The Song Peddler of the Pont Neuf Read online

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Friday morning found me nestled on a bed of straw between two large wine casks in the back of a wagon rumbling north on the rue Saint-Martin. The day was cold and sunny, and the city glistened with a light coating of snow which had fallen during the night. When I had arrived home after watching Cobenzl, my landlord had handed me a message from Houssemaine. The bookseller had contacted the pamphlet writer he had mentioned to me, Eugèn Viot, who was willing to speak to me about the illegal publishing business if I could come this morning to his family’s tavern on the road to Montmartre.

  I had been lucky enough to beg a ride on the Petit Pont from a wine supplier who was going up to the boulevards, and the wagon had quickly made the journey across the Île de la Cité onto the Right Bank and up toward the wide ring of promenades that surrounded the northern half of the city. But as we approached the Church of Saint-Nicolas-des-Champs, we came to a sudden halt. I heard shouting in the street. I pulled myself up on a barrel and looked around. Two fancy carriages, one which apparently had been speeding down the street on the left and the other hurrying from that on the right, had converged at the rue Saint-Martin and locked wheels. Their passengers were now on the pavement arguing with one another about who had the highest social status and thus the right of way, while wagon drivers up and down the street shouted expletives at the liveried coachmen.

  I climbed down from the back of the wagon. “I’ll walk from here,” I told the driver, flipping him a plug of tobacco. “Thank you for the ride. Good luck.”

  I walked a few blocks up the street and passed through the monumental arch of Porte Saint-Martin onto the broad, tree-lined avenue. A few paces down, at the Porte Saint-Denis, I rented a horse to take me on the rest of my journey. I am not an accomplished rider, not having possessed a horse in my youth, but I enjoy leaving the city and riding once in a while. As I made my way down the boulevard, occasionally shading my eyes against the reflection of the brilliant sun on the snow, I noted that despite the cold, many sons of noblemen and wealthy merchants were out on horseback this morning, learning to trot and canter under the watchful eyes of family grooms.

  My mount, a gentle bay quarter horse, plodded through the snow up the rue Sainte-Anne and onto the rue Bergère, where we passed the large complex of buildings that stored all of the grandstands, bunting, daises, and whatnot needed for royal ceremonies and festivals in the city. A small theater stood among the warehouses. Here the ballets and operas that had been performed in Versailles for the court would occasionally play to the public.

  As my horse turned onto the rue du Faubourg-Montmartre, the landscape became rural, the buildings of the city melting away, replaced by small vineyards and market gardens, with neat, stubby houses dotting the road. After a while the route began to climb uphill and became the rue des Martyrs, so named because legend tells that it was here that the ancient martyrs of Paris, Saint Denis and his companions, were beheaded by pagan soldiers.

  I passed by the Jardin Ruggieri, a large park that in summertime presented fireworks, pantomimes, and dancing. Today its gates were locked and all of its sheds were closed up and dark. The street ahead of me was lined with low buildings, at most two stories high, interspersed with tidy market gardens, empty fields, and small vineyards. To my right was a modest cabaret; a few paces later, on my left, a small inn; and at the next corner, a brothel.

  I found Chez Viot at the very top of the street, on the right side across from the country house of one of the king’s ministers, Malesherbes, who was a noted collector of plants. I’d heard that he maintained a large nursery out here, and through the fence I could see rows of bare, espaliered trees set in front of small greenhouses. Ahead of me loomed the customs wall and station, recently built to collect revenue from the wine suppliers who operated vineyards to its north. I could see windmills turning in the light breeze as the road wound its way up the steep hill of Montmartre to the small village at the top.

  Viot’s establishment was a ginguette, a country tavern where the young of Paris came in warm weather to drink cheap wine, socialize, and conduct romances away from the watchful eyes of their parents. The small, one-story building was fronted by a small patio—certainly an inviting place to relax on a hot summer night, but today, abandoned for the season.

  As I dismounted and tethered the horse to a pole, the door to the tavern opened and a young man came out to greet me.

  “Are you Paul Gastebois?” he asked. “I am Eugèn Viot.”

  I studied him as we shook hands. My imagination had led me to expect that a writer of pamphlets like the Memoir of Madame Désirée would be dark and fiery, with glowering eyes and a surly manner. Instead he was a mild, unprepossessing man, slim and small-boned, with wavy auburn hair worn loose at his shoulders, a long aquiline nose, and a scrawny mustache attempting to assert itself on his pale face.

  “Please, come in,” he said, holding open the door to the building. I stepped inside. The interior was one large room, mostly bare, with a high beamed ceiling. The tables and benches that would be occupied by customers during the summer season had been pushed against the walls, and several straw pallets had been strewn in the center of the room. A small fire burned in the large fireplace against the right wall. Viot’s family was gathered around it: a young, pretty wife, heavy with child, who smiled a greeting to me; two small children—a boy banging on a toy drum with a mallet and a girl cooing to a ragged-looking doll; a baby wailing in a nearby cradle; and, sitting stiffly in a large armchair, an old man, his eyes glassy and vacant, his fingers rhythmically plucking the fabric on the left arm of the seat.

  Viot went to the bar counter and poured two glasses of amber liquid. “Let’s talk outside, if you don’t mind,” he said. I took a glass and followed him out to the patio, where we settled on a long bench set against the front of the tavern.

  “How are you acquainted with Théophile?” he asked.

  “We are neighbors,” I said. “I live above the wineshop near his bookstore.” I took a sip of the drink. It was cider, strong and tart. “And how about you?” I asked.

  “I met him at a meeting at the Palais Royal about two years ago,” he said. “I was there trying to make connections, to see if I could supplement my income by doing some writing. I’d always enjoyed it in school. We got to talking. He knows a lot of people in the publishing world. He agreed to review some of my work, and then put me in contact with a few publishers.”

  “I appreciate your taking time to talk with me,” I said. I raised my glass. “This is delicious cider.”

  “We make it here,” he said proudly. “Minister Malesherbes, who owns that large property across the street, allows the children to pick his apples.” He took a long quaff. “Théophile mentioned that you are a confidential inquirer investigating a murder,” he said, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “What does a murder have to do with political pamphlets?”

  “I’m not sure, which is why I wanted to speak to you,” I said. “I was hired to find a missing song peddler. He was found beaten to death on the banks of the Seine a few days ago. I discovered that he had been selling this pamphlet.” I dug Madame Désirée’s Memoir from my cloak pocket and handed it to him. “I wanted to learn more about your business, in order to determine whether that was what got him killed.”

  Viot turned the pages of the pamphlet and handed it back to me. “I didn’t write this one, but I’ve published many like it,” he said. He twisted in his seat and waved up the road at the customs wall. “Look at what they’ve done! When my parents started this tavern, we were situated well outside the city walls. People flocked here—sometimes even this late in the year—because our wine was good and cheap. But now we have to pay the tax to bring the wine in from just beyond that damned wall, so of course we’ve had to raise our prices. It’s no longer worth the trip out here for most of our customers. Business is way down since they put the wall up.” He shook his head. “My mother died last year, and as you could see, my father can no longer work. Th
e young ones keep coming. I have to do something to support them all, so I write pamphlets. I’m paid fairly well for them.”

  “How do you determine what to write about?” I asked.

  “Oh, I don’t decide myself. I am told what to write. I have a set of clients I work with. Most of them are bigwigs at court, some are even ministers, I believe.” He laughed. “Although to be honest, I’ve never met any of them. I travel into the city every few weeks to meet with their representatives in the Palais Royal. These men tell me what the courtiers wish me to write, and pay me a deposit. Sometimes they want me to attack another courtier, because of some personal animosity; sometimes the assignment is about politics.” He gestured to the pamphlet I held on my lap. “I’ve written several nasty tracts about the queen and her clique—especially about how her brother, the Emperor of Austria, is using her to try to influence the king’s foreign policy.”

  “A friend of the dead man told me he suspected the song peddler had argued with the publisher of this pamphlet,” I said. “Have you met any of the people who print and distribute what you write?”

  “No. I just write the pamphlets. When I go back to the Palais Royal, I give them to the go-betweens, who pay me the balance I am owed. I’m sorry, I don’t know what happens to my work after that.”

  We sat in silence, sipping our drinks. From inside the tavern, the baby wailed.

  “Your suspicion that the peddler was murdered because of the pamphlet is strange,” Viot said. “I’ve never heard of any murders in the business. For me, it is all about the money. I don’t have any strong political opinions. I’m just trying to feed my family.”

  I nodded. “Are you familiar with Marc-Étienne Duval, the police inspector?” I asked.

  He grimaced. “Ah, yes. The famous new inspector who has single-handedly cleaned up the publishing business in Paris. He’s just as corrupt as the rest of the government.” He leaned closer to me and lowered his voice, even though there was no one nearby to hear our conversation. “I’ve heard rumors that he is crooked. Apparently he stages raids on bookstores, seizes any illegal publications they might be selling, and then instead of burning them, trades them himself. I’m told he has a large network of colporteurs and bouquinistes selling them for him. Perhaps your dead man was one of those.”

  The door to the tavern opened and the young boy peeked out. “Papa, Maman needs your help,” he said, eyeing me bashfully. “It is time to move Grandpère.”

  I put my empty glass down on the bench beside me and stood. “I’ve taken too much of your time,” I said to Viot, extending my hand. “I appreciate your meeting with me. May I help you?” I nodded in the direction of the tavern interior.

  He shook my hand. “No, I thank you, but there is no need. We are used to managing.” He idly ruffled his son’s hair.

  I hesitated, wondering if I should give him a few coins, but then decided he would be insulted by the gesture. Instead I held the door as he gathered the empty glasses and followed his son inside.

  I entertained possibilities about Bricon’s death in my mind as I slowly rode back down the rue des Martyrs toward the city. So Duval was a corrupt police inspector. Was Viot correct? Had Bricon worked for Duval, selling the illegal pamphlets the inspector had seized from bookstores? Had Bricon somehow crossed Duval, perhaps embezzled more than his share from the profits of the sales of the pamphlets, leading the inspector to beat him to death in order to set an example for others in his network? The explanation had a certain logic to it.

  But what about the blackmail note I had found in Bricon’s room, I wondered. “God will judge you for your heinous behavior,” it had said. There had been no mention of pamphlets in the note. I sighed. Even though Bricon had left a newspaper article about Duval on his table, I might be making a leap to assume that the police inspector was the victim of Bricon’s blackmail. Even if Duval was indeed the recipient of the note, how could I prove that he had killed the old man, and that the two men’s involvement in the world of illegal publishing was the cause of their conflict? It had to be, I thought. What else could an old song peddler know about a highly-regarded inspector of police?

  As I passed by the king’s warehouses in the rue Bergère, I remembered my conversation with Jean-Baptiste Poquelin yesterday. Bricon had been involved in the Playwright’s smuggling ring. Even though Poquelin had denied having anything to do with the song peddler’s death, I wasn’t sure I believed him. The man was charming and I had liked him, but I had learned long ago not to let my feelings for people interfere with my assessment of a case. But Bricon was just a small link in Poquelin’s web of smugglers and sellers. What could he have done to cause the Playwright to have had him killed?

  I wondered if my client had been aware that his friend was selling smuggled goods. I determined to go to Les Halles tomorrow to ask him. I also had to speak with Hyacinthe again. He had been Bricon’s partner and he—

  My horse slipped on a patch of ice as we turned onto the boulevard. I patted him on the neck to steady him, and let him proceed at his own pace back to the stables at Porte Saint-Denis. I paid the balance of the ostler’s fee and walked down the block to the rue Saint-Martin. Despite the cold, I had enjoyed my ride to the foot of Montmartre. I even envied Viot a bit. What would it be like living out there, with only a few neighbors, surrounded by vineyards and gardens, able to see trees every day and to enjoy a view beyond that of the building directly next door? And to have a wife and children, well—I shrugged. I shouldn’t let myself fantasize about such things. My life was satisfying as it was. I had been born in Paris and had spent my entire life there. Of course the city was crowded, dirty, and smelled most of the time. But I enjoyed its rhythms, the hustle and the bustle. Life in the countryside would quickly bore me.

  Or so I preferred to believe.

  • •

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  “It’s time that I found your owner,” I said to the bird as he flew around my room the next morning. “Someone must be missing you.” I balled up the rag with which I had been wiping his cage and tossed it aside for the wash, and then placed fresh food and water in the cage. After a bit of coaxing, my little friend condescended to enter his newly cleaned and provisioned abode. I took my cloak and went out.

  The offices of the Affiches de Paris, the daily community paper, were in the rue Neuve-Saint-Augustin, behind the Place Vendôme. The streets on the Right Bank were crowded with people this Saturday morning. Yesterday’s snow had already melted in the sunshine.

  I stood in line at the advertisement sales window for about a half hour, and when my turn came, told the beetle-browed young clerk that I wished to advertise a lost bird.

  “What type of bird, monsieur?” he asked as he pulled out a sales form.

  “A canary,” I said.

  “Any distinguishing marks?”

  “No, none that I can think of. He’s small. And gray.”

  “Ah!” Common canary, I saw him write.

  “No feathers of another color?” he asked.

  “No. Just gray.”

  “Does he sing any songs?” the clerk asked. “If he does, it will be easier for his owner to recognize him in the advertisement.”

  “I don’t know if he sings at all,” I said. “I’m away from home a lot, he might sing when I am not there. But I’ve never heard him.”

  “How did you find him?”

  “He flew in my window.”

  He raised his bushy brows. “You leave your window open, monsieur?”

  I waved my hand. “Yes, yes, I know, the air is unhealthy. You are not the first to tell me that,” I said.

  “I imagine not,” he murmured. “When did the bird arrive?”

  “Last Monday, in the morning.”

  He inscribed the details onto the form. “What is the address where the owner can call for him?” he asked.

  “Rue Saint-Jacques, at Lacombe’s wineshop,” I said.

  “Ah, near the university,” he said. “Perhaps you’ll have
some luck and his owner will be a wealthy student, eager to give you a reward.”

  “I just want him to be able to go home,” I said. “I’m not looking for a reward.”

  He finished filling out the form and looked up at me. “That will be two livres.”

  Two livres! I winced. Perhaps I should just keep the little fellow. But for some reason, I found myself hating the thought that someone was missing him.

  “I was told the advertisements were free,” I said.

  “They used to be.” He pointed to the line of people behind me. “But as you can see, there is so much demand for them, we had to begin charging. Otherwise we could fill the entire paper every day with only lost and founds. Everyone in Paris seems to be leaving their belongings behind these days—a snuffbox left at the opera, an umbrella in the Tuileries Gardens. Now, monsieur, if you’ll pay me for this, I can move on to the next customer.”

  I handed over the money, took my receipt, and left.

  Once outside, I went down the street and turned into the rue de Richelieu. I walked behind the Palais Royal to cut over to Les Halles, where I hoped to find my client. His dead friend had been involved in several illegal activities, and I wanted to know if Montigny had been aware of them. I didn’t think he had been telling me everything he knew about Bricon when we had met the other day.

  I asked for the old man at the cheese market, where a burly man cutting large wheels of parmesan said Montigny had not reported for work this morning. It was too early in the day for my client to be at dinner, so I hurried over to his lodgings.

  The drapers market in the rue de la Poterie was full of customers, some spilling onto the street, where vendors had piled bolts of colorful calico on makeshift tables. I pushed my way through a gaggle of women examining bright fabrics and entered Montigny’s building. As I climbed the stairs to his room, all was quiet. Most of the residents were probably at work in the marketplace by this hour. When I reached the third floor and approached the old man’s door, I felt a tingling down my neck. I knocked on the door and waited. There was no answer.