“He trains with you?”
“No. He’s a heavy. A henchman. Goes round collecting debts. Selling drugs. Doing the dirty work. Some of my kids, you know, the ones I train, they get themselves into some deep shit. They need money. Some fucking lowlife gets them to do things in return.”
“So who does he work for?”
“Armaud Benoix. You heard of him?”
“No. Should I have?”
“Local drug dealer. Pig-ignorant. The type who pimps thirteen-year-old migrant kids. At the beginning of the year he made news when his eighteen-year-old son was high on ice, swinging a semiautomatic all over Novamatique—the Laundromat. The cops shot him dead during the arrest. It’s all anyone could talk about for weeks.”
Sarraf showed Bish an Internet image of Benoix. Nothing going on in his eyes. Dead cold.
“I’m presuming Benoix’s man isn’t coincidentally in the same place where people die the next day,” Bish said.
“What else do people do around there but camp?” Sarraf asked.
“Bird-watch.”
“This guy, Dussollier, is more the type to hunt birds with a semiautomatic,” Sarraf said.
Bish dialed Attal’s number and put the phone on speaker. “Just tell him what we know,” he told Sarraf. They waited, only to hear Attal’s recorded message. Bish hung up and tried for Attal’s landline. There seemed a diversion and then a voice answered, identifying “Bureau de police.” It was the first and last thing Bish understood before Sarraf started speaking. The woman’s response was quick. Then the click of the line being disconnected.
“Attal’s out and she’ll let him know,” Jamal said.
“Out where?”
Still on speaker, Bish tried Grazier, who picked up with his usual blunt, “Grazier.”
“Can you ring the Bureau de Police Beaumarais and find out where Attal is?”
“What have you got?”
“A name that might interest him. Armaud Benoix.”
“Stay on the line.”
Bish couldn’t sit still. Less than an hour until a possible repeat of what took place at the campsite. He walked to the window, needing air.
“Who is he?” Sarraf asked. “The guy on the phone.”
“Someone who makes things happen,” Bish said as truthfully as he could.
“What sort of things? Arrests? Because I know that name.”
Bish caught Sarraf’s eye. Looked away.
“He makes two-day London visas happen,” Bish said. “And adoptions.”
Sarraf swore under his breath.
Grazier was back on the line.
“It’s not good. There’s been a bomb scare at Calais-Fréthun Station and they’re taking it very seriously. A Brussels to London Eurostar train arrives there at 4:01.”
“Any suspects?” Bish asked.
“Who knows? What about the French bus driver? I still don’t understand why he’s not a suspect.”
“Apparently Serge Sagur had an issue with him because of parking spots,” Bish said. “Did you at least mention Benoix to them?”
“Yes. That name seemed to get a reaction, but not one that they were going to necessarily share with me,” Grazier said. “Stay put. If it’s not a hoax, I’ll need you out there.”
Grazier hung up. Sarraf looked gutted.
“A trainload of people.”
Bish didn’t want his brain going there.
“Could Benoix be responsible?” he asked Sarraf.
“Sort of not his thing. And why go after a bunch of British kids, or a train heading for London? Why wouldn’t he blow up the police station instead? His issue is with Attal. Not tourists.”
“Why Attal?”
“I’m not one for sticking up for coppers, but Benoix’s son was holding a girl and her baby hostage. Attal had no choice.”
Bish’s heart thumped hard in his chest.
“Attal shot Benoix’s son?”
“Yeah. Why?”
Bish moved away from the window. What if…
In an instant he was at the computer, tapping into Lola’s Instagram feed. She wasn’t much of a photographer. Just the type to take snaps of everything. Bish remembered photos taken of the kids inside the French bus. One dated the first day of the tour, one from Bayeux on the fourth day, one from Calais on the last day. The three times that the British and French buses were at the same camping grounds. Marianne Attal was pictured inside her bus, staring out the window. Behind Marianne was the object of Lola’s affections. The French boy who did magic tricks. Bish had looked at these photos ad nauseam. In some of them Lola managed to frame the young magician well, but in most, Marianne’s head was in the way.
“What?” Sarraf asked over his shoulder, staring at the three almost identical photos on the screen.
The French bus, unlike Bee’s, had been full and everyone stuck to assigned seats. Three different days. Same seating. Marianne Attal had been one of the junior coaches on hers, so there was no sitting in the back, Charlie Crombie–style, for her. What had Khateb and Serge argued about? Assigned parking spots.
“What if it was the wrong bus?” Bish said softly.
“I don’t understand.”
“Benoix’s man got the wrong bus. Marianne Attal’s assigned seat was first from the front.”