Moeder put it down to the strain of having Germans on French soil, even though they’d not officially reached our little corner of the world. Vader said it was guilt about leaving our few remaining relatives in Rotterdam to be bombed. Joop argued it was the new car needing costly petrol and attracting more unwelcome attention to the family. As for the harvest, it was bad enough we’d taken on a Roma from the Limousin, but we couldn’t hire any of the ‘retirados’ attempting to reach Spain, in case we were shot. They’d been a ragged bunch who’d shown up at our gates eager to work, desperate for money. I’ve often wondered if one or more of them might have been responsible for the disappearances, but that thought has never lasted long. I’d already logged the suspicious glances around the supper table. Felt the silences like slabs of winter ice, and it was always Joop, nearly still-born, who’d leave the room with tears in his eyes.
“He’s back,” Martine announced.
“Who? Joop?”
“No. Your man, of course.”
*
John Lyon’s skin was glowing. He smelt of strawberry shower gel. His cuts healing nicely.
“I can’t stop long,” he said, devouring a mouthful of my cucumber chunks. “More places to go, people to see...”
“A lot of my material’s missing off the hard drive,” I said.” All about Mas Camps. Tec Monde’s number’s unavailable. I’ve tried calling several times.”
He swallowed. Took another bite. I liked the way his mouth moved. It was hard not to make my stare too obvious.
“Surpries, surprise. I’ve still got the receipt for it, so I’ll go and twist Mr Heimlat’s ear and the rest. And by the way, I tracked Suzman junior’s Merc as far as the turning for the Abbaye Saint-Polycarpe. Seems that’s where they were heading. And I’m pretty sure Joel was in that car too.”
Jésu…
Although Martine gripped my arm, I could barely feel it. “And they’ll be back here,” she said. “To finish the job. You wait.”
Silence. laced with fear.
“We should get a couple of dogs. Big ones.”
“They’ll get topped.” He smoothed out creases in his clothes, turning back the ski jacket’s frayed cuffs. Then his gaze moved on to me. “Best if you write down or dictate to Martine, any memories or others’ recollections of a railway and tunnel being built in Dansac. Any stray children wandering around there or Mas
Camps. Don’t put anything else on your computer. When you’ve finished, hide
whatever you’ve written. I’ll be back by four.”
“Would you like some more lunch before you go?” Asked Martine. “I’m knocking up a tuna pasta.”
“Thanks, but I’ll get something on the road.” He glanced at his watch. I also liked his face at that angle but thought his grazes might take a while to heal. Then he looked up, not accusingly, but something close. “I forgot. As you won’t let me involve the local police or access their records, I could do with some more info on your neighbours at the time - Jeanne Tremblant and Francke and Daniel Boussioux. Anything at all.”
I smiled. It hurt. “I’ll do my best.”
Then he went. But not for long. Martine stopped midway between passing me the mayonnaise when he re-appeared.
“I’ve found something you both should see.” Slightly out of breath, he placed two pieces of junk on my desk, where they perched like gods, rusted, but intact. Horribly intact.
“Manufactured by V Ruissol. A subsidiary of IGF. I’ll find out more.”
“That name’s vaguely familiar.”
“They made the rotovator I use,” said Martine. “And the sledge hammer. Both new last year. Still under guarantee.”
My telephone directory gave a number in Foix, but the operator informed me it was, like Max Heimlat’s, unrecognised. “Since yesterday,” I added.
“Yesterday?” He frowned again. “What’s the Foix address?”
He then wrote it down. Closed his notepad.
I’d missed him and he didn’t know it, instead touched his rusty relics as if thinking hard. Remembering Jeanne Tremblant’s fear and the twenty-year-old Daniel Boussioux’s insistent offers to help with the harvest - something he’d never done in the years before - and his obvious pleasure when Vader said yes.
Chapter 29. John.
Before setting off down the drive, I re-wrapped both my bulky mementos in freezer bags and buried them just out of the CCTV’s range, in a weedy flower bed near that first tower’s rear door. A precaution, as going to Foix wouldn’t be an option until Monday. Nevertheless, I drove through the still-open gates sensing the afternoon could be as productive as the morning.
My route back into the high Pyrenees was longer, more tortuous than that taken by the Suzmans. Each bend in the road seemed worse than the last. How folk living here had managed without the combustion engine, I didn’t know. Maybe they’d failed, because every hamlet and village I passed through, seemed like Dansac - lifeless, soulless. Yet despite local jealousies, the Ryjkels had apparently thrived. Could that immigrant Dutch family whose success with their vines and the brothers’ exclusion from serving their adopted country, fuelled it to a murderous degree? To kill three of them and ther horse, leaving no trace? Not even of their wooden trap? Had there been an incineration somewhere, tucked away out of sight? After all, smoke at that time of year wouldn’t have raised an eyebrow, when burning dead vines was as commonplace indoors and out.
As the road dropped down through forestry and patches of pasture grazed by ghostly white, long-horned cattle, I promised myself a forensic, evidence-gathering walk from Mas Camps to Saint-Antoine, to search for any possibly overlooked physical clues. But what chance of that after so long? Not for the first time I wished I could bring someone else on board. Maybe another flatfoot from my CID days if Karen was so determined to keep the locals out. But no. Dream on, I told myself.
I needed fuel, also something to eat, and when I finally reached La Bastide at the junction of the now familiar road to Roche-les-Bains, I stopped by a crowded bar for a takeaway packet of thin, hot chips and further on, filled up the car.
*
Snow in the air. Nothing obvious, just the odd, melting flake hitting the
windscreen, making me put my heel down as signs for the Abbé Saint-Polycarpe became more frequent. AVolvo with a UK plate and conspicuous GB sticker, could be too much of a handicap, so once I’d turned off to the left, I parked in a Forêt Dominiale car park alongside foreign camper vans and the like, and walked uphill, between luxury, chalet-style houses with impossibly sloping lawns.
At the outskirts of Roche-les-Bains, these in turn became more modest villas, yet the shops and restaurants set back from its tree-lined main street, were still a far cry from Dansac. Most closed until 15:00 hours, but in the half-full Lotus Bar I showed Karen’s receipt from Max Heimlat to the guy at the till, and asked if he knew Tec-Monde’s address.
“No street called that round here,” he said, passing it to an older woman I guessed was his mother. She too, shook her head. “Besides, the guy added, “it’s crap in this place if your machine goes down. Nearest for repairs is over in Andorra.”
Resisting the temptation to break my drink embargo by downing a bière blonde, or two, I walked on in the thin, cold air, up a consistently steep gradient until another left turn. Here, my blood seemed to chill, and not simply because of the plunging temperature, but from the implications of a possible fraud.
Had someone - even Joel Dutroux, former IT student himself - lifted the bulk of Karen Fürst’s research and memories from her hard drive? Keeping a lid on things at all costs? On Herman? On me? And why had the cook’s little finger been taken and left stuck on the fridge? A warning? A punishment? And who’d found that trunk of maggoty old clothes important enough to steal?
*
The Canigou.
Jesus Christ….
Its craggy bulk seemed to hog the whole of the sky. White-cloaked, its brilliance even penetrated my shades. The rugged peak piercing
what were definitely snow clouds.
So this was the ‘Holy Mountain.’
Another sign for the Abbaye Saint-Polycarpe visitors’ car park, was followed by conspicuous reminders prohibiting dogs, cameras and children under sixteen, and to please show respect for that institution’s vow of silence. The concrete apron charging 20 francs for two hours’ parking, was half full of low to middle-priced cars. Nothing showy, and certainly not Paul Suzman’s Merc.
With proper snow floating in on the stiffening breeze, I transferred Karen’s loaded revolver to my jeans’ right-hand pocket and, once through the already opened gates topped by a small bronze of the saint himself, quickened on towards a low red-brick outcrop marked ACCEUIL. Hardly a welcome as I stayed alert for that Merc and its elusive occupants.
“Has any of the Suzman family from Saint-Antoine de Bayrou called in today, by any chance?” I asked the tiny nun perched by her computer, once I’d introduced myself as Geoffrey Lake and given my reason for being there.
“Non.” She didn’t look up. “Is that all?”
I nodded, aware that her CCTV screen capturing the car park showed no silver saloon. Aware too that my surname hadn’t been a surprise.
“As for your rather unusual request,” the nun had changed her mind. “Our Pastoral Director might be able to help.”
*
Monsignor André Besson, a vast, florid man with unusually small hands, almost filled his cramped office that overlooked the Abbey’s Romanesque chapel, and further along, a more functional building with scruffy double doors. A queue of bare-headed young men and women dressed in white robes, clutching their holy books, began to silently move into the chapel’s porch while its bell overhead chimed three o’clock.
I filled him in about Joel Dutroux.
“Missing, you say?” He fiddled with a thick, gold ring on his marriage finger, while his eyes like minnows flickering here and there, took in my less-than-clean ski jacket. Skin wounds from last night. “There’s youth for you.”
“He’s thirty-two. Hardly young.”
A pause, in which the detailed oil painting of Christ and his exposed, bleeding heart, became too oppressive.
“According to his CV, he studied here from 1982 until 1985. Three years in all. I’d appreciate knowing if he had a history of going missing. And if so, has he tried coming back here?”
“And what, may I ask, is your connection to Monsieur Dutroux?”
“He’s just started work for a good friend of mine who’s not long been out of hospital and unable to drive.”
“I see.” With surprising skill, those miniature fingers pranced along his Viglen’s keyboard - a more up-to-date model than Karen’s - while his eyes fixed on its screen. He was keen, alright. Almost too keen. He’d not even asked my
‘friend’s’ name.
“Here we are. Joel Hubert. Novitiate number 5,436. It appears he changed to Dutroux a week after enrolling.”
“Really?”
“It’s commonplace here, Monsieur. A new life, new identity, for all sorts of reasons.” He swivelled the screen round to show me the cook’s punctilious attendance record. Nothing out of order. It had occurred to me to check up on Montpellier where he’d studied IT, but this outfit was closer to home and, I suspected, had played a more important part in his life.
Next, his CV. Here, Besson came to a halt. Turned to face me, hands raised in a gesture of despair. “Time to be frank, Monsieur Lake. I was often ashamed of him. We all were, but freedom of speech has been hard won in France, particularly after 1945...”
“I don’t understand.”
“Look.” An index finger rested on a line near the top of his screen as he read “Fables of WWII - Lies and Cover-ups, by Joel Dutroux.’ Published by Sanctum, a Catholic literary forum in June 1985, just before he left us. In it, he denied any Jews had been gassed in the camps. That most - a few thousand - died from hard labour. He even gave our address for its provenance, if you please. You can imagine the fuss. I and others had to fight to keep our jobs. It nearly went public. There but for the grace of God...” He crossed himself twice.
I recalled that torn cover in Tanguy’s garage. Did they subscribe to that kind of stuff in there too?
“Pure revisionism, Monsieur,” Besson went on. “Unforgiveable, especially as Holocaust memorials were beginning to spring up everywhere, with Bishops apologising to any remaining Jews in their dioceses.”
I wondered why none of this history had shown up on Karen’s search when she’d taken the cook on.
“Am I the only one concerned about your former novice?”
“This year, yes. But last summer a potential employer did ask me for a reference.”
Karen’s name was on my lips, but I stopped in time as he carried on speaking.
“Some academic so she said, wanting a full-time cook. And I, being in the business of forgiveness, gave Joel an excellent one.”
“Which address was that?”
He looked at me. “What an odd question.”
“It’s habit, from being a researcher.”
“The box number was for Saint-Antoine de Bayrou, as I recall. No residential address given. I never did hear if he was offered the job.”
I ignored the expectant look in Besson’s eyes by shaking my head. This had gone far enough. Karen had clearly played safe, but perhaps not safe enough. I stared at the computer screen. At the box number 367.
“Why did Joel keep his published surname?” I tried to divert him. “Didn’t he care who might make the connection?”
“Either recklessness, Monsieur Lake, or seeking notoriety.”
“Are copies of this article still available?”
“No. After that faux-pas, the forum closed.”
“You mean, the magazine?”
A nod.
“And the editor?”
“Dead, so I heard.”
Meanwhile, the white-clad queue had disappeared into the chapel, and in its place, larger snowflakes drifted by the window.
“Did anyone visit Joel on a regular basis while he was here? Three years isn’t exactly an overnight stay.”
“Friends from his college days, family... not many, come to think of it. I have to rely on my memory since a fire in 1983 destroyed most of our records.”
Coincidence or what?
“Which family? Which friends? Max Heimlat, for example? This is urgent.”
“I’ve not heard of him, but I’ll see if anything’s been added to our database
since that calamity.”
Again, those strange fingers played the keys, but suddenly he stopped. “No Max Heimlat, but a Michel Suzman was frequently here. As I recall, his wife Yvette died after an accident in the bath. All very sad.”
Sweat had begun to creep under my clothes.
“When?”
“Christmas 1984.” He prodded the screen. “See it? Joel was thinking of giving up here after that. He was heartbroken.”
“Were they his parents?”
“Who knows? After all, he was given away at birth. Perhaps they did it and felt guilty...”
“Any Suzmans today so far? They seemed to be on their way here a couple of hours ago. I’m convinced Joel was with them.”
A shake of that florid head. Too quick by half.
“He finished almost a year ago. So why?”
Good question, and the more I recalled that Merc and its occupants, the more I could have been mistaken.
“Were you ever present at their meet-ups? Did you overhear Joel actually refer to this Michel Suzman as Papa?”
Besson hauled himself from his chair.
“Monsieur, don’t think I’ve not noticed those marks on your face. Your air of anxiety. I would just say, keep your distance. Save your research for your own country. Go back to your friend and tell him you’ve done your best.”
But all I could think of was the snow beginning to settle, and the hole I’d so eagerly stepped into, growing deeper by the day.
*
As I left the building, I looked up at his window, and on the spur of the moment, stepped into the chapel’s porch. On I went, past notices of prayer meetings and Scripture study sessions, through a black, studded door whose three padlocks hung open, into the nave. Here, the darkness lay thick with an incense smell so strong, I had to bury my nose in my well-used handkerchief. But the real surprise was the lack of any pews, even a lectern. No altar either. And what of that white-clad queue I’d seen earlier?
Aware of my footsteps too loud against stone. I hurried on through what might normally have been a Lady Chapel at the side, but again, with no overtly Christian symbols. Instead, designer chairs and tables were strewn with flyers for all kinds of bonding activities for the Abbey’s new recruits. I picked up one that seemed different, less colourful than the others.
SANCTUM .The only magazine offering honest debate.
40 francs for a year’s subscription, 30 francs for students, the
unemployed and the retired.
A Paris phone number at the end, but one thing struck me. This particular flyer hardly seemed out of date.
*
I’d promised Karen to be back by 20:00 hours, but my watch showed 15:30 already. She’d just have to be patient, I kept telling myself as my footprints darkened the snowy skin covering the tarmac. At least she wasn’t on her own. I also dwelt on Besson’s recent information. The handsome cook’s apparent close links with the Suzmans, and that subversive article he’d submitted. There must be a copy of it somewhere. Even in the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris. Another job for Monday morning.
So, why had Michel Suzman visited Joel here so often?
I picked up a piece of stone come adrift from the chapel wall and as my cold fingertips felt its years, I wondered how many other idealistic young men and women from the cast of thousands, had passed into that incense-filled space, and emerged not enlightened, but quite the opposite.
Ghosts from the Past Page 14