'You should be. Now, what's this all about? You say you're on vacation. In Arcachon, right? So why are you here now?'
'H-hiding, sir. Some men came looking for me there at my hotel. Not just any men. They knew my name, where I lived in Paris, everything.' He paused, swallowed hard. 'One of them pulled out a gun and threatened the front desk man.I overheard it all! How did they know I was there? What did they want? They looked as if they'd come to kill me, and I didn't even know why. So I sneaked out and got to my car and drove away. I was sitting in a hidden cove I'd found, just listening to the radio and trying to decide whether I could go back to get the rest of my luggage, when I heard the news about the horrible tragedy at the Pasteur. Thatthat Dr. Chambord's presumed dead. Do you have any news? Is he okay?'
Captain Bonnard shook his head sorrowfully. 'They know he was working late that night in his lab, and no one's seen him since. It's pretty clear to the investigators that it's going to take at least another week to search through the rubble. They found two more bodies this afternoon.'
'It's too terrible. Poor Dr. Chambord! He was so good to me. Always saying I was working too hard. I hadn't had a vacation, and he's the one who insisted I go.'
The captain sighed and nodded. 'But go on with your story. Tell me why you think the men wanted you.'
The research assistant wiped his eyes with the heels of his hands. 'Of course, once I knew about the Pasteur and Dr. Chambordit all made sense, why they were after me. So I ran away again, and I didn't stop running until I found this boardinghouse. No one knows me here, and it's not on the usual routes.'
'Je comprends. And that's when you called me?'
'Oui. I didn't know what else to do.'
But now the captain seemed confused. 'They came after you because Emile Chambord was caught in the explosion? Why? That makes no sense, unless you're saying the bombing was no simple matter.'
Jean-Luc nodded emphatically. 'There's nothing important about me except that I'm I was the laboratory assistant to the great Emile Chambord. I think the bomb was intended to murder him.'
'But why, for God's sake? Who would want to kill him?'
'I don't know who, Captain, but I think it was because of his molecular computer. When I left, he was ninety-nine percent certain he'd made an operational one. But you know how he could be, such a perfectionist. He didn't want word to get out, not even a hint, until he was one hundred percent sure it worked. You understand how significant a machine like that would be? A lot of people would kill him, me, and anyone else to get their hands on a real DNA computer.'
Captain Bonnard scowled. 'We found no evidence of such a success. But then, there's a mountain of debris as high as the Alps. Are you sure of what you say?'
He nodded. 'Bien sr. I was with him every step of the way. I mean, I didn't understand a lot of what he did, but. ' He hesitated as a new fear made him rigid. 'His computer was destroyed? You didn't find his notes? The proof?'
'The lab is rubble, and there was nothing on the Pasteur's mainframe.'
'There wouldn't be. He was worried it could be accessed too easily, perhaps even hacked into by spies. So he kept his data in a notebook, locked into his lab safe. The whole project was in the notes in his safe!'
Bonnard groaned. 'That means we can never reproduce his work.'
Jean-Luc said cautiously, 'Maybe we can.'
'What?' The captain frowned. 'What are you telling me, Jean-Luc?'
'That perhaps we can reproduce his work. We can build a DNA computer without him.' Jean-Luc hesitated as he fought back a shudder of fear. 'I think that's why those armed men came to Arcachon, looking for me.'
Bonnard stared. 'You have a copy of his notes?'
'No, I have my own notes. They're not as full as his, I admit. I didn't understand everything he did, and he'd forbidden either me or the strange American helping him to make notes. But I secretly copied down nearly everything from memory up to the end of last week. That's when I left for vacation. I'm sure my record isn't as complete or as detailed as his, but I think it'd be enough for another expert in the field to follow and maybe even improve on.'
'Your notes?' Bonnard appeared excited. 'You took them with you on vacation? You have them now?'
'Yessir.' Jean-Luc patted the briefcase at his feet. 'I never let them out of my sight.'
'Then we'd better move, and fast. They could be tracking you from the village and be only minutes away.' He strode to the window and looked down on the nighttime street. 'Come here, Jean-Luc. Does anyone look like them? Anyone suspicious? We need to be certain, so we'll know whether to use the inn's front or back door.'
Jean-Luc approached Captain Bonnard at the open window. He studied the activity below, illuminated in the glow of street lamps. Three men were entering a waterfront bar, and two were leaving. A half dozen others rolled barrels from a warehouse, one barrel after another in a parade, and hoisted them into the open bed of a truck. A homeless man sat with his feet in the street, his head nodding forward as if he were dozing off.
Jean-Luc scrutinized each person. 'No, sir, I don't see them.'
Captain Bonnard made a sound of satisfaction in his throat. 'Bon. We must move swiftly, before the thugs can find you. Grab your briefcase. My Jeep is around the corner. Let's go.'
'Merci!' Jean-Luc hurried back to his briefcase, grabbed it, and rushed onward to the door.
But as soon as the young man had faced away, Bonnard grabbed a thick pillow from the cot with one hand while, with the other, he reached for the holster at the small of his back and slid out a 7.65mm Le Franaise Militaire pistol with a specially crafted silencer. It was an old weapon, the manufacture of the line ending in the late 1950s. The serial number, which had been stamped into the right rear chamber area of the barrel, was now filed off. There was no safety device, so anyone who carried the Militaire had to be very careful. Bonnard liked the feeling of that small danger, and so for him, such a gun was merely a challenge.
As he followed Massenet, he called out softly, 'Jean-Luc!'
His youthful face full of eagerness and relief, Jean-Luc turned. Instantly he saw the weapon and the pillow. Surprised, still not quite understanding, he reached out a protesting hand. 'Captain?'
'Sorry, son. But I need those notes.' Before the research assistant could speak again, could even move, Captain Darius Bonnard clamped the pillow around the back of his head, pushed the silenced muzzle against his temple, and pulled the trigger. There was a popping sound. Blood, tissue, and pieces of skull exploded into the pillow. The bullet burned itself through and lodged in the plaster wall.
Still using the pillow to protect the room from blood, Captain Bonnard supported the corpse to the bed. He laid the body out, the pillow beneath the head, and removed the silencer from the gun. He dropped the silencer into his pocket and pressed the gun into Jean-Luc's left hand. As soon as he arranged the pillow just so, he put his hand over Jean-Luc's and squeezed the trigger once more. The noise was thunderous, shocking in the tiny room, even to Captain Bonnard, who was expecting it.
This was a rough waterfront area, but still the sound of a gunshot would attract attention. He had little time. First he checked the pillow. The second shot had been perfect, going through so closely to the first hole that it looked like one large perforation. And now there would be powder burns on Jean-Luc's hand to satisfy the medical examiner that he, distraught over the loss of his beloved Dr. Chambord, had committed suicide.
Moving quickly, the captain found a notepad with indentations that indicated writing on the previous sheet. From the wastebasket he seized the single crumpled paper and pushed it and the notepad into his uniform pocket without taking the time to decipher either. He checked under the bed and under every other piece of old furniture. There was no closet. He dug the first bullet out of the wall and moved a battered bureau six inches to the left to hide the hole.
As he snatched up Jean-Luc's briefcase, the rise-and-fall scream of a police siren began in the distance. His heart palpitating with the rush of adrenaline, he analyzed the sound. Oui, it was heading here. With his usual control, he forced his careful gaze to survey the room once more. At last, satisfied that he had missed nothing, he opened the door. As Captain Bonnard vanished into the gloom of the upstairs hall, the police car screeched to a stop in front of the rooming house.
Chapter Three
