by Cédric Sire
He turned to the animal that he’d shot down.
It was gone too.
Where the beast had collapsed, a bullet in its head, there was nothing.
In different circumstances, Vauvert would have thought he was losing his mind.
Over the years, he had learned what it meant to be a cop, to be the one who was paid to plunge into the dirty parts of society, into the blood and hate, in order to spare everyone else. And he did plunge into the blood and hate, each time emerging a bit dirtier. But always standing.
Now, as each time before, he was standing. He scanned the yard, trying to calm the rush of blood pounding in his chest.
This was no time to panic. Maybe he didn’t understand what had just happened, but it was a case he had to solve.
In his fifteen years, he had seen his share of other strange sights. Things that couldn’t be put in the reports, things that he understood instinctively as a cop but did not make sense on paper.
He lowered his eyes. His fatigue pants were caked with mud. The wolf had splattered him as it crashed to the ground, so he had not dreamed this.
He walked to the gate and inspected it. At least one of the bullets had damaged the metal. He had thought he hit the animal, though. Twice.
Crouching, he examined the ground.
Casings from the bullets were scattered in the mud..
He also spotted two small lead objects.
From his pocket, he retrieved a pair of latex gloves and a small plastic bag.
Ever so carefully, he picked up the bullets.
He was no ballistics expert, but he could clearly see that they were crushed and fragmented, like bullets that had struck flesh and bone.
And both of these were covered with blood.
28
Sunday, noon
Wearing her sky-blue T-shirt with the image OF Corto Maltese, her favorite graphic-novel antihero, and sitting comfortably on her couch, Leïla Amari was having a late breakfast while watching Funny Face on her big flat-screen television. She owned a large collection of musicals, which she knew by heart and never tired of watching. They evoked a carefree past when you could sing and dance in the rain without getting locked up before the end of the day.
That was her secret pleasure, really—the bubble she could retreat into when she needed to get away. She spent every other day inspecting depressing crime scenes, her nose in the blood, leading her forensics team as they looked for hints of powder and DNA, evidence that revealed each day more macabre secrets. No matter how much Leïla loved her work and no matter how perfectly happy she was managing her own team, just for one afternoon a week, she really needed this escape.
She poured herself another cup of red fruit tea, her eyes glued to the flat screen. Fred Astaire was dancing with Audrey Hepburn, doves and swans all around them. It did not get any better than this.
Until the doorbell yanked her from her reverie, spelling the end of her Sunday afternoon.
She had not been expecting anyone. Grumbling, she paused the video and walked to the intercom.
“Yes?”
“Leïla, it’s Alexandre. An emergency.”
She pressed the button and waited for her colleague to come up the stairs. Soon his massive figure appeared at the door. He stared at her, speechless. She was wearing nothing but her T-shirt, a pair of men’s boxers, obviously too big for her, and thick pale-pink socks.
“Yes?” Leïla asked again.
“Your phone is off,” he said.
“That’s because I’m not on call today.”
“You are now.”
Exactly what she was afraid of. With a gesture, she invited him in. On the flat screen, Fred Astaire was frozen in midair. Farewell, imaginary world where people are always happy. She turned off the video. The screen went black.
“I’m really sorry to bother you like this,” Vauvert said.
“So why don’t you tell me what you want instead?”
“Yes. Here.”
He pulled a transparent plastic bag from his pocket. Inside the bag, she could see two bloody pieces of metal. Leïla frowned.
“Oh. Bullets?”
“Yes.”
She took the little bag and examined the contents.
“And these bullets, where do they come from?”
“They’re mine, Leïla.”
Okay. She was beginning to understand.
“You got yourself in trouble again, right?”
“Not yet. But I need you to analyze the blood on these bullets as soon as possible.”
“Who did you shoot?”
“Don’t worry. It was only an animal. Not a human being, okay?”
Leïla sighed.
“An animal, huh?”
“Yes.”
“And you want me to believe that you actually extracted your own bullets from some creature’s carcass? Who do you take me for?”
“To tell the truth, I didn’t really extract the bullets,” Vauvert said. “It’s, well, it would be too hard to explain. But I absolutely have to know what kind of animal it is.”
She tilted her head.
“Because you don’t know?” She couldn’t help snickering. “I think you really are taking me for a bimbo, Alex. But I won’t force you to tell me the truth. I assume you have your reasons. The lab is closed today, though. It’s Sunday.”
“And you are the head of the team. You can come and go as you please.”
As usual, trying to argue with Vauvert was no use. The guy was definitely pig-headed. But he was also a friend, and she knew that if she were ever the one in trouble, she wouldn’t have to explain herself to him. Vauvert would send every procedural excuse to hell and come to her rescue.
“This really can’t wait till tomorrow, huh?”
“Leïla, would I be here if it weren’t an absolute emergency?”
“I know. That’s what worries me.” She looked down at her bare legs. “Okay. Do I get a minute to put something on, or do you want me to go to the office half naked?”
29
Just as Leïla had said, the forensics headquarters were deserted.
Vauvert sat in a chair in her office while she sifted through the cabinet and picked up a vial of serum.
“You still don’t want to tell me what kind of animal it comes from?” she asked again as she opened her sample box. “It would save us some time.”
The giant cleared his throat.
“Truth is, I don’t know. That’s the reason you’ve got to analyze it.”
“Okay then,” she said. “I’m going to do the search step by step. It shouldn’t be too long, though.”
With a cotton swab, she took a small sample of blood from one of the bullets and placed it on a drop of serum.
As the precipitate turned fluorescent red, Leïla made a face.
“What?” Vauvert asked.
She turned to him, her face loaded with worry and rising anger.
“Stop screwing with me now. Tell me what you did.”
“Why? What’s going on?”
“What’s going on is that this is no animal blood, Alex.”
Vauvert looked stunned.
“Not animal blood?”
She stared daggers at him.
“I don’t know what you’ve done, but this is serious. That’s human blood on this bullet. I can’t cover for you on something as serious as this. Who did you shoot?”
“Well, Leïla, that’s precisely the problem. I have no idea.”
“Cut the crap, please. You extracted these bullets. You damn well saw the person they came from.”
He bowed his head.
“You wouldn’t believe me.”
He massaged the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger. Then he looked at the forensic scientist still staring at him.
“How long would it take you do to a DNA sequencing and run it against the central database?”
“With the new equipment I can do it in less than half an hour. You think that the person
you shot is on file?”
“We can give it a try, right?”
Deep inside, he hoped that wouldn’t be the case.
He walked to the window in the hallway to smoke while Leïla got busy isolating a DNA strand and starting the sequencer.
He had smoked six cigarettes and was lighting the seventh when she came back to see him, her face ashen, to give him the result.
Vauvert felt the weight of the world pressing very, very heavily on his shoulders.
He remained at the window for a while, watching the canal below and the heavy sky above, before he made up his mind, knowing that anything he did now would topple a series of dominoes and that everything would soon be out of his hands. He pushed open the door to the stairwell. One floor below, he emerged in Homicide headquarters.
What Leïla had just told him was spinning in his head.
The DNA sequence match.
Impossible.
Inexplicable.
He would have to find a way to explain this to his bosses. Or else he would have to lie. This type of thing couldn’t be explained. That was clear. No matter what happened now, he knew that it would all blow up in his face sooner or later. Or, in other words, he was neck-deep in shit.
In the break room, he found the shift team. Sebastien, Nicolas, and Christophe: two officers and one detective. The men were in the middle of a card game and looked at him with puzzled faces.
“Listen guys,” he told them. “I won’t beat around the bush. I’m back on the Salaville case, starting at square one.”
“The Black Mountain Vampires?”
“Precisely. I know it’s a cold case, but new evidence makes me think that we missed a third man last year.”
“So what do you need?”
“I want you guys to go back to the farm right now. Take weapons with you.”
The three gave each other concerned looks.
“What’s going on exactly?”
“I went over there this morning,” Vauvert explained. “There has clearly been some activity. Maybe an accomplice, maybe not. Bring back a full status report. Someone has left new inscriptions on the walls of the barn. They’re written in blood, and they’re fresh. You gather samples of everything you find suspicious. And bring back any animal traces that you find. There’s excrement everywhere, in both the house and the barn.”
“Excrement?” Nicolas asked, wrinkling his nose. “What’s all this about? What kind of animals are you talking about?”
“Look, I’m not sure, okay? It may be canidae shit.”
“Say what?”
“Wolves,” Vauvert said. “Or something else, I don’t know. I just want to make sure. You’ll understand for yourselves as soon as you get there, believe me.”
“Right now?” Sébastien asked. “To go get some wolf shit? We’re the only ones on duty, Alex…”
“And I’m your superior officer,” Vauvert answered, clear and unequivocal.
Reluctantly, the three men got up and left to get ready.
Vauvert was alone in the break room. He stayed there for a minute, breathing slowly to settle his agitated breathing. Once he had calmed down a bit, he left the room and walked down the hallway.
He knocked on the door of the only person who would listen without judging him.
30
Once he had finished telling his story, Vauvert raised the can of beer to his lips and downed it in nearly a single gulp.
He was in Detective Damien Mira’s office. His colleague, an old-fashioned cop who kept a stash of beer in the bottom drawer of his desk, was sitting in front of him. His pensive expression exaggerated his heavy jowls. With each passing year, Mira’s frame grew larger. At fifty, that was a whole lot of years that had gone by.
“You don’t mean to put any of this in your report. Do you?”
Vauvert chuckled nervously.
“You kidding? Of course not. There’s no way I could put any of that in writing.”
“At least one thing’s settled,” Mira said.
He looked at the sheet of paper on his desk with the DNA test results that Leïla Amari had produced. For the tenth time, at least, he read the name that was written on it. And for the tenth time, he frowned.
“Right. And there’s no way this could be a mistake?”
“No,” Vauvert answered. “The genetic comparison is a hundred percent reliable.”
“Okay, so we’re talking about the blood of one of the Salaville brothers.”
“Of Roman Salaville, yes.”
“A man who is dead,” Mira said.
“That’s what I thought,” Vauvert muttered. He opened another beer and took a long swig before going on, “God dammit, Damien, I saw the bastard split open on the autopsy table last year, and he looked deader than dead. I don’t get it.”
Mira, pensive, took off his huge tortoiseshell glasses and began to clean them with a handkerchief.
“But the thing you shot at, it didn’t look like that guy.”
“I’ve told you everything already.”
“Yes, I know. You told me it looked like a wolf.”
“Two fucking wolves. With eyes like lasers. I’ve never seen anything like it, I swear.”
“And you have no explanation for any of this?”
“What do you want me to say? There is no explanation.”
“Well, if you ask me… you’re right,” his colleague said. “It is impossible.” He put the glasses back on. “There is one thing funny about your story, though.”
Vauvert gave him a curious look.
“Go on, make me laugh.”
“Those two guys, the press called them the Black Mountain Vampires.”
“They always give them stupid nicknames. What’s so funny about that?”
“Well, that story of yours, the way you tell it anyway, it reminds me of the story of Dracula.”
“Dracula? I don’t get it.”
“You don’t watch vampire movies? The stories are always sort of the same. The vampire has these wolves guarding his castle. They’re really people, servants the vampire chooses from the lowest strata of society, messed-up folks who are easy to control. Once they’re under his will, they find victims for him to feed on. In the story of Count Dracula, the servant was named Renfield, if I remember correctly.”
Vauvert nodded.
“Okay. So you’re saying that the Salavilles were like a Renfield? Servants of a Prince of Darkness who did the dirty jobs for him so he could remain invisible?”
“That’s it,” Mira said, chuckling. “I mean, metaphorically speaking.”
Alexandre Vauvert said nothing. Metaphorically speaking or not, he did not see anything funny about this.
His men had been gone for more than an hour and a half, and he hadn’t heard from them.
He was starting to worry.
When the phone finally vibrated on the desk, he grabbed it.
“Sebastien speaking. I’ve been trying to get you for ten minutes. The signal’s really bad up here.”
“How’s it going?”
“Is this a gag? Because I have to tell you that we really don’t get it.”
Vauvert felt his stomach tighten.
“Why? Was there a problem?”
“Absolutely not. Actually, there’s nothing to report. Everything is clean. The only thing we found were bullet impacts on the front gate. There was a shooting here.”
“Yes, I know. Those were my bullets. It will be in my report. What about the excrement.”
“There is no fucking excrement, Alex.”
“There isn’t?”
“Of course there’s not. Everything is perfectly clean. It’s freaky, actually, how there aren’t any animals around here. I haven’t heard a single bird.”
“The inscriptions,” Vauvert insisted, blood rushing to his temples. “You saw the inscriptions at the back of the barn, right? Fresh blood was used…”
“Nothing that wasn’t here last year. We checked everything several times.�
�
“You’re sure?”
The silence lasted for a few seconds.
“I don’t see what you’re getting at, but it’s not funny.”
Vauvert didn’t know what to say.
“We’re heading back now. But you’d better take care of the report tonight. The boss will want us to justify that trip to Ariège.”
Vauvert uttered something that sounded like a groan.
“So?” Mira asked.
Vauvert said nothing. Things were getting out of control. He stared at his cell, tiny in his enormous hand. In the menu, he looked for the folder where he had saved the photos from the farm. There they were, the photos.
He opened them one by one.
He couldn’t see any traces of the black lumps that had littered the ground in the barn. The droppings had vanished from the images.
“This can’t be possible.”
He had also taken three photos of the wall. “Lords of death and resurrection.” He couldn’t have imagined that, too.
He scrolled down and opened the photos.
The wall was blank. There were no traces of blood on the wall, not in any one of the photos.
Alexandre Vauvert turned off his phone. He tossed it on the desk and glared at it for a long time. Then he took his head in his hands and shut his eyes.
“Damien, I think I’m losing my fucking mind.”
31
Paris
Sunday evening
It was night when Eva drove back home in her Audi. Rain was pouring down in sheets, hitting the sidewalks with raging force. The gutters were overloaded with black rivers that rushed into the streets. Eva had to be careful, because her wipers could not move fast enough to clear away all the water on the windshield.
She saw the hooded figure at the very last moment. The guy was wrapped in a large coat that had not reflected the car’s headlights. He was leaning over the edge of the curb, and the Audi came dangerously close to hitting him.
“Holy shit!” Eva swore, swerving away from him as she could.
She tried to get a glimpse of the man in the rearview mirror, but all she could distinguish was the shape of his coat and the flash of a surprisingly white face turned toward her.
