Chương 6
Elise felt Sabine glance at her.
Sergeant Rochat asked Anouk directly whether she wanted that.
The girl nodded.
At eight fifteen, the board’s legal committee convened in the library.
Elise was instructed not to attend.
She sat with Anouk and Nadine in a private family room while Céline arranged discharge paperwork. Outside the windows, the lake lay flat beneath low cloud. A groundskeeper drove a small utility cart across the lawn, stopped near a row of bare rosebushes, and climbed out to adjust a loose tarp. He worked for several minutes in drizzle, unaware that the institution behind him was deciding how to name the night.
Anouk colored a horse with a green pencil.
Nadine answered messages on her phone. Each time it buzzed, she looked guilty, silenced it, then checked it again. She was a pediatric anesthesiologist at a private clinic in Geneva, and three surgeries had to be reassigned because she would not return that morning.
After the fifth call, she stepped into the corridor.
Her voice carried through the partly closed door.
“No, I don’t know when. Because my daughter—no. I said no.”
She returned with a flush across her cheekbones.
Anouk kept coloring.
“Was that work?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“Are they angry?”
“They will survive.”
“You said Mrs. Pelletier’s baby needed you.”
Nadine sat down. “Another doctor is there.”
“Is she good?”
“Yes.”
“As good as you?”
Her mother hesitated. “Probably less annoying.”
Anouk’s mouth moved slightly, almost a smile.
Elise looked away to give them privacy.
At nine, the south residence agreement was not signed.
A representative from the bank waited in Sabine’s office for forty minutes before leaving. Two foundation officials remained in the building. Victor did not return. His lawyer sent notice that he disputed the school’s authority to exclude him without a formal vote by the full trust.
At nine twenty, a message went to staff.
There had been “a serious interpersonal incident” during the night. Police had been contacted. A trustee had voluntarily stepped back from school activities pending review. Staff were instructed to preserve confidentiality and direct parent inquiries to administration.
No child was mentioned.
No allegation was described.
No lie appeared in the message. Elise read it three times and felt deceived.
At nine thirty-five, Sabine asked to see her.
The headmistress’s office overlooked the main drive. Her desk held three phones, two open laptops, and a silver pot of coffee no one had touched. Philippe Dutoit sat near the window, though Victor was absent. Beside him was Marianne Aeschlimann, vice-chair of the trust, a thin woman in her sixties with white hair cut to her jaw and a reputation for remembering the financial history of every family connected to the school.
Sabine motioned Elise to a chair.
Dutoit introduced himself as counsel for Victor personally, not for the school.
“I know who you are,” Elise said.
He smiled faintly. “That saves time.”
Marianne folded her hands. “We are trying to establish facts before positions harden.”
“The police are establishing facts.”
“The police will determine whether an offense may have occurred,” Dutoit said. “The school must determine what happened within its own safeguarding and employment structures.”
Elise looked at Sabine. “Am I being interviewed as a witness or an employee?”
“Both,” Sabine said.
“Then I would like a staff representative present.”
Marianne’s eyebrows rose.
Sabine nodded. “That is reasonable.”
Dutoit closed the leather notebook on his knee. “Of course.”
They waited twenty-five minutes for Marc Tanner, the faculty council representative, to arrive from a mathematics class. During that time, no one spoke about the incident. Marianne answered an email. Dutoit studied the rain on the windows. Sabine opened a desk drawer that stuck halfway, tugged it twice, then abandoned it.
Elise noticed the ordinary irritation of the gesture and nearly laughed. Not because anything was funny, but because the headmistress’s troublesome drawer had survived the collapse of the night unchanged.
Marc entered smelling faintly of whiteboard marker. He sat beside Elise and placed a blank pad on his lap.
The questions began.
Where had Elise been when the service alarm sounded?
Who had supervised the junior floor?
Had she seen Victor make physical contact with Anouk?
Had she heard him threaten the child?
Was it possible he had raised the folder merely to prevent it from falling?
Why had Elise assumed danger before asking for an explanation?
That question came from Dutoit.
Elise looked at him. “Because a frightened child was standing beneath a raised object and an angry man.”
“You have characterized Mr. Halden as angry. What specific behavior supports that?”
“His jaw was tight. His face was flushed. His voice was sharp. The child was trying to get away from him.”
“You entered after the corridor interaction.”
“Yes.”
“So you do not know what caused his emotional state.”
“I know it was not the responsibility of an eight-year-old to manage it.”
Marc’s pen stopped.
Dutoit’s smile vanished.
Marianne asked about the folder. “How high was it?”
“Above Anouk’s head.”
“In relation to his shoulder?”
“Higher.”
“Was his arm moving downward?”
“I entered before any downward movement.”
“Did you believe he intended to strike her?”
Elise felt the room waiting for a word that would simplify everything.
“I believed I could not risk being wrong.”
Marianne leaned back.
Dutoit tapped one finger against his notebook. “That is not the same as witnessing an attempted strike.”
“No.”
“Yet you called the police.”
“Yes.”
“Before notifying your headmistress.”
“Yes.”
“Then accessed restricted surveillance footage.”
“Yes.”
“Exported it.”
“Preserved it.”
“Using credentials that were not yours.”
“With the authorized night porter’s cooperation.”
Dutoit looked toward Sabine. “Was Madame Hartmann trained to initiate an evidentiary hold?”
“She was trained to preserve relevant footage in a safeguarding emergency,” Sabine said.
Elise turned to her.
The headmistress did not look back.
Dutoit opened his notebook again. “The policy may require interpretation.”
May you like
“Policies usually do after powerful people dislike the outcome,” Marc said.
Marianne gave him a cool look. “Your purpose here is to support procedural fairness, Monsieur Tanner.”
