For a long time he sat motionless, barely breathing, doing what he had been doing for almost five years: longing for some ghost to appear, believing that sometimes the air can still quiver with a long vanished presence. Nothing.
He went outside and phoned Daras. She only listened, did not ask for any details, simply said she would contact a commissaire she knew in Poitiers, who would send some people over, that they would somehow square things later. She made him promise to keep her posted, said, “Take care,” and hung up.
An hour later a team turned up at the house, a young officer and two forensic officers from l’Identité judiciaire who wanted to know what they should be looking for.
Vilar explained everything: that the retired gendarme had disappeared some time between 9.00 a.m. and noon with all his research files, the evidence he had compiled over years, his work on Pablo’s kidnapping; that they had agreed to meet this morning; that the hard drives had been wiped, including encrypted files; the message on the computer screen. The officer nodded, taking notes on a pad, asking no questions.
One of the forensics team was already pulling on his gloves, and the other was slipping on a pair of paper overboots.
“Can you tell me where exactly you’ve been in the apartment, what items you’ve touched?”
“The kitchen tap, I pressed the ENTER keys on both computers, but I used a Kleenex. I was careful not to contaminate the scene.”
The technicians set to work, suggesting that the policemen might like to step into the garden for a while. Vilar picked up the tissue once more, so that he could raise the blinds and open the French door. The officer held out a packet of cigarettes.
“Sorry, I haven’t introduced myself. Lieutenant Delvaille.”
“Pierre Vilar.”
The men shook hands, exchanged a brief smile, and smoked in silence in the muggy shade of a silk tree. Now and then, the scent of roses drifted on the still air.
“Where do you think Morvan is? He would surely have put up a fight? Was he a big guy?”
“A metre eighty-five at least, and about ninety kilos, I think. Yes, he would probably have put up a fight. But if he had, the house would be a bomb site. And there’s something else: I can’t see anyone dragging him unconscious into the street and stashing him in the boot of a car in broad daylight. None of it makes sense.”
Delvaille nudged a twig with the toe of his shoe.
“How did you know him?”
“He was doing research into kidnapping and child trafficking. He was helping me to track down my son – he disappeared in 2000.”
He managed to say this without becoming breathless. Realising he had used the past tense, he was about to correct himself, then stopped. The younger man said nothing. He was staring at a notebook in which he jotted down some things.
“I didn’t realise,” he said finally. “He … When was the last time you spoke to Morvan?”
“Yesterday. He called and said he had something to show me. Not a lead exactly, he said, but …”
Vilar tried to make sense of it. The erased hard drives, the missing C.D.s. All Morvan’s databases were gone. It made no sense. Who could possibly have any use for such information? Suddenly he felt a wave of exhaustion, felt tension squeezing his skull.
They both started as the shutters suddenly flew open and one of the technicians appeared at the bedroom window.
“We’ve got something. Come and have a look.”
Vilar walked ahead of Delvaille into the hall. The sun now streamed in through the open windows of the bedroom upstairs, spilling into the hall.
As he entered the room, Vilar saw one of the technicians bent over the unmade bed, on which he noticed a sunflower-patterned quilt and then a square of sky-blue sheet, while his colleague packed away the camera and rummaged through his case. Going closer, Vilar saw what the first technician was looking at: a bloodstain that extended from the edge of the bed right to the pillow, longer than it was wide, already clotted and brown, the outline almost crisp. There were other blotches spattered over the pale yellow surface, and on the top sheet.
“The mattress soaked up a lot of the blood,” the technician said, lifting the sheet and pointing to an almost perfect copy of the same horror. “And look at this,” he said, lifting a corner of the sheet. “It’s like someone wiped a blade. See these lines? I’d say that someone was tortured here.”
“That changes things,” Delvaille said. “We’re going to need backup.”
“Now I’d be grateful if you could step away from the crime scene,” the technician said, rummaging in his case.
The bedroom door closed behind him. Vilar’s eyes took a moment to adjust to the crimson half-light. He leaned against the wall as Delvaille strode ahead, his mobile pressed to an ear. Vilar felt a suffocating nausea welling up in him, his head throbbed as though caught in a vice. He took a few blind steps, trailing his hand along the wall to guide himself, then a sudden spasm sent him running into the garden where he fell to his knees, though he retched up only bile. The noonday sun pinned him to the ground, he could feel the dense heat weighing on him, bathing him in sickly sweat. He lay for a moment on the scorched grass, trying to catch his breath and still the muffled pounding of the blood coursing through his body. He heard Delvaille ask if he was alright and he groaned that he was fine and struggled to his feet in spite of the dizziness. Delvaille was holding out a glass of water which Vilar gulped down, gagging and choking, and he managed to draw in enough air to bring himself round.
“Do you have any idea who might have done this?”
Vilar stared at the lieutenant for a moment without knowing whether he even wanted to answer. He could hear the two technicians in the bedroom above, pictured the patch of blood – so much blood – and felt a shiver run up his spine in spite of the heat which beat down on the little garden as though determined to scorch everything.
“What do you reckon?” Vilar said. “No, seriously, what do you reckon … ? D’you think I’d be standing here waiting for the cavalry if I had the slightest fucking clue which bastard tortured Morvan?”
“I’m just trying to understand,” Delvaille said apologetically. “My colleagues will ask you some questions. You know the drill. A man disappears the day you’re coming to visit him, and—”
“Yeah, I know the drill,” Vilar cut him off.
“I know it only too fucking well. I’m guessing Capitaine Daras explained the situation to your boss, right?”
“Maybe, but no-one told me. I got the call-out the same time as l’Identité judiciaire. All I was told was it was a missing persons case and here I am. And since I like to be thorough …”
He spoke softly, without hostility, with no arrogance. He seemed to Vilar to be a decent bloke.
“How about we go back inside?” Delvaille said. “We’ll die of heat-stroke out here.”
He gestured for Vilar to go into the living room.
It was almost cool inside. The shade was soothing and, as one, both men took a deep breath.
“My son,” Vilar said. “He …”
Delvaille was staring at him intently, as though he knew what Vilar was about to say.
In a low voice Vilar told him about Pablo’s abduction, about the false hopes and the hopelessness, then he told him about meeting Morvan, told him he could only promise that he would never give up, that he had got results in three similar cases: one of the kids had been found alive in a brothel in Germany, and the other two had been found buried in the garden of a killer named Bernard Fédieu, who had thrown himself out of a window at the police headquarters in Rennes before it was possible to question him about the half-truths and contradictions in his confession to eight other murders.
“That’s why I’m here,” Vilar said. “I’m still clinging to a kind of hope. Though it’s saner not to hope for much anymore.”
He pulled up a chair. Delvaille, looking intently at the computer screens, hardly seemed to be breathing.
“But you manage to
carry on working, you manage to care about all the shit we have to wade through?”
“I don’t know if I really care anymore, it’s more a kind of addiction. It’s either this, or drink, or drugs. Or take up cycling – as long as you keep pedalling, you stay upright. In the past week we’ve had two big cases, and we’re slogging our guts out. I’ve hardly got time to think, I’ve only been home to grab a bite. Drugs aren’t the only thing that turn you into a zombie …”
Two cars pulled up outside, doors slammed, five, maybe six, Vilar was not sure, and Delvaille hurried to the front door. From the hall came the sound of heavy footsteps, muffled voices asking questions, and the young officer answering in a quiet voice. Vilar got to his feet with a sigh, realising that the nausea was gone, and turned towards the door as four men came in while the fifth headed straight for the bedroom, carrying a big black case, shouting to the forensics techs who told him that it was over there, they were almost done with the bedroom. A big man wearing a dark jacket and a fuchsia polo shirt came over and shook Vilar’s hand, the expression on his face difficult to read.
“Capitaine Niaussat. Michel. Marianne Daras briefly filled me in. I have to warn you right now that she and I have agreed that, professionally speaking, you can have nothing to do with this case. So don’t get in the way, please. For what it’s worth, though, if I were in your shoes I’d be doing exactly what you’ve done.”
“But you’re not in my shoes.”
Niaussat stiffened.
“Listen, I’m not trying to wind you up,” Vilar said. “I don’t care about your compassion, but I appreciate your support. You do your job, I’ll do what I have to do. I won’t get in the way. I’ve got more to gain than you in seeing Morvan found – alive and well preferably.”
Niaussat nodded.
“Then we’re clear. Can you tell me some more, so I know exactly what I’m dealing with? Because Daras was – how shall I put it? – pretty succinct.”
They sat in the only two armchairs in the living room; Delvaille and the other officers had to fetch chairs from the kitchen. Over the next hour Vilar told them about his life since 20 March, 2000 at 11.30 a.m., when Pablo, who was almost ten years old, had disappeared on a street corner a hundred metres from his school gates. Never to return. He spoke in an almost placid voice as they stared at him, all knowing that this apparent gentleness simply masked the wound.
When he had given Niaussat all the information he had on Morvan’s work, what he knew about his methods, his contacts and his habits, Vilar struggled to his feet and asked if he could go. Since none of them dared make him stay even a few minutes longer, he left quickly, as muted voices wished him a safe trip back to Bordeaux, before getting on with the investigation.
Delvaille walked out with him as far as his car and shook his hand, promising to keep him up to speed, regardless of whether or not his bosses said he could. Vilar smiled, patted him on the shoulder, then in spite of himself he studied the blazing street for some clue, something out of the ordinary, but as he sat in his sweltering car, breathing the muggy air, he felt as though any road he took now would run out to be a dead end.
9
The drive took a little less than an hour, and towards the end of the journey, after they had passed Saint-Laurent, there were vineyards as far as the eye could see, beautiful houses with turrets and slate roofs set in magnificent grounds, and the two adults – the director, who was driving, and Bernard – were marvelling at how close they were to the famous wineries advertised on the signs along the road. Victor, who had spent most of the trip dozing, turned around once to see a high-clearance tractor spraying copper sulphate, and the curious shape of the tractor surprised him at first, but then he remembered he had seen one before, though he could not remember where or when, and he stared at the machine, enveloped in a bluish haze, until it disappeared.
On the way into Pauillac they got lost, looked for the road to Saint-Estèphe, and ended up on the quays, driving along the swirling muddy estuary, past the forest of masts in the marina, until a woman gave them directions. Ten minutes later they pulled up outside one of the last houses in the village, after which the narrow road ran between the vineyards.
In spite of the heat that poured in as soon as the car doors were opened, Victor did not get out, leaving the two adults to go and ring at the blue front door. Almost immediately he saw a smiling woman with short brown hair, wearing floral-print leggings and a black T-shirt, bend down and give him a little wave through the car window. Bernard came back and gently told Victor he should come over and say hello, meet his new family, that he couldn’t stay in the car all day.
The boy took a deep breath, got out, and walked towards the smiling woman who held out her hand.
“Hello, Victor. Welcome. My name is Nicole.”
Victor looked at the woman, wondering how old she was. He felt an instinctive repulsion and was glad she had not kissed him. Obviously she was old, but he could not work out how old. Older than his mother, certainly. While she talked to the others, offering them a drink, Victor studied her plump features, her wide hips and her fat thighs in the floral-patterned leggings, the full breasts that heaved under her T-shirt.
“Aren’t you thirsty in all this heat?” she said.
She invited Bernard and the director to come into the garden and briefly laid a hand on Victor’s shoulder, urging him to come with them. She led them to a living room with drawn blinds where it was still relatively cool and told them to wait while she got some refreshments. When she asked what he wanted to drink, Victor mumbled inaudibly and had to repeat, “Some Coke”, as he shook his T-shirt to dry the sweat from his back. Seeing him standing there, Bernard gestured to the spot next to him on the sofa, and Victor sat down and crossed his legs, fiddling with the laces of his trainers. The social worker asked if he was alright and he nodded, still staring at his shoes.
“It’ll be fine,” the director said.
Victor did not react. He felt as though he were being tossed on an ocean, floating on the surface, the way it might feel when a current pulls you out to sea or a whirlpool drags you under and you’re shattered and don’t know what to do, except wait out what little time is left and hope that something will float past for you to cling to. He remembered the last scene in the film “Moby Dick” – a teacher had shown it to them at school one day, and it had made him want to read the book – in which the hero is floating all alone at sea, clinging to the coffin of his friend.
Nicole came back with drinks, explaining that the kids were at the beach at Hourtin with her sister, that they were having a picnic there and would be home at about five o’clock.
“You’ll have the whole day to yourself to get settled in,” she told Victor. “After that, we’ve got all the time in the world to get everyone introduced.”
The boy raised his eyes to hers, then averted them straight away.
“How many foster children do you have here at the moment?” the director said.
“Just one, Julien, he’s ten, and now Victor. And there’s Marilou, our daughter, who’s eleven.”
She smiled to herself, looking down, the gentle look of a contented woman, then, seeing that everyone had drained their glasses, she jumped to her feet.
“Follow me, I’ll show Victor his room.”
She led them up a staircase that creaked as they went, and opened a blue door. Victor stood behind Bernard and the director, and they had to urge him to step into the vast attic room, furnished with a big bed, a desk on which stood a large red lamp, and a little shelf on the wall with two books whose titles he could not make out. The woman turned on the bedside lamp, which gave off such a soft, welcoming glow in the dark room with its closed shutters that the boy immediately wanted to be alone in what would at least be a safe, peaceful refuge.
“You’ll be O.K. here,” Bernard whispered.
Victor forced himself to smile. Obviously, it was better than the children’s home, and obviously he had to live somewhere while he was
waiting, though he did not know what it was he was waiting for, and suspected he might have to find it for himself.
Since he wanted to be alone, he mustered enough breath to ask the adults if he could go and get his things from the car and bring them up to his room, and they looked at each other in surprise and, smiling, gave their blessing. As he went downstairs he heard the director reassure Nicole that everything would be just fine, that there was no need to worry.
When he set down his two bags and his suitcase on the bedroom carpet, having refused to accept help, he shut the door and stood at the foot of the bed, breathless, letting the sweat drip from him, tiredness beating dully in his temples. He could smell clean sheets, old timber, and maybe damp. He listened carefully, but he could not make out the grown-ups’ conversation downstairs. The shutters kept out the birds’ distant muffled trilling and the luminous heat that pressed against the two diamond shapes cut out of the thick wood.
After a while he sat down on the bed, hands wedged under his thighs, looked around this peaceful room and nodded, perhaps in approval at the soothing half-light or perhaps at the vague notion that was gradually forming in his mind, less an idea than a foreboding that made his heart beat faster and brought a lump of bitter rage to his throat and made his eyes sting, a thought that he could not yet put into words, and one that he might never voice since he was beginning to think that words were futile, meaningless sounds whisked away by the wind like empty plastic bags to catch on fences and branches.
There was a knock at the door and he hurried to open it. It was Nicole, come to tell him that Bernard and the director were ready to go back to Bordeaux and wanted to say goodbye. He looked at her and realised she had a pretty smile that made those around her feel good, and made him feel handsome. The sort of smile a girl with a crush might give the boy she loved. He followed her downstairs and shook hands with the director, who said he was counting on Victor to build a new life for himself, a great future. Victor did not really understand what he meant by building a life, he often did not understand what the man was saying, with his flowery phrases and intellectual air. Then Bernard shook his hand and patted him on the arm, saying they were counting on him to be happy.
Talking to Ghosts Page 13
