Weep for the Dead

Chapter 1

It was already two o’clock in the morning, the work was going slowly, but Armand Verville was worried about more than that. He straightened up from the bench, laid down the grinder he had been using and pulled off his leather gloves. The tools were cheap, not really fit for purpose in his view, and that angered him too. He had his own tools, he had standards, even for a shit job like this one. His head was thick from the fumes in the building, from the stench of acid and scorched metal. The screech that came from hard metal scraping violently on steel was hurting him deep inside his ears. There were no ear defenders on this job. It was all so careless.

He stretched his back and turned away from the bench to look around. Half of the cavernous tin shed was in darkness, but he could make out the shapes of the big machines, like huge, quiescent creatures lurking in the gloom. There was a flash as someone welding struck an arc, and for a second, the wall behind them turned lilac. He blinked, and he saw that the other three were looking at him. There were the two small ones he called the ducks, expressionless faces half hidden by the goggles they wore, and Old Lionel Meslier, fish-eyed in his goggles, still managing to look anxious, always looking anxious, always there in Armand’s life when he was standing in the wrong place. Was everything all right, he wanted to know. But it wasn’t, it was not all right, not at all.

‘I’m going for a cigarette. Keep working,’ he said, making elaborate hand gestures. Only Meslier looked down and started grinding again.

Armand shook his head and moved away from the benches. A halogen lamp came on as he slid open the metal door at the back of the building and stepped out into the night air. He took a deep breath to clear his lungs of the fumes and the smell of burnt and tortured metal. He placed one finger on the side of his nostril and blew out snot and dust from the other one, then he repeated the process on the other side. Now he could smell the night scents of the long grass and the weeds in the wasteland in front of him. Now he could smell the wind and the river flowing smoothly past on the other side of the high fence. There was a half-lemon-slice moon lounging low in the sky, and he could see its reflection being rippled and buffeted by the currents. He couldn’t make out the far side of the estuary, which was several kilometres wide at this point, but he could see the lights of a small settlement in the distance. But mostly it was dark all around. The river was dark and seemed sinister at night, to him; rivers and lakes and the sea, they were all sinister at night, he thought, maybe it’s as though all the drownings they’ve committed could be sensed in the cold blackness. He shivered, although the night was mild, and he shook himself. Too much imagination for the two o’clock in the morning kind of bravery that had impressed Napoleon. I just don’t have it, thought Armand.

He heard someone step over the metal runner and come out of the sliding door, pulling it closed behind him. Armand didn’t look around. It wasn’t one of the ducks; they wore slippers and moved so softly you never heard them until they were standing right next to you. He couldn’t be bothered to turn around, he wasn’t interested; he was interested in the way the moon rippled on the dark river’s surface. He took out a cigarette and lit it, and holding it out at the end of his arm aimed it like a gun at the waxing moon. Yes, he was very anxious, not just about the work, but about the other, the side he hadn’t known about for sure, until tonight. And now he knew, good money or not, this would be his last shift.

Predictably, at that point, a tune came to him, and Rivers of Babylon started up in that part of the mind that seemed able to run along on another level, for ages, no matter what else you were doing. He knew for certain that he’d be humming and singing the words in his head for the rest of the night. He knew a lot of songs, in French, in English and Spanish. That was ok. Music was the salve on the wounds of life. Who said that? He didn’t know.

He heard someone moving behind him and he turned slightly, expecting to see Old Meslier standing there, with his slumped shoulders and vapid eyes. He started to say something and turned further, but it was another man, a younger one, big, not one of the metal workers. Armand took off the safety goggles he was wearing on the top of his head and nodded to the new man.

‘Nice night,’ he said. The other man raised the heavy wrench he was trailing in his right hand and swung it violently across Armand’s face. Then he stepped quickly over to where Armand was reeling and brought the wrench down with all his strength on the top of his skull that cracked like an egg, and pieces of Armand’s brains and masses of blood spurted out. He was dying quickly before his body collapsed and spread-eagled on the ash-covered ground.

The killer laid the wrench down carefully and called out. A second, much smaller man came up to him from the shadows. They took hold of the arms and feet and carried the body across the wasteland to a gate in the high mesh fence that surrounded the property. They laid the body down and prised open the gate. Then they picked it up again, face down so that the blood leaked less and instead soaked into the tight curly hair on either side of the crevasse in the skull. They stumbled down a low bank and onto an old concrete jetty that protruded for twenty metres into the river. They carried him clumsily, his belly scraping the surface when the smaller man loosened his grip. The killer growled at him. The waters surged under the pillars of the jetty, and it felt as though a great force was surrounding them, squirming and angry. At the end of the jetty, they stood sideways to the river, and on a word swung the body of Armand Verville into the Gironde. They stood watching for a few moments as the body floated and surfed on the current before sinking. The killer looked hard, puzzled, something didn’t seem right. The water was moving in the wrong direction, not what he had expected.

‘It all goes to the sea,’ he said out loud. The other man understood nothing, silently waiting for instructions he continued to stare at the water.

‘Come on clay face,’ the killer said. ‘It all goes to the damn sea.’

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