Beekeeper Read Free Page B

Italians, by the way. Banded yellow over the abdomen and with hairs that are fawn-coloured. Gentle, too, and prolific breeders just like their namesakes.’
    â€˜I never knew you were so well versed about bees.’
    â€˜There’s plenty you don’t know! This cluster had lots of honey and pollen to feed on.’
    He pointed cells out, pricking some and scraping the wax cappings away. A maze of cells, a warren of them.
    Indicating a poorly defined thumbprint, he said, ‘Whoever robbed the hives wore gloves and was afraid of bees. They could so easily have scraped the cluster away and taken everything.’
    Instead, they had left perhaps a good three kilos of honey in each hive.
    Kohler switched off his torch and for a moment the star-filled sky came down to them, the air cold and clear. No hint of smoke or car exhaust in a city of nearly two and a half million. Paris had the most fantastically clear sunrises and sunsets these days, the most beautiful views over its pewter and copper-green roofs.
    In ’39 there had been 350,000 private automobiles and traffic jams like no others; in July of 1940 there had been, and now were, no more than 4,500 cars and most of those were driven by the Occupier. Sixty thousand cubic metres of gasoline had been required per month before the Defeat; now all that was allowed was 650 cubic metres. Thirteen hundred of the city’s buses had disappeared from the streets and virtually all of the lorries.
    Now the city ran on bicycles or on two feet, and when it shut down like this at midnight, it didn’t open up again until 5 a.m. Berlin Time, 4 a.m. the old time in winter and hell for those who had to get up and go to work.
    â€˜So when were the hives robbed and by whom, Chief?’
    Hermann was below him in rank. Sometimes he would use this accolade to prod his partner; sometimes, when others were present, to let them know he was subordinate to a Frenchman.
    â€˜Footprints,’ sighed St-Cyr.
    â€˜I was wondering if you’d noticed them. The préfet’s boys and those of the commissariat on the rue des Orteaux, which isn’t far, is it, but did they have to trample everything and visit every hive?’
    â€˜A woman, I think.’
    â€˜Madame de Bonnevies?’
    â€˜Or another, but the matter can be left for now. Why not go and have a talk with the grieving widow? Let me take care of the rest.’
    The corpse. ‘Are you sure?’
    Having seen too much of it, Hermann hated the sight of death. ‘Positive. Fortunately the study is separated from the rest of the house and this kept the fumes from it, but it’s interesting, is it not, that the woman didn’t spend much time in there after she discovered what had happened? We could so easily have had two corpses on our hands. Use the front entrance; leave me to go in by the back. I want time alone and undisturbed with him, Hermann. I need to think and want Madame out of the way and distracted.’
    â€˜And the daughter?’
    â€˜It would be best if she were to come upon us by surprise, but then these days anything is possible, and a daughter who is absent without a laissez-passer and a sauf-conduit will have to be questioned about what she missed.’
    About the missing permit and safe-conduct pass or the murder? wondered Kohler but let him have the last word, for Louis was in his element.
    â€˜Madame …’ hazarded Kohler on entering the salon.
    The woman didn’t look up or turn from the stone-cold hearth. ‘ Oui. What is it, Inspector?’
    â€˜A few small questions. Nothing difficult.’
    His voice was gentle but this grated on her nerves, though she told herself he was only trying to be kind. She heard him sit in one of the other armchairs, knew he would have noticed there wasn’t a speck of dust in the room and that she must have an obsession about cleanliness. Would he smell the eau de Javel , she wondered, or just the lavender water