The Frozen Dead (22 page)

‘They're about to lift up the corpse,' said Ziegler.

It was much colder and damper than down at the car park. Servaz pulled his scarf tight round his neck, then thought about the strap buried deep in the victim's neck and hastened to loosen it again.

All of a sudden he noticed two details which he had overlooked in the horror of the initial discovery.

The first of these was the victim's only remaining item of clothing, other than the cape: a pair of leather boots that seemed curiously small for such a big fellow.

The second was his right hand.

There was a finger missing.

The ring finger.

It had been cut off.

*   *   *

‘Let's go,' said d'Humières, once the investigators had got the body onto the bridge.

The metal walkway vibrated beneath their feet, and Servaz had an instant of pure panic when he saw the void into which the water was hurtling below. Crouched around the dead body, the investigators were painstakingly removing the hood. There was a moment when everyone watching suddenly recoiled. Beneath the hood the victim had been gagged with silver duct tape. Servaz could easily imagine the screams of terror and pain muffled by the adhesive tape: his eyes were popping out of his sockets. On closer inspection he understood Grimm's eyes were not wide open for natural reasons: the murderer had peeled back his eyelids, pulled on them – no doubt with the help of a pair of tweezers – then stapled them to his eyebrows and cheeks.
He had forced him to watch
 … In addition, the murderer had so badly mutilated his victim's face, probably with a heavy object like a hammer or mallet, that he had practically torn off his nose, for it was only held in place by a thin strip of flesh and cartilage. Finally, Servaz noticed that there were traces of mud in the chemist's hair.

For a moment no one spoke. Then Ziegler turned towards the bank of the racing stream. She signalled to Maillard, who took the mayor by the arm. Servaz watched as they came closer. Chaperon looked terrified.

‘That's him all right,' he stammered. ‘It's Grimm. Oh my God! What have they done to him?'

Ziegler gently nudged the mayor over to Maillard, who led him away from the dead body.

‘Last night he was playing poker with Grimm and a friend of theirs,' she explained. ‘They were the last people to have seen him alive.'

‘I think that this time we have a problem,' said d'Humières, pulling herself upright.

Servaz and Ziegler glanced at each other.

‘We're going to have the honour of being in the papers. All over the front page. And not just the local press.'

Servaz knew what she was getting at: they were going to be in the eye of the hurricane, at the centre of a media storm: the dailies, the weeklies, all the television newscasts. It was not the best way to progress with an investigation, but they would not be given any choice in the matter. Then he noticed a detail that he had missed until now: Cathy d'Humières was very elegant this morning. Not strikingly so, it was almost imperceptible, because the prosecutor was always impeccably turned out anyway, but this morning she had made an extra effort. Her blouse, suit, coat, necklace and earrings: everything matched perfectly, right down to her make-up, which enhanced her austere yet pleasing face. She was very sober, but she must have spent a long time in front of her mirror to achieve such sobriety.

She knew the press would be getting involved so she prepared herself accordingly.

Unlike Servaz, who hadn't even combed his hair. At least he had remembered to shave.

And yet there was something she could not have foreseen: the effect the sight of the dead body would have on her. To a certain degree it had ruined her effort and she now looked weary, run-down and old, despite her attempt to stay in control. Servaz went over to the CSI who was taking shot after shot of the corpse, flash popping.

‘I'm counting on you not to let any of these photographs go astray,' he said. ‘Don't leave anything lying around.'

The CSI nodded. Had he got the message? If any of those pictures made it into the paper, Servaz would hold him personally responsible.

‘Did the pathologist have a look at the right hand?' he asked Ziegler.

‘Yes. He thinks the finger was severed with a sharp instrument, like pliers or pruning shears. A closer examination will confirm it.'

‘The ring finger on the right hand,' said Servaz.

‘Yet his wedding ring and other fingers haven't been touched,' observed Ziegler.

‘Are you thinking the same thing?'

‘A signet ring, or some other ring.'

‘Did the murderer want to steal it, take it as a trophy, or make sure no one else saw it?'

Ziegler looked at him with surprise.

‘Why would he want to hide it? Besides, all he had to do was take it off.'

‘Perhaps he couldn't. Grimm has fat fingers.'

*   *   *

On his way back down, Servaz saw the crowd and felt like fleeing. But the concrete ramp behind the supermarket was the only way out, unless he were to trek all over the mountain. He assumed a suitable expression and was preparing to confront the crowd when a hand stopped him.

‘Let me.'

Cathy d'Humières had regained her composure. Servaz stood back and admired her performance, the way she evaded the issue while giving the impression she was letting them in on things. She answered all the journalists' questions, looking them straight in the eye, gravely, punctuating her responses with a knowing yet restrained little smile, which nevertheless kept the horror of the situation in focus.

It was great art.

He wove his way to his car through the journalists and didn't wait to hear the end of her speech. The Cherokee was parked on the far side of the car park, beyond the rows of shopping trolleys. He could hardly see it through the mist. Stung by gusts of wind, he raised the collar of his jacket, thinking of the artist who had composed that gruesome picture up there.
If it's the same person who killed the horse, he likes his peaks, his high places.

Servaz walked over to the Jeep and suddenly sensed that there was something not right. He stared at the car until he understood. The tyres sagged down to the asphalt like deflated balloons. They'd been punctured. All four of them … and the metalwork had been scratched.

Welcome to Saint-Martin,
he thought.

11

Sunday morning at the Institute. A strange calm reigned. For Diane it was as if the place had been deserted by all its inhabitants. Not a sound. She emerged from under her duvet and headed towards the tiny, icy bathroom. A quick shower; she washed her hair, dried it, then brushed her teeth as hastily as she could because of the cold.

When she came back, she glanced out of the window. Fog. Like a ghostly presence which had used the dark of night to settle in. It drifted above the thick layer of snow, drowned the white fir trees. The Institute was wrapped in it; only ten metres away the view was blocked by a wall of vaporous whiteness. She pulled her dressing gown tighter.

Her plan was to drive down and explore Saint-Martin. She dressed quickly and left the room. The ground-floor cafeteria was empty, apart from the server on duty; she asked for a cappuccino and a croissant, and went to sit by the picture window. She had not been sitting there for more than two minutes when a man in his thirties wearing a white lab coat came into the room. She watched him discreetly as he ordered a large café au lait, an orange juice and two croissants; then he walked over to her with his tray.

‘Good morning. May I sit down?'

She nodded with a smile.

‘Diane Berg,' she said, holding out her hand. ‘I'm—'

‘I know. Alex. I'm one of the psychiatric nurses. So, are you settling in?'

‘I only just got here…'

‘It's not easy, is it? When I first arrived here and saw the place, I nearly got back in my car to run away,' he said with a laugh. ‘And I don't even sleep here.'

‘Do you live in Saint-Martin?'

‘No, I don't live in the valley.'

He said it as if it were the last thing he would ever want to do.

‘Do you know if it's always so cold in the bedrooms in winter?' she asked.

He looked at her with a smile. He had a rather pleasant, open face, with warm brown eyes and curly hair. He also had a large mole in the middle of his forehead, which made him look as if he had a third eye. For a moment, her gaze was unpleasantly drawn to the mole and she blushed when she saw he had noticed.

‘Yes, I'm afraid so,' he said. ‘The top floor is very draughty, and the heating system is pretty ancient.'

Beyond the big window, the landscape of snow and fir trees was magnificent, and very near. It was strange to be sitting there drinking coffee in a warm place, separated from all that whiteness by a simple pane of glass. Diane felt as if she were looking at a film set.

‘What is your role exactly?' she asked, determined to seize the chance to find out as much as she could.

‘You mean, what is the role of a nurse here?'

‘Yes.'

‘Well … the psychiatric nurses prepare and distribute the medication, we make sure the patients take it the way they're supposed to, and that there are no adverse reactions post treatment … We keep an eye on the residents, too, of course … But we also organise activities, we talk to them, we make ourselves available, we're there to listen … But not too much, either. The nurse's job is to be neither too present nor too absent. Neither indifferent nor systematically helpful. We have to know our place. Especially here. With these—'

‘The treatment,' she asked, trying to avoid staring at the mole on his forehead, ‘is it aggressive?'

He gave her a cautious glance.

‘Yes … The dosage here goes far beyond recommended norms. It's sort of the nuclear option, as far as the medication goes. We're not particular about details. But look, that doesn't mean we knock them out either. You've seen them, they're not zombies. The thing is, most of these …
individuals
 … have become resistant to drugs. So we juggle with mixtures of tranquillisers and antipsychotics, enough to stun an ox, four times a day instead of three; then there is electroshock, the straitjacket, and when nothing else works, we resort to a miracle drug: clozapine…'

Diane had heard of it: clozapine was an atypical antipsychotic used with cases of schizophrenia that were resistant to other forms of treatment. As with most medicines used in psychiatry, the side effects could be dreadful: incontinence, hypersalivation, blurred vision, weight gain, convulsions and thrombosis, among others.

‘What you have to understand,' he added with a faint smile that froze into a grimace, ‘is that here, violence is never far away, nor is danger…'

She thought she was hearing Xavier: ‘Intelligence can only be developed where there is change –
and where there is danger.
'

‘At the same time,' he amended, with a short laugh, ‘it's safer here than in a lot of inner-city neighbourhoods.'

He shook his head.

‘Just between us, not that long ago psychiatry was in the stone age, and patients were used in incredibly barbaric experiments. Just as bad as the Inquisition or the Nazi doctors … Things have progressed, but there's still a long way to go … There's never talk of cures here. It's always stabilisation, decompression…'

‘Do you have other responsibilities?' she asked.

‘Yes. There's all the administrative stuff: lots of paperwork, procedures…'

He glanced outside.

‘Then there are the psychiatric interviews prescribed by Dr Xavier and the head nurse.'

‘What do they consist of?'

‘It's all structured. The techniques are proven, the interviews follow the same course, the questions are more or less standard, but there's some improvisation as well … You have to adopt as neutral an attitude as possible, and not give any signs of being too invasive, so as to keep the anxiety level down … respect the silences, have breaks … Otherwise, you risk running into trouble very quickly…'

‘Do Xavier and Ferney do interviews as well?'

‘Yes, of course.'

‘What's the difference between your interviews and theirs?'

‘There isn't really any difference. Except that some patients will confide in us, when they won't confide in them. Because they're closer to us on a daily basis, and we've been trying to create a relationship of trust between caregiver and patient, while keeping our therapeutic distance … The rest of the time, it's Xavier and Élisabeth who decide on the treatments and protocols…'

His voice went strange as he said the last sentence. Diane frowned slightly.

‘You sound as if you don't always approve of their decisions.'

She was surprised by the time it took him to answer.

‘You're new here, Diane … you'll see…'

‘What will I see?'

He didn't reply. He looked somewhat shifty. Clearly he had no desire to go down that path. But she waited, her gaze questioning.

‘How can I explain it? This place, don't forget, is like nowhere else … We're dealing with patients none of the other establishments could treat. What goes on here just isn't like what goes on elsewhere.'

‘Electroshock without anaesthesia for the patients in Unit A, for example?'

She was immediately sorry she had said it. His expression had turned frosty.

‘Who told you about that?'

‘Xavier.'

‘Just forget it.'

He gazed down at his café au lait, frowning. He seemed sorry he had let himself get caught up in this discussion.

‘I'm not even sure that's legal,' she insisted. ‘Does French law allow such things?'

He looked up.

‘French law? Do you know how many cases of people being forcibly sectioned there are every year in this country?
Fifty thousand
 … In a modern democracy, hospitalisation without a patient's consent is the exception. But not here … Mental patients, and even people who are simply presumed to be mentally ill, have fewer rights than normal citizens. You want to arrest a criminal? You have to wait until six o'clock in the morning. But if it's a guy accused of insanity by a neighbour who has signed a third-party request for hospitalisation, the police can show up day or night. The law only gets involved once the individual has already been deprived of his liberty. And even then only if that person is aware of his rights and knows how to make sure they are respected. That's what psychiatry is about in this country. That, and a lack of resources, and the abusive use of drugs, and shoddy treatment. Our psychiatric hospitals are a no-go area. And this one even more so than the rest.'