hessian. As you saw there was no attempt to conceal it.’
‘What the caller told Smet Gaston was going to do, just get rid of it,’ remembered Claudine. ‘Anything special about the hessian? It looked comparatively new.’
‘It was, although he’d been wrapped in it for a long time.’ He looked quickly at his clipboard. ‘Forensic say it’s high-quality sacking: the sort of stuff used for wrapping things of value.’
‘How did he die?’
Rosetti led her to the dissecting table. Claudine followed, unworried by the closeness to a partially dissected carcase. He pointed to the opened anus, then to the blackened pattern on the back of the shaven head.
‘They’re finger bruising; could be either ante or post death. Hands being pressed either side of the head. I think it was during anal intercourse, not necrophilia. There’s no rectal lesion or tearing, which there would have been if entry was forced after death. The lungs are bubble-enlarged, definitely showing suffocation. During the act of buggery his face was forced into something soft, most likely a pillow, until he died. The anus is distended because muscles don’t contract after death.’ He indicated another pattern, wounds this time. ‘Bite marks. Which could give us a jaw formation impression of the killer. I think the penis was bitten, too.’
Momentarily Claudine lost her impatience to leave the room. Almost to herself she said: ‘And that was done by one of the people who’ve got the ten-year-old child we’re trying to get back unharmed.’
‘Yes,’ said Rosetti. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever examined a worse manic sex attack. It’s totally animal.’
‘I’ve got to go. Now!’
‘But…’
‘Later.’ It was six fifteen.
Claudine ran clumsily from the room, hampered by the encumbering suit. Remembering the victim’s homosexuality and the spray of the body fluids she forced herself to slow, stripping off the protective clothing, and was even more careful against outside contact while thrusting it down the incinerator chute.
It was six twenty-three when she emerged from the shower, six twenty-eight when she burst into the corridor, searching wildly for a telephone. And physically collided with Peter Blake.
‘I’ve been stupid,’ she gabbled. ‘If we tell Smet this early he’ll call…’
‘I already did,’ Blake said, holding her at arm’s length, smiling. ‘And he called, too. Twice. And we got the numbers. Felicite is Felicite Galan. She lives at the Boulevard Anspach. Gaston’s name is Mehre. He’s an antique dealer in Antwerp.’ The smile expanded. ‘We’re well up to speed, so you don’t have to run.’
With the image of the distorted and sexually mutilated body horrifically vivid in her mind throughout the remainder of the long day, Claudine couldn’t dispel the feeling mat to run was exactly what she – all of them – had to do. To run as fast as they could in every newly pointed direction and break any law to get to Mary Beth.
It was irrational and unprofessional, she accepted, and totally opposite from what they actually had to do. Which was to proceed step by step with the utmost care. Make no unpremeditated move until they’d located Felicite Galan and established the child was with her, and only then risk a strike to prevent Mary Beth being the next disfigured body on the mortuary slab.
By the time Claudine reached the embassy the surveillance had already been organized and in Brussels was in place. Sure of their target and knowing from Smet’s panicked telephone call that Gaston Mehre was at home over his gallery in Antwerp’s Schoenmarkt, Harding assigned a thirty-man squad to put the antique dealer under total observation.
The lawyer’s call to Felicite Galan, while identifying her from the number, had rung out unanswered. It was again McCulloch and Ritchie who led the operation in Boulevard Anspach. Watchers were positioned outside as before, to warn of the woman’s unexpected return, separate from the evidence-collecting ‘floaters.’ In addition there were four CIA agents, all women, two with paramedic qualifications, if Mary Beth were found to be imprisoned in the house.
She wasn’t.
It was the first and immediate disappointment after McCulloch and Ritchie immobilized the rear-mounted, out-of-date alarm box with instant setting foam and picked the rear door lock.
The two men varied their routine in their immediate search for the child, both looking initially for basement cells before quickly working upwards, room by room. At the same time as McCulloch reported failure on his mobile phone he said that from the disarray and cast-aside clothes in Felicite’s bedroom and en suite dressing room – as well as an open-doored cupboard in which suitcases were stored – she’d obviously packed and left in a hurry. He and Ritchie were reverting to routine: some proxile copied material, including bank statements, was already being ferried back. Again they hadn’t found an address book.
Kurt Volker deputed himself, without argument, to collate what came from the house.
Rosetti got to the embassy by mid-morning. For the benefit of the entire group he repeated what he’d earlier told Claudine, adding that around the anal area and stuck by body fluid to the hessian he’d found four red-pigmented pubic hairs, obviously not those of the auburn-haired victim, from which the killer could be identified by DNA comparison. The body was too decomposed for any semen trace to have remained. There was no dental work from which the victim could be identified from orthodontic or dental records and although quite a substantial amount of the face was intact he thought a model reconstruction from skull and facial bone formation would be necessary if they wanted to issue a picture appeal. A mouth impression of the killer was possible from at least two of the bite marks. No effort had been made to clean the body and there were a lot of forensic tests still to be carried out. No one commented on the quickly developed photographs of the boy that Rosetti circulated.
Harding was actually remarking that antique dealers used hessian to wrap sale items – and specialized glue for repairs – when the first contact came from Antwerp. None of the combined FBI and CIA team had yet entered the premises as purchasing American tourists – the prepared cover – but from external observation there appeared to be two men working there. Both had red hair and from their facial similarity were clearly related.
‘The hessian will match that in the shop, as well as the hair,’ predicted Harding. ‘So we’ve got ourselves a couple of murderers. One at least.’
The still unknown executive at Belgacom was the first caller, just after eleven, to be picked up on the agonizingly limited microphone in Smet’s office. The lawyer did most of the talking, as he did on the three subsequent and connected calls, and a murmur of anticipation went round the listening group at the repetition in every one.
‘My house tonight. Seven.’ To the man they now knew to be Gaston Mehre, he added: ‘It’s desperate. Terrible.’
Harding had already phoned the controller of the Antwerp squad, giving the time when the shop would be empty that night. By then the search of Boulevard Anspach had been completed, listening devices installed in every room and telephone and all documentation McCulloch and Ritchie considered relevant copied and returned to where they had been found. There were thirty CIA and FBI agents dispersed around the house and along every road feeding into it.
Smet didn’t dominate the conversation when Felicite Galan called. He told her about the discovery of the body and in reply to her obvious question said: ‘I don’t know if we’re going to meet this afternoon! The bastard wouldn’t say what was so important about what they’d found! Just that it was good. Important. I’m going to try Poncellet if they go on saying they’re too busy.’
There was a long period of silence, interspersed with grunts and single-word agreement. Towards the end Smet complained: ‘I know they’re stupid. It’s too late now: too late for anything.’ To her unheard response to that, he said: ‘Kill myself.’
His final words were: ‘Please, I’m begging you… I can’t help it… do it now…? When…? Now, it’s got to be now…’
They were careful to keep the sequence in the proper order. Blake told Poncellet there appeared to be a useful amount of forensic clues connected with the body find that wouldn’t be analysed in time for any meeting that afternoon. Further contact from the woman in any case had priority. He said exactly the same to Smet, promising to call him again at the office or even at home that evening if there was any development. They all listened to Poncellet accurately recount his conversation with Blake to the other Belgian when Smet reached him.
‘It looks as if things are moving at last,’ said Poncellet.
‘They haven’t told you what it is?’
‘No.’
Felicite did call McBride. Her attitude – her tone of voice even – was totally different from what it had been
