Chadron, Kadeg, and Riwal had jumped to their feet.
“We’ve got to find out where Paul Daeron is as soon as possible.” Dupin peeled away and ran toward the bridge. He paused, looking at the canal with the perplexing greenish water. The surface was absolutely still. A swarm of black birds flew unhurriedly over the canal without making a sound. It was all infinitely peaceful.
“Shit.”
He said this at the top of his voice. They would have heard it loud and clear at the table.
* * *
“Yes, exactly, we’re looking for Monsieur Daeron. And it’s very urgent.”
Paul had done what they’d been afraid of: he had failed to call back. Rose, Dupin, and their inspectors had hurried to the parking lot at the Centre in the meantime. They were standing, somewhat scattered, near their cars, each of them with a phone to their ear. Dupin had Paul Daeron’s secretary on the other end of the line.
“An hour and a half ago he was on a phone call that was much longer than his usual ones, Monsieur le Commissaire, and then he said he had to go. He told me he wanted to be alone for a while. He … he seemed shaken.”
The secretary seemed at least as shaken, if not more so, now that the police were calling.
“Should I be doing something? Surely you don’t think something awful has happened, do you? After the thing with his brother…”
Dupin thought about it for a moment. “Did he make the call or receive it?”
“I don’t know.”
“What phone was he on?”
“For once, it was his mobile.” The secretary was getting more and more nervous. “Not that I heard anything, the connecting door is well insulated. But I would have seen a call on the landline on my screen. You know, Monsieur Daeron doesn’t get on well with mobiles at all, he’s always complaining, he says he has never even—”
“Give me the number.”
“One moment. I never use it. It’s 0 67 83 76 56.”
“Is that his personal mobile?”
“Yes. Director Daeron doesn’t have a work mobile. It’s one of those prepaid phones. I don’t think he uses it much.”
“Do you have any of the relevant documents? We need the number from the SIM card.”
“No.” The secretary sounded guilty.
“Do you know when he bought it?”
“No.”
Fantastic. Without the ID number from the SIM card they wouldn’t get anywhere at all. No traffic data, nothing.
“And you didn’t happen to, without meaning to, of course, hear a word or two of the phone call?”
“Oh no, not a chance.”
Dupin didn’t believe her. “This is extremely important. It would be so helpful to Monsieur Daeron.”
“No, I genuinely don’t know anything.” This time it was almost a sob.
“One of my colleagues will be in touch about his landlines. And you don’t have any idea where Monsieur Daeron has gone either?”
“No. Unfortunately not. He didn’t say anything. But he never tells me what he does in his personal life. He’s very discreet. You’ve got the addresses of the houses in La Roche-Bernard and on the Île aux Moines, don’t you?”
“Yes. I take it he left in his car?”
“Yes.”
“Thank you very much.”
Dupin almost hung up. But he added one more time: “And you really can’t think of what he might have meant by wanting to be ‘alone for a while’?”
“He says that sometimes. But no more than that. As I say, he never gets personal.”
“Thank you.” Dupin hung up.
“Well?” Rose was standing right next to him. He summarized briefly.
“I’ve got a bad feeling about this,” she said without any emotion. With that quiet composure that Dupin knew.
Rose signaled to all three inspectors and they quickly clustered around her. Only Kadeg was still on the phone, but he hung up quickly.
“Chadron, make sure we try to locate Daeron’s mobile. That’s the main thing. Then we need to know where each of our suspects is right now! What they’re doing. Whether they’re by themselves. Call them and pay them each a visit, send someone from the local police force on ahead if that’s quicker.” Rose was speaking rapidly. “Laurent, Bourgiot, Jaffrezic. And Cordier. Each of you take on one of the four. We’ve got to be fast.”
This was laborious but exactly the right thing to do. Taking the risk of committing themselves to these four people. They needed to act. Paul Daeron was probably in extreme danger. Although he himself was likely to be involved in what had happened.
“A car is already on its way to Daeron’s house in La Roche-Bernard. It’ll be there soon,” Chadron said.
“We’ll take Laurent,” Rose said, glancing at Dupin. Dupin would have chosen Madame Laurent too—he would only have wished to have a crack at her by himself.
“I’ll go after Bourgiot.” Kadeg already had his phone to his ear.
“I’ll take Jaffrezic.” Riwal had his phone in his hand. “We’ve also just got the message that the old friend he went fishing with wasn’t the head of the laboratory. They don’t usually go fishing together.”
At least this didn’t make Jaffrezic even more suspect.
“I’ll deal with Cordier,” Chadron announced grimly.
“I want—” Rose paused a moment. “—someone to take Maxime Daeron’s wife too. Just to be on the safe side.”
Everyone looked at Rose in some surprise.
“I’ll do that too,” Chadron said firmly.
“Off you go then. I’ve got to keep my mobile free in case Daeron makes contact again. You can reach me via radio.”
She glanced at Dupin. “Let’s take my car.” Rose already had the car keys in her hand. “I’m driving.”
Dupin rolled his eyes.
* * *
Madame Laurent’s colleague sounded capable and friendly. “She was in the office until half past three. Then she left.”
They couldn’t get through to Ségolène Laurent on her mobile or at home.
“And you really don’t know where she was going?”
Dupin’s voice was strained. He had turned on the speakerphone so that Rose could listen too. He kept his right hand firmly on the handle above the door during every one of the many bends in the road. He would never have thought it possible, but Rose managed to drive down the narrow streets toward the gulf even more recklessly than she had done over the last two days. This time at least it was with the sirens and flashing lights on, but that wasn’t making speaking or listening any easier.
“No. She doesn’t have any more meetings today. She’s off on a trip to Avignon tomorrow. When she’s in the office and not away, she always leaves around this time on a Friday.”
“What kind of trip is it?”
“It’s to the salt marshes in the Rhône delta.”
“When did she plan the trip?”
“Just this morning. She goes on spontaneous business trips now and then.”
“Was she on the phone before she left?”
“I suppose so. She’s constantly on the phone when she’s in the office.”
“Did she seem different in any way? Did anything about her strike you as odd?”
“She seemed normal. She told me to have a good weekend, she was friendly.” The employee was unflappable. She didn’t even seem particularly worried that a police commissaire was asking all these questions.
“Who might know where she is right now?”
“I don’t know, sadly. Her best friend perhaps, Madame Sinon, the head of Le Gall, the big milk products manufacturer. Madame Laurent is often out. And when she’s not, she’s usually at home on the Île d’Arz. Perhaps she’s swimming right now, she enjoys that.”
“We need the numbers that Madame Laurent dialed in the last few hours from her landline. Could you look these up and call me back immediately?”
There was a pause before the employee responded. “These are important police matter
s, you said?”
“Very important.”
“Call me back.” She seemed to want to hang up.
“Wait—you don’t happen to know if Madame Laurent was in touch with a Monsieur Paul Daeron, do you? In the last few days.”
“Oh yes. Of course. He’s a client of Madame Laurent’s. Saucisse Breizh gets salt from Le Sel.”
“What?” Dupin exclaimed.
“His firm buys salt from Le Sel to make sausages. They speak on the phone occasionally, and meet up too. Madame Laurent thinks it’s important to see her bigger clients face-to-face on a regular basis, she takes it very seriously. I don’t know anything about the last few days—there was no meeting scheduled, anyway. But you’re better off asking Madame Laurent yourself.”
“We’ll do that. Is it a work mobile that Madame Laurent uses?”
“Oh yes. She uses it a lot.”
“Do you know of another, personal mobile? A prepaid mobile?”
For the first time the employee seemed uncertain. “No. And I think it’s very unlikely.”
“So if you wouldn’t mind having a look for those numbers?”
“I’m on it.”
Dupin hung up.
It was remarkable. They were discovering more and more entanglements that nobody had mentioned before.
Rose sped hair-raisingly out of another very tight bend, making the car do a daredevil tilt. With this kind of driving they’d be there in half an hour. Rose had already sent two officers from Auray on ahead.
Rose’s radio came on. “Riwal here.”
“Go ahead.”
The commissaire only had one hand on the steering wheel now.
“Monsieur Jaffrezic is probably in one of his other salt marshes. Most likely by himself, according to statements from his colleagues. In the salt marsh where he has been these last few days, down below the blind pool. I’ll be there any minute. I still haven’t been able to get through to him.”
“Okay.”
“Riwal out.”
Maybe they should have stayed in the Salt Land? Dupin suddenly felt uncertain. Had it been Paul Daeron who had wanted to meet someone—or had someone wanted to meet him? If Paul Daeron had suggested the meeting, then it was probably also him who had dictated the place. Rose had put out a search for Paul Daeron’s car, a Citroën Crosser like his brother’s, except in dark blue.
She still hadn’t put down the radio when it came on again.
“Kadeg here.”
“And?”
“Madame Bourgiot is in a salt marsh, it’s probably a meeting about a new nature trail about salt, one of her colleagues says. It’s not far from the open lagoon, out toward Le Croisic. Combined with bird-watching spots. It wasn’t easy to find someone who knew that. I was only able to speak to Madame Bourgiot briefly, because the reception was so bad. We got cut off again immediately. It’s possible she couldn’t hear me. I’m almost there.”
“So they’re both in the salt marshes,” Dupin said loudly.
There was a short pause. Kadeg didn’t seem to know what to say. Dupin followed this thought through: “How far is the salt marsh Bourgiot is in from Jaffrezic’s salt marsh on the edge of the blind pool?”
“I would say it’s seven hundred meters as the crow flies.”
Rose took over the conversation: “Tell Chadron to have a helicopter fly over the salt marshes and look for Daeron’s car. And any of the suspects. The helicopter from Saint-Nazaire should be there in a few minutes.”
“Understood. Kadeg over and out.”
Dupin’s mobile rang. Developments were coming thick and fast now. It was Madame Laurent’s secretary.
“Yes?”
“The numbers.”
“I’m listening.”
Dupin let go of the handle and fumbled to get his notebook out. The secretary patiently began to pass on seven numbers, with the times of the calls and their durations, and whether they were “incoming” or “outgoing.”
“That’s it. Every call from the last few hours.”
“Thank you very much.”
Dupin hung up. None of the numbers meant anything to him. He would simply call them one after another. The radio came on again. Inspector Chadron.
“Paul Daeron’s mobile cannot be located. It must be switched off. Or damaged. Some officers are at the house in La Roche-Bernard. No trace of him and no sign he’s been there over the last few hours. We’ve spoken to his wife again. She’s very worried, but she doesn’t know where her husband might be. We haven’t been able to get Cordier on the phone yet. After her conversation with you, she spoke to Madame Bourgiot, very briefly, and left the Centre. Her institute is closed on a Friday afternoon. At this time of day, we couldn’t get through to anyone there. I’m driving to her house in Pen Lan right now. Two local officers are already there. Her car isn’t outside the door and it doesn’t look like she’s in.”
“And Maxime Daeron’s wife?”
“She’s got a meeting in Vannes until four o’clock. She told a colleague she was going to do a bit of shopping afterward. We haven’t got through to her directly yet.”
“All right, Chadron.”
Rose hung up the radio again, stepping hard on the gas at the start of a long straight stretch—Skippy would have no chance—and for once placed her other hand on the wheel, Dupin noted with some relief.
He was on the fourth number. One of the ones Madame Laurent had called. The first three, who had all called her, had been unremarkable business contacts.
“Meubles et terrasses, Bonjour.”
Dupin hung up. The next call—also placed by Madame Laurent herself—was a restaurant. Marée des Oiseaux. Madame Laurent had made a reservation for next Monday for three people.
“The best restaurant in the area. There’s a very young chef there and he’s going to be one of the big names. His fennel and sea bream in a salt crust is pure poetry.”
Without a pause, as if she hadn’t just said this, Rose was right back on topic. “We’ve got to get hold of this prepaid mobile. It might have been a clever way for them to communicate. It’s possible each of the people involved had a prepaid mobile. It doesn’t get more anonymous than that.”
Dupin didn’t answer. On the sixth number, an answering machine came on, but there was no name. The seventh was another restaurant. In Marseilles this time, for tomorrow evening. For three people. The business trip. No other names were noted on the reservation.
Rose went on: “He was going to talk. Paul Daeron wanted to tell us everything. Perhaps he himself is implicated and wanted to turn himself in. Get everything out into the open. And he told somebody this, another of the people involved. Maybe he wanted to meet up with this person.”
This sounded plausible. Logically plausible, psychologically plausible. That might be what had happened.
“Or he’s innocent,” Rose concluded, “and learned something, uncovered what happened.”
This was plausible too.
“We will find the point magique very soon,” Dupin said, surprising himself with this sentence—at least as much as he surprised Rose—and he couldn’t help smiling to himself.
* * *
They were still fifteen minutes away from Port Arradon, which was a bit closer to the Île d’Arz than Port-Blanc. Rose had ordered a police boat to be waiting for them at the harbor there.
The inspectors had all been in touch again, and Rose had not put her right hand back on the wheel once.
Kadeg still hadn’t seen Madame Bourgiot or got hold of her on the phone. His despair was audible; the locations in the salt marshes were still vague. He was now systematically combing the outermost salt marshes, next to the lagoon. Kadeg had been able to establish that the mobile reception in the area was unreliable.
Madame Bourgiot was—at least for now—not with Jaffrezic either. Riwal had arrived at his salt marsh and met Jaffrezic. Just like yesterday, he was by himself, and he was in the middle of doing some harvesting. Fleur de sel. He claimed to have been
busy with the harvest all afternoon. Just him. Alone. And that he had neither seen nor spoken to Paul Daeron, not today, and not in the last few days either. Riwal hadn’t found any indication that Madame Bourgiot had been there, and Jaffrezic dismissed the idea as absurd. But Riwal had begun a thorough examination of the salt marsh and the surrounding area nonetheless, especially the hut. During their radio conversation with Riwal, the helicopter was audible twice, and it was extremely loud. It hadn’t found anything so far.
Finally, according to Chadron’s update, Madame Cordier was still unavailable, both of her phone lines going straight to voicemail.
“What do you think?”
For a moment there was silence. Rose had spoken with a certain emphasis. She meant this question very seriously.
“I…”
The radio again.
“It’s the team from Madame Laurent’s house here.”
Dupin didn’t know these officers. There was a certain swashbuckling excitement from this particular officer, who sounded young. It was as though he had said: “SWAT team on the scene, ready to engage.”
“I’m listening.”
“We’ve just arrived”—the radio connection was crackling like mad—“there’s an anthracite Audi A8 in the driveway. That’s her car. We’ve rung the bell but nobody is opening the door.”
“She drove home from the office.” Dupin had accidentally butted in loudly, but Rose ignored him.
“Gain access to the house. Examine the property very carefully. And the surrounding area. She likes to go swimming. It’s not far from the beach. There’s sure to be a direct route from the garden.”
“We don’t have a judicial order. No search warrant.” The “SWAT team member” had switched into a reedy little voice.
“You’re going in there now. Exigent circumstance. You have a direct order from me, which you will obey immediately.” Rose’s unequivocal words and icy tone ruled out any further questions. “We’ll be right there.”
Rose put the radio back down.
They had just reached the edge of Port Arradon, and Rose had reduced her speed to seventy kilometers an hour for this residential area. Dupin was dimly aware of counting three red lights that hadn’t tempted Rose to brake. They cut right across the little village to get to the quay where the police boat was waiting.
The Fleur De Sel Murders Page 26