The guests had left.
The cars had gone down the hill.
The champagne remained on the tables.
Teams discreetly tidied up the terrace.
In the library, however, no one thought of sleeping.
Camille had changed her clothes.
Black trousers.
Cream sweater.
Hair still damp.
A bandage covered his palm.
She was seated opposite Antoine Delacroix.
To his right, Maître Renaud.
To his left, Hélène Laurent.
Two managers from Laurent Patrimoine were on the other side of the table.
Antoine had asked Victoire to wait outside.
She protested.
Then he understood that, for the first time, the mere fact of being his daughter did not give him any right to enter a meeting.
Camille opened a file.
— Eleven reports.
Antoine frowned.
— Our ?
— Received in five months.
"We have received only four."
"The other seven came directly to us."
Hélène pushed the file towards Antoine.
He began to read.
The first testimony came from a seasonal waiter in Saint-Tropez.
The team had to arrive an hour before the declared time to prepare for an event.
This hour was not systematically paid.
When he asked why, a team leader replied:
"In luxury, not everything can be counted by the minute."
The second testimony concerned a maid.
She had been sanctioned after refusing a seventeenth chamber in an already prolonged day.
The third came from a valet.
A customer had insulted him in front of his superior.
The manager had apologized to the customer for "the inconvenience".
Not with the employee.
Antoine closed the file.
"These are serious facts.
Camille looked at him.
"These are mostly facts that are never seen in your presentations.
"We have procedures.
"Yes."
— An HR department.
"Yes."
— Audits.
Camille nodded.
"And yet, people continue to write anonymously to a company that doesn't even employ them.
Antoine remained silent.
Helene intervened.
"That's what worried Camille.
Antoine turned to her.
"And you agreed to let her pretend to be a waitress?"
Helene sighed.
"No.
Camille almost smiled.
"My aunt used the word 'absurd.'
— I also used "irresponsible."
Antoine looked at Camille.
"And you did it anyway.
"Yes."
"Why?"
Camille hesitated.
Then stood up.
She went to the window.
Below, the Mediterranean was black.
The lights of Cannes shone in the distance.
"My mother worked as a seasonal worker for twelve years.
Antoine looked up.
He knew the general history of the Laurent family.
But not this detail.
Camille continues.
His father, Michel Laurent, was heir to a small real estate company that gradually became a hotel group.
His mother, Élise Martin, did not come from the same world.
At the age of nineteen, she was cleaning rooms in a hotel in Juan-les-Pins.
At twenty-one, she was serving breakfasts in Cannes.
At twenty-three, she worked in events.
It was there that she had met Michel.
Camille smiled slightly.
"My mother always said that my father was the only rich customer who brought his cup back to the counter himself.
Hélène smiled too.
Antoine remained silent.
Camille continues.
Élise had married Michel.
But she had never forgotten the years of service.
When Camille was sixteen, her mother forced her to work for a summer in a small hotel of the family group.
Lingerie.
Breakfast.
Rooms.
No comfortable position.
No office.
She came home exhausted.
Complained about his feet.
Hated the noise of the trolleys in the corridors.
One evening, she announced that she would not be returning.
His mother had replied:
"One day, you may sign the salaries of people whose first names you don't know. Before that, you need to know what their body pays for your turnover. »
Camille was seventeen years old.
She had found the phrase dramatic.
His mother died five years later of cancer.
At twenty-two years old.
The year Camille really joined Laurent Patrimoine.
"Since then," she says, "I've always tried to read the reports with the idea of what you can't put in an Excel column.
Antoine lowered his eyes.
"And you thought that Delacroix was hiding something.
"I thought above all that your company might no longer see certain things.