Camille

by Pierre Lemaitre

  They say men who lose women always lose them in the same way; this is what terrifies him.

  *

  8.00 a.m.

  They don’t know what they’re missing, the Turks. Two fat holdalls full of bling. If it was half the weight, it would still be a good haul, even allowing for the fence’s cut. Everything’s going according to plan. And, with a bit of luck, I plan to make a killing from this stuff.

  If all goes well.

  And if it doesn’t, then there’ll be some real killing.

  To be sure, to be clear, you have to be methodical. You have to be determined.

  In the meantime, bring up the lights, it’s show time!

  Le Parisien. Page 3.

  Fire in Saint-Ouen.

  Perfect! Cross the road. Le Balto. A dingy little café. Cigarette. Coffee and cigarettes, that’s what it’s all about. The coffee in this place is like dishwater, but it’s eight o’clock in the morning, so . . .

  Open the newspaper. Drum-roll, please.

  SAINT-OUEN

  TWO DEAD IN MYSTERY BLAZE

  The emergency services were called to a major incident in Chartriers shortly after noon yesterday when a serious fire broke out following a fierce explosion. Fire officers quickly contained the blaze which destroyed a number of workshops and lock-up garages. The fire is all the more mysterious since the area, which is scheduled for urban redevelopment, is currently derelict.

  In the rubble of one of the lock-ups destroyed by the blaze, police officers discovered the burned-out wreck of a Porsche Cayenne and the charred bodies of two individuals. This has been determined as the locus of the blast, and forensic evidence indicates the presence of Semtex. From fragments of electronic equipment found at the scene, forensics officers have suggested the explosion could have been triggered remotely.

  Given the intensity of the blaze, it may prove difficult to identify the bodies of the victims. All available evidence points to a carefully premeditated killing intended to make such identification impossible. Investigators are hoping to determine whether the victims were alive or dead at the time of the explosion . . .

  *

  Done and dusted.

  “Investigators are hoping to determine . . .” Don’t make me laugh! I’m happy to take bets. And if the cops somehow manage to trace this back to a couple of Turkish brothers with no record, I’ll donate their half to the Police Orphan Fund.

  Nearly there. I’m on the Périphérique, I take the exit ramp at Porte Maillot and into Neuilly-sur-Seine.

  It’s nice to see how the other half lives. If they weren’t so fucking dumb, you’d almost want to join them. I park outside a school where thirteen-year-old girls are trooping out wearing clothes that cost thirteen times the minimum wage. Almost makes me sorry that the Mossberg is not an acceptable social leveller.

  I walk past the school and turn right. The house is smaller than those on either side, the grounds are not as extensive despite the fact that every year enough loot from burglaries and armed robberies passes through to build a new skyscraper at La Défense. The fence is wary, a smooth operator, constantly changing the protocol. By now, he’ll have had one of his delivery boys pick up the holdalls from the locker at the Gare du Nord.

  One location for the pickup, a second to evaluate the merchandise, a third to deal with negotiations.

  He takes a hefty cut to ensure the deal is secure.

  *

  9.30 a.m.

  Camille would like to be able to question her. What exactly did she see in the Galerie? But letting her see how worried he is would mean letting her know that her life is in danger, it would terrify her and only add anguish to her suffering.

  And yet, he has no choice but to ask again.

  “What?” Anne howls. “See what? What do you want me to say?”

  The night has done her no good, she woke more exhausted than she had been yesterday. She is fretful, constantly on the verge of tears, Camille can hear it in the quaver in her voice, but she is a little more articulate today, she is managing to enunciate more clearly.

  “I don’t know,” Camille says. “It could be anything.”

  “What?”

  Camille spreads his hands helplessly.

  “I just need to be sure, don’t you see?”

  Anne does not see. But she struggles to rack her memory, tilts her head and stares at Camille. He closes his eyes: try to keep calm, try to help me.

  “Did you overhear them talking?”

  Anne does not move, it is impossible to know whether she understood the question. Then she makes an evasive gesture that is difficult to interpret.

  “Serbian, maybe . . .”

  Camille jolts upright.

  “What do you mean, Serbian? Do you know any words of Serbian?”

  He is sceptical. These days, he has more dealings with Slovenians, Serbians, Bosnians, Croats, Kosovars, waves of them are arriving in Paris, but despite all the time he has spent with them he still cannot tell the languages apart.

  “No, I’m not sure . . .”

  Anne gives up and slumps back on the pillow.

  “Wait, wait,” Camille says. “This is important.”

  Anne opens her eyes again and struggles to speak.

  “Kpaj . . . I think.”

  Camille cannot believe it, it is like suddenly discovering that Juge Pereira’s clerk speaks fluent Japanese.

  “Kpaj? Is that Serbian?”

  Anne nods, though she does not seem completely sure.

  “It means ‘stop’.”

  “How . . . how do you know this?”

  Anne closes her eyes again as though she is exhausted by having to tell him the same things over and over.

  “I spent three years organising tours in Eastern Europe . . .”

  It’s unforgivable. She has told him a thousand times. She has been in the travel industry for fifteen years, and before moving into management, spent a long time organising trips all over the world. She dealt with all of the Eastern Bloc countries except Russia. From Poland all the way south to Albania.

  “Did all of them speak Serbian?”

  Anne simply shakes her head, but she needs to explain; with Camille, everything has to be explained.

  “I only heard one of them . . . In the toilets. The other guy, I’m not sure . . . [Her speech is a garbled, but completely intelligible.] I’m not sure . . .”

  But to Camille, this confirms his suspicions: the guy doing the shouting, rifling the display cases, jostling his accomplice, he is Serbian. The man acting as lookout is Vincent Hafner.

  He is the one who beat Anne, he is the one who sneaked into the hospital and went up to her room, he is probably the one who broke into Anne’s apartment. And he does not have an accent.

  The receptionist was categorical.

  Vincent Hafner.

  *

  When the time comes for her to go for the M.R.I. scan, Anne asks for a pair of crutches. It can be difficult to understand what she wants. Camille translates. She insists on walking. The nurses roll their eyes and are about to manhandle her into a wheelchair and cart her off, but she screams, pulls away from them, sits on the bed with her arms folded. No.

  This time, there can be no doubt. Florence, the charge nurse with the bee-stung lips is called, she is peremptory – “This is ridiculous, Madame Forestier, we’ll take you upstairs for your scan, it won’t take long.” She turns on her heel without waiting for a response, her brusque manner clearly signalling that she is up to her eyes this morning and is in no mood to deal with petulant demands . . . But before she can reach the door, she hears Anne’s voice ring out clearly, her pronunciation is a little indistinct but the meaning is crystal clear: Absolutely not: either I go on foot, or I’m going nowhere.

  Florence comes back, Camille tries to plead Anne’s case, but the nurse looks daggers at him – who the hell is this guy, anyway? He steps aside, leans against a wall, he suspects that the charge nurse has just blown her only chance of finding a peace
ful solution. Time will tell.

  The whole floor of the hospital starts to shake, heads appear in the hallway, the nurses try to restore order – Go back to your rooms, there’s nothing to see! Inevitably, the house doctor shows up, the Indian with the interminable name, who seems to be here from morning to night, working shifts as long as his name, and he is probably paid no better than the cleaners. He comes over, and while he bends down to listen to what Anne is saying, he surveys the cuts and contusions; she looks terrible, but it is nothing compared to how she will look in a few days as the bruises develop. Gently, he tries to reason with her. Then, he listens to her chest. The nursing staff are confused, they do not understand what he is doing, M.R.I. appointments are set in stone, they cannot afford to be late. But the doctor takes his time . . .

  The charge nurse becomes impatient, the porters are champing at the bit. The doctor calmly concludes his examination, he smiles at Anne and requests a pair of crutches. His colleagues glare at him, they feel betrayed.

  Camille looks at the frail figure slumped over the crutches, two porters walk on either side of Anne, supporting her.

  She shuffles slowly, but she is moving. She is on her feet.

  *

  10.00 a.m.

  “This is not an extension of the commissariat . . .”

  The office is an indescribable mess. The man is a surgeon, one can only hope things are more organised inside his head.

  Hubert Dainville, head of the Trauma Unit. They met in the stairwell the previous night while Camille was chasing a ghost. In that fleeting glance, he looked ageless. Today he looks fifty. He is obviously proud of his shock of curly grey hair, it is the symbol of his ageing masculinity, this is not a hairstyle, it is a world view. His hands are carefully manicured. He is the sort of man who wears blue shirts with white collars and a handkerchief in the breast pocket of his suits. An ageing beau. He has probably tried to screw half of his staff and doubtless attributes to his charm the few successes that are simply statistical anomalies. His white coat is still immaculately ironed, but he no longer has the befuddled air he had in the stairwell. On the contrary, he is brusque and overbearing. He carries on working while he talks to Camille, as though the matter were already settled and he does not have time to waste.

  “Nor do I,” Camille says.

  “Pardon?”

  Dr Dainville looks up, frowning. It pains him when he does not understand. He is unaccustomed to the feeling. He pauses in his rummage through the pile of papers.

  “I said, nor do I . . . I don’t have time to waste,” Camille says. “I can see that you’re busy, but as it happens I’m rather busy myself. You have your responsibilities; I have mine.”

  Dainville pulls a face, unconvinced by this line of reasoning, and returns to his paperwork. But still the officer hovers in the doorway, clearly unaware that the interview is at an end.

  “The patient needs rest,” Dainville mutters finally. “She has suffered severe trauma.” He glares at Camille. “Her present condition is little short of a miracle, she could have been left in a coma. She could be dead.”

  “She could also be at home. Or at work. She could even have finished her little shopping trip. The problem is that she ran into a man with no time to waste. A man like you. A man who thinks that his concerns are more important than those of other people.”

  The doctor looks up and glowers at Verhœven. To a man like Dainville, the most innocuous conversation involves a confrontation, he is a shock of snowy locks atop a fighting cock. Tiresome. And pugnacious. He looks Camille up and down.

  “I realise that the police consider themselves entitled to go anywhere, but a hospital room is not an interrogation suite, commandant. This is a hospital, not an assault course. I will not have you tearing around the corridors, upsetting my staff . . .”

  “You think I’m running up and down the corridors to keep in shape?”

  Dainville brushes the comment aside.

  “If this patient does indeed represent a danger to herself or to this institution, then have her transferred to a secure unit. If not, leave us in peace to get on with our work.”

  “Do you have much free space in the mortuary?”

  A startled Dainville gives a little jerk of his head. The cock.

  “I only ask,” Camille goes on, “because until we can question the witness, the examining magistrate will not authorise a transfer. You would not operate unless you were certain of your facts; the police likewise. And we have very similar problems, you and I. The later we intervene, the greater the potential damage.”

  “I’m afraid I don’t understand your metaphors, commandant.”

  “Then let me be clearer. It is possible that a killer is targeting this witness. If you prevent me from doing my job and he wreaks havoc in your hospital, you will have two problems. You will not have space enough in your mortuary and, given that the patient is fit to answer questions, you will be charged with obstructing a police investigation.”

  Dainville is a curious man; he seems to operate like a light switch – there is either a current or there is none. Nothing in between. Now, suddenly, there is a current. He looks at Camille, amused, and gives him a genuine smile, revealing a mouthful of perfect, straight teeth. Dr Dainville thrives on confrontation, he may be surly, arrogant and boorish, but he likes complications. He is aggressive and argumentative, but deep down he likes to be beaten. Camille has met his fair share of such men. They beat you to a pulp and then give you a Band-Aid.

  There is something feminine about him, which may explain why he is a doctor.

  The two men look at each other. Dainville is an intelligent man, he is sensitive.

  “O.K.,” Camille says calmly. “Now let’s talk about how we make this work in practice.”

  *

  10.45 a.m.

  “They don’t need to operate.”

  It takes a second or two for Camille to absorb what Anne has said. He would like to whoop with joy, but instead he decides to be circumspect.

  “That’s good . . .” he says encouragingly.

  The X-rays and the M.R.I. scan have confirmed what the young house doctor told him. Anne will need reconstructive dental surgery, but her other injuries will heal with time. She may be left with some scarring around her lips and on her left cheek. What does he mean, “some scarring”? Will there be several scars, will they be conspicuous? Anne has studied her face in the mirror; her lips are so badly split that it is too early to tell what will permanently scar and what will fade. As for the gash on her cheek, until the stitches are removed, it is impossible to assess the long-term damage.

  “We need to give it time,” the house doctor said.

  From Anne’s face, it is clear she does not believe this. And time is precisely what Camille does not have.

  He has come this morning to deliver a message. The two of them are alone. He pauses for a second and then says:

  “I’m hoping you’ll be able to recognise the men . . .”

  Anne gives a vague shrug that could mean many things.

  “The man who fired the shots, you said he was tall . . . What did he look like?”

  It is ridiculous to try to get her to answer questions. The investigating officers will have to start again from scratch; for Camille to persist now may even be counter-productive.

  “Handsome.” She enunciates carefully.

  “What . . .? What do you mean, ‘handsome’?” Camille splutters.

  Anne looks around. Camille cannot believe his eyes as she gives what can only be called a faint smile, her lips curling back to reveal three broken teeth.

  “Handsome . . . like you . . .”

  In the long months while he watched Armand dying, Camille experienced something like this many times: the least flicker of improvement turned the dial to unbridled optimism. Anne has made a joke. Camille almost feels like rushing down to reception to insist that she be discharged. Hope is a dirty trick.

  He would like to laugh too, but she ha
s caught him unawares. He stammers. Anne has already let her eyes close again. At least he knows that she is lucid, that she understands what he is saying. He is about to try again when he is interrupted by Anne’s mobile phone vibrating on the nightstand. Camille passes it to her. It is Nathan.

  “I don’t want you to worry . . .” she tells her brother, squeezing her eyes shut. She immediately takes on the role of the long-suffering elder sister, weary yet forbearing. Camille can just make out Nathan’s voice, panicked and insistent.

  “I said all there was to say in my message . . .” Anne is making a much greater effort to speak normally than she has with Camille. She needs to make herself understood, but mostly she needs to calm her brother, to reassure him.

  “No, there’s no news,” she says, her tone almost cheerful. “And I’m not on my own, so you don’t need to worry.”

  She rolls her eyes and looks at Camille. Nathan sounds a little tiresome.

  “No, of course not! Listen, I have to go for an X-ray, I’ll call you. Yes, love you too . . .”

  With a sigh, she turns her mobile off and hands it back to Camille. He makes the most of this moment of intimacy, he does not have long. He has one thing he needs to say.

  “Anne . . . I shouldn’t be involved with your case, you understand what I’m saying?”

  She understands. She nods and gives a soft “Uh-huh”.

  “You sure you understand?”

  Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Camille lets out a breath, releases the pressure, for himself, for her, for them both.

  “I got a bit ahead of myself. And then . . .”

  He holds her hand, strokes her fingers. His hand, though smaller, is manly and with pronounced veins. Camille has always had warm hands. He fumbles frantically for words, any words that will not leave her terrified.

  Avoid saying: the scumbag who beat you is a vicious thug called Vincent Hafner, he tried to kill you and I’m sure he’ll try again.

  Say rather: I’m here, you’ll be safe now.

  Don’t say: my superior officers don’t believe me, but I know I’m right, the guy’s a madman, he’s utterly fearless.

  Better to say: we’ll have this guy in custody soon and this will all be over. But we need you to help us identify him. If you can.