‘And what did you do?’
‘It was interfering with my fishing, so it was. Hard enough to catch fish anyway without damned rowing boats getting in the way. I gave it a good push, so I did.’
‘Was that all you did?’
‘Good push didn’t work. It came back to rest where it had been before. So I waded out and put it back into the current. Damned boat should be in Entraygues or even beyond by now.’
‘Did you see what was in the boat, monsieur?’
‘Why should I care what was in the boat, for God’s sake? I come here to fish, not to inspect the insides of people’s rowing boats like some devil of a tax man.’
‘Was the boat empty? Could you see the bottom?’
‘Damned boat had a tarpaulin drawn up all over it. Couldn’t see what was inside. It was pretty heavy, mind you. I could tell that when I shoved it into the current.’
‘Are you telling me that you didn’t even take a peek under that tarpaulin? The cargo might have been valuable, after all.’
‘Nothing to do with me. I’ve told you that already. Now why don’t you give my money and shove off. You’re disturbing the fish, for Christ’s sake.’
With some reluctance Powerscourt decided the man was telling the truth. He handed over some notes and set off back to Entraygues in pursuit of something buried beneath a tarpaulin. As he regained the main road he heard a shout of triumph from the river bank. Maurice Vernais had caught his first fish of the day.
Jean Pierre Roche was a curly-haired youth just past his tenth birthday. His friend Auguste was slightly smaller with a gap in his front teeth. ‘Race you to that rowing boat on the stones,’ said Jean Pierre, setting off at once for he knew his friend was faster than he was. Sure enough, Auguste overtook him towards the end of the hundred-yard dash to the stricken vessel.
‘I win,’ said Auguste proudly, touching the side of the boat in confirmation of his victory. They bent down and peered inside. More or less all they could see was the tarpaulin.
‘What do you think is underneath?’ said Jean Pierre. ‘Smugglers’ stuff, maybe? Perhaps it belongs to some gang of smugglers operating in secret all over southern France.’
Auguste removed the heavy stone that held it down and pulled back the tarpaulin. They stared at Patrick MacLoughlin, his head lying to one side, dressed in the black garments of the novice priest. MacLoughlin did not speak.
‘He’s asleep,’ said Auguste, ‘better leave him alone. I’m hungry. I want my lunch.’
Jean Pierre did not think the man was asleep. He had seen death recently in his own home, a grandfather who went to sleep in his chair after Sunday lunch and never woke up. That had been a year ago and Jean Pierre never forgot the strange pallor that spread over the old man’s face. Gingerly, his hand shaking slightly, he reached inside and felt the face of Patrick MacLoughlin. It was cold, very cold.
‘He’s not sleeping,’ said Jean Pierre, pulling the tarpaulin back over the corpse, ‘he’s dead. I’m going to tell Mama. She’ll know what to do.’ He started off at full speed back to his house. ‘It’s jolly exciting finding a dead person, don’t you think, Auguste? Maybe we’ll be let off afternoon school. I still haven’t finished that maths homework.’
‘Do you think there’ll be some reward?’ asked Auguste, keeping pace with his friend rather than overtaking him. ‘I could do with some extra money.’
Madame Daniele Roche was deeply devoted to all her five children, but if you pressed her up against a wall she would probably have said that Jean Pierre was her favourite. He was so quick and so curious and so bright. But she would have been the first to say that his imagination sometimes got the better of him. Last year he had reported a sighting of a squadron of lancers trotting down the main street of Entraygues. He had been able to give a perfect description of the details of their resplendent uniforms, but no soldiers had visited the town that day. A month ago he claimed to have seen Charlemagne himself on a mighty white charger pausing in the middle of the medieval bridge and asking Jean Pierre for directions to Conques. So when her eldest son announced that he and Auguste had found a dead body in a rowing boat by the river she paid no attention at all.
‘Come along, it’s lunchtime, Jean Pierre. Auguste, you’d better run off home. Your mother will be worried.’
Jean Pierre made no move towards the lunch table where his younger siblings and his elder sister were preparing to tuck into a fragrant stew, made to a recipe from Jean Pierre’s grandmother. Auguste too held his ground.
‘Please, Mama,’ said the boy, ‘I’m not making this up, I promise you. There is a dead man in a boat by the edge of the river. I don’t think he’s French either. I think he’s foreign.’
‘And what would a foreigner be doing lying dead by the Lot in our little town? We hardly ever see any foreigners round here. Come and sit down, Jean Pierre.’
‘Please, Mama.’ Jean Pierre was holding on to her arm. ‘You’ve got to believe me. I’m not making it up. He might be important, this dead man. Maybe the police are looking for him already.’
‘Your father always says, as you well know, that respectable people like us should have nothing to do with the police.’
‘Jean Pierre is right,’ said Auguste, entering the lists on his friend’s behalf. Mothers could be so unreasonable at times. ‘I saw it too, the dead body, I mean.’
Oddly enough the support and testimony of Auguste weighed heavily with Daniele Roche. Jean Pierre was capable of any feats of fancy but she had known Auguste since he and Jean Pierre started school together. Solid, yes, she would have said, reliable, yes, but about as much imagination as a dried raisin. That was what made him an ideal foil for Jean Pierre.
‘Well, maybe,’ she said, beginning to relent, ‘but you must eat your lunch first. Auguste, you’re more than welcome to join us as you’re so late.’
‘Please, Mama,’ said Jean Pierre, tugging at her arm. ‘We must go now. It could be important. How would you feel if one of your children was lying dead in a boat and some mother refused to help because of a plate of stew?’
Daniele Roche restrained herself from pointing out that the only member of her family she could imagine being found dead in a rowing boat was Jean Pierre himself. She entrusted her children to the care of her eldest girl and followed the boys towards the boat. Once there she too touched the dead man’s face. Then she crossed herself and knelt down to say a battery of Hail Marys. She sent the boys to run as fast as they could to tell the doctor, who lived on the far side of the town square, and the local policeman. The two of them, she thought, would be believed. Jean Pierre on his own would not be regarded as a credible witness. About forty minutes later the butcher’s cart, with the doctor on board, could be seen carrying a package wrapped in a tarpaulin towards the doctor’s surgery. The rumours were flying round Entraygues faster than the wind. The body of a top politician from Lyon had been found in the boat. Nonsense, said the more fanciful citizens, it was a mass murderer from Toulouse the police had been trying to apprehend for months. Rubbish, said the party that took its news from the boulangerie, everybody knew that the dead man was American, on the run from the terrible gangsters in New York City.
Lord Francis Powerscourt noticed the tarpaulin as he rode back into town on the Estaing road. He raced up to the melancholy party. ‘Gentlemen,’ he said, ‘please forgive me. My name is Powerscourt. I am an investigator from England, currently attached to a party of American pilgrims, at present resident in Estaing up the road.’ He lowered his voice slightly. ‘One of these Americans is missing. If you have what I think you have under that tarpaulin, I may be able to identify it for you.’
Half an hour later the business was complete. Dr Lafont informed Powerscourt that the dead man had been strangled before being placed in the rowing boat. After Powerscourt’s identification a label was attached to the dead man proclaiming him to be Patrick MacLoughlin, twenty-two years old, resident in the city of Boston in the State of Massachusetts, United States of America, an American citizen. The only other thing found in the boat, apart from the corpse, was a scallop shell, solemnly handed over to Powerscourt. A police sergeant had appeared. He informed Powerscourt that the local officers had all been informed about the pilgrims by their colleagues in Le Puy. An inspector was on his way from the neighbouring town of Figeac to take charge of the investigation. He requested that the pilgrim party remain in the hotel in Estaing and its environs until further notice. Here we go again, Powerscourt thought bitterly as he rode back. Who do we start bribing first? The Mayor of Estaing, whoever he might be? The local cure or his superiors from Conques? More contributions to the widows’ and orphans’ fund of the police force in Figeac?