Chapter 37
“Nathan Troy” Nathan repeated in a whisper.
“Oui.”
Nathan understood why the camera behind him was recording their interview.
“Are you charging me? Am I under arrest?” Nathan’s ears started to throb as blood rushed to his head and the office started to feel very small. The blackness started to rise from the edge of his vision and a pressure started to constrict his sternum.
“No. You’re not under arrest. We’re just talking.” Under recorded surveillance, Nathan thought. As people do.
“You think he said my name because I was the one who killed him.”
The inspector fingered a corner of one of the photos laid out on the table in front of him. “What other words are more important to a man who is about to die, but the name of his attacker?”
“Maybe he didn’t know the name of his attacker. Maybe he didn’t recognize him.”
“Peut-être. Maybe. But then why your name? Why not his mother’s? Or his first love? Why Nathan Troy?”
Nathan felt the sudden need to sleep, like an invisible hand was pushing down on every inch of his body and mind, suffocating him of his breath, and energy, and the very ability to think. The urge to rest his arms on the table and drop his head down onto them, was almost overwhelming. He wanted to block it all out—the inspector and the camera and the photos of a dead man. He needed to think. He needed to focus and clear his head. He hadn’t slept long enough to handle the problem at hand. He’d planned on coming in here and telling the inspector that doctor Wollstoncraft had hired a man to impersonate the monster. That the witness they’d pulled from the train could confirm it. But now– that man was dead. He leaned forward and put both elbows on the table and dug the palms of his hands into his eye sockets. Why couldn’t he think straight?
“There were no other witnesses to the murder?” Nathan asked, blind to his surroundings.
“The only one who seemed to see anything happen said the man who ran off was tall. But he couldn’t be precise about how tall.”
“And no security cameras?”
“Apparently not. It was a small station where he died.”
“And his phone?”
“He didn’t have a phone. At least not when he was delivered to the refrigerator.”
Nathan looked up from the photos, but didn’t let himself ask if they were quite sure. A bum without a phone couldn’t be a surprise. But he had seen enough police dramas to be careful what he said now, when a camera recorded his every move and word. “Am I under arrest?” he asked again.
The inspector let a full breath of air slowly blow out of his lungs. “No. And honestly, I’ve got plenty on my desk besides the murder of some hobo. Under the law, each death is equal, but we do not have an endless basket of officer hours and money. We must set our priorities. We don’t even know his family name. If his blood toxicity charts are abnormal—”
“If he had drugs in his system?”
The inspector nodded, “—If there was any trace of substances in his blood at the time of death, his priority will drop even more significantly.” The inspector took the photos off the table and returned them to the folder. “I expect you to share any relevant information you have about this man’s death. I do not lie, you are a particular person of interest. But until we have further information you will not be charged.”
“I shouldn’t leave town.”
“Do not leave town,” the inspector repeated, then he leaned toward the wall and pushed a button on a panel which Nathan hadn’t noticed before. The red light on the camera above the door turned off. “I don’t know what the hell is going on, but I don’t think I need to specify to you how this man died.”
“Strangulation.”
“Oui. The coroner is making a report, but based on the simple observation of an old fool like myself, I say it looks like the same hands.” He fell back into his seat and crossed his arms over his belly, “Not everyone who is strangled is strangled by the same person. But if I find out they are linked. And that—” his voice trailed, as if he was afraid to say what he meant, even with the camera off, “—and that you have part in any of it. Anything at all—” he leaned forward again, “—the full protection of your American passport will not be enough to keep you out of a sentencing trial.”
“You found me,” Nathan said defensively. “You invited me to be on this case. I didn’t seek it out. What kind of crazy person would volunteer to help with their own murder case? Why would I strangle some bum on a french train platform?”
“Perhaps you were at the scene of the first crime,” the inspector said. “You were watching the proceedings. It is not uncommon for a killer to return to his killing field. And when offered the opportunity to stay close to developments, perhaps only a fool doesn’t seize the chance.”
The inspector stood up, pushing the chair behind him with the back of his legs and grabbed the folder. “You don’t seem like a brutal strangler. The only eye witness we have says the man was tall. You’re tall, no? But I do not think it’s you, evidement. But,” he sighed the sigh of a man ready for retirement and losing the energy to really care. “Maybe I’m just old. Maybe I don’t know anything anymore.” The creases around his eyes seemed to have deepened, the flesh on his cheeks and neck seemed to have become fleshier, and the eyelids drooped further. “Only I know you have any connection to the Krampus case. At the moment, there’s a homeless guy strangled at a rural french train station, who happens to have the name of an American on his lips. And separate to that, I have a case of a man wearing a krampus mask strangling people in Geneva and environs.” The inspector leaned over his desk a bit further, tilting his head. “Anything you’d like to tell me?”
Yes, Nathan thought. Yes! Doctor Wollsonecraft hired a bum to spook his fiance when they were out to dinner, giving him a pretty strong alibi. Then, this same woman ends up murdered at a french resort a couple weeks later by the Krampus strangler. He’s hired this man, and staged it to get photographic evidence. And now he’s killed the one person who might have had a link back to him.
But he was missing something. He had to think. If Wollstonecraft had murdered the bum, and had already passed these same photos to the Swiss police, perhaps he was also working on closing the case around Nathan.
“Doctor Wollstoncraft gave these photos to you–” Nathan said slowly, leaning forward to look at the photos the doctor had spread on his desk.
The inspectors eyes narrowed. “How do you know who this is?”
Nathan had to be careful. “This is the woman who died in the hotel in France. I looked her up – she was quite the Genevan socialite. And was just married to Dr. Wollstonecraft the morning of her death.” He couldn’t remember if this had been in the article in the paper, but you didn’t have to be a Pinkerton to find these things out. “How did the doctor happen to have photos of this incident?”
“They’re stills from a security camera. The flats in that district are quite expensive. It’s not a surprise that someone happened to have a camera that collected also this image.”
Legitimate, Nathan thought. Also not proof that the doctor hadn’t staged the incident where he knew it would be recorded.
“It’s just a thought–” Nathan said slowly, “But have you considered Wollstoncraft himself?”
The American wasn’t sure what he’d expected, but the deep reddening and bluster that immediately rose in the inspector hadn’t been it. “Dr. Wollstonecraft is a highly respected physician and scientist!” he stammered. “The doctor is from one of the oldest Genevan families! He is a cornerstone of this city, his family goes back generations, something an American might not appreciate!” But then Inspector Villeneuve realized he had lost his cool. He straightened up, and ran his hand around the waistband of his pants, retucking in a shirt that hadn’t come out.
“Didn’t you tell me William was from an ancient Swiss family? Surely you can’t both protect the old guard and allow them to be victimized by their own? Is there no democracy here or is it just old money and their henchmen?”
Inspector Villeneuve nearly lost himself again, but he held back. “You Americans might not appreciate how hard it is to preserve the culture of a country like Switzerland. You don’t just show up and–” The policeman stammered at Nathan in his anger. The American waited for him to finish his sentence but he seemed to be struggling to find the right English in his frustration.
The inspector started again. “William Rochat was lucky to have had Dr. Wollstonecraft as his physician. Madame made it absolutely clear she was not at all concerned about the doctor work. It was the boys misfortune to be in the park that night with a woman who could not be trusted.” He narrowed his eyes. “Until now I’ve assumed you had similar misfortune. But your name gets closer and closer to the center of this case.”
“I had no connection to the doctors young wife”.
The inspector narrowed his eyes further. “What are you implying, Mr. Troy?
It was becoming more and more clear to Nathan that Inspector Villeneuve would be loath to accuse a native. It wasn’t just that the nanny had been an easy fall–the tribalism of the inspector was either blinding him or he was actively trying to push aside obvious evidence. Letting a young foreigner fall for the misdeeds of his fellow citizens might just be his MO. Nathan’s head was pounding. He had to think before he misstepped and walked into the setup.
“I think you should leave,” the inspector said, and walked to the door. He put one hand on the handle, but turned back toward Nathan. “It’s one thing when a homeless man dies—they live life with a certain amount of péril. It happens, sadly. But a little boy. And a young woman. If you’re connected in any way. Hiding something from me—” he didn’t finish the sentence but let his tired stare finish the threat.
Nathan realized his armpits were damp. He could smell the stink of cortisone-rich sweat through his shirt and coat. The gripping pressure at the base of his neck had returned–a migraine was only moments away. He had to get out of the building. The inspector was already in the hall, not waiting for him. As soon as the door closed on the officer’s back Nathan stood up and walked to the door. His hand trembled as he raised it to open the door and go out.
When he stumbled out the main door of the Geneva’s police headquarters, it was all he could do to find a wall to lean against. He was shaking. It had been frustrating to watch a young girl he’d been convinced was innocent be charged with murder. It became personal when he got attacked in the park at Plainpalais. But what if he was now being framed for Walton’s death—for all of them? His story of being attacked in the park might start to sound like exactly the clever ruse he’d create to be seen as a fellow victim.
Nathan moved off the wall and started running, distancing himself from the accusations at the police headquarters.
It took only a few minutes to get back to Helene’s apartment. He was up the stairs and in the bedroom in moments, but as soon as he was there, instead of feeling safe, he felt again like the walls were pushing in on him. He wasn’t home. He wasn’t safe. Anyone could have figured out this was where he was living. His mind was going in loops. Words the inspector said were playing on repeat. Nathan changed into a t-shirt and hoodie, gym shorts and running shoes, and went back down to the street.
He left his wallet, his phone, his headphones, his identification, his money—everything but a single door key in a small zip pocket of his running shorts—at home. He secured only a single door key into the tiny zip pocket of his shorts, made for just that purpose, and started running. His head was throbbing with adrenaline. His only fear was the blackness. If it took him now, he knew he’d die. But if he didn’t clear his head he’d end up committed for murder.
Chapter 38
Following the same tram line that stopped at Plainpalais, and out through the neighborhoods of Carrouge and toward Saint Julien, Nathan dodged pedestrians and traffic. He ran like he was wearing blinders, hardly noticing the red lights but acutely aware of the people and obstacles in his path. Instead of looping back to the city as he usually would, he took a left off Rue Saint Julien and continued toward the countryside.
Twenty minutes after leaving the city, he was running on the grassy shoulder of a country road, traffic circling around him on the narrow path out of the city. He didn’t even pause until he reached a small village, directly on the border between France and Switzerland. He passed under the portico of what had once been the Swiss customs house, empty windows now dirty as the building was essentially unused and then, again, a few yards later, through what was the French customs and border crossing, just as empty as the Swiss. Not a single person witnessed his flight.
He started running uphill. Whenever he came to a crossing, he took the route toward higher ground, toward the towering summit of the Saléve, the broad-shouldered mountain that framed the city of Geneva, just over the French border. He passed another small town with farmhouses and small apartment buildings. Probably mostly commuters who worked in Switzerland and capitalized on the cheaper rents in France. When he heard the words of the French inspector running through his head, he forced himself to pick up pace. He made himself hear the pounding of his footfalls and the rhythm of his breathing.
Somewhere he turned off the country highway and followed a narrower, quieter strip of asphalt, curving back and forth in endless switchbacks up the mountain. In the shoulder of one snaking turn, he bent over, hands on his knees in fatigue. A car approached from below, racing toward the curve where Nathan waited, hunched over in oxygen-deprived exhaustion. As it passed, the driver gave a small toot on his horn. Nathan looked up just fast enough to see the three figures within gesture with their thumbs up, the universal sign for ‘good work’ or ‘keep going’.
Despite himself, he choked out a laugh.
The small black Citröen hatchback disappeared around the next hairpin curve. Nathan felt a tug as it drove, as if it were pulling him along with it. With a burst of renewed strength, he started running again, strong and even.
He followed the car upward, chasing it to the end of the asphalt. It was long gone, but he knew it was there. As he ran, again in his own silence, the daemon that had chased him from Geneva returned, its shadow closing distance when Nathan tired. The specter stayed at his foot, never more than one hairpin turn behind him, but as long as Nathan kept moving, it never came closer. The steep grade made his calves ache and his lungs strain to their full capacity. Perhaps there was only one inevitable end to playing defense. Perhaps the only way to deal with real danger, he realized. Attack—to run towards it.
As his muscles went into a heavy anaerobic burn, he lost the ability to control his thoughts. Blips of events came to him like the heads of small rodents popping up in a whack-a-mole game. But one image rose to the surface, and remained. As he ran, the image started to crowd out all other thoughts. Nathan realized after two hairpin curves, that the image was playing like a memory, even though he had not been present for the event. He was picturing something on loop which he’d only been told about, as though he’d been there, watching it happen.
The scene unfolded in his mind at the visual height of a child. He saw a small figure, his neck in the vice grip of a terrible creature. The face of the boy was turned up toward his perpetrator. Nathan saw only brown hair and small hands beating at the arms of a man far too strong to be stopped by childish strength. He saw the yellow eyes and swirling, snake-like tongue and needle-like teeth. He saw horns and warts, and the flailing arms weakening in their resistance as the life of the child drained from him. He heard a growl and a grunt of pleasure as the boy's form started to collapse into itself, the body no longer standing from its own strength as the spirit of life evaporated from it. Nathan saw movement in his peripheral vision, a girl running, a woman’s shriek, a flash of black hair. And just like that, the daemon released the child and disappeared like smoke into the winter night.
Tennis shoes hitting gravel, Nathan ran on, his body finding a hidden reserve of energy as he continued up and around another 180-degree turn. The boy, the masked figure, the dying struggle, the shriek of a girl. Calves burning, lungs exploding, small fists pounding on muscled forearms, tiny leather loafers touching the ground only by their toes, a curtain of black hair flowing like a mermaid in water, a shriek, a growl, nothingness. Asphalt curved along the form of the mountain. The boy, the masked figure, the girl. The boy collapsing on the ground, the beast vanishing into the night, the girl dropping to her knees.
Another car passed him, pulling all the way to the opposite shoulder, leaving as wide a berth as possible between itself and the pedestrian. Horns curving up to heaven, a snaking tongue twisting down to hell, black silhouettes in the evening dark, a woman's voice carrying through the void, the boy’s empty form collapsing on the ground, the deamon towering over the heap of clothes. Another blind curve of asphalt, short but tight, climbing uphill at a slope that surely caused smaller cars to slide downward when the road was frozen. Nathan no longer ran on energy, or on the muscles of his legs, but on a blind unwillingness to stop moving, as if he were running to the boy, those last moments of life appearing and disappearing again and again. Another car came from behind, the driver nearly clipping the runner with his black mirror.
Nathan was on a straight stretch now, a plateau before the summit. A rest before the final climb. He had come nearly to the top of the mountain but one more push waited at the other side of the plateau. His legs screamed to stop, every muscle in his thighs cried to end the torture. Even though his pace wouldn’t have challenged a man walking, he forced himself to keep the form of a runner all the same. His chest burned, his throat was dry, but the straight stretch allowed a slight recovery.
Black pavement, an empty park bench, a white line along the edge of the road leading him on, and a pile of clothes, now just a mixture of textures and material and the empty body of a little boy.
As Nathan’s body crossed the straightaway, he took a mental step back from the scene, as if physically looking away from a TV screen. Why this scene? Nathan stepped out of the repeating reel on the straightaway. Why not the one he had himself lived through? He had also been attacked by the deamon. Or why not the young woman in her hotel room, doubtless nearly as vulnerable as the child?
Nathan knew it was the key. There was something about the series of events that wasn’t random. It was connected. William’s death was the key, and the other incidents were pieces of the story that followed as consequences.
Why William?
Nathan came to the end of the flat stretch, and without choosing to do so, his feet stopped moving and he collapsed to the ground, palms pressing flat on the pavement as if to hold the ground down and stop a volcano from erupting underneath. He hung his head, gasping for air, and then, in a final burst of will, sprang up and sprinted the last 200 meters to the top of the mountain.
The narrow road ended at a small collection of Napoleonic-era houses, and T’d onto a street that looked like it ran along the ridge of the hill. The small handful of buildings at the junction huddled together, naked and treeless. One, a boarded-up hotel in need of a robust coat of paint, stood without any clear indication as to whether it was closed for the season or the epoch. Another was a restaurant, also closed, but less definitively so. Across from the two was a small cafe with apartments above, in front of which was parked the small Citröen hatchback that had passed him earlier on the way up. A patio wrapped around the back of the cafe, and a parking lot overlooked the slopes down the back side of the mountain. Nathan crossed the road and walked into the parking lot, the mental replay fading like paint from a brush in a rinsing glass. Reaching the summit had released him from his mental replay. For a moment, he was free of the chaos that waited for him down in Geneva. Weather-worn logs lined the back edge of the parking lot, as if to prevent unsure drivers from continuing down the other side of the slope. Nathan stepped onto one and looked down. The back of the mountain receding away from him gradually, far less exaggerated than what he’d just climbed.
As he stood, he realized he was penniless and thirsty. What short-sighted blindness had caused him to run this far without a backpack, or water bottle, or cash to purchase something to drink? Idiot, he thought. Running out of the house with nothing but his shoes and a problem was all well and dramatic, but it would have been nice to have his phone camera to document the view stretching below, and a few francs to get something to drink, in a country where even water was served at a price.
Just then he realized someone was calling out from the balcony. The three French men from the Citröen were sitting in heavy winter coats around a small table on the outside patio.
“Bon travaille!” one with a white goatee said, raising a glass of red wine in toast. Nathan didn’t understand the French, but the intention was clear. He smiled, raising a hand to acknowledge the address.
Another man, this one younger, called out, gesturing to him. Nathan wished, yet again, that he’d come further in his language studies. He waved at the second man, but shrugged his shoulders, not understanding what he was saying. The man didn’t accept the gesture and called out again.
“I don’t speak French,” Nathan finally said.
“Ah, oui!” The whole table erupted in understanding. Nathan turned, hoping he could escape the awkward acknowledgment in peace.
“Mais non! Our friend, stop!” The first one said, waving again. “You join us? We drink for the success?”
Nathan laughed. His sweat was already drying into a salty mask in the cold wind sweeping over the summit. He was hardly presentable, and hadn’t a penny with him. He told the group of men the latter of these two facts.
“No problem! We invite you. Such hard work must be celebrated!”
Nathan glanced back at the road he’d just climbed. No beast followed him. He’d been in a dark mood as he climbed the Saleve, but the magic of the summit and the jovial nature of the men–the feeling of having achieved some small victory by his own power—was releasing him from the shadow.
Sheepishly, he walked to the balcony and climbed the weather-beaten wooden steps to their table. A cheer went up from the trio as he approached.
“The conqueror arrives,” the younger one sang out as they raised their glasses to the victor, taking his seat among them.
Authors note :
I’ve been trying to diligently publish these sometime on Monday. But this first chapter simply wasn’t ready. These are the boggy-weeds where the details really count. Who knows what, who’s accusing whom, who is protecting or accusing which character and why. Are the lines clearly drawn? are the clues adding up?
Needless to say, I went through the edits and reading of this first chapter, and it wasn’t right. It’s too late to be beating around the bush — the cards are out. I hope it’s better now.
* * * *
The second chapter is from a run I used to do when I was studying in the same area. I remember being particularly angry about something (not a murder, granted), but pretty riled up, and using that narrow road as a tool for clearing my thoughts.
A cook should never criticize their own food, and I’m trying not to be disappointed with the chapters execution, but… well, I guess we’re all developing. There’s a chapter in Marathon Man where the protagonist is also running from some demons—this particular scene is something of it’s own archetype. The hero runs out the front door and sweats his way to clarity. I was super impressed with how William Goldman pulls of that chapter. It’s a scene more easily captured in film, it’s very visual. But Goldman is able to bring the breath and pacing of a man running through his problems right into the phrasing and sentence structure. It’s an amazing chapter.
If I were going to make this my magnum opus, I’d try and write the scene again.
Work on my other book continues, if jaggedly. Someone please remind me not to split my brain between two stories again !
Hi! You have "cortisone-rich sweat" and I think it should be cortisol..? I misspoke on this exact word a few days ago and was corrected!