Jacquot and the Waterman

by Martin O'Brien

  he Mozart was soft, sweet, lulling in the darkness.

  Steady and graceful. Flute, harpsichord and a weeping violin. The Third Concerto in G major. Just enchanting.

  Hubert de Cotigny sat in his favourite armchair by the study window and watched his wife step onto the terrace. He'd switched off his desk lamp so the window held no reflections - just the watery blue light from the pool, a golden hammock moon through the trees . . . and his wife.

  Suzie de Cotigny was barefoot, dressed in a long silk wrap that licked at her heels as she walked. And Suzie de Cotigny knew how to walk. A slow, measured progress, like the music, shoulders back, hands brushing her hips, tossing her hair like a catwalk model. He watched her glide to the side of the pool where she paused to untie the gown. Parting it, sliding it from her shoulders, she let it drop around her ankles. As usual she was naked, belly flat as a board, breasts taut and full.

  Raising her arms with a languorous grace, she drew back her hair into a coiling black snake and took time slipping on a band from around her wrist. A fabulous body, de Cotigny decided, long and svelte, not an ounce of fat, not the slightest tan mark, his eyes ranging down the length of her, from the dark puckered tips of her breasts to the curve and swell of her hips and the trimmed shadow between her legs. As he watched, she stepped to the edge of the pool, went up on tiptoes and her slim brown body knifed forward into the blue illuminated water, lost to view. He knew he wouldn't have to wait long. Soon enough she'd haul herself from the water and the performance would continue. The new world performing for the old, youth for age. One pleasure providing for another. And beyond it all, lacing the darkness, a sublime soundtrack.

  They'd returned home later than usual, after drinks with the mayor at the Miro opening at the Musee Cantini on rue Grignan, and dinner at Aux Mets de Provence on the Vieux Port with his daughter, Michelle, and her husband, Thomas. Which de Cotigny counted as something of a triumph, the four of them sharing the same table, only the second or third time they'd managed it. Michelle was the very devil to pin down and had yet to be won over by her American stepmother.

  'She's too young, Papa,' Michelle had told him tartly the afternoon he'd broken the news that he and Suzie were getting married. A small ceremony at the Prefecture the following week; he hoped his daughter would come. 'I mean, she's only a couple of years older than me, you know?'

  'Six, to be precise,' de Cotigny had replied. 'And how old exactly is Thomas?' he'd continued. He didn't need to be told. Deputy editor of Le Provençal, vegetarian, environmentalist, all-round do-gooder and bore, Michelle's husband Thomas Thenard was only a few years younger than Hubert was. He'd given his daughter a look and she'd flushed with annoyance.

  'It's not the same at all, and you know it,' she'd snapped, determined to have the last word as usual, marching from the room and slamming the door smartly behind her. But a week later she'd come to the wedding, and grudgingly toasted the bride and groom. And though she'd kept a certain distance since then, it seemed to de Cotigny that recently his daughter's resolve was weakening.

  Down to Suzie, of course. Suzie was the one who made the calls, kept up a dialogue, refused to be snubbed. The invitations to lunch or dinner, the boat, the picnics, the villa, the little soirees she hosted. When she put her mind to it, Suzie de Cotigny could charm the scales off a rattlesnake.

  Which was what Suzie was really good at, the talent Hubert de Cotigny valued above all others in his young wife. The way she played people, seduced them. Found them out. Sensed what they wanted, sensed how to please them. And, in so doing, pleased herself. The control she enjoyed.

  Which was how it had been with the two of them, right from the start. The only woman he'd ever met who understood what he wanted and found no fault with it, made no judgement, happy to pander to his particular requirements and draw her own pleasures from them. The reason he'd pursued her. The reason he'd asked her to become his wife.

  They were two of a kind, Hubert had told her, outsiders who liked the same things, albeit from different . . . perspectives. And she'd agreed, to the marriage, and the . . . perspectives. Just so long as he never, ever, laid a hand on her. That's what she'd said. She could easily and happily accommodate the watching, she told him, but she wouldn't tolerate the other. Those were her terms and, being the gentleman, Hubert had given his word - and kept it.

  For which, he discovered, there were substantial rewards. All he had to do was say that he was going to the study, as he'd done this evening when they got home from dinner, and he knew she'd happily oblige with a last night-time swim. Or he'd specify his dressing room on the first floor, next to their bedroom, where he'd watch on his console as she prepared for bed or bath. What a show she laid on.

  But nothing compared to those other times when she took the initiative. The young girls she found, the waifs and strays. For him, and for her. Bringing someone home he could watch her play with, someone he could lay a hand on.

  How well Suzie knew him, reflected Hubert de Cotigny, feeling himself stir as she climbed from the pool and positioned the lounger just so, only a few feet from his study window, lying back and spreading her legs, her long, slim fingers reaching down.

  So veiy different from his first wife, Florence. Just as pretty as Suzie but in no way as accommodating when it came to satisfying his peculiar requirements. She'd divorced him when Michelle went away to school, generous enough to cite irreconcilable differences but canny enough to make it worth her while. She'd pretty nearly cleaned him out.

  Unlike Florence, there wasn't any question of Suzie being in it for the money. Wealthy herself, she didn't need a bean - about the only thing that comforted his redoubtable mother, Murielle de Cotigny, when Hubert announced their engagement - a fact his mother had been quick to grasp when she met Suzie's family at the wedding. Murielle de Cotigny might not understand the attraction between her son and his new wife, but she knew money when she saw it. And the Delahaye family had a great deal more of it than the de Cotignys.

  Later, after Suzie left the terrace, de Cotigny stayed where he was in the darkened study. It was close to eleven and he was expecting a guest. He wondered if the man would try to make a point by being late, just to prove something.

  De Cotigny sighed, levered himself from the chair and went to his desk. He switched on the reading lamp and selected a cigar from the humidor. He snipped the end, lit a taper and drew in the first of the smoke, rolling it round his mouth. Some things in life you can rely on, he thought to himself, savouring the taste of his cigar, closing his eyes for the last plaintive notes of the Mozart.

  And some things you can't.

  De Cotigny glanced at his watch. Already a little after eleven. Which irritated him. But not as much as the reason behind this late-night visit.

  All in all it had been a most regrettable lapse of judgement. His, and Suzie's. Visiting diat girl she'd found, being persuaded to play away from home. Skin white as alabaster she had, hair black as night. But she was common. Trash. Just a greedy little scrubber, with that dreadful tattoo.

  He should have known better. Now he did. Because now it looked like someone was going to make him pay the price for their endeavours.

  16

  It was not a face that Jacquot had been expecting. Out of the past. Years back.

  For a moment, sitting there in Molineux's glass-walled kitchen-office, Jacquot was certain he must be mistaken. It couldn't be. Not Doisneau. But in the puffy old face, twisting round from the sinks in the tiled, steamy washroom off the main kitchen, Jacquot recognised the same darting eyes from long ago, that hook of a nose, the high, triangular, clown-like eyebrows. Doisneau. No question. After all this time. Up to his elbows in a plongeur's yellow rubber gloves. And trying to catch his attention.

  Jacquot had never planned calling in at Molineux's. But then, he hadn't planned any of the things he'd done in the hours after dropping Gastal at Headquarters. It was just that going back to his empty apartment was not a prospect Jacquot relished. So he put it
off, parked his car in rue Thiars and did the rounds - a cold Guinness at O'Sullivan's, another drink along the quai at Bar de la Marine, before ducking down rue Neot for a steak at La Carnerie and some attentive mothering from Gassi, the proprietors wife. Fifty dressed as thirty, Gassis smile was as wide as her hips and her skirt as short as her breath. Jacquot adored her; and she adored him right back.

  La Carnerie, a basement bistro that served only meat in a city block that at pavement level served only fish, was as it should have been at a little after nine on a Monday evening - a few meals ending, others just beginning - but not so busy that Jacquot's favourite spot in a screened corner was taken. The table might still be covered with dirty plates and breadcrumbs but the chairs were as empty as the bottle and glasses. He nodded to Leon in his chefs whites, taking a restorative marc at the bar, and settled himself down. In an instant, Gassi was at his side, shooing away the waitress and doing the job herself, clucking away as she cleaned the table and set it for one.

  'Such a long time, Monsieur Daniel, we don't see you . . . you're looking pale, and thin, you need some more weight, and someone to go home to at night, n'est-ce pas?' She'd snapped open a napkin, used it to flick away the last remaining crumbs from the chequered cloth, then spread it in his lap. 'Don't tell me. The pavé? Just a little bit over the rare?'

  Jacquot smiled, nodded. 'And a demi. Bandol,' he added, as she turned to go.

  While he waited for his steak and his wine, Jacquot decided he had two choices. Think about Boni, or think about work. He opted for work and fell to musing about the case that had come to occupy most of his time, the murders he'd been investigating with Rully and the rest of his squad, going over the facts to see if there was something they'd missed, some connection they hadn't made.

  Like the journey home, he knew the route by heart.

  Three bodies in the last three months. Three young women. The primary-school teacher Yvonne Ballarde drowned in her bath; the shop-assistant Joline Grez dumped in the fountain at Longchamp; and now the owner of the tattoo in his pocket, the body in the lake up at Salon-le-Vitry. Not to mention four naked bodies washed up along the coast between Carry-le-Rouet and Toulon since last summer. Bodies that could have been tagged as murder victims were it not for the absence of matching forensic evidence, any likely indication of foul play long compromised by the fishes and the rocks after weeks in the water. Three confirmed homicides, four 'maybes'. Seven possible murders in less than twelve months. Maybe others they hadn't found. Would never find.

  But always the water - salt or fresh - the victims routinely drugged, abused and drowned. And still not a single suspect, no one worth bringing in for questioning. They'd been over Grez's and Ballarde's families and friends like a rash. Nothing. No links. No leads. No coincidences or inconsistencies. And nothing that touched Jacquot's instincts, nothing that gave him pause for thought. Painstaking, time-consuming investigation with no return.

  But now, with this third confirmed victim, Jacquot sensed a way forward. This time, this girl up at Salon-le-Vitry, this one would set them on their way. Jacquot was sure of it. And the tattoo was the place to start.

  Two hours later, the pave demolished and three demis downed instead of one, Jacquot was standing beside his car and wondering whether he should drive home. He shook his head, pocketed the keys, and decided to walk.

  Which was how, ten minutes later, he'd found himself outside Molineux's. Set back from the Quai du Port, its picture window framed in a sagging, breeze-ruffled scarlet awning, Molineux's was a Vieux Port institution-fifty years, two generations, serving the finest bouillabaisse in this city of bouillabaisses. If Jacquot hadn't had Gassi's steak, he'd have sat himself down and ordered up the house special. Instead, he'd tipped a wink to the maitre d' and headed for the basement where Molineux junior, seventy if he was a day, coaxed a souffle au citron on him, piercing its sugar- dusted dome with a knife and pouring a shot of vodka into its steaming lemon heart.

  It was there in Molineux's office - chewing on a final shred of lemon, his mouth slick with sweetness, Molineux called away to bid farewell to some favoured customer - that Jacquot spotted Doisneau, saw the nod indicating the back of the restaurant and five yellow-gloved fingers held up.

  Five minutes later Jacquot received his customary hug from Molineux, thanked him for the souffle and went out the back way, past a dumpster overflowing with the restaurant's rubbish, and into a dark cobbled yard pooled with shadow. He looked around. No movement, no sound. And then:

  'Miaaaooow.'

  Despite himself, Jacquot smiled, turned to the call.

  And smiling, too, but with fewer teeth than Jacquot remembered, was the familiar lanky figure stepping from behind the dumpster.

  'Long time,' said Doisneau, holding out his hand. 'You're looking good, Danny.'

  Jacquot wished he could say the same for his old pal.

  The handshake was firm and affectionate, the skin still warm and damp from the sinks, but the features were battered and bruised.

  'Chats de Nuit.'

  'You remember,' said Doisneau.

  'Of course,' replied Jacquot.

  The Chats de Nuit. Their gang. Doisneau the leader. Not because he was the oldest but because he was the wiliest. A real schemer. Up for anything.

  Doisneau released Jacquot's hand, steered him down the yard, nodding towards the street. 'I wondered, you know? Thought maybe you wouldn't get it. You moving on and all.'

  'Some things you don't forget,' replied Jacquot. 'Even if you want to.' And then: 'You been at Molineux's long? I've never seen you there before.'

  'Couple of months. You know how it is . . . Been away.'

  Jacquot knew what that meant. A little time. A peu de vacance courtesy of the State out at Baumettes prison. Jacquot wondered how long Doisneau had 'been away'. And what for.

  By now the two of them had reached the end of the yard. They passed under an arch and stepped out onto the pavement. A few late cars spun by, a bus for the airport at Marignane, its blue-lit interior empty save the driver.

  'You got a minute? I know a place,' said Doisneau, guiding Jacquot to the right and setting a swift pace, limping a little. Three minutes later they were sitting in a booth in a late-night cafe-bar off avenue Tamasin.

  'So. The cops,' said Doisneau, taking a sip of his pression and wiping away the resulting white moustache. 'I heard, you know?'

  'Its a small town.'

  'I heard about your mum, too. I'm sorry. I never got the chance to say anything. Otherwise. . .' Doisneau shrugged. Just the way he always did. He might have put on a few kilos but the old movements were still there.

  'It was a long time ago. But thanks.'

  'You went away,' said Doisneau.

  'To Aix. Went to live with my grandfather.'

  It was thirty years ago now. The moment Jacquot's life changed. The fork in the road and no signpost. He remembered how his mother looked that last morning, tired and drawn, but putting on a show for her boy. And the clothes she wore - the red, flowery print dress, the coral necklace his father had given her, her favourite red shoes clicking on the pavement as they walked together down the slope of Le Panier into town, the kiss on both cheeks when they parted at the school gates, the wave she gave him when he turned back to see if she was still there. And then, three days later, the shop windows at Galeries Samaritaine, boarded up when they drove him past, bound for the orphanage. An anarchist bomb, lobbed from a passing car, while his mother painted a shop-window backdrop, insulated from the blast by nothing more than a sheet of plate glass.

  He'd read about the attack in the newspaper, searched for some mention of his mother. But there'd been nothing. Just one of the fifteen bodies recovered from the wreckage. For Jacquot, three months after his father had been lost at sea, those rough wood panels hammered into place over the shattered display windows meant that things would never be the same again.

  And that included the Chats de Nuit. At the orphanage in Borel, curfew was ten. The Chat
s never met before eleven.

  Jacquot wasn't the only one thinking of the past.

  'And then that try!' continued Doisneau, looking up at the ceiling and smiling gleefully. 'That was the next we heard of you. Oh boy, when we saw you make that run . . . ooufff - from nowhere!' he said, skimming one hand off the other to indicate the speed of it. 'And you were always the slowest, remember?' Doisneau chuckled. 'How many times you nearly got nicked . .. But that day, against Les Rosbifs, you had wings, man, wings on your boots.'

  Jacquot remembered it too.

  A low steely sky and sheets of rain pelting down. Twickenham. Outside London. A sodden pitch, mud as thick and sticky as fridged honey. Seventy thousand crowd. A merciless game. No quarter given. Brutal.

  Jesus, thought Jacquot, he'd die if he tried it now.

  And right from the start all the luck going the English way. Every try, every kick going to the English, somehow clawed back by the French until, in the closing minutes, the English captain, stood deep for the purpose, dropped the ball to turf and toe and sent it spinning like a Catherine wheel between the posts.