Lost (8 page)

‘Come on, Liliane. The whole village was out with the gendarmerie yesterday,’ he said, putting the photograph back into his wallet. ‘You were probably one of the first to know.’

Liliane tried to read the intentions in his face. His eyes, beneath their heavy brows, showed nothing but his habitual anger. His mouth, which had kept its sharp contours, had not changed since he was a boy. She had always felt for Stuart a combination of pity and loathing. He was one of those children
who seemed to hang back from life as though half of them were still inside their mothers. She remembered when his mother had died, giving birth to that strange sister of his. He had the look in his eye of a coward, like his father. There was something bloodless about him.

‘What do you want? Claude wouldn’t have anything to do with the disappearance of a child. You know that.’

‘Where is he?’

She stared at him, to steady herself, for she was feeling weak and nauseous.

‘You know where he is and you know that he has nothing to do with the child.’

‘Get him to call as soon as he gets back, will you? If he comes here.’

‘Of course he’ll come here.’

‘Of course. It’s July.’

She held her tongue, watching him turn. When he was a few paces away she called after him, ‘I’ve kept civil. But you can’t, can you? You’re so bitter.’

He did not turn round but kept on walking.

‘Have a good day, Madame Santini!’

She watched him from her doorway as he walked off down the alley. She despised him, but she was not sure that wrong had not been done to him. He had no real family. His sister hardly counted because she was cold as stone. Still, she told herself, that was no reason. All he had was his hatred of her husband, and if he ever caught up with Coco, his life would be over, of that she felt sure.

When Stuart had disappeared, Liliane noted the smell of the
maestrale
in the air. It would be here for three days, or six, or nine, she thought. She was not sure if it was the wind or Stuart’s visit that had brought on the nausea. She would boil up some garlic water and drink that. Then she would call Babette. She looked up at the sky and saw the last star. Then she turned and went back into her house.

Pushed by the wind, Stuart walked down the main street towards his father’s house. He reached the door to his father’s cellar and stopped. The door was covered over with washed-out and fraying posters. The village noticeboard was on the wall of the
mairie
further up the hill, but those who could not be bothered to climb that far stopped here. Stuart hesitated. He did not wish to see his sister but he felt a superstitious anxiety about passing beneath her window without doing so.

He climbed the steps to the front door. He did not wait long for her to open. She was wearing a pink bathrobe. A white nightdress showed underneath. She stood aside to let him pass into the dark hall.

‘It’s early,’ he said, leading the way to the kitchen.

She went straight to the stove and lit the gas.

‘I was awake,’ she said.

‘You’ve repainted it,’ he said, looking about him.

She ran the tap and filled a saucepan, which she laid on the hob.

‘Manuel did it,’ she said, without turning.

Stuart looked at the plait she had made of her hair.

‘I can’t stay long,’ he said.

She turned.

‘I heard about the child,’ she said. ‘I was in the square yesterday. I saw the mother.’

‘Yes. I have to make some calls. Can I do it from here?’

He just could not be with her.

‘Go ahead. Have you eaten?’

‘I’m not hungry. Coffee would be good.’

‘I’ll make some eggs,’ she said as he left the room.

The shutters were closed and the sitting room was dark. Stuart could smell wallpaper glue. He turned on the light and saw the new walls, papered with a motif reminiscent of clouds in fleshy colours, or scar tissue. The room was all Beatrice: her glass animals in the display cabinet, her floral curtains, her paintings-by-numbers of Provence. There was nothing
masculine
about the room, no trace of Manuel, the father of her child, who now lived at the Hôtel Napoléon because, as the villagers with their cruel euphemisms put it, his sister was ‘cold’. On a new set of shelves that spanned the far wall was Beatrice’s miniature shoe collection, the sight of which had always chilled him. Stuart made his call standing up, as though to keep physical contact with the place to a minimum.

Annie was already at her desk. Stuart asked her to tell Finance to work on the husband.

‘Check all his financial links to the island. Get them to find out who he defended, too.’

Finance always baulked at any extension of their domain, but Annie would not be intimidated.

‘Could you check the deviant files, too, both major and minor cases? And prepare a request for phone taps for Madame Lasserre. I’ll be in by seven-thirty.’

In the kitchen Beatrice had laid a place for him at the head of the table. Two fried eggs sat on a black plate with a red dice motif.

Heavy-hearted, Stuart made his way to the chair and sat down.

‘Really. I’ve no time.’

‘You’ve time for breakfast.’

Stuart ate fast. His eyes scanned the newly painted walls. They were the colour of egg yolk. Beatrice leaned against the kitchen cupboards, her arms folded, and watched him eat.

‘Ophélie chose the colour,’ she said.

Stuart nodded his approval, his mouth full of food. Beatrice’s daughter, Ophélie, would never belong to her. She bore not a single trace of her mother. Every day she ran off to be with her father at the Napoléon, to be with her own kind. Beatrice fed her, dressed her, put her pigtails in. She did what she had always done, what she was supposed to do, and nothing more.

She sat down beside him at the table and watched him finish his eggs and slurp his coffee.

‘I must go,’ he said.

She brought her hands from her lap on to the table. He averted his eyes as he always did, though he knew the sight by heart: her left hand, small and slender, like her right, the skin as pale and two fingers missing, severed just above the knuckles of the fist.

‘More coffee,’ she said.

‘I haven’t got time,’ he said, standing up. He wiped his hands on a cloth she held out to him. She was forty and her lovely face still showed no signs of ageing.

‘Have you got any ideas about the child?’ she asked suddenly. He looked for some sign of mockery in her expression. Finding none, he looked down at the linoleum. He could make out a bow and arrow in the marble grain.

‘I don’t know. We’ll see.’ He smiled at her, a brief, closed smile, which instead of bringing them together, set them further apart. It was a closing signal.

On the way to the door, she said, ‘Come and see me soon.’

She did not linger but shut the door behind him the moment he had passed through it. To shut out this terrible wind, he told himself as he hurried down the steps.

Alice stood by the window with Dan in her arms and looked out at the pine tree on the lawn before the woods. Its trunk was so curved, its parasol lay almost on its side and its foliage glowed amber, as if it were absorbing all the emerging sunlight and leaving the sky with none. Holding Dan’s head against her collarbone, she listened to the suck, suck of his thumb and watched the helicopter battling against the wind. It flew erratically, its tail sweeping dangerously back and forth. She held Dan against her to hide her tears from him. He was requesting nothing of her but to be in her arms, as though he knew this was all she was capable of. She pressed her lips to the top of his head and breathed in the sawdust smell of his hair.

She tried to think of ways out. If Sam didn’t come back, she reasoned, she would be no good to Dan anyway. She cursed Mathieu again for being dead. Now if she died, Dan would only have his grandmother. But perhaps her mother could do less damage to a boy whom she could not mould in her image.

Alice turned round to face Babette, walking along the corridor towards them. Her huge breasts moved in circles, one at a time.

‘Do you want me to take him for a bit?’

Dan tightened his grip on his mother.

‘No. Don’t worry. Thank you.’

‘I came up for some peace,’ Babette said. ‘There’s another policeman come to take over from the fat one. They’re chatting away down there. I’m used to being on my own.’ She smiled, then studied Alice for a moment. ‘I know they’re doing their best,’ she said. ‘I know things aren’t the same on
the mainland.’ She paused, measuring the effect of her words. ‘People here don’t like the police. They’re unpopular. Stuart in particular. I think you should try’ – she hesitated – ‘another tack. So as not to leave too much to chance.’

‘What do you mean?’

Babette held her hand close to her mouth, partially covering it and forcing Alice to lean closer in order to hear her.

‘There’s somebody you might want to talk to. He might be able to help. More than Stuart. He can be very kind. If he says he’ll help, then he will. He’s an important man on this island,’ she said. ‘Actually he’s one of the founders of the independence movement. I mean he was one of the early ones. He’s more in politics now. He’s no angel but he wouldn’t stand for a kidnapping. He knows everybody. If you can get him on your side, he could help you. You wouldn’t want to tell Stuart, though. He hates him.’

‘Who is this person?’

Babette grinned. ‘Claude Santini. People call him Coco.’ She put her hand into the pocket of her apron and took out a small piece of folded paper, which she handed to Alice. ‘You can call him on this number. He’s a bit of a womaniser,’ she added, smiling.

Alice put the paper in her pocket. Babette folded her arms.

‘If you like I’ll get a little girl over so that he’ll have someone to play with,’ she said, nodding at Dan. ‘Her name’s Ophélie. She must be about his age. She’s Stuart’s niece, in actual fact. But she’s a nice little girl. It would do him good to play a bit.’

‘Yes,’ Alice said vaguely. ‘He’s not very well.’

Babette touched his forehead.

‘A little feverish.’ She looked at Alice. ‘If you do call him, use that portable one you’ve got. Then they can’t listen in.’

Alice nodded.

‘Can I get you something to eat, madame?’

‘No. Thank you.’

‘I’ll come up a bit later and see if you don’t want anything.’

Alice went into her bedroom and laid Dan on the bed. She took off his sandals but did not undress him, covering him with a sheet. His eyes blinked open, registered her presence and closed again.

She picked up the mobile Stuart had given her and pressed it against her breastbone. When she had called her brother-in-law she had cried, telling him how much she needed Mathieu with her. Through habit she had talked to David about his brother, but it was not Mathieu she wanted. She wanted to say that, compared to this, Mathieu’s death was nothing, nothing at all.

She dialled her mother’s number again. The machine answered. She listened to the recorded message, her mother’s deep, commanding voice. The tone came, longer this time than all the other times. Once again she left no message.

She lay down close to Dan so that she could feel his little body against her. If she reached her mother she would come immediately and take control. Through habit Alice would shrink back and let her. Even in this environment, so foreign, so inhospitable for women, her mother would be her imperious self. Alice had come far to escape her mother. It occurred to her that it was this flight that had driven her to Mathieu, that had brought her here to this terrible place, to live through this. She thought of her mother’s home in the south of England. There was a place near the house where she had gone as a little girl and that still came to her in her dreams. It was a clearing in the pine woods and she would go and stand in the middle and let her stomach fill with fear. The clearing was wide. Clouds floated above it as if it were there only to frame the sky. There were poplar saplings scattered across it and the sound of their leaves moving in the wind was like the whisper of her mother’s voice, willing her to go home.

She sat up, unfolded the piece of paper Babette had given her and dialled Santini’s number. A woman’s voice answered. She hung up.

Stuart let Angel Lopez precede him into his office. The man smelled strongly of cigarettes and lavender. Stuart closed the door behind him.

‘Sit down,’ he said, went to the window and opened the shutters. The harsh light brought by the
maestrale
filled the room. He walked round his desk and faced Lopez, who sat, legs and arms crossed, a small brown bundle in the chair.

‘You have a lot of medals,’ he said, nodding at the wall behind Stuart.

‘They’re not medals; they’re badges. From other police forces.’

Annie had put them up. She was always decorating his office. He took the Aron file from the drawer.

‘You’ve got the Guardia Civil,’ Lopez said, grinning at the wall. ‘
Todo
por
la
patria
.’ He looked at Stuart. ‘You have friends there?’

Stuart looked down at the search report.

‘I went to Escorial once for a course.’

‘Ah, El Escorial. The Francist Mecca. It’s a beautiful place. A lot of torturing has gone on in Escorial over the centuries but it’s a beautiful place. And nice and near Madrid.’ Stuart looked up. ‘Nice place to go for the weekend.’

‘Do you want a coffee, Lopez?’

Lopez was disarmed only for a moment.

‘Sure,’ he said, smiling. ‘Don’t move, I saw the machine. I’ll get it.’

Stuart stood up.

‘Black?’ he asked.

‘Please.’

Stuart looked at the file, on his desk, considered putting it
away, then decided against it. There was nothing in it Lopez couldn’t get from the gendarmerie.

When he returned with the coffee, Lopez was smoking. He held up his cigarette.

‘Do you mind? I know you smoke yourself.’

‘Not any more.’ Stuart put the coffee down on the desk in front of him.

‘You’ve got the Metropolitan Police, too,’ Lopez said, nodding at the wall. ‘You’re well travelled.’

‘My deputy is. If there’s any travelling to do, I send Gérard.’

‘Pinet.’ Lopez settled back in his chair. ‘He’s what I call a new cop. Smooth and sober. I think I prefer the old kind. Like you, Stuart. At least one knows where one stands with policemen like you.’

‘You’re a nostalgic, Lopez,’ Stuart said.

Lopez smiled and picked up the plastic cup; he sipped and blew, sipped and blew.

‘I want to ask you something,’ Stuart said.

Lopez put down his cup. Stuart slid the heavy glass ashtray across the desk and watched him stub out his cigarette on the Ministry’s acronym.

‘Please,’ Lopez said, rubbing his lips mechanically with his forefinger.

‘Don’t write anything,’ Stuart said. ‘Not yet.’

‘Why not?’

‘Because it would be detrimental to the investigation.’

‘Speak normally. You’re speaking like a new cop.’

‘If you hold back until I tell you, I’ll give you sole access to the file.’

‘To the file?’

Stuart nodded. Lopez picked up his cup and finished his coffee.

‘Why me?’ he asked.

‘Because you can do the most damage.’

Lopez could not hide his pleasure. Stuart stared at him.

‘You’ve never helped me before,’ Lopez said. ‘This is
important. Who do you think it is?’

‘If you hold back and help me keep it out of the papers, I’ll let you in.’

‘How do you expect me to do that? Everyone knows he’s missing already.’

‘Just make sure it stays out of the mainland press. You can do that.’

‘Maybe. Who do you think it is?’ he asked again.

‘Will you give me your word?’

Lopez held up a finger.

‘Wait. You want me to take the story and play it down. And what will you give me?’

‘Access.’

‘Access?’

‘Do I have your word, Lopez?’

‘If you give me access. To the woman, to the investigators – and then I’ll publish when it’s over.’

‘Not the woman.’

Lopez smiled and threw up his hands.

‘But it’s no good without the woman.’

‘You get the story from me. I’ll give you access to all the information. You’ll have the file, Lopez, but you leave the woman out. No, it’s important.’ He hesitated. ‘She doesn’t need this.’ Stuart looked down at the file. ‘Not the woman.’

‘No interview with the woman,’ Lopez repeated, nodding, weighing his options. ‘You tell me where you’re heading. You keep me informed all the time. And if I lose you, I print.’ He held out his hand across the desk. ‘It’s a deal.’ Stuart considered his hand a moment, then shook it once. He wanted him out of his office. ‘We were on the same side once,’ Lopez said.

‘Not for the same reasons.’

‘That’s not important,’ Lopez said, standing up. He took a visiting card from his wallet and held it out to Stuart. Stuart looked at the card.

‘We’ve got your details, Lopez.’

Lopez smiled and returned the card to his wallet.

‘I’m happy to work with you,’ he said.

‘I’m not.’

‘That’s fine,’ he said, holding up his hand and backing to the door. ‘
Todo
por
la
patria
.’ And he shut the door behind him.