Murder on the Ile Sordou

by M. L. Longworth

  Paulik coughed. “I’m afraid we have to begin with the most basic of questions,” he said.

  “Like where was I late Monday afternoon?” Canzano asked, his face poker-straight.

  “Yes.”

  “Where I always am,” he said. “I was in the bar during and right after lunch, and then for apéro.”

  “The bar is closed for a bit in the afternoon,” Verlaque offered.

  “That’s right,” Canzano replied calmly. “I, as do most of the staff, take a siesta, usually between three and six p.m.”

  “Perfectly understandable,” Verlaque said. “As you all wake up long before the guests, and go to bed long after. Did you hear the shot?” Verlaque asked. “It was just before six p.m.”

  “No, I didn’t,” Serge said. “I was back in the bar, but we were playing music, and I had the blender on, so there’s no way I could hear it.”

  “Blender?”

  “Yes, I made a margarita for M. Viale. He was my first customer.”

  “What was your opinion of M. Denis?” Paulik asked. “Bartenders are known to be good observers of people.”

  “He was a difficult man,” Canzano said. “And unloved.”

  “By whom?”

  “His wife and stepson, for one. Only they could love, or not love, him. The rest of us are strangers.”

  Paulik wrote down the words “the rest of us are strangers” and added a question mark.

  “Did you notice anything unusual in the Denis family’s behavior?” Verlaque asked.

  Canzano paused before speaking. “I think that Mme Denis may have . . . no, let me rephrase that. One night Mme Denis left the bar, quite late, and drunk, with M. Viale.” He looked at Verlaque and added, “Your old school chum.”

  “Well done,” Verlaque said. “We went to university together.”

  “What night?” Paulik asked, picking up a pencil.

  “Saturday,” replied Canzano without hesitating. If the bartender thought it odd, or sordid, he did not let on.

  “We’ve asked Mlle Darcette and M. Le Bon to give us your CVs and contact addresses when you are back on the mainland,” Verlaque said. “Is there any other information we should know about you?”

  Canzano shook his head. “Not what you can’t glean from my résumé. I’ve been a bartender almost all of my life, for thirty years. I’ve lived in a studio near the Cours Julien for most of them, but gave it up to take this job. No use paying rent for an empty apartment. I’ve never been married and never had children. My parents are dead.”

  “And you love French history,” Verlaque offered.

  “That I do. You’re observant as well,” Canzano said, flashing a rare smile.

  “We’ll see you later, before lunch,” Verlaque said, returning the smile.

  “Very well,” Canzano said, and getting up he gave a slight bow, reminding Paulik of a servant in the nineteenth-century English dramas Léa and Hélène like to watch on DVD.

  “This should be interesting,” Verlaque said, reading Niki Darcette’s name after Canzano had firmly closed the door.

  Niki Darcette walked quickly in and sat down before she could have a chance to be offered a seat. She pulled at her tight skirt, wishing she had worn her elegant Max Mara shorts that she had bought on sale when she got the job. M. Masurel had told her, after her desperate phone call from Cannes, never to make herself uncomfortable before the police or lawyers; clothes were important: keep them loose, cleaned, and ironed. In moments of stress she would think of his face. She did so now.

  “You began working here in April, correct?” Verlaque asked.

  “Yes,” Niki replied. “You can see that on my CV. I began early to help Cat-Cat with the bookings, before the hotel officially opened.”

  Verlaque leaned forward. “I looked at your CV already,” he said. “This morning.”

  Mme Darcette shifted in her chair.

  “Would you care to fill in the missing years?”

  “The Le Bons didn’t tell you?”

  “No.”

  “I’ve hidden nothing,” Niki said. “They know all about it.”

  “So where were you, after high school in the Var, and before your first job at the Hilton in Bordeaux?”

  “In jail,” Niki replied flatly.

  Paulik stopped writing and looked up.

  “But not for murder,” Niki said. “Theft. Among other things.”

  “Why don’t you start at the beginning?” Verlaque said.

  “Or you can call your colleagues in Cannes and get a more detailed version,” Niki said. Before Verlaque could reprimand her, she said, “I finished high school with a fifteen out of twenty on the bac.”

  “That’s a very good score,” Verlaque replied, where grades above twelve get a special mention. “Why didn’t you go to university?”

  “I got fifteen without even trying,” she answered. “I had good study habits—not thanks to my parents, but thanks to some friends—but then they moved back to Paris when I was in middle school. I fell in with the wrong crowd and moved to the Côte as soon as I graduated, with my then boyfriend, a real louse named Kévin. Kévin worked in a café for a few months . . . maybe it was even weeks . . . and then quit. The work was too hard. Stealing was easier. I saw how he did it and followed suit.”

  “What did you steal?”

  “Kévin would be stupid about it; he’d grab purses and then not know what to do with them except take the money. So I dropped him and started hanging out with some friends of his who were into breaking and entering . . . mostly high-end stores. The ringleader was a real creep named Robert, a million times rougher than Kévin. Funny how I end up with creeps. Anyway, we got caught after robbing a jewelry store. . . . I had one phone call to make, and I knew my parents wouldn’t care nor be of any help.”

  “So you called the family friends,” Verlaque suggested. “The ones who taught you to study, before they moved to Paris . . .”

  Niki tried to choke back the lump in her throat. “Yeah. M. Masurel was a lawyer—a big shot—in Paris. They moved from our village when I was in sixth grade; their daughter and I were best friends.”

  “Yves Masurel?” Verlaque asked.

  “Yes, that’s him.”

  “I’ve worked with Maître Masurel,” Verlaque said. “Brilliant. And entirely honest.”

  “And he set you up with a lawyer in Cannes?” Paulik asked.

  “No,” Niki replied, straightening. “He came down to Cannes that day. He represented me.”

  Verlaque nodded, impressed. “How much time did you get?”

  “Six years, three with good behavior.”

  “Six?” Paulik asked, surprised. It was more than usual, for robbery. He made a note to call the Cannes police.

  “And you learned the hotel business while in jail?” Verlaque asked.

  “Yes,” Niki replied. “They were trying an experiment; training what they called ‘exceptional’ prisoners in restaurant and hotel work. There are more than enough jobs on the Côte. I flourished.”

  “I can believe it,” Verlaque said, smiling.

  “What do you know of Alain Denis?” Paulik asked.

  “Absolutely nothing,” Niki replied. “I’ve never even seen one of his films.”

  “And as a client?” Verlaque asked.

  “A pain in the ass,” she said. “But that’s not telling you anything you don’t already know.”

  “Where were you Monday at six p.m.?” Verlaque asked.

  “I heard the shot,” Niki said. “I thought it was Prosper. I was in the office, making phone calls.”

  “Could you give us a list of those, so that we can verify the calls?” Verlaque asked.

  Niki shrugged. “Sure,” she said. “I kept a list.”

  “And you didn’t see anything unusual on Monda
y?” Verlaque asked.

  “No,” Niki answered. “Except at breakfast, I did see a slight smile, and a weak, barely audible ‘thank you’ come from Alain Denis’s mouth.”

  • • •

  Marie-Thérèse brought Verlaque and Paulik two more espressos and placed them down on their makeshift desk. “Émile vient de faire des financiers,” she said, pushing a plate of small rectangular almond cakes toward the two men.

  “Encore chaud,” Paulik said, dipping one into his coffee.

  Verlaque tried not to be disgusted by his commissioner’s spoiling of a delightfully fluffy cake by turning it into a soggy mess. “Please thank Émile for us,” he said.

  Marie-Thérèse nodded and quickly left, leaving the door open for Brice. The teen walked in, softly closing the door behind him. “Technically, my name comes after my mom’s,” he said, sitting down. “Dortignac . . .”

  “Financier?” Verlaque asked, motioning to the cakes.

  “Gross,” Brice said, wrinkling his nose.

  “We thought we’d speak to you before your mom,” Paulik said, finally acknowledging the boy’s comment.

  “You don’t like financiers?” Verlaque asked, perplexed.

  “But Dortignac comes after Denis,” the boy continued. “I never had that name, Denis. Never.”

  “We realize that,” Paulik said.

  “We’ll talk about your food tastes another time,” Verlaque said, omitting the word “bad.” “So, no desire to carry the Denis name, eh?”

  “Prosper says we should only eat things that come from the sky, and sea, and land . . .”

  Paulik stifled a yawn, while Verlaque suspiciously looked at his financier. “Let’s get back to the name Denis,” Verlaque said, setting his cake down, “and we’ll talk about Prosper later.”

  “I never wanted the name Denis because I never liked him,” Brice said, crossing his arms.

  “Enough to kill him?” Verlaque asked.

  “What?” Brice cried.

  “You were down on the cove on Monday,” Verlaque said.

  “So were a lot of people,” Brice answered.

  “You could have been checking the cove out, trying to figure out how to get Alain Denis down there.”

  “That’s crazy!” Brice yelled. “Besides, where would I get a gun? This isn’t the U.S.”

  “In the U.S.,” Verlaque suggested. “You’re back and forth a lot, no?”

  “Yes, but I don’t have the desire nor competence to sneak a handgun back to France on an airplane.”

  “Nicely phrased,” Verlaque said, his eyebrows raised. “Do you read a lot?”

  “Yeah,” Brice slowly replied.

  “Poetry?”

  “Nah,” the boy answered.

  “Too bad. Prosper has a gun,” Verlaque suggested. “And you were with him on Monday.”

  “He has a hunting rifle,” Brice said.

  “I didn’t say what kind of gun was used to kill your stepfather,” Verlaque said.

  “Besides,” Brice said, his voice finally cracking, “I was with Prosper all day. He can tell you.”

  “All right,” Verlaque said. “When did you get there?”

  “Around midnight,” Brice answered. “I was angry and so I stormed out of the hotel. I didn’t know where to go, so I kept walking toward the lights of the lighthouse. When I got close to it, Prosper heard my footsteps and came running out with his rifle. It scared me to bits.”

  “I can imagine. Continue.”

  “He invited me in—when he saw I wasn’t going to rob him—and made me tea. We talked for a bit—or he talked, and I listened, trying to figure out what he was saying. He must have seen me yawning, because he then gave me this moth-eaten wool blanket and told me I could sleep on a cot in the corner of his kitchen.”

  “And the next day?” Verlaque asked.

  “We ate breakfast out on his pier,” Brice said. “And he told me about the fish, and birds, on Sordou. He knows as much about all that as M. Hobbs does. We had a lunch of cheese and bread—I was starving—and then he took me out into the land behind the lighthouse, looking for rabbits. We didn’t find any though. We spent the late afternoon playing chess; he won both games . . . and then I told him I thought I should be going back to the hotel . . . and you know the rest.”

  “Your father lives in New York,” Paulik said, wanting to get back to the U.S. connection. “Right?”

  “Yeah, in Manhattan,” Brice replied. “But I hardly see him anymore. He’s married to this young model, and they have twin girls . . . babies.”

  “I see,” Verlaque said more quietly than he meant to. “And M. Denis never took on the role of father?”

  Brice laughed. “Didn’t even try.”

  “Did you know that your stepfather was a champion swimmer?”

  Brice looked genuinely surprised. “No. When he was a kid?”

  “About your age,” Verlaque said, lying. Since they hadn’t yet interviewed Mme Poux, he really had no idea when.

  “Well, he didn’t drown anyway,” Brice said.

  “Right,” Paulik said, setting down his pencil.

  “Take good care of your mother,” Verlaque said. “You can send her in now.”

  Brice left the room, and Paulik leaned over toward Verlaque. “He’s a little too . . . smug.”

  “He just could be bright,” Verlaque said. “He reads.”

  “Being a reader doesn’t automatically make him innocent. You were digging into him, getting some good reactions, but then you let up,” Paulik said.

  Verlaque shrugged. “I feel sorry for him.”

  “The sun and heat has . . .” Paulik was about to finish his sentence when the door opened and Brice came in with Emmanuelle Denis, guiding her to a chair with his arm. He helped her to sit down and turned to go, whispering, “À tout à l’heure, maman.”

  Mme Denis looked up at the two policemen, her eyes red and swollen. “How are you feeling, madame?” Verlaque asked.

  “Rotten,” she answered, blowing her nose. “That’s the surprising thing.”

  “Surprising?”

  “Well, yes. I haven’t loved Alain for years. So why do I feel so lousy?”

  Both men stayed silent, hoping that Mme Denis would elaborate. She did. She went on, “I think it’s partly because it’s messy, this death. And we’re still married, so I’m the one who will have to deal with the inquest, the reporters, the fans. . . . Had we been divorced, this wouldn’t have been my job. I don’t want to do any of this. . . . I just want to go away and start a new life, with my son.”

  “Well then, let’s try to get this solved as quickly as possible,” Verlaque said. He was surprised by Mme Denis’s narcissism, and had Alain Denis been a kinder man, Verlaque would have been angered by it. But Alain Denis, although not quite a monster, had been extremely unlikable—and so Verlaque continued, “You can put M. Denis’s agent and manager in charge of dealing with the press; that’s what they’re paid for. Did you see M. Denis after he ate lunch in your suite?”

  “No,” she replied. “Brice’s room has two beds, so I’ve been sleeping in one of them.”

  Verlaque leaned forward. “If you and Brice have been sharing a room, how did you not see that he was absent that night he spent down at Prosper’s?”

  Mme Denis bit her lip. “I was with someone else, in another room.”

  “M. Viale?”

  “Yes,” she answered. “There’s an empty room at the end of our hall that we’ve been using . . . until the commissioner came, of course. I had Mme Le Bon make up the room, and I paid for it. Both nights. I hope that doesn’t make me sound like a harlot, but I’m lonely.”

  “It’s not our business,” Verlaque said. “Unless it interferes with the investigation. Where were you on Monday evening at six p.m.?”

 
“I was in my room . . . our room . . . the one I share with Brice. You were out looking for him, and I was upset, so I just went to the room and lay down.”

  “Did anyone come to your room?” Paulik asked. “Or phone the room?”

  “No, why?” Mme Denis asked. “Oh, I see. To establish my alibi. No, no one came by, or called.”

  “Did your late husband have enemies?” Verlaque asked.

  Mme Denis smiled. “Of course; but I can’t think of anyone who would want him dead. He was an obnoxious man, more and more so the older he got. There are directors and fellow actors who have been enraged by Alain’s selfish behavior on set, but as I said, murder is an extreme way to . . . settle disagreements.”

  “And you’ve never considered murder?” Verlaque asked.

  Emmanuelle Denis stared at him, wide-eyed. “I can’t even kill flies,” she said. Verlaque stayed silent; he had heard that before, from murderers.

  “Thank you, Mme Denis,” Verlaque said, pushing his chair out.

  “One last thing,” she said, ignoring Verlaque’s cue that the interview was finished. “And I’ll tell the Le Bons this as well: my emerald and diamond ring has gone missing.”

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Dreaming of University

  “Are you sure?” Verlaque asked.

  “Positive,” Mme Denis replied.

  Verlaque sat back down.

  “I keep all of my rings together—especially when I travel—in a small silk Chinese purse,” she went on. “I put them on, religiously, each morning, after I have dressed, and take them off—also religiously—just before I get into bed, setting them on the dresser. I love the ritual; so I know I’m not mistaken.”

  “And Brice?” Paulik asked.

  “He looked under the dresser and bed, just to confirm for me that I’m not losing my marbles,” she answered.

  Paulik said nothing; Mme Denis had misunderstood his question: he had wanted to suggest that the boy had taken the ring. He had seen it before: to buy drugs, or even the latest gadget. Mme Denis’s next statement confirmed Paulik’s suspicions that perhaps Brice had taken the ring. She said, “I’ve recently had my jewelry valued, at Drouot in Paris. That diamond and emerald ring was antique; eighteenth century. It was valued at two hundred fifty thousand euros. It was given to me years ago, by . . . well, it doesn’t matter.”