The Hanged Man by Gary Inbinder

this morning, before it opens to the public.”
    The chief smiled. “That’s quite an interesting place for such a rendezvous. At any rate, I’m sure you’ll have some pointed questions for our old friend and colleague.”
    Achille did not read too much into Féraud’s tone of voice and wry smile. But the chief’s expression, coupled with his veiled reference to “pointed questions,” was insinuating. It was as though Féraud had said, You’re a big boy; deal with it.
    Achille replied laconically, “Yes, Chief, I will.”

    Achille’s tricolor badge had gained him admittance to a place once reserved for kings, queens, and their courtiers. He stood in the nave of the Sainte-Chapelle; facing the chevet, he craned his neck and gazed upward as the first light of dawn filtered in through a vast expanse of towering stained glass. The predominantly blue- and red-glazed biblical pictorials glittered like multifaceted gemstones. Rows of graceful piers framed the glass; they towered like ancient trees, their uppermost parts supporting the vault of a starry heaven.
    Let there be light. He thought of the first creative words of Genesis, the heavenly command that imposed order on a chaotic void. Saint Louis, the great crusader, had decreed the building of a chapel to serve as a giant reliquary, housing the spurious relics so prized by medieval kings as symbols of their divine right to rule: splinters of the True Cross; a fragment of the crown of thorns; a piece of the spear that pierced Christ’s side. Trumped-up mementoes of the Passion displayed in a royal jewel box.
    The king’s chapel had been built in the Rayonnant Style: radiant, brilliant, beautiful. The Jesuits had taught him about physical beauty from the perspective of St. Thomas Aquinas, King Louis’s thirteenth-century contemporary. According to Aquinas, the beautiful gave immediate pleasure when perceived, and radiance was one of its intrinsic qualities.
    The sunlit stained glass windows had radiance in abundance; the upper chapel shimmered and floated within a warm flood of reflected and refracted light. But at that moment, alone in the silent chapel, he thought that nothing on earth could compare to the light in Adele’s eyes. He longed for that singular look when he knew, with absolute certainty, that she loved him. Even if God existed, Achille could not touch Him, but he could embrace his wife’s warm flesh, feel the softness of her lips against his mouth. He could see their combined images in their children. Her loving light, something radiant yet tangibly human, could guide him through this investigation with its twists and turns like a dark Montmartre back alley. But he could not discuss the case with her. No, he must rely on Rousseau for enlightenment, his former partner who knew all about the chaotic underworld of criminals and terrorists.
    â€œPraying, Professor?”
    The familiar voice startled him. It seemed to come from the void. He flinched like a cat, and then turned around to face Rousseau.
    â€œYou seem a bit on edge,” the man said. “Well, that’s to be expected. We live in a dangerous world.”
    Achille contemplated the massive frame, small, round head, and porcine eyes. He seemed out of place in the graceful chapel. He was more like the Gothic Grotesques carved in stone that decorated the grimy outer walls of the great cathedrals. Achille was above average height and very fit, a skilled oarsman, a master of savate, and unafraid of a brawl. But Rousseau was a force of nature, a legend in the brigade and on the streets. Years earlier, he had been ambushed in a Montmartre alley by four knife-wielding hoodlums. Rousseau was badly cut and lost a great deal of blood, but, fighting with only his fists and truncheon, he left two gangsters dead on the pavement. A third died the next day in hospital; a fourth had run for his life. A couple of months later, the fourth