The Three Evangelists (18 page)

‘Is it really that bad?’

Vandoosler nodded.

‘Your Breton’s an idiot.’

‘My dear Marc,’ said Vandoosler, ‘if everyone who got in our way was an idiot, it would be too easy. I suppose you didn’t get a sandwich for me?’

‘You didn’t say you’d be back. Shit, you only had to telephone.’

‘We don’t have a phone.’

‘Oh no, of course.’

‘And don’t say “shit” to me, it gets on my nerves. I’ve still got police reflexes.’

‘Yeah, it shows. Shall we go in? You can share my sandwich, and I’ll tell you all about Monsieur Dompierre. The pigeon arrived this morning.’

‘See, I told you it would.’

‘Excuse me, I had to go out and catch it. I cheated. If I hadn’t run downstairs, I would have lost it. But I don’t know whether this is any use at all. Maybe just a sparrow. Whatever you think, I’m giving notice, I’m resigning from this look-out business. I’ve decided to go to Dourdan tomorrow.’

Vandoosler seemed greatly interested by the story of Christophe Dompierre, but he couldn’t say why. Marc thought perhaps he didn’t want to say why. Several times, his uncle read the card wedged on the fireplace under the coin.

‘And you don’t remember the quotation from
Moby Dick
?’ he asked.

‘No, I told you. It was a rather grand sentence, technical and lyrical, with “widest expanses” in it, but it didn’t have anything to do with what he was talking about. It was philosophical, a quest for the unattainable, that kind of thing.’

‘Still,’ said Vandoosler. ‘I would have liked it if you could have identified it.’

‘You don’t think I’m going to read the whole book to find it for you, do you?’

‘That would be too much to hope for. Your idea of going to Dourdan is all very well, but you’re going without any idea what to look for. From what I know of him, I’d be surprised if Siméonidis has anything to say to you. And Dompierre certainly won’t have told him about the “few little pointers” he found.’

‘I want to see what the second wife and stepson are like. Can you take my place this afternoon? I need to think and stretch my legs.’

‘Off with you, then, Marc, I need to sit down. I’ll borrow your window.’

Vandoosler spent the rest of the day watching the street. It kept him entertained, but what Marc had told him of Dompierre was worrying him. He found it surprising that Marc had chased after the man. Marc was good at impulsive actions. Despite his underground lines of conduct, which were firm and even a bit too pure, recognisable by those who knew him well, Marc fired off in all directions when he attempted to analyse things, yet his many deviations, in terms both of logic and temperament, could sometimes lead to valuable results. Marc was torn between the twin perils of angelism and impatience. One could count on Mathias as well, not so much for detective work as for registering things. Vandoosler thought of his St Matthew as a kind of dolmen, a great standing stone, sacred, but unconsciously absorbing all kinds of perceptible events, its particles of mica open to the winds. Well, anyway, a complicated man to describe. Because he was also capable of brusque movements, of racing off, of taking risks at judiciously chosen moments. As for Lucien, he was an idealist, liable to be tempted by every manner of excess, from the top of the scale to the bottom. In the cacophony of his agitation, collisions and impacts were always possible, striking unexpected sparks.

And Alexandra?

Vandoosler lit a cigarette and returned to the window. Marc was drawn to her, that was all too likely, but he was still very entangled in his feelings about the wife who had left him. Vandoosler found it hard to follow what was going on with his nephew, because he himself had never kept for more than a few months promises meant to last fifty years. Why did
he make so many promises, anyway? The face of the young woman with her Greek ancestry touched him. From what he had seen of her so far, Alexandra was an interesting combination of vulnerability and boldness, authentic but repressed feelings, and moments of wild but sometimes silent bravado. It was the kind of mixture of enthusiasm and sweetness that he had known and loved long ago in another person. Whom he had abandoned in half an hour. He could still clearly see her walking back down the platform with the twins, until they were just three little dots in the distance. Where were those three little dots now? Vandoosler sat up and gripped the balcony rail. He had neglected for ten minutes to watch the street. He threw away his cigarette and reviewed once more the string of plausible arguments incriminating Alexandra that Leguennec had drawn up. He still needed to play for time, and for something else to crop up to slow down the investigation by the Breton
inspecteur.
Dompierre might just do.

Marc came in late, followed shortly thereafter by Lucien, whose turn it was to do the shopping, and who had the day before asked Marc to get hold of two kilos of langoustines, if they looked fresh and if it looked easy to steal them.

‘It wasn’t easy,’ Marc said, putting the big bag of langoustines on the table. ‘Not at all easy. In fact what I did was pinch the bag belonging to the man ahead of me in the queue.’

‘Very ingenious,’ remarked Lucien. ‘You really do deliver, don’t you?’

‘Next time, try to have a craving for something simpler,’ said Marc.

‘That’s always been my problem,’ said Lucien.

‘You wouldn’t have made a very effective soldier, then, if you don’t mind me saying.’

Lucien stopped short in his preparations for supper, and looked at his watch. ‘Shit!’ he exclaimed. ‘The Great War!’

‘What about the Great War? Have you been called up? Does your country need you?’

Lucien put down the kitchen knife, with distress written all over his face.

‘It’s June 8,’ he said. ‘This is a disaster. I can’t cook the langoustines. I’m supposed to be at a commemorative dinner tonight, I can’t not go.’

‘Commemorative? Some mistake surely? It’s World War Two you commemorate at this time of year, and anyway it’s May 8 not June 8. You’ve mixed it up.’

‘No, no,’ said Lucien. ‘Yes, of course, the 1939–45 dinner was supposed to be on May 8. But they wanted to ask two veterans of the First War, so as to give it a more historical dimension, see? But one of them was ill. So they put the veterans’ night off for a month, so it’s tonight. I can’t miss it, it’s really so important: one of the veterans is ninety-five but he’s absolutely all there. I must meet him. It’s a choice between History and the langoustines.’

‘Guess it’ll have to be History then,’ said Marc.

‘Of course. I’m off to get changed.’

Lucien gave a final glance full of genuine regret at the kitchen table and went upstairs. Then he left the house at a run, asking Marc to save him a few langoustines for when he got home later that night.

‘You’ll be too drunk to appreciate this gourmet stuff,’ said Marc. But Lucien was out of earshot and running towards 1914-18.

XXVI

MATHIAS WAS ROUSED FROM SLEEP BY A SERIES OF SHOUTS
.
JUMPING
out of bed, he went to the window. Lucien was standing in the street calling his name and Marc’s. He had climbed up onto a big rubbish bin, it wasn’t clear why; perhaps he thought his voice would carry better from there, but he looked very precarious. Mathias picked up the broom handle and knocked on the ceiling to wake Marc. Hearing no response, he decided to do without his help and reached Lucien just as the latter was tottering from his perch.

‘You’re completely pissed,’ said Mathias. ‘What is it with you, yelling at the top of your voice in the street, at two in the morning?’

‘Lost my keys,’ said Lucien indistinctly. ‘Took them out of my pocket to open the gate and dropped them. Really,
I
promise you. Just slipped out of my hands. Passing the Eastern Front. Couldn’t find them in the dark.’

‘You’re the one who’s lost. Come on in, we’ll find them in the morning.’

‘Noooo,
I
want my keys!’ Lucien wailed, with the childish petulance and insistence of someone who is seriously drunk.

He escaped Mathias’ grip and started fumbling around uncertainly, nose to the ground, in front of Juliette’s gate.

Mathias saw Marc, who had woken up in turn and was coming up the path. ‘What took you so long?’ said Mathias.

‘I’m not a caveman,’ said Marc. ‘
I
don’t jump at the first sound of a wild beast. But do get a move on. Lucien’s going to wake the whole
neighbourhood, he’ll wake Kyril. And Mathias, do you realise you’re walking about stark naked? Not that I’ve anything against it, I’m just telling you.’

‘So what?’ said Mathias. ‘This idiot got me out of bed in the middle of the night.’

‘You’ll catch your death.’

In fact Mathias felt a warm glow in the small of his back. He couldn’t understand why Marc felt the cold so much.

‘It’s OK,’ he said, ‘I’m feeling quite warm.’

‘Well, I’m not,’ said Marc. ‘Come on you, take one arm and I’ll take the other, and we’ll get him indoors.’

‘No, no!’ cried Lucien. ‘I need my keys.’

Mathias sighed and went a few yards along the cobbled street. Perhaps the idiot had dropped them long before he got home. No, there they were, between two cobblestones. Lucien’s keys were easy to spot. They were attached to an old lead soldier with red trousers and blue cape. This kind of thing left him cold, but Mathias could see why Lucien was attached to them.

‘Found them,’ he said. ‘OK, now we can go in.’

‘There’s no need to hold on to me,’ said Lucien.

‘Just get going,’ said Marc, not letting him go. ‘We’ve still got to get you up to the third floor. There’s no end to this.’

‘Military stupidity and the immensity of the sea are the two things which convey the idea of infinity,’ said Mathias.

Lucien stopped short in the middle of the garden. ‘Where did you hear that?’ he said.

‘From a trench newspaper called
Making Progress,’
he said. ‘It was in one of your books.’

‘I didn’t know you read my stuff,’ said Lucien.

‘It’s a good idea to know who you’re living with,’ said Mathias. ‘And meanwhile, let’s get cracking. I really am starting to feel cold now.’

‘Ah,’ said Marc. ‘What did I tell you?’

XXVII

NEXT MORNING AT BREAKFAST, MARC WAS AMAZED TO SEE LUCIEN
tucking into the leftover langoustines with his morning coffee.

‘You’ve completely recovered, I see,’ he said.

‘Not entirely,’ said Lucien, pulling a face. ‘My head’s shot to bits.’

‘That should please you,’ said Mathias. ‘War wound.’

‘Ha ha, very funny,’ said Lucien. ‘These langoustines are excellent, Marc. You must have chosen a good fish shop. Next time take a salmon.’

‘What did your veteran have to say?’ asked Mathias

‘He was great. I’ve got a date to see him, week Wednesday. But I can’t remember much else about the evening.’

‘Shut up,’ said Marc, ‘I’m listening to the news.’

‘Why, what do you expect to hear?’

‘About the storm in Brittany. I want to hear what’s become of it.’

Marc was fascinated by storms, though he knew that was not very original. At least it gave him something in common with Alexandra. That was better than nothing. She had said she liked the wind. He put on the table his little transistor radio, covered with spots of white paint.

‘When we’re grown up, we’ll get a TV set,’ said Lucien.

‘Oh, can’t you shut up!’

Marc turned up the volume. Lucien was making an appalling din with his langoustine shells.

The morning news bulletin was being read. The French Prime Minister was meeting the German Chancellor. The Bourse was in a gloomy mood.
The storms over Brittany were abating and moving towards Paris, but in less severe form. What a pity, Marc thought.
Agence France Presse
reported the discovery of the body of a man, in the car park of his hotel in Paris. The murdered man was named as Christophe Dompierre, aged forty-three, unmarried, no family, a delegate to the European conference. Was this a political crime? No other details had been released to the press.

Marc grabbed the radio and stared wild-eyed at Mathias.

‘What’s the matter?’ said Lucien.

‘Did you hear, it’s the man who was here yesterday!’ Marc shouted. ‘Political crime? No way!’

‘You didn’t tell me his name,’ said Lucien.

Marc was running upstairs four steps at a time. Vandoosler, who had been up some time, was standing at his table reading.

‘Someone’s killed Dompierre!’ Marc said, panting.

Vandoosler turned round slowly. ‘Sit down,’ he said. ‘Tell me about it.’

‘I don’t know any more than that,’ cried Marc, still out of breath. ‘It was on the radio. He’s been killed, that’s all they said. Murdered! They found him in the hotel car park.’

‘Oh! the damn fool!’ said Vandoosler, banging his fist on the table. ‘That’s what you get if you try to be the lone ranger. Somebody caught up with the poor fellow. Oh, the damn fool!’

Marc was shaking his head in sorrow. He felt his hands trembling.

‘Maybe he was stupid,’ he said. ‘But he was on to something, we can be sure of that now. You’ll have to tell your Leguennec, because the police will never make the link with Sophia Siméonidis if we don’t tell them. They’ll go looking for some motive in Geneva or whatever.’

‘Yes, better tell Leguennec. And we’ll get a real bollocking from him, for not having told him yesterday. He’ll say that might have avoided this murder, and he could be right.’

Marc groaned. ‘But we promised Dompierre not to tell a soul. What else could we have done?’

‘I know, I know,’ said Vandoosler. ‘So let’s get our story straight. You didn’t go chasing after Dompierre, he came knocking at your door, because you were Relivaux’s neighbour. And the only people who knew
about his visit were you three. I didn’t know anything about it, you didn’t tell me. It was only this morning you told me all this. OK?’

Oh great!’ cried Marc. ‘You just run along and tell him that. We three will be in the shit and have to be questioned by Leguennec and you’ll be in the clear!’

‘Come on, young Vandoosler, use your head! As if I care whether I’m in the clear or not. Getting told off by Leguennec leaves me completely cold. All that matters is if he goes on keeping me in his confidence, d’you understand? That’s the only way we’ll get the information we need.’