The Twenty-Year Death Read online

  Benoît turned to his wife. “Did you hear anything last night?” he called to her.

  She pressed her lips together, and shook her head.

  Letreau caught Pelleter’s eye, and Pelleter nodded once.

  “Okay, Benoît,” Letreau said. “That’s fine.”

  “Did...” Benoît looked at his wife again. “Was... Did something...happen? The man was drunk, right?”

  “Sure. As far as we know.”

  Benoît’s expression eased slightly at that. He had clearly been shaken very badly by the whole incident, and the idea that something more might have taken place was too much for him.

  “Ah, the mop!” he said looking down. “We need the mop.”

  The door opened, letting in another customer, and before it closed a second new customer snuck in as well. They commented on the terrible weather.

  Benoît looked for permission to go, and Letreau said, “Thank you. We’ll let you know if we need anything.”

  Benoît stepped back, his expression even more natural now. He reached one hand out behind him for the mop, which was still several feet away in a corner behind the counter. “Come to my house, and I’ll show you the flood. The water was up to here.” He indicated just below his knees with his hand.

  Pelleter opened the door, and Letreau followed him out into the street.

  “What do you think?”

  “There’s nothing to think.”

  “I just had to be sure.”

  Pelleter nodded his approval. Water sloshed off of the brim of his hat.

  They began to walk back towards the square. “Come back to the station. I’ll drive you to the prison.”

  They waited for an automobile to pass, and then they crossed the street. The rain had eased some again, but it was still steady. Lights could be seen in the windows of various buildings. It was like a perpetual dusk even though it was still before ten in the morning.

  They stepped into the police station through the entrance on the side street beside Town Hall. The station was an open space separated into two sections by a counter. In front of the counter was a small entryway with several chairs. Behind the counter were three desks arranged to just fit the space. Doors led to offices along the back and left-hand wall. Letreau needed to get keys to one of the police cars.

  “Chief,” the young man behind the counter said. “There’s a message for you.” The officer looked at Pelleter, and then back at his commanding officer. Pelleter had never seen the man before, but it was obvious that the young officer knew who he was.

  “This is Officer Martin,” Letreau said to Pelleter. “He’s the one who went out to the baker’s house last night.” Then to Martin as he started behind the counter towards his office, “Did we get an ID on our dead drifter?”

  “Not yet,” the man said. “It was the hospital.”

  Letreau stopped and looked back.

  The young man picked up a piece of paper from the desk on which he had written the message, but he didn’t need to look at it. It was more to steady himself. “Cause of death was multiple stab wounds to stomach and chest. No water in the lungs.”

  Pelleter looked across at Letreau who was looking at him. Letreau’s face had gone pale. His drunken drifter had just turned into a homicide. And no water in the lungs meant the man had been dead before he ended up in the gutter.

  The young officer looked up. He swallowed when he saw the chief’s face.

  “Anything else?” Letreau barked.

  “There were no holes in his clothes,” the officer said. “Someone stabbed him to death, and then changed his outfit.”

  2.

  Malniveau Prison

  The sudden silence in the station was stunning. It was made all the more awkward when two other officers appeared from the back, laughing over some shared joke.

  They saw the state of the room and fell silent as well.

  Letreau stepped heavily across the small space to the counter, and took the message from out of the desk officer’s hand. “I have to call the hospital,” he said, and disappeared into his office, slamming the door behind him.

  Pelleter saw Martin look up at him, but he turned away, uninterested in any paternal conversation. He retrieved the cigar he had started at the café from his pocket, lit it, and took the seat that the baker had occupied the night before.

  The two officers who had been joking returned to their respective desks.

  Pelleter concentrated on the fine taste of the smoke from his cigar. He opened his coat. Light drops of water continued to fall on the floor around him.

  If Letreau was going to be long, he would have to take a taxi. Visiting hours at the prison were short. The warden refused to be accommodating, annoyed by Pelleter’s visits. He felt that they were unprofessional, that the prisoners, once under his guard, were dead to the outside world. Pelleter’s own displeasure for these visits didn’t soften the warden’s opinion.

  The three officers talked amongst themselves in quiet tones. A murder in this town was big news.

  Pelleter looked at his cigar as he blew out a plume of smoke. It was more than half gone.

  Letreau’s office door opened. The officers fell silent, but he ignored them as he strode across the station to the door. “Come,” he said to Pelleter. “Let’s go.”

  Pelleter stood. It was obvious that Letreau was distraught, his easy nature covered by a set jaw and a gruff manner. “I can take a taxi.”

  “No. There’s nothing to be done right now. Let’s go.”

  They went back out into the rain to one of the police cars parked just outside the station. The doors had been left unlocked. Letreau got behind the wheel and Pelleter sat beside him in the passenger seat.

  Letreau started the car, turning on the windshield wiper, and then he pulled out of the spot, and headed east out of town.

  “Any news?” Pelleter said.

  “Just what you heard.”

  The two men remained silent for the remainder of the half-hour drive.

  When the town fell away, it was replaced by fields that extended beyond the wire fences on either side of the road. There was the occasional outlying farmhouse or barn. Cows milled in a large enclosure, the hair on their undersides hanging in muddy clumps matted by the rain. Even in the countryside all colors were muted and everything seemed pinned down by the spring gale. The sky was large and gray.

  The prison was visible ten minutes before they arrived there. It was a heavy, awkward structure imposed on the land, a dark blotch. It appeared a remnant from some earlier age.

  They pulled into the drive. A guard, so bundled as to be indiscernible, appeared from the guard house, waved at them, and went to open the twenty-foot iron gate.

  “A man could kill himself here,” Letreau said, “and no one would blame him.”

  The guard had the gate open. Letreau pulled the police car through, and the guard waved again, but Pelleter still could not make the man out.

  There were several other vehicles—a truck, two police cars, three civilian cars—parked in the small cobblestone courtyard before the front entrance. There was another courtyard in the center of the building where the prisoners took their exercise. The narrow windows in the stone walls were impenetrable black slits, dead eyes watching over them.

  “There’s something wrong about having this place out here,” Letreau said, parking the car. “The men they put here come from far away, from other places. That way the rest of the country can forget about them. And my town is the closest. All the men who work in the prison live in Verargent. Don’t you think they bring some of this back to town with them? We’re a peace-loving community. Most of our complaints are petty thefts and the occasional late-night drunk.”

  Pelleter didn’t point out that somebody had been murdered in town the night before. After all, Letreau was right.

  “It looks this bad on a sunny day too. I hate coming out here.”

  At the front door, there was a loud clank as the lock was released, and th
en the door was opened to admit them. It was musty inside, and the only light came from two exposed light bulbs high on the wall.

  “I’ll take your coats, gentleman,” the guard said.

  “How are you today, Remy?” Letreau asked the guard.

  “I’m still alive, Chief,” the guard said, hanging the coats in a small booth just inside the door.

  “There’s always that.”

  Pelleter pushed open the door to the administrative offices, while Letreau stayed to talk a moment with the guard. Nothing had changed in the two years since Pelleter had been there last. It was the same large room with two rows of desks down the center. The same filing cabinets lined the walls. The same people sat behind the desks. The same drab paint reflected the electric bulbs hanging from the ceiling.

  The warden, a large gray-haired man, must have been informed that Pelleter was there, since he was waiting with a look of impatience just inside the door. He managed to use his irritation to add to his air of importance.

  “Inspector Pelleter. I’m so glad. If you had been even five minutes more, we would have missed each other. I have promised my wife a holiday in the city, and she is expecting me an hour ago.”

  A neat, sharp-angled man stood with his hands crossed in front of him just behind the warden.

  “Let me introduce Monsieur Fournier. I don’t believe you’ve met. Fournier is the Assistant Warden here now. He takes care of the jobs I don’t want to.”

  Fournier took Pelleter’s hand. “He jests.”

  None of the men smiled.

  “Fournier will be in charge while I am away, and he will be more than capable of assisting you with anything you need. Not that you need much assistance. You are an old hand at this.” The warden smiled at that, but it was an expression of pure malice. “You could have probably gone to get the prisoner yourself.”

  He looked around the office. The people at the desks made an effort to focus on their paperwork, but they were clearly uncomfortable.

  “I really must be going.” He looked at his watch and then the clock on the wall. “I shouldn’t have even stopped to say hello. Fournier, you have everything you need.”

  “Yes, Monsieur le Directeur.”

  The warden stepped towards his office, but stopped when the outer door opened to reveal Letreau.

  “Chief Letreau,” the warden said, and he glanced at Fournier, confused and accusatory. “Nothing is wrong, I trust.”

  Letreau paused in the doorway, surprised at being addressed so suddenly. He looked at Pelleter, but Pelleter was unreadable. “As Remy says, I’m still alive.”

  “Yes,” the warden said, almost sneering as he took possession of himself. “There’s always that.”

  Letreau stepped in and greeted the other people in the office including Fournier.

  The warden excused himself, and disappeared into his office.

  “If you’ll follow me, Chief Inspector,” Fournier said. They left the administrative offices, and went down a barren hallway. Fournier conducted himself with an icy precision throughout. “I understand you have been here before.”

  “This will be my third visit.”

  “The warden feels you give this man too much credit and that you make him feel important. It is our job to be sure that these men do not feel important. They are criminals.”

  Pelleter said nothing. He retrieved his partially smoked cigar from his pocket and put it between his lips without lighting it.

  “There is no question that there is a certain intelligence in some of them, and that their crimes require guts. Perhaps in another time they would have been something else. But here they are still criminals. They are to be punished, not applauded. And it is dangerous to make any of them feel important.”

  They were outside one of the visiting rooms, which also served as interrogation rooms if needed. “Is that what the warden says?”

  “It’s what I say,” Fournier said, his expression unchanged. He unlocked the door with a key on a large ring. “Wait here.”

  Pelleter paused, but resisted asking Fournier if he knew just what Mahossier had done. The assistant warden hadn’t seen the way those children had been brutalized. A man who could do that felt important all on his own.

  Pelleter went into the room. The door closed behind him, and his jaw clenched around his cigar at the clang. The room was devoid of any distinguishing features, just stone below, above, and all around. No sounds penetrated the walls. If this was not enough punishment for a criminal, than Pelleter didn’t know what was.

  The door opened only a moment later, and two guards led Mahossier in. He was a small old man, bald, with deep wrinkles across his forehead, and a beaked nose. His hands had been cuffed in front of him, and another set of cuffs chained his legs together. These had been linked by a third chain between the two. The guards sat Mahossier in the seat across from Pelleter.

  Fournier had also come in with the three other men. “We will be right outside the door. If he tries—”

  “We’ll be fine,” Pelleter interrupted.

  “But if—”

  “We’ll be fine.”

  Fournier flared his nostrils, the first time he had allowed his emotions to be seen.

  “The Chief Inspector and I go way back,” Mahossier said, his eyes locked on Fournier, his voice so quiet it was almost soothing.

  Fournier nodded to the guards, and the three men left the room, closing the door behind them and engaging the lock.

  “How’s Madame Pelleter?” Mahossier said.

  Pelleter moved his cigar from one side of his mouth to the other. Facing the man, it was all he could do to keep the images of those children out of his mind.

  Mahossier seemed to know it.

  “Still no children?” Mahossier smiled. “But, of course... That ship has sailed. It’s much too late for you now. Such a shame. Children really make the world worth living in.” His eyebrows furrowed and his lips fell in a theatrical frown. “Of course, there are never any children here.” His expression went cold. “Plenty of rain though.”

  Pelleter bit his cigar again. He’d have to light it soon just to help him breathe.

  “But of course, even if it’s too late for Madame Pelleter, it’s not too late for you. A Chief Inspector! Plenty of young girls out there. Someone to take care of you in your old age. Think of it!”

  Mahossier’s excitement at his own fantasy took him over, and he looked up, almost overjoyed. The chains weighing him down were nothing to him. He looked back at Pelleter.

  “So how is Madame Pelleter? Well, I trust.”

  Pelleter waited patiently. It wouldn’t do to rush him. If Mahossier thought that he was getting a reaction from the inspector, then he would go on forever.

  “How do you like this room? You must...they keep putting you in it. It’s much like mine, although I do have a little window.” He held up his right hand, which forced him to draw his left hand with it because of the cuffs, and he indicated a narrow space with his thumb and forefinger. “It’s a small window, but at least it’s a window. And I have you to thank...Thank you... Thank you...I must have you up some time. You should tell the warden that you are more than welcome...Or Fournier. But then he’ll think I like you, he’s not as smart as you, he wouldn’t know you’re not my type.”

  He looked up again, and it made the wrinkles in his forehead even deeper.

  Pelleter chose to light his cigar. He took his time about it, ignoring the chained man across from him, extracting a single match from his pocket, scratching it on the table, and taking several puffs, making sure the cigar was really lit. Mahossier watched in silence.

  “Okay, I understand you.” His expression had turned serious. “And it’s not as though Fournier will leave me in here forever. The rules are the rules are the rules are the rules...But it’s safer in here with you than it is out there...You’ve had more than one chance to kill me, but I’m still here.” He tapped his chest, and the chains jingled together.

  “The
re’s a first for everything,” Pelleter said. The smoke from his cigar hung in the air between them.

  “Well said! Right to my point. That’s why I can talk to you. Your wife is a very lucky woman...Still no children?” He raised his eyebrows, but then shrugged when the inspector made no response. “Here is the thing—there are fewer of us than there were before...At first it was just one, but now it’s two, three, four...I don’t really know, it’s a big prison and they don’t let me out all that often.” His theatrical frown again. “Glamieux’s gone. He was another one of yours, right? They slit his throat. And there have been others.”

  “What’s that have to do with me? People get killed in prison all the time.”

  “Not all the time...not all the time...Sometimes. Not that often, actually. Not many people in one month. Not many people and nothing’s done about it, said about it...outside. Even here.”

  “What’s the warden say?”

  “What does the warden say?”

  The two men watched each other, both calm, but each in his own way. Pelleter smoked. Mahossier smiled.

  “We need somebody on the outside. Someone we can trust... Someone like you. There should at least be an inquiry.”

  “You want an inquiry into several dead prisoners?”

  “They were people too.” Mahossier’s theatricality undermined any sense of real feeling in his expression. It was chilling as always.

  Pelleter leaned forward. “You want an inquiry?” He stood up. “That’s easy. Let’s have an inquiry. Fournier’s right here. He’s Assistant Warden. He’ll know.” Pelleter was at the door now, his hand raised to knock on the door. “I’ll ask him about all these dead prisoners. He doesn’t seem to like the lot of you very much, but if someone’s killing you...” He motioned to knock. “Let’s inquire.”

  “Please don’t do that,” Mahossier said. His voice was still quiet and even, and for that reason it was commanding.

  Pelleter let his hand drop. “Is there nothing to inquire about then?”

  “It’s just that there are the right people to inquire it of.”

  The two men stared at one another. Mahossier’s face remained self-assured, Pelleter’s steely. The last time Pelleter had come out here, Mahossier had given him the information necessary to capture a murderess in a case that was nearly three years cold.