Seen and Not Heard (Maggie Bennett 4)

Claire hurried in, stumbling slightly on the rotting door sill, with Nicole at her heels. “Tom …” she began, but he was nowhere in sight.

She turned back to Nicole. “He m

ust have headed for the little boys’ room,” she said.

“Comment?”

Claire understood the tone if not the word. “He’s probably gone to the bathroom himself,” she explained more prosaically. “Why don’t we get settled?”

“He’s made a third bed.” Nicole pointed to a pile of clothing a good distance from the two blanket-covered piles of hay.

“How absurd,” Claire said with a sigh, heading over toward the new pile. “He didn’t have to move that far …” Her voice trailed off. As she drew closer in the shadowy darkness of the old barn she began to recognize the clothes. She hadn’t realized Nicole was following her until the child started screaming.

Blood was everywhere, pooling around Tom’s body. He lay face down in it, and Claire knew with heart-numbing certainty that no one could lose that much blood and still live. She bit back her own horrified scream, grabbed Nicole’s limp arm, and ran, straight out into the pouring rain toward the old Peugeot, hoping and praying they’d make it there before Marc.

The keys were still in it. She shoved Nicole into the seat beside her, locked the doors, and began grinding the starter. For long, desperate moments it just coughed and choked, and Claire bit her lip until it bled, ignoring the tears of panic and despair that rolled down her face, cursing and praying and beating on the steering wheel, certain that Marc’s hideously grinning face would appear at the window.

Finally the damned thing caught. There was no sign of anyone, no shadows in the darkness. Claire slammed the car into gear, slid in the mud until she rested up against a tree, and then, yanking the steering wheel with all her strength, she tore off down the narrow, muddy track.

Malgreave sat alone in the darkness of his living room, listening to the rain. He heard the car pull up outside, and only for a brief moment did he allow himself the fantasy that it might be Marie, changing her mind. He knew the sound of a police car when he heard it, he recognized Josef’s hurried tread on the front steps. He’d heard them often enough to memorize them. He stared at the overflowing ashtray on the table in front of him, listening to the sound of his doorbell, the frenzied pounding on his front door.

They’d been trying to get him for a while, but he hadn’t answered the phone. He’d been afraid it would be Marie, and he didn’t know what he could say to her; he was afraid it wasn’t Marie, and he’d be speechless with rage and disappointment. In the end he simply hadn’t answered. If the rest of his department could be a bunch of self-absorbed incompetents why not him, too? He might as well be as inept as the rest of them.

He leaned forward and stubbed out his cigarette, nudging some of the butts aside, out onto Marie’s treasured walnut coffee table. The glass of whiskey sat there, barely touched. For all his determined inattention to duty Malgreave couldn’t bring himself to get as drunk as he so desperately wanted. The game with Bonnard and Guillère wasn’t finished. Even if he’d screwed up his family life, his professional life was still worth salvaging.

He rose, not hurrying, and headed for the door, flicking on the light in the hall as he went. He noted with a distant interest that Josef hadn’t come alone. Vidal, his hated rival, was with him.

“Yes?” He kept his voice low and unpromising.

“They’ve found Guillère,” Vidal announced, and Josef glared at him for stealing his thunder.

“In a small town in the northeast named Jassy,” he added importantly.

“Found him?” Malgreave echoed. “Is he dead?”

“Very much so,” Vidal said.

“He had a bullet in his shoulder, his throat was cut, and his body had been mutilated,” Josef broke in. “And you’ll never guess where he was found.”

“I don’t want to guess,” Louis said evenly, retrieving his still-wet raincoat from the hall floor. “I expect you to tell me, and quickly.”

“He was found in the farmhouse of an old vineyard that belongs in part to Thomas J. Parkhurst.” Josef looked pleased with himself.

“The American friend of Bonnard’s mistress. Interesting,” Malgreave murmured, following them out into the rain.

“And the farmhouse had been recently occupied. Two beds were slept in, clothes were left behind, according to the local gendarmes. Clothes belonging to a woman, a man, and a girl.”

“So it appears Rocco ran afoul of our fugitives. There’ve been no more phone calls?”

“None.” Josef looked abashed. He held the door of the police car for his superior, but Malgreave opened the front door himself and slid in beside Vidal. Josef had no choice but to get in back alone, something that didn’t please him. He knew better than to object.

“Surely you don’t think they killed Rocco?” Vidal demanded, heading out into the traffic at suicidal speed.

“What do you think?” Malgreave countered.

Vidal thought about it. “I would guess the American shot him, and left him there. The bullet would slow him down enough so they could make their escape. Someone else must have used the knife. Someone who’s made a recent habit of using knives. Bonnard?”

“I’d put good money on it,” Malgreave replied. “What do you think, Josef?”