putting a couple of ministers at risk if it meant luring a terrorist squad into the open. Carlos was an unknown quantity, but Bruno had few illusions about the way counterintelligence worked, and he bridled at the prospect of this kind of danger being invited into St. Denis.
“I’ll have to explain to the mayor about holding the summit here. Are you planning to announce it?”
“Oh yes,” said the brigadier, almost casually. “There’s to be a press conference after the agreement, TV cameras present for the signing. You can’t keep that kind of thing secret. So we might as well make an announcement. It depends on today’s inspection whether the conference chamber and facilities will be ready.”
The brigadier gestured to his security men to stay outside and led the way up the steps to the balcony, flanked by a long line of French windows. He tried several in turn, not sure which was the main door. He tapped on a window, and a man in painter’s clothes looked up, waved and came forward to open the last window in the row. The brigadier nodded thanks and shepherded them all inside, over the paint-spotted sheets. He stopped to gaze at the long room.
“This is where the formal meeting will be held, and the final press conference.”
Spanish and French flags were propped neatly against the far wall. Carlos walked down the length of the room to unfurl the Spanish banner, as if studying it for blemishes. He let the folds fall and walked back, studying the space as if he sought to commit its contours to memory.
“Where will the furniture come from?” he asked, opening a door that led into a small closet.
“Government stores,” said the brigadier. “Usual things, conference table, signing table, chairs-they’re supplying some decent antiques. Maybe a statue or two and a couple of sideboards for the walls. They’re probably in that furniture van in the yard.”
“Upstairs?” Carlos asked.
“We’ll have the entire place checked, but upstairs will remain unfurnished apart from a couple of bedrooms in case the ministers want to rest. Nobody’s staying overnight except the security teams. And Isabelle, of course,” the brigadier added in an aside to Carlos, carefully not looking at Bruno. “You remember from Paris, the young inspector on my staff who got shot, walks with a cane.”
“When is she expected?” Bruno asked, his mouth suddenly dry. He suspected it always would be, at the mention of her name. He wondered what the need for a cane might do to that shining self-confidence of hers. He’d been there when Isabelle left the military hospital for the convalescent center outside Paris, still on a stretcher.
“Tomorrow, I think, when the communications systems start being installed. Maybe the day after. She persuaded the doctors that she was fit enough to return to light duties, so she’ll be here, running the base. We’re taking over the local hotel.”
“So I report to her?” Bruno asked.
“Of course. Usual procedure, a morning staff meeting at nine, evening review at six. If I’m here, I’ll take it; if not, then it will be Isabelle and Carlos. I see you’re still using that secure phone we gave you.”
“Have you selected a backup location in case anything goes wrong?”
“What makes you think we’ll need a backup location?” Carlos asked.
“I’ve worked with the brigadier before.”
“Come on out to the balcony,” the brigadier said. “The sun’s out and we can take our casse-croute there.” He turned to his bodyguard. “Can you find us some plates and wineglasses?”
“Already taken care of, sir. Philippe went to the hotel across the road to borrow some.”
“Enough for the bodyguards to have a bit of the foie, Bruno? They won’t drink on duty.”
“Enough for everybody,” said Bruno, pulling the rubber seal on the glass jar to break the vacuum and then levering up the wire catches to open the lid. The brigadier picked it up to sniff. “Try that, Carlos,” he said as Bruno took his Laguiole knife from the pouch at his belt, levered up the corkscrew and opened the bottle of sweet golden wine. He cut the baguette into five portions and brought out a small pot of onion marmalade he had made the previous autumn.
“Bon appetit, and welcome to the gastronomic heartland of France,” he said to Carlos. He took some of the yellow duck fat he had used to preserve the foie and spread it on the baguette before adding a healthy slice of pate and a small dab of marmalade.
“This is wonderful,” the Spaniard mumbled through a mouthful of fresh bread and foie gras. He took a sip of wine, and his eyes widened. “Magnificent. They were made for each other.”
Bruno found himself smiling broadly as the brigadier sniffed at his Monbazillac and said, “Spring sunshine warming the stone of an old chateau, a wonderful foie gras and a glass of the perfect wine to accompany it. What do you say, Carlos? Counterterrorism isn’t always like this, eh?”
4
Lunch with J-J was late, but Ivan offered them an omelette with the fresh, tender buds of the first pissenlit and brought them a carafe of his new house wine from the Domaine down in the valley. His plat du jour was one of the happier memories of his disastrous love affair with a Belgian girl from Charleroi, endives au jambon. Bruno well remembered Ivan’s three months of summer bliss and a crashing, drunken winter of heartbreak when she left him, and his Cafe de la Renaissance almost went under.
“He does a good bechamel sauce, your Ivan,” said J-J, wiping the last of his empty dish with a crust of bread. He chewed with enthusiasm, took a sip of the young red wine and sat back content, his big, square hands resting on his portly stomach. “You don’t know how lucky you are here in St. Denis. No fast food, a couple of real bistros, wine from your own valley. Half my colleagues up in Perigueux seem to live on takeout pizzas and hamburgers.”
“Talking of your men, can you get them to run this for fingerprints?” Bruno asked. He handed across an envelope containing the animal cruelty leaflet that he’d taken from the Villattes’ farm. “I used a handkerchief, but there may be one or two of mine smeared on.”
J-J took it with a grunt. “The priority is going to be identifying that corpse, at least once we get the brigadier and those damn ministers out of the way. They’ll demand the use of half my force for security.”
“So what’s next?”
“I’ll wait for the forensic report. What they told me after the initial examination was pretty obvious-the body of a youngish male, dead at least ten years, probably shot while already in that grave, but that’s not certain. If we get a good estimate of his age and the length of time since death, then we’ll run it through missing persons. But over two hundred thousand people are reported missing in France every year, so it’s a long shot. And we’ve no idea where the dead man’s from. One of the forensics men said the teeth suggested a foreign dentist.”
“He’s not from around here. I know our own missing persons file,” Bruno said. “But there has to be a local connection, if only through the killer. Only someone from around here, or maybe an archaeologist, would know about that site.”
“Not necessarily. They could have been driving around, interrogating him in the back of a car, hands behind his back. They decide to do him in, and it’s a quiet, sheltered place.”
“It’s not that sheltered. And there would’ve been a gunshot. Then they had to bury him. If they wanted somewhere deserted, they could’ve found better places up in the woods. Maybe there’s a reason they picked that spot. If so, there is a local connection-and it’s the killer, not the victim.”
“But until we know who he was…,” J-J said, as Ivan brought their coffee and the check. He stared at the total, blinked in disbelief, and slipped a twenty-euro note under his saucer. “It’s like time travel, coming here. Lunch for two and change from a twenty. Now I know why you like this place.”
“I’ll see if Joe recalls anything. You remember him, he had this job before me?” Bruno pulled out his own wallet. J-J waved it aside, muttering “Expenses” and putting the check into his notebook.
“Keep me informed, particularly if Joe has anything, and I’ll send over the forensic report as soon as I get it. The best clue might be the watch. One of my guys says there’ll be a batch number in the workings somewhere that could give us a better time frame.” He looked at his own watch and lumbered to his feet. “Got to go. By the way, you’ll be getting a call from the new magistrate about the body. I sent a notification through of a suspicious death, and she wants to see the site. Just remember, Bruno, she’s feminist, vegetarian and very Green-in both senses of
