible for him to walk toward the table, Martin somehow did just that. He took a place opposite Riquel, who said his good-mornings and began to peel the sheet from the body. The first thing Martin saw was the corn-yellow hair, then the pallid thin face. Martin’s knees would have buckled under him if he had not been holding on to the edge of the cool iron slab.

“How?”

“Shot by two of my men,” Franc answered from behind. “We heard there was a deserter in the district, Jean-Jacques Merckx, and that he was an anarchist and a traitor.”

And my oldest and best friend. My impossible, demanding, and persistent conscience.
Martin could not stop the tears, so there was no use denying that he knew the dead man.

“Was he running away? Did he say anything before he died?”
Did he mention me? Did you have to shoot him?

“We tried to get him to stop, but he kept running.”

This could not be. Any normal man could outrun the sickly Merckx. Martin looked down at the body. Four bullet holes had pierced Merckx’s emaciated frame.

Martin swiped at the tears that were running down his cheeks, and forced himself to stop sniveling. Then he pulled the sheet up over his friend’s face. “I can confirm that this is Jean-Jacques Merckx, born in Lille, about twenty-six years ago.” He managed to say this in a steady voice, devoid of feeling. He was getting used to dead bodies. “Merckx was a boyhood friend. But,” his heart began to race as he formulated another lie, “I have not seen him since Paris. He must have found out my address, gone there while I was away, and taken things. I’ve been so busy, I must not have noticed what was missing from my room.” He hastened to add, since they had probably found Martin’s paltry savings on Merckx’s body, “Nor have I had occasion to look in my money box. I assume there’s nothing left.”

“You hadn’t seen him—?” Franc sounded unconvinced by Martin’s flimsy fabrications.

“No.” The denial would have come out like a shout if Martin had had the strength. Instead, it was merely a rasp.

“Apparently he had been asking about you near the courthouse. You were in luck, sir, if you did not cross paths.”

Franc’s “if” hung in the air. Martin glanced across the corpse at Riquel, who showed no signs of caring one way or the other. “What are you going to do with the body?” Martin asked quietly.

“I’ll take a photograph.” Riquel was businesslike as usual. “We’ll send it to the army and bury him here in the common grave.”

With Solange Vernet. Martin had meant to make sure that she would be treated with respect. He had failed her. At least Merckx would not care about being buried in sacred ground. Quite the opposite. A violent and anonymous end was the only one he had ever wished for.

Merckx’s cold gray hand lay exposed on the table. Martin touched the fingers and said in his heart what he could not say aloud.
Good-bye, dear Jean-Jacques. May you find more peace in death than you ever did in life.
Martin pushed his friend’s hand back under the sheet while he considered his next move. He had to get away without revealing anything else. He had to find a place to recover his forces.

Martin turned to Franc. “I assume there is no hurry in going to see Westerbury?”

The inspector shook his head warily, never taking his eyes from Martin’s face.

“Well, then, I’m going to let him rot in his cell a little longer. Let’s make sure he knows who’s in charge. I’ll be back this afternoon to decide when and where I am going to interrogate him.” Having delivered this bit of unlikely bravado, Martin turned to the professor to shake hands. “Riquel, thanks as always for your service.” Giving a final nod to Franc, Martin headed up the stairs, leaving his companions to decide for themselves how much of a coward and liar he really was.

Walking a straight line had never been more difficult. Or more necessary. Anyone could be watching. Franc, a gendarme, even a reporter. Martin passed a café but knew he would not be able to stomach a coffee, or even give the order for one. Habit took him along the narrow streets that led past the Saint-Sauveur Cathedral. He decided to slip inside. It was the one place where no one would bother him, and where he could easily see if someone were following. If they were, he thought with bitter irony, at least they would not accuse him of being a godless anarchist.

After he closed the wooden door, Martin slid to his left to watch the entrance. Save for a few old women in widow’s weeds, no one else came in. The burning wax and the incense, which still lingered from the morning mass, filled the air with the comforting odors of innocence and childhood. What he saw before him was just as familiar. Two nuns glided from altar to altar, dusting and replacing votive candles. Worshipers were scattered throughout the cathedral, fingering their rosaries or hanging their heads over folded hands. Wrapped in their private sorrows and supplications, they took no notice of Martin.

The paintings, statues, and tapestries were all obscured in the vast darkness, but Martin did not have to see the huge crucifix over the central altar to feel its presence. How many visible wounds were there on Jesus’s body? Seven? He should know. Every Good Friday the priests and his mother had recited His sufferings in precise and mortifying detail. Merckx had received four mortal wounds. At least someone in Christ’s entourage had tried to chop off the ear of a persecutor. Martin had done nothing. And he would probably not be able to do anything to avenge his friend’s murder. He closed his eyes and swallowed hard. Before the cock crowed the Passover night into the day of death, Peter had denied Christ three times. Martin had just denied his oldest, dearest friend at least that many times in less than half an hour.

He stumbled away from the main part of the cathedral into the ancient baptistry, the only part of the church that he liked because of its simple, classic dignity. The rotunda, once part of a pagan temple, was over a thousand years old. Its eight great columns surrounded a square that contained the round recess into which early Christians had stepped to receive the water of baptism. They had entered between the two black columns representing darkness, been washed of their sins, and then left by another, lighter path, spiritually renewed. Now all the marble columns were pockmarked and darkened by age and neglect. Martin stepped behind one of them and began to cry. In an effort to muffle his sobs, he pressed his face against the marble column and clung to it in a cold embrace.

He had no idea how long it took for him to come to his senses. What would Merckx have said if he could see him now? Martin thought bitterly as he spread out his handkerchief and wiped his face and dripping nose. Certainly he would have mocked the fact that Martin’s mind had so easily turned to old religious myths. Martin sighed as he stared up toward the light that came from the opening in the cupola above the rotunda. Merckx would have preferred to be compared to the anti-Christ rather than the Christ. He would have asked Martin why he wasn’t thinking about Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity instead of religion. Neither God nor Master, remember? That was Merckx’s motto. If you know what justice is, not bourgeois justice, but real justice for the poor, the weak, and the sick, then to hell with the state. No need to be honest with them. Do not think of St. Peter, do not think of having to become a martyr for me. Go on. At the very least, be a man.

Be a man
. Martin walked through the columns of the baptistry and retraced his steps to the back of the cathedral. He took a seat. Merckx’s hectoring voice would stay with him for a long time, perhaps for the rest of his life. Martin had always hated his friend’s mocking cynicism, so often directed at him. This time it could work for Martin, as a reprieve rather than punishment. Merckx would not want him to confess. Merckx would not care if Martin called him a sneak or a thief. Merckx would want him to think of the final cause, the end that justified the means. For Martin, that end was justice for Solange Vernet and the boy. After the Proc got back, if Franc knew something about his meeting with Merckx, the inspector could turn him in at any time. Martin leaned back and closed his eyes. In the meantime, he would honor Merckx’s memory by fighting on and not giving up.

A
S THE BURLY GUARD SWUNG OPEN
the thick iron door that led to the jail cells, Martin was stricken by the kind of dread that only an accused man might feel. This could be his fate. His only chance was to get Westerbury to tell the truth, before the Proc returned. Then he would prove that he was a real judge. A judge capable of solving a murder. And a judge who was incapable of treason.

Martin took a deep breath to calm himself. A mistake, for with that breath he imbibed the stale, putrid odor of prison life. Then there was the noise. As soon as the prisoners guessed who he might be, a chorus of complaints and shouts erupted all around him. Some of the prisoners were housed six to a cell. These men rose up as soon as they saw him and began to call out. “Is that a judge?” “Hey, judge, let me out, I’m the innocent one, Pierre!” “No, not that bastard, me, Jacques. I’m not a thief!” “Tell them to feed us real food in here.” “Judge! Judge!”

Martin and his guard gave no signs of hearing these taunts as they walked to the end of the hall where the dangerous prisoners were held, one to a cell, behind thick windowless doors. The guard stopped at one, chose a large key hanging from a chain on his belt, and unlocked it.

“Do you want me to stay, sir?”

“No, wait outside. The prisoner made it clear he wanted to talk to me alone.”

“You’re right,” Martin’s protector said, as he opened the door and jerked his head contemptuously toward the bed. “I don’t think this one could hurt a fly. Not any more.”

When Martin stepped inside, the guard closed the iron door behind him with a clang. Westerbury was sitting on the bed, his back against the stone wall. He looked awful. His beard was matted into tangled clumps. His hair hung down in dirty strings. His sagging face had aged ten years, and all the dapperness had gone out of him. And the smell. Martin had managed not to vomit out his pain and fear in front of Franc and Riquel, but he was not sure how long he would last here. He began to breathe through his mouth.

Taking note of this, Westerbury roused himself enough to smirk, and pointed toward the hole in the floor. “Welcome to a French prison, monsieur le juge.” A bad start, if Westerbury was trying to garner any sympathy, but Martin did not take the bait. He was going to make this as short as possible. All he wanted was to get the Englishman’s confession and get out. He took a small notebook out of his pocket.

Westerbury stood up. “Would you like a seat?” His arm swept toward the bed in a mock gentlemanly gesture. “I warn you, you might catch some lice. But that would be instructive. Insects are so much more clever than us human beings. They’re millions of years older, and they will outlast us by millions more, I am sure.”