"THE MAN WITH THE LEAD STOMACH" "Part One" "Today is doubly splendid, as I meet my friend." "Monsieur de la Borde." "May I ask what other pleasure you evoke?" "I like the smell of the stage." "And its proximity." "Its proximity or its crowds?" "Indeed, I admit it." "I come to admire a tender and gracious object." "We shall see her soon." "On stage." "What's wrong?" "Your taste in women usually runs to more attractive persons." " Do you know who it is?" " Not at all." "Princess Adélaïde is loved and loves to be loved." "Are they her chaperones?" "Count and Countess de Ruissec." "Old military nobility, severe, devout and drivelling." "They belong to the entourage of the queen and the dauphin." "Says it all." "Your friend Sartine is here too." "Our chief of police." "Always watching over the family of our King Louis XV." "Something terrible has happened to our son." "You do not recognise me?" "Be assured, your Highness, we will ensure they are accompanied home and the affair settled discreetly." "However, certain observations must be carried out." "Commissaire Le Floch, here, will accompany me." "We know him." "My father holds him in high esteem." "Sir, we bid you soothe our friends' distress." "Do not worry about me." "Do what must be done." "Commissaire." "I suppose your great friend, Mr de la Borde, will have told you about Count de Ruissec." "Mr de la Borde?" "Do not play games." "I saw you conversing." "What he said indicates he does not hold de Ruissec in high regard." "Nor does His Majesty." "But the fellow has been useful to various people." "Army Commissioner." "From the devout clan." "The countess?" " What can you tell me?" " The countess?" "Gently, Commissaire." "Don't get carried away." "This case will demand wisdom and tact." "And nimble diplomacy." "Countess de Ruissec deserves concern worthy of her rank." "For that, you will have to enlighten me." "It is not my job to enlighten you." "The facts alone will do that." "I want you to be free from all suggestion." "Free to gather your first intuition." "Take me to my son's chamber and make your report." "Sir, around 9 o'clock," "I had just taken logs to your apartments and had gone back down." "As is custom, I was reading the Holy Scriptures in the kitchen." "Then?" "The viscount came up." "I heard the door to his room close, the key grate in the lock, then there was a shot." " A shot?" "Are you sure?" "My butler is a former soldier." "He served in my regiment." "He has perfect hearing and knows what he's talking about." "Carry on, Picard." "I hurried there but found the door locked." "I called, there was no reply." "Can we force it open?" "Commissaire." "Find a way to open or break down this door." "We are waiting." "To hear is to obey." "I have the solution." "A thieves' picklock comes to the aid of the police?" "I will not have it, sir." "This is my house and my son..." "Sir, please let the magistrates proceed." "Who are you to give me orders?" "Sartine!" "The name reeks of a grocery." "A little magistrate fresh out of his commoner's lot." "Little magistrate, indeed." "Whose orders come from the king." "The king!" "It's all I ever hear." "Do you find fault with His Majesty, sir?" "I would never dream of it." "I will tolerate nothing against the law." "I promised to be discreet, but that is my only promise." "As for your insults, sir, but for the dignity of my office and a royal censure," "I would demand satisfaction." "Monsieur de Sartine!" "The best thing you can do is go to your apartments until you are sent for." "The torso wound hasn't bled." "It was inflicted post mortem." "And there is this..." "A toothless old man?" " Some dreadful old man?" " No, sir." "The late, young, Count de Ruissec." "Young?" "With such a face?" "How can that be?" "What are you doing here?" "I am Lambert, the viscount's manservant." "Does that entitle you to wear stockings and no shoes?" "I was sleeping when I heard a noise." "So you dressed and hurried here straight away?" "In your haste to help, you did not don your shoes?" "You know your master is dead?" "Dead?" "The poor wretch kept his word." "Wretch?" "He had been disgusted for days." "Sick of love, of gambling..." "Or both." "Disgust?" "Why?" "I do not know, sir." "Wait in the corridor." "Odd dilemma, don't you think?" "A choice between the infamy of suicide, and homicide, equally so." "The family is known." "News travels fast." "There's already a rumour in town." "Soon it will reach the court." "We must protect the king." " The king?" " Since the attack on his person by that wretch Damien, the monarch's natural morbidity is fuelled by everything." "Fed by everything... out of all proportion." "We must preserve his mind from noxious fumes." "The viscount was murdered." "Do what it takes to make sure." "The body must be taken from his family to the Châtelet to be examined." "Then go ahead, Commissaire." "Since when do your extravagances require my blessing?" "You are commissaire and magistrate." "Both will take the case." "I leave it to you." "And I leave you." "I have no further interest." "I go to Versailles to warn Mr de Saint-Florentin." "To prime the weak barrage of my influence against Ruissec's storms." "The fellow is one of those whose rank is to be feared." "Left-handed." "Nicolas!" "Yes, Bourdeau." "Do we know the old man's identity?" "He was only 22, and until his recent death, was an officer in the royal guard and set for a grand career." "The man shot left-handed." "Yes." "I had noticed." "Call our men." "We shall have to take away the body." "I doubt the family will consent." "We must act promptly so as not to resort to force." "Finish the observations and seal the room." "I shall keep the enemy busy." "There he is, his master's dog, lost in contemplation of an image that parodies life." "Yet it decorates your salon." "I acquired it from a ruined partisan, fond of such illusion." "I'd just as soon cover them with paintings or tapestries." "One last time, I order you to let me see my son." "Sir..." "I must inform you that his body has been taken from this house and carried away for investigation." "Does this mean you intend to open his body?" "To my great regret, it may be necessary to establish the truth." "The truth!" "What truth do you hope to find?" "My son shot himself in a double-locked room." "You yourself unlocked it." "Why torture a poor lifeless body?" "Perhaps to show your son was wounded cleaning his gun." "This would avoid the disgrace of suicide." "You are lying." "Your voice betrays your incredulity." "And your honour preserved." "Honour?" "How dare you pronounce that word?" "Who are you to talk to me of honour?" "Only those with honour may talk of it." "How dare you, sir..." "What's this?" "Your signet ring." "How can this be?" "Why do you bear the arms of my old friend?" "Your old friend is dead." "From him I hold the blood and chevrons of the Ranreuils." "I advise you to weigh your words." "So..." "The fruit of sin delights in such abject occupations." "What does it matter?" "It is the madness of the age." "An age where sons turn against their fathers." "Where aspiring to good leads to wallowing in evil." "Leave, sir." "I know what I must do." "Sweet Catherine." "Thy chin descends two-fold upon thy breast." "What was that, my boy?" "Nothing." "Just a remembered line from the great Boileau." "I dropped off waiting for you." "Every night I tell you not to wait up." "You must be hungry!" "I have a meat pie and a bottle begun by Mr de Noblecourt before retiring." "He ate very well." "He always does when his gout leaves him in peace." ""Come tomorrow at 4 o'clock to the Church of Carmes."" ""Someone will be waiting"" ""who would benefit from your wisdom."" "A Blavet sonata." "First flute at the Académie." "May the best man win." "I'm reduced to the difficult and dangerous task of sight-reading for traps." "But you, sir, have the look of a pointer on a hunt." "The de Ruissec case, no doubt?" "How do you know?" "Paris is but a village, my young friend." "The court and the town are teeming with rumours." "And my former role as King's Prosecutor opened plenty of doors and made me privy to plenty of confidences." "Catherine!" "My morning feast." "And the same for our Nicolas." "What do you know of Count de Ruissec?" "Don't trust the facade of an old man, buttressed by certainties and delusions of honour." "Though he is known for his courage, he was hard and cruel with his soldiers." "As usual, you have the right to a frothy chocolate." "And piping hot loaves, fresh from the oven." " And me?" "You?" "The doctors consented to a few prunes stewed in their juice and a large glass of medicinal sage tea." "She could return." "Any excuse would do." "Ruissec acquired his general's rank from his wife's dowry." "Before marrying the countess, he was a scrawny squire with no gold but for his coat-of-arms." "But the rumours of plunder hampered him and he didn't achieve the offices to which he aspired." " Rumours?" "His detractors claimed he fiddled on everything." "Clothing, fodder, flour..." "Even cannon powder and lead for bullets." "Lead for bullets?" "Lead for bullets, which was behind that awful Langremont affair." "I was army prosecutor then." "Langremont." "Jean de Langremont." "Old Occitan nobility." "A feared moneylender." "A skilled horseman." "One of the most brilliant and promising officers." "A man of total integrity." "Monsieur de Ruissec." "Oddly dressed for reporting to your general." "Do you at least bring good news?" "Good news?" "Our troops are defeated by your fault." "Defeated?" "Defeated." "The enemy was too strong." "By my fault?" "Or yours?" "You call that lead?" "Our bullets do not carry." "When they do, they do not penetrate." "What do you say, sir?" "What do you say, Monsieur de Ruissec?" "This man is a traitor." "Prosecutor..." "Have him taken away." "His cause was already lost." "I could do nothing to defend him." "Langremont was hanged on the spot as a mark of infamy." "What about the lead?" "It was later proved that the lead was adulterated and de Ruissec had been making vast profits." "That's how he bought his house, in very suspicious circumstances, from a partisan he had pushed to bankruptcy." "Many reasons to hate him." "And now, tired and fighting old age, he is secretly involved in finance and speculation." "But he is in the king's outer circle." " As for his sons..." " Sons?" "Two souls without qualities, conceived without pleasure." "Sons?" "He has several sons?" "You didn't know the viscount had a younger brother?" "So I am of use!" "The vidame Gilles de Ruissec, long promised to the Church." "A gambler." "A taste for the seedy life, one imagines." "Desperado or pervert?" "That is the question." "Watch where you step, Nicolas." "These devout rebels are the worst kind." "Take precautions." "And do not act alone, as you tend to do too often." "See what I mean?" "Honestly!" "So early in the day!" "Inspector Bourdeau wants to see you urgently." "Did Sartine say what he wanted?" "No." "He simply bid me have you appear before him." "This note was passed to me by the Countess de Ruissec." " The Church of Carmes?" " We must go." "Ask Rabouine to lunch at Mother Morel's." "Very well." "Did you know the viscount had a brother?" "Find the vidame Gilles de Ruissec." "Don't detain him." "Find out about him and the place he stays." "And envy my dangerous task of facing Sartine at dawn." "Let me introduce the Baron van Eyck," "Bavarian minister in Paris, who has need of our help." "Yours, in particular." "It concerns a smuggling case." "A tangle that, I am sure, you will unravel." "Our case is being hushed up." "Sartine has given me a case of interest to Bavaria." "The case is closed?" "No." "But they're sticking spokes in our wheels." "What kind of Bavarian case?" "Some story about smuggling, a comical affair." "But I had to oblige Mr de Choiseul." "The king's minster?" "An important case." "A case that was quickly resolved." "I have only to write the report." "Mother Morel." "Could you serve us that sumptuous Sancerre whose secret comes from your cousin?" "You know I don't have that right, Commissaire." "I reserved for you two plates, not knowing whether I'd see you." " Lamb's liver soup." " With a piece of steak?" "Indeed!" "A very tasty piece at that." "Second, I've cooked you seasoned slices of pig's liver in fatty bacon with a dash of white wine." "Perfect." "Our action has been slowed." "But what about the Church of Carmes?" "It is very impolite and uncurious not to heed a refined lady's rendezvous." "Two failings incompatible with my position." "Lack of perspicacity and scorn of accuracy." "I haven't seen Rabouine." "Did you not contact him?" "Have pity, my Lord, on poor Rabouine and his offspring." "Did Bourdeau tell you everything?" "Your will shall be done." "To the letter." "Use assistants." "Yes, my Lord." " Is the child his?" " Probably not." "Some wretch kidnapped as a child for a life of begging." "And who, like Rabouine, is an auxiliary policeman." "Mr de Sartine is right." "The Great Architect's laws sometimes digress diagonally." "Paris is manure on which the flies teem." "Some are timely." "Others are indispensable." "Thank you." "You still intend to open the body?" "More than ever." "I sent word to Sanson." "We'll meet at the Châtelet jail." "You're invited too." "Knowing your delicate nose, don't forget to bring your pipe." "The Countess de Ruissec!" "Whatever your secret, you've taken it with you." "A complimentary ticket." "Report." "At 4 o'clock, a carriage arrived." "An old woman got out and entered the church." "The coachman?" "He didn't wait." "Then a grand lady left the church." "Young, pale face, wearing blue spectacles." " The child tailed her." " Child?" "Don't worry, my Lord." "He commands a whole band and blends into the crowd." "And this child doesn't let go." "Thank you, my Lord." "A complimentary ticket from an actress addressed to the late viscount." "No doubt the countess was to give it to me." "An actress?" "La Bichelière, from the Comédie-Italienne." "The countess died from a violent blow on the side of her neck." "I quickly had the same painful experience, but with a less deadly fate." "The stakes must be high to attack an officer of the king." "The wretch must have lost consciousness." "Plague of a world where questioning is a means of justice." "And where suffering presages even greater horrors." "Even if one has finally surmounted one's disgust, convinced that one's occupation can shake one's compassion..." "Commissaire." "It's not customary to shake the executioner's hand." "I have no prejudices." "Is our homicide still here?" "I feared it may have been taken." "Scemacgus, my friend!" "Given the importance of the case," "I'll conjugate my powers with those of your friend, whose knowledge of anatomy is authoritative." "You are quite right." "Experience sustained by learning." "What do you think, Scemacgus?" " It's a heavy subject." " Heavy?" "Scemacgus is trying to say that this corpse has a weight unlike any other human." "Meaning?" "Look." "Heavy and ductile." "Lead, gentlemen." "This man has a stomach of lead." "Have you seen his face?" "I've never seen such a horrible sight." "The face is shrunken." "Similar to those taken from savage tribes." "This man was killed, tortured, massacred." "He was made to drink molten lead." "Insides burned, head shrunken, organs destroyed." "An awful end." "They shot a man who had choked on molten lead." "I hereby inform you of an order issued by the Count de Saint-Florentin, king's minister in charge of the City of Paris and its environs, to stay all investigation, inquiry and opening of the said person and to give up the body," "that it be transferred to family trustees." "It is yours, sir." "My word!" "Mr de Saint-Florentin." "The blade was hoisted high." "Some know their duty." "Others do their job." "Have you traced young Gilles de Ruissec?" "Without the slightest difficulty." "Vidame Gilles, viscount at Lionel's death, lives at the Ruissec home where we are banned." "Viscount?" "It's a motive." "Vidame Gilles may have murdered his elder brother to be a viscount." "I thought we were off the case." "I know." "I'm persistent." "For the late viscount, the case is indeed closed." "However... for his mother, the countess, it isn't." "The body was examined by Doctor Morand." "His report confirms my suspicions." "Her spine was snapped." "I'm visiting an actress from whom this ticket came." "La Bichelière." "Those girls are smooth-tongued, hot and mostly spicy." "I don't intend eating." "Return to the Ruissec home." "Find an excuse to lift the seals and enter and carry out another search." "I'll find it harder to get in than you." "Goodnight, sir." "Come on!" "I adore you." "Here, my Lord." "Eros undone by ill fortune." "You'll find what you seek on the mezzanine." "Up the red staircase." "To what do I owe the pleasure, sir?" "For creditors' bills, come back at 5 o'clock." "A time when you're at the theatre." "Who are you, impertinent young man?" "Nicolas Le Floch." "Police commissaire at Châtelet." "But you are far too young and appetizing to be a copper." "You are proof that value..." "Well, sir?" "What is it?" "I have here a ticket on which I'd like your opinion." "Where'd you get that from?" "A friend, viscount Lionel de Ruissec." " He spoke of your charms..." " Lionel de Ruissec?" "Don't talk to me about that shit!" "A pig who robbed me, fucked me then abandoned me!" " Abandoned you?" " Yes." "He acted all faithful and devoted then ran off with another." "There wasn't much respite." "He dumped me!" "And for whom?" "Some rancid whore at court!" "Mademoiselle de la Sauvetet!" "No one knows about her." "They claim she paints." "That means she's old and frightfully ugly." "But she's rich." "That excuses everything." "And viscount Lionel?" "Him?" "He's broke." "He can't even pay my debts." "Does he want me in the hospital in a nightshirt?" "What will become of me?" "Yes?" "Have a seat, my friend." "We must talk." "The place may well appear incongruous, but I wanted to be away from prying ears." "I heard Mr de Saint-Florentin, king's minister, yesterday immediately received your chief of police, Mr de Sartine." "Did this lead to the order to abandon the case?" "Yes." " The body was taken?" " Yes." "I heard from Dr Scemacgus that your diagnosis was complete." "Indeed." " There's no doubt it was murder?" " None." "I fear this affair is taking a nasty turn." "Mme de Pompadour wishes to see you tomorrow at the Château de Choisy." " In your role as marquis." " Unaccustomed role." "She wants it to remain a secret." "Good luck, my friend." "You will be seen immediately." "Seen immediately?" "Are you fleeing me, Nicolas?" "You are." "Choiseul told me how pleased he was about Baron van Eyck." "The facts established." "The smuggler identified and shortly arrested." "The baron cleared of all suspicion." "The king loved the story of your exploits." "Bravo, Commissaire." "I heard, too, by the way, of the death of the ill-fated Countess de Ruissec." "And the same misfortune almost cost you your life." "I have my sources." "Just as you have yours." "What do you know of court intrigues, Commissaire?" "The little I learn ill-disposes me to learn more." "I quite enjoy them." "This game is being played in a triangle." "At this point, the summit, is the king." "Here, the dauphin." "As he's surrounded by pious prigs who ceaselessly censure his conduct and condemn his mistress, the king has moved away from him." "Those who grumble about power gravitate to the heir to the throne." "Thus the dauphin, unwillingly and even unwittingly, is now the leader of a band of rebels." "Madame de Pompadour herself considers him her enemy." "Mme de Pompadour?" "The last point of the triangle." "But not the least." "I believe you are to meet her." "It was to be a secret." "I wish it wasn't happening." "I command Le Floch, but as for the Marquis de Ranreuil..." "You're feeling your way." "With La Pompadour in the game, the stakes are high." "Go." "But be cautious." "Keep Bourdeau close." "We need you." "To be continued..." "Subtitles:" "Henry Moon for TELETOTA"