by Ian G Moore
‘You’re sure it was a man?’
‘Well. I think so.’ She was doubting herself again. ‘I just assumed it was. I didn’t see the face, or the hair.’ She looked crestfallen again. ‘I’m sorry, that’s not much good is it?’
‘That doesn’t matter. I’m just intrigued why you should assume it was a man if you can’t remember any other details, there must be something in there,’ he gestured gently towards her head. ‘It’ll come.’ Again, he smiled warmly. ‘Come on. Let’s get you home.’
‘It was the coat. It was a man’s coat,’ she said suddenly and looked up at him again, pleased with herself.
‘You’re sure?’
‘Definitely. A big coat too, heavy. He kind of frightened me, well startled me. He was very tall and I just saw brown buttons in front of me when the door opened.’
‘And he pushed past you?’
‘I think I may have pushed him!’ She was blushing again.
‘Good for you!’ He beamed. ‘A heavy coat though? In this weather. That’s odd isn’t it?’
There was a commotion in the apartment’s main room and a knock on the bedroom door. It was Pouget.
‘Monsieur le juge? Procureur Llhermanault is here sir. He’d like a quick word.’
René Llhermanault was standing alone in the kitchen area as Lombard approached him. He was taking a long swig from a small bottle of water and looking like he wanted to lean on a surface, but knew that he shouldn’t. He kept leaning forward then pulling himself back like someone fighting against sleep on a train. His awkwardness at this, the gritty end of an investigation, was there for all to see.
‘Ah, Monsieur le juge.’ He said, his false bonhomie fooling no-one. They shook hands and then, more quietly he added, ‘I honestly don’t know why you find these situations so attractive. Seedy, tragic little scenes. I’d much prefer to wait for a full report myself.’ Lombard shrugged. Why did you come then? His internal rebel demanded. ‘You know who this Blanchard is, I take it?’
‘No. Should I?’ Guessing now that he must be someone important and therefore the reason Llhermanault was here.
‘He’s the son of William James Blanchard!’ His voice was raised at first and then finished in a harsh whisper as if it were a secret. Lombard just looked blankly at his superior. ‘For Christ’s sakes, Lombard. I thought you knew everything about Tours? He practically bankrolls the history department, pays for a very generous scholarship every year. And he’s funding some regeneration scheme out in the sticks. He’s a very wealthy man.’ The last bit was said as though that was all that really mattered.
‘Why does he do that, then?’ It seemed to Lombard a fair question but Llhermanault treated it almost as an insult.
‘His great-grandfather was stationed nearby here in the first war.’ Lombard thought again about the name of the apartment block.
‘For the French or the Americans?’ It was only a slightly mischievous question but again Llhermanault looked at him like he was a fool. ‘It’s a perfectly reasonable question, Blanchard is a French name after all. Saint Blanchard, for instance. There’s a fountain at Nesle le Reposte in Brie, it’s…’
‘Concentrate, Lombard.’ Llhermanault was trying to be menacing, and pointing at Lombard, who actually was stifling a yawn. ‘I want this over. And soon. Do you understand? This isn’t some retired English teacher or a bar owner. This is money and power now.’
Lombard turned away before he said something he’d regret, and he noticed Aubret watching him. Llhermanault raised his voice again, addressing the room. ‘Monsieur Blanchard is coming over from America.’
‘You’ve already told him the news?’ Aubret couldn’t believe it. ‘He’s not even reached the hospital yet!’
‘It was my duty to do so.’ Llhermanault stood proudly, like a Roman statue. ‘I can’t wait for you lot and your paperwork. A father must know these things immediately!’
‘And what did you tell him?’ Lombard was dreading the answer he thought might come.
‘That we have a lead.’
‘We do?’ Aubret was practically laughing.
‘Of course we do, Guy.’ Lombard wasn’t looking at the Commissaire but at Llhermanault. ‘Round up everyone in the Touraine who knows a standard maker who’s been dead 600 years, still gets angry about the treatment of French martyrs, owns a brown winter coat and drives a Renault.’
‘My suggestion,’ Llhermanault moved closer to Lombard who didn’t move away, ‘is that you clarify all that by the time you meet Monsieur Blanchard.’ The threat was clear; Lombard was being hung out to dry and Llhermanault was preparing a public show of strength. His strength. Lombard turned his back on his superior and heard the man leave without saying another word to anyone.
Everyone in the room who had stopped working, transfixed with the byplay in front of them, suddenly started up again. Aubret opened a box of Gaviscon and put one in his mouth. Lombard saw the look on his face too, he knew there were repercussions for both of them.
‘Fancy a drive out to Saint-Genèse, Commissaire? We could drop Madame Allardyce back home.’ Jane was hovering by the bedroom door, staring into space but she looked up when she recognised that she was being talked about.
‘Yep. OK.’ He didn’t look in Lombard’s direction but gave Pouget a few quiet instructions. Lombard turned to Jane.
‘Shall we go?’ His earlier warmth had evaporated and she seemed startled by his tone, following them nervously down the stairs to the front door where they passed Llhermanault leaning against the wall, talking on his phone.
Llhermanault saw them approach and made no effort to hide his conversation, looking directly at Lombard. ‘That’s right, Juge Dampierre.’ He was saying, ‘There’s no hurry.’
Chapter 28
Lombard had opened the back door of Aubret’s car and, his composure partially restored following Llhermanault’s ridiculous pantomime, beckoned for Jane to jump in.
‘I’m so sorry,’ she’d said nervously, ‘but I get sick in the back. Do you mind if I sit in the front? Sorry.’
Much to his annoyance, he was now sitting in the back of the car and not enjoying the ride either. He’d always regarded this kind of travel foible in others as just an overblown affectation, the same went for those people who always protested on trains that they must sit ‘facing the direction of travel’.
‘Imagine how unadventurous they are in bed!’ Madeleine had once loudly proclaimed in a busy railway carriage. Much to the annoyance of a woman who had already demanded her husband swap seats, and much to the obviously frustrated jealousy of the husband.
The truth though was that Lombard did feel slightly nauseous. He was feeling every bump in the road, swaying with every turn. His legs felt somewhere up around his chest, his chin almost resting on his knees. And the car itself was filthy.
‘Has your dog got any hair left at all Guy? He must surely be bald by now.’ Lombard asked with disgust, rubbing his trousers clean for good measure.
‘She.’ Aubret gave him a hard stare in the rear view mirror. And from there they drove in silence the short distance to Saint-Genèse. Lombard trying not to look sickly, Jane Allardyce constantly checking her phone as though waiting for news. And Aubret tapping on the steering wheel in time to some imaginary tune, clearly enjoying Lombard’s backseat discomfort and its metaphorical overtones.
‘Can we drive through town please? I want to see who’s at the Lagasse place this evening.’ Aubret nodded. ‘We’re going to drive through town Mademoiselle, do you mind?’ He explained to Jane in English and she seemed startled at the sudden communication.
‘Through town?’ She said lightly as if it was an odd concept. ‘Erm, yes. Lucy’s probably there anyway.’ She checked her phone again.
‘Are you expecting a message from her? You keep checking your phone.’
She put it away. ‘I’m sorry. It’s very rude I know.’ Then she continued, more emotionally. ‘I don’t expect her to check up on me we’re both grownups. I don’t
know what I was checking for. News of Mark, I suppose. It’s a force of habit that all news comes via a smartphone these days.’ She stopped talking. ‘Will he be alright?’ she asked again, hoping that he’d heard something.
‘I can’t tell you yet.’ There was no point lying to the poor girl. ‘He’s young and fit, he has a good a chance as any of surviving an attack.’ There was an awkward silence, which Lombard for some reason felt the need to fill. ‘Hopefully he’ll be back soon, and he’ll work it into one of his Loire Valley stories.’
‘Yes.’ There was a sudden hope in her voice, ‘He would do that, I think.’ She paused and looked out of the window as they crossed the bridge. ‘I think he’s very talented, you know? I’m an events organiser at home. I organise seminars, conferences, after dinner speeches and stuff. And he’s really good.’ She smoothed the skirt on her lap again, it was by now a familiar tic. ‘I work with professional comedians all the time and some of them wouldn’t have handled today as well as he did. You see, when a speaker is interrupted or heckled…’
‘Monsieur Blanchard was heckled in Amboise today?’
Aubret, though not understanding the exchange was aware of his colleague’s sudden animation and asked what was going on, Lombard translated for him.
‘Oh yes!’ said Jane, turning around quickly, ‘I’m so sorry, I should have said. It completely slipped my mind.’
‘What happened?’ Lombard leaned forward like an eager child who wants to ride up front with his parents, his head almost entirely through the gap between the front seats.
‘Well, there was this man, what was his name? And he didn’t like what Mark was saying about Amboise and Joan of Arc.’
‘What was he saying about Amboise and Joan of Arc?’
Jane paused. ‘I can’t honestly remember, it was all very silly if I’m honest, just throw away lines really.’
‘Ok. Sorry, carry on.’
‘Well this man – Charles Galopin! Professor Charles Galopin. Same as our notaire, funnily enough. Anyway he was at the back and he started shouting that it was all untrue! But I mean of course it’s all untrue.’ She seemed confused by the confusion, ‘I mean that’s the point! Mark was very good, like I say handled it really well. He even got laughs from pointing that it was untrue.’
‘That could have been awkward, like you say.’ Lombard suspected there was more. ‘And how did it end?’
‘Well, the group just kind of moved off, I think some of them thought it was staged, even I did for a second.’
‘And what made you think it wasn’t?’
‘The look on the man’s face as everyone turned away.’ Her voice dipped. ‘He looked so sad. So, so unhappy. Humiliated really.’ She looked down at her phone again, almost like it was a comforter. ‘I felt really sorry for him.’
‘And you’re sure it was Charles Galopin?’
‘Oh yes. Mark told me later that it’s not the first time it’s happened. Apparently he was Mark’s Professor when he was at the University.’
Lombard sat back and immediately regretted doing so, rubbing his back and arms to remove dog hair. He explained to Aubret the gist of what she had said, and watched as Aubret’s eyes went stony cold before he rolled them in annoyance. ‘I’m very grateful to you for remembering that,’ Lombard tried to hide his own frustration. ‘You’ll have to add it to your earlier statement though. It’s obviously important.’
‘Do you think so?’ asked Jane, almost shocked.
Of course it bloody is! Lombard wanted to shout at her, but made do with a firm, but polite, ‘Yes madame, I do.’
Aubret parked the car between the church and the brasserie. ‘Busy as usual, I see.’ He nodded towards the terrasse. Lucy was there, as were Battiston and Galopin, though not the one that Lombard now desperately wanted to talk to.
‘I thought she’d be here,’ Jane said sullenly, like a spoilt little girl all of a sudden and slamming the door behind her as she got out, followed by the other two. Lucy noticed her and came running over to her half-sister, ‘Jane! Where’ve you been? I was expecting you hours ago! What have you been up to?’ Her voice was a mixture of surprise and salaciousness, though not jealousy, Lombard noticed. She’d obviously had a good time herself. She led Jane away by the hand to her table which was in the full sun on the edge of the terrasse. In the shade nearby sat Clotilde Battiston and Ludovic Galopin. Lombard noticed Marquand indoors, talking to a younger man who was behind the bar, wiping clean a wine glass. Nothing ever seems to change, he thought. No matter what happens, two deaths, a brutal attack and there everybody all is, like the cast of a play awaiting offstage instructions. It would take an earthquake to change the routine here, he thought, a little angry at the serenity all of a sudden. Maybe it was time to start one. If he was going to be hung out to dry by the arrival of Blanchard senior, as he strongly suspected was Llhermanault’s plan, he wasn’t going quietly. He may not have really wanted this case, but now he was determined to finish it.
‘Well Commissaire, what do you think?’ Lombard was speaking more loudly than he needed to, making sure that everyone on the terrasse could hear him. ‘Have we got time for an apéritif?’ He walked over to the shade. ‘Madame le maire, Maître le notaire, mind if we join you?’
‘Not at all.’ Galopin’s permanently downcast face wasn’t exactly welcoming, but it didn’t put them off.
‘Have there been any developments, Monsieur le juge?’ Clotilde asked, leaning in so that they could lower their voices. Something Lombard didn’t seem inclined to do.
‘You could say that, yes,’ he said, looking around for service. He turned back to the mayor and the notaire. ‘Yes, significant developments, eh Commissaire?’
‘Very.’ Aubret had his arms folded and was clearly putting Galopin at even greater unease.
‘Monsieur le juge?’ Marquand had appeared at Lombard’s shoulder with a younger man beside him holding a tray. ‘Can I introduce Andrew Hervé? He’s going to be running the place for the interim.’
Lombard shook the young man’s hand, but without standing up. The change in demeanour wasn’t lost on the others. ‘Monsieur Hervé. Pleased to meet you.’
‘Hervé?’ Aubret asked, also offering his hand.
‘Yes.’ Andrew replied, ‘My mother is Brigitte Hervé. Femme de ménage for, well, the Allardyce sisters now I guess.’
‘Yes, I believe I saw you both here on market day.’ Aubret affected that he was putting a name to a face. ‘You arrived on Monday evening.’
‘Yes. I came down from Paris. But I’m staying for a while, thanks to Monsieur Marquand. What can I get you gentlemen?’
‘Muscat for me,’ said Aubret.
‘I’ll take the same,’ Lombard said after mulling it over. ‘And you Monsieur Marquand? Will you join us?’
Nicolas Marquand recognised when something was a polite invitation and when something was expected of him, especially as even before he’d responded the Commissaire was already reaching for an empty chair from the next table.
‘Three muscats, Andrew. Thank you.’ He sat down next to Aubret while Clotilde lit a cigarette and blew the smoke above them. Nobody spoke, though all were waiting for Lombard to do the talking. Let them wait, he thought. Let them stew a little bit.
‘So Monsieur?’ It was Clotilde herself who eventually broke the silence, ‘What are these developments?’
‘I must say,’ Lombard was leaning back in his chair, looking up into the sky and pretending not to hear the question, ‘It is very convenient you all being here all the time. It saves hunting around for people. As I said to your poor Monsieur Lagasse, everything happens here.’ They all shifted uncomfortably like a party of naughty schoolchildren waiting for the headmaster. ‘Of course, your brother isn’t here,’ he looked hard at Galopin, who was about to say something when Andrew returned with the drinks. He placed three small glasses of muscat on the table.
‘I took the liberty of refreshing your drinks too,’ he said to the other two and placed t
wo glasses of pastis on the table and a fresh jug of water.
‘He’s very good Monsieur Marquand.’ Lombard said, nodding towards Hervé. ‘Again, that’s lucky isn’t it?’
A confused Marquand looked at his town council colleagues briefly. ‘Is suppose it is, yes.’
‘What are you getting at?’ Clotilde, not one for games, had had enough of this.
‘My point…’ Lombard said almost wistfully and leaned his head back again. He looked for all the world like he was organising a mass of information in his head. Only he knew he was winging it, but it was time, he’d decided to shake the tree and see what might fall out. ‘Saint-Genèse is very fortunate, it seems to me. Firstly to have such a dedicated council,’ he waved his arm at the people around the table, ‘the place seems in robust health which isn’t easy these days. It’s down to you three, the mayor, the notaire, the predominant businessman. Two of you unmarried, the town is your life.’ He rode over any attempt at answering. ‘That’s a good team, isn’t it Commissaire?’
‘Very useful.’ Said Aubret, taking a sip of his muscat, a look of belligerent confidence on his face that Lombard knew was for show and which he was grateful for.
‘We have the executive, the legislative and the financial.’ He went from one to the other. ‘There are no obstacles here, are there? Anything you want done, will be done.’
Galopin shifted uncomfortably in his seat. ‘I can assure you that everything is above board…’ Lombard knew that, as far as they had so far discovered, that was true.
‘I’m not suggesting otherwise, Maître le notaire! Not yet.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ Clotilde was trying hard not to lose her temper.
‘Towns like this all over the country are struggling, dying. There are no jobs so the youth move out, the old businesses wither on the vine, if you’ll excuse the pun. The only thing, in some cases, keeping them going is tourism or even the foreign influx. You three, all born and bred here and you’ve saved the place. It thrives. You do that with little state support, little money. How you do it? I don’t know. If this was my home town, I’d be tempted to bend the rules a little, play the game. A judicious purchase of business here, a control of land sales there, building land incentives, nationality documents to encourage people to move here… I wouldn’t blame you if you did. It’s a place worth saving.’ Nobody said anything. Maybe he’d hit a nerve, maybe he hadn’t but he was going to carry on punching anyway.