Murder On The Rue Cassette (A Serafina Florio Mystery) Read online

  He laughed. “I’m even less of a designer, but let me introduce you to our chief of design.”

  They followed him to a desk in the corner of the workroom where a woman of a certain age sat looking through half-glasses at a book brimming with swatches of fabric. Ricci introduced them to Madame Josephine Joyeuse. Pieces of felt lay on her desk as did some peacock feathers, strands of horse hair, netting and lace. At the sound of Ricci’s voice she rose, a tall woman, slender. She had Gallic features and a presence. Her smile warmed the air around them, and her graying hair was pulled up, pinned, curled and arranged in an elaborate French coiffure.

  “My friends have come from Sicily on behalf of my uncle.”

  Carmela cut in. “And I’d love it if you could design a hat for my friend, Madame Joyeuse,” gesturing to Tessa who wore her teal day dress but was hatless.

  “Certainly,” she said, gazing at the hat Carmela wore, a small black pillbox with a spray of dyed feathers and a veil draping slightly over the top and circling down one side. Before they left this morning, Carmela had fussed with it, angled it just so.

  “Please call me Madame Josephine. Everyone does. I’m afraid our showroom is a little crowded this afternoon. We must have our clowns,” she said, cocking her head in Ricci’s direction and pursing her lips, “but perhaps we can find a corner where we are not disturbed. This way.”

  She led them into a private room with a table and mirror where several hats sat on a rack. A few more were scattered about an overstuffed chair in the corner. The designer asked them to excuse her and returned in a few minutes with several basic shapes, a pillbox, a cloche, a beret, and a straw. In her apron she carried some loose flowers, fruit, feathers, and veils. She dumped these on the table in front of Tessa and began by having Tessa stand in front of a mirror while she looked at her reflection, feeling the fabric of her dress, turning her around, and asking her to sit.

  Madame Josephine glanced at Carmela. “You’ve been to our other stores, I see,” she said as she began designing Tessa’s hat, her fingers like the wings of birds in flight, her head cocked to one side.

  “Pardon?”

  “Your hat. Designed for you at our store on the Rue de la Paix, no? Let me guess the designer, I’ve trained them all, you know.”

  “I brought this from home. I made it myself.”

  Josephine Joyeuse stopped, straightened. “Lovely work.”

  She continued creating Tessa’s hat, placing and shaping the felt just so, rejecting it, picking up a deep cadmium red pillbox instead, pinning, prodding, fussing with speed and dexterity, a hatpin between her teeth. She stepped back to appraise the work, adjusting the angle of the hat, her movements transforming the material, shifting it slightly, pulling it backward, forward, refitting the hat on the head, trying a different veil until she was satisfied. Her touch reminded Carmela of how the voice can inflect words to change their meaning.

  “Stand please,” she said to Tessa.

  Tessa looked in the mirror and widened her eyes.

  Madame Josephine straightened her apron. “Now step back slightly from the mirror.”

  Tessa did, and once again saw a change.

  “You see how your whole outfit ‘turns’ when you step back, the same way a painting does. That’s how a hat transforms. That’s how you know it works for you.”

  * * *

  On the way home, they stopped in front of Busacca’s store on the Rue de Verneuil and watched as David filled the display with the last of four new hats taken from the back. He’d rolled up his sleeves and wore a black apron. His face was flushed.

  The front of the store was spotless. On entering, Tessa breathed the scent of soap and polish.

  “No customers yet. It will take a while, but there will be customers, I promise you,” he said, his eyes alive as he glanced at Tessa. “Don’t look in the back, not yet, except I’ve made a stab at the top of my desk.”

  They said goodbye, praising his work and promising to return before they left Paris.

  He gave Tessa his card.

  “Don’t I feel like a cipher,” Carmela said. She smiled at Tessa. “Did you see the way he looked at your hat? You must wear them all the time.”

  She waved a dismissive hand. “In Paris, yes. But at home ... Just wouldn’t do. How I love this city.” Tessa’s cheeks glowed.

  Serafina listened to what Carmela and Tessa had to say about Sophie’s sons and their stores. It confirmed Serafina’s suspicions. “It doesn’t surprise me,” was her only comment. She was interested in the difference between David and Ricci.

  Chapter 24: Waiting for News

  Serafina had a good idea of who killed the woman in the Rue Cassette and who attacked her in Elena’s apartment, but as she waited for Valois to confer with Dr. Tarnier, she felt the press of time. She decided to act before it was too late, so she wired Busacca.

  “Facts in case deliberately confusing. Possible your daughter lives. Letter follows.”

  In her letter to Busacca, she brought him up to date on what she’d learned so far—the discrepancy in appearance and class between the dead woman and a countess, the quick burial of the body, the attack in Elena’s apartment, the similarity of the two bullets discovered in the victim’s mouth and in her own shoulder. She detailed the state of Elena’s health before her “demise” and her appointments with the chief surgeon at La Maternité. She mentioned the release of Loffredo who had wrongfully been charged with Elena’s murder. And lastly, while a study of his business was not part of her commission, she believed the distress of his stores in Paris was indirectly related to his daughter’s disappearance. At the very least, Busacca et Fils needed his attention or his business would be left behind other milliners.

  Once more she and Rosa combed Elena’s apartment, looking for an address, any clue however obscure as to her whereabouts. They didn’t find a scrap. There was nothing for it but to wait—for inspiration, for truth, for definitive evidence from Tarnier. It was after all spring, the season of hope.

  They’d been in Paris a week, and for the last two days talked of nothing but the weather and the food and the sights. Not a bad life, but the pieces had come together in her head and she wanted to get on with the case. The air was warming and Serafina’s spirit was content, the passionate longing for Loffredo dampened for the moment, perhaps because of necessity. It was enough now to be close to him. Truth to tell, she felt empty without him at her side.

  So for a few days they enjoyed themselves and forgot about Elena and Sophie and Valois. They argued about the theater, fashion, cuisine, politics. They argued about what made Paris Paris. They never mentioned the future of Sicily. She went with Loffredo and Rosa to see Sarah Bernhardt in Phèdre. When Serafina said she didn’t see anything divine about The Divine Sarah, the madam had the effrontery to say, “Too much like you.” They sat in the Jardin des Plantes, in the Tuileries, in the Parc Monceau and in her favorite, the Jardin du Luxembourg. They toured the Gobelins, took a cruise on the Seine. They were happy. Loffredo took them to the studio of Sébastien Érard in the Chateau de La Muette and they marveled at the collection of grand pianos. Perhaps Maria would play one someday.

  It was late afternoon when Valois knocked on Serafina’s door. She sent Teo and Arcangelo to fetch Loffredo. They talked of this and that, waiting for everyone to gather.

  Valois cleared his throat. “This morning I talked with Dr. Tarnier who said that Elena Loffredo, expecting a child, was indeed under his care. Her last appointment was April 16 at two in the afternoon. Her next appointment was scheduled for tomorrow at nine in the morning.”

  There was a hush.

  “Why did I doubt you?” Rosa asked.

  “So that means either the woman who was murdered in the early morning hours of April 16 was incorrectly identified as Elena Loffredo, or Dr. Tarnier’s patient claiming to be Elena Loffredo is lying,” Serafina said. “You asked to see her signature, of course.”

  Valois nodded. “We checked the signature
with the Banque de France where she has an account. There can be no doubt: she signed Tarnier’s form.”

  “Any account activity?” Arcangelo asked.

  Valois blew air out of his mouth the way Frenchmen do. “Not since a thousand franc withdrawal on April 15.”

  Serafina shot a swift glance at Rosa.

  “What’s the address she gave Tarnier?” Serafina asked.

  “Her address on the Rue de Passy. Different from the one on her passport,” Valois said.

  “Does she have future appointments?”

  “Twice a month until November.”

  Serafina composed an advertisement for the prominent daily newspapers—Le Figaro, Le Gaulois, Le Petit Journal, La Presse, Le Siècle, Le Temps, et L’Univers. It offered a reward for information that led to the present location of Elena Loffredo née Busacca. While Serafina was convinced that one or two of Elena’s closest friends knew where she was hiding, pinning them down had proven impossible.

  At the risk of disturbing Dr. Tarnier again, Loffredo wished to speak with him. He returned within the hour.

  “There can be no doubt. Elena Loffredo is with child and alive, at least she was alive on the afternoon of the 16th,” he said. “The signature is unmistakably hers. She signed documents on April 9 and on April 16.”

  “And did you find out why she chose to see a doctor instead of a midwife?” Rosa asked.

  Loffredo looked at his feet. “I’d rather not say.”

  They were silent and Rosa rang for café and sweets.

  Chapter 25: A Visit with Sophie de Masson

  They sat in the parlor, Serafina next to the fringed lamp, Loffredo closer to Valois, Rosa on his other side. An overstuffed wing chair on the other side of the fringed lamp stood empty, waiting for Sophie de Masson to arrive.

  Serafina stared at a square of sunlight on the slightly worn carpet beneath her feet and slid her eyes to Loffredo who sat still and at peace. He must have felt her eyes on him for he smiled, glancing quickly at Valois who cleared his throat. Serafina curled her toes, warming them. Her boots creaked and Rosa shot her a look. The madam folded her hands in her lap, her face inscrutable, her hat slightly forward and angled to one side, the way Carmela had placed it on her head that morning.

  As on their previous visit, the butler entered and apologized for the delay, slicking the side of his pomaded hair and glancing at Rosa. He was followed by a maid who poured tea from a porcelain pot, offering them dainty tarts and chocolate bits arranged just so in that stiff way of the French—some of them, Serafina corrected herself. Steam rose from china cups, swirling in rays of sun. She occupied her mind with the play of dark and light. While they ate their tarts, the others talked of the weather. It was warm for April, Valois assured them. His remark was followed by silence except for the jingle of spoons and the distant sounds of the street. Serafina wiped her mouth with stark white linen.

  “Jesse James was married Friday, I read in Le Figaro,” Valois said, and put down his cup, rattling it against the saucer.

  “Who?” Rosa asked.

  “A North American. He robs trains and banks,” Valois said. “Notorious but well-loved by the people.”

  “Many in our town leave for the new world, and I fear for them,” Loffredo said.

  Serafina wished she spoke French as well as he. “I think it’s a mistake, their going to the Americas, the North, especially—such a lawless land.”

  “Not all,” Valois said. “New York is safe, and one can make a good living there. It is the west that is full of bandits, like your country. The James gang, for instance. But now the Pinkerton Agency is after them. They learned detecting from us, you know.” He beamed.

  “Everyone learned detecting from you,” Serafina said. She smiled. And as for New York, she wasn’t about to disabuse Valois of his misconception, but she knew otherwise. The immigrant neighborhoods were ripe grounds for the picking, and men like the don were at the ready.

  “Mark me, they’ll find him.”

  “No doubt. And we’ll get to the bottom of this mystery,” Serafina said, looking at a tear in the wallpaper. Her tea was untouched, her stomach doing somersaults. She suspected Sophie kept them waiting on purpose, and her mind left the conversation about the bank robber and the Americas, focusing instead on Elena and where she could be and who was helping to hide her. Would Sophie reject their claims as preposterous or be contrite and admit her folly in identifying the dead woman as her niece? Was it a mistake on her part or willful obfuscation to identify that poor prostitute as her niece, and if so, why?

  The patch of sun had moved to another spot in the carpet when Sophie entered the room, this time in black bombazine and on the arm of her lady’s maid. Serafina and Rosa exchanged glances while the men rose. Instead of greeting each one of her guests, she nodded around the room while she moved her mouth from one side to the other as if chewing her thoughts.

  After the servants departed, Valois began to speak. Serafina watched Sophie’s face for her reaction.

  “New evidence has arisen concerning the woman slain on the Rue Cassette,” the inspector said. “We think she was a woman of the streets, not your niece. The proof is strong enough to warrant exhumation of the body.”

  Sophie let out an involuntary shudder and moved in her seat, looking not at Valois or anyone else in the room. Her right hand began to tremble and she quickly grabbed the arm of her chair.

  “This cannot be. My eyes fail me, that is true. There is a hole in the center of my vision and it grows, but with this loss, my other senses have been heightened. I know my niece. I touched her face. It was Elena I identified in the morgue, and I stand by it.”

  “How did you know it was she?” Loffredo asked.

  “I know my niece. I keep in contact with her. Unlike you, I care for her. I give her the support of a family who loves her, despite her unusual behavior. It was the shape of her head, the side of her face, the color of hair, the scent she wore, that above all, her perfume. I’d recognize it anywhere, even in that pathetic morgue.”

  Loffredo squared his shoulders. “Elena has a reaction to perfume. She doesn’t use it, never has.”

  Flustered, Sophie lashed out at him. “You’re a poor excuse for a husband. It was because you couldn’t fulfill your duty that she traveled to Paris and sought the company of other men. And when you decided, finally, that you wanted her home, when you could no longer have the young women you so desire, you came to Paris to bring her back. And when she wouldn’t return to that sordid country of yours, you killed her.”

  Loffredo sat unmoving. He stared at Sophie, his gaze unwavering. Serafina wanted to get up and slap her, and she could have, too. She wanted to rip her elaborate coiffure to shreds, but gathering strength from Loffredo’s reaction, she stirred once and stole a glance at Rosa whose face was flushed as she looked down.

  “Elena has a birthmark beneath her right ear. Did you see it?”

  Sophie turned to Valois. “Why do you persist in this folly?”

  The inspector was calm. “Because we have proof that Elena Loffredo was alive some twelve hours after the woman you identified as your niece was murdered in the Rue Cassette, and I suggest you do not fight the order of exhumation. It will look like you have something to hide.”

  “You, sir, are not my attorney.” She rang the bell.

  “A valid point.” Valois ran a hand down his lapel. “But I suggest you consult with him. Right now you have four witnesses to your defamatory remarks. Persist, Madame, and I will take you in for questioning.”

  When the butler arrived, Loffredo took his top hat and gloves from the servant.

  Valois grabbed his chapeau melon. He nodded to Rosa and Serafina. “For now we are finished.”

  Chapter 26: Brasserie Bofinger

  “I can smell Bofinger from here.” Rosa turned to Valois. “Dine with us as our guest.”

  Serafina felt Loffredo’s hand on her back, warming her as he helped her across the street, guiding her to the sma
ll Alsatian brasserie. She smiled up at Loffredo and for a second, wrapped her good arm around his waist. “We need to talk,” Serafina said. “Will it be private enough for us?

  “I think so, it’s a small bistro, but the food is excellent and they serve all kinds of sausage and meats, fish, seafood, sauerkraut,” Valois said, “and they have the best beer in the city. We need a break from that horrid woman.”

  Serafina was beginning to like Alphonse Valois. “You walk often, Inspector?”

  He nodded. “As much as I can. Especially when I need to think. I found Madame de Masson’s reaction quite ...”

  “Remarkable?” Loffredo supplied.

  “Has she always shown such antipathy toward you?” Serafina asked.

  Loffredo nodded. “She was against our marriage, especially Elena’s conversion. She blames me for Elena’s behavior.”

  Valois shook his head.

  The madam hung onto her hat. “You’ll love this brasserie, at least I did the last time I was here. It had just opened and a friend and I had an intimate table in the back. They had tall waiters with blond hair, almost as delicious as the food.”

  They were seated right away at a round table in the small bistro. Serafina sat to the left of Loffredo, her good hand free to roam. Each ordered a beer and watched as the bartender filled four mugs with a rich yellow liquid from a barrel. The waiter brought them to their table on a small round cork tray, the foam bubbling over the sides and the glasses sweating. Taking out a pad wedged between his apron and shirt, he licked the tip of his pencil and stood poised to take their order.

  “Please don’t choose some delicate fish and gentle wine,” Rosa said to Serafina. “This is Alsatian. Order hearty food.”

  “I’ll have what I want. I always do.”

  “Not always,” Rosa said, with a meaningful glance at Loffredo.