As he turned on to rue Mazagran, Lebreton saw three police cars. The lights were flashing in silence. Uniformed officers were darting this way and that as they set up a security perimeter around Maëlle Guénan’s building. Orders were issued in tinny voices that crackled through the walkie-talkies. A vanload of forensics officers from identité judiciaire came to a halt a few yards from the entrance, the team slamming the doors shut before filling the lobby.
It was the same building, but surely this commotion had nothing to do with Maëlle, Lebreton thought, refusing to believe it for a second.
He took his POLICE band out of his pocket and slipped it onto his arm. He flashed his ID at one of the officers at the door, then took the stairs four at a time.
The widow’s gentle face embedded itself in his mind. They should never have reopened the inquiry.
He met two agents on the second-floor landing going door-to-door to question the neighbors. This early in the morning, the man who opened up had his hair all over the place and still looked half-asleep. Lebreton hurried past them. The worn-out tablecloth, the chewed fingernails, the frayed sweater. A day in the countryside for her son’s birthday. The details of a life rushed by and filled his heart with remorse.
Up on the fourth floor, the widow’s door was wide open, and the familiar sounds of police activity reached Lebreton’s ears. He took one step into the apartment and saw a running shoe on the foot of a corpse. A silver star gleamed on the lace. The commandant walked farther into the hallway and recognized Maëlle Guénan without even seeing her face. The body had fallen in a heap on the carpet. Bloodstains had transformed the embroidered butterflies on her jeans into scarlet swabs. The handle of a kitchen knife protruded from her abdomen.
The room was thick with the coppery smell of blood. Forensics officers in their white paper pajamas were dusting the surroundings and putting down yellow markers, while the photographer’s violent flash operated on shy Maëlle. Lebreton still could not see the full scene, and he was about to make his way through to the living room when a black suit, immaculate and buttoned up, stood in his way. On top of it was a face like a blade, with a dark complexion and watchful eyes. Lebreton immediately recognized Divisionnaire Valincourt, the head of brigades centrales.
“Who are you?” he snapped.
The crime scene was inexorably luring Lebreton in, and he could not stop himself from making furtive glances over the divisionnaire’s shoulder, despite the urgent need to answer the question. His information radically shifted the perspective on Maëlle’s murder, and crim needed it to get their investigation under way. Lebreton stated his name, rank, and department.
“Yes, okay. And what are you doing here, commandant?”
Lebreton outlined the bulk of what they had on Yann Guénan, all the while observing Valincourt’s body language. The divisionnaire was swaying gently from side to side; haughty, distracted, eager to get this over with. He was listening to Lebreton, but not attaching any real importance to the words. He was still giving out instructions, responding to one or another of his officers, or browsing any paperwork he was presented with. The commandant fell silent when he was done, obliging the man to display a modicum of courtesy, the sudden pause forcing the senior officer to pay Lebreton more attention.
“Good, very good. And it dates from when, your case?”
“July 1993.”
“I see.”
A half smile crept across the divisionnaire’s face. It would have made Capestan livid.
“Commandant,” he said in an insincere voice, “this is all extremely interesting, and we’ll be sure to look into it . . .”
He took Lebreton by the elbow and ushered him toward the door. A polite yet firm way of ejecting him from the crime scene. The commandant pretended to be heavy footed and uncertain, hampering Valincourt’s maneuver so he could buy himself some time to examine the living room. He wanted to know if someone had searched the room. He spotted a large red notebook next to the telephone on a side table. It looked like a directory of some sort. One thing was for sure: it had not been there on their previous visit. After years at RAID, when he would often have only a few seconds to take mental pictures of a room, Lebreton’s memory was fail-safe. Maëlle must have put the notebook aside after their telephone call the night before.
Having led Lebreton to the door, Valincourt reiterated just how little importance he was attributing to the squad’s information:
“Do send an overview to me at the Orfèvres. In the meantime, you know the drill. We’ll take it from here. Thank you, commandant, you may leave now.”
The divisionnaire signaled to a policeman to escort the intruder downstairs, and the commandant had no choice but to leave the premises without any further intelligence, dismissed like the lowliest, most untrustworthy of witnesses.
Lebreton mulled everything over on his way downstairs. He waited until he was at the junction with boulevard de Bonne-Nouvelle before calling Rosière, who picked up immediately:
“Hi, Louis-Baptiste . . . Pilote, down! Sit! No more jumping around now.”
“She’s been murdered,” Lebreton announced, his spirits all the more dampened by repeating the news.
They had met her barely a week before. They had told her that they would find her husband’s murderer. Now this. She had left behind a son. And to cap it all off, they had been blocked from the inquiry.
But they still had control of the Yann Guénan case. This murder could still be considered a fresh lead. The police judiciaire would have to relay the information to them. In the meantime, they had to make sure nothing got past them.
“Crim has taken control of it, and of course they don’t want us getting in the way. But it’s imperative that we retrieve the information. Give
