 |
| Pelletier. |
Louis Shalako
The pair were back on the street, and as Édouard unlocked the vehicle, their
friendly gendarme was nowhere in sight but there were no parking tickets and
the vehicle was unmolested.
“Did you notice how he seemed a little spooked there,
Inspector? Right at first, for sure. Then. When I mentioned criminal records
and the employees?”
“Er. Which one—” They’d just interviewed about fifteen
people, all busy, harried with the lunch crowd lining up and a few VIPs known
to have reservations.
This was about half their list and they’d have to
follow up.
“Bayer—Fritz, as he calls himself.” He nodded,
thoughtfully, as he stuck the key in the ignition.
“Hmn.”
***
Well, it was the usual thing. With bulging notebooks,
after emptying pockets and briefcases back at the room, it would almost seem
like they were getting somewhere. As impressions went, it would have been
pretty damned misleading. So far, they hadn’t gotten anywhere at all. And, also
as usual, someone, Margot, was just heading out, and Firmin was just getting back
after being somewhere else—which was just another one of their little sayings
around there. The others were all out on cases, which was also predictable
enough.
Ignoring them, Firmin settled in and reached for the
phone. Voice low, pen in hand, he had his own focus.
“So. Édouard.
What are your impressions, so far?”
“Huh. Which case?”
Gilles laughed at that
one.
“You can start anywhere
you like, Édouard.”
The constable nodded,
thoughtfully. His impressions,
insofar as he knew, would be pretty much what any other investigator would have
gathered. Maybe, not even all that good.
Still, the question had
been asked.
“Well. It’s all mostly
bullshit—that is definitely true for the, er, restaurant caper.” And no wonder
the original detectives had given it up, probably gladly.
It simply wasn’t worth
wasting their time—
“Ah.”
“Well, I mean. Seriously. Take the kitchen. There’s
fifteen or twenty people in there on a busy shift, with waiters coming and
going, and certainly during daylight, deliveries coming to the back door.
They’ve got good old Fritz all over them like a dirty shirt. My…my impression,
sir, is that it’s more of an elaborate prank, as much as anything else. Did
those two victims, even exist in the first place? How in the hell would I know,
bearing in mind low-level employees, who might have shown an ID card or maybe
not, when signing on. I’ll just bet
they have application forms, all filled out, and not much else. It’s a funny
thing about such a business. They don’t even write pay-cheques—employees get a
written stub for tax purposes, but their pay is an envelope with bills and
coins, minus relevant deductions. They might get a share of the up-front tips,
even. This is one reason why alien residents so very often end up working in
places like that…” If someone was known
to be an illegal, the deductions were still made, only thing was they never
made it to the relevant government agencies…in an employment and tax scam that
was about as old as time itself. “Half the small businesses in the world are
cooking their books in some way or another…”
It was just another sweatshop, if one cared to think
of it that way, although the cash was paid weekly rather than daily.
“As far as fresh blood goes, any good wino would
donate that in a heartbeat, for a few francs…” Or, you could buy a few pints
out the back door of a clinic somewhere, in any blood type one wanted.
Maintenon nodded, following the logic.
“I mean, there are not too many places paying cash,
and not too many questions asked, either. A job is a job, and maybe they just
can’t go home—the world is full of refugees these days.” Half the world didn’t
even have ID to begin with.
“Ah.”
“Other than that, sir. Every fucking God-damned one of
them is lying to us, whether it even happened or not. What else am I supposed to
think. So far, we haven’t been able to shake any one of them, and unless we can
find some kind of a pressure-point, it seems unlikely to happen, shall we say,
more spontaneously.”
“But why, Édouard.”
“That is but the
question. Whatever the hell it is, whoever
the hell it is, well. There must be a reason. That reason must be pretty
important, or why fuck with the police at all…” Why draw any attention at all.
“That seems pretty
logical.”
“What other conclusion
could we draw? It’s bullshit right from the beginning. It also implies a plan
of some elaboration.”
“Hmn. No, this was no
spontaneous, impulsive little double murder. I’m almost sure of that. It’s like
you say. We’re supposed to go looking for a couple of bodies, based upon a
complaint that looks entirely bogus. It’s also made the headlines, and
naturally, a million eyes are watching us…” Maintenon’s thoughts trailed off.
“The reporters take the facts handed to them, having no reason to question it,
and the readers, with even less reason, sort of take it at face value. To them,
it is now fact. But that doesn’t mean
we have to.”
“Well, there you go.” Édouard.
“I guess you could say, we have our motivation. We have our list of names. We
can check for criminal records, military service, arrests that didn’t go
anywhere. We can knock on doors and see if we can find them at home…it would be
nice to get some mug-shots and fingerprints off of every damned one of them. We
could show them around to the neighbours, or check out previous employers.
Let’s put it to them, tell them we’re waiting for a warrant, and then see who
disappears first…”
Firmin, off the phone
now and sitting there fascinated, and about as quiet as a church-mouse, impaled
Gilles with a long look and a wry grin. He gave an appreciative nod, and Gilles
tried not to show any sign of it, all of this over Édouard’s shoulder.
 |
| Firmin. |
Maintenon nodded,
allowing himself a tight and wry little grimace.
The thing with routine
police work was that it took time, it took money, and more than anything it
took warm bodies. People that knew what they were doing, had some idea of how
to do it, and a dash of imagination. It also had this funny way of working out,
if you just kept at it long enough.
“…and what a tangled
web we weave, when we set out to deceive…”
One had to admit,
Pelletier sure had that one right.
Gilles looked up at the
clock. He had an appointment with Roger at three-thirty, and he wanted to put
some thought into that as well.
“All right. Why don’t
you start off down in the archives. A couple of those gentlemen sounded foreign
as well, you could call the customs and border people. Passport Control. They
have their own records of comings-and-goings, although it does tend to take a
little time. Call the switchboard and tell them what you want. It does require
some patience, ah, sometimes.” He sighed. “One thing we do know. This one isn’t
going to be solved in five minutes.”
Édouard snorted.
“No, I should say not—”
His mouth curled. “You know, I asked them, how is Fritz to work for? I got a
few blank looks on that one, it was like they had no idea of what I was talking
about, or it was like I was just stupid or something. It’s that kind of
environment. They’re all scared shitless of him, and yet they could get jobs in
just about any kitchen in town. A man like Fritz is expected to be an asshole—pardon my language, but there it is.”
Working with someone like Fritz looked well enough on any future resume,
assuming any culinary ambitions at all.
As long as you could
stand it in the meantime—
“And what about the Boitard
case?”
 |
| Cynthie: at least she existed. |
“Hmn. It’s like the
same thing again. I would call it nothing but bullshit, and yet we at least
have a body to anchor it. Cynthie really did exist, on some level—”
He sat there, rubbing
whiskers, unconscious of pretty much everything but his own thoughts.
“Here’s another one,
sir.”
“Yes?”
“Huh! Where in the hell
did Monsieur Garreau, a nineteen year-old kid, who was not even showing up at
work, go for just on two weeks. Did he have a bank account. Did he withdraw
money? Did he have a big whack of cash stuffed under the mattress…and did he
make his own bed or is momma still doing that—she very much seemed the type.
Did anyone even ask. Why did he leave, where did he go, why did he even come
back. How did he live, what did he eat, who was he with. I’d give my left
testicle to hear a few good answers on that one. And yet, ostensibly, the case
has been brought to a successful conclusion, and no harm done. Right?”
Maintenon, to all
appearances was barely listening, but then, he had bit of a stubble himself,
and all the same impressions to consider.
“Ahem.” Firmin stood
there, completely forgotten as it were.
Édouard, mouth open,
craned to look.
“Er, yes, Detective?”
“Come on. Bring your
list. I was just going down there—” He gave Gilles another long look. “Criminal
Records, I mean…they know us pretty well down there.”
“Sure. Why don’t we
start with the one guy who quit, this Monsieur Lalonde. Then we’ll go from
there.” Without a job to worry about, he might be a little more talkative.
“It’s a place to start.”
Firmin raised an
eyebrow, but said nothing as Édouard hauled himself to his feet.
Thank Darwin, or the
gods or someone or something somewhere, but Maintenon’s phone rang at that
exact moment or he might have shown a little more appreciation.
It was all he could do,
just to keep a straight face.
Yeah, this kid was good
all right.
Not everyone got
Firmin’s seal of approval quite so easily.
As for Gilles, he was
fairly convinced.
Right about then
Archambault came back, and then it was Garnier, and now the damned phones were
ringing all at once or so it would seem.
END
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