An Uncertain Place (38 page)

‘Not to you, no.’

‘Right. So he’s feeling quite pleased with himself. But no correction is published about the DNA found in Garches. He’s still a wanted murderer. The little drama goes into reverse. He needs his father now, but he’s confessed to the murder, claimed it. So now he’s scared stiff, is Armel, and he has to make a getaway. An outcome that any manipulative man with an ounce of sangfroid could have predicted. So who? It must be someone who’s known him a while, someone with a hold over him.’

‘The choirmaster,’ said Veyrenc, banging his glass down on the table. ‘Germain. He has a hold over him. I never liked him, nor did my sister, but Armel thinks the sun shines out of him.’

‘Tell me about it.’

‘Armel’s a tenor, he’s sung in a choir ever since he was twelve: Notre-Dame de la Croix-Faubin. I often used to take him to choir practice and listen. The choirmaster had his claws into him. That’s the kind of man he is.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Well, by blowing hot and cold, alternating compliments and criticism, so Armel got to be like putty in his hands. Mind you, he wasn’t the only one, Germain had over a dozen of them round him like that. Then he was transferred to Paris and it stopped. No more choir. But when Armel went to Paris as well, it started up again. He sang a solo in a Rossini Mass and got a lot of praise. He loved it. At twenty-six, he was back under Germain’s thumb. But a year or two back, Germain was charged with sexual harassment and the choir was dissolved. And like a dope, Armel was broken-hearted.’

‘Did he go on seeing him?’

‘He swears not, but I suspect he’s lying. Maybe the guy asks him round, gets him to sing for him. It’s flattering, just like when he was a kid. Armel feels important to the father, whereas it’s the father who possesses him.’

‘What do you mean “father”?’

‘In the religious sense. Father Germain.’

‘What’s his real name?’

‘I don’t know, that’s what they called him.’

Danglard had left the office, gone home and taken off his elegant suit. Now he was slouching in his vest in front of the television’s blank screen, chewing cough drops one after another to keep his jaws occupied. In one hand he held his mobile, in the other his glasses, and checked about every five minutes to see if there was a message. Finally after several hours, 00 381 bleeped. He mopped his face with his handkerchief and deciphered the text message: ‘
Risen from tomb. Run check Fr Germain choirmaster N-D Croix-Faubin
.’

What tomb for heaven’s sake? With sweating hands, Danglard tapped in his reply, his throat tight with rage, but his muscles relaxing with relief. ‘
Why no message B4?
’

‘
No sgnl wrong time so slept
.’

True, thought Danglard guiltily. He had only come out of the basement when he had been dragged out by Retancourt.

‘
What tomb?
’ he texted.

‘
Vault 9 victims Plogojowitz. V cold. Feet recvrd
.’

‘
Uncle’s cousin’s feet?
’

‘
Mine. Back tomorrow
.’

A
DAMSBERG WAS NOT A MAN WHO WENT IN FOR EMOTION
: he skirted around strong feelings with caution, like swifts who only brush past windows with their wings, never going in, because they know it will be difficult to get out. He had often found dead birds in the village houses back home, imprudent visitors who had ventured inside and never again found their way back to the open air. Adamsberg considered that when it came to love, humans were no wiser than birds. And in most other respects birds were a lot more canny. Like those butterflies that had refused to go into the mill.

But his stay in the vault must have dealt him a blow, sending his emotional responses into turmoil, so that leaving Kisilova tugged at his heartstrings. Kisilova, the only place where he had been able to memorise new unpronounceable words, which was something rare for him.

Danica had washed and ironed the beautiful white embroidered shirt for him to take back to Paris. Everyone had lined up in front of the
kruchema
to say goodbye, standing stiffly to attention and smiling. Danica, Arandjel, the woman with the cart and her children, the regulars from the hotel, Vukasin, Boško and his wife, who hadn’t let him leave her side since the day before, plus a few unknown faces. Vlad was going to stay on a few days. He had carefully combed his dark hair and tied up his ponytail. Ordinarily incapable of showing affection, Adamsberg hugged them each in turn, saying that he would be back –
vrati
ć
u se
– that they were all his friends –
prijatelji
. Danica’s sadness was diluted a little, in that she now didn’t know which one she would miss most, the dancer or the enchanter. Vlad said a final ‘plog’, and Adamsberg and Veyrenc made their way to the bus which would take them to Belgrade. Their flight would see them in Paris by mid-afternoon. Vladislav had written out a sheet of phrases they would need at the airport. As they went down the path carrying a bag of provisions from Danica which would easily last them two days, Veyrenc muttered:

‘
He must now leave this place and its sweet fragrant air
.

He leaves broken-hearted, lamenting his fate
.

And his son, whom he found, but already too late
.’

‘You know, Mercadet says that you don’t observe all the rules for alexandrines properly – you don’t always have exactly twelve syllables for instance.’

‘He’s right.’

‘Something’s wrong, Veyrenc.’

‘Yes, I know, that second line doesn’t scan.’

‘No, I’m talking about the dog hairs. Your nephew had this dog, and it died a few weeks before the Garches murder.’

‘Tintin, a stray he’d taken in. His fourth. That’s what abandoned kids do, they rescue stray dogs. So what’s the problem about its hairs?’

‘They compared them with Tintin’s hairs from his flat, and they were the same.’

‘The same as what?’

The bus started its engine.

‘In the room where the Vaudel murder took place, the killer sat on this velvet armchair. A Louis XIII armchair.’

‘Why does it matter that it was Louis XIII?’

‘Because Mordent was keen on it, never mind what he’s been up to since. And the killer sat on it.’

‘To get his breath back, I suppose.’

‘Yes. He had some horse manure on his boots, and there were a few traces of that too.’

‘How many bits?’

‘Four.’

‘See, Armel isn’t keen on horses. Had a fall when he was little. He really isn’t a get-up-and-go sort of person at all.’

‘But does he ever go to the country?’

‘Well, he goes back to the village every couple of months to see his grandparents.’

‘There could be horses on some of the paths out there,’ said Adamsberg with a frown. ‘And he wears boots.’

‘Yes.’

‘To go out for walks?’

‘Yes.’

They both looked out of the window for a minute, saying nothing.

‘These hairs you were talking about, then.’

‘The killer left some on the chair. Velvet – they stick to that. So he could just have had them on the seat of his trousers, from the flat. If we imagine that someone planted the handkerchief, we’d also have to suppose that the dog hairs were planted too.’

‘I see,’ said Veyrenc dully.

‘It’s not that easy even to get someone’s handkerchief, but how do you get the hairs of his dog? By picking them up off the floor of his apartment one by one, while Zerk watches you?’

‘No, by going in when he’s out.’

‘We checked. There’s a door code, and an entryphone. So it suggests whoever it was must have known him well enough to know at least the code. OK. But then you have to get through the house door, then Zerk’s front door. No locks were forced. Worse, our friend Weill and the neighbour opposite both say Zerk didn’t have any visitors. He doesn’t have a girlfriend?’

‘Not since last year. You talking about Weill who used to be at headquarters?’

‘Yes.’

‘He’s involved is he?’

‘He lives in the same building as your nephew. They get on quite well. Perhaps Zerk liked to hobnob with cops.’

‘No, no. It was me, through Weill, that
got
him the flat when he went to live in Paris. But I didn’t know they actually met socially.’

‘Well, they do. And Weill seems to be fond of him. At any rate, he’s defending him.’

‘Was it him that called you yesterday when you were still getting your foot back to life. On your other phone?’

‘Yes, he’s been involved from the start. He says he’s keeping tabs on the hierarchy. He gave me that phone and made me take out my GPS when I left,’ Adamsberg said after a moment.

‘Pity he did that.’

‘Plog,’ said Adamsberg.

‘What does “plog” mean?’

‘It’s a word Vlad uses, but it can mean different things in context. It can mean “yes”, “precisely”, “I understand”, or sometimes “rubbish”. It’s a sort of drop of truth falling.’

The lunch Danica had provided was so copious that it was spread out on a large table in the cafe at Belgrade airport, accompanied by beer and coffee. Adamsberg munched his
kajmak
sandwich and was reluctant to pursue his thoughts.

‘One has to say,’ Veyrenc began carefully, ‘that if we have Weill in the picture, that would solve that entryphone question. He lives in the building, he’s got keys to it, he knows Armel. And he’s intelligent and sophisticated, unquestionably bossy, the sort of person who could well acquire a hold over someone like Armel.’

‘The front door hadn’t been forced.’

‘No, but Weill’s a cop, he’ll have pass keys. Easy lock?’

‘Yes.’

‘Did he ever go to see Armel?’

‘No, but we’ve only got Weill’s own word for it. On the other hand, Zerk quite often went round on Wednesday evenings when Weill held open house.’

‘So he could quite easily have got hold of a handkerchief and some dog hairs. Not the boots with dung on, though.’

‘Yes, he could. The concierge polishes the stairs, and she doesn’t like people going up and down with muddy boots. So she gets people to put any dirty shoes in a little cupboard under the stairs on the ground floor. They all have keys to it. Shit, Veyrenc, Weill was at headquarters for twenty years.’

‘Weill couldn’t care less about the police, he likes being provocative, he likes cooking, he likes art, and not just classic art either. Have you ever been to his flat?’

‘Yes, several times.’

‘So you know what it’s like, it’s splendid and over the top, unforgettable once you’ve seen it. The statue of the man with a top hat and an erection, juggling bottles? The mummified ibis? The self-portraits? Kant’s couch?’

‘Kant’s valet’s couch.’

‘All right, Lampe the valet. The chair the bishop died in. The yellow plastic cravat from New York. In a bazaar like that, knocking out the Plogojowitz clan by an old eighteenth-century Paole might look like an artistic happening. As Weill says himself, art’s a dirty business but someone has to do it.’

Adamsberg shook his head.

‘But he’s the one who’s investigating the rungs of the hierarchy that leads to Emma Carnot.’

‘The vice-president of the Council of State?’

‘The same.’

‘What on earth has she got to do with all this?’

‘She’s got her hooks into the president of the Appeal Court, who’s bought the prosecutor, who’s bought a magistrate, who’s bought another magistrate, who’s bought Mordent. His daughter’s case comes up in a few days and the charge couldn’t be more serious.’

‘Oh hell. But what does Carnot want from Mordent?’

‘Obedience. It was him that leaked the information to the press to cover Zerk’s escape. Since the morning we discovered the murder, he’s been putting obstacle after obstacle in the way of the inquiry, and in the end he planted some stuff on Vaudel’s son, which is intended to incriminate me instead of the killer.’

‘The pencil shavings you talked about?’

‘That’s right. Emma Carnot is somehow linked to our murderer. The page in the register for her marriage has been torn out, so we have to assume that if anyone knew about this marriage, her career would be over. One of the witnesses has already been killed. They’re looking for the other. Carnot would trample on anyone to protect her interests.’ As he spoke, Adamsberg remembered the little kitten under Zerk’s boot and shivered. ‘She’s not the only one. That’s why her war machine will run smoothly, because they all get something out of it. Except Paole’s future victims, except Émile, and except me, because I’m for the high jump in three days. Like the toads. With the cigarettes.’

‘You mean the ones we used to force-feed cigarettes to, back in the days?’

‘Yes.’

‘Did they analyse the pencil shavings or something?’

‘A pal of mine slowed down their trip to the lab. He faked an illness.’