Two France Crime Novels In One Volume August 2023 E-Book

Alfred Bekker

• Herausgeber: Alfredbooks
• Kategorie: Abenteuer, Thriller, Horror
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 265

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2023

Beschreibung

Two France crime novels in one volume August 2023 This volume contains the following France crime novels: Marquanteur seeks Monsieur Caron (Alfred Bekker) Marquanteur On The Beach (Alfred Bekker) An old case takes on new explosiveness when a yacht carrying two people blows up and drugs are found afterwards. Commissaires Pierre Marquanteur and François Leroc search for a ruthless killer who has a certain signature. But there seems to be more than one murderer. Alfred Bekker is a well-known author of fantasy novels, thrillers and books for young people. In addition to his major book successes, he has written numerous novels for suspense series such as Ren Dhark, Jerry Cotton, Cotton Reloaded, Kommissar X, John Sinclair, and Jessica Bannister. He has also published under the names Neal Chadwick, Jack Raymond, Jonas Herlin, Dave Branford, Chris Heller, Henry Rohmer, Conny Walden, and Janet Farell.

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Alfred Bekker

Two France Crime Novels In One Volume August 2023

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Inhaltsverzeichnis

Two France Crime Novels In One Volume August 2023

​Copyright

​Marquanteur Seeks Monsieur Caron

​Marquanteur On The Beach

Two France Crime Novels In One Volume August 2023

Alfred Bekker

Two France crime novels in one volume August 2023

This volume contains the following France crime novels:

Marquanteur seeks Monsieur Caron (Alfred Bekker)

Marquanteur On The Beach (Alfred Bekker)

An old case takes on new explosiveness when a yacht carrying two people blows up and drugs are found afterwards. Commissaires Pierre Marquanteur and François Leroc search for a ruthless killer who has a certain signature. But there seems to be more than one murderer.

Alfred Bekker is a well-known author of fantasy novels, thrillers and books for young people. In addition to his major book successes, he has written numerous novels for suspense series such as Ren Dhark, Jerry Cotton, Cotton Reloaded, Kommissar X, John Sinclair, and Jessica Bannister. He has also published under the names Neal Chadwick, Jack Raymond, Jonas Herlin, Dave Branford, Chris Heller, Henry Rohmer, Conny Walden, and Janet Farell.

​Copyright

A CassiopeiaPress book: CASSIOPEIAPRESS, UKSAK E-Books, Alfred Bekker, Alfred Bekker presents, Casssiopeia-XXX-press, Alfredbooks, Uksak Special Edition, Cassiopeiapress Extra Edition, Cassiopeiapress/AlfredBooks and BEKKERpublishing are imprints of

Alfred Bekker

© Roman by Author

COVER A.PANADERO

© of this issue 2023 by AlfredBekker/CassiopeiaPress, Lengerich/Westphalia

The invented persons have nothing to do with actual living persons. Similarities in names are coincidental and not intended.

All rights reserved.

www.AlfredBekker.de

[email protected]

Follow on Twitter:

https://twitter.com/BekkerAlfred

Get the latest news here:

https://alfred-bekker-autor.business.site/

To the publisher's blog!

Be informed about new releases and backgrounds!

https://cassiopeia.press

Everything about fiction!

​Marquanteur Seeks Monsieur Caron

Alfred Bekker

Marquanteur Seeks Monsieur Caron: France Crime Thriller

by Alfred Bekker

There is a gang war going on in Marseille. Marquanteur's colleague Caron wants to meet with an informant. The informant is discovered and dead, and Caron is kidnapped. Since he can throw away his badge, the kidnappers think he is a crook of the opposite side. Commissaire Marquanteur and his colleagues from the special FoPoCri unit don't have much time to free...

Alfred Bekker is a well-known author of fantasy novels, thrillers and books for young people. In addition to his major book successes, he has written numerous novels for suspense series such as Ren Dhark, Jerry Cotton, Cotton Reloaded, Kommissar X, John Sinclair, and Jessica Bannister. He has also published under the names Neal Chadwick, Jack Raymond, Jonas Herlin, Dave Branford, Chris Heller, Henry Rohmer, Conny Walden, and Janet Farell.

Copyright

A CassiopeiaPress book: CASSIOPEIAPRESS, UKSAK E-Books, Alfred Bekker, Alfred Bekker presents, Casssiopeia-XXX-press, Alfredbooks, Uksak Special Edition, Cassiopeiapress Extra Edition, Cassiopeiapress/AlfredBooks and BEKKERpublishing are imprints of

Alfred Bekker

© Roman by Author

COVER A.PANADERO

© of this issue 2023 by AlfredBekker/CassiopeiaPress, Lengerich/Westphalia

The invented persons have nothing to do with actual living persons. Similarities in names are coincidental and not intended.

All rights reserved.

www.AlfredBekker.de

[email protected]

Follow on Twitter:

https://twitter.com/BekkerAlfred

Get the latest news here:

https://alfred-bekker-autor.business.site/

To the publisher's blog!

Be informed about new releases and backgrounds!

https://cassiopeia.press

Everything about fiction!

1

"Salute, Tigre! What a surprise!"

Jonah "Tigre" Berthier whirled around.

With his right hand, he slid back the plaid jacket. A hard noise that sounded like a ratchet! stopped Berthier from yanking the massive Magnum Colt from his belt.

Berthier froze.

Half a dozen gunmen sprang up from various hiding places. They held submachine guns at the ready. Some lurked at the corners of the surrounding warehouses, others came out from behind the massive bridge piers that supported the bridge of the A55 expressway.

A trap!

This thought struck Berthier like a bolt of lightning. But the realization came too late. Blindly he had stumbled into it. And now there could only be a desperate fight to the death.

Berthier realized that he was surrounded. His gaze circled over the remote industrial site in Marseille/ Les Crottes. It was so contaminated with heavy metals that there would be no one to donate it to for decades to come. Cannibalized trucks were rusting away, warehouses were decaying and had become a home for rats.

A place made for a secret meeting.

And for a murder.

Berthier swallowed.

The sound of gunfire was swallowed up by the noise of the A 55. With the help of an elevated bridge, the busy arterial road was partly routed across the industrial site.

More men were now coming out of hiding. Berthier saw dark sunglasses and submachine guns ready to fire.

"Tigre, you're an idiot," said a cutting voice that belonged to a small wiry man.

"Cassou!" hissed Berthier between his teeth. "I should have guessed."

Cassou stepped forward. The MP hung casually on a strap over his shoulder and crumpled his thousand-euro jacket.

Cold-bloodedly, he fingered a silver case from his inside pocket and put a slim cigarillo in the corner of his mouth. One of his men gave him a light.

"Who did you come here to meet, Tigre? With the people from La Villette? Come on, spit it out! You're stealing our time - and I can't stand that, Tigre. You should know me that well."

Berthier's posture relaxed somewhat.

There was still talk. He was still alive.

But he was professional enough to know that there was nothing left for him to win.

Cassou screwed up his face, took the cigarillo out of his mouth and bared his teeth.

"Listen, we can just whack you or fix you up first so you'll be begging to have a bullet put in your fucking skull!" he then hissed.

Buy time!, thought Berthier.

He squinted at a rusted Mercedes van with no tires or doors, four meters away from him.

"I was here to meet with a cop," he said.

Cassou laughed harshly.

"A rare stupid lie," he commented. "Perhaps to deliver yourself to the knife?"

One of the gunmen reached for the radio.

"Monsieur Cassou, there's a car coming," he turned to his boss.

Berthier thought he had chosen an opportune moment. He pulled out the Magnum Colt, fired wildly, and rushed toward the wrecked Mercedes.

Three or four of the killers fired their MPs simultaneously. Bursts of twenty to thirty bullets per second hissed out of the short barrels. The projectiles perforated the sheet metal of the Mercedes van, scratching the concrete floor. Sparks flew.

Berthier twitched. His checkered jacket turned red. The enormous Colt Magnum slipped out of his hand. Berthier doubled over and lay motionless.

"Come on, clean up!" ordered Cassou, addressing his men.

2

Commissaire Stéphane Caron steered the car onto the abandoned industrial site. He parked the nondescript Ford behind a half-ruined warehouse whose large metal doors were covered in a layer of brown rust.

Stéphane got out, checked the fit of his SIG Sauer P 226 pistol and looked around. The noise of the A55 roared from the nearby bridge.

Stéphane looked at the watch on his wrist.

He was supposed to arrive here at exactly 5:23 pm. Not a minute earlier or later, otherwise the man he wanted to meet here would have cancelled the appointment.

Stéphane was on time.

And he was aware that he was now being watched. Jonah Tigre Berthier was probably waiting for him at a safe distance to make sure that Caron came alone.

Stéphane had complied with all the conditions Berthier had set.

Stéphane walked toward one of the mighty pillars on which a graffiti sprayer had artfully applied Fidel Castro's likeness.

There was the meeting place.

Stéphane walked toward the bridge abutment. On the A55, the rush-hour traffic roared louder than the surf on the seashore in a strong wind.

Stéphane briefly let his eyes wander over the wrecked cars.

Out of the corner of his eye, he perceived movement for a split second. Someone was lurking behind the corner of a dilapidated warehouse.

Stéphane had almost reached the bridge pillar with Fidel Castro. Castro casually held a Kalashnikov in his right hand and a Havana in his left.

Instinctively, Stéphane sensed that something was wrong here.

He kept an inconspicuous eye on the corner by the warehouse.

Maybe the Tigre Berthier is there, Stéphane thought.

Berthier probably just wanted to make sure and observe his interlocutor first.

Nevertheless, Stéphane played it safe.

He positioned himself next to the bridge pier in such a way that he could not be shot down from the warehouse corner.

And then he noticed the red spots near the Mercedes van.

Blood!

The stains on the metal could hardly be distinguished from rust at first glance. But the ones on the floor formed a trail. As if someone had dragged a corpse off!

Stéphane's hand went to the SIG in his belt holster. He pulled out the weapon. Carefully, he put one step in front of the other, circled the massive bridge pier and saw ...

... a few feet!

Seconds later, he saw a dead man lying on the concrete.

Jonah Tigre Berthier.

The position was peculiar. The man was lying on his back with his arms pointing toward his head. His clothes were soaked in blood in the area of the upper body. Numerous bullet holes had virtually riddled him.

Stéphane took a deep breath. Someone had beaten him to it. Someone who had somehow gotten wind of this meeting!

Stéphane whirled around.

He just saw two gunmen emerge from behind one of the other concrete pillars. They had the MPs at the ready. Dark sunglasses protect them against the low evening sun.

Stéphane reacted as fast as lightning. He pressed himself against the concrete while the first volley was already fired in his direction. Sparks flew as the projectiles scratched the concrete. Small pieces were shot out of the bridge pier. Bullets stuck here and there, others became treacherous ricochets. At that moment, Stéphane Caron cursed himself for coming here without any protection. He had taken a full risk. After all, it wasn't every day that an important figure in the international arms trade offered himself as an informant for FoPoCri. And that was when Stéphane Caron had put all his eggs in one basket.

Whole shiploads of state-of-the-art weapons of war, from assault rifles to mobile Stinger anti-aircraft missiles, had been sent all over the world via the port of Marseille in recent weeks, according to information from undercover agents and informants. A few small shipments had been confiscated here and there on the basis of this information, but there was reason to believe that this had been no more than the tip of the iceberg. There was a vibrant trade in death going on, well camouflaged in the background.

And Stéphane had hoped to finally get one step closer to the backers via Tigre Berthier. But this hope had now been dashed.

Stéphane waited until the hail of bullets had subsided. He heard footsteps. Briefly, he saw one of the killers appear and raise his gun. Stéphane fired. He caught the guy in the shoulder. The killer was yanked back, cried out, and staggered to the ground, cursing.

Stéphane sprinted off.

He briefly looked in the direction of the warehouse corner. His suspicions were confirmed. He could not see more than the flash of a muzzle flash. Stéphane threw himself to the ground, rolled over and fired twice with his SIG. Meanwhile, MPi rounds were hitting left and right. Stéphane scrambled to his feet. With a leap, he was at the rusty van. Bullets whistled thickly over his head. The Mercedes van was not good cover. Some of the bullets simply punched through the metal sheets. Stéphane took a deep breath. He reached into his jacket and pulled out his badge.

Stéphane knew what he was doing when he slid him under the van. He did the same with the handcuffs he wore on his belt.

And then he took out his cell phone. One push of a button and he was in contact with FoPoCri Marseille. The number of our headquarters was stored in the phone's menu.

"This is Commissaire Caron. I'm in a jam!" Stéphane gave his position.

A bullet whizzed close to Stéphane's head and hit the cell phone. The phone burst. Stéphane instantly withdrew his hand, threw himself to the side and fired back, lying flat on the ground.

He gripped the SIG tighter.

Something moved behind a pile of rubble. One of the killers emerged briefly. Stéphane shot several times in quick succession, so that his opponent quickly dived back.

My chances are zero, Stéphane realized bitterly.

But he was determined to sell himself as dearly as possible.

3

Tires squealed. The sports car, which the motor pool had put at my disposal, slid over the asphalt a bit more. We pulled open the doors almost simultaneously - my friend and colleague François Leroc and I, Commissaire Pierre Marquanteur. We both pulled out our service weapons.

Commissaire François Leroc and I belonged to the Force spéciale de la police criminelle, or FoPoCri, a special unit in Marseille specializing in organized crime investigations.

We were not the first on the scene.

A few meters away was a Ford in which our colleague Boubou Ndonga had come.

He had obviously been closer. Boubou was Stéphane Caron's partner in service. And also his friend.

With the SIG in both hands, he looked around.

Moments later, a few more cars arrived. Our colleagues. They were supported by forces of uniformed police.

Within half a minute, police forces swarmed everywhere, mostly equipped with bulletproof vests.

The action was somewhat hasty, but nevertheless quite large-scale. Whoever had engaged in a firefight with our colleague Stéphane Caron here on this industrial wasteland had to see that he went into hiding as quickly as possible. For the area was cordoned off over a wide area.

I walked up to Boubou, the SIG still at the ready.

However, my instincts told me that we were probably too late. All the signs pointed to this.

"You were here first?", I asked, turning to Boubou.

"Yes. I was on Rue de Leon, close by here. But that's still five minutes from here. And when I showed up here, there was no sign of Stéphane. Unless ..." He pointed to the bloodstains near the Mercedes van. Together with the numerous bullet holes that had turned the rusty vehicle into something like a Swiss cheese, this made for a picture that I didn't like.

"Only the laboratory analyses will show whether this is Stéphane's blood," Boubou said gloomily. He pointed to the concrete pillar with the Castro graffito. "There are also traces of blood behind it. Seems like whoever was shot here was dragged behind the concrete pillar."

No one said it. But everything suggested that the person in question was none other than our colleague Stéphane Caron.

A helicopter rattled over the industrial site. After all, the most effective way to search the confusing area was from the air.

"This is where he was going to meet Tigre Berthier," Boubou said, pointing to the Castro graffito. "I was in on it, but I wasn't allowed to go. I waited in the Rue de Lyon. After all, we didn't know if Berthier might have the site staked out, and then everything would have fallen apart."

"Tigre was going to unpack?" asked François, somewhat skeptically.

"Yes. And comprehensively."

I understood only too well that Stéphane had not been able to resist the temptation. We had long suspected that Tigre Berthier, a moderately successful import/export merchant, was involved in shady business.

He was probably some kind of middleman in the illegal arms deals that we were dealing with intensively at the moment. Unfortunately, what we had in hand against him had not been enough for the prosecutor to lift even a little finger.

"Why did Tigre suddenly want to unpack?", I asked. "Was there any special reason for it?"

And François added: "Our rather unsuccessful investigations against him can hardly have affected him so much that he wanted to break his silence out of fear."

"I don't know," Boubou opined. "Maybe Tigre has fallen out with his clean business friends - and unlike the judiciary, they don't give a fair trial, they give a short one."

At that moment, our colleague Fred Lacroix radioed in. Boubou took the device out of his jacket pocket.

"Ndonga here. What's up?"

"We found the car Stéphane was traveling in in one of the warehouses," Lacroix reported.

"Any leads?" asked Boubou.

"Tire treads in front of the warehouse. The car was originally parked in front of the warehouse and has been driven into it in quite a hurry. The tires spun on takeoff. The rest will be taken care of by the recognition service."

4

Specialists from the central recognition service finally arrived. We at FoPoCri were also happy to make use of his services.

Dozens of commissaires, recognizers, and police officers searched every square inch of this derelict industrial site.

There was no sign of the gangsters Stéphane Caron had been dealing with during his emergency call.

However, we did not find a body either.

And under the circumstances, we considered that to be good news. After all, it meant no more and no less than that there was still hope for Stéphane Caron.

The specialists from the recognition service collected a lot of cartridge cases and projectiles. There were also tire tracks from several vehicles that were still quite fresh and perhaps related to the case. As for the blood traces, we would have to wait and see what the laboratory said.

Near the tire tracks was a cufflink that seemed quite precious. At least 585 gold plating, I estimated. The design was very unusual. The engraving looked like a Chinese character. Perhaps the jeweler who had made the piece could be determined.

And then there was something else.

One of the people from the recognition service found it under the Mercedes van.

It was a service card, as every commissaire carries, and a pair of handcuffs, as part of our standard equipment.

The pass was issued in the name of Stéphane Caron.

Boubou looked at the paper carefully and then passed it to me.

"Can you make sense of that?" asked Commissaire Fred Lacroix.

"He expected to be captured," Boubou growled grimly. "And he knew that his chances of survival might be a little better if this thing wasn't found on him."

Boubu's hands clenched into fists. He could see how much he was affected by the uncertain fate of his partner.

The matter was very hard on all of us - but certainly on him the most.

His reasoning was logical.

During the investigation of the arms smuggling ring, whose middleman was most likely Jonah Tigre Berthier, two commissioners had already died under mysterious circumstances. Two commissaires who had tried to get closer to the masterminds as undercover investigators.

These people made short work of commissaires.

And the fact that Stéphane had left his ID behind - apparently on purpose - spoke volumes. He had believed that he was dealing with the people we were looking for.

And if he was still alive, he was now in their power.

5

Boubou and Lacroix, along with several other colleagues, took to the premises of Tigre Berthier's import/export company.

Via cell phone they informed François and me that Berthier was not to be found there, but only his partner and some company employees.

But their statements could also perhaps help us.

François and I, meanwhile, were on our way to Meynier, where Berthier owned a villa.

At a cast-iron gate I operated an intercom.

"Pierre Marquanteur, FoPoCri," I introduced myself. "My colleague and I would like to speak with Monsieur Jonah Berthier."

"He's not here," a sullen-looking male voice replied.

"And who are you?", I inquired.

I did not get an answer. The voice contact was simply interrupted. I pressed the button on the intercom again.

"Listen, either you open up for me now, or I'll be back in half an hour with a search warrant and twenty colleagues sweeping the bottom to the top in your villa."

Again I got no answer. But at least the gate now opened with a whir.

"Well, at least something," François said.

We got into the sports car and drove through the gate.

The villa was a few sizes too big for Berthier's financial circumstances. In any case, his import/export company was in the red. It probably served primarily to launder dirty money for a few powerful sharks in the background. And losses didn't matter.

I turned off the car. We got out.

A beefy bodyguard descended the steps to the main entrance. A radio was sticking out of his jacket pocket.

We showed our identification cards.

The guy was not interested. He made a jerky sideways movement with his head, signalling us to follow him.

We were led into a spacious living room crammed with valuable antiques.

"You are free to go," said a sullen male voice addressing the bodyguard.

I recognized it. It belonged to a lean young man, barely twenty-five. He sat in one of the armchairs with a glass of cognac and eyed us suspiciously.

To his left was a woman whose sight would normally have made me hold my breath.

Normally.

At the moment, my thoughts were with Stéphane.

The lady came towards me. Her tight-fitting dress hid as good as nothing of her fantastic figure. On the contrary. It emphasized the dizzying silhouette even more.

"I am Madame Berthier. And who are you?"

"Pierre Marquanteur, FoPoCri. My colleague Leroc and I have a few questions for you. Are you married to Jonah Tigre Berthier?"

"Yes."

I turned to the gaunt young man who was sipping his whiskey glass.

"And who are you?"

"Ronny Berthier. The brother. Maybe you'll start telling us what you want instead of stealing our time!"

"Where is Mr. Jonah - called Tigre - Berthier?", I asked.

Ronny screwed up his face.

"You cops have tried to get your hands on my brother several times, but you haven't succeeded. And shall I tell you why not? Because you don't have a thing on him. Nothing that could hold up in the eyes of justice!"

I paid no further attention to him, but turned to his wife. Somehow she seemed more affable to me.

"Do you know where your husband is?"

"No, monsieur marquanteur. I'm sorry."

"When do you expect him back?"

Her face changed. She looked over at Ronny for a moment, then said, "Tigre doesn't answer to me. I mean, if he has business to do, then ..."

I interrupted her. I just didn't feel like beating around the bush. Stéphane was either dead or in the greatest danger. And if we could still save him at all, we had to be damn good. And above all, fast. So I wanted to take the direct route to the goal, without any detours.

"Your husband was going to meet someone at a disused industrial site in Les Crottes. All we know is that there was a shooting there and at least one person was injured. Maybe killed, too."

I did not mention Stéphane Caron with a word.

That Tigre Berthier had wanted to meet with a Commissaire, we did not trumpet around, in order not to put Stéphane in even more danger - provided he was still alive at all.

Madame Berthier stared at me with her dark brown eyes.

"Oh, my God ..." she breathed between made-up lips.

"There is no trace of your husband," I explained.

And François added, "Do you know anything about this meeting?"

Madame Berthier shrugged her shoulders.

"Tigre never talked business with me, you must know. I had no idea who he was meeting with and where."

"Someone seems to have had something against this meeting," I noted. I studied her finely cut face very closely as I did so. "That doesn't seem to surprise you."

The look in her eyes was perfect. Her smile an ice-cold mask.

"You're wrong," she asserted, "I'm just too stunned to get any sensible sentence together."

"Possibly your husband is dead," I stated. "That doesn't seem to worry you very much."

"I have learned not to let my feelings get out, Monsieur Marquanteur."

"Oh!"

"Now, if you have no more questions ..."

"Did your husband wear cufflinks?"

"Sure."

"Any with Chinese characters on them, too?"

"I'm sure he didn't. I would remember that."

I put one of the cards on her desk that FoPoCri has printed for its employees.

"Call me if you do think of something!"

"I will, Monsieur Marquanteur."

I had already turned to leave when I felt Madame Berthier's gaze on me. I turned my head, looked at her and wondered what was going on in her pretty head now.

She raised her eyebrows.

"Is there anything else, Monsieur Marquanteur?"

"You can call me Pierre," I replied.

"I hardly know you ..."

"Funny, somehow I almost feel like we're going to run into each other a lot more in the near future."

"Is that a threat?"

"A guess."

Her voice dropped by half an octave. A timbre to melt away.

"Farewell, Monsieur Marquanteur."

"Strange!"

"What?"

"You didn't even care who your husband was going to meet."

For the first time, I saw her lose control for a blink of an eye. She hadn't asked about the man Tigre Berthier was going to meet. Possibly that was because she knew.

She rushed toward me, coming so close that I could smell her perfume.

"Well, who did Tigre want to meet with?"

"Sorry," I replied. "With some questions, it's all about timing."

"And now it's too late?"

"No, but I hate to bore you."

"Bored?"

"With answers that you know very well, after all."

6

"A block of ice, that lady," François said as we were on our way back. It was already dark. Marseille had turned into a single sea of lights. A sea of lights so bright that you could hardly see the stars.

"I kind of felt like we didn't tell her anything that would have surprised her," I said thoughtfully. I slammed the heel of my hand against the steering wheel. "Anyway, it annoys me that we can't even get a search warrant for Berthier's villa right now. For crying out loud, Stéphane just disappeared off the face of the earth, and our hands are practically tied!"

"I see what you mean, Pierre."

"I wonder how you can take that so calmly."

"I don't at all, Pierre. Inside, I'm close to boiling point."

I took a deep breath.

"Good to know I'm not alone on that point!"

But I also knew that our chances of success were greatest if we kept a cool head. I thought of the many years we had already worked together with Stéphane.

Boubou reported by cell phone.

The interrogations of Berthier's company personnel and his associate had yielded nothing.

"Did you expect anything else, Pierre?" asked François after the conversation had ended.

"Do you really expect an answer to that?"

We ran into a wall. A wall that Stéphane Caron had wanted to break through with his meeting in Les Crottes.

We would have to come up with something else.

We drove to the police headquarters. Actually, our duty time was long over.

But one of our colleagues had disappeared, maybe dead. And we couldn't just go home and pretend that we had had a normal day.

A short time later, we met a very thoughtful Monsieur Marteau in his office.

Monsieur Jean-Claude Marteau, Commissaire général de police Marseille. Our direct superior.

Boubou Ndonga and Fred Lacroix arrived a little later.

"At Berthier & Thomas Sarl, no one allegedly knew where Tigre was," Boubou reported. "Supposedly, Tigre had not been at the company all day."

And Fred Lacroix added: "Berthier's partner Zacharias Thomas in particular made a rather nervous impression. His lawyer sat next to him and made sure that we learned virtually nothing from him."

Monsieur Marteau nodded and then listened to our report. Finally he said, "Let's face it, we're pretty much in the dark. I know that Stéphane is very close to all of you. But that shouldn't make you lose your cool. As difficult as that may be! But it's the only way we have a chance of making any headway in this matter."

"Do you think Stéphane is still alive?" asked Boubou.

"So far, we have nothing to prove otherwise," he explained. "I'm sorry if that doesn't sound very encouraging. But we have to remain realistic." Mr. Marteau took a deep breath and loosened his tie a bit. "For the moment, we have no choice but to have all the important people in Tigre Berthier's entourage shadowed and wait for the lab reports."

The telephone rang. Monsieur Marteau went to his desk and picked up.

His face froze into a mask.

A quick push of a button followed. Monsieur Marteau recorded the conversation.

A moment later, he lowered the phone, opened his mouth to say something, and turned his head toward the window.

Before our boss could utter a single sound, a huge explosion could be heard from outside.

"That was my car," Monsieur Marteau explained, although he couldn't possibly tell from his position. "I just got a call announcing the explosion," he explained.

7

The parking lot in front of our service building was cordoned off within moments. The fire department arrived to extinguish the fire and allow the forensic experts to approach the exploded vehicle more than ten meters without being scorched.

Monsieur Marteau remained calm.

He called the switchboard to see if the call could be traced. Unfortunately, this was not the case.

Monsieur Marteau then rewound the device that had recorded the call. At least most of it.

"... knows everything about you, Monsieur Jean-Claude Marteau. I know that two days ago you had a pizza delivered to your home by express, around two in the morning ..." The caller's distorted voice broke off. "Look at the window, Mr. Marteau! See your car blow up!" A maniacal giggle was heard. "You weren't behind the wheel today, Marteau! Because today I didn't want to kill you yet ..."

It clicked. The caller had ended the call.

Our boss had been getting threatening letters for some time. The last time we investigated a ring of illegal organ traffickers responsible for a series of gruesome murders, we came across a computer geek who was in cahoots with the criminals and hacked into FoPoCri's computers for them. So the gangsters had known about our operations in advance. At first it had seemed that this computer freak was also the author of the threatening letters. But it had turned out that he was just a copycat. Someone who took pleasure in spreading fear. And through his illegal access to our data, he had of course known about every detail of this case.

After the arrest of this man, Monsieur Marteau had continued to be the addressee of such threatening letters.

And that's not all.

The unknown person who, for reasons unknown so far, longed for Monsieur Marteau's death, had also started to torment our boss with phone calls since a few days.

That the letter writer was identical with the caller was considered as good as proven. The caller confessed to the pasted-together documents that had recently reached Monsieur Marteau and quoted whole passages from them during his calls.

Monsieur Marteau's gaze was turned inward.

"This thing is taking a lot out of you, isn't it?", I turned to our boss.

He shook his head slightly.

"I don't want to exaggerate. The important thing is not that a madman is depriving me of my sleep, perhaps because he wants to take revenge for something or simply trigger fear. What's important is that we put a stop to the people who are behind Tigre Berthier ... And that we find Stéphane again!"

"But Monsieur Marteau," François began.

But our boss interrupted him.

"I'm fully operational. And there will always be crazy people, unfortunately." His eyes narrowed a little. "Concentrate fully on finding Stéphane, Pierre!"

"Of course, boss!"

"Until we find Stéphane's body, we will not give up hope."

No one said a word in response.

But each of us saw it the same way.

8

The next morning I picked up François at the familiar corner.

But we did not take the direct route to headquarters. A phone call directed us to the port.

A body had been propelled and fished out of the sea.

And if the officers of the homicide squad in charge were not mistaken, this was someone the FoPoCri had been feverishly searching for for thirty-six hours.

Jonah Tigre Berthier.

His picture was in the mugshot files and could be retrieved by every department. That's why the colleagues knew pretty quickly that it was a case for our department.

We arrived at the port.

A sharp wind blew across the sea.

The dead man was already coffined and waited for his removal. Divers searched underwater for traces, while the coroner enjoyed a cigarette.

We joined him just as he was talking to Commissaire Jeannot Fernand. We knew Fernand. He was in charge of the homicide squad.

He nodded at us.

"You guys are pretty fast," Commissaire Fernand greeted us.

"But so do you - as far as Berthier's identification is concerned!"

"Matching a photo with the current mugshot file that we have on our notebook in the staff car is not yet an investigative feat, Pierre," Fernand toned down.

And the coroner added: "The man was thrown into the water only a few hours ago. That is why he was relatively easy to identify. However, death occurred hours earlier. The man was just riddled with bullets."

Fernand led us to the zinc coffin in which Berthier lay. Two uniformed men opened it.

It was a picture of horror that presented itself to us.

"Only the autopsy will reveal more details, such as the number of bullet holes and the exact caliber," the forensic pathologist explained.

After all, the face clearly belonged to Tigre Berthier.

The zinc lid closed again. I exchanged a glance with François. We didn't need to say a word to know what the other was thinking. We both hoped that our colleague Stéphane Caron was not in a similar state.

"We will try to calculate where the body was thrown into the water," Fernand announced. "But you know, Pierre ... current conditions, wind speed, weight of the dead body and so on. There are many factors there, and very often nothing useful comes out of it."

At that moment, one of the divers climbed ashore. Fernand looked at him expectantly.

The diver shook his head.

"There's nothing here," he said.

"Look for another body," I said somberly. "Also in the wider area."

"Suit yourself."

I just hoped they didn't find anything.

We stayed at the harbor for a while. But François finally convinced me that we were more or less just in the way here. Commissaire Fernand promised to call us immediately if another dead body was found.