‘See where the edges of the wound are jagged?’ He indicated where the flesh around the wound was turned out and raw. ‘That’s where the weapon was pulled out.’
‘But would a bayonet like this have been enough to kill?’ Rocco had enough experience of bayonets from his own army service, albeit not this kind, to know that Rizzotti was probably right on the button. But he needed confirmation.
‘Absolutely. It would only have needed to go in a short way to have caused extensive internal bleeding into the throat. And the deceased was not a big man, nor was he in the best of health, judging by various other factors which I won’t bore you with and which had no direct bearing on his death. If I’m correct, the assailant probably approached the victim with the bayonet concealed in some way, maybe down by his leg or up his sleeve, then stabbed him from up close and to one side.’
‘So the victim might have known who killed him?’
‘Either that or whoever did it approached him in such a way that it didn’t arouse any suspicions.’
Rocco thought back to the murder scene, a picture forming in his mind of a man standing by the side of the lane. ‘Like somebody stopping to ask directions.’
‘That would fit, yes.’
A nasty way to die, thought Rocco. He’d seen throat wounds in Indochina, caused by bullets, shrapnel and even knives, and few of the victims had survived for long. If the shock and loss of blood hadn’t killed them, infection in the hot, humid atmosphere without immediate medical facilities had soon taken their toll.
Whatever, if Rizzotti was right, this made it a certain case of murder rather than an accidental death: premeditated and carried out with cool precision. The body had been stripped of any clues which might lead to the dead man’s identity.
Rizzotti walked across to a side table and picked up a small metal dish. It contained the paint fragment found near the murder scene. ‘Desmoulins explained where you found this. It’s an interesting theory. The colour looks right, but I can check the paint tone with a dealer here in town.’
‘And the filler cap?’
‘It’s old, but not dirty, not like you’d expect if it was lying in a ditch at the side of the road for any length of time. There’s not much more I can say except if the two items came from the same moped, your theory might fit. Before that, though, can you wait a second?’ He turned and disappeared through another door, and returned carrying a pair of trousers. ‘These belonged to our victim.’ He laid them out on the next table and indicated a dark patch on the right leg, at ankle level. ‘This is oil,’ he explained. ‘I haven’t tested it yet, but if you’re right about the paint, I’m pretty sure I don’t need to.’
‘How so?’ Rocco wasn’t sure where the doc was going, only that he sounded almost excited.
Rizzotti held the material out. ‘The trouser cut is wide in the leg and the material is cheap and light. If he’d been riding a moped or a bicycle, the material would have flapped about in the breeze.’ He mimed holding handlebars and pedalling with one leg. ‘This oil mark could easily have come from the engine on a moped – possibly an older model or one without a protective casing. If we assume from the clothes that the deceased was a city-dweller, he might not have known that you don’t let your trouser cuffs flap about on a moped. At the very least you’ll get them dirty, and the worst is you’ll get them tangled in the engine. Nasty way to dismount, if you ask me.’
Rocco looked at him, impressed with the doctor’s thinking. ‘How do you know that much about mopeds?’
‘Because before I became a doctor I was a medical student with no money. My father gave me a moped; it was old and oily and I soon learned to save on cleaning bills by tucking my trouser legs into my socks.’ He smiled at the memory – or maybe it was with pride at having figured out this latest piece of evidence. ‘It wasn’t stylish, I grant you, but it got me about. I loved that old thing.’
It made sense, Rocco had to admit. But it caused another puzzle: if the dead man had been riding a moped, why had he stopped at that particular point on the lane? Had someone waved him down – his attacker, for example? If so, what had happened to the machine afterwards?
‘Going back to the weapon,’ he said, ‘have you ever heard of this kind being used before?’
‘No. But I’ll ask around. There are probably a few of these in circulation, so it’s possible. I’ll ring a few contacts and get them to put the word out.’
‘You actually have contacts in the business?’ Rocco gave him a wry smile. Rizzotti lifted an eyebrow. ‘Of course. Why not? I have to get some intelligent conversation somehow.’ He nodded at the door. ‘Now clear off and let me get on. And don’t pick up any more curios with poisoned tips.’
Rocco found Mme Denis sitting on a bench outside the hospital, watching the world go by. She got in the car with a grateful smile and nodded to indicate she was ready to go.
Rocco glanced across at her a couple of times, but she made no move to tell him how the visit had gone. He was happy not to invade her privacy if that was what she preferred, but a small voice at the back of his mind wondered who else would ask how she’d got on. She had a circle of friends in Poissons, but like a lot of her generation she could be stubborn and he wasn’t sure how prepared she might be to let others know her private business.
‘I might regret this,’ he said, after they’d covered a couple of kilometres in silence, ‘so do remember I’m driving.’
‘What?’
‘How did it go? Don’t tell me if you don’t want to.’
‘It was fine,’ she replied. ‘As I thought, an old woman’s back not being as kind as it used to be.’
‘You saw the specialist, then?’
‘I did. He poked and prodded and tried his best to push my spine and hips out of place, but finally told me I’d got a touch of sciatica and gave me a packet of pills. I probably won’t take them, though. I don’t hold with modern drugs.’
‘Why not, if they help?’
She puffed her lips out. ‘When I was a girl growing up in Brittany there was a woman in our village who made medicines from plants. Her remedies went back generations, some as far back as Roman times. They didn’t always taste very pleasant, but they worked. At least, none of her patients had any problems until the day they died.’
Rocco had to stop himself from laughing. ‘You’re serious? That’s the best that can be said about her – nobody had a problem until they died?’
She prodded his arm with a finger. ‘Don’t make fun of the ancient ways, young man. She treated lots of people I knew and cured them, too. So that’s what I’m going to do. I’ll talk to Mme Evigny – she knows a thing or two about ailments and cures.’
‘I’ve never heard of her.’
‘Well, you wouldn’t, would you? She’s never robbed a bank or tried to assassinate de Gaulle. She lives in Danvillers, if you must know. Now, concentrate on driving, will you – I’d like to get home in one piece.’
When he glanced across at her, he was surprised and relieved to see a smile on her face, and decided that he could leave further interrogation about her ailments for another time.
Fifteen
Rocco’s alarm clock dragged him from a brief and restless sleep. It was late and the light was fading, time to take over guard duty from Claude. He dressed quickly, an ear cocked for sounds of the fruit rats upstairs, but they were silent, no doubt snuggled up fast asleep. He envied them. Once the water boiled he made a flask of coffee, checked his gun and set out for the Bouanga residence.
Minutes later he was turning off the main road and following the drive to the house, the car lights sweeping over the fences and trees on either side and catching a fox slinking along on its nightly business. As he passed through the gates the pale shuttered windows flashed back at him, and he spotted Claude waiting by the side of the house. He swung the car under cover in the small barn he’d seen earlier.
‘All quiet?’ he asked.
Claude grinned. ‘I haven’t shot anybody y
et, so yes.’ He jerked a thumb towards the house. ‘All locked up and in bed. Can’t actually include the little guy in that because I can never keep track of him. He moves like a ghost and scares the devil out of me by popping up out of nowhere when I’m least expecting it. I’m sure he’s doing it on purpose.’
‘Thanks for the warning. You’d better get home and get some sleep.’
Claude yawned. ‘Thanks. I could do with it. It’s nice and quiet here, but all that space out there… it’s downright spooky. You’d think I’d be used to it spending as much time as I do out at night.’
‘I know what you mean. But you’re not usually expecting anybody to turn up and start shooting at you.’ He leaned back in the car and picked up his service weapon. ‘See you back here at six?’
Claude nodded. ‘Six it is.’ He paused and watched as Rocco took off his coat and strapped on the gun. ‘You sound a bit… off. Is everything all right? I can stay here if you like, keep you company.’
Rocco gave him a sideways look. ‘You really want people to start talking about us?’
Claude laughed. ‘Not really.’
‘Fine. You go. We should be all right with one of us on guard for now.’
‘Fair enough. How’s Mme Denis?’
Rocco still hadn’t got round to telling him about the Farek threat. He decided to leave it until tomorrow. Claude would only worry about it and refuse to leave his side, which wouldn’t do either of them any good in the long run. Exhaustion through lack of rest made for poor security and could lead to accidents.
‘She’s fine. Just back pain, if she was telling me the truth.’
‘Tell her she should go and see the Evigny woman in Danvillers. She’s what they call a herbalist. Very good she is, too.’
Rocco had never thought of Claude as the natural-remedy type. ‘And you know that how?’
‘Well, I get aches and pains, don’t I? It’s all that trudging about in the wet.’ He grimaced and rubbed his leg. ‘I should get danger pay, with all that water.’
Rocco shook his head at the mime. ‘Get out of here you old fraud before I change my mind.’
He walked out to the gate ahead of Claude, and closed it once he had passed through and disappeared along the road towards Poissons. The absence of the engine noise left a hole in the night, and he turned and walked back to the house, allowing the darkness to close around him like a cloak.
First he checked the windows and doors on the inside, moving with care through the house. Claude had already done it and would have done so properly, but the first rule of securing a building was to never leave anything to chance. The most vulnerable point was always during a handover of guards, when their attention was momentarily on the colleague replacing them. Anyone choosing that moment to slip inside the cordon would, for a new guard who chose not to double-check everything, pose a fatal threat.
After checking the interior, Rocco stepped outside and closed the door behind him. He went round testing the shutters, which were locked firm. Next he went through the outbuildings, relying at first on his sense of hearing and instinct, and only using a torch inside to check corners and cubbyholes. Eventually he finished his patrol and stood in the rear garden, staring out across the fields, tuning into the night. An owl hooted gently in a tree barely a hundred metres away and, further off, a fox barked, the high-pitched yelp echoing mournfully, like a creature in pain.
As so often in darkness, he was reminded of a place thousands of kilometres from here, where the night had been both friend and foe, providing cover for the cautious and hidden dangers for the unwary. His memories shifted, often triggered by the contrast with where he was in the present moment. Here and now the rush of smells came back to him: of rotting vegetation, the freshness following a cloudburst, or the amazing fragrances that seemed somehow out of place amid all the carnage and death.
He stepped over the fence and walked down the field towards the slope overlooking the back lane where Vieira had died. But he didn’t go all the way. Instead he swung in a circle to his right and came up behind and to the side of the house, away from the barn and outbuildings.
As he came near the house, a flicker of movement caught his eye, and he stopped. He was already holding his MAB 38, and took it out of his coat pocket, slipping off the safety catch.
It was Delicat. The bodyguard was standing close to the wall, his features indistinguishable. He was watching Rocco, as still as a statue. Then he turned and slipped away along the side of the building and disappeared round the corner.
Rocco decided to check the front of the building before going in for coffee. He was still feeling fresh after his sleep but he didn’t want to lose his edge by allowing tiredness to creep up on him. As he turned the front corner, he saw a tiny flash of light.
He stopped. It had been faint, then gone, coming from the far side of the main road. A trick of the night or was somebody out there? A poacher, perhaps.
He walked down the track towards the gate, sticking to the grass verge, his nerves healthily on edge. He kept his eye as close as he could to the spot where the light had been, but he knew that was at best an unreliable science. The light source could have been a kilometre away across the fields, in which case he’d be wasting his time and leaving the house unguarded.
He arrived at the gate and lifted the heavy latch without a sound, then stepped through and walked the rest of the way to the road, where he studied the darkness for the faintest indication that somebody was out there.
Sixteen
Across the road, in the deep shadows of a thicket, Romain froze in his seat as the gate to Les Sables swung open. It was too dark to discern specific detail, but clear enough to make out the movement of a man on foot. Tall, a large, dark shadow. He knew who it was immediately.
Rocco.
Romain felt a ripple of apprehension in his chest. He’d tried to be careful, using a small torch to check his food box for a sandwich, but had fumbled it. The beam had flicked upwards as the torch fell, the tiniest of flares against the windscreen. He’d quickly grabbed it and smothered the light, but if Rocco had happened to be looking this way it would have been enough.
Which seemed to have been the case.
He thought about waking Lilou, tucked up in the back of the van, but he was reluctant unless he was absolutely forced to do so. Her breathing was soft and rhythmic, showing she was fast asleep. Neither of them had slept particularly well in the past few days, especially in the ratty little cottage they’d found empty in the village where Rocco lived. Wary of making a sound in case the neighbour should scream the place down, the original plan had been to use it as a base from which to hit Rocco, the idea being that he would never suspect a threat coming from within the community. But nerves, and the sense that everybody watched everybody else in Poissons, had left Lilou especially wired and short of energy, and they’d decided to abandon it and use the van instead.
He shifted his legs to relieve the stiffness that came from sitting still for so long. The body and mind needed time to adjust after waking and before leaping into action, and he’d been still long enough for his limbs to have become slow and unresponsive. Soldiers do it because they’ve been conditioned and trained to move without question, their actions automatic and born of long practice. But this kind of work, especially against an experienced and suspicious target like Rocco, needed careful timing and planning. Anything less would be fatal.
Everything they’d been told about Rocco, his army service in Indochina, his anti-gang activity and his successes against powerful odds, such as the late Samir Farek, made it clear he was not to be taken lightly. Watching the investigator now, walking through the gate and along the track, sent a tremor through him, and when Rocco stopped on the far side of the road Romain found that he’d been holding his breath. He released it slowly, as if the movement of his chest alone might alert the policeman to his presence. While doing that he checked that the van’s ignition was ready in case Rocco should step onto the tarmac and
head into the bushes towards him.
But that didn’t happen. Rocco stopped and stared into the dark like a wild animal on the hunt for a moment, his head swinging slowly. Then a truck appeared in the distance and trundled by. He’s a predator, Romain thought, and wondered what it took to develop that kind of skill. Even Farek had seemed in awe of him, although he’d tried not to let it show while giving them their briefing for the contract. Too busy fighting business fires, he’d claimed grandly, otherwise he’d go after Rocco himself. They’d exchanged a quick look at the time, and later agreed that Farek was scared stiff of the big cop.
But then, that was why he’d hired them. Like many of his kind, he had the big talk and the fury, but when it came down to it, he wasn’t capable of doing the job himself.
Romain watched Rocco turn and walk back down the track to the house, closing the gate after him. He relaxed, and was surprised to find that he felt nauseous. It brought to mind something from several years ago. He wasn’t an animal lover, but he’d once visited a touring circus near Lyon out of curiosity, to see what the fuss was about. The acts had been boring and childish, the clowns uninspiring and the balancing acts performed without great style. So he’d gone for a look around the trailers behind the big tent. He’d ended up standing outside a wheeled cage holding a single, pacing tiger. It was an impressive beast, and had held his gaze in unblinking silence. Seeing it there behind the steel bars, so powerful and steady, he’d felt the same sense of threat and unease that he was feeling right now.
Seventeen
The following morning dawned bright and clear, with the promise of a hot day carried on a gentle breeze off the fields. Claude returned bearing more coffee and a couple of warm brioche rolls, and the two men walked around the rear of the house and studied the surroundings while eating.
Rocco and the Nightingale Page 8