The Prone Gunman. Jean-Patrick Manchette
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in the spleen. Alfred convulsed and fell on his side, writhing about and groaning loudly. Terrier grasped his nose between thumb and index finger, forcing him to breathe through his mouth and preventing him from crying out as the brunette and her two kids got back into their Volvo, fifty meters away, and drove off.
“They who?” repeated Terrier. “Want me to start over?”
“Please, no. Some people. Some people called Rossi. Italians.”
Suddenly, Terrier remembered the name. And he remembered Luigi Rossi appearing on a motorcycle on the twists and turns of the road that connects Albenga with Garessio in northern Italy. Remembered wearing Polaroid glasses as he stretched out between the rocks in a blind made of fir-tree branches. Remembered removing the snow protector from the barrel of his Vostok and aiming at the motorcyclist, holding his breath, and pressing the trigger. Remembered how Luigi Rossi fell on the wet road and tried to get back up; remembered how the second 7.62mm bullet hit his forehead, and pieces of helmet and head flew about. Remembered how Luigi Rossi fell back face down on the wet road, assuredly dead, and how he, Terrier, quickly returned to his Peugeot 403, which was equipped with chains, on the forest road and went back to Turin.
He remembered. At the time, he was a beginner. Cox paid him twenty thousand francs.
“Do these people called Rossi have first names?”
“They didn’t say.”
“They just told you that they were called Rossi,” suggested Terrier.
“Yes. Well, no. I heard them talking among themselves. They are brothers or cousins or something. I don’t know.”
“They are brothers or cousins or something, and they don’t call each other by the first name—they call each by the family name?”
“I don’t know. Yes.”
“I think you could describe them for me,” said Terrier.
“Absolutely,” said the pale young man.
“Get back in your heap.”
Grimacing with pain and fear, Alfred Chaton heaved himself into the Capri.
“What are you going to do with me? I’m just a gofer, for God’s sake. I will tell you anything you want to know.”
“Was it you who ransacked my apartment?”
“What? No. No.”
“Do you know who did?”
“Absolutely not.”
With his left hand, Terrier grabbed him by the collar and pushed him back into the Capri. At the same time, he got behind the wheel, took out his automatic, and rested the end of the barrel against the pale young man’s throat.
“Don’t make the slightest move, no matter what.”
The young man blinked. Terrier pressed the cigarette lighter. The eyes of the motionless young man followed his gestures.
“I’m going to burn out an eye,” said Terrier.
“Why? Why? You’re crazy!”
The young man began to weep. With a click, the cigarette lighter popped out, ready for use.
“They told me to tell you that!” the young man cried out. “They told me to follow you and that you would spot me and to say that I was paid by some people called Rossi! I swear, it’s the truth!”
“Who?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know them. I can describe them.”
“Don’t bother.”
“The fucking cunts!” cried the pale young man. “They said you were an okay guy, that you might knock me around a little, but I only had to say I was a gofer and give you the name of the Rossi brothers and you would let me go! You’re going to let me go now, aren’t you?”
“Sure.”
Terrier drew back a little on his seat and stopped pressing the barrel of the HK4 against the throat of the young man. The latter tearfully rubbed his neck.
“Oh! Thank you, thank you!”
“Take this message to Cox,” said Terrier as he put a slug into his heart.
5
Terrier stopped at a motel around midnight, eighty kilometers from the place where he had killed the pale young man. At the reception desk, a false blonde with delicate features, wearing a heavy, ribbed navy-blue sweater and flannel pants, was reading beneath a desk lamp. She had awe-inspiring breasts and eyelashes. Terrier took her for about twenty-six. She gave him a key.
“What are you reading?” he asked.
Silently, she showed him the cover of her book.
“It’s a story about time travel,” she said. “Does that make you laugh? You think it’s childish?”
“Not in the least. I’m all for time travel,” said Terrier. “Besides, that’s exactly what I’m doing.”
The girl gave him a tired, hostile look.
“You’re trying to get me interested?”
“Not really,” said Terrier. “Good night.”
He found his room, washed his face, put on his pajamas, picked up the telephone, and asked for Alex’s number. It was one o’clock in the morning. It served her right if he woke her up. But he got the answering machine again. He waited for the beep. He had nothing to say to Alex.
“You can keep the cat, you idiot,” he said.
It began snowing during the night. It was still dark and still snowing when Terrier left the motel. Just after, he left the highway and headed west. The bad weather slowed him down. It was almost noon when the DS reached Nauzac. It wasn’t snowing there.
Terrier drove slowly all through the town. At one end of the town, a small, low, white perfume factory had recently been built. In the center of town, traffic was heavy and slow. Several times, Terrier almost headed the wrong way down one-way streets. There were parking meters in the neighborhood of the subprefecture, most of them adorned with stickers that read “NO! No parking meters in Nauzac!” and gave the address of the residents’ action committee.
Eventually, the DS left the center of town and plunged into the residential neighborhood, where it drew up near a posh little apartment house. Leaving the engine running, Terrier got out on the sidewalk side. He remained motionless for a second. He seemed to hesitate. He blinked slowly several times. Then he strode to the entrance of the building and examined the mailboxes in the hallway. A West Indian concierge came out of her lodge. Terrier turned away.
“Are you looking for something?”
He turned to the concierge, shook his head, and then nodded.
“Mademoiselle Freux.”
The woman looked perplexed, then raised her chin.
“Monsieur and Madame Freux passed away,” she said.
“I didn’t know. And their daughter?”
“Madame Schrader?” asked the concierge. “Madame Schrader?” she repeated impatiently, since Terrier did not reply.
“Yes,” Terrier said at last. A thin white line had appeared around his mouth.
“She doesn’t live very far from here. Let me get you the exact address.”
She went back inside her lodge, leaving the glass door open. Terrier turned on his heel. By the time the West Indian woman came out with a piece of paper in her hand, he was already back in the DS and on his way.
He had lunch in the center. The exterior of the Brasserie des Fleurs dated from the nineteenth century and had recently been