Babazouk Blues, page 13
It was standard banter. The words jarred, nevertheless. Darac made straight for the coffee machine. ‘Want some hot brown liquid?’
‘I’ll get some in a minute. So what did you find out? Apart from the fact that Mademoiselle Daviot has the hottest fanny this side of—’
‘Let’s get on with it, shall we?’
‘So you did! You did screw her!’ Granot’s face fell. ‘Are you insane?’
‘Probably.’
‘She hasn’t got to you, has she?’
‘Not sufficiently, actually. There are feelings flying around though, but they are mainly to do with Jeanne Mesnel. You’ll never guess who she is. Was, I mean.’
The story seemed neither to move nor even surprise Granot.
‘Alright, Acting Commissaire Compromised, let’s get to the nitty gritty. Did Cristelle know she had been disinherited before Saturday last?’
‘I strongly suspect she didn’t.’
‘Did Léo know?’
‘Again, Cristelle says no. You were right, by the way. Léo is her pimp. I’m going to see him later.’
‘On a “talk or I’ll arrest you” basis?’
‘Under the circumstances, no.’
‘Ai, ai, ai. Cristelle have an alibi for the time of death?’
‘Yes and no.’
‘Johns?’
Darac gestured that he had got it in one.
‘If you can get them to testify, johns make damn good alibis,’ Granot said, rising.
‘I’ve asked Saint-Tropez to question them. She was based there on the day.’
Granot prowled over to the coffee machine and like a laboratory ape performing a cognition experiment, jabbed a sequence of buttons. He brought his reward back to his seat as Darac took a call on his desk phone.
‘Interesting. Go on.’ He looked across at Granot. ‘Any inscription?’ He picked up a pen. ‘OK, get it over to forensics and bring her in. And Malraux? Good work.’
He hung up.
‘A breakthrough?’ Granot said.
‘Sounds like it.’
19
A hiding place, a cross-country course, a gym: the woods around the campsite of L’Ancienne Bastide had served Gilles Voska well in the ten months he’d been holed up there. A couple of collapsed outbuildings alone had provided enough material to keep him happy. He was irritated at having to leave the place sooner than planned but he was well prepared for what was to come.
He picked up the movie camera’s remote release and staring into the lens, pressed the record button. In front of him were two columns of bricks, a metre high and forty centimetres apart. Bridging the gap on top was a V-shaped roofer’s ridge tile. Voska took a pace back. Breaking flats by hand was nothing to an ex-commando. A ridge tile was a different proposition, yet the thought that what he was about to attempt was impossible never crossed his mind. Breathing deeply, his eyes bored into its rolled top.
He screamed, the flexed power of his torso releasing in one cataclysmic explosion. He felt no pain as his forehead hit the target. Pain was a state of mind. The tile fell between his bare feet, snapped in half like a breadstick.
He stopped the recording.
‘Alright, Messieurs Modibo and Rama,’ he said aloud. ‘I’m ready for you.’
20
Smiling pleasantly, Brigitte Andreani took off her coat and sat down opposite Darac as if she’d just dropped in for a chat. Court shoes, a dressy navy-blue skirt and, showing off the lovebirds tattooed on her upper arm to advantage, a sleeveless seersucker top completed her outfit. A sisterly nod toward Sabrina Fabre, sitting pen at the ready in the corner, went unreciprocated. But Brigitte wasn’t deterred. More sympa spirits were present. ‘Lieutenant Granot,’ she smiled. ‘Oh, and hello, Captain. Nice to see you again.’
Amused, Darac almost replied ‘me too’ but he began conventionally. ‘Madame Andreani, you were apprehended at Bercy, the jewellers on Rue Fodere trying to sell a ring. How did you acquire it?’
Brigitte’s expression hardened like quick-drying cement. ‘That’s the way it’s going to be, is it? An interrogation!’ A wispy black bra strap slid down her arm, a blindfold for the lovebirds. ‘And how young Christian could have strong-armed me in here like that, I do not know. Especially as I haven’t done anything.’ She pulled the bra strap back over her shoulder. The lovebirds would just have to take it. ‘Not one thing.’
Granot gave her an irritated stare. ‘You struck Lieutenant Intern Malraux during the execution of his duty, madame. That in itself is an offence.’
‘Struck? It was just a slap. And so would you have slapped him if you’d got up to what we did the other night.’ She dropped her voice to a conspiratorial whisper. ‘I thought we’d got something going, you know? But if I’d known what sort he’d turn out to be, I would have bitten his dick off.’
Despite the situation, Darac laughed out loud. Suddenly delighted with herself, Brigitte smiled as if she had intended her remark to be funny.
Granot was a far tougher audience. ‘How did you come by the ring?’
‘It was my mother’s.’
‘Your mother is dead?’
Making the sign of the cross occasioned further adjustment of her bra strap. ‘God rest her soul.’
‘She is not dead, madame.’
‘Well, not technically, no.’
The ring in question, as Darac had learned when Malraux had called, bore a faint but legible inscription on its inner surface: On this our wedding day, 7 May 1958. ‘When is your parents’ wedding anniversary?’ he said.
‘September twenty-second.’
‘And they married in what year?’
‘Nineteen six… nineteen seventy-one.’
Granot made Brigitte jump as he brought his hand down on the desk. ‘Cut the crap!’
Darac put a calming hand on Granot’s forearm. It looked like classic good cop–bad cop shtick but the sentiment was genuine enough. ‘Brigitte,’ he said, ‘the wedding ring belonged to Madame Mesnel. An inscription proves it.’
Her pulpy cheeks flushed. ‘I want to see a lawyer.’
‘You’re not entitled to one just yet. Answer the question. How did this ring come into your possession?’
She tugged the crucifix at her throat first one way, then the other. ‘I found it.’
‘Where? On Madame Mesnel’s dead body? After your boyfriend drowned her?’
Darac was no longer her favourite. ‘He didn’t drown anyone.’
‘Look, he’s got form. He’s going down for fifteen to twenty years over this. And you, an accessory, will also do time.’
Brigitte set her jaw, crossed her arms and, picking a spot on the side wall, stared resolutely at it as the questions penetrated deeper, the penalties for not co-operating grew more explicit. In exasperation, Granot finally reached for her chin.
‘Look at me.’
She allowed him to guide her head back into line but then immediately turned back to the wall.
‘Enough.’ Darac got to his feet. ‘Book her.’
‘About bloody time. Brigitte Maria Andreani, I am arresting—’
‘No, wait a minute! I’ll tell you the truth.’ She composed herself. ‘I did find the ring just as I told you.’
‘Where?’
‘On my patio.’
Granot threw up his arms.
‘Ridiculous.’
At that moment, Flaco brought in a note and handed it to Darac. Brigitte smiled at the newcomer. ‘Nice cornrows, darling.’ She looked a little closer. ‘Quite nice.’ Slight concern now. ‘Do them yourself?’
‘No, I don’t. Why?’
‘No reason. Bye, dear.’ As Flaco took her leave, Brigitte’s smile faded. She leaned across to Granot and shook her head. ‘Not trained, whoever did them. Three years I did. Apprenticeship.’
‘If you’ve quite finished? You’ve been brought in for questioning. Remember?’
Brigitte sat back, put out all over again.
‘So there you are, sunning yourself on the patio when out of nowhere, you notice a twenty-four-carat gold ring glinting between all the piles of shit? Pull the other one.’
‘Actually, madame,’ Darac said, passing Flaco’s note to Granot, ‘you didn’t so much find the ring between the shit as in it, true? In a sample excreted by your dog.’
For the first time, Brigitte looked vulnerable. It offered Darac a way forward. ‘Do you ever allow Thierry to roam the streets unsupervised?’
‘Never. He is always on the lead. Always!’
‘So who was with him when he bit Madame Mesnel’s finger off? You or Marcel?’
Brigitte shook her hands in front of her as if rubbing out the words she’d uttered. ‘No, I didn’t mean to say that. He has got out once or twice. Ask the neighbours! And any dog coming across… well, a piece of meat, will help itself, won’t it?’
Granot could see where Darac was going. ‘Yes, but a Rottweiler can turn live flesh into dead meat all by itself. That is what happened. Your pet killed Madame Mesnel.’
‘No! Thierry is as gentle as a kitten. You’ve seen him!’
‘In light of this…’ Granot stared hard into her eyes. ‘I must tell you that Thierry will have to be put down.’
‘Put down? No!’
‘Your dog bit Madame Mesnel’s hand off in the attack and the proof wound up on your patio. Dogs have DNA as well as humans and their teeth leave characteristic bite marks. And we have hair samples. We can prove it was Thierry.’
‘No, it wasn’t.’ The words spluttered out as Brigitte’s tears began to flow. ‘It wasn’t!’
Darac passed her a tissue. She clutched it, absently.
‘Where is the dog now?’ Granot said. Brigitte didn’t answer.
‘You’re not taking Thierry.’ She shook her head determinedly. ‘You are not.’
‘We-ll, there just might be a way of saving him.’
‘What? Tell me!’
‘If it was Marcel who set the dog on the old lady, Thierry won’t have to be put down.’
Brigitte wiped her eyes.
‘I repeat: we won’t have to take Thierry if you tell us the truth about Marcel. Effectively, it was he who killed Madame Mesnel, wasn’t it?’
Brigitte was thinking about it. Granot shared a look with Darac.
‘Well he did…’ she began, the words bubbling through her tears. ‘He did once teach Thierry to…’ But the magnitude of the moment got to her and she went no further.
‘Teach Thierry to do what?’ Darac said. ‘Attack on command?’ Brigitte ran her tongue over her lips. ‘Would you like some water?’
She shook her head. ‘Marcel did do that, didn’t he? Train Thierry to attack when he said a certain word or phrase?’
She stared into space, defeated. ‘I shouldn’t have tried to sell the ring. I couldn’t see it had an inscription. Marcel would have done but he was stuck in here.’
‘But he did train the dog as I said?’
‘“Pulling Thierry’s trigger,” he calls it. He’s tried to show me loads of times but I don’t want to see.’
‘Has he shown anyone else?’
‘He said he showed Dagger.’ She gave a sour little laugh. ‘As if that would make me change my mind.’ She looked into Darac’s eyes. ‘Thierry’s been trained. But he could be untrained, couldn’t he?’
It was as heartfelt a plea as he had witnessed in an interrogation.
‘Of course he could,’ Granot said. ‘And he wouldn’t have to be put down if you come clean about Marcel. He didn’t just threaten to kill Madame Mesnel, did he? He went to Chemin Leuze and did it.’
Brigitte lowered her eyes. Granot lowered his voice.
‘I can see your difficulty. And what’s a dog’s life matter, anyway? If you’re worrying about it, Thierry wouldn’t feel any pain. He wouldn’t feel the injection. It would be just a jab like any other. Some dogs even wag their tails before the poison—’
‘Shut up!’ Sobs now. ‘Shut up!’
‘But you can save him. All you have to do is—’
‘Alright. Alright. He… did it.’
‘Who did?’ Granot said.
‘Marcel, you dick. Who do you think?’
‘Marcel Battail murdered Jeanne Mesnel last Saturday, 2 January?’
Brigitte lowered her eyes to the floor and kept them there. ‘Yes. It was Marcel.’
Granot turned to Darac wearing the sort of expression conjurers favour after pulling off a deft sleight of hand.
‘So Marcel told you what he’d done, did he?’ Darac said.
‘Yes.’
‘How did he do it, exactly?’
‘Uh… Using Thierry, like you said.’
‘Where did the dog bite her?’
‘Where? Well, the hand.’ She fingered her own wedding ring. ‘The left hand.’
‘And the attack words. What were they?’
‘I don’t know. I swear.’
‘Excuse us a moment. Officer Fabre will pour you a coffee if you’d like one.’
Darac led Granot out of the office and closed the door. They began a slow-motion taxi around the floor. ‘Promising start but we’ve strayed off into the realms of fantasy. Or even into the Theatre of the Absurd.’
‘Good old Brigitte has just fingered her boyfriend for the murder. We’ve got a result.’
‘The bite marks on the exposed arm stumps were caused post-mortem, remember?’
‘The exposed marks, yes. But what’s to say the dog hadn’t bitten off the old woman’s lower arm and hand days before that? Between noon and 6 pm last Saturday, to be more exact. She’s told us Marcel trained him to attack on a trigger word.’
‘Yes, Battail is the sort of fuckwit who would think it clever to teach a dog to attack on command; but you’re forgetting the COD. Madame Mesnel didn’t bleed to death, she drowned. It’s obvious Brigitte hasn’t the faintest idea how she died. She didn’t give Marcel an alibi when she had the chance. And she’s only saying he did it now because she would rather lose her boyfriend than her dog. You can hardly blame her.’
Granot looked for a hole in Darac’s argument and couldn’t find one. ‘I still think he did it and Brigitte will testify to it. With his record and with Madame Loret’s testimony against him as well, he’ll likely be convicted even without the lab’s corroboration. Everyone’s a winner. Frènes will be happy his initial suspicions were proved correct. Now you’re acting commissaire, you should be happy your figures for the ministry will get a boost. The only loser is a wife-beating arsehole named Marcel Battail.’
They turned the corner at the end of the first leg of the circuit.
‘It’s tenuous.’
‘People have been convicted on less.’
‘Tenuous and untrue, at least in the way you outlined it to Brigitte…’ Darac put his hands on his hips and kept his eyes on the carpet as he walked.
‘What are you thinking?’
‘I forgot the immediate cause of death, myself. She drowned, yes. But she suffered a heart attack first, didn’t she? Is it possible Battail could have used the dog to frighten her to death? It is the biggest bloody hound you’ve ever seen in your life.’
‘So it happened like I said except he didn’t free the dog once he’d said the word.’
‘Madame Mesnel did have severe cardiac problems,’ he conceded. ‘An experience like that might trigger a heart attack.’
‘The bastard probably laughed as he watched the poor old dear go under.’
Darac gave Granot a look. ‘You’re not talking to Brigitte now. “Wag their tails?”’
‘It worked. That’s all that matters.’
‘It’s an unlikely way to kill someone. If she did die that way, Marcel possibly didn’t intend it. He was just giving teeth, real ones, to the threat he made before: “Turn the music down or next time I’ll let him off the lead.” Now that scenario I can picture.’
‘It might downgrade it to manslaughter,’ Granot said. ‘We can do better. I’m looking forward to my next chat with Battail. Even though he’ll have seen a lawyer by then.’
‘Having his rights pointed out to him won’t help him much.’
‘What now, then?’
‘We release Brigitte. No charges. Alright, the property she was trying to sell was technically stolen but the word I don’t like there is “technically”.’
‘Like her mother wasn’t “technically” dead?’ Granot shook his grizzled head. ‘We could give her real grief over that ring. This wouldn’t have happened in the old days.’
‘This isn’t the old days and we can always come back to it. And for her own safety, advise her to move out for a while. If Frènes doesn’t grant us an extension on Battail’s custody, he could be home tomorrow so tell her to do it straight away.’
‘We’re not social workers. Except where her dog is concerned, that woman is as hard as nails. And you, my friend, are as soft as a pile of its shit.’
‘I’m in good company.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I hear you let Cristelle smoke in the morgue.’
‘I thought she might knock a few euros off for me later.’
Darac let that go. ‘Alright, the next thing we do is ask Raul Ormans to send a forensic team to Battail’s. The dog may have buried Madame Mesnel’s hand there, somewhere. We should have done it before, really.’
Granot shrugged. ‘We couldn’t dig up the whole of Beaulieu-sur-Mer, could we? Thanks to Brigitte, at least we’ve narrowed it down.’
‘If Thierry frightened Madame Mesnel to death, there’ll be no exchange evidence to examine. But if he did bite off her dead hand and we can dig up even a fingernail, there may just be some skin particles from the perpetrator.’
‘So is it Frènes time for you now?’
Darac looked at his watch. ‘Still got a couple of hours, but I have other stuff to do first. Clear on everything?’
‘With this old brain of mine, I don’t know.’
‘Have another koffee,’ Darac said, as he took his leave. ‘That’ll sharpen you up.’
21
Through Cristelle, Darac had arranged to meet Léo at Café Avanti in Boulevard Risso, a favoured spot before the Brigade’s temporary move to Commissariat Joinel.
