The Disappearance of Adèle Bedeau (3 page)

Jeantet guided Manfred into his office by the elbow and towards two leather armchairs, uttering a series of proclamations about how delighted he was to have such a bright young man on board.

‘Sit down, my boy, sit down,' he exhorted. ‘That's a fine suit you're wearing. A little loose if I may say, but that's the way you young chaps are wearing them these days. I'm old-fashioned myself, or so my wife tells me. But I say quality never goes out of style, eh? What do you say? Ha ha.'

‘Certainly,' said Manfred.

‘Now, this occasion calls for a drink, don't you think?' And despite the fact that it was not yet nine o'clock the bank manager reached for a decanter on the table between them. He poured out two generous measures and toasted to a long and fruitful relationship. Manfred sipped his drink, feeling that he was being initiated into an archaic society of sherry drinkers.

‘It's important to cement relationships,' Jeantet went on. ‘That's something you'll learn. I've got much to teach you – running a bank isn't about money, no, not at all. It's about people.' He paused and gave Manfred a meaningful look to underline the point.

Then quite suddenly, as if a cloud had crossed his face, Jeantet put down his glass and sat back in his armchair, clasping his hands across his belly. Manfred too put down his glass.

‘Now,' he said in an altogether more sombre tone, ‘your grandfather – a fine man – has told me that you have failed your
baccalauréat
. That is not something to be applauded and normally I would not consider taking on a member of staff whom I did not consider to be up to scratch in the old brain department.' Here he tapped the side of his forehead. ‘However, your grandfather has assured me that you are a bright young man and I am prepared to take him at his word. I trust you will repay the faith I am showing in you.'

He nodded seriously and then, to indicate that he had said his piece, once again took up his glass.

‘Academic qualifications are all very well, but what matters in life are hard work and a keen eye for human behaviour. I myself am an avid observer of the human animal. I'm not going to lie, you've landed on your feet with me. Observe and learn, and you'll go far.'

He leaned in over the table and indicated that Manfred should do the same, before continuing in a stage whisper. ‘Between you and me, I plan to retire in a few years. Those mangy old bags out there,' he jabbed his thumb towards the door, ‘haven't got two brain cells between them. That's monkey work out there. All they're interested in is gossiping and picking up their pay cheque at the end of the month. But a bright young man in a good suit like yourself, if you play your cards right, you could be sitting in my place in just a few years. Now, what do you think of that, my boy?'

Manfred resisted the temptation to tell him that he would rather throw himself into the Rhine than spend one minute more than necessary working in the Saint-Louis branch of Société Générale.

‘I'm very grateful for the opportunity,' he said.

That same day Manfred made inquiries about the apartment above the Restaurant de la Cloche, but it was occupied by the new proprietor and his wife. He then, as a temporary measure, took the apartment off Rue de Mulhouse.

T
HURSDAY WAS MARKET DAY
. At half past twelve the Restaurant de la Cloche was thronging with people. Manfred recognised most of the customers and acknowledged those who spotted him with a nod or a silently mouthed ‘good day'. That was the extent of his interaction with his fellow regulars. Among those who lunched daily at La Cloche, there was, like railway commuters, a tacit understanding of the boundaries of communication. Manfred took his place at the table in the corner that Marie had reserved for him. The menu rotated on a weekly basis and offered a choice of two starters, two main courses and a special followed by dessert or coffee. In almost twenty years the daily menus had never varied. Thursday's special was
pot-au-feu.
Approximately once a month, Manfred made a joke to Pasteur about changing the menu. ‘Do you see a suggestion box around here?' the proprietor invariably responded.

Adèle appeared at Manfred's table to take his order. He felt inexplicably excited to see her.

‘Hello, Adèle.' He said attempted to make eye contact with her, seeking some acknowledgement of what had passed between them the previous night.

‘Monsieur,' Adèle replied blankly. She did not raise her eyes from her notebook and she recited his Thursday order (onion
soup,
pot-au-feu, crème brulée
) before he had the chance to say anything else. Manfred was tempted to suddenly change his order just to get her attention, but as she turned away with an air of great ennui, he was glad he hadn't. Such an act would only bring Pasteur to the table demanding to know what had brought about such a change of heart. Manfred imagined himself shouting, ‘I just felt like a change!' before throwing over his table and storming out of the restaurant, batting other customers' glasses of wine against the walls as he went.

He opened his copy of
L'Alsace
to the financial pages and gazed blankly at the columns of share prices. Adèle returned with his soup. She continued to betray no sign of the intimacy that had passed between them. Perhaps when she returned with his main course, he should casually enquire whether she had had a pleasant evening. He could even ask about the young man. What could be wrong with that? He had seen them together after all. Wasn't it perfectly natural to acknowledge the fact? Manfred had already finished the glass of wine that was included in the set menu. The soup was watery and under-seasoned.

Customers arrived and left continually. When it was busy, the Restaurant de la Cloche ran like a well-oiled machine. Marie often paused at a regular's table to exchange a few words, but her eyes were continually scanning the room for empty plates and customers wishing to pay their bills. These were despatched with a minimum of fuss by Pasteur from his station behind the counter. Tables were cleared and reset with military efficiency. There was a constant clatter from the kitchen and the calling of orders as they were delivered to the hatch. Customers spoke in loud voices with their mouths full, conscious that they were not expected to linger over their lunch. Most elected not to have coffee. If they did, it was brought with their dessert. Adèle attended to the other customers with the same sullen demeanour she displayed towards Manfred. She moved slowly and heavily like a cow on its way to milking, but, in her way, she was every bit as efficient as the bustling Marie.

Adèle collected his soup bowl on her way past, balancing the plates from another table on one arm. This was hardly the time to engage her in small talk. But as she turned away, Manfred spoke up. ‘Actually, Adèle, if it's not too much trouble, I'd like to change my order. I'll have the
choucroute garnie.'

This would get her attention! Adèle turned back and said, ‘Certainly, monsieur.' Her face remained blank. Manfred had to admire her nonchalance as she turned towards the kitchen.

‘And, Adèle,' he said, raising his voice a little to make himself heard above the din, ‘Another glass of wine.'

He had to hand it to her, she displayed not a flicker of emotion, but as he watched her push through the swing doors to the kitchen, he could imagine the commotion as she announced that Manfred Baumann had changed his order. And he was having a second glass of wine! He sat back in his chair and surveyed the other patrons of the restaurant. They were oblivious to the momentous events taking place.

Manfred awaited the proprietor's arrival at his table to enquire if the
pot-au-feu
was no longer to his liking. But Pasteur did not come over. He remained behind the bar decanting wine into carafes, acting as if nothing unusual had occurred. He did not so much as glance in Manfred's direction.

Adèle arrived with his
choucroute. ‘Bon appétit,
' she said.

The pork was fatty and overcooked. The
choucroute
too sharp. He missed the braised meats of which Marie was so proud. The
pot-au-feu
was Manfred's favourite dish of the week, but that was not the point. He cleaned his plate. He would look very foolish if, having changed his order, he did not appear to have enjoyed his selection. He drained his second glass of wine and sat back with a feeling of great satisfaction.

At the bank, Manfred felt the effect of the extra glass of wine. He caught himself dozing off at his desk and buzzed his secretary to bring him coffee. He saw a farmer named Distain about extending the grace period of a loan. Manfred half-listened for fifteen minutes as the hoary farmer droned
on about pressure from the supermarkets, the inequities of common market regulations and the threat to the French way of life. Glancing at his file, Manfred could see that the farm had been losing money for a decade. He granted Distain a repayment holiday of three years, the maximum possible. Distain could barely contain himself. For a terrible moment Manfred thought that the man was going to weep tears of gratitude. As he ushered him out of his office, Manfred had to physically wrench his hand from his grip.

Manfred dreaded Thursday nights. He arrived at the Restaurant de la Cloche at the usual time and took his place at the counter. He ordered his first glass of wine and downed it swiftly. Lemerre and Cloutier were at their table. Petit was late. In the mirror behind the counter Manfred saw Lemerre take out the cards and absent-mindedly shuffle them. Petit arrived, took off his jacket and hung it over the back of his chair. Lemerre and Cloutier were already two-thirds through the first carafe of the evening. The three men talked in low voices for some minutes, before Lemerre (it was always Lemerre) shouted across the bar, ‘Swiss, are you making up our four tonight?'

Manfred always waited to be summoned in this way. There was no reason why he should not join the men at their table when he arrived, but he never did. Instead, because he keenly felt the absurdity of the charade being enacted, when Lemerre called him over, he adopted an expression of surprise, as if the fact that this was the evening of the card game had slipped his mind.

Manfred obediently took his glass to the table and sat down. The three friends invariably sat in the same seats, obliging Manfred to take what he thought of as the dead man's chair. There could be no discussion of who would partner whom, since any change would necessitate swapping places. Thus Manfred played with Cloutier, and Lemerre played with Petit. Cloutier was a rotten player, unable to read Manfred's bids and timid in his play. Lemerre and Petit engaged in a system of ill-concealed
cheats: scratching their noses, coughing and tapping the table. So transparent was their primitive code that it worked in Manfred's favour. They might as well have laid their cards on the table for him to see. Despite the fact that Cloutier played like a half-wit, they invariably won. Once, Lemerre had even accused Manfred of cheating. More often Lemerre and Petit simply shook their heads at their opponents' good fortune.

Adèle brought a fresh carafe of wine and a glass for Manfred. As she bent over the table Manfred stole a glance at her cleavage and thought of the young man he had seen the previous night.

On Thursdays, four carafes were drunk. Manfred ensured that his consumption of wine kept pace with the others so that he could be accused neither of drinking more than his share nor of lagging behind. At the end of the evening Manfred's contribution to the tab would be pocketed by Lemerre. The three men settled their bill on a weekly basis. Manfred could certainly have made a similar arrangement with Pasteur and bring an end to the embarrassing tipping ritual, but he had never requested a tab and to do so after so many years would seem odd. ‘Why,' Pasteur would surely ask, ‘have you never asked for one before?' Manfred would have difficulty answering such a question. He could hardly claim that it never crossed his mind. He thought about it on a daily basis.

Lemerre drew up the score sheet on the back of an envelope. Since the death of Le Fevre, Lemerre had become the de facto leader of the group. He smelt of a mixture of hair products and sweat. His jowly face wore a permanent expression of scorn and he could often be heard loudly decrying immigrants, Jews (whom he blamed for the majority of the world's problems) and, a favourite bugbear, homosexuals. ‘Your lot,' he liked to tell Manfred, ‘have the right idea, Swiss. Keep the Turks and Jews out.' His tirades were delivered in a vaguely effeminate manner, accompanied by elaborate hand gestures, which seemed to suggest that he was sprinkling gems of wisdom among his acolytes. The effect was both comic and menacing. On occasion
Manfred had allowed himself to be goaded into debate with Lemerre, which only led to being denounced as a communist queer. Now he left it to Pasteur to intervene when Lemerre's diatribes got out of hand.

The cards were cut and dealt. Lemerre and Petit engaged an elaborate exchange of coughs and table-taps from which Manfred inferred that they were both weak in spades. He was long-suited in spades and deduced that Cloutier must hold at least a couple of face cards of that suit. He ignored his partner's opening gambit of two hearts and leapt straight to six spades.

‘Where you getting a call like that from?' said Lemerre.

Manfred shrugged. He took all thirteen tricks with ease.

‘Didn't have the bottle to go the whole hog?' Lemerre goaded. ‘A faint heart never won a fair lady, eh?'

The game continued in the same vein. Manfred even threw a hand now and again, giving Lemerre the opportunity to gloat about his mastery of the game.

On the rare occasions Cloutier had the lead, Manfred watched Adèle go about her business. Her demeanour was less sullen than usual. She exchanged a few pleasantries with diners. Her posture was more upright, as if a sack of coals had been lifted from her back. Clearly, thought Manfred, she was in love with the young man on the scooter. He did not feel pleased for her, only a certain loathing for the young man, indeed of all young men who could woo a girl with a scooter and a few vulgar compliments. Adèle came over to the table with the final carafe of the evening.

Without thinking, Manfred blurted out, ‘You look nice tonight, Adèle.'

The three companions stopped dead. Petit's hand, about to lay a card, was suspended in the air. The three looked at each other, waiting for their cue from Lemerre. He merely burst into raucous laughter, immediately echoed by his two cohorts. Manfred blushed deeply and looked at the table.

‘You watch yourself there, my girl,' Lemerre spluttered through his laughter. ‘Quite the lady's man, our Swiss.'

Adèle appeared unfazed. She directed a thin smile in Manfred's direction and returned to the counter with the empty carafe.

At the end of the evening, Manfred bid the other players goodnight and left the restaurant. He was relieved that Adèle was still sweeping up when the game had come to an end and the last carafe had been drunk. He was quite certain that she would be meeting the young man again at the little park outside the Protestant temple. Sure enough, he was there, leaning on the seat of his scooter, smoking a cigarette.

This time Manfred got a better look at him. He could not have been more than eighteen or nineteen. He had fair, wispy hair and his complexion was fresh, as if he had yet to start shaving. As Manfred drew closer, he wondered if the youth would recognise him from the previous night. If he did, he gave no sign of having done so. He neither made eye contact nor averted his gaze. He had blue eyes and thin lips. Manfred felt a strange sense of relief that he did not look like the kind of young man who picked up and discarded girls readily.

As Manfred passed by, the young man drew on his cigarette. He held it awkwardly between the tip of his thumb and index finger. Smoking was as yet an affectation. Manfred imagined he must be as awkward in bed, if he had got that far. It pleased him that Adèle was not involving herself with some worldly Romeo. He continued past the little park towards his apartment. Then he stopped and turned around. When he considered this later, he could not explain what had made him do it. He had not thought about it in advance, nor could he remember making any decision. It was a momentary impulse to which he submitted.

At the end of the little park was an apartment building set back from the pavement. Manfred ducked towards the doorway of the apartments and concealed himself behind the shrubbery. The young man was facing in the direction from which Adèle would approach. There was no danger of him spotting Manfred and, even if he turned round, he was well hidden. The youth finished his cigarette and looked at his watch. A few minutes
passed. Manfred began to wonder what he was doing there, but he had waited this long, it would be foolish to leave now. In any case, were he to do so, he might make a noise and give himself away.

Adèle appeared, walking slowly along the pavement. The young man raised his hand in greeting and Adèle waved back but did not quicken her pace. Manfred wondered why he did not meet her outside the bar. They must have some reason to not wish to be seen together. Perhaps their parents did not approve of their liaisons. Manfred, though, could not imagine Adèle living with her parents. If asked, he would have guessed that she was an orphan or that she had run away from home. There was something in her self-containment that suggested she was alone in the world.