The First Fingerprint (27 page)

“There are some things you haven't told me, Professor. You haven't told me why you followed her that night in particular. Why?”

“I can't answer that.”

“Listen, Monsieur Palestro,” Vidal said, “we're going to be honest with you: we have at least one good reason to take you into custody, and you could end up rotting in prison for a few months. Of course, we could turn a blind eye to what you've just told us, for the moment at least. But you must understand that your statement makes you the ideal suspect. This was a murder, you do understand that?”

“Yes, perfectly.”

“So, I'll ask you my colleague's question again. Why did you follow her that evening?”

“I've told you, I have no answer to that. It must have been intuition.”

“Perhaps …”

They stared at each other for some time, then the scientist set off again. They went as far as the diggers' shed. It was a dilapidated structure, just a few struts nailed to wobbly beams and covered with rusty corrugated iron. Through the window they could see a table covered with trowels of various sizes and a mason's riddle.

“I have one more question to ask you,” de Palma said. “The evening in question … do you remember the exact date?”

“Of course. It was November 30. I never saw her again.”

“November 30,” Vidal repeated out loud, “and you never saw her again.”

De Palma looked daggers at his colleague.

“Do you know a psychiatrist called François Caillol?” asked Vidal, ignoring the Baron's evil look.

Palestro leaned on the side of the shed.

“In the prehistory world, everyone knows Caillol. He specializes in neuropsychology and he worked with Christine on rituals, trances and hallucinations.”

“Do you know him personally?”

“No. Christine knew him well, but I don't. In fact, I don't really believe in all his theories.”

“What do you mean?”

“His idea is that, by studying certain ethnic groups, we can get a good understanding of Magdalenian man—Christine agreed with this. Caillol is probably not wrong, fundamentally, but I think we should be extremely prudent about the world of magic and superstition. Otherwise there's a risk of relying solely on inferences, of saying that things are like that among Australian Aborigines, and so they must have been the same in the caves. It's a bit reductive.”

“Did you know that he has killed at least two young women over the past few months?” Vidal asked.

“No.”

“You obviously don't read the papers … Have you ever seen this man?”

Vidal handed him a photo of Franck Luccioni. Palestro looked at it for a moment and replied without the slightest hesitation:

“No, definitely not. She was seeing someone, but it wasn't him.”

Vidal and de Palma exchanged glances.

“Can you describe him?”

“O.K., I have to admit that I'm a jealous man. As soon as I noticed that Christine's attitude toward me had changed, I began to observe all kinds of details in her behavior. I began to follow her, like I said. And that's how I discovered that there was a man in her life!”

“What did he look like?”

“Tall. About one meter eighty-five. Blond hair. What else? He wore glasses. That's all.”

“Thick glasses?”

“Yes, that's right.”

“Can you describe him in more detail?”

“Listen, the easiest way to describe him would be to say that he looked like Christine. It was striking. He was just like her, but a man.”

“Where did you see him?”

“The first time was in Aix. He was waiting in the university car park.”

“And the second time?”

“Outside her building, when I followed her. He walked around my car, then he vanished.”

The two policemen looked at each other for a long time. Then de Palma held out his hand to the professor.

“She was homosexual, wasn't she?”

Palestro only grimaced.

“Je ne pourrai plus jamais sortir de cette forêt!

Dieu sait jusqu'à où cette bête m'a mené
.

Je croyais cependant l'avoir blessé à mort: et voici des traces de sang!”

The first thunderstorm broke in the early afternoon. The electricity in the air was disturbing the radio waves of France Musique as it broadcast “Pelléas et Mélisandre”; but Golaud's voice was defiant:

“Mais maintenant, je l'ai perdue de vue;

je crois que je me suis perdu moi-même
,

et mes chiens ne me retrouvent plus.”

De Palma waited on place La Castellane, behind a McDonald's delivery van. He tried to adjust his radio, and peered outside: heavy drops threw up dust and shook the buds of the plane trees. In seconds, a peppery sauce smelling of hot tarmac began to pour down boulevard Baille, filling the square and beating down on the roof of the policeman's Clio. A couple of pushers who had been hanging around outside the métro exit now dashed inside the station.

“Je vais revenir sur mes pas…

j'entends pleurer …

Oh! Oh! Qu'y a-t-il au bord de l'eau?”

The storm hammered so hard on the thin metal roof that the din
of the city vanished as if by magic, although a few exasperated horns could still be heard through the curtain of dense spring rain. The radio fell silent.

It was 3:00 p.m. He had to be at Les Baumettes prison before 4:00. Barbieri did not like being made to wait, even though he could be dreadfully late himself. He decided to wait another two minutes before turning to the last resort. The rain was now moving down avenue du Prado, blown by gusts of wind which furiously shook the ancient plane trees.

Things were not getting any better. De Palma switched on his siren, drove up on to the pavement and, a few meters further on, dropped back on to the road which took him as far as the Prado roundabout. The traffic was becoming more fluid, but this did not stop him running all the red lights on boulevard Michelet. Golaud's voice reemerged from the void:

“Je n'en sais rien moi-même
.

Je chassais dans la forêt. Je poursuivais un sanglier
.

Je me suis trompé de chemin
.

Vous avez l'air très jeune. Quel âge avez-vous?”

In the distance, heavy clouds had gathered around the crests of Mont Puget, tinged with pink and black. The cliffs at Luminy were under fire from the sky; huge bolts of lightning came down from the cumuli, hitting the creeks with their jagged shafts.

At Châteauneuf-les-Martigues on Wednesday, Vidal had asked Palestro a great many questions. He was becoming increasingly important, and de Palma did not like it. So later that afternoon, he had given the new boy a bone to chew: a long, routine job concerning the murder of the Ferri couple. The Baron could not help feeling wary of the young officer.

These thoughts deserted him as he parked outside Les Baumettes prison.

There were contorted, hideous statues set in the high outer walls: greed, lust, jealousy … The seven deadly sins.

Morality dressed in stone.

The huge, gray door was covered with obscenities and vengeful graffiti. De Palma rang the bell and held his ear to the reinforced intercom.

“Commandant Michel de Palma, murder squad.”

When the door opened he walked over to the guard-post, slipped his tricolor card into the drawer and smiled at the warder. The glass which separated them had been starred by the impact of a bullet.

“Monsieur Mariani, the head warder of D wing, is expecting you. Is Judge Barbieri with you?”

“No, he must be late.”

“It doesn't matter. Go on, Commandant, you know the way!”

An attractively curvaceous warder in a navy blue uniform was expecting him at the entrance to B wing, her face as dry as a husk. De Palma deposited his Bodyguard and his mobile, then went through some doors, gates and more doors …

Thick bars on the grills. Heavy locks.

The warders, positioned at the far ends of the lines of huge wooden doors, communicated from afar by walkie-talkie. A kind of anxiety rose in him. Suddenly, the loudspeakers started bawling: “North courtyard, end of exercise. I repeat: North courtyard, end of exercise.”

The warder looked at de Palma with narrowed eyes and gave him a peevish smile. He did not return it.

“North courtyard, end of exercise …”

He looked round at the décor, the cream walls, the flaking paint on the bars. He felt the prison's filth envelop him.

“Your prisoner is in solitary, Commandant, D wing. I suppose you know the way?”

“Oh yes, this isn't the first time …”

Five minutes later, all the inmates of the north courtyard had returned to their cells. The doors slammed, and only a few murmurs could be heard. De Palma and the warder set off toward D wing.

They passed the sex offenders section and climbed up a first flight of stairs. More bars. The next corridor was in better condition. They went into another wing. More bars. More stairs. One floor. Two floors. Daylight began to filter into the prison. More bars.

The fifth floor. Solitary confinement. The warder took Judge Barbieri's permit and vanished into her guardroom. It was a good minute before he heard the dull sound of a stamp.

“Go to room number 56. I'll fetch him. Judge Barbieri has just called. He'll be here in about half an hour. Do you want to wait?”

“No, I'll start without him.”

“O.K. I'll be there in two minutes.”

A song rose from the cells. A barbaric rhythm, muffled by the walls. Blows on metal, filling the space with a beat: “Boom, boom … Boom, boom …” Then, a tiny, muted voice. “Hey boss, come over here … boss, I've got something to tell you …”

De Palma looked questioningly at the warder, who stared at the floor.

“Hey boss, come over here … boss, I've got something to tell you …”

He went into the small visiting room, put his backpack on the Formica table and peered out of the window. The storm had passed; the air was now free of humidity. Beyond the prison he could make out the slightest detail in the landscape. Pointe-Rouge bay was a matte, blue patch between the white towers of Le Roy d'Espagne, the green escarpments of the Marseilleveyre hills and the foothills of Notre-Dame de la Garde, scattered with shining villas. Beyond the seawall, the storm had turned the sea white and a cargo ship was wending its way, to Algeria perhaps, or Tunisia, or to the magic of Alexandria … Or perhaps even further, beyond the Mediterranean, beyond Suez.

The head warder awoke him from his reverie. He turned round to face François Caillol. He was closely shaved, his eyes were on fire and his face gleamed. The cancer of prison was already at work. Caillol would never be the same again. De Palma could see that the man who stooped before him, his arms dangling, was not a murderer.

“Good afternoon, Monsieur Caillol. I'm Commandant Michel de Palma, from the murder squad.”

“Good afternoon.”

“Do you want a cigarette? Something to drink?”

“No thanks.”

“Take a seat.”

De Palma looked at the accused and weighed him up. He was going to have problems making him talk. Neither the interrogation, nor the metallic din of the prison, nor his total isolation had made him malleable. On the contrary.

“How are you, Monsieur Caillol?”

“Fine.”

“I'm here unofficially, for personal reasons. But the deputy public prosecutor has given me permission. This never normally happens. Do you understand?”

“Yes.”

“I'm here to ask you about Christine Autran. Did you know her?”

“Yes.”

“What sort of relationship did you have?”

“We weren't lovers, if that's what you mean. She was just a friend. We used to work on projects together.”

“What kinds of projects?”

“We shared the same interests. But for her, it was her profession. To put it simply, let's say that we talked for hours about shamanism.”

“Please don't put it simply with me,” de Palma said coldly. “I might even advise you to be truthful. Is that clear?”

Caillol nodded.

“We had decided to write a book on the subject. I was to deal with the psychoanalytic and neuropsychological aspects.”

De Palma stood up, as though to break the tone of the interview. The psychiatrist would not tell him anything until he had shown that he already knew certain things about him. He took out his exercise book and pretended to look for some information. Caillol observed him discreetly.

“Doctor, why did you go on ethnographic missions with Christine?”

This policeman's ruse went unnoticed. After a few seconds, Caillol answered:

“We made three trips. The first was to Australia in the winter of 1993. The second was to New Guinea in 1994. Then the third was to the highlands of New Guinea in 1997.”

“What were you looking for there?”

“Perhaps you know that ethnology can often come to the assistance of prehistorians, in the same way that reconstructions might be used to validate theories. In Australia, we met some Aborigines in North Queensland and in the Wessel Islands. I was able to work on some paintings there … A Jingaloo Aborigine explained to me at some length the meaning of certain drawings which evoke the history of his tribe in dreamtime.”

“What did Christine do during your stay?”

“More or less the same as me, but her interest was purely ethnographic. She filled up a series of notebooks, especially on their painting techniques.”

“Then you went to New Guinea?”

“The first time, we went to the northwest coast, to a huge tropical forest. We wanted to meet the Asmat. It's a strange country, between earth and water, a forest crisscrossed by thousands of streams. The Asmat are headhunters … They collect skulls in their homes. The men sleep on them to appease their ancestors' spirits.”