didn’t interest the police. The drugs squad was running the investigation and the Sophia incident didn’t have a drugs angle. So Dompierre’s son had to let it drop. But when Sophia in turn was killed, he got back on the case. The affair was still alive. He had always believed that his father and Fremonville had been killed not because of the cocaine, but because somehow their paths had crossed that of the attacker. And that he’d shot them to stop them talking. It must have been terribly important for him.’
‘Your story doesn’t make sense,’ Marc said. ‘Why didn’t this attacker shoot them straightaway afterwards?’
‘Well, because he probably had a stage name. If you were called Roger Prune for instance, you’d probably change it to something like Franck Delmer, or some fancy-sounding name that might appeal to a director. So he disappears under his stage name, his real identity can’t be traced and he’s out of danger. Who’s going to connect Franck Delmer with Roger Prune?’
‘Well, so what? I still don’t bloody get it!’
‘You’re on edge today, Marc. Well, imagine that a year later, the guy meets Dompierre under his real name and is recognised. Then he has no choice. He shoots them both, him and his friend, who almost certainly knows too. He knows that Fremonville deals in cocaine and that suits him fine. He plants the sachets at Dompierre’s, the police buy the story and the case is referred to the drugs squad.’
‘And why would your Prune-Delmer kill Sophia fourteen years later, since Sophia didn’t even identify him?’
Lucien, looking excited once more, produced a plastic bag which he placed on the chair. ‘Don’t move, pal, don’t move.’
He fished around in it and pulled out a roll of paper held by a rubber band. Vandoosler was looking at him, visibly impressed. Luck had favoured Lucien, but he had also very skilfully harpooned his lucky chance.
‘After our talk,’ Lucien said, ‘I was a bit shaken. And so was the old lady. It had upset her to dredge up her memories. She didn’t know that Christophe Dompierre had been murdered and as you can guess, I didn’t tell her. We had a cup of coffee at ten o’clock to restore ourselves. And then, that was all very well, but I was still thinking about my war diaries. I’m only human after all, you can understand that.’
‘OK, I understand,’ said Marc.
‘Mme de Fremonville had a good look for the war diaries, but she couldn’t find them anywhere, they really were lost. But while she was drinking her coffee, she gave a little cry. You know the kind of thing, like in old movies. She remembered that her husband, who was very attached to these war diaries, had had them photographed by his magazine’s photographer because the paper was fragile and starting to disintegrate. She told me that with a bit of luck, the photographer might have kept the negatives or proofs of the photographs, because he had taken a lot of trouble over them. The diaries were written in pencil and not easy to reproduce. She gave me the photographer’s address, in Paris luckily, and I rushed straight over there. And there he was, making prints. He’s only about fifty and still in business. And get this, Marc. He had kept the negatives and he’s going to print a set for me. I kid you not.’
‘Great!’ muttered Marc crossly. ‘But I was talking abut Sophia’s murder, not your notebooks.’
Lucien turned to Vandoosler and pointed to Marc. ‘He’s really edgy, isn’t he? Too impatient.’
‘When he was little,’ Vandoosler said, ‘if he dropped a ball from the balcony into the courtyard, he would stamp and cry until I fetched it. It was all that mattered to him. The number of times I went up and down the stairs. Just for those little cheap plastic balls with holes in, you know.’
Lucien laughed. He was looking pleased again, but his brown hair was still dark with sweat. Marc smiled as well. He had entirely forgotten about those plastic balls.
‘Listen,’ said Lucien, still in a whisper. ‘This photographer, as you might expect, accompanied Fremonville on his assignments. He did the press photos for shows they covered. So I thought he might have kept some old prints. He knew about Sophia being killed, but he hadn’t heard about Christophe Dompierre. I told him about it and he thought this sounded so serious he went to look for his file on “Elektra”. And here,’ said Lucien, waving his roll under Marc’s nose, ‘we have a set of press photographs. Not just of Sophia. Of the whole company.’
‘Come on then, show us!’ said Marc.
‘Patience, patience,’ said Lucien.
Slowly he unrolled the photos, and took out one picture which he laid on the table.
‘The whole company on parade the first night,’ he said, using wineglasses to press down the corners of the photograph. ‘Everyone’s on it. Sophia in the middle, with the tenor and the baritone either side of her. They’re all made up and in costume of course. But can you recognise anyone?
Marc and Vandoosler leaned over the photo. The faces were made up, small but clear. It was a good photograph. Marc who had been feeling himself falling way behind, as Lucien became more and more ebullient, felt all his strength draining away. His brain was muddled and confused. He looked at the little white faces, but none of them rang any bells. No, wait a moment, there was Julien Moreaux, looking young and thin.
‘Yes, of course,’ said Lucien, ‘but that’s hardly surprising. Look again.’
Marc shook his head. He felt almost humiliated. No, he couldn’t see anything. Vandoosler equally baffled, pulled a face. However, he pointed to one face with his finger.
‘That one,’ he said in a low voice, ‘but I can’t put a name to it.’
Lucien nodded. ‘Quite right,’ he said. ‘But
He looked quickly towards the bar and round the rest of the room, then drew even closer to Marc and Vandoosler.
‘It’s Georges Gosselin, Juliette’s brother,’ he whispered.
Vandoosler clenched his fists.
‘Pay the bill, St Mark,’ he said curtly. ‘We’re going home at once. Tell St Matthew to join us as soon as his shift’s over.’
XXXII
MATHIAS RAN HIS HANDS THROUGH HIS MASS OF BLOND HAIR GETTING it even more tousled, if that was possible. The others had told him everything and he was shattered. He had not even changed out of his waiter’s costume. Lucien, who felt he had done more than his bit for the time being, had decided to let the others get on with it and to move on to something else. While waiting to go and meet the photographer at six o’clock to pick up the first prints of the promised notebooks, he had decided to polish the big dining table. He had brought the refectory table into the house when they moved in, and did not want it spoilt by cavemen like Mathias or careless people like Marc. He was putting beeswax on it now, lifting the elbows in turn of Vandoosler, Marc and Mathias to get under them with his bulky cloth. Nobody protested, because they knew it would have no effect. Apart from the sound of the cloth polishing the wood, the silence lay heavy over the refectory as each of them tried to sort out and digest recent events.
‘If I’ve got it right,’ Mathias said at last, ‘Georges Gosselin attacked Sophia and tried to rape her in her dressing-room fifteen years ago. Then he ran off and Daniel Dompierre saw him. Sophia didn’t say anything, because she thought it must have been Julien-is that right? A year or more later, the critic met Georges Gosselin and recognised him, so Gosselin shot him along with his pal Fremonville. But the way I see it, it’s far worse to kill two guys in cold blood than to be charged even with assault and attempted rape. A double murder is out of all proportion.’
‘The way you see it maybe,’ said Vandoosler. ‘But for a weak, secretive sort of person, to be put in prison for assault and rape might seem like the end of the world. He’d lose his image, his reputation, his work, and his peace of mind. What if he couldn’t bear to be seen for what he was, a brute, a potential rapist? He panics, acts instinctively, and shoots the two men.’
‘How long has he been living in rue Chasle?’ Marc asked. ‘Do we know that?’
‘Must be about ten years, I reckon,’ said Mathias. ‘Ever since the old grandfather with his beet fields left them his money. Juliette has been running
