Total Chaos (16 page)

“Hey, I never killed a guy.”

“You almost killed him. In my book, that makes you a kind of murderer.”

“I told you, I was plastered. Shit, I only punched the guy.”

“Tell me about it.”

“OK. I'm coming out of the bar, and I see this guy. Looks like a girl from a distance, with his long hair. I ask him for a smoke. Guy says he doesn't have any. He's jerking me around, you know. So I say to him, If you don't have any, suck my dick! And you know what he does, he starts laughing! So I punch him. That's all I did, man. That's the truth. He takes off like a rabbit. He was just a fag.”

“Except you weren't alone,” Pérol said. “You had your buddies with you. You all ran after him. Stop me if I'm getting this wrong. He ran into the Miramar. You dragged him out. And you really made a mess of him. Might have killed him, if we hadn't gotten there. And you're really out of luck, because in L'Estaque you're a star, and everyone knows your face.”

“That fag is going to withdraw his fucking complaint.”

“Doesn't look like it.” Pérol looked at Mourrabed, letting his gaze linger on his shorts. “Nice shorts. The kind a fag would wear, don't you think?”

“Hey, I'm no fag. I got a girlfriend.”

“Let's talk about that. Was she the one we found in bed with you?”

I'd stopped listening. Pérol knew what he was doing. He was just as disgusted by Mourrabed as I was. Mourrabed was beyond hope. He was on a downward spiral. He'd stop at nothing, not even murder. Perfect fodder for gangsters. In two or three years, he'd be taken out by someone tougher than he was. Maybe the best thing that could happen to him would be to go inside for twenty years. But I knew that wasn't the answer. The fact was, for someone like Mourrabed, there was no answer.

The telephone made me jump. I must have dozed off.

“Can you take it?”

It was Cerutti. “We couldn't find a thing. Nothing. Not even a gram of marijuana.”

“How about the girl?”

“A runaway. Saint-Denis, Paris region. Her father wants to send her back to Algeria to get married, and...”

“I get the picture. Bring her here. We'll take her statement. You stay there with two guys and check if it's Mourrabed who rents the apartment. If he doesn't, find out who does. I need to know as soon as possible.” I hung up.

Mourrabed watched us coming back. “Anything wrong?” he said, smiling.

Pérol slapped him again, more violently than the first time. Mourrabed rubbed his cheek.

“My lawyer won't like it when I tell him about this.”

“So is she your girlfriend?” Pérol asked, as if he hadn't heard.

I put on my jacket. I had to go. I had an appointment with Sanchez, the taxi driver, and I didn't want to miss him. If the strong-arm men last night hadn't been sent by Batisti, maybe they were connected to the taxi driver. And to Leila. That was a whole other story. But could I believe Batisti?

“I'll see you at the station.”

“Wait,” Pérol said. He turned to Mourrabed. “About your girlfriend. You have a choice. Say yes, and I'll introduce you to her father and brothers. In a closed cell. Seeing as how you weren't part of their plans, you may have a hard time convincing them. Say no, and you're looking at corruption of a minor. Think it over. I'll be back.”

The sky was filling with heavy black clouds. It wasn't ten o'clock yet, but the air was humid and sticky. Pérol joined me outside.

“Don't do anything stupid, Fabio.”

“Don't worry. I have an appointment. I'm hoping for a tip-off. About Leila. The third man.”

He shook his head. Then he pointed at my stomach. “And that?”

“A fight, last night. Over a girl. I'm out of training, so I didn't do too well.” I smiled at him with that seductive smile of mine, the one that women like.

“Fabio, we know each other pretty well by now. So give it a rest.” He looked at me, waiting for me to react but I didn't. “I know you have your own troubles. I'm starting to get an idea what they are. But you don't owe me anything. You can keep it all to yourself. Stick it up your ass if you want, that's your business. But if you want to talk about it, I'm here for you. OK?”

It was the most he'd ever spoken. I was touched by his sincerity. If there was anyone I could still count on in this town, it was Pérol, even though I didn't know anything about him. I couldn't imagine him as a family man. I couldn't even imagine what his wife was like. It had never bothered me. I'd never even wondered if he was happy or not. We were partners, but strangers. We trusted and respected each other. That was all that mattered. To both of us. Why was it so difficult to make new friends once you were past forty? Was it because we didn't have dreams anymore, only regrets?

“That's just it. I don't want to talk about it.” He turned his back on me. I caught him by the arm, before he could step away. “I've been thinking it over. It might be better if you and your wife came to my place for lunch on Sunday. I'll cook.”

We looked at each other. I walked to my car. The first raindrops started falling. I saw him go back into the station, looking determined. Mourrabed would have to behave himself. I sat down, put in a Ruben Blades tape, and started the car.

I drove through the centre of L'Estaque on the way back. L'Estaque was trying to stay faithful to its old image. A little harbor town, a village really. It was only a few minutes from Marseilles, but people said: I live in L'Estaque. Not Marseilles. But the little harbor was surrounded and dominated by housing projects full of immigrants who'd been chased out of downtown Marseilles.

It's always best to say what's on your mind. Of course it is. But although I was a good listener, I'd never been very good at confiding in anyone. At the last moment, I always clammed up. I was always ready to lie, rather than talk about what was wrong. I guess my life could have been different. I'd never dared tell my father about the things I got up to with Manu and Ugo. I'd had a really rough time in the Colonial Army, but I hadn't learned my lesson. With women, there was an even worse lack of communication, and then I suffered when they left me. Muriel, Carmen, Rosa. By the time I reached out my hand, by the time I finally opened my mouth to explain myself, it was too late.

It wasn't that I didn't have the courage. I just didn't trust anyone. Not enough, anyhow, to put my life and my feelings in another person's hands. And I knocked myself out trying to solve everything on my own. The vanity of a loser. I had to face it, I'd lost everything in my life. Manu and Ugo for starters.

I'd often told myself I shouldn't have run away that night, after that botched holdup. I should have confronted them, told them what I'd been thinking for months: that what we were doing was getting us nowhere, that we could do something better with our lives. And it was true, we had our lives ahead of us. The world was waiting to be discovered. It would have been great, to go around the world together. I was convinced of that. Maybe we'd have quarreled. Maybe they'd have carried on without me. Maybe. But maybe they'd also be here today. Alive.

I took the coast road past the harbor and the sea wall. My favorite route into Marseilles, with a glimpse of the various basins. Bassin Mirabeau, Bassin de la Pinède, Bassin National, Bassin d'Arenc. The future of Marseilles was here. I still wanted to believe it.

Ruben Blades' voice and the rhythm of the music, full of Caribbean sunshine, were starting to have an effect on my head, dispelling my anxieties and soothing my pains. The sky was low and gray, but full of an intense light. The sea was turning a metallic blue. I liked it when Marseilles clothed itself in the colors of Lisbon.

 

Sanchez was already there, waiting for me. I was surprised. I'd been expecting some kind of loudmouthed
mia
, but he was short and pudgy, and from the way he greeted me—limp handshake, lowered eyes—I could see he wasn't a very self-confident kind of guy. More the kind who always says yes, even when he's thinking no.

He was scared. “I'm a family man, you know,” he said, as he followed me into my office.

“Take a seat.”

“I've got three children. My cab's my livelihood. I can't afford to make mistakes. Red lights, speed limits...”

He handed me a sheet of paper. Names, addresses, phone numbers. Four people. I looked at him.

“They can confirm it. At the time you say, I was with them. Until half after eleven. After that, I went back to work.”

I put the paper down on my desk, lit a cigarette, and looked him straight in the eyes. Little piggy eyes, bloodshot. He lowered them very quickly. He kept wringing his hands. There were beads of sweat on his forehead.

“What a pity, Monsieur Sanchez.” He looked up. “If I send for your friends, they'll be forced to make false statements. You're going to get them into trouble.”

He looked at me with his red eyes. I opened a drawer, took out a file at random, a thick one, put it down in front of me and started leafing through it.

“I'm sure you realize we'd never have asked you to come in here for something as trivial as a red light.” His eyes widened. Now he was really sweating. “It's more serious than that. Much more serious, Monsieur Sanchez. Your friends will be sorry they trusted you. And you—”

“But I was there! From nine to eleven!”

Fear had made him raise his voice. But he seemed sincere, and that surprised me. I decided to quit fooling around.

“No, monsieur,” I replied, firmly. “I have eight witnesses, and they're as good as all your witnesses. Eight police officers, all on duty at the time.” He opened his mouth, but no sound came out. In his eyes, I could see his worst nightmares coming true. “At ten fifteen, your taxi was on Rue Corneille, in front of the Commanderie. I could charge you as an accessory to murder.”

“It wasn't me,” he said, in a weak voice. “It wasn't me. I can explain.”

S
anchez was bathed in sweat. Big drops were running down his forehead. He wiped himself with the back of his hand. The sweat was all over his neck too. After a moment he took out a handkerchief and mopped himself. I started to smell his sweat. He couldn't keep still on his chair. He must be desperate to take a leak. Maybe he'd already wet his underpants.

I didn't like this guy Sanchez but I couldn't bring myself to hate him. He was probably a good father and husband. He worked hard, every night. He went to sleep at the same time his children went to school. When they came home, he went back to work. He probably never saw them. Except on the rare Saturdays and Sundays when he took a day off. Once a month, I guessed. At the beginning, he'd fucked his wife when he came home, waking her up, which she didn't like. After a while, he'd given up, and now he made do with a hooker a few times a week. Either before going to work, or after finishing. With his wife, it was probably only once a month now, when his day off fell on a Saturday.

My father had led the same kind of life. He was a typesetter on the daily paper
La Marseillaise
. He'd leave for the paper about five o'clock in the afternoon. I'd grown up during his absences. When he got home at night, he'd come in and kiss me, smelling of lead, ink and cigarettes. It didn't wake me up. It was just part of my sleep. Whenever he forgot, which sometimes happened, I had bad dreams. I imagined him abandoning my mother and me. When I was about twelve or thirteen, I often dreamed that he had another woman in his life. She looked like Gélou. He'd be feeling her up. Then, instead of my father, it'd be Gélou who came in and kissed me, which would give me a hard-on. I'd hold on to Gélou and caress her. She'd come into my bed. Then my father would appear, and make an angry scene. And my mother would join in, in tears. I never found out if my father had had other women. He'd loved my mother, I was sure of that, but their lives remained a mystery for me.

Sanchez moved around on his chair. My silence worried him.

“How old are your children?”

“The boys, fourteen and sixteen. The girl, ten. Laure. Laure, like my mother.”

He took out a wallet, opened it, and handed me a photo of the family. I didn't like what I was doing, but I wanted to put him at his ease, in order to get as much from him as I could. I looked at his kids. They all had flabby faces and shifty eyes, without a spark of rebellion. They'd been born bitter. They'd never hate anyone except those poorer than themselves. Anyone they thought might take bread off their tables. Arabs, blacks, Orientals. Never the rich. It was already clear they'd never amount to much. Best case scenario, the boys would be taxi drivers, like their dad. And the girl a trainee hairdresser. Or an assistant at Prisunic. Ordinary French people. Citizens of fear.

“Nice kids,” I said, hypocritically. “So tell me. Who was driving your taxi?”

“Let me explain. I have a friend, Toni, well, not exactly a friend. We're not really close. He's got this thing going with Charlie, the bellhop from the Frantel. They find groups of suckers. Businessmen, executive types, you know what I mean? Toni lets them use the cab for the night. Takes them to the hottest new restaurants, clubs where they won't have any problems. To finish off the evening, he fixes them up with hookers. High class ones, of course! The kind who have little studio apartments...”

I offered him a cigarette. He felt more at ease. He'd stopped sweating.

“I guess they go gambling too. Play for high stakes. Am I right?”

“Yeah. There are some really top class places. Like the hookers. Know what they like, these guys? Exotic women. Arabs, blacks, Vietnamese. But clean ones, you know what I mean? Sometimes they even make a cocktail.”

He was unstoppable now. It made him feel important to tell me all this. Plus, it excited him. I guessed he sometimes got paid in hookers.