The Missing Corpse: A Brittany Mystery, page 28
part #4 of Commissaire Dupin Series
So Dupin had made a mistake on this point too. And even more importantly: Tordeux had lied again!
“And Delsard was also a co-investor in the purchase of the farm in Cancale. Two hundred thousand euro.”
In both cases the amounts that Delsard had contributed were—in light of the total prices—not exorbitant sums. Nevertheless, Tordeux and Delsard were in fact doing business together, that had now been established.
“This is just unbelievable. I’ve had enough now.”
Dupin had stopped walking, his hands balled into fists. He became lost in contemplation of the silver Atlantic beyond the Belon estuary. Half of the village must have heard him ranting.
Did everything essentially revolve around a dispute between Tordeux and Delsard? Had the pair of them quarreled? Maybe then there really would be ties to the sand theft in the end …
“I want to speak to Delsard.”
Dupin himself would never have thought he would say these words, especially with such determination.
Kadeg couldn’t hide his satisfaction. “You see, there you go. And the prefect is expecting you to call him. Immediately, I’m to tell you.”
“I’m not going to do anything.”
“He has postponed the press conference till four P.M. and wants to, and I quote, talk to you immediately.”
“What”—this sentence wasn’t easy for Dupin to utter either—“about the sand theft? Are there any updates on that?”
“It’s looking more and more solid.” Kadeg’s self-satisfaction was insufferable. “Construction Traittot used significant quantities of sand, and its existence and purchase is not recorded anywhere. That’s beyond doubt. And there’s only one conclusion to be drawn from it. There are also links to a bogus shipping company in Lorient, a company with no contracts. It could have collected the sand from the beaches—I already have circumstantial evidence of that too, I had told you that. We’re expecting an arrest warrant for Delsard to be issued any moment now.”
“This is a disaster,” Dupin blurted out. It was all playing perfectly into the prefect’s hands. Including the genuine business ties that had now been proven between Delsard and Tordeux.
It was like a bad film, but he had to face up to the situation: Kadeg’s ridiculous obsession with the sand theft, his unauthorized, childish surveillance farce, that had all been on the right track. Dupin had been seriously wrong. But, he thought with his gaze fixed on the river, even if all of this presumed major criminal intent made every other crime, even murder, seem possible—why the hell would someone have murdered Smith and Mackenzie in this situation?
The commissaire heaved a deep sigh.
“We’re going to meet outside Delsard’s house in three minutes. Three minutes!”
Dupin took his mobile out of his pocket and set off. His mood was in the doldrums.
Before he could even think about the most skillful way of beginning the phone call with the prefect, the tirade was already pouring forth.
Dupin held the receiver as far away from his ear as his arm would allow. But he still heard the words loud and clear: “disgraceful behavior,” “willful boycott,” “disciplinary proceedings,” “suspension,” there was even mention of a “transfer to the real end of the world,” a phrase that Kadeg brooded over briefly: What on earth could the real end of the world be in the prefect’s eyes?
Only gradually did the voice on the other end calm down.
Dupin held the phone to his ear carefully. He had taken a turnoff on his left, onto the picturesque path along the Belon.
“I’ve had to postpone the press conference. A second time! Which is entirely your fault. All of the evidence is there and I hear nothing! Nothing at all. Disgraceful. Only piecemeal and from this person or that person. The supposed car accident! Delsard and Tordeux’s business entanglements that Kadeg had to dig up for you! The blackmail!” Dupin should have known. Kadeg had spoken to the prefect first and already informed him about everything. “That it was definitely an arson attack! You’ve known for hours that Delsard wanted to kill Tordeux and I—the person with sole responsibility—I don’t know a thing.”
Dupin thought this over quickly: with his last point, the prefect must be referring to the footprints in the wood and the tablecloth—it was evidence but purely circumstantial! And he was still not finished:
“And you—you’re chasing the two Scotsmen, some ridiculous chimeras and nonsense that have nothing to do with us anyway. If you hadn’t deliberately held back the evidence of Delsard’s attack on Tordeux because it didn’t conform to your obsessions and confused theories, then—”
“Has the forensics team found anything on the tablecloth?”
The prefect raised his voice even more. “I … no. But do you know where the old policeman from the Monts d’Arrée found it? Yes? In front of Delsard’s house. Another piece of evidence!”
“Behind the house. Placed so conspicuously that a pro would spot it as an artificially placed clue immediately.”
Locmariaquer didn’t seem to have heard this.
“Incidentally, we have the extremely well paid, best forensic investigator in the world, and you have that old man from the mountains come? But we’ll discuss that in detail later, along with everything else.” His tone of voice was softening slightly. “So I’m not going to appear before the press until this evening now.”
“And what story are you going to tell?”
There was quite a long pause. Even now, Dupin didn’t think it was impossible that his question would provoke another fit.
“The story about how we’re dealing with a hardened criminal in Delsard!” The wording sounded like a joke, but obviously not to the prefect. “Sand theft on a systematic scale, over the course of years, meticulously organized. An arson attack, attempted murder, potentially other murders. Dirty business dealings. And there’ll be a few more things. Tordeux was his front man, Delsard did business through him, invested in various fields, definitely not just in the oyster industry, but we’ll be able to prove it! Presumably he secretly used semilegal company structures to evade the tax. Exactly: tax fraud will no doubt be part of it! So Tordeux becomes aware of some things and blackmails him. He wanted a bigger slice of the pie, that’s how it goes! And then there’s always blackmail! So Delsard wanted to get rid of his accomplice.”
It was remarkable how the prefect was twisting things.
“And the two Scotsmen, Monsieur le Préfet?”
“I’ve said it before and I won’t say it a third time: the poor oyster farmer was in the wrong place at the wrong time—at the handover of the money. He—”
“And why would Tordeux and Delsard, who knew each other well, suddenly meet at a place like that to hand over the money like strangers? That just doesn’t make any sense, they…”
Dupin broke off. It didn’t make any sense to ask the prefect these questions. He had become fixated and there was no way to put him off course.
“Do you see?”
Dupin had no idea what that was supposed to mean.
“Your questions lead nowhere. You don’t have the beginnings of an answer! We can easily leave the two Scotsmen to the Scottish police. We’ll send our colleagues all of the facts. And then this matter is over and done with! Do you hear me, Commissaire? That is an official order! You are going to halt all further investigation into this issue! The two matters are unrelated, I don’t need to tell you how often that happens: a coincidence, a coincidental intersection of events.”
Dupin didn’t speak. He knew all too well that protesting was pointless. The awful thing was that the story would, if you told the bare bones of it, sound thoroughly plausible to an outsider. The commissaire had been through this more than once: sometimes on a case, there came a point when nobody had any real interest in knowing the truth all of a sudden, in continuing to laboriously dig for it. It ebbed away, it died, it was a kind of general exhaustion. At some point—and it had nothing whatsoever to do with the actual duration of the investigation, its real length, but to do with an internal dynamic—it was enough to be able to tell a credible-sounding story that rounded everything off, just to find an ending. Regardless of whether the story still had holes or how big they were. A story that roughly linked everything together, covering the main elements. And everyone concerned was then often relieved—although their consciences prickled now and again. Dupin knew the temptation, he knew it well, but it had always been impossible for him to give in to it. It was simply impossible for him to accept something he knew was not correct.
“All right.” The prefect had, of course, misinterpreted the silence. “We’re in agreement then. Don’t take my words too much to heart, they’re meant to be more of a warning to you.” The prefect took a theatrical breath in. “Ah, mon Commissaire, sometimes people get carried away, sometimes things are just complicated. So it’s good to have a smart sparring partner. I have some more good news, by the way: I am personally coming to Port Belon and will carry out Delsard’s arrest. And get your inspector to come back from Scotland immediately, that expensive work trip is probably already putting an undue strain on your commissariat’s travel budget.”
“You can…” Dupin paused.
“I repeat: I expect you to summon Riwal back immediately.”
The commissaire sensed how serious the prefect was about this. Deadly serious.
“I’ve got a series of important calls to make now. I’ll see you on the scene very soon!”
The prefect had hung up.
Dupin didn’t know what he was feeling: disgust, bewilderment, revulsion, fury, rebellion—all at the same time.
He shook himself, once, twice, and ran a hand through the hair on the back of his head.
He had walked quite a distance without realizing. Along the Belon, around the first large inlet. There were tall stone pines amongst the oaks that went down to the bank. The water was calm here, crystal clear; some stones lay on the pale sand and little fish darted about in the shallow water.
He immediately turned on his heel and ran back, half jogging, as he held his mobile to his ear. He wanted to hear what Riwal had to report.
“Riwal, what’s the—”
“Boss?”
Like last time, he could only just make out what Riwal was saying, although there were different disruptive noises in the background this time. Voices. Lively voices.
“We need—”
“I can barely hear you, boss. It’s pretty busy in the pub. I ordered myself a haggis with Harold, and a pint on the side, delicious, but not for the fainthearted. People are wrong to make fun of Scottish cuisine—”
“Riwal! What did the reporter say?”
“We had a long talk. It was all very dramatic in this bank robbery. Harold really got to grips with the details back then and he thinks he still has his old notes. You’d like him, boss.”
“Get to the point, Riwal!”
At least it was easy to hear him now.
“At first, the holdup was going smoothly for the three men, but then everything got out of hand. A guard drew a pistol, there was a scuffle. Mackenzie, who was clearly the leader of the gang, attacked him, seized control of the gun, and shot at the guard. He received a stomach wound and survived. But during the commotion, Mackenzie hurt himself too, which meant he couldn’t escape. Smith and Ben Osborn, the third man, fled on motorbikes. Osborn had the money—it was exactly two hundred and forty-three thousand pounds! Smith was apprehended an hour later, probably extremely drunk. The third man tried to get away on a small boat but the sea was rough. A fisherman saw him putting out to sea, he didn’t stand a chance.” By his standards, Riwal was reporting very concisely; thoroughly but concisely. “Two days later the wrecked boat was found on a rock, along with a single shoe and the mask.”
“The money?” The commissaire was walking at a brisk pace.
“The money was never found. The coast guard searched for a few more days. The assumption is that it got lost in the Atlantic. When the search was called off, the fishermen and other locals began to dive for the money. It was a sensation, of course. Such a big sum just floating around in the sea, in a plastic bag! Can you imagine? It became a kind of sport. But it never turned up again.”
“And Mackenzie and Smith?”
“They confessed and were put inside for four and three years respectively. They were seriously lucky to be under twenty-one. Otherwise the sentences would have been much stiffer.”
Even Dupin himself couldn’t have said why this story interested him so much.
“Perhaps someone did find the money and didn’t say anything,” said Riwal.
“What do you mean?” Dupin had already been somewhere else in his thoughts.
“One of the fishermen could have found the money. He could have spent it bit by bit without attracting attention. Or he could have moved away.”
Starting from the assumption that the money hadn’t gone missing threw up endless possible stories.
There was a rather long pause.
“Or … or the money didn’t even end up in the water because it had been dumped somewhere beforehand, or”—Dupin was running through more possibilities—“the third man never had it, Smith did. And he dumped it somewhere.”
“You’re right, boss, all possible. It’s all based on just these two men’s statements. We only know this version. It’s possible they came up with a version together. Mackenzie and Smith were in the same prison. Even before the trial.”
“Maybe Smith lied to Mackenzie too. Maybe he invented the story that the third man had the money.”
“Harold said that too.”
“Were there any clues indicating that?”
“No. Nothing.”
“What else does this Harold say?”
Dupin was almost back at the château now. Magalie Melen was waiting for him outside Delsard’s house.
“The three men had known each other since they were sixteen. They all came from the Isle of Skye, albeit from different parts, and to begin with, they learned to fish in Portree for a year. Then all three of them worked on an oyster and mussel farm. They were always hanging round together, going to the same pubs. And they got up to plenty of mischief. One time, they took their boss’s boat and went on a three-day bender to the Outer Hebrides. They almost died in the process. He fired them afterward.”
“Any other offenses?”
“Just harmless things, sometimes a brawl, broken furniture, a damaged car, never anything bad, no bodily harm, no grand larceny or anything like that. They wanted to take the money from the bank robbery and get out of there.”
Dupin thought it would be terrible, miserable, awful: life as a young person in the seventies on a godforsaken island in a godforsaken part of the world, isolated and with no prospects. He instantly understood the wild boat trip. And, as stupid as the idea of the bank robbery had been, he understood the urge to get out of there.
“How long were they employed in oyster and mussel farming?”
“Almost two years.”
“Keep poking about, Riwal. Let Harold talk.”
“Another thing, boss: we’ve tracked down the reporter who wrote the article for Piping Today. He and a photographer were there for two nights. They stayed in Pont-Aven, in the Central.”
Riwal waited for a response from Dupin. It didn’t come. The commissaire knew the hotel well.
“They didn’t notice anything unusual; they only spoke to the leader of the group, a Monsieur Danneau. The photos weren’t meant to show anyone specific.”
“Okay. Call Nolwenn and update her on everything. Otherwise don’t tell a soul. Don’t answer any calls from anyone! Apart from calls from me and Nolwenn.” Dupin needed to protect Riwal. He wouldn’t tell him anything about the prefect’s order yet, but he wouldn’t summon him back either. “Most importantly, don’t answer any calls from Quimper. Or from unknown numbers. And stay in touch!”
Dupin hung up. He was standing a few meters away from Delsard’s house.
Perhaps that dramatic business from years back did play a part in the present in some crazy way. The dilemma was this: How and why would this business crop up again more than forty years later, in Brittany of all places? Could the money still exist? Could it have made its way here via a circuitous route? To a person whom Mackenzie, Smith, or the third man had known back in the day? Known well? A person who had also been in the photograph in Piping Today?
Dupin pulled himself together.
He would get over his terrible inner exhaustion and redouble his efforts. Take another careful look, and that meant at everything!
* * *
Magalie Melen was standing in the driveway of Delsard’s property, next to a dark green Porsche SUV. She had been waiting for Dupin.
You couldn’t make out the house from the road—it was screened off by tall oleander, camellia, and laurel bushes, and it wasn’t until you took a few steps down the driveway that you saw it: a stylishly restored old farmhouse with a barn, on the edge of a parklike garden facing east toward Riec. There was a magnificent pool in the middle of the lush garden, along with a few palm trees. Large mallow bushes here and there. Beyond the garden was the beginning of the wood and the path that cut through it, near where they had found the tablecloth.
Melen had her mobile to her ear. “All right, thanks.”
She hung up and came a few steps closer to the commissaire. “He’s in his study with two lawyers. He’s expecting you.”
It sounded like the preparation for a showdown in a Western.
“Then let’s go.”
Melen turned round and strode past the car; she clearly knew the way.
“Cueff will be here in half an hour,” she said when Dupin caught up with her. “The bacterium still has not been detected in the Belon, but the sales ban will remain in place for now. There is further evidence of Tordeux’s systematic fraud, we can now be confident there must have been a crime; nothing new on the blackmail letter, the computer experts have not been able to recover any other relevant document so far. And no trace evidence could be found on the tablecloth either.”
