Irene (20 page)

The area of Glasgow Cross where the victim lived was a quiet, city-centre neighbourhood, with tall, imposing houses behind wrought-iron gates covered with many layers of black paint. Gallagher asked whether he wanted to meet the victim’s parents, but Camille diplomatically declined. This was not his case and he had no wish to give the impression that he had come to pass judgment on the earlier investigation. They moved on to the Metropolitan, a former cinema converted into a nightclub. The exterior – this one a riot of neon light, its windows slathered with red paint – looked like the gateway to hell.

*

Camille was staying in a hotel in the city centre. From there, he called Irène at her parents’.

“Did Louis drive you to the station?”

“Of course not, Camille, I took a taxi like a big girl. Well, like a very big girl, these days …”

“Tired?”

“A little. But it’s my parents who really tire me out.”

“I can imagine. How are they?”

“Same as ever, that’s the problem.”

Camille had only been to visit his in-laws three or four times. Irène’s father, a retired maths teacher, now village historian and president of almost every regional society, was a local celebrity. Smug to the point of tedium, he would regale Camille for several minutes with tales of his pitiful successes, his trivial victories, his society triumphs, after which he would challenge his son-in-law to a game of chess, lose three games on the trot and spend the rest
of the day sulking and pretending he had a stomach upset.

“Papa wants us to call our son Hugo. God knows why.”

“Did you ask?”

“He says it’s a name for a conquering hero.”

“Can’t deny that. Ask him what he thinks of ‘Caesar’.”

A brief silence. “I miss you, Camille.”

“I miss you too.”

“I miss you more. What’s the weather like?”

“Here they call it ‘changeable’. Which means it rained yesterday and it’ll rain again tomorrow.”

The Glasgow flight landed shortly after 2 p.m. In the arrivals hall Camille found Maleval looking even grimmer than usual.

“No need to ask if there’s bad news. The look on your face says it all.”

Maleval took Camille’s suitcase and handed him a copy of
Le Matin
.

“
WITH
LAIDLAW
, THE ‘NOVELIST’ SIGNS HIS THIRD ‘VOLUME’.”

There was only one possible source: the bookseller.

“Fucking hell!”

“My reaction exactly,” Maleval said as he started the car. “Louis was a little more restrained.”

Camille’s mobile indicated he had two missed calls, both from Le Guen. He didn’t even bother to listen to his voicemail.

Had it been a mistake to give the journalist short shrift? Could he have bought himself more time?

But it was not this thought that made him feel weary. It was the thought of the inevitable response to the article and the dozens of similar articles that would probably appear the next day. He had seen no reason to inform Le Guen and Deschamps about
the possible link between McIlvanney and the Glasgow murder before his trip; he had been wrong. The morning papers had just informed his superiors of a lead he had known about for two days. His removal from the case was no longer a possibility, it was a certainty. He had screwed up the investigation; from the very beginning of the case he had been slow to catch on. Even though four murders had now been linked, he could still not claim to have a definite lead. Even the media seemed to know more about the case than he did. Never in his career had Camille felt so helpless.

“Drop me off at my place.” Camille’s voice was jaded and almost inaudible. Then, almost to himself, he added, “We’ve had it.”

“We’ll track this guy down,” Maleval declared in a burst of enthusiasm.

“Someone will track him down, but it won’t be us. At least it won’t be me. I reckon we’ll be told to exit stage left, probably this afternoon.”

“What are you talking about?”

Camille briefly summed up the situation and was surprised by Maleval’s reaction. He seemed more upset than Camille. Over and over he muttered: “I don’t fucking believe it.”

But it did not matter what he believed; it was the truth.

*

As he read the article – written by Buisson, naturally – Camille’s gloom turned to fury.

As he read, he looked up from the paper several times, brooding.

“That fucking shit,” he muttered at one point.

“They’re all the same.”

“Who are you talking about?”

“Journalists.”

“Actually, I was thinking about a different little shit.”

Maleval fell silent. Camille looked at his watch.

“I’ve got a little shopping to do before I go home. Take the next right.”

There was nothing to be said. The moment Camille strode into the bookshop brandishing the newspaper, Jérôme Lesage got to his feet and held out his hands, as though leaning against an invisible wall.

“I’m sorry,
commandant
… I swear, I—”

“The information you had was covered by judicial confidentiality, Monsieur Lesage. You have broken the law.”

“So have you come here to arrest me,
commandant
? That seems
a little ungrateful.”

“What exactly is your game, Lesage?”

“The information you came looking for may be a secret as far as this investigation is concerned,” the bookseller said, “but it’s hardly a secret in literary circles, far from it. In fact, I’m rather surprised—”

“At what philistines we are, is that it?” Camille said scathingly.

“I wouldn’t go as far as that. But, then again …” The ghost of a smile played on Lesage’s lips. “So—” he began.

“So,” Camille cut him off, “you had no qualms about prostituting your literary knowledge for a little publicity. You have the morals of a used-car dealer.”

“Everyone loves publicity,
commandant
. But I would remind you that there was no mention of my name in the article. Unlike yours, if memory serves.”

The retort stung. Camille realised it had been pointless to come here and he regretted acting on this rash impulse. He tossed the paper onto Lesage’s counter. He gave up trying to explain to this man the consequences that his actions – whose motive he did not really understand – would inevitably have on the investigation. Resignation won out. He left without a word.

“I’ll just drop off my luggage and change,” he said to Maleval as he got into the car, “then we’ll go down to headquarters and sound the retreat.”

*

Maleval double parked with his lights flashing. Camille collected his post and trudged up the stairs. Without Irène, the apartment seemed terribly empty. In spite of himself, he smiled when he glimpsed the baby’s nursery through the half-open door. Now he would have more than enough time to take care of his family.

What should have taken only a minute or two required more time than expected. Maleval considered calling the
patron
on his mobile. He had been waiting for what felt like a long time and was sorry he had not checked his watch. He got out of the car and smoked a cigarette, and then another, staring up at the windows of Camille’s apartment which betrayed no sign of life. He had just made up his mind to call when Camille appeared.

“I was starting to get worried,” Maleval said.

The wound Camille had suffered from the newspaper article was clearly beginning to fester. He seemed to Maleval even more haggard than before. Camille stood on the pavement for a moment, checking the voicemails from Le Guen. There were three now.

The first was incandescent:

“You’re really starting to piss me off, Camille. This shit is all over the fucking papers and I don’t know a thing about it. Call me the second your flight lands, got it?”

The second, which had come a few minutes later, was more instructive:

“Camille … I’ve just had the
juge
on the phone … Best if we have a quick chat to discuss things because … well, this is going to be a shitstorm. Call me, O.K.?”

The last was almost sympathetic:

“We’re due in the
juge
’s offices at 3.30 p.m. If I don’t hear from you before, I’ll see you there.”

Camille erased the messages. Maleval started the car. On the way, the two men did not say a word.

Le Guen was first to get to his feet; he shook Camille’s hand, grasping his elbow. It was as though he were offering condolences. Deschamps did not move other than to nod towards the empty chair in front of her desk. She took a deep breath.

“Commandant Verhœven,” she began coolly, staring down at her fingernails, “a disciplinary procedure is a rare occurrence, and one that I do not undertake lightly.”

Deschamps’ dressing-downs were never dramatic, they were calculated. That was the word: the calm, detached tone in the face of crisis, the terse delivery. Finally she looked up.

“There can no longer be any excuse or justification for your failings and your negligence. To be brutally honest, I did not even attempt to defend your actions. It was a lost cause. Given that I have already reprimanded you for breaches in procedure, to have given information to the press even before the
procureur
’s office—”

“That’s not what happened,” Camille interrupted.

“That does not make one whit of difference. Nor have I any interest in knowing what precisely did happen. I regret to inform you that you have been removed from this case.”

“
Madame la juge …
” Le Guen began.

Camille raised a hand to interrupt him.

“Leave it, Jean.
Madame la juge
, I did not inform you of a connection between the Glasgow murder and the novel mentioned in the newspapers because the connection had not been substantiated. That confirmation only came today, which is why I am here now.”

“I read all about it in the papers,
commandant
, and I’m delighted. But there has been no real progress on this case. All the media can talk about is you, but you still don’t have a solid lead. You are precisely where you were on day one.”

Camille sighed. He opened his briefcase and took out a small, glossy booklet which he showed to Deschamps.

“This is a magazine called
Nuits Blanches
. It’s a weekly and specialises in detective fiction. They review new books, run profiles and interviews with writers.”

Camille opened the magazine and turned to page five.

“And it has classified ads. Most of them looking for rarities, books that are out of print, that sort of thing.”

He had to get up from his chair to hand the magazine to the
juge
.

“I’ve circled an ad on the bottom left. It’s very short.”

“‘B.E.E.’? Is that what you’re talking about? And underneath is … your home address?”

“Yes,” said Camille, “B.E.E. stands for Bret Easton Ellis.”

“What exactly is this about?”

“I tried to contact our killer. I ran a classified ad.”

“On whose authority—”

“No, no,
madame la juge
, I think we’ve covered that subject already,” Camille cut in. “The little speech about my shortcomings, my recklessness, my failure to follow accepted procedure, I’ve taken all that on board. But yet again I circumvented the chain of
command. What can I say? I’m impulsive, it just sort of happened.”

He handed her two printed sheets of A4 paper.

“And this,” he added, “arrived in the post this morning.”

Monsieur,

So good to finally make your acquaintance. Your advertisement came as a relief to me. I almost said a deliverance, which perhaps gives some sense of how much I have suffered over the years to see how blind, how obtuse the world is. How unfeeling. It was a long, dark time, I assure you. Over the years, I developed a lamentable opinion of the police force. For I have seen my fair share of inspectors and detectives. Not a scrap of ambition, not one iota of finesse. I came to think of these people as idiocy incarnate. Gradually, I came to consider myself as a man with no illusions. In my moments of despair (and God knows I have known many), I felt overwhelmed by the thought that no-one would ever understand.

Before you many passed me as though sightless, so many that your appearance could not but kindle hope in me. You were not like them; there was something different about you. Since you stepped onto the stage which over time I have crafted with great patience, I have watched you draw nearer to the heart of the mystery; I knew that you would decipher it. And so you have. I knew it the moment I read the newspaper article, that profile of you which I found so profoundly one-sided. At the time, it was no more than a theory. But I knew you understood me. I knew that, before long, we would make contact.

“B.E.E.,” you ask.

It is a long story. A long-cherished project that I could not
bring myself to embark upon until I was certain that I was equal to what, to me, is the paragon. Bret Easton Ellis is a virtuoso, and it required great modesty, great humility if I was to hope to serve his masterwork. And it was a pleasure. Have you noticed (I know you have) how precisely I recreated the scene? How faithfully I have served the master? It was a difficult task. It required great preparation. I inspected a thousand locations, visited so many apartments. When I encountered François Cottet, I – like you, no doubt – immediately had the measure of the man. What a fool he is, don’t you agree? But the location was perfect. It did not prove difficult to snare such a dullard. His need for money was etched into his face, his moral bankruptcy oozed from every pore. He imagined he had clinched a brilliant deal. These words are like “open sesame” to such a man. In his defence, it should be said that he was conscientious and obliging. Indeed he unhesitatingly agreed to personally take delivery of the removals van I had leased. What more could one ask? (You will surely have noticed that I ordered the furniture in the name of Peace, an obvious homage to the author of the “Red Riding Quartet” …) Naturally, he did not know that there his role in my little drama would end. It did not prove difficult to lure him away on Monday night. By then you had scared him witless, and he was prepared to do anything to extricate himself from an imbroglio in which, truth be told, he played only a minor part. I took no pleasure in killing him. I abhor death. His demise was necessary, nothing more. You will find his body in the forêt de Hez near Clermont-de-l’Oise (three hundred metres north of the spot known as “La Cavalerie”, I erected a small cairn to mark the precise location). I do not doubt your ability to gravely convey the news to his family.