paper, l’Équipe,’ Christine said. ‘Contact the local sports federation to see if

they have any records. If you have the names of the players, or of the team, it

should be quite straightforward.’

‘I only have one player’s name, but not the name of the team nor any other

information. The team played in an amateur youth league, and won a championship

in 1940 but I think their coach had been a professional player. I have his name,

Villanova.’

‘It could be a long search, Bruno,’ Christine said. ‘Regional papers like le

Marseillais tend to keep microfiche records, but I’d be surprised if they have

been digitised and so you can’t do an electronic search. You may have to go

through all the issues for 1940. But if they won a championship, that would

probably be at the end of the season, in the springtime, March or April. You

might try just looking for those months. Is this to do with that murder inquiry

you refused to tell us about when you were last here? We saw the reports in

Sud-Ouest.’

‘Yes, poor old Hamid, as you know, was the victim, and nothing seems to have

been taken except his wartime medal and this old photo, so I’m curious to see if

it might shed some light on the affair. It’s just a chance – he may have taken

the things down from the wall himself or thrown them away. We might be following

a false trail, but so far we don’t have much to go on.’

‘I thought I heard on Radio Périgord that some suspects had been detained, in

Lalinde, was it not?’ asked Pamela. ‘They didn’t give any names.’

‘No, if they’re under eighteen, they’re juveniles and their names cannot be

released. Some local youngsters involved in the Front National have been the

subject of police inquiries, but so far there’s no real evidence to connect them

to Hamid’s killing, or even to connect them with Hamid.’

‘I don’t know many young people around here,’ said Pamela thoughtfully. ‘Perhaps

I should. Some of my guests here have teenage children and it might be a good

thing to introduce them to some young locals. We did that a bit last summer with

a young French couple who played tennis on the court here. Rick and Jackie, I

think they were called.’

‘Rick and Jackie?’ Bruno said sharply. ‘Could that have been Richard and

Jacqueline?’

Pamela shrugged. ‘I just knew them by those names. An attractive young couple,

about sixteen or seventeen. She’s a pretty thing, blonde hair, a very good

tennis player. He’s slim, maybe sixty kilos. I think he said his father is a

doctor around here. Why? Do you know them?’

‘How did you meet them, Pamela? And when was this, exactly?’

‘They said they’d been walking in the woods and noticed my tennis court. They

said they’d never played on grass before and asked if they could give it a try.

I had an English family with some teenage children and they spent the afternoon

playing tennis. They seemed very pleasant and polite, but I got the impression

they had been courting pretty energetically in the woods, rather than just

walking. It must have been late August, maybe early September last year. Rick

and Jackie came two or three times. I think she had a car, but I haven’t seen

them this year.’

‘You say they came out of the woods and down to your property. Which woods,

exactly?’

‘Those over that hill.’ She pointed. ‘Over towards Hamid’s place. From the hill,

you can see both my place and his.’

‘Did they ever mention Hamid, or meet him, or see him here when he came to tell

you how to prune your roses?’

‘Not that I can recall.’

‘When they came to visit you again, did they come the same way, from the woods?’

‘No, they came up the road by car. I remember it well because she drove too fast

and I had to tell her to slow down.’

‘Did they go walking off into the woods again while they were here?’

‘Yes, I think they did, teenage passion and all that. You’re sounding very

policeman-like and serious, Bruno. Do you think they could be connected to

Hamid’s murder?’

‘I don’t know, but it suggests that they may have known the old man, or seen

him, or at least had the opportunity to do so, and other than that there is

nothing to connect them with Hamid.’

‘They didn’t seem like Front National types. They weren’t skinheads or thuggish

in any way. They seemed pretty well educated and had good manners, always saying

please and thank you. They even brought me some flowers once. They spoke quite a

bit of English, got on well with the English kids. They were really very

pleasant – I enjoyed meeting them.’

‘Well, it may be nothing, but since we have so few leads, we have to follow them

all. So I must say thank you for the game and get back to work. But I’d better

stroll up to those woods and see whatever’s to be seen before I go.’

‘Can we come too?’ asked Christine. ‘I have never seen a real policeman at

work.’

‘I’m not a real policeman, not in that sense,’ Bruno laughed. ‘I won’t be like

your Sherlock Holmes with his memory for a hundred different kinds of cigar ash

and his magnifying glass. I just want to take a look. Do come along if you

like.’

It turned into a gentle Sunday stroll up to the top of the rise, perhaps a

kilometre to the first thin trees. Another hundred metres through the woods and

over the ridge line, and there was Hamid’s cottage, five hundred metres or so

away and the only building in sight. They walked along the fringe of the woods

and found a small clearing of soft turf, sheltered and private but with a

glorious view over the plateau – a perfect place for a romantic rendezvous in

the open air, thought Bruno. He looked carefully around and found some old

cigarette stubs and a broken wine glass under a bush. He would have to send the

forensics team up here.

They walked back to Pamela’s house mostly in silence, and quickly drank what was

left of the champagne. Then the Baron and Bruno took their leave. The pleasant

atmosphere after the tennis had become sombre. They made no plans to play

together again, but Bruno decided he could always call. Now would not be a good

time, not with the shadow of a neighbour’s murder hanging over Pamela’s house

and the knowledge that the suspects had visited her, enjoyed her hospitality,

and played on the same tennis court where they had spent such an agreeable

morning.

CHAPTER

15

The Juge-magistrat, a dapper and visibly ambitious young Parisian named Lucien

Tavernier who might just have reached the age of thirty, had arrived on the

early morning flight down to Périgueux airport. Bruno took an instant dislike to

the man when he noticed the predatory way he looked at Inspector Isabelle at the

first meeting of the investigative team. It was just after eight a.m. and

Isabelle had woken him with a phone call at midnight to say his presence would

be required. Bruno had not wanted to go; he had a parade to organise for midday

and he was not a member of the investigative team, but

J-J

had specially asked

him to be there to explain the new evidence that put Richard Gelletreau and

Jacqueline Courtemine in the vicinity of Hamid’s cottage. Without Bruno’s phone

call to

J-J

on the previous day, Richard would already have been released.

‘What he said is that he used to go to the woods to have sex, and he hadn’t even

noticed Hamid’s cottage since he had other matters on his mind,’ said

J-J

. With

his hair awry and his shirt collar undone, he looked as if he’d barely slept as