Six Months to Kill

by Enzo Bartoli

  ‘Right . . . yes . . . But what are we going to . . .’

  ‘It’ll be a surprise!’

  She’s waving at me like a mad thing as I step down to the platform at Lille Flandres station. As though I might miss her. She’s like a shining beacon standing bang in the middle of the hundreds of passengers scurrying around her. A lot of them look annoyed, as most of the trains are running two hours late, including mine.

  When I near her, I think for just a split second that she’s going to put her arms around me, but she holds back and takes my arm, leading me outside.

  ‘I didn’t think you’d ever get here! Do you know what happened?’

  ‘Something to do with some cables falling on the lines, it seems. But I had a thesis to read that one of my students handed in. The time just went.’

  ‘I just don’t know how people can spend so much of their lives buried in complicated things like theses. Oh, it doesn’t matter. You’re here now . . . Do you know Lille at all?’

  ‘I’ve been once, but it was a long time ago. It was to take my wife to one of her cousins’ weddings. All I remember is that everyone drank a lot, laughed very loudly, and that I had no clue what most of them were talking about.’

  ‘You’re unbelievable. Come on. Let’s go. We’re going to have a bite to eat first. I know a really nice little place and it never gets too crowded, so you’ll survive.’

  She isn’t lying. It is a lovely place and I’m pleasantly surprised. We’re in an old-fashioned brasserie with huge gold mirrors and elegant waiting staff. It’s formal, but not too in-your-face. Chloé asks for a table in the back room, where only three others are occupied. We are at least four metres away from our nearest neighbours, which is a plus – as I’m sure we’re about to embark on a highly confidential conversation. But we’re not there yet. As we sit down, she addresses the waiter, who is holding out the chair for her.

  ‘No need to bring us the menus,’ she tells him. ‘I’ll have the Maroilles salad and my husband will have the full Welsh. And we’ll have two beers. Pints.’

  That’s a lot of information for me to take in. I have to make a superhuman effort not to lose the plot as I ask her, tut-tutting, what exactly it is I’m about to eat.

  ‘You’re going to adore it! The Welsh is every disastrous food habit known to man, especially you, all in one go!’

  ‘And what are these “disastrous” habits of mine?’

  ‘Are you joking? You eat worse than a teen who lives above a McDonald’s. It’s all fried meat and crisps at your place! I just loved watching your face when anyone ever tried to give you vegetables when we were in Brittany!’

  ‘All right, all right! So what am I about to eat, then?’

  ‘It’s like a toasted sandwich, drowning in melted cheddar, with a sausage and an egg on top. Served with chips, obviously.’

  ‘If it wasn’t already in the offing, I’d presume you want me dead.’

  I already regret my attempt at a joke, but it just came to me and I know that Chloé doesn’t mind me talking about death. But I ask her to forgive my clumsiness.

  ‘Don’t worry about it.’

  Her face darkens, but she forces herself to give me an indulgent and compassionate look as she says, ‘I don’t blame you. I suppose it must be playing on your mind all the time, and every now and again it just has to come out.’

  ‘I don’t know. Let’s talk about something else.’

  ‘Well, haven’t you got anything to ask me?’

  ‘I don’t think so.’ I’m such a dreadful comedian. I try to show a healthy devil-may-care attitude, but I’m terrible at it. At least I manage to get a hint of a smile out of her.

  ‘Come on! Ask me!’

  I take the bait. ‘When did we get married, then? Haven’t we rather rushed into it?’

  This time the expression on my face, which I adopt deliberately, makes her laugh out loud.

  ‘It all depends on how you look at it.’

  She’s interrupted as the waiter returns to the table with a fully laden tray. There’s far too much food for two people. He puts down our beers first, then the salad for madame before banging down the biggest plate of chips and a huge bubbling dish of God-knows-what swimming in oil. I’ve never paid much attention to my diet and I have even less reason to do so now, but the thought of ingesting all that seems unreasonable. I think I detect a touch of irony in his voice as he wishes us the standard ‘Bon appétit!’

  He moves away and Chloé, who I can sense is almost shaking with impatience, jumps back to the case in point. ‘Right! Let me tell you everything! And don’t worry, I’ll get straight to the point. This won’t take long. In fact, you’ll be home safe and sound by tonight, I imagine.’

  ‘So . . . we’re actually going to do something today . . .’

  ‘Yes. This afternoon. I can even give you a precise time. We’ll be doing something at 4 p.m. It’s just that you’ll need a bit of time to imagine yourself in the role of . . . well, it’s something you’ve never done before.’

  Hmm! I don’t like the sound of this. She’s approaching the whole thing with kid gloves, which means she knows I’m not going to be happy about whatever it is.

  ‘Just explain what’s what.’

  ‘No need to panic. It’s just that you’re going to have to become a daddy.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Relax, Régis. You’re the father of an only child. OK? A boy. His name is Mathéo. He’s nine years old and he’s really sweet, but the poor kid’s disabled, right? It’s a shame, isn’t it?’

  ‘I hope I’m totally misunderstanding every word you’re saying.’

  Chloé laughs loudly. I can’t see myself in any of the mirrors because they’re too high when I’m sitting down, but I imagine my face is a real picture.

  ‘Where is this kid, then?’

  The laugh is even louder this time. ‘Don’t worry! You won’t even see him.’

  I still haven’t the foggiest. I’m starting to find the whole conversion frustrating now. I decide to have a little sulk for a while and get stuck into my Welsh.

  It’s only when I’ve finished this heart attack on a plate (which obviously I love) that we start speaking again. Chloé supposes I’m not going to bother with a dessert, and she supposes right.

  When she looks directly at me again, she appears in the best of moods. ‘Come on, then, I’m listening. Tell me what you want to know.’

  ‘Just explain it all a bit better about the kid.’

  ‘It’s no biggie. Just calm down. We just need to pass for parents wanting to send their child to the local school. That’s all there is to it. What else?’

  ‘But who is it?’

  ‘The name of the person we’re going for? You’ll never have heard of him.’

  ‘But perhaps I’d like to know why he’s in the firing line?’

  ‘All in good time . . .’

  Our coffees arrive. To make sure the waiter doesn’t eavesdrop, we embark on a brief conversation about Belgian beer. He recommends a beer brewed at the Abbaye de Oudkerken, and as soon as he’s gone we get back to business.

  ‘He’s called Guy Brison. He was thirty-two years old back in 1991, when he was arrested following a crime of a sexual nature. At the time, he was a primary school teacher here in Lille and the crime took place at his place of employment . . . I don’t think I need to elaborate, do I?’

  ‘That won’t be necessary.’

  ‘But nothing ever came of it and we don’t know why. We suspect that pressure was put on the magistrate from someone up high. Probably someone with the same predilections. But we were never able to prove anything. All that happened is that he was moved to a different school – somewhere in the south of the country.’

  ‘And where is he now?’

  She seems satisfied with my level of interest and answers in a suitably disgusted tone. ‘He came back to the region in 2003. He’s still a teacher. Actually, he’s a head teacher now at a primary school in Villeneuve
-d’Ascq. It’s not far from here.’

  ‘And do you think it’s still going on?’

  She hesitates slightly before giving me a response. She is a lot less categorical than she’s been in the past. ‘He’s never been pulled up for it, but there are definite doubts. Plus, he always spends his holidays in Thailand, and I don’t think that’s a coincidence.’

  ‘OK! So you’ve decided to do . . . what’s required.’

  ‘This isn’t a personal thing. Other people in my group have talked to me about him and I took some time to study his case, and I agree with them. It’s gone on for too long and the powers behind me have helped set this up.’

  ‘I see.’ It’s a pretty matter-of-fact response, given that I’ve just been informed that within mere hours I’ll be killing again. I do need a few more details, though, willing as I am. ‘What about the set-up?’ I continue.

  ‘It’s very straightforward. School finished at the end of last week, but he’s still working until the end of this week. There’s a heap of admin to do and the budget to sort out and all the rest of it. We are parents. Mathéo’s parents. He is disabled. We want him to start at the school in September. He’s going to need a support worker and a whole range of equipment. We’re having a meeting with him this afternoon to talk over our needs.’

  ‘That all sounds fine. And what do we do when we get there?’

  ‘He’ll be on his own. The other teachers, the secretary and the two dinner ladies are all on holiday. We’ll inject him. I managed to get hold of a product that I’m told works very well. It kills really quickly. It’ll look like a heart attack – the great thing is, the chemical doesn’t show up in a post mortem. And it can be injected into muscle. So it’s going to be a lot easier than last time. I’ll just distract him, and you do the rest. He’ll more than likely put up a fight for a few seconds, but then that’ll be it.’

  I watch her closely. She is so convinced and so full of good intentions, even when it comes to wiping someone off the face of the earth. How could I fail to follow her? She knows it, too. She leans down to the floor to get something out of her handbag. She discreetly shows me a little black case. I recognise it. It’s the same one we used for Arthur Reimbach.

  ‘I’ve already prepared the needles and syringes. You need to keep all this with you until you get back to Paris. I think it’s wise to do it that way. There’s more chance of me being stopped by the police in my car than you on a train.’

  ‘We’re not going back together?’

  ‘Nope. As soon as we’ve finished, I’ll drop you off at the station. I’ll go back on my own – via Belgium. I don’t want us to be seen together. Just in case.’

  ‘Fine. If you think that’s best,’ I say, disappointed.

  ‘I’ll be back with you in Paris in no time. Promise.’ She looks down at her mobile on the table to check the time. ‘Let’s pay up and get out of here.’

  ‘Right you are.’

  CHAPTER 16

  It takes us at least half an hour to pick up her car and drive out to Villeneuve-d’Ascq in the suburbs of Lille. The school we’re heading to is a huge, austere-looking building at the end of a quiet little street dotted with pretty red-brick houses.

  When Chloé pulls up and switches off the engine, we can’t hear a sound. There isn’t a soul around. The school playground has been empty for almost a week. The kids are all at home now, deafening their parents and making their lives a misery, no doubt. We make our way slowly over to the gates. He’s left them half-open, perhaps for us; we haven’t taken two steps into the playground when we hear his voice calling out.

  ‘Monsieur and Madame Schneider?’

  We look up to see where it’s coming from and see his head sticking out of a first-floor window just above the main entrance. His face looks severe, his eyes mean, and his salt-and-pepper hair is cut too short.

  ‘Come on in and it’s the staircase on your left.’

  There’s very little warmth to his voice. I’m sure it must be something to do with being impatient to get his work over and done with, so he can go out to Pattaya and see his other children.

  I feel my heart skip a beat as I push open the door. I don’t think these places have blackboards and chalk any more, but the smell is just as I remember. I can still recall the endless hours of torture I experienced in a building not dissimilar to this, all those years ago; torture inflicted upon me by my so-called ‘classmates’. Mates they were not. They made my life hell. They did the same to the teachers. But they singled me out because of my IQ and used any excuse to humiliate me.

  The headmaster is waiting for us at the top of the stairs. He’s shorter than I thought he would be. He is stocky with little legs – quite ugly, in all honesty. He’s wearing a grey velour jacket that only the oldest and most weirdy-beardy types would have dared try to get away with even back in my day. I don’t have a good feeling about this.

  ‘Monsieur Brison, the headmaster of this school,’ he bellows at us, holding out his hand.

  I wouldn’t be at all shocked if he clicked his heels together, military style. I’m a bit disappointed when he doesn’t.

  ‘My office, please,’ he adds, inviting us to follow him.

  The room is like the man. Old and grey. There’s a map of the world above his chair on the back wall and I’m surprised that the USSR and French Equatorial Africa aren’t on it.

  ‘So . . . you are the parents of . . . erm . . .’ He leans forward and picks up a folder. ‘Mathéo, is that right?’

  ‘That’s right,’ replies Chloé with a cheerful grin.

  He takes a seat without asking us to follow suit, but we sit down anyway.

  ‘Right, then. What’s wrong with him, then – your son?’

  Even though I know we’re talking about an imaginary boy, the brutality of his question leaves me flabbergasted. I’ve never wanted kids. I’m not even curious about what it’d be like to have one, but who would dare speak to the parents of a disabled child like this? Chloé is just as shocked. I can see it on her face. And I don’t think the teacher fails to spot it either.

  ‘I don’t tend to sugar-coat things. Sorry about that. It’s just that I’d rather be honest with you. Having a cripple here at the school could be a source of great worry, not only for me, but for the teaching staff. It’s problematic. There’re not only the safety aspects to consider, but the worry of how he would get on with his fellow pupils . . . You know . . . cohesion. And then we’d have to swap about all the extracurricular activities, too.’

  I can see that Chloé is about to pounce. She couldn’t be any angrier if the man were talking about her actual son. ‘But the school board has given its approval and they’ve already spoken to me about a classroom assistant,’ she says between gritted teeth.

  ‘Yes, so that’s one more member of staff for me to have to manage. It’s all well and good for the school board to be making these decisions. For them, a handicapped boy is just a file and a number that needs to be rubber-stamped. I’m the head of this establishment and I’m going to have to deal with all the extra work it entails.’

  ‘Well, actually, the law demands that you . . .’

  ‘Don’t worry yourself about it. I know that I’m obliged to accept your child come September, so please, let’s just try to make this easier on everybody. What am I to expect with him?’

  This man isn’t just a bitter old fool, he’s a dangerously nasty piece of work. I find myself thinking back to Chloé’s words when she first came over to my flat. She said, ‘You’ll see that these are people nobody will miss’, and she was so right about that. No normal human being could regret hearing about this dreadful person’s passing. Nobody.

  We’d said that Chloé would distract him while I did what needed to be done. I’ve been fingering the two syringes in my pocket for a couple of minutes now. I stand up. Brison must be hoping that I’m on my way out and about to take my troublesome wife with me. But I am instead trying to give him the impression that I’m ref
lecting on what has just been said. I pace a little, put my head into my hands and rub my eyes. I’m trying out the shattered-father look, worn out by all the obstacles and constant struggles in my life. I walk behind his desk slightly to take a closer look at the map. Guy Brison turns to watch me. It’s as though he’s worried I’m about to explode at any moment. Reassured, however, that I’m simply lost in thought, he returns his gaze to Chloé. And I make my fatal move. I pull out one of the needles and plant it in his neck. He has enough time to let out a scream before I clasp my other hand over his mouth. It’s such a pathetic, high-pitched little noise that nobody could have heard it. I quickly feel the weight of his head against my arm. There’s no reaction from him. I push his body forwards. His cheek hits the file on my ‘wrong’ son with a thud. I pull out the needle and check for a pulse. Nothing. He’s dead. I have no doubt about it. I’m getting quite good at making that diagnosis now. No need for the second syringe.

  Chloé hasn’t moved. I can see a definite hint of satisfaction and, dare I say it, I think she’s impressed.

  We pause to listen but can’t hear a thing, other than a few birds chirruping in the playground. She gets up and we leave the office and trot down the stairs. There’s nobody outside. Chloé gets back behind the wheel and I check to make sure there are no nosy neighbours twitching any curtains.

  It’s 4.15 p.m. Back to Paris, then.

  On the way to the station, I check my phone for the train times. I’m going to have a job on. There’s no way I’ll make it in time to catch the next one and I’m going to have to wait almost an hour for the one after that. Just as we’re arriving at Lille Flandres station, I explain this to Chloé and suggest that we go for a drink together, to help me pass the time; but she refuses. No reason. She’s congratulated me on what I’ve just done, for how efficient I was – but no more than that. Not a word.

  I find myself alone at the bar in a soulless station cafe with a panaché. Fortunately, one of the regulars asks the owner to put on the big flat-screen so he can watch the last stages of the Tour. This entertains me for a while, but not long enough. I decide to pay up and go for a walk, without venturing too far from the station. As I stand up, I feel a light pain, a strain really, under my left arm. I’ve been worrying about a lump that I found there yesterday evening. I’ll talk to Lazreg about it next Tuesday. Maybe.