Black Diamond - Martin Walker [73]
He handed the phone to Madame Condorcet, took the key and opened the door carefully. He slipped inside, closing the door behind him, and his nostrils caught the same feral scent he had noticed in the sack. There was more darting from the far side of the room. As he moved into the sitting room beyond, he saw droppings on the carpet and sofa. Rats! A knot of four or five of them were huddling in a corner. In the bedroom, the coverlet had been pulled from the bed to make a nest, and more droppings were smeared on the bed. More rats were squeaking by the window. He checked the other rooms before he let himself out, depressed at the mess a dozen rats could make in what had been an impeccably neat home.
“Rats,” he told Madame Condorcet, taking the phone as she put her hands to her face in horror. He spoke to Tran again. “They emptied a sackful of rats into the house. It’s quite a mess.”
“So the message is, ‘Next time we let the rats loose on your kids,’ ” said Tran. “Putain, you know that was an old Chinese punishment. They tied you down and left you in a sealed room with some hungry rats. Some of the triads are supposed to do it still, exemplary punishment for traitors. Threatening to do this to kids is about as deadly an insult as you can get.”
“Are you kidding me? This still happens? It’s medieval,” Bruno said, turning away lest Tran’s voice reach Madame Condorcet. He didn’t want word of this getting out in St. Denis.
“The Chinese were supposed to have done the same thing to some Viet prisoners of war in seventy-nine when they tried to invade and we stopped them at the border. I say ‘we,’ I mean the Vietnamese army. A short war but a nasty one. There were lots of rumors about atrocities against our POWs.”
“I don’t believe this is happening in France,” Bruno said.
“I told you, bad times,” Tran said. “This is very serious shit, Bruno. Remember how it was in Bosnia? That’s how it’s going. We’re having to organize to defend ourselves.”
“That includes burning down Chinese restaurants?”
“We have some real militants of our own, but this is getting beyond them. Look, I’m glad you called. I put the word out about your wanting to see Vinh and got the message back that there are some people you ought to meet. They very much want to see you. Maybe you should come here to Bordeaux and have that dinner we always talked about. The sooner, the better. And don’t worry. We’ve got lots of protection.”
“When’s a good time?”
“How does tonight sound? You can stay with us overnight.”
“I’ll call you back and let you know,” said Bruno. “How would you feel if I brought somebody else along who needs to know all this, another policeman. A good one.”
“Anyone you vouch for would be fine,” said Tran. “Call me.”
Bruno closed his phone, wondering whether it would be a good idea to take J-J along. He sometimes took a rather literal view of the law, and if he thought he was meeting people involved in throwing gasoline bombs into Chinese restaurants, he might feel compelled to take official action. On the other hand, J-J needed to make some contacts in the Vietnamese community if he was going to stop this gang war from turning into something more sinister. He was smart enough to balance the short-term benefit of making quick arrests against the more important long-term benefit of getting to know what kind of people Tran wanted Bruno to meet. Tran had been a good soldier, one of the team who counterattacked the Serbian platoon and got Bruno to the medevac helicopter after he’d been shot. Bruno trusted him, and he trusted J-J. He’d take the risk of inviting J-J and make sure it worked.
“Who would want to put rats into a nice house like that?” asked Madame Condorcet.
“I don’t know yet,” said Bruno. “But I’ll find out. You said you saw that the men who came were Asians. Do you think you might recognize any of them if you saw them again?”
“There was a very young one. I’d know him because his face was in the headlights.”
Bruno nodded, called the fire station and told Albert, the fire chief, about