Past Imperfect (53 page)

The transcript had arrived only minutes before and Dominic was scanning frantically down. A short hand-written note from Marinella Calvan was at the front: Breakthrough! You were right - it wasn't the poacher Machanaud. Or at least it doesn't sound like him. Hope it's helpful.

Dominic was eager to get to the part that revealed it wasn't Machanaud - but his attention was wavering. He could see Guidier standing by the door expectantly.

'It's just the report from St Etienne,' Guidier said. 'There's some urgency involved because they already have someone in custody. They've either got to file and charge him quickly or release him. They need the comparison report on car thefts back from us straightaway.'

'…The day your bike broke down. Did you meet someone lower down the river that day?'

'No... I didn't meet anyone there. I didn't cross the river there...'

Dominic looked up sharply. Only
St Etienne
,
urgency
and
custody
had registered. 'Yes, yes... I know. I'll deal with it. But I need ten minutes alone. Ten minutes!' Dominic made a pushing gesture with one hand. 'Shut the door behind you and make sure nobody else disturbs me. And no calls.'

Dominic looked straight back to the transcript, his mind screaming
where? who?
He hardly heard the click as Guidier shut the door, one finger tracing rapidly down the page...
Christian walking down the road from where he left his bike
- they'd been wrong, he
hadn't
cut across the fields - until a few lines later the words hit him like a hammer blow: Sports car.
Green car
. Slim, dark hair.
Duclos!
Duclos had picked up Christian before he even reached the village!

Dominic closed his eyes for a second. He'd always suspected, though now it struck him that it had never been more than that. He'd buried his suspicion, his doubt, in the
instruction
and trial process, in the witnesses who said they'd seen Duclos in the restaurant, in the general throng pushing towards Machanaud and away from Duclos. And the thirty years since had buried it still further. Amazing that any glimmer of doubt had survived, he thought sourly. Just enough to occupy his mind for a few minutes every decade. Pathetic. If he'd really believed, had been convinced of Duclos' guilt - then he wouldn't have been so shocked as he read the words, felt suddenly cold and desolate, his stomach sinking still further as he forced his eyes open again and read Christian's description of the car turning and heading back, the rough farm track and him pointing to where his bike was hidden among the long grass, Christian's growing panic as Duclos reached out and touched him...

Or was it his own guilt at staying silent suddenly hitting him? Machanaud's innocence and the long years he'd spent locked away. Until a moment ago that too had been no more than a nagging doubt.

V-A-R-N?
Marseille-based truck? Nothing immediately sprung to mind. Dominic read the remaining page of the transcript, then went back, honing in on where Christian was with Duclos, re-reading individual lines for finer detail and small nuances. Then he went back to the beginning of the transcript and read it through for anything else he might have missed.

At length he looked up, rubbing his eyes. The elation that he had something that put Christian in Duclos' car, finally after all these years, rose slowly above the shock and emptiness, and he clung to that, forcing it home stronger,
yes
! Rapped one hand sharply against the desk, urging himself on. The possible start of a new case where before he had nothing. Something he could send a Prosecutor. He drew on that new energy over the next hours.

Immediately after dealing with the St Etienne enquiry, he tackled the mounting stack of papers from Lepoille at the corner of his desk - Manson, Hurkos, Joseph Chua, Geller, Berkowitz - sifting through the murky depths of murder cases involving psychics. Searching for the few key points that might entice a Prosecutor's interest. By late afternoon, he had finished his notes and put them into a five page covering letter to Henri Corbeix. After background of the original case and trial, much of the letter was exploratory, questioning. Seeking the best way forward, procedural process, what they should look for in the sessions remaining and requisite validation beyond Monique's confirmation and the credentials of Calvan and Lambourne. His reference notes to past cases involving psychics came at the end of the letter, and he attached the relevant files from Lepoille.

Despite the exploratory tone of the letter, it struck Dominic that his underlying aim had still shone through: convincing Corbeix that this most unlikely of cases stood some chance of successful prosecution.

THIRTY-THREE

Limoges, May 1985

Large eyes, full of passion, willing him on. Light hazel with grey flecks. The edges of the dream were less distinct, hazy, but the sensations burned through strongly. Alain Duclos was excited.

The boy was quite young, not yet twelve. It was the boy he'd been with on his last trip to Paris. He couldn't remember his name, only that he was a half Haitian, half French mulatto.

He could see the faint sheen of sweat on the boy's cream brown skin, but the main excitement of the dream was that it was all so tactile - he could
feel
the sweat, feel its warm moistness as he slid back and forth and the boy looked back at him. Feel the smooth contours of the boy's body, the lean plane of his back, one thumb sliding slowly up the ridge of his spine. Then spreading slowly, out and around the stomach as he leant forward, feeling the warmth of the body tight against him... moving the hands slowly up the boy's rib cage and onto his chest... until he felt...
felt
something... something was wrong! The chest was too developed, too soft and fleshy. He recoiled suddenly in horror. The boy had breasts!

The boy's smile turned slowly to a leer, and as Duclos looked closer through the haze of the dream, he could see that the hair was not dark and wavy but short and blonde. It was Betina. She'd tricked him!

She slowly pouted and blew him a kiss, but he felt suddenly repulsed. Sweat that smelt now like acid and roses, its stickiness against his skin, her attempt at a look of burning passion little more than leering stupidity... she made him sick. A sour bile rose in his stomach, a sense of utter disgust, and he mouthed 'You tricked me!' as he went to push her away.

But suddenly she was below him and holding tight, looking up with big liquid eyes staring straight through him, not saying anything but silently pleading:
'I want you... I want you. Give me a child!'
Gripping tight with her arms and legs wrapped solidly around his back, pulling him closer into an embrace, her tongue darting out and moistening her lips... he couldn't get away. The stickiness of her skin clung all around him, the grip of her arms and legs like some slithering, repulsive reptile... the musty, acrid smell of her sweat, the darting snake's tongue - and he started protesting, screaming:
'...No... no... You tricked me! Let me go... let me go... let me...'

Duclos sat up in bed with a jolt, his eyes slowly adjusting in the dark. The sweat felt suddenly cold on his skin. He looked over. Betina was still asleep, he hadn't disturbed her.

I want a child.
The first time she'd mentioned it had been almost three years ago. She would be thirty-six next birthday; if they didn't have one or two children by the time she was forty, by then it might be too late.
Two?
He was still struggling with the unthinkable of one. She'd mis-read his look, fought to be re-assuring. 'I know it hasn't been easy for you with me at times... and mostly my fault because of my past problem. But this is important to me. I'll make an effort, I promise.'

A nightmare come true. He was sick with flu for over two weeks. Probably psychosomatic. But then he had to become more inventive: headaches, allergies, sprained muscles, sudden business trips, stress and overwork... the chain of excuses became laughable, pathetic. She wore him ragged, he virtually broke out in a cold sweat each time she smiled at him approaching bedtime.

But between the various excuses and trips away, miraculously he managed to succumb to sex no more than once every eight to ten weeks. Even then he would fail the occasional performance halfway through, claiming that he was too tense or that he could sense she was nervous, was perhaps trying too hard. At most there would be three or four occasions a year where she could possibly conceive.

But it was probably the worst possible time for the problem to have arisen. The calls from Marc Jaumard had started only ten months before her drastic bid to have a child. Five years with no calls; then one out of nowhere. Duclos could hardly believe it. Only months after Chapeau's death, he'd erased thoughts of any possible repercussions from his mind; felt confident he was free of the problem once and for all. All those years with no blackmail, the first years of happiness with Betina, and now both problems were plaguing him at the same time. Duclos shook his head. It was like some ridiculous cruel joke.

Marc Jaumard didn't have the same abrasive, taunting style of his brother, but on several occasions he'd been drunk, as if he needed Dutch courage before making the call. Duclos didn't want Jaumard calling his office, so gave him his home number. Often the calls would come through at night, probably after Jaumard had staggered out of some bar, and with him having to subdue his voice and often leaving for an impromptu meeting, Betina had become suspicious.

During one of their failed lovemaking sessions, she'd rolled over furiously and asked him if he was having an affair - who was it that kept phoning? The thought of him in bed with the unkempt, overweight Jaumard, invariably Pernod-breathed, made him laugh out loud. One time when Jaumard woke them up with a 2am call and Betina was staring at him accusingly, he'd thrust the phone out angrily: 'See for yourself. It's just some drunken asshole.'

A second's silence from the other end as Jaumard got over the surprise, then slurringly Jaumard apologized for phoning so late. 'It's jussst... jusst some business with your husband.'

He'd thought the jealousy, her concern that he might be having an affair, could have partly been behind her new amorousness - but removing that worry had made little difference. She was as relentless as ever. Finally, eight months later, she became pregnant. All his efforts had been to no avail. She was now in her fourth month.

The first moment she told him, a cold chill had crept up his spine. His reaction perplexed him at first. He should have been relieved. The ordeal was over. No more bedtime demands. She finally had what she wanted. What had worried him more? His loathing of their having sex or her getting pregnant?

But months later, when she suggested a scan to check that the baby was healthy, he found himself about to protest the idea - before realizing he had no good, rational grounds against a scan. Except one. In that moment, the root of his worry suddenly hit him. He was afraid to know it might be a boy! A girl, fine, and even a boy in those early years. But as it became older, started to remind him of the boys he sneaked off to see in Paris and Marseille, he would feel unsettled. His own son. Those big, innocent eyes staring straight through him... somehow sensing his awful secret. He could hardly think of a worse nightmare.

Dominic spoke to Corbeix late Friday. Corbeix had been busy in court most of the day, apologized that as yet he'd only had half an hour to skim through the letter and the files sent. 'It looks intriguing. But give me the weekend to look through it in more detail. Let's speak Monday.'

Shortly after sending everything to Corbeix, the questions started turning in Dominic's mind: What happened immediately after Christian was by his bike with Duclos? According to the original medical report, the first sexual assault. But where had Duclos kept Christian afterwards, between the two attacks? Tied up somewhere near his bike, or did Duclos take him straight to where he was finally found, perhaps hidden in the woods somewhere upstream from Machanaud? Whichever, the café in between had obviously been to create an alibi. It never occurred to them that Christian might have been tied up and left alone for all that time, it was always assumed that his attacker had stayed with him throughout, wouldn't risk leaving him to be found by someone else. If the boy had been discovered, his attacker could have returned straight into the arms of a gendarme welcoming party. Duclos had taken quite a risk.

'... But I didn't realize it till I came out of the darkness. The field...'

Darkness mentioned again. A period of darkness between the first and second attacks. Probably a blindfold. He'd discussed it on the phone with Marinella Calvan late Thursday, linking details from the transcript with what was known from the original investigation. Guide points for the next session.

Green sports car?
Christian hadn't said that it was an Alfa Romeo. It could be argued that there were other green sports cars in the area at the time. Already he found himself pre-proposing the points that Corbeix might raise.

By mid-afternoon Monday with no call from Corbeix, other concerns sprang to mind: Perhaps Corbeix was staunch RPR and wouldn't dream of going near the case? He phoned Verfraigne and, at the end of a conversation about Corbeix' overall strength and track record as a prosecutor, asked casually about his political leaning. 'He's a socialist, I think.'

Surely he'd made allowances for the tenuous nature of the case in his opening letter? He was just seeking guidance at this stage, what they should be looking for in the remaining sessions, what might help turn the case from something purely tentative, exploratory, into something prosecutable. Surely Corbeix wouldn't just cast it aside at this first stage, surely...