Impure Blood (38 page)

‘You still there, Frankie?’

‘Uh, yes, yes… He did it just before she made to leave and then followed her outside. Of course, he was soon escorting her. Feeling out of it suddenly, Anne-Marie was grateful for the use of his arm. How kind a gentleman he was. Then he brought her here.’

‘But after he and Ranson had spent all that time clearing…’

‘I know it doesn’t make sense but you have to realise we’re dealing with compulsion here. When the impulse kicks in, rationality disappears. It’s a disease.’

‘A disease, okay. The Manou angle. How did that work this evening?’

‘He phoned Volpini from the taxi office – keeping the conversation bland so as not to alert the dispatcher.’

‘Jesus Christ…’

Frankie could picture Darac at that moment – his face a clenched fist as he ran a hand through his hair.

‘…That’s my fault. I should have had Peerless’s phone tapped as well as Manou’s own.’

‘It wasn’t a mistake, it was just a bad break. And you haven’t exactly had nothing else to do this last couple of days.’

‘Manou.’

‘Yes. Volpini was furious with him, he said. He’d tried to call the boy numerous times. Where had he been? Manou said he’d be right along. But he didn’t take the car, as usual.’

‘Why?’

‘Because unknown to Volpini and his associates, he’d spent the last twenty-four hours at the Caserne and he’d had enough. He went to tell Volpini that they could get themselves another driver. He’d only done it in the first place to be able to buy a multi-gym machine, he said. Muscles – can you believe it? He did it for bigger muscles.’ She exhaled deeply. ‘Well… that’s about it from here.’

‘Ah. I was hoping you were saving the best until last.’

Frankie gave a sad little shrug.

‘That Volpini somehow knew what connects Florian and Agnès? No. Sorry.’

‘Too much to hope for. But this is brilliant work, Frankie. Now go home and get some sleep. We’ll need you fresh later on.’

‘It’s only… a quarter to three. I can keep going for at least another half-hour.’

Frankie lived in La Turbie, a thirty-minute drive from the city.

‘Sensible girl. See you later.’

She rang off, wrapped things up with the forensic team and then walked out through the yard into Rue Monteverdi.

‘My car?’ she said to the uniform on cordon tape duty.

‘It’s been left for you down the street, Captain.’ He indicated a line of vehicles to their right. ‘That way.’ He lifted the tape for her.

‘Thanks. Goodnight.’

It was 2.50 am and the air was as hot and thick as soup. Were the pavement not blatted with dog shit, she would have slipped off her shoes and walked the rest of the way barefoot. But even given cool, clean stone, it would have been no walk in the park. A montage of images was running in her head. She got into the car, started the engine and lowered her window. But she felt she couldn’t drive away. She needed to take stock for a moment. She recalled the conversation she’d had with Agnès in the cell block. Might it prove their last? It seemed inconceivable. But…

A man’s unseen hand reached in through the window. Frankie jumped as she felt a finger jabbing her shoulder.

‘You’re it!’ The drunk’s breath was a 70% proof fire hazard. ‘Now
you’ve
gotta count to five thousand.’

Frankie put the car in gear.

‘I’m going home. That’s what I’m going to do.’

It was thunder that finally woke Agnès. A cracking, rolling roar that threatened to bring the heavens themselves crashing down. Crashing her out of one nightmare into another.

At least she was not alone. She felt someone’s foot nudging her calf; a hand, its fingers splayed, digging into her side. As her eyes grew accustomed to the dim light, she could make out the forms of several others. All of them were naked, as she was. All of them were shaven-headed, as she was. Nevertheless, there was safety in numbers, wasn’t there?

She couldn’t tell what kind of structure they were confined in but she seemed to be the only one sitting on its floor. The bodies of her companions were snagged together as if they had been bulldozed into the space.

They were all dead.

As the thunder continued to roll overhead, she tried to scream. But then she heard a sound, a wonderful voice calling to her from beyond the dead.

‘They’re just dummies, darling. Mannequins from a window display.’

‘Papa? Oh, Papa! Thank God. Thank…’

She slipped into darkness once more.

Flat matte black and with a round-edged shiny black surround, the screen wasn’t in itself interesting. In fact, it wasn’t even as interesting as the digital thermometer. But oh boy, when it was turned on. He thought of the phrase: ‘Her face lights up when she smiles.’ She, whoever she was, had nothing on the TV. The whole world came to life in its face.

Cancellara yesterday. The time-trial king. The course wasn’t ideal for him but it didn’t matter. You’d bet your TV that he’d win it. So later on today, it would be Cancellara that would don the yellow jersey and roll out with the others as race leader.

A rustling of cloth.

It’s the fat one! My beloved fat one! I thought she was gone for ever.

‘Hello.’ That smile. ‘You got your TV after all. That’s wonderful.’

He blinked once.

‘You’re enjoying it?’

He blinked once.

‘Of course. Perfect for you. And being able to watch your son and everything.’

He blinked once.

‘I’m on another ward now but I thought I’d just pop over to see how you are. May I look at your mouth?’

He blinked once.

The familiar smell of her fingers. The loosening of the plate. He felt air cool his lips. What was happening? He felt air on his lips.

Felt it.

‘That’s looking much better. Just a little more cream and we’re there.’

The smell of the cream. He expected that. Come on, let’s feel its greasy softness now.

‘And now the gauze.’

He hadn’t felt the cream. Another false summit.

‘Here we go.’

Warmer. And a covering sensation. Almost imperceptible. But it was there.

‘And now the plate.’

Pressure. Tightening. Strong words for what were the most delicate of sensations. But sensations they were.

‘Upphhh…’

The fat one’s eyes widened. Her mouth fell open.

‘What?’

‘Upphhh…’

‘No. Don’t try to speak.’ Her face a study in concentration, she looked at the bank of readouts on his monitors. And smiled, excitedly. ‘In a moment, I’m going to prick the back of your hand. Is that alright?’

He blinked once.

‘I want you to blink once if you can feel it; twice if you can’t. I’m going to do it on three. One, two… three.’

He blinked once.

‘Yes!’ she said, her eyes almost disappearing behind the rising crescents of her cheeks. ‘Let’s try it again.’

Yves Dauresse jinked neatly between two whip-cracking towels. A Garde Républicaine shower area was no place for the slow of wit and limb.

‘Missed, you sad bastards!’

Roger Lascaux and David Jarret were almost changed into their inspection overalls as he joined them at their lockers.

‘I don’t know why my bare backside seems to fascinate everybody.’

‘Fair play to it.’ Lascaux slipped his watch over his wrist. ‘It is a decent arse.’

‘Thank you, Roger.’

They shook hands.

Jarret was drying his hair.

‘Except you’ve got to remember who the towel-flickers, the ones who hang around in the shower at the end, are. They are benders. That is why they go for it.’

‘Any arse in a storm, eh? I thought I was special there for a minute.’

Lascaux gave him a look. He knew just how special the man was. And then he realised something was missing.

‘I hate to think where you’re hiding my watch.’ He held out his hand. ‘Give.’

‘What? No, you must have dropped it.’ Looking for a likely spot, Dauresse finally settled on his riding boots. He reached into one of them. ‘Well look at that. Imagine finding it there.’

With exaggerated gratitude, Lascaux took it and walked away.

‘Shouldn’t wear it on your right wrist!’ Dauresse turned to Jarret. ‘Lefties. Eccentric people.’

It was Jarret’s turn to look Dauresse up and down. Gags, cryptic remarks, unsuspected knowledge, sleight of hand: there seemed to be no end to the man’s capacity to surprise.

‘They’re not the only ones, mate.’

The banter and general horseplay continued through all the routines and rituals that marked the start of the GR’s day.

And what a day it promised to be for the three of them.

The mannequins had been removed by the time Agnès woke for a second time. Or perhaps it was a third. Or tenth.

She was wearing a nightshirt now. It was short, thin and filthy but it covered her nakedness. And there were better messages from her body: it hurt like hell. She was sitting with her back drawn up against the side wall of some vehicle. Releasing an avalanche of pain down her spine, she tried to get up. She couldn’t. Her wrists were manacled to a chain that ran through an eyebolt fixed behind her. In the dim light of what she now realised was a panel van, her eyes began to focus more securely. The sharpening image she saw almost broke her heart.

‘Thank God you’ve come back to me.’ Vincent’s words were shot through with tears. ‘Thank God!’

She tried to hold out both arms to him but the chain was too short to allow it. One arm would have to do.

‘It’s alright, Papa.’ Agnès’s throat was dry and the effort of raising her voice made it crack. ‘It’s alright.’ She was scared to death but she was even more scared of showing it. ‘I’m feeling much better now.’

‘Thank God, thank God…’

Their reaching hands were well out of touching range but the look that passed between them felt strong enough to walk on – a suspension bridge across the nightmare. In her head, Agnès was herself enough now to realise that whatever was happening, it was the product of someone else’s madness, not hers.

Thunder rolled overhead.

‘We’ll get out of here, Papa. We’re not going to die trussed up like this. They’re out there now looking for us – Darac and the others. The Brigade,
our
brigade is looking. And they’ll come through for us, Papa. They’ll save us. But we mustn’t give up in the meantime. Do you hear me? We must keep going. We mustn’t give up. You taught me the value of that. Like so many other things.’

Vincent’s head dropped.

‘
Come on
, Papa. We’re in this together. As always.

Let’s think about it. Let’s think about what we can do to help ourselves.’

For the moment, the thunder rolling overhead subsided.

‘There’s no…’

‘Yes there is!
Look
at me.’

His head remained bowed. When he spoke, his voice was a desiccated replica of itself.

‘I meant there’s no… toilet or toilet paper. I… had to go just to the side here.’

A proud and fastidious man, her beloved papa, reduced to this. Somehow, Agnès managed to stop herself from weeping. Calling on every resource she had, she spoke out in a strong, clear voice.

‘Pee-pee and ca-ca aren’t going to kill us, you know.’

He didn’t respond.

‘Hey – remember when I was a toddler? I don’t remember it but you and Mama used to say that when I’d finished on my potty, my favourite game was pouring everything I’d done over my head. Do you remember that?’

He looked up, the slightest smile of recognition lightening his face.

‘Yes. For a time, you were the most disgusting child.’

‘Bodily emissions aren’t going to kill us. And our hair will grow back. Well, mine will. And things could be worse, Papa. Thanks to these gorgeous
bon chic
,
bon genre
nighties, at least we won’t have to look at each other’s wrinkly old bodies now, will we?’

Vincent gave a little laugh.

‘
That’s
it. We’re not beaten. We haven’t even begun to fight.’ Rasping the chain through the eyebolt, she looked carefully at the way it attached to her wrist restraint. Whatever the fight was going to consist of, she realised, it wouldn’t involve freeing themselves from their manacles. It would be a waste of valuable energy to try. ‘We’ll get out of this, Papa. I’m absolutely certain of it.’

More thunder from above, rolling in the opposite direction this time.

‘The van is parked under a rail viaduct, isn’t it? That’s why they haven’t bothered gagging us.’

Vincent’s face seemed more animated suddenly. Anger was a great galvaniser.

‘They were wrong, weren’t they? The so-called
experts
. They said the Sons and Daughters of the Just Cause were “a joke”. Or a smokescreen.’ He essayed the neutral Parisian accent. “They’re not terrorists.” Well look at
us
! I go to the door. A man in a ski-mask pushes me over, then injects something into my arm. Next thing I know, I wake up in this hell hole. Who do they think has done that? Children?’

Agnès smiled.

‘That’s better, Papa. Much better. My experience was the same. The injection part anyway.’

‘Exactly!’

‘But the people who’ve taken us are
not
terrorists, Papa. What sort of targets are we? And there are numerous other factors. Whoever is doing this is doing it to punish us personally. So who? Come on. Let’s get our brains in gear. Who hates us? Who have we wronged? No, let me rephrase that. Who might think they have been wronged by us?’

‘No, no, no, it’s… terrorists, isn’t it? Fanatics. Lunatics. No?’

Agnès calmly returned his look, saying nothing. After a long moment, he shook his head.

‘You’re right. It’s not terrorists.’

‘No, it isn’t. And that’s good news because it’s not our field. Whoever has done this is a bank robber, an enforcer, a rapist – a murderer. We’re in our comfort zone here!’