“No-one has a perfect life.” said Pierre. “It’s not possible. You cannot be happy all the time. Everyone has problems. Maybe you don’t see these problems when you look at a person, from the outside, but they are there.”
Aimee gazed thoughtfully at the people walking past. They were sitting at a little table outside the Cafe Plume on the Rue Montorgueil in the 2nd Arrondissement.
“What about those two?” said Aimee, pointing at a couple who were walking along the street laughing, their arms around each other.
“They are laughing now, but what happens at home?” said Pierre. “Do you think they never argue? And what if they have a child and they can’t get enough sleep, and they have to still work and support themselves? Of course they will argue. Of course they will struggle.”
“What about her?” said Aimee, pointing at a young woman.
The woman was immaculately dressed in the latest fashion, and perfectly made-up. She carried a bag from a fashionable clothes shop on one arm, and she was smiling.
“Probably her father is rich and she buys what she wants and she enjoys the attention she gets from her male friends, who are all in love with her. But so what? Do you think her parents don’t pressure her to do something with her life? Do you think her female friends aren’t jealous of her? Do you think she will never get ill? Will she always be young and pretty? No. She has problems already now, and they will only get worse.”
“You have a dark and disturbing mind, Pierre.” said Jean-Paul, regarding Pierre with an expression of amusement before sipping his glass of wine.
“He’s been reading Schopenhauer again.” said Charlotte, sucking on her cigarette. “I can tell just by the expression on his face; by the way he walks and the way he holds himself. I told you, Pierre, you should never read Schopenhauer.”
“You’re wrong.” said Pierre. “You’re all wrong.”
He took a bite out of a croissant and chewed it, waving a finger in the air to indicate that further explanation was forthcoming.
A woman rode past on a bicycle, carrying a stick of bread in the basket at the front. At their feet, two sparrows pecked at the crumbs they had dropped. A faint breeze provided a welcome contrast to the warmth of the sun. The air was redolent with the scent of freshly-baked pastries, lavender, and Charlotte’s perfume. On top of these underlying persistent odours sat an ephemeral layer of coffee, wine and cigarette smoke.
“I will tell you something.” said Pierre. “I used to have a friend who was a brilliant producer of music. His name was Étienne. Sometimes I played guitar for him, and he would work my guitar in with other instruments and even electronic sounds, creating incredibly complex layers. His music was becoming only more and more popular. He never had to worry about money; he made music for many famous musicians in France, Spain and Italy. He also had a girlfriend who loved him like crazy. Actually all women loved him; he was good-looking, charming, clever, witty.
“Every man I knew wished they were him. I even wished I was him. But you know what? He had these black moods. Dark, uncontrollable moods. He hid it from everyone, including me. He would disappear for a day, two days, and afterwards he would tell people he had been working on a musical piece. Perhaps that was even true; I don’t know. Then, one day, he was found in a hotel room, only a block from his own apartment, hanging by the neck.”
“He killed himself?” Jean-Paul asked.
“Yes.” said Pierre. “He couldn’t bear it anymore. He had become impossibly depressed. No-one knew about it. He kept it from all of us. Not even his girlfriend knew he was suicidal. Whenever anyone saw him, he was always smiling. So you see, you can never know what is going on in the life of another person. Not really.”
“That’s horrible.” said Charlotte, shuddering.
“I’ve a proposal.” said Jean-Paul. “Let’s all concede that Pierre is right, that everyone has problems, and let’s talk about life, love, fine literature, and tonight’s performance.”
Pierre smiled.
“Victory.” he said.
“Well maybe it’s a passing thing, here today, gone tomorrow, but I can say I am truly happy.” said Aimee. “I’m happy to be here with all of you, and I love my life.”
Charlotte gave a little cheer.
“To life and being happy!” she said, raising her glass.
They clinked their glasses against hers.
“Seriously.” said Aimee. “Four years ago I was living in London working on the reception of a stupid bank, and I was so stressed and miserable. I took a chance; I came here, to Paris, determined to make a living as a violinist, even if I would never have any money to spare. Then I met you three, and I began performing with Pierre, and I’ve never looked back. With Charlotte’s voice and Jean-Paul’s lyrics, we are going to be a huge success. I know it. Life can only get better and better.”
Meanwhile, Charles Schiller, a full-blooded Englishman in spite of his Germanic surname, was quietly living his own perfect life in Staffordshire, England. Certainly Charles’ life had not been without difficulties, but most of those were now in the past, or else insignificant.
He lived with his wife, Angela, and their two daughters and their son; the eldest of these approaching nine years old and the youngest a mere four.
Around 11 a.m. Angela knocked on the door of his study, where he was tightening a bolt on a hexagonal machine, and said “Call for you from Professor Richards.”
“Oh, thank you.” he said, and he went to take the call.
On the way, Ellie, his 7-year-old daughter, grabbed his legs shouting “Daddy, Daddy, do you like my drawing?”
He took the drawing in his hand and looked at it earnestly.
“It’s wonderful, darling, one of your best yet.” he pronounced solemnly. “Now, I must just get the phone.”
“Will we go for a walk later?” said Ellie.
“Yes, I think so.” said Charles.
After the call he kissed his wife and apologised for not hearing the phone.
“It’s all right.” she said, laughing. “Are you making progress?”
“I’m almost there.”
“Time for a little walk after lunch?”
“Of course, of course.” he said, as he ran back to his study.
When lunchtime came, he had to force himself to leave his work and eat with his family, but he did so gladly, and made an enormous effort to temporarily put the machine to the back of his mind and concentrate on the present. Then, of course, they wanted to go for a walk, and he agreed to the idea.
In spite of the magnetic lure of his work, Charles never neglected his family, and he loved them with all his heart.
They walked down the little lane that led away from the large country house where they lived, and around the edge of the little lake, where they sometimes fed the swans and often spotted herons and kingfishers.
Whenever any thought of the machine crossed Charles’s mind, he dismissed it immediately. He showed his son Tristan how to make a whistle from a willow stick, as he’d promised he would, and he told Tulip, their youngest, about how swan couples stay together for life and how the little swans are covered in grey fur.
When they finally arrived home he made a bee-line for his study, where he plugged the machine into a computer and began attempting to calibrate it for the experiment he had planned for the evening.
He continued working well into the night, reaching such a fever pitch of excitement that he could not persuade himself to go to bed when his wife retired to the bedroom at 11pm.
At around 12.30 a.m Charles attached four sturdy crocodile clips to a large metal sheet, almost as tall and wide as himself. Then he entered “Paris, France” into a computer and the machine spat out some GPS coordinates. He then entered the command “activate-displacement-engine” and, with a fast-beating heart, hit the return key.
Meanwhile, the group of friends in Paris had enjoyed a very successful evening. They had given a performance of several of their latest songs to a small but very appreciative crowd at Cafe Plume. In-between songs, Charlotte had charmed the audience with her silvery smooth voice and her stories of the inspirations behind Jean-Paul’s lyrics, while Jean-Paul himself had played an electronic piano with impressive dexterity; Pierre’s classical guitar work had been particularly on-form, and Aimee had played her violin beautifully and effortlessly, positively swinging the bow from side to side with passion and sensitivity.
When the performance came to an end, the audience jumped to their feet, giving them a standing ovation. They had stayed on for a while, drinking cocktails and discussing their songs with audience members.
Then, finally, they had made their way home on the metro and through picturesque streets to the ground floor flat they shared in the Belleville area.
By 12.30 a.m. they were all asleep, except for Pierre, who was an insomniac. Pierre was lying awake thinking about certain plans he had for the following week, when the noise of smashing glass caught his ear, seemingly coming from the cellar.
He sat up, alarmed. A grill separated the cellar from the street and sometimes people are known to break into cellars in Paris. He got out of bed and, opening a drawer, took out a large ugly hunting knife. Then he stealthily made his way towards the cellar.
He paused at the top of the steps, listening. There was clearly someone down there. He could hear someone shuffling about in the dark, perhaps looking for a light switch. He began to step silently down the dark stairs. Then he froze, realising that whoever was in the cellar had found the stairs and was now feeling his way up them.
He listened, grasping the knife firmly in his hand, as slow, stumbling footsteps made their way up the stairs.
When he was nearly at the top of the stairs, to his terror, Charles spotted the shadowy figure holding the wicked-looking knife. Before he could react, Pierre thrust the knife at him and he jumped back. The point of the knife penetrated the plaster wall, where it stuck, and Pierre began frantically waggling it around in order to extricate it. In the few brief moments between the knife sticking in the plaster and Pierre managing to get it loose again, Charles grabbed Pierre and threw him down the stairs. Pierre screamed, and then was silent.
For a second Charles froze, horrified by the unexpected turn of events, then he ran up the last few stairs and found a light switch. The switch activated a light in the cellar stairway. At the foot of the stairs was the body of Pierre, his neck twisted horribly at an unnatural angle. He was clearly dead.
He stared at Pierre’s corpse, his mind racing, the icy hand of terror grasping his heart in its cold fingers. He felt as though he couldn’t move. It was as if he had stepped into a living nightmare. For almost a minute he stood there, trying to decide on the best course of action, caught between conflicting sentiments.
Then there was another scream.
Pierre’s yell had woken up Aimee, and she was now standing behind Charles. Startled, Charles also screamed, causing Aimee to scream again.
Aimee staggered backwards.
“Please don’t hurt me!” she said, thinking even as she said it, that Charles, with his round spectacles, tweed jacket and greyish beard, didn’t look the type to harm anyone.
“I …. he …. he attacked me with a knife!” stammered Charles. “Oh my word! I didn’t mean to hurt him!”
“Who are you?” said Aimee.
Charles’ mouth opened and closed but no sound emerged. Once Aimee knew his name, he would be in a whole other cricket game. On the other hand, he could not go around killing people, even accidentally, and evading all responsibility.
In the end his conscience won out.
“My name is Charles.” he said. “I’m a scientist.”
“What are you doing in our apartment?”
“I created a spatiotemporal nexus. I simply wanted to test it.”
“A what?” she asked faintly.
“A kind of spacetime portal. In your cellar. I knocked over a vase and then someone attacked me.”
Aimee gawped at him, speechless. Then she said, “I don’t think so.”
The kitchen light blinked on and Jean-Paul and Charlotte appeared.
“What’s going on?” said Jean-Paul.
“He’s killed Pierre!” said Aimee.
“It was an accident!” said Charles. “He tried to stab me!”
“Who are you?” said Jean-Paul.
“His name’s Charles.” said Aimee. “He says he’s created a portal in our cellar.”
Charlotte was already lighting a cigarette.
“He looks harmless.” she said.
“I am harmless.” said Charles.
Charlotte peered down at Pierre’s body.
“I never liked him anyway.” she said.
“That’s beside the point!” exclaimed Aimee.
“He looks like a scientist.” said Charlotte. “I believe him.”
“I don’t.” said Jean-Paul. “Show us this portal.”
Charles looked from one shocked, angry face to the other.
“He might still be alive.” said Aimee. “We should call an ambulance.”
“He’s dead.” said Charlotte. “His neck’s completely broken.”
“I want to see this so-called portal.” said Jean-Paul.
“Follow me.” said Charles.
They descended the cellar stairs. Pierre was a grotesque sight, his head at an angle to his body that was clearly incompatible with life.
“Oh my God!” said Aimee, as she stepped over Pierre.
Aimee was shaking and crying. Jean-Paul was pale, his jaw grimly set. Only Charlotte seemed relatively unaffected.
In the cellar stood what looked like a piece of darkened glass, about five feet high and a foot and a half in width. In the glass could be seen a dim view of Charles’ study.
“We are supposed to believe this is a portal?” said Jean-Paul.
He reached out to touch the surface of the glass, and his hand went straight through it.
“J’hallucine!” he said.
“I’ve created a connection between my house in England and your cellar.” jabbered Charles. “We’re in Paris, aren’t we? I didn’t know it was your cellar. I got carried away. Of course your friend thought I was a common thief. But he tried to kill me! Surely that’s excessive! I was only defending myself. Oh my goodness. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
“Can we go through this into your house?” said Jean-Paul.
“Yes.” said Charles. “Yes, if you want.”
One by one they stepped through the portal into Charles’ study.
“It’s incredible.” said Jean-Paul.
“You built this thing?” said Charlotte.
“Exactly.” said Charles.
“We need to call the police or an ambulance.” said Aimee.
“No, no.” said Jean-Paul. “It was an accident.”
“Typical of Pierre to try to stab someone.” said Charlotte. “If you ask me, it was completely his fault. Who stabs an unarmed burglar? You go to prison for that.”
“Pierre’s dead!” said Aimee desperately.
“Aimee,” said Jean-Paul, “this man is a genius. He cannot go to prison. This invention will benefit all of humanity. What’s done is done. We can’t bring Pierre back.”
“Not sure I’d want to.” said Charlotte. “I’ve always thought there was something off about him. We can easily find a new guitar player. Guitarists are, how do you say, ten a penny.”
“Let’s go back.” said Jean-Paul, and he led the way back into the cellar. Charles followed mutely.
Jean-Paul pointed at Pierre’s body.
“We need to get rid of this.” he said. “Charles, you can open a portal from your house to our cellar. Can you open a portal to somewhere else? Halfway across the Pacific Ocean, for example?”
“Y-yes.” said Charles. “Anywhere.”
“Then we will put Pierre in your study, and you will go back and close the portal. Then you will open it again over the Pacific, and throw his body into the water. D'accord?”
“Oui.” said Charles. “I mean, yes. I can do that.”
“And what happens when the police come round looking for Pierre?” said Aimee.
“Why would they?” said Jean-Paul. “He knows no-one apart from us. He’s never mentioned his parents. Either they are dead, or they don’t care about him. If anyone asks, we’ll tell them we had an argument and Pierre left.”
“Let’s get on with it.” said Charlotte, stubbing out her cigarette on some loose bricks.
They dragged Pierre by the arms into Charles’ study.
“You’d better give us your contact details in case we need you for something.” said Jean-Paul to Charles. Charles wrote his name and telephone number down on a piece of paper and handed it to Jean-Paul.
“Maybe we should call the police.” whispered Charles, a stricken expression on his face.
“Don’t be silly.” said Charlotte. “The French courts are terrible. It’s better not to get mixed up with them. It was an accident, and that’s that.”
“I would love to talk with you about your work sometime.” said Jean-Paul.
“Of course.” said Charles.
“OK, we go back, and you switch it off or whatever.” said Jean-Paul. “I advise disposing of Pierre quickly. Au revoir. Until we meet again.”
“Au revoir.” said Charles, and he watched them retreat into the cellar before he flipped a single, solitary, rather pathetic plastic switch, and the portal disappeared, and he was left alone in his study with Pierre’s corpse. He quickly switched off the lights in his study and stood there for some moments, looking down sorrowfully at Pierre’s body.
Had Pierre not hopes and dreams? Had Pierre not struggled and schemed, loved and worked? Now here he was, quite dead, and he, Charles, had killed him.
He shook himself. Mustn’t think like that. It had been an accident. Of course there were bound to be accidents with any new technology, yet he could not afford to lapse in despair or self-pity, or even guilt. Did Alfred Nobel give up when his brother, Emil, was blasted into pieces by nitroglycerin in the course of their experiments? Did Pierre Dulong give up when the nitrogen trichloride he discovered blew out his eye and several fingers? No, a man of science must at all costs persist.
He went to the computer and, after a bit of fiddling, established the coordinates of a particularly desolate part of the Pacific Ocean. He typed the command to activate the portal. When he hit the return key, a tremendous blast of ocean spray hit him in the face.
It seemed something of a storm was underway in the Pacific at that point.
Fighting against a considerable headwind that threatened to dislodge the wires connecting the metal plate that formed the portal when energised, he managed to push Pierre out into the sea. Then he switched off the portal and all was calm.
He was still standing there, shaking slightly, when Angela appeared, causing him to jump.
“Darling, whatever’s happened?” she said. “Goodness, you’re soaking wet.”
“Just a little problem with the machine.” he said. “I’ve fixed it now.”
“Come to bed. It’s very late.”
“Yes, I’m coming. I’ll have a quick shower first.”
The following morning, Aimee, Charlotte and Jean-Pierre sat drinking café au lait and eating croissants at a little cafe in Belleville.
“Sooner or later, someone will come looking for him.” said Aimee.
“We need to get rid of his stuff.” said Jean-Paul. “We can say he moved out.”
“I say we start immediately after breakfast.” said Charlotte. “The sooner the better. We should put it all in rubbish bags and throw them in dumpsters.”
“Poor Pierre.” said Aimee. “He deserves better than this.”
“Everyone dies in the end.” said Charlotte. “I watched my grandmother die. It was horrible. It took two weeks and she was in pain the whole time. He’s lucky he died quickly.”
“He was twenty-seven years old!” Aimee protested.
“Look,” said Jean-Paul, “it was an accident. Anyone can have an accident. Now it’s happened, there is nothing to be done. It’s the same if we go to the police, except an innocent man, a genius, goes to prison, maybe.”
Back at their apartment they began to sort through Pierre’s things.
“He has some really weird stuff.” said Jean-Paul, holding what looked like a human skull.
“Look at this.” said Charlotte. “Do you think it’s real?”
She was holding a small jar containing a slightly bluish fluid. In it floated what appeared to be a human eye.
“No.” said Jean-Paul. “I’m sure it’s plastic. Or maybe from an animal. He had a very dark sense of humour.”
Then they noticed Aimee, who was holding a large book and shaking.
“What’s wrong?” said Charlotte.
Aimee didn’t reply.
Jean-Paul gently took the book and examined its contents. It was a photograph album, and it was filled with photographs of people in various stages of apparently being tortured to death, ranging from alive and tied up, to dead and dismembered.
“It can’t be real.” he said.
Charlotte took the book and began to leaf through it.
“I recognise this one.” she said. “She went missing two months ago. And this one. He went missing last year. He was a schoolteacher.”
They looked at each other in horror.
“Pierre was a serial killer.” said Aimee in a hoarse whisper.
She took the book from Charlotte’s hands and flicked through the pages.
“Who is this?” she said.
One of the photographs displayed a man in the act of dismembering a woman. He was covered in blood and was smiling.
“It’s not Pierre.” said Jean-Paul. “That’s the main thing.”
Aimee leafed backwards and found a photo of Pierre posing with the man, both of them holding severed arms.
“OK then, it’s good that he’s dead.” said Jean-Paul.
“He has an accomplice.” said Aimee. “An accomplice who’s still alive. We have to go to the police.”
“We can’t go to the police.” said Charlotte. “We’ve already disposed of the body. Improperly.”
“Well we can’t just let this other man go on murdering people.” said Aimee. “What if we contact the police anonymously? We can send them the photographs.”
“No good.” said Charlotte. “Then they’ll come looking for Pierre, and they’ll want to know what happened to him.”
“Is it really our problem?” said Jean-Paul. “There are serial killers in the world. They exist. If Charles hadn’t accidentally killed Pierre because Pierre tried to stab him, we wouldn’t even know about this man. I don’t think it’s our responsibility.”
“Of course it’s our responsibility!” said Aimee. “Now we know about it, it’s definitely our responsibility. We have to do something. If we can’t go to the police, then we have to stop him ourselves.”
“We should go through the rest of Pierre’s stuff very carefully.” said Charlotte. “See if we can find out more about who he is.”
Jean-Paul sighed, shaking his head. “This is getting really crazy.” he said.
By lunchtime they had managed to discover that Pierre’s accomplice was called Hugo and he lived only two kilometres away. Hugo owned a house and it was there that Hugo and Pierre had tortured their victims to death.
For several days they argued about what to do, always conscious that at any moment, Hugo might murder someone else; or worse, he might come looking for Pierre. Eventually they decided that, whatever the solution to the problem, it would almost certainly have to involve a spatiotemporal nexus.
When Charles put the phone down, he had a smile on his face.
“Who was it?” asked his wife.
“My dear,” said Charles, “there are some things I have to explain to you. I have been struggling under a terrible burden these past few days, but now everything is fine. Almost everything.”
He proceeded to tell her about the portal and Pierre, and the discovery of Pierre’s accomplice.
“So you see, I simply have to kill one more person, and everything will be all right.” he finished.
“Absolutely not.” said Angela. “You can’t be involved in this, Charley. I forbid it.”
“You can’t forbid me to do things!” Charles protested.
“You forbade me to buy more shoes.”
“I wasn’t completely serious, you know that. I was only saying that the entire house cannot consist entirely of shoes. Buy more shoes if you really want more shoes.”
“Dearest, if you love me, don’t kill anyone else.” she said, tears in her eyes. “If everything you say is correct, it’s good that this Pierre is dead. But now you’ve done enough killing. I don’t want you to go to prison, Charley.”
Charles sighed and rubbed the side of his beard thoughtfully.
“I can find some other solution, but I have to let them use the nexus system. No-one knows about it. The police will never guess I was involved. I was here, in England, when Pierre was killed. I’d never even met Pierre.”
“And what happens when you announce your discovery? One of these French musicians only has to spill the beans and you’ll end up an accessory to murder.”
“I’ve been thinking about that. I will keep the machine secret. At least for twenty or thirty years. It’s too dangerous anyway. If the whole world becomes connected, there will only be horrific wars and violence. Think of it! A man in a violent country like—like Sweden—could step right into our living room. No, I will keep it to myself.”
“I still don’t want you murdering anyone.”
“I won’t murder anyone myself. One of the musicians will do it. But I must let them use the machine.”
“I’ll do it.” said Aimee. “If neither of you want to do it, then I’ll do it.”
“That’s no good.” said Jean-Paul. “You’re a woman. You’re not strong enough to kill a man.”
“And you would, what, overpower him with your physical prowess?” said Charlotte sarcastically.
“OK, I’m not a body builder but I’ve more chance than she has.” said Jean-Paul.
“I won’t need to overpower him.” said Aimee. “Charles will open the portal next to his bed when he’s sleeping, and I’ll stab him. He won’t even wake up. That’ll be the end of the matter.”
Charlotte and Jean-Paul exchanged glances.
“It could work.” said Charlotte.
“There’s a problem with it.” said Jean-Paul. “They can find your DNA at the site of the murder.”
“I’ve thought of that too.” said Aimee. “It won’t matter if they find my DNA there. I’ll have an alibi. Charles will organise a party in England. We’ll all attend, to play music there. He’ll put an ad in a music magazine for someone to play typically French music, and we’ll reply to the ad. Then, in-between songs, I’ll go through the portal and I’ll kill Hugo.”
Fortunately the anniversary of Charles’ and Angela’s marriage happened to be in only two weeks, providing a convenient occasion for a party. Meanwhile Charles rigged up a very tiny portal and used it to observe Hugo.
It was clear that he was preparing for another kidnapping and murder. Often during the day he followed people around, trying to find some place or time at which he could kidnap them. He owned an old van, which he carefully cleaned and stocked with things he might need in the course of a kidnapping. He was clearly also puzzled by Pierre’s disappearance, and twice he went to the apartment the musicians shared and stood outside, waiting for Pierre.
Charles discovered a fact which was extremely useful for their purposes: Hugo, who seemed to have no obvious source of income or employment, tended to sleep during the afternoon and wake up around midnight, after which he liked to prowl around the town. Thus he could be fairly well relied upon to be asleep in the evening, although the time difference between Britain and France meant they would have to complete the extra-judicial killing before 11pm.
The party consisted largely of scientists, together with people from the literary and art worlds, invited by Angela. The three musicians played quietly in the background, with Charlotte singing in French.
It was agreed by all present that the party was a great success. Around 9pm the musicians took a break, and Aimee sneaked into Charles’ study.
“The portal will open directly by the side of his bed.” said Charles. “I suggest you stick him in the neck. Likely there will be a lot of blood but it’s the surest way. Are you sure you can manage it?”
Aimee was pulling on white plastic overalls.
“Don’t worry.” she said. “I’ve seen the photographs. I’d gladly kill him a hundred times over.”
“Very good.” said Charles. “I will prepare the nexus.”
Five minutes later, Aimee stood in front of the metal plate, holding a kitchen knife, and Charles’ finger was poised over the return key.
“Ready?” asked Charles.
“Do it.” said Aimee.
Charles pressed the key and the metal plate seemed to thin until it became completely transparent, and there, in front of them, was the form of Hugo sleeping in his bed, covers drawn over his head.
Aimee stepped forward through the portal and raised the knife.
At that moment, the lights in the study blinked off, the portal disappeared and a cry arose from the guests in the enormous living room down the hall.
Charles’ eyes widened in horror.
He shouted “No!” and ran down the hall to the living room.
Professor Inchley-Smythe had apparently tripped on a cable leading to a small guitar amplifier used by Jean-Paul, and the glass of wine he had been holding had spilled over a box at the end of an extension lead behind a television, into which five different things were plugged.
“I’m so sorry.” Inchley-Smythe was saying. “I’m so sorry.”
Angela was assuring him it was no-one’s fault, and dabbing at the wine with tissues.
Charles pulled out the extension lead plug and ran to the circuit breaker panel in the cellar. Sure enough, one of the switches had flipped out, so he flipped it on again and a cheer rang out from the living room.
Then he ran back towards his study. In the living room, an innovative mixed-media artist by the name of Don Simmons tried to talk to him, saying, “Charles, I’ve been meaning to ask you …” but Charles said, with remarkable composure and a brief smile, “Sorry, just got to check something.” and ran to the study.
It took him ten minutes to reboot the computer and reconfigure everything, during which time Jean-Paul and Charlotte arrived in the study to ask what was happening. Finally he was able to reactive the portal, and to their horror, there was no sign of Aimee. Hugo’s sleeping body seemed entirely undisturbed.
“I don’t understand.” whispered Charles frantically.
“We need to go in there and investigate.” whispered Jean-Paul.
Charlotte finished lighting a cigarette and picked up a spanner from next to the machine.
“Let’s go.” she said.
Jean-Paul stepped first into Hugo’s bedroom, looking all around cautiously.
“There’s no-one here.” he hissed.
Then he carefully pulled back the covers from Hugo’s sleeping form.
“Putain!” he exlaimed.
Underneath the covers, where they had expected Hugo’s head, was only a pillow.
A little while earlier, Aimee had made the same discovery, only a second after the portal had blinked off. Unable to return to Charles’ study, she had peeked around the door of Hugo’s bedroom only to find herself face-to-face with Hugo himself.
She had tried to stab him and had succeeded, but the wound hadn’t killed him, and instead he had grabbed the knife and wrestled her to the ground.
Soon he had her tied to a chair in his basement.
“I was expecting a police raid, after that inspector came here sniffing around yesterday.” he said. “Instead, I find you. You are one of Pierre’s friends, no? How did you get in?”
“You left your door unlocked.” said Aimee. “My friends know I’m here. If you do anything to me, they’ll kill you.”
“Interesting that your friends aren’t also here.” said Hugo, examining the blade of the knife. “I don’t think anyone is coming to help you. Anyway, I’ve been meaning to talk to you. I would like to know, where is Pierre?”
“He left.” said Aimee. “I don’t know where he went.”
“I see.” said Hugo. “It’s a shame he couldn’t be here. I’m going to enjoy cutting you into pieces. Perhaps I can show him the photographs afterwards, if he comes back.”
“We know what you’ve been doing. If you hurt me, it’ll be all the worse for you when the police arrest you.”
Hugo turned to her and smiled; a horrible, toothy grin, filled with malice.
“Strange that they haven’t arrested me, then. Do you know what I think? I think you killed Pierre, then you came here to kill me. Now the tables are turned. Soon you will be food for fish in the Seine. But not before I’ve had my fun. However, I can’t deal with a crude instrument like this. I have my own instruments.”
He put down the knife and opened a zip case of surgical instruments on a little table with wheels. This, he then pushed over to her side.
Aimee screamed: “Help! Help me!”
“No-one can hear you down here.” said Hugo. “This cellar is dug into the stone underneath the city. That’s why I bought this place. You can scream as much as you like.”
He took a scalpel from the case and waved it menacingly in her face.
Then the cellar door burst open and Jean-Paul, Charlotte and Charles appeared.
“The game’s up, Hugo.” said Jean-Paul.
“I don’t think it is.” said Hugo. “To me, it seems like the night’s—how do you say in English—festivities, are only just starting. Maybe I’ll need this after all.” he added, picking up the kitchen knife.
“There are four of us and one of you.” said Jean-Paul.
“One of you is tied up and the other three are unarmed.” said Hugo.
Charlotte raised the spanner.
Hugo spluttered in laughter.
“What do you think you are going to do with that, little girl?” said Hugo.
Charlotte carefully used the spanner to switch off the light.
For several seconds chaos reigned in the cellar.
The only thing Hugo could see was the glowing tip of Charlotte’s cigarette, and he lunged for it with the knife, not realising she had taken it out of her mouth and was holding it at arm’s length to her side. The knife stabbed harmlessly at thin air.
She then pushed the cigarette into his face. He yelled in pain, and Jean-Paul grabbed the arm in which he held the knife. Hugo lashed out frantically with the scalpel, nicking Charles’ arm. Finding himself uncharacteristically enraged, as soon as Charlotte switched the light on again, Charles landed a punch firmly in Hugo’s face, and Hugo sank to the ground.
Jean-Paul took the kitchen knife and was about to plunge it into Hugo when Aimee said, “Wait! You’ll get covered in blood! Untie me first.”
Charlotte used the scalpel to cut the ropes that bound Aimee to the chair. Aimee said, “Give me the big knife.” and Jean-Paul complied.
Aimee was still wearing the white overalls.
“You might want to step back a bit in case it spurts.” she said.
The other three retreated to the cellar door. Hugo opened his eyes, only to see Aimee plunging the knife into his chest.
A quarter of an hour later the musicians were again playing background music at the party, and Inchley-Smythe was still apologising.
Over the following few days, after returning to Paris, the musicians removed all traces they could find of Pierre from Hugo’s house, before dragging his body over to the front door. Five days after that, the dreadful smell of his decomposing corpse attracted attention, and the police broke into his house and discovered his murderous hobby.
By then, the musicians were again performing in Cafe Plume, having already replaced Pierre with a new guitarist; a boy named Alain who also wrote sensitive poetry and whose guitar playing was well-liked by everyone.
“I don’t regret anything.” said Jean-Paul one morning, as he sat with Charlotte and Aimee outside the cafe, eating breakfast. “Pierre and Hugo, they were really worthless people.”
“Neither do I.” said Charlotte. “I regret nothing. Simone de Beauvoir said, one’s life has value so long as one attributes value to the life of others, by means of love, friendship, indignation, compassion. I believe that. Pierre and Hugo, they made their own lives nothing but a void. An abyss.”
"Man is nothing else but what he makes of himself." said Jean-Paul. “Sartre.”
“All the same, don’t you sometimes have nightmares about it, Aimee?” said Charlotte. “If it was me who got tied to a chair by that nutcase, I don’t think I’d ever get over it.”
Aimee sipped her cappuccino.
“I’ve had a few.” she said. “But you know, no-one has a perfect life.”
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