17:25
They make their way out of an almost empty restaurant, agreeing they will meet in an hour. Lily watches her mum approach the Seine to take in the sights.
The interview room is colder. A smell of damp rises.
Lily still has questions.
Monsieur Briac appears, more dishevelled. He carries no papers to put on the table. He lurches over. His confrontational manner makes her feel like crying even before he starts to speak.
‘I want to know whether Thierry said anything else about the attack,’ he says.
‘Can’t you ask him?’ she replies, flatly.
‘I’m asking you,’ he says. ‘Was there anything in his behaviour? Did he talk about Luc Claude?’ Monsieur Briac stabs his chewed biro on the tabletop.
She thinks.
‘No. He didn’t speak about Luc. Only when I mentioned that Didier was in a coma did he really flip.’
‘Alors . . .’
‘You’re questioning Luc?’ she interrupts. ‘He will fill in some gaps.’
‘There is much we’re asking Luc about the attack on Thierry.’
‘And about Raymond Claude's dealings?’
‘Précisement.’
‘There’s nothing else. Madame Briac said Thierry would speak in his own time.’
‘She is right also.’
‘I don’t know any more.’
Monsieur Briac purses his lips. ‘The camera? How did he behave about the camera?’
‘I don’t know what’s on it, if that’s what you mean,’ she says. ‘He’ll say or you’ll find out. He won’t gain anything by keeping quiet now.’
‘This is not about what’s on the camera,’ Monsieur Briac continues, his voice laced with annoyance. ‘It’s about what Thierry believes is happening.’
Lily answers, ‘When I told him about Didier he said he needed space. I think he meant physically and mentally. He struggled with the anxiety. The camera didn’t play a part of it. Not then.’ She checks Monsieur Briac’s stony expression. ‘Look, I don’t know how much he is caught up in all this,’ she says.
‘It is a road of discovery,’ he says.
‘Yes,’ she replies. ‘I’m trying to take it in.’
‘A policeman’s job.’
The remark frustrates her. Meant to placate but patronising all the same. ‘He said you made it easy,’ she retorts.
Monsieur Briac rubs at one of his eyebrows. ‘Thierry stole a gun from me to give to Marc-Olivier. Marc was fool enough to take it to look big in front of Raymond Claude and the rest of his so-called friends.’
‘You didn’t know?’ Her voice burbles with incredulity.
Monsieur Briac’s face lifts. He guffaws. ‘No. But it was a replica anyway.’
Lily pulls away from him. ‘Even so, I think this will put you in a dangerous position with your authorities.’
‘And you are right. They will ask me.’
His lightness of manner fades and she cannot read him.
‘Especially with talk of police corruption . . .’ she says.
Monsieur Briac senses her fervour, his face contorts with anger.
‘Not involving me, if that’s what you’ve heard,’ he snaps.
‘I can’t make sense of what I’ve heard. The drummer Yves—’
‘Ssh!’ he says, raising a hand. ‘Yves Devaux? Yes, that makes sense to me. Big talk from young mouths like his that don’t know any better. Yves wants to beware of what is coming to him. He has a habit of being caught in the wrong places. He needs to learn from the past.’
Monsieur Briac strides to the small window, grinding it up to its limit.
‘Raymond Claude is the one corrupted,’ he says, eventually. ‘We need to talk about Raymond Claude.’ A chattering of magpies almost drowns him out. His tone of voice changes again. All feeling is drained. ‘Claude once worked as a police officer. Here at the Commissariat. His knowledge of the drugs field is immense and he is a trained marksman. You already know he’s not using his skills for the power of good.’ Getting back to the table he towers over her again, pinning his dark eyes on hers. ‘To make it worse on Monday I walked in on the scene and accidentally shot his son across the ear.’
She will not look away from him.
‘They were right,’ she says. ‘They said it was you.’
‘Do you think I don’t regret firing,’ he says, standing back. ‘It was meant as a warning to Claude.’
‘Your aim was bad,’ she says.
He unwraps gum and starts to chew. ‘The room was in chaos,’ is his reply.
‘What's more, you said Marc-Olivier thinks he made the shot. With your gun,’ she enunciates. ‘Thierry believes it too. How can you let them both suffer?’
‘You’re wrong. They are not both suffering. I told Marc the truth after the questioning this morning.’ Monsieur Briac breezes over his sentence. ‘I explained to him. The gun held nothing but blanks. He grabbed the wheel of the car. You saw it happen. You saw us ride over the kerb. Yes?’ He sniffs, twisting his lips awkwardly.
‘Yes, I saw,’ she says.
‘Thierry will know. Soon enough.’ Monsieur Briac clicks his tongue.
Lily feels the trust between Monsieur Briac and Thierry is thin.
She sits motionless. Her eyes are twitching, aching to close.
‘Where is Thierry?’ she asks, her voice blends with sirens somewhere outside.
He does not answer. ‘Excuse me a moment,’ he says, without explanation. He lets the door bang.
She is alone.
She stands by the side of the open window.
A riverboat passes, bursting with top-deck tourists.
‘He has much passion . . . for la justice,’ Lily remembered Pascale saying about her stepfather.
Passion and more, Lily thinks. Monsieur Briac’s voice brims with contempt for Raymond Claude. She learns more about the beige suited policeman by the minute.
And she guesses there are things she still doesn’t know.