by Michel Bussi
“Fucking hell, JB . . . You’ve got children! That kid saw it all! People shot dead right in front of him, perhaps only a meter away. Possibly people he knew.”
Marianne felt a furious desire to keep spitting her hatred in JB’s face. Using a child as bait during an armed robbery, cheating on his wife at the risk of destroying his family, the lives of his innocent children . . . The same crime! Same punishment!
Except that the lieutenant did not seem to notice the anger that was bubbling up inside Marianne. He just put his hand on her shoulder, his eyes flaring with excitement, like a bloodhound catching the scent.
“People he knew . . . You’re right, Marianne. That’s it! That’s the key!”
In the next moment, they were both sitting on Malone’s bed.
“Let’s go back to the beginning,” said JB. “A group of friends from Potigny are organizing a robbery. Cyril and Ilona Lukowik, Timo Soler, with Alexis Zerda presumably being the fourth musketeer. And then there’s also Timo Soler’s girlfriend, whose name we don’t know.”
“This probably took several weeks of preparation,” Marianne took up the thread. “Months maybe. Except that, on D-Day, the perfect plan falls apart. Ilona and Cyril are killed before they reach the car and Timo Soler is identified . . . ”
“And the police figure out the identity of the fourth robber to be Alexis Zerda, although they don’t have any proof. Not a single witness. None of Timo Soler’s friends will talk, no one seems to know anything. No one could have imagined at that time that there were two other witnesses: Timo’s girlfriend and their son.”
JB moved a little closer to Marianne so he could sift through Vasily Dragonman’s file. The captain immediately shifted away from him, crushing Buzz Lightyear’s spacesuit beneath her. Buzz protested with a noise that did not sound even remotely interplanetary.
Surprised, Marianne slid her hand under the duvet and took out a small, soft photo album, the cover decorated with monkeys, parrots, and tropical trees, which made a noise a bit like a xylophone when you pressed it.
She opened it.
In the first photograph, a baby sleeping in a wicker basket, protected by a kind of delicate white sheet, like mosquito netting or a slightly kitsch piece of lace.
Was that Malone?
She couldn’t recognize him . . . Even though, in the cradle, placed next to the baby’s little pink mouth, was a brand new, perfectly clean Gouti.
“Two other witnesses,” JB went on, paying no attention to Marianne’s discovery. “If we’d known after the robbery that Timo Soler had a girlfriend and a kid, we’d have questioned them. The girl could have lied to us, of course . . . ”
“But,” the captain interrupted, “we’d have got the truth out of the kid! About his parents. And his parents’ friends.”
“About the Lukowiks, and especially about the shadowy person who must have been to the Solers’ flat plenty of times, to have a drink, study the map of Deauville, then ride his bike down Rue Eugène-Colas, stopwatch in hand. Alexis Zerda.”
“Alexis Zerda,” repeated Marianne. “Malone knew him—of course he did. He might have sat playing with his toys when he was in the room, or spotted him when he woke up at night to do a pee-pee or sat in his mother’s lap. Even subconsciously, he would have remembered his face. If we got to that kid, we’d have proof that Zerda was involved. It’s even possible that the Solers, the Lukowiks, and Zerda were living together in the same hideout, away from prying eyes and ears.”
“The hideout we’re looking for now. The one buried in Malone’s memories, surrounded by pirates, castles, and rockets. The place that Vasily Dragonman must have found.”
Marianne turned to the next page of the photo album. The plastic pockets were grimy from having been touched by damp, sticky fingers.
The baby was a few months old. He was sitting in the grass. The weather must have been nice, because the baby was wearing only a nappy and a little red bandana on his head that made him look like a pirate.
A boy. Almost bald. Eyes narrowed in the sunlight, so it was impossible to tell what color they were.
Malone? Maybe . . . She still couldn’t be sure.
In his chubby little hand, he was holding Gouti by his hind paw; the toy already looking a little rough around the edges, but still relatively new.
“So that’s the theory,” said Captain Augresse in a quiet voice. “They make the child disappear. Give him to a local foster family, while the affair dies down. And, more importantly, buying themselves time for the child to forget everything he’s seen. Alexis Zerda’s face in particular.”
Before continuing, she thought about what Vasily had told her regarding the memory of a child, the theories he’d explained in her office less than five days earlier.
“It doesn’t take long, JB, for a kid under three to forget his past and become a mute witness for the rest of his life. Only a few weeks to forget a face. A few months, a year at most, to forget everything he’s experienced before . . . ”
JB moved closer to Marianne again to look at the photo album she had found in Malone’s bed.
“Clever. More than that, in fact: it’s all very logical. But that still leaves a lot of unanswered questions. How could they pull the whole thing off? How would they find this foster family? And change the boy’s identity, at the age of two and a half? And, above all, why take such a risk? All Soler’s girlfriend had to do was hide somewhere with her child, because we didn’t even know of their existence. We’re getting warmer, Marianne, but there’s still a piece of the puzzle missing.”
She turned to the next page of the album.
This time, the baby was more than a year old. He was standing up, and disguised as an Indian. Behind the tree where he was leaning, they could see the pond at the center of the housing estate in Manéglise and the cream-painted houses a bit further off. This time, it was Malone, without any doubt, because the photograph was taken closer up, the face better framed and the light clearer.
No trace of Gouti or any other cuddly toy.
She turned more pages. Malone on a merry-go-round, in front of an aquarium, next to a birthday cake, with Amanda and Dimitri. Three candles.
And then the last page: Malone standing next to a Christmas tree. Curiously, the captain thought this last picture seemed thicker than the others. She slid her finger into the plastic pocket, under the photograph, and removed a sheet of clumsily folded paper.
It was a drawing. Done by an adult, but colored in—scribbled on—by a very young child.
Malone?
The picture represented a classical Christmas scene: a family together in front of the presents and the sparkling tree; one of those drawings that a parent might do with an over-excited child the night before Christmas as a way of persuading them to be patient, and which they say they will give to Father Christmas when he drops by. The three family members—Papa, Maman, child—were crudely drawn; there was no way it could be used to produce descriptions . . . although the mother did have long hair, much longer than Amanda Moulin’s.
Marianne noted one last detail: the drawing was accompanied by four words. The first two were written next to the star at the top of the tree: Noel Joyeux.
The last two were written next to the presents: N’oublie Jamais.
She examined the sheet of paper for a moment. It was worn, presumably from being held by Malone for hours on end. The four words were written in a feminine hand, probably his mother’s. They would have to compare this handwriting with Amanda Moulin’s. What did all of this—the four words, the three figures, the Christmas Eve celebration—represent for this child?
The questions collided in the captain’s head.
A new mystery? Another clue? How could they be sure? Every object in this ordinary child’s bedroom could have been put there for a reason. To fulfill a planned function, fabricating another reality, the one th
ey wanted Malone to accept. Were these simple toys, or traps cunningly laid? That calendar depicting the solar system? Those stars on the ceiling? This Toy Story duvet? That Happyland airplane? That crate full of cuddly wild animals? Those Playmobil pirates? This photo album . . .
As she continued to leaf through it, Marianne thought about her deputy’s theory. Who was this child in the photos following the first three years of his life, as if it were a fairy tale?
Was it the same child?
Or two different kids, their identities merged through skilfully retouched photographs?
Or, more plausibly, the same baby, but one who had been given two versions of his life. The first version until he was three years old, until the armed robbery, the tragedy, the terrible trauma. And then the second, in order to forget the first, to protect the adults he’d been around since his birth. Sacrificing him in order to protect him.
What mother would accept that? Accept losing her child, even for a few months, if those few months were enough to erase every memory and turn her into a stranger in the child’s eyes?
More shocking still, what mother would agree to exchange her child for another? Because they had the proof, after Lucas Marouette’s excellent investigative work: Amanda and Dimitri Moulin really did have a child, Malone, born on April 29, 2012, at the local clinic.
If Timo Soler’s child had taken that other Malone’s place, then what had happened to the first child?
Had he, too, flown away?
55
Little hand on the 1, big hand on the 11
After descending more than half of the stairway, they had almost reached the level of the top of the four large cylinders. The boat was floating in front of them. To their right, the first abandoned houses were beginning to appear.
Amanda had never come here. She had sometimes heard about this strange place, but she’d never made the connection with the stories Malone told.
Now, she understood.
Malone was still holding her hand. Docile. Obedient. Lost in his thoughts. His memories, perhaps.
Zerda was just behind them, moving at the same pace. She could sense that he would have liked to go faster, but he didn’t say anything. The boy kept going without whining about it, and that was surely the best that Zerda could hope for.
He didn’t say anything either when she stopped for a few seconds to take off her trench coat and sling it over her arm. She was soaked beneath the acrylic, the cold drops of sweat trickling down her back. The fear. It was a difficult descent. The icy wind lashed her face, but all the same she undid two buttons on her blouse.
Her throat bare. Sheer madness. She’d catch her death. Or maybe she’d just delay it. The excuse of the physical effort from the descent was ridiculous, but what other weapon did she have? What choice did she have but to send Zerda a few crude messages?
That she was a woman.
That, if he wanted . . .
This was the only thing she could sacrifice to give Malone a chance of escaping with his life. She had not been able to protect her first child. She had to save the second.
She kept going, one step after another at a steady tempo. There were another hundred or so before they reached the beach. The stairway to hell.
The one that Malone fell down.
The other Malone. The dead one.
On January 17, 2015, the day when she received the letter from the Joliot-Curie clinic announcing that her son had only a few weeks to live, that the lesion was opening up his brain like a crack splitting a stone . . . that day, Dimitri had not said anything when he left.
He had come back that evening.
With another child. To replace the first, the doomed one sleeping in his bedroom upstairs.
The promise of another child, to be more precise; if she agreed.
At first she had thought he was insane. She didn’t understand any of his story about the lost friend he hadn’t seen in years. Alexis, a friend willing to do them a favor, a mutual favor, an exchange, a swap, a good deal, those were the words he had used, the kind of words you use when you are negotiating with your neighbors at a car boot sale.
Except that they were talking about a child. Their child.
It was temporary, that was what Dimitri had said at first; just for a few weeks, a few months at most, enough time for her to grieve, for the pain to fade. A sort of anti-depressant; a kid in the house, laughing, needing a mother, needing games and hugs. Then, quickly, he realized that this was not the right strategy. Even if he was incredibly stupid.
The image of her husband’s corpse passed briefly through Amanda’s mind. Temporary. Dimitri had been right, in fact. Temporary—which was prophetic, for him at least. A few months: that was exactly how long he’d had to live.
But that evening, still alive and kicking, Dimitri had changed tack. He’d pronounced the necessary words, the only ones that would have changed her mind, made her accept this infernal plan.
Maybe we can even keep him.
Amanda had only asked questions later. She wanted to know the story of this child, a gift from God to replace the other one, she wanted to understand why they had to protect him, why his mother and father wanted to distance themselves from him, to start with. And maybe never see him again, if Dimitri’s promise was not merely another lie.
Maybe we can even keep him.
Amanda had still hesitated. What an idiot she’d been, when she thought about it now. But to think that, if she’d refused Dimitri and Alexis’s proposal, she’d never have felt the warm hand of a little boy in hers again, the warm heart of a sweet little thing against hers, the damp lips of an imp against her flabby cheek.
Thankfully, in the end, she’d said yes. She’d realized that this child they were offering her was a chance—a second chance.
Malone was doomed. He hadn’t spoken to anyone but his damn insects in weeks. Maybe he communicated telepathically, with invisible antennae, but he never spoke or expressed his feelings out loud. No joy, no pain. It was the doctors who diagnosed the ache that was gnawing at him, the pain that all the pills he swallowed could not diminish, any more than they could re-solder the fissure that was cleaving his brain. Fevers, migraines, delirium. That cursed, collapsing Pons Varolii. He never showed them that he was suffering.
Maybe it had been better for Malone to fly away, to escape his suffering, and for his mother to be given the chance to raise another baby, to protect another child. That seemed so clear to her now, so obvious.
The sea licked at the pebbles. Amanda wondered if the tide was coming in or going out. In the absence of any wet marks on the stilts, any seaweed sticking to the wood, she concluded that it was coming in. They had to move fast.
* * *
At last, they had reached the final steps. All that remained was a concrete parapet for them to get over, and then they were on the beach. Amanda tried to help her son, but he evaded her, agile, and hauled himself up, only offering her his hand after he’d crossed it, his head covered by the hood of his coat.
A little monkey.
Of course, she’d thought, in tears as she’d looked at Malone sleeping in his chair, drooling, pissing himself, weary like a dying animal. Of course, this one, the new baby, she wouldn’t love him as much, he wouldn’t be hers. It would just be a way of earning forgiveness from her real child, of proving to him that she could be a good mother, generous, attentive, protective, so that he could be proud of her, there where he was, where he wasn’t suffering anymore.
She squeezed her son’s hand before jumping down onto the pebbles. A little jump of a meter or so. She squeezed hard. Too hard.
He didn’t complain. He never complained.
She couldn’t have known, back then, just how much she would love this other child, who had to take the same name as her first son.
He was intelligent, imaginative, reserved. He was the kind
of man she loved. The kind of man she could have loved, would have liked to love. Kind, thoughtful, sensitive to poetry and flights of fancy, more interested in rockets than cars, loving magic wands more than swords, roses more than balls, dragons more than dogs.
She was prepared to do anything for him, even if he didn’t love her, not like a mother, not yet, but with time that would come. And if there wasn’t time, at least he could love the memory of her, if she died for him.
For an instant, without even turning to Zerda, she imagined that the salty sea spray dripping down her bare throat made her seem desirable.
Now they’d reached the beach, they were progressing even more slowly. Amanda was sure of it now: the tide was rising fast, the waves rolling over the dry pebbles, a few centimeters higher each time, and them dragging them back, wet, with a noise like a construction site.
Zerda had gone in front. He gestured at the third house, the one with broken shutters, not even glancing at Amanda, never mind noticing her soaked cleavage. In fact, he went to the opposite extreme, exaggerating his indifference, leaning towards Malone, as if his mother no longer existed.
“Hurry up, child. We’re not safe here anymore. Apparently you told a stranger about our secret hideaway.”
He winked at him, to show him that he wasn’t angry about this.
Standing up, he did now look intently at Amanda: a vertical gaze, from her face down to her chest.
“There’s no time to lose,” he insisted.
She trembled, thought about putting her jacket back on.
No time to lose?
Amanda no longer had the strength to fight. In a few meters, they would reach that abandoned house on this deserted beach. Doubts swirled through her mind; the shifting pebbles beneath her feet prevented her from thinking; the slightest noise broke her concentration; when it came down to it, she was no more intelligent than Dimitri. She would end up the same way, lying in a pool of blood, a bullet between her eyes.