by Nell Goddin
Lapin opened the notebook to 1999 and put it on the counter so they could both see.
“How come every single person in France has beautiful handwriting but you? Good Lord, Lapin, such scribbling,” said Molly, using the English word for “scribbling” since in her excitement her French was getting shaky.
Lapin ignored the jab. “I’m not sure what looking at the list of names is going to accomplish anyway, if there’s no record of which family sold me the necklace,” he said. “And I am sorry for not keeping better records. But look at this place,” he said, gesturing around the shop. “People collect so much stuff—sometimes I might collect hundreds of things just from one estate. And most of it’s junk, just between you and me.”
“You were all up in these people’s business right after a death in the family—you saw them at a difficult time in their lives, a time when maybe their defenses weren’t as strong as usual? Thinking back, did anyone—or anything—feel a little off? Come on, look at each name, and tell me if you remember anything at all.”
Lapin nodded and chewed his lip, as Molly ran her fingers slowly down the first page of names.
“Are you looking, Lapin? And thinking?”
“Yes! Settle down, Molly. I have a bottle of pineau in my desk, would you like a nip?”
“No! I want you to focus on this list of names and tell me what you know. Why is it you seem to be the key to half the murders in Castillac, and so reluctant about it?”
Lapin grinned and shrugged a theatrical shrug, trying to hide his reaction to the reference to the Amy Bennett case, which was still painful to him.
“Wait a minute,” said Molly slowly. “What year are we looking at, in this column?
Lapin leaned down to look more closely, then flipped back a page. “2004.”
“Two years ago?”
Lapin nodded.
“These names,” said Molly pointing to Jean-Pierre Labiche and Marie Labiche, route de Canard, Castillac.
“Yeah? Dairy farm just outside of the village. Um, nondescript farmhouse but a nice piece of land. Their son farms it now.”
“And you were hired after they died?”
“Yes. An ordinary job, I believe, nothing there of much value. I did sell a few old farm implements to some Brits who used them as decorations in the yard.”
“But so…Jean-Pierre and Marie, they were Achille’s parents, and they died the same year, 2004?”
Lapin nodded. “If I remember correctly, I was hired in 2004 to sell some things that had been part of their estates. I believe they died awhile before that.”
Molly said slowly, “I met the son. Achille. He told me his parents were alive.”
Lapin and Molly looked searchingly at each other.
“I don’t know why he would do that,” said Lapin. “He’s rather a shy sort. Harmless enough, I suppose. Doesn’t like to come into the village much. Keeps to himself.”
“Could you have gotten the necklace from him?”
“I told you—I’m about 99.9% sure it came from someone in the notebook….”
“What do you mean, ‘rather a shy sort’?”
Lapin held up his palms. “I don’t want to—”
“Oh my God,” said Molly, slowly. “He lives…I’m right about this, aren’t I? He lives right next door to Gilbert Renaud? The missing boy?”
* * *
“Thank heavens you picked up,” said Molly, having called Dufort for what felt like the millionth time. “Where have you been? At Rémy’s?”
“No,” said Dufort. “I was out for a walk, in La Double.”
“I’ve got news,” Molly said. “Ben, a lead. For real. Can you meet me at Lapin’s shop right now?”
“On my way.” It was something to love about him, how he didn’t slow down to ask a lot of questions but understood she was serious and came immediately.
There was no room to move around inside the shop so she stepped out to the sidewalk and walked up and down, Lapin following. “Tell me everything you know about Labiche,” said Molly. “It was only two years ago that he hired you. How close together did his parents die? Did he seem, I don’t know, capable of…of….”
“Of abducting Valerie? I couldn’t answer that, Molly. How is anyone supposed to see that possibility in another person?” Lapin thought for a moment. “His parents had been dead for some time before Achille hired me, I’m pretty sure. Maybe four or five years earlier, something like that? It’s not unusual for people to wait awhile after a death before hiring me. They want to keep reminders around, it helps them grieve, you understand? And then later on, they start thinking maybe they could make a little extra money if they sold some stuff they don’t really want anyway, and that’s when I get the call.
“Obviously if I had gotten the idea he was up to something I might have mentioned it to Dufort. But to be honest, I think you’re barking up the wrong tree. So what if he lied? Maybe he likes to pretend his parents are still alive because he’s lonely. It doesn’t have to mean anything.”
“Just tell me what you remember, Lapin. What sort of person is he?”
“Achille is…let me see…sort of placid. Like a cow. I remember thinking here was a man who had exactly the right job. Dairy farmer, you understand. The last person I would guess capable of violence, or something sick like abducting Valerie.”
They heard a loud motorcycle and both of them startled and looked down the street to see who it was, but the street was empty. Molly was trying, mostly unsuccessfully, to think of reasonable explanations for Labiche to lie about his parents’ being alive.
Sometimes people blurt out some stupid thing they don’t mean, and then are too embarrassed to admit they said the wrong thing. Molly had certainly done so, although she was getting better at correcting herself.
That was believable. It fit with Labiche having some social difficulties, too. But…she did not think that was what happened. She could remember his expression as he spoke, and it was not the flustered look of someone who has burst out with words he did not mean to say. It was…veiled hostility, she would call it. She imagined that he had liked the idea of his parents showing up and getting rid of this bothersome person—her—and none too gently either.
She thought Labiche needed his parents to manage for him, even at his age and in a situation as harmless as a woman he didn’t know asking a few questions about genealogy. His parents had been dead for years, and yet he still needed them that much, even for a simple social exchange, a few sentences back and forth.
“What else, Lapin? Give me more detail. Can you remember what you bought from him? Did he make a tidy sum?”
“Nah,” said Lapin. “An antique plow, a wagon wheel, he didn’t have much.” Lapin paused. “Well, he’s a bit odd, all right,” he said finally. “But you know, growing up with a mother like that, it couldn’t have been easy. He was terribly shy. Probably got made fun of at school. You know how it is.”
“What do you mean, ‘a mother like that’?”
“I don’t know what her diagnosis was, but uh, totalement loufoque. Dingue. Off her rocker. She was taken off to the psychiatric hospital more than once.” He waved at Dufort who was walking briskly down the street towards them.
Molly couldn’t wait another second to tell him what she’d found. “Ben! Lapin has Valerie’s necklace!” she shouted, holding it out for him to see. Ben hurried up to them.
“What? Let me see…”
“And Achille Labiche—he lied to me about his parents. Told me they were in the back pasture when I went to see him, and Lapin says they’ve been dead for years. Lied right to my face for no good reason. And—as I don’t have to tell you—he lives right next door to the Renauds. He could have Gilbert as well.” She delivered these last sentences as though they were the crowning glory of an airtight case against Labiche, but Dufort looked unimpressed.
“Molly, you’ve got to understand. Achille…he’s had a pretty sad life. His mother wasn’t well and I believe she died in the mental hospital a long whil
e ago. He was lucky enough to have a good father, but still, as you can imagine, a thing like that is very tough for a boy. I don’t think—”
“But Ben! The necklace!”
Dufort reached out his hand and Molly dropped it into his palm. He looked at it for a long moment, then held it up, but it was too tarnished to catch the light.
“Where did you get it?” he asked Lapin.
Lapin shrugged. “Just a bauble. Nothing anyone would pay much attention to.”
“It is silver though, yes? Real silver?”
Lapin shrugged again. “The chain is. But not the charm, which is nickel. I told Molly that I only had it in the shop because it’s something a little girl might like.”
“Indeed. I remember her mother told me that Valerie wore it because her older brother gave it to her when she was young. She was devoted to him. He had a heart condition no one knew about and died in his sleep out of the blue when he was at university.”
“How horrible,” said Molly under her breath.
“Yes. Well, finding the necklace is a start, Molly. Good work.” He smiled at her and lifted his arm as though to put it around her shoulders but then let it drop.
“But…you’re not going to do anything? What about the lie Labiche told? You don’t think that’s strange? It was like he wanted to scare me off, like he was saying the grownups were coming and I’d better get going.”
Dufort looked at Molly. “The way it is here, in Castillac,” he said slowly. “We try our best to take care of our weaker members. Community means everything. So what if Achille has trouble talking to people and keeps to himself,” he shrugged. “It’s no reason to jump to the conclusion that the necklace came from his farm. Not unless Lapin says it did.”
Molly desperately wanted to stamp her feet and yell but she contained herself. “The problem is,” she said, her face turning red, “that you grew up here, and you have this loyalty to everyone in the village that’s so deep you can’t really accept that someone is capable of something evil. You have no objectivity.”
Dufort looked stung. It did not help that lack of objectivity was exactly the reason the gendarmerie did not want officers serving the communities where they had grown up, and he had cajoled them into allowing him to work in Castillac anyway.
Molly saw that she had hit a nerve, and with a softer tone said, “Shouldn’t we at least go out there and poke around, ask some questions?”
“We’ve got nothing to tie him to the necklace or to Gilbert,” said Dufort. “And today’s Saturday—isn’t this your big work day of the week, moving guests in and out?”
“Yes,” said Molly crossly. “It’s all taken care of—it’s nearly dinnertime, Ben. I think we should hurry out to that farm, I really, really do. Can’t we just pay him a friendly visit?”
Dufort looked off down the street. “Well, I’m not official anymore, now that I’ve quit the gendarmerie.”
“Exactly! And you know Labiche, right? It’s not like you’d be showing up to a stranger’s house. Come on, let’s go!”
“I wouldn’t say I know him, Molly. But all right. You’ll promise not to do anything that will make him want to call Maron? That would be awkward,” he said, with a small smile. “No running past him to get a look in the attic, no accusations?”
Molly threw her arms around him. “What do you take me for? I’ll behave.”
Dufort nodded and put the necklace in his pocket. “I’m doubtful about this, Molly. Just because the man doesn’t fit in with everyone else doesn’t mean he’s capable of snatching girls off the street.” In spite of his words, for a moment he allowed the possibility to enter his mind that the case was actually on the point of being solved. But he couldn’t allow it for more than a second before his defenses against disappointment flew up, solid as ever.
“And if I’m wrong and Valerie is there, well, no one will be happier than I, believe me. I’ll jog back to my apartment and get my car. Meet you at the south intersection just before the village.”
Molly nodded, gunned the engine, and took off. Lapin and Dufort watched Molly zip down rue Saterne on her muddy scooter.
“She’s really something,” said Lapin.
“Yes,” said Dufort, blushing. “She certainly is.”
43
It was cool in the barn. There was a window in the room where Gilbert was chained to the floor, and he could see the warm sun shining but not feel it. He spread the blanket Achille had given him on the floor, and curled up on his side.
He was so afraid.
Most of the time he could push thoughts of his mother out of his head. He knew she was doing everything she could to find him—she was not one of those people who get hysterical and just run in circles or give up. No, she would be hysterical and calling up the gendarmes every other minute, and out searching the woods herself until she was about to drop from exhaustion. He tried to think of Dufort coming to the rescue, and taking Labiche away in handcuffs, but the image felt made up and didn’t make him feel any better.
Plus he couldn’t forget that no one had found Valerie in all those years, when she had been practically right under their noses.
No one had listened when he tried to tell them. And now…Gilbert worried he would never have the chance to explain.
Gilbert sat up and inspected the chain again. It was linked to a loop on the thick leather belt Monsieur Labiche had cinched around him. If only he could get the belt off! He sucked in his stomach to loosen it just a little, and tried to pry the little piece of metal out of the hole in the leather, but he couldn’t move it even a tiny bit. He kept trying, over and over, but got nowhere, the tips of his fingers now raw.
Is Valerie chained up somewhere too, nearby? he wondered.
He wasn’t hungry. Monsieur Labiche had given him some milk that morning, and toast. Since the morning milking, all had been quiet.
He was afraid, but finally Gilbert decided to risk making some bird calls. At first he did them quietly, but when Monsieur Labiche did not appear, he made them louder and then louder still. He didn’t know what he expected to happen as a result, only that he felt better for having made some noise. Maybe Valerie, if she was still alive, would hear, and know she wasn’t alone.
He didn’t actually know any bird calls, not technically. But he made bird-like sounds, tweeting and whistling and cawing, disrupting the calm quiet of the farmyard. He paused from time to time to listen, but heard nothing in response.
Monsieur Labiche had kept Valerie for all this time, all these years…but Gilbert understood that it was not the same for him. Labiche had not chosen him.
There was no good way to think about that.
Some rustling out in the farmyard. A yip from the dog, and then he heard Labiche’s footsteps on the concrete floor of the barn, coming towards him.
44
Molly kept the scooter running while she waited anxiously for Dufort to show up at the south intersection. Where on earth is Ben, she thought, pulling out her phone but resisting the urge to call. She craned her neck to see down both streets that led out of the village, hoping to see his dented green Renault appear.
Waiting was agony. She was dying to get to the farm and have a look around. Maybe Labiche would be busy and she could sneak off and have a real look around. She didn’t remember noticing on her first visit, but probably the farm had numerous outbuildings, the perfect place to keep someone hidden.
Molly felt supercharged, as though she needed to move, needed speed. Her mind flicked quickly through various scenarios and images like a slide projector on steroids. Oscar. Saying goodbye to Wesley Addison. Bobo jumping joyfully through the meadow after a vole. The warm, sturdy feeling of Ben’s hand when he had held hers on the walk with Boney.
Valerie. Gilbert. The necklace. The note.
Eventually the green Renault came into view. Molly waved, Dufort waved back and then pulled ahead of her, turning onto Route de Canard. The Labiche farm was only a few kilometers away.
Molly
glanced at the Renaud farmhouse as she passed it, wondering if Madame Renaud was home or if maybe Gilbert had turned up, but then her attention was back to Labiche and Valerie.
Dufort had parked just a short ways down the driveway, far from the house, and Molly hopped off the scooter and used the kickstand. The farmyard was quiet. They saw no chickens, no dogs, not even any cows. To Molly the place felt ageless, the old stone buildings (except for the new barn) looking as though they must always have been there.
“No car, but I’m not sure whether he owns one,” murmured Dufort.
Molly was swiveling her head around, scanning for anything that seemed out of order, just as she had when doing her phony survey. Maybe I’m just no good at finding something when I don’t know what I’m looking for, she thought. She walked slightly behind Ben, reminding herself to let him take the lead if Labiche turned out to be home.
“Monsieur Labiche!” called Dufort, in what Molly thought of as his gendarme-friendly voice. He rapped on the door of the farmhouse.
No answer.
“Maybe we should check the barn?” Molly said, hoping to get a good look around in there.
Dufort rapped again. “Labiche!” he said. They waited, then began walking towards the barn.
Ben and Molly had just gotten around the side of the house when they saw the dog. A border collie, running in that smooth, workmanlike way of collies when they have a job to do.
“Hello, dog!” said Molly, reaching out her hand. But the dog wasn’t interested in that. She yipped and nudged Dufort on the back of one calf, urging him in the direction of the barn.
“She’s herding you,” said Molly.
“Labiche!” Dufort called again.
The dog nipped at Molly’s leg. “Ow! Look, I’ll go where you want, just lead the way!” The dog made a wide circle and ran behind them, back and forth, barking, as they got closer and closer to the barn. Once they got to the end where the wide opening was, the dog ran past them and into a room off the side, towards the back.