The Missing Corpse: A Brittany Mystery, page 22
part #4 of Commissaire Dupin Series
“Have I committed a crime?”
She knew who he was.
“No, Madame…” He realized he didn’t know her last name.
“Béa to my friends. Come with me.”
With these words, the oyster farmer had hurried into the plant, and a moment later the light went on, very yellowish light that turned the whole thing into a surreal theater set.
“You might be able to help me with some information,” Dupin said, following her in.
“I’m intrigued.”
He had walked down the concrete walkway between the pool and the shed. Several long tables with pale marine-blue work surfaces made from plastic were lined up along the wall of the shed.
“Do you like these?” Béa pulled a croissant out of the paper bag she was holding.
“Oh, I love them.” Dupin hadn’t had breakfast yet; he had been meaning to stop at a boulangerie later.
The croissant tasted really good, crisp and buttery. Béa had, without another word, disappeared inside the shed. He could hear metallic noises, a knocking sound, a tap. Dupin could have recognized those sounds in his sleep: an espresso machine.
He looked over the waist-high wall at the inlet that seemed so much brighter than the rest of the scenery. The receding water had exposed long stretches of sand banks that looked like whales’ backs, covered in carpets of gaudy green algae in some places. It looked very nutrient-rich, the way the oysters probably loved it. A few sailing boats that appeared unnaturally white in the early morning light were in the middle of the water. There were three flatboats by the bank, clearly special boats, more like large, floating platforms that likely belonged to Béa’s farm.
Béa came over with two red, chipped china mugs in hand.
“The most beautiful office in the world.” She handed Dupin one of the cups and stood next to him. The coffee was perfect. Strong, but not bitter.
“Do you know Matthieu Tordeux?”
“He bought the oyster farm at the other end of the bay. I don’t like him.”
Béa put down her cup. Dupin had been observing her from the side. Wild, curly hair, shoulder-length, a face covered in laugh lines that spoke of life, of both pleasant and serious matters.
“Why?”
“He’s a real smooth customer. But he’ll cut you down without batting an eyelid if you stand in his way. With rampant egotism. He wants to play with the big boys, do business on a grand scale.”
“He recently bought a farm in Cancale too.”
“I know. Think big. Apparently a building contractor went in on it too.”
“Who’s saying that?”
“Jacques, the owner of the pub up on the little square in La Forȇt-Fouesnant. He knows things like that.”
Dupin believed this straightaway; the owners of local bars were generally well informed about these things.
“You mean Pierre Delsard from Construction Traittot?”
“Yes. Delsard is an even bigger idiot than Tordeux.”
Béa had lit a cigarette. Dupin got out his notebook.
“Many years ago, Tordeux doctored cheap imported oysters in Cancale with a pigment so that he could sell them as fines de claire. Is there talk of him being up to any dirty tricks on the Belon?”
Béa was still looking at the water. She took a drag on her cigarette. “I haven’t heard anything. Brutal business practices, yes. Snatching customers away, ousting rivals, bribes, falsely orchestrated losses for outrageous tax returns. I’ve heard of those.”
“But no dishonest oyster deals?”
“I haven’t heard anything about that yet.”
“Do you know of any cases of shady refinement on the Belon in recent years?”
“No. The last verified case was many years ago. A good ten years ago. The trader was from Riec and he immediately lost his license.”
“And the other farmers and traders in Port Belon—does anything spring to mind that I should know about them?”
“I know Madame Laroche from the château and Baptiste Kolenc a little, they’re all right. I’m not there much, though. That trader is a phenomenon. I’ve forgotten her name. Hyperactive. A speed demon.”
Dupin almost laughed. “Matthieu Tordeux’s ex-wife?”
Apparently Béa didn’t know anything about that. “Really? She was married to Tordeux? Well, everyone makes mistakes.”
“What do you think—will this oyster blight make it as far as here?”
“On verra. It’s not worth brooding over.”
The same attitude as everyone else he had asked about it.
“Could an oyster farmer know sooner than other people that a blight has been detected, insider knowledge, as it were, and could you make some money from that?”
Béa understood straightaway. “It’s complicated. There are several institutes and authorities testing the seawater in the oyster areas at the same time. With independent cross-checks. It would be extremely laborious.”
Which also meant not impossible. Dupin would ask Melen or Kadeg to take a painstaking look at the method of examining seawater samples in Port Belon.
“Of course, the value of intact cultures of European oysters would increase manifold. Traders from the affected areas would need new breeds immediately. That’s also how it was after 2008. We all needed fresh cultures. The only areas in Europe not affected were northwest Scotland and Norway.”
“Perhaps there would soon be an enormous demand for European oysters from Scottish farmers. And not many farms there. They could practically ask for any price. Do some highly lucrative business. And traders in the affected areas who could have secured themselves cultures in advance, maybe even still at normal prices, would possess an immense competitive advantage,” Dupin said.
“Absolutely correct. If—if a devastating blight were to set in.”
Dupin noted a few things down in his notebook.
“Everyone has it in for plates, they have countless enemies.” Béa’s gaze came to rest almost tenderly on the pale, round baskets in the pools in front of her: dozens of European oysters. “Crabs prise their shells open, ship worms bore through them, starfish paralyze them with poisonous saliva and slurp them up, birds nosedive to peck at them, arched slipper shells compete with them for food.” Béa laughed huskily. “Like everywhere else in the sea, everybody eats somebody else. But the most destructive enemy of all is the Pacific oyster.”
“The creuses?” Dupin asked in bafflement.
“The creuses spread like wildfire and are displacing the European oysters everywhere. Higher reproductive rates, higher population densities, faster growth. And it’s not just the European oysters they’re having a terrible effect on. In the blink of an eye, they transform enormous mussel beds into oyster reefs. The creuses are ruthless, they destroy everything. We call them the giants.”
This sounded brutal. Riwal hadn’t mentioned anything about it yesterday.
“But they taste irresistible too”—Béa glanced lovingly at two baskets at the edge of the pool—“and now is the best time to eat them. They’re big and fleshy but there’s no fat on them. For the first eighteen months we take them to the flat regions where they often lie on dry land and get food less often, so they get tough and greedy. In the second eighteen months, we place them in the most nutrient-rich currents and they feast till they’re fat—that’s the old method. Do you want to take a few with you? I’ll wrap them up for you.”
“Thank you—no. I’m just about to drive to Cancale.” Dupin didn’t feel like having to explain that he didn’t eat oysters.
Béa had lit a second cigarette. “The self-proclaimed oyster capital of Brittany.”
“You don’t happen to know a Monsieur Cueff in Cancale?”
“No. There are at least sixty farms there.”
Dupin put down his little china mug. “Thanks for everything, Béa. I’ve got to go.”
“Kind of a mess.” Béa’s wonderful smile was back, her eyes sparkling.
“Absolutely. See you soon.”
“See you soon.”
Dupin walked briskly to his car, which was parked right in front of Béa’s plant, in the middle of the beach.
It would be a long journey to Cancale.
* * *
“That’s enough, Kadeg! I don’t want to hear any more about any of that, do you understand?” Dupin yelled. He had got the car back onto a paved road and tried to get hold of Riwal. Kadeg’s call had intervened.
“Our colleagues from Lorient and I have a—”
“I said that’s enough. Full stop. I—”
“Search warrant. We have a search warrant!”
“You have a…” Dupin faltered.
“Search warrant for Construction Traittot.” There was unbridled, conceited triumph in Kadeg’s voice. “We have sufficiently reliable evidence that a sand theft did occur in recent weeks. A whole series of them, in fact. Organized sand theft on a grand scale! We’re going to conduct a raid in Lorient soon, at the building contractor’s headquarters. And take a look at all of their business records. My photos were the deciding factor.”
There he was again: the Kadeg Dupin knew. Just yesterday he was still teetering along the edge of a terrible abyss and would undoubtedly have fallen in if not for the commissaire.
“I knew it. I was right about it all.”
“Pierre Delsard,” Dupin murmured to himself.
It was unbelievable—there truly did seem to be something to this sand theft business. Which meant that there really was extensive criminal activity in the area. Carried out by a building company whose boss owned a weekend home in Port Belon and was friends with one of the local oyster farmers. Good friends.
“The prefect was extremely pleased. He—”
“Kadeg! We have our own case, an extremely complicated case—and we’re right in the middle of it! Has Riwal filled you in on everything? Are you up to speed?”
It took a while for an offended Kadeg to mumble, “We talked in detail on the phone last night. I know about everything. He just called me from the airport too. He couldn’t get through to you. There’s some new information.”
“And you’re only just coming out with it now?” Dupin was about to lose his temper.
“Jane Mackenzie is Mackenzie’s second wife. His first wife died twenty years ago.”
“So what?”
“Riwal thought you wanted to know every little thing. Everything. He—”
“Has Mackenzie’s business partner from the oyster bar in Glasgow turned up again?”
“I presume the situation is unchanged there. I didn’t realize that point was so important.”
“It’s incredibly important. On this case, when someone wants to take a spontaneous trip, it doesn’t end well. Any other information?”
“Mackenzie was involved in a bank robbery as a young man, just like Smith.”
A ritual for young people in Scotland, apparently.
“Why didn’t we hear anything about that yesterday?”
“They had to have a good look at old files in the Fort William police station first; this information is not on any system.”
“Did Mackenzie come to police attention again after that?”
“Not at all. Riwal will be sitting in the car to Tobermory right now and he won’t have reception. He—”
“What about the fire investigation? What do the specialists say?”
“That young blond woman from the station in Riec—”
“Magalie Melen, Kadeg! Her name is Magalie Melen.”
“She just tried to call you too. The team leader says that they can now say with certainty that the fire broke out in the back left corner of the annex.”
“Inside or outside?”
That was the crucial part.
“He tends toward outside.”
“Really?”
Then it was highly likely it had been arson.
“Tordeux could of course have set the fire from outside himself—but that wouldn’t make any sense. If so, he would have made it look more clearly like an attack from the beginning.”
This was true.
“Any other news from Melen?”
“No. Nothing, boss. But I think you’re on the wrong track with the oysters.”
Dupin’s blood pressure instantly shot up.
“Kadeg, I’m not on a track at all. We…” He composed himself and took deep breaths. It would be a waste of time to have a serious discussion about this with his inspector.
“What about that woman on the bus? Have we got her?”
“No, but the blond woman—”
“Kadeg!”
“No, but Melen is still working on it. The other one, that nice colleague from Riec, had something else interesting: Tordeux spent a week in Cancale last year. At a meeting of the umbrella organization for oyster farmers, and Cueff was registered for it too. You should definitely bring that up during your visit to Cancale.”
This could be important. It would be one of the links—albeit indirect—that they were desperately searching for. From Mackenzie via Cancale to Port Belon. Clearly retraceable. Mackenzie—Cueff—Tordeux. Three people.
“I’ll do that. And you speak to Tordeux again. Look into him, Kadeg.”
“Whatever you say.”
“And one more job: I want to know as soon as possible whether anyone from the Belon bought oysters in northern Scotland in 2008 or during another oyster crisis. As fresh cultures, to rebuild their stock. And have a careful look at the authorities that monitor oyster farming, the whole system. I want to know whether it’s possible for someone to have information about the spread of a bacteria earlier than other people. Whether someone has any contacts. Keep at it!”
“And what are you aiming—”
“As soon as possible.”
And with these words, Dupin hung up.
Perhaps he should have sent Kadeg to Scotland and not Riwal, he thought. Far, far away.
Dupin had reached the four-laner, which he would now stay on until Cancale. He stepped on the gas. The speedometer leapt to 170. The speed limit was 110—but he was on duty.
He tapped Nolwenn’s number.
He had a few specific questions.
“Abred ne goll gwech ebet—You never lose when you’re early, Monsieur le Commissaire. You never lose when you’re early! Everyone is long since on duty.”
Dupin felt instantly grounded.
“Nolwenn, this Festival Interceltique in Lorient…”
“‘Memoire et rêve du monde celtique’ is the motto this year. It’s going to be wonderful. That’s why there will be so many Scottish people who have come to Riec for the preparatory meeting. Do you think it’s possible there’s a link between the festival and the events in the Monts d’Arrée and Port Belon? I mean, apart from the fact that it was two Scotsmen who were killed?” Nolwenn didn’t beat about the bush. “Do you think”—she sounded gentler now—“Mackenzie and Smith were using the festival as a platform for something?”
“I don’t know.”
With just six Celtic regions, it obviously wasn’t such a great coincidence that Scotland was the host nation this time. It was just striking that the Interceltic and Scottish connections had been multiplying constantly since yesterday. Stacking up.
“You’ll find plenty of connections between here and Scotland. Just think of the forthcoming Bagpipe World Championship in Glasgow in May. There are fifteen Breton pipe bands, or bagadoù, as we call them! They consist of bagpipes, bombards, and drums. Quimper has been producing the Breton champions for years! The regional qualifying rounds are taking place everywhere over these few weeks. And for Cornouaille, Riec was the venue this time—so there was a big Interceltic event in Riec back in February, it’s not just at the moment!” Nolwenn still wasn’t finished. “Or think of the abundance of Scottish-Breton friendship societies. Our parliament in Rennes has agreed to lots of cooperation agreements with all of the Scottish regions, districts, and cities.”
“Tordeux, the oyster farmer, is one of the sponsors of the festival, along with the shady building contractor Pierre Delsard, who has his weekend house in Port Belon,” Dupin quickly interjected as Nolwenn was drawing breath. The only thing he cared about was not talking about a forthcoming Bagpipe World Championship.
“The festival has lots of sponsors, Monsieur le Commissaire.”
“I’d like Magalie Melen and a team to tackle all of the Interceltic activities between Scotland and the Belon. Especially the ones our oyster players are involved in.”
“Okay. Yes, Magalie is a really excellent policewoman. We could do with reinforcement like her here in Concarneau right now.” This was the tone of voice Nolwenn adopted when she was pursuing her own plans behind the scenes and Dupin was to be prepared for something in passing. The commissaire knew this tone well. “Do you actually know how similar Brittany and Scotland are? The Scottish kingdom was founded in 843, the first major Breton one in 851! The brutal annexation by England happened in 1603, the one by France in 1532! Brittany has four point five million Bretons, Scotland five point one million Scots—and most importantly: we share, as we do with all of the other Celtic nations, the harsh but wonderful fate of having been tossed far out into the raging Atlantic. Something that shapes everything!” Dupin had never heard Nolwenn speak so sympathetically about a different country. “However, we have much better weather. And of course, we have Brittany.”
The commissaire didn’t know how to respond.
“Celts—we are all Celts! I’ll be in touch as soon as there’s news, Monsieur le Commissaire. Have a good journey!”
Nolwenn hung up.
He could see the sign for the turnoff to Lorient. The venue for the festival. The headquarters of Pierre Delsard’s company.
The Celts, the “bold”—the mysterious people around whom so many stories, fantasies, and legends had grown up. Every child in Brittany could rattle off the history. When the famous Celtic ruler Vercingetorix laid his weapons down in front of Caesar after the historic defeat against the Romans, the continent’s last Celtic kingdom ended with the Gauls. The Celtic Britons only survived on the islands. On the biggest island, the Celtic Britons were then brutally massacred in the fifth and sixth centuries A.D. by barbaric Teutons, Saxons, and Angles. They retreated to northern Scotland and Ireland, some groups left “great Britain” entirely and came back to “little Britain,” the second Celtic settlement. That was what the nation had been called ever since: Brittany. Dupin found the Celtic name much more impressive: Armorica, “land by the sea.” And they had survived here to this day. And to this day the Celtic names of their last refuges on the outermost, rugged fringes of northwest Europe sounded like mythical poetry, like regions Tolkien might have invented: Éire, Ellan Vannin, Alba, Cymru, Kernow, Breizh.
