He went into the kitchen where he knew his mother would be and threw the papers on the table.
Lydia followed him in.
Without a word Madame Berger took one of them and began to read it.
There were big headlines.
It was front-page news.
“I’ve been to Jojo’s Bar.
They can talk of nothing else.
Jordan was one of their regular clients and everybody knew him.
I talked to him myself on the night he was murdered.
He’d not done so badly on the day’s racing and he was standing everybody drinks.”
His conversation was so easy and natural, you would have thought he had not a care in the world.
His eyes glittered and there was a slight flush on the cheeks that were usually rather pasty.
He was excited, but showed no sign of nervousness.
Trying to make her tone as unconcerned as his, Lydia asked him:
“Have they any idea who the murderer was?”
“They suspect it was a sailor.
The concierge says she saw Jordan come in with one about a week ago.
But of course it may just as well have been someone disguised as a sailor.
They’re rounding up the frequenters of the notorious bars in Montmartre.
From the condition of the skin round the wound it appears that the blow was struck with great force.
They’re looking for a husky, big man of powerful physique.
Of course there are one or two boxers who have a funny reputation.”
Madame Berger put down the paper without remark.
“Dinner will be ready in a few minutes,” she said.
“Is the cloth laid, Lydia?”
“I’ll go and lay it.”
When Robert was there they took the two principal meals of the day in the dining-room, even though it gave more work.
But Madame Berger said:
“We can’t live like savages.
Robert has been well brought up and he’s accustomed to having things done properly.”
Robert went upstairs to change his coat and put on his slippers.
Madame Berger could not bear him to sit about the house in his best clothes.
Lydia set about laying the table.
Suddenly a thought occurred to her, and it was such a violent shock that she staggered and to support herself had to put her hand on the back of a chair.
It was two nights before that Teddie Jordan had been murdered, and it was two nights before that Robert had awakened her, made her cook supper for him, and then hurried her to bed.
He had come to her arms straight from committing the horrible crime; and his passion, his insatiable desire, the frenzy of his lust had their source in the blood of a human being.
“And if I conceived that night?”
Robert clattered downstairs in his slippers.
“I’m ready, mummy,” he cried.
“I’m coming.”
He entered the dining-room and sat down in his usual place.
He took his napkin out of the ring and stretched over to take a piece of bread from the platter on which Lydia had put it.
“Is the old woman giving us a decent dinner tonight?
I’ve got a beautiful appetite.
I had nothing but a sandwich at Jojo’s for lunch.”
Madame Berger brought in the bowl of soup and taking her seat at the head of the table ladled out a couple of spoonfuls for the three of them.
Robert was in high spirits.
He talked gaily.
But the two women hardly answered.
They finished the soup.