An Uncertain Place

blond curls.

‘Do you speak German, Commissaire Adamsberg?’ asked the gracious Viennese colleague, lighting a long cigarette.

‘No, afraid not. But Commandant Danglard will translate.’

‘That is most kind of him, thank you, but I am capable to speak your language. Happy to know you, commissaire, and also happy to share. I saw yesterday your case in Garches. It would have been cleared up quickly if the Blodmanner of the press had keeped their mouths shut. Your man escaped?’

‘What does Blodmanner mean, Danglard?’ Adamsberg whispered.

‘Jackals.’

‘Yes, he has got away,’ Adamsberg confirmed.

‘I am regretful for you, commissaire, and I hope you keep the inquiry, yes?’

‘So far, yes.’

‘So maybe I can help you and you also for me.’

‘You’ve got something on Louvois?’

‘No. I have got something on the crime. That is, I am nearly sure I too have this crime, for it is not usual, no? I send you pictures, better to see what I mean.’

The blond head disappeared and a village house came up on-screen with half-timbering and a gabled roof.

‘This is the place,’ Thalberg’s mellifluous voice continued. ‘Here is Pressbaum, near Vienna, five months and twenty days ago, and one night. A man also, Conrad Plogener, younger than your man, forty-nine only, married with three children. His wife and children had gone for the weekend to Graz, and Plogener was killed. He was a furniture dealer. Killed like this,’ he went on, as a picture appeared of a bloodstained room with no visible body. ‘I don’t know for you, but in Pressbaum the body was so cut up that nothing remained. Also crushed on a stone and scattered in many directions. Do you have similar modus operandi?’

‘Looks the same at first sight, yes.’

‘I can show you some close-ups, commissaire.’

There followed a slide show of about fifteen pictures repeating the nightmarish spectacle of Garches. Conrad Plogener had a more modest lifestyle than Pierre Vaudel, no grand piano or tapestries.

‘I was less fortunate than you, we found no trace of the Zerquetscher.’

‘Crusher,’ Danglard explained, twisting his hands against each other to mime it.

‘Ja,’ Thalberg said. ‘The people here started calling him der Zerquetscher, you know they always like to give a label. I found some footprints of mountain boots. I’m saying that there is a big possibility we have the same Zerquetscher as you, even if it is a great rarity that a killer does not act only in his own country.’

‘Quite. Was the victim Austrian? No trace of French in his background?’

‘I have been to verify that, just now. Plogener was quite Austrian, he was born in Mautern in Styria. Mind you, I am talking just of him, because nobody is completely something, my grandmother came from Romania and so, everybody also. And Vaudel was French? You don’t have any Pfaudel or Waudel or anything else with his name?’

‘No,’ said Adamsberg, sitting chin in hand, and seeming stunned by this new bloodbath at the home of Conrad Plogener. ‘We’ve looked through most of his papers and there’s no connection with Austria. Oh. Wait a minute, Thalberg, there is a German connection. A Frau Abster in Cologne, apparently an old sweetheart of his.’

‘I’ll write down Abster. I check his private papers.’

‘Vaudel wrote her a letter in German to be posted to her after his death. Give me a moment, I’ll get the piece of paper.’

‘I can remember it,’ said Froissy. ‘Bewahre unser Reich, widerstehe, auf dass es unantastbar bleibe.’

‘Then a Russian word that seems to read “kiss lover”.’

‘I’m writing it. A bit solemn I find, but the French are often eternalists in love, opposite to what people say. So perhaps we have a Frau Abster who dismembers her former lovers. I am just making a joke of course.’

Adamsberg made a sign indicating drink to Estalere, who shot out of the room. He was the coffee specialist in the squad, knowing everyone’s preferences – with or without sugar, or milk, espresso or americano. He knew Adamsberg liked the cup with the orange bird on it. Voisenet, who was a bit of an ornithologist, said the bird didn’t look like any existing species, and that was how habits got ingrained. It was not servility that made Estalere memorise everyone’s tastes but a passion for small technical details, however insignificant, and perhaps that was what made him bad at taking an overall view. He came back with a perfect tray, as the Viennese commissaire was offering a diagrammatic image of a body on which the parts most savagely attacked were marked in black. Adamsberg sent in return their own version with red and green.

‘I would be convinced that these two cases must be connected.’

‘Yes, I would be convinced also,’ murmured Adamsberg.

He drank his coffee, registering the marked zones on the Austrian diagram: head, neck, joints, feet, thumbs, heart, liver – yes, almost a carbon copy of their own drawing. Thalberg’s face came back on-screen.

‘Give me the address of this Frau Abster, I will see that someone visits her in Koln.’

‘In that case, you could take her the letter from her friend Vaudel.’

‘Yes, that would be polite.’

‘I will send you a copy. You will take care how you tell her about his death, won’t you? I mean, there’s no need to go into detail.’

‘Always I take care, commissaire.’

‘The Zerquetcheur,’ Adamsberg repeated several times, thoughtfully, when the videoconference was over. ‘Armel Louvois, the Zerquetcheur.’ He pronounced it as a French word.

‘Zerquetscher,’ Danglard corrected, in German.

‘What do you think of this face?’Adamsberg asked, taking up the newspaper Danglard had left on the table.

‘Mugshots fix people’s features in a rigid pose,’ said Froissy, respecting the ethical obligation not to comment on the physical appearance of suspects.

‘That’s true, Froissy, he does look fixed and rigid.’

‘Because he’s looking straight at the camera, without moving.’

‘Makes him look a bit of a thug,’ commented Danglard.

‘But what else? Can you see danger in this face? Or fear? Lamarre, would you like to meet him in the corridor?’

‘Negative, commissaire.’

Estalere took the paper and concentrated, then he gave up and handed it back.

‘Well?’ asked the commissaire.

‘Nothing. I think he just looks normal.’

Adamsberg smiled and put down his cup. ‘I’m going to visit the doctor,’ he said, ‘and Vaudel’s imaginary enemies.’

He consulted his watches, which were as usual out of sync, took an average, and gathered that he had little time in hand. He picked up Cupid, who looked somewhat odd, since Kernorkian had cut off some of the dog’s coat to collect traces of manure, and went across the main office towards the cat and the photocopier. Adamsberg presented the animals to each other, and explained that the dog was just a temporary visitor unless his master died, which was not impossible, because some bastard had given him blood poisoning. Snowball unfolded part of his enormous round body, and glanced briefly at the frantic little creature which was licking Adamsberg’s wristwatches. Then he put his head back down on the warm lid of the machine, indicating that so long as his meals continued to be served on time, and so long as he could occupy the photocopier, the newcomer left him indifferent. On condition of course that Retancourt did not become seduced by this dog. Retancourt belonged to him and he loved her.