“We’ll wait and see first.”

  “What did you do in 2008 during the great oyster death?”

  “That nearly ruined us. All of us. But my instinct tells me we’ll avoid it this time.”

  Madame looked up, but not at Dupin. Her gaze swept over the Belon as far as the estuary. It remained fixed there. As if this was her way of warding off the evil.

  “You’ll be hearing from us again, Madame Premel,” the commissaire said in farewell, and did nothing to lessen the threatening undertones in his words.

  “I need to be on my way too.” Madame Premel set about getting the bags back into the pool. The two baskets were full to the brim. “I’m out and about a lot at the moment. But you’ll find me.”

  “That we shall.”

  * * *

  Dupin was heading for the small quay.

  Lunchtime had brought some warmth. Astonishing warmth. The sun dominated the sky, proud and unchallenged.

  Dupin was sweating in his pullover. He felt that profound tiredness again, even worse than before. And at the same time an increasingly anxious discontent, an irritability. Almost a kind of anger. They needed to make the breakthrough now. They had reached the critical phase. Riwal’s discovery had been so promising in this. All the more so because Dupin was certain that parts of the story they were looking for were right there, under their noses. And they just couldn’t recognize them. Everything was too confused. A total mess. What he needed was a walk, half an hour to think in peace.

  “Ah. Our commissaire! I missed you at lunch.” Dupin had reached the quay and stopped. Madame Bandol was just coming out of La Coquille, dressed all in pale beige today, apart from her dark hiking shoes that looked like a sophisticated, stylish accent. Behind her came Baptiste Kolenc in his civvies, jeans and a red-checked flannel shirt, while his daughter was wearing a long summer dress in a pale blue that emphasized the blackness of her hair.

  “Have you spotted Kiki yet?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “There.” She pointed along the Belon toward the estuary. “Do you see?”

  Around three hundred meters away was an awe-inspiringly large fin and a second, smaller one behind it. A surreal image. The dark, sinister triangle cut through the water like a knife. Dupin had seen Jaws and lots of other films about sharks. You could instantly believe the fish was directly related to the white monster. If the commissaire had found the name Kiki inappropriate the day before yesterday, this feeling was only stronger now.

  The animal was swimming toward them at great speed. Truth be told: it was heading straight for them.

  “Kiki likes the Belon. Nowhere else has such delicious plankton.” Madame Bandol sounded extremely affectionate, turning her head away a moment later and giving Dupin a serious look.

  “Where are we? What stage are our investigations at, Monsieur le Commissaire? And what’s this about all these new developments?” It sounded like a genuine dressing-down. “You haven’t kept me up to speed! We won’t get anywhere like this. I’ve told you multiple times.”

  There was an amused astonishment on Kolenc’s and his daughter’s faces. Madame Bandol carried on unperturbed:

  “I’ve been thinking. I actually think this is all a big trick! What does it have to do with my dead body? It’s all nonsense!” Her outrage came from deep within, apparently, although it was not clear what exactly she was outraged by. “What we are concerned with is just one question: What’s the real story behind what’s going on here?”

  “It was attempted murder, Madame Bandol.” Dupin spoke loudly on purpose. “Matthieu Tordeux’s accident was an attack. Someone deliberately gave him a fright behind a bend so that he lost control of his car.”

  Word ought to spread about what they knew, or rather, suspected. The perpetrator really ought to hear they were hot on their heels—nervous perpetrators were careless perpetrators.

  “Somebody tried to murder Monsieur Tordeux?” Baptiste Kolenc had taken a step toward the commissaire, his face pale. “Are you absolutely sure?”

  Without meaning to, Dupin had been keeping a furtive eye out for Kiki’s fin. It was gone. Which made it even creepier. The direct relative of the great white shark was probably very close by. You just couldn’t see it. Dupin forced himself to give an appropriate answer.

  “We are sure, Monsieur Kolenc.” It wouldn’t help the impact of his strategy if he admitted that they didn’t have any evidence for this assumption as yet.

  “Really?” whispered an aghast Kolenc.

  “So what? That just means this crime is part of Monsieur Delsard’s disgraceful sand theft schemes.” Madame Bandol snorted unsympathetically. “That’s all. And has nothing to do with our case at all!”

  “Monsieur Kolenc,” Dupin said, and turned away from the water suddenly, “a vital part of our investigations is having everyone here tell us where they were this morning between nine fifteen and ten.”

  Madame Bandol stared at Dupin with a horrified look on her face. Kolenc forestalled her tantrum with a calm answer:

  “We just told a colleague of yours: I—”

  Madame Bandol interrupted him, but had obviously decided against a tantrum in the end.

  “Well, this monsieur here”—she linked arms with Kolenc for a moment—“he has a watertight alibi. He and I set out at half past eight and weren’t back till twelve. My walk down by the Belon! Sometimes Baptiste comes with me. Far too rarely, though.”

  “That’s right.” Kolenc smiled. “Then my daughter and I had lunch together.”

  “I was doing the tastings and sales in the yard. From nine o’clock onward,” Louann Kolenc said in the cheerful tone of voice that Dupin had liked so much the day before. “I closed the yard at half past eleven. There were only four guests there, older couples. Port Belon is not much of a draw at the moment.”

  “The alibis are absolutely bulletproof. Personally, that means I’m tremendously relieved. An investigator mustn’t exclude anyone from suspicion, even their best friend, until he’s ruled out with absolute certainty!” Madame Bandol had spoken very firmly, but there had been an ironic smile visible at the corners of her mouth as she said these last few words.

  “So what alibis do the others have? Nolwenn Premel? That building contractor? And can you definitively rule out this man from Cancale creeping around here? And,” she became mysterious, “don’t forget the bit players! Read about it in Poirot! Not the real bit players, but the ones in between—between the center and the outermost edge of the story. Them!”

  “Who do you have in mind?”

  “Well, the niece from the château, for instance. That kind of character. Or”—her eyes gleamed—“you pay attention to the people in the center. The obvious ones!”

  “So do you have a hunch now, Madame Bandol?”

  “For heaven’s sake, no! I was just explaining. Personally I would categorically rule out the girl from the château having anything to do with it! And a lovely creature, through and through!”

  “I see.”

  “I suppose you’ve heard about the current sales ban on Belon oysters,” Kolenc said seriously. Dupin was glad that someone else was bringing up the topic with the appropriate level of concern.

  “Yes. What do you make of it?”

  “I’m not panicking. It’s not worth it. On verra.”

  “I have another question, Monsieur Kolenc.”

  Kolenc looked at the commissaire in surprise.

  “Your hobby—the bagpipes. Have you played for a long time?”

  “Thirty years. We have a brilliant bagad here. It’s a lot of fun.”

  “Have the bagpipes ever taken you to Scotland? Without your bagad? Privately?”

  “Unfortunately not. Oysters don’t like to be left alone.”

  “And if the Scottish bands come on a visit—do you get to know them well?”

  “No,” Kolenc had answered harshly, quickly adding: “Although they’re very nice.”

  “Did you notice Monsieur Tordeux becoming friendly with one of them?”

  “No.”

  Dupin sighed inwardly. He wasn’t making any headway. “Thank you, Monsieur Kolenc.”

  He turned to Madame Bandol: “I’m going to drop by your house later. Then we can talk.”

  “All right, if needs be. I’ll be expecting you.”

  She winked at the commissaire and a radiant smile appeared on her face. The smile that Dupin liked so much.

  “We—” He broke off.

  Directly in front of him, less than two meters away, he saw a dark giant in the water, just beneath the surface. Up close, the twelve meters looked even bigger. Its snout open incredibly wide, Dupin could see it clearly, and even though he knew that humans were not on the menu for basking sharks, it was obvious that this snout wouldn’t have had any trouble with a full-grown human being.

  “Don’t worry, he won’t go after you, Monsieur le Commissaire.”

  Dupin had heard these words from owners of large dogs before and distrusted them on principle.

  Kolenc’s daughter smiled and took her father by the arm. “We need to go too. Au revoir, Monsieur le Commissaire.” Madame Bandol left with them.

  Dupin had given them a friendly nod and then quickly stared at the water again, as if under a spell.

  The shark had disappeared without a trace.

  The phone’s beeping broke the spell. He glanced quickly at the screen.

  Riwal.

  “Yes?”

  “I’m just about to meet Harold in a pub, boss. In Oban. It’s extremely windy here, I hope you can hear me.”

  There was a terrible hissing sound on the line.

  “Who are you meeting? In a pub?”

  “One of the old local reporters. The police barely know anything about that bank robbery anymore. It was the pre-digital era, you’ve always got to bear that in mind. And more than forty years ago. An older policeman gave me the tip about the local reporter. It’s a grim story. A bank clerk was shot and wounded, a third perpetrator was drowned while fleeing. There was over two hundred thousand pounds involved. Harold was the local reporter for Fort William News at the time. He worked on the story.”

  This was exactly why Dupin had sent Riwal to Scotland. To poke around. And come across this kind of information.

  Hurried footsteps rang out behind him.

  “Commissaire. Even more news!”

  Magalie Melen and Brioc L’Helgoualc’h.

  “Just a moment.” Dupin put the phone to his other ear. “Anything else for the moment, Riwal?”

  “Mackenzie’s wife doesn’t know anything about the holdup, and the photos didn’t mean anything to her either. I’ll be in touch again later.”

  The hissing on the other end was becoming increasingly unbearable.

  “Straight after you speak to the reporter!”

  Dupin hung up.

  Melen and L’Helgoualc’h were standing in front of him. L’Helgoualc’h was holding, Dupin now saw, something that looked like fabric in his right hand. And he was wearing thin plastic gloves.

  “I found this in the wood, under some bushes. On the plot of land behind Delsard’s and Tordeux’s houses, to one side of the path.”

  “And?” Dupin didn’t understand.

  L’Helgoualc’h unfolded what looked like a coarse tablecloth, thick linen, presumably once a dark beige, very faded and covered in dirt.

  All at once, Dupin understood. Melen’s ghost theory.

  “Where did you say the tablecloth was?”

  “Behind Delsard’s and Tordeux’s houses.”

  “To one side of the path?”

  “Yes. Ten meters away from the path. I didn’t find the place where the person left the path until my third attempt. The ground is covered in undergrowth and thick ivy. The person was very skillful.”

  “A light person?”

  “Not necessarily, if they’re agile.”

  “The size of the footprint?”

  “Not particularly big, but that’s hard to tell too, it’s very tricky ground,” L’Helgoualc’h mumbled. Dupin always got the feeling with him that he only gave information with the utmost reluctance, although he didn’t mean to be at all unfriendly.

  “Were you able to find any other footprints?”

  “It was just one person, I think. Prints here and there, all partial, the ground is too stony. The person came from Port Belon and went back there too, via a narrow, seldom-used path, a hunting trail that starts at the parking lot and forks several times in the woods.”

  “Someone could have come with the tablecloth and disposed of it on the way back,” Melen pondered aloud.

  “How long does the path take? From the parking lot in Port Belon as far as the bend?”

  “Seventeen minutes. There and back. Just walking the path itself at a brisk pace; the person didn’t run. But I didn’t say the person joined the path at the parking lot. They could just as easily have come from one of the back gardens and then joined the path.”

  “Those would be Tordeux’s or Delsard’s gardens,” said a startled Melen, “but it would be a stone’s throw for Premel and Kolenc too. There are small lanes and paths all over Port Belon.”

  That was true, but L’Helgoualc’h’s remark was still interesting.

  “Take the tablecloth to the forensic investigators.” Dupin rubbed his forehead. “So the whole operation only took twenty or twenty-five minutes.” That was important, particularly with inconclusive alibis. “If everything played out the way we’re assuming it did.”

  “Maybe someone wanted to direct the suspicion toward Delsard by hiding the tablecloth in the undergrowth behind their houses. Leaving a false trail.” Melen was right again.

  Dupin nodded.

  “Do you still need me?” L’Helgoualc’h’s emphasis made it clear that he would consider it an imposition.

  “Not at the moment. Thank you so much.”

  “Then I’ll take the tablecloth away.”

  L’Helgoualc’h neatly folded it up and trudged off sulkily.

  * * *

  Magalie Melen and Dupin had walked to the command center in front of the château. Like last time, Dupin didn’t sit down, pacing feverishly up and down in front of the tables instead. “We’ve got the alibis from Premel, Kolenc, and his daughter for this morning.”

  He was holding his notebook as he gave a brief report.

  Magalie Melen nodded after each name.

  “That tallies with all of the statements we had already taken. The young woman from the château was also doing the sales and tastings on-site from nine o’clock, over there in the château’s little yard. But of course that can’t be verified down to the minute. We’re talking about twenty or twenty-five minutes. If not much was happening, she or Louann Kolenc could have slipped away unnoticed. And even if people had arrived in the meantime, they might have waited, left, or come back later. We won’t be able to verify that.”

  “And Kolenc and Bandol are giving each other an alibi with their walk,” said Dupin.

  “All of the alibis are vague—and will probably stay that way.”

  There were deep furrows on Dupin’s forehead. Not from worry, but from annoyance.

  “Somebody needs to sound out Premel’s colleagues. Very carefully.”

  “I’ll send Braz. Just quickly, regarding Tordeux, Commissaire. The hospital has been in touch. He has fallen back into a coma again. The doctors are not venturing a prognosis. So he won’t able to tell us anything for now. We—”

  “Hello?”

  Dupin recognized Kadeg’s voice. It was cracking with excitement.

  “We’ve got something. Something important!”

  Of course.

  Kadeg came running down the street. And so the dramatic scenes in front of breathtaking backdrops continued. The sun made the Belon’s last stretch before the Atlantic glitter brightly. Millions of dancing diamonds.

  “My data expert has accessed some of Tordeux’s encrypted correspondence.” Kadeg paused gratuitously and Dupin noticed the acid in his stomach rising—his data expert? And in any case, what did Kadeg have to do with their case again all of a sudden?

  “We’ve found a deleted folder. And a highly significant document inside it.” Kadeg had stopped in front of Dupin, a single sheet in his hand. “We have found”—another pause; this time it was meant to seem dramatic—“a blackmail letter.”

  “A blackmail letter?”

  Kadeg held the sheet triumphantly in Dupin’s face.

  The commissaire took it and held it so he could read it.

  I expect the money tomorrow, Thursday. In cash.

  Meet me at 4 P.M.

  “That’s all? Just these lines? No greeting? No place?”

  “Just this for the moment.” Kadeg sounded offended. “We need to check whether we can de-encrypt more. It was in a folder deleted at six P.M. yesterday along with various business correspondence. We’ve been able to read some of it, and as far as we’ve been able to tell, it’s not relevant.”

  “This isn’t much, Kadeg. And it can’t have been the first letter, can it? The crucial pieces of information are missing. Including the amount. Above all, the addressee.”

  “The experts are still looking.”

  “Was it possible to establish what day the data was created?” Melen asked.

  “Yesterday afternoon, two o’clock.”

  Dupin ran a hand roughly through his hair again.

  “Shit.”

  He had raised his voice and begun to walk in circles. Kadeg spun round with him.

  How could this suddenly be about blackmail? What could be behind this? He didn’t have the faintest idea. But it clearly looked as though Tordeux had tried to blackmail someone. Tordeux, again and again. He had clear and considerable criminal intent. And ambitions. Dupin had to admit that he had considered this level of criminal intent out of the question. But he had made a mistake. An enormous mistake.

  His thoughts were racing. The fire had probably been a warning. That Tordeux had obviously not taken seriously.

  “And this is really all you found?”

  “As regards that issue, yes. But we did find out something else: when Tordeux bought the oyster farm near La Forȇt-Fouesnant, Delsard did—contrary to Tordeux’s statement—have a financial interest. To the tune of exactly a hundred and fifty thousand euro! We have seen the transfer on both accounts, with exact details, even the notary’s case number, everything properly accounted for.”

 

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