“Was there any identification on the car registration documents?”
“Yes. He was, or seemed to be, Gunther Marc Roche, a Swiss national with a Swiss driver’s license, of 18 rue de Basle, Geneva. All those details turned out to be false. But the French police have launched a nationwide search for the car he purchased from Laporte. So far it has not been located.”
“So, basically, we have a murder hunt for a foreign national who murdered a couple of guys at this vacation town on the ocean?”
“Not quite. And now you may put down your pen. Because what I am going to tell you is only a tip-off. You must establish the facts from another source.”
Étienne put down his pen and sat back.
“The two men who were murdered,” said the detective inspector, “were the private bodyguards of Monsieur Henri Foche.”
The reporter’s eyebrows shot skyward. “Non!” he said, an electric bolt of excitement lancing through his entire body.
“Oui!” said the detective. “Both men worked for him full-time and had done so for several years. The late Marcel was a true confidant of our Gaullist leader.”
Monsieur Varonne paused and looked down at his desk. Then he looked up and said, “But, Étienne, there is something else. A few days ago we were given a tip-off there was a threat against Monsieur Foche’s life, and it may emanate from England. The coincidence of this renegade ship-stealing maniac from the UK, landing in Val André, and being met by Foche’s guards is too much.”
Étienne weighed the difference between a huge front-page story, maybe the biggest he had ever written, and the alternative of a story on page 7, a minor murder and a modest headline. “Are you forbidding me to use it?” he asked.
Varonne replied, “Absolutely not. But I have tipped you the truth, and you must find a way to establish it from another source. My advice would be to try Detective Inspector Paul Ravel in Saint-Malo, and then Henri Foche himself.”
“I’m still not sure why you are so jumpy about it,” said Étienne. “The murders are public. Their employment details surely cannot be kept secret for long. I can’t see the fuss.”
“And that is essentially why I sit in this chair and you have to run around writing silly stories,” said Varonne. “Now pay attention. We have a killer on the loose somewhere in France. He has committed two murders today, and may commit more. But his target may be the next president of France, and we do not wish to make it any easier for him than it already is.”
“How do you mean?”
“First, we do not wish to alert him that we are on his trail. We don’t want him to know we are aware he’s after Foche. We want him to be confident. That way he’ll make a mistake. But things cannot be kept under wraps. And when you found out something was going on, then you had to be told the truth.”
Étienne stood up and thanked the inspector. But before he went he asked one last question. “Sir, what was the cause of death?”
“I was told he broke both their necks. But so far as I am concerned, that is unconfirmed. Try the police mortuary up the road. The pathologist is in there now.”
“Thank you, Monsieur Varonne. Thank you very much.”
By eight Étienne had spoken to Paul Ravel, who was not prepared to tell a lie, however badly the police wanted the matter kept under wraps. And while he did not offer much, he did confirm the facts. Étienne then called Henri Foche at home, and the politician also confirmed that Marcel and Raymond did indeed work for him and had for several years. Yes, he did understand there had been a threat to his life. But no, he had not detailed his men to go to Val André. However, his men always worked very closely with the police department, and he imagined there had been some cooperation when the hijacker’s landing place was established.
Henri Foche had no intention of upsetting Le Monde, and Étienne rang off happy that he had parted on good terms with the next president of France. He now had sufficient information to write a very polished front-page splash for his newspaper. He called the night editor at eight thirty, and filed immediately. His story read:Millionaire Henri Foche, the Gaullist front-runner for the presidency of France, was in shock last night after learning that his two personal bodyguards and close friends had been savagely murdered on a Brittany beach early yesterday morning.
The dead men are Marcel Joffre and Raymond Dunant, both in their early thirties and residents of Brittany’s capital city, Rennes. Police believe death was caused in both cases by an expert in unarmed combat who broke their necks. Marcel also had been blinded in both eyes, and Raymond’s right arm was snapped in half at the elbow.
At the time of death the men were armed with heavy-duty service revolvers, though neither gun had been fired. Detective Inspector Paul Ravel of the Saint-Malo Police Department assumed command of the case this morning, following a visit to the scene of the crime by the chief of the Brittany force, Pierre Savary, himself a close friend of Monsieur Foche.
The bodies were discovered by two young boys who were attracted by Raymond’s handgun, which was lying on the sand. One of them fired it and blew out a neighbor’s bedroom window. “We were lucky he didn’t kill someone,” observed Detective Inspector Ravel.
At first police suspected a terrorist involvement, since Monsieur Foche is a director of an international arms manufacturer in the field of guided missiles. He is known to have Middle Eastern business connections. But by lunchtime no Islamic extremist organization had claimed credit for the murders.
As the afternoon wore on, a tale of much deeper intrigue became apparent. In the past two weeks, an elaborate plot by a foreign power to assassinate Monsieur Foche has been bubbling below the surface. Police and private bodyguards have been placed on high alert to deal with it.
All signs pointed to the threat emanating from Great Britain, though it was not thought the British were in any way involved. Someone, however, intended to launch an attempt on his life, and the source, police say, came from London.
Nothing definite emerged until last night when the British put out an SOS for a stolen fishing trawler, from which the crew had been hurled overboard. The description of the man who perpetrated this crime fitted that of the suspect in the double slaying at Val André beach. Tall, Caucasian, powerful, black curly hair, thick black beard. He is believed to be of Swiss origin. The trawler is still missing.
Étienne did as he was instructed and left out all references to the car and the police manhunt in progress. But essentially he was out in front with the story, with the press pack on both sides of the English Channel trying to catch up. Le Monde led their first edition with the scoop.
All day a stratospheric level of gossip was winging its way across France from the residents of Val André. By nine that night even the notoriously sluggish newsrooms of the television stations were on the case. The state-owned France 2 led their 10:00 P.M. bulletin with “The Mysterious Events on Val André Beach.” As a general rule, when television news broadcasts use the word “mysterious,” it means they have only the remotest idea what they are talking about, and no one is very anxious to help them out.
A growling Le Monde, in search of the truth, might strike fear into the heart of the steeliest French policeman, whereas television news has an ephemeral quality that can be fobbed off—I’m sorry, there is a government inquiry pending on that. We can say nothing at this time. . . .
Nonetheless, France 2 somehow got a few facts into gear and offered the public an interview with the lady in Val André whose bedroom window had been shattered by the gun-wielding young Vincent Dupres, aged eleven. The lady confirmed there were two men lying on the beach. In her opinion they were dead, but she had no idea how or why.
Detective Inspector Paul Ravel told the television reporters almost nothing except that there were circumstances that laid themselves open to the gravest suspicions. Yes, a helicopter from Rennes Police Department had flown up to Val André. No, he could not reveal the names of the dead men until next of kin had been informed. Yes, the police were hun
ting for the killer, but had not yet located him.
When the first editions of Le Monde came up in a few hours, the France 2 news editor threatened to fire about seven people.
Thus, the cat peeped out of the bag at around 10:15, but it did not leap out, red in tooth and claw, until the small hours. And of course the small hours in France are not the small hours in the USA.
It was only 8:30 P.M. when the newsroom of Fox Television in New York picked up the developing story in France—and the part that grabbed them was the revelation that someone was planning to assassinate the Gaullist leader, Henri Foche, who was certain to become the next president of France. That was terrific. And it got better. The double murder of Foche’s personal bodyguards on the beach at Val André. The black-bearded killer, on the run, after hijacking the fishing boat. The near certainty that this was the man who was coming after Foche. Is that a massive story or what?
Oh la la! Holy shit! BREAKING NEWS! BREAKING NEWS! The Fox foreign editor would gladly have kissed far-away Étienne Brix, whose byline adorned the Le Monde lead.
CNN, the rival twenty-four-hour American news station, was too busy criticizing the Republican president for everything he had ever done to find time for the big story in Europe. They caught on just before 10:00 P.M., by which time Fox was up and charging.
They had a top-class foreign editor, an ex-Fleet Street newsman in London, brought on board by the laser-eyed Aussie media tycoon Rupert Murdoch and his henchmen. His name was Norman Dixon, and he knew how to update a hot story like a mongoose knows how to nail a swaying cobra.
“The only new angle we’ll get at this time of night in Paris is the security,” he snapped. “The new heightened security on Foche. It has to be immense. Get Eddie in Paris and tell him to get me something. Anything—just a line to say the entire French security forces went on high alert in the small hours of the morning.”
“But Norman,” offered a girl reporter who looked like she’d just jumped off the front page of Vogue, “they’ll all be asleep.”
“ASLEEP!” yelled the fabled Dixon. “With some black-bearded psychopath on the loose, trying to put a bullet straight between the eyes of the next president of France? And if they are asleep, wake ’em up. Just get Eddie on the case.”
Thirty minutes later, Fox News staffer Eddie Laxton came through from his apartment in Montmartre after speaking to a wide-awake duty officer at the Prefecture de Police, an officer he knew by sight.
“Yes, of course there has been a substantial security increase. And it will continue until this killer is apprehended.”
“Will it come into operation today?”
“Of course. Monsieur Foche is speaking in Saint-Nazaire today, and there will be an extra thousand men on duty all through the town and shipyards.”
“A thousand! Christ! Who made that decision?”
“Who the hell knows, Eddie? But it came from high up. It was a political decision, not the police.”
“Could it have been the president himself?”
“Shouldn’t be surprised. Anyway, it’s done. There are guys swarming to Saint-Nazaire from all over the country.”
“Armed?”
“Damned right they’re armed.”
The opening sentence from the Fox newscaster on the 10:00 P.M. bulletin was: The president of France stepped in last night and ordered a massive security cordon around the Gaullist leader Henri Foche, whose two bodyguards were savagely murdered on a beach in northern France this morning. The rest was pretty well rock-solid Étienne Brix, to whom the network gave full credit for the world exclusive in France’s most important newspaper. Norman Dixon wanted to give him a job.
Almost four hundred miles to the northeast of the Fox newsroom, Jane Remson almost jumped out of her chair. Harry was on the phone, and she rushed out into the hall and urgently advised him to come and watch the newscast.
Harry wound up his call, but by the time he reached the study, the newscaster was winding it up with political background on Henri Foche. He ended the story by saying, “The question is, can Foche survive until the election with this dangerous assassin on the loose?” The anchor was instantly on the wrong end of a growled reprimand from Norman Dixon, who told him, “Never end a newscast with a question. You’re not here to ask questions. You’re here to answer them. Just give them the news.”
As reprimands go that was mild. A lot milder than the one Jane Remson was about to issue to her husband.
“What’s going on?” asked Harry, as he came into the study.
“Going on! Oh, nothing much, except your personal assassin is currently being hunted by the entire security forces of France, having just murdered Henri Foche’s two bodyguards.”
“Is Foche still alive?” asked Harry.
“Yes, thank God.”
“Have they caught the murderer? Or named him?”
“No, they haven’t done either.”
“Then it’s not that bad, right?”
“Harry, I respect our pact that the subject is never to be mentioned. And for a few weeks I have pretended it wasn’t happening. But we both know it is happening. And now half the world knows it’s happening. So there’s not much point in the pretense anymore, is there?”
Harry Remson did not reply. He walked across the room and poured himself a drink. And then he turned to face his wife. “Jane,” he said, “you’ve got me on the hop right now, because you saw the broadcast and I didn’t. Can you just tell me what was said?”
“Oh, that’s easy. Someone in England stole a big fishing boat and crossed the English Channel into France. It seems the coast guard was waiting for him, plus two of Henri Foche’s bodyguards. They were both found dead on the beach, and there is now a nationwide manhunt for the killer, who police suspect may be after Foche himself.”
“Jesus Christ,” said Harry. “Any clues about the killer?”
“Yes. He’s apparently a big guy, well over six feet tall, with long, curly black hair and a black beard. They think he’s Swiss.”
“Sounds just like Mack Bedford, right?”
“Well, we can only assume he’s hired someone else to carry out the deed itself. But it does not in any way lessen the obvious danger to ourselves. And the dreadful position you have put us in.”
“Jane, I can assure you, Foche has a lot more enemies than just us. Some people believe he owns the factory that makes that banned missile, the Diamondhead, the one that keeps burning our boys to death in Iraq.”
“I don’t care how many enemies he has. Nothing alters the fact that you have somehow taken out a contract on the next president of France, and it’s just a matter of time before the assassin is caught. They’re on to him before he’s started.”
“Are they?”
“Of course they are. There’s a thousand men in the shipyards in Saint-Nazaire, looking for him. Foche is apparently speaking there tomorrow.”
“But they haven’t caught him yet?”
“Not yet. But no one can evade that many armed security guards in a controlled space. The odds against him are a thousand to one. And when they catch him, it will all come out—Mack’s involvement, your involvement, and in the end mine. We’ll all be in court within a month, charged with either murder, conspiracy to commit murder, or maybe just conspiracy. None of it is very appealing, and all of it is utterly, stupidly unnecessary . . . jeopardizing our entire lives.”
Harry stared at his beautiful, angry wife. “If the hit man, whoever he is, gets Foche before the guards get him, Remsons Shipbuilding is back in business. I spoke to Senator Rossow today, and he’s been in contact with Foche’s rival, Jules Barnier. Not only did Rossow assure me the order for the French frigates would continue to come here, but Barnier himself is considering buying a small holiday cottage with a dock somewhere on the Maine coast. He’s a big sailor, and he’s bored with the Med.”
“Not as bored as we’ll be in some prison cell,” said Jane.
Mack Bedford surveyed his new world headquarters.
At the front of the room there were two windows that looked directly out onto the shipyard concourse. On the rear wall directly opposite there were two more dust-covered windows that looked out directly over the harbor. The other two walls were lined with wide floor-to-ceiling wooden shelves, with inch-wide gaps between the struts like decking.
The room was probably 12 feet high, and behind the top two shelves on the door wall there was a high window, smaller than the others. The first thing Mack did was to see which windows opened and which ones he might have to force. All four of the lower sash windows were stiff with dust and neglect. But they all gave way before Mack’s upward onslaught, and they all opened. He closed them all slowly, attracting no attention from the dark shipyard below. And there was one thing he knew—this was a perfect spot to strike at Henri Foche, but it was almost certain the room would be “swept” by the security forces sometime in the coming hours. If that happened, he would at first try to hide among the shelves, or even retreat farther up the building, maybe even to the roof. But if push came to shove, he may need to go into combat. And that would change the rules, because it would almost certainly mean he would need to evacuate and regroup.
Diamondhead Page 40
