The Honest Folk of Guadeloupe (15 page)

They came to the open parking space.

“We’ll get out here.”

The ground was hard, dry and uneven beneath the thick soles of her Paraboots. They set off on foot toward the beach. Trousseau had insisted upon taking the umbrella, but rather than giving shade, it prodded at Anne Marie’s face, uncomfortably close to her eyes.

A sign announced Tarare beach and invited visitors to remove their clothes.

Trousseau straightened his tie, allowed himself a sly grin, and they went down the steep incline that led to the beach. From time to time he held out his hand to offer support. Anne Marie noticed, not without pleasure, that her
greffier
was considerably less agile than she. After a while, he closed the umbrella and used it as a stick to give him balance.

Out of the wind, the air was close. Insects danced in Anne Marie’s eyes and there was a pervasive odor of rotting plants and dead cactus.

Suddenly the path opened out and they came on to the crescent
beach, brilliant beneath the overhead sun. With relief Anne Marie rediscovered the breeze. Sweat ran down her back and her linen blouse clung to her skin.

“Very quiet.” Trousseau wiped his face with a handkerchief. He had dropped umbrella and attaché case to the ground.

With its palm trees, Tarare could have been the picture of tropical paradise in a tourist brochure. The sea was calmer than at the Pointe des Châteaux. It was a bright blue, becoming turquoise over the sand, then turning darker where the coral outcrops lay beneath the surface, a magic patchwork of kaleidoscopic greens and blues. The Caribbean as the postcards liked to show it. Even the lapping of the waves against the sand was perfect.

Gwada, pa ni pwoblem
.

The restaurant was as Anne Marie remembered it; a wooden building surrounded by tall palm trees, their trunks painted white up to a meter from the sand.

On the wooden veranda stood half a dozen tables. They were bare. The door to the kitchen was closed and bolted. The only living thing was a solitary cat that eyed the two functionaries of the state with indifference.

There were living quarters at the back of the restaurant—a small bedroom with an outside sink and cracked mirror.

“I think we’ve come at the wrong time,
madame
.”

She remarked, “We can have a look around, can’t we?”

“And I get no meal?”

“Forgotten the Sunkist, Monsieur Trousseau?”

While Trousseau sat down wearily at one of the tables, the closed umbrella between his legs, Anne Marie wandered off along the beach.

The water looked so limpid, so inviting, that she was tempted, out of the view of her companion, to go for a dip. But, as she reminded herself, not only was she without a costume, but she did not have anything to dry herself with. Without fresh water to rinse her body, the salt would be sticking uncomfortably to her skin for the rest of the afternoon.

She took off her shoes and sauntered along the beach. From time to time, the warm water ran up to her feet. Rediscovering an old friend. She felt a strange happiness at being here, at not being in
Pointe-à-Pitre, not being in her office, not being at the morgue. She started to whistle and had gone some seventy yards when she heard a movement to her right. She stopped.

Anne Marie saw a low sea grape, but apart from that, nothing. No movement.

She glanced back at Trousseau. He had lowered his head onto the table as if trying to doze. “Alphonse,” she said, smiling to herself. Anne Marie resumed her whistling.

“Bonjour!”

In front of her stood a tall man with his arms crossed against a dark, broad chest. Tall but beginning to take on flesh at the midriff. He had fine features and a long, straight nose. A reflex camera hung from his neck. He held out his hand.

“My name is Richard.”

A bright, white smile but the eyes were bloodshot. The man had not shaved in several days.

Apart from the camera, Richard was as naked as the day he was born.

She felt like a schoolgirl playing hooky.

“Take the umbrella.”

Anne Marie shook her head and got out of the car. “Trousseau, get this man to the hospital as fast as you can and then get hold of Bouton.”

So much to do and yet Anne Marie did not want to return to Pointe-à-Pitre. Not yet. She would get a taxi back to town, or failing that, would wait for one of the rural buses.

She waved but her
greffier
was sulking—for the last half hour he had been saying he was hungry. Without looking at her, he released the clutch and set off toward Pointe-à-Pitre, accompanied by Richard, immobile in the back seat. The tires screeched on the tarmac road.

There was something terribly pathetic about Richard, Anne Marie thought. He did not look at her, he did not turn his head on the fleshy neck. Lost in his thoughts, indifferent to what was happening around him.

She walked toward the wooden fence.

Loud music came from a radio. There was a gate in the fence that was ajar and as she stepped into a small garden, Anne Marie was surprised by the abundance and brightness of the flowers. So green. The dry season was long over here in the Grands Fonds.

Dark clouds had come scudding in from the east and the sky was now turning grey with the threat of rain in the afternoon. The green
and mauve leaves caught the luminescence of the overcast sky and reflected it with a sullen intensity.

The music grew louder.

Anne Marie made her way down the path to the shack, pushing back ferns, tall grass and the branches of a pepper tree. Thanks to the dry air of the Pointe des Châteaux, Anne Marie felt a lot better. Yet the memory of Madame Vaton’s perfume lingered in the pit of her belly. Anne Marie would soon have to return to the morgue. She could feel a lump swelling in her chest.

(In all her school years, in Algeria as at Sarlat, Anne Marie had never once played hooky. She could hear Luc’s voice, “You’ve always been a goody-goody.” She smiled guiltily to herself.)

The door to the shack was open. Anne Marie went up the wooden steps. “Anybody at home?” She knocked at the jamb, leaning inside.

The interior of the shack was clean, the music noisy.

A bare floor, walls of unvarnished planks and a table of molded orange plastic. A couple of matching seats had been taken from a car. A vase beside the radio contained dried bullrushes. The room was empty, but there was another open door that gave on to the back garden.

The music came to a stop as a local disc jockey chatted with a woman who had phoned in to request, in banana French peppered with Creole, a record: Zouk Machine. The radio screeched strident feedback.

Anne Marie stepped into the house and she noticed an exotic smell that took her back to her childhood in North Africa.

“Looking for me?”

A young woman’s face appeared at the rear door. An oval, pretty face, bright eyes, dark skin and hair plaited into long, parallel rows.

“Madame Augustin?”

The woman smiled. “Mademoiselle Augustin.” She came up the plank steps into the room. She was wearing a skimpy cotton halter and khaki shorts. She wore sandals; there was mud on her feet. The skin of her legs was perfect except for a vaccination mark at the thigh. In her hand she held several green limes. “I’m Marie Pierre Augustin. Who are you?”

“Madame Laveaud. I’m an investigating judge.”

“Investigating what?”

Anne Marie ran a hand along her forehead. “I wonder if you could give me a drink of water? Would you mind if I sat down?”

The young woman laughed a nasal laugh. “Of course not.” She spoke French with the intonation of the Paris suburbs. Drancy, Aubervilliers, Saint-Denis. Postal code 93.

“Perhaps I could also ask you to turn down the radio—I’m hot and sticky. Finding anywhere in the Grands Fonds can be so difficult … even with a map.”

“You don’t like music?” The girl rolled the limes onto the table. She switched off the radio and went with a light, youthful step through the doorway into the kitchen. Kitchen, living room and another room—the bedroom, no doubt—were separated by hardboard walls that rose to a height of a couple of meters. No ceiling. Above the walls, four sloping sheets of corrugated iron formed the roof of the shack.

Anne Marie lowered herself onto one of the car seats. The smell seemed stronger.

An entire side of the living room was filled with leather bags—small heaps of shopping bags, handbags, men’s bags—that were kept in plastic wraps. There were little tags. Stretching her arm, Anne Marie took a bag and looked at the price tag. The figures were in a currency she did not recognize; the writing looked Spanish.

Anne Marie raised one of the bags to her nose; it had the rich odor of oiled leather.

The girl returned, holding out the glass. She said, nodding to the handbag in Anne Marie’s hand, “Just got back from Brazil.”

“I need to ask you a few questions.” Anne Marie drank some water. “Nothing very serious,
mademoiselle
.”

“I hope not.” The girl’s mouth smiled a pretty smile.

“I’ve always dreamt of going to Rio.”

“I spent three weeks there.” She gestured to the articles on the floor. “On business.”

Anne Marie held up her hand. “I’m not from Customs.”

“We paid customs,
octroi de mer
—the lot.”

“I really couldn’t care less—provided it’s not cocaine from Latin America.” Anne Marie took another sip of water, her eyes on Marie Pierre. “I’ve a son at the
lycée
and like most parents, I have an obsession about drugs.”

“Drugs?” The young woman shook her head. “I stick to lemongrass tea from the garden.” She made a gesture toward her garden.

The sky had darkened.

It was the same incense her grandmother always used to smell of.

“You’d care for something to eat?” Marie Pierre was sitting crossed-legged on a rug. She kept her back upright and her hands were placed on her knees. “There are lentils in the pot.”

Anne Marie shook her head. “You’re very kind.”

“I am a vegetarian. Or perhaps you’d care for a yogurt.”

It had started to rain. There was a short silence as the two women listened to the first patter of raindrops on the roof. Then Anne Marie asked, “What made you become vegetarian?”

“I believe in harmony.”

“Hard to believe in harmony when you’ve seen an autopsy.” Anne Marie changed the subject. “Why the leather goods, Mademoiselle Augustin?”

“We wanted to set up a little business. Selling handicraft, authentic souvenirs—that sort of thing. Ponchos, panamas.”

“We?”

The frown returned to the smooth skin. “Why are you asking these questions? I’ve already told you the
octroi de mer
’s been paid on everything.”

Anne Marie cast a glance round the room. The furnishings were functional and the place was clean. There was none of the untidiness that came from two people living together. “You’re married?”

“Used to be.”

“And now?”

“I have a friend. Do we make love? Is that what you mean?”

“It’s not my wish to pry.”

“What do you want?”

“You talk about ‘we.’ ”

“I’m not ready for another marriage. There are a lot of things to do in life and I’m not yet ready to settle down, serve one man and have children. Cook three meals a day.” She shook her head. “Each thing in its own due course.”

The patter on the iron roof became more insistent.

“How long have you been together?”

“What’s that got to do with you?”

“I’m curious.” Anne Marie gave an apologetic smile.

“Why?”

“All part of my job.” Anne Marie did not wait for a reply. “You said you used to work in a shop.”

A nod. Anne Marie saw hesitation in the girl’s eyes.

“You worked for Monsieur Dugain, didn’t you, Marie Pierre? Along with another girl, you informed the work inspectorate you were being paid with government apprenticeship money.”

“I’ve answered enough questions about Monsieur Dugain.”

“He subsequently died in mysterious circumstances.”

“I didn’t know he was going to kill himself. I just wanted to be paid decently. I wanted my social security payments. There was nothing personal against Monsieur Dugain. I liked the job.”

“He flirted with you?”

“I never said that.”

“What was your job, Marie Pierre?”

“Monsieur Dugain has a health food shop in Abymes.”

“What did you do there?”

“Working there I decided to become a vegetarian. Agnès and I were sales girls.” She shrugged. “Dugain wasn’t paying our health contributions.”

“Whose idea was it, your seeing the work inspectors?”

“I was fed up with being screwed by that man.” She paused. “Agnès’s boyfriend’s an accountant.”

“And?”

“Olivier said Dugain was not paying us, but the government was
giving him money for us. That working in Dugain’s shop was part of the training program and that we could complain to the inspectors because he made us do a lot more than the contract stipulated. We never got any training.”

“You threatened him?”

She looked down at her hands, at the long fingers and the specks of deep red nail varnish. “Agnès wanted to have a baby. She needed health coverage to pay for the doctor.”

“How did Dugain react?”

The falling raindrops became more angry, faster. Wind blew at the open doors and water darkened the wood of the threshold.

“They said he jumped from the top of a building.” Marie Pierre nodded to an old television set that stood on a molded plastic stand. Her eyes reverted to Anne Marie.

“How did Dugain react when you threatened him,
mademoiselle
?”

“I’d left the shop in February, long before he killed himself.” She tilted her head to one side. “How was I to know he was going to kill himself?”

“How well did you know Dugain?”

“He helped me when he gave me the job.”

“You didn’t like him?”

With her regular features and her perfect skin, she reminded Anne Marie of an African goddess carved in a black hardwood.

The girl rose from her cross-legged position and went to close the door. Rain fell onto the back of her hand and glistened there.