Charlie considered her last conversation with Inspecteur Bernard and realised that her own goodwill with the Cité Metro Police was also on shaky ground. If she wanted to stay in Paris as an investigative reporter, she was going to have to rely on her own resources.
Allard sighed again and ran his fingers through his curls. ‘These wild goose chases are getting us nowhere, just annoying my men, who could be looking at facts. We are missing a central piece.’ He twisted the Tours pin on the map behind him. ‘But Ibelieve there is a connection between all these homicides. The bullet in the back of the neck feels premeditated. The disposing of the bodies in the woods. Makes sense he would not go to the same place.’
‘He?’ queried Charlie. ‘You’re assuming the killer is male.’
Allard regarded Charlie for a moment, taking in her fitted shirt dress, and shivers ran up her back. She felt exposed. She hoped he didn’t sense it.
‘You strike me as very strong. Physically and mentally. Yet even you would struggle to carry a male body like Jouet’s several hundred metres through a park, then into the woods. He was eighty kilograms.’
‘Perhaps,’ Charlie conceded. ‘I haven’t tried.’ She remembered tossing her siblings over her shoulders in a fireman hold and pretending to escape from an imaginary bushfire when she was a teenager. Her younger brother adored that game. But carrying a grown man up to a kilometre? A dead weight, no less. That would be tough, no question.
She snapped her notebook closed and said, ‘I know what I need to do next.’ She checked her watch—they had time to eat their croissants, and then she needed to make some notes, phone George to update him, and get ready for the evening. She had promised Violet she would be at the event tonight.
She coughed and asked, ‘Have you got a tuxedo?’
Chapter 21
VILLA TRIANON, VERSAILLES
Charlie James sat in Lady Ashworth’s reception room at Villa Trianon, draped on a large chintz chair, her arm dangling over the edge. The room was the most extravagant in Versailles, with oversized tables, overstuffed sofas and walls covered in gold and fuchsia silk wallpapers. Animal hides covered half the parquetry floor. The lights were dimmed and the room glowed with the light of hundreds of candles.
The guests were about to arrive and Violet was flitting between the models arranged over sofas, propped against gilded window frames and lying on the floor, adding last-minute necklaces, adjusting a bunch of grapes balanced on a hand, draping hair across a neck or just murmuring some words of reassurance.
Violet joined Charlie where she sat poured into her blue silk dress. ‘We’re looking for languid and dreamy, darling,’ she said,kissing Charlie’s forehead and clicking her fingers for an assistant to bring more necklaces to swathe around Charlie’s neck. The beads felt cold against Charlie’s skin and she shivered. ‘These positions are just for when the guests walk in—then I want you to walk.’ She put her hands up to mimic wind. ‘No, I want you toglideamong the guests and let them see how the silk moves, how it sits across your body.’
‘And you think my glide will sell dresses?’
‘If you do it properly, then yes,’ replied Violet, tilting Charlie’s head, ruffling the necklaces and patting her on the arm. ‘I also want you to use your words. You’re not just a pretty face.’
‘Got it. Charm the guests. Make them buy dresses.’
‘Dresses. Exactly. Plural. You do look like a dream. Is the forester coming?’
‘Detective Allard. Who knows? I gave him the invitation, but as you know, he has a number of cases on his hands at the moment. They seem to be multiplying, unfortunately. I’m going to need another one of your secret brown expenses envelopes to go to Saint-Cloud on Monday.’
‘I’ll get it when I’m back in the city tomorrow.’
‘Honestly, I have no idea what I’d do without you. I’m going to Rue Véron tomorrow for a tip I want to check out, so I can meet you nearby for lunch if you like and I can grab the money then.’
‘Rue Véron? I love Montmartre. The back avenues have the best stores and markets. Also the best bars. Forget lunch, I’ll come with you to Montmartre.’
Charlie considered the name on the young Schmidt’s reference: Koch. German. It would help to have a translator on hand just in case his French or English was unclear. ‘Great. You can be my translator. It can be payment for my modelling fees.’ She laughed, because they both knew it would take Charlie a year to pay off the dress she wore if she had to buy it.
Aleksandr walked into the room holding a bottle of champagne and started to fill the flutes on the sideboard. Lady Ashworth trailed behind him and waved at a waiter to take over Aleksandr’s job.
‘Come, come, Aleksandr, and take my arm. We need to greet our guests.’
Aleksandr did as he was told and stood beside Lady Ashworth, who was dressed demurely in a black silk wrap dress, her green hair piled high in a loose beehive.
‘Thank you, Lady Ashworth,’ he said as he threaded his arm through the one she’d propped on her hip.
‘Nonsense, the thanks is all mine. You make me feel so wonderful, I can’t keep you to myself. We only have a few coming.’ She lowered her voice. ‘But they will order well, I know it.’ She winked.
‘Look at you, Charlie!’ Lady Ashworth bent over to kiss Charlie on both cheeks and did the same with Violet. ‘You are a Titian goddess.Magnifique!’ She waved her hands and said to Violet, ‘I love what you’ve done with the place.’
‘I had a great base to work with.’ Violet blew the older woman a kiss and planted one on Aleksandr’s blushing cheek.
‘Positions.’ Violet clapped then took Aleksandr’s other arm, kissed his cheek again for good luck and guided him and Lady Ashworth to greet the arriving guests.