She wiped her eyes and shrugged bitterly. ‘How on earth should I know? At some party or nightclub, I suppose. She just started mentioning him one day. We never asked, because we didn’t want to know. He’s just a deadbeat. A degenerate. Probably spends most of his time hanging out with other deadbeats and degenerates just like him. What does it matter? All I care about is that the police will be onto him now, and justice will be done.’

‘You said he doesn’t have a proper job. What does he do for money?’

‘He works part-time in that awful bar. Cleaning toilets, probably. Who would trust scum like that with any kind of responsibility? She was often there with him, drinking, dancing, God knows what. I told her a nice, respectable young lady doesn’t go to a place like that.’

Ben’s memory flashed back to the picture on Romy’s phone that showed her and Michel standing outside the bar. ‘Le Geronimo?’

Madame Juneau frowned. ‘Yes, that’s the name. I’d forgotten it, or else I would have told Detective Boucher.’

‘That’s not a problem. I’ll tell her myself. Did you happen to give her an address for Michel Yassa?’

She shrugged and shook her head. ‘No, I don’t have it. But I told her I know he lives in one of those terrible housing projects in Saint-Denis. That’s where they all live. Like rats in a hole.’

‘Did Romy go to visit him there often?’

‘I told her it wasn’t safe there. No decent French girl in her right mind would go near that place. Those that do are always getting attacked and raped. But she wouldn’t listen to me. She never listened. Always going off to dangerous places, and we’d warn her against it, and off she’d go anyway. Last time it was Tripoli, in Libya.’

Ben realised that she was talking about Romy’s recent field trip. This was the information he needed. ‘That would be for her job with the Institut Segal, yes?’

‘She went there with the director. Otherwise I’d have been terrified. You hear all these stories about what happens to white girls travelling in those countries.’ She gave a bitter laugh. ‘Except nowhere is safe now, is it?’

‘Tell me more about her trip to Libya. Do you know the dates she went there and came back?’

Madame Juneau didn’t need to think about it, because the memory was very recent. ‘It was only last week. She came home just a couple of days ago. Why are you asking? I don’t see the point.’