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Pascal nodded at his son, standing with his back to the door.
    “Tu vais bientôt mourir assez vieux fou,” spat Pascal Junior. “Come. He has a dirty mind.”
    I followed Armand Pascal back through his apartment. At the door he turned to me and said: “Come back later when he is asleep. I will answer your questions then. Here, you will need a key for the front door.” He handed me a key on a string.
    “ Merci . Please, thank your father again for the photograph.”  I did not like the old man much, but I was grateful to him all the same.
    Armand Pascal shrugged and closed the door on me.
    *
    I found a small local shop and bought cleaning products: strong carbolic soap, a dust pan and brush, an apron, a roll of cheesecloth, two dusters, and rubber gloves. I asked the shopkeeper if she knew of anyone with a vacuum cleaner I could borrow. I doubted Armand Pascal owned one, given the state of his home.
    The shopkeeper shrugged. ‘ Non ,’ she said, packaging my goods in brown paper and tying it with string.
    I smiled bleakly at her. I had a mammoth task ahead of me. Sorting through the detritus of Berthe’s life was going to take forever. Not for the first time I wondered why she had just upped sticks and left.
    I stopped at the café on the corner of the Rue Tronson du Coudray and ordered an omelette filled with tiny mushrooms and much garlic, and a coffee. My package sat on the chair next to me. The locals eyed me with suspicion. I ignored them.
    The café owner leant over her counter and whispered in a loud voice: “ Qu'est-ce que dans votre forfait?”
    “ Nothing,” I said. “Rien.”
    “Ah… You are American?”
    “Yes, but my Grandfather is French.” I thought that might endear me to her and to others, listening in on our conversation.
    “And you have moved here?”
    “No. Not yet.” I was not sure I would be ‘moving’ to Paris as such. I gulped my coffee, eager to be gone.
    The café owner pressed on: “ Où se trouve l'appartement ?” Is it close?”
    “Yes, just round the corner.” I had a thought. “Perhaps you know… Monsieur Pascal?”
    “ Oh, mais oui. Deux d’entre eux . Him and his father. Though I have not seen the old man for a long time. You have moved into the old rooms, no?” She dusted the top of the counter with her dish cloth.
    “Old rooms?”
    “ Oui , I know everyone who lives in that building. The old rooms are the only ones that are empty. You have heard the singing? Non ?”
    “Singing?” I was about to pick up my coffee cup and my hand froze mid-way. “What do you mean singing?”
    The café owner came out from behind her counter, bringing the pot of coffee with her. She moved my parcel onto the floor and sat down next to me, setting the coffee pot between us.
    “No one has lived in there for many years. Personne .” Her whisper grew louder.  All other conversation in the café ceased. “It is a sad place. Old man Pascal, he knew her. She was an opera singer you know.”
    “He told me.”
    The café owner stared deep into my eyes. “You have seen her, Non ?”
    “No, I never met her. She died a few weeks ago.” I was confused. What was this woman telling me?
    “Ah… C ’est intéressant. ” She picked up the pot of coffee and rose from the table. “I wish you luck my dear. If you need anything…” she tapped her chest. “Colette is here.”
    I thanked her, mystified by what she had said. I wanted to talk further, but she turned her back and busied herself with the coffee machine. Conversation amongst the other patrons resumed and I fell in to wondering what it was I had gotten myself into.
    In the time it took for me to finish my lunch and down my coffee, the weather turned nasty. The driving rain sprayed under the café’s awning, the wind rattling the tables and chairs on the sidewalk. I clamped my hat firmly on my head, raised the collar of my mackintosh and tucked the parcel under my arm. I stood for a brief moment under the awning, and