Authors: Pierre Lemaitre
She
has propped the passport on the washbasin, open at the photograph, and is studying herself in the mirror. Her eyes flick back and forth from her face to the photograph. She picks up the passport again and checks the issue date: 1993. It is old enough for her to pass. Véronique Fabre, born February 11, 1970 – not much of an age gap – in Chevreaux. She has not the faintest idea where Chevreaux might be. Somewhere in the middle of France? Not a clue. She will have to look it up.
Translator. Véronique said that she translated from English and Russian. Sophie, when it comes to languages . . . A little English, a few words of Spanish, and that was long ago. If she has to offer proof of her occupation, things will fall apart, but she cannot imagine any circumstances in which it might arise. Come up with more improbable languages: Lithuanian, Estonian?
The impersonal passport photograph shows an unremarkable woman with short hair and banal features. Sophie looks at herself in the mirror. Her forehead is higher, her nose broader, her eyes are very different. But she has to do something. She opens the plastic bag containing everything she has just bought at the
nearby Monoprix: scissors, a make-up bag, dark glasses, hair dye. One last glance in the mirror. She sets to work.
She
tries to read her fate. Standing beneath the departures board, her suitcase next to her, she scans the destinations, the times, the platform numbers. Choosing one destination rather than another might make all the difference. Avoid the T.G.V. for the time being, since she would be trapped inside. Decide on a densely populated city where she can easily melt into the crowd. Buy a ticket for the last station on the line, but get off at an earlier stop in case the person at the ticket desk remembers her. She picks up a handful of timetables and, at the table of a snack bar, works out a convoluted route which will take her from Paris to Grenoble, with six changes. It will be a long journey, it will give her time to rest.
The ticket machines are literally under siege. She will have to use one of the counters. She wants to choose. Not a woman, since they are supposed to be more observant. Not a young guy who might find her vaguely attractive and remember her. She finds the perfect person at the last counter and joins the line of people waiting. It is a single queue from which customers go to the next available ticket desk. She will have to manoeuvre subtly to end up with the one she wants.
She
takes off the sunglasses. She should have done so earlier so as not to call attention to herself. She will have to think about these things now. It is a long queue, but her turn comes too soon for her liking, she moves forward, pretending not to notice a queue jumper slip past her and now finds herself in the perfect position. There is a God who watches over criminals. She tries to make her voice sound firm, pretends to rummage in her bag as she asks for a ticket to Grenoble on the train leaving at 6.30 p.m.
“I’ll see whether there are any seats left,” the man behind the counter says, and begins tapping into his terminal.
This possibility had not occurred to her. She cannot change her destination now, or decide not to buy a ticket since the man staring at the screen would surely remember that fact. She does not know what to do, thinks about turning and walking away, going to a different station, a different destination.
“I’m sorry,” the man says after a moment, looking at her for the first time, “I’m afraid the 6.30 p.m. is booked out.”
He types a little more.
“I still have seats on the 8.45.”
“No, thanks.”
She spoke too quickly. She tries to smile.
“I’ll think about it.”
She can feel it is going badly. What she is saying is implausible, it is not something a normal traveller would say in such a situation, but it was all she could think of. She picks up her bag. The next customer is already standing behind her, there is no time to lose. She turns and leaves.
Now she needs another counter, another destination, but also another strategy. She has to phrase the question differently so she can choose without needing to hesitate. Despite having carefully
chosen the ticket seller, she is terrified that he will remember her. It is at this point that she notices the sign for Hertz Car Rentals on the station concourse. By now, her name will be public knowledge, people will be looking for her, but not for Véronique Fabre. She has the driving licence, and she can pay in cash, or by cheque. A car would offer her greater independence and freedom of movement. It is this thought that persuades her, she is already pushing open the glass doors to the rental office.
Twenty-five minutes later, a suspicious employee is walking her around a dark-blue Ford Fiesta, commenting on its perfect condition. She responds with a calculated smile. She has had time to think and, for the first time in hours, she feels resolute. People will be expecting her to get away from Paris as soon as possible. For the time being, her plan amounts to two things: check into a hotel in the suburbs for one night, and tomorrow buy a couple of number plates and the tools for changing them. As she drives through the outer suburbs, she feels a little freer.
“I’m alive,” she thinks.
Immediately tears begin to well again.
LE MATIN
– 13/02/2003 – 2.08 p.m.
WHERE IS SOPHIE DUGUET?
Police
experts were all agreed and, depending on the sources, the predictions hardly varied: even in the worst case scenario, Sophie Duguet would be arrested within a fortnight.
Yet it is now eight months since the most wanted woman in France disappeared without trace.
In a series of high-profile press conferences, public statements and communiqués, the senior police detectives and officials at the Ministère de la Justice have been passing the buck.
This, then, is what we know:
*
On May 28 last, shortly before midday, a cleaner working for M. and Mme Gervais discovered the body of their son Léo, aged six. The child had been strangled in his bed with laces from a pair of hiking boots. Police were immediately called and suspicion rapidly centred on his nanny, Sophie Duguet (née Auverney), 28, who had been looking after the child and has not since been found. Early evidence seemed damning: there was no sign of forced entry to the apartment, Mme Gervais, Léo’s mother, had left Sophie Duguet in the apartment at 9 a.m. that morning, supposing her son to be still asleep. The autopsy has revealed that by this time the child had been dead for several hours, most probably having
been strangled in his sleep during the night.
The
police judiciaire
were all the more determined to make a quick arrest since, in the days that followed, the murder provoked a public outcry. The media circus around the case undoubtedly owes much to the fact that the victim’s father was a close associate of the Ministère des Affaires Étrangères. Farright parties, notably Pascal Mariani and several other organisations, some of which had notionally been disbanded, used the case to call for the reintroduction of the death penalty for “particularly heinous crimes”, and in this they were vociferously supported by the right-wing member of parliament, Bernard Strauss.
According to the Ministère de l’Intérieur, the suspect would not be able to evade justice for long since rapid police response would have made it impossible for Sophie Duguet to leave the country. All airports and train stations were swiftly alerted. “Those few suspects who manage to stay on the run succeed only by virtue of experience and considerable preparation,” commissaire Bertrand of the
police judiciaire
confidently assured the press. But this young woman had scant financial resources and no relatives or friends in a position to help her, with the exception of her father, Patrick Auverney, a retired architect who was immediately placed under police surveillance.
According to the Ministère de la Justice, apprehending the suspect would take “a matter of days”. The Ministère de l’Intérieur went so far as to say “eight to ten days, maximum”. The police were more prudent, suggesting “a few weeks at most”. . . Eight months have passed since then.
So what happened? No-one knows. But the fact remains that Sophie Duguet has literally vanished into thin air. With shocking audacity, the young woman left the apartment where the child lay dead, stopped at her apartment to pick up her passport and clothes, and went to the bank where she withdrew almost all the money she had. Police have confirmed that she was seen at the Gare de Lyon, but after that there has been no trace. Detectives are convinced that neither the murder of the child, nor the escape, were premeditated. If this is true, it gives a frightening insight into Sophie Duguet’s ability to improvise.
Almost everything about the case is shrouded in mystery. No theories have been advanced as to Duguet’s motive. The only inkling comes from the investigators’ assertion that Duguet was suffering intense emotional
trauma as a result of two bereavements. Her mother, Catherine Auverney, to whom she seems to have been very close, died of cancer in February 2000, and her husband, Vincent Duguet, a 31-year-old chemical engineer, paralysed in a road traffic accident, committed suicide the following year. Duguet’s father – and her only surviving relative – is apparently sceptical about this line of thought, but has declined to talk to the media.
The case quickly became a headache for the authorities. On May 30, two days after the child’s murder, Véronique Fabre, a 32-year-old translator, was found dead in her Paris apartment by her boyfriend Jacques Brusset. The woman had sustained multiple stab wounds to the stomach. The time of death established at the autopsy confirmed that the murder took place on the day Sophie Duguet disappeared, sometime in the early afternoon. Traces of D.N.A. found at the scene prove beyond doubt that Duguet had been in the apartment. A car was later rented by a young woman using a driving licence stolen from the victim’s apartment. All evidence indicates that the woman who hired the car was Sophie Duguet.
Within two days of absconding, Sophie Duguet had been implicated in a second murder. The manhunt was intensified, but brought no results . . .
Despite repeated calls for witnesses, constant surveillance at all locations the suspect might use as a refuge and information from police informers, no new information has come to light. One cannot help but wonder whether Sophie Duguet has succeeded in fleeing the country. The police and the judiciary have half-heartedly attempted to shift the blame, but in fact it seems as though Duguet’s success in so far evading capture is not due to any procedural errors in the investigation, but to her fierce determination, careful planning (contrary to police theory) or to an exceptional ability to improvise. The Préfecture denies reports that it has called in a crisis-management specialist.
We hear that the hunt goes on, and there is nothing to do but wait. Meanwhile, detectives at the
police judiciaire
can only keep their fingers crossed and hope that the next they hear of Sophie Duguet is not news of another murder. As for predictions, official sources are now more guarded. News may come today, tomorrow, or never.
Sophie
walks stiffly, her hips do not sway. She walks in a straight line, like a wind-up toy. When she has walked for too long, her pace begins to slacken. At that point, no matter where she is, she stops, then starts again, with the same mechanical gait.
She has lost a lot of weight. She eats very little, mostly junk food. She smokes a lot and barely sleeps. In the morning she wakes with a start, sits bolt upright, her mind a blank, wiping tears from her face as she lights her first cigarette. For a long time now, this is how it has been. The morning of March 11 was no different from any other. Sophie is living in a furnished apartment outside the city centre. She has added no personal touch to the décor: the same dated wallpaper, the same threadbare carpet, the same battered sofa. As soon as she gets up, she turns on the television, an antiquated model where every channel comes with a blizzard of static. Whether or not she is actually watching (and she spends countless hours staring at it), the television is always on. She has got into the habit of leaving it on with the sound muted when
she goes out. She often comes home late and, from the street, she can see the flickering blue glow of her apartment. The first thing she does when she comes in is to turn up the sound. Most nights, she leaves it on. At first she had hoped that even in her sleep the sound would keep her mind distracted and spare her the nightmares. To no avail. But at least when she wakes, every two hours, it is to the reassuring babble of early-morning weather reports, of tele-shopping programmes which she can be glued to for hours, sometimes the midday news if she has taken something to knock herself out.
Sophie mutes the sound and leaves. She goes down the stairs, lights a cigarette before pushing open the entrance door of the building and, as always, pushes her hands into her pockets to conceal their constant trembling.
*
“Are you going to shift your arse, or do I need to give it a kick?”
Rush hour. The fast-food joint is humming like a hive, whole families are queuing to be served, the smells from the kitchen fill the whole restaurant, the staff weave between the tables collecting trays left by customers, clearing away the polystyrene containers full of cigarette butts in the smoking area, wiping up the spilled drinks. Sophie is working with a mop. Customers balancing trays step over it, somewhere behind her a group of schoolchildren are making an infernal racket.
“Don’t pay any attention to him,” Jeanne says as she passes. “Stupid little bastard!”
Jeanne, a thin girl with a vaguely cubist face is the only person she gets on with. As for the “stupid little bastard”, he is anything but little. He is about thirty, tall, dark-haired and clearly spends his evenings lifting weights. He wears a jacket and tie
like a junior manager in a department store. He is particularly punctilious with three things: timekeeping, salaries and the arses of the female staff. During the lunchtime rush, he “marshals his team” like a legionnaire, and in the afternoon lull, he fondles the buttocks of any female staff members foolish enough to dawdle; the others have made a dash for the exit. His life is perfect. Everyone knows that he is running a scam with the franchise manager, that hygiene is a trivial consideration. And everyone knows why he loves his job: on average, he pockets 20,000 euros a year in backhanders and gets to fuck fifteen girls desperate to keep a job that scrapes the bottom of the employment barrel. As she mops the floor, Sophie can see he is watching her. In fact, he is not exactly watching her. He is sizing her up, with the air of someone who can have whatever he wants. His expression says it all. He treats his “girls” as objects. Sophie carries on working, telling herself she is bound to find another job soon.