Bertie and the Crime of Passion, page 4
No news of the police inquiry into the murder of that young man I mentioned in yesterday’s letter. I decided to drive out to Montroger and visit the Agincourt family to express our sympathy and see if there was anything one could do—unlikely, but at such times the support of old friends can be a solace. Jules, poor fellow, is visibly depleted by the blow that this has dealt to his entire family. The others were too grief-stricken to meet me. I gather that they were all present in the dance hall when the wicked deed was perpetrated.
I am constantly looking out for a letter from Fredensborg, but I suppose tomorrow is the earliest I can hope for. My love as always to you, Toria, and Maud.
Your becalmed Bertie
Bernhardt really is the limit. She gave me no clue as to what I might expect on my visit to Toulouse-Lautrec; I think she wickedly relished seeing me in a state of confusion.
By day—by a sharp, clear day in March at any rate—Montmartre is another place from the one I portrayed in the previous chapter. The bon viveurs had abandoned the quarter before dawn and the residents in respectable employment had left in droves for Paris soon after, so apart from the occasional nursemaid, we saw nobody. Rue Caulaincourt, where the count had his studio, was a few minutes only from the Moulin Rouge (which, like most of the pleasures of this world, is a disappointment in daylight). We stepped from the carriage into a street of respectable bourgeois dwellings that must have been built about twenty years before. Number 21, a three-storied apartment building with tall, shuttered windows, was at the corner of another street, the rue Tourlaque, giving it the novelty of a second address. The third-floor window, on the angle of the corner, had obviously been enlarged.
“That will be his studio.”
“What time is it, Bertie?” Bernhardt asked me.
“A few minutes after noon. Even an artist should be on his feet by now.”
We made ourselves known to the concierge, who was clearly a dyed-in-the-wool republican, for without batting an eyelid she asked whether Monsieur Toulouse-Lautrec was expecting us. Left to myself, I would have informed the lady at once how persons of rank are addressed. However, Bernhardt subscribes to the view that a Parisian concierge ranks as royalty in her domain, and perhaps she is right. After an ingratiating speech from Sarah, we were permitted to pass. The count, as we had surmised, lived on the third floor, the one with the studio window.
“You’d better tell me if you’ve met him,” I said to Sarah while we were climbing the stairs, since she seemed to be on familiar terms with most of the French aristocracy, and I needed to know whether a formal introduction would be necessary.
“No—but I have seen a photograph.”
“That’s not the same thing at all.”
“It ’elps,” she said in English, with an impish glint in her eyes that I didn’t understand. Each time I think back, I become more reproachful of her conduct that day. I am not without experience in the machinations of the fair sex, but, believe me, Bernhardt is irredeemable.
I knocked.
There was no sound of movement inside so I knocked again, trusting that the concierge would not have sent us upstairs if the count had been away from home.
After a considerable delay, I heard someone coming.
“He was in bed,” murmured Bernhardt.
The door opened a fraction. The shutters must have been across, because it was difficult to see inside. A whiff of cognac crept into my nostrils and that was all. I put my face closer and still saw nobody. Then the light from outside caught the shimmer of a pair of spectacles at about the level of the door handle. I assumed that a poor-sighted child had answered our knock. Bernhardt hadn’t mentioned that the count had a family. I bent lower and started to say in an avuncular tone, “Good morning, would you kindly ask your . . .” when my words trailed off, because the crack in the door had widened sufficiently for me to see that the child had the head of a grown man sporting a mustache and beard. My sense of shock was the greater because, not to mince words, he was an ugly fellow, swarthy, with an overlarge nose and thick, moist lips. He was dressed in a flannel nightshirt that reached to the floor.
I am not sure how much of my astonishment showed. I know Bernhardt—the wicked hussy—would tell me if I inquired, but I have never given her that satisfaction.
I managed to say, “Sir, I must apologize. We have clearly called at an inconvenient time.”
He adjusted his pince-nez and after an uncomfortable interval said, “Yes.” There was another pause for reflection before he thought fit to add, “If you are who I think you are, I would have wished to receive you in better circumstances . . . Your Royal Highness? And . . . Madame Bernhardt?”
In the circumstances, it was as gracious a welcome as we could have expected. I nodded and took a step back. “No doubt you would prefer us to call again.”
He opened the door fully. “On the contrary, sir. I can make myself more presentable, but I doubt whether I can make my studio more presentable, and since you have seen me already . . .”
One could only admire the little man’s composure. When I say “little,” I should qualify the word. I once met a truly little man, General Tom Thumb, who was just over three feet in height. Toulouse-Lautrec was almost five feet, but it is a trick of perception that anything a few inches below the norm appears freakish. To compound his difficulties, he walked woodenly and used a stick.
We were admitted to the studio while its owner hobbled back to his bedroom to change out of the nightshirt. Presently, we overheard subdued voices, and one was unmistakably female.
“Can you believe it?” I whispered to Bernhardt.
“He’s popular with the ladies,” she whispered back.
“A little fellow like that? He must have hidden charms.”
She smiled. “They call him ‘The Coffeepot.’”
I turned away. I can’t in honesty say that I admired his paintings any more than the posters. There was a vast canvas lying against one wall that depicted a group of drinkers at—I think—the Moulin Rouge. It had been painted in reddish browns, ochers, and pale greens, with some black areas for the men’s hats and overcoats. The people were drawn with some facility, but to my untutored eye, the brushwork was slapdash, the perspective faulty, and the whole scene at such an impossible angle that the drinks looked about to tip off the table.
“Do you recognize anyone, Your Royal Highness?” Toulouse-Lautrec had reappeared, decently attired in a morning coat and check trousers. Before giving me a chance to comment, he touched his stick against a figure in the background. “That, of course, is me, with my cousin, Tapié de Céleyran, the tall man.”
“And the woman adjusting her hair must be La Goulue,” I was pleased to be able to add.
“Ah, you know La Goulue, then?”
“We saw her perform last night.”
“A phenomenal dancer. Let me show you some other examples of my work.”
This, I realized too late, was fraught with embarrassment. He assumed that we wanted to buy one of his pictures. Why else would well-to-do strangers call? With the best will in the world, I didn’t want a Toulouse-Lautrec adorning the walls of Sandringham.
He was tugging out canvases from a great stack behind an easel, and the strain on his small physique was all too apparent. “I am looking for one I did of an Englishman, an artist I know who studied at the Slade School.”
Impulsively, I uttered a complete untruth. “It is your posters I admire the most, monsieur le comte.”
He turned and the pince-nez flashed. “Oh, I don’t use the title.”
“But you are a count, are you not?”
“It doesn’t make any difference to my painting, sir. People here in Montmartre call me Toulouse, or Lautrec, or Toulouse-Lautrec, or simply Henri. I was named after the Comte de Chambord, the pretender to the throne of France, but I am not interested in the royalist cause. I am a disappointment to my father.”
“You don’t see many of your own class?”
He laughed. “Not in Paris. Sometimes in Albi, by force of circumstance.”
“So you wouldn’t know the Comte d’Agincourt?”
“We have not been introduced, if that is what you mean. I know the gentleman in the sense that I would recognize him. I sketched him at the Moulin Rouge last week.”
Bernhardt clapped her hands in delight. “Marvelous! Was that the night the man was murdered?”
“Yes, madame.”
“You were sketching the dancers?”
“The dancers, the onlookers, the orchestra, anything that caught my interest. I am often there.”
Bernhardt’s eyebrows soared like pheasants at a shoot. “Then it is possible that you sketched the man who fired the fatal shots.”
“If I did, madame, there is no way of telling who he was. I saw no one pointing the gun at the victim.”
“May we look at your sketches?” She was ahead of me, I have to admit. I was thinking of ways of getting out without having to buy a picture.
Toulouse-Lautrec said, “I thought you were interested in the posters.”
I said quickly, “The sketchbook interests us more.”
Bernhardt said, “May we see?”
“I am sorry, madame, but you may not.”
“You refuse to show them to us? We are extremely interested.”
“That is evident.”
“And if I offered to buy them . . .” suggested Bernhardt after a pause.
“I would be unable to accept.”
“But why? What is there to be secretive about?”
“That is not the point.”
“But it is. What if His Royal Highness demands to see them?”
He was silent, but the expression on those fleshy lips didn’t give me any confidence that a royal command would do the trick.
Bernhardt is used to getting her own way and was becoming shrill in her protests. “Don’t you see? A murderer is at large and the pigheaded attitude you are taking may lead to a second killing.”
He said, “I never heard anything so ridiculous.”
The dispute was fast becoming detrimental to our investigation, Bernhardt was pursuing it so vehemently. The painter and she were liable to end up screaming at each other if I didn’t intervene, so I said, “If you will allow me, Sarah, I think we should explain to monsieur le comte why we are here.”
She gave a sigh of impatience and capitulated by sitting on a chaise longue and folding her arms.
With the absolute candor of one gentleman addressing another, I explained that I was investigating the murder of Letissier for two good reasons: the first, that I was a longstanding friend of the Agincourt family; and the second, that I was doubtful whether the Sûreté were capable of solving the crime.
“You can do better than the Sûreté?” asked Toulouse-Lautrec, sounding more skeptical than impressed.
I said, “I have had some modest successes as an amateur detective. Monsieur Goron of the Sûreté has admitted that this is a baffling case. I am not baffled. With the support of Madame Bernhardt, I am actively pursuing the murderer.”
Bernhardt blinked and fortunately said nothing.
“A dangerous pastime, surely?” He picked up a sketchbook and I thought for a moment that my candid statement had won his cooperation, but then he opened the book at a blank page and reached for a piece of charcoal. “Kindly hold the pose, Madame Bernhardt.” With no more preamble than that, he pulled a stool across the floor, climbed onto it and commenced a drawing of Sarah as she sat in her attitude of pique. “Have you considered the danger? The assassin has killed once, and that is enough to earn him a kiss from madame la guillotine. Why should he not kill a second time and a third? One kiss is all he will get. No, please keep your head quite still, madame. This will not take long.”
I said deviously, “Perhaps if you cooperate, Sarah, my dear, monsieur le comte may be persuaded to show us the rest of his sketchbook.”
Bernhardt said in a long-suffering voice, “He’ll want me stretched out naked for that.”
The artist smiled. “I am open to negotiation.”
“I am not,” said Bernhardt.
He worked fast. A passable likeness was already taking shape on the paper, although whether it would please the sitter was another question, for it picked out signs of middle age that Bernhardt probably never noticed when she looked in a mirror. I privately resolved not to submit to a sketch.
But I was not immune to his satire. “You must be familiar with Sue, Your Royal Highness,” he remarked while continuing with the drawing.
“Sue?” I frowned, uncertain where this new avenue was leading and not caring for it. I’m not in the habit of discussing ladies of my acquaintance with comparative strangers.
He preserved me from making an ass of myself by saying, “Eugéne Sue, the author of Mysteries of Paris.”
“A writer? I don’t get much time for reading.”
He said, “Forgive me, then. I thought perhaps he was your inspiration. Sue’s chief protagonist is a prince, Prince Rodolphe, who visits the dens of iniquity and studies the habits and careers of thieves and murderers, exposing injustice and crime.”
I said firmly, “Sir, I do not frequent dens of iniquity.”
To which Toulouse-Lautrec replied cryptically, “I do. My best work is done in dens of iniquity.” He held the sketch at arm’s length and studied it. “You may move if you wish, madame. I have finished.” He jumped off the stool.
“May I see?” Bernhardt reached for the sketchbook.
“Certainly. You may keep it.” He tore out the sheet with her portrait and handed it to her. He was not parting so lightly with the rest of the book.
Poor Sarah—my sympathy went out to her as she frowned at the all-too-penetrating likeness. She said, “Is that how I look?”
The little man had the grace to say, “No. That is how I drew you, madame.”
To forestall a second demonstration of his skill, I said, “We shall not detain you much longer, monsieur. There is much to do. It would oblige us greatly if you would give us your recollection of the fatal incident at the Moulin Rouge.”
“Is that your reason for calling?”
“Yes.”
With a shrug, he said, “My recollection will be no better than anyone else’s. The cabaret was announced and a crowd formed on the dance floor as usual. Among them were the Agincourt party, new faces to me and quite helpfully positioned opposite me—I sit at a table on the dance floor—so I sketched them rapidly without knowing who they were, the distinguished older man and the youth so similar in feature that he must have been the son, and the mother built like a ship’s figurehead and the rather pale, beautiful daughter.”
“And the victim?”
“The man who was killed—yes. Like the father, he was in a silk hat and looked ill at ease so close to the dancers, who are rather risqué in their movements. These were thumbnail sketches, an artist’s notes, of no practical value to anyone except me. Presently the chahut began with La Goulue and Valentin le Désossé as usual attracting all the attention. The next thing I recall were the two reports. People screamed. The dancing stopped and, as the audience drew back, the young man dropped to the floor. His hat fell off and I remember being surprised to discover that he was bald. Understandably, the people with him were very distressed by the attack. The victim was there some time before they removed him to the dressing room.”
“Did you go over to see?” asked Bernhardt.
“No, madame, I am not very mobile. I continued to sketch the scene from where I was sitting.”
Bernhardt’s bluster hadn’t succeeded in prizing the sketch book from Toulouse-Lautrec, so I decided to appeal to his sense of duty as a citizen. I literally stood over him and said with authority, “I really must insist that you show us your sketches of that evening. However rudimentary they may be, they are evidence, and one shouldn’t withhold evidence, you know.”
Rubbing his hands vigorously to remove the charcoal dust, he said, “Sir, I would not dream of withholding anything from you or Madame Bernhardt. If I had the sketchbook here, you would be more than welcome to examine it. Unfortunately, I do not. It is in the hands of the Sûreté. Monsieur Goron was here last week and took it away. I can only refer you to him.”
I was so taken aback, I could only repeat the statement. “Goron has the sketchbook?”
“He is a very astute policeman.”
Bernhardt spoke a word that I cannot possibly translate here; the effect is strong in the French, but several times stronger in our own tongue.
Without disguising my disappointment, I said to the artist, “You could have told us this ten minutes ago.”
“I am sorry. I was of two minds. Monsieur Goron particularly instructed me not to gossip to anyone about his visit.”
“I’d hardly categorize a statement to the English heir apparent as gossip,” I remarked. “However, it seems you acted from the very best motives, monsieur le comte.”
