Tell the Truth, Shame the Devil(50)
“You still love him?” It’s almost an accusation.
“Not in that way, not anymore. But he’s a good man. My husband, David, feels a bit put out that they’ll never be friends. We’re selfish, he and I. We want our cake and to eat it too.” Then Rachel can’t stop herself from asking, “Have you ever loved someone you shouldn’t?”
“Yes. My father.” Noor sighs, world-weary. “Why are you here, Rachel?”
“Do you want the selfish answer?”
“It’s probably the most honest.”
Rachel touches one of the photos. “I haven’t seen Bee this happy since before her brother died.” She tries not to cry again but fails. “Violette and Eddie mean something to her, and I’m frightened that if anything happens to them it will be the last straw for Bee.”
Noor does not respond.
“You know Violette’s in danger out there,” Rachel says. “You need to find a way of letting her know it’s safe for me to walk her into a police station.”
“I don’t know where she is,” Noor says emphatically. “I’ve told your ex-husband that. He stuffed up by not getting on Jimmy’s good side in Calais.”
“What has your brother told you?”
“Just that Violette and the boy came to visit him. I didn’t get a sense Jimmy was holding anything back.”
“You think you’re being tapped?” Rachel asks.
“Oh, I know we’re being tapped. Since last week, anyway. Jimmy by the French, and my calls are recorded here.”
“So you don’t think your brother knows their whereabouts?”
“Not consciously. But Violette and her uncle speak all the time when she’s back home. They have the luxury of longer conversations. So if anyone can get into Violette’s head, it’s Jimmy.”
A guard enters without a knock. “Time’s up. Let’s go.”
Before Rachel can stop herself she reaches for Noor’s hand. The other woman squeezes it in return.
“Tell your ex-husband that if he wants to find Violette and Eddie, he’ll need my brother.”
23
It had been almost ten days since the bombing and the media were uncompromising in their attacks on the French and British authorities, accusing both of dragging their feet. As yet, no one had claimed responsibility. In the eyes of the world this ruled out Al Qaeda and ISIS, who were never shy about owning up to atrocities. French intelligence, according to Attal, seemed to be focusing on Ahmed Khateb, the driver of the French bus, but they were keeping tight-lipped about it.
As far as Bish could tell, there were at least five agencies involved, the most official of which were French intelligence and MI6. If his suspicions about Grazier and Elliot were correct, MI5 were also onto it. The Spanish were conducting their own investigation, based on the death of Lucia Ortez. The Australian Federal Police had sent over a couple of people to find out what the French knew about Violette, which, according to Elliot, who was in touch with her grandparents, was nothing.
And then there was Attal himself. Bish welcomed the clumsy texts he received from the French copper, although they demanded intense analysis through Google translations. Attal may have been officially off the investigation, but the bombing was within his jurisdiction and his daughter had been at the campsite. Bish knew that nothing would stop Attal from continuing his own inquiries, especially since the driver of her bus was a suspect. For Attal, this was personal. He had returned to the campsite often, suspecting that an employee there knew something. Someone had to have given details about which security cameras to avoid when planting the bomb. Attal had revealed to Bish that the camera overlooking the bus parking bays had been smashed. On the day of the bombing, Attal’s people had backed up footage from the other three cameras still operating: one outside the recreation hall, one outside the office, one overlooking the pool. The footage had yielded very little, but did confirm the presence of a security vehicle. When Attal spoke to the owner of the security company, he was told that all their vehicles were accounted for. But between the evening before the bombing and the morning after, there was a discrepancy of eighty kilometers on the odometer of one of the vehicles and very little petrol in the tank. Greta Jager hadn’t imagined what she saw.
Photographies, Attal texted more than once. The answer to who was responsible possibly lay in the photographs taken by the kids.
The lack of progress in the official investigation meant that Violette and Eddie remained in danger of the ignorance that had swept across London and beyond. Social media was abuzz with sightings of them in Richmond, Pimlico, Edgware Road, Manchester, and Swansea, all on the same day. According to Elliot, the only two that could be confirmed were Richmond the day before, when Violette and Eddie had been caught on CCTV on the foot ferry near Orleans Road, and Edgware Road tube station later in the afternoon.
Bish had spent the previous night studying a map of those areas and their surroundings. London Central Mosque? Had someone in the community made contact with Violette? Promised her protection? Or were Violette and Eddie fearless enough to go sightseeing at Madame Tussauds?
“They split up,” Elliot told him early Monday morning while Bish drove them around Edgware Road for what Elliot called a clue spark. “She knows they’re looking for a girl of seventeen and a boy of thirteen, so on the tube they separate so as not to draw attention, and they travel during peak hour so they can get lost in the crowd. They look like the least nervous kids in the country. No backpacks, which means they have some kind of home base. A different football beanie each day for him. Hats and wigs for her. Yesterday morning Violette looks like Eliza Doolittle; later in the day she’s a rock chick.”