Syndrome E

13

Refine her strategy. Take him unaware before he can hang up.

Lucie let a good fifteen minutes go by, then redialed the number with Vlad Szpilman’s partially recharged cell. With a little luck, her interlocutor would recognize the contact and not hang up. Not immediately, in any case.

She paced anxiously in front of the Belgian’s house. Even though he’d been fairly easygoing and cooperative, she didn’t want Luc to hear the conversation—assuming there was one.

The phone was picked up after two rings.

“Vlad?” went the voice with the Quebec accent.

“Vlad is dead. This is Lucie Henebelle, a lieutenant in the French police. Criminal division.”

She’d blurted it all out at once. This was the decisive moment. An interminable silence followed, but he didn’t hang up.

“Dead how?”

Lucie squeezed her fist: the fish was hooked. She just had to reel it in gently now, without any sudden jerks.

“I’ll tell you. But first tell me who you are.”

“Dead how?”

“A stupid accident. He fell from a ladder and cracked his skull.”

Several seconds passed. A host of questions burned Lucie’s lips, but she was afraid he’d cut the connection. It was he who finally broke the ice.

“Why are you calling?”

Lucie played it straight. She sensed that the other man was under great pressure, and that he’d sniff out a lie in two seconds flat.

“After he called you on Monday, Vlad Szpilman immediately went up to his attic to get a film. An anonymous film from 1955, made in Canada, that I now have in my possession. I’d like to know why.”

Apparently she’d hit a nerve. She heard his breathing become more labored.

“You’re not with the police. You’re lying.”

“Call my headquarters. Lille police department, Criminal Investigations unit. Tell them that—”

“Tell me about the case.”

Lucie flipped through her recall at top speed. What was he talking about?

“I’m sorry, I—”

“You’re not with the police.”

“Of course I am! Lieutenant in Lille, for God’s sake!”

“In that case, tell me about the five bodies, the ones discovered near the factories. How far have you got with the investigation? Give me the technical details.”

Lucie understood: the bodies at the pipeline. So that was what had triggered Vlad Szpilman’s phone call. They were reporting it on the news.

“I’m sorry. We work by jurisdiction, and mine is the north. We’re not the ones handling that case. You’d have to check with—”

“I don’t give a damn. Get to know the people handling it. If you’re really with the police, you’ll get hold of the information. And in case you try to trace me, my phone is a cell registered under a false name and address. Because of you, I’ll now have to destroy it.”

He was about to hang up. Lucie decided to bet all her chips.

“Is there a link between that case and the film?”

“You know there is. Good-b—”

“Wait! How can I reach you?”

“Your number came up when you called. I’ll reach you.” A moment’s pause. “I’ll call you back at 8:00 p.m., French time. Have the info, or you’ll never hear from me again.”

Call ended. Silence. Lucie stood there, mouth agape. That had certainly been the densest and most intriguing phone call of her entire life.

After thanking Luc for the use of the phone, she settled deeply into the front seat of her car, hands on her forehead. She thought about that voice separated from hers by some thirty-five hundred miles. Clearly, her interlocutor was scared stiff of being identified; he hid behind stolen phone numbers and abbreviated any form of exchange. Why was he hiding? And from whom? How had he got in touch with Vlad Szpilman? But the question that nagged at her the most was to find out what invisible connection could possibly exist between the anonymous film and the bodies unearthed in Normandy.

That evil reel might have been the tree that hid the forest.

Caught up, Lucie knew at that moment that she had no choice. Her conscience forbade her to call it quits or drop the bone. It was always like that, in a snap, that she decided to pursue her cases to the end. That same relentlessness that had pushed her to wear the badge. And sometimes, to go too far.

As of now, time was of the essence. She had until eight o’clock to find the right contact in Paris and ferret out the info demanded of her.