Mind/Reader

by Brian Freemantle

  Siemen accepted his coffee, smiled and said: ‘That seems to have cleared the point up as far as I’m concerned.’

  Claudine took another offered chance. ‘We are a team. And all three of us have a good idea of the difficulties we face, even though we can’t yet guess just how difficult it’s going to be. What we do know is that the problems will get worse, not better. So let’s not create additional and unnecessary ones for ourselves. We’re not in competition with each other. Just as we don’t need reminding of the difficulties, we don’t need reminding what this means to us personally. I don’t intend to fail. I don’t imagine either of you do, either. I’m asking that we cooperate at all times, in everything.’ She stopped, looking directly at Poulard. ‘I’m suggesting any misunderstandings that might have existed up to now are forgotten. And that we take our relationship - and the job we’ve been formed to do - forward from this moment.’

  ‘That seems perfect to me,’ nodded the broken-faced German.

  ‘And to me,’ said Poulard.

  Claudine noted, impressed, that it was from Siemen’s practical suggestion to check the stacked files that they discovered there was only one copy of each and gave Yvette her first positive job, arranging duplicates for each of them to study independently. Yvette’s search uncovered several folders of scene-of-crime photographs, none of which appeared to distress her. She actually asked in which order she should set them out on the display boards, before being instructed to do so. Claudine and Siemen went along with Poulard’s idea of keeping the murders and each applicable exhibit in chronological order. Siemen, practical again, insisted Yvette create and personally maintain an evidence log in which everything should be listed. Anything removed from the room should be recorded against their signed authority. He was speaking as Kurt Volker made his third and final return with his personal files and Siemen proposed the log be duplicated on a computer database. Poulard appeared uninterested in the basic, pedantic police procedure. Claudine recognized it as such and decided Siemen was an essential part of their team: initially - and probably for some time afterwards – he was likely to make a bigger contribution than either she or the Frenchman. Siemen liked patterns and order, although in quite a different way from herself.

  The various decisions took them up to lunch and there was no discussion or doubt that they would eat together. Their entry into the dining room attracted even more interest than Claudine had been conscious of earlier. Poulard responded, smiling and twice making hand gestures to people who acknowledged him. Siemen seemed oblivious of the attention.

  Claudine hadn’t expected anything resembling a social situation and hardly thought the meal qualified as one, but it was at least an opportunity to soften the edges of a strictly professional relationship. Poulard created it. He began, perhaps obviously, talking of the personal benefits from his Europol posting. He was happy to leave his stalemated career in Paris, after the divorce from his wife, surrounded by mutual friends having to choose sides. It was better for him to start again, in everything. Eliane had the boy and the Europol salary and allowances would help with the alimony, which was too high considering her independent income as an advocate. When he got settled in Holland, he might appeal: get a better lawyer than he had for the divorce, whom Eliane, representing herself, had chopped up in little pieces. Siemen thought the true victims of divorce were children. He had five and a happy marriage. They liked The Hague - they’d already bought a boat to sail on the Vijver lake - but wanted German education for the children. They had left their eldest two sons at boarding school in Munich. The others would go there when they were old enough. It would be a sacrifice. He and Greta had never intended sending them away: he’d even thought of rejecting the Europol job because of it.

  Claudine knew she had to contribute but was reluctant. There seemed to be so little to offer, apart from Warwick, and she certainly didn’t intend to talk about him. Poulard recognized the name of her mother’s restaurant in Lyon, claiming to have had the best pigeon he’d ever eaten in his life there, and because it was something with which two policemen could associate she talked of her English father’s career at Interpol, although not of the prematurely enforced, pastis-soaked retirement. That prompted from Poulard the inevitable question about encouraging her into criminal investigation, which she dismissed as shortly as she had to Henri Sanglier.

  ‘Forensic psychology is surely an odd specialization, particularly for a woman?’ pressed Poulard.

  ‘What’s gender got to do with it?’

  There was the suggestion of a smirk, which she guessed the beginning of an open reference to sex, but then Poulard’s face straightened. ‘Nothing, of course. I’ve never known a woman practising it before, that’s all.’

  ‘A friend of my father’s at the British Home Office mentioned it as an emerging science, a year before I graduated from the Sorbonne. It coincided with my tutor discussing specialization with me.’

  ‘So your father was an influence?’ said Siemen.

  Never, about anything, thought Claudine. ‘He’s been dead for ten years.’ It was psychologically predictable - because she was a woman - that they would press her for more than they had volunteered but she wanted it to stop.

  ‘After Paris I find the social scene here non-existent,’ complained Poulard. ‘Don’t you find the same thing, after London …’ there was the staged pause ’ … particularly someone as attractive as you?’

  Claudine stretched the disconcerting silence, holding Poulard’s eyes. Then she said: ‘My husband died suddenly, five months ago. I have no interest in any social scene. I have no interest in anything except the job I’m here to perform.’

  Poulard flushed, discomfited, and Claudine thought she’d probably chipped away a little of the working foundation they’d been establishing. But it ended the private lives discussion so it was a worthwhile loss.

  All three were impressed when they got back to their incident room to find that Yvette Fey had organized the duplication of all the files on the French and English killings and had been assured the remainder would be copied before the end of the day. What was already available was waiting for them in three neat stacks. The girl had already begun fixing photographs in their dated order on exhibit boards.

  Volker had rearranged the computer station set-up, removing the screens separating the terminals to bring them much closer together, virtually side by side and in a half-circle around him. It reminded Claudine of a treat to which her parents had taken her on her eleventh birthday where a pianist had produced recognizable tunes by playing three pianos at the same time. All Volker’s screens were on but full of ASCII symbols, numerals and codes meaningless to everyone except him. The man’s lips were moving, although he wasn’t making any sound, as he swivelled from display to display.

  Each collected their individual pile. Poulard and Siemen went into their offices. Claudine carried hers to the small table at which they had sat that morning.

  Very shortly after she began reading Claudine turned to the boards at which Yvette was working, confirming an impression although she didn’t ask the girl outright, deciding to wait until she’d read everything, even the files so far unavailable. Even before they arrived, she didn’t have any doubt. She’d prepared a lined pad and pencils to make notes but had barely filled one side of paper by the time she completed what files she had, late into the afternoon. Her finishing coincided with the delivery of the remainder.

  ‘Any thoughts?’ demanded Poulard, emerging from his room.

  ‘None that’s going to lead to a Sherlock Holmes solution at the moment. What about you?’

  Poulard shook his head. ‘Blank walls.’

  Claudine stretched the cramp from her shoulders, indicating the newly arrived folders. ‘I’m going to finish those off tonight in my own office. Maybe there’ll be something more there.’

  ‘Should their being taken from the room by any one of you three be logged?’ asked the dutifully efficient Yvette.

  ‘Yes,
’ said Siemen, from his office door. ‘And signed for.’

  His back to Siemen, Poulard made a grimace towards Claudine. She gave no response. When she signed the log Claudine saw hers was the first withdrawal entry and wondered if it would be an omen. She couldn’t imagine what, exactly, it might be.

  Claudine had worked for an hour, the light already on because of the encroaching darkness outside, when there was a knock on her door, immediately followed by the entry of Scott Burrows.

  ‘Midnight oil time?’ he said, advancing into the room. His tie was loosened and his over-strained collar undone, which it often was. Perfumed cigar smoke trailed behind him.

  ‘Good to have something to work on at last,’ said Claudine, pushing herself back in her chair.

  He slumped, uninvited, in the facing easy chair. It wasn’t really big enough for the man. ‘How’s it going?’

  ‘Too soon to say.’ She tapped the folders spread over her desk. ‘I haven’t finished reading the case notes yet.’

  ‘Mind if I take a look?’

  Shit, thought Claudine. ‘We’ve established an authorizing system. Stuff has to be officially logged in and out.’

  Burrows made the pretence of pulling back in his chair, as if he’d been slapped. He was too fat for it to work. ‘Hey, remember me? Scott Burrows, FBI. Done a lot of work on criminal profiling.’

  Claudine shrugged, conveying an unfelt apology. ‘It’s my assignment.’

  ‘You think I’m trying to steal your glory?’

  ‘There isn’t any glory to steal. And might not be.’ There was no official reason why he couldn’t see them, but Claudine guessed Sanglier, along with every other Europol psychologist, would hear of her sharing files and of Burrows’ opinion within fifteen minutes of her making them available to the American. And if there was any glory - the justification for her new life - she didn’t intend sharing it with anyone.

  ‘I’m only offering to help. I’ve got the experience, you know. That’s why I’m seconded here. I’d like to show the experiment was worthwhile, beyond those goddamned seminars.’

  ‘I know. And I appreciate it. But this isn’t my first case, either. And it wouldn’t be right if I fouled up and you were associated with it, out of an act of kindness.’ Burrows’ secondment was a political one and she’d been warned about political sensitivity, although not in this precise context. Perhaps she should mention it to Sanglier. But if she did he might think it a good idea and she didn’t want the opinions she offered to appear to be shared any more than the official recognition of her ability.

  His face had stiffened. ‘In other words, fuck off.’

  Claudine had never been sure whether his swearing was a natural part of his persona or an affectation for a tough guy image. He’d done it from the beginning. The Austrian psychologist, Otto Lang, thought it was directed personally towards her and indicated latent misogyny. It didn’t offend her, as Poulard’s attitude had offended her. She didn’t often utter obscenities aloud herself - it would have indicated lack of control - but often thought them when venting an opinion or confronting hard-headed stupidity.

  She had to stop holding back, so she made the effort. ‘I want my chance, Scott. By myself. If I don’t make it, then someone else will have to be brought in.’

  He nodded slowly. ‘There’s a difference, I guess, between someone like myself who originally came into the business as a trained FBI agent and someone like you, who came in with all the degrees and qualifications. I’m a team player.’

  The fact that Burrows was a layman who had invented a science now practised by professionals was another familiar gambit. It had endeared him to traditional detectives whom she’d seen him address. She’d analysed it as a latent inferiority complex, like his relying on the successful profiles of the past instead of risking mistakes by thinking differently about profile indicators in the present or the future. ‘I’m a team player, too. The team’s been selected and I’m working with it.’

  ‘I’ve encountered this sort of attitude from professionals before.’

  ‘For Christ’s sake, Scott, I haven’t got an attitude!’ she erupted in final exasperation. ‘I’ve got a new career that I want to succeed in, on my own merits!’

  ‘Sure.’ He had difficulty getting up from the chair. Momentarily he stood in front of it. ‘If you change your mind. Need a sounding board.’

  ‘I’ll remember. I really will.’ There seemed an awful lot to remember and consider. And she hadn’t properly started on the job she was supposed to be doing. It was a fucking minefield.

  She read steadily for another hour before a second interruption. Rene Poulard came confidently into the room, smiling, and said: ‘I’m calling it a night.’

  ‘Any thoughts so far?’ invited Claudine, concealing her annoyance at the distraction.

  ‘Not from the files,’ he said pointedly.

  Surely the arrogant bastard wasn’t going to try another sexual approach! ‘What, then?’

  ‘Thought it was important you and I sorted out any personal problems.’

  ‘I wasn’t aware there were any.’

  ‘I don’t want there to be. That’s why I’m here. No hard feelings about what happened before?’

  ‘Not on my part.’

  ‘I didn’t mean to offend you.’

  ‘It’s forgotten.’

  ‘A new start then?’ The smile widened.

  ‘A new professional start.’

  ‘I wasn’t suggesting anything else.’ Poulard offered his hand and Claudine took it, embarrassed at the theatricality. Poulard added: ‘Which doesn’t mean we couldn’t have a drink if you felt like it.’

  Persistent shit, Claudine thought. She tapped the dossiers and said: ‘Too much to do.’

  ‘Another time.’

  ‘Professional relationship,’ she reminded him.

  Thirty minutes later Sanglier listened to Poulard’s account of the working arrangements they had decided upon and said: ‘So everything’s amicable?’

  ‘She is aloof,’ volunteered the detective. ‘I’ve got a feeling about her.’

  ‘What sort of feeling?’

  ‘That she might like women more than men.’ Momentarily Sanglier was speechless, the possibilities jostling in upon him. ‘What makes you say that?’

  ‘Instinct.’

  ‘I wouldn’t want anything like that to interfere with what you’re supposed to be doing. Watch out for it. Let me know.’

  ‘I will,’ Poulard assured him.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  ‘Inadequate, to the point of being useless, in every single case,’ insisted Claudine.

  ‘I thought it was a comprehensive German summary,’ said Siemen defensively.

  ‘I’m not making a country-by-country criticism,’ said Claudine. ‘A summary, comprehensive or not, is no good to us. We’ve got to find the linking factor or factors. That’s not possible from anything we’ve got so far, from any country …’ She paused. ‘What we’ve got here is nothing more - in some cases, I’d guess, a carbon copy - of what has gone to Interpol: a precis for their record systems.’

  The discussion had gone on for half an hour around the small table, initiated by Claudine who that second morning had arrived before everyone else specifically to check further the exhibits so far mounted by Yvette. Claudine had expected the two men to be as concerned as she was, although she didn’t think either had completed the case files overnight, as she had. They didn’t seem to be.

  ‘Inadequate for you? Or us?’ asked Poulard.

  ‘Both,’ said Claudine. ‘And for the reason I’ve already given. We can’t divide our roles until we know which direction we’re going in.’

  Poulard flashed another open smile when Yvette arrived with coffee and Claudine guessed from the previous day’s conversation the man had undergone the sculpted dental work before his expensive marriage break-up. And built up his wardrobe, too. Today’s outfit was a mohair check jacket with knife-edged black slacks and Gucci loafers.
Idly she wondered if the Frenchman tinted his tightly waved hair: there wasn’t a hint of grey in the uniform brownness.

  ‘You really think it’s that bad?’ questioned Poulard.

  ‘Don’t you?’

  ‘I’ve got a lot of questions,’ conceded the Frenchman.

  ‘Look!’ urged Claudine, stretching out her arm towards the display boards. ‘Count the gaps in the photographic selection alone. Each is an allowance for a photograph that should be there, according to the supplied exhibit list. But isn’t.’

  ‘And Commissioner Sanglier told us yesterday that every force had been asked to supply everything they’d assembled,’ Siemen said.

  ‘Obstructed before we start?’ suggested Poulard.

  Even now the man didn’t appear as irritated as Claudine would have expected. ‘Disregarded, certainly.’

  ‘The commissioner should protest,’ declared Siemen at once.

  ‘I’d like to complete what’s left over from last night before we make the formal complaint,’ said Poulard.

  Shuffling responsibility like card sharps, thought Claudine. ‘Something that should be possible before the end of the day.’

  ‘It could still take time for every force to comply,’ Siemen said.

  ‘Why should it?’ demanded Claudine. ‘We want it all. Which means exhibit officers simply have to copy everything and ship it to us. We were given more than a dozen summaries, which Yvette got copied in one day.’

  The girl, still working at the exhibits, briefly turned and smiled at the praise. Today’s blouse and skirt weren’t as tight as the dress she’d worn the previous day.

  ‘I do want to finish what we’ve already got,’ said Poulard, talking directly to Siemen. Briefly he switched to Claudine. ‘Which, of course, I will complete today.’ Returning to the German he went on: ‘But I don’t think we should waste time hanging around to be inundated by irrelevant material. We’ve all agreed speed is absolutely essential. I think we should start work at once.’