The First Fingerprint (15 page)

De Palma went down to Yvonne Barbier's flat and asked her a few questions. She had of course heard the phone ring several times, but no other sounds of footsteps or doors closing. Nothing.

“When someone comes in, I inevitably hear them because the main door slams as it closes. Only regular visitors close it gently because they know it disturbs me. But I still hear it. I've lived here for more than sixty years, so I know all the sounds in this place.”

“Think carefully, Madame Barbier. Can you remember a man or a woman who came here frequently? A friend or acquaintance of Christine's?”

“Of course. Last time I told you that she never saw anyone. But, in fact, that's not quite true. He hasn't been around much for about a year now, but he used to come regularly enough.”

“Who do you mean?”

“Professor Palestro. He never spent the night here, but I think that he and Christine … There are some noises you can't mistake. Or else silences. As you like.”

“Really?”

Yvonne looked as inquisitorial as Louella Parsons.

“Oh yes. Don't you know what I mean? Anyway, I believe he really was in love with her, but she didn't give a damn. All that interested her was her career. Period. Palestro was just part of her game plan.”

“Thank you, Madame Barbier.”

De Palma went down to the entrance of the building, then opened and closed the heavy oak door several times. Sure enough, it slammed loudly if not prevented from doing so. However, it was also possible to close it without Madame Cerberus upstairs hearing a thing.

The Vieux Scaphandre was as much a symbol of Marseille as its boats and wood-fired pizzas. It was the town's oldest, best-known, and best-stocked diving store. Vidal pushed open the door and immediately felt as though he was walking into a cartoon. To his right, he was welcomed by a mannequin dressed in an ancient deep-sea diving outfit, its orange color partially bleached by years in the sea. Vidal was intrigued and stared at its face through the meshed window of its bronze helmet, then looked down at its lead-soled shoes.

“Can I help you, sir?”

“Good morning, Maxime Vidal, murder squad …”

Gilbert Simian, the shop's owner, propped his glasses up on his bald pate and looked at Vidal with eyes as round as marbles.

“You're from the police?”

“That's right. I'm investigating a disappearance.”

“Really?”

With a wave of his hand, Simian beckoned him into the back of the shop.

As they passed a display case, Vidal noticed the same type of knife as had been found in Sugiton. A collection of flippers of every conceivable color were piled up any old how on some shelves. Below them, two fluorescent yellow and blue wetsuits dangled from hangers, with large labels pinned to them: “Special Offer.”

The office was in the same apparent mess.

“So, how can I be of help?” Simian asked.

“Well, I want to know if you sold a diving knife and torch with the following serial numbers.”

Vidal handed him a piece of paper.

“What makes you think they were bought here?”

“You're the best-known shop, that's all.”

Simian grimaced, pursing his lips.

“For the ‘Lagoon Legend,' it won't be difficult because I don't sell that many. But for the torch …”

“So start with the knife.”

“I don't have a computer. I don't know how to use them. Otherwise, it would be quicker! And as I don't keep customer records …”

Simian stood to open a decrepit cupboard. On top of it stood a huge, scale model of a clipper in full sail, measuring about a meter long.

“Here, I still have all the bills since last May. I say ‘May' because that's when the knife came out.”

The owner of the Vieux Scaphandre looked about sixty and spoke with a heavy Marseille accent. The skin of his hands and face had been weathered by the sea. Two deep lines furrowed his forehead.

“There … I sold two ‘Lagoon Legends' … one on May 20 and the other on August 30 … and you say the serial number was K6-2216?”

“That's right.”

“Here's a copy of the guarantee … you're lucky, it was a customer who has an account here! His name's Franck Luccioni.”

Simian pushed his glasses on to his forehead and sat up in his chair. His eyes searched Vidal's.

“Wasn't Luccioni found dead at Le Torpilleur?”

“Exactly …”

“Goodness me! But just now you told me you were investigating a disappearance.”

“We can't reveal everything …”

Simian's hand flopped heavily on to a stack of bills. Vidal remained impassive.

“You also asked me about the torch …”

“Indeed.”

“That could take some time. It's a very popular model …”

“Look at the same period. You never know …”

“I'll try a different way … I'll take a look at the stock book.”

He went back to his cupboard and removed a file covered with
stickers of various brands of diving equipment. After a few minutes, Vidal stood up and paced around the store. On a noticeboard, several small ads offered trips out to sea. Beside them was a poster for the Le Guen Cave exhibition, going back to the time when it was first discovered. Vidal read the large letters printed on a negative hand: “The Frescoes of Silence. The Treasures of Le Guen's Cave.”

Then Simian's voice called out from his office:

“O.K., I've found it!”

Vidal returned to the room.

“It was Luccioni as well. It's lucky he had a customer account, otherwise we'd never have found the name! There you are, he bought it on March 15.”

Vidal wanted to ask him a few questions about lifting blocks of concrete under water, but he restrained himself. He produced a photo of Luccioni.

“Did you know him?”

“No, he was a customer, that's all.”

“Did he come here often?”

“Quite often, yes. He bought a lot of things here: crossbows, masks, a knife … He was a good customer!”

“Nothing else?”

“No, nothing …”

Simian looked sorry as he shook his head. “He was a good diver, was he?”

“To judge from the equipment he bought, he must have been very good. He must have done underwater pot-holing too. When I looked through my bills just now, I noticed that at the beginning of last year he bought a 20-watt lamp and a T 25, a superb lamp with two Xenon bulbs and a revolver grip. It can last for up to four hours … a marvelous piece of kit!”

“What would equipment like that be used for?”

“For anything, just to see underwater …”

De Palma emerged from the Prado-Carénage tunnel at 9:30 a.m. A dull light had settled on the dome of La Major and was creeping down its salt-eroded Byzantine walls. On the horizon, the sky had lined up small mouse-gray clouds; winter rain, fine and steady, was on its way. Stuck in a traffic jam just a few meters from headquarters, the Baron waited patiently. He lit a Gitane and watched as the lights on the upper decks of the
Danièle-Casanova
gave in, one by one, to the new day.

A quarter of an hour later, he pushed open the door of Le Zanzi, shook a few hands and sat down beside Vidal who was reading
La Provence
, his nose between the crumpled pages. The Baron roused his team mate from his usual morning lethargy by tapping his finger on the front-page headline:

“So, kid, aren't you interested in gangland bastards when they get whacked?”

“Hi, Michel. He's the second one this year …”

“They have to die of something, don't they? A work accident!”

“Did you know Sarlin?”

“Of course I did. People say that he gunned down half of Marseille at the beginning of the '90s. He'd just come out of prison. Eight years for a burglary in the north of France.”

“Lulu and Jean-Pierre have gone from headquarters to pay homage.”

“Those two just love executions. They know they won't be up all
night trying to find out who killed who and why. They just have to say that they're working on it but the going is tough. That's all. Then Paulin's happy, Duriez doesn't give a damn, and the press count the bodies. Anyway, the gangland has gone. It's all gambling syndicates now …”

“Who knows …”

“Two out of twenty-three executions solved in the last two years. Pretty good statistics! And even then, when they come up for trial, the defense attorney will pull the case apart like a set of Lego. No proof, only tapped phones and plenty of explanations. I can just picture them yammering away in the witness box.”

De Palma took quick sips of his coffee under Dédé's weary gaze.

“Why are you looking at me like that, Dédé?”

“Because you drink your coffee with a stiff little finger, like a real baron.”

“I
am
a real baron, never forget it.”

De Palma turned toward Vidal.

“Right, kid, stop reading all that crap about Sarlin. Time to go.”

A few minutes later the two men were in their office.

“How about a little sitrep?”

“About time.”

Since his first visit to Autran's apartment, de Palma had been wondering about the total absence of family souvenirs: not one object, not a single photo, nothing. No trace of her past at all. It was as if the prehistorian had systematically destroyed any vestiges of her childhood and adolescence. He had never before encountered such a void. He was finding it impossible to think his way into the victim's personal life, and this made him feel uneasy. He did not like being in the dark about the past histories of the corpses he dealt with. There could be only one explanation: Christine must have suffered in her youth and she had drawn a line beneath the entire period.

“So, Maxime, have you found out anything about her?”

“I've had problems discovering what she did when she was young. Her father died in 1970 and her mother in 1982. She left school in 1975 and went to university. She moved from Marseille to Aix. I have all her addresses except those in Aix. Apart from that, not much.”

“Obviously, twenty-five years on … It's almost the year dot!”

“As I said, the old couple I met didn't tell me much, except that her father died an accidental death, while changing a lightbulb … he fell straight on to his head. That's pretty original! Then her mother died in a car crash.”

“And does that all sound odd to you?”

“I dunno. The couple told me that the father was an engineer and adored his children. But, according to Madame Allegrini, she didn't really have the ideal mother.”

“Well, nothing exceptional there … not a thing to go on. Didn't she have any other family?”

“No, except for a twin brother. But he's dead, too. Madame Allegrini couldn't remember when. Just that it was before the mother died.”

“Her neighbor on boulevard Chauve told me that she never had any visitors.”

“So for the neighborhood investigation it's not a great start,” sighed Vidal. “Do you want me to keep at it?”

“No, not for now. I don't think it's that important. We'll probably find out more at the university. I'm going to call on a few people, her close colleagues first of all.”

“Maybe they'll know something about her past.”

“I doubt it. I reckon Autran had completely broken with her youth. There's nothing in her flat, not a single photo of her parents or of school. Nothing. I've never seen anything like it. A real blast of cold wind!”

“Yeah, I know.”

“Get in touch with everyone in her address book. Check their phone numbers. Have you got the report from the creek? You know, the investigation they did on dry land which they should have given us ten days go …”

Vidal handed a file to the Baron, who opened it and flicked through it for a few seconds.

“As usual, the buggers didn't find anything more than I did. Not a single pube.”

“I know, I read it last night.”

“Did you get me everything on the stiff at Aubagne?”

“I put it on your desk, it's right there in front of you.”

De Palma laid his hand on the file and stood up.

“I think the first thing to do is to look into her adult life. Who she hung around with when she was a student. Who she worked with. Her life and works! And her sex life, too. That's vital.”

“What about the torch and the knife?”

“You did a good job there, but that's Luccioni. We're not on that case, and don't you forget it! Our darling Commissaire is going to ask us to report on Autran, not Luccioni.”

“But can't we say that there's a connection?”

“In my opinion, there's more than just a connection. But keep that to yourself. We'll have to convince the public prosecutor to open an investigation. Then we'll have room to maneuver.”

Anne Moracchini came into the office, her face still damp from the rain. A dark lock of hair stuck to her cheek which was glowing from the chill air.

“What time do you call this, my little Capitaine?” de Palma remarked, glancing at the stainless-steel clock.

“I was at Sarlin's place. You should have seen his wife!”

“She told you she didn't know why her husband had been whacked and then burst into tears.”

“Of course. They're always innocent. You know that as well as I do! But it's a shame for the kids.”

“Tell me, Anne, do you recall that woman at Aubagne?”

“Yes, I was the first person at the scene.”

“Good, do you remember anything in particular?”

“No, nothing, except the missing bits. One leg was never found. Do you think it was the same person?”