A Taste for Vengeance

by Martin Walker

  “What?…I see. Well, that’s good news, better than we found in Montignac. Our bird has flown. I want a very thorough search of the house and car, particularly any papers, computer, phones or SIM cards. Thanks, J-J.”

  “They got the other one, Kelly, as he was pulling out of his driveway, suitcases and briefcases in the back of his wife’s car,” Prunier said. “Two minutes later we’d have lost him. He was armed with a handgun, but he and his wife came quietly and are now demanding a lawyer. We can hold him on the firearms charge, and forensics are working on the car. His wife had a map of southern France on her lap, open to show the route to Spain.”

  “I have to organize roadblocks and contact the Police aux Frontières,” Prunier went on. “Inspector Moore will search what papers have been left here and we’ll get another forensics team in. And you, Bruno, had better find out just how it was they were tipped off. I suggest you start with your colleague Louis.”

  “Yes, sir. I’m sorry for this.” Bruno felt his face turning brick red with shame as he left. The story would be all around the entire police force of the département by morning and he’d never live it down. It would give ammunition to all those who argued that the police municipale were a bunch of amateurs who should be pensioned off and the work left to real policemen.

  He was driving to Louis’s place on the other side of town when he stopped at a pedestrian crossing for a bunch of men who were walking none too steadily. Behind them were the lights of a bar, with its name above the lace-curtained window, Le Relais du Chasseur. A hunters’ bar was the kind of place where Louis would drink. On an impulse, Bruno parked, entered the bar and found the owner sweeping up. Another employee was stacking chairs onto plain wooden tables.

  “Bonsoir à tous, and sorry to disturb you as you’re closing,” he said, putting out his hand to be shaken by a tired-looking man in his fifties with a shaven head and goatee beard. “Was my colleague Louis in here tonight? I think he was here when I phoned him.”

  “Yes. He’s in most evenings but he left half an hour ago. You’ll find him at home, but knowing him he’ll probably be snoring by now.”

  “What about that Irish friend of his, Damien? Was he in tonight?”

  “Yes, a nice guy. Damien Aroque, something like that. He’s in the same hunting club as Louis. His French isn’t much but he’s a lovely singer and is always ready to buy a round. They were all at the same table at the back, their usual place. I remember Louis got up to answer a phone call and came back and made some joke. Soon after that, Damien left.”

  “Thanks, I’ll catch Louis at home and hope I don’t have to wake him up.”

  “Good luck.” The owner shrugged and gave a half smile. “You’re Louis’s new boss, aren’t you, from St. Denis? I saw something in the paper this week. I don’t think Louis is very happy about that.”

  “Understandable,” said Bruno. “I might feel the same way if I were in his shoes. Is Louis a friend of yours?”

  “He’s a good…” The man paused and then went on. “He’s a regular customer and his being a cop means I don’t get much trouble, which suits me fine.”

  “So he doesn’t try to drink for free?”

  The landlord shrugged. “Let’s just say I don’t get much profit from him, but he’ll buy a round once in a while.”

  Bruno nodded and sighed. “So long as he’s not abusing his position.” He put out his hand again. “Call me Bruno and thanks for the chat.”

  “I’m Laurent,” said the owner. “Fancy a quick one for the road?”

  “No thanks,” said Bruno. “I’m on duty, and anyway I have to wake up Louis and I wouldn’t want my breath smelling like his.”

  The owner grinned. “Good night, take care.”

  Louis lived on a development built in the 1950s, in a semidetached house with a big rear garden but no garage. His police van was parked on the street. The only light Bruno could see was a dim glow through the frosted glass above the front door. Bruno went around the back, where Louis had his vegetable garden and where he kept his hunting dogs. These were new puppies in training since his old dogs had been killed in sniffing out an attempted terrorist attack at the Lascaux Cave. He had been handsomely compensated for their loss, but Bruno could imagine the grief Louis must have felt.

  The kitchen light was on and Louis was sitting at the table, a glass of what looked like cognac before him, smoking his pipe and nodding off in front of a TV that stood on a counter beside the fridge. Bruno tapped on the window. Louis sat up with a start, rubbed his eyes, saw Bruno at the back door and his face fell.

  “Do you know what time it is?” he began, blustering and holding the door half-closed.

  “Time for you to tell me exactly what you said to your Irish friend tonight in the Relais du Chasseur,” Bruno said, pushing Louis back into the kitchen and into his chair. Bruno then perched on the table beside him.

  “What do you mean?”

  “That little joke you told in the bar just after I called you.”

  Louis’s eyes dropped. “I don’t remember. Here, have a drink. A nice bit of Armagnac from my cousin in Condom.”

  “I’m on duty, Louis. This not a social call and you are in real trouble. What did you tell your Irish friend tonight?”

  “Only that he ought to take care because I’d just heard the fisc were after him. It was a joke. A lot of people have problems with the fisc.”

  “The fisc are in law enforcement, like you’re supposed to be. And your Irish friend turns out to be a convicted terrorist who has now flown the coop with his wife a few minutes before we raided his house. The damn cooking pot in his kitchen was still warm. And it was you who tipped him off, you damn fool.”

  “Don’t you talk to me like that.” Louis was angry now, gripping the arms of his chair. A big vein was throbbing on his forehead. “All high and mighty and the darling of the newspapers with your shiny new medal. I should have had that job, you smug bastard.”

  “Watch your tongue, Louis, I’m your boss.”

  Was this drunken fool actually thinking of taking a swing at him? Louis was bigger and weighed a lot more than Bruno, but he was nearly twenty years older, out of condition, and he’d never been trained to fight. Bruno suspected it was the Armagnac speaking, but he stood up from the table. He edged his right foot back a little so he could slam Louis’s face down onto his rising knee if he tried to come at him. Louis must have seen something in Bruno’s eye and he sat back.

  “Screw you, Bruno, and screw your fancy women and your stupid little dog. It was you who got my dogs killed, the best hunting dogs in the valley. And I don’t care if Damien got away, he’s worth ten of you any day. And what’s this crap about him being a terrorist? You’re making it up.”

  “He served time for it. And it wasn’t only him who got away, it was also his friend in Bergerac. Luckily we managed to get him at a roadblock. He was armed. We’re still checking the phones but we think that when you tipped off Damien, he tipped off Kelly and they both made a run for it. Do you realize how much trouble you’re in?”

  “Not my fault, it’s yours,” said Louis, with something like cunning in his eyes. He had let go of the arms of his chair and reached for his glass of Armagnac. “It was you who told me about Damien and the fisc, Bruno. And you didn’t tell me it was a state secret.”

  “I told you to keep it to yourself, and my phone has an auto-record function. You’ll hear it for yourself when this comes up in your disciplinary hearing, you stupid old drunk. Commissaire Prunier was on this raid tonight, along with British and American officers from counterterrorism, and you blew the operation. This is on your head, Louis, and I think there’s a good chance that you might lose your job, and probably your pension with it.”

  With that speedy switching of emotions that Bruno had seen so often with drunks, Louis seemed to shrink back into himself. The eyes that ha
d been blazing with anger and indignation a moment earlier were now mournful and self-pitying.

  “They couldn’t do that, not after thirty years of service,” he said, trying to sound confident, but there was a whine in his voice and tears welling in his eyes. Bruno wasn’t sure whether he felt saddened or sickened.

  “Read the regulations, Louis, and what it says about dismissal with cause. Revealing police operational details to a member of the public, let alone to a convicted terrorist, is a serious offense. And you’ve got half the cops in the département hunting an armed and dangerous man. Prunier will have every right to throw the book at you, and I don’t think your drinking chums in the mairie will lift a finger to help.”

  The tears were now trickling down Louis’s fat cheeks and his hands were twisting together in his lap. Then the kitchen door opened.

  “What’s all this damn shouting about? You’ll wake all the neighbors, you and your drunken…”

  Louis’s wife, in a vast and floppy nightgown and bare feet, her face gleaming with cream and her hair in curlers, suddenly caught sight of Bruno standing there sternly in uniform. Her hand came up to her mouth, belatedly trying to hide the fact that she had removed her dentures.

  “Putain, Louis, what the devil have you gone and done now?”

  Bruno felt a wave of pity wash over him for her, some of it for Louis as well. It wasn’t entirely Louis’s fault, he reminded himself. He’d been showing off that evening and he knew about the man’s loose tongue.

  “Bonsoir, monsieur,” Louis’s wife said. “I’m sorry, I didn’t realize it was you. Can I make you some coffee?”

  “No, thank you, madame. I’m going. I think you’d better get Louis to bed. He’ll need to be in good shape in the morning. Good night.”

  Bruno let himself out the way he had come in and went back to his van, thinking that both he and Louis would almost certainly be hauled in front of Prunier the next morning. He checked his phone automatically. There was a terse message from Prunier, requesting that Bruno deliver a written report on the affair, to be on Prunier’s desk by noon.

  “I expect you to come in person,” Prunier had added.

  It was not simply Prunier’s official response that alarmed him as he drove back to St. Denis but Bruno’s own sense of shame. He had behaved like a foolish young recruit. At a much deeper level, Bruno had been shaken by the outrage and anger that Isabelle had displayed. There had been something close to contempt in her reaction, and that was the most wounding of all.

  Chapter 14

  The next morning Bruno was woken up by the cocorico of his cockerel, Blanco, greeting the break of day. And a beautiful day it looked to be when he stepped outside in his old army tracksuit and running shoes. There was not a cloud in the sky and the air was so fresh he could almost taste it, and so clear that each leaf on the trees and each wrinkle in their bark seemed distinct. His gloomy mood of the night before had gone, and as he and Balzac jogged through the woods Bruno felt a new resolve. With it came a determination to establish precisely what his new role entailed and under whose orders he now came.

  There had been no further messages from Prunier or from J-J about his attending that morning’s staff meeting in Périgueux. Bruno decided to remain in St. Denis. At the stroke of eight he was waiting outside the door of the mayor’s office.

  “Bonjour, Bruno. What can I do for you?” the mayor asked at the sight of him. “You look as if you have something on your mind. Come in and have a coffee.”

  “It’s this new job, sir,” Bruno began, once Claire had brought in two coffees from the mayor’s private stock. “I’m kind of confused. Do I still work for you and for St. Denis or what?”

  The mayor sat back, considering. “It’s complicated, but yes, you continue to be chief of police of St. Denis and your traditional salary is paid by the town budget. But you are also chief of police for the whole valley, so you work for the community of communes, the standing committee of all the mayors who are supposed to pay for your extra salary and the greater contribution to your pension. But for the next year that’s supposed to be paid by a special grant from the Ministry of Justice, since this is their pilot project, and they’ll also pay for your administrative assistant once one is hired. We haven’t seen their money yet, so right now you are still wholly employed by St. Denis.”

  “But what about that oath that I swore to uphold the discipline and regulations of the Police Nationale as an officier judiciaire?”

  “I was interested by that, so I looked it up,” the mayor said. “Article fourteen of the Penal Code says such an officer is charged with determining infractions of the law, establishing proofs and seeking out the authors of such crimes. It gives you powers of arrest and detention and of requisition, according to the rules and regulations of the Police Nationale and subject to the authority of the procureur.”

  “So I don’t come under the authority of the Police Nationale?”

  “Not as such, since you’re not formally in their chain of command. But as a courtesy and as a matter of efficiency, you’ll naturally cooperate with them to the best of your ability. Your duties here take precedence, though.”

  The mayor smiled. “Tell me, has our friend Commissaire Prunier been trying to get you under his command?”

  Bruno nodded.

  “I thought as much. You may have heard, Bruno, of La Guerre des Polices, a famous film in the seventies, about two competing police forces seeking the same criminal and getting in each other’s way. It was probably before your time, but it pretty much sums up the relationship between the gendarmes and the Police Nationale. They are rivals, competitors, sometimes almost enemies. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing. The system was designed that way, quite deliberately. Ever since the Revolution, the Republic has been wary of one single, all-powerful police force. We may lose some efficiency, but we gain constitutional security.”

  “You mean the way so many countries have separate intelligence services, one for domestic affairs and the other for international work, like the CIA and FBI?”

  “Exactly,” the mayor said. “Or MI5 and MI6 in Britain and Mossad and Shin Bet in Israel. It’s the same principle. Ambitious officers like Prunier always seek to widen their authority, but he’s not your boss, Bruno. I am, or rather, the people of St. Denis, as represented by the mayor and council, who pay your wages and define your work. Should you have any trouble with Prunier, tell him that and let me know you did. Now, explain to me what brought this on.”

  Bruno described the events of the previous evening and the context of the IRA connection, the presence of Moore, Hodge and Isabelle, and Prunier’s demand for a written report. He admitted that he had doubtless been guilty of showing off.

  “But wasn’t Prunier showing off too before this august bunch of officers? How often does a commissaire race off in the night to lead a raid on a suspect’s home?” the mayor asked. “Your call to Louis in Montignac triggered the flight of these two Irishmen. That in itself suggests guilt. I’d say you cunningly smoked them out. No, Bruno, I don’t think you should worry about that. Nor about Prunier’s request for a report. You can tell him that you have reported to your own chain of command, which means me. If Prunier wants anything further, he’s free to contact me. Remember that whenever several bureaucracies are involved in a project, they’ll inevitably try to pick someone to take the blame if things go wrong. Make sure it isn’t you.

  “Now that your problem is out of the way, let’s talk about road traffic,” the mayor went on, rising from his desk to look at the large map of the commune on the wall. “The transport ministry has authorized the funds for two speed-trap cameras to be installed on our roads. Where do you recommend we put them?”

  Twenty minutes later, having sent his brief but polite email to Prunier, Bruno was reaching for the paperwork in his in-tray when his desk phone rang. Assuming it would be Prunier, he sig
hed as he reached for it.

  “You’re the luckiest amateur cop I ever knew,” J-J announced. “A gendarme roadblock at Montauban picked up your Irishman from Montignac. And my forensics guys found cocaine traces in the car of the one we got in Bergerac. The narcotics squad sent their dog team in to sniff through his garden and found a stash of two kilos under his compost heap.”

  “Which wouldn’t have happened if I hadn’t called Louis and he hadn’t tipped off the one in Montignac to make them run,” Bruno said, feeling emboldened.

  “I wouldn’t try that on Prunier if I were you. I hear he’s told you to deliver a report on it all this morning. When are you coming in? If you want, I can give you a hand with the phrasing. After all, it was me who put that idea into your head about using the fisc.”

  “Thanks, J-J, and I appreciate that, but I’m not coming in and I’m not filing a report,” said Bruno. “I reported to my own chain of command, the mayor, and that’s all. I don’t work for Prunier.”

  “Putain, Bruno, are you out of your mind?” The shock in J-J’s voice was evident down the line. Bruno could imagine the look on his face. “You can’t flout his authority like that, he’ll go ballistic.”

  “I have no choice. I’m under orders from the mayor, who also chairs the committee of communes for whom I work. The mayor wants to make the point that I don’t work for the Police Nationale.”

  “If it comes to a turf war between Prunier and your mayor, you’re going to be in the middle. And in that tussle, my money’s on Prunier.”

  “You could be right, and don’t think I’m feeling comfortable about being in the middle of this situation. But I doubt whether it will come to that,” Bruno said, thinking that J-J was probably the man best placed to defuse the situation. He could talk to Prunier and warn him against picking a fight with a professional politician. So Bruno had better make sure J-J knew how serious this could become.