One Green Bottle

by Curtis Bausse

  He let out a little sigh of exasperation. ‘I’m working on Roncet, Magali. I can’t get involved in the others. My job’s up here, I’ve got other stuff going on, it’s a local paper, I can’t just drop everything to go after stories on the other side of the country.’

  ‘I’m not suggesting you drop everything, just…’ She didn’t know how to finish. Just tell me I’m right, believe in me. But she’d only come across as needy, wheedling, fragile – the sort of person you instinctively don’t believe. The sort of person a right-minded person runs away from. ‘OK, the emails,’ she said. ‘Just Roncet’s emails. Can you get hold of them or not?’

  ‘The way things are looking, I doubt it.’ From cool to icy cold, freezing her out. ‘The police still have them but the case is closed so they see no reason to release them. They say they need the authorisation of the investigating judge. He could give it but he’s reluctant, hiding behind procedural rules. Afraid that if he starts, he’ll end up having to reopen the case.’

  ‘But isn’t that exactly what we want?’

  ‘Of course it is. But we have to tread carefully, reassure him.’ He left a pause. ‘Unfortunately, I mentioned your name. Which means, I’m afraid, that he now has a perfect excuse to refuse.’

  ‘Shit,’ she breathed. ‘Look, I’m sorry. It’s my fault, I know. But we really do need those emails.’

  ‘I’ll have to start over again, put the argument differently.’ His voice was flat. ‘Send me what you’ve got. I’ll see if there’s anything useful in it.’

  So much for Roudy. She hadn’t lost him, but they said goodbye like a couple of disappointed friends, driven apart by events beyond their control. She’d set out to find a staunch, untiring ally, but all she’d achieved was to make him wearier and more defeated than ever.

  ***

  Krief? After what he’d written, the very idea seemed preposterous. But he was good, no doubt about that. He was the only one to introduce a different angle on the case: the phoney private detective angle. Somehow, in the space of just a few hours, he’d found out about her interest in the Perle and Terral cases and her serial killer theory. He wasn’t just reporting facts, he was sniffing around himself.

  But then he was careful to make it look very dubious. A deluded psychotherapist whose own mind was twisted. The only surprising thing was that he hadn’t yet discovered that she was no more a psychotherapist than she was a detective.

  Whatever the outcome, he’d win either way. If she was right, he’d have his sensational scoop: Amateur Detective Brings Down Serial Killer. And if not, he’d have a different story: Crazy Therapist in Sleuth Personality Disorder. Not so sensational for him, perhaps, but for Magali a disaster.

  So yes, he was good. But trustworthy? I’ll be on your side, Madame Rousseau. Was she ready to believe him? No way.

  She called him anyway and in less than ten minutes he was there. Had he been waiting outside her house? He was clearly making it his business to scour Sentabour for any fuel for his story. Whichever one it turned out to be. She was taking a risk, but she reasoned it was better to have him at least in her sight.

  ‘I’ll level with you,’ he said. ‘I had to fight to get this story. You do the local news and as soon as something big happens, you’re told it isn’t local any more. I don’t intend to be kicking my heels on the inside pages of La Provence for the rest of my life. A serial killer? I have just as much interest in tracking him down as you do.’

  ‘And if he doesn’t exist?’

  ‘No harm done.’

  ‘Not to you, of course.’

  He smiled. ‘Well, you’re the one who’s sticking your neck out. And very bravely too. So obviously it’s a risk, even if I do what I can to protect you.’

  ‘Protect me? Expose me as a fraud, call me delusional, what sort of protection’s that?’

  ‘You didn’t give me much choice. “Get out or I call the police.” I was hoping for some cooperation.’

  ‘Where did you get it from anyway?’

  ‘As I’ve said, I protect my sources. But I’ll tell you one thing. Another murder was mentioned, which you also believe was committed by the killer. But my source didn’t know the details. Perhaps you could fill me in now.’

  ‘I’m afraid not. Because my side of the bargain is this. I tell you what I see fit, no more.’

  ‘Hardly sounds like a bargain to me.’

  ‘What I don’t want is for you to go publishing speculation. And covering yourself with “Magali Rousseau alleges…” Then putting it down to my delusions if it’s wrong. Nor do I want to antagonise the police unnecessarily. And if I’m right, what I certainly don’t want is for the killer to know how much I know about him. He’s already been here, threatened my son, killed my friend. So if you want your story, you’ll have to play it my way.’

  ‘All right.’ He bowed his head. ‘I make do with whatever crumbs you choose. Give me some.’

  ‘Paul Daveney is innocent.’

  He gazed at her steadily. ‘The crumbs.’

  ‘He made considerable progress during our sessions.’ Was that a lie? Or simply bending the truth? ‘I consider it highly unlikely that, medicated or not, he could kill. But that’s just my opinion. So here are the facts. Nothing momentous but even crumbs require an explanation.’

  For the next few minutes, he listened to her account, photographs backing her up. Then he rubbed his chin. ‘You’ve shown this to Marty?’

  ‘He said he’d look into it. Add it to the file. But he doesn’t take me seriously, I can tell. It was just to fob me off.’

  ‘Hmm.’ He sat back and crossed his legs. ‘Anything else you can show me?’

  ‘Not for the moment. I want you to run this first. Make sure the killer knows there’s a different lead being followed. That we aren’t stopping with Daveney. And when I say we, that’s the two of us. None of that deluded therapist crap any more. From now on, this is your investigation as much as mine.’

  When he left, Magali spent a few futile minutes writing his article in her head. She got no further than fragments: photographic evidence … a curious anomaly … alternative explanation. Joining them up coherently in a way that put the onus on Marty to provide some convincing answers would be a challenge. Marty had the whole weight of officialdom behind him – not to mention a piece of string that connected Paul to Antoine as closely as a pair of yoked oxen. All she had was the lone voice of a fake detective and a game of spot the difference.

  But now, for better or for worse, she had Krief.

  ***

  After her run, she sat at her computer and opened a spreadsheet. In it she entered three columns: Roncet, Perle, Terral. In each column, she noted dates, circumstances and evidence. There were similarities, which she knew already, but seeing them ordered and digitised, set out in Arial Black, gave them more substance. Remote village. Evening. No sign of struggle. Above all, those curious duplicate objects: Napoleon book, Satie score, purse. Could it really be pure coincidence?

  But then there were differences too. Roncet’s killer was right-handed, the Terrals’ left-handed. For Enzo’s she entered right-handed followed by a question mark. The supposed motive, in the case of Enzo and Roncet, was an argument. Here again, the odd one out was the Terrals, whose house had been burgled. Apart from a terse ‘Thanks, Y.B.,’ Balland had not responded to her report.

  Interesting, Madame Rousseau. But frankly, a load of tosh.

  There had to be something more. She shut down the spreadsheet and looked at the pictures from the Terrals’ house again. Bedroom, kitchen, dining room, garage. The freezer where Lucie had got the fish pie. The window the burglar climbed through. The workbench he stepped on to get down. Michel Terral’s tools, neatly arranged above the workbench. The floor.

  She’d only taken one picture of the workbench and the detail could have been sharper. She stared at it for several seconds, zoomed in on the floor, stared again.

  Then she reached for her phone and dialled.

 
Chapter 21

  ‘Good. Thank you.’ Yves Balland nodded ponderously. ‘Now we’re going to go through all that again.’

  ‘What? I’m sorry, I don’t…’ Magali blinked. He’d read her report, which she’d just repeated with a few more arguments added, and he still hadn’t got it? Either he was spectacularly slow or he was trying to make a fool of her.

  ‘What you’ve got,’ he said, ‘is a theory. A little theory of your own, one that you like. Not so little, either – four different murders, maybe more, committed by the same person, including one for which there’s a man already behind bars. So much as you like it, there’ll be plenty of others who won’t. So I want you to repeat it and I’m going to take it apart bit by bit.’

  ‘What? You brought me here all this way and you’re not even going to listen?’

  He jabbed a finger at her. ‘You’re the one who’s not listening. I said I was going to demolish your theory. So I have to listen to it first, right?’

  ‘Simply in order to demolish it? If you don’t consider it on its merits, you’re just… It’s hypocrisy.’

  ‘Madame Rousseau,’ he said with a sigh. ‘Getting attached to a theory is one thing – even scientists do it – but a good scientist is one that doesn’t get so attached he can’t look at the facts differently. And take it from me, there’ll always be people to tell you you’re wrong.’

  He poured her some wine. They were sitting in front of a large platter of seafood in one of the smartest restaurants in Narbonne. His answer to her phone call had surprised her: ‘You’re what, three hours away, a bit less? Let’s meet for dinner at eight.’ The Clio grumbled and shuddered but got her there, booked into a motorway hotel, with over an hour to spare.

  ‘You want everything?’ she said. ‘Enzo, Roncet, the lot?’

  ‘Just the Terrals. I don’t know enough about the others.’ He teased a sea snail out of its shell, popped it in his mouth, munched contentedly and swallowed. ‘We’ll take it in stages.’ He wiped his mouth. ‘The weapon first. You say he brought it with him.’

  ‘If it was a burglar who was upstairs when the Terrals came in, the only place he might have found a Stanley knife was the baby’s room. Michel was going to paper it, so the paper and glue were up there. But nothing else – no ladder, no tape measure, no brush. The baby wasn’t due for another two months. He wasn’t about to paper the room the next day. He’d just put what he’d bought there in the meantime. And you told me he didn’t buy a cutter.’

  ‘Because he already had one downstairs. He took it up to open one of the rolls.’

  ‘That could be done with anything. Nail scissors.’

  ‘Not Michel. Everything in its place, everything for a purpose. No, the knife was up there, the killer used it and took it away with him. How do I know? The mud on the floor. You said yourself, why would he go into an empty room? Because he heard the Terrals come in, looked round for a weapon and saw the knife. What’s the alternative? He deliberately went in to make it look as if he’d picked up a knife that wasn’t there? You’ll have trouble getting anyone to buy that.’ His fingers hovered above the platter before swooping on a langoustine. ‘Now your next point. The car.’

  ‘Right.’ One-nil to Balland. She took a deep breath. ‘This is simpler. Why didn’t he park behind the house, where the Terrals park theirs? It’s not only the closest, it’s also the most hidden.’

  ‘Precisely. He didn’t even know he could. He didn’t know there was a space.’

  ‘He knew there was a space. And he also knew it was occupied by the Terrals. You don’t go and burgle a house without first making sure there’s no one inside. That means walking all round to see if the owner’s car’s there.’

  ‘Huh!’ He shook his head in derision. ‘This is your burglar equivalent of a street mugger. Not the sort that stakes out the place beforehand. He’s driving along looking for the first opportunity, spots a house with no lights on, goes for it. It’s a foggy night, he pulls up nearby. Gives himself thirty minutes.’ Balland spread his hands. ‘Simpler indeed. Now the window.’

  Two-nil. But the window would clinch it for her. ‘Lucie went out to the garage to get the fish pie. It was a cold night but she didn’t feel the air coming through the window? She didn’t notice it was open?’

  ‘She’s bending over a freezer in an unheated garage. Would she feel a draught from a window on the opposite side?’

  ‘What about the carrots? The vegetable rack’s on the same side as the window.’

  ‘She brought them in earlier. Before they went out.’

  ‘All right – why did he switch off the oven? Why not let everything burn?’ She tapped the table in emphasis. ‘Because if the house burned down, the purse on the table would be lost. And he didn’t want that. The duplicate items he leaves behind are his signature.’

  ‘The oven was off already. Lucie had started the cooking when they decided to go out for some reason.’

  Magali couldn’t help letting out a sigh of exasperation. It caused Balland to grin. ‘The point I’m making,’ he said, ‘is that my theory works just as well as yours. And it’s more economical. We’ve got fibres from the window, footprints all over the house, stolen jewellery. Common sense says it’s a burglary.’

  ‘What size?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘The footprints. Have you got the size?’

  ‘On the small side. Forty-two at the most. Adidas trainers, newish.’

  All the certainty drained away: three sizes smaller than the footprints in her garden. She fiddled with her fork and said nothing.

  Balland didn’t notice her discomfort. ‘You know why I’m in Narbonne?’ he said. ‘A couple of Roma kids moved down here just last week from Royan. Got word I was sniffing around and disappeared. Occam’s razor, you know? Why go looking for a serial killer when a local kid on the run fits the bill? And don’t go spouting any wishy-washy crap about prejudice.’ He jabbed his finger again. ‘They get to be as delinquent as anyone else.’

  Magali dipped into her bag. ‘The reason I called. I only noticed this morning. See the workbench? If we zoom in here’ – her fingers kissed the screen of the iPad – ‘you can see the traces of its legs on the floor. Slightly to the right of where it is now. And here a couple of smudge marks.’

  Balland peered at the screen. ‘It was moved to beneath the window.’

  ‘And back again. Not very far. But enough to give someone coming in a convenient place to step on to. It would be rather awkward otherwise. Whoever it was didn’t want to risk spraining an ankle.’

  Balland considered this for a moment. ‘Michel moved it. Maybe a long time ago. Wanted to clean the window, fix the catch, who knows?’ He sat back with a smirk on his face. Four-nil.

  For a moment she contemplated pelting him with oysters. Did he really believe it or was he simply playing the devil’s advocate? ‘You still haven’t found where the Terrals went that evening? No witnesses?’

  He shook his head.

  ‘Because they didn’t. They were there when the killer arrived and he knew it. He brought a purse with him, similar to the one in the bedroom, one he’d deliberately damaged before sending. He rang the doorbell, apologised for the damaged article, said he had a replacement. They let him in, he cut their throats. Then he went into the garage, moved the bench, went out, broke open the window and climbed through. Moved the bench back again, not quite to the same spot – his single mistake. Went upstairs, taking care to leave plenty of traces of mud, and tipped out the contents of the drawers. Took a few items and left through the front door again.’

  ‘And the footprints in the baby’s room?’

  ‘A decoy. He saw the wallpaper – maybe he thought there was a knife – but it didn’t matter to him if there was or not. He already had his own.’

  Balland drummed his fingers on the table. ‘He goes to the trouble of climbing in when he had no need to? The way you describe him, he even put those fibres there himself.’

  ‘I woul
dn’t put it past him.’

  ‘You’re talking about someone clever. Diabolically clever.’

  ‘They generally are. Which is why they eventually get caught. They think they’re cleverer than everyone else.’

  He gazed at her archly. ‘But you’re cleverer still.’

  ‘No!’ The accusation roused her to anger. ‘Is that what it is? You think I’m playing games? Out of vanity?’

  Balland put out a hand to hush her. ‘Look, you’ve come a long way to see me, I appreciate it. And I wouldn’t have asked you if I really thought that. I’m simply suggesting you don’t get carried away with a theory that’s going to need a lot more than what you’ve got to be taken seriously. I’m not saying you’re wrong but don’t expect me to stop what I’m doing to go looking for a serial killer.’