The Watchers (29 page)

‘It doesn’t smell like a heart attack, Inspector.’

The Inspector gestured towards the door.

‘Please, after you, and step no further than the plastic sheeting on the floor.’

Harper stepped ahead.

A wrought-iron bed behind the door, other side of the room the night clerk was pinned to the wall like a bug. An iron rod running through his naked chest and into the wall, arms and legs hanging lifeless. Streaks of blood on his face, eyes gouged from his skull, black socks stuffed in his mouth. Abdomen sliced open, blood and body fluids spilled over the floor.

‘Bloody fucking hell.’

‘An apt description. A forensics team of the Montreux police worked the room for physical evidence before my arrival. You may be interested in knowing what they found.’

‘Which was?’

‘Nothing.’

‘Nothing?’

‘No fingerprints, other than those you would expect to find. No footprints on the floor, no samples of skin or hair not belonging to the victim, no traces of anyone being in this room but the victim and his tropical fish. Abu Marwan was cleaning the hall when he saw blood seeping under the door. The door was bolted from inside and he called the Montreux police. They arrived and broke open the door. Please notice the bars on the windows. The flat is on the fire escape and the bars can only be opened from inside the room, they haven’t been disturbed. Residents of the building were interviewed. No one saw strangers in the building, no one heard sounds of struggle.’

‘So what the hell happened?’

‘Frankly, we’re stumped. And the reason I called for you.’

‘Me.’

‘Yes, we thought you might help us with one of your hunches.’

Harper stared at the Inspector. Same I-know-something-you-don’t smirk on the copper’s mug. Mutt and Jeff in the doorway, waiting to be impressed as well. Harper swept the room with a quick glance.

‘Fine. It appears the night clerk, having succumbed to a fit of remorse over working in Switzerland without a permit, locked himself in his room, tore an iron rod from the bed frame, gouged out his eyes and his bowels before impaling himself through the chest and pinning himself to the wall at a pressure of five thousand pounds per square inch. It also appears he gagged himself beforehand, so he wouldn’t disturb the neighbours. How am I doing so far?’

‘You’ve forgotten what he did with his eyeballs, Mr Harper.’

‘Dissolved them in battery acid?’

‘More along the lines of digested.’

The Inspector pointed to the aquarium, the fish snapping at tiny bits of flesh floating in the water. Harper rubbed the back of his neck.

‘Right. Missed that one.’

‘As did the forensics officer of the Montreux police. There’s also the question of the victim’s missing heart, liver, kidneys and tongue. We’ve checked the neighbourhood skips to no avail. Leading us to believe whoever murdered Mr Toda wanted his organs as a killing trophy of some kind, if not lunch.’

Harper looked at the dangling corpse, guts sliced to shreds.

‘Jesus wept.’

‘Indeed. Shall we go down for some fresh air?’

Back down the stairs, out on the street. They stood in a pool of white light from the lamp above the door. A Mercedes pulled up to the pavement, 500 series, dark blue. Matched the suit under the Inspector’s cashmere coat.

‘No doubt, Mr Harper, you’re asking yourself what the Deputy Director of the Swiss Police from Berne is doing at a murder scene in Montreux.’

‘No doubt you’re about to tell me.’

‘We only have a handful of wilful homicides per year in Switzerland and I keep abreast of all such investigations, I like to see that they’re conducted properly.’

‘Don’t think I’d care to be the forensics lad who missed the eyeballs in the fish tank.’

‘I promise you you would not. When I learned the victim was working at the hotel in which Alexander Yuriev was staying, I thought I’d best swing by.’

The driver lowered his window, handed over a clear plastic bag. Something inside, a magazine.

‘Thank you, Sergeant Gauer, please inform the morgue they may collect the body. Mr Harper, there was one item deliberately left at the scene.’

‘Deliberately?’

‘One must assume from the lack of physical evidence that nothing was left by accident. In this case, the most recent issue of
Playboy
magazine that was found on the victim’s bed. Would you care to have a look at Miss December?’

Magazine opened to a shot of Miss December. Harper looked at her. Pretty smile.

‘And this means what?’

‘If you look at the bottom of the page you’ll see a telephone number. There’s no name but I believe it to be yours.’

Harper saw the number. No bloody idea. Then again, maybe that wasn’t the fucking point.

‘You really want me to answer, Inspector, or are you just profiling the manner of my thinking again?’

‘Truth be told I knew immediately it was yours.’

‘How?’

‘Elementary, my dear Mr Harper. I saw, I dialled, you answered. When would Mr Toda have written this?’

‘The Port Royal, Friday night, the night I was supposed to meet Yuriev at GG’s. I’m surprised he got it right.’

‘Why’s that?’

‘Took him a few tries. Given where he wrote it, he was probably otherwise engaged.’

‘Did he call you at any time in the last few days?’

‘No, but I called him a few times.’

‘When was the last time you spoke with him?’

‘Would’ve been Sunday. In the early morning, around three a.m.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘That I called him, or that it was three a.m.?’

‘Just answer the question, Mr Harper.’

‘I was searching strip joints and bars for Yuriev all night. Ended up on Rue Caroline and heard the cathedral bells ring three times.’

‘And what was the substance of the conversation?’

‘Same as the rest. I asked him if there’d been any word from Yuriev.’

‘Did Mr Toda sound in any way distressed?’

‘Not that I could tell.’

‘I see. Would you get in the motorcar, please?’

Mutt and Jeff both sides of the Merc, holding open the passenger doors.

‘Am I under arrest, Inspector?’

‘Nothing of the sort. I just happen to be on my way to Lausanne. Dinner at the Palace Brasserie with the Doctor. Our annual oyster fête before the holidays. Bit of a tradition.’

Eviscerated corpse followed by a serving of gutted
Ostrea edulis
.

‘You must have a cast-iron stomach, Inspector.’

‘Feelings and emotions are best laid aside in our line of work, wouldn’t you agree?’

‘This isn’t my line of work.’

‘Actually it is, you’re just a bit slow on the uptake.’

Harper didn’t like the sound of it.

‘I’ll take the train, thanks.’

‘Please, don’t make me pull rank. Besides, there’s something else I’d like to show you.’

Rochat packed three flannel shirts, a pair of trousers, two pairs of winter socks and two clean towels in his rucksack. It wasn’t easy. Every time he turned his back, Monsieur Booty jumped in to claw at the contents.

‘Listen, you miserable beast, I told you. I’m staying in the tower the next few nights. We’ve had lots of snow and Monsieur Taroni says an ice storm is coming. So you just get out of the rucksack and stop bothering me. I have important duties.’

Mew
.

‘No, you can’t come.’

Mew
.

‘What do you mean who’ll feed you? Is that all you can think about at a time like this?’

Mew
.

‘Oh, your litter box. Don’t worry, Teresa will feed you and clean your litter box. And thank you for reminding me about little boxes.’

He packed his vitamin box and two wool jumpers. He sat on the edge of his bed and tried to think of anything else, even though there wasn’t any space in the rucksack for anything else. Outside the balcony windows, the dungeon tower of Château d’Ouchy stood soldierlike in the fading light. Monsieur Booty jumped up on to Rochat’s lap and purred. Rochat scratched the beast’s head.

‘Did you have bad dreams last night, too?’

Mew
.

He stood with the cat in his arms and shuffled to the balcony windows. He pulled a window open and smelled the cold air. Down the corniche, packs of Swiss children digging madly in the snow. Rolling fat balls of snow and stacking them into a long line of snowmen facing the lake. Topping them with stocking caps, sticking twigs in the sides for arms, using pine cones for faces. Young voices shouting, boots stomping against the cold, mothers calling the children home.

‘Marc?’

He turned, saw his mother on the bed. She was very sick, days away from being lowered into the winter ground at Cimetière Saint-Charles.

‘Hello, Maman.’

‘What are you doing at the window?’

‘I’m watching the children make snowmen and I was thinking how sad I am that you’re going away.’

‘I know, and when the time comes, I don’t know how I’ll say goodbye … but to keep you safe in this world, I have to let you go. I’m not strong enough any more to protect you.’

‘Because you’re going to die?’

‘Yes, darling, I’m going to die.’

‘Why can’t I die with you?’

‘Because your life is a miracle, and you must live for me, for all of us. Come here, let me hold you.’

Rochat climbed on the bed, laid his head at his mother’s breasts. She traced her fingers through his black hair.

‘You’re going to Lausanne and you’ll go to school and learn such wonderful things. You’ll be safe there, your father and kind people will protect you.’

‘From the bad shadows?’

‘Yes, from the bad shadows.’

‘I’m afraid, Maman.’

‘Oh, Marc, you fought so hard to come into this world, you wouldn’t give up. And you’ll never stop fighting, you’ll never run away. You’ll grow to be the bravest of them all, won’t you?’

‘How can I grow up to be brave if I’m so small and crooked now?’

‘Listen to me, darling, being brave is nothing more than standing up when you’re afraid. Will you remember that?’

‘I’ll try, Maman. I’ll try very hard.’

‘I know. Now, draw the curtains and light the candles.’

‘Are you going to make shadows on the ceiling and tell me the story of the angel coming to Lausanne Cathedral?’

‘No, not tonight. Tonight I want to give you something, a secret thing so one day an angel will know who you are. Look in my eyes, Marc, listen to my voice …’

Rochat blinked, found himself at the open window with Monsieur Booty in his arms still, the two of them staring out into the dark. The children and mothers on the now lamplit corniche were gone, only an army of snowmen left behind to stand guard along the shore, silent and unafraid.

Mew
.

‘You’re right. No time for beforetimes, not now. You have your duties.’

Rochat stepped back into the flat, closed the door.

‘Where were you? Oh yes, you were sitting on the bed, thinking if there was anything else to pack.’

He shuffled to the bed and sat. Monsieur Booty jumped from Rochat’s arms and into the rucksack.

Mew
.

‘I told you, you can’t go. I’m very sure Monsieur Taroni wouldn’t like the idea of a cat in the belfry, you’d eat the pigeons. They may be annoying with their poop and feathers, but that doesn’t mean they should be turned into cat food.’

He looked at the photograph on the bedside table. His mother and father standing on the Plains of Abraham. He slipped it between the jumpers, tied the rucksack closed. Then he shuffled through the flat, locking the windows and dousing the lights. He put on his overcoat and boots and headed for the door. At the hall entrance, Monsieur Booty sat blocking the way.

‘What is it now?’

Mew
.

‘Of course I’ll come back.’

The beast looked at Rochat with a pitiful look.

‘Oh, all right.’

Rochat went to the drawing room and wrote a note: ‘M. Booty visiting towar. Back in 3 days.’

He left the note on the kitchen table for Teresa to find so she wouldn’t worry because Monsieur Booty wasn’t home. He shuffled to the hall closet, dug out Monsieur Booty’s travel cage. He set it on the floor, opened the gate.

‘Get in and sit.’ The beast got in and sat. Rochat closed the door and peered inside the cage. ‘Remember, you must be a polite guest in the belfry.’

Mew
.

‘The timbers are very old and not your personal scratching posts.’

Mew
.

‘And no eating the birds.’

Silence.

‘I said no eating the birds.’

Mew
.

He tossed the rucksack over his shoulder and picked up the cat cage. He looked at himself in the mirror by the door. He stood as straight as he could.

‘
Tu es le guet de la cathédrale de Lausanne
, Rochat. Be not afraid.’

He stepped into the lobby, locked the two locks of the door and called for the lift. Then he went back to the door, checking both the locks the way Monsieur Gübeli had taught him. The lift came up in its iron cage and stopped. He opened the door, pulled aside the gate.

Shhhclunk
.

He looked in the cat cage. ‘Are you ready for an awfully big adventure, you miserable beast?’

Mew
.

‘Me, too.’

He stepped into the lift, pulled closed the gate and pressed the button with the letters ‘L-O-B-B-Y’.

‘Down, please.’

The lift heard and obeyed.

eighteen

It was him, Alexander Yuriev. Sitting at a bank of slot machines in the Casino Barrière. He wasn’t playing, he was talking. To a bloody slot machine.

Harper pulled his eyes from the photographs, looked ahead through the windscreen. White light from the headlamps of the Inspector’s Merc swallowing the dark road. Rounding bends, he watched the light fan over the lake like a searchlight.

‘What are your thoughts, Mr Harper?’

‘About what, Inspector?’

‘The photographs, of course. Sergeant Gauer had them printed from the casino’s surveillance cameras with the assistance of your acquaintance, Miss Lucy Clarke. Time codes burned in the photographs have Yuriev entering the casino at eight thirty-five Friday evening and leaving at nine o’clock. You were to meet him in Lausanne the same evening, I believe.’