Brian Freemantle - The Predators

‘Thank you,’ said Volker, the frown replaced by an even-toothed smile.

She was extremely convincing, thought Norris, in reluctant admiration. But that was hardly difficult for her, knowing it all from the inside as she did. This was going to be one of his most successful investigations – spectacular even – exposing her for what she was.

‘But the fact that they used the school for proof could be another cause for concern,’ Claudine continued. ‘The first two messages had identification that could have only come from Mary herself. Why didn’t the third, to maintain the pattern?’

‘You think she’s dead?’ demanded Harding.

Was she trying to soften them up, prepare them for something that had happened? wondered Norris. That couldn’t be right: he couldn’t save Mary – prove to everyone that he’d been right – if she was already dead. So it couldn’t be true. It didn’t fit. ‘No! She can’t be.’

Blake and Harding regarded the American psychologist in surprise, as if they’d forgotten he was in the room. Seemingly abruptly aware of their attention, Norris said: ‘I don’t read the message as Dr Carter does. In my opinion Mary Beth’s still alive.’

There were discomfited looks between Blake and Harding. Poncellet openly shook his head. Only Smet gave no reaction.

Forcefully Claudine said: ‘The lack of anything that must have come from the child herself is the strongest indicator so far that Mary’s dead. It could even be the reason for the anger that I believe is there.’

‘How much more difficult will it be to find them if she is dead? If the body is buried or disposed of?’ queried Smet.

Harding looked sideways, inviting Norris to respond. When he didn’t the local FBI man said: ‘I think it would make Washington doubly determined to catch them. The investigation would increase rather than decrease.’

‘If this morning’s message hasn’t carried any negotiation forward what do we do?’ asked Poncellet.

Claudine was positive. ‘Now’s the time to wait.’

‘What if they don’t come back to us?’ said Blake.

‘She’ll definitely be dead,’ declared Claudine. ‘And we’ll have failed.’

‘ You’ll have failed,’ said Norris.

Jean Smet kept his house as the venue but individually warned the others that Felicite would be attending too. She had to know – they all had to know – everything that had happened. It didn’t change the need to get rid of the child – it made it all the more necessary, despite Harding’s bravado – and when she heard how close the investigation was getting Felicite would have to agree. That way they’d all be in it together, without any falling out. Which he wanted as much as the rest of them.

He expected Felicite to arrive last, which she did, but wasn’t prepared for the triumphal entrance, a diva commanding the stage. ‘Well?’ she demanded.

It was Henri Cool, the one most worried about identification, who first realized Felicite actually had her hair in a chignon, although crossed in the way she always wore it, not as it had been shown in the computer picture. ‘You’re mad! Totally mad!’

She laughed at the schoolteacher. ‘I walked here by the longest route I could find. I started in the Grande Place and actually obliged two tourists by taking their pictures in front of the Manneken Pis, imagining what fun we could have had with a chubby little chap with a prick like that.’ She smiled towards Smet. ‘Just for you I wandered by the Palais de Justice – it really is the ugliest building in Europe, isn’t it? – and went through the park to the royal palace before making my way here.’ She paused again, surveying them all. ‘And even with my hair like this no one looked at me a second time.’ She snapped her fingers. ‘So that for the pictures you were all shitting yourselves about.’ She slumped into a chair, shaking her clamped hair free of its pins. ‘I’m totally exhausted.’ She looked at Henri Cool. ‘Anything happen to you?’

‘I called in sick. Stayed home.’

‘That was very clever!’ sneered Felicite. ‘That wouldn’t cause any curiosity in anyone who might have seen a resemblance, would it, you bloody fool!’ She made a languid gesture towards Smet and said: ‘I’ll have champagne.’

Smet had two bottles already cooling in their buckets. He gestured for Michel Blott to serve, wanting to concentrate entirely upon the woman. ‘Today was incredible. It’s gone a long way beyond computer pictures.’

‘What is it now?’ she sighed wearily.

It was not something he would have admitted to the rest – he was reluctant to admit it to himself – but Smet had actually come close to enjoying that afternoon. Of course he had been frightened, weighing everything he said and heard, but the fear had even added to the sensation. He found it difficult to define precisely – a combination of power, at perhaps being able to influence the very people hunting him; and mockery, at being able to laugh at their stupid ignorance; and the tingling fear itself, at actually being there, so close to them, talking to them, being accepted by them – but supposed it was akin to what Felicite felt. The difference between himself and her was that he didn’t constantly need the experience, like an addict permanently in search of a better and bigger high. There was even something like a physical satisfaction – another manifestation of power, he supposed – at the varying, horrified reactions from everyone except Felicite. He’d anticipated that, too.

‘There was only one more cut-out, after Menen,’ disclosed Dehane, hollow-voiced. ‘If he’d got through that he would have been back to me! Oh my God!’

‘It was stupid, using the school,’ said Felicite.

‘What else did I have? You didn’t give me anything to identify her with!’ retorted Smet. ‘That was stupid.’

Felicite didn’t like being so openly opposed, certainly not in front of the rest. Nor did she like having to admit, if only to herself, that the man was right: she had been stupid. To Dehane she said: ‘You’ve got a relay bug in the cafe system?’

‘Yes.’

‘Could you get it out?’

Dehane shook his head doubtfully. ‘They would expect me to do it. Be waiting for an unauthorized entry.’

‘Would it lead to you, if they found it?’

‘No. It’s a one-way system: I’ve got to access it.’

‘So there’s no danger, even if they find it?’

‘Not really. And it would take a very long time, no matter how good this man Volker is.’

‘So we can use what they think is a breakthrough to our advantage again,’ said Felicite. ‘We simply leave dozens of policemen wasting their time in a part of the country we’re never going to go near again.’

The insane bitch still didn’t intend changing her plans, Smet realized. The others had to hear her say it, to convince them later what was necessary. ‘We mustn’t go on with it.’

‘It doesn’t alter anything,’ chanted Felicite, like a mantra.

‘We’ve got to get rid of her.’

‘There’s nothing to discuss. I’ve told all of you what’s going to happen. And it will. Exactly as I say.’

‘You can’t be serious!’ protested the other lawyer. ‘This doesn’t make any sense at all.’

Felicite was extremely serious, although still outwardly showing the sangfroid with which she’d arrived an hour earlier. The investigation – everything – was very different from the last time. Nothing was like what had happened then: not so technical nor as determined nor with such an inexhaustible supply of police and specialists to be called upon at a moment’s notice.

So it would be madness to prolong it much further: madness to try to recapture the exquisite, first-time pleasure of last night, being with Mary but ultimately holding back from touching her. Ecstasy from abstinence: priestly fulfilment.