Each meeting, each rebuke and insult, each payment, the fear of discovery and downfall stronger with each year... had bit by bit built a patchwork quilt of hatred and resolve. He would have to do it himself; there was nobody else.
'Are you okay?' asked Chapeau.
'Yes... yes. Fine.' Duclos stuttered. He could feel his nerves returning as he steeled himself, the trembling was back in his legs. 'Let's get it over with. As you say, it's cold out here.' He passed the envelope to Chapeau.
The gun and ammunition would be untraceable. Nobody had seen him come into the lane, and the location was miles away for both of them. There would be no possible connection. He would have to make the first shot count, hitting the chest or stomach, with two or three in quick succession after. A superficial wound or a miss and Chapeau would start firing back.
Chapeau was opening the envelope, starting to count the money.
With Vacharet now dead, the last link between the two of them had also gone. The last traces of 1963 would die with Chapeau. He'd got away with it once, he could do it again. He tightened his grip, felt his palm sweating on the gun butt. The best moment was while Chapeau was looking down, distracted with counting the money.
'Thirty thousand, wasn't it?' Chapeau confirmed. But he hardly looked up from counting.
'Yes.' Twelve years focused into a single moment. His legs were trembling uncontrollably and there was a tight constriction in his chest. He swallowed to try and ease it. He'd thought initially of shooting Chapeau through the coat pocket, but then realized that with the mark and powder burns he'd have to dump the coat; it could be traced. But now he began to worry that in lifting the gun out, Chapeau would see it. A flicker in the corner of his eye while he was counting, making him reach for his own gun.
Chapeau was two-thirds through counting the first bundle. Duclos knew the routine: Chapeau would count the first bundle fully, then would flick quickly through the other bundles and measure them against the first. There were six bundles in all: 5,000 Francs each made up of 100 Franc notes.
All the months of preparation, and now the moment was upon him, he felt frozen into inaction. He'd even gone out to a deserted field near Limoges one weekend to fire off a few rounds: make sure the ammunition wasn't damp or faulty and get used to the feel of the gun. But what use was that now. This was no longer cardboard targets, but pumping bullets through flesh and bone! His nerves were racing, his whole body starting to shake. Perhaps he should wait until Chapeau had finished counting, started to walk away. Shoot him in the back.
Chapeau was finishing the second bundle.
But what if Chapeau suddenly looked up and read into his expression that something was wrong? Chapeau would see that he was in a cold sweat with panic, would reach for his gun before he even had the chance. Chapeau was flicking rapidly through the bundles... starting on the fourth. Any second he could look up and the chance would be gone.
With one last silent prayer into the misty air, Duclos started to ease the gun from his pocket.
TWENTY-THREE
Marseille. 3rd October, 1978
Heartbeats. Their own pulses marking time. All the three men in the car could hear as they waited for the full cover of darkness. They watched as two more people left the bar.
'How many would that leave now inside, Tomi?' the man behind the wheel asked.
'Maybe nine or ten.' Twenty minutes earlier Tomi had gone in the bar for a quick reconnaissance, downed a pastis and left. 'I doubt if we'll find a time with less people inside. Later on, it will start filling up again.'
The driver, Jaques, took out the 11.43mm automatic from his shoulder holster. In the back, Tomi's fingers tapped nervously on the barrel of a pump-action shotgun. Heartbeats. It had all been agreed earlier: they couldn't leave any possible witnesses. When they'd been handed the photos and half the payment two days before, they'd been told that this was the only place they'd find all three at the same time. Tomi had already checked that all three targets were there.
The sign 'Bar du Telephone' was only partly visible between the trees which shadowed their car. Jaques looked ahead and in his mirror: there was nobody approaching. He nodded and they pulled on the stocking masks. No more words were spoken between them as they followed him briskly into the bar.
Only two people turned and stared as they walked in and raised their guns to fire. Surprise had hardly registered on their faces as the first volleys rang out, deafening in the confined space. Tomi saw one of the targets towards the far end of the bar and picked him off quickly with a chest shot, then swung to his right and fired at a man diving for cover. Jaques quickly found their second target and picked off two bystanders trying to escape.
Among the pandemonium of chairs and tables overturning and glasses breaking as people tried frantically to escape the relentless volley of fire, the three went through the bar as if it was a routine military exercize. It had all been agreed beforehand: chest shots, floor as many people as possible quickly, then finish off with head shots. Cries and screams mingled with the groans of those already wounded, and the air was thick with smoke and the smell of burning cordite.
At one point Jaques held one hand up, in the few seconds lull taking stock of who was left to fell. A small movement in the corner - Tomi swung and fired. Everyone else was already gravely wounded or dead. Jaques nodded and they moved in to finish off the wounded.
One man in his late twenties looked up and pleaded as Jaques levelled his gun at him. 'Monsieur, please, no... no!
'Pardon.' Jaques pressed the gun barrel into the soft flesh below the man's ear and fired.
Within another fifty seconds, they'd delivered a head or neck shot to everyone in the bar. Jaques grimaced disdainfully; with the carnage, the tile floor was slippery with blood. He'd almost fallen over twice. Jaques signalled and they headed out. Less than three minutes had passed since they'd entered.
Shortly after them leaving, a faint liquid wheezing came from a man by the bar counter. He'd been shot twice in the neck, but miraculously had survived. The gunmen had also failed to notice a faint flicker of movement on the stairway at the back of the bar as they'd entered.
Nicole Leoni, wife of the bar's owner, saw the lead gunman as she was walking downstairs - quickly heading back up again and barricading herself in an upstairs bedroom. She was unsure whether or not the gunman had seen her, and stared nervously at the door as the shots rang out below, fearful of it bursting open at any moment. She stayed in that position for almost three minutes after the last shots fired, still trembling as she finally ventured close to the door and listened, afraid that it might be a trick and they were creeping up the stairs to surprise her.
Five days since the shooting. The main division responsible for the investigation was in North Marseille where the incident took place, but then quickly involved divisions covering the Vieux Port and Panier districts where most of the interviews for suspects was centred; and finally Chief Inspector Fornier's division in West Marseille for liaison with Paris and due to his past experience as an Inspector in the Panier district.
Co-ordinating the investigation was Divisional Police Commissioner, Pierre Chatelain. Dominic had received calls practically every day from Chatelain, anxious that liaison with Paris went smoothly.
Dominic was keenly aware of the background. Gangland battles between rivals in Nice and Marseille had left almost sixty dead over the past two years. Not a blink from the politicians and police officials in the north. But this was different. Along with three known criminals, six innocents had also been killed. Nine dead: two more than the St Valentine's Day massacre. Apart from the obvious comparisons to Chicago, suddenly it was a concern that tourists might get cut down in a hail of bullets while sampling some local pastis. Holidays were cancelled or re-arranged for the South-West coast, Italy or Spain. With tourism dropping, foreign exchange would be effected too. Suddenly it was a national issue. Ministers and Police Commissioners wanted results. Fast.
The local crime network, t
he milieu, felt one of the coldest investigative draughts in years. The message was clear: kill each other by all means, but never let it spread outside of that fraternity.
Dominic and most of his division had been working virtually round the clock since being brought into the investigation, and now a more concentrated vigil lay ahead. Phones and teleprinters went almost constantly and files arrived at regular intervals by messenger. Towards the end of the second night, as a stack of files shifted and almost knocked the smiling family photo of his wife and two sons off his desk, he was reminded to phone home. 'Just a couple of hours more, I'll be finished then.'
His wife reminded him that it was their younger son Gerome's birthday in just three days, he'd be six. 'Try and leave at least some time over the next two days to put thought towards his present.'
'Don't worry, once I've filed this report tomorrow, things will be easier.'
The two hours turned into four by the time he'd run the report through a phone preview with Chatelain before sending it to Commissioner Aimeblanc.
The final report was sixteen pages long. A complex and sordid saga of two rival gangs vying for control of casinos, clubs, race-tracks and profitable extortion and prostitution rackets. Background and texture to the final massacre - milieu revenge for the hi-jacking of a shipment of fake Omega, Cartier and Piaget watches from Italy, by three men: André Leoni, the Bar du Telephone's owner, and two associates present that fateful night. All others killed were incidental.
Details of the killings were gruesome. All the victims had been hit first with chest or stomach shots, then finished off executioner style. Miraculously, one man, Francis Fernandez, was shot twice in the throat but survived. But he was purely a casual visitor to the bar, his descriptions of the three killers was vague, apart from the fact that 'they all wore stocking masks and one had a beard.' Three different calibre bullet were found at the scene: 9mm, 11.43mm and 12mm, the last probably from a shotgun.
Aimeblanc came back within three hours of viewing the report: he wanted the suspect list narrowed. With little firm evidence, successful prosecution might hinge purely on confessions: a more workable interview list was essential. By late the same day, Dominic had narrowed it to just twelve names. Aimeblanc added his own two page summary and passed the file to Interior Minister Bonnet. With an additional foreword summary, Bonnet had the file copied and duly distributed.
Fourteen ministerial departments were on his direct distribution list, and another eighteen requests had been made. Some were due to ministerial involvement in regional or national crime commissions, or because of the incident’s grave reflection on overall crime trends. Others simply because of the concern of constituents who had business interests, holiday homes or vacationed regularly in the area. Among the request list was the RPR Minister for Limoges, Alain Duclos.
TWENTY-FOUR
'Was there much in the press about it?'
'A fair bit. Two or three clippings in La Provençal, at least. It probably even hit Le Figaro or Le Monde at one stage - though possibly lumped together with coverage or other child murders.'
'When will you know for sure?' Marinella asked. The concern had come through in her voice, she sensed; perhaps even sounded how she felt: desperate, deflated.
Philippe described being bounced between libraries and news agencies half the morning. 'But I think I've finally found a couple of reliable sources. I've left them my fax number at the LSE. I should get the results of a search and copies from microfiche records within the next few hours.'
There was nothing she could do but sit it out, wait for Philippe to receive his faxes. David Lambourne was in with a patient, and she felt ill at ease sitting by the phone in his waiting area. She wanted to bounce thoughts off him straightaway. Though was it purely to vent some of her frustrations, or get an alternative viewpoint?
She glanced at the phone. If it was later in the day, she could have at least put through a call to Sebastian and her father - but it was only 5.10am in Charlottesville. Besides, she'd called them just the day before. Her father had been preparing red snapper with peppers and bean rice for later and the night previous they'd had chicken arroz brut; it was like a restaurant waiter reading out the menu. Sebastian would have been happy to stay with her father for a month. And to phone the university - catch up on activities the last few days and perhaps get some feedback from Donaldson - she'd have to wait even longer, almost four hours. She decided on a walk, burn off some of her restlessness.
She walked for almost half a mile and found herself on the edge of Covent Garden. She decided to have a coffee in the piazza, found a deli with outside tables in the ground floor courtyard. A string quartet played Vivaldi while she sipped her cappuccino.
Just the day before she'd been excited about the case. A genuine rush at the first bit of tangible information. Philippe had traced the death certificate in the Bauriac town hall register: Christian Yves Rosselot. Death registered at 9.54 pm, 23rd August, 1963. Parents Monique and Jean-Luc. Address: Rue des Rigouards, Taragnon. The boy not only existed, some of the main details checked out!
But the registrar had mentioned a coroner's note on the certificate. Marinella asked Philippe to check. Coroner's notes were not in themselves unusual, present in all manner of accidental deaths, so she was not immediately alarmed. Towards the end of the same day, having followed the trail through the coroner's office and the Ministère Publique which had ordered the report, Philippe phoned her and dropped the bombshell: the boy had been the victim of a murder, quite a notable case in the region at the time. It was too late for Philippe to do any more checking that day, libraries and town halls in France were already closed; she'd have to wait till the morning for the confirmations she feared were looming.
On the edge of the piazza, a mime artist juggled with three red balls, making them disappear dramatically behind his white gloved hands. A bit like this case, she thought: now you see it, now you don't. If she continued and published a paper, they would laugh at her back at Virginia. A prominent murder case that had been splashed across the press. Almost as bad as the boy claiming to be Maurice Chevalier or Joan of Arc. All the details were there for him to regurgitate.
Stock lines of defence rolled through her mind about the age of the press articles and the family's lack of knowledge of France. But she knew that the sceptics's barrage would be relentless: old newspapers perhaps kept by relatives who had holidayed in the region, current books with prominent murder cases from bygone years, fresh news stories that reflected back to past cases. She knew she couldn't even start to defend her corner until she'd seen the news items from Philippe, weighed the full extent of damage.
She felt deflated, despondent. Brought to the edge of what looked like an exciting case only for it to evaporate before her eyes yet again. Was this to be the pattern of her life? Each case that looked like it had real promise ending in disappointment. Perhaps she should just get the first flight back to Virginia, erase it quickly, a fresh workload and new cases to occupy her mind. She checked her watch: Lambourne's session would have ended a few minutes ago. She headed back.
David was sipping at a freshly made tea as she walked back in. He offered her one, but she declined with thanks. 'I've just had coffee.'
She'd flagged her concerns the evening before and now fleshed out the details: as she feared, the case had been reported heavily - she'd know just how heavily by early afternoon. They'd have to start thinking in terms of the case being completely fabricated or, at best, subliminally influenced. If they didn't adopt that stance, the critics certainly would. The case and any resultant study papers were heading nowhere. 'Sorry, David - but if the news from Philippe supports what I fear, I'm bailing out. I've already been four days away from my family, there's no point in my staying on just to face another disappointment.'
Lambourne held one hand up, trying to slow her down. 'Wait a minute. Putting aside the sceptics view - what do you think? Do you think the boy's fabricating?'
'I don't k
now.' She thought of the frail, lost voice, how convincing it had seemed. She shook her head. 'I'm not sure either way. It looks suspicious, that's all. But I have to take a safe stance, look at the downside. If I don't, someone else will - they'll rap me over the head, beat me senseless with it. Make me look foolish.'
Lambourne was about to comment, is that the most important thing, that you don't look foolish, then thought better of it. Too harsh. 'Are you sure you're not reading too prematurely into the view the critics might, only might take on this. As Donaldson commented - playing too much to the gallery.'
'It's okay for Donaldson, he never faces the critics like me. Never does personal interviews. Just goes on his jaunts to India or wherever, compiles his papers and books, and if they don't like his findings - fine. He just lets them stew in their own juices. He's in his own little cocooned academic netherworld, protected from it all. Unlike me, he doesn't have to sit on panels and face Professor Novision, a special study team of nerds from Sceptics Incorporated and flat earth preachers who conveniently forget that over half the world's religions believe in reincarnation. It's okay for Donaldson to pontificate about the gallery, because he has absolutely no idea what-' Marinella cut herself short as she read David Lambourne's expression: shocked at the strength of her feelings, or uncomfortable at her mention of ambivalence with Donaldson? She let out a long, tired breath and apologized, admitted that the stress of another promising case curtailed abruptly had got to her. She hung her head slightly in submission. 'Donaldson has built up a body of work and a reputation within the profession that I can only but hope to emulate. It was wrong of me to criticize. I'm sorry.'
Lambourne held his palms out. 'So, what do you want to do? Anticipate the flak you might receive from sceptics and give up now - or battle on?'
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