Extract - Chapter 1

The madness of the strongest mind

Perhaps they unraveled their Love for the pleasure of raveling it up again. Quarrels, disappointments, followed their embrace. But this ritual had now lost its rage; without a word, she would fall asleep in the bed, suddenly so big, and he would lay down, there, on the sofa, eyes wide open, for several hours.

“Alec, you won’t forget...?” she begged him in the morning, on the doorstep; her thin face sticking out above a long woolen coat.

“How could I ever forget you”, he muttered.
The bells of Saint Andrew's church had just struck 6 o’clock.
“No, Georgina, her ... you won’t forget her?” Mary insisted.
“My darling ... as if the Dead really gave us a choice! They cling to our memory ... after all, what else do they have to do?”

Cambridge shivered under the snow that the night in turn powdered with a strange darkness. Down below, a few street lamps cut into, here and there, the wrapped shadows of the passers-by. Christophe had joined Professor Alec Leedham on the roof of the chapel overlooking St John's College. He had found the ladder that rose along the inner wall of the sacristy to the confines of gargoyles and stars. Throughout the climb, he wondered if he were not dreaming. Why had Leedham, Emeritus Professor of Anthropology at Cambridge, who had opposed his candidacy, urged him to come here? On a roof! At the top of the tower, he watched the dance of nonchalant flakes, heavy with night and their own whiteness, gradually blurring out the slightest trace of the horizon. Only the peaks of the Colleges, which made up the university, pierced this shroud, waving like the ghost masts of sinister ships.

“Monsieur d'Armencourt ... do you remember that ... um ... incident, shortly before Christmas? ” asked Leedham without waiting any longer.

He did not even turn his head. Standing near the eave, he pulled up the collar of his jacket which he had slipped over a pale linen shirt. Only his pointed chin appeared from beneath his panama.

“An incident?” Christophe faltered. He approached cautiously. The sheet of snow slipped under his boots.

“I remember... I remember the crime... if that's what you want to talk about..”. he eventually said.

After almost two years in Cambridge, the young French man was still not used to Anglo-Saxon euphemisms.

“Exactly! shouted the Professor, turning around. The crime! The unresolved crime! But then Monsieur d'Armencourt ... don’t you find all these silences ... deafening?”
He caught his breath before continuing:

“I assure you, nothing like that has happened in Cambridge since ... well, some time now. As for murders and assassinations of all kinds, I must admit, for once, the undoubted superiority of Oxford,” he added, clearing his throat.
With a firm hand, he pulled Christophe towards him by his coat-sleeve.

“Remember Georgina Edwards ... poisoned, her chest covered with pebbles, her hands tied, dragged in her nightshirt behind the portal of our college, St John's! Not to mention the morbid baby doll at her side! You remember the baby, I hope!”

“Of course, Professor. Yes, it's a shame, it's a real shame,” muttered Christophe, on the alert.

Leedham let go of him. He invited his visitor to sit on the wet snow. Christophe, wrapped in various layers of woolen cloths and a three-quarter coat, complied with a clear lack of enthusiasm and flexibility. The Professor was looking again at the void that the night dug at their feet:

“Georgina Edwards was in third year at Newnham College, brilliant, it seems, or at least that’s the rumor. When a rumor grazes death, it sometimes turns into a tender caress.” Leedham did not think much of Christophe: his muscular but thick build, his brown curls held back poorly by a rubber band and, above all, the cursed nonchalance that Christophe walked around like others walk a stumpy-legged dog: never in any kind of hurry. Moreover, his French accent, still pronounced, imbued each syllable, weighing down all sounds that should have risen up.

Leedham continued:

“Miss Georgina Edwards grew up in York, a childhood full of pumpkins at Halloween, fireworks on Guy Fawkes night, barley sugars in socks at Christmas... well... I should probably not believe a word of all that, but it's the information that is constantly being hacked about by the media. Georgina arrived in Cambridge about two and a half years ago and her life ended here, behind the portal of our College. From St John's!”

“You fear that our College is involved ... I understand,” said Christophe, on his guard.

His colleagues had warned him. The crime had, from the beginning, disturbed the Professor more than was reasonable. Yet, over time, his obsessions seemed to have frayed. Who or what had fueled his old certainties, lent a voice to his nagging ghosts?

“Involved? But our College is obviously involved! said the professor. This body is much more than a body, it is a message, Monsieur d'Armencourt! A message addressed to us!”

A few chips of stone bounced before falling into the void. Christophe did not know what to think. His two-year contract at the University, won in spite of Leedham, was nearing its end; he hoped, however, to renew it. Failing to support ... the madness of the Professor could precipitate his departure. Of course, he could have left: another departure, another tear. He would hardly notice the pain now. But he was not ready to go back; to go back there, to France, to re-open his scars again and to be a stranger in his own country. He suddenly thought about an article, the interview of the inspector in charge of the case.

“Give the police some time,” he suggested vaguely.
Leedham interrupted him.
“The case is closed.”
He pulled a tube of mints from the bottom of his pocket.
“How do you know? The investigation has just begun,” Christophe replied incredulously.
“I know it, that's all,” said the Professor, swallowing a mint.
“But remember, in the article, the inspector had sworn to find the murderer...” insisted Christophe.
He leaned against the low door that ripped open the roof. His breath growing short, Leedham joined him. Despite the thin sheet of snow, he slid his back against the door on the ground and wiped his sweaty hands on his chino before continuing:

“Yes, and I can assure you that Inspector Parker was sincere ... Even if it meant sacrificing more than one might like on his way.”

“I do not understand: is the investigation closed? Yes....no?”

“Let's say that any facts, down to the name of the culprit, will probably not be published in your favorite newspaper, whatever it is,” whispered the Professor. “Haven’t you noticed Monsieur d'Armencourt? Cambridge University and the city of Cambridge have two separate hearts. The affairs of the University should, as much as possible, be dealt with within the University ... and this is especially true when a dead body gets in the way.”

He paused a second before continuing:

“What I am going to tell you, you must not whisper a word of to anyone. I hesitated a lot before asking to see you ... but only you can help me ... without arousing too much suspicion.”

Christophe's face took on an expression that intrigued Leedham: his pale green eyes darkened, the irony deserted his mouth. Leedham saw the man behind the mask, and he did not displease him. Not completely.

“But Inspector Parker ...” Christophe persisted, embarrassed by the confidence.

“The inspector confirmed it to me: the police were ordered to close the file,” said Leedham abruptly.

“And it was the inspector who asked you to conduct an informal investigation?” Christophe tried to hide his skepticism. Leedham grabbed his backpack in the snow. He pulled out a flask of hot tea and two plastic cups.

“Tea?” he said.

Without waiting for the answer, he handed the amber liquid to Christophe who hastened to lover the cup between his frozen fingers. The first sip crucified him on the spot.

“I may have added a little more whiskey than usual,” the Professor said, resting his cup on his lap. “More ... but certainly not enough ... When I talk about Inspector Parker, you see, ... I sometimes need something a little stronger than Earl Gray.”

“So you know him well...” concluded Christophe.

“Up to the name of the Inspector’s perfume, the colour of her negligee in fact,” said Leedham.

Christophe looked at him stunned and took a second sip. The Professor finally added: “Inspector Mary Parker was, until three years ago, my wife.”
Christophe then remembered rumors overheard in the St John’s college hallway. Mary Parker allegedly cheated on Leedham with a colleague. She had left him later, without even bothering to keep her lover. Christophe decided not to ask questions, perhaps because the Professor seemed suddenly weighed down beneath his fitted jacket.

“I hadn’t seen her since the beginning of the investigation. She’d even done her best to give me as little information as possible. But, against all odds, Mary came to me at St John's yesterday. The very portrait of irritation in high heels !”

Leedham suddenly had to catch his breath before continuing, as if all at once, the infinity of the sky there, at hand, crushed him beneath its heavy lid.

“Monsieur d'Armencourt, do you know what noise the truth makes when suffocated by the shadows? No ? Well, it makes no more noise than when one crushes the tiniest butterfly.

And that's exactly what one or two puppet masters had just ordered Mary to do... to forget the Georgina Edwards case, to crush the butterfly one last time...”

“To forget everything? Her body, the stones, St John's ... the baby doll at her side?” murmured Christophe.

Suddenly disenchanted, he looked at the horizon of tiles and turrets. What kind of woman, no matter how “ex”, had chosen to revive the Professor's obsessions? thought Christophe for a moment. But, suddenly intrigued, he asked:

“Did Mary ask you to do anything? Anything in particular?”
Slowly the “tea” warmed his body, lending a little summer to its winter. “Prayed!” declared Leedham with a nasty grin. “Mary asked me to investigate in secret at the university! I still hear my colleagues repeating to me, like primary teachers in a playground, that the assassin did not mean specifically to leave the body of Georgina at St John's .... and just when I was about to believe them, Mary comes back to persuade me of the opposite ...! “The reason is the madness of the strongest mind”... isn’t it, Monsieur d'Armencourt?”

“The reason is the madness of the strongest mind...” These words resonated in dismal echoes in Christophe's head. Perhaps that was exactly what he should have whispered to Ana-Lou before her hallucinations gnawed at her, before the clinic door closed behind her, before losing her. He jumped, as if rising to the surface of murky water. He handed his empty cup to Leedham, who refilled it to the brim.

“But Mary is still hiding something from me,” mumbled the Professor, cuffing the flask. “You see, what I do not understand is that it's not the first time ...’
“The first time that...?” asked Christophe.
“That Mary was ordered to close a file before even opening it. She usually obeys without flinching but this time ... this time, it’s different. And I wonder why. Yes, why?” sighed Leedham.

His cup spilled into the snow.
“Christophe, I need ... your eyes.”
“My eyes?” repeated Christophe reluctantly. “You need my eyes?”
“Your gaze ... your eyes are like scalpels, thin and sharp. I'll need those blades for a while,” said the Professor.
Christophe found nothing to reply, surprised by what, coming from the anthropologist, sounded like a compliment. He wiped away some flakes that were already building up on his sleeves.

“Closer to the world ...and closer again, whispered the Professor,” jumping up suddenly. “Closer to this sad world ...”

He approached so close to the gutter that Christophe stopped breathing for a moment. Leedham tilted his head towards the street.

“You see, as a student, I could recognise the grain of every gargoyle under my fingertips ... I stroked the twisted pleasure of their faces. Several of us, students, climbed at night from one roof to another ... to challenge death, I guess ... Then ... I decided to understand what motivated the coming and going of these little black dots constantly moving down there. I came closer to the world. I had the audacity to explain why and how these little points ran around, believed this or that about the beginning of the world, tore themselves apart, sometimes even loved each other, burned candles and incense before burning out
in their turn ... But follow me, rather ...”

Despite being fifty-five, Leedham had kept the energy of the boxing and rowing champion he had been in his student years. He was walking along the ledge now. Christophe, still tangled up in his cloak, hoisted himself up with less grace than his elder; he caught up with him. Almost.

“But I'm not so free anymore ...” Leedham continued. “Your colleagues ... our colleagues, will probably have already told you ...”

It is true that they had not been stingy with details. Since his divorce three years ago, Leedham had slowly packed his suitcase; his suitcase, his ambitions and his fieldwork. He had turned his back on the people of the high altitudes of Tibet and the Himalayas, ignored the call of their beliefs. A fear of new situations, crawled into the Professor's head and sometimes seized him by the throat to the point of taking his breath away. Suddenly, Ana- Lou’s last smile seemed to float slowly over Christopher’s thoughts. Perhaps he understood the Professor more than he could ever have expected.

“I am the prisoner ... I am the jailer,” added the Professor. “Some places are inaccessible to me. But ... I need to see the environment where Georgina was evolving ...where she laughed, cried, loved and whispered.”

“But, exactly, why me?” Christophe asked uneased. “Angela, for example, you know her far better ...”

Angela Walker, an expert in the Anthropology of Religion, must have burned countless candles in hopes of attracting the attention of the Professor. Leedham had always had a gruff charm that appealed to many women.

“Angela cannot be involved,” said the professor abruptly, pulling on his scarf.

“Would it be out of courtesy?” Christophe ventured.

“You will find that Miss Walker does not arouse in me any of those impulses which impel me to hold the door open for ladies. Of course, it has nothing to do with her mustache. Rather...Do you like theater, Monsieur d'Armencourt?” asked the Professor, opening the hatch on the roof.
He put on his backpack.

“I did a lot of acting in Toulouse ... I thought I'd get back to it at some point...”

The snow was thickening on his shoulders. But already Leedham had put his feet on the first rung of the ladder.

“So maybe you should go and see the A.D.C. The oldest university theatre in all of England ... it's teeming with ghosts and young talents,” Leedham replied. They are doing Cabaret right now, he added ... Remember, the musical, Liza Minelli ...”

But his boots were already echoing on the metal bars as they descended into the bowels of the tower barely lit by a thin bulb. The moist air leaped at his face. Christophe had to unbutton his three-quarter coat to follow him.

“Yes, yes, a cabaret ... Berlin in the thirties, a love story,” said the young man in a more and more distant voice.

He remembered listening to this record, happy, his head leaning against Ana-Lou’s warm chest. Before.

“Why the A.D.C Professor?” He shouted.
His question bounced on the stone walls.
“Georgina Edwards spent a lot of time there. In fishnet stockings, it seems. Let's say I wonder what role she really played ... You will meet her boyfriend, a certain Pip ...”
“Ah .. well ... yes, of course, Professor ...” said Christophe who, out of breath, was already listening with only one ear.
The Professor's boots finally slammed down against the slabs of the chapel floor. Christophe joined him in front of the Crucifix. The door of the sacristy, at the very end of the nave, was still open.

“In any case, Monsieur d'Armencourt, do not forget that we are in Cambridge ... all our suspects will be terribly intelligent ... but no one is as brilliant as he or she thinks ...” Leedham closed the sacristy door behind them before walking away. Christophe watched his figure melt into new squalls of snow. He glanced at his watch:19.00. His stomach, still on French time, suggested that a small meal would not be too much. A little meal and a little Chablis. Perhaps that would be enough to repel the ghosts of the past and deal with the demons of tomorrow.