Authors: Tim Davys
Tourquai (22 page)
T
he haze lay damp and heavy over the city. The sky was milky white and the sun still no more than a pale, yellowish ball of light just over the horizon.
Igor Panda was freezing. He was sleeping under the open sky, wrapped up in a dark blue wool blanket with yellow embroidery he had found in Golden Retriever’s car. During the night, the blanket had absorbed the dampness of the forest and no longer provided any warmth. Panda shivered.
There was a simple explanation for why he had made his way to the narrow ravine in the mountain in the Bois de Dalida. As far as Panda knew, only he and Jake Golden Retriever knew about the ravine.
En route through the forest toward the mountain yesterday evening, Panda buried Golden Retriever’s head in the soft earth next to a copse of wild raspberry. He had not chosen the place with any particular care; it was yet another of the impulsive decisions of the last few days. He had dug with only his paws, and despite his powerful claws the work had been hard. This grave would not do in the long run; he would have to get rid of the head. But that was a problem for later.
Igor squirmed restlessly in his sleep. His arms hurt, his shoulders, his entire upper body. And at last it was sore muscles that caused him to waken.
He opened his eyes.
It was Sunday, the ninth of June, and he was alive.
That was his first thought.
The second thought was about the vipers. There had been occasions when Panda himself had been drawn into the vipers’ surveillance work, when he had given them information in exchange for services; he knew how they functioned. His deadline had expired at midnight, now an example would have to be made; that was a prerequisite for VolgaBet’s operation.
Igor sat up with a jerk. He threw off the blanket, feeling the outside of his jacket.
The bundle of currency was still in the inside pocket.
He breathed out, his shoulders lowered.
He had thought about
asking his mom. When he left yesterday with the painting in the backseat and the dog’s head on the floor on the passenger side, that had been his first thought.
Mom.
It was a lovely forgery. The painting was associated with Hummingbird Esperanza-Santiago’s earliest period, which had been a surprise. The forgeries that Panda had sold during the past year had been more reminiscent of the artist’s later works.
A canvas that size could mean a price tag of between three and four million. That would be enough to pay the gambling debt; it would go further than that. He was certain that Dad had money at home in the safe under the open fireplace in the bedroom.
With a gnawing feeling of doubt, Panda drove down toward Amberville. The thought of his parents had been instinctive. The secure, prosperous parental home was imagination’s natural refuge in a desperate situation like this. But the longer Panda drove, the more time he had to reflect.
With only a few miles left until he reached his childhood home in Le Vezinot, he changed his mind. He could not draw Mom and Dad into this. On the contrary, he had to keep them as far away as possible. There was a life on the other side of all this misery, and Panda had to try to preserve that, too.
He turned off of oxblood red Mina Road into the neighborhood by Swarwick Park, parked outside a café, and went in. He ordered a latte, asked them to sprinkle the milk with cardamom, and sat down on a high bar stool next to the window so that he could see the car—and the painting—from his seat.
There were a handful of buyers who would bite. But there were only one or two who had that kind of money available the same day.
Igor Panda finished his coffee and returned to the car. From there he called Rodrigo Buffalo.
“Rodrigo?” said Panda, trying to sound casual. “Am I calling at a bad time?”
“Not a problem,” Buffalo sighed. “Not a problem.”
Panda had been up in Buffalo’s office six months earlier. Now he pictured the dark room with the gigantic plasma screen hanging on the wall across from the desk and showing sports around the clock. Rodrigo Buffalo’s primary occupation was looking for investments for his family’s money.
“I thought about making it into an auction,” Panda said into the telephone. “But . . . the truth is I’m in a hurry. This is something outside the ordinary. It’s an Esperanza-Santiago. It’s been in private hands for over twenty years, and now it’s on the market. You’ll make at least ten percent on the investment in six months. At least.”
Outside the car window in Swarwick Park, life went on as usual. The dark-tinted windows on Igor Panda’s Volga Deluxe allowed him to sit in the midst of reality, but still screened off. None of the stuffed animals walking past could imagine the circumstances around the negotiations going on in the black car.
“Ten percent in six months, you say,” Buffalo repeated and Panda could hear how he took a gulp of something, maybe coffee. “And you can guarantee that?”
“We know each other,” said Panda, impatient about having to listen to the rich buffalo’s attempt to demand guarantees they both knew were impossible to give. “We know one another, you give me half now and half when you sell.”
“How much is half?” asked Rodrigo Buffalo.
In the background the cheering of a wild sports crowd could clearly be heard. Buffalo was probably watching reruns of last year’s championship matches. They always showed that kind of thing in the afternoon.
“One and a half million,” said Panda, trying to make it sound like a trifle.
“Lot of money,” Buffalo sighed. “Lot of money. And ten percent you say?”
“In six months,” Panda repeated without conviction.
Involuntarily Panda’s gaze fell on the plastic bag on the floor in front of the passenger seat. For a dizzying moment he imagined that what he’d done was not yet done.
The thought made him nauseous.
“When do you need the money?” Buffalo asked at last.
Igor Panda was hungry.
His body heavy from dampness and aching, he slowly climbed up the edge of the low ravine and sat down to wait for the sun on the cliff. He did not recall when he’d last eaten, and now his belly was screaming. The haze was about to disperse, and morning would come, warm and clear as always. But Panda knew that for him the sun would never look the same again.
He weighed his options. Probably it was wisest to remain in Lanceheim. In Yok he would attract attention and, besides, that part of the city was full of the vipers’ informers. In Tourquai everyone had a purpose, on their way to or from a meeting, and his lack of that would expose him. And in Amberville he might very well run into an acquaintance or customer.
Yesterday he had been hiding from the police. Today he had the vipers to think about as well. But he had the money. Even if the deadline had passed, he had the money. It was a matter of a few hours, no more; that ought to make a slight difference. If he only gave VolgaBet an opportunity to get out with their honor intact, it would work out for him.
He decided to remain sitting on the cliff in Bois de Dalida until the sun had dried him off. Slowly the haze dissolved across the sky. Panda twisted his head and looked northward, toward the forests that surrounded Mollisan Town. He was sitting so high that he could see the massive crowns of the trees disappear toward the horizon in what appeared to be an immeasurable infinity.
A feeling of insignificance filled him, just as strong as it had when he was little. Only the fact, he thought, that the short life span of stuffed animals seemed to be measured out even from the start, made all conflicts and intrigues ridiculous. It was like living in a closed room where you run into the walls over and over again while pretending not to. At the same time, Panda thought, within the narrow framework of our lives, freedom was endless. In the closed room you not only could—you had to live. Igor Panda knew it was this freedom that had finally crushed him.
He turned his head in the other direction and closed his eyes. The sun warmed his face.
Life was best when it was simplest.
Panda had parked his
black Volga Deluxe in an abandoned stable in one of the least accessible areas in Bois de Dalida. He didn’t dare keep driving Jake’s car; he had no idea whether anyone missed the dog and was searching for him at this point. It took him almost half an hour to walk to the stable from the ravine, and during the last ten minutes the Morning Rain started to fall. In a trash can along the path he found an old newspaper that he folded and held over his head, but as he came to the stable he was just as damp as he’d been when he woke up an hour earlier.
During the walk there, he had made a plan. It made him feel stronger and better. First he would return to the pier and there expose the forger. An established art dealer and an ingenious forger could accomplish great things together. Whatever happened in the future, Panda knew this: his need for money would not diminish.
Only after that would he look up the animals behind VolgaBet and pay the loan. With interest.
Panda stepped into the
decaying stable where the rain seeped down through the roofing. The chrome on the black car shone in the daylight; there was something inappropriate about the contrast between the luxurious vehicle and the simple building. Panda knew the car was conspicuous, and he hesitated: Should he leave it there? But to make it down to the boathouse by the Dondau in time he was more or less forced to drive. A taxi was not an option; the city’s taxi drivers had always been the vipers’ deepest, richest source of information.
Igor Panda turned the ignition key and backed out.
After ten minutes on a double-rutted forest path that tested the shock absorbers beyond any reasonable limit, he turned onto North Avenue. Panda saw a couple of police cars parked by the sidewalk in the crossing at gray Friedrichstrasse and he smiled to himself. The police were standing outside the refreshment stand at the corner. All on their own, the cops sustained the city’s sales of pineapple flambé.
Panda accelerated. It would work out. He felt it.
T
he photograph was the first thing Larry Bloodhound saw when he opened the door to the office. Bloodhound always worked on a Sunday; he got more done on Sunday than during the rest of the week, and Cordelia had no objections. Every week built up toward the crescendo that was Saturday night, and then, the stillness of Sunday morning. The deserted department up on the fourth floor on rue de Cadix was never more grandly dramatic than in solitary semidarkness.
It might seem strange that he saw the photograph immediately; the piles of old junk scattered across the desk and on the shelves in Larry Bloodhound’s office—both organic and electronic waste could be glimpsed between the drifts of binders and papers—were not comprehensible to just anyone. Nonetheless, the superintendent immediately discovered the photograph. It stuck out, like a grease stain on a wire-brushed drying cabinet or fridge. Someone had been in the office without his knowledge.
The superintendent remained standing, staring at his desk. Had anything else been moved? But no paper towers had toppled, no inability to let things alone had upset the disorder, and the pleasant odor of old bacon was intact.
Larry Bloodhound went up to the desk and picked up the picture. The black-and-white graininess immediately revealed that it was taken by a surveillance camera, and Bloodhound recognized the portable grandstand that had become something of a trademark for VolgaBet. On the other hand, he did not recognize the mournful bear that was circled with a marker. It took him a moment to turn the picture over, so that he discovered the text on the back: “Igor Panda at VolgaBet.”
The superintendent’s expression changed. It was difficult to say whether the grimace was an attempt at smiling.
“Up yours,” he muttered to himself, picking up the phone.
He called in his team, even though it was Sunday.
Ècu and Lynx were
on the scene thirty minutes later. While waiting for the inspectors, Larry had emptied the vending machine by the elevators of all the mint chocolate pigs by fiddling with the opening with a small chisel that by chance he had discovered worked as a skeleton key when he was trying to fix the vending machine six months ago.
With his mouth full of chocolate, he showed the police officers into his office, letting them sit down in front of the desk while he went to the other side.
“Here,” he said, picking up the picture and letting it nonchalantly float through the air.
Anna still had her coat on. She had left Todd with Mom and taken the direct route to work without asking Larry for an explanation. She had heard it in his voice; it was urgent. The picture landed upside down on her lap, which is why she first read the text on the back and then turned to the picture. Ècu had also seen what it said.
“This is . . . the heir,” Falcon observed.
He had been in the middle of cleaning the stove and oven, and his wings still smelled of the strong detergent.
“And the surveillance camera has dated the occasion for us,” Anna observed.
In the top-right-hand corner of the picture was the date—a little more than a week ago—and the time: a couple of hours and some minutes after midnight.
“But,” Ècu said excitedly, “this is . . . all we need, isn’t it? The heir, the son: Igor Panda is the one who gains the most from his father’s death. And he plays VolgaBet! This is too good! For heaven’s sake, everyone who gambles is in debt to that organization. And if you’re used to dealing with lots of money . . . his debts must be gigantic.”
“The tipster strikes again,” Anna muttered, moderately enthusiastic.
Falcon directed his wide-open gaze from the superintendent to Lynx and back to the superintendent again.
“But, this is just . . . too good to be true!” he said. “Do you want me to check on it? It’s not hard to find out whether Panda is mired in debt.”
Anna did not reply. She set the picture back on the superintendent’s desk, almost putting her hand in a sticky stain she had discovered several days ago, which she believed was traces of an overturned chocolate milkshake.
“Tipster or not,” Ècu continued, raising his voice in a way unusual for him, “this is a good deal better than Jasmine Squirrel! This is someone who actually gains from Vulture’s death.”
“Calm down, cloth-bird,” Bloodhound growled. “To start with, I want you to find out who came into my office yesterday evening, or during the night,” Bloodhound growled.
“The picture?” asked Anna.
“Didn’t come in the mail,” the superintendent confirmed. “It was lying here when I arrived this morning.”
“And why take the risk of putting it in your office instead of sending it in a letter?”
“Haste,” the superintendent answered with certainty.
“And what would be the cause of that?”
“Something that happened in the investigation. Something that happened yesterday or on Friday.”
“Squirrel?” asked Lynx.
“Might be,” said Bloodhound.
“So this is to save Squirrel?”
“Might be,” Bloodhound growled again.
During this conversation, Falcon’s grip on the armrest of the chair grew tighter and tighter, and now he shot up.
“But,” he said. “Excuse me for saying this, but what are you talking about? We have to act. We have to arrest the panda. This is—”
“Sit down,” Superintendent Bloodhound growled.
Falcon fell silent and stared at his superintendent. He sat down. He was quivering with frustration. After several days of mistakes and false leads, a clear, uncomplicated, and obvious suspect had been identified. What was there to talk about?
“And if it’s a police officer?” asked Lynx, not concerned in the least about Falcon Ècu’s outburst.
“What do you mean?” growled the superintendent.
“The only one who could make their way into your office without risk is a police officer,” Anna continued. “And if the tipster has been a police officer all along, it would explain how he could call our direct lines last Monday. He knew he would get you to go to Nova Park by calling Falcon.”
“He called our direct extensions?”
“According to Charlie.”
Bloodhound suddenly remembered that the call last Monday did not go through the switchboard. And the suspicion he had was growing to a gnawing conviction.
“Hmm,” he growled.
Falcon Ècu couldn’t sit still any longer. He got up again.
“Please excuse me,” he said. “For even though I think what you’re saying is interesting, it has nothing to do with the case. We arrest Panda. I can get him to explain both the telephone calls and the mysterious pictures.”
“You think that Panda put a picture of himself on Bloodhound’s desk to draw attention to it?” Anna Lynx asked with surprise.
“With all due respect, Anna, I don’t care who put the picture there. It’s there. Look at it!”
Bloodhound dismissed Falcon’s theatrical maneuvers as stupidity.
“Falcon, we’re not going to do a damn thing. One day you’ll grow up and get some common sense stuffed through your beak. We are absolutely not doing a damn thing. This picture,” the superintendent growled, holding it up and shaking it in front of Ècu’s eyes, “hints at desperation. Believe me. We forget about this, and worse crimes than breaking into my office are going to be committed.”
“But you can’t—” Falcon began with a raised voice.
“Shut up!” Bloodhound growled, holding up a threatening paw that pointed at Falcon. “You do as I say. Understood?”
Falcon summoned all the self-control of which he was capable and managed to remain quiet. Intellectually he knew that he ought to nod an “understood,” but that was more than he could bear. His normally white cheeks shone as pink as his throat, and without a word or a gesture he left the superintendent’s office.
“What was that all about?” Bloodhound asked when Ècu had closed the door.
“He didn’t have time to finish scouring the oven before he came here,” Anna replied to smooth things over. “He’ll understand . . .”
But Inspector Lynx was wrong about that.
The fatal mistake of
which Falcon Ècu was guilty immediately after the meeting with Superintendent Bloodhound on Sunday morning, the ninth of June, could not be excused. It was due not only—but partly—to the unfinished oven cleaning and the ignominy that the arrest of Earwig had entailed. It was due not only—but partly—to his constant feeling of isolation in combination with an improbably high level of ambition.
Falcon Ècu left Bloodhound and Lynx, went with determined steps over to the stairs, and continued two floors down to Captain Jan Buck’s well-swept, light-filled office in the northwest corner of the police station. Without a thought that it was Sunday morning and that Captain Buck probably wasn’t there, Ècu went straight into Buck’s office and discovered his highest commander sitting in front of the computer, playing strategy games.
“What the—?” Buck exclaimed in irritation, failing in an attempt to click up another document in front of the game.
As Falcon Ècu told his story, however, Captain Buck’s astonishment turned to readiness for action, and when the inspector was done, Buck had already put on his jacket and taken the pistol from the regulation drawer.
“Show me,” he asked.
Ten minutes after Falcon
Ècu had rushed out of Superintendent Larry Bloodhound’s office, he returned. This time with Captain Jan Buck in tow.
Anna Lynx was again sitting at her workstation. From a distance she heard Falcon approach with his sententious steps breaking the silence of the office area. She immediately read the situation and understood that her colleague was beyond saving. In a way this mortified her; she had invested both time and concern to get him to fit in. But the matter was clearly hopeless, and the countdown of Falcon Ècu’s days at rue de Cadix had begun. If he left tomorrow or in a week, it was impossible to guess, but once you stuck a knife in Larry Bloodhound’s back you could count on being paid back in the same currency. At best Falcon Ècu would be offered a job as a traffic cop, but nothing else.
“Superintendent?” Ècu cleared his throat outside Bloodhound’s door.
Captain Buck, however, did not intend to wait to be invited. He squeezed past the inspector, opened the door, and stepped into Bloodhound’s burrow.
“Larry,” Buck said, “I hear you’ve fished up a new prime suspect in the Vulture case.”
Bloodhound looked up from his desk with surprise, flabbergasted and wondering for a few seconds how Buck turned up in front of him, but then he caught sight of the falcon outside the door and understood what had happened.
“Captain,” he began, “I—”
“Do you have the picture here?”
“I have the picture here. But I don’t think that—”
“May I see it?”
It was impossible to refuse him, so Bloodhound dug in his wastebasket and found the picture. He handed it over to Buck, who only gave it a confirming glance and nodded.
“Good,” he said. “Let Squirrel go and issue an arrest warrant for Panda. Search the whole city—I want him here no later than this afternoon.”
“Captain,” Bloodhound growled with restraint, “with all due respect and without trying to be an ass, I don’t intend to do that. I’m rather certain. My suggestion is that we wait.”
“Why?” asked Buck, without seeming interested.
“Because I believe that the pile of shit who put the picture on my desk has a few things to tell. And he’s soon going to tell them.”
“Really?” said Buck. “And what ‘pile of shit’ are you talking about, Superintendent?”
“That . . . I’m not quite sure of yet,” Bloodhound admitted.
“You’re not sure?” Buck repeated derisively. “Well, I’m sure. Release Squirrel. I’ve already talked with the prosecutor. It’s Panda we’re going to bring in.”
“You’ve talked with the prosecutor?”
“I gave you a chance, Bloodhound,” Buck explained. “You didn’t take it. You’ve despised me since the first day I installed myself here at rue de Cadix. You think you’re better than everyone else. But I’m a professional. So I gave you a chance. You should view me as a role model. I’m taking over this investigation, Bloodhound. As of now. We’ll have to figure all this out when Vulture’s murderer is sitting behind lock and key.”
And with these words Captain Buck turned his back on the superintendent and left him behind his desk.