A Clean Pair of Hands (13 page)

The four cyclists rode rapidly up the short slope from the quiet side road in Maisons-Lafitte, a smart, low-density suburb in the Yvelines department, to the north-west of Paris. The leafless tree-lined streets were sparsely lit and there was nobody around to see the small peloton swoop into the cul-de-sac that served four large detached houses. There was a faint clicking of gears and the riders stood on the pedals, taking the short climb easily. A bystander might have thought them to be athletes on a training ride, but this was just after one o’clock on a Sunday morning in December, when the night air was cold, clear and clean. The shadowy figures were made to appear darker still by their clothing; tight-fitting black tracksuit bottoms, black trainers, black zipper jackets with hoods over ski masks, and gloves to protect them from the cold. They leaned their bicycles carefully against the white rendered outer wall of a garden, and used them to assist their climb to the top. The last man handed up a backpack and they silently lowered themselves to the ground on the other side, walked quickly across the lawn, and disappeared into the shadows at the back of the house heading for the garden door.

Michel and Charlotte Bodin were in bed, both still
reading, one of their favourite pastimes, especially when Michel came home late. It helped Michel to relax and prepare them both for sleep. Charlotte nudged Michel. “Did you hear that noise?” Charlotte often heard noises at night, so Michel was not quick to respond. He lowered his book, looked straight ahead over his half-moon reading glasses, listened intently for a few seconds, pulling his lower lip with his fingers, and then heard a faint knock from downstairs. Sometimes the refrigerator made that noise when the motor stopped. It might have been that, but he decided to investigate, feeling irritated at having to get out of a warm bed. As he opened the bedroom door he felt a faint current of cooler air, but all was quiet.

He left the door open and moved slowly out of the warm light cast by the bedroom reading lamps, across the darker landing towards the stairs, listening for any unusual sounds. As he passed the open bathroom door he noticed the single, yellow, glowing eye of a deodorant dispenser watching him. It detected his movement and uttered a noise like a distant crow, causing him to jump in an involuntary reflex. He silently cursed the device and continued barefoot down the stairs without switching on the lights, and checked the front door to ensure that it was bolted.

Nothing wrong here,
he thought. Michel was familiar enough with the repertoire of natural sounds in his house to know there was nothing to worry about, but he was still curious about the sound he had heard. As he was about to turn towards the kitchen he was struck by an almighty blow from behind. It had the effect of a bright flash. Michel sank to his knees in a daze, but was immediately roughly pulled to his feet and he took another hard blow to the left side of the face before he lost consciousness. He was vaguely aware that his arms were secured behind him and he was being pushed up the stairs by several men.
He stumbled several times and before he reached the top. Charlotte came out onto the landing, saw what was happening and screamed. She turned to re-enter the bedroom to reach a telephone, but one of the men bounded up the remaining stairs and thrust open the bedroom door before she could secure it. He threw her across the bed face down and held her there. When the others arrived, they opened a back pack and quickly taped her arms. They thrust Michel onto a small wooden chair, taped his legs to it and put a double band around his body. The buttons of his pyjama top had been ripped off in the struggle to drag him upstairs, so the tape was roughly stretched across his chest hairs. With one snatch, one of the intruders tore the bedroom telephone cable out of its plug.

Now they moved to Charlotte. They rolled her over to face up. One man ripped open her pyjama top while two others pulled off her trousers. They taped her ankles, now wide apart, to the lower bed posts. Michel was regaining consciousness. He could see very little out of his left eye, but he tried to focus on the raiders to detect any form of identification. There was none. There were not even the usual recognisable brand marks on any of the clothing or shoes the men wore. If any wore a watch it was concealed by their cuffs. There was only a smell of sweat and warm clothing to identify the intruders.

One of the captors went to Michel’s sports jacket, which was hanging on the arms of a trouser press. He first felt the garment all over, then took out Michel’s wallet, removed a wad of high-value notes and, leaving the credit cards, put the wallet back in the pocket. Next, he reached into an inside pocket in the lower lining of the jacket and took out a large roll of bank notes and put those into the back pack. The same man came back to Michel and adjusted the chair so that he was facing his wife. He then
placed a gloved hand on her pubis and brushed it gently. Charlotte and Michel tensed as they guessed what might be about to happen.

The attackers had taped the mouths of their victims and by the time they left, not a word had been spoken and no sound uttered since Charlotte’s scream.

A few days later, in a telephone conversation between Thérèse and Michel, when she commiserated with him about the break in, she also probed his obviously defensive answers about the attack and suggested that the truth would set him free. Michel misunderstood the purpose of the question and responded, “How do I say it? What is the right time?” He realised he had already said more than he wanted and cut the conversation short. He would always cut short an uncomfortable conversation and refuse to respond to any questions from Thérèse that delved beyond Charlotte’s intuitions about their relationship.

The loving relationship that had once flourished between Michel and Charlotte Bodin entered the final stages of its extinction from that time on. It had already suffered severely from Charlotte’s increasing distrust and Michel’s concealment of the truth. From Michel’s point of view, his relationship with Charlotte was descending into bitterness. He had felt for some time that the atmosphere at home was becoming unbreathable and he felt a tension in his chest from the minute he entered the house. Michel’s problem was partly due to the fact that he could not accept that his life was changing, and not only of his own volition. He was getting older and things he had taken for granted no longer functioned on demand. He regarded the change as a poison that diminished him, but he could not accept that the cause lay within. The fault must lie elsewhere and he must seek alternative forms of
stimulation to overcome the shortfall. He was trapped by a tyranny of the senses.

Although external appearances remained plausible and they continued to share the same bed, there was no intimacy between the couple. Michel missed the warm contact of Charlotte’s body, but when he attempted to touch her there was no reciprocation. Though they still lived in close proximity, they had become distant. Charlotte’s previously warm, expectant eyes were now cold and suspicious. There was no longer the same complicity and intimate connection. Michel’s secrecy had destroyed that.

Michel rode a Kawasaki 650cc motorcycle for easier travel into and around Paris. It solved a practical problem and at the same time satisfied his love of fast motorcycles. One evening, a week after the break-in, he was riding along a narrow side street leading to the place where he usually parked on the pavement outside his office. He was making his regular call before the staff closed the office to get an update on the day’s affairs and prepare for his evening calls. There were cars parked all along one side of the road and he was probably moving faster than he should. A man briskly approached the kerb from the right at the next junction, looking towards the approaching motorcycle. Michel saw no immediate need to slow down, but turned his attention to the man, expecting him to stop at the kerb, which he duly did; but Michel had been distracted a few seconds too long because when he saw another movement to the left, out of the corner of his eye, it was too late, and he collided with the front of a small van that had accelerated across his path. Michel flew across the bonnet of the van and lay dazed in the road. The van continued its journey, its engine revving fiercely, and leaving passers-by to collect the victim. Nobody saw the driver or the number of the van. Michel was unhurt apart from being dazed,
and later suffering from a few bruises and a stiff shoulder. His clothes were grazed, but the motorcycle was badly damaged, with bent forks and frame. He replaced it with a 4x4 car and stayed away from motorcycles for a while.

Within six months of the break-in, Michel sold the house at Maisons-Lafitte and the couple moved to a rented, spacious three-bedroom second floor apartment near La Défense in Paris. It was a step down in space and facilities and two of the girls would have to share a bedroom if they all stayed at the same time, but it was prestigiously appointed, with a wide balcony looking out towards the centre of Paris.

Thérèse and George Milton never had a satisfactory explanation for the burglary at Maisons-Lafitte, but they understood why Charlotte would feel unsafe in that house with Michel often out at night, so they weren’t surprised at the move, though they could not understand why the Bodins would give up serene verdure for concrete buildings, however prestigious. The primary reason for the move was that Michel was liquidating most of his capital assets and focusing on his new business. He had opened the small office in Paris administered by his wife, while he continued prospecting his previous clients and contacts network. This time he was acting as an independent sales and design consultant, leaving the building and project management to others. Once again Michel’s charm and persistence worked and the business, with lower overheads than before, performed brilliantly. Despite their differences, the couple worked together on a daily basis and Charlotte continued to manage the accounts.

There was soon another discordant note when there was a break-in to the basement lock up below the Bodins’ apartment. Michel’s substantial wine collection, temperature controlled cabinet, golf clubs and other sports gear
were taken. It might have been a random initiative, but Charlotte was beginning to wonder if there might be more to it than that. She soon had confirmation that her hunch was correct.

A few weeks later, as Charlotte left her car in the underground car park of the apartment, two men in black leather jackets approached her, barring her way to the door leading to the apartments. She was just putting her car keys away and getting the apartment keys out of her bag when each man grabbed an elbow and they started dragging her towards a large dark car, where a third man waited behind the wheel. Charlotte’s hand desperately groped in the bag and emerged with a pepper spray she kept there for just this eventuality. Both men received a paralysing dose full in the face and Charlotte started coughing and crying too. She saw the third man getting out of the car, so she took off towards the hall entrance door and once on the other side, used the night-time security locks to bolt the door to the car park then ran into her apartment, again bolting the door behind her. She called the police and they arrived within fifteen minutes. They looked around downstairs, found nothing, took her general descriptions of the men and their car, and left.

When Michel came home later that evening she told him what had happened. He frowned, said little and they went to bed, both deeply concerned in different ways at what had occurred. Michel wasn’t naive enough to believe that his run of bad luck was unrelated to the affair with Schmitt, which had to be settled. He had to find a solution, but he feared that as far as Schmitt was concerned there could only be one outcome.

The Bodins did not share their thoughts and the next day went about their business as if nothing had happened.

Shortly after the incident in the underground car park, Michel Bodin went to meet Schmitt at his office. At first sight it was not the sort of place you would associate with a successful businessman. The office was on the fourth floor of a derelict concrete building which might have been at its best forty years earlier, when it was the head office of a mail order firm. The car park area was partly occupied by loose rubbish, overflowing skips and a few twenty-foot shipping containers pointing in different directions. At one side of this scene of desolation and neglect was a large, low, open-fronted hangar in which were parked a scattering of expensive cars, including a dark blue Mercedes 500, not unlike the one Charlotte had recently described to the police. Bodin entered by a fractured plywood ground floor door dangling at the right hand corner of the building and made his way up the bare concrete stairs, noting that his progress was watched at every landing by small idle groups of sullen African males. He had no idea what kind of business Schmitt was in, and so far couldn't place it with certainty in any particular industry category.

Once on the fourth floor, Michel walked carefully along a corridor strewn with broken glass, possibly from some of
the office partitioning that had been clumsily removed. He saw that the only possible working office was at a far corner and as he reached it, he found the door was open to reveal a cared-for board room table, surrounded by comfortable chairs, and with windows on two sides, giving views across one of the most dismal areas of the Paris suburbs.

At the head of the table, facing him, sat Claus Schmitt reading a newspaper and smoking a cigar. His suit jacket hung on a clothes hanger on a wooden, traditional type of hat and coat stand located just behind him. The man sported wide braces, a striped business shirt, and incongruously, a bow-tie. With his feet up on the table, he resembled Humphrey Bogart in a Raymond Chandler movie. The soles of his light tan leather boots, which were the closest point of contact to Michel, looked expensive, probably Italian-crafted, with a pattern round the outer edge that showed little sign of wear. Schmitt didn't rise to shake hands. Instead he smiled and waved Bodin to a chair, offered a cigar, which Michel declined, and waited with hands locked high across his chest to hear Michel's news.

Michel, somewhat nervously and with a dry mouth, explained that their deal had been done when Charlotte was under the influence of a drug, but she was already regaining consciousness by the time Schmitt appeared, and the immediate opportunity for him to take control of her had been lost. Since then, the desired conclusion had always depended on Charlotte's consent. Clearly that wasn't going to happen now, and further intimidation was only likely to lead to escalation of consequences and more trouble for all concerned. Michel omitted to say that Charlotte still knew nothing about the deal and he had not attempted to broach the subject with her.

Schmitt appeared unmoved. After a period of silence,
Michel suggested that they should do a deal which would release Michel from his bond and ensure that Schmitt was adequately compensated. Schmitt ruminated, leaning back in his chair savouring his cigar, but said nothing. Michel was starting to sweat around the back of his head and neck. He maintained eye contact and as in a game of poker, tried to give no hint of what sort of hand he held, or what he feared Schmitt might do to him and/or Charlotte, though he had already had a glimpse of the range of possibilities. After an interminable pause, which Michel found increasingly difficult to maintain, Schmitt was the first to speak.

“It must be nearly a year since we agreed that deal. Maybe I took you by surprise at the time.” Michel nodded. He wasn't going to admit that he had no experience of such deals until this one, and he wasn't going to repeat the experience.

“Well, I guess that over that time I have rather lost interest in your good lady. In fact I can hardly remember what she looked like, though obviously she must have seemed attractive at the time, perhaps because of what she was wearing.” There was another long pause.

Schmitt grinned and looked up at his cigar smoke rising to the ceiling. He was thinking that he had only pursued the settlement as a matter of honour. He no longer felt any particular fancy for the woman. “I'll tell you what I'll do to make you happy; I'll accept one hundred thousand francs as an immediate payoff, and later I will let you know what else you can do for me.”

Michel was instinctively about to reach for his cheque book, then suddenly realised he would firstly look too compliant, and moreover dumb in not offering cash. He nodded, swallowed and then marshalled his thoughts
about the implications of Schmitt's demands. “That's an expensive deal, and what do you want me to do for you? It sounds open ended.”

Schmitt just couldn't help smiling

“You only need to keep me informed of what you are doing. That's all. If there's something in it that interests me I'll let you know, and when I need more, I'll tell you. You don't have to accept.” Schmitt's smile was now almost avuncular. “I will accept a cheque, if that's what you're concerned about. Make it out to Arnak Investments. Then we will invest it for you. I can't promise any dividends, but that will save you having to declare them for taxation.” The smile broadened.

Michel felt as though the spider was peering into his face. He could see the intensity of the eyes and imagine the sharpness of the jaws, and he couldn't move a limb. He suddenly pulled himself upright in the chair. “I'll make out the cheque now.” This time Schmitt stood up and reached across the wide table to shake hands.

While Michel wrote the cheque, Schmitt turned to look out of the window, raised one hand to support his other elbow, drew on the cigar and exhaled slowly. Then, after a few seconds had passed, he spoke to the window. “Of course, if there should be any change of plan regarding the processing of that cheque, your wife will be the first to feel the effects.”

“There will be no change of plans,” Michel assured him.

When he reached the front door of the building and took his first breath of outside air, Michel realised that he was not only sweating profusely, but his hands were trembling. He reached for a cigarette and went for a long walk before getting back into his car.

There were no more ‘incidents.' But Michel wasn't naïve enough to think that he was now free of Schmitt's
attention. On the contrary: he was now Schmitt's creature, caught in a web, and when his fate had been decided he would be told exactly what to do. He could talk to nobody about his predicament and he could see no way out, yet.

A few days later, Michel received an envelope containing some official-looking documents from Arnak Investments. The writer said that M. Michel Bodin had made one of the biggest and most important decisions he would ever have to make…

The initial investment had been placed in their high risk high earnings fund where his nest egg would grow whatever the economic climate… It went on,

‘
But first, we need to make something clear
…'

“What the hell does this mean?” muttered Michel with a grimace. “Why are they writing to me at all, and where are they ‘investing' my money?” There was nobody to answer him.