Cinderella Six Feet Under(17)

“But—” Ophelia said.

Penrose drew her away. “Thank you, Mr. Grant,” he said over his shoulder.

“What a slinky dog!” Ophelia whispered, once she and Penrose were in the corridor. “Not breathing a word to the police?”

“He was immediately forthcoming to us about the girl’s name.”

“Well, certainly. Because anyone else in this building could tell us the very same thing.”

“True. Should we attempt to learn where Miss Pinet lived? I believe I noticed some sort of clerical office downstairs.”

*

A cluttered room with wooden cabinets and shelves led off the downstairs corridor. Its frosted glass door was ajar. Inside, a sparrow-shouldered woman with faded blond hair and sagging, powdered cheeks sat at a desk. She wore a plain gown and, surprisingly, carmine paint on her lips.

Theater folk, Gabriel believed the term was. He glanced at Miss Flax in her preposterous disguise.

“Go ahead,” Miss Flax said to him softly. “Ask her about Sybille.”

“Excuse me, madame,” Gabriel said to the clerical lady in French. “Did you by chance know Sybille Pinet, a young dancer in this company?”

“I keep the books. I know everyone. And I know, too”—the lady’s eyes suddenly filled with tears—“of Sybille’s death. Are you her uncle?”

“No. We are both her friends.” Gabriel paused. “I beg your pardon, but why did you not suppose I am Mademoiselle Pinet’s father?”

“You are too young, for one thing. And she said her father died five years ago.”

“She knew Sybille,” Miss Flax said in an excited whisper.

“Yes,” Gabriel said. “And Miss Pinet’s father died five years ago—or so she said.”

“Ask her why the police haven’t figured out who Sybille was, why nobody said anything to the police.”

Gabriel translated.

“Sybille was a quiet girl,” the lady said.

“But surely everyone knew her, still, and her picture was in half the newspapers in Europe, and surely every newspaper in Paris,” Gabriel said.

The lady hesitated. “We, well, we decided to keep the connection between her death and the opera ballet . . . concealed.”

“What’s she saying?” Miss Flax whispered, impatient now.

“Who decided to conceal it?” Gabriel asked the clerical lady in French.

Miss Flax’s umbrella poked Gabriel in the ribs. He winced.

The clerical lady glanced out into the corridor. She lowered her voice. “Monsieur Grant. The dancing master. He made an announcement to the company, and all the musicians and stage hands, too, that we should avoid speaking with the police.”

“Whatever for?” Gabriel discreetly pushed Miss Flax’s umbrella away.

“He said that the murderer had already been identified, that justice would prevail, and that, therefore, there was no need to drag our company’s name through the mire through association with a—a sordid crime. Because Sybille—oh!—I believed her to be a good girl, but why, then, was she in that costly gown that she had no business wearing, out in the night, alone? Shot?”

“Tell me what you’re talking about,” Miss Flax whispered. “This is my investigation, Professor.”

“I haven’t forgotten, Miss Flax, and neither have my ribs.” Gabriel told her what the lady had said.

“Everyone in the company agreed to silence?” Ophelia said. “That’s peculiar.”

Gabriel said as much in French to the clerical lady.

“Yes, well, Monsieur Grant’s word carries much weight. He is not the impresario, but he is the head choreographer as well as the dancing master. He is much feared. He alone casts the roles and hires and dismisses dancers.”

Gabriel passed this on to Miss Flax, who nodded. “Does she have any notion why Sybille might have been in Le Marais that evening?”

Gabriel translated.

“Oh dear me, no,” the lady said. “Although . . . well, we do try to protect the girls, but . . . now and again, one slips through the cracks.” Her eyes were distant. “I wonder . . .”

“She was extraordinarily beautiful,” Gabriel said. “That is sometimes dangerous.”

“She was briefly employed as an artist’s model, I was told, a year or so ago, which will mix a girl up with the wrong sort. And she had no protector. No family. She was a bit mysterious, yet with something quite prim and proper about her. She had grown up in an orphanage of some kind, where she had taken dancing lessons, and she had demonstrated ability. She danced for Monsieur Grant in one of our annual auditions. That was, let me think . . . nearly two years ago.”