Wash This Blood Clean from My Hand

LXIV

EVERYONE WAS IN DRESS UNIFORM AT THE SQUAD HEADQUARTERS. Danglard looked around contentedly at the hundred or so people in the Council Chamber. At one end, a dais had been prepared for the official speech by the divisionnaire, who would recount Danglard’s merits in the service, compliment him and pin on his new stripes. Then he would have to make an acceptance speech, crack a few jokes and convey some emotion. After that, his colleagues would congratulate him, everyone would relax, and there would be booze, canapés and chatter. He was watching the door to see whether Adamsberg turned up. It was possible the commissaire might not want to return to the squad on such a formal occasion. Clémentine was there however, in her best flowered dress, accompanied by Josette who wore a smart suit and tennis shoes. Clémentine was quite at ease, a cigarette in her mouth, and happily reunited with Brigadier Gardon, who had once, long ago, lent her a pack of cards, as she had not forgotten. The fragile hacker, the indispensable lawbreaker, afloat in a sea of police, stuck close to Clémentine’s side, holding her glass in both hands. Danglard had seen to it that the best quality champagne had been ordered, and had laid in plenty of it, as if wishing to make this evening as dense as possible, to impregnate it with fine bubbles which would run through it like molecules. For him the ceremony was less about his promotion than about the end of Adamsberg’s long agony.

The commissaire appeared discreetly at the door and for a moment, Danglard was vexed to see that he had not even put on his uniform. Then he realised who he was, as the man advanced hesitantly through the crowd. This man, with a handsome dark face with high cheekbones was not Jean-Baptiste but Raphaël Adamsberg. The capitaine understood how Retancourt’s plan had been able to work, if he was glimpsed across a car park in Gatineau. He pointed him out to Sanscartier.

‘That’s him, the brother,’ he said. ‘The one talking to Violette Retancourt.’

‘I can see how he fooled my colleagues,’ said Sanscartier with a grin.

The commissaire had followed his brother in soon afterwards, his uniform cap covering his tonsure. Clémentine looked at him, openly appraising him.

‘That’s three kilos he’s put on with us, Josette,’ she said proudly surveying her work. ‘It suits him well, his blue uniform.’

‘Now he has no more locked doors, we won’t be hunting in the underground any more,’ said Josette with regret.

‘Don’t worry. Flics pick up trouble non-stop, it’s their job. He hasn’t finished with his troubles, you can be sure, m’dear.’

Adamsberg gripped his brother’s arm and looked around. In the end it was probably a good thing to re-enter the office like this, seeing all the officers and other staff at once. In a couple of hours it would all be over, his return, the questions and answers, emotions and thanks. Much more simple than going round to see people one by one, office after office, in confidential conversations. He let Raphaël’s arm go, made a friendly sign to Danglard and joined the official top brass, Brézillon and Laliberté.

‘Hey man,’ said Laliberté, slapping him on the back, ‘I got you royally wrong, I was way out of line. Will you accept my apologies? I tracked you like a damned murderer.’

‘You had every reason to think it,’ said Adamsberg with a wry smile.

‘I was talking about the profiling with your boss. Your lab worked overtime to get it done by tonight. They’re the same hairs, goddamnit, they belong to your infernal judge. I wouldn’t have credited it, but you were right. A great piece of work.’

Unsettled by Laliberté’s familiarity, Brézillon had stiffened into a very unbending French manner, and shook Adamsberg’s hand formally.

‘But say, you made me look a real dummy, slipping out under my nose like that,’ Laliberté interrupted, giving Adamsberg a vigorous shake. ‘I’ll tell you straight, I was fit to be tied.’

‘I bet you were, Aurèle. You don’t do things by halves.’

‘Don’t worry, I’m not mad at you now. Right? It was the only thing for you to do. You’ve got your head screwed on right, for someone who shovels clouds.’

‘Commissaire,’ Brézillon broke in, ‘Favre has been posted to St Etienne under observation. There are no further consequences as far as you’re concerned. I condoned your action as a mere show of strength in the face of insubordination. But that’s not what I think it was. The judge had already got under your skin. Am I right?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘In future, please be on your guard.’

Laliberté took Brézillon by the shoulder.

‘Don’t worry, pal,’ he said. ‘A hellhound like that isn’t going to turn up again in a hurry.’

Embarrassed, the divisionnaire extracted himself from the superintendent’s large hand and made his excuses. The platform was waiting.

‘Bit uptight, your boss, isn’t he?’ commented Laliberté. ‘Talks like a book, walks like he could shit logs. He always like that?’

‘No, he puts out his cigarette with his thumb.’

Trabelmann was advancing on them.

‘So that’s your childhood memory wrapped up then,’ he said, shaking Adamsberg’s hand. ‘Prince Charming can spit fire after all.’

‘The black prince.’

‘The black prince, yeah.’

‘Thanks for coming, Trabelmann.’

‘Sorry about what I said about Strasbourg Cathedral. Shouldn’t have said that.’

‘Don’t be sorry, on the contrary. It’s been keeping me company all through this.’

Adamsberg realised, as they spoke of the cathedral, that the menagerie had melted away from its apertures. The spire, windows and doors were all open and unencumbered. The beasts had returned to their usual haunts. Nessie was back in her loch, the dragons in their fairy tales, the labradors in fantasy land, the fish in its pink lake, the general of the Canada geese in the Ottawa River, the one-third of the commandant of gendarmes back in place. The cathedral had returned to being a jewel of Gothic architecture and was soaring high among the clouds, much higher than him.

‘A hundred and forty-two metres,’ said Trabelmann, picking up a glass of champagne from a passing tray. ‘None of us is that big, not you or me.’

And he burst out laughing.

‘Except in fairy tales,’ said Adamsberg.

‘How right you are, commissaire.’

Once the speeches were over and Danglard had had his medal pinned on his chest, the Council Chamber was full of chatter, discussion and cries, all made louder by the champagne. Adamsberg went to greet the twenty-six agents of the squad who, during his absence, had been waiting with bated breath for twenty days, without one of them believing the charges against him. He heard the voice of Clémentine, around whom a little group had gathered, consisting of Gardon, Josette, Retancourt, who was followed everywhere by Estalère, and Danglard, who was watching the level of champagne in the glasses and topping them up relentlessly.

‘When I said the phantom was a real devil, I was right, wasn’t I?’ she was saying. ‘And it was you, my little one,’ she went on, turning to Retancourt, ‘who hid him in your skirts, under the noses of the Mounties. How many of them were there?’

‘Three, in a room six metres square.’

‘Well, there you are. He was as light as a feather, easy to lift, before I fattened him up. I always say the simplest ideas are the best.’

Adamsberg smiled, as Sanscartier moved over to him.

‘Gee, it’s great to see them all in this full dress stuff. You look a treat in your ceremonial gear. What are those leaves on the epaulette?’

‘Not maple leaves: oak and olive.’

‘They meant to mean something?’

‘Wisdom and peace.’

‘Don’t take this the wrong way, but I’d say that’s not quite your style, Jean-Baptiste. Inspiration is more like it, and I’m not saying that to make you big-headed. Only there aren’t any leaves that mean that.’

Sanscartier’s kind face contorted into a thoughtful frown as he tried to think of a symbol for Inspiration.

‘What about grass, just ordinary meadow grass?’ suggested Adamsberg.

‘Sunflowers perhaps? But they’d look silly on your shoulders.’

‘My intuitions, or inspirations as you call them, are sometimes a damned nuisance. Get me into big trouble. More like couch-grass.’

‘That so?’

“Yes, and sometimes I put my foot right in it. Sanscartier, listen to this, I have a son who’s five months old, and I only realised it three days ago.’

‘Christ, you missed out on that?’

‘Completely.’

‘Had she given you your marching orders?’

‘No, it was my fault.’

‘You didn’t love her any more?’

‘Yes. No. I don’t know.’

‘But you played the field.’

‘Yes.’

‘So you gave her the runaround and she was unhappy?’

‘Yes.’

‘Then one fine day you broke all your promises and walked out, just like that.’

‘You couldn’t put it better.’

‘Was that why you got drunk that night at L’Ecluse?’

‘Among other things.’

Sanscartier gulped down his champagne.

‘Don’t take this the wrong way, but if it’s hurting you now, it could mean you made a mistake. You follow me?’

‘Only too well.’

‘I’m not a clairvoyant, but I’d say take your logic in both hands and switch on your lights.’

Adamsberg shook his head.

‘She looks at me from a long way off, as if I’m a huge threat.’

‘Well, if you want to get her to trust you again, you can always try.’

‘How?’

‘Like on the timber site. They pull up old tree trunks and plant maples.’

‘How?’

‘Like I said. They pull up old trunks and plant new maples.’

Sanscartier drew a circle on his temples, indicating that the operation required a little reflection.

‘Should I put that in my pipe and smoke it? Or as Clémentine would say, put my thinking cap on?’ asked Adamsberg with a smile.

‘That’s it, chum.’

Raphaël and his brother went back home on foot at two in the morning walking in step at the same speed.

‘I’m going home to the village, Jean-Baptiste.’

‘I’ll come on down after you. Brézillon’s put me on a week’s leave. It seems I’m in a state of shock.’

‘Do you think the kids are still making toads explode with cigarettes up by the washhouse?’

‘No doubt about it, Raphaël.’