Japrisot Trap for Cinderella

1. Auflage 2025
ISBN: 978-1-80533-597-9
Verlag: Pushkin Vertigo
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark

E-Book, Englisch, 176 Seiten

A young woman wakes in a hospital room. What happened to her and why is a mystery. Is she victim or murderer?The young woman has been badly injured in a fire and has amnesia. But what happened to her? Is she Mi, Micky or Michèle, or Do, Dominique? As she struggles to rebuild her identity, she starts to recall the crime that was committed and the house on the French Riviera. She remembers the rich heiress and the faithful friend - but which is she?

Sébastien Japrisot (4 July 1931 - 4 March 2003) was a French author, screenwriter and film director, born in Marseille. His pseudonym was an anagram of Jean-Baptiste Rossi, his real name. Japrisot has been nicknamed 'the Graham Greene of France'. One Deadly Summer was made into a film starring Isabelle Adjani in 1983. A Very Long Engagement was an international bestseller, won the Prix Interallié and was later also made into a film starring Audrey Tatou in 2004.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Japrisot, Sébastien

Weitere Mitwirkende

Weaver, Helen

Leseproben

I WOULD HAVE MURDERED

The taxi took me to Boulevard Suchet and left me in front of a new-looking building with large bay windows. I saw the name of the man I was looking for on a brass plate in the hallway. I climbed three flights of stairs, out of some nameless fear of the lift, and rang the doorbell without thinking twice. Friend, lover, admirer, vulture: what difference did it make?

The door was opened by a man of thirty, tall, good-looking, in a grey suit. I heard people talking in the apartment.

‘François Chance?’

‘He’s out for lunch. You wanted to see him? He didn’t tell me he had an appointment.’

‘I don’t have an appointment.’

Undecided, he showed me into a large hall with bare walls and no furniture, leaving the door open. I did not feel as if I had met him before, but he looked me up and down in a strange manner. I asked him who he was.

‘Who am I? Who are you?’

‘I am Michèle Isola. I just got out of the clinic. I know François. I wanted to talk to him.’

It was obvious from his bewildered expression that this man also knew Michèle Isola. He walked away slowly, shaking his head twice as if in doubt, then said, ‘Excuse me,’ and dashed into a room at the end of the hall. He returned with a man who was older, heavier, less attractive, who was still holding a napkin in his hand and had not swallowed his last mouthful.

‘Micky!’

He was fifty, perhaps, with a receding hairline and a soft face. He threw his napkin to the man who had answered the door and came towards me with huge strides.

‘Come, we can’t stay here. Why didn’t you call? Come.’

He took me into a room and closed the door. He put his hands on my shoulders and held me before him at arm’s length. I had to undergo this scrutiny for several seconds.

‘Well, if this isn’t a surprise! Of course I would hardly have known you, but you’re lovely and you seem fine. Sit down. Tell me about yourself. Your memory?’

‘You know about that?’

‘Of course I know about it! Murneau called me again the day before yesterday. Didn’t she come with you?’

The room must have been his office. There was a big mahogany table covered with files, some plain armchairs and glass-covered bookcases.

‘When did you leave the clinic? This morning? You haven’t done anything foolish, have you?’

‘Who are you?’

He sat down facing me and took my gloved hand. The question disconcerted him, but from the expression on his face – surprised, amused, then distressed – I could watch it travel rapidly through his mind.

‘You don’t know who I am and yet you come to see me? What’s going on? Where’s Murneau?’

‘She doesn’t know I’m here.’

I sensed that he was having a series of surprises, that things must be simpler than I thought. He dropped my hand.

‘If you don’t remember me, how do you know my address?’

‘From your letter.’

‘What letter?’

‘The one I got at the clinic.’

‘I didn’t write to you.’

It was my turn to look surprised. He was looking at me the way one looks at an animal. I saw from his expression that it was not my memory he doubted, but my sanity.

‘Just a moment,’ he said suddenly. ‘Don’t move.’

I rose as he did and blocked his way to the telephone. In spite of myself I raised my voice and began shouting.

‘Don’t do that! I did get a letter, your address was on the envelope. I came to find out who you were, and for you to tell me who I am!’

‘Calm yourself. I don’t understand a word you’re saying. If Murneau doesn’t know about this, I must call her. I don’t know how you got out of that clinic, but obviously it was without anyone’s permission.’

He took me by the shoulders again and tried to make me sit down in the chair I had left. He was very pale at the temples but his cheeks had suddenly flushed.

‘I beg of you, you must explain to me! I’ve had some strange ideas, but I’m not crazy. Please!’

He gave up trying to make me sit down. I took him by the arm as he made another dive for the phone on the table.

‘Calm yourself,’ he said. ‘I wish you no harm. I’ve known you for years.’

‘Who are you?’

‘François! I’m a lawyer. I handle Raffermi’s business. I’m on “The Register”.’

‘“The Register”?’

‘The account book, the people who worked for her, who were on her payroll. I’m a friend; it would take too long to explain. I was the one who handled her contracts in France, see? Sit down.’

‘You didn’t write to me after the accident?’

‘No. Murneau asked me not to. I asked after you as everyone did, but I did not write. What am I supposed to have said?’

‘That I would belong to you always.’

As I repeated the words, I realised how absurd it was to imagine this man with the heavy face, who could have been my father, writing a letter like that.

‘What? That’s ridiculous! I’d never take such a liberty! Where is this letter?’

‘I don’t have it with me.’

‘Listen, Micky. I don’t know what’s in your head. It’s possible that in the state you’re in, you imagine all sorts of things. But please let me call Murneau.’

‘Actually it was Jeanne who gave me the idea of coming to see you. I got a love letter from you, then Jeanne told me that you “never had a chance” with me: what was I to think?’

‘Did Murneau read this letter?’

‘I have no idea.’

‘I don’t understand,’ he said. ‘If Murneau told you that I never had a “chance” with you, firstly it’s because you used to make that play on words, and secondly it’s because she was talking about something else. It’s true you caused me a lot of trouble.’

‘Trouble?’

‘Let’s not talk about it, please. A matter of childish debts, dented wings; it’s not important. Sit down, there’s a good girl, and let me call. Have you had any lunch?’

I did not dare stop him again. I let him walk around his table and dial the number. I backed slowly towards the door. As he listened to the phone ringing at the other end of the line he did not take his eyes off me, but it was obvious that he did not see me.

‘Do you know if she’s at your place right now?’

He hung up and dialled again. At my place? So she had not told him, any more than she had the others, where she was keeping me, since he thought I had left the clinic this morning. I realised that before coming to get me, she must have lived somewhere else for several weeks, somewhere that was ‘my place’, and it was there that he was calling.

‘There’s no answer.’

‘Where are you calling?’

‘Rue de Courcelles, of course. Is she out for lunch?’

I heard him call ‘Micky!’ behind me but I was already in the hall, opening the front door. My legs had never felt so tired, but the steps were wide, Aunt Midola’s shoes were well made, and I did not fall down the stairs.

For a quarter of an hour I walked through empty streets near Porte d’Auteuil. I realised that I still had Dr Doulin’s folder of newspaper clippings under my arm. I stopped in front of a mirror in a shop window to make sure my beret was on properly, that I did not look like a criminal. I saw a girl with drawn features, but calm and well dressed, and behind her I saw the man who had answered the door at François Chance’s apartment.

Instinctively I clapped my free hand over my mouth and jerked around with a start that hurt from the shoulders to the crown of my head.

‘Don’t be afraid, Micky, I’m a friend. Come, I must talk to you.’

‘Who are you?’

‘Don’t be afraid, please come. I just want to talk to you.’ He took my arm gently. I relaxed: we were too far away for him to force me to go back to François Chance’s.

‘You followed me?’

‘Yes. When you came just now I lost my head. I didn’t recognise you, you didn’t seem to know me. I waited for you outside the building in my car, but you left in such a hurry I couldn’t stop you. Then you turned into a one-way street, and I had a hard time finding you.’

He held on to me firmly until we reached his car, a black saloon parked in a square I had just crossed.

‘Where are you taking me?’

‘Wherever you like. You haven’t had lunch? Do you remember the Chez Reine?’

‘No.’

‘It’s a restaurant. We used to go there often, you and I. Micky, I assure you, you have no reason to be afraid.’

He squeezed my arm and said very quickly, ‘It was me you came to see this morning. I was beginning to think you’d never come back. I didn’t know about … well, that you couldn’t remember who you were. I didn’t know...