Marquanteur And The Corpse In The Étang De Berre: France Crime Thriller

By Alfred Bekker

Marquanteur And The Corpse In The Étang De Berre: France Crime Thriller

by Alfred Bekker

 

 

Who murdered the dead man in the Étang de Berre, the largest inland lake in France, located near Marseille? Archaeologists discover body parts of a man during excavation and diving work. It is Grand-Armand Lafontaine - but he should live for years safely from extradition in Morocco. The body had been lying in the Étang de Berre for some time, and the trail seems cold when Commissaire Marquanteur is entrusted with the investigation.

 

Alfred Bekker is a well-known author of fantasy novels, thrillers and books for young people. In addition to his major book successes, he has written numerous novels for suspense series such as Ren Dhark, Jerry Cotton, Cotton Reloaded, Kommissar X, John Sinclair, and Jessica Bannister. He has also published under the names Jack Raymond, Robert Gruber, Neal Chadwick, Henry Rohmer, Conny Walden, and Janet Farell.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Alfred Bekker
• Release date: Sep 11, 2023
• ISBN: 9798215504376

Alfred Bekker

Alfred Bekker wurde am 27.9.1964 in Borghorst (heute Steinfurt) geboren und wuchs in den münsterländischen Gemeinden Ladbergen und Lengerich auf. 1984 machte er Abitur, leistete danach Zivildienst auf der Pflegestation eines Altenheims und studierte an der Universität Osnabrück für das Lehramt an Grund- und Hauptschulen. Insgesamt 13 Jahre war er danach im Schuldienst tätig, bevor er sich ausschließlich der Schriftstellerei widmete. Schon als Student veröffentlichte Bekker zahlreiche Romane und Kurzgeschichten. Er war Mitautor zugkräftiger Romanserien wie Kommissar X, Jerry Cotton, Rhen Dhark, Bad Earth und Sternenfaust und schrieb eine Reihe von Kriminalromanen. Angeregt durch seine Tätigkeit als Lehrer wandte er sich schließlich auch dem Kinder- und Jugendbuch zu, wo er Buchserien wie 'Tatort Mittelalter', 'Da Vincis Fälle', 'Elbenkinder' und 'Die wilden Orks' entwickelte. Seine Fantasy-Romane um 'Das Reich der Elben', die 'DrachenErde-Saga' und die 'Gorian'-Trilogie machten ihn einem großen Publikum bekannt. Darüber hinaus schreibt er weiterhin Krimis und gemeinsam mit seiner Frau unter dem Pseudonym Conny Walden historische Romane. Einige Gruselromane für Teenager verfasste er unter dem Namen John Devlin. Für Krimis verwendete er auch das Pseudonym Neal Chadwick. Seine Romane erschienen u.a. bei Blanvalet, BVK, Goldmann, Lyx, Schneiderbuch, Arena, dtv, Ueberreuter und Bastei Lübbe und wurden in zahlreiche Sprachen übersetzt.

Book preview

1

Professor Dr. Richard Melliere stifled a yawn as he hung up the diving suit to dry. Then he let his gaze wander briefly over the shore of the Étang de Berre, located near Marseille. This, the largest inland lake in France, was a former sea bay that until today was connected to the Mediterranean Sea by a channel. Once, the Étang de Berre had been a third smaller than it is today. And there, where archaeologist Melliere and his team had been diving daily for weeks, had once been the prehistoric camp of a group of hunter-gatherers.

I wonder if someday in the distant future, someone will take care of our garbage as meticulously as we do with what these hunters leave behind, grinned Eric Clavieux, a student.

Well, for archaeologists of the future, the dumps of Marseille would surely be a paradise too!

Professor Melliere! Come over here! You've got to see this! someone shouted from one of the tents that formed a semicircle near the shore. It was Jean-Paul Roebergé, Professor Melliere's assistant. They were large tents with solid floors and standing height. Melliere left Clavieux standing and walked the few meters to the first tent and entered.

A man with thick glasses stood in front of a wallpaper table on which several dozens of finds, only barely cleaned by the mud, could be seen - among them a skull. So either we're looking at an archaeological sensation here, and the hunters had their teeth capped 13,000 years ago, or this dead man is from our time!

2

Roebergé had cleaned the skull in a makeshift manner and held it out to Dr. Melliere.

But put on latex gloves before you touch anything! Otherwise the DNA tests we want to do won't be worth anything afterwards.

Melliere grinned.

"If it then turns out that the hunters of yesteryear were descended from the Israelites, our guild will at least have another sensation - and we can urgently use that. It is becoming increasingly difficult to raise the necessary funds for projects like this!

You have your sensation, Professor Melliere! clarified Roebergé. Only it will probably mean that the police will re-define the dig site into a crime scene for us. I found something else, by the way.

Melliere followed him to another table on which there was a plastic tub. In it lay a few half-cleaned bones.

Roebergé picked up a femur with a discolored piece of metal on the end. He grinned.

Straight out of the Stone Age! he laughed. By that, though, I don't mean the late Paleolithic of the hordes of hunter-gatherers, but the Stone Age of the artificial hip joint - and that's no more than twenty-five years ago.

Melliere nodded slightly. His face had become very serious.

I don't think we can sweep this under the rug.

No, at least not if we want to get out of this without a lot of trouble.

The trouble is going to be big enough either way. I can't even think about a few philistines from the recognition service destroying a unique archaeological site.

3

The Ford Maverick SUV stopped in front of 32 Tampic Boulevard in Bompard. This rather middle-class part of Bompard was characterized by neat bungalows and single-family houses. By Marseille standards, the lots were kept quite spacious.

The driver of the Maverick was looking through the passenger side window. Sunglasses with mirror lenses covered the eye area. His face was angular. The hard lines appeared carved. He seemed nervous. The thumb and forefinger of his right hand played around with a gold crucifix hanging from a chain around his neck. The shiny precious metal contrasted sharply with the heavily tanned skin.

In the driveway of the house with the number 32 stood a yellow Lamborghini.

Roland 'Rolly' Patesse's car, the gray-haired man knew and had to grin. Even if this Patesse probably had millions on the high side - his taste in cars was still that of a nouveau riche upstart who wanted to show everyone how fat his wallet was. 

Anyway, now I know you're home, the gray-haired man thought.

He turned off the engine and got out. The light-colored blouson bulged slightly under the left shoulder.

The gray-haired man went straight to the front door and rang the bell.

A young woman opened to him: no more than thirty years old, slim, petite and with long, dark blond hair. She wore a tight-fitting blue dress and was at most half the age of the owner of the house.

I assume you're from the brokerage firm Zidane & Partners. We spoke on the phone earlier.

I would like to speak with Mr. Patesse.

She frowned.

He's not at home. Sorry. You are not Mr. Zidane?

Do you want to sell the house? It's quite nice here, isn't it?

The young woman tried to close the door again, but the gray-haired man was faster. His foot was in between. Quick as a flash, he stepped forward, grabbed her neck and flung her against the wall. On her high shoes she lost her footing.

The gray-haired man kicked the front door into the lock with his heel.

The young woman was dazed for a moment. When the gray-haired man realized that she wanted to scream, he gave her a well-aimed blow that made her slump down unconscious. She slid down the wall and remained motionless.

Patesse, you rat!, went through the gray-haired man's head. I guess I'm just in time, before you want to disappear never to be seen again.

He took off his sunglasses and put them in the side pocket of his blouson. Then he took out an automatic with a silencer. He now systematically went through the rooms one by one. The gray-haired man estimated the kitchen-living room of the bungalow at about one hundred square meters. There was no trace of Rolly Patesse anywhere. The bedroom and bathroom looked as if no one had ever lived here.

He must have smelled the fuse, the gray-haired man thought. You couldn't fool a man like Patesse.

The gray-haired man searched the cellar and attic. The house contained almost no personal belongings. The telephone was disconnected.

Finally, the gray-haired man returned to the hallway. He grabbed the woman lying on the floor under her armpits and dragged her into the bathroom. There he lifted her into the tub and ran cold water.

The young woman startled up with a scream. Her eyes were widened in fear. Blood ran from a laceration on her temple.

The gray-haired man turned off the water.

We need to talk, he said. It's up to you how painful that's going to be!

4

I turned from Avenue de Channale in Marseille into Rue de Boissons.

It must be right here, said my colleague François Leroc. Slow down! We can't go back!

Rue de Boissons was a one-way street and certain rules even police officers are only allowed to break in an emergency. But not if they don't want to cause a stir - and that was the case at the moment.

A call from a certain Roland 'Rolly' Patesse had reached our office. Patesse believed that a killer was after him and had holed up in a cheap hotel. There he sat now, waiting for us to help him.

Patesse did not trust the police. He was convinced that they would be riddled with his mafia enemies. Only the FoPoCri had enough trust in him to turn to them for help in this situation.

This was not without a certain irony, because a few years ago he had regarded our commissariat as his worst enemy. Rolly Patesse had been part of the Lafontaine syndicate, according to the conviction of the judiciary. However, he had known when enough was enough and had stopped in time. It had never been possible to do anything to Patesse in court, and in the meantime he had safely invested his millions somewhere on the high edge and retired.

But our job is to fight crime - and it doesn't matter whether the victim may have once been on the side of the gangsters himself. We had a duty to protect the life of a man