by Katie Penryn
*
Thirty minutes later, Dubois and a round dozen of his men set off on their ground penetrating trek across the countryside around the Château de Portemorency. The machine proved to be reliable, but the going was slow with many deviations around obstacles, not to mention the rows of vines tied to their supporting wires. At four in the morning they found themselves out of the vines and into an area of rough land with outcrops of an ancient rock that pre-dated the laying down of the standard chalk of the region. As they’d traveled slowly along on foot, Dubois had instructed his men to scout on either side of the tunnel to a distance of ten yards in the hope that they might discover something pertinent to the case.
It wasn’t until they hit the outcrop that one of his men shouted out, “Inspector, over here.”
The officer stood halfway down a steep incline leading down to a gulch. Dubois hurried over. He shrugged his shoulders when he reached the spot above his man. He couldn’t see anything from the top of the slope and began to turn away in disappointment.
“There,” said his man. “Do you see it? You have to come down to this level, Inspector.”
Dubois half scrambled half fell down the uneven surface to fetch up against his officer. He looked down to where the man was pointing. A splash of white showed up as the officer swung his flashlight across the greenery. The two men climbed down the rest of the way. They’d found the white van. The villain had hidden it in the dip and stretched jungle camouflage across it. No wonder the police helicopters hadn’t picked it up.
Dubois walked around it checking for signs of ownership. Many years had passed since the last renewal of the disks for insurance and vehicle control. The villain had been lucky not to be stopped for that. Mud obscured the number plate as the ballet teacher had reported.
“Wipe that off,” he instructed his man, “and check for the owner.”
As the officer bent down to brush the mud away, Dubois hissed, “Gloves, man, gloves.”
Dubois gloved up and walked back to the driver’s door and opened it. He made a quick search but found nothing immediately useful. He’d leave the detailed work to the forensics team when he called them at the end of the operation. He didn’t want to alert the villain now. He called six of his men down to join him telling the others to continue with the GPR machine.
“With the van hidden here, either the cave we’re looking for is close by or there’s a second entrance to the tunnel. Let’s see if we can find one or the other. He wouldn’t keep his vehicle far from his hideout.”
*
They searched the slope either side of the van for an hour and were on the point of giving up when Dubois himself decided to take a look at five yards more. And there it was… behind a fall of Virginia creeper. An entrance to a tunnel. He’d missed it on his first pass because the surrounds had collapsed, leaving only a hole in place of the stone lined entrance that had once been there. He called back to one of his men to fetch the others.
“Leave the GPR for now. We’ll check this out first,” he said.
Dubois crawled through the hole. When he stood upright, he found himself inside a tunnel which unlike its entrance was in good condition. He set off sure his quarry was close at hand. He’d covered about forty yards when sounds of his team following along behind reached him. Caution told him to wait for them to catch up. As they neared, he waved his hand up and down to signal quiet. From that point on, they crept forward like commandos on a clandestine raid. As the pale dawning light of a new day faded behind them, the damp closed in around them. Lit only by their flashlights, the tunnel was a creepy place. Dubois rounded a corner in advance of his men. Ahead of him light glimmered. Was it another opening or had they found the cave?
He waited for his men to catch up to him again. “Flashlights off. Stay close. I’ll keep mine on.”
He shifted his flashlight to his left hand, took out his gun and using it to shield the beam, he edged forwards slowly. The light grew brighter and larger as they approached it along the tunnel. Suddenly, the tunnel opened out and debouched into a cave. They’d found the cave they were hunting for as witnessed by the furniture and by the man lying trussed up and gagged on the ground in the center, his eyes wide with terror, unable to do anything but moan.
But was he their villain or another victim?
Dubois didn’t run forward to free him. He took his time giving him a good looking over. The man was overweight and bald, not that his unappealing appearance proved he was a villain. However, the strong whiff of body odor emanating from his scruffy clothes hinted at his sleeping rough, presumably in the cave. A large red mark under his jawbone suggested he’d received a hefty punch. He’d have a huge bruise later on in the day. Dubois decided to play it safe and leave the man tied up for the moment. He scanned the room for obvious threats before waving his men in. “Check the place out without touching anything,” he instructed them.
Dubois went to stand over the man on the floor again while he waited for his men to report.
They all shook their heads. “Nothing, Inspector.”
“Cover me,” he said to his next in command. “Film this,” he said to the officer with the video camera.
Dubois knelt down to search the man’s pockets. Usual junk. A few coins, a half-smoked roll-up, a filthy face tissue and a wallet which held a tattered driving permit in the name of Albert Menton. The surname rang a bell but Dubois couldn’t remember why.
“You’re Albert Menton?” he asked the man who nodded his head. “Have we met?”
The man shook his head vigorously and grunted.
Dubois moved on to the next pocket. A Bic lighter, a chewed lump of gum in its wrapper and a folded piece of paper. As Dubois opened it, the man rolled onto his side turning his head away.
The note was dated with the day’s date and read:
Hi Dubois, Penzi and I found Marc here early this morning. In case you come across this villain before we’ve got hold of you, we’ve taken Marc home to his father. We tried to call you but couldn’t get through. This is the man who kidnapped Marc and Nina and, presumably, damaged the vines. I’m sure your forensics team will find proof of both in the cave. I ambushed him and tied him up for you. Felix Munro.
Dubois couldn’t help the slight feeling of frustration that hit him. Yes, he’d wanted the man caught and the child freed, but he’d liked to have been the one to do it. However, knowing how generous Penzi always was with allowing him to take credit for her actions and deductions, he took a deep breath and told himself not to be so petty.
“It’s the kidnapper all right,” Dubois told his men. “The Department’s civilian contacts whom most of you know, Madame Mpenzi Munro and her colleague, got to him first some time during the night. They’ve taken the boy home to his father and left this parcel of sh–, let me rephrase that, sheer evil for us to process.”
Dubois reminded his men the cave and the area round the van were crime scenes. He instructed two of his men to await the forensics team in the cave and sent two back to the van to await a second forensics team from, he hoped, one of the neighboring Departments. They hauled Menton out of the cave. Once outside, Dubois made the necessary phone calls to forensics. Then he called Jean-Claude and told him the good news: Albert Menton would be getting his next meal in a police cell.
Dubois asked Jean-Claude to guide the police van down to the cave to pick them all up, apologizing for the fact that it was close to where Hélène had met with her death. While they waited for their transport, Dubois phoned Penzi and woke her up.
“We’ve got him,” he shouted down the phone with glee.
“Whaaat?” asked Penzi half asleep and useless before she’d had her morning cup of tea in bed.
“The villain. The man Felix tied up. We found the cave by a different route. So, Albert Menton, wicked kidnapper of children and destroyer of our precious Cognac vines is about to be transferred to the gendarmerie.”
“Bravo, Xavier. We tried to call you.”
�
�We must have been underground in the tunnels. I’ll explain everything when I see you. Can you make it to the gendarmerie when we question the blighter at 7 p.m.? Forensics should have finished their work by then.”
“Of course. Wouldn’t miss it for the world. And I have a present for you.”
“Till seven then,” and Dubois rang off.
Penzi rolled over and fell fast asleep again.
Chapter 39
We’d returned home in the early hours of the morning. I’d gone straight to bed leaving Felix to write a note telling Gwinny and Jimbo that we’d found Marc and taken him back to his father. Gwinny told me later she’d done her best to keep Jimbo downstairs, but he’d been too excited to wait for me to wake up naturally. So, when we left for the gendarmerie at half past six I have to admit I felt hung over from the expenditure of too much adrenaline and lack of sleep. I was turning out of the Esplanade to go up the hill when I remembered the plastic box of urine soaked soil lying in the bottom of the fridge.
I slammed on the brakes and began to turn the car around in the nearest driveway.
“What are you doing?” Felix cried out as his seatbelt walloped him backwards and forwards.
“I forgot the box of urine.”
“It could’ve waited.”
“No. Dubois is holding a case conference this evening. Being able to put Albert Menton on the scene of Hélène’s death could be useful to him,” I answered as I pulled out into the road again.
When I reached Les Dragons, I dashed out of the car leaving the engine running and Felix shouting out after me that I should have switched off. Gwinny turned round as I rushed into the kitchen and opened the fridge door.
“You’re back soon,” she said with a healthy touch of sarcasm.
“I forgot the pee,” I told her blithely as I leaned down to take the box out of the bottom drawer.
“What do you want peas for?” she asked me.
I brushed past her saying, “Pee not peas.”
“What do you mean–pee?”
“It’s the villain’s pee. We found it at the scene of Hélène’s accident. I must go. Bye.”
Gwinny followed me out into the hall and as I closed the front door, I could hear her muttering behind me, “This sleuthing is all well and good, but I’ll not have urine in my fridge. We could all have died from food poisoning.”
I passed the box to Felix, “Put this on the floor by your feet. You’d better pray Gwinny will let us back in the house. She thinks we’ve contaminated it.”
“I hope Dubois appreciates your gift,” Felix said and fell about laughing all the way to the gendarmerie.
*
Dubois led us through to an office at the back of the station where we found Madame Fer-de-Lance and an officer Dubois introduced as Michel Kohl, his forensics expert. After civilities all around, we got down to business–a review of the case against Albert Menton.
Madame Fer-de-Lance began the proceedings. As juge d’instruction and a highly qualified lawyer, her role was similar to that played by the Director of Prosecutions in England and a District Attorney in the States. She had to make the decision whether there was evidence enough to take the case against Menton to trial.
“Now, as to charging him with murder,” she began and gave a French pout and a shrug of her shoulders. “We can probably come up with enough circumstantial evidence to prove he placed the traps if we work on what we have, but I don’t see how we can ever prove murder. Yes, he could have had an intent to kill, but kill whom? That is the question we can’t answer. Of all the ways of murdering someone, this is the most hit and miss I’ve ever come across. What do you think, Dubois?”
Dubois shrugged back. “He couldn’t have been sure who would step in the traps. The court would see the situation as being one of trying to protect his den, his cave, his adopted property. Anyone could have stepped in one of the man traps, even a child out having an adventure.”
Madame Fer-de-Lance nodded. “The best we can go for as far as Hélène de Portemorency’s death is concerned is some degree of manslaughter.” She stopped and looked at Felix and me. “French law is not the same as the Anglo-Saxon law of England and the States. Our thinking is different and, therefore, our terminology and the available penalties. My opinion is that it would be almost impossible to get a verdict against Menton that would guarantee a heavy penalty.”
“Certainly no death penalty,” Felix whispered to me.
“Quite right,” said Madame Fer-de-Lance. “We have no death penalty in France and the longest sentence even for what we call assassinat, your first degree murder, is only thirty years.”
“So, what do you suggest, madame?” I asked her.
“Menton made the grave error of kidnapping those two poor children, Nina and Marc de Portmorency. We prove that, and he will get a sentence to fit his crimes.”
“Tell Penzi what you mean, madame,” said Dubois.
“Kidnapping for ransom carries a penalty of thirty years’ imprisonment.”
That didn’t seem long enough to me but it would probably see Menton’s life out; he had to be in his fifties.
Madame Fer-de-Lance was still speaking. I looked up and she caught my eye.
“I know what you’re thinking,” she said, “but if the victims of the kidnap are under fifteen years of age, the penalty is extended to life imprisonment.”
Everyone in the room let out their breath at the same time. That was more like it.
Madame Fer-de-Lance grinned at our reaction. “So, we forget about trying to prove murder or manslaughter, or even the lesser charge of malicious damage to the de Portemorency vineyards, and concentrate on the kidnapping charges.”
I thrust my plastic container towards Dubois saying, “You won’t be needing this then.”
He was so surprised he almost dropped it. “What is it?”
It was Felix’s turn to grin. “We found someone had urinated close to where Hélène met with her accident near the cave where we found Marc. Penzi scraped up the mud. We had it analyzed for DNA because we were sure it was human pee.”
Madame Fer-de-Lance looked at me aghast. “Where’s it been all this time?”
“The less said about that the better,” said Felix.
Madame Fer-de-Lance recovered her poise. “You have the analysis?”
I handed her the report from Catrine which she passed on to her forensics expert. “See if this matches Menton’s DNA.”
He turned aside to his laptop, clicked away and compared our report with his records. “It does, madame.”
“That helps us, but it won’t stand up in court. No chain of evidence and so on,” she said. “Your action was well intentioned. Now, back to the kidnapping charge. What do we have, Kohl?”
“A plethora of trace evidence: DNA evidence that both children were transported in the white van our colleagues found and the same for the cave where Marc was found by the Munros. Hairs, blood spots and the gag that was used on the boy. Oh, and the DNA evidence from the contents of the bucket the children had to use for a toilet.”
“And I have the photos I took of Marc before we set him free,” said Felix handing over a data stick to Kohl who slotted it into his laptop.
“Take a look, madame,” he said to the prosecutor.
She examined the photos and nodded. “So we can prove both children were in the van and the cave at some time. Felix’s photos prove Marc was held under restraint. What about the girl, Nina?”
Dubois mentioned that the police had taken photos of Nina when she was returned to the château. They showed the burns on her wrists from the rope Menton had used the first day he had her in his power.
“And,” he added, “both children have identified Menton from a photo line-up. They’re too young to be submitted to a live line-up.”
Madame Fer-de-Lance took her seat again. “There’s adequate proof that Menton was living in the cave. So, back to first principles. Means? We can prove he used the van. What about CCTV around th
e ballet school or the château?”
Dubois shook his head. “Negative to both. But we can prove he took an unhealthy interest in Hélène de Portemorency’s funeral. The CCTV cameras at the church and the photos taken at the burial site both show him now that we know who to look for. And the van shows up in the photos of the cars lined up outside the cemetery.”
“And as for motive, we have all the ransom demands. Menton threatened the vines, and when that didn’t work he threatened the children.”
“And Hélène,” I said.
Madame Fer-de-Lance tutted at me. “Yes, yes, but we decided we can’t prove her accident was anything but an accident. Now, what about motive?”
Kohl coughed in the background.
Madame Fer-de-Lance spun round, “Yes?”
“We still have to prove Menton was the sender of those emails. We have someone working on it, and I’m sure they’ll track down his disguised IP address given time.”
I gave Felix a nudge. He raised his eyebrows at me. Big cat that he was, Felix was wary of the prosecutor. Not only did he find her intimidating, but he feared she might put her finger on his vulnerability–not having proper documentation.
Madame Fer-de-Lance had noticed our interaction. “You have something to add, Monsieur Munro?”
“I can help you with the IP address, madame. I had to find him on the dark web to pay him the ransom of a million Euros.”
“Good, good. You’ll tell our man later?”
Felix nodded and said, “Yes, madame.”
“On to opportunity,” Madame Fer-de-Lance said.
“Same proof,” answered Dubois. “He had the van. He had his hide-out all kitted out. The ballet teacher puts the van on the spot. Marc says the man offered him a lift when he fell off his bicycle. Nina says he picked her up outside the ballet school. Both children say it was Menton.”