A Dream of Death Page 6

  One woman she met through her new work, Agnes Thomas, became one of her closest friends and confidantes. For the remainder of her life, Sophie treated Agnes like a sister. She trusted Agnes implicitly, and the two women were in almost daily contact right up until the time of Sophie’s death.

  Another person she met through UniFrance was Daniel Toscan du Plantier. For a time, Sophie worked for Daniel, who was elected to the prestigious role of chairman of UniFrance in 1988. Daniel was 47 years old, while Sophie was 31 years old. He already ranked as one of the most influential people in French cinema and was a hugely respected producer. Among his film credits were Peter Greenaway’s acclaimed film The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover.

  Daniel du Plantier had originally worked for the publisher of the prestigious French newspaper France-Soir, but then pursued a career in the film industry. From 1975 he served as the director general of the Gaumont Film Company, the oldest in the world. It was a period of tremendous success for Gaumont, which had the backing of multimillionaire French media tycoon Nicolas Seydoux. The firm was so successful it forged collaborations with international film giants such as Disney and Sony.

  When Sophie joined UniFrance, Daniel had just divorced his second wife, having been married first to Marie-Christine Barrault and then Francesca Comencini. Ms Comencini was a well-known Italian actor in the European film industry.

  After Sophie’s death in 1996, Daniel would marry again. In 1998 he married Melita Nikolic, who had moved to France from the former Yugoslavia with her parents. He was 57, while she was 29. Just as with Sophie, Daniel met Melita through UniFrance, where she was pursuing a career in the film industry.

  In their five years together before his death, they would have two children, Tosca and Maxime. Melita had become involved in a Moroccan film festival through her husband and, after his death, continued her involvement in the Marrakech event in his memory.

  The late 1980s marked the pinnacle of Daniel du Plantier’s career and, at the time, he ranked as one of the most powerful men in the influential French cinema industry. He rubbed shoulders with the great and the good in French society and was known to be quite friendly with Jacques Chirac, then the mayor of Paris, who would go on to become the president of France. But he also boasted links across French industries such as car manufacturing, petrochemicals and telecommunications. Executives in these industries were only too happy to support high-profile French films and film events.

  Over this period, Sophie had been involved in a number of relationships, but they were brief and never threatened to rival the romance she had previously had with Pierre-Jean. Her devotion was entirely focused on little Pierre-Louis. Mother and son spent a lot of time together in Paris and Sophie insisted on taking her son with her on family holidays abroad.

  Sophie was already setting her sights beyond UniFrance. Daniel, whom she had grown to know and trust, encouraged her to follow her professional dreams. Working at the agency had helped her focus on what she wanted for her career – and had helped build her confidence in her ability to achieve it.

  She used Daniel as a sounding board for her plans to work in the film industry, with little intention of getting involved in a relationship with the older man whom she considered more of an ally and an advisor. However, over time, they grew closer. Initially regarding him as a trusted industry friend, Sophie was wary: the older film executive was known for his dalliances.

  Sophie and Daniel became involved, and, in 1990, just over two years after they met, they married. It was a marriage that was greeted with some reservations by her family and friends. Her new husband was almost 17 years her senior and had already been divorced twice. But Sophie was adamant, and both her friends and family had learned that, once convinced of something, she was nothing if not single-minded.

  The couple were highly visible in French society, appearing at major film and cultural events in Paris as well as the annual Cannes Film Festival. They made for a dashing pair – Daniel was sophisticated and elegant, Sophie was young, beautiful and had a personality that made her stand out from the crowd.

  But Sophie was determined she would be regarded for her own work rather than for working with her second husband. She pursued independent film projects and became friendly with some of the most ambitious and talented people in the French film sector, including Jérôme Clément, who was the driving force behind the highly regarded ARTE television channel.

  It was an exciting period within the French film industry, with a whole new generation of French stars helping to broaden the appeal of indigenous films, particularly in English-speaking markets such as the UK and US. That, in turn, led to opportunities for smaller film projects and, in particular, for documentaries, which were becoming a hugely popular genre of their own.

  Daniel was wealthy and, as well as a beautiful home in Paris, he had a holiday villa in Ambax, located in the Haute-Garonne region. It was a beautiful area of France and Sophie became very fond of the home in Ambax. The couple would spend a lot of their time together there. She began to find more and more time for writing. Her poetry was very much influenced by nature, and she found her muse in the countryside of both her parents’ native Lozère as well as Ambax. But she increasingly found herself thinking about the wild countryside she had seen in Ireland as a teenager almost two decades earlier.

  With financial support from Daniel, she began to consider the possibility of buying a holiday home in Ireland. Her enthusiasm was infectious, and she quickly enlisted her friends, fully briefing them on precisely what she was looking for. Her cousin Alexandra was particularly supportive and was trusted by Sophie to select and view potential properties. Her priorities were a location in a wild, isolated area, with, if possible, either a view of the sea or easy access to the coast. Sophie looked in west Cork, Kerry and even Wicklow during her search, using various Irish bed and breakfasts as bases for property exploration. At one point, she even considered a house on an island off the west Cork coast but rejected this on the basis of practicalities and ease of access.

  Having considered numerous options, she finally settled on a well-maintained cottage at Toormore, located off the Skibbereen–Schull road. It fit the bill. Isolated, with astounding views over the rugged local countryside, it was located about 100 metres from another property – but so far from the main road as to offer a sense of total peace and seclusion.

  Author and screenplay writer Michael Sheridan was the first to outline the circumstances of Sophie’s choice of Irish getaway in his 2002 book, Death in December. He revealed that although Sophie was enchanted with the Toormore house she eventually selected, her cousin was less enthusiastic. Alexandra had an uneasy feeling about the house – a sense of dread. She favoured a different property, but Sophie had her mind made up. Alexandra’s foreboding about Toormore was something that would be noted in the years after the tragedy.

  The Toormore house quickly became Sophie’s special place – her refuge. She proudly brought her family to her new Irish holiday home, and it became a favourite summer holiday location for Pierre-Louis and his school friends. She also brought work friends and her cousins for short visits. Georges and Marguerite were brought to Toormore and given a tour of their daughter’s favourite local shops and restaurants, often choosing to have their evening meal on the small flagged terrace in front of the property, with its views south over the hills and fields to the sea.

  Her friend Agnes Thomas visited Toormore once with Sophie and noted how her friend loved the west Cork area. ‘She loved being by the sea and she was fascinated by the beautiful view outside her house,’ Agnes recalled years later. Poignantly, Sophie had wanted Agnes to travel with her to Toormore between 20 and 23 December 1996, but Agnes was unable to travel because of a commitment to a birthday celebration in France. ‘I wanted to go, but because of a birthday could not. Perhaps if I had been there, Sophie would still be alive. I had lost my best friend. It was very shocking.’

  Sophie’s repeated visits led to her for
ging some friendships in the area. She became friendly with her close neighbours, Shirley Foster and Alfie Lyons, French expats Yvonne and Thomas ‘Tomi’ Ungerer, publicans Billy and Angela O’Sullivan, Josephine Hellen and US-born cheesemaker Bill Hogan.

  The wildness of the countryside surrounding her new holiday home proved everything that she had hoped for. She adored the desolate, rugged coastline, with pathways leading to headlands and cliffs battered by the Atlantic. Sophie would carefully plan her walks to the headlands between Roaringwater Bay and Dunmanus Bay, and these would then inspire her writing and poetry. One of her favourite walks was to Three Castle Head, wedged between Mizen Head and the entrance to Dunmanus Bay. Years later, her friends would recall that when Sophie returned to France from her west Cork holiday home, she immediately seemed to be planning her next trip back. ‘She loved this place – it was very special to her,’ Marie-Madeleine explained.

  Daniel never shared his wife’s enthusiasm for the isolation and rugged beauty of Toormore. He considered the house too remote, too difficult to access and too far from the social hubs around which their lives now revolved. One friend recalled that the French film executive considered the house ‘cold and draughty’. He never needed the sense of isolation that Toormore offered Sophie.

  His view was apparently that, if they needed a quiet period away from their frenetic work and social scene in Paris, didn’t they have the house in Ambax? They both loved the Haute-Garonne property, and it was far easier to access from Paris. Toormore never held any magic for him, unlike the attraction it offered to Sophie.

  Daniel would ever only make one visit to Toormore with Sophie. After her death he would return to Toormore just once more.

  In the early years of their marriage, there were strains, mostly linked to their career demands and strong personalities. Often, Sophie would seek a little time away from the apartment they shared, usually just a matter of hours or, on rare occasions, a few days. Toormore became the place Sophie went to think, to write and to consider where her life was going. Sometimes the differences between the couple would lead Sophie to seek time alone, either in west Cork or at a flat she had in Paris. Now in her mid-30s, Sophie didn’t hesitate to opt for time alone when her relationship with Daniel became fraught or complicated. On occasions, these separations were only for a matter of days. At one time, she stayed away from Daniel’s apartment for two weeks. But these short periods apart all occurred in the early part of their marriage, roughly around the time of her relationship with Bruno Carbonnet, from whom the police had sought a statement after her murder.

  A relationship between Sophie and Bruno developed in 1991, which saw Sophie bring the artist with her to Toormore – something that, for her, carried great significance. Their relationship continued for slightly over a year before Sophie ended it in 1993.

  From 1993 onwards Sophie and Daniel’s marriage slowly adapted to the demands of their strong personalities and hectic careers. The couple had forged an understanding of each other and a very close bond. There were no more extended periods apart and, as Daniel du Plantier told French police after Sophie’s death, they were in 1996 discussing having a child together. Years later, Agnes Thomas would verify this. The tragedy was that, at the end of 1996, Sophie and Daniel were enjoying the happiest period of their married life.

  If Daniel du Plantier knew about the relationship with Bruno Carbonnet, he never publicly commented on it. The confirmation of the relationship came in statements made by the artist to French police in the immediate aftermath of Sophie’s death and at the request of gardaí, who wanted to eliminate him from their inquiries.

  What is known is that, when Sophie arrived alone at Cork Airport shortly before 2.30 p.m. on Friday, 20 December 1996, her relationship with Bruno Carbonnet had been over for more than three years. She planned to spend a short break at Toormore before flying back to Paris to spend Christmas with her husband. She then planned to fly to Dakar for a New Year’s break with Daniel. The following year, 1997, was when the couple hoped to have a child together.

  Sophie was planning to fly back to Paris on the Aer Lingus flight from Cork Airport on Monday 23 December for onward transfer to Toulouse, where she would meet her husband. She would be murdered roughly 12 hours before her scheduled departure time.

  4

  IAN BAILEY

  Ian Bailey was born just outside Manchester, England, to middle-class parents in 1957, just 12 years since the end of World War II. Manchester, one of the great industrial hubs of the UK, had suffered severe damage from German bombing, along with its outlying industrial outposts including Salford, Bolton and Stockport, where the Bailey family lived.

  Even football clubs had suffered at the hands of the Luftwaffe. Manchester United had, for a time, been forced to use the stadium of their fierce opponents, Manchester City, while bomb damage to their own facilities was repaired. The post-war years had been difficult in Manchester, as in all other parts of the UK, with vast areas of damage to be repaired and shortages of many goods, especially luxuries, until well into the 1950s. Food rationing had only ended in the UK, having been introduced in 1940, just three years before Mr Bailey’s birth.

  But with the rebuilding of the city and suburbs came optimism and opportunity. By the 1960s, when Mr Bailey was a schoolboy, Manchester had become not just an economic hub for the UK but also a cultural and artistic centre, just like its near neighbour and great rival Liverpool.

  Intelligent, outgoing and with a passion for the arts, Ian Bailey couldn’t have picked a more vibrant place to spend his early childhood, possibly with the exception of London. A good student, he tested towards the top of his school classes and had a particular flair for literature.

  In 1966, when Ian was nine years old, his father and mother decided to relocate their young family, which now included a daughter, Kay, to the south. The Baileys were set on a move to Gloucester, some 217 kilometres south of Stockport. Ian’s father worked as a craft butcher, and employment opportunities were better in Gloucestershire than in Lancashire. It was also thought that the area might offer a better lifestyle for the two children. Years later, Ian Bailey would recall his parents as hard-working people who were utterly devoted to their young family.

  Mr Bailey was enrolled in a religious-run school called The Crypt, and the move south, if anything, saw his grades improve. The Crypt traces its history back to 1539 and it ranks as one of the oldest schools in England. The UK at the time had a tiered education system, with the very best students guided towards grammar schools. These schools boasted a record of academic excellence with an exceptionally high proportion of students going on to university.

  In this environment, the teen’s interests in literature, poetry and the arts were further encouraged. By his late teens Ian had decided on a career in journalism, which offered not only the variety to indulge his interests, such as archaeology and history, but also the flexibility for him to pursue his interest in writing and poetry.

  A key moment for his choice of career was when he stumbled across a copy of All the President’s Men, the acclaimed investigative book by Washington journalists Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward that detailed their work on the Watergate scandal. He admitted that the book captivated him and sparked what would become a lifelong fascination with journalism and, in particular, with investigative reporting.

  Almost half a century later, and in very different circumstances, Mr Bailey would explain the impact the book had on the course of his life. ‘I thought, that is what I want to do. You are trying to discover things.’

  Like many other journalists, his budding career started by reporting on local community events. He submitted articles to the local paper in Gloucester on events he came across and incidents at his school. Some were relatively mundane, such as reports on school rugby matches, community appeals or local festivals. Others were more dramatic – such as an attack by a swarm of bees on a group of locals. He had taken a part-time job on a fish stall at the popular Gloucester marke
t, and this helped to deliver stories through local tittle-tattle.

  Filing such reports taught him how to properly present news copy and, even more usefully, gave him an introduction to key figures within the local journalism industry. This was instrumental in helping to secure him a trainee placement with a local news agency. Provincial papers and agencies provided some of the very best training for young journalists, with some of the top journalists in both the UK and Ireland tracing their beginnings to a local newspaper or radio station. As a result, Ian’s burgeoning portfolio of published work secured him a place on a journalism course in Wales.

  It was in 1978 that Mr Bailey first met fellow English journalist Sarah Limbrick. She was a talented young reporter working on the Gloucester Gazette. She would go on to work for a number of national newspapers and TV stations, as well as working on television scripts. A relationship quickly developed between the pair, and in late 1979 the couple married. However, the whirlwind romance didn’t last. The marriage soon ran into difficulties, eventually ending after just four years. Ms Limbrick would later go to work in London while Mr Bailey remained in Gloucestershire.

  By 1980, having successfully completed the journalism training course, and with the experience of the Gloucester news agency safely under his belt, Mr Bailey moved to Cheltenham, where there was freelance work available. A busy town, Cheltenham-based journalists benefited from its famous racecourse and its associations with both the military and intelligence communities. Cheltenham had a famous military academy, several army and RAF bases and was also home to one of the most secretive elements of the British defence network, General Communications Headquarters. Mr Bailey’s innate confidence, striking good looks and determination to make a success of his career quickly began to pay dividends. Having supplied stories on a freelance basis to a number of leading UK national and provincial papers, he subsequently secured work with the Sunday Times and their respected Insight investigative team.