Stone steps cut into an earth mound at the end of the row led up to a grassy area that concealed the roofs of the buildings beneath it.
Up here, bunkers were set into the ground and covered over with earth and grass. Concrete gun emplacements constructed along the north wall had once played host to huge German cannon that covered the strait beyond. Wide stone chimneys venting the fires that had once heated the offices and living quarters below pushed up through the ground and were covered by rusted sheets of curved metal.
Enzo heard a sound behind him and turned, alarmed, to see the uniformed Gueguen emerging from one of the bunkers. The gendarme was carrying his kepi in his hand and ran a hand back through his hair before pulling it firmly back on to his head. “You startled me,” Enzo said.
Gueguen smiled. “Pretty much as Killian must have startled Kerjean and his woman.” He turned and looked back through the arched doorway, and down the short flight of stairs he had just climbed. “They were down there. Making love, having sex. Whatever it is Kerjean does with his women.”
And Enzo reflected that even in Gueguen he detected a hint of envy. Kerjean, it seemed, had something every man wanted. He was attractive to women. Enzo walked to the doorway and peered down into the darkness.
“Go on in. Have a look. It’s not the most romantic of places to bring a woman. But, then, I don’t think anyone would ever have accused Kerjean of being a romantic.”
Enzo walked down four steps into the former guard house. Here, he imagined, soldiers on surveillance duty had eaten and slept and taken turns on watch, ready to man the guns at a moment’s notice should the alarms go off. A miserable, confined existence, a hated occupier in a land far from family and home. Scarred and crumbling plaster walls revealed patches of red brick, and a large red-lettered sign read DEFENCE DE FUMER. So they had not even been allowed the comfort of a cigarette.
“What on earth was Killian doing here?”
Gueguen shook his head. “It was ridiculously innocent, really. He was out with a net sweeping for butterflies down near the shore. He must have seen the two cars parked out front and the open gates and wandered in. The fort is normally locked, so I imagine he was curious.”
And Enzo visualised how that curiosity must have led him on a route very similar to the one that Enzo had followed himself just a few minutes earlier. Peering into long-deserted darkened rooms, climbing the steps to the gun emplacements. And it occurred to him that he had just inadvertently walked in a dead man’s footsteps. “How was Kerjean able to access the place?”
“In those days he was involved with the island youth movement. And this place was used as a kind of activity centre for youngsters in the summer. He had a set of keys.”
“So Killian stumbled upon Kerjean having sex with some woman, and that was enough to motivate Kerjean to want to kill him?”
“She wasn’t just “some woman,” Monsieur Macleod. She was Arzhela Montin, the wife of the first adjoint of the mayor, a privileged and respected man in the island community. On the face of it, happily married, with two young children. Montin was a Parisian, regarded as being quite a catch for an island girl. For a woman like that to be having an affair with a man like Kerjean… well, it would have been the talk of the island. And it very soon was. Within a week of Killian catching the two of them together here, the story was out.”
“And Kerjean thought it was Killian who blew the whistle on him?”
“He didn’t just think it. He was convinced of it. And there were dire consequences, for both Kerjean and his lover. Kerjean worked for the council at that time. A kind of cantonnier, involved in island maintenance. Roads, verges, hedgerows, and clearing the kilometers of pathways that criss-cross the island for walkers and randonneurs. It took the administration no time at all to find a reason for sacking him. He also worked as a kind of informal stringer for the Breton newspaper, Ouest-France. They couldn’t get him fired from that position, but all the sources of official information that provided him with most of his copy, dried up just like that.” He snapped his fingers.
“And the woman?”
“Oh, her reward was a very messy divorce. The first thing Montin did was kick her out of the family home. And by the time Kerjean went to trial, Montin had divorced her and won custody of the children.”
“Well, at least they still had each other. I mean, Kerjean and Arzhela.”
“Oh, no, monsieur. She refused to ever see Kerjean again. And when it came to his trial she gave some pretty damning evidence against him.”
Enzo turned his gaze toward the sun shimmering across the strait. Scraps of white sail caught the light, flashing against the petrol blue of the ocean, late-season sailors out catching the breeze. “So what was the consensus of opinion at the time? Was Killian really responsible for letting the cat out of the bag?”
“No one knows for sure. By the time it became an issue, Killian was dead. But to be perfectly honest, monsieur, it would have seemed very out of character to me. Adam Killian was not exactly integrated into the island community. Incomers rarely are. Particularly the English. I’m sure he knew or had met Montin at some point, but I can’t imagine for one moment that he went knocking on the man’s door to tell him that his wife was having a relationship with the cantonnier.”
“So why would Kerjean think he had?”
“You’d have to ask him that. Not that I’d recommend it.” The gendarme scratched his chin thoughtfully. “Although I imagine it was probably the timing of it all. Kerjean and Arzhela must have been pretty sure no one else knew about them. Then Killian chances upon them here at the fort, and in a matter of days it’s all out in the open.”
They walked along the grassy bank in silence then, to where it rose up above the line of chimneys sunk in the earth. From here they had a panoramic view across the island, and Enzo felt the comforting warmth of the sun on his face. He tried to imagine the encounter here that day. How had Kerjean reacted? He was known for his violence and his foul mouth. Had he said or done something that had prompted the reclusive Killian to seek revenge in some way? “What was it that first pointed investigators in Kerjean’s direction?” he asked.
“Well, it was a strange situation,” the adjudant gendarme said. “Killian was found by his cleaning lady the morning after the murder. She called the gendarmerie, quite hysterical. A radio call went out to a couple of officers who were down at the harbour in the van. By the time they got out to Killian’s house, Kerjean was already there.”
Enzo turned to look at him, surprised. “What was he doing there?”
“I told you that he was a stringer for the newspaper Ouest-France. He said that as a matter of habit he was always tuned into police frequencies and heard the radio call going out to our officers. Told us he’d driven straight out there. Murder on Groix! He could sell the story all over France.”
“So he got to Killian’s place before the police?”
“Yes.” Gueguen pulled a face. “Which provided a very convenient explanation for his fingerprints being found on the gate and a muddy footprint in the garden. And, as I told you, island officers in those days had no idea how to treat or secure a murder scene. So all sorts of people had tramped all over it before senior investigators arrived from the mainland.” He shook his head. “There was hell to pay, I can tell you. And, in the end, it probably cost us the conviction.”
“What other evidence was there against Kerjean?”
“You mean other than his lack of alibi, his murder threats against Killian, and the item of personal property we recovered from the scene?” Air exploded from between his lips in remembered frustration. “Dammit, Monsieur Macleod, if our people hadn’t been so inept there’s no way Kerjean would have got away with it.”
“Tell me.”
The gendarme removed his kepi and scratched his head. “About two days after the murder a pen was discovered in the grass near the annex. A very expensive, hand-crafted pen called a Montblanc. Turned out to have Kerjean’s prints all over it. He confessed that it was his, a gift, he said, and claimed that he must have dropped it when he was there to report on the murder. The boys from the mainland were already suspicious, and they really turned the spotlight on him then. Which is when they discovered that he couldn’t account for his whereabouts the night of the murder.”
“Where did he say he was?”
“At home in bed.”
“Aren’t they all?” Enzo grinned. “So there was no one to vouch for that?”
