This Night’s Foul Work

RETANCOURT SANK DOWN WITH ALL HER CONSIDERABLE WEIGHT ON AN OLD plastic chair in Emilio’s cafe.

‘Not wanting to be rude,’ said Emilio, ‘but if the cops turn up here too often, I might as well shut up shop.’

‘Just find me a little pebble, Emilio, and we’re out of here. Three beers, please.’

‘No, just two,’ said Estalere. ‘I can’t drink it,’ he said looking at Retancourt and the New Recruit to excuse himself. ‘I don’t know why, but it goes to my head.’

‘But Estalere, it goes to everyone’s head,’ said Retancourt, who never ceased to be surprised at the naivety of this twenty-seven-year-old boy.

‘Really?’ said Estalere. ‘It’s normal?’

‘Not only is it normal, it’s the whole point.’

Estalere frowned, not wishing at any price to give Retancourt any hint that he was reproaching her with anything. If Retancourt drank beer during working hours, it was not only permitted but obviously recommended.

‘We’re not on duty now.’ Retancourt smiled at him. ‘We’re looking for a little pebble. Quite different.’

‘You’re angry with him,’ observed the young man.

Retancourt waited until Emilio had brought their beer. She raised her glass to the New Recruit.

‘Welcome. I still haven’t got your name right.’

‘Veyrenc de Bilhc, Louis,’ said Estalere, pleased with himself for having remembered the whole name.

‘Let’s stick with Veyrenc,’ proposed Retancourt.

‘De Bilhc,’ said the New Recruit.

‘You’re attached to your fancy name?’

‘I’m attached to the wine. It’s the name of a vintage.’

Veyrenc moved his glass closer to Retancourt’s but without clinking it. He had heard a good deal about the extraordinary qualities of Violette Retancourt, but all he could see at present was a tall, very well-built blonde woman, rather down-to-earth and jolly, displaying nothing that enabled him to understand the fear, respect or devotion which she inspired in the squad.

‘You’re angry with him,’ Estalere repeated glumly.

Retancourt shrugged her shoulders. ‘Well, I’ve nothing against going for a beer in Clignancourt. If that amuses him.’

‘You’re angry with him.’

‘So what?’

Estalere bowed his head unhappily. The difference and indeed frequent incompatibility of behaviour between his commissaire and his colleague distressed him deeply. The double veneration he felt for both Adamsberg and Retancourt, the twin compasses of his existence, allowed no compromise. He would not have deserted one for the other. The young man’s organism functioned entirely on nervous energy, excluding all other forces such as reason, calculation or intellectual interest. And like an engine which can only run on purified fuel, Estalere’s was a rare and fragile system. Retancourt knew this, but had neither the subtlety nor the desire to adapt to it.

‘He’s got some idea in his head,’ the young man persisted.

‘The file ought to go over to Drugs, Estalere, full stop,’ said Retancourt, folding her arms.

‘He says not.’

‘We’re not going to find any stones.’

‘He says we will.’

Estalere usually called Adamsberg only by the pronoun – ‘He’, ‘Him’ – as if he were the living god of their team.

‘Please yourself. Look for this stone wherever you like, but don’t expect me to come crawling under the tables with you.’

Retancourt surprised an unexpected sign of revolt in the brigadier‘s green eyes.

‘Yes, I will go and look for the stone,’ said the young man, standing up brusquely. ‘And not because the entire squad thinks I’m an idiot, you included. But he doesn’t. He looks, and he knows. He looks for things.’

Estalere drew breath.

‘He’s looking for a stone,’ said Retancourt.

‘Because there are things in stones, their colour, their shape, they tell stories. And you don’t see that, Violette, you don’t see anything at all.’

‘For instance?’ asked Retancourt, gripping her glass.

‘Think, lieutenant.’

And Estalere left the table with a show of teenage rebellion, going to join Emilio who had taken refuge in the back room.

Retancourt swirled her beer round in her glass and looked at the New Recruit.

‘He’s on a knife-edge,’ she said. ‘He gets carried away sometimes. You have to understand that he worships Adamsberg. How did your interview with him go? Was it OK?’

‘Not exactly.’

‘Did he jump from one subject to another?’

‘Sort of.’

‘He doesn’t do it on purpose. He had a very hard time recently in Quebec. What do you think of him?’

Veyrence smiled his crooked smile, and Retancourt appreciated it. She found the New Recruit very attractive, and kept looking at him, checking over his face and body, seeing through his clothes, reversing the usual gender roles by which men mentally undress a pretty girl they see in the street. At thirty-five, Retancourt behaved like an old bachelor at the theatre. Without any risk of involvement, for she had locked up her emotional space in order to avoid any disillusionment. As a girl, Retancourt had already been massively built and she had decided that defeatism was her only defence against hope. That made her the opposite of Lieutenant Froissy, who took it for granted that love was the sweetest thing, and that it was waiting for her round every corner – and who, as a result, had accumulated an impressive number of unhappy love affairs.

‘I’ve got a different take on him,’ said Veyrenc. ‘Adamsberg grew up in the Gave de Pau valley.’

‘When you talk like that, you sound like him.’

‘Possibly. I’m from the next valley along.’

‘Ah,’ said Retancourt. ‘they say you should never put two Gascons in the same field.’

Estalere walked past them without a glance and went out of the cafe, slamming the door.

‘He’s shoved off now,’ said Retancourt.

‘Gone back without us?’

‘Apparently.’

‘He’s in love with you?’

‘He loves me as if I were a man, as if I were what he wants to be and never will be. Big and strong, a tank, a troop carrier. In this outfit, you’d do well to take care of yourself and keep your distance. You’ve seen them, you’ve seen us all. Adamsberg and his inaccessible wanderings. Danglard, the walking encyclopedia, who has to run after the commissaire to stop the train going off the tracks. Noel, who’s a loner and likes being as crude and narrow-minded as he can get away with. Lamarre is so shy he never looks you in the face. Kernorkian’s afraid of the dark and germs. Voisenet’s a heavyweight, who goes back to his zoology as soon as your back is turned. Justin’s a perfectionist, meticulous to the point of paralysis. Adamsberg doesn’t always remember which is Voisenet and which is Justin, he’s always calling them by the wrong name, but neither one of them minds. Froissy is always unhappy about something or other, and eats to make up for it. Estalere, whom you’ve met now, is a worshipper. Mercadet’s a genius with figures, but he can’t keep his eyes open in the afternoon. Mordent’s inclined to take a tragic view, and has hundreds of books on stories and legends. I’m the big fat all-purpose cow of the team, according to Noel. So what the heck are you doing in this outfit?’

‘It’s a project,’ said Veyrenc, vaguely. ‘You don’t like your colleagues, then?’

‘Oh yes, of course I do.’