dealer’s face.
‘So — how does that affect me?’
‘It means anyone involved,’ Rocco explained carefully, ‘anyone — no matter what their role — gets the same sentence as the person who drove the car.’ It wasn’t entirely correct because of the likelihood of extenuating circumstances, but he wasn’t about to tell Bellin. Let the grubby little toad sweat a bit.
‘Hey — no! Wait!’ Bellin appeared to wake up as the words finally dropped into place like coins in a slot machine. ‘That’s not right. I told your man, the car was outside when I got here. I don’t know who left it there. I can’t be held responsible for what happened before it came here, can I?’
‘You can,’ Desmoulins put in, ‘if you don’t explain why you’re about to cut up an expensive car like that. You’d make a nice sum even if you sold it to one of your grubby criminal potes to do up. Give it new paperwork and a bit of paint, and sooner or later some mug will buy it.’ He leant closer. ‘And don’t tell me that hasn’t crossed your devious little mind, because I know you better than that.’
Bellin said nothing, but his beady eyes were going runabout, Rocco noticed. Not that he would crumble too easily; men like him would only cave in if they were on the brink of arrest and saw no other way out.
‘I think Mr Bellin gets the message,’ he said. ‘We’ll let him think it over.’ He walked away and stopped alongside the Citroen.
The uniformed officer gave a nod of recognition. ‘I hope this is the one you’re looking for.’
Rocco studied the damage to the side of the car. It looked as if a giant fist had hit the car amidships, pushing in both front and rear passenger doors. Had it not been for a network of sturdy metal poles welded together and covered in foam padding to form a protective cage, he guessed the damage would have been more extensive. He tugged a splinter of oily wood from the gap between the doors and sniffed at it. It smelt faintly of tar.
A connection.
‘I think it just might be. But we’ll soon find out. Well spotted.’ He looked around at the oil-sodden ground they were standing on and nodded at Desmoulins, who was peering in the driver’s side. ‘We need to get this out of here. Can you get it picked up and taken to the station? We can get Rizzotti to have a proper look there.’
‘Sure.’ Desmoulins looked at the patrol officer. ‘Can I use your car radio?’
The two men walked away, leaving Rocco to consider the car and what secrets it might eventually give up. That the vehicle had been left here to quietly disappear, he had no doubt. The same happened in Paris and other cities on a regular basis. Cars used in criminal enterprises were routinely repainted, re-registered or underwent some other transformation, often permanent. And yards like this were nearly always involved. They had the equipment and willingness to do such work… and their unwelcoming appearance, aided by guard dogs, was usually enough to put off casual snoopers from paying too much attention to what they were doing.
He peered through the splintered glass remaining in the side windows. He could see nothing inside, neither normal travel rubbish nor personal effects, and if there was any kind of crime involved, such as the death of a vagrant, even accidentally, it was probable that it had already been cleaned out. But as he knew well, even the most careful cleaning sometimes failed to remove everything.
He rejoined Bellin, who was busy lighting another foullooking cigarette. The man had to take three tries before it caught, and he avoided looking Rocco in the eye.
‘Last opportunity,’ Rocco murmured. ‘See, I know you’re lying. But there’s no need for your men to hear. Tell me where the car came from
… or who wants it to disappear. Phone number, name, location — any or all will do. Otherwise I’ll put a squad in here this afternoon and they’ll go through this rat hole centimetre by centimetre.’ He took his diary from his coat pocket. It was leather-bound and slim. ‘See this?’
Bellin nodded. ‘Yes. So?’
‘It’s the official log of every car stolen in northern France over the last eight months. Now, what are the odds of me finding one of the plates listed here among all that shit out there?’ He nodded at the piles of junk. ‘Or do you trust your men implicitly?’
Bellin stared at the diary, then his eyes flicked away. He nodded. ‘Okay. But I’m not admitting anything. This guy called me last week, said a car would be dropped off. It would probably be badly damaged, he said, and he’d pay good money for it to be scrapped. I didn’t argue, and why would I? The demand for scrap metal isn’t that good at the moment. I can barely keep those two men on as it is.’
‘My heart bleeds for you. Who was this benevolent person?’
‘No idea. On my mother’s life!’ He was looking intense and Rocco detected a note of desperation in his voice. Maybe he was telling the truth… or maybe he was more scared of the man who’d called him than he was of the police.
‘All right. Who dropped it off?’
‘I told you, it was-’
‘Suit yourself.’ Rocco began to turn away. ‘This yard is closed as of now. Nothing leaves here. Send your men home and give me the keys to your office.’
‘Wait!’ Bellin looked shocked and grabbed Rocco by the elbow, then let go with a cry of dismay when Rocco instinctively bunched his arm. ‘Sorry… I didn’t mean anything.’ His voice dropped to a hoarse whisper. ‘But you’ve got to listen to me… being seen talking to you could get me in the middle of one of those piles.’ He nodded at the heaps of chopped-up car parts lying around the yard. Few of them were much bigger than a man’s torso.
Rocco waited, his interest kicking into overdrive. If Bellin was this scared, he’d like to meet the person who could inspire this level of dread.
‘You’d better hurry, then, hadn’t you? Then I can be out of your hair.’
Bellin hesitated, then caved. He said quietly, ‘All right. This mec — I didn’t ask his name — just turned up outside the gate. He said this was the car for cutting, as arranged. That’s all. Then he jumped into another car that was waiting and that was the last I saw of him. And before you ask, I didn’t take a note of the registration or see the other driver. It wasn’t worth my face to look.’
‘When was this?’
‘Two days ago.’
Rocco considered it for a moment. The time frame was right, at least. But was he telling the whole truth? So, a guy turns up at the yard and dumps a car. Where hadn’t he heard that story before? It was probably going on right now in every other city across France, no questions asked, in exchange for hard cash or favours. Some of those favours might include leaving the yard owner’s face in one piece, as Bellin was suggesting. He guessed he wasn’t going to get much more from this man. Even crooks had their limits when self-preservation was at stake.
‘Can you describe him? Young, old, dark, fair, bad breath… what?’
Bellin gave an elaborate shrug, undoubtedly more for the benefit of his two men than anything, a display of obduracy should anyone have cause to ask later. ‘Youngish, early thirties, medium height, dark hair, a bit of a tan. Didn’t notice anything else.’
‘Like a million other Frenchmen. That’s a big help.’
Bellin’s eyes narrowed, as if he’d suddenly seen a way out. He dropped his cigarette in the mud and stamped on it. ‘Actually, that’s the thing. Not like any Frenchman — not in that way, anyway.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘He spoke French okay… but not good. And he wasn’t dressed like anyone around here.’
‘Go on.’
‘I think he was a Rosbif. An Englishman.’
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
If there had ever been a street name to the narrow run of ruined buildings on the outskirts of Creteil, in south-east Paris, it no longer existed save on old maps of the commune or in the memories of its more senior inhabitants.
Now, and in the dark, it was a place visited by bored kids looking for trouble, the occasional drunk seeking a place to doss down, and the various creatures of the night which had made it their own.
