Louis Shalako
“See who that is.”
“Ah, yes, sir.” Tailler moved to the front of the
cabin, and they could hear him talking to somebody out there.
“Hello.”
The other voice was barely audible, being outside and
the pair moved to follow him into the living room.
“Yes? Can I help you?”
“Hello. Is
Marko there?”
“Ah, no. Not really. Would you care to leave a
message?”
“Um. Nope.”
Mouths open, they listened intently, Maintenon moving
to the window and peeling back the curtain on the side furthest from the door
so as to peek out through a small crack on an oblique angle.
The little girl was totally nude except for pink
flip-slop sandals. She might have been nine years old.
There was a strange sense of guilt and one’s heart
pounded for some reason. Yet it was hard to imagine what else they might have
done—
“When’s he going to be home?”
“Ah, I don’t know.”
“What’s your name?”
“I’m Emile. What’s your name?”
“I’m Judith. What are you people doing here?”
“Are you with your parents? What’s your last name?”
The little girl regarded him solemnly. A strange man
in a suit in a community of naked people must have set some kind of little bell
ringing in her head and her caution spoke well for her intelligence.
“Why do you want to know?”
Maintenon snorted quietly, and now Larue was squeezing
in for a look, so he stepped back.
“Look, I’ll tell him you were looking for him, okay?
So, uh, what’s your mommy’s name?”
“Sylphie. Sylphie Courtenay.”
“And your father?”
“Guillaume.”
“Okay. Well, then, ah…goodbye now.”
Tailler gently but firmly shut the door in her face
and turned to face them as Maintenon watched the girl turn and walk slowly
away, towards the park and what he thought was a pool and shower complex.
It was like any public pool—they would make people
take a shower, with plenty of soap and hot water, before getting into the pool.
“It really is a bit disturbing, isn’t it?” Larue had
this odd look on his face. “Quite frankly, I think the Inspector was having a
real hard time with this one. I reckon that’s why he called you. That’s one
reason, anyways.”
The Inspector, as he put it, was a devout Catholic and
a pretty die-hard conservative politically as well as in the social sense.
Tailler put his handkerchief away after dabbing sweat
from his forehead.
His eyes sought out Maintenon.
“Yeah, I hear you, Larue.” He’d seen his own kid
naked, of course, getting them ready for bed, in the bath and all that sort of
thing. “Ah. Gilles. I was thinking—we’d better have a look at that camera—and
all of that exposed film.”
Maintenon nodded grimly.
Tailler was right, but Gilles already knew about
Monsieur Dubzek and his kind.
He’d been in trouble for that sort of thing before.
Sort
of.
Almost.
***
“We could really use any guidance or assistance you
can give us.” Larue was professional enough to know they were a little out of
their depth here. “We’re only too happy.”
The local detachment had about forty men, spread over
three shifts with a small, senior staff on daylight hours. Most had nowhere
near the training of the big-city police just a few short kilometres away and
Larue was candid enough to bring it up early in the dialogue…as he put it.
Maintenon nodded grimly.
“Tailler.”
“Sir?”
“Get over to the office. Use the phone. Call
Chiappe—don’t let anyone put you off. Tell him we need a complete forensics
team here.” He looked over to Larue. “No disrespect to your people—and we can
only pray that we haven’t contaminated the scene beyond hope. But Monsieur
Dubzek is known to me. And I’ve got a real bad feeling about this one.”
“What sort of feeling, sir?”
“A sick feeling, gentlemen. One very sick feeling.”
And if his theory was correct, perhaps some small
smidgeon of sympathy for the killer.
That wouldn’t stop him from doing his job, but it
might make it a little harder. It’s not like anyone ever really enjoyed it—it
simply wasn’t that kind of a business.
One of the keys to solving any homicide lay in
remaining objective—and yet, here he was, with all kinds of thoughts.
It would be wise not to jump to conclusions.
“And in the meantime, sir?”
Maintenon shrugged.
“Seal it up again. And then we wait.”
It was terribly unorthodox, and could play absolute hell
with any eventual prosecution.
What were they supposed to do, though?
Larue swallowed, understanding the implications.
“There’s a pretty good little hotel in town. The
food’s not bad, and it’s clean. A bit of a disclaimer, ah, my cousin owns it.”
“That will do, Detective. That will do. In the
meantime, we keep our mouths shut as best we can, gentlemen.”
“Yes, sir.”
***
There were certain questions they could ask, of
course, and it would be unusual if they didn’t.
The place to start was with the neighbours. The people
on the west side of Number Eighteen weren’t home, although the place was
currently occupied judging by wet towels on the line and windows thrown open to
the breeze. There was an older female at home on the east side, Number
Seventeen.
With no buildings on the other side of the laneway, the chalets were
numbered odds and evens, which seemed a bit unusual.
Maintenon was sitting on a bench in front of the tall,
V-shaped glass front of the chalet. Fanning himself with his hat in the
unusually hot late June day, he let the younger detectives handle it.
Tailler took the lead, with Larue listening and
observing his style rather intently and taking copious notes.
“So. Madame, ah, Bouvier. What was your neighbour
like? Can you tell us if you saw or heard anything unusual, over the last two
or three days, perhaps?”
Thankfully, the woman, safe in the privacy of the
chalet, had elected to answer the door wearing a thick terry-cloth housecoat
although her feet, veined and skeletal, were bare, with the nails painted a
hideous scarlet. Why did ugly people take such pains, one had to wonder
sometimes.
“Oh, I don’t know.” She blinked in the harsh sunlight,
seemingly reluctant to invite them in. “They say he was a medium, though, and
some said a genuine warlock.”
“A warlock?”
She laughed nervously.
“It was all bullshit, though. Mostly, I think, he was
just entertaining. A most charming man, when he wanted to be.”
“You mean, like when he wanted something?”
Larue scribbled away.
“Yes, exactly.” She seemed a little more involved now.
The lady took a breath and let it out.
“If nothing else, it was at least quiet over there.
Some other people are just mad, you know, what with all the noise and the music
and the shouting. There was big fight a while back—a domestic dispute as I
believe you call it.” She went on. “This was a while back.”
“What unit?”
“Ah, eleven, I think.”
So she wasn’t exactly stupid, then. Keep it to the
point.
“Did he have any particular friends here in the park?”
“I don’t know about that. We all know each other of
course, but people came to stay with him from time to time. For the most part,
they kept to themselves…”
***
“Do you know what this is, Monsieur?’
Maintenon held an exposed roll of film in his palm.
“Ah, yes, sir. That would be an ASA 125,
120-millimetre, thirty-six exposure roll of Agfafilm…”
“That’s not exactly what I meant.”
The gentleman coloured.
“Then what do you mean, sir?”
“Did you know that Monsieur Dubzek had a camera.”
“Well, I sort of presumed so—he did purchase film from
time to time.” Monsieur Delorme straightened up with a sigh.
He had an account book open on the desk in his private
office, along with the guest register, what looked like employee time-sheets
and a very small number of punch-clock cards. A grandfather clock ticked loudly
in a corner and there were three cats sprawled about in various states of
indisposition.
The cats did not appear to be unhappy, merely unable to move a
muscle for anything less than the apocalypse…the wall looking out into the shop
was all glazed, and the desk was positioned to have a good view. In winter
season, when there were very few guests, one or two people would have to look
after everything, including the cooking. There were newspapers, a magazine on
nudism or two, and an empty coffee cup. He seemed to like plants, for there
were a number of them scattered about.
Larue cleared his throat.
“Er…” He blushed furiously. “But with all of these
naked people around…”
There were laws about photography, especially without
consent, or for blackmail and badger games.
The gentleman uttered a deep sigh.
“May I remind you gentlemen, that nudity is not
illegal. This is a private club, on private property. It is part of the charm
of the lifestyle, naturism, that people are not particularly self-conscious.
Parents take pictures of their children, and each other. We have a few pictures
up on our bulletin board. It’s not all that unusual.”
“So, how many people, what percentage, have cameras?”
Larue glanced at Maintenon who gave him a faint nod as Tailler looked around
for a seat, notebook open. “When was the last time Dubzek bought film?”
“I would say that a good half of them have cameras.
Not all of them use them very often, but one of the kids had a birthday a while
back and I saw a few then.”
He considered the second part of the question.
“Monsieur Dubzek might have bought a couple of rolls
of film. I wasn’t on the counter but I see all the receipts, you understand.”
According to him, people could charge to an account and settle up at the end of
their stay, especially if they had been long-term members of the club.
“Hmn, I see. And so—”
“Yes, well, in general. The 120-format is a little bit
expensive, a little bit big for the average person, who mostly have those
little cameras that were all the rage a few years back. The Pixie, I think they
called it.”
“Very well.”
A lady came out of the back room and looked at him
inquiringly, but Larue put her off with an upraised hand. It had been decided
to put lunch off until they got a properly-trained technical team onto the
murder scene. She was just turning away when the bell over the door rang and a
couple of small boys came in, their penises tiny and hairless. These ones didn’t
even have sandals on. One was carrying a small change purse and they made a
beeline for the sweets counter as Larue struggled on.
“Ah, did Monsieur Dubzek have company often?”
“Yes, certainly.” Delorme seemed imperturbable, eyes
occasionally straying back to his books.
“What sort of people were they? Anyone stand out in
particular in your mind, sir?”
Maintenon looked at his watch, stomach rumbling. Turning
at the sound of gravel crunching under wheels out front, he was rewarded with
the sight of a long black car with the unmistakeable look of the department.
His jaw momentarily dropped. The men in the car were ogling a girl, a jolly
nice girl, unfortunately one who looked to be about fifteen years old. They
were taking their bloody time about opening up and coming in. Finally one door
opened hesitantly. It was that honey-golden tan, of course, that and not being
overweight—and walking barefoot maybe. She was the picture of health and
innocence. Possibly even the Garden of Eden, considering the verdant colours
and the bird life.
The clouds, the sunshine and the sky, always different
outside of the city limits.
“Oh, I don’t know. Just people.”
“Male or female?”
“Both, I should think. Guests are allowed to have
guests, although there’s a limit of eight per cabin, if people are staying
overnight.” That was due to fire regulations, and in his experience, people who
might not otherwise have been able to afford it—it was quite expensive compared
to regular camping holidays, so people put together a party of like-minded
people and split on the cost of accommodation. “They have to register, which
means showing proper identification. If there’s one speck of trouble, I throw
people out and they never get in here again.”
That seemed pretty firm.
Finally Maintenon spoke.
“We would like to speak to the maid—the one that
discovered the body, anyone who might have gone in there for any reason. I mean
the staff, of course.”
“But of course, ah, Inspector.”
