The Honest Folk of Guadeloupe (19 page)

“What money?”

“There’s always money for politicians in our
département
.”

“Including yourself, Monsieur Desterres?”

“If money’d been my motivation, I could’ve gone into an alliance with Dugain and his pals.” He paused. “My family is not
nouveau riche
. We’ve been here a long time after having moved down to Trinidad when Victor Hugues and the French Revolution set up their guillotine and started chopping off the heads of the aristocrats.” He looked at her without blinking. “A jumped-up mulatto from Martinique.”

“Victor Hugues?”

“Dugain’d done good work on the mangrove—and dined off that for ten years. The mangrove was excellent for his profile among the researchers at the university, and through them, with the Ministry of the Environment.”

“You got Dugain to give a job to a young lady.”

Silence.

“Mademoiselle Augustin—Marie Pierre Augustin—tells me you helped her get a job in Dugain’s shop.”

“She can also tell you why I helped her.”

“You raped her.”

“I’ve never raped anybody.” He began to lose control of the immobile face. “Why do you accuse me of rape? Why not the Indian? He was with the damn nurse. Why don’t you accuse him?”

“You helped Mademoiselle Augustin find a job with Dugain and now she has sufficient funds to travel to Brazil with her friend and to set up a little business in leather goods.”

“I know nothing about that. With a male friend?”

Anne Marie nodded.

Desterres’s blank face broke into a broad smile.

“Geneviève Lecurieux?”

Anne Marie watched carefully as he ran the back of his hand across his mouth. “You knew her? Before the meeting at Tarare beach, had you ever met Geneviève Lecurieux?”

“You think the nurse was Geneviève Lecurieux?” The unblinking eyes stared back at her.

“You are going to lie?”

“Why should I lie?”

“You’re scared and because there’s something you wish to hide.”

“I’ve told you the truth.”

“Monsieur Desterres, you knew it wasn’t Vaton who was killed.”

He raised his hand in a spontaneous gesture of protest. “I knew nothing,
madame
, and I still don’t.”

“You knew Evelyne Vaton was a friend of Geneviève Lecurieux.”

He shook his head. “I haven’t seen Geneviève Lecurieux in a very long time.” A dismissive shrug. “She lives in Paris. She’s a doctor, not a nurse. It was a young nurse I met on the beach. Along with the strange Indian. What has any of this got to do with Geneviève?”

“The murdered woman was staying with Geneviève’s family.”

“She said she was in Basse-Terre—nothing else.”

“Vaton and Lecurieux work in the same hospital.” A pause. “Lecurieux was with Richard and the murdered girl—but you didn’t tell me.” She folded her arms. “That’s lying.”

Although the evening air was now cool, there were large patches of sweat under the arms of Desterres’s green shirt. Perspiration pearled his forehead. “As far as I know, Mademoiselle Lecurieux’s in Paris.”

“Perhaps you can tell me who you spent Sunday afternoon with?”

“I met the two people on Sunday morning.”

“There was another woman, wasn’t there, Monsieur Desterres?”

“No.” He ran his tongue along the pale lips.

“You don’t have an alibi for Sunday afternoon.”

“I was in my restaurant.”

“Until what time?”

“Until the last customer had left … eight, nine o’clock in the evening.”

“The girl was murdered around midnight on Sunday night.”

“She left with the Indian. I never saw her again.”

He licked his lip again as he turned to glance at the police officer sitting by the door. The eyes were slightly bloodshot.

The ocean breeze wafted through the open window, tugging at the lace curtain.

“Well, Monsieur Desterres?”

“I’ve told you everything,
madame le juge
.”

“There was another woman, wasn’t there?”

Desterres looked at her without speaking, without blinking.

“You’ve nothing to add?”

“You’ve already made up your mind.”

Anne Marie opened her drawer. She took out the black and white photograph. Without looking at them—the closed eyes and the false tranquility of death—she pushed it toward him. “This is the woman in the morgue.”

Taking the photograph he frowned slightly, but there was no hint of recognition.

“Do you know this woman?”

“Whatever I say,” Desterres said, holding the photograph at a distance from his eyes, then looking up at Anne Marie, “I get to spend the night at the
maison d’arrêt
.”

Anne Marie made a movement of irritation with her hand. She pointed at the photograph. “Do you know this woman?”

“Geneviève has parents here, people who know her. This isn’t her.”

“Who is it?”

“The nurse who called herself Véli.”

From the open drawer she pulled out a thick pad of lined paper.

“I think it’s the nurse. I’d never seen her before and once she left, I never saw her again. She went off with the Indian. It’s not Lecurieux. You’re bent upon arresting me—so why bother asking me? Ask the other witnesses—the two gays on the beach.”

“Who?”

“They saw me. A schoolteacher and another man—he’s a technician at RFO by the name of Léonidas. Check with him—but you won’t, will you, because it’s me you want to put in the shit.” Desterres emitted a rasping laugh as he handed the photographs back to her. “You’ll regret the mistake,
madame le juge
.”

Anne Marie looked at the photograph. A full frontal view— narrow hips and large breasts. The girl must have been pretty, a pleasant face and youthful body. Now she was dead. Dead and unclaimed in the city morgue. Repressing a sigh of empathy, Anne Marie placed the photographs back in the folder.

There was a mocking tone to Desterres’s voice, “It certainly isn’t Geneviève Lecurieux.”

Anne Marie nodded to the policeman, who, catching her eye, stood up.

“Phone her—Lecurieux should be in Paris.”

“Should be, Monsieur Desterres?”

“She’s one of those women who aren’t interested in men. There was a time—a long, long time ago—when Geneviève was interested in the environment.” He paused. “Five, six years ago before she went off to Africa. I’ve had no news—she’s probably pounding millet in Togo and getting back to her African roots.”

Anne Marie took out the enlargement of the Polaroid—the photograph of Desterres, the dead girl and Richard. “You admit this is you?”

“Of course—and that is the nurse. And that’s the crazy Indian.”

“Crazy?”

Desterres smiled. “For an intelligent woman, you don’t have much of an understanding of men.”

“What do you mean?”

“Men resort to physical violence when they can’t satisfy their needs in other, more persuasive ways. I may not be intelligent, I may not be rich and I have good reason to believe I’m not physically
prepossessing—but rest assured,
madame le juge
, there’s no shortage of women in my bed.” He smiled. “At least, there used not to be, before we all started to worry about AIDS.”

“Monsieur Desterres, you know this girl and I’m convinced you know what happened to her. You came to see me to protect yourself.”

The policeman was standing behind Desterres and held the unlocked handcuffs in his hand.

“Luc, I was just about to leave.”

“Glad I caught you.”

“What did you want to tell me?”

“I’m not going to be available over the weekend.”

“You told me that this morning.”

“I wanted to hear your voice, Anne Marie.”

“If you want to hear my voice, you can give me a ring during the week.”

“Why are you so aggressive?”

“Your wife isn’t waiting for you?”

“I missed you and now that I phone you, you start to attack me.”

“Luc, I’m tired.”

“I know you’re tired and I want to be of help.”

“That’s why you accuse me of attacking you?”

“I want to help. I’m your friend, remember?”

“It’s been a long day. I was in the morgue again this evening. I seem to spend my time talking to people whose company I could easily do without.”

“You can do without my company?”

“Luc, why do you take everything so personally?”

“I’d like to see you.”

“You have your wife.”

“We’ve had this conversation before, Anne Marie.”

“Precisely.”

“I’d willingly get a divorce. You’ve only to say the word.”

“Luc, let’s not go into all that. Not now. Another time, but not now.”

“You never want to talk.”

“In bed, I recall it was you who refused to talk.”

“At two in the morning I’m not really interested in the difference between male and female pubic hair.”

“I can understand that, Luc.”

“Can you understand I’m your friend?”

“Go home, Luc. I’m sure your wife’ll be pleased to see you, and unlike me, she won’t be aggressive. She loves your company and she isn’t difficult as I am. She won’t wake up in the night and make unreasonable demands. Perhaps she doesn’t care about female pubic hair—and even less about male pubic hair. A good and loving wife, you don’t want to lose her. She can give you all the warmth and affection an aggressive magistrate could never give you. Then in the middle of next week, if you really feel you want to talk to me—about pubic hair or my aggressiveness—you can give me a ring. But only if you feel like it. Goodnight, Luc, and have a pleasant weekend.”

The
procureur
had appeared out of the crowd. He smiled tensely and took Anne Marie by the arm.

The reflected light on a steel helmet reminded her of Algeria and she felt fear in her belly—fear that took her back to 1958.

The rue Henri IV had been sealed off to traffic. One or two cars remained, perched with two wheels on the sidewalk outside the school. The police had set red tape across the road to keep the hushed crowd at a distance.

The air away from the sea was warm and damp.

Bright beams were trained on the front of the school. Two men with machine guns and leather boots, heavily overdressed in the tropical night, their bodies bulky beneath the flak jackets, were like insects caught against the pink wall.

The center of the city had fallen silent, apart from the croaking threnody of the frogs. The crowd did not speak. From somewhere far distant came the wail of a siren and the approaching
clap clap clap
of a helicopter rotor blade.

One of the officers gestured and the two men moved sideways, out of the circle of light, toward the nearest of the CRS vans.

Bastia was in charge. He stood behind the Renault truck, holding the transmitter loosely in one hand, while in the other he had a hailer. He was not in uniform and Anne Marie noticed incongruously that he
wore scuffed boating shoes without socks. He was blaspheming in his soft, Corsican accent.

Beside him, two unsmiling men had trained their rifles on the school. Another man had climbed onto the roof of the optician’s.

“Tell Bourguignon to switch that damn light off.” Bastia turned and caught sight of Anne Marie. “A rasta and he’s already killed someone.” He saluted perfunctorily.

“Who?”

“About five minutes ago there were was the sound of gunfire. Somebody crying and then another explosion.”

“Who?” Anne Marie spoke with difficulty. A knot in her gut. “I was on the phone to Lucette about an hour ago,” Anne Marie said.

“Lucette?”

“Miss Salondy—the headmistress. My sister-in-law. She’s in her office.”

Bastia rubbed his chin unhappily, looking at Anne Marie.

“Where’s Miss Salondy now?”

Bastia pointed to the administration buildings where Anne Marie had been talking with Lucette, where the two women had walked across the yard, between the trees, beneath the pendulous, unripe mangoes swaying gently at the end of their long stalks. Where Anne Marie had been reminded of her school years in Algeria.

“The perpetrator’s hiding there. He’s armed—and he’s already killed the janitor. Stabbed in the heart with a syringe.”

Anne Marie ran a hand along her forehead. “Arnaud, give me a cigarette.” Overhead, the helicopter hovered and cast down its cone of bright light onto the corrugated roofs.

“Stupid bastards,” Bastia said, and rasped an order into the walkie-talkie.

“Can’t be many people inside the school at the moment.”

The
procureur
asked, “How are you operating?”

Bastia gave the
procureur
a brief glance, devoid of sympathy. “Waiting for you,
monsieur le procureur
.” If he was being sarcastic, there was no hint of it in his voice. “I’ve sent three men in through the back, through the
boulangerie
in the rue Sadi Carnot. Equipped with tear gas and stun grenades but no night vision, I’m afraid. The helicopter’s working as a decoy. At the moment we don’t know
what kind of firepower he’s got and we don’t know who he’s got in there with him.”

“Hostages?”

“He mixes his French with Dominican Creole. I can’t understand his English. High on ganja or something. Up there”—he pointed—“behind the window. Screaming a minute ago, saying he was going to kill everybody.”

“Is he going to kill everybody?”

“We tried to phone into the school but nobody’s answering,” Bastia said. “You can hear the phone ringing from here. Ignorant bastard probably doesn’t know what a telephone is. Immigrants. Too many damn immigrants in this island.”

“Where exactly is he?”

“There’s the concierge and his family still in there. From what the Dominican seems to be saying, there are two women with him.”

“You could drop somebody onto the roof.”

“Corrugated iron,
monsieur le procureur
. If our rasta gets suspicious, he’ll shoot through the ceiling.”

“A risk we’ll have to take.”

“No point in losing a set of balls.” Bastia grimaced at Anne Marie.

The
procureur
asked dryly, “The
préfet
’s been informed?”