by John Brooke
‘She sounds just plain cold,’ muttered Souviron.
Claude indicated, No. ‘It was my problem. Not hers. I’d misread her. This kind of thing sends you in the wrong direction. I mean all the gossip. I was looking at her and thinking I was exactly what she needed, but Pearl Serein does not see herself the way I was seeing her…or the way those seven others did. Not in the least. She just does not believe this big story about herself. Can’t. Won’t. I don’t know. But there’s a gap.’
Gérard Richand was perplexed and maybe insulted in the way a righteous judge can sometimes be. ‘But you slept with her, after all?’ His tone was verging on accusation.
Fuck Gérard. Claude was anxious to give them the right view on last night. ‘She wasn’t helping me. I was ready to back off, look at it from a different angle. Protection could still be provided, sure, but it was a mistake, a waste of time — I mean my presence there. But she cries again, so I stay over…same routine, back to the divan. It’s a great place to sleep. Beautiful to see the morning from up there. She came to me later, in the middle of the night.’
With information?
‘A question.’
What question?
‘Are you a good cop?’
And you made love to her to show you were.
Claude ventured a smile. ‘Voilà.’
And you held her hand this morning.
‘It was the least I could do.’
‘Romantic,’ commented Norbert Fauré, the old cop, laconic.
‘Not really, believe me,’ responded Claude.
Then they find Belfort in the garbage and she runs.
‘Yes.’
They asked: But why?…why do you think she ran…right at the point when she had actually come to trust you?
Claude replied directly. ‘Because of you. She’s afraid of you. Of us…of this.’ The Law.
Why?
‘Because she’s innocent.’
What does an innocent person have to fear from us?
Claude told them, ‘If everyone else gets her wrong, why would she believe that we would get her right?’ Then he rested. Vague, unprofessional, but there it was. That was his story.
‘And seven hearts attacks,’ said Fauré, pondering the pathologist’s reports. ‘But still no case.’
‘No,’ Claude admitted for the third time, ‘not strictly speaking.’
There was the matter of Didier Belfort. The City team had already found the noble’s car — in Pearl Serein’s parking spot down on the second level of the building parking area. First estimation from Raphaele Petrucci had put the time of death at sometime Friday afternoon or evening.
They had Captain Deubelbeiss’ notes, but still they asked, Where were you Friday?
‘Friday morning I was meeting with the divisionnaire…’ Claude tapped his file of notes.
Fauré nodded.
‘Mid-afternoon, after I got back, I was at the club for an hour or so arranging things with Gaston…’
Gaston?
‘The manager. I’ve applied to join. Then I went back to the office.’
Fauré’s eyes were hooded, bleary. ‘You’ve applied to join this club?”
‘Yes.’ Claude nodded warily.
Fauré leaned forward. ‘And Friday evening?’
‘I was at home.’ In bed, lingering over a glass of wine with Aliette Nouvelle.
‘Proof?’
‘No.’
‘I hear you got a new place befitting your new station?’ Fauré said.
Claude indicated, Yes. But it was not the time to tell the boss of his new house in the north end.
Chief Magistrate Gérard Richand swiveled in his chair, tapped his notes, edgy, eager. ‘I’ve got so much circumstantial here.’ He would love to stick it to Claude.
Procureur Michel Souviron shook his head at Gérard. ‘But you still have no MO.’
They asked, Was there anything else Pearl Serein told you that might be useful?
‘She told me her dream.’
They were not interested in her dream.
They excused him from the room while they conferred.
21
The Price to Pay
A preliminary investigation would be conducted by the local Police Judiciaire, the focus and limit of which would be a search for Pearl Serein. Inspector Nouvelle would lead and submit all findings to the divisional office at Strasbourg. City Police Commissaire Duque would conduct an investigation into the circumstances surrounding the deaths of Bruno Martel, Raymond Tuche and Didier Belfort and submit all findings to the divisional office at Strasbourg. Remy Lorentz would be detained and interviewed in depth; both teams could have access. A specialist from the medical faculty at Strasbourg would be made (officially) available to work with Dr. Petrucci in determining the means causing death, costs to be underwritten by Strasbourg. All materials gathered would be considered by the divisionnaire and presented back to the office of Judge Richand for subsequent referral to Procureur Souviron. Lack of prima facie evidence connecting Commissaire Claude Néon or Pearl Serein to any of the victims had been duly noted, although autopsy reports on the last two victims were still pending. (Circumstantial evidence was another matter.) That Commissaire Néon had taken obvious steps, and in good faith, to present the suspect for questioning was also taken into consideration. While the investigation proceeded, Commissaire Néon would be suspended from duty with half-pay, his status to be reviewed by Division as more facts came to light and/or when the investigation was resolved. It went without saying that Commissaire Néon would take no part, active or otherwise, in any subsequent events pertaining to the matter, apart from what might be required of him in the way of testimony in a court of law. They accorded him the benefit of the doubt concerning his claim to have no idea where Pearl Serein might be.
The fact they had left the ‘murder’ aspect with Duque meant it was still a big huge nothing. Everything depended on Aliette Nouvelle finding Pearl. Still, it seemed fair to Claude, looking out the window as night fell over his untended garden. Fair because it was within the rules and he deserved the benefit of the doubt. He had leveled with them. Better to sit here than in jail…
The previous autumn, when prices were down and his confidence up after eight scandal-free months as PJ commissaire, Claude Néon had dared to make a downpayment on a residence in the posh quarter north of the Parc de la République. He had told himself it was in keeping with his new status. He had since told his mother he hoped someone would live there with him some day soon. Aliette Nouvelle had stayed over a few times, including a couple of smoothly domestic weekends, but preferred the bed in her apartment. She said it was less visible. She had wanted to keep their love affair quiet — had been almost fanatical in insisting on his silence. He’d thought she was being overly cautious, maybe paranoid. Now he was glad.
Now he was lonely. Claude opened a beer, cut himself a hunk of muenster and took his meal to the salon where he reclined in front of the télé, a free but somewhat restricted citizen, and watched the evening news. The lead story featured pictures of the morning’s big event: look at Pearl run! Look at the commissaire run!…God, do I really look like that when I run? And now here was Norbert Fauré walking. Now a uniformed cop overseeing medics loading a bagged Didier Belfort into a hearse. And the disgruntled tennis pro, still trying to take a swipe at anyone within his range as he was packed into the back of a police car. Then Cakeface, dressed to the nines in blue: Initial reports by the examining physician point to some kind of seizure. There are no marks, no signs of violence, exactly the same circumstances surrounding the six other unlucky lovers. In the meantime, Pearl Serein has gone missing, while the last of her known boyfriends, tennis pro Remy Lorentz and Commissaire Claude Néon, have been remanded for questioning. At this point, no clear motive or clue has emerged to cast light. Although love would appear to be at the center of it all, this bizarre string of deaths seems to be out of everyone’s control. The most a citizen can ask is, Where will it end?
Cake signed off, unaware that a certain blonde cop had got herself into the frame and stood there, staring, bemused, over the reporter’s shoulder and out at the watching world.
It prompted Claude to call Aliette. Her phone rang and rang…Where are you?
Twenty-four hours ago Claude could look down and see her apartment.
Not any more. He had returned to ground level.
There was shame. There was anger. A void in the vicinity of his heart was primary to both.
How to deal with it? Claude was not what you would call a reader. It was another reason Aliette had said she felt slightly out of her territory in his house: no books. (‘Read, Claude. Don’t become an old man who sits in front of the television. Nothing more pathetic.’) Apart from the newspaper and a couple of best-sellers on management strategy, all he had to read were gardening columns. Having been raised in a 4th floor apartment in deepest, darkest Paris, Claude knew precious little about gardening. With the arrival of spring, Monique had been assigned the task of going through Le Cri du Matin gardening column in search of tips that might help her boss keep pace with community standards, because Claude’s new home came with a garden he would be obliged to tend, the neighborhood being what it was. Mon beau jardin, twinned with the bird column on the back page of the second section, was overleaf from Le Vrai Tommi.
Claude was wishing he’d remembered to take that book as they left Pearl’s place this morning. Evolutionary psychology: fascinating stuff about instincts. It had told him his own instincts were on the mark…that he was making the right moves, because when it came to natural selection and propagation of the species, female genes perceived a house in the north end as the most secure of nests to be feathered. But now? He had overshot the north end, hadn’t he? Apparently. Oui. Bedazzled by the highest nest in the city, Claude had flown too high and something had gone wrong. What had possessed him? After all, he was just a cop. Perhaps the answer lay farther along in that same book… But there was no way he could risk going back and removing it from her place. Even if he pulled it off, he had already removed it once from another place (Gagnon’s), and they would surely notice. He was not sure it wouldn’t be a mistake to go and buy his own copy. They’d be watching him closely and drawing lots of conclusions, reading motivation into his every move.
No way he’d give that bastard Gérard Richand the slightest further crumb of circumstantial.
He considered the reading materials which remained at hand. But he was not of a mind for gardening columns. Or birds. He couldn’t bear the thought of that cretin Bonneau. And now that he was temporarily out of the office, management gurus were not much comfort.
What about some music, then? Slapping it in. Turning it up to fill the space.
But the hard, fighter thing that usually connected him to his favorite band was just not there.
All Claude Néon really had for diversion was the television.
He sat, counting the hours till the late news report was aired, when he might see it all again.
PART 2
The experience of romantic love is beyond all conditions, claiming devotion beyond all bounds… Romance feels fateful, feels like kismet, karma, destiny.
— James Hillman,
The Soul’s Code
22
A Very Specific Mandate
Tuesday morning, Local Scene cited the previous evening’s television coverage:
Did you see her face on your screen last night? I am speaking of Pearl in flight, her fear telegraphed, canceling her beauty. And did you see the artless buffoons trying to catch her? What a travesty! It has been close to three years since our Pearl and Didier Belfort shared the limelight. His was a sad fall, so unbecoming — the stories one could tell! …then dying the way he did, in such an ignominious manner, literally in the shadow of the palace he bestowed upon our Pearl. And now seven men are dead.
For those of us who study the ways of the heart, there is something truly dark at play here.
What is going on? We must have results — and the truth!
‘Bizarre,’ was Dr. Gilles Conan’s only comment as he laid the paper aside and accepted a cup of Raphaele Petrucci’s famous cappuccino.
‘She’s the reason you’re here, Doctor,’ said Raphaele.
Conan smiled. ‘I’d like to meet her.’
The renowned cardiac specialist from the university-affiliated wing of Hôpital Jeanne D’Arc had wandered into Raphaele’s morgue yesterday without airs or introduction. It had been a chaotic morning dealing with the discovery of Didier Belfort. Raphaele had been up and down the stairs four times as jurisdictional priorities were clarified — whom you reported to made a difference in how you reported. The body had just been delivered, he was standing there, exhausted, gazing down at his newest customer, sharing the blank solitude of the dead the way he sometimes did, when the morgue door had squeaked and swished. ‘Oui?’ Raphaele did not even look up, assuming yet more functionary communication from upstairs.
‘Doctor Petrucci?’
Conan stood there, bag in hand, like someone’s long-lost bachelor uncle. Into his sixties and a little ruddy in the cheeks, snowy hair thinning, but a twinkle in his gray eyes, and admirably trim and spiffy in green suede shoes, gray flannel, Harris tweed. Raphaele Pretrucci recognized him of course and adjusted instantly, welcoming the great man with cappuccino and biscotti. Apologizing in advance as he presented his notes, he pulled five hearts from a refrigerated drawer. ‘Radio, cinema, law, God knows…’ referring to the heart of Bruno Martel, ‘and fine art,’ tapping the tray marked Tuche. All he had were notes on the banker’s heart. For this, he apologized again.
Conan made a joke about the lawyer’s heart being a darker shade.
He complimented the coffee. The biscotti. (God bless you, mama!)
Then he donned smock and gloves and together they removed the heart of Didi Belfort.
Raphaele soon relaxed. ‘I should have got them all,’ he confessed, but he’d let the banker’s get away. Dr. Conan averred that the banker was a senior citizen and in that sense an anomaly as regards pathology. Raphaele confessed again. ‘I know I jumped the gun with victims two and three. But losing number one like that, I felt a sense of scientific duty and…’ He shrugged: why not? A heart’s not much use to the dead, much less the dead’s family, whereas the police maintain a genuine interest that covers both the near and far sides of life. (In his role as légiste, Dr. Raphaele Petrucci definitely considered himself to be a policeman.) Then a third confession, this one existential: ‘People think we’re ghouls,’ he murmured. He needed commiseration, if not approbation, ‘…and there were only two to start and it was just coincidence.’ And Raphaele hastened to add that Strasbourg had granted permission to take the lawyer’s, and, well, with these final three, he’d just assumed and gone on harvesting.
Conan smiled. ‘It’s hard in this old culture. My friends in America order them by the dozen.’
It did the younger man’s heart a world of good. Shades of the mentor he never had.
They’d spent an enjoyable first afternoon analyzing and collating data.
This morning Conan was set to meet the investigators and provide his initial thoughts. It was coming up ten when Inspector Nouvelle and Commissaire Duque escorted Instructing Judge Gérard Richand into the morgue. Dr. Conan, polite yet perfunctory in greeting the two males, beamed as he shook the blonde inspector’s hand. ‘My friend Norbert has told me all about you.’
She asked straight off, ‘And what do you think of our mystery?’
‘It is enticing, Inspector.’
The judge followed directly. ‘Any ideas where we might be headed?’
Direct and rather blunt. Gérard Richand had made it clear he did not like having his judgements manipulated from above. He believed they were wasting time and money. He resented Néon’s gaffe on an almost personal level. In his way, Gérard had practically promised to be no help at all.
Aliette had warned Raphaele.
He’d promised their visitor would be carefully prepped as to the prevailing power structure.
So Gilles Conan was politely circumspect in telling Gérard, ‘We’ve barely begun.’ He mentioned the equipment he’d ordered sent from his lab up north.
‘But have you ever seen anything like it?’
‘Do you mean like heart attacks?’
‘I mean like murder. I mean like physical evidence for same, Doctor.’
‘Of course.’ Personal biases aside, it is the instructing judge’s duty and prerogative to ask the toughest questions. Conan knew that. Fetching his notes, he was thoroughly businesslike in perusing his preliminary findings…making the skeptical Richand stand back and wait.
Dr. Conan offered a professorial smile. ‘Would a hormone satisfy you?’
Gérard Richand tilted his head. ‘Which hormone?’ His wife was obsessed with them.
‘Noradrenaline.’ Gesturing at the six hearts in their respective trays. ‘These hearts are awash in the stuff, relatively speaking. I would guess the banker’s was as well.’
