The Dying Minutes Page 12

  That’s when he felt something hard press against the side of his head, through the hood.

  He knew what it was.

  There was no time for fear.

  He took a sharp, deep breath.

  It was his last.

  Part Two

  31

  CLAUDINE ARRIVED AT Marseilles’ Marignane airport on a Wednesday, shortly before lunch. She had arrived in Paris earlier that morning after a three-day delay in Guadeloupe; the tail end of a hurricane whipping past the island had grounded all flights. Making much of her condition at Charles de Gaulle airport, she had managed to get on the first connecting flight south to Marseilles. Waiting for her bags at the carousel, still a little ashamed of her small deceit – a six-month pregnancy that still hardly showed was poor grounds for preferential treatment – she suddenly felt tired and heavy and creased, and longed for a shower, for her own soft, warm bed. And for Daniel, of course. What was it about pregnancy? she wondered. One minute she felt fat and unattractive, the next all she wanted to do was …

  After a long wait, long enough for her to look around for somewhere to sit, the carousel started up and the cases began to appear, sliding down the chute. All, it seemed, except hers; the penalty, she decided, for jumping a flight at the last moment. But then, she reasoned, if her case had been the last to be loaded at Paris Charles de Gaulle then surely it ought to have been the first to appear in Marseilles. But of course it wasn’t, and she watched as other passengers stepped forward to claim their bags and leave for the Arrivals Hall. And each time the sliding doors opened for those passengers whose cases had appeared on the carousel before hers, Claudine peeped through to see if she could spot him. But the doors never seemed to stay open long enough, and the angle was too tight to see anything more than the scrum of waiting friends and family gathered excitedly at the barrier, and the wall of stone-faced drivers in suits holding name boards.

  When she finally came through the doors with her case and her carrier bags of duty-free, a quick look round established that Daniel wasn’t there. No sign of him. She felt a twist of irritation – another unfamiliar response she put down to pregnancy. They had spoken the previous day, before she’d finally boarded her flight in Pointe-à-Pitre, and he’d promised – he’d promised – he’d be there.

  And then she saw him – or rather someone who looked like him but clearly wasn’t. Younger, slimmer than she remembered. Leaning against a pillar, hands in pockets, one foot crossed over the other. A deep tan against a white T-shirt, an old cream jacket, faded blue jeans and espadrilles. And then, of all things, she recognised the jacket. His jacket. Daniel’s. The very same.

  And then the man’s eyes latched on to hers and he was raising an arm, waving, pushing away from the pillar and coming towards her. In that single moment, she felt an exquisite curl of delight and excitement. It was him. Daniel. Looking better than she could believe. A big warm smile as he drew closer, the gleam of his teeth making the tan even deeper. And no walking stick, just the slightest stiffness and a roll to his walk, favouring his stronger leg. He really did look very good indeed.

  For the last week in Midou’s cottage in the hills above Pointe-à-Pitre, mother and daughter had joked about her homecoming, how Daniel would look after being left alone, without her supervision. How much weight he’d have put on. All those lunches and dinners pressing against his belt, and no real exercise beyond a little light gardening and housework. Clothes a little rumpled, a little unshaven. In short, they’d agreed, he’d have let himself go.

  On the phone, of course, he’d sounded fine, still the same old Daniel – telling her about the house, how things were his side, asking about the baby, how she was, then letting his voice drop to tell her that he missed her and loved her and wanted her. Right now. Not next week, or whenever it was she was coming home, but right now. Which had made her giggle, a soft chuckling sound that had made Jacquot draw in his breath with longing. She’d actually heard it, that gasp, at the other end of the line, that little intake of breath.

  All that distance, an ocean between them, and yet …

  And yet … she and Midou couldn’t have been more wrong. Maybe it was just spending some time away from him that made him look so good. Because he certainly did. Good enough to eat.

  And then she was letting go of the handles of her case and carrier bags, and straightening up, and she felt herself caught up in his embrace, almost lifted off her feet, his arms around her, hugging her to him, kissing her, a strange salty smell on him, mixed with a soapy pine scent that smelled of hot showers and careful preparation for this moment, for her return …

  ‘You look beautiful,’ he whispered into her ear, and she felt his hand on her belly. ‘Both of you.’

  She warmed to his words, the closeness of him, the wide spread of his hand, a fluttering of movement at the touch that she could feel but he wouldn’t. The flutterings had started on holiday, and she was proud of them, longed to share them with him.

  ‘And you, Monsieur, must have taken a lover,’ Claudine replied, pushing out of their embrace, her lips stinging from the hard pressure of his.

  At which he’d laughed, and after leaning down to take her case and bags he led her through the crowds to the Exit, then out to the parking lot, asking about her flight, and Midou, and the island. How good she looked … how tanned …

  ‘I said, you must have taken a lover,’ Claudine persisted, half as a joke, half in serious enquiry. There was something strange about him, something different, and she felt a tug of uncertainty. She’d been away too long. Or maybe it was just being pregnant, and feeling fat and frumpy and unattractive.

  ‘Not a lover, ma chérie. But a woman all the same,’ he finally admitted, stowing her bags in the boot of their car and opening the passenger door for her. Sliding into the driver’s seat, a great deal more easily than Claudine remembered from the last time he’d driven her, he started the engine and turned out of the parking rank. ‘Her name is Constance,’ he said. ‘But Constance can wait. First, I want to take you home.’

  Jacquot had been hard at work. The house, she could see at once, was immaculate, smelled gently of aftershave and coffee, mown grass and garlic, the table in the kitchen already laid for lunch.

  But first, as the daube simmered on the range, he took her upstairs, to the bedroom; windows open, shutters half-closed, sunshine slanting through the slats like leaning ladders of light. And the bed, freshly made, pillows plumped, the ceiling fan turning slowly.

  ‘I should shower,’ she said, turning towards him as he kicked the door closed behind them.

  ‘Afterwards. Shower later,’ he whispered, and with strong brown fingers he pulled the collar of her shirt away from her shoulder and laid his lips against the warm hollow of her throat.

  ‘I want you right now. Like this.’

  32

  ‘MERDE, HE WEIGHS a ton,’ said Léo.

  The two men were no more than fifteen metres from their Toyota 4x4, still within the beam of its headlights, but the body was already slipping from their grip. And there were still another forty metres to go, off into darkness, over steep, rough terrain, before the slope levelled out.

  ‘I’m losing him,’ said Zach, Léo’s companion, and they stopped, let the body slump to the ground. A stone, dislodged by the impact, rolled away down the slope.

  Hands on hips, the body sprawled between them, the two men paused to draw breath. The night was still warm. An owl called its haunting two-tone somewhere to their right, and five hundred metres below them the narrow coast road from Théoule-sur-Mer to Mirabeau was unlit save for the occasional beam of passing headlights cutting through the night. Beyond the road, a dark, silent sea slapped against the cliffs, the glow of unseen lights from Fréjus outlining a distant ridge.

  ‘He’s so short you’d think he wouldn’t be so heavy,’ said Zach, taking in a breath of the night air and tipping back his head to look at the stars. Taller than Léo by a few centimetres, with a gym build and tight
crew cut razored in an angry line around his ears and neck, Zach, sometimes known as Zak-Zak, was an ex-boxer who looked like he’d taken as many steroids as he had punches. ‘Heaviest I ever had to do up here.’

  ‘Short, sure. But he’s built,’ said Léo. ‘Solid. Must have kept himself in trim.’

  ‘Wasn’t half this bad when we hauled him into the van back on Paradis.’

  ‘Well, he wasn’t dead meat then,’ said Léo. ‘There was movement, right? Momentum. Like ju-jitsu – you use your opponent’s energy to your own advantage. So … you ready?’

  ‘We could always drag him.’

  Léo grunted. ‘You say that every time. You and Dhuc and Milagro, you’re all as bad as each other.’

  ‘Well, who’s to know?’

  ‘It’s not worth it. We got to carry. No signs, remember?’

  ‘Then you mind if we swap? You take the arms?’

  The two men changed position, Léo shaking his head, and together they bent down to retrieve the body.

  ‘Un, deux, trois … hup-la!’

  They struggled to their feet. This time they made sure their grip was solid, with elbows locked around the dead man’s armpits and knees rather than taking his wrists and ankles. In this new position the head was now pressed against Léo’s chin, and the bare feet felt as though they were actually walking behind Zach, one of the knee joints not so pliant, jerking and crunching with every step he took.

  ‘You think he knew about the gold?’ asked Zach, between breaths.

  ‘If he did, a nine-millimetre in the ankle and kneecap would have had him squawking. You ask me, he didn’t know a thing.’

  ‘He didn’t see it coming, did he?’

  ‘They never do. Always think they’re the ones who’ll beat it.’

  ‘That Didier’s a cold one, isn’t he? Gets the nod from the old man and I swear he smiles each time he pulls the trigger.’

  ‘You don’t mix it with Didier, that’s for sure,’ said Léo, who’d worked for the Famille Polineaux a few years longer than Zach and didn’t like it forgotten. ‘Looks like butter wouldn’t melt, but you’d be wrong. There’s plenty who’ve played him that way and paid the price. And with the old man fading, he’s someone we better keep in with, if you follow my meaning.’

  Grunting with the effort, Léo and Zach covered the remaining ground and dropped the body with sighs of relief. By now the Toyota’s headlights were far enough back not to throw shadows.

  ‘You bring the torch?’ asked Zach.

  For answer Léo switched it on and played the beam around them. They were standing on level ground, a few metres into the brush, at the foot of a rising face of red Esterel rock and just a few metres from where they needed to be.

  ‘Why don’t we roll him?’ asked Zach. ‘It’s clear now and there’s enough of a slope. No one comes in this far.’

  ‘Suits me,’ Léo replied, and the two of them, using their feet, pushed the body to the lip of a sinkhole concealed beneath the base of the rock wall. With a final kick from the two of them, it rolled over the side and disappeared. Léo switched off the torch and in the darkness they listened for the impact. It came seconds later, with a dull, distant thump from somewhere deep beneath their feet.

  ‘Voilà,’ said Léo. ‘And good riddance.’

  ‘We got time for a drink then?’ asked Zach, as they turned back to the Toyota. ‘There’s that beach place in Théoule.’

  ‘You got any money?’

  ‘Enough, sure. No problem,’ said Zach, quickly perking up. A few drinks, some good music, and those pretty waitresses. A nice way to end the evening.

  And then, stepping out on to the track, Léo froze, held up his hand. He stopped so unexpectedly that Zach stumbled into him.

  ‘Shhh! You hear something?’

  The two men stood just outside the arc of the headlights and listened hard.

  ‘Where? What was it?’ whispered Zach, crouching down, reaching for his gun.

  ‘I thought …’ Léo played the torch through the thin low brush to the left and right of the track.

  Zach followed the light with the muzzle of his gun.

  ‘I don’t know … I thought I heard something.’

  They stood there for a minute, peering into the darkness, watching the shadows of brush and boulder shift and spring away from the sweeping beam of the torch.

  ‘There’s nothing there,’ said Zach, straightening, slipping his gun back into its holster, anxious now to make it back to Théoule before the beach bar closed. ‘It’s nothing. A fox maybe. Allons.’

  Zach pushed past him, but Léo stood there a moment longer. Playing the torch, looking, listening.

  ‘I could have sworn …’

  33

  JACQUOT FELT A huge sense of excitement the following morning as he pulled out from the millhouse and set off down the lane. Beside him, Claudine watched the familiar fields spin past.

  ‘You’re being very mysterious,’ she said. ‘And I’m not sure that I like it.’ Which was true. She didn’t. Since Marignane, Jacquot had been maddeningly elusive, refusing to be drawn on who this Constance was. She had no idea what was in store, who she was about to meet. All she could really say was that she’d been warmed by his welcome home. But was it just a cover for something she might not like as much?

  ‘Seat belt,’ said Jacquot when they came to the main road, determined not to reveal anything about Constance. He wanted to play it like Salette. Lead her on. Let Constance do to Claudine what she had done to him. He was sure she would. Hoped and prayed she would. If Claudine took against Constance for some reason, pointed out the impracticalities, well, there’d have to be a reappraisal, some adjustments. After all, a boat could be a serious distraction, not to mention a serious, and unnecessary, extravagance – something she might feel didn’t fit too well with the impending addition now only a few months off.

  As they skirted through Cavaillon and headed for the autoroute, Jacquot wondered what he’d do if Claudine put her foot down and said ‘no’. Sell the boat? Hand her back to Salette? After the time he’d spent with Constance, he wasn’t sure how he’d feel about that. Well, actually, yes, he was. He knew exactly how he’d feel. He didn’t want to sell her, or give her back to Salette. He wanted Claudine to smile with delight and wonder at their unexpected good fortune, and be tantalised by Constance, just as he had been. And say ‘yes’.

  An hour later, the two of them came up from the underground parking on Cours d’Estienne d’Orves and he led Claudine down Place aux Huiles to the port. It was a bright sunny day, the sky a high, distant blue, the air sharp and fresh with the scent of the ocean.

  Waiting for the traffic on Quai Rive Neuve, Claudine slipped her hand into his. ‘Where are you taking me?’

  ‘You’ll see,’ he replied, and five minutes later, holding open the mooring quay security gate, he stood aside for her to pass.

  ‘Constance lives on a boat?’

  Jacquot smiled. Exactly the words he’d said to Salette. But he didn’t reply and, securing the gate behind them, set off down the pontoon, steering Claudine ahead of him.

  ‘If we carry on any further, I’ll end up in the harbour,’ she said, as they reached the end of the pontoon. And then her head turned to the left and Jacquot could see that her eye had been caught by the name of a boat. Just as he had planned it. She looked at the name, frowned, then turned back to him.

  ‘Please don’t tell me you’ve bought a boat?’

  Almost the same words he’d spoken to Salette. But somehow they didn’t sound quite the same coming from Claudine. Without replying, and just as Salette had done, Jacquot clambered aboard and made his way round the deck and wheelhouse, loosening the ties on the cover and hauling it off.

  In the morning sunshine, Constance sparkled. The paint, the varnish, the brass and chrome trim, everything caught the sun and seemed to wink at him, as though they were in on the set-up together. Their little trick. As he hauled in the cover and folded it, Jacquot looked a
round proudly. All that hard work he’d put in had paid off. It was as though he was seeing the boat through Claudine’s eyes. For the first time.

  He glanced back at her, to see how she was taking it. She was still standing on the pontoon. There was no expression on her face, just a long thoughtful look, cheeks slightly sucked in, lips almost pouting. To fill the moment, Jacquot bent down to stow the cover in its seat locker. But in his haste, he failed to pack it away neatly. Which meant the seat top didn’t close properly. Which annoyed him. He had wanted it to be perfect, and for a moment he considered taking the cover out, unfolding it, re-folding it and then stowing it correctly.

  But he didn’t. He caught Claudine’s eye, and he left the cover as it was, the seat locker not quite closed. She’d crossed her arms on her chest and was tilting her head to one side, no longer considering the boat. Now she was looking directly at him. A stern, unwavering gaze. She didn’t smile, and she certainly didn’t look amused. Jacquot felt a lurch in his guts and found himself struggling to think of something to say – an explanation, a justification – something to fill the silence.

  But she beat him to it:

  ‘So tell me, Daniel …’

  Another lurch in the guts. He recognised that voice. Its disbelieving tone. This did not sound good.

  ‘Sure,’ he grinned, managing somehow to keep the grin in place. A schoolboy’s grin of innocence. Hard held. ‘Tell you what?’

  Claudine narrowed her eyes, pinned them on him even more tightly.

  ‘Tell me how, exactly, did this … Constance come into your possession? And how much, even more exactly, did it cost?’ she asked.

  ‘I was left her,’ he replied. ‘A bequest. From an old friend of Salette’s called Philo. And I only met him a few times. Quite extraordinary, isn’t it?’