The Mystery of the Lost Cezanne (11 page)

Schoelcher for a Beer

M
arine stood under a streetlamp in the middle of the rue Adanson and texted Sylvie, who lived around the corner. “I'm still up,” Sylvie texted back. “Come on over.”

Marine walked quickly down the street, turning left on the rue Campra. At times living in Aix felt suffocating, especially when she ran into acquaintances from junior high or high school, people she hadn't liked when she was fifteen and whom she liked even less now. But tonight she was thankful that she lived in a town small enough to walk across in fifteen minutes. She buzzed three times in quick succession at Sylvie's door and it opened with a click.

Marine walked up to the third floor and smiled when she saw Sylvie standing in the doorway, wearing pink bunny slippers. Prada was Sylvie's preferred footwear.

“Hey, come on in,” Sylvie said, giving Marine the
bise
.

“I hope it's not too late for you,” Marine said, taking off her coat and hanging it on the overstuffed coatrack.

“For me, no,” Sylvie answered. “But Charlotte's in bed. We were invited to the neighbor's for the Fête des Rois, even though it was officially yesterday.”

“Oh, I'm so glad!” Marine said. “Did Charlotte go under the table?”

“
Non, grande drame!
” Sylvie said. “Charlotte's no longer the youngest. Their son Alex is now three, so he was able to call out everyone's name. Last year he was too young.”

“Was Charlotte upset?”

“At first,” Sylvie said. “I could see it in her eyes. But Alex was so cute calling out our names—he has a bit of a baby's lisp and can't say his s's, so my name becomes Tylvie—and after about two minutes Charlotte was laughing. A year ago I would have had to give her the ‘not everything revolves around you' talk.”

Marine smiled, thinking of Antoine.

“I put some tea on when I got your text message,” Sylvie said, passing Marine a mug decorated with Man Ray's large black-and-white eye. “But I won't offer you any sweets.”

“That's more than fine,” Marine said. “I had two pieces of galette last night at the Pauliks'.”

“You know,” Sylvie said, pouring mint tea into their cups, “I hate almond paste.”

“Yet another thing you have in common with Antoine Verlaque. He ate his to be polite.”

“Well, I flat-out refused,” Sylvie said. “But then again, I'm not as well bred as Antoine. So, what's up? Are you gonna whine into your tea like you did last week?”

Marine set her cup down and stared at her friend. “Did I do that?”

Sylvie nodded.

“I'm so sorry,” Marine said. “I don't know what's wrong with me.”

Sylvie blew on her tea, saying nothing.

Marine continued, “I have so much to be thankful for. But I can't shake this feeling of . . .”

“Disappointment?” Sylvie asked.

“Yes! It's as if my head is buzzing with obsessive thoughts about my failures.”

Sylvie laughed. “You? Failures?”

“I teach in Aix, not Paris, not New York,” Marine said. “I haven't published enough. It's a crazy panicked feeling I get—especially in the morning—that I've let life pass me by. And it makes me feel so ungrateful.”

Sylvie set her her mug down and went into the living room, picked up a magazine, and came back, throwing it on the kitchen table.

Marine looked at the cover and said, “Sylvie, not
Psychology Today
—
again
.”

“It's called the U-curve,” Sylvie said, sitting down. “And you're not alone. Research being done at a few English and American universities has uncovered a recurrent pattern in various countries around the world: that life satisfaction declines with age the first couple of decades of adulthood, bottoming out right now—in our early forties.”

“Interesting.”

“I know,” Sylvie answered. “And it has nothing to do with whether you're from a rich or poor country, married or divorced, employed or unemployed, with or without children. The common denominator is the age—our forties—when we experience this feeling of discontentment.”

“There's just one little problem.”

“Yeah,” Sylvie said, “you're not in your forties yet.”

Marine smiled.

“But,” Sylvie went on, pointing in the air, “you've always been ahead. You skipped a grade, right?”

Marine laughed. “Yes. And I'll be forty soon enough. So where does the U-curve come in?”

“It gets better,” Sylvie said. “That's the good news. All of a sudden, somewhere in our early to midfifties, the nagging feeling that we're losers disappears. And apparently sixty is awesome.”

“Hurrah,” Marine said flatly.

“Yeah, well, the research indicates that people in their seventh decade are at their emotional peak of happiness. It's like they're on a high.”

“My parents,” Marine said. “I can hardly keep up with them.”

“There you go.”

“There's an obvious explanation,” Marine said, tapping the table.

“Spoken like a true lawyer,” Sylvie said as she opened the window to allow the smoke from her cigarette to billow outside.

“Time horizons grow shorter as we age. People concentrate on what is most important,” Marine said.

“Meaningful relationships.”

“For example. They focus on the present.”

“Walks in the countryside and that kind of crap.”

Marine laughed. “Are you suffering from these forties blues?”

“A little bit,” Sylvie said. “Especially in the morning, like
you said. But having Charlotte to look after keeps my inner demons at bay.”

“Charlotte is the same age as Léa Paulik,” Marine said. “And when I see Léa with Antoine, and he laughs like he's a kid, I get this knot in my stomach. Am I jealous?”

“Hmm,” Sylvie said, finishing her cigarette and setting the ashtray in the flower box, closing the window. “No, I don't think you're jealous of Léa. You see moody Antoine all happy at the Pauliks', and you don't understand why he isn't like that all the time. Do you want his attention all the time?”

“No, that would be suffocating.”

“Do you want him to be happy only when he's with you?”

“No,” Marine answered. “I want him to be happy all the time. He deserves it.”

“What do you think makes Antoine so happy at the Pauliks'? What do they have that you don't have?”

Marine looked at Sylvie.

“I think I just answered my own question,” Sylvie said after a pause.

“So maybe I'm not in this forties blues thing yet.”

“No, I don't think you are,” Sylvie said. “There's a very specific reason for your feelings of disappointment. You want to have what the Pauliks have, with Antoine Verlaque.”

 • • • 

Verlaque was surprised to see someone he knew looking up at the sculptures on the Halles aux Grains pediment. It was late and the streets were full of tipsy students on their way to and from Aix's many bars and cheap restaurants.

“Good evening, Officer Schoelcher,” he said.

“Oh!” Jules Schoelcher replied. “Judge Verlaque. I wasn't expecting to see you here.”

“I live around the corner.”

“So do I.” Jules quickly stubbed out his cigarette on the pavement.

“You should smoke these,” Verlaque said, holding up his half-smoked Churchill short. “No chemicals, handmade.”

“I don't even smoke,” Schoelcher replied. “I bought these out of desperation. I had a fight with my girlfriend—”

“The coffee shop girl?” Verlaque asked. “Sorry, news travels fast at the Palais de Justice.”

“Yeah, I know,” Jules replied.

“That makes two of us.”

“Excuse me?”

“This evening I had a good row with Marine, my girlfriend. Care for a walk?”

Being that Antoine Verlaque was about a mile ahead of him in the chain of command, Jules didn't feel like he could refuse. But he felt some kind of connection with the judge: Jules was known at the precinct, this he knew, as an uptight, by-the-book policeman from Alsace, and Verlaque was known as a rich Parisian. They were both outsiders in Aix. “Sure,” he said.

“The strange thing is,” Verlaque said as they walked through the square, “I don't even know why Marine's angry with me.”

“Oh, I know what's bugging Magali,” Jules said. “And it's always the same argument we have. She hated being with my folks at Christmas and I hated being with hers at New Year's.”

“Oddball families?” Verlaque asked. “Sounds familiar. I sometimes think that Marine's mother wants to drive a dagger through my chest.”

Jules laughed. “Magali sees my family as uptight Germanic Catholics. But you should see hers! I hate to say this, but . . .
ils sont
ploucs!
”

“Low-class?”

“Oh my God,” Jules went on. “Marseillais but not the fun-loving Marseillais that you see in old Pagnol movies, or see in restaurants having a great, loud time. Her brother has been in prison for theft, her father drinks too much and is a domineering lout, and her mother just sits there chain-smoking, wringing her hands . . .”

“That sounds awful.”

“Yeah, and I have so much respect for Magali, that she got out of that family and is here in Aix. She loves her job, and she paints these amazing still lifes—”

“ ‘I will astonish Paris with an apple,' ” Verlaque said. “Was it Magali who taught you that?”

“Of course,” Jules said. “Magali's still lifes are more a cross between Cézanne's and Frida Kahlo's—but still, they're amazing.”

Verlaque tried to imagine what a Cézanne/Frida Kahlo still life would look like.

“It was such a stupid fight—” Schoelcher stopped there, thinking maybe he was talking too much about his own problems. But he figured that the judge would speak up if he wanted to divulge information on his fight with Marine Bonnet, whom Schoelcher knew—thanks to blabbermouth officer Roger Caromb—was a well-known law professor whose classes were year after year full, not because of her beauty but because of her fascinating lectures. Two of his fellow policeman had even snuck into one of her classes when it was found out that she was dating Verlaque. “Riveting,” one had said, while the other had made a sweeping motion with his hand over his head. That had been Roger.

Verlaque stopped in front of the Bar Zola, which he
realized he had wanted to go to all along, with or without company. “Care for a Guinness?”

“A decent beer sounds perfect.”

“I have an ulterior motive for coming here,” Verlaque explained, opening the door to allow wafts of smoke and loud Rolling Stones music to pour out. “This was René Rouquet's favorite spot to come and tie one on.”

“After you.”

J
ules led the way, pushing through the crowd. He looked over his shoulder and Verlaque signaled to the bar. The tall blond policeman gently excused himself as he squeezed through the patrons, finally finding a spot at the bar big enough for the two men to stand. “
Deux Guinness
,
s'il vous plaît
,” Jules told the barman as Verlaque arrived beside him.

The barman, who wore a long beard and a Harley-Davidson T-shirt, looked twice at Verlaque before saying, in a mock posh accent, “
Bonsoir, Monsieur le juge.
”

“Hey, you got your hair cut,” Verlaque said, his hand motioning a chop just below his ear.

Jules Schoelcher tried not to look surprised.

“It looks really good,” Verlaque said, giving the barman a thumbs-up.

The barman rolled his eyes but finally smiled. “Wife's orders,” he said while slowly pouring out the Guinness. “Apparently classical music concerts and long hair don't jibe.”

“Bruno told me that your son plays piano wonderfully,” Verlaque said. He looked at Jules and said, “Léa and—”

“Matthieu,” the barman said.

“Léa Paulik and Matthieu are at the conservatoire together,” Verlaque explained. Schoelcher took a sip of his beer, looking from his boss to the barman, trying to block out the noise from the music and the bar's patrons to understand just how these two very different people seemed to know each other.

“Patrick,” the barman said, reaching across the bar.

“Antoine,” Verlaque said, taking the barman's hand that was adorned with three or four skull rings. “And this is my colleague Jules.” Verlaque took a sip of beer, smiled, gave the barman another thumbs-up, and said, “Have you heard Léa sing Fauré's ‘In Prayer'?”

Patrick pretended to wipe tears from his eyes.

“I have the same reaction,” Verlaque said. He took another sip, then looked around him and said, “Zola gets a young crowd in, no?”

Patrick shrugged his shoulders. “Mostly,” he said. “Except at the bar,” he added, winking.

Jules said, “Don't look at me.”

Verlaque laughed. “Thanks, Jules.” He then leaned across the bar and asked, “But older guys do come here, don't they? Did you know a retired postman named René?”

Patrick leaned his muscular forearms on the bar. “Why the past tense?”

“He's dead,” Verlaque said.

“Why is it every time you come in here,” Patrick asked, “I lose a valued customer?”

Verlaque shrugged. “When was the last time he came in?”

“That's easy,” Patrick said as he wiped down the counter with a small towel. “Last night.”

“Did he chat with anyone?” Schoelcher asked.

“Yeah, me,” Patrick said.

“That's all?”

A girl bumped into Jules and they both said “
Pardon
” in unison.

“But you can see that if you're standing at the bar—” Patrick said.

“Anyone can hear,” Jules said, looking over at the girl and smiling.

Verlaque sipped more of the Guinness and asked, “What did you talk about?”

“It was René doing the talking,” Patrick said. “He got more and more incoherent as the evening went on. I finally cut him off around ten o'clock.”

Verlaque said nothing and waited for the barman to go on.

“It's a little weird,” Patrick said. “Okay, he's bragged before that he lives in Cézanne's old apartment, but this time he was saying that he found something in the apartment. Something that was once Cézanne's.”

“
Pauvre gars
,” Verlaque said. “He should have kept his mouth shut. Was he specific?”

“Well, I took it to be a painting,” Patrick said, “because he was talking how valuable it must be.” Patrick laughed and then said, “He was going on about Christie's and Sotheby's. Did he really find a Cézanne painting?”

Verlaque looked around him and closed his eyes slowly, then opened them. “We're not sure what it is,” he said. “But if it is—”

Patrick whistled. “So I see what direction you're going with these questions,” he said. “Should we step outside?”

Verlaque and Jules put their coats back on and made their
way through the crowd carrying their half-finished beers. Patrick followed, having poured himself a whiskey. “Let's walk around the square,” he said, closing the bar's door behind him.

Verlaque relit his Churchill and they strolled toward a statue of a wild boar that sat in the middle of the square. “Was René murdered?” Patrick asked as they stopped beside the statue.

“Yes, last night or early this morning,” Verlaque said. “He called a former neighbor, worried that he had been followed home.”

“
Oh merde
,” Patrick said. “I feel like it's my fault. I should have cut him off earlier.”

“It could have been a break and enter,” Jules said. “Unrelated to your conversation in the bar.”

“But it is important that you remember who was standing at the bar next to M. Rouquet,” Verlaque said. “Any short, thick, bald men?”

Patrick took out a cigarette and lit it. “One or two,” he said. “But of all the students, riffraff, and lonely hearts in here last night, that's not who I remember best.”

“Oh really?” Verlaque asked.

“There was this Amazon,” Patrick said, shaking his head back and forth. “One of the most gorgeous women I've ever seen.”

Verlaque and Schoelcher exchanged looks. “What did she look like?” Jules asked.

“Tall, black, striking in an original way,” Patrick said. “Like she had just walked off the fashion runway, but circa 1972.”

 • • • 

Bruno Paulik sipped his
vin chaud
, watching people walk up and down the Cours. The more he tried to think of his wife,
Hélène, the more the image of Rebecca Schultz popped into his head. He hadn't meant to stay so long at the Hôtel Fleurie, but the hotel owner had put on an opera CD and he and Rebecca—as she had insisted he call her—chatted about the music for longer than he realized. It was Bizet's
Pearl Fishers
, an old recording sung by Enrico Caruso and Giuseppe De Luca, the men's voices in perfect harmony.

“Have you seen the film
Gallipoli
?” Rebecca asked.

“Only about a million times,” Paulik replied.

“This is the song that the officer is listening to,” Rebecca said.

“Yeah. He knows that the next morning his soldiers will be going over the top,” Paulik said. “And he with them.”

“He's drinking champagne—”

“It's his wedding anniversary. It kills me to watch that scene,” Paulik said. “It proves that there's no need for violence and gore in a war movie.”

“I agree,” Rebecca said. “Just some opera and a man staring at his wife's photograph.”

Paulik was brought out of his reverie by his cell phone ringing. “Bruno? Verlaque here.”

“Yes?”

“Am I interrupting?”

“No,” Paulik answered, embarrassed that he had been thinking of Dr. Schultz.

“Schultz has been bullshitting us,” Verlaque said. “She was in the Bar Zola last night.”

“You're kidding.” Paulik quickly finished his hot wine and motioned for the bill.

“Beauty is a complex subject.”

“I'm not following,” Paulik said.

“Cézanne said that,” Verlaque said. “But it fits our Yale professor. Listen, I'm going to try to get some sleep now, and then I'll go into the Palais de Justice tomorrow and also speak to Dr. Schultz. I don't expect to see you because tomorrow's Sunday. Okay?”

“Right,” Paulik said.

“You're extra chatty tonight, Bruno. Is everything all right?”

“Sorry, the fatigue seems to be catching up with me,” Paulik said. “I'll see you Monday. Feel free to call me with any updates.” He hung up and set some coins down on the table.

On the way to get his car out of the underground parking garage under the Palais de Justice, Bruno Paulik found himself looking into the windows of some of Aix's finest clothing stores. He had never bought clothes for his wife; besides, Hélène's daily work gear was blue jeans or coveralls and a wool sweater if she was working in the cellar. She looked fantastic dressed up—Bruno loved a short, sparkly gold dress she wore for wine-tasting and publicity events—and he couldn't remember her ever talking about fashion. She certainly didn't read fashion magazines; she subscribed to
La Revue du Vin
and
Vinum
. And so why, he asked himself, when five minutes earlier he had so desperately wanted to see his wife, was he wasting his time looking at a two-thousand-euro Sonia Rykiel dress? Research, he answered. He was trying to understand what kind of money their top suspect, Rebecca Schultz, spent on clothing.
No, Bruno, stop trying to imagine what Rebecca Schultz would look like in the Rykiel pink knit dress
. But even with his untrained eye, Bruno Paulik knew that Dr. Schultz wore a lot of money on her back.
And on her long legs
.

Paulik sighed and moved on to another shop, this one full of designer shoes. Did university professors make that much
money in the States? He knew in France that professors, as civil servants, made about the same salary as he did, and that wasn't much. How could Dr. Schultz afford such clothes? Perhaps Marine Bonnet, who had colleagues who worked for American universities, could fill him in? He pressed his nose up against the glass. The January sales hadn't yet started, but the shiny black Prada shoes, with their transparent, glass-like heels, would be still be more than three-hundred euros on sale.

His phone rang.

“Are you busy, sir?” Alain Flamant asked.

“No,” Paulik said, staring at a pair of knee-high green and purple Italian leather boots, fascinated by the intricate stitching running up their sides. “Not really.”

“If you're still in Aix, sir, I think you should come in to the precinct. A body has been found,” Flamant went on. “Shot. We've identified him as Guy Maneval, small-time crook twice jailed for burglary. But he was found with—”

“Yes?”

“Well, a landscape around his neck. I mean, someone slammed a painting over his head.”

“Seriously?”

“Um, yeah. But probably after he was killed.”

Paulik was suddenly desperate to get home and see Hélène, who at five foot two would never make a fashion model but who was the most beautiful woman in the world to Bruno. But instead of walking underground to fetch his car out of the Palais de Justice's parking lot, he walked through the front door, nodded to the policeman on guard, and walked upstairs to see what Alain Flamant had to tell him.