Blowback

Chapter Thirty-one

Paris, France, October 2010

Enzo had not known what to expect of Jean Ransou, but the image that confronted him when they met outside the blue gates of the hippodrome, deep in the Bois de Vincennes on the eastern outskirts of Paris, was like that of a character who had just stepped out of a fifties French noir movie.

He was a big man, almost as wide as he was tall. He wore a black fedora tipped slightly forward at an angle on his head, and a long black coat with a cream silk scarf hanging loose at his neck. His black shoes were polished to an immaculate shine, so dazzling that had he wanted, he could have tipped his head forward to adjust the angle of his hat in the reflection. Black was the fashionable color in Paris, making the grey pallor of his face stark in contrast. A face that would turn heads in any crowd.

Pockmarked by adolescent acne, or perhaps childhood chickenpox, it was a wide, fleshy face flanked by gross, cauliflower ears with a broken nose at its center, squashed almost flat to one side. Fat, pale lips bore the scars of frequent splitting, and the whole gave the impression of a cake that had been left out in the rain.

Only his eyes betrayed the man behind the face. The palest of grey eyes that fixed Enzo in their compelling gaze, both wary and amused, but clearly intelligent. A faint smile parted his lips as they shook hands. “Started out life as a boxer,” he said. “But I can see you’ve already worked that one out.” His voice came from his throat and sounded like someone trying to shred stone with a cheese grater. “Wasn’t any good at it, though. As you can see. Discovered that horses were more my game. Betting on them that is, not riding them.” He laughed. “Might have kept my good looks if I’d found out sooner.”

It was clearly a well-rehearsed opening gambit, and it probably impressed actors and politicians. Enzo was more cautious, allowing himself only the most perfunctory of smiles. Which did not go unnoticed. The amusement faded from Ransou’s eyes.

“I’m only going to tell you this one time, Monsieur Macleod. Repeat anything I tell you today to anyone in the police or the judiciary, and I’ll be sending my condolences to your family.”

“Why did you agree to see me, then?”

“Because I want to see the bastard that murdered Marc Fraysse caught and hung up by his testicles till he drops off.” The smile returned to his face and he slapped Enzo’s back, guiding him through the turnstile toward the main entrance. “Come on, let’s eat. I don’t want to miss any of the racing.”

Escalators zig-zagged them up from floor to floor through the vast echoing hallway of the main stand, a mammoth edifice of steel and glass. They climbed the last few steps to the open doorway of Le Prestige restaurant at the top of the building. A dinner-jacketed flunky almost bowed in deference to the man in black, ushering him and Enzo to a private table in a booth that looked out through panoramic windows across the racetrack below.

The oval circuit consisted of what looked like black gravel or ash. Tractors dragged giant rakes around it to drain a surface turned to sludge by the rain. The area contained by the track was grassy and peppered by parked cars and horse boxes. A huge screen conveyed flickering images of a live race in progress at Deauville.

A waiter in a white jacket brought them menus.

Enzo said, “Why are you so interested in finding Marc’s murderer.”

“Because I liked him, monsieur. He was one of the most famous men in France, but he had no airs or graces. He came from poor peasant stock in la France profonde, in the same way that I grew up in the banlieus of Paris, the son of a road sweeper and a Hungarian immigrant. He treated me with the same respect he treated all men, he made me laugh, and he cooked the most wonderful food I have ever tasted.”

“He also owed you a lot of money, I think.” Enzo watched carefully for a reaction. But there was none.

Ransou said simply, “He did.”

Down on the track, several jockeys were out with their horses and sulkies, warming up for the competition ahead. It was to be a day of harness racing in the rain.

“He was a lost soul, monsieur. Eaten up by the urge to gamble, destroyed by his recklessness and his unfailing ability to lose.”

“Exactly the sort of people you make your living from, I would have thought.”

The grey eyes turned to steel. “Be careful, monsieur.” He drew a long, slow breath, as if controlling some violent internal urge. “Marc Fraysse owed me more than a million. But I’d never have called it in.”

“A million?” Enzo had realized that the debt probably ran to several hundred thousand, but the figure of a million plus was breathtaking. Men had killed for much less. “Why wouldn’t you have called it in?”

“Because I regarded him as my friend. We met often when he came up to Paris. And the money he owed me…? Well, it wasn’t real, was it? I mean, I didn’t lend it to him. It was notional money. Winnings on a bet. I wasn’t actually out of pocket.” He laughed. “Besides, I had the restaurant as security. There was no way I was ever going to lose.”

Enzo frowned. “Chez Fraysse? You had the auberge as security against his losses?”

“Yes. In a way I owned the best restaurant in France, even if only by proxy.”

Enzo was stunned by the revelation.

On the far side of the track the first race was underway, riders manoeuvring their horses to achieve a prime position for their sulkies coming off the first bend. Ransou was momentarily distracted, raising binoculars to his eyes to see for himself how the order was shaking out. Enzo watched the TV coverage on the big screen. Black muck from the track was thrown up by the hooves of horses into the faces of the riders in their little buggies behind them. The jockeys’ eyes were protected by goggles, but nothing could protect them from the horses’ tails that slapped wet in their faces, along with whatever else might be involuntarily expelled from the animals’ rears. There was nothing very glamorous about their profession.

“You like a flutter yourself, Monsieur Macleod?”

Enzo turned to find Ransou smiling at the disgust on his face. “No, Monsieur Ransou. I’m not a betting man.”

“Oh? That’s not what I heard.”

Enzo tilted his head and cast a quizzical look at the ex-boxer. “What did you hear?”

“I heard that you bet you could solve the seven best known cold cases in France by applying new science to old evidence.”

“Well, let’s just say I only bet on a sure thing.”

Ransou grinned. “Me too.” He paused. “I’d have given you good odds on that.”

Enzo was forced this time to smile. “I bet you would.”

“Hah!” Ransou jabbed a finger in Enzo’s direction. “There, you see? You’re more of a betting man than you knew.”

Enzo’s reluctant smile developed into a grin. Ransou was a dangerous man, he knew. Certainly not one to cross. But there was, nonetheless, something irresistibly likeable about him. “So… when Marc died, you just wrote off the debt?”

Ransou wrinkled his face in mirthful amusement. “Good God, no. I called it in and it was paid off in full.”

Enzo stared at him in amazement. “But… who? Who paid you?”

“His brother, Guy, of course. I had no qualms at all about taking the money off him.” The first race came to an end, jockeys lashing sweating horses across the finish line below them. Ransou looked satisfied with the result, and picked up his menu. “Let’s order, shall we? I’m starving. And I just earned lunch.”