Keller balled his right hand into a fist and drove it with all his strength into Devereaux’s blood-soaked shoulder.
“But back to the matter at hand,” he said while the Frenchman writhed on the bed in agony. “You’re going to tell me everything you know about Jean-Luc Martel. The names of your suppliers in Morocco. The routes by which you bring the drugs into Europe. The methods you use for inserting the money into the financial bloodstream of JLM Enterprises. All of it, René.”
“And if I do?”
“We’re going to make a video,” said Keller.
“And if I don’t?”
“You’re going to get the JLM treatment. And I’m not talking about a nice dinner or a night in a luxury hotel suite.”
Devereaux managed a smile. Then, from deep within his throat, he produced a rich, gelatinous ball of phlegm and spat it into Keller’s face. With a corner of the bedding, Keller calmly wiped away the mess before going out to retrieve the hammer from the Corsican. He struck Devereaux with it several times, concentrating his efforts on the right shoulder and avoiding the head and face entirely. Then he went up the companionway to the main salon, where he found Don Orsati watching the football match.
“Was it something he said or didn’t say?”
“It was something he did,” answered Keller.
“Was there blood?”
“A little.”
“I’m glad you waited until I left. I can’t stand the sight of blood.”
A thunderous cheer spilled from the television.
“It’s a rout,” said the don gloomily.
“Yes,” answered Keller. “Let us hope.”
37
The Mediterranean Sea
Christopher Keller made three more trips to the smallest of Celine’s cabins—one at eleven, a second shortly after midnight, and a lengthy visit beginning at half past one that left René Devereaux, a hardened Marseilles criminal with much blood on his hands, weeping uncontrollably and begging for mercy. Keller bestowed it, but only on one condition. Devereaux was going to tell him everything, on camera. Otherwise, Keller was going to break every bone in Devereaux’s body, slowly, with care and forethought and pauses for refreshment and reflection.
He had made a great deal of progress toward that eventuality already. Devereaux’s right shoulder, in which a bullet was lodged, had suffered numerous fractures. Additionally, the right elbow was fractured, as was the left. Both hands were in deplorable condition, and the injury to the right knee, were it allowed to heal properly, would likely have left Devereaux with a permanent limp to match Saladin’s.
Moving him to the salon, where a camera had been mounted atop a tripod, proved to be a challenge. Giancomo pulled him up the companionway while Keller pushed from beneath, giving much-needed support to the ruined leg. Cognac was provided, along with a powerful over-the-counter French pain medication that could make one forget a missing limb. Keller helped Devereaux into a bright yellow watch jacket and with a comb tidied up his lank, thinning hair. Then he switched on the camera and, after scrutinizing the shot carefully, posed his first question.
“What is your name?”
“René Devereaux.”
“What do you do for a living?”
“I own an electronics shop on the Place Jean Jaurès.”
“What is the real nature of your work?”
“Drugs.”
“Where did you first meet Jean-Luc Martel?”
“At a restaurant in Marseilles.”
“Who owned the restaurant?”
“Philippe Renard.”
“What was Renard’s real business?”
“Drugs.”
“Where is Philippe Renard now?”
“Dead.”
“Who killed him?”
“Jean-Luc Martel.”
“How did he kill him?”
“With a hammer.”
“What does Jean-Luc Martel do now?”
“He owns several restaurants, hotels, and retail businesses.”
“What is his real business?”
“Drugs,” said René Devereaux.
They put in at Ajaccio at half past nine. From there it was only a pleasant walk around the curving shoreline of the gulf to the airport. The next flight for Marseilles departed at noon. Keller arrived at eleven fifteen, having stopped for a late breakfast and to purchase a change of clothing. He dressed in an airport washroom and then cleared security with no possessions other than his wallet, a British passport, and his MI6 mobile. On it was a compressed and heavily encrypted video of René Devereaux’s interrogation. At that moment it was perhaps the most important single piece of intelligence in the global war on terrorism.
Keller switched off the phone before takeoff and did not turn it on again until he was walking through the terminal in Marseilles. Mikhail was waiting outside, in the back of Dmitri Antonov’s Maybach. Yaakov Rossman was behind the wheel. They listened to the interrogation through the car’s magnificent sound system while heading eastward on the Autoroute.
“You missed your true calling,” said Mikhail. “You should have been a television interviewer. Or a grand inquisitor.”
“Repent, my son.”
“Think he will?”
“Martel? Not without a fight.”
“There’s no way he can hide from this video. He’s ours now.”
“We’ll see,” said Keller.
It was approaching four in the afternoon by the time the Maybach turned through the gate of the safe house in Ramatuelle. Entering, Keller transferred the video file into the main operational computer network. A moment later René Devereaux’s face appeared on the monitors.
“Where is Philippe Renard now?”
“Dead.”
“Who killed him?”
“Jean-Luc Martel.”
“How did he kill him?”
“With a hammer.”
And on it went for the better part of two hours. Names, dates, places, routes, methods, money . . . It all came down to money. Under Keller’s relentless questioning—and the threat, unseen on the video, of the hammer—René Devereaux surrendered the network’s most precious secrets. How the money was collected from the street-level dealers. How the money was loaded into the laundry that was JLM Enterprises. And how, once it was cleaned and pressed, it was dispersed. The detail was granular, high resolution. There was no hiding from it. Jean-Luc Martel was in their sights. But who would be the one to offer a lifeline? Paul Rousseau declared it would be him. Martel, he said, was a French problem. Only a French solution would do.