by Lex Lander
‘You have a basis for this conclusion?’
‘Yes.’
The Minister did not ask him to postulate. ‘If it happens while he is in the air this would require a missile launcher of some kind, I should think.’
‘In theory the helicopter patrol will forestall any such attempt. They will be using infra-red search equipment, so I am told.’
At the Minister’s instigation they moved on, approaching the Orangerie. Out of the blue he said in a low, almost reverential voice, ‘Do you attach any credence to the report that a senior government minister is implicated in this affair?’
Mazé didn’t point out that he was the source of this particular report.
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I have seen the evidence for myself.’
‘Ah, yes, of course. The famous note with the photographs. That was you, was it?’ He sighed, side-stepping a small boy who was coming at him on a collision course, a matronly woman in wheezing pursuit. ‘This is a very complicated affair, Commandant. The assassination attempt itself does not appear to be politically motivated but there are those of the right who see an opportunity to foment instability and perhaps even insurrection.’
Startled, Mazé glanced sharply at Debre. Surely he was exaggerating?
‘So you see,’ the Minister continued, as they turned right at the Orangerie and approached the octagonal lake, ‘there is more at stake here than the life of the President of the Fifth Republic.’ He patted Mazé’s broad back. ‘The Fifth Republic itself may be imperilled. In any case we will consider your suggestions. I shall speak to the President this very afternoon. Well done, well done.’
Mazé grinned uncertainly, happy to bask in the Minister’s praise but mildly alarmed at the prospect of brickbats from his immediate superior should it get back to him. ‘Thank you, Monsieur le Ministre. If I could ask a small service …’
‘Name it, my dear Mazé. A modest pecuniary advantage, perhaps?’
‘No, no!’ Mazé protested (later reflecting that perhaps he was a shade too hasty with his protest). ‘It’s not at all that. But I would be most grateful if you could you speak to Monsieur Renard and explain that I was not trying to go over his head.’
* * *
A light shower began as Barail walked from the door to where his government-issued Renault Safrane was parked, beside Lux’s identical but-for-the-paintwork model. Simonelli accompanied him and stood by as Barail slid behind the wheel.
‘Have a pleasant drive south,’ Simonelli said, leaning on the top of the open door.
‘I am already late,’ Barail grumbled, ‘thanks to this unnecessary meeting.’
The shower was developing into a serious precipitation. The shoulders of Simonelli’s cream suit were acquiring a dark rash.
‘Do not be so disgruntled, my friend. From now on you can relax. Your job is done and, unlike me, your official record has not been besmirched. You will still have your government pension to fall back on in case your new-found wealth slips through your grasp like a piece of wet soap.’
The simile did not improve Barail’s humour. As Simonelli stood back from the car he pulled the door shut brusquely then lowered the window.
‘We may not meet again,’ he said, twisting the ignition key. ‘Let me remind you though, that your job is not yet done. You have received the down payment, and all the financial arrangements are in place for the balance. Now earn it.’
‘Bien entendu, Monsieur le Commissaire,’ Simonelli said waggishly. ‘In any case it has been a privilege to work with you.’ He thrust a hand through the open window. Barail took it with a hint of reluctance.
A thoroughly wetted Simonelli retreated to the house, turning to watch the black Safrane accelerate down the driveway on the final leg of its journey that would terminate at the Crillon estate.
* * *
The restaurant of the old auberge was half empty and they were able to find a corner table, far enough from the nearest diners to be able to talk freely.
‘Won’t Rafael be jealous?’ Lux asked playfully, as they worked through the main course of venison en croute.
Sheryl was amused. ‘Of what? Us having dinner together? You flatter yourself, my friend. Just because I succumbed to your seduction routine in a moment of weakness and sexual deprivation, doesn’t mean I fancy you.’
‘That’s okay by me,’ Lux said as he forked the last morsel of venison into his mouth. ‘Anyhow, since we last met I’m spoken for.’
If Sheryl was disappointed by this piece of news she kept it off her face.
‘Well, congratulations or something. Is it serious?’
‘Kind of.’
Sheryl eyed him thoughtfully. Certainly she could detect a subtle change in his attitude, a new maturity. All of a sudden she wondered if he was still capable of going through with the contract. If his new love had perhaps softened him, even made him decide to go respectable.
‘So, Jill, or whatever your name is,’ Lux said, ‘if this dinner isn’t about a repeat performance of London or to get Rafael fired up, what is it for?’
‘Good question.’ Sheryl tore a piece from the bread roll and mopped the last of the sauce estragon from her plate. ‘First of all let me ask you how you think the meeting went this afternoon.’
Lux laid his knife and fork on his plate as he assembled a reply.
‘A lot of hot air, but essentially we covered all the ground.’
‘You didn’t say a lot.’
‘In case you didn’t notice, Simonelli had elected himself my mouthpiece. You and he are close so I figured you were happy to let him make the speeches.’
Sheryl somehow combined a grimace with a grin. ‘His heart’s in the right place where it concerns me, but I’m not sure he’s a hundred per cent reliable. Let me put it this way: I want assurance from the horse’s mouth, not from the jockey’s. Or should it be the other way round - and do I mean reassurance?’
‘That it’s going to happen just the way Simonelli told it, you mean? I can buy that. The only feedback you’ve had so far is from him and Barail so I’m not surprised you’re looking for comfort. No offence meant towards Simonelli, I guess you have confidence in him, but neither of those guys are exactly stand-up, are they?’
At that moment the waitress approached to enquire ‘Terminé?’ and whisk the cleared plates and accessories off the table, darting a winsome smile at Lux that Sheryl didn’t miss.
‘You’re right that I have confidence in Rafael but that doesn’t mean I treat everything he tells me as if it were lifted from the pages of the Holy Bible. Barail’s the one I’m wary of and Rafael is very dependent on him. So when Rafael says we’re steaming ahead very nicely and no worries, I’m pretty sure most of what he’s feeding me is parroted from what Barail’s fed him.’
‘And Barail’s parroting what I’ve fed him in many cases,’ Lux reminded her. ‘So maybe I’m the one you should mistrust.’
Sheryl folded her arms and rested her elbows on the white tablecloth. She looked right into the American’s eyes.
‘I don’t think so, Dennis. I’m a good judge of character. You’re an outlaw … ‘ Darting a glance towards the nearest occupied table, she dropped her voice to an octave above a whisper, ‘An assassin … a murderer some would call you. The worst kind of criminal - a taker of human lives. I hold no brief for that, yet I can’t condemn it because I’m using your skills and your willingness to kill for my own ends, and it wouldn’t matter to the rest of the world that those ends were unselfish and for their own good. So whatever you’re guilty of, so am I. To get back to the point … my gut tells me you’re straight-talking and straight-dealing. A man of your word. A man of honour.’
‘Phew! Me?’ Lux tilted back on his chair, running both hands through his hair. ‘All those things? Maybe I should get you to write my CV … Jill.’
‘My name’s Sheryl,’ she said on an impulse, letting out a hollow laugh. ‘You see, I’m even trusting you with my name. ‘Sheryl Glister. Now you can turn me i
n any time you like.’
Lux shook his head slowly, in bemusement as well as denial, that she should reveal her identity when there was no need, merely to underline a point.
‘I really appreciate your faith in me. And your instincts are good, take my word. So how do we play this - like a quiz game? Ask me what you want to know and I promise to either answer honestly or, if I can’t, I’ll explain why to the best of my ability.’
‘That sounds fair. But we don’t need to set out a precise format. We’ll start off that way and see how it develops.’ Sheryl glanced across the restaurant. ‘Here comes the waitress … are you having a dessert?’
* * *
As Lux was checking out of the hotel an unexpected visitor turned up.
‘Good morning, Lux,’ Barail said. From his stern expression this was not a social call.
Lux pocketed his credit card wallet and acknowledged the Commissaire urbanely enough. He didn’t like surprises. He couldn’t recall mentioning the name of his hotel to Barail.
‘May we talk?’ Barail said, taking Lux’s elbow peremptorily. ‘Here will do, in reception.’
‘All right,’ Lux said curtly and lugged his suitcase after him to a table across the lobby screened by a lush cheese plant.
‘Did you pass an agreeable night?’ Barail enquired, settling in a basket weave chair and crossing his legs.
‘Get to the point.’ Lux sat down opposite, more to blend with the décor than to be sociable.
‘I would like to know the purpose of your liaison with Madame Fougère.’
Lux goggled. ‘What?’
‘According to information passed to me last night, Madame Fougère is a divorced woman, currently unattached, with a small child by her marriage to a certain …’ Barail pulled a notebook from his pocket and flipped it open, ‘Albin Fougère, at present living in Belgium. You have installed her in your house. This raises certain, ah, security issues and I would like to have your assurance that you have not been indiscreet.’
‘Are you following me?’ Lux’s voice was controlled, unlike his emotions which were running amok. Ghislaine divorced? So who the hell was Michel Beauregard, who had posed as her husband?
Barail shrugged. ‘Désolé. A precautionary measure, you understand.’
The urge on Lux to sock Barail was powerful. He restrained himself. A public disturbance only two days from the killing would not have been smart.
‘What else do you know about Madame Fougère?’
Barail checked his notes. ‘Not a lot. She is a fonctionnaire¸ that’s all we can say. Please understand we have not been following her. We have no interest in her background.’
Lux snorted. ‘Just enough interest to check into her marital status and her job.’
‘It was volunteered to us by an informant. We were not seeking to know. But it matters not who she is or what she does, simply that you clearly have serious intentions towards her and I must be assured that you have not discussed our … business transactions with her.’ His gaze was direct, unapologetic. ‘The way lovers do.’
Lux got to his feet, buttoned his sports coat.
‘I insist on knowing,’ Barail said, rising with him, ‘or we will consider you to be in breach of contract.’
Lux’s anger deflated before the reality. ‘All right, so I’m having an affair with her,’ he said between clamped teeth. ‘The timing’s unfortunate but it has nothing to do with the job.’
‘I see it differently. You know too much to be allowed complete freedom. You will cease all contact with this woman until you have completed your task.’
‘You can go and fuck yourself, Barail. Do you think I don’t know when to keep my mouth shut?’
Lux hefted his suitcase and left a visibly fuming Barail with the cheese plant for company.
* * *
At 150 kph on a near-empty autoroute a driver can almost switch off. All you have to do is stay in lane and avoid contact with the central barrier or another vehicle. Once past the toll booths south of Lyon Lux had ample opportunity to reflect on Ghislaine’s apparent deception, she who claimed to rate honesty above all other personal attributes.
Why say she was married if she was divorced? The other way round would have made more sense. Yet she had almost flaunted her so-called husband, made much ado about leaving him, with her great shows of contrition and conscience. Now, if Barail’s intelligence was reliable - and why would he invent it? - she had been merely playacting. Even her job as a journalist was a sham. The lies didn’t trouble him as such; he had told more than a few of his own. But he had to know the reason.
Given that their meeting on the Crillon estate was chance, a possible explanation was that she had created a bogus identity to cover up her real activity. That she was perhaps part of an anti-Chirac faction, a terrorist even, and that instead of spying out the Crillon place for a magazine feature, her goals and Lux’s were not so far apart.
It was a far-fetched hypothesis yet not without credibility. He found himself laughing aloud at the irony. Not that he really did believe it. Coincidences happened, but not on so momentous a scale.
As the miles flew by his speculations became ever more arid. In a conscious effort to break the trend he pulled off the autoroute at the service area near Montpellier. There he freshened up and ate an indifferent salad with tarte aux pommes for dessert, washed down with a glass of Perrier. When, around three p.m., he resumed his journey southward, he forcibly shunted Ghislaine’s subterfuge into a siding in his mind, there to remain until the job was done.
* * *
By design Barail was excluded from what was expected to be the final meeting with President Chirac. Le Renard had despatched his second-in-command a day early - overruling protests that it was quite unnecessary - ostensibly to review the arrangements for security at the Crillon residence. Barail had planned to go in any case, though not until Saturday.
When Debre and Le Renard were summoned into the presidential study at a little after eleven, Chirac was standing at one of the open windows looking out into the gardens. He was jacketless, his hands in his pockets.
He greeted them without turning. ‘Bonjour, messieurs. Asseyez-vous.’
They responded in chorus like a stage duo and took their seats before the desk.
The meeting proved to be of short duration.
‘We still do not know how it will be done,’ Le Renard could not resist reminding the other two. He was still smarting over Mazé’s hobnobbing with his chief, of which he had only been informed ten minutes previously, as he and Debre kicked their heels in the Salon des Ordonnances.
‘Quite so,’ the President said, increasingly irritated by the whole business. ‘Let me see if I understand the security procedures correctly, gentlemen: the grounds will be thoroughly searched before nightfall on Saturday by a team of one hundred gendarmes. The outer wall will be simultaneously guarded by a further one hundred gendarmes and continuously guarded thereafter by shifts of one hundred gendarmes.’ He glanced enquiringly from Debre to Le Renard.
The former nodded; the latter said, ‘Oui, Monsieur le Président, c’est exacte.’
‘This means,’ the President said, ‘that no unauthorised person can be in the grounds at the intended time of my arrival, nor can enter the grounds before, during, or after my arrival. Is my understanding correct?’
‘Entirely,’ Le Renard said. ‘In addition, we have decided to illuminate the whole exterior of the wall, to ensure that no one slips through under cover of darkness. The work is under way at this very moment.’
‘Forgive me for saying this, mon cher Renard, but it rather sounds as if you will make the place so secure that no assassin could possibly penetrate it. Doesn’t that rather defeat the object of the exercise?’
Neither Debre nor Le Renard had thought of that.
Le Renard said, ‘Barail knew of most of these precautions, indeed he was involved in the discussions when they were agreed. Yet as at 13th May, before his affair with Agent 411 ca
me to an end, the project was going ahead. Nothing has changed.’
‘Except the lighting,’ the President reminded him. ‘May I suggest you reconsider the question of lighting. If our Jackal friend comes by night and sees the place illuminated like the Arc de Triomphe he may well turn around and go home and our elaborate preparations will all have been for nothing.’
‘As you wish, Monsieur le Président,’ Le Renard muttered, secretly fuming at the implied rebuke as well as the prospect of looking foolish when he rescinded the order.
A pigeon, newly alighted on the window sill, cooed softly and the distant voice of someone calling from below, probably a gardener, filtered into the room after it.
‘Continuing my appraisal of the precautions,’ the President said, ‘I understand that the house, annexes and outbuildings have been swept for explosive devices and will be swept again on Saturday and on Sunday morning, and that a full complement of bodyguards will be in place.’
‘All correct, Monsieur le Président,’ Debre confirmed.
‘Good.’ Chirac glanced at his watch. ‘Then as I am required elsewhere twenty minutes from now I shall call this meeting to a close. We will not meet again, gentlemen, until next week, when I trust it will all be over.’
As Debre and Le Renard stood up to leave, the President pulled out the top right hand drawer of his desk and depressed the stop button of the recording machine.
PART EIGHT
JUNE
Midsummer Execution
Twenty-Five
* * *
The Crillon estate had taken on the look of a military encampment. Blue and khaki uniforms by the dozen and great comings and goings of vehicles. Watching this bubbling cauldron of activity Mazé found himself questioning the point of it all. No assassin with a halfway functioning brain was going to try and penetrate such defences.