The Honest Folk of Guadeloupe

by Timothy Williams

  60

  Carnation

  They got out of the car and walked up the hill to the main hospital building. Saturday afternoon was a popular time for visits, with children free from school.

  She was still angry with Trousseau, but since he had not given any sign of wanting to take his Saturday afternoon off, she said nothing. She was glad to have him with her.

  Trousseau meanwhile whistled tunelessly under his breath, occasionally breaking off the private melody to pick at his teeth.

  Anne Marie bought a large bunch of red carnations from a woman sitting on a wooden stall.

  The prison section was at the back of the new hospital, in old colonial buildings that bore the scars of time and several earthquakes. The walls had been painted a dark ochre that had lost its texture. A row of coconut trees bent in the wind, their fronds creaking noisily.

  A couple of male nurses were smoking in the shade of a tree. Neither man seemed to notice Anne Marie as she hurried past. One, who was wearing a round white cap, called out to Trousseau, who laughed and replied in Creole.

  They entered the low building and walked along a corridor, past a trolley with its load of kidney dishes and steel utensils. There was a smell of ether and sea breeze. As in many buildings in the tropics, the ground floor was open to the elements. There were no doors and instead of windows, there were regular gaps in the brick wall through which Anne Marie caught sight of the Atlantic, silver and sullen at this time of the day. Although the hospital was some distance above sea level, and although it was exposed to the trade winds, Anne Marie felt hot and very sticky.

  “He was embarrassed, wasn’t he?”

  “Who, Trousseau?”

  The greffier turned to look at her, surprised by the curtness in her words. “I did not know Eric André was a relative of yours.”

  “Used to be.” Anne Marie spoke flatly. “He married one of my ex-husband’s sisters.”

  “He quite likes you.”

  “Just one of his problems.” She looked at him. “What do you know about Ilet Noir?”

  Trousseau gave a small smile, ran his finger along his moustache and was about to say something when a man called out, “Madame Laveaud?”

  They stopped.

  The man held a microphone and there were earphones around his neck. Sitting on a bench behind him was another man, a television camera placed on the lap of his tennis shorts.

  61

  Harassment

  “I have nothing to say.”

  “Why not?”

  Anne Marie recognized him because he frequently presented the local news at 7:30. “I have nothing to say for the moment.”

  “Is it true, madame le juge, that the murderer of the Pointe des Châteaux killing has been identified?”

  “No comment.”

  “If you have already identified the murderer, why are you here in the penal section of the hospital?”

  “Why are you here, gentlemen?”

  “Has the murderer been identified?” The man who held the microphone had a round face; the curly hair had started to move back from the high forehead. It was the first time that she had seen Jean Paul Grégory in the flesh. Without makeup and studio lighting, he appeared fatter than on the small screen. Fatter and even more complacent. His skin was damp with perspiration.

  “No comment.”

  “Is there is a connection between last night’s siege at the Collège Carnot and the murdered girl?”

  “No comment.”

  Trousseau was standing beside her. He held her flowers in one hand. He now placed himself between the journalist and Anne Marie.

  “Is it true the slain Rastafarian had a criminal record?”

  The lisping voice and self-satisfied tone made her angry. Anne Marie held up her hand. “You must be very careful.”

  “Did the rasta have a criminal record of sexual violence?”

  She tried to move forward. “You’re interfering with the course of justice.”

  The reporter unexpectedly pushed hard against Trousseau, who was forced to step back. Trousseau said something in Creole—something vulgar that Anne Marie had heard in the mouths of irate detainees.

  The cameraman in shorts with earphones around his neck switched on an overhead lamp that he held out at the end of a perch. The sudden light was blinding. Anne Marie brought her hand to her brow to protect her eyes.

  “Do you intend to arrest Richard Ferly?”

  “Please let me past.”

  “Are you going to arrest Richard Ferly?”

  “You must go.”

  “Why do you intend to arrest Monsieur Richard Ferly if the murderer of the Pointe des Châteaux’s already been identified?”

  “I’m an investigating judge involved in official business. Get out of my way.”

  “Are you aware that Monsieur Ferly has already undergone psychiatric treatment?”

  She could feel her heart thumping against her chest. “Take your microphone out of my face and turn off that light.”

  “Is it true, Madame Laveaud, that Mr. Ludovic Desterres, a well-known ecologist and also a politician … is it not true, Madame …”

  From somewhere a man in white had appeared.

  “Is it not true, Madame Laveaud, that Ludovic Desterres’s lodged a complaint against you and against the parquet for unlawful arrest?”

  He had tortoiseshell glasses and he was gesticulating. A stethoscope danced on his chest. He was accompanied by the two nurses who had been smoking beneath the tree.

  “Has Monsieur Desterres brought a complaint of harassment and false arrest against the parquet?”

  The doctor cursed noisily.

  “Why don’t you answer the question, madame le juge?”

  The bright light went out as suddenly as it had come on, and Anne Marie found herself being bundled into a small office, her arms pinned to her sides by the man in white.

  Anne Marie saw that the frayed black tie had worked its way round to the left, under Trousseau’s stiff collar. With illogical relief, she also noticed that Trousseau was still holding the carnations.

  62

  Les Messieurs de la Martinique

  “I never arrested him.”

  Trousseau was sweating profusely in his dark suit. He now straightened his tie.

  “I really don’t see how Desterres can accuse me of wrongful arrest.”

  “I’m sorry about that, madame le juge. The journalist is a bastard from Martinique and next time I’ll use my stethoscope.” The doctor held out his hand. “I’m Lavigne, and if I’d known you were coming, I’d’ve been waiting with a machete.” He added, “Didn’t know the television people could be so aggressive.”

  Her heart was still thumping. “First time it’s ever happened to me.”

  “I thought the journalists at RFO were civil servants like everybody else. Why the need to behave like paparazzi? You know what people from Martinique are like—they like to think they are more gentlemanly and more French than us honest folk of Guadeloupe.”

  “The Pointe des Châteaux killing,” Anne Marie said simply. “Bad for business and bad for the island—white girl killed on a black island.”

  “And perfect for the decentralized media,” Trousseau remarked. He wiped his forehead with a grubby handkerchief.

  Anne Marie smiled at the doctor. “Thanks for rescuing me.”

  “As for your visit …” Lavigne folded his arms against his chest; a pack of cigarettes peeked from the chest pocket. “I don’t think Monsieur Ferly’s going to be of much use to you. At least, not for now.”

  She presented Trousseau and the two men shook hands. Lavigne nodded. “Monsieur Trousseau and I’ve already spoken over the phone.”

  “Apart from Trousseau, nobody knew it was my intention to come here,” Anne Marie said thoughtfully. “I mentioned to Lafitte I hoped to speak with Richard but I didn’t know I’d be coming until Monsieur Trousseau told me we could.”

  “Madame le juge, it will not do much goo
d trying to speak to him.”

  Anne Marie took a deep breath. She looked at the doctor, who was still standing with his back against the door, as if afraid the journalists would attempt to break through with their microphone and overhead lighting. Like monsters in a science fiction film. Anne Marie ran a hand through her hair and smiled gratefully at the doctor.

  Then she looked about her. The room smelled of ether. The louvered blinds were made of glass, high in the wall. It could have been any small ward in a tropical hospital—the beds, the cotton blankets, the white cabinet, the chipped paintwork—if it were not for the bars against the high windows.

  The beds were all empty.

  “Richard Ferly may hold the key to the killing at the Pointe des Châteaux.”

  The doctor turned and gestured for her and Trousseau to follow. They went down the ward and into a small corridor. Lavigne put a finger to his lips, bent forward and quietly unlocked a second door that opened into a small room.

  The air was very cold. A conditioner buzzed high in the wall. The blinds had been drawn. The room was dark except for narrow slants of thin afternoon light squeezing through the closed louvers.

  “Ferly?”

  “Madame le juge, your star witness’s sleeping.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with him?”

  “Nothing that sleep can’t repair. Lots and lots of sleep.”

  “I need to talk to him, doctor.”

  “I don’t want him woken up.”

  Anne Marie placed her hand on the doctor’s sleeve and looked up at him. Doctor Lavigne had an intelligent face, freckles and thick lips. He was not from France, she now realized, but a Creole and despite his remarks, he may well have been from Martinique. A gentleman from Martinique. “Richard Ferly’s the last person to have seen the murdered woman alive. If I’m to arrest the right person, I must speak to him.”

  “Then come back on Monday.”

  “Monday?”

  Docteur Lavigne added cheerfully “Perhaps you and your greffier would care for a drink?”

  63

  Sigmund

  “Mild schizophrenia.”

  “Does that mean Richard’s capable of murdering?”

  Lavigne smiled. “I don’t think I can answer your question, madame le juge, because I don’t know the patient sufficiently well. From what I’ve been told, Richard seems a mild sort of person and not at all aggressive.”

  “Schizophrenics can be murderers?”

  “Six percent of prisoners in high security are schizophrenics, but more often than not, their anger, their rage is directed against themselves.”

  “Suicide?”

  “One in four attempts suicide.” Lavigne added, “One in ten succeeds.”

  It was strangely quiet in the long, empty ward. Docteur Lavigne sat on the bare mattress of a bed. From time to time, Anne Marie’s eyes went from his face to the paint at the bedpost—paint that had been chipped away. By handcuffs, no doubt.

  “You must understand my problem, Doctor.”

  “You must try to understand my position.” He took a cigarette from the pocket of his jacket and lit it. “Another drink?”

  She shook her head, but Trousseau went to the refrigerator and poured himself a second glass of mineral water.

  “Is Richard capable of having murdered the young woman at the Pointe des Châteaux?”

  “Anyone is capable of murder, madame le juge. In the right circumstances. Murder can be the instinct for survival breaking free from the norms imposed upon us by a civilized society. We’re all animals.”

  Trousseau coughed noisily.

  “Darwin tells us all species seek survival. Without the desire to survive, there’s no life. Life must procreate in order to live.”

  Trousseau coughed again, even more noisily. He had returned to his plastic chair. Drops of moisture glistened on his straightened tie.

  “We don’t know whether animals have moral codes but we humans do have codes. You and I, madame le juge—there are things we do, not because we need to do them but because our group has told us to do them.”

  “Like murder?”

  “Like not murder. Murder—in terms of group survival—isn’t a very good idea. Nor is incest. That’s why we created subjective rules which in time have taken on a force of their own.”

  “What’s this got to do with Richard?” Anne Marie asked.

  Lavigne laughed, and she liked the way the corner of his lips moved upwards in amusement. She also liked his long, delicate fingers. He must have been in his early forties, with his hair greying at the temples and the first wrinkles coming to the corner of his eyes. He did not wear a wedding ring. “The human brain’s a highly sophisticated piece of machinery. A Porsche among Renaults.”

  “Mine feels like a Mobylette scooter.”

  “Whereas you can put your Porsche on a jack and send in the mechanics, nothing’s so easy with the brain.” He laughed to himself. “Removing a bad plug’s less dangerous than lobotomy.”

  “Lobotomy for Richard?”

  “Richard’s an autonomous human being. He can live his life perfectly well. When he came in, he told me he had a doctor and I’ve been in touch with Docteur Finlande.”

  “If Richard can run his life perfectly, why was he hanging around on the beach at Tarare, unshaved and unwashed? It’s normal for a bank employee to wander around in swimming trunks and a camera? To judge from his breath, he hadn’t eaten for several days.” Anne Marie crossed her legs and sat back. The synthetic leather of the upright chair was uncomfortable beneath her skirt. “Docteur Lavigne, I’m sure Richard’s a lovely person—kind, good and affectionate—but I need to know whether he killed the woman Agnès Loisel.”

  “You know how she was killed?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Schizophrenics tend to retreat into themselves. Like you and me …” Lavigne paused, glanced at Trousseau. “… and like your greffier, they’re capable of murder. But the schizophrenic’s not the sort of person capable of plotting ahead. His is the sudden, explosive rage of restrained forces suddenly being set free.”

  Trousseau said, “On the way back from the Pointe des Châteaux, he talked about killing.”

  “Killing who?”

  “He wanted a Kalashnikov and said there were twenty or thirty people in Pointe-à-Pitre who needed to be eliminated—people who talked about him, who were plotting against him.”

  Lavigne turned back to Anne Marie. “In a state of acute stress, his idea of violence and revenge’s not very sophisticated. More Rambo than Macchiavelli.”

  “Most people don’t go around talking about killing other people.”

  “That fat journalist who was sticking his microphone into your throat—you don’t think with a gun in your hand, you could’ve pulled the trigger?”

  “Stop putting ideas into my head.” She smiled, almost against her will. “I’m taking the children to church tomorrow.”

  “You’ll be going to confession, madame le juge?”

  Trousseau coughed again. Anne Marie turned and frowned. Trousseau drank more water. Her greffier stood up, setting the battered carnations into an empty coffee tin. He took a comb from his pocket and started to comb his hair, looking into the mirror.

  “You go to confession, madame le juge?”

  “Haven’t got time.”

  “To go to confession? Or you haven’t got enough time to confess everything?”

  Anne Marie wondered whether the béké doctor was flirting with her. “Docteur Lavigne, I’ve never murdered anybody.”

  Lavigne inhaled on his cigarette, put his head back and watched the blue-grey smoke swirl toward the ceiling. “Richard’s a mild sort of character. Indeed, Finlande says he’s personable, when he doesn’t slip into one of his depressions.”

  “What do you know about him?”

  “In his late thirties. Richard Ferly’s held down a good job in a bank for over ten years. He draws up financial reports and is well-educated and literary. H
is director …” A slight bow of the head. “The bank’s run by a cousin of mine from Martinique. The director’s got no complaints other than the occasional absence, but all absences are accompanied by a medical certificate. Lately they’ve been more rare. Some surprise at the bank when Richard disappeared without warning. Nobody saw the connection between their well-mannered colleague and the Indian of the Pointe des Châteaux killing.”

  “He’ll lose his job?”

  “That depends largely on you, madame le juge.” Lavigne smiled. “If you feel you’ll have to arrest him for murder and rape, I don’t think my cousin at the Crédit des Outremers will be able to keep him on for very long.”

  “What set Richard off on this depression?”

  “He’d been hearing voices like Joan of Arc.”

  “The maid of Orleans was a schizophrenic?”

  “Would you have stayed in Orleans if you thought the English were going to burn you at the stake?”

  “I ceased being a maid a long time ago.”

  “Hearing voices and having the impression people are plotting against you are frequent symptoms of schizophrenia. But with Richard it’d got to the stage where he couldn’t endure staying in his house. Had to get out into the open to places like the beach. He lives in the city center and he was being woken at nights by the sound of talking. According to his doctor, what Richard believes to be the figment of his imagination was in fact taxi drivers making a din outside his house in the night and the noise was preventing him from sleeping. Once Richard started to lose sleep, he’d lose touch with reality—an objective sound his mind would transform into devils and demons plotting things against him. He’d lose sleep, he’d cease to eat—and started spinning out of control.”

  “Out of control when he met the girl at the Pointe des Châteaux?”

  “No idea—I can only tell you what I know about Richard. He grew up in Paris, where I assume he felt slightly out of things because of his color.”

  “He never married?”

  “Richard doesn’t have much respect for himself. Although he would appear to be attractive to the opposite sex—and he has a good job but he’s never lived with a woman. He told his doctor he isn’t interested in local girls—only in white women.”