Where Secrets Reside

by Susan Finlay

  “Go on,” Goddard said.

  “Over the four months I was there, I wasn’t able to see her more than a few times. We would occasionally talk on the phone or send text messages. One evening she sent me a text message asking me to meet her at a bar, knowing that her husband would be out. Ten minutes after I arrived, four men showed up. One of them was her husband. They beat me up and threatened to kill me if I didn’t leave the city.”

  “Did you report the attack?”

  “No. I realized that I probably had it coming.”

  “What is the woman’s name?”

  “Please leave her out of this. She doesn’t need to get her husband riled up again, and neither do I.”

  “Her name?”

  Alain groaned and said, “Odette Armistead.”

  Goddard scribbled it in his note pad.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  DAVE WALKED PAST Café Charbonneau and the town hall to the dirt trail that led him home. Once out of sight, he rolled his neck back and forth several times, then lifted his shoulders, released, and repeated five times. It was a stress reduction technique he’d learned while on the Chicago police force.

  The interview with Captain Goddard early in the day had been difficult. Going home afterward and talking to Maurelle about something she would not want to hear—that would be worse.

  He slowed his pace when he reached the area where Maurelle had found the child. He’d seen the police tape marking the area, and he’d even looked around the area for clues the gendarmes might have missed. What baffled him, as it must Goddard, was how the child had ended up here. It wasn’t close to the cave. Had the child been out all night during the storm?

  The thought of a young child all alone in the dark, thunder crashing around her and rain and hail pelting her was almost enough to make him sick. What would an experience like that do to a child? She must have been scared to death. The only positive was the thought that the baby might not have witnessed her mother’s murder. Dave had heard of cases where a child witnessed the murder of a parent, and the psychological effect often lasted a lifetime. The thought brought on a sudden chill and an urgency to get home to Maurelle and their unborn baby.

  “CAPTAIN, I HAVE the information you asked for. The names of the colleges the women attended and the dates.”

  “Ah, thank you.”

  Goddard accepted the piece of paper from Officer Vargas. Glancing down at the information, he released a loud sigh.

  “Do you know what this means?” Goddard asked.

  “No, sir.”

  “Maura Barrington graduated from the same university as Gabrielle Thibault. Birkbeck College, University of London. It’s in the Bloomsbury district of central London. The dates they were there overlap by one year, with Gabrielle having left at the end of Maura’s first school year. What do you think the odds are of the victim and a suspect both attending the same university at the same time? If they were from the same area and attending a local university, perhaps I could accept it as coincidence, but from two different countries, attending the same major university is quite a coincidence.”

  “At least the second victim, Felicia Beaumont, didn’t go to school in England. She attended the University of Orléans here in France.”

  Goddard nodded.

  “We need to find out if the women knew each other.” No matter how much he suspected the killer was a man, probably a married man who was having an affair, there was no way he could ignore the links to Maurelle Martin, aka Maura Barrington.

  “Officers Roland and Jaillet are still in Paris. I’ll need you to check with the university in London. Speak with admissions personnel and some of the professors in the college of education. See if anyone remembers the women. Did they have any classes together?”

  “Yes, sir. How soon do you want me to leave?”

  “No. Not leave. Do this over the telephone.”

  Vargas’s shoulders slumped. “Sir.” He turned to leave, then hesitated. “Oh, I don’t know if anyone told you. I saw Beaubrun bring in your next suspect, Jonas Lefèvre, about ten minutes ago. He’s in the interview room.”

  “Thank you, Officer Vargas. That will be all.”

  “I’M SORRY I was gone so long,” Dave said as he walked into the kitchen where Maurelle was chopping vegetables.

  Maurelle looked up from the cutting board and smiled. He looked tired. “Come sit,” she said. “We can talk while I work on dinner.”

  He slid one of the bar stools over to the counter and sat down.

  “Did you find out anything?” Maurelle asked.

  “Not much. It started raining. I took cover indoors and chatted with a few shop owners. I tried to explore your cave, but I couldn’t get inside. At one end there were gendarmes and at the other end was a barricade.”

  “That’s normal, isn’t it, during an investigation?”

  “I was hoping the gendarmes might not know about the interior entrance.”

  “Well, if they didn’t know, someone probably told them,” Maurelle said. “I can’t understand people around here. At times they’re tight-lipped and at other times they blurt out everyone’s secrets or make-up things to give themselves something to gossip about.”

  “Yeah, I know what you mean. Hey, speaking of which, have you heard anything related to Jonas and Lillian?”

  “I don’t think so. Why?”

  “It’s probably nothing, but I saw Lillian down by the river. She was throwing something into the water. I might have thought she was feeding the ducks, but whatever it was made a loud splash and she acted odd. Like she wanted to make sure no one saw her.”

  Maurelle tilted her head, thinking about it. “Well, I don’t like repeating idle gossip, but I was told that Jonas is having an affair. At least with one, maybe two women. I don’t know if Lillian knows, or not. I don’t know why that would make her throw something in the river, though, other than Jonas,” she said, smirking.

  “Hmm. Maybe I’ll try talking to her.” He was quiet for a moment while Maurelle took some tomatoes and carrots out of the refrigerator. When she set them on a plate, he said, “Speaking of talking, could I steal you away from the kitchen for a while?”

  She frowned. “Why?”

  “We need to talk. Let’s go into the living room.” He didn’t wait but turned and walked away, apparently expecting her to follow.

  Wondering what this was about, she laid down her knife, wiped her hands on a towel, and took off her apron. In the living room, she found him sitting on the sofa. He patted the seat next to him, and she sat down. His face looked somber, making her worried.

  He sighed, then said, “I don’t know how to tell you this, Maurelle. I lied to you about where I was going. I didn’t go to the U.S. on a book tour. I went to England.”

  Her mouth dropped open and she stared at him, uncomprehending.

  “I received a phone call from Nigel James. Remember I told you he was Greg’s detective friend in London?”

  She nodded.

  “Nigel said that the case might be reopened. Someone, a neighbor of Jared and his mother, came forward and said she saw you leave the house on the night of Jared’s murder. She said you were slinking away in the shadows, with your head down like you were trying to hide your face. She recognized you from your clothes—beige slacks and a purple jumper, supposedly an outfit you wore a lot.”

  “What . . . I mean, why would someone say something like that after all this time? Ian Waitley confessed. He’s in prison.”

  Dave placed his hand over Maurelle’s. “I have to ask you: Did you go to the house that night?”

  “No, of course not. I told you what happened.”

  Who had gone to the police and made that statement? And why now? This was crazy. She pushed her hair behind one ear, squirmed, and tried to control her breathing.

  Dave leaned forward on the sofa. He was no longer looking at her but instead down at the floor. “Maurelle, I talked to the woman. She said she was ill at the time of the murder.
She’d been undergoing radiation treatments and had been in bed most of the day. When she finally got up and went into the kitchen to get something to eat, she took her dinner into her living room to watch television. Her dog ran to the window and started running back and forth, barking. The commotion made her get up and look outside.”

  “She—she was mistaken. Or maybe she dreamed it. My mother went through radiation, too. Sometimes she would sleep fitfully and have nightmares.”

  “The woman didn’t think too much about it until she saw police next door in the morning.”

  “Well, why didn’t she say anything to them if she thought she saw something?”

  “Her caregiver was at her house to take her to the hospital for her treatment. On the way, they were in a car accident. She didn’t get out of the hospital for many months. It was months after that when someone told her what had happened, and that Ian Waitley was in prison. I have to tell you, she sounded convincing.”

  Maurelle’s head was spinning. She remembered Alice Rickards. A friendly spinster who pottered in her gardens and gave away any vegetables she couldn’t eat. Who wouldn’t believe a rosy-cheeked old lady?

  “I won’t lie to you,” Dave said. He turned his body so that he was facing her again. “If the case is reopened, you’ll have to go back to England. I talked to Ian Waitley’s solicitor. Ian still says he murdered Jared, but I don’t know what will happen in court. This is really bad and there isn’t much I can do unless you tell me the truth.”

  “I did tell you the truth. You’re calling me a liar?”

  “Did I say that? I only meant that I need to know everything that happened right before you left England. Those last few days.”

  Maurelle gritted her teeth.

  Dave turned again and looked at the floor as he said, “If you can’t do that, my only hope is that the gendarmes will eliminate you as a suspect before they start poking around in England. That will at least buy us some time.”

  “Scotland Yard won’t reopen the case, will they?” Her voice sounded shrill even to her own ears.

  Dave stood up and started pacing.

  “I tried to keep it from you as long as possible. If Scotland Yard takes this woman’s statement seriously, and I’m afraid they might, then you’ll look guilty of both crimes.”

  “What does the Reynier murder have to do with me? The woman’s being in the cave where I hid doesn’t mean I killed her.”

  Dave sighed. “Don’t you get it? If you’re suspected of murder in both countries, then both sides will look at you much more closely. They’ll have damn good reason.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “You aren’t stupid, Maurelle. You know what it means.”

  “But I didn’t kill anyone! Damn you. Why don’t you believe me? I’m your wife.”

  He didn’t answer right away, and Maurelle glared at him.

  “You truly think I’m lying?”

  “I don’t think you killed anyone. But you can’t expect me to believe you didn’t go to the house. Come on. Be honest with me.”

  “What a hypocrite! You lied to me about where you were going and what you were doing, and now you’re calling me a liar! That’s—that’s so unfair.” She stood up, grabbed her jacket off the hook near the door, and stuck her feet in her slip-on shoes. Walking out, she slammed the door, causing it to bounce against the frame and remain slightly open.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  “WHAT IS YOUR occupation, Monsieur Lefèvre?”

  “Clock-maker. I design and build clocks for companies, some for resale in shops and some for decorating offices.”

  Looking at the cheap clock hanging on the interview room’s wall, the kind you could see in any school classroom, Goddard asked, “Are these clocks one-of-a-kind, or do you mass-produce them?”

  Seeing Goddard eyeing his wall clock, Jonas clarified. “Generally, one-of-a kind pieces, not that kind of cheap junk. Oh, I occasionally contract for a small limited quantity production, but I don’t have a factory, as such. I work out of my home.”

  Goddard pursed his lips, then said, “Where are your customers located?”

  “The majority are in Paris.”

  “So you travel to Paris on occasion?”

  Jonas Lefèvre nodded.

  “And how frequently might that be?”

  “Usually every week; some trips for meeting with current clients, some for scouting and acquiring new clients. Of course, I have to check out what is popular in the Parisian market, on occasion. One must stay competitive.”

  Goddard nodded and considered the man’s demeanor. Jonas was medium build, looked mid-thirties, and had greenish eyes and medium brown slicked back hair. He was leaning back in his chair, legs casually flung out, one arm bent and lying over the top edge of the chair back. No lack of confidence there. What was it that Vargas had told him about Jonas Lefèvre? Ah yes, he boasted to his friends of his many women, favoring himself as a ladies’ man. No one seemed to care that the man had a wife sitting at home. That brought to mind one of Goddard’s neighbors, a man not unlike Jonas. The man was constantly flirting with Chantal. Goddard didn’t want to believe Chantal might cheat on him, but she had been paying much more attention to her appearance lately.

  “Tell me about your relationship with Felicia Beaumont.”

  Jonas twitched slightly but otherwise kept his face immobile. “I was friends with her. Beautiful lady. I still can’t believe she’s gone. I will miss her. I can’t imagine why someone would hurt Felicia.”

  “Where were you last night?”

  “Out drinking with some friends here in Belvidere.”

  “Where did you go?”

  “I don’t know. Bars. We moved around from one to another.”

  “I need names.”

  “Look, I was drinking pretty heavily. How do you expect me to remember the names of the places we went? I wasn’t expecting a test.”

  Irritated at the man’s flippant response, Goddard said, “There aren’t many bars here, Monsieur Lefèvre.”

  Jonas shrugged and gave a smirky kind of smile that Goddard wanted to wipe off his face.

  “We will need to verify who you were with and where you went.”

  “Why? I’m not a suspect. I didn’t do anything wrong, unless it’s against the law to walk a couple blocks drunk and spend the night at a friend’s house.”

  “Who was this friend? Can he or she confirm you alibi?”

  Jonas folded his arms.

  “I’m not giving you any names. You got that?”

  “Ah,” Goddard said, leaning back in his chair. “I am beginning to see a picture here. Isabelle Lambert also gave me a similar account of her activities last night and she wouldn’t name her friend, either. Perhaps a sober night in Belvidere in my fine establishment might change your attitude, make you more cooperative, yes?”

  Jonas made a swallowing sound and stared at Goddard.

  Having made his point, Goddard continued. “Let’s start again, shall we. What were you doing yesterday afternoon, late in the day, before you went out with friends?”

  “I don’t know. I guess I went out for a walk?”

  MAURELLE STUMBLED OFF the dirt path onto the paved road near Café Charbonneau, having tripped on a small boulder someone had placed in the middle of the path, probably a kid’s prank, barely avoiding falling altogether. She continue walking toward Fabienne’s house. With her head bent down, determined to avoid tripping again, she didn’t see Simone sweeping around the café’s entrance until it was too late and she walked right into her, mumbling an apology.

  “Well, well,” Simone said, “you look madder than a swatted hornet. Are the gendarmes getting to you?”

  Maurelle ignored her and kept walking.

  “Dave must have been disappointed to have to come back early from his business trip. I hope he isn’t too angry. It must be difficult for him having his wife a suspect in yet another murder. Poor Dave.”

  Maurelle’s relati
onship with Simone had always been difficult. Simone would act amiable when there were others around but quite different when they were alone. Maurelle tried to avoid thinking the “B” word but in doing so had already failed. She turned on her heel and said, “I’m not the only person around here the gendarmes are interviewing. There are plenty of suspects, including Dave and Alain.”

  “Perhaps, but you’re certainly at the top of the list.”

  “Oh, shut up, Simone.”

  Simone opened her mouth in surprise. Before she had a chance to say anything, Maurelle walked away and didn’t look back.

  Simone yelled out, “Are you going to cry on Fabienne’s shoulder?”

  Oh crap. That’s exactly what she was planning to do. Fabienne had enough to worry about already. Maurelle certainly couldn’t talk with Jeannette, either. Everything anyone told Jeannette would go straight to Fabienne and to anyone else who would listen. In this village, that was nearly everyone.

  Sometimes, the quaint village-atmosphere that lured so many people to move out of big cities had its drawbacks. If it hadn’t been for Dave, Maurelle would still be the outcast, the stranger whom everyone pointed at and whispered about and it wasn’t only because she was English or that she had been a murder suspect in London. The fact of the matter was she’d always been somewhat of a loner. She’d never been an enthusiastic socializer and was not a good conversationalist—not with polite, ice-breaking conversation, anyway.

  As she passed the back of the chateau, she turned and ran down the stairs leading to the main street. She walked past the shops and past people standing in little groups, gossiping. Heads turned to look at her. She looked away. Dave wouldn’t be able to protect her from her past—not this time.

  Damn him. He shouldn’t have lied to her about going to England. If he’d told her, she could have gone with him. She wouldn’t have been here on the night of the storm, and she wouldn’t be a suspect in a new murder case.

  “OH, HELLO, MAURELLE,” Jeannette called out from a table in front of the bakery. “Come, sit, and join us for a snack. Paul and I are having coffee and pastry and talking about gendarmes and scandal.”