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Authors: Susanne Alleyn
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thick fur. The cat, disturbed, turned drowsy blue eyes toward him. Madame de Laroque clucked and took a scrap from a half-eaten plate of roast quail beside her. “No kin of mine has ever been entangled with the police,” she declared, feeding the cat. “Of course, there was that unpleasantness with poor Marsillac,” she added, waving a vague hand toward a portrait on the wall, “but he suffered for his indiscretions in the end … well! What is it you want from me?”
“My business here regards your great-grand-niece, madame,” Aristide said.
“Poor Célie,” sighed Madame de Laroque, continuing to feed the cat bits of quail. “Poor child. And after our family withstood this horrid revolution with nothing more than a few inconveniences … and I’m told so many people did lose someone close to them … after all that, to have some monster kill poor little Célie … it must have been a madman. No one could have deliberately murdered her, no one who knew her.” She paused and peered at him. “Are you wearing mourning for the king, too?”
Aristide found himself speechless for an instant before realizing she had mistaken his black suit for mourning costume. He could scarcely remember a time when he had not worn the same austere black; he had worn mourning for his mother and father, as he was told to, when he was nine years old, and somehow had never abandoned it.
“Police officials customarily wear black suits, madame.”
“A police official,” she mused. “The royal lieutenants of police are commonly noblesse de robe, I believe, like the magistrates, buying their titles; not real nobility. But most of them are of good family, if not quite genuine aristocracy. Are you a gentleman?”
“I hope so, madame.”
Somehow, Aristide thought, the Revolution seemed to have passed Madame de Laroque by without making very much impression upon her. How could one tell such a woman, anchored in the prerevolutionary past, that there was no more royal lieutenant of police in Paris, no more “nobility of the robe” in France, no more nobility at all?
“I shall give you the benefit of the doubt. You may sit down.”
Aristide took the armchair she pointed out to him, after evicting an enormous, sleepy black-and-white cat. “Please, if you would, tell me about Célie.”
“I don’t know what I can tell you. A young thing of twenty isn’t likely to seek advice from an old relic like me. The world has changed so much, you know, since I was a girl. The Grand Monarch himself was still alive in those days, think of that!” She paused, sighing and shaking her head. “To think I could live to see the day when the rabble would actually spill the king’s blood. If the Grand Monarch had been alive …” She stroked the white cat’s head and it arched its neck, purring. “I call him the Sun King, just as a little joke, because he’s so regal. Isn’t he beautiful?”
“He’s very handsome,” Aristide agreed. The black-and-white cat leaped onto his lap and he absently scratched its chin. “Madame, what did you and Célie talk about when she visited you? Did she confide in you?”
“Look, Mouchette likes you. What did we talk about? Oh … whatever crossed our minds. My grand-niece—her mother—died four years ago, and I imagine Célie brought me the little quandaries she’d otherwise have taken to her mother. Just small matters of friends and etiquette and so on. Once or twice she said her father had mentioned offers of marriage. She was already in love, of course, and prospective marriage does put a damper on one’s young love affairs.”
“In love?” Aristide echoed her.
Madame de Laroque uttered a sound he interpreted as a refined and ladylike snort. “She was keeping it a secret from her father, I suppose, but it was plain as the nose on your face. Five or six months she came here all smiles and misty-eyed. You can’t hide that when you’re a chit of twenty. Are you married, young man?”
Aristide
“My business here regards your great-grand-niece, madame,” Aristide said.
“Poor Célie,” sighed Madame de Laroque, continuing to feed the cat bits of quail. “Poor child. And after our family withstood this horrid revolution with nothing more than a few inconveniences … and I’m told so many people did lose someone close to them … after all that, to have some monster kill poor little Célie … it must have been a madman. No one could have deliberately murdered her, no one who knew her.” She paused and peered at him. “Are you wearing mourning for the king, too?”
Aristide found himself speechless for an instant before realizing she had mistaken his black suit for mourning costume. He could scarcely remember a time when he had not worn the same austere black; he had worn mourning for his mother and father, as he was told to, when he was nine years old, and somehow had never abandoned it.
“Police officials customarily wear black suits, madame.”
“A police official,” she mused. “The royal lieutenants of police are commonly noblesse de robe, I believe, like the magistrates, buying their titles; not real nobility. But most of them are of good family, if not quite genuine aristocracy. Are you a gentleman?”
“I hope so, madame.”
Somehow, Aristide thought, the Revolution seemed to have passed Madame de Laroque by without making very much impression upon her. How could one tell such a woman, anchored in the prerevolutionary past, that there was no more royal lieutenant of police in Paris, no more “nobility of the robe” in France, no more nobility at all?
“I shall give you the benefit of the doubt. You may sit down.”
Aristide took the armchair she pointed out to him, after evicting an enormous, sleepy black-and-white cat. “Please, if you would, tell me about Célie.”
“I don’t know what I can tell you. A young thing of twenty isn’t likely to seek advice from an old relic like me. The world has changed so much, you know, since I was a girl. The Grand Monarch himself was still alive in those days, think of that!” She paused, sighing and shaking her head. “To think I could live to see the day when the rabble would actually spill the king’s blood. If the Grand Monarch had been alive …” She stroked the white cat’s head and it arched its neck, purring. “I call him the Sun King, just as a little joke, because he’s so regal. Isn’t he beautiful?”
“He’s very handsome,” Aristide agreed. The black-and-white cat leaped onto his lap and he absently scratched its chin. “Madame, what did you and Célie talk about when she visited you? Did she confide in you?”
“Look, Mouchette likes you. What did we talk about? Oh … whatever crossed our minds. My grand-niece—her mother—died four years ago, and I imagine Célie brought me the little quandaries she’d otherwise have taken to her mother. Just small matters of friends and etiquette and so on. Once or twice she said her father had mentioned offers of marriage. She was already in love, of course, and prospective marriage does put a damper on one’s young love affairs.”
“In love?” Aristide echoed her.
Madame de Laroque uttered a sound he interpreted as a refined and ladylike snort. “She was keeping it a secret from her father, I suppose, but it was plain as the nose on your face. Five or six months she came here all smiles and misty-eyed. You can’t hide that when you’re a chit of twenty. Are you married, young man?”
Aristide
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