The Circle (60 page)

He groped for his mobile. His fingers curled around it, his thumb found the big on-switch in the middle.

Then the smaller keys below. Except that he couldn't open his contacts, let alone read them. He tried to dial a number, and lifted the phone to his ear, but an implacable voice told him it was invalid. He tried again. Same result.
The buzzer.
He groped next to his bed looking for it, found it, and pressed it. And waited. Nothing. He pressed it again. Then shouted, ‘Is anyone there?' No answer. Fuck, where were they all? He threw back the sheet and sat up at the edge of the bed. A strange sensation came over him.
There was something else.
Another thought was lurking at the edge of his consciousness,
trying to catch his attention. It was something to do with what had happened since he had been in this room. He was having trouble clarifying his thoughts. The sedative was beginning to work; he felt heavier and heavier, groggy. But urgency was driving him on. He had to stay awake no matter what. He had been on the verge of a very important thought. Something …
vital.

A Draw

He had made only one mistake, but it was enough.

Ziegler thought of the way he had briefly touched her breasts. Because of the pain in her torso, her breathing was shallow. She was lying on her back in the middle of the corridor, handcuffed. Twisting like a worm on the ground, wincing, clenching her teeth, she managed to grab the hem of her T-shirt and pull on it violently. Good God, this cheap shit was tougher than it looked. No matter how hard she tugged, the material refused to tear. God dammit! She put her neck on the dusty floor to catch her breath, and forced herself to think. Then she turned her head to the skirting board.
A nail
… Clearly the hammer had missed it, because it was sticking out one or two centimetres. She edged sideways to get closer to the wall. It was a flat-headed nail, fairly big. It was a crazy idea, but it wouldn't hurt to try. She slid so that the nail was level with her belly button, then she tried to roll over in that direction. She was amazed to discover how difficult it was when you were handcuffed with your arms behind your back. On her third attempt, however, she managed it and found herself with her cheek and shoulder crushed against the wall just above the skirting board, the rest of her body jammed between the floor and the base of the wall, and the nail just below her T-shirt.
You're almost there
… She wedged her hips as close as she could against the skirting board, then began wiggling slowly downwards. That, too, was bloody difficult. But she was relieved to see that she had caught her T-shirt on the nail. And once the nail had lifted the T-shirt far enough, she took a deep breath.
One, two, three
… She pulled away from the wall as violently as possible. The sound of her T-shirt ripping made her almost exultant.

She closed her eyes, paused for a second and listened out. She could hear him rummaging in a desk drawer, then loading a cartridge
into his gun. A wave of fear went right through her. Then she realised that he was making a phone call.

A brief respite.

Goaded by urgency, it was almost as if she didn't feel her pain. She hurried to grasp the back of her jeans between her handcuffed hands, and wriggled until her hips, buttocks and almost all her thighs were out of her trousers, then she struggled like a devil, edging along the floor to make her trousers slide along her legs until she could push them off with her feet. Her entire body was screaming with pain but she managed.
That bastard doesn't know who he's dealing with.
Wearing only her leather jacket opened onto her torn T-shirt, her bra and her pink thong, she waited for him to come back, her legs spread suggestively.
It's now or never
, she thought.
The big scene between Little Red Riding Hood and the Big Bad Wolf.

‘Fuck, what have you done?'

She raised her head. Saw his oily gaze take in her breasts, belly, knickers … And she knew she had chosen the right strategy. That he belonged to that category of men. Maybe it wouldn't work, but there was a tiny chance. Zlatan's gaze stopped at the top of her thighs. He seemed puzzled. He knew this wasn't the right time, of course – but he found it hard to turn his eyes away. She lay sprawled at his feet, and she was in his power.

‘Untie me,' she said. ‘Please … don't do it …'

She spread her thighs, she wriggled and arched her back, as if she were trying to get free. He was staring at her: a hard, black gaze. Shining.
Primitive.
A predator. Once again she could read the dilemma in his eyes. He was torn between the urgency of getting rid of her, and what he saw before him: a very beautiful woman, practically naked, at his mercy. And the allure of the flesh was almost irresistible for a depraved man like him. He'd never have such an opportunity ever again, that's what he was thinking. She could tell that arousal was blurring his reasoning.

He put his hand on his belt and unfastened the buckle. She took a deep breath.

‘Stop … no … don't do that,' she said.

She knew that it would have the opposite effect on this man. He reached for his flies, slowly, without taking his eyes off her. He took a last step forward. It was just as he was struggling with a stubborn button, his gun still in his other hand, that Ziegler's legs closed
abruptly around his ankles like a pincer – and she snapped them violently towards her, her own ankles crossed in a deadly vice.

She saw the flash of surprise in his eyes as he lost his balance. He paddled the air with his hands. Fell with all his weight. His head banged hard against the skirting board. But it was the gun that Ziegler did not take her eyes off as it fell. It went off, with a deafening sound. A shrill whistle pierced her ear, and a warm gust of air caressed her cheek as the bullet went right by her to land in the wall behind with a sharp thud. There was a cloud of smoke and a bitter smell of cordite. She was already crawling, wriggling, wiggling, pushing desperately with her feet along the floor, and she grabbed the pistol just in time. She rolled over onto her side, her shoulder crushed against the floor, looking straight at Zlatan's feet and, beyond, at his face, with the gun in her bound hands, pointed at him.

‘Don't move, you bastard! If you make the slightest move, I'll empty it into your belly, you bloody fucking shitface!'

He gave a nasty laugh. His eyes were two pools of darkness, staring at the black hole of the barrel, his eyebrows creased.

‘And what are you going to do, now?' he said mockingly. ‘Kill me? I doubt it. Are we going to stay here for long? Have you seen the position you're in? In two minutes, your arm will be completely numb.'

He was looking at her with the tranquil assurance of the predator who has all the time in the world. He was right. The blood was already hardly circulating in the shoulder jammed beneath her, and the hand holding the gun was shaking uncontrollably. Soon she would be trembling too hard to aim correctly and he would have recovered sufficiently to hurl himself on top of her.

‘You're right,' she agreed with a smile.

He gave her a surprised look. Immediately afterwards, she fired, and he screamed with pain when his knee exploded.

‘Fuck, you're crazy!' he screamed, writhing in pain. ‘You could have … you could have killed me, fuck!'

‘Exactly,' she said. ‘In this position, I fired blind. I could have got you anywhere … in the belly, the chest, the head … Who knows where the next bullet will go?'

She saw him turn pale. Paying no more attention to him, she pulled both handcuffed arms back at an angle of forty-five degrees, the gun forty centimetres from the floor, and she kept her finger on the trigger, shooting blindly into the little room behind her, towards the window
she had seen on her way past. Behind her back she heard the glass shattering. She thought she could hear shouts from the street below.

‘Now the cavalry should be on its way,' she replied, satisfied.

A new thought came to him, obvious, spontaneous, terrifying: if his hunch was right, he was in danger, too. Right then. Because contrary to what he had assumed, the murderer knew where to find him. He was more vulnerable than ever.

He was probably already on his way, thought Servaz, with another wave of nausea.

Sitting on the edge of his bed, he could feel the terror race through him. He didn't have a minute to lose; he had to get out of there. Quickly. Hide somewhere. He reached again for the buzzer and pressed it. Nothing.

Stupid idiots!

Instinctively he looked all around him, although he couldn't see a thing, and he got up, his hands held in front of him. He groped his way along the wall, felt its coarse surface beneath his fingers, pipes going every which way, and finally he found a chair by the head of the bed with a plastic bag on it. He felt inside. His clothes. He hurried to put them on, then grabbed his mobile from the night table and headed towards the place where the door ought to be.

He opened it. The corridor seemed strangely silent. He wondered where all the staff had got to. Then a word lit up in his brain:
football.
There must be other matches to watch, even without the French team. Unless they'd all been called to another floor. It was getting late, and the daytime staff had gone home. He felt fear invading him. He turned his head from left to right. He suddenly felt very exposed and vulnerable.

With all his senses on the alert, he held his arms out in front of him until his hands reached the opposite wall. He chose to go left at random. He was bound to find someone sooner or later. He almost stumbled over a cart that was against the wall, then went round it and resumed his progress. Pipes, papers pinned to a cork board, a box with a key and a chain – maybe the fire alarm. For a split second he thought of turning the key. Then he reached a corner, and went around it. Stood up straight.

‘Is anyone there? Please, help me!'

No one. He felt a tightness in his chest, and a cold sweat rolled
down his back. He continued to grope his way along the wall. Suddenly he froze. His fingers had just touched a metal surface that protruded from the wall, and there was a button …
a lift!
His hands trembling, he hurriedly pressed it and heard a ping in response. He could hear the rumbling of the lift beginning to move. The doors opened a few seconds later with a whoosh. He stepped inside when a voice behind him called out:

‘Hey! Where are you going?'

He heard the man come in and the doors of the lift closed behind them.

‘Which floor?' asked the voice next to him.

‘Ground floor,' he replied. ‘Are you a staff member?'

‘Yes. Who are you? How did you get here in that state, anyway?'

The man's tone was suspicious. Servaz hesitated, choosing his words.

‘Listen. I don't have time to explain. But you have to do me a favour: call the police.'

‘What?'

‘I have to get out of here. Immediately. Take me to the gendarmerie.'

He could tell that the man was examining him closely.

‘Why don't you start by telling me who you are?'

‘It's complicated. I – I'm …'

The doors opened. A recording of a woman's sugary voice called out through the loudspeaker, ‘Ground floor/reception/cafeteria/newsagent's'. He took a step outside, heard voices a bit further away, and sensed from the slight echo they produced that they were in a vast space, probably the hospital entrance hall. He started walking.

‘Hey, wait, take it easy!' called the man behind him. ‘Not so fast!'

He froze.

‘I told you: I can't stay here.'

‘Oh really? Why not?'

‘I don't have time. Listen, I'm a policeman and—'

‘So what? What does that change? You're in a hospital, you're our responsibility and have you seen the state you're in? I can't let you out like this! You can't even—'

‘Which is why I'm asking you to help me.'

‘To do what?'

‘Get me out of here! Take me to the gendarmerie. I told you … For Christ's sake, there's not a minute to lose!'

There was a silence. The man must have thought he was crazy. On edge, Servaz listened out, trying in vain to identify the voices and sounds around them, to locate any possible threat. But the man's presence at his side reassured him.

‘In that state, wearing those clothes? You're completely nuts! Have you seen the weather? It's pissing it down. Tell me why you're so eager to go to the gendarmerie. Maybe we can call from here. Why don't we get the staff from your floor so we can talk it over quietly with them?'

‘You won't believe me if I tell you.'

‘Try me.'

‘I think someone is trying to kill me, and I'm afraid he'll come here.'

As he was speaking he realised that his words would cast doubt on his sanity. But he was no longer in a state to think calmly. The sedative was taking effect; he felt exhausted, disoriented by his blindness, and increasingly woozy. Again, silence.

‘I see,' said the man, sceptically. ‘Seriously, do you expect me to swallow such a crazy story?'

Suddenly Servaz recognised the voice. It was the young man who had come into the room earlier on, when Espérandieu was there.

‘You came into my room,' he said.

‘I did.'

‘There was another man with me, do you remember?'

‘Yes.'

‘He was a policeman. Like me. What do you think he was doing there?'

He could tell the young man was thinking. He took the opportunity to put his hand into his pocket.

‘Here. Take this. It's my mobile. His name is in my contacts: Vincent. He's a police lieutenant. Call him. Right away. Tell him what I just told you. And then give me the phone. Quick! It's an emergency!'

People went past them, chatting. Outside, an ambulance siren wailed then stopped. The man took the phone from his hands.