The Circle

by Bernard Minier

  The adults had wanted to evacuate them, but they had all refused. They were already together; they had stood their ground in unison, watching the rescue operation from a distance, the futile efforts, until the bodies of their little drowned comrades rose to the surface and began to float on the water, iridescent in the beam of that single headlight shining like a Cyclops’s eye. One, then two, then three, then a good dozen little bodies rose like balloons until someone shouted, ‘Get those children out of there, for fuck’s sake!’ It had happened on a June evening, an evening that should have symbolised freedom regained, the beginning of the holidays: the most exciting period of the year.

  It was in the psychology unit at the hospital in Pau, where they had spent part of the summer recovering, that the Circle had been born. The idea came to them naturally, without any need for consultation. They had understood, instinctively, that they could never be separated. That the bonds with which fate had brought them together were much stronger than those of blood, friendship or love. It was death that united them. Death had spared them and marked them out for each other. That night they had understood that they could only ever count on themselves. They had had the proof. Adults were not to be trusted.

  David felt the warmth of Virginie and Sarah’s hands in his, and – through them – the warmth of the group. Then he remembered that there were not ten of them there that evening, but nine. Someone was missing. Hugo. His brother, his double. Hugo, who was rotting in prison despite all the signs he was innocent. It was up to him, David, to get Hugo out of there. And he knew how he would go about it. He was the first to break the Circle, then Sarah and Virginie in turn let go of the hands they were holding, and so on, like a chain reaction.

  ‘Shit!’ exclaimed Elias when he saw them move. ‘They’re going to see the Saab!’

  He stood up, grabbed her hand and pulled her to her feet.

  ‘Hurry!’ he said in a loud whisper. ‘It will take them a while to get the girl in the wheelchair back to the van.’

  ‘Unless David, Virginie and Sarah leave first. They’ll reach their car before us. And besides, we’re too close. If we start running, they’ll hear us!’ muttered Margot.

  ‘We’re fucked,’ said Elias glumly.

  She could see his mind was racing.

  ‘Do you think they’ll recognise the car?’ she asked.

  ‘One car all alone in the car park at this hour? They don’t need to recognise it. They’re paranoid enough as it is.’

  ‘Do they know your car or not?’ she insisted.

  ‘How the fuck should I know! There are dozens at school. And I’m just a first-year student, a nonentity as far as they’re concerned …’

  She saw them walk away along the edge of the road, speaking animatedly, their backs to them.

  ‘No one’s noticed us: come on, let’s run. But no noise!’

  She dashed off, zigzagging as silently as possible across the irregularities of the terrain.

  ‘We won’t make it!’ he said, when he caught up with her on the path. ‘They’ll be just behind us on the way down and then they’ll figure it all out!’

  ‘Not necessarily. I have another idea,’ she said, sprinting along the path.

  He hurried after her. His legs were longer, but she was running flat out as if she had the devil on her heels. She scrambled down the slope to the Saab, opened the rear door, and motioned to him to climb in.

  ‘Sit on the back seat! Hurry up!’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Do as I say!’

  Already the sounds of cars starting rose above the silence of the lake and echoed back to them. They’re about to drive off, they’ll pass right by us in a minute, she thought.

  ‘Come on!’

  He did as he was told. Margot immediately lifted her hood over her head and sat astride him. She had left the door open facing the side of the road. She opened the zipper of her sweatshirt and her small white breasts appeared.

  ‘Grab them!’

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘Go on! Feel me up!’

  Giving him no time to react, Margot took Elias’s hands and placed them on her breasts. Then she glued her mouth to his, darting her tongue between his lips. She heard the cars coming, they slowed down as they drew near, and she guessed that they were looking in that direction. She went on kissing him even as she felt the fear wash over her. Elias’s fingers were pressing against her chest, more in response to a reflex than to any desire. She had put her arms around him and went on kissing him. She heard someone say, ‘Fuckin’ hell!’, there was laughter, then the cars accelerated. She turned her head cautiously. They were driving away. She looked down at Elias’s fingers, still clinging to her breasts.

  ‘You can take your hands off,’ she said, sitting up.

  She met his gaze, and there was something new in it, something she had never seen there before.

  ‘I told you to let go.’

  But he seemed to have decided not to do anything of the sort. He grabbed her by the neck and put his mouth on hers. She pushed him away violently and slapped him, harder than she meant to. Elias stared at her, his eyes wide. There was surprise, but also a dark fury in his gaze.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, wriggling to extricate herself from the car.

  39

  Shots in the Night

  Servaz went back to his car, dragging his feet. He felt overwhelmed. The lights from the street lamps filtered through the dark leaves of the trees lining the road. He leaned against the roof of the Cherokee and breathed deeply. He could still hear the echo of the same television. The commentary sounded lacklustre, and he knew that France must have lost.

  He was gazing at a pile of ashes. Marianne, Francis, Marsac. It had not been enough for the past to re-emerge. It had only done so in order to disappear forever. Like a ship that rights itself and plunges up and down before sinking. Everything he had believed in, his best years, the memories of his youth, all that nostalgia: all illusions. He had built his life on lies. With a weight like a stone on his chest, he went to open the car door. Almost immediately his mobile beeped twice. A yellow envelope on the screen: a new message.

  Espérandieu.

  He opened it. For a fraction of a second he wondered what he was reading. He still had a hard time with text-speak.

  Meet me Elvis house found sthg

  He sat behind the wheel and called Espérandieu, but got an anonymous voice asking him to leave a message. Impatience and curiosity lifted the weight from his chest. What was Vincent doing in Elvis’s house at this hour when he was supposed to be keeping an eye on Margot? Then Servaz remembered he had told him to dig into the Albanian’s past.

  He drove more quickly than usual as he left town. He reached the turnoff for the side road not long before midnight. The moon came out from behind the clouds and bathed the dark woods all around in its blue clarity. At the next crossroads, he took the rough track, every blade of grass lit by his headlamps. With his free hand, for the third time he pressed the ‘call sender’ option. In vain. What was his assistant doing? Why didn’t he answer? Servaz was getting nervous.

  He put down his phone and it began to vibrate.

  ‘Vincent, you—’

  ‘Dad, it’s me.’

  Margot …

  ‘I have to talk to you, it’s important. I think that—’

  ‘Is something wrong? Did something happen?’

  ‘No, no, nothing. It’s just that – I really have to talk to you.’

  ‘But you’re all right? Where are you?’

  ‘Yes, yes, I’m fine. I’m in my room.’

  ‘Good. I’m sorry, sweetheart. I can’t talk to you just now. I’ll call you back as soon as I can.’

  He hung up and put the telephone down next to him. Barrelling along the rough track, he went over the little wooden bridge, and the headlights lit up the tunnel of greenery leading to the clearing.

  He didn’t see any cars.

  Shit! Halfway up the drive he switched off the ignit
ion and got out. The sound of the slamming door seemed deafening. He remembered the winter evening when he had been attacked at an abandoned holiday camp and nearly been killed, his head wrapped in a plastic bag. There were times when he still went back there in his nightmares.

  He opened the car door and hit the horn, but nothing happened, and the noise itself made him even more nervous. Servaz opened the glove compartment, took out his weapon and a torch. He slid a bullet into the gun. The moon had disappeared again behind the clouds, and he started walking through the darkness, swinging the beam of his torch into the bushes and the dark foliage. He shouted Vincent’s name twice, but there was no answer. Finally he reached the clearing. The moon deigned to reappear for a moment, lighting up the wooden veranda and the house. The windows were dark. Shit, Vincent, where are you? If he had been there, Servaz would have seen his car, a sign, something.

  All at once he was terrified at the idea of what he might find. The house projected an ominous shadow.

  He climbed up the steps. Was there someone in there?

  He realised that the hand holding his gun was trembling. He had never been a good shot; he had always been a cause of incredulous despair to his instructor.

  Suddenly he no longer had any doubt. There was someone in there. The message was a trap, from someone who wasn’t Espérandieu. From the person who had bound Claire Diemar in her bathtub and watched her die, who had rammed a torch down her throat, who had fed a man to his dogs. And that person had his assistant’s mobile phone. He remembered the layout of the place. He had to go in there.

  He went under the gendarmerie’s tape, thrust the door open and immediately rolled onto the floor in the dark. A gunshot shattered the wood on the doorjamb. He had crashed into something as he dived, and cut his forehead. He fired twice in the direction of the shot and the deafening sound burst in his eardrums while the burning metal of one of the casings hit his leg. Despite the buzzing in his ears, he heard the gunman move backwards, knocking over a piece of furniture. There was a second shot, lighting up the room, but Servaz had already begun to crawl behind the bar in the open-plan kitchen. Then silence fell. The sharp odour of powder in his nostrils. He listened out for a noise, breathing. Nothing. His mind was racing. The sound the gun made hadn’t been familiar; it wasn’t a handgun – or a revolver or an automatic pistol.

  A hunting rifle, he thought. Double-barrelled. And only two shots … The gunman had no more ammunition. He would have to open the rifle, eject the used cartridges and reload. Servaz would see him and kill him well before. The man was trapped.

  ‘You’re out of ammunition,’ he shouted. ‘I’ll give you one chance: throw your rifle on the ground, stand up and put your hands in the air!’

  With his free hand he groped behind him for the handle to the fridge door. That would give him enough light. He had lost his torch when he plunged to the floor.

  ‘Go on! Throw down your gun and get up!’

  No answer. Servaz felt something trickle into his eyes. He blinked, let go of the fridge for a second to wipe his eyes with the back of his sleeve. His forehead was streaming with blood.

  ‘What are you waiting for? You’ve got no chance to get out. Your rifle is empty!’

  Suddenly, a new sound. A door creaking. Shit, he was getting out the back! Servaz rushed in the direction of the noise and knocked over a metallic object that fell noisily to the floor. He reached the back door. The forest. Darkness. He couldn’t see a thing. He heard a sharp click in the bushes to his right: a rifle being closed. His assailant had managed to reload. He crouched down. There was a first shot, then a second, and a sharp pain went through his arm and made him drop his gun. He reached out towards the ground, groping all around him to find it.

  Fucking hell, where is the bloody thing?

  His hands were scrabbling around desperately. He spun on his knees on the ground. He knew that he hadn’t been shot, it was just a fragment from a ricochet. He heard the rifle being opened again a few metres away. When a bullet went through the bushes above him with a deadly whine, he set off in a random direction into the woods. A new bullet whistled past, slicing through the leaves. He heard the rifle being reloaded, then the gunman began to walk in his direction. Servaz could hear him pushing aside the bushes, unhurriedly. The gunman knew what had happened! That Servaz hadn’t responded, that he’d been disarmed. Servaz ran, and stumbled on a root. Again he hit something. A tree trunk. His face was covered in blood now.

  He got back up and began to run in a zigzag.

  Two new shots, not as well aimed as the previous ones. He hesitated between continuing to run or hiding somewhere. Run, he decided. The further away he got, the greater the area his aggressor would have to search. The moonlight drifted through the foliage, making the landscape look unreal. It didn’t help. He was trying to get through a new wall of undergrowth, but his shirt caught on some brambles. He struggled furiously, desperately, to get free, and tore it. Then, aware that its light colour made him an easy target, he unbuttoned it before rushing off again. His pale skin was not much better. What an imbecile he was – an imbecile who was about to die. A dishonourable death, a cop without his gun, defenceless, shot in the back by his own quarry. As he ran through the woods, increasingly out of breath, his throat on fire, he thought about Marianne, Hirtmann, Vincent and Margot … Who would protect her if he was no longer there?

  He pushed aside a last bush and froze.

  The gorge.

  The sound of the river rose to him. He stepped back, gripped by vertigo. He felt nauseous. He was standing on the edge of the cliff. He could see the water shimmering among the trees, twenty metres below …

  He recognised the dry little snap of a branch breaking.

  He was dead.

  He had the choice between jumping into the void and shattering against the rocks below him, or being shot in the back. Or turning to face his murderer … At least he would know the truth. Small comfort. He looked down. His knees trembled. He pictured himself falling, and again he felt sick. He turned back to the woods so he could no longer see the void; even bullets would be better than that.

  He heard the gunman coming closer. In a moment he would see the face of his enemy.

  He glanced over his shoulder again, towards the gorge, and saw that the cliff did not plunge straight to the bottom. Slightly off on his left, roughly four metres down, there was a little ledge suspended above the void to which a few bushes clung. It seemed to him that there was a black shadow under the rock face. Was it a recess? Servaz swallowed. Could this be his last chance? If he could get down there and slip under the rock? This would make things infinitely more difficult for the murderer: with a loaded rifle in one hand, would he follow him down the cliff, when he really needed both hands to hold on and avoid a deadly fall?

  Impossible. He could never do it – even if his life was at stake. It was beyond him.

  You’ll die if you stay here. Vertigo won’t kill you, but a bullet will!

  There was a sound behind him in the woods. No more time to think. With his back to the gorge not to see the drop, he lay flat on his stomach, concentrating his gaze on the rock face a few centimetres from his nose, and began his downwards crawl, feeling with his toes for a foothold. Faster! He didn’t have time to make sure of his footholds; he had no time for anything. In only a few seconds his pursuer would reach the edge of the cliff. He closed his eyes and went on. Urgency was pumping his blood, his legs were trembling violently. His left foot slipped. He felt himself go, carried by the weight of his own body. He screamed. A vain attempt to scratch at the rock face with his fingernails. He skidded down the rounded rock face like a toboggan, his naked belly and chest scraping painfully over every jagged edge. He felt the bushes stabbing his back and stopping his fall when he landed on the tiny platform. He saw the void and rolled in the opposite direction, terrified. He crawled and huddled beneath the rock face, in the recess, like an animal.

  His hand groped for – and found – a big rock. H
e lay there, his chest rising and falling in terror.

  I’m waiting for you.

  Go on, come down here, if you dare.

  He was covered in blood, earth, scratches. He had returned to his savage state. Fear and vertigo gave way now to anger, to a murderous rage. If the bastard came this far, he would smash his skull.

  He couldn’t hear a thing. The noise from the river echoed against the walls of the gorge and drowned out any sound. His heart was still beating wildly. The gunman might still be up there, his rifle pointed calmly at the exact spot where he was hidden, waiting until he dared put his head out of the hole. After a while, he relaxed. There was nothing else to do but wait. He was safe as long as he stayed there. His aggressor would not risk coming down. He checked his watch, but it was broken. He stretched out – he could stay there for hours. Then suddenly he thought of something.

  His phone.

  He took it from his pocket. He was about to call Samira for help when he realised there was something not right. It took him a few seconds to grasp the problem. Servaz sometimes felt as if he had just climbed out of a time machine when it came to technology; he had been one of the last people to buy a mobile phone, three years earlier, and it was Margot who had helped him enter the names of his contacts. He remembered very well that together they had entered Vincent.

  Not Espérandieu.

  He looked for his assistant’s name in his contacts. Bingo! Two different numbers. Someone had got hold of his mobile phone without him knowing and had entered a new name before sending him a text message. He tried to remember when he might have left his phone unattended, but he couldn’t think clearly.

  He dialled Samira’s number and asked her to send the gendarmes urgently. He was going to ask her to come, too, when the word ‘diversion’ flashed in his mind. What if the gunman’s aim was not to kill him? None of the bullets had even grazed him, they had all gone wide. Either the gunman was a lousy shot, or …

  ‘Be careful!’ he said. ‘And ask for back-up. Call Vincent and tell him to get here as quickly as possible. And tell the gendarmes that the guy is armed. Hurry up!’