Wash This Blood Clean from My Hand

‘An obsessive man, who’s had too much to drink, who’s lost his memory, and who’s being driven nuts by that girl. Me, reliving my brother’s life. Reliving the judge’s career. Crazy, off balance. I’m finished, Retancourt. Fulgence has got me. He’s got inside my skin.’

For a quarter of an hour, Retancourt drove in silence. Adamsberg’s state of collapse needed, she thought, the respite of silence. Probably days of it, driving all the way to Greenland, but she didn’t have time for that.

‘What are you thinking about?’ she asked after a while.

‘My mother.’

‘I understand. But it’s not the moment.’

‘You think about your mother when you’ve come to the end of the road. And I’ve come to the end of the road.’

‘No, you haven’t. You can still make a break for it.’

‘If I make a break for it, I’ve really had it. Proof of guilt.’

‘Well, you’ve certainly had it if you turn up at the Mounties’ headquarters on Tuesday morning. You’ll sit rotting here until the trial, and there won’t be any way of getting out to try and investigate what happened. You’ll be stuck in a Canadian prison, then eventually they’ll transfer you to Paris. Twenty years minimum. No, in my view, the only thing for it is to cut and run.’

‘Do you realise what you’re saying? Do you realise that you’d be making yourself an accomplice in my escape?’

‘Yes, perfectly.’

Adamsberg turned to his lieutenant. ‘But what if I did kill her, Retancourt?’ he forced himself to say.

‘You’ve got to run,’ she said, evading the question.

‘Retancourt, what if I did kill her?’ repeated Adamsberg insisting.

‘Well, if you have any doubts on that score, we’ve both had it.’

He leaned over to examine her face.

‘And you haven’t any doubts?’ he asked.

‘No.’

‘Why not? You don’t like me, and there’s a mountain of evidence stacked up against me. But you don’t think I did it?’

‘No. You’re not the sort of man who would kill anyone.’

‘How do you know?’

Retancourt pursed her lips slightly, seeming to hesitate.

‘Well, let’s just say that it wouldn’t interest you enough.’

‘Are you sure of that?’

‘As sure as I can be. Your best course is to trust me, or yes, you’ve had it. You’re not defending yourself, you’re getting yourself deeper in it.’

Into the mud of the dead lake, thought Adamsberg.

‘I just can’t remember anything about that night,’ he repeated, mechanically. ‘I had my face and hands covered in blood.’

‘Yes, I know. The janitor told them that.’

‘Perhaps it wasn’t my own blood?’

‘You see? You’re getting yourself in deeper and deeper. You’re accepting it. The idea’s wriggling into your mind like a worm, and you’re allowing it to.’

‘Maybe the idea’s always been in my mind, since the Trident came back to life. Maybe something went off in my head when I saw the fork.’

‘You’re going down into his grave,’ Retancourt insisted. ‘You’re putting your head on the block.’

‘I realise that.’

‘Commissaire, think quickly. Who are you going to choose to trust? You or me?’

‘You,’ Adamsberg replied instinctively.

‘OK. Run for it.’

‘Can’t be done. They’re not stupid.’

‘Neither are we.’

‘But they’re already right behind us.’

‘Well, we certainly can’t run in Detroit. The arrest warrant has been issued to cover Michigan. We’re going to return to the Hotel Brebeuf on Tuesday morning as arranged.’

‘And sneak out via the basement? But when they see I haven’t turned up at the right time, they’ll look everywhere. In my room, everywhere in the building. They’ll see the car’s gone, put a watch on the airports. I’d never have time to get a flight, or even leave the hotel. They’ll eat me alive, like they did Brebeuf.’

‘But they’re not going to be chasing us, commissaire. We’re going to lead them where we want them.’

‘Where?’

‘Into my room.’

‘But your room’s as small as mine. Where are you going to hide me? On the roof? They’ll go up there.’

‘Of course.’

‘Under the bed, in the wardrobe?’

Adamsberg hunched his shoulders in a gesture of despair.

‘No, on me.’

The commissaire turned to the lieutenant.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said, ‘but it’ll only take two or three minutes. There’s no other way.’

‘Retancourt, I’m not a hairpin. What are you going to turn me into?’

‘Nothing, I’m going to turn myself into something. A pylon.’

XXXV

RETANCOURT HAD STOPPED FOR TWO HOURS TO SLEEP AND THEY entered Detroit at seven in the morning. The city was as mournful as an old duchess, in the ruins of her estate, still wearing the ragged remains of her robes. Dirt and poverty had replaced the former wealth of old Detroit.

‘Here’s the block,’ said Adamsberg, consulting his street plan.

He looked up at the building, which was soot-blackened but otherwise in good condition, with a cafe on the ground floor, as if he were examining a historic monument. And in a sense he was, since behind these walls Raphael lived, moved and slept.

‘The Mounties are parking twenty metres behind us,’ Retancourt remarked. ‘Very clever. What can they be thinking of? Do they really imagine we haven’t noticed they’ve been behind us all the way from Gatineau?’

Adamsberg was leaning forward, his arms folded tightly against his stomach.

‘You go in on your own, commissaire,’ she said. ‘I’ll go and sit in the cafe.’

‘I can’t,’ said Adamsberg in a whisper. ‘And what’s the use anyway? I’m on the run like he is.’

‘Exactly, so you’re quits. He won’t be alone any more, nor will you. Go on, it’s the best thing to do, commissaire.’

‘You don’t understand, Retancourt. I just can’t. My legs won’t move. They feel as if they’ve turned to iron bars.’

‘Shall I have a go?’ asked the lieutenant, turning sideways and putting her hands on his shoulder blades.

He nodded. After about ten minutes of the massage, he felt as if a kind of warm oil was flowing down through his thighs, making it possible to move again.

‘Is that what you did to Danglard in the plane?’

‘No, Danglard was just afraid of dying.’

‘So what am I afraid of?’