The Skeleton in the Cupboard To stoke his ill humour, he asked the taxi to stop at a poorly lit café in Corbeil and ordered two glasses of marc, one for the driver and the other for himself. The bitter taste of the brandy made his throat constrict, and he said to himself that marc had been a feature of this investigation. Why? Pure chance. It was probably the drink he least liked. Besides, there had also been old Jeanne’s disgusting Kummel, and that memory, that tête-à-tête with the bloated old alcoholic, still made him feel nauseous. Yet she had once been beautiful. He now knew that she had loved Malik, who had used her the way he used everyone and everything. And now it was a curious mixture of love and hatred, of bitterness and animal devotion that she nursed for this man, who only needed to appear and snap his fingers for her to do his bidding. There are people like that in the world.
