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| Aubert: an uncle in the furniture business. |
Louis Shalako
“I have an uncle in the furniture business. That’s
how I got this job in the first place.”
Monsieur Aubert of Aubert Fine Furnishings and
Appliances was a rather large and florid man in his mid-thirties. A not very
subtle comb-over did little to hide the early-onset male baldness although the
hair that was left was still black with no trace of grey.
The three of them stood in the middle of their
household appliance section.
It was a large store, two thousand square metres. It
was a big, rambling space for this part of the city, two full floors, most of
it devoted to the softer furnishings, couches, chairs, lamps and tables, and
then there were the cabinets, dining sets and other wooden wares.
“So, what was different about this particular sale?”
“Yes. I distinctly asked if it might have been
better to get a much larger, commercial freezer, but he said no. It was just
that he, or they, he and his wife, they had a big family, and a big house too,
which was fortunate for them. He made a little joke of it.”
The average household might be at the butcher’s shop
every day or two, looking for fresh meat or even just soup bones. There were
those who invested in a side of beef, or a quarter, all cut up and packaged.
Some subscribed to frozen food services, including vegetables and berries, fish
and poultry. The savings over time might be significant, assuming one had the
freezer space to hold it. There were those with a home garden, freezing and
canning all the fruits, berries and vegetables in season.
It all took up a lot of freezer space.
According to him, they were fortunate to have two of
the same model in stock. A previous customer had taken a look at their display
model, plumped down the required deposit, and so they’d ordered one straight
from the factory. They generally took a couple of days to arrive. When he’d
called that particular customer, in order to ask them when they’d like to
accept delivery, (and to write a nice little cheque for the remainder), the
telephone number had been out of service. He’d been relieved when another
customer had wanted two of the exact same article. Now, of course, it was
looking like a pretty fortuitous coincidence—for somebody.
It they ever turned up, he would cheerfully refund
their deposit, or, just maybe—order another unit for them, and hope they didn’t
vanish again. If the gentlemen did call back, he would definitely call the
police.
That other person’s name was Guy Landry and it would
almost certainly be fake. The address he’d given was probably bogus as well.
The detectives exchanged a glance upon hearing this—but now, even the civilians
were making deductions. Putting a lot of detail into a news story was a
two-edged sword, not that they needed much of a reminder.
“Did this second man give a name? What did he look
like, what was he wearing. You say he paid cash—” Garnier was handling this
one, and he seemed good enough at it.
“Hmn. The name was Thierry. The other thing was the
wife. As often as not, they’re tagging along with the husband. Especially on a
major household purchase. It’s a question of the colour, sometimes. They say
the human eye can distinguish over a million different hues. Women, as you know, have a name for every single one of them.
Dressed well enough in a grey suit. He seemed able to afford it, and I had no
reason to doubt the story. But this fellow had the moving van along with him,
and a wallet full of cash. There were two others with him, ah, the signs on
their coveralls said Montgolfier Brothers.”
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| Monsieur Thierry. |
“So he talked about the wife and kids, and yet he
came alone.” That wasn’t particularly suspicious, except insofar as it fit the
pattern.
“It also seems that money was no object…” Another
deduction from the Monsieur, admittedly he was not too far off the mark with
that last one.
“Okay. Is it all right if we call back and give you
the serial number from, ah, the freezer we have?” Monsieur Aubert could check
that against his own records.
“Certainly. I would be only too happy to help.” He
smiled. “I’ve worked my ass off my whole life—and it isn’t even halfway done
yet. I’m not real fond of thieves, and other such criminal types.”
The gentleman had handed over a substantial sum in
cash. They had backed into the loading area at the rear of the store, and
loaded up both freezers, one still in the crate and one uncrated, which had to
be rolled off the display floor on a sturdy cart that they kept for just such
purposes. He pointed out the exact model, lined up among a bunch of smaller
units. It was fairly popular and he sold a number of various models each and
every month. The furniture business involved shifting a lot of large, heavy
objects as he said.
The date was after the theft of the blue delivery vehicle,
but well before the thing had appeared in Maintenon’s kitchen. This confirmed
more than one surmise. For one, the crime had been long in the preparation
required to pull it off.
The plan had been well thought-out and fairly
specific in its details.
This particular vehicle had been large, white, with
no signs on the sides. Big enough to hold two deep freezers, with plenty of
space left over, and then there were the two laborer-types. Monsieur Thierry
had walked off down the street, to pick up his own vehicle. Or to catch a bus,
a taxi or the Metro, perhaps. At the time, he hadn’t thought too much of it,
except for his own good fortune in making the sale. Holding too much in stock
tied up a lot of cash, so, why not let the manufacturers store it for him.
On his invitation, the pair followed him through a
double doorway and then out into the warehouse. Unlocking the big overhead
door, he opened it up.
“See that vehicle?” It was a big, boxy, slab-sided
delivery van, also in white. “That’s ours. His was more or less the same size.
I have no idea of what business he might have been in. You can rent them by the
day or lease them on a longer contract. It’s routine to deliver a new couch,
armchairs, beds, refrigerators, all the big stuff, right. For a walk-in to come
along, and they have their own vehicle all set to go. It’s just different,
that’s all. There are people who have the means and it saves them a small
delivery fee. But. This way, the man kept us in the dark as to the address and
phone number. And that, is one more reason why I called you.”
Interesting.
“And what did Monsieur Thierry look like, as far as
you can recall…” Could you describe the other two gentlemen, and Monsieur
Landry.
Did they look or sound foreign, for example…were
they of average height, weight, colouring and build sort of thing…they’d been
hearing a lot of that lately.
“Ah, let’s see. Oh, one of the ones in coveralls had
a mustache, average height, not real heavy. A mop of dark hair. Dark brown
eyes…”
Now was the time to whip out the football team
picture.
Monsieur Aubert picked out Abu Samaha without
hesitation…
That was about as good as it was going to get.
***
Éliott had searched for a clean towel, a clean rag,
and he had been frustrated in the end.
There were a few rags, scraps of cloth for washing
up, even one bath towel, not very clean, but that wasn’t what he needed right
now.
The old man, slumped on his bench by the wall,
snored softly in the dim light of the fireplace and the guttering stump of one
candle. Outside, it was only the stars and the bats, the crickets and the
tree-frogs for company and it was about as quiet as he’d ever heard it.
Finally, he had sacrificed his handkerchief,
thoroughly soaking it in hot, soapy water. He had to move some junk out of the
way including their table. He got his little milking stool and put that in
close. Gently, ever so gently, he lifted the man’s chin off of his chest and
carefully rotated the head. It was on the left side, up fairly high. Dabbing
with the damp pad he’d made of the folded bit of cloth, he began loosening up
the dried blood, pus and whatever else might have leaked out of the man’s
skull.
Snork.
The man’s eyes popped open, and Éliott held his
breath, crouched there at the man’s elbow, all too close in terms of the normal
space people liked to have about them. The eyes closed and the snoring started
anew.
He let out a careful breath.
He kept dabbing away at it, his once clean
handkerchief taking on at first a pink hue, then getting darker and darker as
he went along.
There was a lot of swelling in the tissues
surrounding the wound. It was all black around the edges. Not much dirt, it was
mostly just hair.
The eyes popped open and the head twitched. Éliott
hung on to that chin in a kind of gentle violence.
“Argh. Hey. What in the hell are you doing?”
“I’m cleaning up this bloody fucking head wound,
sir. We have already discussed this, sir, as you may recall—and you promised.
Now, if you don’t mind, please hold still just
for one, single, fucking minute longer…”
“Argh. Fuck off.” Groggy with sleep, the man was too
lazy to struggle—too surprised, maybe that was it.
He was still pretty drunk, too.
Éliott laughed.
“One more minute, sir, and then I plan on doing just
that.”
Actually it took three minutes, with the hermit half
awake and half asleep and pretty incoherent.
When he finally made up his mind and questing hands
began struggling to find a support, preparatory to getting up, Éliott had to
give it up, but only temporarily.
“All right, sir. Let’s get you to bed. Ah—how about
a little night-cap? There’s a good bit still in the bottle.” He’d given the
girl a little money, nothing too crazy, and hopefully she’d be back tomorrow
with another bottle of the good stuff. “I still need to slap a proper bandage
on that.”
There was one more thing.
“You know, that swelling. It’s caused by one hell of
an infection. I have just the thing, incidentally. I use it all the time. It
really is no wonder you haven’t been feeling yourself lately. Have you felt
feverish…very hot one minute, chills and stuff the next…any kind of weird
headaches, stuff like that…”
Predictably, the question was ignored.
“I have to piss.”
“Good! Good for you, sir, here, let me help you
up—please. Why, you’ve had quite a lot to drink, are you sure you’re okay?”
“Fuck you. I know how to piss, young man.”
“Of course you do, sir, of course you do. All
righty, then. Off you go—”
Checking his watch, it was coming up on nine p.m.,
and as long as the days could be at this time of year, it was pretty much
pitch-black out there. The cliff itself, and all of those trees made sure of
that. The hermit was still struggling to get up, so he grabbed a wrist and an
elbow and pulled…
“All right, all right. Let me go, for crying out
loud…”
“Here. Hold on there, partner.” Éliott snapped a
match and lit one of the little black cheroots for the man. “Take your time.
I’m not going anywhere.”
The man took the cigar and staggered for the door, trailing
sinuous tendrils of blue smoke. It was like a series of question marks hanging
in the air and following him out the door.
The hermit was talking to himself pretty good out
there. There was nothing wrong with his vocabulary.
His grin faded.
It might be a good idea to keep an eye and an ear on
the man. There was no telling what he might be capable of. Concussions had
their side effects, and however or whatever or whoever, had stuck that blow, it must have come damned close to
killing him outright.
The shotgun was right there, leaning up against the
wall by the front door. He’d been wondering if it was actually loaded. He’d get
a chance to look when the old man fell asleep.
As for a little touch of amnesia, hopefully that
would pass with time—stranger things had been known to happen. He didn’t know
enough about it, but in his impression, permanent amnesia was the exception
rather than the rule. This case had not been caused by some underlying medical
condition. It had been caused by a short, sharp blow to the head.
He really should have brought three cups, keeping
one hidden away, but for the next little part of the plan, he would have to
find something that would suffice to grab a few fingerprints. He would polish
that up, whatever it turned out to be, something that would not immediately be
missed, using his own shirt-tail if it came down to that.
The real key to the situation was the girl.
Apparently, she lived just down the road, and while the centre of town was a
few kilometres away, she did have a bicycle. He was asking a lot of her—
Extremely protective of the hapless old man, crusty
and prickly as he was, she would have to be at her bravest and her most
intuitive in order for this to work—and passing notes and mouthing words into
her eyes was pretty limited in the sense of what he could do and what he might
hope to get away with.
Hopefully she would just trust him.
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And only for as long as the hermit considered him
another fellow-traveller, just another forgotten man, holding the world in a similar
disdain. That was only good so long as it lasted.
With the hermit, that might not be for very long at
all.
The gentleman liked his booze and his cigars, and
that would be very helpful.
“Don’t get lost out there. There’s still a few bears
up in them there hills.”
The sound of water lightly splashing not too far
outside the front door was reassuring enough, and another good reason not to go
walking around barefoot.
“Fuck off, you stupid bastard.”
Éliott grinned from ear to ear.
That, is
exactly what I wanted to hear.
Other than that, and continuing to work on the old
man, it was about time to start thinking of his own stomach.
Sausages and beans, eh. Throw a little mustard on
there and you got something.
That sounded pretty damned good right about now.
And simple pleasures were the best.
END
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Chapter Thirteen.
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