Apocalypse Baby (16 page)

He'd stopped seeing her. He'd fucked her one more time, in an alley, anyone could have seen them, from behind, like a whore. It hadn't succeeded in making things sordid enough for him to be free of that image of her. It had been fantastic, yet again. When she turned round to look him in the eye, there was no more to be done. They both knew they'd crossed the frontiers. She was a divinity. Too attractive. Pleasure in abjection. To touch her made him too feverish. He had no desire to learn any more about this stranger inside him, the one who emerged every time he touched her.

Just after he had come, making her take it up the back, she had stayed with her forehead against the wall. He'd walked away without saying anything. When she called to him, he'd said it was over, she must forget him, give him up. He didn't want her to come near him again. Ever. She hadn't insisted. She'd disappeared from his life.

He had missed her, missed not seeing her any more. He even missed her silliness. When she got angry, she was like a furious kitten. But he breathes more easily now he doesn't see her. It's a danger avoided.

His mother and Nadja are still talking away with the detective. He's surprised how friendly they're being. This private eye's good at her job. They don't usually chat like that. Especially since they hardly know Valentine, in fact. They're going on about how happy she was to discover she
had a family, how she liked meeting her grandparents, her false shyness. Yacine says nothing. He gets up to make some coffee, and offers one to the woman, who accepts at once; he wonders if she's going to camp there. She's carrying out her plan, saying ‘Oh really?' and ‘Are you sure about that?' to get the conversation going again, you can see that mentally she's registering every word.

In the kitchen, he heats up some water. A spoonful of instant coffee in both glasses. The detective appears, stops at the kitchen door and asks: ‘Can I have five minutes with you on your own?' He gestures towards a chair with his head. She acts like a cop, Clint Eastwood style. She must have seen his films when she was young and considered him a good role model. Yacine wonders what kind of man shacks up with a woman like this. Must have brass-lined balls, her guy. Yeah, she's good-looking. But too masculine. Could be a turn-on, but you can't imagine yourself coming home at night and asking her what's for supper. You're be scared she'd punch you on the jaw. Yacine looks at the floor, hands clasped between his knees, unmoving. She says nothing. He breaks the silence.

‘I didn't say anything in there, because I've got nothing to say.'

‘But I know that Valentine was in love with you, I think you saw each other without anyone else knowing, and what I'd like is if you'd tell me, just quickly, what happened.'

How does she know this? She was careful to keep her voice low so that they can't hear from the next room. He doesn't like what she said one bit. He keeps calm.

‘You're wondering if I've locked her up in some cellar and
how much I want for her? Sorry, madame, wrong address. Try the Africans across the landing, maybe they've eaten her?'

She stares at him, glacially, then changes tactics and bursts out laughing. She can look after herself. Women as a rule find it hard not to convey that they find him attractive. Even when they try to play ice-queen, there's some giveaway glance or smile. They can't hide it. But not her. She's got the situation under control. She's unreachable. It makes her attractive. In spite of everything, he's glad he made her laugh.

‘I don't know where you've dug up a story like that, I don't know any more than what they told you next door, and that's the truth.'

‘Ah yes, but on the internet there are some pictures of the two of you… Photos, I wouldn't exactly call them compromising, but the way she's looking at you, I'd say that you know each other a lot better than you're telling me.'

He is silent. Nadja and her damned computer. Nadja and her craze for photos. He doesn't bother himself with what she gets up to on the internet. He'd forgotten the photos. The private eye isn't charming now, she's just a standard model cop. An unarmed cop. Out come the violins.

‘And you don't think she might be in danger, and it would be better if I can find her?'

What he really ought to do is slash her ugly mug and have done with it. He clenches his teeth. He hates her. He has no desire to tell her what happened. She insists, still speaking in a low voice.

‘If you like, we can go down for a walk, nobody else needs to know what we're talking about. I've got a deal to suggest.'

‘You're threatening me? You'll make trouble for me if I don't cooperate, right?'

She leans across and speaks in such a quiet voice that her lips hardly move, she doesn't stop looking him in the eye, her face is expressionless.

‘Your cousin Karim, for me it's not a problem to get them to reopen the file, discover it was a case of mistaken identity and he shouldn't have been charged. I can get him out in 48 hours. Interested?'

That waste of space. His cousin Karim. Shooting around on his scooter, when some other kids were chucking stones at the police. This one cop got hit on the head, bust a blood vessel, and was paralysed after that. OK, tough luck, but come on, it's his job, he should have been wearing riot gear and a helmet. What kind of cop goes round in the middle of a riot without head protection? Practically professional misconduct. They arrested everyone in sight, of course. Karim hung about, because he's stupid, and he thought just because he hadn't done anything, no reason to rush off. And they got hold of him, among others. They formally identified him – as if you have time to photograph one out of about fifty guys milling round the place. He didn't get done for the stone that hit the cop, by chance they pinned that on another couple of cretins. Apparently those two weren't even down there when it happened. They were fetched out of their homes. But between what people say and what really happened, they don't bother to distinguish. Karim's been charged with attacks on public property, supposedly setting fire to a dustbin during the riot. As if he had nothing better to do. He could cop it hard though. Be made an example. Actually, Yacine has
never liked his cousin. He's stingy, cowardly and fat, he likes football, porn movies and fancy cars. Not much to be done with him. But he's family. The bitch. She's really worked hard on her little file, before turning up at the door with her foundation-covered face. Yacine resists. But he knows she's got him.

‘If he gets out like that, everyone will say it's a deal, gotta be something behind it.'

‘Up to you. If you tell me the truth, he'll be out in a week. I give you my word.'

She empties her coffee cup, throwing back her head to catch the last drop. She really does act like a man.

‘You know perfectly well what happens to little girls all alone in the big city. It isn't as if you were up to anything criminal. I've got to find her. And I need to know what she was doing in the weeks before she took off. I think you had a relationship. I want to know what she told you, the kind of things she was interested in. And don't forget that if I don't solve this case quickly, one of these days it'll be the police knocking at your door. I found you through the internet, and they'll soon turn up the same photos. All they're interested in is getting your name down on a charge sheet, so they can say to their boss, “Right, sir, I've got it sorted.” The truth never got anyone promotion.'

She's playing superwoman now, but getting more angry, and Yacine wonders if she practises this for hours in front of the mirror because she does it very well. For a bitch. She stands up.

‘OK, I'll walk to the metro with you.'

‘I came by car.'

‘All right then, I'll walk you to the car.'

He knows already that she's right. It's in his interest to talk to her. Whereas from the pigs, he can expect nothing but trouble.

THE HYENA FOUND VALENTINE'S MOTHER'S
precise address before Rafik did. The night we've just spent watching the tarmac flash by has hardly lessened my irritation: for once I'd had a lead to follow up. As dawn breaks, just before we reach Barcelona, we pass some enormous and intriguing white globes: a nuclear power station gleaming in the already blazing sunshine. A spaghetti junction of motorways, and we're slipping into the city. The resounding blue of the sky, a uniform backdrop, magnifies everything it covers. I didn't sleep much, I'm bizarrely wakeful, with the glucose from the Red Bull plus caffeine circulating in my jangled nerves, on a platform of dulled calm. Electricity on my nerve ends. The blinding light hurts my eyes. I feel well, actually, although I'm on the edge of a strange and worrying abyss. The absurd happiness of seeing the first palm trees, and the façades of the buildings covered with useless florid detail, the balconies bright with every colour of the rainbow. At the first red light, the Hyena operates the central locking.

‘Watch out, they have very cunning thieves here.'

‘Worse than in Paris?'

‘Much. They're cutting-edge delinquent in this town. They can empty a car at the speed of light, very nifty, very effective.'

She wants a coffee and stops when she finds somewhere to park. Her features are drawn with fatigue, but a joyful expression, such as I haven't seen on her before, lights up her face. She says cheerfully, ‘Nice here, eh? Come on, we can go to a bar, have a fag, that'll revive us.'

For the first few hours of the drive, the Hyena gave me a long description of Yacine, his sister Nadja, and how much she liked their mother, whom she would gladly save, if she had the time, from the ‘shipwreck of heterocentrism'. Gradually we're getting a picture of Valentine, but without yet being able to describe her clearly. The Hyena is interested in this little teenager, I think she's touched by the way the kid bounces all the time from one side to the other, without finding her place, but without getting tired. She's a valiant little pinball.

When you get away from Paris, you realize what a grey, noisy, depressing and morbid city it is. As we sit on this café terrace, the wind on our skin hasn't the same texture. We proceed slowly to our hotel.

A tiny room, very expensive. The tap water that I splash on my face has an unpleasant smell. I check that the television works, then crash on to the bed and go to sleep. Less than half an hour later, the earth shakes, the walls vibrate, and I just have time to realize I've got a headache before I see from my window a whole lot of workmen, naked to the waist, attacking the façade with pneumatic drills. I lie there under the sheets, can't get my brain in gear. A knock at my door, the Hyena bursts in, she's beside herself. I immediately imagine the drills being confiscated – the poor men don't know what's coming to them.

‘I'm out of here. They've got a fucking nerve, saying they don't have any quieter rooms. In reception, they said nobody but us complains, that people don't come to Barcelona to spend all day in their hotel rooms. I'm off, I need my sleep. I'm going to a girlfriend's place. Are you coming, or do you want to stay here?'

I grab my things and follow her without thinking. On the way she works out how to get some advantage from the fiasco. ‘I'll make out some false hotel bills, that'll bring us out ahead.'

‘Whose place are we going to?

‘Some French women who live here. We'll be fine over there.'

The streets have now been invaded by scooters. Buzzing insects coming at you from all directions. Crash helmets, flipflops, summer clothes, graceful bodies on two cylinders. The city has become a vast cauldron of noise. People sound their horns all the time, while gigantic machines are digging up the roads, exposing the town's entrails, taking the din to new levels. It seems to be a local custom.

The blonde woman who takes us in is built like a lumberjack in exile from her forest. Solid and slightly gaunt. She has poor skin, and very fine hair receding from her forehead, her nose is prominent and her bluish-grey eyes are bulging. She serves us coffee so strong it's practically all grounds. The Hyena monopolizes a joint as soon as she has sat down.

‘Good thing you're here… when they started to knock down the hotel wall, I was on the point of murdering one of them.'

‘Touch a hair of their heads? Building workers in Barcelona?
Don't even think about it. It's their religion here. Barcelona's the noisiest city in Europe. They're always knocking everything down all the time. You see them working on building sites at midnight on Saturdays. Nothing stops them. Cranes – they're the opium of the masses for the Catalans. They dig up the pavements just to see what's underneath. You wouldn't believe. They'd kill their father and mother, just to be able to put up a new building.'

These two are old friends. I don't dare say that I want to go to bed. I drop off on the couch. When the noise around me forces me to come out of it, the heat is stifling in the room, and the curtains aren't effective enough to filter the blinding sunlight. The house has filled with people, and I've had a lot of painful dreams that I can't quite remember. There are a dozen or so girls scattered throughout the rooms. Hoarse voices. The blonde, now with a cigarette in her mouth, is hanging up some black garments.

‘Sleep OK? Want anything? A coffee? Or I can show you your room.'

‘A coffee, yes, I'd love one. Where's the Hyena?'

‘Telephoning out on the terrace.'

She drops the clothes she's hanging up and leaves them there on the ground, not bothering to come back to them. She goes off to make me a coffee, but forgets me on the way, to take a draw on a joint passed to her by a little blonde punkette in a shiny skirt, Fairy Tinkerbell in the city. I'm sorry now I didn't stay at the hotel. Going on to the terrace, I pass a girl with a red Mohican, naked to the waist, tattooed, with a leather skirt and big boots, snorting a line from the wall. It's like a scene from
Mad Max
.