Paris: The Novel

now—like you, to keep the family business running.”
    Thomas Gascon wouldn’t take any money for the coffee. Marc made a mental note to go to the restaurant sometime, and leave a tip.

    Gérard. Dead. Even now he could scarcely believe it. He’d been in the office when it happened. A clerk, ashen-faced, had come into his office and led him down the passage to Gérard’s. His brother had been sitting at his desk—almost as he usually did, except that he was leaning back at a strange angle in his big chair. The stroke had obviously killed him quite suddenly. There had been no warning at all.
    And Marc had been obliged to take over in his place.
    Looking back, it seemed to him that from the first day Gérard had asked him to join him, his brother had had an inkling of what was coming. He’d taken care that, little as it interested him, Marc obtained a good idea how the wholesale business worked, who the suppliers were, how to treat them and the workings of the distribution process. Though Gérard controlled the finances, including those of the department store, Marc understood how all the accounts were put together and where all the information was kept. He was quite surprised to discover, after the first shock of Gérard’s death, that he knew exactly what to do.
    For the last three months, he’d kept everything in good order. Not only that, he’d made his own investigations into every corner of the businesses,just to make sure that some aspect of them didn’t suddenly take him unawares.
    That was how, last week, he had made the two awful discoveries that had been haunting him ever since.
    Gérard had known he’d discover those, too. In fact, Marc realized, he’d wanted him to.
    He wondered what Aunt Éloïse would say when he told her.

    She had changed remarkably little down the years. She used an ebony stick when she walked, but didn’t always bother to do even that. Her face remained smooth. She was as elegant at seventy as she had been at forty.
    He’d offered to take her out to dinner, but she preferred to have a delicious little supper served in her own apartment. They dined under a small Manet and a Pissarro. He waited until the dessert before he told her.
    “I have two pieces of bad news. The first is that I made a discovery in the accounts. It went back to early 1915, but I happened to find it when I was going through the records of one of our suppliers.”
    “We owe money?”
    “Not exactly. Worse. Gérard had dealings with a wholesaler up on the north coast. Dunkirk to be exact. They were supplying shipments of food to the French army.”
    “What of it?”
    “A huge shipment—potatoes, flour, all kinds of essentials—went missing. Apparently the Germans took them. But Gérard was paid all the same.”
    “There’s nothing wrong with that.”
    “Except that he sold them to the Germans.”
    “Are you sure?”
    “There can be no doubt. But the Germans didn’t get them. He told them that the French army had captured the shipment. So the Germans paid him to get some more.”
    “Which he delivered?”
    “No. He said that the French had captured them too.”
    “So who got the supplies in the end?”
    “The French. But they had to pay for them. He sold the same goods four times.”
    “At least we got them in the end.”
    “But it’s criminal.”
    “By Gérard’s standards, one might say it was patriotic. The Germans paid twice and got nothing.”
    “God knows what else he did that I don’t know about. The question is, what do I do? I’d like to do something for the French.”
    “The first thing is that you must not say a word about shipments. Not a word. It will never be discovered now, and does nothing but bring his memory and our name into disrepute. Think of his widow and his children. You should burn the records straightaway. Give them to me and I’ll burn them. Then forget about it. By all means find any way you can to contribute to our war effort. You will be thanked, and that is good. After all, you had no part in the business, and I know that you would never have done such a thing.”
    “I’m just shocked.”
    “You said there were two items of bad news. What is the other?”
    “Joséphine. The store. It’s losing money. In fact, it has been since the war began. Gérard always told me that we were breaking even. But he was lying. I was running it, but I left the financial side to him. I feel a fool.”
    “I’m not surprised in the least. A war isn’t the