off whatever excesses he might have indulged in the night before.
Finally, he saw a movement behind the glass, and the door swung open. Kerjean looked bad in the cold light of day which revealed a sickly pallor and deep shadows beneath his eyes. Silvered stubble covered his face, and his hair was a bird’s nest of tangled, greasy curls. He wore a flannelette robe, and his bare feet drew the cold from a stone-flagged floor. He squinted at Enzo from behind puffy eyes.
“What the fuck do you want?”
“A word.” Enzo heard the tightness in his own voice.
Kerjean stared at Enzo for a long time, conducting some internal debate. At length he said, “You look like shit.”
“So do you.”
And for the first time, Enzo saw a smile light Kerjean’s face. The man whom everyone believed had murdered Killian let the door swing open and he turned away into the interior without a word. Enzo followed him into a large, square kitchen. Next to the door was a window that would flood the room with pink light at sunset. Opposite, a panelled glass door led out to an east-facing terrace. A long table sat in the centre of the room. A wood-burning Raeburn stove was set against the north wall, while cupboards and cabinets lined the others, shelves cluttered with jars and glasses and crockery. A little residual warmth emanated from the stove, and the table was littered with half a dozen empty beer bottles and the congealed debris of the previous night’s meal.
Enzo closed the door behind him. Kerjean found a pack of cigarettes on the table and lit one. He turned toward the Scotsman. “So what word do you want, exactly?”
Enzo glared at him, barely able to hide his anger. “You bastard!”
Kerjean stood his ground and smirked. “That’s two words. And I’ve heard them before.”
“You nearly killed me last night.”
“I saved your God-damned life, for what it’s worth.”
“You don’t deny it, then?”
“Why should I? It’s just you and me here and now. Your word against mine.”
“Why did you do it?”
“Why did I do what?”
“Save my life.”
“Contrary to popular opinion, monsieur, I am not a killer. But in spite of all my warnings, you’d been nosing around asking about me, poking your nose into the past. So I decided it was time to rough you up a bit, provide a little incentive to send you on your way.” He chuckled. “But I didn’t expect you to go throwing yourself into the Trou de l’enfer.”
Enzo’s anger rose up through him almost from his feet. A sudden, unstoppable surge of it, fuelled by a furious rush of adrenalin. Kerjean never saw the big fist that swung at him out of the gloom until it hit him square on the side of the head, sending him crashing across the kitchen table. His legs buckled and he toppled on to a chair, and then to the floor.
Enzo heard the sound of Kerjean’s head striking hard, unyielding stone, but in that moment he was more concerned with the pain in his hand. Sharp, stabbing, all-consuming. He called out involuntarily and clasped and unclasped his fist, waving it around, as if it might be possible to shake away the pain. For a moment, he feared he had broken bones, and was relieved to find that all his fingers could still move. He rubbed the palm of his left hand soothingly over knuckles that were already beginning to swell.
Kerjean was stunned, pulling himself first to his knees, then steadying himself with a hand on the table as he swayed from side to side, blood trickling from a split cheek and a gash on the opposite temple. He shook his head and growled. A deep, feral growl that rose up from his diaphragm, and Enzo was reminded of Michel Locqueneux’s description of him as an animal. Kerjean dragged himself to his feet and turned murderous eyes on Enzo.
Enzo faced him down, breathing hard, heart pounding, fist aching, but clenched once more, ready to strike again in spite of the pain. Perhaps it was something he saw in Enzo’s eyes, a determination to stand his ground no matter the consequences, that extinguished the fire in Kerjean. He was ten years younger than Enzo, and still fit despite his drinking. Had he chosen to make a brawl of it, he would almost certainly have come out on top. Instead, he went almost limp, all the tension draining from him, and he stooped to pick up his cigarette from where it had fallen on the floor.
“I suppose maybe I deserved that,” he said, and he drew a deep lungful of smoke, touching his fingertips to his cheek, feeling the blood and then looking at it on them.
Enzo saw the change of body language and relaxed a little. But he was still tense, and still hurting. “For God’s sake, man, why don’t you just tell me where you were the night of the murder?”
Kerjean flicked him a surly glance. “You must know the story by now.”
“Only the one you told at the trial. But your car was running perfectly, Kerjean, and you’re no mechanic. So why wasn’t it sitting out there the night that Killian was murdered.” He tipped his head toward the door, and the courtyard beyond.
Kerjean stared at the stone flags, taking several long drags at his cigarette, before crossing to a cupboard and lifting out a bottle of Islay malt and two glasses. He banged the glasses on the table and filled them both. Then he lifted one and held it out to Enzo.
Enzo hesitated. Much as he enjoyed a glass of good Islay whisky, it was only just after ten in the morning, and this much whisky could ruin the rest of the day. But it felt that he was on the point of a breakthrough here, and he didn’t want to let it slip through his fingers. He lifted the glass. “ Slainthe.”
“ Yec’hed mat.”
Both men sipped at the pale liquid in silence.
Kerjean ran his tongue over dried lips, savouring the taste of it. “I love that smoky, peaty taste of the island whiskies. It’s like drinking the earth itself. It connects you to the ground that feeds you.”
Enzo nodded, saying nothing, waiting for Kerjean to speak. And even as he looked at him he saw, for the first time, beyond the image that the world had of him. There was a strangely attractive quality about his eyes, and the line of the jaw. Even the way he held himself. A kind of dignity, not yet entirely excoriated by the drink.
“I was with someone who shouldn’t have been with me.” His voice sounded slightly hoarse, as if reluctant to give up the secret it had held for so long.
“A woman?”
Kerjean pursed his lips and cast Enzo a look. “What do you think?”
“But you’d only just broken up with Arzhela Montin.”
Kerjean took another mouthful of whisky, and swilled it around his gums. “I can’t help it, monsieur, that women find me attractive. Or, at least, used to. When I was younger. And sober.” He paused. “Arzhela was gone.”
“Why didn’t you tell that to the police?”
Kerjean sucked in more whisky, followed by more smoke, and turned dead eyes on his visitor. “I might be many things, monsieur, but I would never betray a woman’s trust.”
“Even if it meant going to prison?”
“Even if it had meant that.” He held Enzo steady in his gaze, almost as if challenging the Scotsman to contradict him.
“Then it’s a pity the women in your life didn’t show the same loyalty to you.”
Kerjean frowned. “What do you mean?”
“You always believed that it was Killian who told Montin about you and his wife. It wasn’t.”
In the nearly sixty seconds of silence that followed, Enzo became aware for the first time of the slow tick, tock of an old grandfather clock in the corner of the room. “How can you possibly know that?”
“Because I know who told him.”
“Who?”
Enzo took another sip of his whisky. “Tell you what, Monsieur Kerjean. You tell me who you were with that night, and I’ll tell you who told Montin about you and Arzhela.”
Kerjean drained his glass and put it on the table to refill it. He waved the bottle toward Enzo. “Another?”
Enzo had barely drunk half of his. He shook his head.
Kerjean raised his own to his lips and took another large mouthful. Then he turned his gaze back toward
