“I’ve spotted him once more on camera,” said Mrs. Belfast. “The previous times, he seems to be entering the building, but in this one he’s on his way out. I think he figured out where the security cameras were and did his best to avoid them. You’ll see that his face is turned away from the camera, or hidden by the scarf, in each of the stills. I also found two more people who appear more than once in the footage. One appears in the bank on two successive days. And the other appears at the drug store on one day and then a couple of days later at the bank. I saved them for you. I still have about an hour and a half of footage to go through.”
“That’s great progress. Are you still okay with this investigation?”
“To tell you the truth, dear, I’m a little annoyed with my brother. When I think of the fright he gave me last night, I don’t feel very kindly towards him. Anything I can find that will speed his departure from the island will be most welcome.”
“In that case, I’ll leave you to it. I want to see what the internet has to say about Rochelle Chirac.”
Chapter 7
The only previous references to Rochelle online were clustered around her disappearance fifteen years earlier. She had vanished at a time before social media got a grip on the news cycle.
Reporters who had spoken to her mother framed her as a runaway, while those who had spoken to her father regarded her disappearance as suspicious.
In other countries, it might not have made the news at all. Teenagers disappeared all the time. Sometimes they came back, and sometimes they didn’t. But on Prince William Island, disappearing teenagers were not the norm. The very fact that it was an island made it difficult to disappear. The only way off the island was via the airport or the Port of Prince William. Not many teenagers had the ingenuity or resources required to smuggle themselves out of the country. Those who did usually had adult help.
It struck Eulalie as odd that Rochelle’s mother had been so ready to believe that her daughter had run away when she’d had no known boyfriend or adult companion to help her get off the island.
Eulalie scanned the media reports looking for any reference to an investigating officer. It wouldn’t have been Detective Wesley Wright. He hadn’t been working missing persons back then. The case would have been assigned to someone else.
She finally found a reference to it in a Madagascan newspaper. The authorities had shared Rochelle’s name and photograph with the public and asked them to be on the lookout for a runaway teen from Prince William Island. The person who had reported the case to the Madagascan authorities was Detective Ferrier of the Queen’s Town police department.
Eulalie fired off a quick text to Chief Macgregor.
Eulalie: Do you have the full name and contact details for a Detective Ferrier who worked the Rochelle Chirac case 15 years ago? He might have been in missing persons.
While she waited, she deepened her search.
The website for Queen’s Town High School had two levels of online information. The first was available to the public, and included the school’s homepage, and its Facebook and Twitter accounts. The next level included pockets of information that were only available to specific password holders.
There was a site that students could access to view their exam results. There was a site that teachers could access with information reserved especially for them. And there was a third site that alumni could access if they wanted to view old school magazines and other information relevant to them.
Eulalie didn’t have permission to view any of this. She could have applied to be registered as an alumna but that would take twenty-four hours to be approved.
She linked her fingers together and stretched her arms straight up above her head, feeling the knots in her shoulders loosen. It was time to dust off her hacking skills. Twenty-four hours was too long to wait in a murder investigation.
It would be a soft hack, because this was hardly the Pentagon. Such encryption and firewalls as the school had in place would be easy to breach.
She opened her most basic hacker program and set it to work on the school’s website. Within minutes, she was in. The alumni site was the one that interested her most.
Eulalie isolated the year before and the year of Rochelle’s disappearance. There were several class photos and sports photos that included her. In each, she was part of a bigger group, and there was nothing that stood out as interesting.
Eulalie was more concerned with casual snapshots taken at school events where the students were standing with the people of their choice, rather than compulsory groupings into classes or sports teams.
The year before Rochelle’s disappearance, she appeared next to the same girl in every photograph. The snapshots weren’t labelled so there was no way to know her name. For a whole year, Rochelle and this girl seemed inseparable.
Then in the year of her disappearance, they stopped hanging out together. There were occasional glimpses of the other girl, but she was always standing far away from Rochelle.
Sudden fallings-out between friends were common enough, but Eulalie wanted to know what had happened. She went through the class photographs looking for the girl, but the faces were too indistinct to identify her. She could have been any one of a dozen ponytailed teenagers.
Eulalie selected the clearest photograph of Rochelle with the mysterious girl and printed it out. Perhaps she was Sheena Macintyre. If so, the mystery would be solved quickly. If not, Sheena might be able to identify her and give Eulalie a name to go on.
When she was confident that she had extracted all relevant information from the school’s website, she scrubbed away the digital traces of her presence and exited the site.
She stood up to stretch her legs. “It’s lunchtime, Mrs. B. Are you going out?”
“I don’t think so, dear. I already had a walk to the post office today. I’ll stay in and eat lunch at my desk.”
“Anything new on your search?”
“I have finished reviewing the footage. There was nothing else that was noteworthy.”
“Then could you spend the afternoon doing background checks on all the people who appear more than once on the security cameras. Any history of criminal activity, unusual computer skills, a background in hacking – anything like that. If you find something, red flag it and I’ll look at it later.”
Mrs. Belfast might have been convinced that her brother was working alone, but Eulalie strongly suspected that he had a client. She had enough experience of industrial sabotage to know that there was usually a disgruntled employee or a competitor behind it. As soon as she got access to the internal servers of the affected companies, she could investigate the hacker’s handiwork. But until then, the security footage was all she had to go on.
“Certainly, dear. I’ll get onto it straight after lunch.”
“Thanks. I’m going to visit Fleur now. Then I have more interviews this afternoon.”
Mrs. Belfast stroked the cat sprawled on her desk next to her computer. “We’ll hold the fort, dear. You find out what happened to that poor girl.”
After sitting at her desk for so long, Eulalie felt like a walk. She left her Vespa parked in the street and set off on foot to Sweet as Flowers. She walked up Bonaparte Avenue and turned left onto Lafayette Boulevard. Most of Queen’s Town seemed to have had the same idea. Prince William Islanders took their lunchtime seriously. Unlike Mrs. Belfast, they didn’t believe in sandwiches consumed hastily at their desks.
The island’s office workers chose to eat lunch at one of the many cheap bistros lining the boulevard. Most offered a two-course lunch special at an affordable price. It would be something along the lines of a bowl of clear soup, followed by a slice of quiche with salad.
A few years ago, it had been normal for office workers to enjoy a glass of wine over their lunches before returning to the office in the afternoon. That was less common these days. They mostly restricted themselves to water, although the older generation still considered lunch incomplete without a glass of
wine.
Eulalie regretfully admitted that she did not belong to that generation. A glass of wine would make her sluggish for the rest of the afternoon.
She resisted the temptations of the sidewalk cafés and street carts and kept going all the way to her friend’s coffee shop. She was looking forward to a peaceful meal spent catching up with Fleur and discussing the ins and outs of her case. For someone who had only lived on the island for seven years, Fleur knew a lot of people. Eulalie had cracked more than one case simply by holding a picture in front of her friend and saying, ‘Do you know this person?’
As she got closer to the coffee shop, her dreams of a peaceful lunch were shattered. The screaming could be heard half a block away. Eulalie had no difficulty in recognizing Fleur’s voice.
Fleur’s temper was legendary. The islanders attributed it to her fiery red hair and accepted it as part of who she was. She never lost her temper without justification. Eulalie wondered who had done what to annoy her on such an epic scale today.
“… keep your filthy hands off my wait staff,” Fleur screamed. “What makes you think you have the right to lay hands on a woman without permission? You’re disgusting! Disgusting, I tell you.”
Eulalie quickened her footsteps. She didn’t want to miss the show. From the way people had gathered on the boulevard, they didn’t want to miss it either. She jogged up the steps into the coffee shop to find Fleur confronting two British businessmen at a table.
“But, I didn’t,” one of them protested. He turned to his friend. “Did I touch her, Bert?”
“You did not, Lou.” His companion spoke with a mock-solemnity that told Eulalie they were both drunk – had probably arrived at the coffee shop drunk.
“Daisy!” Fleur screeched. “Get over here. Now!”
One of the waitresses scuttled over. “Yes, Fleur?”
“What did this man do to you?”
“He… uh… grabbed my butt, Ms. du Toit. He grabbed it and wouldn’t let go.”
“See?” Fleur rounded on the men with blazing fury. “You come in here stinking drunk and assault my wait staff. Who the hell do you think you are?”
The man called Lou stood up. He had transitioned from clownish to belligerent.
“I’m the customer, and the customer is always right. Nobody assaulted anybody. What is the world coming to if I’m not allowed to pinch a waitress’s bum?”
“Get out!” Fleur stamped her foot. “Get out of my restaurant.”
The other man stood up. They were both tall and beefy.
“We’ll leave when we’re good and ready. We’ve ordered lunch. We’re not going until we get it.”
“You’re not getting any lunch. I wouldn’t serve you if you were the last men alive.”
There was a smattering of applause from outside.
The man’s eyes narrowed. “Say that again, bitch.”
“I said I wouldn’t serve you if you were…”
He lunged at her.
Before he could register what was happening, Eulalie had stepped between him and Fleur, deflecting his shove with her arm.
“I believe the lady asked you to leave.”
He blinked at her. “Where did you come from?”
“These people would like to get on with their lunch. Please leave now.”
“Who’s going to make us?”
Eulalie stepped forward and then back. She lifted her hands to show that she was holding their passports and wallets.
“What the…?”
“How did she…?
“Do you boys like to play fetch?”
She tossed their possessions out the door and onto the street where the crowd of spectators lunged at them.
With howls of dismay, the men rushed outside to rescue their money. Jethro shut the door behind them and flicked the latch.
“Thanks,” said Fleur. Then she marched through to the kitchen.
Eulalie settled herself in her usual spot by the cash register. Fleur needed time to decompress after one of her tantrums. It took her a while to start being her normal, sunny self again.
Jethro brought Eulalie a citron pressé. He didn’t bother with a menu. She knew it off by heart anyway.
“It’s a little scary how fast you can move,” he said. “It’s as though you knew what those guys were going to do before they did.”
“I can’t have done, because that would be weird. And I am not weird at all.”
Jethro laughed. “Apart from your grandmother, you are the weirdest person I know.”
Eulalie shook her head as he left to take another order. She had been fighting the weirdness label since the age of twelve. Everything that had made her well-liked and respected in the village made her a weirdo in the city. Disoriented and homesick, she had learnt to suppress everything that was different about her and to strive for the cloak of normality. Even as an adult, she craved that camouflage of ordinariness. It gave her a pang to realize that people saw through it.
“What’s up, my friend?”
Fleur had returned from the kitchen. The angry blotches were fading from her face leaving it milky white with a spatter of freckles on the nose. She looked relaxed and happy.
“Lunch, I hope,” said Eulalie. “I’ll take the grilled cheese sandwich with a side salad.”
“Sure.” Fleur nodded to Jethro as he went to the kitchen to deliver the order.
“How’s the confectionary empire?”
“All good. I got the St. Michael’s contract. Did I tell you?”
“No, but that’s great. Well done.” Eulalie had been with Fleur when she had pitched to supply bespoke confectionary items to the exclusive boarding school on St. Michael’s Cay – a satellite island off the coast of Prince William Island.
“It’s not every day, or even every week. It’s only for special occasions for now. But they have a lot of special occasions, so it will help my bottom line.”
“Add that to your contract to supply the minibars at the Four Seasons, and it’s been a good year for you.”
Fleur smiled. “I guess it has, if you forget about a certain disastrous relationship with an international conman. But let’s not think about him. How’s your case going?”
“It’s complicated.” Eulalie pulled out her phone and scrolled through the pictures. “Have you ever seen this person before?”
She held up the computer-generated mockup of Mrs. Belfast’s brother. Fleur looked at it carefully.
“I might have seen him a couple of years ago, but not recently. Who is he?”
“He’s Lorelei Belfast’s brother, and he’s a hacker. A couple of years ago sounds right. That would have been when he was last on the island. Did he come in here?”
“I don’t think I ever served him, but he definitely looks familiar. He has a memorable face. The mouth is wrong, though. His lips are fuller than that.”
“I’ll ask Mrs. B. for a recent photo of him. It’s awkward though. This is her brother I’m investigating.
“Family is tricky.”
“It certainly is.” She held up another photograph. “How about her?”
“Also familiar. But the blond ponytail is wrong. She looks different these days. I can picture her with short, dark hair.”
“This is from fifteen years ago. Her name isn’t Sheena, is it? Sheena who works at Curl Up and Dye on Beach Road?”
“Definitely not. I know Sheena, and this isn’t her.”
“This girl was Rochelle Chirac’s best friend in their junior year. They don’t seem to have been nearly as close in their senior year.”
“Intense teenage friendships don’t always last.” Fleur tapped the screen. “I’m pretty sure this woman still lives on the island.”
Eulalie flicked to the next image. “How about this guy?”
“He teaches at the high school, doesn’t he? How does he fit into the picture?
“I’m not sure yet. Some sort of mentor to Rochelle. He might have favored her over the other students, which cause
d some jealousy. There was a perception that Rochelle could get away with anything. Have you heard anything about him?”
“Not much. He’s good looking, isn’t he? The last fifteen years have been kind to him. Wasn’t he there when you were at school?”
“He was, but I don’t remember much about him. He taught me biology and kept a low profile.”
“You didn’t have a crush on him?”
“Not at all. He wasn’t on my radar in those days.”
Chapter 8
Eulalie rode her Vespa down one of the side roads that connected Lafayette Drive with Beach Road.
The two main roads ran parallel to each other. Beach Road, as its name suggested, was right on the beach, while Lafayette Drive was about a quarter mile inland. To the north and to the south, Beach Road became the Coast Road that ran all the way along the eastern shore of the island. To the south, the island was rocky and precipitous, with hulking cliffs and dramatic gorges. To the north, it flattened out onto a plateau that was largely taken up by sugarcane farms.
Beach Road was a festive, touristy street where the party never stopped. On one side was the famous Cinq Beach – a five-mile stretch of powdery white sand with gently lapping waves. On the other were big chain hotels like the Four Seasons and the Marriot, and smaller, boutique hotels and B&Bs. Nightclubs abounded, as well as support industries like convenience stores, beauty salons, and hairdressers. These ranged from the exclusive and expensive to the cheap and cheerful.
Curl Up and Dye fell into the cheap and cheerful category.
Moneyed tourists and the kind of locals who lived in Edward Heights had their hair done at salons with names like Toni and Benn or Ferguson Hair. Everyone who worked at such places wore black, and the atmosphere was restrained and sophisticated.
Curl Up and Dye was nothing like that.
Its signage consisted of pink neon tubing that flashed on and off intermittently, and the atmosphere was anything but restrained.
As Eulalie walked in, she was greeted by a blast of hot air and chemicals. Pop music blared from a sound system and everyone seemed to be talking at once. It made her miss her quiet little hair salon in Finger Alley where the Armenian hairdresser hardly spoke a word of English or French.
The Complete H-Series of The Eulalie Park Mysteries Page 123