Private Paris (Private 10)

“Take a lot of photographs?” I asked.

“Can always throw the bad ones out.”

“Remember the girl you sang to last week near the mosque?” Louis said.

“I don’t sing.”

“Really?” I said, and then sang, “‘Wake up, Fatima, don’t let me wait. You Muslim girls start much too late’?”

The kid broke into a painful smile and laughed as if his ribs were broken. “I remember now. She was hot.”

“Any chance you took a picture of her?”

“Who is she?”

I said, “She may have been involved in the Sevran bombing last night.”

“Yes?” he said, the gears of his brain meshing and spinning. “So a pic of her could be a get-out-of-jail-free card? ’Cause I did not set that mosque on fire. I was in the area taking pictures and got attacked.”

“Did you get a picture of her?” Louis demanded.

“Had to,” he replied, grinning painfully. “That sweet Fatima was one of a kind.”

Chapter 92

17th Arrondissement

11:15 a.m.

OUTSIDE A CAFÉ near the headquarters of La Crim, we found Investigateur Hoskins and Juge Fromme drowning their sorrows in a bottle of wine.

“Kind of early to be drinking on the job,” Louis said.

“We’re off the job,” Juge Fromme said miserably.

Hoskins nodded. “Counter-terror and the military are taking over.”

“Guess you’re not the people we want to show this to then,” Louis said, sliding his iPhone across the table.

“It’s her,” I said. “The woman on the bus.”

Fromme set his wine down and fumbled for his reading glasses. Hoskins peered at the photograph, and then used her fingers to blow it up.

Du Champs had caught her from an odd angle: looking up and in three-quarter profile, from the chest of her brown robe to the top of her brown head scarf.

“You said the woman on the bus was a redhead with nickel-gray eyes,” Fromme said. “This woman has dark hair and brown eyes.”

“Contacts and rinsable dyes,” Louis said.

“It’s her,” I insisted. “There’s no doubt in my mind.”

“How can you be sure from this angle?” Hoskins said. “You can barely see the right side of her face.”

“When I close my

eyes, I know they’re the same person,” I said. “This picture should be given to every media outlet in the country.”

“That won’t happen,” the magistrate said. “This woman has rights. If you’re wrong and we say she’s a suspect, we could be destroying her reputation.”