Alex (39 page)
“I hit Alex …” Vasseur says.
His voice is toneless. He is staring at Camille, but it’s as though he’s talking to himself.
“In the café. When I saw she was taking pills, I was angry. She tried to calm me down, she ran her fingers through my hair, but her ring got snagged … When she pulled it away, it hurt. There were hairs stuck in it. I slapped her – it was a knee-jerk reaction. My hair …”
Vasseur emerges from his daze.
“She had the whole thing set up from the start, didn’t she?”
He looks around for help, finds none: Armand, Louis, Camille simply stare at him.
“The whole thing is a put-up job; this is a set-up pure and simple and you know it! Everything – the ticket for Zurich, the new suitcase, the taxi she ordered … it was all to make you think she was doing a runner. That she had no intention of killing herself. She arranges to meet up with me somewhere I won’t be seen, she bangs her head against the washbasin, she wipes away her fingerprints, leaves the pill bottle with my prints, drops one of my hairs on the floor …”
“I’m afraid that might be rather hard to prove. As far as we’re concerned, you were there, you wanted to get rid of Alex, you hit her, you forced her to drink the whisky and swallow the pills. Your fingerprints and your D.N.A. support our case.”
There is silence for a moment.
“I’ve got good news and bad news. The good news is that the custody period is over. The bad news is you’re under arrest for murder.”
Camille smiles. Vasseur, slumped in his chair, manages to raise his head.
“It wasn’t me! You know she did this, don’t you? You know that!”
This time he is speaking directly to Camille.
“You know it wasn’t me.”
“You’ve displayed quite a fondness for black humour, Monsieur Vasseur.” Camille is still smiling. “So I feel I can allow myself a little witticism of my own. I’d say this time it was Alex who screwed you.”
At the far end of the office, Armand, who’s just tucked his hand-rolled cigarette behind his ear, is just going out of the door as two uniformed officers are coming in.
“I’m sorry to have kept you in custody for so long, Monsieur Vasseur,” Camille says apologetically. “I realise two days is a long time. But we needed the D.N.A. tests and the forensics lab is snowed under. These days, two days is the minimum.”
For some inexplicable reason what triggers the epiphany is Armand’s cigarette. Maybe because of the hardship implied by a cigarette rolled from old butts. Camille is so dumbfounded by the realisation, he stops dead. He does not for a moment doubt it – something which is also impossible to explain – he simply knows.
Louis walks down the corridor; behind him is Armand, shoulders permanently hunched, dragging his heels, wearing the same clean but shabby worn-out shoes.
Camille pops back into his office and scribbles a cheque for 18,000 euros. His hand is shaking. Then he picks up his files, and darts back out into the corridor. He feels overcome, but there will be time later to consider what this gesture means. He is soon standing in front of Armand’s desk. He sets the cheque down in front of him.
“It was a kind gesture, Armand. I’m really touched.”
Armand’s mouth forms an O, dropping the toothpick he’s been chewing.
“No, please, Camille.” He sounds almost offended. “A present, it’s a present.”
Camille smiles. Nods, hopping from one foot to the other. He rummages in his briefcase, takes out the framed photograph of the painting and proffers it. Armand takes it.
“Oh, that’s so sweet, Camille. That’s really kind.”
He is genuinely happy.
*
Le Guen is standing on the flight of steps, two steps below Camille. The weather has turned cold again and it’s late; it’s like a winter night come early.
“Good work, gentlemen,” the magistrate says, shaking the divisionnaire’s hand. He takes a step down and holds his hand out to Camille.”
“Commandant …”
Camille shakes his hand.
“Vasseur will probably claim this is a conspiracy, a frame-up, Your Honour. He insists he’s going to ‘demand the truth’.”
“Yes, I heard something of the sort,” Vidard says.
For a moment he seems preoccupied by this thought, then he shakes it off.
“Oh, the truth, the truth … Who’s to say what’s true and what isn’t, commandant? As far as we’re concerned what’s important is not truth, it’s justice – right?”
Camille smiles and gives him a nod.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Thanks to Samuel for his unstinting kindness, to Gérald for his invariably knowledgeable rereading, to Joëlle for her advice on medical matters and to Cathy my affectionate sponsor. To all the team at Albin Michel.
Last, but not least, to Pascaline.
As ever, I owe much to many other writers.
My sincere thanks to – in alphabetical order – Louis Aragon, Marcel Aymé, Roland Barthes, Pierre Bost, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Cynthia Fleury, John Harvey, Antonio Muñoz Molina, Boris Pasternak, Maurice Pons, Marcel Proust and others for borrowing slightly here and there.
PIERRE LEMAITRE
has worked for many years as a teacher of literature. His novels to date have earned him exceptional critical and public acclaim as a master of the crime novel, and have won him the Prix du Premier Roman de Cognac 2006, the Prix du Meilleur Polar Francophone 2009 and the Prix du Polar Européen du Point 2010.
Alex
is his first novel to be translated into English.
FRANK WYNNE
is a translator from French and Spanish of works by Michel Houellebecq, Tomás Eloy Martinez, Frédéric Beigbeder and Marcelo Figueras.
Camile Verhœven will return …
Spring 2014
Follow the first lead at
www.pierrelemaitre.com
