Iain Pears - The Last Judgement

‘Oh, great. You can have him if you like. I was going to send him back anyway.’

‘Shall we take over? We’ll give you a call when we’re done. There’s no need for you to hang around if you want a break.’

‘Fine by me. I could do with one. This is my twentieth today.’

He stood up, stretched and, with a friendly smile at them, and a scowl at the man he’d been interviewing, strolled out of the room leaving Flavia and Argyll in charge.

‘Come with me,’ Flavia said briskly to the immigrant, who now looked terrified. ‘And shut up,’ she added as he began protesting his innocence.

She opened the door on to the public area and looked out carefully. The armed guards were still outside the door of their original cubicle, idly chatting to each other. More passport officers were in operation now; more importantly, the one who had nobbled them had vanished.

‘Come on,’ she said, and marched confidently out towards one of the passport desks.

‘We’ve got to take this one off to charge him,’ she said to the man on the desk. ‘All the paperwork’s in order. You can have him back once we’ve done the fingerprinting at the station.’

‘OK. As long as you don’t lose him.’

‘We won’t. See you in half an hour.’

And with Argyll gripping the man’s other arm, she frog-marched the protesting Algerian through the immigration and customs sections and out into arrivals. There, she just managed to suppress a snigger.

‘And with one leap, we were free,’ she said. ‘Oh, do be quiet,’ she said to their prisoner as she walked swiftly out to the taxi rank. ‘Do you understand me?’ she added.

The man nodded, still deeply upset.

‘Good. Now. Get in this taxi. Take this money,’ she went on, pulling out a bundle of Edward Byrnes’s notes and thrusting it into his hand, ‘and go and have a nice life. OK? I don’t advise going too near any police for a bit.’

She told the driver to head for central Paris and watched as the cab disappeared along the ramp and into the night air.

‘Now it’s our turn,’ she said, heading for the next one. ‘Christ,’ she added as they got in. ‘I accidentally gave him about six thousand francs. He must think it’s his birthday. How the hell am I going to explain that to Bottando?’

‘Where to?’ asked the driver, revving up his engine.

‘Neuilly-sur-Seine. That’s where he lives, isn’t it?’

Argyll nodded.

‘Good. Take us there then,’ she said to the driver. ‘And as fast as possible, please.’

It was now after nine and the rush-hour traffic was easing off, allowing the taxi-driver to show what he could do. He drove a vast Mercedes, hopelessly uneconomic from a commercial point of view, in Argyll’s opinion, but undeniably effective in rushing them into Paris as fast as was conceivable.

The only difficulty was that the driver wasn’t all that certain about where they were going. Flavia and Argyll, neither of them exactly experts in Parisian geography themselves, had to lend a hand: Flavia with a map, Argyll with his memory of the last time he had visited Rouxel’s house. With the three of them working together, they made a decent job of the trip; only two wrong turns and one of those not completely disastrous. The driver, feeling quite pleased with himself but not overjoyed to be leaving his fare in the middle of a residential district with no chance of picking up anyone else, dropped them in the next street along from Rouxel’s.

Caution is a virtue, even when it is not necessary. She needn’t have worried too much. No matter how many police would shortly be swooping down when they got their act together and worked out that their captives had fled the airport, no one had turned up yet.

This time the gate was not locked, and opened with a slight squeak.

‘Flavia, before we go any further here, what is this about?’ Argyll asked.

‘Dates,’ she said.

‘What dates?’

‘The dates for the break-up of the Pilot network.’

‘I’m not with you. But no matter. What has that got to do with anything?’

‘We’ll have to ask Rouxel.’

Argyll sniffed. ‘Have it your own way, then. Although I must say that if I didn’t trust you so much, I’d be mightily tempted to go back to the airport.’

‘But you do. So shall we stop talking and go in?’

Cutting off further opportunity for dissent, she wheeled around and rang the doorbell. There was no answer. After waiting awhile and pressing it again, and tapping her foot with impatience, she decided that in the circumstances the social niceties could be disregarded. She turned the handle, found it open and pushed. Walking into other people’s houses seemed to be becoming a habit.

There was a light on in the hallway, which gave on to three rooms, each with the door firmly closed. Under one, there was a faint chink of light. She picked this one to start off, and went in.

It was empty. But evidently someone had been there recently: there was a book open on the carpet and a half-empty glass of brandy by the hearth.

‘I can hear something,’ Argyll said quietly. There was no great need to whisper, but it seemed appropriate.

‘Well?’ she asked, as they stood outside the room that the noise was coming from.

Although it was an absurdly fastidious piece of courtesy on the part of someone who, after all, had just barged uninvited into someone’s house, Flavia knocked softly. There was no answer. So she again reached for the handle and pushed the door open.

‘Who’s that?’ came a quiet voice from the corner as she opened the door and looked in. Rouxel was by a veritable forest of house plants, spraying the leaves with some unguent. Argyll had said he was keen on plants, Flavia thought unnecessarily.

The room was dark except for two pools of light, one by the desk, the other by a nearby armchair which contained Jeanne Armand. It was the study where Argyll had interviewed — or been interviewed by — Rouxel a few days previously. Dark wooden bookshelves lined with leather-bound books filled one wall. Heavy and comfortable armchairs were on either side of the fireplace.

Flavia looked around the room to try and gain a few moments to think. She was becoming confused about how to proceed. On the one hand was her certainty that she finally understood. On the other was a sudden and burning hatred for it all.

‘Who are you?’ Rouxel said again.

‘My name is Flavia di Stefano. I’m with the Rome police.’

He didn’t seem very interested.

‘I’ve been investigating the theft of your picture.’

‘That has been returned.’

‘And the two murders associated with it.’

‘Yes. I was kept informed. But it’s all over now, I think.’

‘I’m afraid you’re wrong. It’s not at all over.’

She walked over to the far wall, on the side of the room opposite the glass doors leading on to the garden. ‘Where is the picture?’

‘Which picture?’

‘ The Death of Socrates . The one given to you by your mentor, Jules Hartung.’

‘Ah. Well, you know, it was so much trouble, I had it destroyed.’

‘You what?’

‘It was Jeanne’s idea. She burnt it.’

‘Why?’

He shrugged. ‘I don’t think I have to explain to you what I do with my own property.’

‘Still, you have others left,’ she said. ‘Like this one.’ She pointed at the small painting hanging beside a mahogany bookcase. It was about the same size as all the others. Argyll’s sort of thing. Christ sat in the centre of the Apostles, in a fashion derived from Leonardo’s Last Supper ; they all looked serious, but some of the Apostles had an air of sympathy, even sadness on their faces. Below them was a queue of people, with one kneeling and awaiting his verdict.