The Resistance Man

by Martin Walker

  “Paul, handsome little Paul,” she said. “We’ll have something in the personnel files. He was with us just under six months, driving the small vans. He wasn’t licensed for heavy goods.”

  “I only saw big trucks in the yard.”

  “Some customers don’t have much furniture. And then we’ve got a sideline business, storing antiques and stuff for the brocante dealers who come down here every year for the summer trade. That’s why we use the small vans.”

  “A nice guy, was he?”

  “A bit too nice, if you get my meaning. I was interested in him at first, but I got the impression that women weren’t his preference.”

  Bruno deliberately let his eyes linger on the cleavage. “His loss,” he said.

  Smirking, the woman rose from behind the counter, turned and swayed into a rear office, her hips swiveling in the tight skirt of royal blue that matched her eye makeup. She came back bearing a slim file and a teasing expression.

  She tapped him on the chest with the file and then let him take it. Inside the file Bruno found a job application form and copies of an ID card and driving license. Paul Murcoing, he read, age twenty-eight. There were three different addresses listed for him in the six months he’d worked at the movers, one in Belvès and two in Bergerac. The elusive connection now came to Bruno. He’d last seen Paul in a photograph in the house of his dead grandfather, the résistant. If Paul and Yvonne had kept the family name that meant their mother had been unmarried. Idly, Bruno wondered if they had shared the same father.

  The woman leaned forward on the counter, her hands together so her arms could squeeze the magnificent bosom into even greater prominence.

  “I suppose now you’d like me to make you a photocopy.”

  “What I’d like you to do could get us both arrested,” said Bruno, by now thoroughly enjoying himself. “But a photocopy would be very kind.” He paused. “My name’s Benoît.”

  “I’m Nichole.” As she went into the rear office, she turned and waved her blue-tipped fingers and said: “Be right back.”

  Bruno called J-J’s mobile to tell him that he had a suspect. He gave Murcoing’s name and last-known address, read out his aunt’s telephone number from his notebook and added: “According to one woman he worked with, there could be a gay connection.”

  “Hang on while I look him up in the records,” said J-J.

  “Are you still questioning Valentoux?”

  J-J grunted assent, and then Nichole returned with the photocopies.

  “Très bien, Monsieur le Commissaire,” Bruno said into the phone. “Right away.”

  He clutched the photocopies, leaned forward to plant a kiss on Nichole’s cheek and said: “Got to go, that was the boss. One last thing: did Paul have any friends here in the zone?”

  “He might have had one, but like I said, he wasn’t interested in girls.”

  As he opened the door to leave, she called: “Hey, Benoît.” He stopped and turned. “That was fun,” she said, and blew him a kiss.

  8

  At the first address Paul had listed on his personnel form, Bruno found an elderly North African woman in a headscarf with an imperfect command of French. A young man in a tracksuit with a shaved head and a large single earring turned from the blaring TV set and said: “We’ve only been here three weeks.” He had never heard of Paul Murcoing and never seen the man in the photo.

  At the final address in Bergerac, a curtain twitched when he rang the bell. After a minute, a young woman in a dressing gown opened the door on a chain, yawning, and asked him the time.

  “Eleven-twenty.”

  “Merde, I only got off work at six. What is it?” She clutched at the neck of her gown where it was falling away to reveal a large rose tattooed on the curve of her breast.

  Bruno explained and showed the photo. She gave a nod of recognition. “That’s Paul, sure enough. He doesn’t live here, but he sometimes used to come to visit his sister.” He tried not to look at the tattoo.

  “Is she in?”

  The woman shook her head. “Yvonne moved out a month or so ago, maybe more. She said someone had offered her a room near where she worked, but she may have hooked up with some guy she met. She does that sometimes. I haven’t seen Paul for ages.”

  “How well do you know him?”

  “I was at school with Yvonne so I’ve known him for years, even before he came out. What’s he done this time?”

  “He’s been in trouble before?”

  She looked at him levelly and began to close the door. “None of my business.”

  “This is pretty urgent. He could be a witness in an important case. Do you know where Yvonne works, where I could find her?”

  She sighed. “Promise I can go back to sleep if I tell you?” When he nodded, she said: “She does part-time cleaning in foreigners’ houses up around Les Eyzies, some company run by an old Scottish guy who wears a kilt.”

  “You mean in St. Denis?”

  She nodded. “Can I go back to sleep now?”

  “Thanks,” said Bruno. “Sweet dreams.”

  Back in his van he looked through the list of employees Dougal had given him. There she was, Yvonne Murcoing, on the list of the part-time staff. The name should have jumped out at him. The address Dougal had listed for her was the one he’d just visited. He called Dougal and asked if Yvonne was still working for him.

  “She’s out sick, but I think she’s been staying in one of the staff houses we use.” He gave Bruno a phone number and an address. Bruno called the number, but there was no reply. He tried calling J-J, got only voice mail and so tried one of his deputies, a young inspector in Bergerac who would have been assigned to any previous search for Murcoing. There was no news. At the most recent address Murcoing had given the warehouse, no one had seen him for weeks. Bruno then called Joséphine, Murcoing’s aunt, and left a message, asking her to call him, that he had news about the funeral.

  He took the back route from Bergerac through Ste. Alvère to avoid the traffic on the main road along the river. He parked opposite the gendarmerie and noticed Valentoux’s silver car in the lot, so obviously he was still being held. Bruno walked across to look at it. He could see fingerprint dust on the door handles and mirrors. That meant forensics should have finished with it. He put on a pair of gloves and opened the door, wondering if they had checked for discarded receipts that could buttress Yveline’s theory that Valentoux could have driven down a day early to commit the murder. He found nothing.

  He was about to close the car door when a thought struck him. He opened the glove compartment and pulled out the car’s manual. There was a section at the back where careful drivers could record their gas purchases and the number of kilometers driven and work out their consumption. But Valentoux had never made an entry. Tucked inside the manual was the little compartment where most people kept their carte grise and other documents that the police asked to see when a car was pulled over. There was a receipt from a contrôle technique garage, an inspection station where older cars were required to be tested every two years. Bruno saw that the car had been inspected nine days before. The form listed the number of kilometers on the odometer when the test was performed. He compared that with the present number. Valentoux had driven seven hundred and twenty kilometers in the past nine days. Paris to St. Denis was nearly six hundred. If he had made a second journey to kill Fullerton, he could not have done it in his own car.

  Bruno entered the gendarmerie. From behind the desk, Sergeant Jules shook his hand and said Yveline was in the interview room with the suspect. Bruno was directed to the room where J-J was working. Bruno handed him the contrôle technique and explained what he had found out. “But I suppose he could have hired a car and done it that way,” he said.

  “Only if he knew someplace that let him have a car for cash,” said J-J wearily. “We’ve been through his credit cards and bank account. There’s no sign of any odd transactions.” He took off his glasses and eyed Bruno. “Is it you I have to than
k for that phone call we got last night from the procureur’s office?”

  “What phone call?” Bruno asked innocently.

  “From your friend Annette Meraillon, asking if it was true we were questioning a murder suspect.”

  “My friend?” said Bruno. “She’s a vegetarian feminist who thinks I’m a dreadful old meat-eating dinosaur like you. Anyway, she’s too junior to be assigned a case like this.”

  “One of these days you’ll go too far,” J-J grumbled. He tried to glower at Bruno, but his heart didn’t seem to be in it.

  “How’s Valentoux bearing up under the interrogation?” Bruno asked.

  “He seems fine. He obviously has great faith in French justice. He keeps saying he didn’t do it, has a little cry when he thinks of his dead friend and then dries his eyes and credibly answers everything we throw at him. He’s been very cooperative, hasn’t even asked for a lawyer. I was going to release him this morning when the juge d’instruction arrived, but Yveline was keen to have another crack at him, and I don’t want to start an argument with the gendarmes. The juge is talking to him now.”

  J-J turned to a young woman sitting at an adjoining desk and handed her the inspection station receipt Bruno had taken from Valentoux’s car and asked her to explain its significance to the magistrate in the interview room. Then J-J looked at his watch. “I wonder what your friend with the bistro is doing for his plat du jour?”

  “Ivan usually makes côtelettes de porc au céleri today.”

  “So what are we waiting for?” said J-J. He lumbered to his feet and headed for the door at a pace that belied his bulk. A bowl of potage de légumes later, mopped up with part of a fresh baguette and washed down with a glass of Ivan’s house red, J-J sat back and looked at Bruno.

  “So you can put Murcoing at the murder scene at the relevant time, in a van with a forged sign, and you say he’s probably gay, so that could be a connection with Fullerton. I ran his name through the records when you called. He’s got two convictions for car theft, another for hunting without a license, and he was questioned last year on suspicion of selling stolen antiques but released for lack of evidence. He could be a suspect, but it’s all circumstantial.”

  “And his sister is in a position to know which houses would be empty and open for burglary.”

  “That’s the problem. Why would he want to rip off a gîte? There’s no furniture worth taking.”

  “Maybe he knew Fullerton and knew he had a truckload of antiques with him.”

  “It’s a bit thin,” J-J said, surprising Ivan, who was about to serve the pork chops. “Not you, and not this fine-looking dish,” J-J said hurriedly and then leaned forward to breathe in the aroma of the celery sauce. A wide smile appeared on his face as he waited for Ivan to return with the vegetables.

  “I warn you, he’s raised his prices,” said Bruno. “Probably your fault for overpraising him. It’s ten euros fifty now for the set lunch.”

  J-J swallowed his first mouthful, nodded in approval and sipped at his wine. “Soup, this fine pork chop with vegetables done to perfection, then a green salad followed by cheese and topped off with—what’s the dessert today?”

  “Tarte Tatin.”

  J-J looked up to the heavens. “Thank you, God.” He looked back at Bruno. “Plus a quarter liter of this very drinkable red, all for ten euros fifty? I don’t know how he does it.”

  “It will be an extra euro twenty for the coffee, and then you’ll probably want a glass of Monbazillac with the tarte and then maybe a digestif and suddenly your bill is twenty euros,” Bruno said. “That’s how Ivan makes his money.”

  “It’s worth every penny and we’ll economize. No digestif for you today. By the way, who’s his latest girlfriend?”

  Ivan’s menu varied with his love life, which in turn was usually defined by those girls he met on vacation whom he could persuade to return with him to St. Denis. There had been a Belgian girl who seduced him into producing endless moules. The Spanish lover had introduced St. Denis to gazpacho and paella, which were greatly appreciated, although the sounds of crashing pans and murderous curses that came from the kitchen when she was angry with Ivan were also relished by the regulars. The new German girl had been a pleasant surprise; her Wiener schnitzel, hammered so thin it overlapped the plate, served with a succulent potato salad had become a local favorite that Bruno tried never to miss. Hugo from the wineshop had even started to stock an Austrian wine, Grüner Veltliner, in its honor.

  “It’s still the German,” Bruno said, “but the signs aren’t good. Ivan’s been seen sitting alone at the bar and drinking after the place has closed.” As a result, he explained, there was now keen anticipation in the town of Ivan’s next vacation plans. One faction was urging him to explore Southeast Asia and bring back a Thai cook, while another was suggesting that the French Caribbean islands of Martinique and Guadeloupe might bring an exotic tropical spice to the plat du jour.

  “And who’s your latest recruit, the woman in the office?” Bruno asked.

  “That’s Josette. She’s just completed her detective’s course and transferred from Nontron. Married to a motard.” J-J used the slang for a motorcycle cop. “Any day now I’m expecting her to announce she’s going on maternity leave. She’s the one who looked up Murcoing’s record. We’re putting an all-points bulletin out on him.”

  “So if you’re no longer taking Valentoux seriously as a suspect, why are you still holding him?”

  “I told you, Yveline wanted another go at him, and then Bernard had to question him. He’s the juge d’instruction they assigned, Bernard Ardouin. He’s pretty good, a Socialist, of course, but sensible. He used to play rugby for Sarlat. I told him I thought we’d wrung Valentoux dry, and he seemed to agree. I don’t think there’s much point keeping Valentoux any longer. He’ll be out this afternoon.”

  “With a big sign around his neck saying ‘gay murder suspect.’ Can’t you put out a statement saying he’s been cleared?”

  J-J shrugged and attacked his tarte Tatin as if he hadn’t eaten for days. It disappeared in four large spoonfuls. “Sure you won’t join me in a little Armagnac with the coffee?” he asked. “By the way, you didn’t tell me Isabelle’s back in town.”

  “I saw her this morning.” Bruno explained Isabelle’s interest in Crimson’s background.

  “I hate it when intelligence gets involved,” J-J said. “Always screws things up. A little bird in the prefecture told me the brigadier has got you assigned to his team again.”

  “Afraid so. I’m supposed to find the burglars and get Crimson’s stuff back.”

  J-J snorted. “I’m surprised at Isabelle. She knows how tough burglaries are to solve. She damn well should; I trained her.”

  “There may be one possible way into this,” Bruno said. “You say it’s thin, but what if there really is a connection with the murder? Fullerton’s an antiques dealer, and Murcoing has an arrest for stolen antiques, even if nothing was proved, and that’s what the burglars have been taking.”

  “And we have to find out what happened to that load of antiques Fullerton had in the back of his van.”

  “So it’s all the more important that we track down Murcoing,” Bruno went on. “Perhaps you could put through a request to the British police to see if anything’s known about Fullerton. We know he was an antiques dealer, but maybe he was a crooked one.”

  J-J nodded, picked up his phone, called Josette and asked her to take care of it.

  “Let me make sure I have your theory right,” said J-J. “Murcoing could have had some dealings with Fullerton in the past, maybe doing the burglaries, and then Fullerton ships the goods back to England. He goes to meet Fullerton at the gîte to pick up Fullerton’s latest shipment, which might even be stuff stolen in England. They transfer the stuff into Murcoing’s van, and then they have a falling-out, maybe over money, and Murcoing kills him.”

  “And then there’s the gay angle. We know from Valentoux that Fullerton was gay, and one of
Murcoing’s sister’s friends confirmed the brother is gay. Maybe they fell out because Fullerton had found a new lover in Valentoux.”

  “That corpse was a crime passionnel if ever I saw one,” J-J agreed. He sipped his coffee and called for the check. “So even though Isabelle and the brigadier want you focused on the burglary, you want to be part of the murder inquiry, because that’s how you think you’ll solve it all.”

  J-J opened his wallet, put a twenty-euro note and a ten onto Ivan’s saucer, waving away the change, and tucked the receipt away with the rest of his cash. “Suits me,” he said. “I’ll make sure you’re kept informed of everything we get: forensics, records, anything from the British police and the men I’ve got making the rounds of the local antiques dealers.”

  “And I want to be there when you question Murcoing.”

  “We have to find him first. Inspector Jofflin from Bergerac is in charge of that. Now let’s get outside. I’m dying for a cigarette.”

  “I’ll come back to the gendarmerie with you. I want to speak with Valentoux once you let him out.”

  “In that case, give me an hour to square things with Yveline and Bernard.”

  Bruno headed back to his office to deal with his e-mails, phone messages and the usual pile of mail. There was a message from the British consulate in Bordeaux saying that Fullerton’s brother would arrive by plane in Bordeaux the following day to take care of the funeral arrangements. He’d rent a car and contact Bruno on arrival in St. Denis. The consulate had booked him into Les Glycines in Les Eyzies for three nights. There was an e-mail from the adjutant of the Fourth Régiment de Transmissions in Agen confirming that a squad of troops would mount a guard of honor for Loïc Murcoing’s funeral, asking Bruno to verify the date and time. Bruno called Father Sentout to confirm the funeral arrangements and was about to call Florence when the mayor put his head around the door, came in, closed the door behind him and leaned against it.

  “I had a phone call from Jacqueline Morgan. I gather you know about Cécile’s condition,” he said. He looked exhausted.