Impure Blood (39 page)

A bitter smile played on Vincent’s lips.

‘That’s been our lives, alright.’ He shook his head. ‘I should never have let you join the Brigade.’ The chain rasped through the eyebolt behind him as he raised a hand. ‘Look where it brought you.’

‘Hey. You didn’t
let
me join. I joined. And it was the best move I ever made. Now let’s move on. Forwards, Papa, remember? We go forwards. So let’s think about those who might have done this. It might help us later.’

‘How?’

‘What did you always say? “Knowledge is…?”’

She let him complete the phrase.

‘“Knowledge is power.” It’s true, yes.’

‘We may find ourselves in a position where we can use that power.’

He looked sheepish.

‘I need to go to the… Just to pee this time.’

‘Do it. I’ll look the other way.’

Agnès’s back was an inquisition of pain and turning her head to the side brought a new torment. But she was determined not to show it; not to show any weakness or negativity.
Thank God I’m my father’s girl
, she said to herself. The Dantiers had never given in. They had always pushed that little bit harder. Always been winners.

‘Are you alright, Papa? All I can hear is grunts. I want to hear a nice steady psssssssssssss.’

Vincent was finding it hard to manoeuvre himself into position. But by moving his left hand as close to the eyebolt as he could, there was sufficient play in the chain to allow his right hand to do the needful.

‘I’m alright.’

‘Good. And if it turns out to be more of a trickle than a torrent, don’t worry about it.’

‘It’s not coming out at all. Come on, damn you.’

‘Listen, Papa. I’m going to go as well, alright? Maybe that will help.’

His whimpering started up again but this time, it wasn’t through the effort of moving.

‘Sweetheart… sweetheart… You’re so…’

‘Hey, stop that. Come on.’

‘Yes… Yes, you’re right. Positive. Positive is the way forward.’

It was all Agnès could do not to cry out in pain as she turned on to her side.

‘When we get out of here, I’m going straight to the osteopath,’ she said, relieving herself. ‘Back’s a little sore.’

‘You poor darling.’

‘There you are. Listen to that flow. No problem.’

Her strategy worked.

‘Better, Papa?’

‘Better.’

Accompanied by more rasping of chains and grunts from Vincent, they set about righting themselves. For a moment, Agnès thought she might vomit with pain but she held on.

‘Now – to work. I can think of at least… five people I sent down who swore they would come for me when they got out.’

More thunder, rolling in the opposite direction.

Vincent suddenly looked stronger.

‘Who were they? Bastards.’

‘Benoit Greuze is the first one that comes to mind.’

‘Greuze, Greuze… Strangled a man he swore blind was burgling his house.’

‘He did.
Strangled
the burglar, note. It was obvious he’d lured the man to the house for the express purpose of murdering him – he was convinced he was having an affair with his wife. Greuze always maintained I tricked him into confessing. He’s out now. Been out almost a year.’

‘He could never organise a thing like this. Without help, anyway.’

‘Agreed.’

‘Who else?’

As the unrecorded minutes ticked by, the pair began to compile an impressive list of candidates. Eventually, they cast their vote.

‘So who do you go for, Papa?’

‘Cyrille Monceau,’ he said.

Bodies lay sprawled over desks in the squad room like victims of a mass poisoning. Only Darac, revived by a shower in the Caserne, was awake.

He flipped his mobile.

‘Who am I speaking to?’

‘Cabriet, Captain.’

The boy sounded about seventeen years old.

‘And you’ve relieved Captain Tardelli’s man, yes?’

‘That’s right, sir.’

‘You have the Delage house in clear sight?’

‘Yes.’

‘Any activity to report?’

‘No, I’m under orders to ring you if Madame Delage or anyone else turns up. No one has.’

‘I’m coming over. Do you know what I look like? I don’t want you ringing me to tell me I’m standing on the doorstep.’

‘I do, sir. I’ve seen you play at the Blue Devil a few times. And I’ve got some of the quintet’s CDs as well.’

Darac was stunned. In almost fifteen years on the force, he had come across only three other officers who were jazz fans.

‘Practically unique, Cabriet. That’s what you are. We’ll get together over a beer and a couple of albums sometime. Or the other way around.’

‘I’d love that, sir.’

‘I’ll see you shortly.’

* * *

Darac had read Corinne Delage’s letters over and over again; every name in her somewhat scanty address book had been rung or visited; her financial accounts had been scrutinised; and her most recent employer, much to the woman’s annoyance, had been disturbed at eleven the previous evening for an interview. One or two call-backs aside, there didn’t seem much that could be added to the picture of Delage – not in time to help find Agnès and Vincent. And yet Darac was persisting. She was the key to it, he was certain. He put on gloves, went in through the back door of Delage’s house, and called Cabriet.

‘Yes, I saw you go round, Captain.’

‘Let me know straight away if anyone turns up.’

‘Yes, sir.’

The photos. The personal effects. Even Angeline’s god-damned soap – Darac intended to look at everything again. Maybe they had missed something.

Twenty minutes went by. Thirty. And beyond. It wasn’t until he was on the point of leaving that he noticed the foot stool that lived under a nest of tables in the living room. Sitting on stubby wooden legs, it was a leather drum-shaped object – Delage in furniture form, Darac reflected. More for the sake of completeness than in the hope of finding anything useful, he decided to give it a closer look. Reaching under the tables, he felt its top lift slightly as he pulled it out. The top wasn’t just a top. It was a lid. For a moment, he was back with Medusa’s plinth. He lifted it off.

‘How did we miss this?’

The stool doubled as a work basket. An upper tray contained all the typical accoutrements of sewing. A collection of more diverse objects lived in the compartment below, most of them in need of some sort of repair. Kneeling on the floor, he removed them item by item.

One piece immediately intrigued him. With screw holes cut into lugs protruding from either end, it was a small, flat metal case. A vaguely arabesque design was incised into its japanned upper surface. He wondered what the thing was and why it was in the basket – it didn’t appear damaged. A bag containing a couple of matching screws was taped to its rear side.

Holding the base, he slid off its lid. Inside was a rolled-up piece of parchment-like material bearing a handwritten text. The script was exotic. He looked at it for a moment, uncomprehending. But then, although he couldn’t remember what such things were called, he suddenly realised what it might be. He took out his mobile and photographed the object from all sides. His mind alive with ideas, connections and possibilities, he forsook the floor and went to sit at the bureau. Turning on an Anglepoise lamp, he directed the beam at the screw holes in the lugs attached to the case.

Getting to his feet, he moved quickly to the kitchen door and carefully examined the frame. Nothing. The door to the staircase was next. Nothing. And finally, the door into the front lobby. No better news there. Now what? He went over to the bookcase. He’d been through it once already, shaking out each title to see if anything had been hidden between pages. This time, his attention was directed to the titles themselves. He scanned them one by one.

‘Shit.’

So far, nothing had reinforced the theory that was taking shape in his head.

He flipped his mobile.

‘Cabriet – alright to step out of the front door?’

‘Have you finished then, Captain?’

‘No. I just want to stand on the front doorstep for a minute.’

‘Alright. Yes, everything’s clear.’

Darac went to the front door and opened it. It took two seconds to find what he was looking for. At about shoulder height on the right-hand side of the doorframe, there were two small holes, one above the other. He offered up the parchment case. The holes in the doorframe appeared in the dead centre of the screw holes on the case’s lugs. Another matching pair of holes appeared lower down. He went to the back door and repeated the experiment. Three pairs of matching holes there. He was already calling Frankie as he went back inside.

‘Paul?’

‘Yes, I’m over at the Delage house. Are you at home, Frankie?’

‘No – been back in my office for about an hour or so now.’

‘Good. Check your inbox – I’ve emailed you a couple of photos.’

‘Of what?’

‘This might seem a strange place to start but you’re Jewish by birth, aren’t you?’

‘By birthright and mess of pottage… Sorry, that’s not helpful. Yes I am. Non-practising, of course. And non-believing, come to that. Most of the time.’

‘But you know Jewish lore?’

‘Try me.’

‘What do you call those text-containing cases that Orthodox Jews attach to their doorframes? To attract good luck.’

‘To attract good luck and good Nazis, my grandfather used to say. Mezuzoth – mezuzah in the singular.’

‘Mezuzah – that’s it.’

‘Why?’

‘Because I think Corinne Delage has one. And it’s been attached, taken down and reattached to her front and rear doorframes several times. It’s not in favour at the moment.’

‘I never thought I’d have anything in common with Corinne Delage.’

‘I just want to be sure it’s what I think it is before I go any further.’

‘You’re sounding pretty upbeat… Ah, here we go. I’m opening the photos now… Okay. The first one
could
be a case. Little untypical, though. No Star of David or anything in the pattern. Now the second… is the text:
Shema Yisrael.
It’s a mezuzah, alright.’

‘This is it. This is
the
lead, Frankie. Granot and Bonbon are still researching old files. Tell them they can stop. I don’t know the details yet but I think I know what’s behind this whole thing.’

‘What?’

‘We pass a plaque commemorating it every day.’

‘The… round-up? In ’42?’

‘The round-up. I’ve got some people to see and other calls to make but I’ll be back as soon as I can.’

He began by calling Adèle Rousade in Archive.

Darac strode into a squad room that bore no relation to the sleepy, report-strewn mess he’d left a couple of hours before. The news that he was on to something had got around. More than thirty officers and assistants were crowded in. But before he got the meeting rolling, he needed to check a couple of things.

At the back of the room, the projector he’d called up was hidden under the blond blackout curtain of Erica’s hair.

‘Alright back there?’

‘Having to replace the bulb holder. Be a couple of minutes.’

‘Did Adèle come up with all the files I asked for?’

‘All of them.’

‘Good, thanks.’

He found Granot next.

‘I’m going to need your help during this. Got a ruler and a pad to hand?’

‘Yes?’

‘All will become clear in a minute.’

Darac returned to the front of the room. Behind him, the screen had already been set up.

‘Okay, everyone.’ The buzz subsided. ‘While we wait, I’ll explain why I’ve come to the conclusions I have.’ His eyes swept the room, engaging with every face. ‘Put the following factors together and see what they suggest to you. Corinne Delage was on hand when poison was jabbed into the arm of Emil Florian; and later, playing a more active role, she was there when he finally succumbed to it. Then we learn the frugal, seventy-year-old Delage recently bought a van for €9,500. The money was given to her by a third party – obviously to mask the purchaser’s true identity. That van is then identified as almost certainly the one used in the kidnapping of the boss and her father. Now this morning, I learned something we didn’t know about Corinne Delage. Frankie’s best placed to help us with this.’

Feeling strangely moved, Frankie enlightened the team on the concept of the mezuzah.

Darac took it on from there.

‘Thank you. Now clearly, a non-Jewish person could own such a thing, though it’s less likely they would display it in the prescribed manner. But there’s an interesting aspect to this. A pair of matching screws was taped to it. All four turning surfaces in the slots were chewed-up. I then found several pairs of matching holes in the front and rear doorframes. In other words, Delage had attached, removed and reattached the mezuzah on a number of occasions. I think I know what this on-off approach implies about her Jewishness but let’s move on. We know she was a war baby. We’re not sure of the true details because her original birth certificate was lost but she was registered as born into a family of tenant farmers, the Groismonts from Grandeville in the Île de France.’

The monologue drying his throat, he went across to the water cooler.

‘Last night, Bonbon and I came to the conclusion that the Groismonts were not Delage’s natural parents. Reinforcing that theory is a remark Madame Groismont, who was not Jewish, makes to her in a letter. She refers to the day young Corinne came into their lives, and I quote, “wandering in like a little lost lamb.” Not “climbing out of the car” or anything like that. “Lost” and “wandering”. It suggests she was unaccompanied, doesn’t it?’ Grandeville is a small, rural community…’

Perand examined his nails for a moment.

‘…but it’s also a rail head. Land Registry confirms that in the forties, the Groismont farm lay right alongside the principal train line from Paris to the south-east – the line used to transport Jews from Nice to the holding camp at Drancy. The records we’re about to view should help us with this but I believe that the girl who became Corinne Groismont was on board one of those trains. I’m contending she somehow escaped from it as it slowed to a crawl or made an unscheduled stop alongside the farm. The authorities sealed carriages and freight vans. But I’ve just been told that there are numerous accounts of captive passengers cutting holes with concealed tools, even forcing apart planking under the noses of the guards. The picture I have in my mind is of someone, probably the parents, seizing the opportunity when the train was stationary to thrust Corinne through such a crack. She was only a toddler, remember, and tiny. Eventually, she found her way across the fields to the Groismonts’ cottage. And there, they welcomed in the lost lamb with open arms. And it seems they kept them open.’