‘Well, let’s start with latitude and longitude,’ said Delphie, taking control, which was a relief to Jacquot. ‘That’s us here,’ she continued, running her finger along the 43° line north to south, and then doing the same east to west along the 05° line. She tapped the spot, on the very edge of the coastline. ‘I’m right, aren’t I, Daniel?’
‘Looks good,’ he agreed.
‘You don’t know?’
‘Hey, I’m a cop not a yachtsman. All I’m saying is it sounds right. Looks right.’
‘So you don’t know how to chart a course?’
Jacquot gave her a grim, apologetic look. There was no point pretending.
‘I know where the sun comes up,’ he said, ‘and I know where it sets. Anything else – something like this – it’s never going to be much better than guesswork. Until I do some homework, or take a course.’
Out on the water there was a sudden, loud splash and the two sisters jumped.
‘What the hell was that?’ asked Delphie, gathering her shawl around her and looking nervously into the darkness.
‘A fish. The sea’s full of them,’ said Jacquot with a smile. ‘And night-time they like to feed.’
‘Sounded like a big one to me,’ said Claudine with a shiver.
‘They come in all sizes, ma chérie.’
‘Like men,’ said Delphie. ‘Big and small and always thinking of their bellies.’
Jacquot grunted and turned back to the chart.
‘So, okay, I’m no expert, but if I had to guess, I reckon we need to head south-west,’ he said, tracing a line with his fingertip. ‘In that general direction, out towards the islands, and keep checking the co-ordinates as we go. It can’t be that difficult, can it?’
100
THERE WAS A fine dew on the deck and the roof of the wheelhouse when Jacquot came up from the main cabin the following morning, leaving footprints in its wet silvery skin as he set about tidying up from the night before. It was chill, too, the sun already a few hours old but yet to reach Calanque des Sirènes, just the very top of its western ridge bathed in early morning light. Jacquot knew it would be a couple of hours, at least, before that line of sunshine reached the inlet where they were moored. But by then they would be at sea, searching for the spot marked ‘X’ and a pot of gold.
If, indeed, there was any gold.
And if, indeed, they could even find it.
Last night he might have shared the sisters’ enthusiasm, been caught up in the marvel of it all. But in the cold light of day, it all seemed very improbable.
But they’d give it a go. They’d take a look. At the very worst it meant a pleasant day cruising along the coast. Which wasn’t too bad a return.
Jacquot had weighed anchor and Constance was drifting free when he smelled coffee from the main cabin. As he started up the twin Volvo diesels, Claudine came up from below deck with a mug of coffee.
‘There’s a splash of your favourite flavouring in it,’ she said with a grin, and he smelled the Calva as he raised the mug to his lips. ‘To warm you up,’ she continued. ‘We girls need to keep our skipper happy, you know?’
‘There’re other ways to warm up a sailor, and keep him happy,’ he said, and leaned forward to snatch a kiss.
But she pulled back, waved a finger at him.
‘Coffee, Calva, croissants – that’s all you’re getting for now, Capitaine. We need to have you in prime order for the task ahead. Think of yourself as a footballer, chéri, holding back for the big game.’ And with a sweet, coy smile she climbed back down into the main cabin.
Racking the wheel to port and opening the throttles, Jacquot turned Constance and headed for the inlet’s entrance.
101
LÉO AND ZACH were asleep, the pair of them. Zach was curled up under his tree, head cradled on an exposed root softened with a sweat-shirt, and Léo was stretched out on the bedroll and cushion that he’d persuaded Dhuc to leave when they’d come back up to take over the watch.
It was the turning of Constance’s engine, a dull chortling rumble climbing the sides of Calanque des Sirènes, that woke Léo. For a moment he wondered where he was, opening his eyes and taking in the spread of soft tamarisk branches above his head. The next thing that dawned on him was that he was damp – a fine dew beading his clothes. And then, only then, did he remember where he was and what he was doing – or rather, what he was supposed to be doing.
Without thinking he scrambled to his feet and then ducked down, scurried forward and peered over the ridge. Sixty metres below him Constance was making a tight turn, a wash of white water bubbling up from her screws and forming a u-shaped hook. They were on the move.
‘Zach, wake your arse! They’re off,’ said Léo, snatching up the bedroll and cushion, binoculars and thermos flask, and stuffing them into Dhuc’s rucksack. The only thing he didn’t pack away was the walkie-talkie. It was going to take them a good twenty minutes to scramble back down the path to the beach, in which time Corsaire could have upped anchor and set out after Constance. If he held back for a few more minutes before calling, and put on some speed down the path, then they wouldn’t get left behind.
Five minutes later, legs aching from the scrabbling descent, Léo paused and flicked the transmit button.
‘Didier? Cassel? You there?’
He waited a few seconds for a reply, and then repeated the call. This time there was an answering click and Cassel, Corsaire’s skipper, came on line.
‘Cassel, this is Léo. They just pulled up anchor. We’re on our way down. We’ll be on the beach in ten.’
‘Got it. I’ll send the launch. And ten minutes max, okay?’
102
DUCLOS WAS HAVING breakfast in his stateroom when Aris knocked and entered.
‘Corsaire’s on the move, boss. Engines have started up and they’ve sent a launch to the beach. Which means that Constance is probably on the move too. Problem is, I can’t find Hamid.’
Duclos smiled. ‘I asked him to sort out the coffee. It’s disgusting. He’s probably down in the galley.’
Aris nodded, was about to close the door.
‘And when you find him,’ continued Duclos, ‘tell him to prepare for departure. As soon as Corsaire is past, we’ll follow her at a safe distance. And don’t let anyone see you or the boys on deck. Just in case they recognise you.’
When Aris had gone, the bathroom door opened and Hamid came out. A towel was wrapped round his waist, his body brown and smooth.
‘I better get moving,’ he said, going to the far side of the bed and picking up his whites. He pulled off his towel and began to dress.
Duclos sipped his coffee and watched with an appreciative eye. The tight white underpants, the white shorts, the white polo shirt, his lover sitting on the edge of the bed to pull on his long socks and tie his plimsolls. With every movement, the young man’s body flexed and rippled, the room filled with the musky warmth of him.
‘One more kiss,’ said Duclos, as Hamid stood up from the bed.
Hamid did as he was told.
103
ISABELLE CASSIER PUT down the phone, her ear ringing from the tirade she had just endured from Monsieur Jean-Claude Vaillant, the chief executive of Basle et Cie. A court order had been secured by the Judiciaire the previous afternoon and served on his ex-wife, Madame Jeanne Vaillant, authorising a search of her home on rue Savry in the Roucas Blanc district. Isabelle checked her watch. At some stage in the next few hours a forensics team from Avignon would be entering the property to start a series of shallow excavations in the basement of her home and in its terraced gardens.
And her ex-husband wasn’t happy about it – not at all – as he had made abundantly clear.
Tant pis, thought Isabelle as her phone began to ring again. With a sigh she reached forward and picked it up. Who was it going to be now?
‘Oui? Allo? Chief Inspector Cassier.’
It was Gala Desfornado, her voice low and urgent.
‘You told me to cal
l if he didn’t return. Monsieur Jacquot. There’s still no sign of him. The berth is empty.’
‘As you said, maybe he decided to moor somewhere overnight,’ said Isabelle. ‘The weather is good, he is still on sick leave, he has company …’ For a moment she felt a twist of envy. An overnight stay on Constance, with Jacquot, moored somewhere remote, romantic. It was almost too much to bear.
‘It’s just that I’m worried,’ Madame Desfornado continued. ‘I had a friend at the Vieux Port Capitainerie call him up on the radio, but there was no response.’
‘Maybe his radio is switched off. Or not working properly. Or maybe he was ashore, or swimming,’ replied Isabelle, which made her think of his body in the water, what it would be like to hold on to him, his arms around her, pulling her tight, the warm, salty taste of him …
She looked up, saw Laganne heading for her desk. There was a sly smile on his face. One of these days, she thought, he was going to pluck up the nerve to ask her out. And she was going to have to let him know in no uncertain terms that such a thing would never happen. She was spoken for.
‘You’re right, you’re right. I’m being silly,’ said Madame Desfornado on the end of the line. ‘I shouldn’t worry so, but I do. I just have a feeling …’
‘Why don’t we leave it another twenty-four hours? See what happens,’ said Isabelle, as Laganne dropped a print-out on her desk and tapped it with his finger, then tapped his nose with the same finger. Something was up. ‘I’m sure there’s absolutely nothing to worry about, Madame, but thank you again for calling, for letting me know.’ And before Madame Desfornado could say anything else, Isabelle replaced the phone in its cradle and reached for the print-out. She turned it towards her: harbour movements along the coast from Nice to Marseilles.
‘And?’ she asked, shooting Laganne a what-about-it look.
‘Just a hunch,’ said Laganne. ‘About the gold. Seems things have suddenly got very active all of a sudden. Corsaire out of Antibes, then here in Marseilles, moored across the harbour from Jacquot. Then Désiré out of Sanary yesterday morning. And both boats still out. Like Jacquot, so I hear.’
‘Corsaire? Désiré? You’ve lost me.’
Her phone started ringing again. Probably the Mayor, or the Préfet, calling to give her grief about the Vaillant order. She let it ring.
Laganne slid her a smile.
‘Monsieur Polineaux. And Monsieur Duclos. Corsaire and Désiré are theirs.’
104
WHEN JACQUOT TOOK Constance between the bluffs of Calanque des Sirènes and out into open water, they crossed the line from shade to light, from early morning chill to a glorious, embracing warmth, the sun over Cap Canaille now flooding down on them, splashing through the wheelhouse windows on his port side, flashing off the glass dials on his instrument panel and warming his skin.
There was another good thing about open water. Radio reception.
Jacquot had thought about it the previous night but knew he’d have to wait until morning before he could do anything about it. He might not know how to accurately read a chart in relation to a set of co-ordinates, but he knew someone who did. He reached up to the radio extension screwed into the wheelhouse roof, switched it on and, unhooking the mic, put a call through to Salette’s sloop in L’Estaque. The old harbour master was aboard and a few seconds later he came on air.
‘I have a favour to ask, old man,’ said Jacquot.
‘There’s no old man here, salaud,’ replied Salette.
‘Well, he’s the one I’m after. The good-looking one. The one all the girls tell me about. The one who knows everything.’
‘Ahhh,’ came the reply. ‘That one.’
‘You have a chart handy? Marseilles to Genoa?’
‘Don’t you?’
‘Alors, I’ve got some co-ordinates here,’ said Jacquot, ignoring the jibe. ‘Can you give me a rough idea where they point to?’
‘You can’t do it yourself?’
‘Just double-checking,’ he replied.
‘Of course you are. So give them to me. See if I come up with the same answer as you, Monsieur Magellan.’
Pressing himself against the wheel to keep a steady course, Jacquot reached into the pocket of his shorts and brought out Philo’s bookmark, read out the co-ordinates.
Five minutes later, as Claudine and Delphie settled on the aft deck with their mugs of coffee, turning their faces to the sun, Salette called back.
‘Did your calculations put you anywhere near Île des Pénitents?’ he asked.
‘Pretty close,’ replied Jacquot, with a pulse of excitement. The scrubby slopes of Pénitents were in sight, on his starboard side, rising out of the chop just a few kilometres to the south west.
‘It’s difficult to be precise without a proper GPS fix, but I’d say north side, somewhere around plage des Solitaires or the old prison ruins.’
‘Onshore, or offshore?’ asked Jacquot.
‘Landside, that’s my guess,’ the old harbour master told him. ‘So what’s it all about? Why the interest?’
‘I’ll tell you later,’ replied Jacquot, not wanting to say too much on an open channel. Signing off he hooked the mic back in its cradle and switched off the radio. Then he turned the wheel and watched the bow pull round on to the sun-bleached limestone slopes of Île des Pénitents.
105
CORSAIRE’S SKIPPER, HENRI Cassel, might have missed the co-ordinates Jacquot had passed on to Salette, but he’d caught the end of their exchange. As he came out of Calanque d’En Vau and passed the headland into open water he could see Constance ahead by two or three kilometres and, beyond, the looming crags of Île des Pénitents.
After keeping watch on her in Marseilles’ Vieux Port, Constance wasn’t difficult to spot, but even that early in the morning they weren’t the only vessels around: a tourist ferry bearing down on his starboard side, a couple of speedboats heading for Callelongue, a fishing skiff idling along close to the limestone slopes, and, far enough away to seem stationary, a flock of white-sailed yachts heeling to the off-shore breeze. Reaching for his Leica binoculars Cassel took a bead on her just to make sure. And there she was: the black hull, the white wheelhouse roof, rearing through some chop by the look of it, an occasional spray lifting off her bow.
Up on Corsaire’s bridge, Cassel was hardly aware of any swell, but the smaller craft ahead of him was starting to roll as she took on some looming broadside peaks and deepening troughs. The previous day, it had been flat calm out here, but this morning, the sea had a sharper, edgier character.
Cassel put down the glasses. Whoever this Jacquot was, he wasn’t the most experienced skipper. In conditions like these he’d have been better off keeping close to shore until he hit the wind shadow of the islands. In the calmer water he could have turned into the lower swells head on and made his life a great deal more comfortable. Instead he was taking a direct course to the islands, diagonally across the chop, and giving himself no end of trouble.
He sure was in a hurry, thought Cassel.
106
THE MOMENT CORSAIRE was out of sight behind the headland, Hamid started up the engines and swung Désiré in a wide circle. By the time he reached the point of the headland and passed out of Calanque d’En Vau, Corsaire was heading due south into the swells, ploughing a steady course out to sea. And there, a few kilometres ahead on its starboard side, was a small launch making heavy weather of the incoming conditions.
‘They’re pretending not to follow,’ said Aris.
‘Not an easy trick to pull off when you’re our size,’ replied Hamid, turning the wheel and heading away from both boats. ‘My guess is that they’ll keep south and then circle.’
‘And Désiré?’
‘We’ll keep close to shore, hold them on our port side. Corsaire has just the one boat to worry about. We have the pair of them. The boss wants us to hold back until Constance and Corsaire engage, if indeed they do. If Constance had headed back to Marseilles, we’d have been wasting our t
ime, but it looks like she’s up to something. After something.’
‘The gold?’
Hamid turned and smiled. ‘Maybe. If we’re lucky.’
‘You think it’s out here? After all this time?’
‘The boss thinks so. And that’s all that counts, n’est-ce pas?’
‘What I can’t understand,’ Aris continued, ‘is why this fellow, Jacquot, hasn’t called it in. He’s a cop, after all. The place should be swarming with patrol boats.’
‘Maybe he’s making sure it’s there before he does anything.’
‘Or maybe he wants to keep it for himself. Fatten his pension.’
‘That too. Some pension.’
107
‘IS IT SUPPOSED to be like this?’ Claudine called out. She was down in the main cabin with Delphie, the two of them wedged between table and banquette in an effort to counter the roll and plunge as Constance rode the swells.
‘Not far now,’ Jacquot called back, closing on Pénitents and seeing up ahead that the swells appeared to be lessening in the lee of the island. Too late now, he remembered what Salette had told him on that first voyage they had taken together in Constance. And here he was taking some of the rollers close to beam on, doubling their power and menace – exactly what Salette had told him not to do. He wondered what his old friend would have to say about his seamanship. And Philo, too. Would Philo have made the crossing in conditions like these? Or would he have stayed in Sirènes with Eddie and waited it out?
Jacquot looked around, back to the sloping limestone cliffs they had come from, behind him towards Cassis, and ahead to Callelongue and Marseilles. The only vessels out here in open water were large cruisers and the tourist ferries, while smaller craft hugged the coast or holed up in more sheltered moorings.
The Dying Minutes Page 34
