fair depth by a dam. Running down to the edge of the pool was an inclined board on which the clothes could be scrubbed. After passing over the dam in a miniature waterfall, the stream flowed on in a wide curve down to the lake.
‘The flashlight.’
Lucienne took command once more. The bundle was unrolled on the tiled floor of the lavoir. Lucienne did the work while he held up the light. The body rolled over, a shapeless mass of wet, crumpled clothing. The hair had dried somewhat. Beneath it Mireille’s features were twisted into a horrible grimace. It only needed a push now. The body rolled onto the inclined board, slid down it, and splashed into the pool. With her foot, Lucienne gave it a jab to make it sink.
She then gathered up the canvas, groping in the dark, as Ravinel had already switched off the flashlight. It was twenty past five.
‘I’ve just got time,’ she muttered.
They went into the house and hung up Mireille’s hat and coat in the hall. Her handbag they left on the dining-room table.
‘Hurry up,’ urged Lucienne whose cheeks had regained a little color. ‘The Nantes express is at six four. I mustn’t miss it on any account.’
When they got back into the car, Ravinel had for the first time the feeling that he was a widower.
FIVE
Ravinel walked slowly down the steps of the Gare Montparnasse. At the entrance to the station he bought a pack of cigarettes. Then he went over to Dupont’s. Chez Dupont tout est bon . That’s what the neon sign said in sickly pink letters, glaring through the wet dawn. Through the windows he could see a row of backs at the long bar, on which stood an enormous percolator with all sorts of valves, handles, and gauges, which a waiter was polishing, yawning as he worked. Ravinel chose a seat behind the door, sat down and tried to relax. It wasn’t the first time he’d been there at that hour. Far from it. Again and again, after driving through the night, he had made a detour and stopped there so as not to get home too early and wake Mireille up. It seemed just the same today, only…
‘Black, please. And three croissants.’
He felt like a convalescent. He was conscious of his ribs, of his elbows, of his knees, of every muscle. At the slightest movement a wave of fatigue went through him. His head seemed to be packed with some hot, throbbing substance which pressed on his eyeballs and drew the skin taut over the bones of his face. He was tempted to go to sleep then and there in the warm steamy atmosphere of the café. But he mustn’t. For the most difficult part was still to be done. He had to discover the body.
This overpowering sleepiness—he hadn’t bargained for that. Yet he saw that it might serve his purpose. Everyonewould think that he was stunned with grief. He got his money ready on the table, then dipped one of the croissants into the coffee, which had a nasty acrid taste, like bile. Thinking things over, he decided that the gendarme incident was quite unimportant. Even if the man remembered that there was a woman in the car, there was an easy answer. A hitchhiker. A woman he didn’t know from Eve. She had thumbed a ride as he was leaving Angers, and he had put her down at Versailles. No one could possibly connect her with Mireille. And who would think of inquiring about a woman passenger on the early morning train to Nantes?
Even if she came under suspicion for a moment, they’d go no further than checking her alibi at the estimated time of death. As for Ravinel, he had been in Nantes all the time, and he could bring forward twenty or thirty persons to prove it. His movements could be verified almost to the hour. There wasn’t a single gap long enough to matter.
Wednesday, November 4th. The post-mortem would certainly establish the date and no doubt make a fairly accurate guess at the time. Wednesday, the 4th. What had he done? Passed the evening at the Brasserie de la Fosse. And the next morning… But what was the point of going over all that?
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