The Circle

by Bernard Minier

  He heard the door close and the silence fall. Beyond the window echoes of thunder reverberated throughout the sky. They seemed to be calling to each other, surrounding the hospital.

  The shrill blast of a car horn sounded in the street. Ziegler sensed movement behind her. She understood that he’d gone around to get her from behind, and waited until there was some noise to move. She turned round. Too late. The punch hit her temple with a violence that made her fall to her knees, stunned. Her ears were ringing. She had scarcely had time to turn her head to cushion the blow.

  Then she felt a kick in the ribs, her lungs emptied and she rolled on the floor. There came another kick in the stomach, but she had curled into herself, her hands around her head, her knees up, and her elbows close to protect herself, so he only partially reached his target. Then came another shower of furious blows.

  ‘Filthy bitch! You really thought you could fuck me over like that? What do you take me for, stupid cow?’

  He went on insulting her, spluttering, as he hit her. The pain was atrocious. He bent down, grabbed her by the hair and banged her face against the floor. Her vision was invaded by a cloud of black dots, and for a moment she thought she would pass out. He grabbed her by the ankles, turned her over, even though she was lashing out, and fell with all his weight on to her, crushing her to the floor, one knee in the hollow of her back. He twisted her arms behind her and she felt him putting thin plastic handcuffs on her wrists, which he tightened until they were biting painfully into her flesh.

  ‘Fuck! Do you understand what I’m going to have to do now? Do you understand, you stupid bitch?’

  His voice was enraged and whiny at the same time. He could have killed her right then. But he was still hesitating: killing a cop was one hell of a step to take, a decision that required some reflection. Perhaps she was still in with just a tiny chance …

  ‘Don’t be stupid, Zlatan!’ she cried. ‘Kanté knows all about it, and so do my superiors. If you kill me, you’ll be sent down for life!’

  ‘Shut it!’

  He gave her another kick, not as hard this time, but it was somewhere he’d already struck and she winced with pain.

  ‘You’re really taking me for a fool, aren’t you? You didn’t even get out your badge. And you’re not on assignment. I’ll take care of Kanté. Who else knows about this?’

  He kicked her again. She clenched her teeth.

  ‘You don’t want to talk? No problem: I’ve dealt with tougher ones than you.’

  He spat on the floor. Then he leaned down, searched her pockets, took her iPhone and her gun, and went back to his office, leaving her handcuffed and frantic in the middle of the corridor.

  Servaz wasn’t asleep. He simply couldn’t fall asleep. Too many questions. Caffeine was galloping through his veins, along with the sedative the nurse had given him – and he didn’t know which one out of the arabica, the adrenaline and the bromazepam would be first over the finish line.

  All he could hear was the storm outside and from time to time footsteps outside the door to his room. He had tried to imagine what the room was like, but he couldn’t. He felt completely helpless.

  He stared at the void in front of him and let his thoughts come.

  The discovery of the corpse in the Mercedes was the proof that his assumption was right: the murders were connected to the coach accident. The fire chief’s fight with the homeless men had, in all likelihood, been staged. The men had never been found. The murderer or murderers had been very clever: it would be difficult or even impossible for an investigator to find a connection between a fight that went wrong in Toulouse and a disappearance 100 kilometres away, three years later. Not to mention the fact that other cases might come to light, concerning other people involved in that tragic night.

  But there was still something wrong.

  The nagging feeling he’d had earlier was back. There was something that wasn’t clear. If these were murders and not accidents, the driver’s and fire chief’s deaths were carefully disguised. But not Claire Diemar’s …

  The painkiller they had forced him to take was beginning to work. His head was spinning. It seemed in the end that Sister Morphine stood the best chance of winning. He cursed the doctors, nurses and all the medical staff. He wanted to stay lucid. All these doubts were blossoming in him, like a poisonous flower. Claire Diemar had been killed in a way that connected her, beyond the shadow of a doubt, to the coach accident. The torch in her throat, the lit bath, even the dolls in the swimming pool … But this was the first time that the murderer had wanted to make the link. Claire’s death very clearly evoked the accident. And it testified to the murderer’s rage at the moment he committed the crime. His lack of control.

  Suddenly everything fell into place. Why had it taken him all this time to see what had been right in front of him from the start? He recalled how he’d felt at the very beginning of the investigation, when he found the cigarette butts in Claire’s garden. How he’d had the unpleasant impression that he was watching a magician’s trick: someone wanted to make him look the wrong way. He had sensed the presence of a hidden shadow moving behind the drama, unbeknownst to all. Except that now, he knew. He felt a wave of nausea. He hoped he was wrong, prayed that he was. He was still staring out at his room without seeing it. The thunder in his ears was incessant. In the same manner, the thought came back to him. Why hadn’t he seen it sooner? No one was better positioned than he was to understand. He had to warn Vincent. Immediately. And the magistrate.

  He groped for his mobile. His fingers curled around it, his thumb found the big on-switch in the middle.

  Then the smaller keys below. Except that he couldn’t open his contacts, let alone read them. He tried to dial a number, and lifted the phone to his ear, but an implacable voice told him it was invalid. He tried again. Same result. The buzzer. He groped next to his bed looking for it, found it, and pressed it. And waited. Nothing. He pressed it again. Then shouted, ‘Is anyone there?’ No answer. Fuck, where were they all? He threw back the sheet and sat up at the edge of the bed. A strange sensation came over him. There was something else. Another thought was lurking at the edge of his consciousness, trying to catch his attention. It was something to do with what had happened since he had been in this room. He was having trouble clarifying his thoughts. The sedative was beginning to work; he felt heavier and heavier, groggy. But urgency was driving him on. He had to stay awake no matter what. He had been on the verge of a very important thought. Something … vital.

  46

  A Draw

  He had made only one mistake, but it was enough.

  Ziegler thought of the way he had briefly touched her breasts. Because of the pain in her torso, her breathing was shallow. She was lying on her back in the middle of the corridor, handcuffed. Twisting like a worm on the ground, wincing, clenching her teeth, she managed to grab the hem of her T-shirt and pull on it violently. Good God, this cheap shit was tougher than it looked. No matter how hard she tugged, the material refused to tear. God dammit! She put her neck on the dusty floor to catch her breath, and forced herself to think. Then she turned her head to the skirting board. A nail … Clearly the hammer had missed it, because it was sticking out one or two centimetres. She edged sideways to get closer to the wall. It was a flat-headed nail, fairly big. It was a crazy idea, but it wouldn’t hurt to try. She slid so that the nail was level with her belly button, then she tried to roll over in that direction. She was amazed to discover how difficult it was when you were handcuffed with your arms behind your back. On her third attempt, however, she managed it and found herself with her cheek and shoulder crushed against the wall just above the skirting board, the rest of her body jammed between the floor and the base of the wall, and the nail just below her T-shirt. You’re almost there … She wedged her hips as close as she could against the skirting board, then began wiggling slowly downwards. That, too, was bloody difficult. But she was relieved to see that she had caught her T-shirt on the nail. And once th
e nail had lifted the T-shirt far enough, she took a deep breath. One, two, three … She pulled away from the wall as violently as possible. The sound of her T-shirt ripping made her almost exultant.

  She closed her eyes, paused for a second and listened out. She could hear him rummaging in a desk drawer, then loading a cartridge into his gun. A wave of fear went right through her. Then she realised that he was making a phone call.

  A brief respite.

  Goaded by urgency, it was almost as if she didn’t feel her pain. She hurried to grasp the back of her jeans between her handcuffed hands, and wriggled until her hips, buttocks and almost all her thighs were out of her trousers, then she struggled like a devil, edging along the floor to make her trousers slide along her legs until she could push them off with her feet. Her entire body was screaming with pain but she managed. That bastard doesn’t know who he’s dealing with. Wearing only her leather jacket opened onto her torn T-shirt, her bra and her pink thong, she waited for him to come back, her legs spread suggestively. It’s now or never, she thought. The big scene between Little Red Riding Hood and the Big Bad Wolf.

  ‘Fuck, what have you done?’

  She raised her head. Saw his oily gaze take in her breasts, belly, knickers … And she knew she had chosen the right strategy. That he belonged to that category of men. Maybe it wouldn’t work, but there was a tiny chance. Zlatan’s gaze stopped at the top of her thighs. He seemed puzzled. He knew this wasn’t the right time, of course – but he found it hard to turn his eyes away. She lay sprawled at his feet, and she was in his power.

  ‘Untie me,’ she said. ‘Please … don’t do it …’

  She spread her thighs, she wriggled and arched her back, as if she were trying to get free. He was staring at her: a hard, black gaze. Shining. Primitive. A predator. Once again she could read the dilemma in his eyes. He was torn between the urgency of getting rid of her, and what he saw before him: a very beautiful woman, practically naked, at his mercy. And the allure of the flesh was almost irresistible for a depraved man like him. He’d never have such an opportunity ever again, that’s what he was thinking. She could tell that arousal was blurring his reasoning.

  He put his hand on his belt and unfastened the buckle. She took a deep breath.

  ‘Stop … no … don’t do that,’ she said.

  She knew that it would have the opposite effect on this man. He reached for his flies, slowly, without taking his eyes off her. He took a last step forward. It was just as he was struggling with a stubborn button, his gun still in his other hand, that Ziegler’s legs closed abruptly around his ankles like a pincer – and she snapped them violently towards her, her own ankles crossed in a deadly vice.

  She saw the flash of surprise in his eyes as he lost his balance. He paddled the air with his hands. Fell with all his weight. His head banged hard against the skirting board. But it was the gun that Ziegler did not take her eyes off as it fell. It went off, with a deafening sound. A shrill whistle pierced her ear, and a warm gust of air caressed her cheek as the bullet went right by her to land in the wall behind with a sharp thud. There was a cloud of smoke and a bitter smell of cordite. She was already crawling, wriggling, wiggling, pushing desperately with her feet along the floor, and she grabbed the pistol just in time. She rolled over onto her side, her shoulder crushed against the floor, looking straight at Zlatan’s feet and, beyond, at his face, with the gun in her bound hands, pointed at him.

  ‘Don’t move, you bastard! If you make the slightest move, I’ll empty it into your belly, you bloody fucking shitface!’

  He gave a nasty laugh. His eyes were two pools of darkness, staring at the black hole of the barrel, his eyebrows creased.

  ‘And what are you going to do, now?’ he said mockingly. ‘Kill me? I doubt it. Are we going to stay here for long? Have you seen the position you’re in? In two minutes, your arm will be completely numb.’

  He was looking at her with the tranquil assurance of the predator who has all the time in the world. He was right. The blood was already hardly circulating in the shoulder jammed beneath her, and the hand holding the gun was shaking uncontrollably. Soon she would be trembling too hard to aim correctly and he would have recovered sufficiently to hurl himself on top of her.

  ‘You’re right,’ she agreed with a smile.

  He gave her a surprised look. Immediately afterwards, she fired, and he screamed with pain when his knee exploded.

  ‘Fuck, you’re crazy!’ he screamed, writhing in pain. ‘You could have … you could have killed me, fuck!’

  ‘Exactly,’ she said. ‘In this position, I fired blind. I could have got you anywhere … in the belly, the chest, the head … Who knows where the next bullet will go?’

  She saw him turn pale. Paying no more attention to him, she pulled both handcuffed arms back at an angle of forty-five degrees, the gun forty centimetres from the floor, and she kept her finger on the trigger, shooting blindly into the little room behind her, towards the window she had seen on her way past. Behind her back she heard the glass shattering. She thought she could hear shouts from the street below.

  ‘Now the cavalry should be on its way,’ she replied, satisfied.

  A new thought came to him, obvious, spontaneous, terrifying: if his hunch was right, he was in danger, too. Right then. Because contrary to what he had assumed, the murderer knew where to find him. He was more vulnerable than ever.

  He was probably already on his way, thought Servaz, with another wave of nausea.

  Sitting on the edge of his bed, he could feel the terror race through him. He didn’t have a minute to lose; he had to get out of there. Quickly. Hide somewhere. He reached again for the buzzer and pressed it. Nothing.

  Stupid idiots!

  Instinctively he looked all around him, although he couldn’t see a thing, and he got up, his hands held in front of him. He groped his way along the wall, felt its coarse surface beneath his fingers, pipes going every which way, and finally he found a chair by the head of the bed with a plastic bag on it. He felt inside. His clothes. He hurried to put them on, then grabbed his mobile from the night table and headed towards the place where the door ought to be.

  He opened it. The corridor seemed strangely silent. He wondered where all the staff had got to. Then a word lit up in his brain: football. There must be other matches to watch, even without the French team. Unless they’d all been called to another floor. It was getting late, and the daytime staff had gone home. He felt fear invading him. He turned his head from left to right. He suddenly felt very exposed and vulnerable.

  With all his senses on the alert, he held his arms out in front of him until his hands reached the opposite wall. He chose to go left at random. He was bound to find someone sooner or later. He almost stumbled over a cart that was against the wall, then went round it and resumed his progress. Pipes, papers pinned to a cork board, a box with a key and a chain – maybe the fire alarm. For a split second he thought of turning the key. Then he reached a corner, and went around it. Stood up straight.

  ‘Is anyone there? Please, help me!’

  No one. He felt a tightness in his chest, and a cold sweat rolled down his back. He continued to grope his way along the wall. Suddenly he froze. His fingers had just touched a metal surface that protruded from the wall, and there was a button … a lift! His hands trembling, he hurriedly pressed it and heard a ping in response. He could hear the rumbling of the lift beginning to move. The doors opened a few seconds later with a whoosh. He stepped inside when a voice behind him called out:

  ‘Hey! Where are you going?’

  He heard the man come in and the doors of the lift closed behind them.

  ‘Which floor?’ asked the voice next to him.

  ‘Ground floor,’ he replied. ‘Are you a staff member?’

  ‘Yes. Who are you? How did you get here in that state, anyway?’

  The man’s tone was suspicious. Servaz hesitated, choosing his words.

  ‘Listen. I don’t have time to ex
plain. But you have to do me a favour: call the police.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I have to get out of here. Immediately. Take me to the gendarmerie.’

  He could tell that the man was examining him closely.

  ‘Why don’t you start by telling me who you are?’

  ‘It’s complicated. I – I’m …’

  The doors opened. A recording of a woman’s sugary voice called out through the loudspeaker, ‘Ground floor/reception/cafeteria/newsagent’s’. He took a step outside, heard voices a bit further away, and sensed from the slight echo they produced that they were in a vast space, probably the hospital entrance hall. He started walking.

  ‘Hey, wait, take it easy!’ called the man behind him. ‘Not so fast!’

  He froze.

  ‘I told you: I can’t stay here.’

  ‘Oh really? Why not?’

  ‘I don’t have time. Listen, I’m a policeman and—’

  ‘So what? What does that change? You’re in a hospital, you’re our responsibility and have you seen the state you’re in? I can’t let you out like this! You can’t even—’

  ‘Which is why I’m asking you to help me.’

  ‘To do what?’

  ‘Get me out of here! Take me to the gendarmerie. I told you … For Christ’s sake, there’s not a minute to lose!’

  There was a silence. The man must have thought he was crazy. On edge, Servaz listened out, trying in vain to identify the voices and sounds around them, to locate any possible threat. But the man’s presence at his side reassured him.

  ‘In that state, wearing those clothes? You’re completely nuts! Have you seen the weather? It’s pissing it down. Tell me why you’re so eager to go to the gendarmerie. Maybe we can call from here. Why don’t we get the staff from your floor so we can talk it over quietly with them?’

  ‘You won’t believe me if I tell you.’

  ‘Try me.’

  ‘I think someone is trying to kill me, and I’m afraid he’ll come here.’