Another Sun (24 page)

“Don’t make such a noise.”

“Hey, look. It’s a box—Maman, it’s a box.”

“Don’t touch it—Fabrice, don’t touch it.”

He stood back, suddenly frightened and his eyes wide open.

It was too late.

Somebody had left the box in front of the apartment door.

Accidentally, Fabrice had knocked off the lid.

Anne Marie crouched down and gingerly she looked into the box. She looked at the dark, black object.

R.I.P.

A coffin. A small coffin made from black cardboard.

“What does it say, Maman? What does it say?”

FABRICE LAVEAUD, 1973–1980 Requiescat in pace
.

Anne Marie stood up. With a trembling hand, she searched for the door key in her new handbag.

She felt sick.

Land crabs scurried away before her like an army in retreat. One or two fell into the brackish water that had been cut off from the sea by the falling tide.

Beneath her breath, Anne Marie cursed the driver.

Mist was coming from the lagoon, and somewhere a dog was barking.

Anne Marie found the path. It was scarcely discernible—a thin, sandy track beneath the stunted grass. Mosquitoes danced before her eyes. Then through the bushes and the tilting coconut trees, she caught sight of the revolving light of a police van.

Trousseau was leaning against a tree trunk. The sun had at last peeped over the horizon and was lighting the sea with the first strips of red. Anne Marie could not make out Trousseau’s face as they shook hands, but she recognized the glint of his teeth and saw that he was smiling.

“You should’ve got the Indian to drive you another couple of kilometers. There’s a turning near the hotels. No need to walk, madame le juge.” He had set the typewriter case on the humid sand, and the red crabs were hurtling their bodies against it in organized futility.

“I don’t like being pulled out of my bed at five in the morning. What’s going on, Monsieur Trousseau?”

He gestured. “You’d better ask them.”

Anne Marie went toward the police van and caught her shoe in a hole. She looked down and saw the naked roots of the tree. More crabs.

An ugly place.

The coconut trees stood only a few meters from the edge of the sea. Rotting branches, rotting roots, tin cans and plastic flotsam from the sea.

She recognized neither of the two gendarmes, but she nodded as they came to attention to salute her. Then she saw the old Peugeot pickup. An ancient car in battleship grey, the driver’s door open lopsidedly, and the gear stick stuck out from the steering column. Sitting in the passenger seat was a little boy.

His head was in his hands, and he was crying.

To the east the sun was getting warmer, and the trees were taking on long, giraffe-like shadows. The craters in the sand formed weird penumbra. A man in overalls leaned against the back of the pickup that sat low on its wheels. The tailgate was down and a square-handled shovel stood upright in the mountainous cargo of grey sand.

“Christ, it’s taken them nearly an hour to get here.”

A vehicle came bouncing down the sand track road. Like the police van, it had a revolving blue light. The wail of the siren was strident in the morning air.

A body lay on the ground.

Anne Marie approached the body as the ambulance came to a halt and the driver jumped out. The assistant followed him. Both were dressed in white, and they hurried over to where the man lay on the chill sand. “They told us to go to Morne-à-l’Eau,” the driver said defensively. “Not our fault if we’re late. Only ten minutes ago the radio told us it was Gosier.”

The wail of the siren died as the driver knelt down and felt for the pulse of the man.

Anne Marie crouched down beside him. “Well?”

“Still alive.”

In his state of unconsciousness, Michel Gurion had taken on the appearance of a younger man. Despite the paleness, despite the fact that one of the lenses of his rimmed glasses had been smashed, the television journalist seemed both healthier and younger than when Anne Marie had last seen him at the marina.

The chest rose and fell almost imperceptibly. A look of contentment on the face; there was also several days’ growth of beard.

Anne Marie touched his forehead. It was cold. She stood up. “How the hell did Gurion get here?”

She turned round to face the other man, but the man ignored her. He was looking at his watch. Young and good looking, he was dressed in a two-piece white linen suit that looked as fresh and well-pressed as if he had just come from a dinner party. Particles of sand stuck to the soles of his shoes but the polished leather was immaculate. He wore a blue shirt, a red and blue striped tie.

“Are you going to tell me how Gurion got here?”

The stretcher was lowered and the body carefully shifted onto it, then ferried to the waiting ambulance.

The man said to the ambulance driver, “I’ll have to report your being late.”

The second ambulance man did not reply but climbed into the back of the vehicle. The doors were slammed shut. The blue light still flashed against the whitening sky. The siren came alive as the ambulance pulled away, bumping slightly on the ridges of the track.

“I’d like to know how Gurion got here.”

The man turned, and it was only then that Anne Marie recognized him: one of the men who had been with the procureur outside the Palais de Justice and then later at the marina. She recognized the ambitious eyes.

His smile was unexpected and appeared sincere. “Azaïs.” He
held out his hand. “Jacques Azaïs, Renseignements Généraux.” He wore gold cuff links.

They shook hands. “I don’t see why I had to be brought here.”

“You’re the juge d’instruction, I believe,” Azaïs said.

“Madame Laveaud.” Anne Marie nodded. “I got a phone call twenty minutes ago—and the police chauffeur picked me up. Azaïs, I’ve got better.…”

“Call me Jacques—everybody does.” The
Négropolitain
—a West Indian who lived in France—gave her a broad smile. He had the physique—and the accent—of a rugby player from the Southwest. His nose must have been broken a couple of times. He had the hair of a métis, combed into a part.

“I was taken from my bed.”

Azaïs raised an eyebrow.

“And Monsieur Trousseau—my greffier—I’m sure he’s got better things to do at this time of the morning. Like sleep.”

The sun had risen, throwing its sparkling reflection across the windless surface of the green Atlantic.

Azaïs looked at his watch. “Nearly seven o’clock.”

“I didn’t come all the way from Pointe-à-Pitre for you to tell me the time.” She tapped the shabby Kelton at her wrist—Jean Michel had promised her a Swiss watch with his first pay slip in Guadeloupe.

He shrugged.

“I have a family to look after, Azaïs.”

“Jacques.”

“A son who must be dressed and fed before being taken to school.”

“You’ve had breakfast, madame le juge?”

“And you could have the courtesy of telling me how Gurion got here.”

“Gurion?” he asked, as if slightly surprised by her request. He placed a hand on her arm and guided her toward the Peugeot pick-up. The man in overalls had climbed in behind the steering wheel. “Kidnapped.”

The little boy still wept. He was about the same age as Fabrice, and she gave him a smile.

“Who’d want to kidnap Gurion?”

A military-type trunk stood on the sand. It was like the trunks that she and Jean Michel had used to bring their possessions from France, but a bit larger. The combination lock hung from one of the hinges. The metal flap of the hinge had broken off.

“He must have broken his way out.”

Anne Marie asked incredulously. “Gurion was in that?”

“They took him on Sunday—and nobody seemed to notice his absence. Not FR3—not even his wife.”

“I didn’t know he was married.”

Azaïs looked at her quizzically.

“How long was he in that thing?” She touched the trunk with the tip of her moccasin.

“Most of the night.”

“He could’ve died.”

“A lucky man. He managed to break the hinge—and then the old man saw him and alerted the police. Perhaps the combination lock will be able to tell us something.” He turned and called to the two gendarmes.

One gendarme was smoking. He threw the cigarette onto the sand.

Azaïs pointed at the trunk. “Put gloves on and make sure you handle it carefully. Get it to
Médico-Légal
. You got your camera?” He made no attempt to be polite.

They shook their heads.

“Can’t be moved until we’ve got a few photographs.” Azaïs swore under his breath. “Call up
Médico-Légal
. Heaven knows why you didn’t do it before.”

“Waiting for your orders, monsieur.”

“Time you learned to make decisions for yourselves.”

They nodded unhappily.

“And keep me informed.”

They saluted and returned to the van.

“Idiots,” Azaïs whispered. “No better than the blacks—no initiative, no common sense.” He raised his voice and shouted at the retreating men. “What are you going to do with the old man?”

The two gendarmes turned sheep-like faces and shrugged.

“You put handcuffs on him,” Azaïs said coldly, “and you arrest him.” He turned away and said over his shoulder, “I’ll be back after I’ve had my breakfast.”

“Why arrest the old man?”

Azaïs was raising a glass of pineapple juice to his lips and he smiled as Anne Marie sat down opposite him. “You managed to make your phone call, madame le juge?”

“I’ll try again in five minutes.”

“While you wait, enjoy your breakfast.” Azaïs smiled brightly. “I love breakfast, don’t you?”

“When I’m with my family.”

Anne Marie was tired. Jean Michel had laughed off the coffin and had snored softly beside her all night. She had been unable to get to sleep and just as she finally began to doze off, she was woken by the phone. Now she felt sick, and her hand hurt. The skin was marked with red weals that burned at the flesh between her fingers. “Are you married, Monsieur Azaïs?”

“I was.”

“You have children?”

“A boy of ten—he lives in France.”

Anne Marie bit her lip. “Perhaps with a more thoughtful attitude toward your own family, a separation wouldn’t be necessary.”

“My son lives with my parents in Bayonne.” Azaïs gave her a friendly smile. “My wife died in a road accident.”

She looked down at the cup of coffee.

“Hit on the way to the pre-natal clinic.”

“Monsieur Azaïs, I have a job to do and I try to do it well. I am sorry to hear your wife died, but my problem is I don’t enjoy being woken during the night and then being taken by an unhelpful driver to the scene of a crime that is no concern of mine. Particularly when there’s already on location a juge d’instruction better qualified than me.”

“You believe that I am a juge d’instruction?”

“Renseignements Généraux don’t wear bespoke tropical suits.”

“Madame, I’m no more qualified than you.”

“Gurion’s your problem, not mine. You’re responsible to the Cour de Sûreté de l’Etat.”

They were sitting only a few meters from the hotel beach. His eyes caught the sunlight reflected off the surface of the sea. “You believe it was a political kidnapping?”

“Of course,” Anne Marie replied.

“And Calais?”

“The Calais murder’s not the same thing.”

She turned to look at Trousseau.

Trousseau had not wanted to come to the hotel—unlike Anne Marie, he had known that it was little more than a couple of hundred meters from the forlorn beach and its lunar landscape—but she had managed to persuade him, and he was now sitting at the same table. He did not seem to be following their conversation.

The typewriter case was on the seat beside him, and Trousseau sat upright, his hands crossed on the blue tablecloth. He glanced at Anne Marie, but the dark, intelligent eyes said nothing. He ran his finger along the narrow line of his moustache.

Azaïs said, “Very good breakfast.”

“Next time, I’d like to be invited well in advance.” Anne Marie drank the bitter coffee.

“You mustn’t blame me, madame le juge,” Azaïs said. “I didn’t kidnap Gurion.”

“You had me brought here.”

“Really, madame, now that you’re here, you might as well enjoy the food.”

“I worry about my son.” She paused before adding, “A threat has been made against his life—a Voodoo threat. A coffin left on the doorstep.”

Azaïs put his head back and laughed. In that moment, Anne Marie felt that she could happily have sunk her nails into his Uncle Tom neck. “Voodoo, madame le juge—but that’s for these people. You really give credence to the vestiges of animist cults from Africa?”

“I don’t want anything to happen to my son.”

“You don’t believe.…”

“You still haven’t told me what the old man has been arrested for.”

Azaïs did not reply. He pushed his glass of fruit juice aside and started slicing a watermelon. “We’re not getting on very well, are we?”

Anne Marie gave him a cold smile. “Why are you having the old man arrested?”

“Who?”

“The old man with the Peugeot truck and the little boy.”

“High time the local police and the gendarmerie did something about those thieves.”

Trousseau was looking at the tourists who took their food from the buffet tables. Tourists in beachwear, white legs and blue veins.

“You saw the holes in the sand—you saw what a state the beach is in. There’s just no more sand. These people come down at night, and they steal all the sand. And in this benighted country, nobody cares. All the gendarmes care about is their overseas bonus—and not getting their throats cut with a machete.” He shrugged. “The people here are destroying their island, pillaging it—and if they go on taking the sand with impunity, there’ll be no more beaches.”

Trousseau turned. “The beaches are no worse than after a hurricane.” He looked at neither Anne Marie nor Azaïs.

“They take the sand for cement. They steal it in the night—and then make a fat profit.” Azaïs took a second slice of watermelon. “The man’s going to jail—and he thought he was doing his duty. He was down on the beach at half past three with his son. Too dark to see much—but they heard a noise. Most people, I imagine, would’ve run off—an evil spirit, a zombie.” He glanced at Trousseau, then gave Anne Marie a lopsided smile. “This old fellow had a flashlight, and he went to have a look. He found the trunk just as Gurion was breaking his way out. Instead of running away, he helped Gurion.”