‘They’re both employed by a company called Cominter whose registered office is in Nassau.’
‘There’s also a garage,’ says the concierge. ‘They’ve each got a car. The same make, as a matter of fact. A red Mini for Fatima, a black one for Marie-Christine.’
‘Let’s go and take a look. We’ll come back up afterwards.’
In the underground garage, there’s a timer switch affording only a dim light. The concierge points to the double lock-up. The door is simply pushed to. An inspector opens it. Empty. And there, splattered on the right-hand wall at head height, is a dark stain, a long trail down to the ground ending in a dark brown puddle of dried blood. Silence. Noria closes her eyes, overcome. This was where Fatima was shot, her neck split open, the blood on the wall, the body sliding, crumpling, drained. All that remains of the murder are the grisly bloodstains. Bonfils touches her arm. She jumps. Everyone around her has sprung into action.
Two Crime Squad inspectors call the forensic team and seal off the garage. The others go back up to the apartment to search through the papers, find her flatmate, visit the bank …
Marie-Christine Malinvaud has family in the country, with whom she’s still in touch. They phone each other. She’s planning to spend Christmas with them in a few days’ time. In Pithiviers, the concierge tells them.
Malinvaud, in Pithiviers. Directory inquiries.
An inspector telephones. And finds Marie-Christine.
She’s there a few hours later, at Crime Squad HQ, a tall girl with fair hair tied back at the nape with a bow and dull hazel eyes. Wearing baggy trousers, a shapeless anorak and clumpy shoes, she sits wan-faced as she is interviewed by Patriat, the chief of the Crime Squad team investigating the killing of Fatima Rashed. In his grey suit and grey and blue patterned tie, he remains resolutely distant as he conducts the enquiry.
Born in 1963 in Pithiviers. Father a notary’s clerk, mother a housewife. No brothers or sisters.
‘Yes, we were both part of Mado’s call-girl ring, rue de Marignan. Do you know it?’ No reply. Half smile. ‘You’d be the only ones in the police not to.’
‘Let’s keep to the point, Mademoiselle Malinvaud. As you know, Fatima Rashed was murdered, and for the moment you’re our chief witness. A role you ought to take seriously. Let us resume. How long have you been working for Mado?’
‘A year.’
‘How did you get into contact with her?’
She shakes her head, her eyes vacant.
‘It’s such a classic story, that now I can’t understand how it could have happened to me. After I left school, I came to Paris to do drama. Actually, I just wanted to get out of Pithiviers. I enrolled at the Einaudi school and worked part-time in a supermarket to pay for my lessons. I think at that point I still believed in it. People regularly came to watch us work. I started hanging around with Lentin, the film producer, and his crowd. Actors, film technicians, famous people. He promised me small parts in his films as soon as an opportunity came up, and entrusted me to a friend of his, a so-called stills photographer, apparently wanting to put together a portfolio. At that point, I stopped working in the supermarket. He took nude photos of me, I slept with him, and with his friends, telling myself this would help launch my career. He didn’t force me, let me make that clear. And then I started with strangers to whom he’d shown the photos and who paid me a lot. I stopped going to drama school, I had no talent to be honest, and I found myself on Mado’s books.’
‘When did you meet Fatima Rashed?’
‘When I arrived at Mado’s. She was my mentor, so to speak. And she took her job very seriously. It was she who found us a flat to rent. She supervised my wardrobe, got me to read the novels everyone was talking about, dragged me to various exhibitions, kept an eye on who I was meeting. I think Mado gave her a commission on my clients.’
‘And you found it hard to put up with her keeping an eye on you?’
‘Not especially. As a matter of fact, I spent several years not thinking for one moment about what I was doing. And besides, Katryn …’
‘Katryn?’
‘… It’s Fatima’s nom de guerre. And nom de guerre it was. I’d say she was a … fascinating woman. She hated men with a single-minded vengeance. The only thing she enjoyed in life was making them pay, and pay as high a price as possible. The idea that a man could touch her without paying would have made her sick, or made her scream. She attempted to pass that hatred on to me, day after day. I don’t have that kind of strength, but it was reassuring to see. A sort of call girls’ Robin Hood, if you see what I mean?’
‘No comment. Why did you run off to Pithiviers the day she was murdered?’
‘Katryn was mixed up in a very dangerous game. She was collaborating with a journalist called Chardon. The pair of them entrapped clients and blackmailed them. They weren’t Mado’s clients, because she’s well organised and protected and Katryn would have been busted straight away. But there was a violent incident at Mado’s recently, a very young girl who was beaten up by Lentin and his buddies. They’d crossed the yellow line, and I know Katryn intended to make money out of it. The other day, she had a lunch date with Chardon to discuss it.’
‘Do you know this Chardon?’
‘I’ve met him several times, that’s all, and his story doesn’t stack up.’
‘Where can we find him?’
‘He lives near us, at 38 rue Philippe-Hecht.’
‘So, Friday, she was seeing Chardon. And then?’
‘We were supposed to be working together in the evening and had arranged to meet back at the apartment at seven. She didn’t show up. I went down to the garage to get my car, and I found the wall covered in blood, still fresh, and no Mini. I panicked. I know that Mado’s protectors are capable of killing …’ She lowers her voice … ‘I know that they’ve already killed … I felt I was in danger because I knew what Katryn was up to. I jumped into my car and drove straight to my parents’, without going back up to the apartment.’
‘You realise of course that you could have killed Fatima Rashed yourself and that you have a motive for doing so: she was creaming off money from you, in short, and she was spying on you for Mado.’
‘Yes, I understand that you see it that way, but I didn’t kill her. And I don’t think I’m capable of killing anyone.’ After a silence: ‘I’m afraid, I’m a coward, I’m tired, and I want to change my life. Go back to Pithiviers, marry a pharmacist, have children and play bridge.’
‘And why not? You won’t be the first prostitute to end up a bourgeois wife.’
Then the group leader turned to his inspectors:
‘The priority is to find this Chardon at all costs.’
It’s aperitif time in Mado’s office. Wearing a simple, well-tailored grey suit, she mixes cocktails with neat, precise movements. She proffers Bornand a stiff whisky sour. He thanks her, and starts taking little sips. Here, he’s on well-charted territory, no surprises, no hysterical outbursts, a moment of repose. For Cecchi, her pimp, a tall, well-built man with greased grey hair, the starchy demeanour of a provincial lawyer, but with a heavy, brutal jaw, it’s a tequila with a slice of lemon. And for herself, a very light vodka orange.
Cecchi opens the conversation:
‘Katryn has been murdered.’
‘Mado told me over the telephone.’ A long silence. He turns to her. ‘Katryn was mixed up with a certain Chardon. I don’t know whether you were aware of it?’ Mado and Cecchi exchange a glance. ‘A gutter press gossip columnist who was prosecuted for living off immoral earnings. That’s not good for the reputation of your establishment.’