Like a teenager caught doing something wrong, Rosie lowers her head and screws up her mouth. She looks as though she has been caught shoplifting a T-shirt in a department store rather than encouraging her son to set off six bombs in Paris.
“So, tell me Rosie, little Johnny seems to be pretty traumatised by this whole ‘father unknown’ thing.”
She cocks her head and gives Camille a glassy stare. Her mouth drops open.
“Oh, no!” Camille bellows into her face. “Don’t give me any of that simpering shit. It might work on Jean, but you’re dealing with the police now, Rosie. And we want the truth, am I making myself clear?”
Camille has a list of the objects retrieved from the cardboard suitcase found in her bedroom wardrobe: magazines from the 1980s, Podium, OK Magazine, Top 50, singles by power-pop duo Peter et Sloan, and Eurovision winner Marie Myriam, and a mind-boggling collection of pictures of the singer Joe Dassin. The autographed photograph dedicated to Rosie was pasted to the cardboard cover and ringed by heart-shaped stickers.
“Don’t tell me then,” Camille says. “I’ll tell you: you were fifteen and you were knocked up.”
At this point Rosie makes a mistake of the kind one should never make with an interrogator like Verhœven:
“They never got along, my father and him,” she says, looking hurt. “My father was dead set against the marriage. When I say him, I mean Jean’s father, and he wanted to get married, he really did, he even suggested we elope, but you have to understand, I couldn’t leave my father, I just couldn’t. He was all on his own after my mother died . . .”
Camille sighs and his lips curl into a smile.
“Cut the crap, Rosie, you’re wasting your breath.”
He is calm, his arms folded, head tilted slightly to one side.
“That’s a story you cooked up for Jean. A tragic melodrama with all the stock characters: a strict father, a dead mother, an adoring boyfriend and, to cap it all, a love child. Something straight out of a Harlequin romance, you didn’t have to look very far. Let me tell you the real story: you probably don’t even know the name of the guy you slept with.”
Rosie instantly blushes.
“O.K., I’ll make a bet with you: you always told Jean that his poor dear papa left to go to Australia, am I right?”
12.30 p.m.
His name is René René. Some parents are frankly cruel. His father was a customs officer, René always claimed that was why he was dumb. These days, he is pushing sixty, he’s protected by the statute of limitations, but he’s still a bitter, twisted man, like many sour-faced alcoholics, the sort of guy who mutters into his moustache.
In fact, when his colleague calls him “René! René, get over here, like, now!” René simply mutters “Yeah, yeah, yeah, no need to panic.”
He slowly climbs down the metal ladder. Last week, he “earned his boots,” the pair the company owes him, it’s the law, they have to provide regulation-issue boots. René carefully writes down the date by which they should arrive, if they are even a day late, he kicks up a stink. He does the same for his overalls. As it happens, the pair they gave him pinch so hard he can only wonder whether they gave him a half-size too small. Either that or his feet have grown, which doesn’t seem likely. He has tried everything, stuffing them with wet newspaper overnight, wearing them while sitting in front of the T.V., nothing has worked, they still hurt like hell.
Every rung of the ladder is sheer torture, and he’s up and down them all bloody day. Retirement can’t come soon enough.
But retirement is far from certain for René René because, as he arrives in the telecoms substation, he finds himself nose to nose with his co-worker who is staring in horror at a 140mm mortar shell to which is taped a digital alarm clock, its blue numbers blinking with every second.
2.00 p.m.
Garnier’s aim is immediately apparent to anyone. The shell was planted in a telecoms substation beneath 144, boulevard de Mulhouse. During the day, it is a busy street, but not a major thoroughfare, a 140mm shell might leave three people dead, a low return on the effort invested.
At night, however, at about eight o’clock, there are seven or eight people per square metre, because 144, boulevard de Mulhouse is a multiplex cinema, and the manhole entrance to subterranean digital exchange is located exactly where cinemagoers queue for tickets; if you include collateral damage (the huge plate-glass windows will shatter, sending millions of glass slivers and aluminium shards flying at least fifteen metres in every direction), you are guaranteed more than fifteen fatalities, and, at a conservative estimate, sixty injured.
As soon as he arrives at the site, Basin registers that the bomb is set to go off in the evening. He checks his watch – no need to panic – and decides on a plan of action: the surrounding streets are cordoned off, everyone within a 100 metre radius is evacuated. As always in Paris, within minutes all traffic in the city grinds to a standstill.
Then the Securité civile gets to work. Not so much bomb disposal experts, as artists.
Everything went according to plan: the evacuation, the police cordon, the reassuring public statement, the media kept at a respectful distance, even the dishonest press release from the local préfecture which, though unimaginative (a break in a gas main), proves convincing.
But the real glory goes to the bomb disposal experts, led by Basin. His initial assessment proved correct, the bomb was set to detonate three days from now at 8.15 p.m. According to Garnier’s logic, this was bomb number five.
“The ordnance wouldn’t have exploded anyway,” Basin tells Camille over the phone. “There was no charge left in the detonator, and the primer was defective.”
This is the good news.
Which leaves only the bad news: at nine-thirty this morning, when the nursery school bomb failed to materialise, everyone breathed a sigh of relief and assumed that Garnier’s threat was nothing but bluff.
They now have proof to the contrary.
The first shell exploded on the rue Joseph-Merlin, the second failed to discharge, the fifth has been found and deactivated, this means there are still four out there.
One of which is set for some point in the next twenty-four hours.
6.00 p.m.
Camille went for an hour’s sleep – an area of the canteen has been set up with cot beds where officers can take a short nap before heading back to their offices, eyes puffy with sleep, their faces drawn as one sleepless night drags on to the next. Camille lay down and immediately dozed off, but his sleep was anything but restful. His head is spinning with all the information he has gleaned from the files on the Garniers, transcripts of interviews, names, photographs, diagrams of mortar shells, even the image of the bewildered little boy with his empty clarinet case, lying on the rue Joseph-Merlin.
Once back in his office, he taps Louis on the shoulder, they swap places, and Louis goes for a rest.
While Commandant Verhœven was asleep, he created and printed a timeline of dates and events split into two columns: Rosie on the right, Jean on the left. They are looking for links, but they do not know what sort. Camille skims the first page, then the second. As ever, Louis’ work is detailed and meticulous, nothing escapes him and, without seeming to, he works at extraordinary speed.
Page three. Page four. Page five.
Camille stops, flicks back, runs a finger under one line.
May, five years ago. Rosie Garnier is ill.
In the left-hand column, it is clear that during this period, Jean was not in Paris, he was in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques.
Camille is suddenly wide awake.
He gets up and searches for a report in a pile of papers on Louis’ desk, but cannot find it.
“What are you looking for?”
He turns. It is Louis. He couldn’t sleep and decided to come straight back. Without a flicker of hesitation, he locates the report concerning Alberto Ferreira, for whom Jean was working five years ago. Ferreira has since died. They look up the date: May 24. Louis does a
quick internet search: May 24 was a Tuesday.
Camille has already found a transcript of the interview with Marie-Christine Hamrouche, Rosie’s colleague and friend.
“[. . .] Rosie was always complaining about her son [. . .] They were always at each other’s throats [. . .] when he talked about moving away, Rosie was delighted. You’d think she was the one who’d had a wedding proposal.”
Finally, here it is:
*
Extract from witness statement
M.-C. Hamrouche: It was always the same. He’d go away, Rosie would come alive, then he’d come back and the fighting would start up again. It was non-stop.
Officer: Did Jean Garnier regularly spend time away from his mother’s home?
M.-C. Hamrouche: No, not “regularly”. Three or four times maybe. I remember four or five years back, he was working with a builder who moved down south to work and suggested Jean go with him. Because he was a good worker, that lad. Well, when he actually worked . . . Anyway. Rosie was so happy that she decided to take a holiday. It was very sudden, I guess it was the relief, more than anything. She talked to me that night, she was planning to set off the next day – and she was never one to travel. She went and spent a week with her aunt in Brittany.
Officer: And when did Jean Garnier come back?
M.-C. Hamrouche: He was hardly gone and he was back! Though it wasn’t his fault, not that time, his boss was killed on a building site. So the whole thing about moving to the south wasn’t going to work out, obviously.
[. . .]
*
The rest of the interview is of no interest.
Camille and Louis exchange a look.
If their hunch can be substantiated, they finally have a thread.
It will need to be unravelled, and that will take time, but it is the first glimmer of sunlight in a sky that has been overcast for days.
8.00 p.m.
Checks and cross-checks, corroborating evidence, supplementary questions, tests . . . Camille was reluctant to request outside help. Louis was not convinced, he pleaded his case, we’re wasting valuable time, but Camille said:
“Until I’m absolutely certain, we tell no-one about this . . . I don’t mind people thinking I’m a pain in the arse, but I don’t want them to think I’m an idiot.”
The observation room behind the one-way mirror is full: the juge, a couple of brass hats from the police, another from the préfecture, and the Other who has just returned from the ministry . . .
In the interview room, Camille and Louis sit facing Jean Garnier, the former is empty handed, the latter has a pile of seemingly innocuous papers.
“I don’t know about you, Jean, but I’m starting to feel like we’ve known each other all our lives. I know you’ve barely been here twenty-four hours, but so much has happened in that time . . .”
Now freed from the handcuffs, Jean slowly rubs his chafed wrists. He has spent hours sitting here and must be aching to stand up, but he does not show it. He simply stares down at the table in front of him, utterly emotionless. His eyes are red-rimmed, his face ash grey beneath the stubble that looks blue in the harsh fluorescent light. Perhaps the failure of his shells to detonate is taking its toll.
“We’re pretty close, now, don’t you think?” Camille says. “Thing is . . . you think you know someone and it turns out you don’t know them at all. Take your mother for example.”
Jean flinches. Ever since his arrest, his response to questions about himself, about what he did, where he went, has been to stonewall, but now that they are talking about his mother, a flicker of apprehension comes into his eyes.
“You look at Rosie, you think butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth, and yet . . .”
Camille glances around as though making sure they are not overheard, then leans towards Jean to confide a secret.
“I don’t think this is the first time she’s been a bad girl . . .”
From Jean’s reaction, Camille knows that his intuition has not failed him.
Louis slides the case file across the table and Camille opens it.
“Alberto Ferreira. Ring any bells? Oh, come on now, you worked for him a few years ago. As an electrician. Is it coming back to you? Thing is, you seemed to get along pretty well, the two of you. He hired you in January and by April, he’s already giving you bonuses. Not a fortune, I’ll grant you, but with employers, it’s the thought that counts. He’s pleased with your work. I have to say, from what I know of your technical skills, you’re pretty good. Diligent. I’d even say meticulous. Obviously, you had to rely on the mortar shells still being active, but to judge from how you went about things, you have excellent organisational skills. What was I saying? Oh yes, Alberto Ferreira. So, what do you say, Johnny? Didn’t have much luck, did he? Dead before he even turned forty. Life’s a bitch, isn’t it? And such shame, because he had big plans didn’t he? The south of France, sunshine, blue seas. He buys a company in Biarritz that sells air-conditioning systems, decides to move there come September, and he’s so happy with your work that he takes you with him. To Biarritz! So what did you think of Biarritz, Johnny? I mean is it nice, is it easy to find a place to rent? I only ask because I can see from this (he taps a document) that he sent you on ahead to get the lay of the land. You must have liked the idea, because before you can say ‘suntan lotion’, you’re stuffing your suitcases. I mean, Rosie’s sweet and all, but she was cramping your style, wasn’t she?”
Jean swallows. His eyes dart round the room, vainly trying to anchor himself.
“So, there you are in the south of France, doing a bit of work, waiting for your boss, who’s planning to show up a month later, when he’s shut up shop and packed his belongings – and then, a week before he’s due to leave Paris, one night when he’s doing some last jobs on a site in the suburbs of Paris, Ferreira takes one step too many and falls head-first from the seventh floor. Goodbye Biarritz and air conditioning. The prodigal son heads home with his tail between his legs. Because you went straight back to maman, didn’t you? Am I right so far? Well, the thing is, I found this story very moving. No, honestly, I swear, the enterprising entrepreneur, his hard-working electrician, it’s inspirational. So, I took an interest. And, it’s amazing what you find if you do a little digging . . . Coincidence can be fascinating . . . For example, did you know that when Alberto accidentally defenestrated himself, Rosie was on leave from work? Yeah, I know, the link isn’t immediately obvious, but wait, you’ll see where I’m going with this. Just after you left for Biarritz – the day after in fact – Rosie doesn’t show up for work. She tells her best friend she’s going to stay with an aunt in Brittany, but the thing is, Rosie has no aunt in Brittany, she has no aunts at all. And she’s obviously in one hell of a hurry, because seeing that it’s too late to apply for holiday leave, she phones in sick. But as she has better things to do than go and visit a doctor, she doesn’t provide a sick note. She disappears for four days as though she doesn’t give a damn about the consequences. And in fact, when she comes back, she is given a written warning and docked four days’ pay. It was on the third day that Alberto died . . . Then, an hour or so to get back to Paris, have a quick wash and . . . You don’t look convinced. Here, let me show you . . .”
Camille riffles through the file, takes out a sheet of paper, turns it around so that Jean can read it, but Jean shies away, he keeps his head down, like a stubborn animal refusing to move.
“This is a summary of the investigation conducted after Alberto died. No-one could work out what happened. It was nine o’ clock at night, the building site was deserted, the only person there was Ferreira, laying cables before the screed floors went down. He’s working all hours because he’s sick and tired of this, he wants it done and dusted, he wants to head off to Biarritz, that’s hardly surprising. Now, Alberto is an experienced builder, he’s not the kind to go right to the edge of the deck and tumble over the protection barrier. And what happens? He falls arse over tit and lands thirty metres below! It’s com
pletely baffling. There are serious doubts. But, well, there was no-one on site, no trace of evidence on the body, he had no known enemies, no money to leave . . . What do you expect? The police and the prosecution service rule it an accident. Brought about by exhaustion, overwork. So far, so normal. When they examine Alberto’s mobile phone, they find four calls from Rosie. At the time, the detectives didn’t see this as suspicious. They questioned your mother, she said she phoned to ask him about you and that, since Alberto never answered, she had to call several times. If she’d wanted to know where he was, get in touch, or arrange a meeting, she would have done the same thing. She was the last person to call Ferreira . . . funny, isn’t it?”
Camille suddenly stops.
“You still don’t look convinced, Johnny. I have to admit, it does sound like I’m splitting hairs, but . . .” (He claps his hands as though he has just worked out how to square the circle.) “Talking about hair . . . Now, you’ll say this is just another coincidence, but let’s talk about little Mademoiselle Bouffant.”
Jean continues to stare at the table, but his eyes are hard and glassy. Camille, who does not seem overly concerned, sees in it the same stubbornness he saw in Rosie. Family resemblances are often depressing.
“I said Bouffant – that was in poor taste, sorry. Her name is Françoise Bouveret. When was it you first met her?” (Camille looks down at the case file, Louis runs his finger under a passage) “Thank you, Louis . . . it was March four years ago.”
Camille takes off his glasses and calmly sets them down in front of him.
“Now, I’m not one to criticise, Jean, but I think you really made Rosie’s blood boil. Because your ladylove, Mademoiselle Bouveret, well, she wasn’t quite old enough to be your mother (and we only get one mother, huh?), but really . . . thirty-eight? She was thirteen years older than you. It’s not just the age difference, and I don’t want to offend, but with that cheap, gaudy jewellery and that tarty make-up (I’ve seen the photos), she was hardly the sort of girl your mother dreamed of for her only child. But never mind. You fancy her, you’re really into her, you need experience, nothing abnormal about that, and you’re so besotted that, three months later, you’re packing a bag and moving in with her. This undying love lasts two months. We know that from your mother’s case file, we did a little cross-referencing, we dug out the paperwork. I’ll spare you the details, but I have to admit you weren’t exactly lucky. There you are, living the dream, with Mademoiselle Bouveret teaching you things you never imagined in your wildest dreams, and then she goes and decides to use her hairdryer while she’s in the bath. Surely by the age of thirty-eight she would know better? There is a curious detail – the apartment door wasn’t locked. The police were a little worried, obviously, they wondered if there was something fishy going on. You had no motive, obviously, and besides, you had an alibi. You weren’t there, there were eight co-workers ready to swear on a stack of Bibles that you were with them on the building site in Poitiers. And none of us gave Rosie a second thought. At the time, she wasn’t in the frame. But that was an oversight on our part, if you get my meaning. I can tell that you know what I’m getting at. We’re going to go through the file again, point by point, we’re going to reopen the case . . . but back when all this happened, what it meant for you, Johnny, was slinking back home to maman. Ferreira, Bouveret, Carole . . . I’m thinking maybe Rosie can be a little bit clingy, huh?”
Rosy and John Page 8