‘Exactly, Port Manech and Le Pouldu. The one in Port Manech is bigger and has a bigger warehouse too. The one in Le Pouldu is apparently more of a shed. But of course I haven’t seen either of them myself. He described them to me a little bit. There are other plots of land in the inheritance, but they’re smaller.’
‘Can you tell me exactly where these two plots of land are? Do you have the addresses?’
‘The will just lists the possessions bequeathed. Then it refers you to the land registry entries and quotes the land registry numbers. The land registry entries are in Monsieur Pennec’s private papers. Perhaps the Pennecs will know… sorry, I mean, perhaps Madame Pennec might know where exactly the plots are, or maybe Madame Lajoux or Monsieur Delon.’
‘I’d rather find out some other way.’
‘Hmmm… you could try the mayor’s offices.’
‘All right then.’
‘I’m sorry I can’t be more helpful.’
‘You’ve been extremely helpful!’
‘Good, it’s been a pleasure, Monsieur Dupin. I’m sure you’ll solve the case soon.’
Dupin smiled in spite of himself. ‘Maybe, Madame Denis. Au revoir.’
He had no idea how far he’d walked along the path through the wood. He hadn’t been paying much attention to the landscape on the way and he was paying even less now. Port Manech and Le Pouldu. Port Manech was ten minutes away by car, Le Pouldu perhaps three quarters of an hour. He needed the exact addresses.
‘Nolwenn?’
‘Are you still thinking?’
‘I need two pieces of information.’
‘That was quick.’
‘What?’
‘Nothing. And I take it you need both pieces of information right now.’
‘Exactly. Pierre-Louis Pennec had two larger plots of land, each around a thousand metres squared, one in Port Manech, one in Le Pouldu, each with a kind of warehouse on it. I need the exact addresses.’
‘One is in Port Manech, one in Pouldu.’
‘That’s right.’
Nolwenn had hung up.
Now Marie Morgane Cassel. He dialled her number. It took her longer to answer this time.
‘Bonjour, Monsieur Dupin.’
‘Yes, it’s me.’
‘Where should I be headed?’
‘Really? I mean, if you could, if your commitments allow… I think you could be extremely helpful to us again. It’s possible we’re reaching the end of this case.’
‘The last act?’
‘Possibly. The hotel I think, yes, that would be good. If you could come to the hotel… Inspector Le Ber will be waiting for you there.’
‘I’m on my way.’
‘Thanks. Thank you so much.’
Now Le Ber again. He dialled his number. Le Ber answered immediately.
‘Yes, Monsieur le Commissaire?’
‘Madame Cassel is on her way from Brest, she’ll be with you in an hour. Then I want you to go with her to… I think to Port Manech. I’ll let you know the exact address. Is there any news from Labat? From Beauvois?’
‘I imagine Labat will only just have arrived in Quimper.’
‘Good, it’ll just be the two of us then. Which of our colleagues from Pont-Aven are there?’
‘Monfort. All hell has broken out here since we last spoke. Everyone has read Le Figaro, or at least heard about it. The officers from Pont-Aven, the guests and the whole village, apparently. Of course everyone thinks the painting is still hanging here in the restaurant. A few people have already asked whether they can take a look at it sometime. What should we do?’
‘Nothing. Our work. That’s got nothing to do with us.’
‘And what do we want with Port Manech?’
‘You’ll see soon enough.’
‘Okay. We’ll hit the road as soon as Madame Cassel gets here, Monsieur le Commissaire.’
‘Hurry. I’m heading there right away, as soon as I get to my car.’
‘Where are you now then?’
‘I’ll see you in Port Manech, Le Ber. Speak soon.’ Dupin thought Port Manech was the most beautiful town on the coast. This was where the Aven and the Belon flowed into a sheltered bay. And from the little beach opposite their estuaries you could either look at both rivers or out to the open Atlantic. A dozen tall fairytale palm trees grew in the dazzlingly white, fine sand. The beach sloped gently downwards to the turquoise sea. The coast’s landscape was rugged where the Belon met the sea, cliffs towering upwards, twenty or thirty metres high. The cliffs were overgrown with grass in every shade of green, somewhat reminiscent of Ireland. The hills were higher here than in Pont-Aven and it was striking how steeply they fell away to the sea, so that the streets led down to the beach and harbour at a mind-bending incline, dividing the village into three: the Port Manech on the plateau above, the one on the hillside with the magnificent villas and the Port Manech down by the water. Dupin particularly liked its cosy little harbour.
Nolwenn still needed a little time, it was more complicated than it had seemed; she had given him a brief update. Of course, none of the records were digitised yet – everything had to be looked up in bulging files. Dupin urgently needed caffeine. Right on the beach, but set back a little on a raised platform, there was a small, unpretentious café where you could sit and look out on the Belon estuary. There were only a few tables on the terrace but none of them were taken. The waitress, a young girl in a faded blue dress with artfully dishevelled hair, looked very tired. Dupin ordered a coffee and a pain au chocolat. He had just placed his mobile on the table in front of him when it rang. Nolwenn. Dupin answered immediately.
‘I have the addresses, both of them. Le Pouldu was easy actually, Port Manech was a bit of a mission. I had to speak to the mayor personally on the phone.’
‘Fantastic. Right, let me have it.’ He took his notebook and pen out of his pocket.
‘Where are you?’
‘In Port Manech. Down on the beach.’
‘Okay. Listen carefully. Take the road past the beach, it’s called the Corniche du Pouldon, and then follow the steep road up the hill to your left, as though you were leaving the village. That really narrow road.’
‘Okay.’
‘Drive for around three hundred metres and there’ll be an unpaved path on your right just before you take a sharp left.’
‘Okay.’
‘There’s a villa on the left hand side. That’s where the big pine trees are. Turn onto the path here. Drive for around two hundred metres, in the direction of the Aven in fact. Another path branches off to the left. It’s parallel to the Aven and it goes back down the hill a bit. This is the one you take.’
‘How do you know all this, Nolwenn?’
‘I was faxed a copy of the site map by the mayor’s office… and I have Google Maps. Then you keep going straight until you reach the warehouse. It must be about another three hundred metres.’
Dupin had copied down every detail.
‘I’m sure I’ll find it. Thank you.’
‘The big new Citroën has an excellent satnav.’
‘I know.’
This was one of Nolwenn’s favourite topics. And she was right; he might find a device like that very useful. He must seriously consider it. He drank the coffee in one gulp, stood up, left the money and took the pain au chocolat back to his car with him.
Nolwenn’s description had been accurate. Five minutes later he took the last turning onto a path that was little more than a dirt track, and parked the car. He walked slowly down the path. Even this was picturesque. Gentle hills, fields, meadows, little woods. You could see them – the landscapes by Gauguin, Laval, Bernard. You found yourself inside them. Very little had changed here over the last hundred years. Dupin found it astonishing how realistic the paintings seemed once you were here. They were more accurate than any photograph.
To his surprise, the warehouse was not a warehouse at all, but a magnificent kind of barn. Dupin had been expecting something completely dif
ferent, something smaller. The walls were made of stone, at least fifteen metres high, although not in good condition. And the slate roof sagged dangerously, overgrown with moss.
On the side closest to the Aven there was a hefty wooden door that rounded at the top, but no windows.
Dupin had no trouble with the door; it was surprisingly easy to open. It must have been used recently. An enormous, imposing room appeared in front of him, much bigger than it had seemed from outside. It had a dirt floor. He stepped inside. A thin beam of light fell through a hole in the roof that Dupin hadn’t spotted from outside. There was total silence. A musty smell. Dupin flinched. His phone was ringing. He saw Le Ber’s number.
‘Yes?’
‘Madame Cassel has arrived at the hotel. Where do you want us to drive to? And Labat wants to speak to you about Beauvois. I’ve spoken to Salou on the phone already too, he was outraged not to have been informed of the progress we’d made and then he had to read –’
‘I’ll call you back.’
Dupin hung up. Not now. He waited until his eyes had grown accustomed to the dark and then walked back and forth across the room. The room was completely empty. Bare. It was odd, but there really was nothing here. Nothing at all. And it seemed as though nothing had been here for many, many years. There were no footprints on the ground.
Dupin had been so sure the painting would be here, but he must have been wrong. Or at least his first guess was wrong. But maybe he’d been wrong about everything.
He went to the door, stepped outside and walked once around the outside of the barn. There was nothing unusual here either. Not in the least. He closed the door and felt for his phone.
‘Le Ber, we’re going to meet in Le Pouldu, not in Port Manech. At the entrance to the village. You’ll probably be there before me.’
‘At the sign for Le Pouldu, if you’re coming from Pont-Aven?’
‘Yes.’
‘When?’
Dupin would have to take the small roads towards Pont-Aven, go through the village, over the Aven, through bustling Riec-sur-Belon, around the Belon, westwards slightly, then back down to the sea. Perhaps an hour.
‘I’m leaving now. Give me half an hour.’
It was quarter past twelve when Dupin arrived in Le Pouldu, having managed the journey in twenty-seven minutes. He had seen Le Ber’s bright red Renault in the distance. It was right next to the sign, so close it looked like Le Ber had crashed into it. It read ‘Le Pouldu’ and underneath was the Celtic name: ‘Poull du’, or black sea. And in the same size lettering: ‘The Artists’ Path’. Dupin still remembered the marketing slogan competition they had held for over a year and a half, the winner of which had been ‘The Artists’ Path’; Brittany had decided to embrace its artistic inheritance – but as there had been so many painters in Brittany, in so many different towns, the same sign was up everywhere.
Nolwenn had given him just as precise a description for Le Pouldu as she had for Port Manech, he just hadn’t been able to write it down while driving. He drove slowly past Le Ber and nodded to him. He could see Madame Cassel in the passenger seat. Le Ber started his car and drove close behind Dupin. It was the first turn off to the right after the entrance to the village, then they had to follow the signposts for the so-called ‘Buvette de la Plage’ which had recently been turned into a museum. Gauguin lived and painted here for a few months, together with his friends Meyer de Haan, Sérusier and Filiger. The house had belonged to Marie-Jeanne Pennec too but she had sold it while she was still alive after the painters had left the area one by one.
Dupin drove to the ‘Buvette’ as Nolwenn had called it, then along the little road parallel to the sea and took the first right onto a bumpy track. They drove along at walking pace and followed the path as it veered sharply to the right after some woodland.
Suddenly the building appeared out of nowhere, right in front of them on the path. This one was really a shack, weatherbeaten wood, an ugly corrugated iron roof and not big, just a few metres square. They drove right up to it and turned off their engines.
Dupin got out and went over to Le Ber’s car.
‘Bonjour, Madame Cassel. I’d like to thank you again, once more you are –’
‘Here? You think the Gauguin is going to be here? A forty-million-euro painting in this shed?’ She was nervous.
‘If we find the painting, you might be able to give me an initial, provisional confirmation of its authenticity. That could be crucial. And you –’
‘Nobody would keep such a valuable painting here.’
‘But perhaps they’d stash it here temporarily. For a little while.’
‘How did you come up with your theory that the painting could be here? I mean how did you come up with this place in particular?’
It seemed a little strange now, even to Dupin. It was just a suspicion, and he had set so much in motion. ‘It’s a long story.’
‘Let’s search the shed, Monsieur le Commissaire.’ Even Le Ber was impatient now.
Oddly enough the door was on the other side of the shed, so they walked around it quickly. It was locked with a heavy padlock which looked neither obviously new nor obviously old. The little windowpane next to the door was blacked out. Before Dupin could even say anything, Le Ber had rummaged in his pocket and pulled out a thin wire. Dupin was always forgetting that Le Ber’s practical skills sometimes verged on the magical. Madame Cassel was also looking at Le Ber in awe. It took less than half a minute to pick the lock. Excellent.
‘I’m going in. Le Ber, stay here with Madame Cassel.’
The narrow little door wasn’t easy to open; it jammed and stuck on the uneven ground. Dupin managed to get it open a crack. It was completely dark inside the shed; the only light came through the small opening in the doorway and it didn’t help much.
‘I’ll get you a torch.’
With Le Ber already on his way back to the car, Madame Cassel and Dupin tried to make out some of the objects closest to the door. The shed looked like it was filled up to the rafters. Right next to the door there was a pile of empty canisters and they could see farming machinery, two big barrels and an old bathtub. A moment later Le Ber was standing next to them with the torch. It was huge.
‘An LED Lenser X21.’
Le Ber’s eyes lit up for a moment. Dupin shrugged and turned it on. He squeezed nimbly through the narrow opening in the doorway and cleared a path for himself inside the shed. He had to do more climbing than actual walking. It was pitch-black. The torch cast a clear, very bright beam of light on the various objects in the shed. A large, rusty plough with several old wooden chairs balanced precariously on top. The chairs were missing anything and everything: sometimes the backrest, sometimes a leg, sometimes the seat. More canisters of various sizes. The beam of light was dancing around wildly as Dupin moved. He was impressed by the amount of stuff that could fit in a shed of this size; it seemed as though more and more objects had simply been squeezed in over the course of decades, piled up and stuffed down in a manner as chaotic as it was artistic.
Dupin had somehow managed to force his way into the middle of the room, and was now standing still. A sharp, pervasive smell hung in the air. Disgusting. Dupin pivoted slowly around on one leg and moved systematically through the room with the torch.
‘Monsieur le Commissaire?’ It was just a few metres, but Le Ber’s voice sounded far away, muffled. ‘All okay over here.’
‘Found anything?’
‘No.’ Dupin cleared a path for himself to the opposite wall, it didn’t look as though anything had been changed here recently. The dust lay centimetres deep. ‘There’s nothing here.’ Dupin had to shout so that they could hear him. He moved back to the centre of the room and tried to make his way to each of the corners from there – insofar as this was possible. Anyone who wanted to hide the painting here would have had the same difficulties. This wasn’t plausible.
‘I’m coming out.’ The sense of resignation that washed over him was so great that Dupin
couldn’t even scream. Nothing. Yet again, nothing.
He clambered back the way he had come. Just before the door the beam of light fell on the far end of the bathtub, which was effectively divided into sections by a thick pole lying across it. Dupin could make out what looked like a blanket or towel. A white fabric. With some careful manoeuvring, he climbed over the pole jutting out into the room. The fabric looked like a sheet – a pristine one. He was standing next to the tub now. He felt the object carefully. Underneath the sheet was something soft, then something narrow and hard with sharp edges. It was large. With his right hand he felt for the seam in the sheet and tried to pull it away. It wouldn’t come off.
‘Le Ber?’
‘Yes?’
‘I need you.’
‘Have you found something?’ Le Ber tried to open the door a bit wider, but couldn’t.
‘I’ll give you some light, Le Ber. I’m near the door, but you’ve got to go to the middle of the shed first, and then come towards me.’
Le Ber deftly made his way over to Dupin.
‘Hold the torch, I want to pick something up.’
Le Ber did as he was told and Dupin carefully lifted the object. The dimensions were exactly right. This had to be it. Dupin had gone very quiet. ‘You go first.’
They made their way towards the door in single file. Marie Morgane Cassel watched the bizarre procession, peering right inside through the crack in the door. They reached the exit.
‘You squeeze through, Le Ber, then I’ll hand it to you.’
As Dupin stepped outside, he had to keep his eyes closed for a moment. The sun was practically still at its peak and it was blindingly bright. Slowly he opened his eyes. Le Ber had placed the covered object in the field next to the path. Without saying a word, the three of them knelt down in front of it. Dupin pulled back the white sheet, revealing a dark blue blanket. He gently lifted this too.
Even in direct sunlight, the garish orange jumped out at them.
Dupin pulled the blanket off. The painting was in pristine condition. All three of them stared at the Gauguin and were silent. It took their breath away.
Marie Morgane Cassel was the first to snap out of the reverie. ‘It can’t be kept in the sun like this.’
Death in Pont-Aven Page 23
