Past Imperfect

woman alone in a remote farmhouse. A cakewalk. He'd put on the infra-red goggles, switch off or cut the mains electricity from the garage, and break in through a downstairs window. The woman would still be fumbling for candles and night-lights when the bullet hit. One head shot, maybe two, and out. It would all be over in seconds.

Brossard kept low as he moved through the last fifty metres of grass towards the stone wall. Then he stopped again, studying the farmhouse closer and trying to work out the likely position of rooms. He quickly checked his gun and silencer, then took out the night-time goggles and put them on.

Waiting a moment for his eyes to adjust to their grey-green light, he slid over the wall and started the last distance towards the farmhouse.

'What time would you hope to get here?' Monique was speaking to Yves, her eldest son. He'd phoned to tell her he would be coming up from Marseille for the weekend. She hadn't heard from him for almost two months, so they'd spent a few minutes catching up on news before returning to when he would be arriving.

'I'm on a late shift at the station tomorrow night, finishing at ten. I'll leave straight after that. So probably close to eleven. But I've got Saturday and Sunday free.'

'That's good. Gerome will be here, he's not going anywhere this weekend as far as I know. It'll be nice to have a house full.' Already she was thinking of food and preparation: steamed C'ap Roig with cous-cous, pate en croute to start. A few bottles of wine on the terrace. It was going to be a good weekend. 'Gerome should be back soon. You might get a chance to speak to him.'

'It's okay. I've got to go now. But I'll see him tomorrow anyway.'

'I'll try and make sure your father relaxes a bit as well. At least one full day without calls. See you tomorrow.' Monique looked thoughtfully at the phone as she put it down. Family. New family… Old family.

With the tapes she'd played repeatedly, she'd found herself thinking more about Christian and Jean-Luc. Memories that had plagued her the first few years, sapped her strength before she'd pushed them harshly away: self-preservation for the sake of both her sanity and her new marriage. She couldn't give all to her new family while burdened by ghosts from the past.

The only vestige Dominic had complained about, at times pointedly, had been her obsessive protectiveness with Yves and Gerome. The ghosts of the past might have been buried, but a shadow had remained. She could never face losing another child, going through what she'd suffered with Christian again.

But the tapes and transcripts had brought it all back. With each playing, images of Christian and Jean-Luc had grown stronger. She'd resisted going out to the wheat field the day Dominic had met Eyran and Stuart Capel. She'd always vowed she'd never go there. The memories were too harsh. But knowing the three of them had stood in the empty filed, searching for long lost answers, had raised her curiosity about Taragnon. Perhaps the farm would be different: the memories there happy as well as sad. Alone at Vidauban that afternoon, looking out across the farm fields at the back, she'd finally made the decision. She'd taken the old Simca left permanently at the farm for transporting garden pots and plants, and driven out to Taragnon.

Though it was only thirty-five kilometres away, she hadn't been back to the area for over twenty-five years, after they'd finally sold the old farm.

She parked in the road outside the old farm and looked up. Apart from some modernization with new windows and doors, it had changed little. The outside stonework was much the same.

As she looked, a small boy of no more than four or five came out of the back door and started peddling a toy car around the courtyard. And in that moment, as she closed her eyes, she pictured Christian in the courtyard at little more than that age, laughing and playing, his gentle high-pitched voice echoing slightly from the walls. And Jean-Luc coming in from the fields, picking Christian up on his shoulders and swinging him around playfully, smiling. The proud father.

Tears streamed unashamedly down her face as she drove back to Vidauban. She'd cried bitter tears for both of them for so many years, but not recently.

And then not long after returning, at six o'clock the news item had come on about Duclos. She'd found herself honing in on the face flashed up on the screen as if drawn by a magnet. A face suddenly put to this new suspect Dominic had talked about almost incessantly the past weeks — Christian's real murderer! A rounded, slightly bloated face with thinning black hair and dark green, almost black eyes. Thirty years? She tried to imagine in that moment what he looked like then, when he'd murdered Christian. But it was the one leap back through the years her mind wasn't able to make.

As it grew dark, she took out a night-light and lit it in the small alcove by the telephone at the back of the drawing room. In the first glow of its light, she'd seen Christian's face clearly, the memories of those last nights of hospital vigil flooding back. She could almost feel his presence; as if he was partly with her now, guiding her actions, willing her to light the night-light.

She hadn't prayed for Christian and Jean-Luc for years, but she would that night. She felt that by purposely casting them from her thoughts, she'd also in a way abandoned them. It was time to make some amends.

Now, putting down the phone from Yves, she looked thoughtfully towards the light. She remembered the night that Yves was born, the joy she'd felt. The doctors had told her later she'd been lucky to live. At least she'd been given a second chance at happiness. Some people didn't get even that.

With a last slow sigh, she knelt down before the light, gently closed her eyes and started to pray: for Christian's and Jean-Luc's souls, for the many memories, for the happiness that once was… for the final justice that might now be so close…

Suddenly the lights went out.

The quietly murmured prayers caught at the back of her throat. Her eyes flickered open. A sound outside the house, faint rustling, or was she imagining it? She listened harder, but could hear nothing more. Only stillness, silence. Pitch darkness beyond the weak glow of the night-light.

She wondered what had happened with the electricity. Sometimes there were power cuts when there was a storm, but the weather had been fine. She straightened up, deciding to take the night-light with her to investigate.

But barely two paces away, the phone rang, startling her. She turned to pick it up.

Dull grey-green light. It took a second for each shape to become clear.

Brossard moved stealthily away from the garage after switching off the mains. He'd already worked out the geography of the house. Drawing room with an office leading off, centre hallway, then a kitchen and dining room the far end. Bedrooms upstairs.

The woman was in the drawing room, but he didn't want to enter from that side, possibly alarm her while he fumbled to break in. He would go in at the far end. The kitchen window was too small, so he chose the dining room.

Looking through, he could see that the connecting door to the hallway was closed; sound wouldn't travel easily. He took the glass cutter and sucker from his knapsack, cut a neat hole, reached in and turned the window latch. He was in within twenty seconds.

Eyes adjusting, orientating. Objects became clear quickly, but it took a second longer to judge distance. Long table. Six chairs. Cabinet. Side table. Archway through to the kitchen. He focused on the door ahead. The door to the hallway and the drawing room beyond. Only the sound of his own breathing as he moved.

Sudden noise, alarming. Deafeningly loud among the silence and darkness: phone ringing! Beyond the hall — in the drawing room where the woman was, Brossard judged.

It stopped. It had been picked up. Good. She would be talking, he could move into the hallway without worry — and he made the last distance swiftly, turned the handle and went through. And waited again, crouching, listening.

But as he fought to pick out her voice and movements beyond the door, another sound came without warning, drowning it out. A car swinging into the courtyard, its lights flashing briefly across a small window by the front door.

Brossard's nerves tensed. An anticipatory thrill rose up from his spine and bunched the muscles at the back of his neck. His jaw set tight, every nerve end suddenly alive, tingling. This was more like it: two targets and only seconds to decide which to drop first!