Sebag absolutely did not remember that.
“Yeah, vaguely . . .”
“If this guy had had other mistresses, we can imagine another husband taking revenge on him. A guy who didn’t have the balls to punch him in the face and chose a different method.”
Sebag thought the idea pertinent. Unfortunately. He would have greatly preferred to work on a different kind of case . . . . The burglaries in Bas-Vernet, the merchants, tobacco smuggling, drunk driving, speeding. Anything but these endless cases involving adultery . . .
“I called Balland a little while ago. He’s waiting for us where he works.”
“Now?”
“Whenever we want.”
Sebag rubbed his eyes. He would have liked another glass of whiskey. But Jacques was already on his feet and was playing with his keys.
“You driving or am I?”
Gilles gave his partner a severe look. An idea occurred to him. He too could take a little revenge.
“It’s nice this morning, let’s go on foot.”
“On what?”
“On foot, you know, walking.”
“That’s what I thought you said.”
“Feet are those things you put in your shoes every morning, you know. And what are shoes made for? For walking!”
“I thought they were used only to press on the accelerator.”
“They can also be useful for giving a kick in the ass to a colleague who’s a little too lazy.”
“Stop, I’m scared . . . All right, we’ll go on foot: I like new experiences.”
The Archipelago, where Christine Abad’s lover worked as a sound engineer, was a recently constructed theater that people considered prestigious. Or pretentious. Designed by the architect Jean Nouvel, its four different structures rose over the south bank of the Têt. Molina liked the “Garnet,” a kind of flying saucer the color of the traditional Catalan gems. This ovoid edifice rested on a pink cube whose façade was engraved with cultural quotations. All that was not bad. But why had the famous architect decided to add two metal hangars alongside it? While it was being built, Jacques had thought that they were construction sheds. Only later did he realize that they were part of the masterpiece.
“Forty-four million euros for this piece of shit,” he complained as they entered the building.
“You’re a little harsh.”
“I’d be less harsh if Perpignan weren’t already one of the most indebted cities in France!”
Éric Balland was waiting for the policemen under the great glass roof of the lobby. He had them sit down around a table.
“Was it really necessary to come here? I could have gone to police headquarters. It’s right nearby.”
He wasn’t trying to conceal his irritation.
“It’s right nearby for us, too, and we felt like walking,” Molina explained. “We also wanted to find out how you’re doing.”
“Very kind of you! My wife has thrown me out, she never wants to see me again, and doesn’t want me to see my children, either. Not even the dog! Now I’m living alone in a residential hotel just next door. There, now you know everything!”
“Am I mistaken or are you angry at us?” Molina retorted.
Balland ran his hands over his face. His irritation subsided.
“Sorry, you’re not to blame for this, it’s true. I take responsibility for it, it’s my fault, I did something foolish.”
“Still, what your wife did isn’t cool,” Molina conceded to calm things down. “She threw you out for . . . a single mistake. That’s pretty hard-nosed . . .”
“Yeah.”
Balland seemed ill at ease. Molina saw that Gilles had been right the other day. “It might not have been the first time that she learned about something . . .”
The lover gave him a black look. He wasn’t yet ready to let the cat out of the bag.
“My wife didn’t throw me out until she’d caught me a second time,” Jacques admitted. “How about you?”
“You didn’t come here just to talk to me about my private life, I suppose?”
“Yes, we did!”
“Are you joking?”
“Do I look like I’m joking?”
Balland didn’t have to look at him long to have his answer.
“I have nothing to say to you, it doesn’t concern your investigation!”
“There have been developments you don’t know about.”
“That’s a pretty facile argument to worm information out of me.”
“So there is information to be wormed out . . .”
“I have nothing to say to you.”
“We can go ask your wife.”
“At this point, I don’t give a damn.”
“Really?”
The two men glared at each other. Molina sensed hesitation in Balland. He stood up.
“All right, then, we’re leaving. You coming, Gilles?”
Jacques was using the technique usual in difficult interviews: he established at the outset that he was the one running the show, and then let Gilles develop his questions. Balland waved his arm to get Molina to sit down again.
“OK, you win.”
Jacques sat down at the table. He waited for Sebag to take over, but nothing happened.
“I’m listening.”
Balland let a few seconds go by before finally saying:
“It was the . . . third time that she discovered something.”
“Were they all married women?” Molina asked. “By ‘married’ I mean, of course, ‘in a couple?’”
“Most of them, yes.”
Molina raised an eyebrow. Balland’s answer had been clumsy, even blundering. He had to seize the opportunity.
“Most of the three or most of all of them?”
“Are all these questions really useful?” Balland moaned.
“Yes, I assure you they are. Answer me and I’ll tell you what justifies them.”
Balland shook his head several times. He was becoming resigned.
“I’ve cheated on my wife seven times since we were married. Always with women who were ‘in a couple,’ as you put it. Contrary to what you think, I was very attached to my family life and I didn’t want one of my affairs to become too important, or one of these women to ask me for more than I could give her.”
“Could you tell us the names of these women?”
“You’re jok—”
Balland interrupted himself. Molina still didn’t look like he was joking.
“I can’t do that. It’s impossible.”
Sebag coughed. He was waking up.
“We have learned that an anonymous letter-writer had informed Stéphane Abad of his wife’s infidelity. Someone photographed you with Christine in front of the Gecko and sent the photos to her husband.”
Sebag paused to give Balland time to take that in. In order to put pressure on the lover, on the way to the theater they’d decided to conceal the other hypotheses they were also pursuing.
“We have good reason to think that this someone also acted with the intention of harming you.”
“To harm me? But why?”
“After what you’ve just admitted, don’t you have any idea?”
“Jealous husbands?”
“For example.”
“That’s nonsense!”
Balland’s tone lacked conviction. As he was speaking, he must have been reviewing the list of his conquests and their husbands.
“I really don’t see it. In any case, I very seldom knew the husbands.”
“That’s why we’d like to have a list . . .” Molina said, trying again.
“Out of the question! This business has already broken up my marriage, I don’t want to break up anybody else’s.”
“You’re forgetting the Abad couple!”
Sebag replied curtly.
“That’s true . . .”
“We’ll be very discreet . . .” Molina promised.
“I won’t do it.”
“You have no choice.”
“One always has a choice.”
“We can indict you for obstruction of justice.”
Balland shrugged.
“If you think that will make me do what you want . . . I’ve lost Christine, I’ve lost my wife, I may be going to lose my children. I don’t want to lose respect for myself.”
Molina applauded loudly. In the lobby, faces turned toward their table.
“Bravo! What a speech! It’s lovely, but it doesn’t get us anywhere. We want a list.”
“I won’t give you one.”
Balland was digging in his heels.
“Do you think someone other than a jealous husband might have had it in for you? A co-worker, for example?”
Molina admired Sebag’s attempt at an end run.
“No, I don’t,” Balland answered calmly. “There’s a good atmosphere here, people are cool. We have a great job.”
“You don’t have other . . . other weaknesses in your life? I don’t know, gambling, for instance.”
“I occasionally play poker with friends but we don’t place large bets. And as I said, they’re friends!”
“So we come back then to jealous husbands,” Molina concluded. The other day you told us that you knew that Stéphane Abad was violent. Do you recall another husband with a fiery, vindictive temperament?”
“No. As I told you. I didn’t know much about them.”
“In this city there is a man who has it in for you and who seems prepared to do anything to hurt you. Don’t you want us to arrest him?”
“Not at that price. And there’s nothing he can do to hurt me: I’ve lost everything, he has already won.”
“Maybe he doesn’t consider his vengeance complete. He might want to attack your children?”
“You’re trying to scare me, and I’m not fooled.”
“We prefer to foresee the worst so that it doesn’t happen. You’d be the first to reproach us if we didn’t.”
Sebag tried a new, parallel approach.
“This accusation led to Christine’s death. Don’t you want us to catch this guy?”
“Nothing indicates that that is what he wanted. Maybe now he regrets it. And then he isn’t the one who pulled the trigger!”
“But he is partly responsible, isn’t he? And you don’t give a damn whether or not he’s punished?”
Balland sighed but did not give in.
“No, I do care, and I hope you’ll catch him. But I won’t help you. Not in the way you’re asking me to. Don’t persist. You may think that I’m just a skirt-chaser, but I had feelings for each of the women I slept with, and I’ve maintained contact with some of them. I won’t betray them.”
Molina slapped his thighs, loudly.
“OK, fine. So here’s what we’re going to do: we’re going to send you an official summons for another interview at police headquarters, and if you still refuse to cooperate, we’ll indict you for obstruction of justice. In the meantime, we’re going to investigate your private life on our own, and we won’t be tactful or subtle about it. You can trust me, I’m an expert in that domain. We’re going to question all your colleagues and all your friends, including your yoga partners. I’m warning you: this may cause damage.”
He forced himself to remain firm but he felt a certain respect for Balland’s obstinacy. For the first time since the beginning of the interview, Balland took his time before answering. But he did not yield.
“If you have time to waste . . .”
Molina stood up.
“We’ll leave it there for the moment. But you’ll soon be hearing from us.”
“I’m sorry.”
“You’ll be really sorry. Soon. I guarantee you that.”
On the way back to headquarters, Sebag and Molina remained silent for a long time. They had obtained nothing from Balland. Even the final bluff hadn’t worked. But was it really a bluff?
“You’re not going to mess up his life?” Sebag asked with concern.
“I admit that I’m pretty tempted to kick the anthill.”
“First we have to be sure about this line of investigation. Let’s wait and see if François gets anywhere. This morning he was supposed to try to find the former guard at Cantalou. I haven’t yet had any news about that.”
“Yeah, you’re undoubtedly right. And then I might have another idea . . .”
“Two ideas in one day, wow! Is it your English girl who’s stimulating you?”
“Must be!”
Jacques suddenly frowned. Sebag remembered that he had found him in a bad mood when he got to work. He avoided any mockery in his tone.
“And what is this new idea?”
“I don’t know if you deserve to hear it.”
“You have the right to maintain the suspense.”
“I’m going to work on it this afternoon and I’ll tell you tomorrow. Maybe . . .”
“OK.”
“What about you, what are you doing this afternoon?”
“Uhh . . . I’ll talk to you about it tomorrow. Maybe . . .”
The “madman of the Rue Viollet-le-Duc,” as the media had nicknamed him without much originality, remained hospitalized under police surveillance. The psychiatrist who had examined him feared that he might still be a danger to others and especially to himself, and wanted to have him transferred to the psychiatric hospital in Thuir.
“He’s a fool, that doctor. I’m not crazy!”
“Of course not, but you need help and support. Now, if you’d prefer to go directly to jail, I can have a word with the judge.”
“Uhh . . . I think I’ll try the insane asylum, then. But do you really think I’m going to go to jail?”
“We’ll do everything we can to avoid that. I promised you.”
Gali was sitting on a chair next to the room’s window, and Sebag had put one buttock on the bed.
“Do you think that anything is still possible with Véronique? I love her . . . I miss her already.”
“You’re the only one who can answer that question.”
“But what do you think?”
“I’m not a shrink . . .”
Sebag contemplated the blue sky through the window. The weather was incredibly warm. On the way to the hospital he had heard on the radio that the temperature in the department had risen above 20° C.2222 For January 6, that was exceptional.
Gali was still waiting for a real answer.
“Every couple has to find its own way,” Gilles explained, “its own way of defining the goal and setting the limits. What one must and wants to accept, and what one can’t tolerate. I can’t answer for the two of you, or for you alone.”
“But you can answer for yourself, and it’s your opinion I’m asking for.”
“I’m not in a good position to do that.”
“On the contrary.”
Sebag no longer wanted to talk about himself. But he had to provide after-sales service.
“Frankly, I don’t know. First of all, there’s the past, which you’ll have to cope with, that wound that is going to have to heal. Then, and especially, there’s the future: restoring trust . . . Since both of you want it, you’ve got to try. But above all it’s a battle against yourself that you’ll have to wage . . .”
After having said good-bye to Bastien, Sebag went down a few floors to visit Véronique in another ward. The young woman had recovered; she would be released the following day. Social services had already found her a place in a center for battered women. She confirmed that she would not be filing a complaint. He spoke to her about nothing else. When he bent down to give her a good-bye peck, he could
tell that her hair still smelled of gasoline.
Night had fallen and the wind was coming up. Winter was returning full force. As he got out of his car, Gilles pulled up the collar of his jacket. In front of police headquarters he found Elsa Moulin smoking a cigarette. She handed him her pack.
“Smoking is bad for your health,” he sighed, taking a cigarette. “We‘d be better off quitting.”
“Are you afraid of cancer?”
“No, bronchitis! In the winter, it’s risky to smoke out of doors.”
She offered him a light. He put his hands on hers to protect the lighter’s flame.
“By the way, I’ve got news for you,” the head of the forensic police announced. “I was just about to call you.”
“Did you speak to Ménard about it?”
“No. Should I have?”
“We’re working on one of his ideas . . .”
Elsa looked at him with curiosity.
“I was just thinking that you didn’t look so good. Are you sick?”
“Why do you ask me that?”
“Since when is it Ménard who has ideas?”
22 68° F.
CHAPTER 27
Sebag followed Elsa Moulin into the lair of the forensic police. To reach her office they had to pass through the laboratory. On the white tile drain boards, utensils were piled, each of them more mysterious than the next. Gilles considered his colleagues modern sorcerers who were capable of making objects, fluids, marks, and even dust speak, alchemists endowed with powers that were scientific, to be sure, but obscure for common mortals. For a long time, these cops had borne an image of rigorous, tiresome drudges, people who worked in offices and laboratories, dreary and austere. But over the years they had developed their techniques so far that even the most obsolete beat cop now expected them to perform miracles. Molina loved to repeat that on the basis of a single pubic hair found on a crime scene, these magicians could tell you the guy’s age, how long it had been since his gun was fired, the bar code of his last condom, his bank balance, his mother’s first name, and that of the postman . . .
Elsa leaned against the doorframe of her office and gestured to Sebag to enter. To get past her, he couldn’t avoid grazing her white blouse, which absorbed her form without completely concealing it. The cops in the forensic unit had really changed recently! Elsa Moulin had been running the unit for only a short time, and Gilles had never regretted the departure of her grumpy predecessor, Jean Pages. He liked the young woman’s smile as well as her relaxed style, her availability, and her competence. Once they were both seated on one side of the desk, Elsa showed him big piles of copies and a few stapled sheets. She put her hand on the first pile.
Crimes of Winter Page 21
