The Paris Directive (37 page)

“Merde!”
He threw down his pipe and was sucking his finger when the telephone rang.

“Yes?” he barked angrily.

“That you, Paul?”

Recognizing his friend Couterau’s voice, Mazarelle forgot the pain in his finger.

“Did you find anything, Daniel?”

“Maybe. We made a sweep of our files and came up with a single Pierre Barmeyer. He might be the guy you’re looking for. A thirty-six-year-old teacher in a Strasbourg
lycée
. Could that be the one?”

“A teacher? Do you know if he’s away on vacation now?”

“Yes, he’s away. Permanently. Pierre Barmeyer died last year in a rock climbing accident in Switzerland.”

“You’re sure?”

“Gstaad. Next time I hope you’ll give me a live one. Now can I go home?”

“Thanks, Daniel. I owe you one.”

Whoever this Barmeyer was, Mazarelle feared he was bad news. Using an assumed identity—and having authentic papers to prove it. He was either hiding something he’d done or, worse yet as far as the inspector was concerned, something he was about to do. The thought that the mysterious Pierre Barmeyer and the stranger he met at the Café Valon who’d played pool with Ali might be the same person made his eyes smart—like in a scrum when you’re blindsided and get a fist in the face. Some freak blow out of the blue. Mazarelle had to warn Molly at once, put her on guard without scaring her out of her wits. He prayed that he hadn’t waited too long to insist that she go back home.

Louise Charpentier answered the phone. Molly had left with Pierre Barmeyer about a half hour ago. Asked if she knew where they went, Louise said they were going to his place for dinner.

“And where’s that?”

Louise wasn’t sure. She recalled Molly saying that he was staying at a house not far from L’Ermitage.

Mazarelle felt a bone stuck in his throat.

“Anything wrong?”

“No, no. Ask her to call me at home when she gets back.”

“I’ll probably be sleeping, but I’ll leave a note.”

“
Merci
bien,
Louise.”

Whatever his real name, Pierre Barmeyer was his man. He was using the McAllister house as his hideout. How was it possible that Mazarelle had been in there and not found him? How could he have forgotten that it was there in the kitchen he’d seen the Le Creuset box? How had he not recognized that it was the musty smell of the McAllister house that he sniffed on the stranger’s leather jacket in the Café Valon? No wonder that house seemed to be stalking him, that stranger in the café, eyeing him with amusement. Goddamn it, they were! Shoving himself away from his desk, Mazarelle thundered down the stairs and rushed into the shadowy office of his task force, which at that hour was empty.

The only lights came from the three spectrally glowing computers that Roger Vignon had set up in the middle of the room. One ran CHARDON (Comportements Homicides; Analyse et Recherche sur les Données Opérationnelles Nationales), their special software for identifying perps by finding similarities in criminal operations. Another used ANACRIM (Analyse Criminelle), the first-rate national gendarmerie system for hunting serial killers. The inspector had managed to wheedle it out of the tin soldiers at the start when he and his men, suspecting that the murders at L’Ermitage might not have been committed by locals, were still following a two-track investigation. And the third, a police computer, contained
le
réseau Rubis,
the Ruby Network.

Mazarelle flipped on the overhead fluorescents, sat down at the police radio, and tried to reach Duboit, but there was no answer. “Come on, Bernard, where the hell are you?” Wherever he was, Mazarelle assumed that he was tight on Barmeyer’s tail and keeping a close watch on Molly. He hoped to hell that he hadn’t fallen asleep or gone into a café for
un
petit
verre
. Then he remembered Duboit’s mobile and dialed that number—also with no success. In a
last-ditch effort to reach him, the inspector left a call on his beeper, which Bernard sometimes wore on his belt, but Mazarelle wasn’t too hopeful.

Tired of wondering whether to stay put and keep trying to reach Duboit or go after him, the inspector went to see if there was any coffee left that was drinkable when the ringing began. Since leaving Paris, he hadn’t heard that sound often. It was one you didn’t forget or confuse with a phone call. There were no routine messages on the Ruby Network. They all were important, but some were ringing and urgent, and a few were very urgent—the screen pulsating with flashing lights and sound. This one from Interpol headquarters in Lyons was
très, très urgent:
Dieter Koenig, escaped German serial killer, rumored sighted near Taziac. Koenig believed to be armed and dangerous. Proceed with
extreme
caution. Photograph follows …

Mazarelle had no time to wait for pictures. He hurried back upstairs and yanked open the bottom drawer of his desk. His silver .38 Special was dusty, which made it seem only a little heavier than it was. Wiping it off on his sleeve, he cracked the revolver open and spun the empty cylinder. It looked okay. He tore open the box of bullets, took six, and loaded them into the cylinder. Grabbing a handful, he dumped them into his jacket pocket and stuffed the gun into his waistband. On the desk, Martine, smiling mischievously at her husband the famous homicide detective, watched him go.

47

THE OWLS IN THE CUPOLA

R
einer pulled off the road at the gravel pit. “I missed the turnoff,” he explained. Backing his Renault around, he waited for the car that had been following them to pass.

Molly was annoyed. “Why doesn’t he put on his lights?”

Reiner suspected it was the same car that had been following them on the way to Les Eyzies.

When they drove back, she wasn’t surprised that he’d missed his turnoff. It was completely unmarked and, even though still twilight, it was impossible to see any house from the road below. The narrow dirt road zigzagged dizzyingly to the top of the hill, where the dark, secluded, three-story house was set back in a sea of high grass like a crouching animal. As soon as he shut off the engine and they got out, Molly could hear the crickets, smell the lavender. A large sprawling country house, but it didn’t seem as if anyone was paying much attention to it.

Reiner opened the front door and fumbled for the light switch.

“This is great,” she said. It was surprisingly cool inside, comfortable, but sort of musty like a wine cellar.

“It’ll do. It’s fine for a short stay.”

“Mind if I open a window?”

“Unfortunately there are no screens. If you like, later we can shut off the lights and open the windows.”

The furniture was minimal, but there were two fireplaces and the space was roomy enough even for an artist. Besides, how much furniture does one person need? Molly often thought that she could do
with fewer chairs, tables, and boring junk in order to make more room for her books.

“How about something to drink?” he offered.

“Lovely.”

Molly was admiring the wildflowers and candles on the dining room table when she heard the shot from the kitchen. Before she’d time to find out what had happened, Pierre was back with two wineglasses and a bottle of champagne. He poured them each a glass.

“Amor y pesetas”
—lifting his glass in a toast—
“y tiempo para gastarlas.”

“I’ll drink to that—whatever it is.”

The bubbly white was cold, crisp, silky-smooth, and delicious. The gold label said Louis Roederer, Brut Premier.

“Hmm, not bad!”

“Good?”

She laughed as he refilled her glass. Molly was losing some of the edginess that she’d felt on seeing him again. There was something unpredictable about Pierre that she found intriguing, but it made her a little nervous. She asked what had been in the empty case on the wall.

“Guns, I suppose,” he replied after a pause, suggesting whatever it was he couldn’t care less.

Molly pointed her glass at the framed reproduction over the fireplace. “What about Turner? Does he interest you?”

Reiner sipped his wine and reserved comment.

“I once studied that painting in a course on nineteenth-century British art.”

“There is no nineteenth-century British art.”

How typically French, Molly thought. And he wasn’t joking either because he didn’t joke. Pierre had a casual way of making sweeping categorical statements that took her breath away. She asked him: What about Blake, Constable, George Stubbs?

He brushed them away like gnats.

“What about Angelica Kauffmann?” she demanded heatedly, burying the sudden thought that Kauffmann might have been born in Germany or Switzerland, but this was no time for full disclosure.

“Never heard of her.”

“Well, you should have. She’s not bad. But then you don’t even seem to care for Turner.”

“That’s right. Why should I? I don’t do seascapes and don’t like them.”

“What sort of art
do
you do?”

He looked at her as if surprised by her question, though Molly felt he was pleased that she’d asked.

“I do faces.”

“That sounds interesting.” Not having glimpsed any sign of his paints or canvases, she was genuinely curious. “I’d love to see your work, Pierre. Do you have anything that you’ve done here?”

“Have you forgotten? This is my vacation,” he reminded her, refilling her glass.

The third glass of champagne tasted even better than the first two. Molly walked over to the fireplace. “Do you know what it’s called?”

He glanced up at the small tilted ship with no sails, its masts like twigs, in a storm-tossed, white-capped, churning sea.

“I have no idea.”

“The Slave Ship.”

She told him that Turner had read an article about a slave ship on which an epidemic had broken out and the captain, who was insured against the loss of slaves at sea, but not by disease, dumped his human cargo over the side. Molly found the cruel things that people did to one another in this life almost beyond belief. “Isn’t that awful?”

“No, not really. The captain was a businessman. A smart, practical shipowner with an investment to protect. Not some idealistic Pollyanna. He wasn’t out there in the middle of the screaming ocean risking his ass for nothing. It makes perfect sense to me.”

Molly set her glass carefully on the mantelpiece. Placing her hands on her hips, she glanced down and shook her head in wonder, not knowing what to make of him.

“You’re kidding. You’ve just got to be kidding.”

Reiner could resist her no longer. The tight black dress, the red hair, the bright mocking eyes. He reached out, put his arm around her waist.

“What’s the matter? You’re shivering.”

“It’s cooler in here than I thought.” She looked up. “What was
that
?”

He’d heard it too. A loud, crashing sound outside, as if a large tree limb had fallen close to the house. Jumping up, Reiner went over to the dirt-streaked window and looked out.

“Probably a deer. They’re all over this place in the early evening. Hunting for food, I imagine.”

“Which reminds me,” Molly said, giving him an easy champagne smile, “what’s for dinner? I’ve worked up an appetite.”

“Good. Come on.”

Dinner, he promised, would be a revelation. Simple, delectable, and a meal that she would never forget. The main course a local favorite, omelette aux cèpes, which he could throw together in no time. The secret, he revealed, was in the mushrooms. Admiring them as he took each one from the basket and cleaned it, deftly cutting the heads from the stems and slicing them into thin strips. Then when the oil in the pan was hot, he tossed in the mushrooms and, as soon as they took on a light golden hue, lowered the flame and covered the pan. Molly was impressed. It was obvious that he knew exactly what he was doing.

“Now they have to cook very slowly for a while. That’s another secret. Would you like a salad?”

“Okay, but let me help. I’m to salads what Verdi is to opera.”

He handed her the endives, the grater, the Roquefort. “It’s all yours. I’m going out to get some wood for the fireplace. Like some music?”

He turned on the radio, revving up the volume so that the pulsing rock beat filled every corner of the kitchen.

“Je t’aime, je t’aime, je t’aime,

Oh! Ma tendre blessure—”

As Reiner slipped out of the house, the back door closed on Johnny Hallyday, muting the old heartthrob’s yearning, lovesick voice. The light from the kitchen windows spilled onto the woodpile in the backyard. Reiner had thought there was an ax nearby, but all he could find was a heavy shovel. When he lifted it up, an army of ants underneath the blade—hundreds of them—went scurrying for their lives in all directions.

Hidden in the tall grass at the front of the house, Duboit rubbed his leg where he’d injured it tripping over the fallen tree limb. It was scraped but not bleeding—at least not very much. The music from inside the house sounded like they were having a good time. One of Johnny’s golden oldies from the seventies. He hadn’t heard it in years. Why the hell was he here anyhow watching her getting it on with lover boy when the case was over? The only one who didn’t seem to know it was the
patron
. Duboit wondered what the real reason was that he was so interested in this young woman. Maybe he had the hots for her himself. His boss liked them young and tender. When they looked like that, how could you blame him?