Saturday, September 30, 1820

Javert came back from lunch to find a con, very well-dressed, sitting calmly in his office at the Montreuil-sur-Mer police station. Backing up, he returned to the front desk, where the sergeant de poste was standing around, doing nothing of actual use. "Michaud, what's the mayor doing in my office?" He said mayor the way most people would say pest or plague.

"He said he wanted to see you. I told him you'd be back soon," replied Michaud, rather unhelpfully. Why would he want to see me? I'm just about the only person in this town that doesn't think he's a saint. Well, only one way to find out.

And so Javert went into his office. The mayor, proper as usual, stood up as Javert entered. "Good afternoon, inspector," he greeted. How is it that he makes me feel like I'm coming into his office, bugging him? wondered Javert, consciously uncrossing his arms. He shouldn't be the defensive one here. He was the cop, this man was a criminal - or at least Javert was pretty sure he was.

"Monsieur le maire," replied Javert in his best attempt at a gracious tone of voice, even though what he really wanted to say was what the hell do you want? "How can I be of service?" That was the polite version.

"Ah, well, there's been a robbery at the factory. The money received for the latest shipment of black glass products was taken from the iron chest in the factory office. The safe itself and the lock on it isn't broken or disturbed, but the office door's lock was tampered. The thief must have had the combination or cracked it somehow, but not the office key. I keep the combination written down at home, in case I forget it. But the paper is just where I left it, in my desk drawer. I'm very concerned not only because someone close to me must have done this, but also because the hospital needed that money. Most of it was going to be a donation." Probably a donation to your own pocketbook, thought Javert. He didn't buy this saint act for a minute. Yet the mayor was the picture of anxiety, as if he actually worried about that hospital of his.

"Just a moment, Monsieur." Javert turned around and dug through one of his many desk drawers, all full of neatly-stacked paperwork. In a few moments, he found what he needed, and whipped it out of the drawer a little too quickly. "Ugh, Dame," Javert muttered, then remembered who was listening. "Just a papercut," he explained.

"Are you okay?" Why do you care? "Here." The mayor handed Javert a handkerchief.

"Thank you," said Javert. For feigning concern so well. Perhaps a little exaggerated, though. He pressed the cloth to his finger, stopping the slight amount of blood. "Apparently paperwork hates me as much as I hate it." The mayor laughed politely. "I need to fill out a robbery report and find a starting place for the investigation, though, so may I ask you a few questions?"

"Go ahead."

"Does anyone have access to that desk? Any home employees?"

"Yes, my maid would have been able to go in there, but I get visitors in there often enough. The desk drawer doesn't lock, I just assume that no one will go through those papers." Javert knew it was just like this man to be so trusting with his employees and guests. It was almost naive, so ironic for someone who had stolen himself – no, no. He's Monsieur le maire. Not Valjean. Not yet.

"I'll need a list of recent guests, and to speak to your maid. Can you remember if you left any of them in the room alone?"

"The maid - her name's Toinette, ah, that is Antoinette Bonnefoy - could have gone in at any time, but I trust her. And as for everyone else, I do have lots of company, understandably, and I don't bother keeping a very close eye on them."

"How much was stolen?"

"Around fifty francs." A good deal of money - that could most likely feed a family for a year. Javert wouldn't put it past a desperate servant or a greedy visitor to snatch the key while the mayor wasn't paying attention. Who to question first? Well, the people who ended up in that office were pretty diverse - everyone had a concern or a petition for the mayor. Local businessmen probably visited; but they weren't cash-strapped. Some of the local men of influence, that type that paraded around in the latest fashions and considered themselves very important. And of course townspeople in need of some sort of help, since Valjean – Madeleine, Dame, it was supposed to be Madeleine - was always so eager to offer it. Might as well start with the maid, thought Javert. She had the most chances to commit the crime.

"That's quite considerable." Javert wrote down all this information, his pen scratching across the paper very quickly, yet still in neat handwriting. "One last thing – there's a space for complainant full names, so what's your first name?"

"Jean." There was a silence as Javert contemplated whether it had been bold or stupid of Valjean to not change his first name. Well, it was a common enough first name, though, so he could pull it off if - "What's yours?"

"Wha – pardon?"

"What's your first name? It just occurred to me that you've never told me yours, either."

It took all of Javert's enormous self-restraint to not blurt something like none of your business. Truth was, Javert hated his first name. His mother had apparently tried to pick something sophisticated, and overshot the mark by far. "It's Alphonse." A loaded silence followed. Javert, irrationally feeling compelled to fill it, added, "I'm not too fond of it."

"Hmm. I wouldn't have guessed that," said the mayor.

"And I wouldn't have picked it. But anyways, thank you, Monsieur. I'll get this matter resolved as quickly as possible."

"I'm sure you will, Inspecteur. I'll be at the factory." Madeleine got up and, putting his hat back on and tipping it slightly, left the office before Javert could even get up, leaving the inspector alone with his growing headache.

After a brief walk, Javert was knocking on the mayor's house door, which was quickly opened by a sunny older lady, who fussily offered to take Javert's coat and complimented him on his shoes. He replied politely, hoping not to show his impatience to get down to business.

"Are you Antoinette Bonnefoy?" asked Javert. "Monsieur le maire was just telling me that you might know something about the unfortunate events at the factory, or at least be able to point me in the right direction."

"Shame, that. Who'd rob money destined for a hospital?" So it really was for the hospital. Would this man ever stop surprising Javert? "Can I get you some tea? A seat?"

"No, thank you." Her smile dimmed a little at his polite refusal, so he course-corrected. "It's a lovely home, Madame. I can tell you take excellent care of it."

"Thank you, thank you, Inspecteur." She smiled brightly again. "What do you need to know?"

"I would like to see the paper where the mayor wrote down the safe's code, please."

"Oh, yes, yes. Right in here," she proceeded through a hallway and a couple more rooms, coming into a large, sunny office with a heavy desk in one end and a few maps and posters on the wall. Antoinette dug through the papers in the desk's right drawer, then pulled out the safe's manual. "This is it?"

The manual was a small pamphlet, with a picture of the safe, a square thing of black metal with rivets at regular intervals on its surface and a few carved decorations around its edges. The last page of the manual contained a spot where the owner of the safe could write down the combination, but it was empty. There was also a default combination listed. Huh, thought Javert. Why would you buy a safe then not bother to set a secure combination? If this was accurate, the mayor had just left the default combination. The lock wasn't damaged. The combination paper was just where he left it. But Madeleine used the default combination, and there were enough thieves who knew those – anyone could have bought that knowledge for a few francs and a glass of absinthe from one of Montreuil-sur-Mer's fine yet few career criminals. Of course, locksmiths would also have that knowledge. He should just confirm his suspicion.

Javert said goodbye to the servant then quickly left. He should have this case over by evening, and it would be a relief.

Javert went to knock on the factory office door, but hesitated suddenly. I should get this over with quickly as possible. Then go back to other work. Javert would have liked nothing more than to get called to the scene of some theft or spot whatever suspicious activity there was to be spotted. But no, this was for the mayor, so of course it was first priority. Curse this little town for being so peaceful. As he stood there, he noticed that the front door of the office had indeed been tampered with. The door lock had scratches around its keyhole, showing that it had been picked. Well, that was helpful; it meant that the robber had some sort of knowledge of theft, since he knew how to pick locks with relative ease.

Javert knocked, and the door was immediately opened by a perfectly calm mayor. The inspector got right down to business. "I believe I have a good lead, Monsieur. Could I try something with the safe?"

If the mayor found the lack of greetings and pleasantries odd, he didn't say so. "Of course, Inspector. Go ahead and inspect it." Ignoring the bad joke, Javert walked over to the safe. It was a mid-sized thing, square-shaped, and set into the wall. Its front face was made of a tough metal painted black, with a dial on the front that could select numbers from one to nine. Javert inputted the five-digit code from the instruction manual, and the safe swung open smoothly. "Impressive. How did you do that?" The mayor seemed extremely curious. "Usually, one has to turn the dial slowly, listening for clicks, to see what the combination is. My lock is resistant to that tactic anyways, it has extra notches on the wheel inside to confuse anyone who tries that. But you just seemed to know it. Did you go question Antoinette?"

"Yes, I did look at the combination. But I noticed that the have you ever changed the lock's combination from the default setting?"

"No, I tried to, but the mechanism didn't seem to react. I thought there might have been some sort of error with the mechanism, so I tried to figure out it works, so I spent a while fiddling with the safe itself to figure it out." He shrugged. "I couldn't figure out how to fix it."

This interested Javert, somehow. He never figured that the mayor had an interest in tinkering. "Might I suggest that next time, you read the manual before hiding it in the bottom of your drawer?" Javert said with a hint of a grin. "But this means that pretty much anyone could have gotten in. And perhaps your safe was even tampered with."

"How's that? I don't imagine anyone's really interested in the default combinations of safes, or tampering with mine, specifically. I didn't show the manual to anyone. And anyways, how could they have known that it could only use the default combination? This just leaves us figuring out who went through my drawers again, Inspector."

"Criminals and locksmiths are very interested in safe combinations, Monsieur. I'm sure that there's a few people in town who know what a safe of this model's default code is. Who did you buy the safe from? Anyone in their shop could have tampered with your safe, then sold the default code to a thief, or done the deed themselves."

"I can't recall the name of the locksmith. He has a shop here in town."

"Then I should check with local locksmiths. If you'll excuse me, Monsieur." This time, it was Javert who left hastily, as Madeleine finished saying "Thank you."

Javert returned to the police station to find the sergeant-de-poste still at his desk, papers strewn on it. Well, at least he looks like he's working. Can't say if he actually is, reflected Javert. Getting Michaud not to slack was an oddly irritating part of Javert's job. "Michaud, are there any locksmiths here in Montrueil?"

"Of course. Remember when we needed to get one of the locks on the cell doors repaired?"

No, Javert seriously didn't. That was Michaud's job, not his, but he knew the conversation would drag on if he pointed this out. "Could you check the records, to see what the man's name was and where his business is? Please." It didn't hurt to be painfully specific when giving instructions to Michaud, as Javert had found out over time.

The sergeant-de-poste turned around and started digging around in one of the filing cabinets behind him, his tongue sticking out a little from concentration. Javert suppressed an exasperated sigh. "Building repairs, materials invoices, stationary orders..."

"Dame, you're hopeless. Go back to what you were doing, I'll get it," growled Javert, practically shoving Michaud out of his way. The younger cop made an apologetic, nervous kind of noise, like a kicked puppy, and did as he was told as Javert dug through the many sheets of paper. It was kind of amazing how much repairing and resupplying the station needed – there had to be hundreds of pages, recording everything from writing ink purchases to masonry repairs on the front door, and it all went back at least a year. Finally, Javert found what he was looking for. The locksmith's name was Philippe Rougeau, according to the record. The address for his business pointed to a street not far from the station.

A bell over the door rang as Javert entered the locksmith's cramped little shop. The walls were covered with padlocks and door locks of all descriptions, and a line of iron chests ranged along the back wall. A man stood behind the clean and bare counter, and silently watched Javert as he entered. Was it the Inspector's imagination, or did he seem to pale a little when Javert walked in? "Good day, Monsieur. Are you Philippe Rougeau?"

"Why, yes."

"Very good. I think you did some repairs at the police station a while ago?"

The locksmith made an affirmative kind of noise, nodding a little. Why so nervous? For some odd reason, Javert could almost imagine Madeleine saying something like "you have that effect on people".

"Excellent. Did you sell the mayor a safe recently?"

"Y-yes? I mean, yes. I did, it was this model, actually." He motioned to a safe identical to the mayor's, up against the left wall of the store.

"Yes, yes. And how is business lately?"

"Not excellent. Why do you ask?"

"Because I want to know if you would have sold someone – maybe a slightly shady someone – a peek at the manual to that safe. Specifically the default code, listed in the back. And then tampered with the inner workings of the mayor's safe so that a new code couldn't be set."

"Monsieur, you come into my shop thinking I've done all this -"

"Not thinking, knowing. This will be far easier for you if you simply tell me what monkey business occurred regarding the good mayor's safe. Quickly, if you would." Javert gave the locksmith his best glare, a very refined skill of his. "Or I could interrogate you back at the station – and that could get long and unpleasant -"

"Fine. Fine, I did it."

"Excellent. Details, please?"

"He wants details, too," The locksmith sighed. "I have a family, monsieur. Details could cost me my safety and livelihood – details are dangerous -"

"As a detective, attention to detail is part of the job description. But there's one detail I really care about more than the others," began Javert, loping over to the counter and taking a seat on top of it. "The name of the man you were in cahoots – cahoots, I love that word, the sound of it. Tell me who you were in cahoots with."

"Cahoots," muttered the man. "It was a man, a tall man. Brown hair. Pale. Didn't tell me his name. I just agreed to tamper this one safe, and give him the default code just this one time."

This one safe. This one time. Those are suspiciously specific denials. And his description fits a quarter of Montreuil. "Hmm. Of course, monsieur." Javert swung his legs back and forth. "I'll need your sales records. Just the ones concerning safes and lockboxes."

"Why?" The locksmith fidgeted.

"Would it be cliche if I told you that I ask the questions here?"

"I'll get them." The locksmith dug through several drawers, and dug out a thin wad of papers. "Here."

The policeman nodded, tucked the papers into his inside coat pocket, and stood up, stretching like a cat getting down from a sofa. He produced a pair of handcuffs. "Thank you. Well, let's get you back to the station."

Once Rougeau was comfortably stewing in his cell, Javert decided to check something out. He figured that if he was right, he'd save himself a wild goose chase; if he was wrong, he'd only have wasted half an hour.

"Michaud." The sergeant-de-poste had actually managed to fall asleep on the hard surface of his desk, and was currently snoring gently into his paperwork. Javert couldn't blame him; the poor guy worked such long shifts. But then again, it was fun to watch him squirm. Javert bent over, positioning his mouth right next to the sleeping sergeant's ear, and shouted in his best menacing tone – another well-practised skill - "Michaud! Quel con. Wake up, tete de merde!"

"Y-y-yes, Inspector. I was just -" The look on Michaud's face was hilarious. 'Baffled' and 'stunned' didn't even begin to cover it. The Inspector forced himself to keep a sneer on his face, laughing internally.

"Oh, save it. Get me the records of all thefts from safes in Montreuil-sur-Mer in the past few years! Go!" With this, Michaud jumped up, sending several papers flying. Got to keep a straight face... The more senior policeman walked off into his office, trying to look irritated.

About ten minutes later, Michaud bustled into Javert's office, arms full of case files and apologies. "These are all the unsolved ones, sir. Sorry for sleeping on the job, sir, I will do better in the future, sir, I -"

Javert sighed, feigning exasperation. "Have a seat." Michaud did, very hastily, and dropped the files on Javert's desk. "So, let's see. I took in a locksmith earlier, and he confessed to tampering the mayor's safe and giving away the combination. Said the actual theft was done by a mysterious tall criminal who never mentioned his name."

"That does not sound likely to me, Inspector."

"Exactly, Michaud. It stinks. So, I want to -"

"Look through the case files to see if the same thing was done to other safes. Monsieur." Michaud realized he'd interrupted Javert and looked sheepish.

The inspector wasn't offended. "Exactly. I've got a safe sold to an old woman for her jewels, by the name of Euphrasie Blanchemaine."

Michaud shuffled the papers, searching. "Yes, that safe was tampered and robbed."

"A businessman, Francois Bedard."

"That was robbed too. Apparently he never tried to change the combination, just left it at default on purpose. And get this – a man matching the locksmith's description was seen fleeing the scene."

"No mysterious tall men?"

"I'll read them through, but doesn't seem to be in any of the cases here."

"Well, well, well. I need to have a talk with this locksmith."

"Thank you. It's excellent to have these funds back – they'll go to a great cause." I feel so warm inside, thought Javert sarcastically. Actually, come to think of it, access to cheap or free medical care might reduce the theft rate... those desperation cases were always the worst. And it never hurt to have less sick people wandering around on the street. You know, maybe this man's work did do some good. Although the idea of a helpful criminal was odd, Javert had no doubt that this was all part of Valjean's facade, making sure that no one would suspect him of being an escaped parolee.

"See, this locksmith didn't just do this to your safe – he's repeated the same crime with no less than five of his clients, with no help or partners. We now have him in custody, and if he's convicted – and there's no reason he wouldn't be – he's going in for twenty years. There were more proceeds of crime recovered, most of them of unknown origin. The police usually destroys recovered funds, but there are better uses. This is not to be mentioned, but I'll give them to you for the hospital. I'm sure it will do much good, and of course, the guilty party will be punished."

For some reason, this statement of fact made Madeleine sigh. "Well, thank you very much. Your generosity won't be forgotten."

"It's not my generosity, it's the police's. And I'd prefer if it was forgotten."

"Of course. Well, thank you for your excellent detective work."

"Monsieur le maire, it's just my job."

"Not everyone does their job as well as you, Inspector." You're telling me.

"Thank you, Monsieur." Javert cleared his throat. This made him feel like such a fool – it seemed like something a blushing girl would do – but he had to. "And thank you for, uh, loaning me this." He held out Madeleine's handkerchief, and awkwardly dropped it on the mayor's desk.

"You're welcome."

Javert nodded and turned to leave, but remembered something and turned back. "I almost forgot. You will also get a new safe to replace this tampered one. No charge. Might I suggest that you set it to a code you'll remember? It's six numbers, so maybe... two-four-six-oh-one?" He kept his face almost completely straight, saying this off-handedly. You should know what you're dealing with, crook. Nothing you can do will fool me, Valjean. Maybe if he spooked the old con, he'd make a mistake. After all, he couldn't keep this up forever. And Javert had all the patience in the world.

The look on the mayor's face told Javert everything he needed to know.