The Resistance Man (Bruno Chief of Police 6)

activity on Paul’s account at orange.fr.
    He felt he was making progress, step by step. An image of Paul was beginning to build in his head. There was the photograph, that cheeky smile with its flash of intelligence. There was his relationship with his grandfather and their shared obsession about the Neuvic train, his fondness for serious films and his relationship with his sister. How often did siblings in their twenties go on holidays together? But there was so much yet to learn, so much of the image that was fuzzy or blank. What of the connection to Fullerton? Was it business or pleasure or both? And what would Paul have done with the vanload of Fullerton’s antiques? If he and his sister were looking for acamper van, they’d need somewhere to store Paul’s white van and the furniture. The old family farm had been sold, so that was ruled out. Perhaps Paul knew of an abandoned barn up in the hills, but that would not stay long undiscovered.
    There was a knock on his office door and a tall thin man with sloping shoulders and a mournful expression entered the room carrying a black briefcase. He shook hands as he introduced himself.
    ‘Bernard Ardouin,
juge d’instruction
. We have a mutual friend in Annette, who says I have to be sure to listen to you.’
    An interesting start, thought Bruno, and unusual. Under French law since Napoleon’s day, a magistrate appointed to be
juge d’instruction
in a case had almost unlimited control of the investigation. He could interview witnesses and review evidence, define the lines of inquiry the police should pursue, authorize arrests and prosecutions. Finally he or she would present the case to a court. Unlike the adversarial system in Anglo-Saxon countries, where a prosecuting lawyer and a defence lawyer fought the case to win a verdict of guilty or not guilty, a French
juge d’instruction
was supposed to discover the full truth, and had broad powers to do so. That was why the French novelist Balzac had described such a figure as ‘the most powerful man in the world’.
    ‘You’re very welcome,’ said Bruno. ‘Do you want to chat here in the office or go down to the café?’
    ‘Let’s start here. Cafés tend to have lots of ears listening for gossip. And it’s not good for our reputation when people realize how little we know. All I have so far is the certificate of death and a preliminary pathologist’s report which says death was inflicted by a succession of heavy blows causing multiplefractures to the skull and facial bones. It also says that the victim was HIV-positive and taking the usual drugs to keep it at bay.’
    Ardouin removed a thin file from his briefcase and ran over the facts. The victim was a foreigner, Francis Fullerton, aged thirty-six, a British citizen and antiques dealer. The body was discovered by Yves Valentoux, aged thirty-five, of Paris, a French citizen, with whom the deceased was in a homosexual relationship. He looked up.
    ‘I interviewed Valentoux yesterday and was satisfied that he could be released. I understand it was you who worked out his movements through the garage and
péage
receipts. The
Police Nationale
tell me they are looking for a possible suspect, Paul Murcoing. Perhaps you’d take me through this from the beginning.’
    Bruno described the steps he had taken, the visit to Dougal, the postman’s identification of the van, the sign-maker and the warehouse at Belvès.
    ‘So the only evidence of his involvement is that this white van was seen by the postman approaching the
gîte
not long before Fullerton’s death,’ Ardouin said. ‘Plus this Murcoing had been arrested on suspicion of dealing in stolen antiques and may also be homosexual.’
    ‘He’s disappeared and so has his sister. She tried to rent a camper van on the evening of Fullerton’s murder.’
    Ardouin looked up again from where he was scribbling notes on a pad and gave Bruno a look of amiable scepticism. ‘And he’s the only lead you’ve got.’
    ‘True,’ said Bruno. ‘But if somebody goes to the effort of buying a fake sign for his van with a fake address and hepays in cash, then it’s reasonable to assume he’s up to no good.’
    Ardouin nodded. ‘But not necessarily murder. He could have met Fullerton by agreement, loaded his van with Fullerton’s antiques and then left him alive and well. Then someone else comes along and kills him for entirely different reasons.’
    ‘I agree,’ said Bruno. ‘Even so, he’s someone we very