Death at the Clos du Lac

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Rocco decided to walk to the barracks and take a chance on catching Inès in. It wasn’t far, out towards the eastern suburbs, and the exercise and fresh air would help him think. He checked in at the guard post and was given a pass and directions to Inès’s room. The single rooms for visiting personnel were located in a separate wing of the barracks building set apart from the central offices by a low wall. He followed a stone walkway and entered the building through a glass-panelled door, following the signs up to the first floor.

There was no need to knock at Inès’s door: it was open. He heard someone humming and looked inside. The floor was being swept by a woman in a grey cotton overall. A cleaning trolley stood just inside the door, loaded with sheets and cleaning items.

‘Dion? She’s gone,’ said the woman, and checked a clipboard on the trolley. ‘Yes, she checked out early this morning. I thought she was staying longer, but there you go — that’s the military for you.’ She smiled. ‘My husband was in the army for thirty years. Hated every day of it. Killed him in the end.’

‘I’m sorry to hear it. In action?’

Her look could have frozen a lemon. ‘You could say that; he fell out of a second-storey window when a woman’s husband came home.’

Rocco felt as if everything was getting away from him. ‘I suppose you don’t know where Dion went?’ It was a vain hope, but he’d been lucky in the past with such chance remarks.

The woman smiled, the ice gone as quickly as it had appeared. ‘Sorry. They don’t tell us what they’re doing.’

He walked back outside, then turned and went back in and showed the cleaning lady his card. ‘I’m investigating a murder and need to get hold of Inès Dion. Was there anything left behind … any papers she might have disposed of?’

‘Take a look, Inspector.’ She flapped a hand towards the cleaning trolley out in the corridor. ‘I just emptied the waste basket in the bag on the back.’

Rocco checked, but other than a magazine, some food wrappers and some used toiletries Inès had clearly decided were no longer worth keeping, there was nothing.

He thanked the woman for her help and walked back to the administrative office and another brick wall.

‘Sorry, Inspector,’ said the manager, examining his card. ‘We’re not allowed to give out the private addresses of military personnel without a court order and instructions from the Defence Ministry. It’s a matter of security. I’m sure you can understand.’

Rocco thanked the man and returned to the station in a dangerous frame of mind. He rang Captain Michel Santer, his former boss in the Clichy-Nanterre district of Paris.

‘Before you start,’ he told Santer, ‘I’m planning on coming to the city, so name a restaurant and I’ll let you know when.’ Santer was constantly reminding him of the favours he had done Rocco, and the expensive meals he was owed as a result. The captain was probably one of his closest friends, and a man he trusted implicitly.

‘God, touchy today, aren’t we?’ Santer said with a smile in his voice. ‘Still, never let it be said that I can’t be magnanimous.’ His voice dropped. ‘What do you really want, Rocco? Another favour, I’ll bet. It usually is.’

‘An opinion, that’s all.’

‘Ah, an opinion. Well, I’ve got lots of those, mostly uncomplimentary and uncouth, yet true, about detectives who disappear off into the countryside and forget about their old comrades. Go on, then.’

‘There’s a PTT office in Neuilly, called the Central Services Department. Know anything about it?’

‘Ouch. That’s a locked box, my friend. Why do you want to know about it?’

Rocco told him in brief about his conversation with the telephone service supervisor.

‘Well, you can rest assured that the person you talked to was telling the truth. I know that office block and it’s got more security than the president’s private bathroom. You don’t intend breaking in there, do you?’

‘No. Nothing like that. Just checking that I wasn’t being spun a line.’

‘You weren’t, take it from me. If that office issued an instruction to disconnect a number and eradicate the details, it came from somewhere not too far from the Place Beauvau.’

Back to the Interior Ministry. Wheels within wheels.

When he got back to the office, he was handed a message to call Captain Antain in Evreux.

‘I’ve dug around as you asked,’ Antain told him, ‘and can confirm that there was a Stefan, listed as the elder son of Honoré and Maude Devrye-Martin, with a younger sister, Josette. Several cousins live in the area, too, mostly elderly and female. The family has been established here since 1730, and apart from various business dealings have been active in local politics, although they are less so now. The parents are both in their eighties and rarely seen in public these days. Josette lives in Switzerland. As I indicated to you before, the family is very private, wealthy, with extensive land ownership, much of which is leased out to tenant farmers in the region and further south.’

‘Stefan’s the name I have,’ Rocco began, then stopped. ‘You said “was” listed.’

There was a brief hesitation, then Antain said, ‘Well, there we have a small problem, Inspector. According to our records, Stefan Devrye-Martin is dead.’

Rocco felt the air go out of him. ‘How — and when?’

‘Three years ago in Thailand. A report lodged with us from that time states the cause as blood poisoning following a motorcycle accident. Apparently he didn’t receive adequate treatment in time and infection set in. He died ten days later. Not uncommon in that part of the world, I understand.’

Rocco could confirm that. He reached across the desk and picked up the American photography magazines. He checked the issue dates on the front.

They were just two months old.

‘There’s no other S. Devrye-Martin?’

‘No. Not even a woman’s name. Sounds as if your information is wrong.’

‘Yes, it does.’

Antain cleared his throat. He sounded unsure of himself, and his voice dropped a few notches. ‘Actually, Inspector, this might not be relevant, but I don’t actually come from here, you see, so I don’t have a feel for all the local history. But when I asked around about Stefan, I hit something of a brick wall. It seemed as if people were reluctant to talk about him.’

‘Who did you ask?’

‘Colleagues of course, an avocat who comes in regularly … one or two locals. It was only when I asked a friend who’s lived here all his life that I actually got anywhere.’

‘Go on.’

‘Well, it seems there were rumours of a nasty scandal surrounding Stefan about ten years ago. It all blew up, but just as quickly blew away again after a barrage of lawsuits by the family closed it down.’

Rocco felt his pulse quicken. ‘What sort of rumours?’

‘Something about taking inappropriate photographs of children at a swimming pool. I say pool, but it was more of a public swimming area in a lake. A father who went looking for his eight-year-old son was charged with assaulting a man he said was using a camera to take pictures of children in a state of undress. I believe it was fairly relaxed around here then and young children changed clothes without bothering too much about covering up. Anyway, Stefan Devrye-Martin was treated by a local doctor for cuts to his head and his attacker was arrested.’

‘What happened to him?’

‘That’s the odd thing: the case was later dropped when the accusations of assault against the father were withdrawn by the family. The local police captain at the time tried to press ahead with the investigation, because some of the children confirmed that Stefan had indeed been taking photos of them — and it wasn’t the first time. My friend said Stefan was rumoured to be a bit soft in the head, so it was thought he wouldn’t have known what he was doing was wrong. We have no way of confirming that, of course. In the end, the captain was overruled by a magistrate with, um, connections to the family.’

‘Connections?’

‘A cousin.’

‘You sound almost sceptical, Captain,’ Rocco observed.

‘Well, if it had been me, I’d have made a fuss. But money talks, I suppose, as it always has. Not long afterwards, Stefan disappeared to the Far East and nobody heard anything more about him until the report came in of his death three years ago.’

Convenient, thought Rocco cynically. It wouldn’t be the first time someone had been reported dead in an effort to foil justice. But was it relevant? And would a supposed dead man be stupid enough to come back and take out a magazine subscription in his real name?

‘Was the body repatriated for burial?’

‘There’s nothing on record. I checked.’

Also convenient. It seemed on the surface to be a dead end. But Rocco wasn’t so sure. Something about this business didn’t sound right. Any family able to suppress an investigation of this kind had the reach and influence to do more, if they needed to. The idea raised his hackles enough to want to follow it through. And there was only one way of seeing if this had any legs or not.

Visual confirmation.

‘This is a long shot, Captain, but do you have a photo of Stefan on file?’

Another pause, longer this time. Then Antain said, ‘Are you sure this is about stolen property, Inspector?’

Rocco hesitated. This was a sensitive issue, but he had no choice but to take a punt on the captain’s professionalism. He explained that he was investigating a murder, and had been trying to be discreet in the process so as not to alarm the family unnecessarily. Antain hadn’t seemed to mind the small lie, and even sounded impressed.

‘I don’t have a photo here — the family’s very shy of publicity, as I told you. But I know the owner of the local newspaper. He might have one. Do you want me to ask?’

‘I’d consider it a favour, Captain Antain. But be careful. If the family is connected, you don’t want to make official enemies.’

‘No problem. If there is anything I’ll get it couriered to your office.’

That evening, he called round to give Mme Denis the news about the pipes.

‘I know,’ she said grumpily, her chin jutting out. ‘I heard. You think I want charity? Preferential treatment because I’m old? I don’t need that kind of help, thank you very much.’

Rocco sighed inwardly. He preferred dealing with criminals — they were so much easier to negotiate with. You never needed to placate them, and if they got too bolshy, you could always threaten to lock them up for the night.

‘I realise that,’ he said. ‘But if you were my mother, I’d do the same. Why keep pumping water when you can simply turn on a tap?’

‘It’s not the tap I object to, young man!’ she snapped. ‘It’s the special treatment.’ Then her face softened. ‘I don’t want people thinking I need your help.’

‘Well, I need more eggs,’ he replied. ‘So, let’s look on it as a trade. You get your pipes first, and I get to eat more omelettes. We both win. How’s that?’

She scowled at him in suspicion and said, ‘One moment.’ Then she went inside, She returned moments later with a small basket of eggs. ‘That’s a down payment.’ Then she slammed the door.

But not before he saw her face break into a smile.