Looking to the Woods

by Frédérique Molay

  “Sorry,” Nico said, already heading out Anya’s door.

  “Keep us posted,” Dimitri said, turning back to the computer. He had grown up with those urgent calls from headquarters.

  Out in the street, Nico glanced at the Alexander Nevsky Cathedral, which Anya attended. He said a silent prayer to the image of Christ above the entrance and then rushed off to headquarters by way of Place de la Madeleine, Place de la Concorde, and the highway along the Seine. Cars pulled over for his siren, and he had to honk at only one recalcitrant driver. He’d heard the urgency in the commissioner’s voice. This was no ordinary prank letter. It was something else. But what?

  Nico saw the relief on the secretary’s face as soon as he walked through the door. She wasn’t wearing any makeup or her usual skirt and jacket. She, too, had been called in at the last minute on this holiday.

  “Go on in,” she said.

  Commissioner Nicole Monthalet was at her desk. Unlike her jeans-clad secretary, Monthalet wore a superb beige Burberry trench dress that suited her perfectly and complemented her eye makeup. Without a word, she held out a sheet of paper in a clear-plastic evidence pouch. The message was in red ink, and the slanted handwriting was meticulous.

  Nico started reading.

  Ladies and Gentlemen at Paris Police Headquarters,

  Will you fully appreciate my art? Will you figure out who I am? Will you stop me in time? Will you stop me at all? Are you able to? I am your gamemaster.

  Mikołaj wszedł przez komin.

  Ale gdzie są zabawki?

  Schowały się w jego worku.

  Oto wychodzą:

  jeden mały prosiaczek,

  dwa ładny misie . . .

  But where is the piglet?

  “Well, this isn’t the first time a head case has challenged the police force,” Nico said.

  “They don’t usually put on such a show.”

  “Hmm, looks like Polish,” Nico said. “But I don’t know what it says.”

  Nico’s Russian mother had married into a Polish family that had moved to France generations ago.

  “I’ll send the original to Professor Queneau. I already called a forensic document examiner,” Monthalet said.

  “The new guy?”

  “Yes, Brice Le Goff. I’ll have him send you a copy right away. Find a translator—a real person, I want to make sure we pick up all the nuances. And keep me informed. I’m not going anywhere till we know more.”

  Nico took the stairs back to his office and picked up his phone.

  “Hello?” The man on the other end of the line had the groggy voice of someone who had just been woken up. He’s probably taking advantage of the holiday to sleep in, Nico thought.

  “It’s Nico. Sorry to wake you.”

  “Is something wrong?” Iaroslav Morenko asked in Russian. It was a reflex, as Russian was his native tongue. Under his tutelage, Nico and Dimitri were learning the language of their forebears.

  “It’s just work,” Nico answered in Russian. “Don’t worry.”

  “Criminals don’t have any respect for holidays, do they. Then again, we all like to do our favorite things on our days off. How can I help you, Nico?”

  “I need someone who can translate Polish.”

  “Right away?”

  “In half an hour, at police headquarters.”

  Iaroslav whistled. “At headquarters? Cool!”

  “You sound like one of the college kids you teach,” Nico said. “Do you have someone in mind?”

  “I have just the person for you: Małgorzata Włodarczyk. She works with me at the university.”

  “And you can get this gem of yours here in thirty minutes?”

  “Yes, she is a gem, a precious one, and yes, I can have her there right away. She just happens to be right next to me, fast asleep. I’ll wake her up and bring her over. I hope it’s nothing too gory. She’s a bit squeamish. One drop of blood and she’ll be screaming for help.”

  “Just a few sentences to translate. That’s all.”

  “Okay, we’ll be there ASAP.”

  Nico figured it shouldn’t take them long to get there. Morenko lived in the thirteenth arrondissement, in “Little Russia,” two rows of whitewashed dwellings erected in the early twentieth century above a Citroën garage that had originally been built to house Russian taxi drivers. Nico enjoyed visiting Morenko at this offbeat site near the Butte-aux-Cailles.

  Because it was a public holiday, quiet reigned in the maze of courtyards inside the Palais de Justice and the forensics lab at 3 Quai de l’Horloge. Charles Queneau walked down the dilapidated hallway, looking out the ground-floor windows at the temporary modular offices—which had long ago become permanent—and the tables and chairs that the crime scene investigators used on their breaks.

  He climbed a flight of stairs to the questioned-documents department, which was responsible for extracting the truth from written words of all kinds. Brice Le Goff was already hard at work, his forehead wrinkled in concentration. That was bad news for the person who wrote the letter. Le Goff looked up when Queneau came in. His left eye was twitching, and Queneau understood what this tic of Le Goff’s meant. Something was terribly wrong.

  “This red . . .” Le Goff managed to say, his voice tight and barely audible.

  “Anything you see or hear in this building is confidential,” Nico said, leading them down the hall.

  The two professors nodded and followed in silence. Nico knew that being in the legendary Paris police headquarters had that effect on outsiders. He ushered the visitors into his office and handed Małgorzata Włodarczyk the paper.

  “Yes, it’s Polish.”

  “What does it say?”

  “Hmm . . . it’s a counting ditty for kids. Let me see, I can almost make it rhyme in translation: ‘Down the chimney comes Santa Claus. But where, oh where, are all the toys? In his big bag, at the bottom . . . Now here they come: one piglet fair, two teddy bears . . .’”

  Nico jotted down the verse.

  “That’s a big help. Thank you,” he said, standing up and handing her his card.

  “If you need anything else, don’t hesitate to let me know. Iaroslav is sweet when he says I’m a delicate little thing, but my father was a cop back in Poland, and I heard all sorts of things growing up.”

  Morenko’s jaw dropped, and Nico grinned. This woman was well suited to his Russian friend. He waved down a uniformed officer to accompany them out, his mind consumed by the nursery rhyme.

  He reread the letter.

  Ladies and Gentlemen at Paris Police Headquarters,

  Will you fully appreciate my art? Will you figure out who I am? Will you stop me in time? Will you stop me at all? Are you able to? I am the gamemaster.

  Down the chimney comes Santa Claus,

  But where, oh where, are all the toys?

  In his big bag, at the bottom,

  One by one, here they come:

  One little piglet fair,

  Two teddy bears . . .

  But where is the piglet?

  The author clearly had an exaggerated sense of self-importance: “I am the gamemaster.” Why was the poem in Polish? Was it simply intended to throw the police off course? Maybe he just wanted to keep them on their toes, which would support the theory that the man was crazy. Furthermore, the way the letter was written had to mean something. The author had used red ink, and the handwriting itself was formal, as though lifted from the eighteenth or nineteenth century, when writing was an art. Nico shook his head. These were clues, certainly, but hardly enough to establish a reliable psychological profile.

  “Can I come in?”

  Nico looked up, keeping his cool even though Commander Théron had spooked him.

  “Of course.”

  “You’re not going to believe how that damned letter ended up here. At exactly 7:35 this morning, some dude called a courier on Rue de la Tour d’Auvergne in the ninth arrondissement. He told the courier to go to the Square de Montholon, which is close
to the courier’s agency, where he’d find two envelopes stuck in one of the hats on the Saint Catherine sculpture. One was to be delivered to 36 Quai des Orfèvres. The courier’s fee was in the other envelope.”

  Nico pictured the statue, with its five working-class women linking arms and wearing extravagant hats. Back in the day, unmarried women had donned such headwear on Saint Catherine’s Day and gone out in search of husbands.

  “The caller said he was a cop pranking his buddies. He used a burner phone that pinged through a tower near the intersection of Rue de Montholon and Rue La Fayette. We’re canvassing the neighborhood, but I wouldn’t expect much. It’s a holiday, and most people were still in bed at that hour.”

  “Methodical and precise,” Nico said. “I’d say we’re dealing with someone who has his wits about him—not someone who’s just a bit off his rocker.”

  “I agree.”

  Cock Robin’s “Hunting Down a Killer” played through his head, particularly the line, “But I haven’t got a clue.” He had the letter, yes, but he was still clueless.

  “We need to catch this guy—and fast,” Nico said. No way would he let himself feel so powerless.

  “The writing is contrived,” Brice Le Goff explained. “Any graphic individuality has been blurred. The writing’s also diligent. He wanted to make an impression. He pressed down hard, as if he was determined to win or was feeling some intense pleasure.”

  Professor Queneau took over. “We didn’t get any leads from the paper itself. The ink is a fast-drying agent that’s perfect for calligraphy. It was made from a nineteenth-century recipe and a pigment used since Roman times—lead tetroxide, which is also called red lead or minium. It’s toxic. Unfortunately, a lot of brands use the same formula. The pen is a classic fountain pen that the author filled by dipping it into an inkwell. He would have needed to refill the pen several times, and he had to be meticulous to avoid having any ink drip onto the page.”

  “That’s it?” Théron asked.

  “Not much, I admit. No prints and no specific traces of any kind. But the letters . . .”

  Nico shuddered. Tall, heavily slanted letters in red ink. Like bloodied bodies toppling over.

  “I understand why Commissioner Monthalet came in on a public holiday,” Queneau said. “This red ink looks like something from a horror movie. Marc and I are going to look into it. We’ve got an idea. Give us a couple of hours.”

  “Be quick, Professor,” Nico said.

  “I understand the urgency. But is there something you haven’t told me?”

  Nico cleared his throat. “I’m wondering where the little piglet is.”

  “You’re worried that the big bad wolf is about to devour it, right? So am I.”

  7

  It was 7:00 p.m. on the dot when he rang the bell. He liked punctuality—the politeness of kings. Eva opened the door, her face radiant. She was beautiful, with her midlength brown hair falling softly on her bare shoulders. She was wearing a light dress, nothing provocative, but all the more sensual because of it.

  “Come in, please.”

  He held out a small gift. She took it and ripped off the ribbon and paper. He knew how to make the ladies happy. She smiled as she held up the complete works of Oscar Wilde. She kissed his cheek, and he was sure she was pleased with his scent—L’Homme Libre by Yves Saint Laurent. The damsel’s final ramparts were collapsing. She was literally falling.

  “I reserved a table at Le Moulin de la Galette,” he said, his voice deep and languorous.

  “I love that place!”

  It was a historic restaurant and former windmill in Montmartre, a mythic place that had seen the last of Paris’s millers, followed by the tout-Paris who frequented the cabarets, and then any number of great painters who immortalized it, including Renoir, Van Gogh, Utrillo, and Dufy. In addition to being romantic, it had a wine list worth the detour. In truth, however, he had never reserved a table.

  “Wonderful,” he said.

  “It’s still a bit early. Can I offer you a drink?”

  “With pleasure. How is your documentary coming along?” he asked, following her to the kitchen.

  She took two flutes from the cupboard and a bottle of Champagne from the refrigerator—a Dom Pérignon worth over a hundred euros. She had means, thanks to Daddy.

  “I’ll be finished soon, in large part because of your help. You’ve been a real gold mine of information.”

  “To the successful completion of your studies,” he said, raising a glass to her. “To you . . . and, I hope, to us.”

  She blushed. For weeks now he’d been warming her up, and she was finally ready. All he had to do was light the fuse and delight in the fireworks of screams and agony. He couldn’t wait.

  “Another glass?” she suggested.

  “That’s not what I want,” he whispered, gazing into her eyes.

  He stepped toward her, wrapped his arms around her, and rubbed his cheek against hers, stoking her desire. He pressed his lips against hers, and a line from The Picture of Dorian Gray came to mind: “The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it. Resist it, and your soul grows sick with longing for the things it has forbidden to itself.” Oscar Wilde—now there was a master of the genre.

  8

  Friday, May 10

  Nico stared at the piece of paper taped above the bed. The handwriting, in red ink, was the same: “Piglet.” An arrow—a monstrous, revolting arrow—pointed to the body.

  The apartment was silent, except for the moaning. William Keller—the William Keller—was in the throes of grief. Keller was a French Canadian movie director whose work was reminiscent of François Truffaut’s and Claude Lelouch’s. Critics called it poetic. The public admired him.

  Uniformed officers were sitting with him in the living room.

  His daughter, Eva, was no longer. The director had dedicated his last project to her. Nico remembered the film, as well as what he had said about the daughter he loved so dearly, the daughter with whom he had shared his passion for filmmaking. She had worked alongside him, working twice as hard as anyone else to earn his respect.

  Eva Keller’s career ended on Friday, May 10.

  Nico’s thoughts once again flashed to Dimitri. Eva Keller had been in a safe field of study. But what about Dimitri, bent on pursuing an occupation that could conceivably put his life on the line every day? Yes, he was proud of Dimitri, but in the face of this father’s grief, he didn’t know if he could bear the anxiety.

  Eva Keller was twenty-one. She was studying at the French film school La Fémis, a highly selective institution with an international reputation and an impressive list of graduates, including William Keller himself.

  “Let’s get started,” Nico finally said.

  The squad’s crime scene investigator picked up her digital camera and started shooting the scene. When she finished, she began methodically diagramming the room. Even seemingly unimportant details could ultimately be a lead.

  Commander Joël Théron opened the drawers of the armoire and felt around for clues. Nico, however, couldn’t take his eyes off Eva Keller. The weapon—a screwdriver—had been left behind on the bloody sheets.

  Lisa Drill, the crime scene investigator on Théron’s team, was now leaning over a shag rug and vacuuming up dust and particles, which would be examined later.

  “Not much point in housecleaning when you’re just going to mess it up again,” Théron said, pointing at the black fingerprint powder, fiber duster, and lifting tape.

  Drill shrugged. On other cases she might have had a comeback to lighten the mood, but not now. It was just too grisly. She finished collecting the trace evidence, glanced at the body, and looked at Théron, her face expressionless.

  “Commander Théron always acts like a jerk when he’s freaked out,” Nico said.

  Drill nearly smiled.

  “He’s right,” Théron admitted. “My wife never laughs at my jokes. She calls them predictable, like all men.”

  �
�Not all men,” Dominique Kreiss said, nodding at the sight on the bed. She walked over to Nico, who filled her in.

  “Eva Keller, twenty-one, a film student at La Fémis. Her mother tried to call her last night and again this morning. She got worried, because they always talk before Eva goes to class. When she didn’t hear from her by noon, she asked Eva’s father—the film director, William Keller—to drive over to her apartment to check on her. He found her like this. He managed to call it in before collapsing in the hallway.”

  “There’s no sign of a break-in,” Théron said. “Either he was invited in or he rang the doorbell and pushed his way in.”

  “The killer has a clear penchant for cruelty,” Kreiss said as she stared at Eva’s body. “He’s someone who gets his pleasure from making his victim suffer. Only someone who’s extremely sadistic could inflict these injuries.”

  “Sadism and masochism are sometimes closely connected,” Nico said.

  “Yes, Sigmund Freud coined the term sadomasochism. According to him, a person could be both sadistic and masochistic and derive extraordinary sexual pleasure from either dominating or submitting. That’s why sadistic killers often prefer weapons such as knives, which allow them to get close to their victims. You may not believe this, but a sadist capable of doing what we see here could also have suicidal urges.”

  “Are you telling us that he might be acting out a death wish?” Théron asked.

  “It’s possible. He could be acting on some morbid fantasy that he’s carried around for some time.”

  “How do you explain the fact that after beating and mutilating this woman, the killer took the time to brush her hair?” Nico asked. “Look at that ponytail. It’s perfect.”

  “Indeed, that is strange,” Kreiss said. “In any case, the killer had a taste for the aesthetic . . .”