Jacquot and the Waterman (5 page)

Now, thought Jacquot as he made his way along the
lanes of Le Panier, now it looked like Boni had gone for
good.

Guimpier was tall, gaunt and round-shouldered, a
short-sleeved singlet visible beneath his cream striped
shirt, the loose knot of his tie not quite hiding the collar
button. His hair was a comb-tined mix of grey and white,
slicked straight back off a high forehead, his eyes blue and
slanted, lips thin as splinters, cheeks long and hollow.
Le
Chef.
The Man. He might look like he'd been squeezed
out of a tube but Jacquot knew that Guimpier could
handle himself. Thirty years with the force and only the
last four behind a desk.

Guimpier nodded to a chair and Jacquot sat down.
Guimpier stayed standing, slid his shaking hands into his
pockets and looked back down into the street where a
jackhammer grunted. The shaking hands were the reason
he found himself behind a desk.

'You hear?' began Guimpier, keeping his back to Jacquot.

'Hear what?'

'Rully. Broke his leg. All we need.'

Jacquot closed his eyes. Opened them. 'When?'

'Saturday.'

'How?'

'How do you think?'

'Where is he?'

'Conception. You should call in, see him.'

Jacquot nodded.

'Any luck with the body?' continued Guimpier.

The body. The reason Jacquot had been out of town.
There'd been no need to go but it beat staying in the
apartment. Boni had returned home Friday evening, still
in her uniform, and they'd started straight in. The way it
had been the last few weeks. The sniping, the scratching.
Little things. Then a weighted silence. Moving around the
apartment like shadows, no word spoken.

The drive north had soothed him, the chalky bluffs, the
clear, snaking highway, a high blue sky and the lulling salsa
rhythms of Stan Getz and Joao Gilberto. And then in Aix
the company of his old friend Desjartes, from way back.
He'd arrived in time for lunch, a little place off Cours
Mirabeau, just the two of them talking over old times, then
seen the body and noted the tattoo - eleven letters in red
and blue and green, elegantly scrolled and stitched into
the skin high up on the inside of the thigh. The tattoo and
the welts, a web of them criss-crossed over her buttocks
and the tops of her legs, the original red stripes leached by
the water into a cross-hatching of black lines. The third
body they'd retrieved in as many months.

'Like they said,' Jacquot shrugged. 'Nothing. Except the
tattoo. We're checking prints and missing persons.

Something'll turn up if she was from round here, or has
form.'

Guimpier turned from the window, pulled out his chair
and sat down.

'How long was she in the water?' he asked, stretching
out and clasping his hands round the back of his head.

'According to Desjartes's boys, a week, ten days.'

'Drowned there or dumped?'

'They're pretty sure she was drowned there. Fresh
water in the lungs - no trace of salt, chlorine or fluoride.'

Guimpier took a deep breath, let his eyes drift to the
ceiling, then dropped them back on Jacquot. 'Access to the
lake?'

'Not easy. There's the slipway at Salon-le-Vitiy, but this
time of year there's too many people around. A restaurant,
the sail school, campsite. He'd never have managed it. And
there's no current to account for the drift. Three kilometres, at least, to the beach where she was found.'

'Any other possible drop-offs?'

'The rest of the shoreline is too thickly wooded. Maybe
a ten-metre bank most of the way round and difficult to
reach. Too much trouble to carry or walk her through. The
beach is different. I went out yesterday, took a look with
Desjartes. There's a track leads down from the road. It's
rough going, but not that rough.'

'So he knows the area?'

Jacquot shrugged. 'Not necessarily. He could have
checked it out beforehand. It's pretty deserted round
there.'

Guimpier nodded, took it in. 'Whose land?'

'A farmer called Prud'homme.'

'Anything on him?'
'Not a thing. Too old, anyway. Late seventies. Maybe
eighties.'

'Family? Workers?'

'According to Desjartes, all accounted for.'

'Anything on the track? The beach? Tyre marks? Footprints?'

'Nothing. No rain up there the last month.'

'Who found her?'

'An English guy. Stopped there with his family.'

Guimpier looked interested. 'Could there be any
involvement?'

Jacquot shook his head. 'When the body went into the
lake, they were staying at a
gîte
outside Orange; place
called Courthezon. Desjartes checked their stoiy and it all
held.'

'She drugged?' asked Guimpier, moving on.

'They're still waiting for the tests to confirm it, but
Desjartes reckons if she was, she was maybe coming
round. Realised what was happening and tried to fight
back.'

'And how does he figure that?'

'There were traces of a rubbery black material under
two of her fingernails. Actually a sponge. Neoprene. Looks
like our man wore a wetsuit.'

'Water gets cold up there at night,' said Guimpier
thoughtfully. 'Sex?'

'Hard to say. Again, we'll have to wait for the report.
But she'd been beaten.'

Guimpier gave him a questioning look.

'Caned,' explained Jacquot. 'What with the tattoo,
Desjartes reckons it might be work-related.'

'On the game?'
'It looks that way.'

The other victims? They weren't hookers.'

'Not so far as we've been able to establish.'

'Any clothes? Jewellery? Anything lying about?' This
last was said hopefully. They needed something.

Jacquot shook his head.