“That’s for sure. I hope we can move ahead quickly.”
“With a little luck, it will be his woman friend who killed him, and she’ll cry on Lambert’s shoulder and confess it all. It wouldn’t be the first crime of passion committed at the age of seventy, right?”
“Yeah, no doubt, but that’s not very likely.”
“You don’t see it that way, huh?”
“No. Like you, I’d put my money on the can of worms.”
Sebag had finished picking up all the papers and putting them back in order. He tapped them to make a neat pile and slipped it under his arm. Then he followed Molina out of the office.
When Sebag got home, Claire and Sévérine were sitting comfortably on the sofa, watching television. He kissed them and saw them grimace. He hadn’t had time to change his clothes since his visit to Martinez’s apartment.
“I know, I’m going to take a shower.”
Without saying any more, he disappeared into the bathroom adjoining the bedroom. He put his clothes in the laundry basket and stepped under a spray of hot water. He let it run over him for a good five minutes while he cleaned his skin and shampooed his hair.
After he dried off, he put on a bathrobe.
“Is Léo here?” he asked the girls, who hadn’t budged.
“In his room,” Claire answered.
Gilles crossed the living room and went down the hall that led to the children’s rooms. He knocked at his son’s door. No response. He went in. Léo was wearing a headset and was totally focused on his computer.
“Hi, there,” Sebag said in a loud voice.
Léo hardly moved his head.
“Hi, Dad.”
“Did you have a good day?”
“It was O.K.”
“Not too much homework?”
“No, it’s all right.”
For a few seconds, Sebag contemplated the nape of his son’s neck. He hesitated. He’d planned to remind Léo one more time to be careful on his scooter, but he was well aware that this “one more time” would be perceived as “one time too many.” It was better not to push too hard. His relationship with his son was not conflictual—not yet—but their old closeness had waned over the years and Gilles missed the time when they played games together in the yard or on the computer and had long discussions in the evening before going to bed. But that’s life, after all. Léo had grown up. He’d become a teenager of sixteen. A boy of his time. Autistic with respect to his parents, but capable of talking all day long with his buddies on the internet.
Sebag sighed, shut the door, and returned to the living room. It was separated from the kitchen only by a bar. On the counter he found, under a glass cloche, a plate with stuffed zucchini and a little rice. He put it in the microwave to heat. While he waited, he glanced at the television screen. An American series, obviously a cop show. That’s all there was on TV now.
The microwave beeped. Sebag took out his food and sat down at the table. Claire soon joined him. Sévérine had put on a headset so she could watch the rest of her television program in peace.
“How did your day go?” Claire asked.
“A lot like your TV show.”
“A murder?”
He’d just put a big forkful in his mouth and had to limit himself to nodding.
“Was that the smell?”
He explained the main outlines of the case.
“That was a great thing to come back to after vacation,” she said.
“You can say that again. But aren’t you going to keep watching television?”
“I saw the first episode, and with what you just told me, I no longer want to see the rest.”
“As they say, fact is stranger than affliction.”
“Haven’t you already used that one?”
Gilles loved to give proverbs a new twist, but after twenty years of living with Claire, he no longer had any new ones.
“Probably. How was your day?”
Claire told him about her routine as a French teacher at the middle school in Rivesaltes, the tensions between the faculty and the new principal, and then the difficulty of maintaining order in overenrolled classes, especially 4-C, which included two or three students who were a little more insolent than usual. She also talked about relaxing for a moment at the gym, the pleasure of letting off steam physically and then ending her session with a hammam with her girlfriends.
Sebag’s mind wandered. He just couldn’t focus on what Claire was saying any longer. A word or a gesture was sometimes enough to make a sickening jealousy rise up in him, a wave of malaise, an ache in his stomach and his guts that had been with him since the preceding summer, when he had discovered by the cruelest and most painful of chances that Claire had been lying to him. Precisely about a gym class, which he knew she hadn’t attended. He’d had doubts, but had never said anything about them.
The suspicion that his wife had been unfaithful to him had grown stronger over the following days, to the point that he became almost certain it was true.
And he still hadn’t said anything.
It would have been easy, however, for Lieutenant Sebag to use his detective’s skill to find out the truth of the matter. He could also have simply talked about it openly with Claire. He knew her well; if anything had been going on, she’d have told him all about it. He was sure of that.
But in the end he’d decided he didn’t want to know.
In view of the love and desire that Claire continued to show him, he’d concluded that the truth was of no interest. The only thing that counted was their love, their mutual love, always their love. That was the only sincerity that really mattered. And this love was so strong that it could easily cope with a little scratch. Especially since he hadn’t noticed anything unusual in Claire’s behavior since school started. If his wife had had an “adventure,” it was over.
Being able to take philosophically such a painful and commonplace misfortune that would have broken up many a couple made Sebag feel noble and great. Sublime and generous. Magnanimous. And this positive image of himself had been a balm for the wound to his pride.
But now the balm no longer had any effect. And it was himself that he doubted. More and more often he wondered whether his fine magnanimity was concealing something else.
Fear, pure and simple.
The fear of knowing and not being able to bear the truth.
He’d let the scratch heal over with bits of gravel still under the skin. The wound had put its mark on his soul and from time to time reminded him that it was still there. More and more often. Like a deep-seated infection that was eating away at him.
“I don’t like it when you look at me with those eyes.”
He came back to himself. To her. Claire was gazing at him sadly.
“I don’t like it when you look at me with those eyes,” she repeated softly.
A faint smile lit Sebag’s lips.
“They’re my eyes. I don’t have any others.”
“That’s not true,” she said. “Your eyes are loving and tender. These eyes are hard and cold. And above all, they’re far away. Too far from me.”
Gilles’s smile broadened.
“Ah, there we are, that’s better,” said Claire. “As soon as you smile, your eyes come back.”
They looked at each other in silence for a few long moments. An immense cold seized his gut and stopped his breath. He saw Claire’s lips start to open and then immediately close again. He had the terrifying feeling that they were thinking the same thing. But he didn’t want to talk about it, he didn’t want to lance the boil. Not now. As long as he could stand the pain he would stand it. All he hoped was that they could very quickly resume the normal course of their love.
Wearing the headset, Sévérine was standing next to them. She took Gilles’s glass and filled it with water that she gulped down.<
br />
“I was thirsty,” she said as she went back to slouch in front of the TV.
The moment had passed. Whew . . . Claire was the first to change the subject.
“You must not have had time to work on Mathieu’s accident?”
“No, but I brought the file home, and I’m going to have a look at it right now.”
“Sévérine expects a lot of you.”
“I know.”
“But if there’s nothing to be found, she’ll understand.”
“I hope.”
Sebag stretched out on the bed and stuck the pillow behind his back. He was beginning to read the file.
Mathieu’s accident had taken place the preceding Wednesday. The boy had been on his way home from Perpignan’s Olympic pool where he trained every Wednesday afternoon. According to the police report, it was 5:15 when the white delivery van owned by Chevrier Transportation suddenly swerved to its left, striking Mathieu’s scooter head-on. There was no trace of skid marks on the pavement. The collision had been violent. As Sebag already knew, the boy had immediately stood up, apparently unhurt. And then suddenly collapsed a little later. Internal hemorrhaging. The emergency team’s doctor had recorded the time of death as 5:57.
The driver of the van—Pascal Lucas, 45, the father of two children—claimed he had suddenly swerved to avoid a car that had run a stop sign on his right. The witnesses described a driver who had panicked and clearly showed all the signs of being drunk. Sebag glanced through the documents until he found the medical certificate made out later at police headquarters: 1.2 grams of alcohol in the driver’s blood. Further on, he found a copy of the driver’s police record. This wasn’t a first offense for Pascal Lucas. Three years earlier, his license had been suspended for driving under the influence. It was getting to be a little much. Unfortunately, the case looked like it was going to be very simple.
Claire emerged naked from the bathroom. Gilles followed her with his eyes as she put on a short, cream-colored nightie with a band of pink lace at the bottom. He was still looking at her when she stretched out alongside him. He loved to look at her when she was getting dressed or undressed. He knew that she liked it, too.
Claire pressed her legs against his. The moment for questions was past. Had it ever really come?
“So, this file?” Claire asked.
He shrugged.
“It looks bad for the driver. He’s the only one who says that another car ran a stop sign. None of the witnesses mentions that. It really looks like something he invented to reduce his responsibility.”
“If you don’t find anything, it’s not serious. What the family needs is to be sure that the accident really happened the way the police say it did.”
“My colleagues don’t always do bad work.”
“Do you know the one who handled Mathieu’s accident?”
“Yes, of course.”
“Is he a good cop?”
“Uh . . . a wildcard.”
“Ah . . . So it might be worthwhile to dig a little further,” she added as she turned out the light.
“Aren’t you going to read?”
“No, I’m exhausted this evening. The kids were really unruly today at school. And then Monday is usually a busy day.”
She sat up to kiss him.
“Good night.”
“Good night.”
More than fatigue, Gilles felt a deep weariness. But he tried to go on reading. He looked at the dates and times of the reports. They’d all been made the same day, right after the accident. Cardona had worked late but he’d apparently decided that same evening that there was nothing in the case that required further investigation. A case that had been quickly closed. But had it perhaps been closed too quickly?
Sebag put the sheets of paper on his night table before turning out the light. He lay on his back for a moment, staring at the ceiling lit by the orange light coming in from the street. The shadows of the palm tree in the yard were dancing gracefully. Claire was breathing regularly. She was already asleep.
He closed his eyes but the pages kept passing in front of him. Reports from the ambulance men and the emergency team, witnesses’ testimony, Cardona’s summary.
Something was bothering him, but he didn’t know what.
He turned the lamp back on and quickly reread all the witness statements, compared them. Claire turned over in the bed, disturbed by the sudden return of light. She moaned a little. Gilles paid no attention and continued to go through the documents.
And then he understood.
Yes, the case had been closed too quickly, and there was something to dig into, as Claire had put it. Not much, to be sure, probably just a false lead, but who could tell? It might be the kind of thread that sometimes made it possible to unravel the whole case.
He turned out the light again and soon fell asleep.
CHAPTER 5
Algiers, November 25, 1961
The three men have been waiting in the Renault Dauphine for half an hour.
“What the fuck is Georges doing, for God’s sake?” The driver is getting impatient.
One of the two men in the back seat reprimands him.
“We told you: no names, O.K.? Just the code names. And calm down, Omega. Take Sigma as your model. It’s his first operation, but do you see him losing his cool?”
He elbows the young man sitting on his left. The man he’s given the code name of Sigma feels tense nonetheless but manages to hide it behind a permanent half-smile.
Omega turns around again to face the men in the backseat.
“Where are we going afterward? Do you know, Bizerte?”
“I have a vague idea, yes, but Babelo will confirm it. He’s the boss.”
Sigma tries to smoke his cigarette calmly. He draws in long puffs that he lets out slowly. One, two, three, four, five, six . . . He counts silently as he breathes. Today’s operation is a kind of test for him: he has to show that he’s fit before he’ll be authorized to continue the fight.
In the street, boys in short pants are playing with a ball, paying no attention to the world around them. A doomed world. Sigma doesn’t feel much older than these kids. He is separated from them by few years, at most, and a few whiskers on his chin. He never imagined that his transition to adulthood would take place with a gun stuck under his belt.
Babelo appears at the street corner, elegantly dressed, as usual. He stops, strokes his thin mustache, and takes the time to look around him before approaching the Dauphine.
Bizerte opens his window and shakes Babelo’s hand.
“We’re ready. We’re just waiting for you.”
Babelo gets in alongside the driver. He looks at his watch.
“It’s almost noon. We’re on time.”
Omega turns the key. The Dauphine’s engine starts to hum.
“Where are we going?”
“Boulevard de Champagne, the bottling factory. It will soon be time for the lunch break.”
Despite his nervousness, Omega drives carefully. He doesn’t want to draw attention to himself, even if there is little danger that the cops would dare to stop four men in a car.
A quarter of an hour later they’ve arrived at their destination. Babelo signals to Omega to stop the car fifty meters from the factory. Shortly afterward, a dozen Arab workers come out of the building. They sit down on the ground in a lane with thin grass, gathered around a shared mess tin.
Babelo gives his final instructions.
“Omega, you’ll drive in front of them and turn around farther on. As you’re coming back, stop near them, on the right side of the road. Bizerte and I will open the windows, and you, Sigma, will get out of the car and lean on the roof.”
Omega restarts the Dauphine. As they pass in front of the factory the first time, Sigma takes care to look toward the other side of the street; he does
n’t want to see anyone’s face beforehand. Omega drives slowly as far as the next intersection and then makes a U-turn. He comes back toward the factory at a higher speed and stops right across from the workers.
The workers, frightened, immediately get up but Babelo and Bizerte have already lowered their windows. They start firing. Sigma gets out of the car, stands up, and following instructions, braces his pistol on the roof. He aims at a worker who is already running toward the door of the factory. He hits the target. The man collapses. He aims at another one who is standing, petrified with astonishment, in front of his mess tin. He hits him but has a feeling that he is not the first one to do so.
The rest of the shooting is more confused. When Babelo gives the order to stop firing, no Arab is still moving. Bizerte puts away his gun and grabs a bag he’s holding between his knees. He gets out, digs in the bag, and pulls out sheets of paper that he throws on the bodies.
Then he gets back into the car. Omega makes the tires squeal as the Dauphine takes off down the boulevard.
“Nice job, men,” Babelo congratulates them, a broad smile on his lips. “Now I’m going to take you all to the movies. Rio Bravo is playing at the Rex. With John Wayne. A film they say will become a classic in the history of the western.”
An intoxicating smell of gunpowder is floating in the car. At the intersection with the boulevard, Sigma meets the eyes of a child. A street kid. Rather well-dressed for a little Arab. The boy has seen everything and is pointing an accusing finger at the car. The Dauphine turns, with another squeal of its tires, and the kid disappears from Sigma’s sight. The young man thinks the child will disappear from his life as well. There’s nothing romantic about war. Sigma, despite his youth, has just realized that.
In front of the bottling factory, the police count six men dead and three wounded, one seriously. As they carry out the usual routines, knowing they will serve no purpose, they are trampling on the tracts left there by the killers. The tracts that the wind will scatter around Algiers contain only one sentence, crudely printed in black on white:
Autumn, All the Cats Return Page 4