Between the movie posters that overlook the cinemas on Boulevard Montparnasse, in Paris, a slightly rowdy advertisement catches the eye: "Abac Detective: investigations, research, spinning".
The panel immediately propels the curious into a black and white world, populated by heroes in beige raincoats, pretending to read a newspaper on the terrace.
But, instead of the old, mustached detective imbued with the smell of tobacco, it's a 71-year-old almond-eyed young man in a denim shirt who opens the door for us.
Her name ?
Gérard Thomas, forty-nine years of experience.
He has plenty of stories.
Like the time he tracked Jacques Brel down to his windows to find out whether or not he was hiding a mistress.
In the early morning, the author of "Do not leave me" had launched to him, opening its shutters: "Do not stay there, well, go upstairs and drink the coffee!
"In the entry of the agency throne besides this quote from the singer:" What counts in a life is the intensity of a life, it is not the duration of a life.
" An entire program.
"It was exhilarating to be paid just to have fun!"
Gérard Thomas' long career can be traced back to his professional cards.
He worked through the Duluc agency, before creating his own firm in the 1980s ./LP/Arnaud Dumontier
A program which began in the summer of 1971. After failed medical studies, this son of a policeman, born in Saigon, in French Indochina, presented himself to Michel Forget, the boss of the largest detective firm of the time.
“I thought he was looking for a courier, explains Gérard Thomas, and there, this elegant man in a jacket and tie offers me to join the team.
"
The 20-year-old boy with long black hair quickly became the agency's best “spinner”, a spinning specialist.
His mission ?
Follow a target without being detected in order to find adultery or fraud.
"Can you imagine how exhilarating it was to be paid just to have fun!"
“Gérard gets carried away.
At the time, photography was not yet used in the trade.
His observations in the field were enough for the detective to establish a report that blackened carbon paper notebooks, now preciously kept in the cellar.
“Later, I decided to use photography for my work, I even installed a dark room in my apartment.
"
After starting out on the hats of wheels - motorcycle, mainly -, our man joined the legendary Duluc agency, located 18, rue du Louvre, and whose neon green sign fascinated passers-by and filmmakers (Woody Allen shot there a scene from the film “Midnight in Paris”).
His boss, Martine Baret, 73, remembers a “competent, intelligent and courageous man in the field”.
"To be a good detective, you have to be physically fit, have an irreproachable lifestyle, be always punctual, and above all discreet," explains one of the rare women in the field.
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A rigor to which our agent has always applied himself by regularly practicing diving in a specialized swimming pool in the Paris region.
"Going down to 25 meters underwater allows you to learn to manage your stress in dangerous situations", comments Gérard in front of the monofin which sits in his bathroom.
Because the "investigations of morality", which constitute the bulk of its work, can take a perilous turn, as during the Boutboul affair, which had hit the headlines, more than thirty years ago.
"Our job is 90% perspiration and 10% inspiration"
Spinning is an art that requires tenacity and discretion.
Gérard Thomas masters it perfectly./LP/Arnaud Dumontier
On December 27, 1985, a brilliant lawyer and great friend of Laurent Fabius, Me Perrot, was found murdered, shot by three 22 long rifle bullets in the middle of Paris.
“I had been following him for three weeks, at the request of his mother-in-law, for a possible affair.
At the end of my mission, I learned from the press that he had been executed, ”recalls Gérard.
He is then summoned by the police, who interrogate him and get hold of his notes.
Four years later, the body of the assassin is recovered in the port of Le Havre, and it is finally his client, Elisabeth Boutboul, who is indicted for having ordered the murder of his son-in-law and then that of the killer.
"I had found him three mistresses after all!
»Says Gérard.
Apart from this not trivial matter, his daily life is divided between his spinning mills and his office, where he receives his clients and writes the precious reports that will provide them with decisive proof for the settlement of a heated divorce, child custody, a thorny inheritance, or insurance fraud.
"Our job is 90% perspiration and 10% inspiration", he says, paraphrasing a character in the film "Stolen Kisses", by François Truffaut (1968).
Beginning of the 1980s. In the small studio in the 15th arrondissement that he shares with his fiancée, Gérard Thomas decides to set up his own agency.
“Every morning, I would draw a large curtain to hide our bed, then I would deploy trestles to set up my desk.
»His very first client, he receives her squarely in his pajamas.
“A 75-year-old widow rings the bell one morning to ask me to find her childhood love.
The problem is that Gérard never carried out in-depth investigations, only spinning mills!
In front of the pile of letters left by the old lady, he decides to call for help Dubly, one of his former employers, who finds the trace of the man thanks to the stamp of the army visible on the envelopes.
“In three days, he knew where he lived, the names of his wife and those of his children.
"
Phew, honor is safe!
But the phone hardly rings.
The detective then has a brilliant idea: so that his name goes back to the head in the Minitel directory, he decides to add the letter "A" to his surname and files this new company name, which will then change to give Abac , its current name.
“Thanks to that, I was a hit for twenty years,” he admits.
So much so that he even had to hire his sister-in-law, a peaceful stay-at-home mom, to pick up the handset when he was on a mission in the field.
A professional plaque adorns the door of Gérard's office, boulevard du Montparnasse in Paris./LP/Arnaud Dumontier
"Hello, am I at Abac Detective?"
A hesitant voice asks on this peaceful autumn morning.
"Absolutely, what can I do for you?"
»Answers Gérard, happy with this timely call.
Obviously, this is the first time that the person has taken such a step.
The voice launches into the convoluted story of a scam story.
Executive in the advertisement, the man would have given 20,000 euros in cash to an intermediary for a collaboration with an Internet influencer.
But the intermediary has evaporated.
Gérard interrupts him.
“No need to go into details.
May I ask you how you got to know me?
The voice replies that he has simply "typed" the word detective into Google.
“Ah!
we must stop wanting to hit the detectives!
»Jokes Gerard, who leaves in a thunderous laugh.
"I work for everyone, from the concierge of the building to the lady of Neuilly, even if I have the reputation of being the most expensive detective in Paris," he prides himself after hanging up.
For a spinning mill, its average price is 150 euros per hour, with an additional 500 euros for the photos file.
“A woman whom I had followed by order of her husband, because she had a lover, contacted me thirty years later.
I asked her the reason for her call and she said:
This time, he's cheating on me, and I want you to take the pictures!
"
Surprisingly, at a time when everyone has a technology capable of transforming us into formidable hackers, old-fashioned spinning still seems to have a bright future ahead of it.
To meet the very sustained demand, Gérard has enlisted the services of Sandrine Le Duc for six years.
At 48 years old, this former audiovisual production manager has reconverted thanks to the training provided by the University of Assas, one of the three schools of private research agents recognized in France.
“I was tired of working for reality shows.
When I announced to my relatives that I was going to become a detective, they thought it was a joke, ”she testifies, her mind focused on the photos of her last spinning mill.
When the mission requires more specific skills, such as breaking through a banking secret or finding the trace of a PSA (for "left without leaving an address"), the two private individuals can rely on a large network of informants, in various administrations, and investigators specialized or instructed by Gérard himself when they leave school.
"Mr. Thomas is one of the last great old-fashioned detectives trained on the job," confirms Samuel Mathis, director of Esarp Paris, the Higher School of Private Investigators, which regularly sends him interns.
Because, since 2008, investigators have been forced to undergo initial training.
And, in 2011, the profession was drastically regulated.
Consequence: of the 3000 agencies at the time, only 1200 were able to continue to operate.
“Before, it was rather retired civil servants who became detectives;
now, it is young people who have completed higher education, ”Samuel Mathis analyzes.
For the spinning mills, his pet peeves are the traffic jams and the mask
In the 1970s, Gérard Thomas decided to use a camera during his spinning mills.
Since then, he has been accumulating boxes on a shelf in his office./LP/Arnaud Dumontier
Gérard loves gadgets.
On the shelf next to his desk are his first cameras, a car key equipped with a mini-camera, mini-mirror mirrors to follow his targets "in front", but also old camcorders and binoculars .
"Do you want me to show you the stuff of the future?"
He leaves for a few seconds in the hallway and comes out perched on roller blades.
“Camera in front, and camera behind!
I train diligently, you know!
»Any means of transport is good so as not to lose sight of its targets in traffic.
“We Parisian detectives are all color blind, we only see green lights!
I am on my seventh license recovery stage.
“Besides traffic jams and speed limits, his other pet peeve is the mask.
For his spinning the day before, Gare Montparnasse, he was forced to call on a second agent to help him "unmask" a young woman of 35, at the exit of the TGV.
What do we have to blame him for?
Her stepmother suspects her of having an adulterous affair.
This is about to confirm Gérard, who followed her to the hotel where the thirty-something had made an appointment with her lover.
Once the masks have fallen, the photos of the kisses are formal.
Does our agent ever feel remorseful about sabotaging passionate stories like these?
Not really.
“I am against lying.
Through my spinning mills, I help my clients know the truth, which often allows them to move on.
"
Prevent his investigations from ending in a tragedy
Self-portrait of Gérard Thomas, private detective and founder of the Abac agency, in its early days. / LP / Arnaud Dumontier
In more than forty years of career, he would have received no complaints from his former "victims".
“Except once, because I had pushed the plug a little too far,” he concedes.
In this case, it was the wife of a senior politician photographed in his car kissing her lover.
Before the judge, his lawyer argued that the interior of the vehicle was a private place.
“Imagine if it had been a convertible!
»Emphasizes Gérard mockingly.
The agent also takes all precautions to prevent his investigations from ending in a tragedy.
Thirty years ago, while still a beginner, one of his clients shot his wife and her lover to death with a shotgun, forty-eight hours after receiving proof of their affair.
“Since then, I have systematically signed a clause stating that my clients undertake not to harm the people involved.
“He still experienced a total of four“ passionate dramas ”, as he describes them.
Gerard is silent for a moment.
His eyes are lost in the trees which taunt his window.
Beneath his boastful allure, this fan of Coluche, follower of "Charlie's humor", has easy tears.
At the mention of a lady, to whom he had learned that her husband's mistress was his daughter-in-law, his eyes blur and he pauses to blow his nose.
“My problem is that I can't keep a distance,” he concedes.
You know, in our business, reality goes beyond affliction!
"
Next year, Gérard will celebrate his jubilee.
Fifty years of career, all the same!
He already imagines a beautiful evening with guitar in hand with his wife, Nathalie, his colleagues and clients who have become friends.
Her colleague from Duluc retired this summer.
The sign on rue du Louvre is extinct forever, without a buyer.
He polishes his exit.
His proteges, including Sandrine Le Duc, should take over and he will never be far to chaperone them.
"Do you know what's annoying when you have a fascinating job?
he concludes, it's because it goes too quickly.
For me, fifty years ago, it was yesterday.
»Does he intend to write his memoirs?
“Rather take a boat and complete the round-the-world trip that I started in my youth.
"The perfect plan B for our agent" A ".