‘Can I help you?’
‘Roby Stricker.’
‘My orders are to say that he’s sleeping.’
Frank pulled out his badge. As he removed it from his jacket, he made sure that the doorman saw the Glock hanging from his belt. ‘This says you can wake him.’
The doorman changed his tune immediately. The saliva he swallowed was harder to get down than that last mouthful of food. He picked up the intercom and punched in the number in a single nervous movement, letting it ring for a long time before pronouncing his verdict.
‘No answer.’
Odd. Stricker couldn’t have slept through those rings. Frank didn’t think he had the balls to skip town. He had scared him badly enough to keep him from doing anything rash. Though if he had taken off, it would be more of a nuisance than a tragedy. If they needed him, that asshole would be very easy to find. Even hidden behind his father’s legal protection.
‘Try again.’
The doorman shrugged.
‘Still no answer.’
Frank had a sudden, terrible premonition. He thrust his hand at the guard.
‘Give me the master key, please.’
‘But I’m not authorized—’
‘I said please. If that’s not enough, I can be less polite.’ Frank’s tone was final. The doorman swallowed nervously. ‘And then go outside and tell the policeman there to come up to Stricker’s apartment.’
The man opened a drawer and gave him a key on a BMW key chain. He shifted his weight as if he were about to get up. ‘Get moving!’ Frank headed towards the lift and pressed the button.
Why aren’t lifts ever there when you need them? And why are they always on the top floor when you’re in a hurry? Damn Murphy and his law . . .
The door finally slid open and Frank got in, hurriedly pressing the button of Stricker’s floor. In the eternity of that ride, he hoped that he was wrong. He hoped that his sudden suspicion would not become a mocking reality.
When he reached the fifth floor, the lift opened with the same soft whoosh. Frank saw that the door to the playboy’s apartment was ajar. Taking out his Glock, he pushed the barrel against the door to avoid touching the handle.
The hallway was the only thing in order. The living room where he had sat with Stricker and the girl was a complete mess. The curtain of the French door was half torn from the rod and hanging down like a flag at half mast. There was a glass on the floor and the bottle of whisky that Stricker had been drinking from earlier lay shattered on the pearl-grey carpet. The contents had spilled on to the floor, leaving a dark stain. A painting had fallen, revealing a small safe in the wall. The glass had slipped off the table, strangely enough without breaking, and lay on the floor beside the crooked frame. Cushions lay scattered on the floor. There was nobody in the room.
Frank crossed the living room and turned right, down the short hallway that led to the bedroom. On the left, a door opened on to the bathroom. Empty. The room was neat and untouched. He reached the doorway of the bedroom and had to catch his breath.
‘Shit. Shit. Shit. Motherfucking shit,’ he uttered.
Frank stepped forward, careful where he placed his foot. Roby Stricker’s body lay on the marble floor in the centre of the room, in a pool of blood. The entire room seemed covered in it. He was wearing the same shirt he had on when Frank had left, except now it was soaked red and glued to his body. There were a number of stab wounds on his back. His face was heavily bruised and there was a deep cut on his cheek. His mouth was a bloody mess and Frank could see that his left arm, bent at an unusual angle, was broken. Frank leaned over and touched his throat. No pulse. Roby Stricker was dead. Frank jumped up and tears of rage obstructed his vision.
Another one. The same night. Another fucking murder just hours later. He silently damned the world, the day, the night, and his role in the whole thing. Damn Nicolas for involving him. Damn himself for letting him do it. He damned everything he could think of.
He removed the walkie-talkie from his belt, hoping they could pick up his signal. He pressed the button.
‘Frank Ottobre for Nicolas Hulot.’
A crackle, a sputter, and finally the inspector’s voice. ‘Nicolas here. What’s up, Frank?’
‘Now I’m the one who has to give you some bad news, Nick. Really bad.’
‘What the hell happened now?’
‘Roby Stricker’s dead. In his apartment. Murdered.’
Hulot let loose with a string of curses that ordinarily he would seem incapable of pronouncing. Frank knew exactly how he felt. When his anger cooled down, and after a little more crackling, the inspector asked what he wanted to know most.
‘No One?’
‘No, just plain murdered. His face is still there and there’s no writing on the wall.’
‘Describe it.’
‘I’ll tell you what I see at first glance. Death probably wasn’t instantaneous. He was attacked and stabbed. There are signs of a struggle everywhere and blood all over the floor. His murderer thought he was dead and left while he was still alive. It sounds strange, but that poor bastard Roby Stricker accomplished much more as he was dying than he managed to do in his whole life . . .’
‘Meaning?’
‘Before he died, he wrote the name of his killer on the floor.’
‘Do we know him?’
Frank lowered his voice slightly, as if he wanted to let Hulot digest what he was about to say.
‘I do. If I were you, I would call Durand and have him issue a warrant for the arrest of Ryan Mosse, captain in the US Army.’
THIRTY-FIVE
The door opened and Morelli entered the small, windowless room and placed a stack of black-and-white photos, still damp from printing, on the grey Formica table where Frank Ottobre and Nicolas Hulot were sitting. Frank leafed through them, chose one, and turned it in the direction of the man in front of him. Leaning forward, he pushed it to the other end of the table.
‘Here we are. Let’s see what this tells you, Captain Mosse.’
Ryan Mosse, sitting handcuffed, lowered his gaze to the photo with complete indifference. He turned his expressionless hazel eyes back to Frank.
‘So what?’
Morelli, who was leaning against the door beside the one-way mirror that covered the entire wall, shifted at the sound of Frank’s voice. On the other side of the mirror were Roncaille and Durand, who had rushed to headquarters at the news of the two new murders and the arrest.
Frank was conducting the interrogation in English and they were both speaking quickly. Morelli missed a word here and there, but he understood enough to realize that this suspect had steel cables instead of nerves. Confronted with the evidence, he was about as emotional as an iceberg. Even the most hardened criminal would give in and start blubbering in a situation like that. This guy made you feel uneasy despite his being handcuffed. Morelli imagined Roby Stricker face-to-face with this guy holding a knife. It was not pretty.
Frank leaned back in his chair.
‘Well, this here on the floor looks like a dead body, right?’
‘So?’ repeated Mosse.
‘So, doesn’t it seem strange to you that your name is written next to the dead body?’
‘You need a good imagination to get my name out of that scribble.’
Frank leaned his elbows on the table. ‘You’d have to be illiterate not to.’
‘What’s wrong, Mr Ottobre?’ Mosse smiled. ‘The stress getting to you?’ It was the smile of a hangman opening the trap door.
And Frank’s smile was that of a condemned man hanged by a rope that had suddenly broken.
‘No, Captain Mosse. The stress got to you last night. I saw you talking to Stricker in front of Jimmy’z when we came for him. You cleared out when you saw us, but not quite fast enough. If you like, I can guess what happened next. You were watching his house and then you waited a little longer after you saw us leave. You saw Stricker’s girlfriend leave, too, and then you went upstairs. You had an argu
ment. The poor guy must have freaked out and then so did you. There was a fight and you knifed him. You thought he was dead and you left, but he had time to write your name on the floor.’
‘You’re hallucinating, Ottobre, and you know it. I don’t know what drugs you’re on, but you’re taking too much. Obviously, you don’t know me very well.’ Mosse’s eyes turned to steel. ‘If I use a knife on someone, I make sure he’s dead before I go.’
‘Maybe you’re losing your touch, Mosse,’ Frank said with a wave of his hand.
‘Okay. At this point I have the right not to answer without a lawyer present. It’s the same law in Europe, isn’t it?’
‘Sure. If you want a lawyer, you’ve got a right to one.’
‘Okay then. Go fuck yourselves, both of you. That’s all I’m saying.’
Mosse closed himself off. His eyes settled on his reflection in the mirror and went blank. Frank and Hulot looked at each other. They would get nothing more out of him. Frank gathered the photos on the table and they got up and went to the door. Morelli opened it to let them through and followed them out of the room.
In the next room, Roncaille and Durand were on edge. Roncaille turned to Morelli. ‘Give us a minute, would you, sergeant?’
‘Sure, I’ll go and get some coffee.’
Morelli left the four of them alone. On the other side of the mirror they could see Mosse, sitting in the middle of the room like a soldier fallen into enemy hands.
Captain Ryan Mosse, US Army, number . . .
Durand nodded in his direction. ‘A tough nut to crack,’ he said.
‘Worse. A tough nut to crack, who knows he has all the connections he needs. But even if he’s connected to the Holy Ghost, he can’t get out of this one.’
The attorney general took the photos from Frank’s hand and examined them once more.
The image showed Stricker’s body on the marble floor of his bedroom, his right arm bent at a right angle, his hand on the floor. He died writing the word that nailed Ryan Mosse.
‘It’s a little confusing.’
‘Stricker was dying and his left arm was broken.’ He pointed to the arm bent in the unnatural position. Frank remembered the agility Mosse had displayed during their fight. He had experienced it in person. Mosse knew how to break someone’s arm very easily. ‘In the apartment we found some pictures of Stricker playing tennis. He was clearly left-handed. Here, he was writing with his right hand. It’s obviously not his normal handwriting.’
Durand kept staring at the photo, puzzled.
Frank waited. He looked at Hulot, leaning silently against the wall. He, too, was waiting to see what was coming. Durand made up his mind. He finally took the bull by the horns, as though the study of the picture had helped him find the right words.
‘All hell will break loose because of this. The diplomats will be on to it soon and it’ll sound like the start of the Grand Prix. Right now we’re just holding Captain Mosse. If we actually charge him, we’re going to need incontrovertible proof so we don’t end up with egg on our face. The No One affair has already made us look ridiculous enough.’
Durand wanted to emphasize that the prompt arrest of Roby Stricker’s probable killer did not in any way make up for the murder of Gregor Yatzimin, a new slap in the face for the Principality’s police force in charge of the investigation. Frank’s participation was simply a collaboration between investigative bodies, and the main responsibility still fell on the local police. They were the butts of biting newspaper headlines and caustic op-ed pieces by TV commentators.
‘As far as Mosse is concerned,’ said Frank with a shrug, ‘it’s obviously your decision. In my opinion, for what it’s worth, we have more than enough evidence to go forward. We’ve got proof that Ryan Mosse knew Stricker. I saw them myself last night in front of Jimmy’z. There’s his name in the photo. I don’t see what else we need.’
And General Parker?’
Frank had been there when they had gone to pick up the captain that morning at Beausoleil. On reaching the courtyard of the Parker family’s rented house, the first thing Frank had noticed was that, except for a few small details, the house was almost identical to Jean-Loup’ s. He made a quick mental note of it, soon buried by other considerations. He had expected the general to kick up a fuss, but he realized that he had underestimated him. Parker was too smart to create a scene. He was impeccably dressed when he greeted them, as though he had been expecting their visit. When they had asked, he had simply nodded and called Mosse. When the police had told him to accompany them to headquarters, Mosse was visibly tense and had thrown an enquiring glance at the old man. Waiting for orders, sir.
Frank suspected that, if Parker had asked him, Mosse would have exploded in fury at the men who had come to arrest him. The general had simply shaken his head ever so slightly and the tension in Mosse’s body had relaxed. He had held out his wrists and accepted the indignity of handcuffs without a word.
Parker had found a way to be alone with Frank as they were taking Mosse to the car. ‘This is bullshit, Frank, and you know it.’
‘What your man did last night was bullshit, general. Serious bullshit.’
‘I could testify that Captain Mosse never left this house last night.’
‘If you do and they find out it’s not true, not even the President could get you off charges of aiding and abetting and perjury. Nobody in North America would risk protecting you. Want my advice?’
‘Let’s hear it.’
‘If I were you, general, I’d just keep out of it. Captain Mosse is in deep trouble and not even you can get him out. Military tactics provide for situations like these, don’t they? Sometimes you simply have to cut your losses and leave one of your men to his fate.’
‘No one gives me lessons in military tactics. Especially you, Frank. I’ve taken people who were harder than you’ll ever be and torn them to pieces. You’ll just be one more, mark my words.’
‘Everyone’s got to take his chances, general. That’s the rule of war.’
Frank had turned his back and left. On the way out he had seen Helena standing at the living room door, to the right of the hallway. Frank could not help thinking how beautiful she was, with her luminous eyes and skin. Her blonde hair. Their eyes had met as he passed. Frank had noticed that, contrary to his initial impression, her eyes were blue, not grey. And her gaze held all the sorrow of the world.
Driving downtown, Frank had leaned back in his seat, his eyes studying the plastic lining of the ceiling. He had kept trying to erase two overlapping images from his mind. Harriet and Helena. Helena and Harriet. The same eyes. The same sadness.
Frank had tried to think of something else. As they reached headquarters on Rue Notari, he had pondered the general’s mocking words. No One gives me lessons in military tactics. The general didn’t realize all the implications of what he had said. Just then, there was a killer at large who could give lessons to them all.
‘I said, what do you think General Parker will do?’ repeated the attorney general.
Frank was so deep in thought that he had let Durand’s question go unanswered for a little too long.
‘Sorry. I think Parker will do everything in his power to help Mosse, but he won’t throw himself off a cliff. The consulate will surely get into this, but there’s one important fact to be noted. Mosse was arrested by an American FBI agent. We wash our dirty laundry among ourselves and we save face. We’re the country that came up with impeachment, after all, and we’ve never been afraid to use it.’
Durand and Roncaille exchanged glances. He was right. There were no problems there. Durand took his time getting to the point.
‘Your presence here is a guarantee that everyone has the best intentions. Unfortunately, the road to hell is paved with them. Right now, we – and I mean the Principality police – need results. The Roby Stricker case has apparently nothing to do with the killer we’re after.’
Frank felt Nicolas Hulot standing behind him. They both knew wh
at Durand was driving at. There were dark clouds hanging over them. And behind those clouds, there was an axe raised, ready to strike.
‘There was another victim last night. The fourth. We can’t just sit here letting garbage get dumped on our heads. I repeat, your collaboration is greatly appreciated, Frank.’
Politely tolerated, Durand. Only politely tolerated. Why don’t you use the right words, even if I did just hand you General Parker and his thug on a silver platter?
Durand went on in the same vein, dumping the garbage at Hulot’s door.
‘I’m sure you realize that the authorities simply cannot continue to watch a chain of murders like this without taking steps, unpleasant as they might be.’
Frank watched Nicolas. He was leaning against the wall, suddenly alone on the battlefield. He looked like a man refusing a blindfold before a firing squad. Durand had the decency to look him in the eye as he spoke.
‘I’m sorry, inspector. I know you’re an excellent officer, but at this point I have no choice. You are removed from the case.’
‘I understand, Dr Durand,’ Hulot said, nodding simply. He was probably too tired to protest. ‘There won’t be any problems.’
‘You can take a holiday. This case has been extremely wearing for you. The press, of course—’
‘I said there was no problem. There’s no need for you to sugar the pill. We’re all adults and we know the rules of the game. The department must do as it sees fit.’
If Durand was impressed with Hulot’s reply, he did not let on. He turned to Roncaille. Until then, the police chief had listened in silence.
‘Good. You’ll take over the investigation, Roncaille. As of today. Please keep me informed of every development. Any time of day or night. Goodbye, gentlemen.’ And the ever polite attorney general Alain Durand walked away, leaving a silence behind him that he was relieved not to share.
Roncaille ran a hand through his already smooth hair.
‘I’m sorry, Hulot. I would have liked to avoid this.’