Jacquot and the Waterman (82 page)

'So what do we know about this Julianne Perot? Her background?'

'Well, she's not Aixoise. And nor is she Marseillaise. We were right there. According to her employment records she comes from - you'll love this - Villars-les-Dombes.'

'The Dombes? Lakeland?'

'The same. Just along the road from Aix.'

'What else?'

'Forty-three years old. Unmarried. Only child. Both parents dead. Taken into care when she was thirteen. Finished school in Villars and trained as a nurse in Lyons, going on to specialise in orthopaedics. Co-workers at the clinic said she was friendly and conscientious but she kept to herself. After her arrest, the local police searched her home - a small, one-bedroom apartment a few streets from the clinic - but found nothing of any significance. Except for a stack of tourist brochures, maps and guides to—'

'Don't tell me,' interrupted Madame Bonnefoy. 'Marseilles, La
Rochelle ..."

'. . . Cherbourg, Dieppe, Annecy. In Marseilles, Lescure discovered that she worked at La Conception. Four months.' Jacquot thought it prudent not to add that it was the same hospital where his partner, Rully, had been laid up. The possibility that Jacquot might have passed the Waterman in a corridor, shared a lift with her, or that Rully might have had his pillows plumped by her had not escaped him.

There was a long pause at the end of the line. And then:

What else? There's something you're not telling me, Daniel. I know it.'

Jacquot smiled, recrossed his ankles. He was enjoying this.

'Her parents.'

'Yes?'

'They both drowned.'

'Drowned
? You
are
joking?'

'Absolutely not, Madame.'

'So? Tell me.'

'After Perot's arrest, Lescure had a couple of his boys go to Villars, ask around. According to police files, her father died first. Nearly forty years ago. The family had a smallholding, a few hectares outside Bouligneux. Maize in the summer, fish, a few ducks. He was clearing a channel between two ponds when a sluice gate gave way. The weight of water crushed him against the second sluice gate and that was that. Accidental death.'

'And the other?'

'Perot's mother died ten years later. Cause of death, a heart attack, in the bath.'

'Incredible.'

'But that's not all,' continued Jacquot, saving the best for last. 'She'd been raped first.'

After a second's delay, Madame Bonnefoy came back on the line: 'Did they find who did it?'

'They drew a blank. No suspects. No arrest.' 'What about the daughter? She was what, fifteen, fourteen? Didn't she see anything, hear anything?'

'Asleep in bed, according to the reports. Didn't see or hear a thing. And there's something else. While Lescure's boys were in Villars they traced a journalist who'd covered the case for the local paper. Old fellow, retired now, called Davide. According to him, it wasn't the happiest of families. Father was a drunk, mother a loud-mouth and bully. People he spoke to after her death seemed to think "good riddance". She wasn't popular. There were even whispers that she might have been responsible for her husband's death. Apparently his skull had been fractured, but this was put down to the force of water hurling him against the sluice gate. Whatever, no one had a good word for her, but they all said how sorry they felt for the daughter, growing up in a home like that.'

'Abusive?'

'Who can say, Madame? It was a long time ago.'

'So where is she now, the daughter?'

'Police custody in Grenoble. But not for much longer. Lescure says he'll have to release her for clinical evaluation. If she won't talk, won't cooperate, he has no option.'

'Maybe the doctors will get somewhere with her.'

'I'm not holding my breath.'

'You don't think so?'

Jacquot shook his head as though Solange Bonnefoy was across the desk from him. 'She was blank, Madame. Just closed down.'

'You were there?'

'At the lake. Sitting beside her, Madame.'

'In Aix? That's Savoyard jurisdiction.'

Jacquot smiled. Just the kind of thing Marseilles's examining magistrate would latch onto. 'Chief Inspector Lescure was kind enough to include me in his team,' he replied.

'Impressions?'

'Lescure or the Waterman?'

There was silence down the line, then another sigh.

'Resigned,' said Jacquot. 'Not particularly happy at being picked up, but not sorry either.'

'I heard she tried to make a run for it.'

'Hardly a run, Madame. When I introduced myself, she gave me a long, hard look, as though she recognised me from somewhere, then got up and started walking away - like I'd said something offensive, propositioned her, you know? It was Lescure who did the honours, falling in beside her. Took her arm in his and just steered her along the path to a car.'

'A good result, then.'

'A good result, Madame.'

There was another silence from Solange Bonnefoy. And then: 'So when are you coming home to Marseilles, Daniel? We miss you.'

'Who can say, Madame?' replied Jacquot, swinging round in his chair, watching the rain spatter across his window. 'Who can say?'

Dorothy Linda O'Brien 17th 1921 - September 4th 2000