The Circle (65 page)

On the paper it said:

She betrayed your trust and your love, Martin. She deserved to be punished.

Summer 2010. Spain.

It was hot. He went slowly down the cobbled streets bordered with lanterns and flowered balconies towards the Plaza Mayor, and he saw dozens of happy people in the warm Spanish night. It was strange, he thought, how a simple football match can make millions of people happy for a few hours.

As he swayed through the crowd that was dancing, singing, shouting their joy to his face, he could hear the hysterical chatter of the television presenters from the balconies above him.

The Plaza Mayor was lined on all four sides by arcades, its facades decorated with eighteenth-century frescoes. Its bright colours made it look so much like an Italian piazza that several pasta brands had used it in their commercials. The thought of it made him smile, a ghostly smile, due to the fact that he'd been drunk since five o'clock in the afternoon and now it was past midnight.

He collapsed into the only empty chair on the terrace.

‘You've been drinking,' said Pedro, putting down his beer and staring at him, laughing.

‘Mmm … What will you have?'

Pedro pointed to his empty glass.

‘Same again.'

He saw his friend was about to talk to him about the French team. He liked to tease Servaz about it.

‘Well, did they get rid of the manager?' asked Pedro.

‘Not yet,' said Servaz.

‘And that player who insulted him, and the ones who went on strike during training, will they be punished?'

Servaz gave him an almost delighted smile: there could be only one country where multimillionaire players were capable of going out on strike during the World Cup: his own. Suddenly he was thirsty.

He stood up unsteadily and went into the big café to order
una caña
and a
carajillo de cognac.
He watched the barman as he poured the powdered sugar into the bottom of a tiny glass, added two coffee grains, lemon zest, a shot of brandy, then brought the potion almost to the boil with the coffee maker's steam spout before setting it on fire with his lighter and pouring black coffee into it. Servaz narrowed his eyes with an air of absolute seriousness which betrayed the extent of his drunkenness.

When he went back out, with his scorching glass on a little plate, Pedro was still there, going back over the match for the tenth time with the people at the next table. Servaz went over to his chair but missed it when he tried to sit on it. The coffee and brandy splashed over his shirt and as he lay on the ground he burst out laughing, oblivious to the looks from the other tables.

‘That's enough,' said Pedro. ‘Time to go home.'

He grabbed the policeman under his arms and dragged him into the adjacent street. He was smaller than Servaz, but stronger. Servaz leaned on his shoulder. He looked above the roofs at the starry night, a night like a poem by García Lorca. He had decided to take every holiday day, every hour he was entitled to, and no one at the Criminal Division had found any reason to object, in the circumstances.

Not long after he'd put in for his holiday, Sarah Lillenfeld and Virginie Croze had been indicted and imprisoned, other members of the Circle had been remanded in custody, and the investigation was continuing – but without him, now. He had packed his suitcase and gone to see Ziegler, who'd been granted ten days' medical leave after the attack, and who would have to appear once again before the gendarmerie's disciplinary board. He wondered what the sanction would be this time. He knew that Irène was close to handing in her resignation, and the thought of it made him sad. She had told him, too, that she had hacked into the computer system at the prison where Lisa Ferney was locked up, and that Lisa was her bait: she had a strange conviction that Hirtmann would get in touch with her someday. Then he had gone on his way and found refuge in this little village on the other side of the Pyrenees, in the province of Huesca in the Alto Aragon, four hours' drive from Toulouse. In the middle of nowhere, the region was breathtakingly beautiful. No one would come looking for him here. No one knew him. Here he was
el Francès.
Except to Pedro and a few others, whom he'd known
for only two weeks, but whom he presumptuously considered his friends.

Now Pedro stopped every three yards, with Servaz leaning on him, to celebrate Spain's victory with everyone he met – which seemed like the entire town. Servaz had got a phone call from the director a few days earlier, too: they had discovered the origins of the leak in the press. There had simply been no leak. At least not from inside the force. They went back to grill the manager of the Internet café – Servaz recalled Patrick, the manager with cold stubborn eyes behind his glasses – and Patrick admitted that he had called the papers as soon as they had left. By the sound of it the reporter himself had deduced Servaz's identity from the manager's description. When Patrick had told him that the cops had received an e-mail sent from his Internet café, that they were looking for a tall man who spoke with a slight accent and that they had seemed in a bit of a panic, the reporter immediately recalled the most sensational criminal affair in recent years.

‘You're a lucky man,' said Servaz in a thick voice as they made their way arm in arm.

‘Why?'

‘To live here.'

Pedro shrugged. They went through the door of the
hostal
, along the corridor until they reached the inner patio. White walls and galleries of varnished wood ran around each floor, decorated with green pot plants and antique furniture. There was a sweet smell of clean laundry and jasmine. They climbed the stairs to the third floor, and Pedro pushed open the door of the room, which was never locked.

‘One day you'll tell me what happened to you,' he said, putting him down on the bed. ‘I'd be interested to know. You don't destroy yourself like this without a reason.'

‘You are a … philosopher,
amigo.'

‘Yes. I'm a philosopher. I probably haven't read as many books as you,' added Pedro, glancing at the Latin authors lined up on the dresser as he pulled off Servaz's shoes. ‘But I've read a few. And I know how to read people's hearts. You only know how to read words.'

There wasn't much in the little room apart from the books: a suitcase, some clothing, a Walkman of the kind no one, except Servaz, used any more, and CDs – Mahler's symphonies. That was the
advantage of music over books, he always said to himself. Music took up less room.

‘I love you,
hombre.'

‘You are drunk. Goodnight,' said Pedro.

And he switched off the light.

Servaz was roused at seven in the morning by the din of a pneumatic drill, car horns blaring, and workers calling to each other, and once again he wondered how this country got by on so little sleep. As inert and empty as a puppet that's lost its strings, he lay for a long time staring at the ceiling. He could tell his mouth was furry, his breath was heavy. He had a terrible headache. He got up and dragged himself to the bathroom. Without hurrying. Nobody was expecting him anywhere. There was no more urgency in his life.

He let the lukewarm water flow over his neck and shoulders. He brushed his teeth and put on his last clean shirt. He filled a glass from the tap and dropped an aspirin into it.

Ten minutes later he was heading up the main street, passing underneath an arch to turn into a narrow shady street that led up through the arid hillside. All around him the village was waking up. He inhaled the smells of coffee, and of flowers enlivened by the morning. He could hear children shouting. Radios celebrating the victory – they couldn't get enough of it. All this energy that he felt around him, all this
life.
He thought about the economic crisis, all those reporters talking airily of people and things they knew nothing about, repeating numbers and statistics until they were blue in the face. And all the bankers, economists, speculators, corrupt financiers and blind politicians – they should come here, to understand. People here were alive. They wanted to work. To exist. To live. Not just survive.

Unlike me
, he thought.

He climbed up the hill. Above the rooftops, a plane left a white trail in the pale blue sky. He reached the cathedral built against the cliff amidst the pine trees. He followed the long gallery of colonnades, went up a few steps and found himself in the cool shady cloister. He walked around the green basin of water and continued climbing up the path that wound its way up to the top of the cliff. This was where you had the best view. A huge Christ, eight metres high, spread his arms, extending his futile blessing to the entire region.

It was a magnificent panorama. But what brought him here every morning was not the view: it was the cliff. And the void. The call of the void. It was a temptation. A possible liberation. He had been toying with the idea for a while, but one thing kept him from going through with it: Margot. He knew as well as anyone what it meant to lose a father in this way. He thought a great deal about David, too. Once you opened the door to it, suicide was like a tenant you couldn't evict. He had given it a great deal of thought and had reached the conclusion that if he made his decision, he would make it happen here. This would be the best way. A fall of thirty metres – no way to bungle it. No sordid death in a hotel room. He would take flight. Into sunlight and blueness.

He'd been toying with the idea for several days – perhaps weeks. It was just an idea. He had no intention of going through with it. At least not for now. But the idea in itself was comforting. He knew that he was depressed and that there were ways to treat depression – but he didn't feel like it. He had seen too many dead people, had buried too many of them, had been betrayed too often. He was weary. All he wanted was to rest and to forget, but it all kept coming back, again and again. He was tired of seeing Marianne's face in his memory, and his parents', and others' as well. He was convinced that she was dead and, like Hirtmann's other victims, she would never be found. She had wanted to save her son, but she had also betrayed Servaz. He wanted to believe, in spite of everything, that there had been something sincere about their reunion, that she had not slept with him merely out of self-interest. But every time he thought about what she must have gone through before dying, staring at the thought head-on was as unbearable as staring at the sun.

He could see Pedro leaving his workshop, a tiny figure in overalls all the way down below. Pedro raised his head to look up at the sky, in his direction, but he didn't see him. He was watching the children as they headed off to go swimming in the river.

‘They told me I'd find you here.'

The voice made him jump. He turned round. Ordinarily, he would have been happy to see her. But that morning, he didn't know whether he was happy – or ashamed. She had changed. She had removed her piercings and her hair was once again its natural colour. She looked several years older.

‘How did you find me?'

‘It looks like it wasn't just your love of books you gave me but also your investigator's genes, Dad.'

She had obviously prepared her words in advance, and it made him smile. She was suntanned, wearing a tank top and a pair of denim shorts.

‘I remembered that you and Mum and I came here when I was a kid, and that you liked this place a lot. But it's not the first place I've been to. I've been looking for you for over a week.'

She took two steps and leaned out – and immediately recoiled.

‘Wow! What a view – but it's so high up!'

She did not see him blush with shame, his stomach churning.

They spoke. In the days and nights that followed, they spoke. Drank. Spoke. Smoked, laughed, spoke – and even danced. He got to know his daughter. Elias was there, too, a silent beanpole of a boy with hair that covered half his face. Servaz realised that he liked him. Sometimes he kept them company; sometimes he left them on their own. They had wonderful days where they were together in a way they had never been, and other days when they argued. Like the night she found him dead drunk after she had spent the evening with Elias. He began to drink less. Then not at all. They seemed to have all the time in the world. School did not start for weeks and he wondered if she had planned to work during the summer holidays. Eventually he asked her when they would be leaving.

‘Whenever you're ready,' she answered. ‘You're coming with us.'

He introduced them to Pedro and others, and they made a happy little team. Elias began to talk – at least, a little bit. They went to bed late, but he realised that when he got up in the morning he had more energy. And he no longer stayed on his bed staring at the ceiling. Margot and Elias had a room on the floor below his, and it looked out onto the patio like his, and on mornings when he was making a slow start she would come up and knock on his door. They went on long walks or drives through the region, and they discovered vistas which left them speechless, whole villages of stone and slate straight out of a Western. They bathed in streams of ice-cold water. They went cycling and canoeing. They chatted with the locals and with tourists, they went to parties to which they were given last-minute invitations. She took photos and for once he didn't mind having his picture taken. To his great surprise he discovered that he
could smile. When they came back from their outings, they were always famished.

The days went by, halcyon days, simple, perfect. Nothing was planned, nothing really mattered. Nothing was at stake. And then one morning, shortly before dawn, he woke up, very calm, took a shower and packed his suitcase. That night he had dreamt about her. Marianne was alive. Somewhere. And she needed him. If Hirtmann had already killed her, he would have found a way to let him know. Servaz left his room. Everyone was still asleep on the other floors, but daylight had already reached the patio. He went down, his suitcase in his hand, took a deep breath to fill himself one last time with the perfume of jasmine and laundry, of wax polish and departure. He had loved this place. Then he knocked on the door.