Freeze Frames

Chapter Three

Paris, France, October 28, 2009

It was nearly a year since the bullet had punched through Raffin’s chest and almost ended his life. As far as Enzo could see he had never been the same man since.

He climbed the circular stairs to Raffin’s apartment and heard clumsy fingers practising scales on a distant piano. The same fingers, he thought, which had been playing eleven months earlier when the shots were fired. They seemed to have made little progress since.

He hesitated by the door, remembering how the journalist had lain bleeding here in the hall as Enzo tried desperately to staunch the blood. There was no trace of it left on the tiles.

Raffin looked tired when he opened the door. His usual pallor was tinged with grey, and his pale green eyes, usually so sharp and perceptive, seemed dull. He smiled wanly and shook Enzo’s hand. “Come in.” Enzo followed him through to the sitting room, noticing how he no longer moved with the fluidity of youth. Still only in his middle thirties, he had the demeanour of a man ten years older. His brown, collar-length hair seemed thinner, lank and lacking lustre.

He ushered Enzo to a seat at the table. It was strewn with documents and photographs and scribbled notes. A well-thumbed copy of his book, Assassins Caches, lay open at the chapter about Killian. A half-full bottle of 1998 Pouilly Loche, Les Franieres, stood beside an empty glass at Raffin’s place, condensation trickling down the misted bottle. “I’ll get you a glass.”

“No, thanks.” Enzo could not resist a glance at his watch. It was not yet ten in the morning. Too early, even for him. And he watched with some concern as Raffin re-filled his glass. He had never considered this fashionable young Parisian a suitable match for his daughter. Less so now. “How’s Kirsty?” She had not been in touch for several weeks.

“Fine, last time I saw her. She’s still in Strasbourg.” But he wasn’t going to be drawn on the subject. He sat down and sipped at his wine. “I’ve been going through my research notes. I’d almost forgotten how much more there was about the Killian case than ever went into the book.”

“Why was that?”

“His son’s widow, Jane Killian… she’s still haunted by the call he made to her the night of his murder. He made her promise that nothing in his study would be touched, moved or removed, until such time as his son, Peter, could get to see it. He told her he’d left Peter a message there, something only his son would understand. Sadly, the son was killed in a road accident in Addis Ababa and never got to see it.”

“So what never made it into the book?”

“Any detailed description of what was in the room. She’s had psychics, and journalists, and private investigators go over it with a fine-toothed comb but has always refused to allow publication of the details.”

“Why?”

“She’s afraid that whoever the message was about might read and interpret those details.”

Enzo shook his head. “But it’s nearly twenty years since Killian was murdered, Roger. Can it still matter?”

“It might, if it gives a clue as to who killed him.”

“She still owns the house?”

Raffin took another sip of his wine. “Yes. By law it went from father to son, but since the son was dead within a week of the father, it passed to his widow. No children involved, you see.”

“And she’s still keeping her promise to the old man?”

“Scrupulously. His study remains untouched, just as it was the day of his murder.”

Enzo felt the first rush of adrenaline. It was like a crime scene preserved in a time capsule. “Tell me a little more about Killian himself.”

“There’s not much more to tell than appeared in my book. He was sixty-eight years old. English. He’d owned the house on the Ile de Groix for almost twenty years, using it mainly for family holidays until he retired there full time in ’87, one year after the death of his wife.”

Enzo consulted his own notes. “A professor of tropical medical genetics at London University.”

“Yes, he worked for the university’s tropical medicine group. But insects were what really turned him on. According to his daughter-in-law, it was an obsession. He’d been a member of the Amateur Entomologists’ Society in the UK for years, and couldn’t wait to retire to devote himself to it full time.”

“Time wasn’t on his side, though, was it? I mean, even if he hadn’t been murdered, he didn’t have long to live.”

Raffin shook his head. “No. The lung cancer was diagnosed in the spring of 1990, and he wasn’t expected to see out the year.”

Not for the first time, Enzo turned this information over in his mind and found it puzzling. “Okay. And what about Kerjean? Is he still around?”

“He was when I was there. A thoroughly unpleasant character, from all accounts. Of course, he wouldn’t talk to me. Hasn’t given a single interview since the trial.”

“You don’t give much of an account of the trial in the book.”

“It didn’t merit it, Enzo. Sure, the guy had motive and opportunity, but the evidence against him was entirely circumstantial. It should never have gone to court.” He drained his glass and refilled it. “Anyway, I had a long talk with Jane Killian on the phone last night. You can cancel your hotel booking. She’s agreed to let you stay at the house, in the little attic room above the study.” He chuckled, but there was no humour in it. “I think she sees you as the last hope of ever solving this case. I got the very firm impression that if you can’t figure it out, she’s going to give up and sell up.”

Enzo nodded slowly. “So, no pressure, then.”

Raffin grinned. “I’d have thought it was right up your street, Enzo, given that your specialty was crime scene analysis.”

Enzo canted his head in acknowledgement. “I have to confess, it’s an intriguing challenge. But I hate to be anyone’s last hope.” He looked up to see Raffin pursing pale lips in faint amusement. “Tell me…What was it you saw in that room that Jane Killian wouldn’t let you write about?”

“Oh, I think I should leave you to see that for yourself.” Raffin looked at his watch, and Enzo noticed how his hands trembled. “Shall we lunch at midi? I can call and book a table at the Marco Polo.”

Enzo felt the colour rising slightly on his cheeks. “I can’t today. I’m meeting someone.”

Raffin looked at him speculatively and nodded without comment. He took another sip of his wine, then after a moment, “Have you seen Charlotte, lately?”

“No. Not lately.” Which was the truth. But he wondered why he was reluctant to confirm Raffin’s obvious suspicion that it was the journalist’s former lover that Enzo was meeting at midi. He wanted to leave right there and then, but it would have been churlish to do so. And he wasn’t due to meet Charlotte for over an hour. “Maybe I’ll take that glass of wine now,” he said. As Raffin crossed to fetch a glass from the cabinet, Enzo glanced from the window into the courtyard below. Drifts of leaves from the big old chestnut blew across the cobbles on a chill fall breeze, and he wondered why anyone would want to kill a dying man.