Moroccan and Corsican blood is predominant in her features. His family's prejudice starts to show through. Cheap young Moroccan whore seduced their poor young boy, which is laughable seeing as he's ten years older than her. Don't they have prostitutes at the age of twelve on the street there? You know the type of comment. In the end they had a bellyful of it and moved. She was more resilient than him, I hear; she could have stayed and put up with it, but he insisted on moving. Cut himself off entirely from his family, had little or no contact with them. When the little girl was born, they just sent a photo, no invitations to the christening, nothing.'
'Where did they come from?'
'Beaune, not far from Dijon. But it was out of the frying pan and into the fire. What with the fact that they were newcomers and her dusky looks, she attracted more than her fair share of attention. You couldn't really call it prejudice, but it was curiousity so blatant it was almost rude. You know, the way you would expect a lost tribe to react upon seeing their first explorer. I was probably one of the darkest skinned people in Bauriac until she arrived, and I attracted a fair bit of attention in my time, let me tell you. It took a few years for Monique to be accepted here, for them to look beyond her colour and realize what a nice person she is. And by the time your mother and you arrived, they'd practically been numbed into acceptance.'
So this is what all this was about, thought Dominic. Why Louis had been so inquisitive about Monique Rosselot. It was all Bauriac newcomers together time. Battling against the odds of small town minds and prejudices. It was difficult enough being a newcomer without standing out as one and, true enough, when his parents had arrived four years ago, his mother had encountered a few raised eyebrows. Her lineage was part French Indonesian, part French, and Dominic's father had been pure French Alsace. By the time it reached Dominic, the Indonesian blood had left only a slight almond slant at the corner of his eyes, looking almost out of place with his proud gallic nose. Girls either found it endearing and mysterious, or they didn't like him at all. It might have caused some problems at the station too, but Dominic could never be sure; the fact that he was newly transferred and enjoyed Warrant Officer status so young were reasons enough for resentment.
Louis had travelled up from Marseille thirteen years ago to be the chef at the Cafe du Verdon, and when the owner had died four years later and the relatives were keen to sell on, he'd mortgaged his neck between the banks and private bills of exchange to take over. Only in the last few years, having cleared the bills of exchange, had Louis enjoyed the fruits of his labour. Dominic could imagine that the locals had not been too keen on a Corsican owning such a prominent local establishment, especially all those years ago. Marseille was teaming with migrant workers and cosmopolitan mixes, and the tide of invasion by outsiders and foreigners was accepted on the coast fifty kilometres away, but not in Bauriac.
Louis was shaking his head. 'It's hardly believable, something like this. Her and Jean-Luc have been through such a tough time already. They've had to work so hard to make a go of that farm, they were sold a real pig in the poke. Previous owner saw them coming a mile off, as locals often do with people like us from outside. Bastard. Drainage was bad, top soil and yield was poor, it's been a real struggle for them. And she dotes on that boy. I don't know how she'll get over this.'
Dominic nodded thoughtfully. He was still trying to get a picture of Monique Rosselot. She sounded quite exotic, a rare beauty according to Louis; surely he'd have seen her in the past year. He realized then how closeted and predictable his life had become the past seven months, his time spent between the gendarmerie, home with his sick mother, and the occasional drink at Louis. Even on his dates with Odette, they always went to the same places: the cinema, the Cafe du Verdon, or on the rare occasions they felt more adventurous, on his bike to a favourite club in St Maximin.
Valerie was up at the bar, ordering drinks for herself and her friend. A Marie Brizard and soda and a glass of red wine. 'You having another dance soon, Louis?'
'Maybe later. I'm not as young as I used to be.' He smiled as he watched her walk back to the table with the drinks. 'How's Odette these days?'
'Okay. A bit too demanding. Wants to go out every night. I just don't have the time, even if I did have the energy and the inclination.?'
'What first attracted you to her?' Louis leant forward slightly. He lowered his voice conspirationally. 'Come on, you must remember that. That first flush of romance.'
Dominic thought for a moment. 'I think it was when we first went on a picnic. The way she wrapped her mouth around a bread stick sandwich. I knew then she was the girl for me.'
Louis smiled broadly. 'Is that the only qualification your girls need?'
'No. I quite like it if they're good at yoga and can put their ankles behind their ears.'
Louis guffawed so loudly that Valerie and her friend looked over briefly. Still chuckling, Louis poured another Pernod. 'You're a card, Dominic. An absolute fucking card. Excuse me.' He swept out from behind the bar and, half kneeling with a bar towel draped across one arm, asked Valerie to dance. Ray Charles 'Take these chains' was playing on the juke box.
Dominic took a quick slug of brandy and smiled to himself. Normally, he was quite considerate and romantic with women. But that wasn't the image Louis wanted to hear. Louis would probably have been happier to hear he'd split with Odette, back to how he was the first five months in Bauriac: different dates every other week, screwing his way endlessly through the local girls in search of nirvana. That at least was the idyllic, swashbuckling image in Louis' mind. In reality, half of the dates had been a disaster; Dominic didn't know it was possible to go out with so many girls and still feel so lonely. The only consolation had been, editing the dates down to just the highlights, that he'd kept up his stock of bar stool stories for Louis.
Dominic watched Louis and Valerie dancing, smiling as one of Louis' rogue hands drifted down towards her bottom in the clinches. After Ray Charles came the Crystals 'Da Doo Ron Ron.' Louis' attempt at the jive looked more like a flamenco dancer in the grips of epilepsy, and Dominic fought to keep a straight face. Louis thought of himself as a good dancer and Dominic didn't want to spoil a good friendship by shattering that illusion. After a moment his thoughts took over and the dancing and music faded into the background.
Tomorrow would be a big day. They would have the first forensics report, plus the findings of the medical examiner. They should know the timing of the attack, the exact weapon used, any other blood groups found and any other irregularities. They would hopefully get the first responses to appeals for witnesses in the area, and he would meet Monique Rosselot for the first main interview to learn the boy's last movements before the attack.
They should also know if her son was going to live.
Dominic wasn't sure if it was the events of the day or the two brandies at Louis, but it took him a long while to get to sleep. He'd checked on his mother on coming in; she was already fast asleep. Often, if she was awake, he would bring her a hot chocolate and they would talk for ten minutes. Her weight loss in the past four months had been more dramatic, but her mind was still lucid, so Dominic grabbed whatever conversations he could. He knew that at any day her mind could slip.
If the day hadn't been too eventful, they would reminisce: the days from his childhood in Louviers near Paris were the most memorable. Some of the memories jumbled with the events of the day as he tried to get some sleep. Images of the young boy, the dark blood against the bleached white wheat, preparing himself for the interview with Monique Rosselot, flashes from his own chidhood and thinking of his own mother as she was then, how she could have possibly coped with anything so horrific. It was the closest he could come to trying to understand how Monique Rosselot felt.
His bedroom’s French windows led onto a small first floor patio overlooking the garden. Left partly open with the summer heat, the sound of the wind through the trees outside wafted gently in. After a while, he finally drifted off to sleep.
The dream came three hours later. He was a boy again in Louviers, and the wheat fields stretched out endlessly before him. The sheaves seemed so tall, he could hide among them and nobody would find him. He walked ten paces into the field and crouched down, holding his breath as he hid; the sheaves were at least a foot above his head.
Then suddenly he was looking down at the field. He could see the gendarmes tapping across the field with their sticks to find him. He felt suddenly that he'd done something wrong, but didn't know what, and he wasn't sure whether to leap up and let them find him. But in the end he stayed crouched and hidden. He could hear them tapping closer, closer, and his heart pounded with the sound of their nearby movement. Though looking down from above, he could see that they'd already passed him.
