Into the Fire by Scott Manda

Author:Scott, Manda [Scott, Manda]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Historical, Crime, Mystery, thriller, Suspense, Fantasy
ISBN: 9781448169580
Amazon: 1448169585
Goodreads: 24462780
Publisher: Transworld Digital
Published: 2015-06-18T07:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

ORLÉANS,

Wednesday, 26 February 2014

11.30

‘MAÎTRE DUCAT! IS it true that a fingerprint was found at Orléans! 24/7 that might lead you to the people who perpetrated this atrocity?’

It’s true, yes, they have a fingerprint. A single, perfect, absolutely clear-as-newsprint set of swirls. They have a 98 per cent probability match in the local database that has given them a name. The press know about the print, but not the name. They scent something, though, and are not about to let it go.

From the cool of Éric’s lab, Picaut watches on a wide screen TV as the BBC reporter asks his question. The camera pans to Ducat, harassed, sweating, standing on the steps that lead up to his office. He gives his gap-toothed smile and replies in perfect English.

‘It is true that one hundred and fifty different prints have so far been identified in the Orléans! 24/7 building. The police are sampling all the staff from the cleaners to the CEO. When they have ruled them out, they will begin to look at who else might legitimately have been there. Only when we rule out all of those can we consider that the print might belong to one of the perpetrators.’

‘Maître! Is it true that not one but two bodies were found inside, and that therefore one of the arsonists was caught in the blaze?’ This is Die Zeit, but the question comes in French. Ducat could probably answer in German. So far, as well as French and English, he has spoken Italian, Dutch and a Scandinavian language that Picaut thinks might have been Swedish. She had no idea he stretched this far. She is impressed.

‘You all saw the ambulance. We cannot comment on identity until we have a pathology report.’ That’s clever. He hasn’t mentioned a number, so, later, he can’t be accused of lying.

‘But you did find the missing intern from Orléans! 24/7 staff? Marianne—’

‘As I said, we cannot comment.’

Ducat’s face is thunderous. He can’t comment, but they can keep asking questions, can play out the entirety of Marianne’s biography on their rolling news channels, her Pinterest, Instagram, Twitter and Facebook streams, the Facebook page set up in her memory, the trolls already lurking at its nether margins, spinning webs of hate.

More than ever before, Picaut is working in a goldfish bowl. The forensic team was filmed going in and coming out, and when they found the fingerprint on the inner door frame the long-lensed cameras broadcast the fact before they had time to call in the news to the station, never mind identify whose print it was.

Picaut, meanwhile, is waiting for the moment when someone asks, ‘Is it true that your police captain is the target of the last two attacks?’ Luc’s warehouse and now the studio that hosted her. Everything at one remove, but coming closer.

On the steps to Ducat’s office, the questions press on.

—When will you bring a case against the perpetrators?

‘When Capitaine Picaut provides me with sufficient evidence to do so.’

—So we can hope for

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