Fred Vargas - An Uncertain Place

‘Why should we protect Mordent? He’s acted like an arsehole.’

‘Because the straight and narrow is never straight. Mordent’s not part of the snake. He was swallowed whole. He’s in its belly, like Jonah in the whale.’

‘Or the uncle in the bear.’

‘Aha,’ said Adamsberg. ‘I knew you’d show some interest in that story one day.’

‘But what sort of idea of Mordent will be left inside the great snake?’

‘A thorn in the side, and the memory of failure. That’s something at least.’

‘So what are we going to do about Mordent?’

‘Whatever he thinks he will do himself. If he wants to, we’ll take him back. A damaged man is worth ten. You and I are the only people who know about this. The others all think he’s had a nervous breakdown because of his daughter, and that that explains his mistakes. They’ve also heard he’s recovered his testicles intact, and that’s as much as they know. Nobody knows that he went to Pierre Vaudel’s place.’

‘Why didn’t Pierre Vaudel tell you about going to racecourses and the horse manure?’

‘His wife was not supposed to know he was involved with the bookies.’

‘And who paid the concierge, Francisco Delfino, to give Josselin a false alibi. Josselin himself or Emma Carnot?’

‘Nobody. Josselin simply sent Francisco on holiday. For the first few days after the Garches murder, Josselin impersonated Francisco. He took his place, knowing there’d be a visit from the police sooner or later. When I saw him, the lodge was dark, he was wrapped up in a blanket, including his hands. All he had to do after that was nip back up to his apartment via the service stairs and get changed to welcome me in.’

‘Sophisticated.’

‘Yes. He’d thought of everything, except his ex-wife. As soon as Emma discovered that Josselin was Vaudel’s doctor, she realised before us. Right away.’

‘Here he comes,’ Danglard interrupted. ‘Justice has been pronounced.’

Mordent was emerging alone, under the cloudy sky. The children have eaten sour grapes and the father’s teeth have been set on edge. His daughter, a free woman now, would have to go back to Fresnes for the paperwork and to pick up her things. She would eat her supper at home that night, he had already done the shopping.

Adamsberg caught Mordent under one arm, and Danglard took the other. The commandant looked from side to side, like an old heron trapped by the disciplinary police. A heron having lost its prestige and its feathers, condemned to fish alone and in disgrace.

‘We’ve come to celebrate the triumph of justice, Mordent,’ said Adamsberg. ‘And to celebrate the arrest of Josselin, and the liberation of the Paole clan, who will now return to their uncomplicated destiny of being ordinary human beings, and to celebrate the birth of my elder son. Plenty to celebrate. We left our beers on the table.’

Adamsberg’s grip was firm, his face was tilted sideways and he was smiling. Light flickered under his skin, his expression was lit up, and Mordent well knew that when Adamsberg’s cloudy eyes became gleaming orbs, he was approaching his prey or some great truth. The commissaire marched him over to the cafe.

‘Celebrate?’ said Mordent in a blank voice, unable to find anything else to say.

‘Yes, celebrate. And we’re also celebrating the disappearance of a certain scatter of pencil shavings and a cartridge case under a fridge. We’re celebrating my freedom, Mordent.’

The commandant ’s arm barely moved in Adamsberg’s grip. The old heron had lost all his strength. Adamsberg sat him down between them, as if dropping a bundle. The F3 fuse has gone, he thought, a psycho-emotional shock, inhibited action. No Dr Josselin around to heal it either. With the departure of Arnold Paole’s descendant, medicine was losing one of its great practitioners.

‘I’m up to my neck in it, aren’t I?’ murmured Mordent. ‘Deservedly,’ he went on, ruffling his grey hair and stretching his long neck, with that movement of a wading bird that was peculiar to him.

‘Yes, you are. But a cunningly constructed dam has been built, which is going to block the mud outside the doors of the Gavernan Assize Court. From there on down, there will be no visible traces of betrayal, nothing but innocent procedures. In the squad nobody else knows anything. Your job’s still there. It’s up to you. On the other hand, Emma Carnot is going to go up in smoke. You were taking orders directly from her?’

Mordent nodded.

‘On a special mobile?’

‘Yes.’

‘Which is where now?’

‘I destroyed it last night.’

‘Good. Don’t try to protect yourself by rushing to help her, Mordent. She’s killed one woman, she had Émile shot at and then tried to poison him. She was on her way to bump off the other witness to her marriage.’

Ever vigilant, Danglard had ordered a third beer which he put in front of Mordent, with a gesture as authoritarian as Adamsberg’s arm, meaning ‘Drink up!’

‘And don’t think about doing away with yourself either,’ Adamsberg went on. ‘That would be irrelevant, as Danglard might put it, when Elaine needs you most.’ Adamsberg stood up. The Seine was flowing a few metres away from them, flowing to the sea, flowing towards America, then to the Pacific, then back here again.

‘ Vratiću ,’ he said. ‘I’m going for a walk.’

‘What did he say?’ asked Mordent, looking surprised, and for a moment back to normal, which seemed to Danglard to be a good sign.

‘He’s still got a little bit of the Kisilova vampiri inside him. It’ll disappear in the end. Or not. You never know with him.’

Adamsberg came back towards them, looking preoccupied.

‘Danglard, I know you’ve told me this before, but where does the Seine rise?’

‘On the Langres plateau.’

‘Not Mont Gerbier de Jonc?’

‘No, that’s the Loire.’

‘ Hvala , Danglard.’

‘Don’t mention it.’

‘That means “thank you”,’ Danglard told Mordent. Adamsberg walked off again towards the river, with jaunty steps and holding his jacket over his shoulder with one finger. Mordent raised his glass clumsily, like a man who is not sure if he has the right to do so, and moved it first in the direction of Adamsberg then towards Danglard sitting beside him.

‘ Hvala ,’ he said.

ADAMSBERG WALKED FOR OVER AN HOUR ON THE BANK OF the Seine that was in sunlight, listening to the seagulls mewing in French, and holding his mobile in his hand, waiting for a call from London. It came through at 2.15, as Stock had promised. It was a very short conversation, since Adamsberg had left a single question with DCI Radstock, one to which he had only to reply ‘yes’ or ‘no’.

‘Yes,’ said Radstock, in English. Adamsberg thanked him and snapped his phone shut. He hesitated a moment, then chose Estalère’s number. The young brigadier was the only person he could think of who would offer neither comment nor criticism.

‘Estalère,’ he said, ‘go and see Josselin in hospital. I’ve got a message for him.’

‘Yes, sir, what shall I say?’

‘Tell him that the tree on Highgate Hill is dead.’

‘The tree in Highgate?’

‘That’s right.’

‘That’s all?’

‘Yes.’

‘Will do, commissaire .’

Adamsberg went back up the boulevard slowly, imagining the tree roots in Kiseljevo rotting away around the grave.

Where will they grow again, Peter?

Fred Vargas was born in Paris in 1957. As well as being a best-selling author in France, she is an historian and archaeologist.