The dreadlocks twined with cowrie shells and yellow and red beads were familiar. Very familiar. Idrissa!
Aimée gasped. The half-open eyes were visible. There was a band of toche noire, a reddish brown tissue, across the pupils. Not a pretty sight. But a drying effect she recalled from premed.
She must have been killed several hours ago. Her face was distorted, her neck cocked at an impossible angle. Poor Idrissa, what a waste.
She knelt down. Something looked peculiar.
Peeling the bag lower, she saw dried rivulets of blood. But it wasn’t Idrissa.
It was a man. A man who’d been in the picture with Idrissa at Club Exe. Ousmane, the kora player.
Don’t get involved, she told herself.
Ahead, on rue Ste-Foy, she heard the whine of the late night garbage truck. Before the truck hit the square, she took a good look at the man. The pink bra and garter belt he wore were too large. Like an afterthought, Aimée figured. To make him look the Saint Denis type, on the off chance this bag, destined for the garbage truck, might be opened and the body found.
“We have to get the flics,” she said, still trying to shield the boy.
Fear shone in the old woman’s eyes. She shook her head, clutching him. She didn’t know or want to know. Maybe she had no papers.
“S’il vous plaît, before the trashmen come!”
Aimée didn’t want to do this. Get involved with this.
But the woman backed up, pulling the boy. What could Aimée do? The woman hobbled toward Passage du Caire. No time to follow them.
She’d been looking for Idrissa and now she’d found her accompanist. Why had Idrissa’s partner been killed? Had the killer made a mistake?
AIMÉE DRUMMED her heels on the 2nd arrondissement Commissariat floor. She sat inside a smudged glassed-in cubicle with scuffed walls, her hands on the wooden desk. Crumpled paper cups and memos filled the metal garbage can. On the duty binder was a stenciled memo, “Don’t forget the ten fingers of procedure!”
“Where’s Sergeant Mand?” Aimée asked. “I’d like to speak with him.”
“En vacances,” the on-duty flic answered.
Too bad. She’d made her first Communion with his daughter. Knew the family well. She’d lost a baby molar down their bathroom drain.
“Let me get this right,” the flic from the découvertes de cadavres unit said, pausing with his two fingers on the typewriter. “You found the body and recognized her?”
He really meant how would she recognize an African, un noir.
“A him, it’s a man.” Aimée didn’t want to admit she’d been looking for Idrissa. Didn’t want to tell him why.
“Voilà, a man,” the flic said. “Then how did you recognize him?”
“He’s well known in nouvelle griot music,” she said. “I’ve heard him with his partner at Club Exe.” The stale air and cigarette smoke made her nose itch. Itch for a cigarette.
“Let’s see, you give your address as 17, Quai d’Anjou on Ile St. Louis.” He pecked at the keyboard, not looking up. “What were you doing in the Sentier?”
She wanted to say None of your business. But in reality it was.
Flics could stop you any place, any time, demand your identification, and hold you on suspicion. Suspicion of anything.
“Going to get my nails done,” she said. She thrust her chipped red fingernails at him. “A disaster, eh? My friend has a nail salon.”
“Not much stays open this late in the Sentier.”
True. She thought quickly.
“But on rue Saint Denis, the girls stay open day and night, right? Who’s investigating the case?”
“Right now I am, Mademoiselle Leduc,” he said, his tone bored. “As I’m sure you’re aware, the police judiciare takes charge and will confer with le proc,* when she gets here.”
“Le proc, here? But that’s unusual,” she said. Normally, the flics submitted the evidence dossier to him or her at the Palais de Justice. Rarely did one get involved in investigation legwork.
“Unusual … good word,” said the flic, nodding in agreement. He scratched the back of his neck. “Life’s unusual these days. Especially with everyone on vacation!”
“The victim’s not a pute,” she said. “Nor a transvestite. He’s a musician!”
*Procurer de la Républic—the state prosecutor.
“I’m glad we have your word for it,” he said, even more bored.
After ten minutes the flic gave her a typed statement to read. There were plenty of spelling and grammar mistakes. But she thought better of bringing them to his attention.
She was about to sign when loud shuffling sounds came from the corridor. A middle-aged man was escorted to the other desk in the small cubicle.
He gripped the frayed plastic armrest, then sat down with measured slowness. His ashen pallor contrasted with his grease-stained black fingers.
“Now if you’ll sign this,” the flic said, irritation in his voice, “you’ll have done your civic duty and I can end my shift, Mademoiselle Leduc.”
Out of the corner of her eye, Aimée saw the man’s body jerk. After she’d signed and looked up, she realized he was staring at her. Staring with disbelief.
Like Georges and Frédo at Action-Réaction.
Again a shiver went up her spine.
“Monsieur Pascal Ourdours, residing in Conflans, Cergy Préfecture,” said the blue-uniformed flic, reading his ID. “Pretty late for you to drive so far to your home, eh?”
“Not really,” the man said.
“Can you explain your reason for being on rue des Jeûners?”
He sat, rodlike. “Visiting friends, like I told the officer.”
“Did you see anyone running in that vicinity?”
But Aimée never heard his answer. The flic tugged her arm, indicating she should give up her seat to a miniskirted, blue-eye-shadowed middle-aged woman tapping her worn sandals.
“Vite, chérie,” the woman said. “My feet hurt.”
On her way out, Aimée searched for familiar faces. She heard the duty desk flic talking over a police radio: “Quiet night except for a homicide, two witnesses, plus the usual working ladies. That’s all, patron.”
So Pascal Ourdours was the other witness.
She recognized Edith Mésard, the new Procurateur de la République, striding into the Commissariat. As “La” Proc, Mésard had a lot to prove in the male-dominated system. Aimée wanted to renew their old acquaintance and get information.
“Madame Mésard,” she said. “Congratulations on your appointment to your position.”
Edith Mésard paused.
“Merci,” she said. Her voice quavered.
Aimée knew she’d had throat surgery. The woman sounded weak but her conviction record was strong. Strongest in the court.
Her gaze took in Aimée’s outfit. “Investigators are waiting, if you’ll excuse me….”
“Bien sûr,” Aimée said. “Perhaps later, I’d like to talk with you.”
“Will what you say interest me, Mademoiselle … Leduc, isn’t it? I’m sorry but my days get filled by eight A.M. I reserve my time for victims, enforcement officers, and the court docket.”
Underneath the Rodier suit, graceful manner, weak voice, and aristo manners was pure iron—formidable, in a word.