Read Online Have Mercy On Us All by Fred Vargas - Free Book Online Page B

very handy.”
    He leaned over the desktop and wrote down:
Thin. Redhead. Photographer …
    “Remind me of the name …”
    “Barteneau.” Danglard almost spat it out. “Daniel Barteneau.”
    “Thank you,” said Adamsberg as he finished writing it down in his memory-jogger. “Did you realise we have a real dickhead in the squad? I said
a
dickhead, but there may be others.”
    “Favre, Jean-Louis.”
    “Hole in one. So what are we going to do with him?”
    Danglard shrugged with a broad sweep of his arms. “That’s a problem for the whole wide world,” he said. “Can we try to make improvements to him?”
    “That would take at least fifty years.”
    “What are you messing about with these 4s for?”
    “Aha.” He opened his notebook on the page where Maryse had made her drawing. “That’s what they look like.”
    Danglard glanced at the sketch and gave the pad back to Adamsberg.
    “Was any offence committed? Any violence?”
    “No, nothing apart from brush strokes. It won’t cost anything to go have a look. Anyway, until we’ve got the windows barred down here, all the real cases have to be handled by the Quai des Orfèvres.”
    “That’s no excuse for taking on nonsense. There’s lots to do so as to get things set up properly.”
    “This isn’t nonsense, Danglard, I promise you.”
    “Graffiti.”
    “When did wall-daubers ever decorate stairwell doors? In three different places in Paris?”
    “They could be jokers. Or the next avant-garde.”
    Adamsberg shook his head slowly.
    “No. There’s nothing avant-garde about this. On the contrary. It’s much murkier than that.”
    Danglard shrugged his shoulders.
    “I know what you mean,” Adamsberg said as they left the office. “I do know.”
    The photographer was coming into the courtyard and moving towards them over the builders’ rubble. Adamsberg shook his hand. The name that Danglard had made him rehearse had now slipped his mind entirely. The best thing would be to copy the notes in his mind-jogger into a pocketbook so he could have it to hand at all times. He’d get on with it tomorrow, because this evening there was Camille, and Camille came ahead of Bretonneau or whatever the man’s name was. Danglard came up behind his chief and said over his shoulder “Hallo, Barteneau”.
    “Hallo, Barteneau,” Adamsberg parroted, with a glance of gratitude towards his number two. “Let’s go. Avenue d’Italie. Nothing nasty today. We just need some art photos.”
    From the corner of his eye Adamsberg could see Danglard putting on his jacket and tugging at the bum-flaps to make sure it sat squarely on his shoulders.
    “I’ll be coming with, if I may,” he mumbled.

VII
    JOSS HURRIED DOWN Rue de la Gaîté at three and a half knots. He’d not stopped wondering since yesterday afternoon if he’d really heard the old bookworm aright, when he’d said “The room’s yours, Le Guern”. Yes, of course, he had heard him say that, but did the words really mean what Joss thought they ought to mean? Did they mean that Decambrais was actually prepared to rent his room to the Breton Brute? With carpets and Lizbeth and dinner and all? Of course that’s what the words meant. What else could they mean? But saying that yesterday was one thing. Maybe the aristo had had a night of inner turmoil and woken up this morning firmly resolved to back out. Joss was sure that he would sidle up to him after the morning newscast and say how sorry he was, but the room had already been let – first come, first served, you know.
    Yep, thought Joss, that’s what was going to happen, no later than a few minutes from now. That jelly-kneed old fraud had been most relieved to learn that Joss wasn’t going to blurt out the business about the lace, and that’s why he’d had a sudden burst of generosity and offered his room to the old sea dog. But now he was going to take it back. That’s Decambrais for you – a bore, and a louse to boot. Just like he’d always