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"So," she said in French, her voice low and steady. "We have your name. We know where you live. What we don't know is why you are here in Paris, at night, with paint on your face, and a very strange disguise."
She waited. He didn't answer, simply stared from one of them to the other. Juliette sighed. This wasn't going to be easy.
"You ran when the police approached you. You were asked to stop, and you fled," Lucien said, his voice harsh. "Why did you flee? Were you feeling guilty? What was your intention when you were out there on the streets? What goal did you have? Were you looking to kill another woman?"
Now, the man's eyes widened slightly and he gave the tiniest shake of his head.
So, he was able to understand them and to respond, but he was simply choosing not to.
"Look," she said, her voice firm. "You can either cooperate, or we can take you down to the cells, and keep you there overnight. We can do this the hard way. Or else, you can talk to us, and tell us. Perhaps there's a reason and if so, I suggest you explain it to us. It's up to you."
She waited, her gaze locked with his. She thought she’d tried to sound forceful yet reasonable, and she sensed she had made a connection with him. Would it prove to be so?
Then, slowly, he opened his mouth.
"I'm not running from anything. I'm searching for something," he said, his voice a low murmur.
"What are you searching for?"
"I'm a pilgrim," he said. "A pilgrim on the journey for truth."
Lucien let out a mocking laugh. "You're a common killer. Prove me wrong," he jeered.
But Francois simply turned and looked at him patiently.
"I am a pilgrim, and my journey is to find the truth of life. I want to perform in every city of the world. So far, I have performed in four cities."
"With papers?" Juliette asked.
He shook his head. "No. I don't need papers to find the truth. I don't need them. I may not have papers, but I am an artist. I am a creator, a dreamer, and an explorer. I am on the path, the path of truth and enlightenment.I just need to be who I am, to give my art to one city, and then I can reach out to the next."
He was icy and calm. Juliette was surprised by his poise and control. Now that he was speaking, it seemed as if he didn't have any emotion to show, or maybe it was bottled up inside him.
Lucien turned to her and mouthed, "He's our man. I know it."
But as she stared at him, Juliette felt less sure. He was most definitely strange, someone who defied society's norms, who was on his own mission and who defied normality. But the differences were making her worried, and the small details were perturbing her.
That paint. It was wrong. Even the brush strokes were different. More amateurish than the perfection she’d seen on the bodies.
And she thought about where he'd been found. It was slightly outside of the area where she'd instinctively expected to find him.
Why is that?
Now the instinctive voice in her mind that had been worried about the locations was asking her that exact question, and loudly.
Why did you think he’d be somewhere else? Is there a reason for that?
Maybe this suspect is not the man you need, the voice told her. But maybe you’re focusing on him for a reason now, and that reason is that he’s helping you think of something you do need to know.
Perhaps, he’s going to allow you to join the dots in your mind.
Perturbed by her instinctive voice’s loudness, Juliette looked down, thinking frantically about the similarity, the link she’d just made.
What if the killer was the same kind of person, someone who wanted to travel from place to place, creating a record of his journey through kills?
The statues that he created with his make-up were flawless. Just like another statue - a statue that until now, she hadn't thought about or realized.
The Statue of Liberty.
