Death at the Clos du Lac (3 page)

The air along Avenue de Friedland felt cool and fresh after the warm, perfumed atmosphere of the exclusive
Salon Elizabeth
, and their first client of the day brushed a stray hair from her face and walked east towards Boulevard Haussmann. Her thoughts were on shopping, and meeting her husband for an early lunch. He had been tied up for several days in business negotiations, and she wanted to make sure that he took a break from work and relaxed, if only for an hour or two. Success, as she knew well, was too expensive if bought at the expense of one’s health.

She caught a glance of her reflection in a window, pleased with the magic worked on her hair by Marcel, the
Elizabeth
’s chief stylist. She hoped her husband would approve, and gave a wry smile before moving on.

She came to a narrow street between elegant apartment buildings. A block of shadow was cast over the pavement and she shivered momentarily, glancing back to check
before crossing, eager to be back in the sun. As she did so, a grey furniture van signalled and pulled alongside her, the driver holding up a clipboard and smiling.

She stopped. Another out-of-towner lost in the maze of city streets. It happened all the time and she sympathised. She waited for the driver to wind down his window. But instead of looking at her, he was now glancing up and down the street, frowning in concentration. Something touched her consciousness, that tiny part of the human instinct warning of imminent danger, and she heard the metal ping of a door opening, and the scrape of feet on tarmac. A movement to one side caught her attention, and a tall figure stepped out from behind the van.

‘What are—?’ Her words were choked off by an arm whipping across her throat. She felt herself lifted by another powerful arm around her waist, and a smell of male body odour filled the air around her. Then she was out of the sunshine and in the dusty, close interior of the van, and being thrust face down onto a mattress lying on the floor.

The van began moving.

‘Lie still. Don’t shout,’ whispered the man holding her, his breathing hot in her ear. He smelt of onions and cigarette smoke, and she felt the smooth texture of a leather jacket against the skin of her neck. ‘Be good and you’ll live to see your fancy salon another day. Give us trouble and … well, you wouldn’t want Robert to have to attend your funeral, would you?’

She lay still and was quickly bound with lengths of fabric tape, which she recognised as the sort used by furniture delivery men to lash goods to the sides of their vans. Then
a soft cotton hood was drawn over her head. She realised that she still hadn’t seen her captor’s face.

‘I can’t breathe!’
she cried, and shook her head violently as a rush of claustrophobia overtook her. ‘You’re making a mistake!’ Then she recalled that the man had mentioned her husband’s name. This was no error. With it came the cold chill of knowledge that the one thing Robert had feared, but that she had never truly believed possible, had finally happened: she was being kidnapped.

Her instinct was to fight. She had played a part in the Resistance during the war, mostly as a messenger and a carrier of weapons, sometimes ammunition and supplies. Young women were able to move about much more easily than men, although the risks had still been great. But the experience of battling the constant dread surrounding her back then had given her courage beyond her understanding, and the idea of being taken by the Germans had instilled in her and her colleagues the certain knowledge that to submit was to die. It was that early experience that she called on now.

She drummed her heels on the floor of the van, then lashed out with a kick, hoping to connect with the man who had torn her away from her freedom out there on Avenue de Friedland. The mattress absorbed all of her attempts to draw attention from outside, and her kicks were fended off with ease before her ankles were caught and held in a powerful grip.

‘Enough,’ said the man, as if he were chiding a troublesome child. ‘You’re wasting your time. Nobody will hear you from in here.’ Seconds later, she felt the same fabric tape being used to tie her legs together, and she became immobile, waiting to see what would happen next.

Her breath was coming in short gasps as the van’s movement began to rock her back and forth on the mattress. It absorbed some of the bumps, but she could feel the ribbed aluminium floor underneath and picture the road speeding past below. They had already made several sharp turns, but she soon lost all sense of direction or speed, and gave up trying. Instead, she focused on listening to sounds, hoping for something to indicate where they were. But soon that became a blend of noises and she gave that up, too. She could hear other traffic outside, but it was muted as if through cotton wool, and she guessed they had taken precautions to reduce any chances that she might call for help and attract attention.

‘Why are you doing this?’ she demanded. Engage him in conversation, she told herself. To communicate is to lower barriers, according to her husband, a practised and very successful negotiator. But there was no reply. Whoever her captor was, he either did not believe in unnecessary talk or had learnt the same lesson about communication.

She forced herself to breathe slowly, deeply, trying to regain a sense of calm, in spite of her fears. There was no point in becoming stressed to the point of exhaustion, and this entire episode had taken place with no shouts of alarm on the street, and with such ease that it spoke of practised skill. It was probable, therefore, that it had all gone unseen, with nobody the wiser that a woman had been snatched off the street and was now being carried who knew where by men who would no doubt soon make their demands clear.

She put her face down and continued breathing. Robert would soon have her freed, she was certain of that. For now, though, she had to survive.

‘Should we be here?’ Claude eyed the surrounding countryside as they pulled to a stop. They had driven in Rocco’s car to a tiny village a few kilometres north of Poissons, leaving Alix on duty at the sanitarium as the local police presence.

Berlay hardly merited the title of village, consisting of a clutch of houses and two smallholdings strung out along a narrow dead-end road leading into open fields. No church, no shop, no bar. Lots of perfectly formed cowpats in the road, though, Rocco noted, so not much motorised traffic passed this way.

‘Better than hanging around near Levignier,’ Rocco replied.

It struck him that if a man wished to hide himself away, this was as good a place to do it as any. Like dropping off the end of the world. Yet he wondered why Paulus would live here when there was so much more choice in Amiens
or even Poissons. Maybe Alix had been right about him having a relationship with Ms Dion; they certainly couldn’t ask for more privacy than this.

The cottage rented by Paulus was a single-storey
plaster-and
-lathe building with a corrugated metal roof and a rusted chimney stack. The structure looked lopsided, as if it was trying to melt into the landscape. And if Paulus was any kind of gardener, he’d put his talents on hold for a while: the grass was long, a once cultivated area with sticks for vegetables was overgrown, and the path leading to the front door was a barely visible trail of flattened stems.

Claude checked the chimney. ‘No smoke. Could be out.’

Rocco got out of the car and led the way up the path. ‘Check the back,’ he said.

He knocked on the door. It rattled, the sounds echoing back with the uniquely hollow aura of a deserted building. Above the keyhole was a handle with a simple thumb latch arrangement. He pressed it down.

The door swung open and he stepped inside.

They were too late.

Whatever Paulus had or had not done at the Clos du Lac, his part in the proceedings was now over. He was lying slumped in an armchair, head thrown back, a mass of dark blood across his chest, soaked into his shirt. None on the floor, though, or the chair, Rocco noted.

Paulus was a big man, somewhere in his forties, with a no-nonsense brush-cut and the beginnings of a day-old growth of beard. He had probably been good-looking in life, but he now looked softened and somehow twisted in death, his mouth open and wrenched to one side. He was
dressed in dark trousers and shoes and a dark-blue shirt, but no tie. Almost a uniform. The watch on his wrist was a utilitarian model, probably steel, of the kind favoured by military men for simplicity and robustness.

Rocco bent close to examine the chest area. Paulus had been shot twice at close range at the base of the throat. He went behind the chair and gently eased the body forward. It felt cold and the stiffness of rigor mortis was on its way. No exit wounds and no blood. Low charge rounds.

The work of a professional.

Claude came through the front door and joined him. ‘Nothing to see round there – Mother of God!’ He crossed himself.

Rocco checked the room carefully. It didn’t take long; it was a living room-cum-kitchen combined and held a table, two chairs, the armchair, a heavy metal range and a rustic oak dresser with a collection of household bits and pieces on the shelves instead of crockery. He saw nothing that would be of any help: a couple of paperback novels, scattered newspapers, magazines, pens, a large flashlight battery, some keys, a few coins and some new socks still clipped together. The twin cupboards underneath held a selection of saucepans and heavy plates, cups and bowls, with an assortment of tinned goods, two bottles of wine and half a stale baguette. Not unlike his own collection, he reflected; just enough to get by, a single man’s idea of the basics in life.

He walked through the only door into a small bedroom. The air smelt stuffy. There was a double bed with rumpled bedclothes and a single, ancient wardrobe. A few clothes hung from a rail inside: shirts, trousers and a couple of jackets. And a woman’s blouse, plain white.

The single shelf held a pair of women’s panties, folded and resting on brown paper alongside a small, floral washbag. The bag held a small bar of soap, a tin of tooth powder and a toothbrush and a small jar of face cream.

A woman’s overnight kit. Alix had been right.

‘Do you think he could have done it – the murder back at the Clos?’ Claude had followed him in and was standing by the door looking back at the body.

‘Possibly. As a night security guard he’d have had access to all areas of the building. He would have had plenty of opportunity to get into the patient files, too, if he needed.’

‘And he might have known how to operate that pulley thing.’

Rocco nodded. ‘That, too.’ And from what Stefan had said, if the patient was drugged to the eyeballs, as most of them were, he wouldn’t have had any trouble fitting him into the harness.

But why end up dead afterwards? A killer killed? It didn’t make sense.

He checked through the jacket pockets in the wardrobe. Nothing there. He went through the rest of the room, then walked through and checked Paulus’s trouser pockets, careful not to disturb the body. Nothing there, either. No cash, no wallet. Then he had a thought. He checked the belt. It looked like service issue, the leather in good condition apart from a two-centimetre stretch just above the left hip, where it was slightly distorted and shiny.

Paulus had been wearing a hip holster. So where was it now?

He stood back, puzzled. The place was clean. Too clean.

‘We need to call this in,’ he said, and led the way out of the house.

‘There’s no car,’ Claude observed, stubbing his toe on a well-worn rut at the edge of the lane where a vehicle had been parked. ‘So how did he get around?’

‘He was killed somewhere else,’ Rocco said. ‘No blood spillage and no signs of a struggle. The car will have been dumped.’

He drove fast past the collection of houses, and saw no sign of the inhabitants. They were probably out in the fields by now, working. He’d send someone back later to see if anyone had heard or seen anything.

As they hit a straight stretch, another car approaching from the opposite direction sped by, kicking up a column of dust. It was a dark Renault saloon with two men inside.

‘Cops,’ Claude said, turning to look back. ‘Somebody beat us to it. Shouldn’t we go back?’

Rocco shook his head. ‘No. Not cops.’ More of Levignier’s men, he was certain of it.

The vultures were gathering.

They were halfway back to Poissons when Claude suddenly slapped his knee in frustration. ‘Hell, I must be getting old. What an idiot!’

‘What?’

‘The nurse – Dion. I thought she was screaming for the police when I first heard her.’

‘Yes. So?’

‘I just realised – she wasn’t calling the police. She was calling
him
– the dead man: Paulus.’

‘We have all reasonable grounds for taking this over as a murder enquiry.’ Rocco was in Massin’s office, having driven straight to Amiens from Berlay. Also present were his deputy,
Commissaire
Perronnet, tall, aloof and keeping his own counsel as usual, but ready to support Massin, and Captain Canet of the uniformed branch. Slightly flushed of face and stocky, with a well-developed stomach, Canet was genial enough and inclined to favour action rather than talk. Massin had listened to what Rocco had reported, before calling in the other two in for a council of war and despatching a clean-up team to the Paulus cottage, including Dr Rizzotti.

‘You’re probably right, Inspector,’ Massin agreed smoothly. ‘But I’ve already had instructions from Paris.’ He gestured at the telephone on his desk. ‘
Commandant
Levignier is in charge of the investigation regarding all matters related to the Clos du Lac – including the
subsequent death of the security guard. If required we are here in a support role only.’

‘That’s just my point,’ Rocco argued carefully. ‘The murder of Paulus took place outside the sanitarium. It’s a civilian matter, which places it within our jurisdiction.’

Massin said nothing, but looked at the other two officers for their opinions. Perronnet wagged his head from side to side, signalling indecision. Canet nodded and patted his stomach subconsciously. ‘I agree with Rocco, sir. The second murder might be connected with the sanitarium, but it did happen outside. We have to have some autonomy, surely.’

‘That may be true, Captain. But we don’t know where the shooting took place. We have only a brief examination of the scene at the Paulus residence to go on, although,’ he tipped his head towards Rocco, ‘I’m not suggesting you’re wrong, Inspector.’ He chewed his lip.

‘We should not ignore the question of jurisdiction,’ Perronnet conceded reasonably, drawing a startled look from the other three. He was not well known for voicing any opinion in contradiction to Massin. ‘What I mean is,’ he hurried on, ‘what if other deaths were to occur – although God forbid that they do, of course – involving people related to this place but unconnected with the first murder? Where do we draw the line? And we are bringing the body of Paulus back here, are we not?’

Rocco sighed inwardly at the convoluted argument and wondered whether Perronnet wasn’t merely playing an even field, trying to remain uncommitted in what could become a prolonged argument. But he decided not to let the opportunity offered go by.

‘I agree,’ he said. ‘We could end up being expected to clear up the mess with none of the authority to investigate the cause.’

Massin nodded slowly. ‘I can see I’m outnumbered.’ He chewed on his lip in thought, then tapped his desk with the tips of his fingers. ‘Very well. I will go back to the Ministry and let you know what their response is. But don’t be surprised if they lock us out. This Clos du Lac is clearly a government facility, so we should not expect them to allow access too easily.’

‘I’d like to know what kind of facility,’ said Rocco. ‘Drugged patients, armed security, and the presence of three Ministry men within hours of a death?’

‘Yes, well, if you’ll excuse the untimely reference, don’t dive deeper than you can swim, Inspector,’ Massin warned. ‘They may not be your favourite people, but they carry a lot more influence and weight than anyone in this room. Push too hard and you might find yourself assigned to some hellhole of an island in the Pacific.’

Outside in the corridor, Rocco nodded at Canet. ‘Thanks for the support.’

Canet smiled. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll expect you to return the favour one day. Frankly, I like to see the Ministry noses put out of joint now and then; there are some, like Levignier, who treat the uniformed branch like second-class citizens most of the time. Be good to win a point back now and then.’

Rocco headed for his desk to clear some paperwork. On the way, he spotted the muscular outline of Detective René Desmoulins coming down the corridor. He was one
of the best investigators in the region, and Rocco trusted him implicitly.

‘You busy?’ he asked.

Desmoulins smiled shyly, smoothing his thin moustache. For something he was so aware of, it never seemed to progress much beyond a heavy fuzz, but Rocco admired his determination. ‘Nothing I can’t drop. Why?’

‘I want you to find out everything you can on an André Paulus, former or serving naval cop. Try the records office in Brest.’ He ran through the little that he knew from nurse Dion. ‘Did he leave the navy, if so, were there any problems – the usual background stuff?’

Desmoulins nodded, committing the details to memory. ‘Will do.’

Rocco left him to it and went to his desk. It wasn’t long before he got a call from Massin.

‘You’ve been given authority to investigate the Paulus death,’ the senior officer told him. ‘But that’s all. Anything inside the facility is strictly off-limits.’

‘That was quick,’ Rocco said. ‘Has Rizzotti had a look at Paulus’s body yet?’

‘He has. I have him with me. Come to my office and he can tell you himself.’

Rocco climbed the stairs and found Canet and Perronnet were there, too. Rizzotti grinned when he saw Rocco.

‘You’re still dragging them in for me to play with, I see,’ he said, referring to Rocco’s talent for finding corpses. He was a pale individual with thinning hair and wire spectacles, and seemed completely at home when poring over bodies or evidence that needed his opinions.

‘Your report, please, Doctor,’ Massin said softly.

‘Of course. Well, it’s very simple. The deceased was shot with two nine-millimetre rounds to the upper chest.’ Rizzotti looked at their faces. ‘Anyone want the full medical details? No? Well, that’s it. Whoever did it was very clever, however. Neither round exited the body, yet I found nothing solid to have impeded them.’

‘Meaning?’ Massin urged him.

‘Meaning that whoever killed him used reduced-charge cartridges to restrict the range.’ He nodded at Rocco. ‘As I learnt from Inspector Rocco, it’s a method used by professional assassins for close-quarter kills. The lack of blood at the scene would appear to confirm some care was taken in the execution,’ he winced at the unintended pun, ‘although it’s probable the shooting occurred outside the premises. But wherever it happened, there are clear signs of powder burns around the entry wounds, to the clothing and the flesh, suggesting that the killer was standing close to the deceased when shooting him. As near as I can estimate, death occurred during the night, sometime between midnight and 6 a.m.’

‘If he was killed elsewhere,’ said Canet, ‘why not leave him? Why would they bother dumping him back at the house?’

‘Now that,’ Rizzotti gave an expansive shrug, ‘science – even my limited version of it – cannot tell you. Perhaps where he was killed was inconvenient for the killer. But that’s up to Inspector Rocco to find out.’ He smiled at Rocco as he handed over the baton.

‘There has been a suggestion,’ said Massin, waving his thanks to Rizzotti, ‘that the killing might be a simple case of jealousy. He was rumoured to be involved with
the nurse, Dion. Levignier has suggested that might be an avenue worth pursuing.’

Rocco nearly laughed. ‘Levignier said that? He can’t be serious.’

‘You don’t think it’s an explanation worth exploring?’

‘Only if Dion was also involved with a jealous hitman. Rizzotti’s right – this has the hallmarks of a professional kill. A jealous lover wouldn’t take all the personal effects the way it was done here. Neither would they bother hauling the body back to the house. And Paulus disappeared in the middle of his shift; it’s too much of a coincidence that it just happened while a murder was taking place at the Clos. He either left his post under his own steam or was forced. Then shot.’

‘I heard another suggestion,’ Perronnet put in. ‘That Paulus might have been involved in the first killing in some way. He may have been paid to leave the building in order to leave the way clear, but for some reason became surplus to requirements. It’s a possibility.’

‘Where did that one come from?’ asked Rocco.

‘I forget. One of Levignier’s team, I believe. It was a passing remark.’

Rocco wasn’t surprised. It was a reasonable assumption, but all too easy – and far too quick. He sensed an attempt to sidetrack them. Somebody in the Ministry had seen the potential problem in denying access to a normal murder investigation, and was tossing these suggestions out as a concession, a meagre bone to a dog.

‘I need access to Inès Dion,’ he said. ‘She’s a material witness to what happened.’

‘That has already been agreed. But the director, Drucker,
will be there at all times. And you should take another officer with you. I suggest
Gardienne
Poulon, to avoid any unfounded accusations of pressure.’ Massin’s voice hardened. ‘Make no mistakes, Inspector, and remember what I said: you have been given reasonable access, but do not abuse that permission. You should also not forget that you have other cases to investigate, such as a shooting not far from Poissons. The report is on your desk, I believe.’

‘I’ll behave myself,’ Rocco replied. ‘Scout’s honour.’

He turned and left before Massin could make a comeback. He’d never been in the scouts and doubted they’d have accepted him. But Massin wouldn’t know that.

He scooped up the report marked urgent from his desk and scanned it on the way around the building, finally locating Alix Poulon in the basement, knee-deep in paperwork. She looked glad of a diversion and dropped what she was doing immediately.

‘What are we doing, exactly?’ she asked, as they walked out to Rocco’s car.

‘First we’re going to sort out two troublesome brothers who’ve been shooting at each other. Then we’re going hunting.’