“Watch your mouth, Milo!” said Sylvain.
“Well,” said Hardy, as he and his colleague, hot on his heels, turned to go. “We’ll leave you to settle this among yourselves.”
“We may be in touch with you again,” said Laurel as the two men took their leave. “And if you do hear any news about Monsieur Depardieu, you can contact us at this number.” He handed his card to Tiphaine and the two men left.
As soon as the front door closed behind them, Milo demanded an explanation.
“What’s going on? Why are they asking questions about Inès’s dad?”
“He’s disappeared,” said Sylvain darkly, giving Tiphaine an accusatory glare. “No one’s heard from him since he left here last night.”
The implication, if she got it, didn’t get a rise out of Tiphaine, who contented herself with a glower directed at Sylvain. Milo, however, looked stunned.
“What do you mean, disappeared?”
“Disappeared!” Sylvain repeated with a touch of irritation. “He didn’t go home last night. Vanished into thin air! No more Inès’s daddy.”
“What? How’s that possible?”
“Well, that’s the six-million-dollar question,” Sylvain said, giving Tiphaine a meaningful look.
“Why did you go to see Inès?” Tiphaine repeated, ignoring Sylvain’s insinuation.
“It’s none of your business,” he said, turning heel and going back up to his room, taking the stairs three at a time. Tiphaine and Sylvain didn’t move. Sylvain turned to his wife, who didn’t give him time to open his mouth.
“I know what you’re thinking. And I don’t give a damn. Whatever’s happened to that piece-of-shit attorney, it’s nothing to do with me. But don’t think I’m going to waste a second of my time trying to prove that to you.”
And she turned and went back into the kitchen, leaving him standing there, open-mouthed. After a minute or two he sat down on the sofa and put his head in his hands.
Did Tiphaine have anything to do with Gérard Depardieu’s disappearance? She had seemed genuinely surprised when she’d heard there had been no news of him since he’d left their house the previous day. But he knew his wife. He knew what she was capable of.
Chapter 45
The weather turned foul that afternoon, lasting through the weekend. The Geniots spent Sunday with Tiphaine’s family, pretending to be a regular couple. For the last eight years they had never shown any affection in public, which meant that no one noticed the chill between them.
Tiphaine seemed to have perked up again. She had abandoned the listless air she’d maintained throughout Friday evening, and over the course of Saturday she grew gradually more cheerful, more so after the police officers’ visit. By Sunday she was up and about again, though that didn’t allay Sylvain’s concerns. There was something hard about her. Cold. Determined. To do what? It was impossible to know. She was a warrior about to go on the offensive—he was sure of that. From time to time he caught her staring at him, and the gleam he saw in her eyes sent a shiver down his spine. He knew her by heart. He knew she was up to something.
That afternoon he took her aside and spoke to her frankly.
“You have something up your sleeve. I know you do. Be careful, Tiphaine: we may have gotten away with it once, but we won’t have such luck next time. Tell me the truth: did you have anything to do with Depardieu’s disappearance?”
By way of an answer she simply threw him a contemptuous look, then turned and went back to join the others in the living room.
Nora, meanwhile, spent Sunday holed up inside, alone, her nose glued to the upstairs windows that looked out onto the two neighboring backyards. Her stomach was in knots. There was a lump of anxiety stuck in her throat, keeping her from breathing freely. She dragged herself from one room to another, short of breath, tortured by this forced stillness, this unbearable apathy. If one of the Geniots were to discover the body before the police did, what would happen? Why hadn’t the police searched the house, the basement, the attic? The garden?
Not to mention the children’s growing anxiety about Gérard’s radio silence. The atmosphere at home had become electric. Several arguments had broken out between them, which Nora, already at her wit’s end, could barely deal with. The children were able to express their suppressed anxiety about their father only with bursts of aggression toward each other, which was torture for Nora. All three were jittery with the endless waiting. Inès and Nassim were waiting for their father’s return, or at least some sign of life, an answer, an explanation. She, powerless to offer them the least comfort, unable to reassure them, was waiting for the tragic news to break, and all the sorrow and pain that would come in its wake. Her unbearable responsibility. The weight of a secret she could never admit.
To make matters worse, she hadn’t heard anything more from Mathilde. Her friend’s silence filled her with resentment, regret, and guilt. Disappointed and uncomprehending, Nora felt caught in the trap of solitude. She had no one to share the burden of her guilt, to alleviate the horror that was flooding her mind in great waves. As she began to realize that the only person who had the strength, love, and composure to help her through this terrible ordeal was Gérard himself, she almost collapsed in despair.
The only thing that helped her to bear the torture of her conscience was the total absence of any sign of life from Sylvain. Not a word, not an email, not even a brief text message to tell her that he’d be in touch as soon as things had calmed down. She was furious with him, though she blamed herself even more for having believed in fairy tales; for having killed Gérard, even unintentionally; and for having hidden his corpse in the Geniots’ yard. But there was no way back.
Lost in thought, her forehead pressed against the glass of her bedroom window, Nora was drawn from her lethargy by the shouts of her children downstairs: they were fighting again. She closed her eyes, tempted to stay there without moving, to sink into a stupor that lacked any emotion or pain.
With a sigh she forced herself to move, put one step in front of another, leave her observation post and move away from the window.
To leave the room.
Downstairs in the entryway, Nassim was accusing his sister of stealing his pencil case.
