Fred Vargas - An Uncertain Place

It was true, the landing on the second floor was as large as an entrance hall. The doctor had installed a coffee table and armchairs, with magazines and books, an antique lamp and a water cooler. A refined and somewhat ostentatious person. Adamsberg sat down to wait for the man with magic fingers, and called Châteaudun hospital, with apprehension, Retancourt and her team, without hope, and Voisenet’s team, while trying to keep at bay the unworthy reflections of Commandant Danglard.

Professor Lavoisier was slightly more hopeful – ‘Well, he’s hanging on.’ The fever had gone down slightly; the stomach had survived the pumping; the patient had been asking whether the commissaire had found the postcard with the word on it -’ He seems obsessed with that, mon vieux .’ ‘Tell him we’re looking for the postcard,’ said Adamsberg, ‘and that we’re dealing with the dog, the samples of manure. Everything going to plan.’

Must be a coded message, thought Professor Lavoisier, noting down every word. Well, none of my business, I suppose the police have their methods. But with this new inflammation and a perforated stomach, it was still touch and go.

Retancourt sounded relaxed, almost jovial, whereas all the signs were that Armel Louvois would not be back. He had gone out at 6 a.m. The concierge had seen him leave with a backpack. Instead of their usual friendly morning exchange, the young man had merely waved his hand at her as he went past. It sounded as though he had been heading for a train. Weill was unable to confirm this, since he did not rise until the gentlemanly hour of midday. He turned out to have a certain affection for his young neighbour, and was extremely vexed by the news of the crime. He had fallen silent, appeared to be sulking, and had provided only a few irrelevant scraps of information. Unusually, Retancourt did not seem too affected by this obstruction. It was possible that Weill, who was a connoisseur of fine wines, had distracted the duty patrol by offering them a decent vintage in fancy glasses. With Weill, who had his suits handmade, since he was extremely rich, extremely snobbish and almost spherical in shape, anything was possible, including the suborning of officers on duty, something which would no doubt give him a paradoxical pleasure. Retancourt did not seem to realise she was on guard outside the apartment of a madman, the Zerquetscher who had reduced an old man to mincemeat; indeed, it seemed that Weill’s indulgent attitude to his neighbour had overcome her vigilance. ‘Tell Weill that he dismembered another person in Austria,’ Adamsberg ordered her.

The Voisenet-Kernorkian team, on the other hand, now on its way back, was on its knees. Raymond Réal, the father of the artist, had taken ten minutes to put down his shotgun and let them into his semi-basement in Survilliers. Yes, he’d heard the news, and yes, he called down God’s blessings on the guy who had taken revenge and wiped out that old bastard Vaudel, and God willing the cops would never catch him. So, the papers had come out in time to warn him, and he’d got away? Good! Vaudel had at least two deaths on his conscience, Réal’s son and his wife, and don’t you forget it. Did he know who might have killed Vaudel? Could he tell them where his sons were? They must be joking if they thought he’d tell them, even if he knew. What fucking planet were they on? Kernorkian had muttered, ‘Planet Deep Shit,’ which had seemed to mollify him somewhat.

In fact, Voisenet was explaining, ‘he scarcely let us say a thing. He had this gun on the table, only a shotgun, OK, but loaded, right? He had three bloody great dogs and his lair, the only word for it, was full of motors, batteries, hunting stuff.’

‘And you don’t know where the sons are?’

‘What he said, and these are his actual words, was: “One’s in the Legion and the other’s a truck driver: Munich- Amsterdam-Rungis, so you can bloody well look for them yourselves.” And he told us to get out, “because you stink to high heaven”. Actually,’ Voisenet added, ‘he wasn’t wrong about that, because Kernorkian had been handling the dog.’

Listening to all this, Adamsberg reached under the glass-topped table to pick up a toy left by one of Dr Josselin’s patients – a little heart made of foam rubber covered in red silk, which you could press inside your hand to calm your nerves. As he made his next call, to Gardon, he twirled it on the table to make it spin. Third time round, he got it to spin for a few seconds. The goal was to get the letters on the front – LOVE – to face the right way when it stopped. He succeeded on the sixth try, as he asked Gardon to get hold of all the postcards from among Vaudel’s papers. The brigadier read him a message from the Avignon police. Pierre Vaudel had been at the law courts all afternoon, preparing a brief. Information not verifiable. He had returned home at 7.12 p.m. Local bigwig, being protected, Adamsberg thought. He closed the phone and went on playing with the little heart. Was the Zerquetscher on the way somewhere else?

‘He got away, did he?’

Adamsberg got up heavily, feeling tired and shook hands with the doctor.

‘Didn’t hear you come in.’

‘No harm done,’ said Josselin, opening the door to his flat. ‘And how is little Charm? The kitten who wouldn’t feed,’ he explained, seeing that the name hadn’t registered with Adamsberg.

‘All right, I suppose. I haven’t been home since yesterday.’

‘With all this fuss in the press, I’m not surprised. Still, can you let me know how she’s doing, please?’

‘What, now?’

‘It’s important to follow up one’s patients for the first three days. Would you be offended if I receive you in the kitchen? I wasn’t expecting you, and I really need something to eat. Perhaps you haven’t eaten either, I’d guess? In which case we could share a simple meal? Don’t you think?’

I wouldn’t say no, thought Adamsberg, who was searching for an adequate way of talking to Josselin. People who said ‘don’t you think?’ always disconcerted him on first acquaintance. As the doctor took off his jacket and put on an old cardigan, Adamsberg called Lucio, who was astonished that he should be asking after Charm. She was fine, her strength was coming back. Adamsberg passed on the message and the doctor snapped his fingers with satisfaction.

It goes to show that you can’t rely on appearances and, as they say, we never really know other people. Adamsberg had rarely been received with such simple and natural cordiality. The doctor had left his pompous manner behind, like his jacket on the coat stand, and proceeded to lay the table casually – forks on the right, knives on the left – before tossing a salad with grated cheese and pine nuts, cutting a few slices of smoked ham, and putting on to the plates two scoops of rice and one of pureed figs, using an ice-cream scoop, which had been lightly oiled with his finger. Adamsberg watched him move around, fascinated, as he glided like a skater from cupboard to table, deploying his large hands with the utmost grace, a sight combining dexterity, delicacy and precision. The commissaire could have watched him for ever, as one might a dancer accomplishing movements one could never do oneself. But Josselin took a mere ten minutes to get everything on the table. Then he looked critically at the half-full bottle of wine, which was standing on the counter.

‘No,’ he said, putting it down, ‘I so rarely have visitors that it would be a pity.’

He bent down to look under the sink, surveyed what was there, and re-emerged with agility, showing his guest the label on a fresh bottle.

‘Much better, don’t you think? But to drink it all on one’s own would be like having a birthday party with no guests. Rather sad, don’t you think? Good wine tastes a lot better if it’s shared. So if you’ll do me the honour of joining me?’