Jacquot squeezed his eyes shut, then opened them, focusing on the scene below him, and his attention was drawn to the perimeter fencing and the billboards fixed along its length. The names of the major contractors - FranCon, Martco, TerrePlus. After weeks of construction Jacquot knew the names by heart.
Then, from out of nowhere, he had it.
The boards at Aqua-Cité, sited along the access road. The names of the contractors and building companies involved in the construction of the new open-sea extension. FranCon again, SeaWayCo, Siemens . . .
And Valadeau-Basquet.
Valadeau.
Valadeau et Cie. Soap people, Madame Piganiol had said. But suddenly it seemed they were more than that. Not only did Valadeau own the building on Cours Lieutaud where Vicki Monel had lived, it also looked like the same company had been involved in construction work on the open-sea extension at Aqua-Cité where the latest victim had been found. One company, two bodies. It was a link, but a tenuous one. Maybe something, maybe nothing. But in Jacquot's book far too much of a coincidence to let pass.
He turned from the window, picked up the phone and called through to the switchboard.
'Could you get me Valadeau et Cie, please?'
While Jacquot waited for the connection, Gastal came into his office. He yawned, took a chair and made himself comfortable. He seemed about as interested in their investigation as one of his snails, thought Jacquot, giving him a nod. He was about to say something when he heard the ringing tone break off and a young woman's voice.
'Good afternoon - Valadeau et Cie.'
'Yes,' said Jacquot. 'I wonder if you could put me through to Monsieur Valadeau?'
There was a brief silence at the end of the line.
'I'm sorry, there is no Monsieur Valadeau.'
Jacquot frowned.
The woman's voice came back again. 'Unless you mean Monsieur Basquet? Our chief executive. I believe he is married to old Monsieur Valadeau's daughter.'
'That's the one. How silly of me. Thank you.'
'Please hold, Monsieur. I'll put you through to his assistant.'
Across the desk from Jacquot, Gastal looked at his watch, pointed to the time and made signals that he was off home, or out of the office at any rate, two pudgy fingers walking through the air. It was not quite late enough to call it a day, but nor was there much time to get anything useful done.
Jacquot nodded and Gastal mouthed the word 'tomorrow'.
Another woman's voice came on the line. 'Genevieve Chantreau speaking. How may I be of help?'
'I'd like to make an appointment to see Monsieur Basquet,' replied Jacquot, watching Gastal waddle out of his office.
'I'm afraid Monsieur Basquet is a little tied up at the moment. May I ask what this is in connection with?'
Jacquot recognised the tone of voice - cool but impenetrable. A barrier between her boss and unknown individuals like Jacquot who rang up imagining they could just walk in and see the man himself whenever they felt like it. The message was clear: Monsieur Basquet was a very important man, a very busy man.
'This is Chief Inspector Jacquot from the Police Judiciaire,' said Jacquot curtly. At five o'clock in the afternoon, with another body laid out on the slab in the city morgue, he wasn't in the mood for pandering to corporate types, or to their snotty assistants for that matter. Not with a killer stalking his city. 'I'd appreciate a moment of his time.'
'Of course, Chief Inspector,' came the reply, her voice a little more conciliatory. 'Now, let me see . . .'
'Perhaps you could tell me where your offices are?' asked Jacquot, wanting to speed things along.
'Down on La Joliette, the old docks, Chief Inspector. But. . ;
Jacquot looked at his watch. 'I could be with you in ten, twenty minutes? I'll only need a few moments of Monsieur Basquet's time.'
Just enough for me to get a look at the man, thought Jacquot, decide whether the lead was worth pursuing. Or whether it was just coincidence, pure and simple. One of those strange conjunctions that sometimes crop up out of nowhere, and end up headed in the same direction.
'As I was about to say,' the assistant continued, 'I'm afraid it would be a wasted journey. Monsieur Basquet is out of the office right now. But I could get you in to see him for a few minutes, let's see . . . early tomorrow afternoon? Say . . . two-twenty?'
'That'll do fine,' said Jacquot and put down the phone.
32
At the offices of the planning department in Marseilles's Prefecture, Paul Vintrou, one of the city councils assistant planning officers and Hubert de Cotigny's acting deputy, could hardly believe his ears.
The Calanques plans?'
'When you have a moment, Paul,' said de Cotigny over his shoulder, watching the breeze ripple through the trees in the square beneath his office window, a lowering sun catching on car windscreens and winking through the branches. Already the afternoon's rush-hour traffic had started to build up.
De Cotigny didn't need to be told why Vintrou sounded so astonished. He'd known this was how his deputy would respond. The Calanques proposal? It had been up before the planning committee on three separate occasions and each time it had taken only a few moments before the plans were voted down, de Cotigny always the first to voice his concern and signal his disapproval.
But then, Vintrou didn't know about de Cotigny's late-night caller; Vintrou hadn't seen the tape; and there was no way Vintrou could comprehend the immense pressure being brought to bear. Nor would he, nor anyone else, if de Cotigny had his way.
Of course, de Cotigny could have gone to the library and asked for the plans himself. But he sensed there was something furtive about that kind of approach, something that might suggest some personal interest, possibly something underhand. And anyway, making visits to the library - where unsuccessful planning proposals were kept for three months pending appeal - was not what the chairman of the Marseilles planning committee would do. Instead he'd decided to have Vintrou fetch them for him, late afternoon, when everyone was going home. Everything above board.
'But it didn't even make it past conditional approval,' said Vintrou, wondering what could have started de Cotigny thinking about the Calanques, wondering how long it would take him to get what his boss wanted from the planning library.
De Cotigny sighed, as though the effort of explanation was really too much to bear. But he did it anyway, just as he'd planned, his eyes still fixed on the square below.
'I had a call from a magazine. Some American publication,' he replied, as if somehow that gave his request more substance. 'Said they'd heard something about the Calanques project and could I give them more information. Something to do with sustainable energy . . . the way ahead, that sort of thing. I couldn't remember the details, so I thought I'd better get up to speed on it. I know it's late, but if the press start asking questions I'd better have some answers
De Cotigny tailed off. It was a lie, of course. But plausible.
'Why don't you just tell them it was a no-go? Which it is. Protected site. Possible national park.'
At which de Cotigny finally turned from the window and smiled indulgently at his deputy.
'Paul, really.'
Which made Vintrou blush.
'And what do you suppose the mayor will say when the magazine phones him?' de Cotigny continued, pulling out his chair and sitting down. 'As they surely will, if they don't get what they want from me.'
'He'll call you.'
De Cotigny nodded. 'Correct. So why don't we prepare ourselves? Who knows what's going to happen?'
Striding down the corridor from de Cotigny's office, on his way to the planning library, Vintrou decided the time had finally come to join the architectural firm that had sounded him out about the job in Avignon. Good salary. Excellent prospects. A partnership if everything went okay.
And no politics.
Vintrou knew he'd never get the hang of it, the way local government functioned.
Not like de Cotigny.
33
Anais Cuvry worked the moisturiser into her skin, from between her toes to the line of her jaw, sitting on the edge of the tub to work on her feet and calves, standing for her thighs, then turning to the bathroom mirror as she soaped her belly and breasts, feeling as she did so an unfamiliar ache of sensitivity as the brown button nipples slid past her fingers.
Every day, for fifteen years, Anais had followed this same routine, keeping her skin as smooth as glass. Back in Martinique she had used aloe cut from the plants along the Plage Grande Anse. Now it was Chanel or Dior, or whatever else her clients sometimes thought to buy her. She had enough supplies to last a lifetime. Even if she gave up the job tomorrow. Which, if all went according to plan, she might just do; well, if not actually tomorrow, then certainly, all things being equal, by the end of the month. It was a prospect that made her insides flutter.
Working the last of the moisturiser in between her fingers, Anais parted the bathroom drapes and looked into the garden. The Aleppo pines on the hillside no longer wore their midday skirts of shadow. Now they cast a slanting rail across her lawn. It was a few minutes before six at the end of a sweltering Marseilles afternoon, the first really hot day of the year, a white-sky day when the sun was just a glare of squinting light beating down on the city. Now, at last, the air that had crackled at lunchtime was turning gentle.
She let the curtain drop, then went through to the bedroom, picking up the watch he'd given her from the bedside table. He'd be here in minutes, she thought. Always punctual. Exactly an hour after the first phone call. That's all she had. The hour. If she was free and answered the phone. Which she'd done exactly fifty-three minutes earlier. She replaced the Rolex a little behind the bedside lamp, arranging its coils so she'd be able to see the time without too much manoeuvring.
Anais went to the wardrobe, flicked impatiently through a line of clothes, then turned to the bed. Still too hot for clothes, she decided. And what was the point, anyway? When they wouldn't be on her for longer than the time it took him to pour a drink.
She bent down and picked up a silk wrap from the bed. Wasn't this the very one he'd bought her? She held it out, trying to remember, then slipped it on with a nod of recognition, reaching for the ties, pulling them tight till the material stretched. At least he'd been a generous lover. All the clothes, trinkets and little treats. Not like some of them . . . Which was a comforting thought.
At the dressing table Anais adjusted the lapels and sprayed her wrists with scent, raking them across her throat, neck and between her breasts.
A minute or two still to go.
For the first time, she admitted to herself that she was nervous. This was not a man to fool with. While she'd been his mistress she'd seen and heard enough to know that he had a nasty little temper. But so what? She'd done it before and it had worked, and with bigger fish than him. So why, she reasoned, shouldn't it work again?
Except, of course, these were higher stakes.
This time she really was pregnant.
Anais shook her head crossly. Don't be sentimental. Right now she had to be strong.
Just take the money. A reasonable amount - something he could easily manage, but which she would take years to earn. Then run. Disappear. London, perhaps. Maybe Geneva. No, no, she thought. Too cold.
She'd started thinking about going home to Martinique when the door bell sounded.
Her lover.
Paul Basquet.
34
By the time Jacquot retrieved his car from the underground car park it was a little after six and, as usual, he was thinking of something to do rather than go home to Moulins.
For the last three nights he'd half-expected - maybe half-hoped was more accurate - to open the door of his apartment and find Boni there, hanging her clothes in the wardrobe, putting the curtains back up; contrite, apologetic, wanting to start again. Smiling at him the way she used to. Reaching for the zip on her skirt, or just wriggling it up around her hips. But every night the apartment was just as he'd left it - cool, empty, reproachful. Which was why, save for Madame Foraque's rabbit on his return from Salon-le-Vitry, he'd eaten out. It looked like he'd be doing the same again this evening.
Not that he hadn't had a chance to do something about it. He'd been about to leave the office when Isabelle Cassier knocked at his door with a report on the Internet company she'd been tracking down, the company that had bought and displayed Vicki Monel's photos. According to their records, she told Jacquot, they'd secured the last set of images a month earlier, from an agent in Paris. 'So I chased him up and got him to give me the photographers name. Some guy in Toulon,' said Isabelle, looping a curl of black hair behind her ear. 'And the names of the models she . . . appeared with. Maybe one of them . . . ?'
Jacquot had been impressed, and had told her so.
She'd smiled, and then, right out of the blue, suggested a drink, said in such a way - an eyebrow lifting, a smile on her lips, a soft brushing of the file against her hip - that there could be no mistaking her intent, that this was more than a drink-with-a-colleague-after-work sort of situation.
For a moment Jacquot hadn't quite known how to respond. She was a good kid, Isabelle, hard-working, conscientious, and pretty in a cheeky, gamine sort of way. It was also clear that she had some nerve . . . coming on to him like that. Her boss. And though he couldn't be certain, Jacquot had a feeling this wasn't the first time she'd tried something, made a play; though nothing quite so forward, so . . . unambiguous.
Not wanting to offend her, or reprimand her, Jacquot had taken the easy way out, telling her that he couldn't manage it, had someone to see. But thanks all the same. Maybe another time. As though he'd completely missed her clear intent.
She'd taken it well: 'Sure, no problem,' she'd said, as though she'd been expecting it. But Isabelle Cassier wasn't so easily put off. When she got to his door she'd turned, raised the corner of the file to her lips and given him another mischievous little smile that said, 'I know you'll crack one of these days.' And then she was gone.
Now, ten minutes later, coming up the ramp from the underground car park, Jacquot rather wished he'd taken her up on the invitation. It would have been good to have the company, someone like Isabelle to pass the time with, and as he joined the evening traffic on rue de L'Evêché he had little trouble persuading himself that he'd never have allowed it to go too far. Just a couple of drinks. Maybe supper somewhere. What was wrong with that? Better than going back to an empty apartment. And if it had gotten difficult, why, he'd just show her the ring, the wide silver band on his wedding finger. To deter her, let her down lightly. The ring Boni had given him. Not a real wedding ring, but a token, she'd said. Of her love. She'd slipped it onto his finger just a month after they'd met and he still wore it, hadn't thought to take it off.
Turning out of Le Panier towards the Vieux Port, Jacquot headed back to town, away from the apartment on Moulins. Rue Haxo, he decided. Dinner at La Coupole, followed by a few drinks at Gallante to finish him off. Then, when the focus started going and the tiredness kicked in, he could safely head back home, alone, to bed, and deep, blackout sleep.
Which was when Jacquot saw the sign, screwed onto the inside column of a doorway on rue St-Ferreol, a small glass panel with the words Allez-Allez Gym painted in racy italics across its surface. He tried to place the name. Where had he seen it? What was the connection? Why had it caught his attention? It was like the building site earlier that afternoon. The contractors' billboards fixed to the perimeter fence.
Something . .. something .. .
Then he had it.
The very same name on the membership renewal form on the table in Vicki Monel's apartment.
Merde.
Two blocks further on, Jacquot found a parking space in a side street off St-Ferreol and went back to investigate. At first, coming at it the other way, Jacquot couldn't see the doorway or the sign. But then he recognised the cafe-bar on the other side of the road and remembered that it was directly opposite the gym.
And there it was. The glass plate. Allez-Allez Gym. And inside, a flight of stairs leading up to the first floor.
A couple of girls, tote bags over their shoulders, passed him in the doorway. One of them gave him an odd look as he made room for them, as though he shouldn't have been there, loitering. Then he realised why. In small letters beneath the horaire, the times when the gym was open, were the words Femmes Seulement.
By the time Jacquot reached the first floor, the two girls were signing in at a reception desk. It gave him a moment to get his bearings, look around - potted palms in every corner, a square of sofas, low tables set with fashion and fitness magazines, the walls hung with blurred, blown-up photos of women athletes arching their bodies over bars, breasting tapes, slicing goggled and capped through Olympic pools - and, overlaying it all, the warm, sinuous scent of liniment and perfume, steam and bodies.
Jacquot and the Waterman Page 15