Affairs of State (19 page)

‘It’s a very complicated case, involving a great many people − potential dynamite.’ Lanteri taps the table with his fingertips. ‘And we’re in sole charge of it.’

Macquart nods and waits. Lanteri goes on: ‘For reasons that escape me, Bornand seriously has it in for the Paris Intelligence department.’

‘I read the article in the
Bavard Impénitent
.’

‘So did I, but that’s not all. After leaving here, Bornand went to the Interior Ministry where he used all his influence to push for the disbanding of the Intelligence Service again.’ Another pause. ‘If the Iranian arms case is closed, if he recovers his full freedom to manoeuvre, he can cause you real damage.’

‘And will he recover it?’

‘It certainly looks that way. The plane vanished in thin air, Flandin dead of a heart attack, Cecchi murdered. What about Beauchamp, do you know him?’ Macquart nods. ‘He’s ready to bargain anything for his freedom and a new start in life … He was associated with Bornand in the past, and probably holds quite a few trumps.’ Lanteri sighs. Bornand’s one of those people who are indestructible. Always ready to bounce back.

Macquart goes back to Intelligence headquarters, to get on with some dreary routine paperwork. In a corner, Levert and Noria are writing their reports and filing the photos.
Still no news from Laurencin. Macquart gets a coffee from the machine and eats two chocolates.
Got to nab Bornand as quickly as possible, it’s him or us. What do I have left? Fernandez, if he’s still alive, if I can find him. Chancy. And the names of the Swiss banks. Given the Security department’s position, for the time being, the only way to use this information is an anonymous letter. But who to send it to? Not to the
Bavard
. Too close to Bornand and they wouldn’t publish it, or not soon enough. To the magistrate investigating Cecchi’s killing? It depends who’s in charge of the case, and besides, the prosecutor may well refuse to delay the hearing. No obvious link with Cecchi’s murder. And no other investigations running. Switzerland? That might be a good idea, Switzerland …

The pair of them are sitting at a small round table. Laurencin has ordered a coffee and the waiter brings the doctor half a bottle of Beaujolais without being asked.

‘Why are you interested in the Michel family?’

He knows them. Think carefully
.

‘I’m a historian. I specialise in the war years and the Liberation in Lyon. I’ve found some unsigned personal documents on this period, and I’m having trouble seeing how they fit in. They contain quite a lot of references to Michel and his daughter Antoinette, and I’m trying to cross-reference …’

It’ll have to do, for a hasty explanation …

‘Do you know if Antoinette’s still alive, doctor?’

‘I have no idea. I haven’t seen a death certificate with her name on it in Lyon, but she could have moved away, abroad, perhaps.’

Laurencin looks at the doctor.
I’m on the right track, he wants to talk. Mustn’t rush him
. He allows a long silence to set in, then Méchin speaks:

‘It is a painful memory for me.’ He breaks off. ‘Michel was a brute who used to beat his wife. According to my father, he beat her to death. But that was during the war, he was in the Militia and nobody asked any questions. He also used to beat his daughter, Antoinette. She got pregnant, she was very young. I don’t remember the date …’

‘Her daughter was born in October ’43.’

‘Sounds possible. It was my father who told Michel the news, and who took the girl into our house for a while, to protect her from being beaten. And then, on the Liberation, Michel was killed in his apartment, nobody was sorry, but it happened in front of his daughter, it wasn’t a pretty business, and afterwards her head was shorn and she was paraded around the whole city.’ He stops. ‘And this is the really painful part. My father took care of Antoinette, he knew the child’s father, but he hadn’t really been part of the Resistance, he was afraid, and he didn’t lift a finger to defend her, and neither did I. And she was never seen again. Forty years on, and it’s still something I’m not exactly proud of.’

‘Who was the father? Wasn’t he around either?’

‘A young militiaman who spent a lot of time with Michel. His name was Bornand.’ Laurencin found it hard not to show his surprise. ‘He disappeared during Antoinette’s pregnancy and we never saw him again. He must have been killed. You know, a lot of people got killed during those years.’

‘Well, that answers my question. The author of my documents must be this person, Bornand.’

Macquart takes Laurencin’s call at eight p.m. Françoise Michel is Bornand’s daughter.

‘Come back to Paris right away, Laurencin.’ A silence. ‘And thank you.’

Noria and Levert look up from their work. Macquart looks back at them and smiles. Incredible. A broad, jubilant smile through set lips, not exactly reassuring.

‘You see, these are rare moments of triumph. We were mistaken, not completely, but almost completely, and we’re going to win all the same. I don’t know what comes closer than this to pure happiness.’

The phone rings. Macquart picks up the receiver. ‘It’s Fernandez on the line,’ says the switchboard operator. Fernandez … well, well, good things always come in threes.

‘Can you trace the call?’

‘We’re already onto it, superintendent.’

‘Good. Put him through … Hello, Fernandez.’

‘Superintendent, I’d like to talk to you, can I come in and see you?’

‘Spot of trouble, young man?’

‘Yes, superintendent, big trouble.’

Bornand’s envoy? I don’t think so, not now, when Bornand thinks he’s holding all the aces, and not after having gone underground for forty-eight hours. But I’ve got a better card. I’ll keep it back for now. Just in case … I’ve got Bornand in a stranglehold, and it won’t take him long to realise it.

‘I’m up to my ears, Fernandez. Come and see me on Friday, does that suit you?’

‘Perfect, thank you, superintendent.’

Macquart hangs up. The switchboard calls back: Hôtel de la République, in Saint-Germain-en-Laye. Where he’s been staying since last Monday.

Macquart addresses Noria and Levert:

‘You’re off to Saint-Germain. It’s close to Paris, and rather a pleasant place. You’re going to find out what Fernandez wants to tell us, since he doesn’t appear to have taken any precautions to stop us tracing his call. And be back here as soon as you can. Tomorrow morning, I’m the one who’ll have the duty and honour of informing the President of the delicate situation in which his advisor finds himself …’

At the Intelligence Service headquarters there was tension in the air as the day dragged by following Macquart’s return from the Élysée. Eyes and ears had been positioned everywhere they possibly could. Reports came in regularly: nothing’s happening. Bornand is at home, he’s not moving, not telephoning, not receiving any visitors. Françoise Michel is having dinner with a girlfriend at the Champs Élysées Drugstore as if it were the most normal thing in the world. They’re going to the cinema to see
The Year of the Dragon
. Macquart wagers she has no idea of what’s going on.

Fernandez arrived at the Hôtel de la République, in Saint-Germain-en-Laye at around midnight on Monday evening. He parked his car in a paying car park, and hasn’t moved it since. He goes for walks in the forest, reads the newspaper, bets on the horses and plays table football at the nearest bar-cum-tobacconist and betting shop, eats at the hotel and drinks whisky in his room.

Macquart summarises for them. ‘In other words, he’s telling us that he’s been out of Paris since Monday evening. But he’s right next to a busy train station where there’s no likelihood of his being identified … We’ll soon see about that.’

Bornand has shut himself up in his drawing room and sits slumped in an armchair. He’s had his mistress informed that he’s not available, sent Antoine away, locked his door, unplugged the telephone, and opened a bottle of vodka. The President refused to see him and congratulated himself in front of his closest associates for never having invited Françoise Michel to the Élysée. The verdict has been delivered and it is final: no scandals of this nature in the corridors of the presidential palace. Bornand is asked to leave his office at the Élysée immediately, and its door is now closed to him. With all his files inside. He is not the only one who understands the workings of power. He is to put an immediate end to this affair, and ostensibly go back to living with his wife. ‘Then, we’ll see,’ says the President, ‘it all depends on the reaction of the press and of public opinion.’

Bornand takes a large slug of vodka and closes his eyes. Go back to living with his wife. A half smile. They never had lived together. They’d lived in the same house while Thomas was alive, that’s all that can be said. Then Bornand’s wife moved away to live in Saumur, one day after the funeral. It was several days before he noticed she’d gone. So, resume their cohabitation, why not?

The vodka bottle is empty. His stomach’s burning. He feels shut in. Plagued, as in the past. Sees himself locked in his room with Thomas, his father-in-law to be, pacing the floor, shouting, randomly banging into furniture.

‘In the Militia! You idiot … What are you trying to do? Act the martyr? … Wake up. This is March 1943. The Germans have lost Stalingrad, the Americans are in North Africa and the Japanese are retreating in the Pacific. Can’t you see for yourself that Hitler has lost the war, and Vichy and the Militia will go down with him?’

He follows Thomas with his eyes and says nothing. Vichy, the new homeland, building the Europe of tomorrow, destroying Communism, the enemy of Western civilisation, is he the only person who believes in it?

‘The kids’ games are over. You’ll go and live with my mother in the country, and you stay put until further orders. Let people forget you. I’ll have enough on my plate trying to salvage my business after the war, without having a collaborator on my hands as well.’

He gave in, that’s all, neither a rebel nor a hero. Just like today. The solitude is unbearable. Of course he will step back in line and go back to his wife, at least for a while. He opens another bottle of vodka and falls asleep.

Bornand wakes up in a daze.
Blood spurting in the telephone booth, strangers, their faces pressed to the glass, staring at him in curiosity, revulsion? He’s covered in blood
. He gets up with difficulty, picks up a pretty Chinese lacquer box from the table behind the sofa and snorts two pinches of cocaine. Lies down again and breathes slowly, his eyes closed.

Dead. A man of around forty, who looks like an ordinary kind of man, a primary school teacher, three streets away from the Michel’s place, and a Communist before the war. ‘A man who supports the Resistance,’ said Michel. Five of them lay in wait for him, with coshes, under a porch on a street corner. In broad daylight. When he came out, they jumped on him. Bornand got him in the shoulder, he fell to his knees, more blows and he keeled over exposing the nape of his neck, and Bornand struck. A sound of snapping wood and the Communist’s body lay motionless on the ground. A few more kicks, to let off steam. Intense. No comparison with Flandin’s abstract murder. They return, accomplices and victors both. Then Thomas locks him in his bedroom. End of story.

He has always been attracted by killers. Flashback to Moricet walking through the streets of Beirut, his gun wedged into his belt in the small of his back, under his elegantly cut jacket. Killers with class. Even Cecchi … A lot of deaths recently. Karim … hardly a murder, more a vanishing shadow. Flandin, Cecchi … Cecchi whose corpse flashes into his mind, half
his face blown away, on the pavement outside the Perroquet Bleu …

No doubt a gangland killing, even if I let Mado think I believe the Intelligence Service had him killed. In any case, his death came at an opportune moment, ridding me of a burdensome ally. I have to admit that in the end he had me completely at his mercy. This murder is a stroke of luck. Of course.

He gets up and sits down on the sofa, runs his hand through his hair and smoothes his moustache. The President also has his family secrets, and is very keen for them to remain secret.
I am the man who knows. He can’t manage without me. I just need to lie low for a few days at my wife’s house, and I’ll be back.

He gets up and goes into the bathroom. A freezing shower and a handful of amphetamines to keep himself awake.

What do I do with Françoise? When she came to my place, the first time, blackmail and seduction, a real gift out of the blue. I fucked her and flaunted her. So, incest, it’s just a word. You get used to it, you get bored, as with everything else. Don’t want to fuck any more. Flashback to the blonde fury, the other day. I’m losing her. Almost relieved to leave her without a confrontation. When things have calmed down, I’ll set her up in a furnished apartment with an allowance. She’ll understand. She has no choice.

He gets into his Porsche, and drives alongside the Seine towards the west of Paris.

He is tailed by two cars from Intelligence. Departure 05.07. Erratic driving. Pont de Sèvres, 05.30, then he takes the N118. All good, he’s on his way. He accelerates suddenly, they lose him.
Presumably he’s heading for Saumur, we’ll take the A10 motorway
. Back on Bornand’s trail at the first service station.
He fills up. The car is parked in front of the shop. Bornand buys razors, shaving foam. He goes into the toilets and shuts himself in a stall. Makes himself vomit. Then, standing bare-chested at the washbasins, he splashes himself with water, washes his face, rinses out his mouth and has a shave. Peering into the mirror, he is tense and on his guard. He trims his moustache with the razor and combs his hair. He goes into the shop, eats a sandwich, drinks three coffees, swallows two pills and gets back onto the motorway at 06.15. He drives at a steady, moderate speed. They have no difficulty keeping him in sight.

Another stop at Le Mans, where he calls his wife to announce his arrival. It is 07.45.

This is the chance Macquart’s been waiting for.

‘Ghozali, go and see Françoise Michel. She knows about Bornand’s business deals, we had proof of that in Geneva. Find a way of getting her to tell you all she knows. Woman to woman … I’m counting on you …’

He leaves the words hanging in the air.

On reaching the outskirts of Saumur, Bornand vaguely remembers having been there before when his wife bought the estate, but he gets lost. He asks the way, crosses the whole centre of Saumur, follows the Loire, drives up along the cliff and takes a dirt road between two big paddocks where the horses graze. At 08.50 he parks his car in a gravelled courtyard in front of a small eighteenth-century manor house built of white limestone with
a blue slate roof. The front door opens into a hall that runs through the house and leads out via a French window to the terrace and the grounds. A man in his forties wearing brown velvet trousers and a heavy beige polo-neck sweater, greets him.

‘Madame Bornand is finishing off her inspection of the stables.’

Madame Bornand. He knew, of course, that she had kept her married name, but hearing it, today and in this house …

‘I’ll wait for her.’

He is shown into a sort of parlour, a small room adjoining the kitchen, all in white limestone, with a chequered white stone and slate floor, a tall narrow fireplace where a log fire burns lazily, a worn leather armchair in front of the fire, a big oak farmhouse table and a few straw-bottomed chairs. In a corner near the fireplace is a coat rack heaped with old raincoats, hats and leather chaps. There’s a smell of wet earth and horses. He goes over to the French window. In front of him is the end of the terrace, then a vast tree-fringed manicured lawn stretching down to the stables below. He puts a log on the fire, pokes it, then returns to the window. Facing him is a sandy avenue leading directly to the far end of the estate. She’ll come up this path to meet him. His mind goes back to an image of himself standing in the chancel of the church of Saint-Pierre-de-Chaillot, aged twenty-four, wearing morning dress. The church is packed out, there are probably hymns and organ music, but he can’t hear anything. He stares at the red carpet stretching straight ahead of him to the open porch, and in the pool of light, a couple is walking towards him. Thomas, a dashing fifty-something, very slim in his grey morning coat, his daughter on his arm, in her wedding dress, slowly approaching. Thomas watches him intently, only him, smiling.
He stops in front of him, places his hand on his shoulder, Bornand closes his eyes. When he opens them again, the girl is now alone beside him, her face concealed by the white tulle veil. What did she look like that day? Impossible to remember. And today, what will she look like? A woman without a face.

He shudders. Nothing stirs in the park outside. He goes back to the fire and sinks into the armchair, resting the back of his neck against the leather, his eyes half closed. A few images, the moving curve of a very long, pear-shaped breast, dense pubic hair, the warmth of an armpit, but no face. From the catalogue of his mistresses, not a single face emerges. Even that of Françoise, always overcast by the ghost of her adolescent mother’s face, is hazy, uncertain.
For me, women have been no more than territories where I’ve met men, men with whom I’ve made peace or war, men whom I’ve loved or fought, which amounts to the same thing
, he thinks half dreaming.

Christine Bornand comes in through the kitchen door. He jumps. He must have dozed off. He looks at her with curiosity. Not very tall, a bit plump, a lively woman with short, curly chestnut hair, hazel eyes and chubby cheeks, pink from the cold.
She’s about the same age as me and not a wrinkle
. He gets to his feet, she gives him a cold stare, then begins to remove her anorak and leather chaps. The man who showed Bornand in brings a tray from the kitchen with two china cups, a big coffee pot and a basket full of little pastries, puts it down on the table and leaves the room. Christine Bornand sits down and motions him to do likewise.

‘Coffee, is that all right with you? So to what do I owe this visit? I worked out that we haven’t seen each other for twenty-two years, not since my father’s death. Twenty-two years,
exactly the age of the first brood mare that was born here. She didn’t get pregnant this year.’

She bites into a
pain au chocolat
.

He finds it very hard to approach her. Even though he prepared for this meeting, he’s not on top form as a result of the vodka and amphetamines.

‘I’m in a very nasty mess.’ Christine dithers, then takes a second
pain au chocolat
. ‘I got dragged into a deal selling arms to Iran that was borderline legal and which, for the time being, is costing me a fortune …’
not good, cut to the chase, you can see she doesn’t give a fuck
… ‘worst of all it’s likely to get me into trouble with the law. Until the storm dies down, I’ve got to appear exemplary. But I’m not, and I never have been.’
Bite the bullet and get it over with quickly
. ‘The woman who lives with me, or, to be more precise, in the apartment above mine, is my daughter …’

Christine knocks her coffee over onto her trousers, scalds herself, and groans.

‘… That has led to all sorts of rumours, unfounded of course. But I have to put an end to them. I’ve come to ask you if I might possibly come and stay here, or if you would accompany me to Paris, and live in my apartment for a few months.’

The telephone rings. Christine gets up, goes into the hall and picks it up. She calls:

‘François, it’s for you … have you already given your secretary my number?’

When he picks up the receiver, the caller hangs up.
Françoise, without a doubt. Who else? She already knows? Who told her? I’ll sort that out when I get back
.

Christine has poured herself another coffee and is smiling at him.

‘I don’t want to hear another word about that girl. You have no idea how delighted I am to learn you’re in the shit. How could you imagine for one moment that I would lift a finger to help you?’

‘We’re still married …’

‘We have never been married, François. You didn’t marry me, you were adopted by my father. Two very different things.’

Irritated, Bornand adds:

‘I meant we’re still legally married, and with a shared inheritance which your father insisted upon. Which means that this estate, for example, is as much mine as it is yours. Which means that we had better come to some agreement and support each other.’

He speaks in an assured, frankly menacing tone. Christine rubs her hand mechanically over her coffee-stained trousers. She remains silent for a long time, gazing at the fire. Then she gets up:

‘Wait here for me, I’m going to get changed.’

Once the door closes behind her, Bornand goes to sit in the old armchair and lets himself go, his body slumped, his eyes closed.
Is it possible that I’ve won, once again?
He feels a sort of numb indifference.

Noria rings the ground-floor bell of Bornand’s apartment. A man opens the door.

‘Police. I’d like to speak to Françoise Michel.’

He shows her into the drawing room, quite coolly, without offering to take her coat, and leaves her there without saying a word.