After the Crash (38 page)

They set off again. Malvina changed the cassette in the tape player.
She had chosen this one randomly, because she liked the sky-blue
colour of its packaging:
Brothers in Arms
by Dire Straits. Mark
Knopfler’s voice alternated with the ecstasies of his guitar. Malvina
was the first to speak:

‘That doesn’t alter the fact that Grand-Duc is a piece of shit. He
always hated me; I don’t know why. Maybe because he guessed that
I knew the truth.’

Marc was hardly even listening. He felt betrayed. How much of
the detective’s notebook was true, and how much of it lies?
‘Three days ago, he tried blackmailing my grandmother,’ Malvina
went on. ‘With that bullshit story about a last-minute discovery.
One hundred and fifty thousand francs, he wanted. Three times
that if he provided her with proof! I don’t know who killed him, but
they did the world a favour.’
Marc’s fingers drummed on the steering wheel. He thought about
what Malvina had just told him, and his discovery of Grand-Duc’s
corpse. A bullet in the chest, head in the fireplace, she had said, as
if he were the victim of some macabre ritual. His face covered in
blisters and ashes.
‘And as for that DNA test . . .’ Malvina continued. ‘We both
know that Lyse-Rose is the one who survived. So all those tests
prove is that Grand-Duc was a lying bastard.’
An awful doubt was growing in Marc’s troubled mind.
‘And anyway, he was crap at his job,’ Malvina concluded. ‘My
grandfather paid him a million francs and he couldn’t even manage
to bump off two old farts in their sleep . . .’
Marc’s fingers tensed around the worn leather steering wheel.
Mark Knopfler’s guitar screamed out one last riff.
It was just her sense of humour, he told himself. Remember . . .

After five hours on the road, the Citroën was still going strong.
Well, strong is maybe an exaggeration – it struggled on certain sections of motorway, unable to move any faster than 70mph – but at
least it was still going.

They had already played all the cassettes in the glove compartment: a compendium of 1980s hits, including Supertramp’s
Famous
Last Words
and Jean-Jacques Goldman’s
Positif
.

They stopped at Vitry-le-François, a town surrounded by cornfields in the Champagne region, and ate at a restaurant by the side
of the road. They were the only customers. Marc ate an omelette
and sat thinking in silence. Malvina opted for the three-course
menu – charcuterie, steak and a crème brulée.

‘She’s got quite an appetite, your wife,’ said the owner, winking
at Marc. ‘I wonder where she puts it all!’
Back on the road, they went through Saint-Dizier and Chaumont. The flat cereal-growing plains were marked out by lines of
cuestas – sudden steep slopes like the steps of a staircase, at the base
of which lay wooded depressions. The Citroën van sped up each
time they descended a cuesta slope, as if braking were impossible
and it was just hoping for another upward slope in order to slow
it down. Renaud sang ‘En Cloque’ for the third time. Malvina and
Marc had not said a word for almost two hours.
‘Do you think Lyse-Rose would want a sister like me?’ Malvina
said suddenly.
Marc, driving through a village called Fayl-Billot, did not reply.
‘You know her,’ Malvina said. ‘Do you think she’d be able to
understand me . . .to accept a big sister as ugly and nasty as me?’
Still Marc did not speak. On the whole, he preferred it when
Malvina stuck to her dark humour.
‘I can change,’ she insisted. ‘Will you tell her that I can change?’
‘Are you really sure that Lylie is your sister?’
‘Of course. We’re both sure of that, aren’t we?’

Marc envied Malvina’s absence of doubt, her determination. It was
as if she lived inside a bubble that nothing could burst. Just after
passing Vesoul, Marc received a text from Lylie. He picked it up
one-handed while continuing to drive.

Marc, the operation will take place tomorrow at 10 a.m. Don’t worry,
everything will be fine. I’ll call you afterwards.
Tomorrow at 10 a.m. So, he had less than twenty-four hours.
Goldman yelled ‘Envole-moi!’ Instinctively, Marc pressed down
on the accelerator, but the van didn’t go any faster. As the miles
accumulated, the crazy theory that had taken root in Marc’s brain
began to gain weight and substance, seeming ever more plausible.
Obvious, even.

Three hours later, they passed through Montbéliard. The town’s
roads seemed too wide for the sparse amount of traffic; huge boulevards, avenues, bypasses – perhaps as a reflection of the Peugeot
factory nearby, which had, at its peak, employed more than 40,000
people. The largest factory in Europe . . . Less than a third of it
remained operational today.

Marc handed Malvina a map, telling her she had to find a tiny
hamlet called Clairbief, where Monique Genevez ran what Crédule
Grand-Duc had described in his notebook as the best gîte in the
region.

‘What are we going to do there?’ Malvina moaned. ‘You think
you can get back the cash that my grandma sent to Grand-Duc?’
Marc shrugged, then checked that the Mauser was still in his
pocket. Would he have to use it? Was it possible he was right, and
that they had all been manipulated from the very beginning?
Malvina stopped complaining and concentrated on the map.
She proved a remarkably competent navigator. Seven miles after
leaving Montbéliard, they passed through Pont-de-Roide and the
valiant orange-and-red van began to climb the foothills of the
Jura mountains: first a narrow, winding road alongside the Doubs
until they reached Saint-Hippolyte, then the steep slope of a
B-road.
The Citroën groaned and creaked in protest, but it kept going.
When they reached the top of the first hill, they were given a glorious view of the valley below. The van then happily descended back
down towards the river, through a forest of pines and gold-leafed
deciduous trees.

Monique Genevez’s gîte was impossible to miss. Only one road ran
alongside the Doubs. The chalet’s pale wood was reflected in the
river’s calm waters. Marc held his breath and touched the Mauser
inside his pocket once again. He stopped the van in a car park
opposite the chalet. There were no other vehicles there. In this tiny
village at the end of the world, time itself seemed to have stopped.
Marc was struggling to breathe, his mind filled with the possibility
that his quest might be about to end here.

‘So, are we going?’ Malvina said.
‘Hang on . . .’
Marc took out the Mauser and made sure it was loaded.
‘What are you planning to do with my gun? Bump off Mrs

Genevez?’
Marc looked at Malvina. ‘Do you remember Grand-Duc’s
corpse?’
‘Er, yeah.’
‘What do you remember?’
‘What are you on about?’
‘You remember a corpse in Grand-Duc’s house, wearing GrandDuc’s clothes and shoes and watch . . .’
Malvina suddenly went pale.
‘A corpse, with its head in the fireplace,’ Marc continued. ‘The
face so badly burned and covered in blisters that it was unrecognis
able. Right?’
‘What’s your point?’
‘Follow me!’
They got out of the van. Monique Genevez was already standing
outside the chalet, flanked by window boxes full of geraniums.
‘Hello!’ Marc called out to her. ‘We’re friends of Crédule GrandDuc. You know him, I believe?’
The woman’s face lit up.
‘Mr Grand-Duc! Of course I know him. He has stayed here every
December for more than ten years now.’
‘I think he came back early this year, though, didn’t he?’
‘He certainly did,’ said Mrs Genevez. ‘But I’m afraid you’re out
of luck. He left just this morning.’
Marc felt the ground shift beneath his feet. Beside him, Malvina
stopped breathing. Unaware of her visitors’ reactions, Monique
Genevez continued in the same untroubled tone: ‘He was here yesterday and the day before, staying in Room 12 as usual. The day
before yesterday, he stayed here most of the morning because he
was waiting for the post to arrive before he went out. And when the
postman arrived, he had a large envelope for him. But he left very
early this morning, around six.’
‘Do you know if he’s coming back?’ Marc managed to ask.
‘Oh, I’d be surprised. He usually only stays for a night or two
when he’s here. He calls it his pilgrimage, you know. He’s a very
intriguing man, your friend. Perfectly kind and polite – and he has
a very good appetite! – but I don’t understand his obsession with
that plane crash. After eighteen years, I’d have thought it was time
to forget about it, wouldn’t you?’
Marc was silent for a few seconds. Finally he said: ‘Do you know
where he was going?’
Monique tore a few dead stems from a geranium. ‘No, I’m afraid
not. Mr Grand-Duc is not the type of man to reveal his secrets, not
even after a bottle and a half of Vin Jaune. Anyway, I would never
ask. But I imagine he’s gone back to Paris, don’t you? That’s what
he normally does.’
Though he asked Mrs Genevez a few more questions, Marc did
not discover anything else. He and Malvina went back to the van.
Inside, Malvina spat angrily: ‘I told you that bastard had been
fucking with us from the beginning!’
Marc said nothing. He felt powerless. So, Grand-Duc
was
alive
. . . but they had missed him. The last lead in this investigation had
slipped through his fingers.
‘But hang on,’ said Malvina. ‘If you guessed that Grand-Duc had
faked his own death and killed someone else in his place, what the
hell are we doing here?’
‘Oh, shut up!’
Malvina clapped sarcastically. ‘You’re a genius, Vitral. We’ve just
done a ten-hour drive for nothing. Couldn’t you have phoned first?’
‘I said shut it.’
‘You could at least get me a room in Mrs Genevez’s gîte. It looks
nice.’
‘Shut the fuck up or I’ll shoot you right now and throw your
body into the river.’
Malvina looked at Marc curiously. ‘What is your problem? I
mean, it’s hardly a great surprise that Grand-Duc is a piece of shit.
Why are you in such a terrible mood suddenly? And why are you in
such a rush? Are you marrying my sister tomorrow, or something?’
‘Forget it. You wouldn’t understand.’
Marc turned the key in the ignition.
‘Where are we going?’ Malvina asked. ‘Don’t you want to stay
here for a while?’
‘No, I don’t! I promised you a pilgrimage, and that’s exactly what
you’ll get. We’re going to Mont Terri.’

Through binoculars, Crédule Grand-Duc followed the postman’s
bright yellow van as it wound along the curving track through the
pine forest. It was advancing slowly, taking its time, stopping at
every chalet along the route. It wouldn’t get there for another ten
minutes.

The Xantia was parked a mile or so higher up the hill, just before
the road entered Saint-Hippolyte. Sitting in his car, the detective
watched the postman’s van for a few moments longer.

Ten minutes . . .
Would this be the right one, at last? He had already followed
seven other postmen, fruitlessly. But all he had to do was keep going,
and eventually he would have his reward. He had been searching
for this Mélanie Belvoir for three days now. Apparently she was
completely out of touch with her family, and her name did not
appear in any phone book, electronic or otherwise. He had found
no trace of her existence in any government listings. She might
have married, but no Mélanie Belvoir appeared in any of the local
wedding registries. So he had finally thought to question the local
postmen. Even if Mélanie Belvoir had changed her name, she might
still continue to receive correspondence under her maiden name. A
postman would know that, especially in a rural backwater like this.
A postman would probably know every single address on his route.
And yet none, so far, had ever heard of Mélanie Belvoir.
But there was nothing to do but keep hammering away.
Persistence was his middle name. And he did not lack motivation.
This was the closest he had come to finding the Holy Grail, the
solution to his investigation.
He thought about the precariousness of life. Four days ago, he
had been sixty seconds away from shooting himself in the head.

Inside his pocket, Grand-Duc gripped the handle of his revolver
– a Mateba. Semi-automatic. His gun had become practically a collectible since the American company that made it had gone bust.
He had to order his bullets from Canada now, at the outrageous
price of forty Canadian dollars for a box of six. But what did he
care? He could afford it, now more than ever. Yesterday morning, at
Monique Genevez’s gîte, he had received the one hundred and fifty
thousand francs sent by Mathilde de Carville.

And that was only a down payment.
What else could he ask for? Apart from a clean conscience . . .
He thought again about his notebook. Lylie and Marc would have

read it by now. They probably wouldn’t have gone to his house, and
discovered the corpse there. But even if they had, he had covered his
tracks. To them, he would appear to be a victim, not a murderer. As
for the rest . . . had he been skilful enough in his account? Would
they suspect the truth? That he had been the one who tampered
with that ridiculous gas pipe, one night in November 1982?

Over time, Grand-Duc had persuaded himself that he had been
nothing but the instrument of the de Carville family, a mere tool
in their hands; that he had never wished to harm the Vitrals. And
even if he had refused Léonce de Carville’s offer, some other thug
would have carried out the deed– and they would not have spared
Nicole. He had redeemed himself since then. He had become close
to Nicole, and to her grandchildren. He had come to know them,
and to love them. Especially Nicole. He had never betrayed them,
since that first time, and he had always done his best to be impartial
when investigating the case. To write everything down for them, in
his notebook. Well, everything except that night in Le Tréport.

He was no angel. He had never claimed to be. But he had been
thorough and meticulous in his investigation, even when it came to
those DNA tests . . . those stupid tests that had driven him crazy,
driven him to the point of suicide.