“They said you were a troublemaker.”
“I am. But tell me anyway.”
“Sergeant Bellan’s my superior,” he said.
Merde! Bellan had it in for her. No wonder he’d sent a trained lackey. A nice way to show how low she rated on the totem pole.
“. . . and Sergant Bellan’s a good one,” she said, gritting her teeth.
It stung to say that. Especially after the way he’d badmouthed her father. But it was best for her to compliment Bellan if she wanted to learn more. When Bellan stayed off the liquor, kept his rage under control, and didn’t take things personally as he did with her, he scored high marks in the Commissariat. Word had gotten around he was up for promotion. “Of course Bellan’s good, my father trained him.”
She hoped that sank in.
“Would you say,” he asked, “robbery was the motive for the first attack?”
Robbery?
“Does it make sense for Mathieu to attack and rob someone in front of his atelier?”
Had Bellan been saddled with a new recruit he had no time to work with? Silence.
“I’m the one asking questions here,” he said. “Let’s move on. Could robbery be the motive for this incident?”
“Not in the way you think,” she said. “My laptop and things were left. Only my phone was taken.”
“Mathieu Cavour was released. This morning.”
So they’d let him go? At least she’d learned that. She wanted to stand up, get the kinks out of her neck, feel the warmth from the heater. Her thoughts flowed better that way.
If only she could see his face, read his movements. But she couldn’t. All she had were intuition, some sensory antennae and whatever she could glean from his words. She had to get him on her side. Get him to cough up more of the latest info.
“Let’s assume, after luring out Josiane Dolet, the attacker got me by mistake,” she said. “I’d picked up her phone. We were wearing the same jacket. He realizes his mistake too late, after he’s bashed in my head. People come down the passage, frightening him away. But he finds Josiane in the next passage. He kills her, the most important part, but we don’t know why, then wraps her in an old carpet which isn’t discovered until later the next day. Meanwhile I’m blind, out of commission, but Josiane’s phone is nowhere to be found and eventually he realizes I must have it. He figures his number’s on the speed dial or it incriminates him some way, so he discovers where I am and breaks into the room . . . but he gets my phone . . . not hers. Thwarted again.”
“So Mademoiselle Leduc, why not give me the phone,” said Officer Nord.
He’d learned something from Bellan after all, how to listen. Josiane’s phone was her face card . . . the only one. The murderer wanted it. So did the flics.
“Tell me how you’re investigating the attack on me,” she said. “If you’ve found any suspects, and what’s happened to Vaduz, the Beast of Bastille.”
“If you’re trying to negotiate by withholding evidence needed in a homicide case, mademoiselle. . . .”
“Negotiate? Someone attacked me. So viciously, Officer Nord, that it blinded me. The doctor doubts I’ll ever see again.”
Silence.
She wouldn’t give in unless he met her halfway. “I want to discuss this with Bellan.”
“That’s impossible.”
No warmth in his voice. Was he writing this down? He sounded far away . . . had he moved?
“No more until I talk to him.”
“Sergeant Bellan’s away.”
“Away? A workaholic like him?”
“Family problems. The baby’s sick,” he said.
For the first time, the flic sounded human.
“Aaah, sorry to hear that.” Her back felt stiff from sitting on the hard divan. “Then to Commissaire Morbier.”
“He’s assigned to another case. The Beast of Bastille won’t strike again. That’s the official story, anyway,” he said, his voice faltering. “I didn’t know you’d lost your sight. Sorry.”
He grew more human every minute.
“Has Vaduz confessed?”
“As far as the Prefet’s concerned, as good as.”
“So where is he?”
“After a rampage outside Porte de la Chapelle, he crashed the car he stole. We’re not supposed to reveal this yet, especially to the media, but whatever they found was sent to the morgue.”
“You mean . . . Vaduz is dead. . . . When?” Why hadn’t Morbier told her?
“No announcements. No details released to our unit, anyway. So please keep it to yourself.”
“I want to, but if Vaduz died before I was attacked in the residence, that’s important.”
“How?”
“It could mean that someone else attacked me in the passage and killed Josiane, the same one who later came to the residence. That’s why I have to talk to Morbier.”
“Sergeant Bellan‘s handling the case. Everything goes through him. Of course, you’ll mention Josiane Dolet’s phone and reveal its whereabouts when I pass on the message to call you, won’t you?”
She nodded. “So they said I was trouble?”
“I made that up,” he said, “but looks like I got it right.”
Thursday Late Afternoon
RENÉ PRESSED THE SECOND number he’d copied from the list on Josiane Dolet’s speed dial.
“Architecture Brault,” said a middle-aged male voice.
“I’m calling concerning Josiane Dolet,” he said.
A pause. “Who’s this?”
“I’m with Leduc Detective,” he said, glancing up from the courtyard at the gleaming limestone buildings on the steam-washed cobblestoned alley. One could eat off the pristine stonework façades. A decade earlier, many would have avoided the area. It had been a district of weed-filled cours and small dilapidated porcelain and bronze fixture factories. These stood next to former seventeenth century nunneries that had once held an army of nuns in cloistered convents, seats of wealth and power that had rivaled the king’s. “Please spare me a few moments,” said René. “I’m downstairs.”
A head appeared at a window. All René could see was a halo of copper hair.
“I’ve got a backlog of clients . . .”
“We should talk in person,” René said. “Your number was on Mademoiselle Dolet’s speed dial.”
“My firm deals with many people.”
“This concerns Josiane Dolet’s murder. I just thought we should have a chat before I talk with the flics.” René let the silence hang.
“Ten minutes. Between clients,” he said. “The code’s 43A6, second floor, first door on the right.”
René took off his jacket, undid his right cufflink, rolled up the sleeve of his pink tinged custom-made shirt, got on his tiptoes, and just managed to hit the digicode.
The door buzzed. He pushed it open and reassembled himself in the glassed-in foyer, which melded two old factories. An ingenious arched portico opened up to an azure glass-roofed courtyard. Ochre-stained pots of bamboo bordered a minimalist bleached-wood desk. The reception area lay empty.
René took the lift. The wet weather kicked his arthritis into an aching winter mode early. He’d cut back his martial arts practices at the dojo. Not details he would share with Aimée in her condition. Or ever.
A man with thinning copper hair, small black-framed glasses, and a pale complexion stood as René entered. Surprise painted his face for a moment. René was used to that, and to the customary downward glance at his long torso and short legs.
“René Friant, of Leduc Detective.”
“Brault, of Brault Architecture,” the man said, extending his hand. René saw no welcome in the pale, guarded face.
René approached the side of the desk and shook hands. His arms wouldn’t have reached across the desk.