Meaning it made Carole-anne nervous.
Wiggins drove him to Heathrow, where he got the three o’clock flight to Paris.
“It’s 4:00 p.m. there; the shop’s open until 7:00, so you’ll have plenty of time to get there. And this Gabrielle will be there; I checked on that.”
“And does Gabrielle have a last name?”
“Belrose.”
It was a little shop in a little street in Saint-Germain-des-Prés. A bell made a tinny sort of music when he opened the door.
A woman—looking more like a girl—stood behind one of the three long glass display cases, choosing chocolates to place in small, dark paper cups lining a black-and-gold box with which Jury was now quite familiar.
“Pardon me,” said Jury, “but are you Gabrielle Belrose?”
She looked up over the case. “Oui.”
“May I speak with you for a few moments, mademoiselle?” When she hesitated, he said, “I’m a policeman—”
“The Sûreté? Again?”
Jury tried to work up a comforting smile. “The British version. New Scotland Yard. Not again. It’s about Manon Vinet, the owner. You were a good friend?”
Her eyes rimmed with tears. “Oui.”
“I don’t want to upset you. I’m sure you’ve had enough dealings with police, but—”
She looked away. “Enough.”
Jury said, “Look, if you’d rather not talk to me, that’s all right. I’ll just go away.”
Her smile at that was slight, her lips pale, as if her face were refusing comfort and color, and her face was very pretty indeed. “I did not know police went away.”
“This one does.” Jury fished the hotel card from his pocket, wrote his name and mobile phone number on the back and shoved it across the counter. “If you feel like talking to me, I’m at this hotel. Thanks, Gabrielle.” Jury turned to leave.
Then she exclaimed, “Attendez!”
That, he thought, meant “Wait!” and he turned back.
“I do not mind talking to you. I’m closing the shop up now. Could we perhaps go for a drink?”
“We certainly could. But let’s go one better. Let’s go for dinner. I passed a nice-looking restaurant, just down the Rue des Beaux-Arts.”
“Le Vin d’Or? But that’s … trés, trés cher!”
“Good. It’s time Scotland Yard paid for something trés cher.”
She looked down at her skirt. “I don’t know if I’m dressed—”
“I may not be, but believe me, you’re dressed for anything. Close up and let’s go.”
Whether they were dressed for it could not be discerned from the smile of the maître d’ at Le Vin d’Or, who seemed happy to lead them to a table despite their not having a reservation. And the table was well placed against a wall made warm-looking by a smoked-glass sconce directly above it, complemented by a tea candle beneath it that the maître d’ lighted.
He placed very small menus before them, not the dinner menus but ones listing appetizers and numerous drinks.
It was up to their waiter to hand over the larger-than-life dinner menus and take their order for drinks. Jury looked around. “This place is spectacular in its very lack of pretense.” The staggering prices he thought were justified from sampling the ambience and the friendly service before he’d sampled the food. “Don’t even think about it,” he said, nodding toward the menu, when he saw her eyes widen. “Just order what you want and dig in.”
Her bell-like laugh came again. It was as if she’d brought the candy shop with her.
They both ordered the same thing—fillet of beef and accompanying side dishes, whose names were too difficult for him to bother sorting out so he let her do it.
“How long have you been working at Manon’s, Gabrielle?”
“Friends call me Gaby. I started about nine or ten months after she opened it, so it’s been about eleven years.”
“You probably knew her better than anyone. God knows, better than Scotland Yard, as we didn’t know her at all. That’s why your help is so important. You understand.”
She nodded, sadly, watching the waiter pour their wine.
“That is, we do know she had at one time been involved with Gerald Summerston.”
“Yes.”
Jury had been pretty sure this trip wasn’t a waste of time. Now he was even more sure.
“Did you know him?”
“Yes. He came to the shop often. That’s how she met him. He loved chocolate.”
“Did you like him?”
“No.”
The abruptness of the answer startled him. He said nothing, only waited until she looked up at him.
“He was not a good man.” She paused. “He had a wife.” She regarded him as if expecting a challenge. “You think perhaps in France we … ah … blink at such behavior.”
“No, I don’t think that. What sort of life was he offering her?”
The waiter was setting their plates before them, pouring more wine, softly treading off.
“I feel life was not what he was offering at all. Even though he told her he would divorce his wife and marry her.”
“He was lying?”
“Oui. But she believed him. This man was very charming. Very. I think he could have convinced her of anything. But he was sexually obsessed. It seemed to be all he thought about; he tried seducing nearly every woman he knew. He even tried it with me. Of course, I didn’t tell her. But I have a feeling she knew, anyway.” She cut into her fillet. After a few bites, she picked up her wine glass and sat looking at it. “You know, Manon drank a lot. A bottle of wine a day. Every day. Then, a little while after he left Paris, telling her he’d be back in a few weeks, she stopped drinking. Completely stopped. I asked her why and she said, ‘Because Gerald thinks I drink too much.’” Gaby frowned.
“An odd time to do it, to stop, after he’d left.”
“I thought so. But she had her reasons. And then a little while later, perhaps a month later—and of course, he hadn’t come back to Paris—she left.”
“She left?”
“To go to London. He contacted her to tell her he was sick. He wanted her to come. He’d made arrangements, he told her, for her to come to the Summerston place as a nurse.”
“But Lady Summerston wouldn’t—”
“Apparently she would. For some reason she accepted the nurse-charade. Madeline—Manon—told me it had something to do with a private hospital where he had told his wife she worked. I didn’t understand any of this, but—”
Jury thought of the foundling hospital, which Summerston himself owned. “And when Gerald died, she returned to Paris?”
“Not for a few months. Two, I think. She spent them in the North at some friend’s place.” Her puzzlement was evident.
Jury pushed his plate away. “I think she spent them at that private hospital. She was pregnant, don’t you think? That’s why she stopped drinking a bottle a day. And she was gone long enough—about six months?—to have had his baby, right? I’m guessing she told him she was pregnant and might have given him an ultimatum which, in any event, he couldn’t have done much about as he was genuinely and terminally ill. He got her to come to London so he could manipulate her into not telling anyone, especially not telling Eleanor Summerston.”
The waiter collected their plates and slipped two dessert menus in place. Jury didn’t look; he let Gaby do the looking and didn’t bother her with questions until she was done.
“Crème brûlée,” she said. “I’ve always loved crème brûlée.”
Like a lover she’d lost who’d come back at last.
“Me too.”
When the waiter reappeared, Jury ordered two. “And how about some cognac?”
“I’m half-drunk already.” She laughed. The music again.
“There’s always the other half.” Jury asked for the cognac to be brought later. When the waiter disappeared into the ephemeral light of this restaurant, Jury said, “Manon came back to Paris with the baby?
”
Gaby shook her head. “No. I don’t know what happened. She did get Gerald Summerston to admit to paternity, if it turned out she was pregnant. Manon was no fool.”
“What do you mean?”
“That she wouldn’t tell anyone, wouldn’t make a fuss, but only if he’d put it in writing to leave the child some part of his fortune; he was very rich, you know.”
“And did he?’
“Yes. I have the note he signed.”
“So she stayed in Paris for six years without returning to England until now. How did she seem? Excited? Upset? How?” Jury had to wait out this answer for the time it took the waiter to set down their crème brûlée and vanish again.
“Neither one. Manon didn’t really show her feelings that way. She was quite calm.” Gaby took a bite of the custard and closed her eyes.
No wonder, thought Jury, as he spooned some up. “I don’t think I’ve ever eaten such silken food in my life.” But he was so full he couldn’t eat any more of the rich dessert and pushed it to one side. “So Manon told you nothing, except about this agreement? You have no idea why she ended up on the tiny island of Bryher?”
“Maybe there was someone she wanted to see there.”
“But the only person she knew beside Summerston’s wife was dead. Daisy Brownell.”
“Daisy … that name is familiar, yes.” Gaby then said nothing until she’d finished the crème brûlée. She put her spoon down and said, “But that isn’t the only person she knew, is it?”
“Who else was there?” Jury was puzzled.
“What about the baby?” She looked at Jury’s crème brûlée. “Are you going to eat that?”
PART IV
Bookaboy
30
At the same time Richard Jury was walking the streets of Paris, Melrose Plant was opening his front door—Ruthven being busy with taking tea to the hermitage—to find a lad of perhaps twelve or thirteen with a canvas bag and a determinedly “I’m not buying” look for whatever Melrose was selling. He dropped his canvas bag long enough to pull a bit of paper out of his pocket.
“You this—Mr. Plant, then?”
Suddenly recalling this appointment he’d all but forgotten, Melrose said, “You must be Gerrard.”
“Maybe,” said Gerrard, covering his bases.
The lad was apparently prepared to debate his own identity. “In the event you are, please come in.”
That invitation, with its margin for error, must have satisfied Gerrard, and he entered.
Melrose held out his hand. “I’m Lord Ardry.” He tried out the title to see how the boy would take to it.
He didn’t. Instead, he again pulled out the crumpled bit of paper, smoothed it, and said, “They told me you was Mr. Melrose Plant.”
“I am. You’re familiar with titles, I assume?”
“Yeah. That’s what you got?” He surveyed the marble foyer. “Nice place. Kind of—ostentatious—that the word?”
“I hope not. It’s a word, yes. I bet you like big ones.” Melrose gestured toward the living room. “Come on in and have some tea.”
“Good idea. I could use a cuppa.” He looked almost happy before he hid it.
Taking his usual wing chair, Melrose indicated the chair on the other side of the fireplace, and Gerrard sat down, giving the living room another sweep of his eyes.
“That’s some Christmas tree you got there.”
“Pretty ostentatious, isn’t it?” For indeed it was. The sumptuously decorated tree—over-decorated, Melrose thought—had come from a tree farm just outside of Sidbury. Martha, Ruthven and Pippen had set to work with heirloom crystal balls and figurines; tiny china animals by Herend, Wedgwood and Spode. It would have given Claridge’s tree a run for its money, and “money” was what it screamed.
“Nah. It’s a Christmas tree. Supposed to be fancy, ain’t it? And look at all them fancy presents!” Gerrard let out a soft whistle.
Melrose looked. Most of them had been wrapped by Pippen, who, Melrose was surprised to hear (since Pippen, their new maid, didn’t look old enough to have worked anywhere, including here) had held a job in the gift-wrapping department at Harrods. “Quite a stack, I’ll admit.”
“A lot of money’s wrapped up in that lot.”
“Right. Incidentally, what’s your family name? If your first name’s Gerrard.”
“Gerrard,” he said.
“What? Both names? Gerrard Gerrard?”
“That’s it.”
“Couldn’t your mother have found another first name for you?”
“Too lazy, I expect. We’re a lazy lot.”
Melrose shook his head. “Not according to the FamilyHire agency. They said you’re diligent and hardworking.”
“Yeah, I am.”
“And they also said you’re stubborn, self-centered, arrogant, and demanding.” Melrose smiled. “And clever.”
“Sounds about right, except for the clever bit.”
“And you’ve got a sense of humor. They didn’t tell me that.”
“Didn’t know, it’s my guess. But if I’m stubborn and all that other stuff, why’d you want me?”
“Because I need those excellent qualities to deal with someone else who has them. She’s my aunt.”
“Yeah. I got one of them, too.”
Just then, Ruthven arrived with the heavily-laden tea tray, and Gerrard sat up, arrow-straight.
“Ruthven, this is Gerrard. I told you he’d be staying with us—for how long—?”
“Booked me for two weeks. I could do longer, o’ course.” He was studying the tea tray when he added that.
To Ruthven, Melrose said, “Perhaps you could show him to his room after tea.”
Ruthven bowed. “Certainly, m’lord.” He turned to Gerrard. “I hope you enjoy the tea, Master Gerrard.”
Gerrard was absolutely wowed. He smiled brightly for the first time. “A butler! Wow! A master, me?”
Far better a butler than an earl. Far better a “Master” than just a Gerrard.
“Okay, back to business,” said Melrose, first allowing Gerrard to people up his small plate with everything—scone, cucumber sandwich, egg mayonnaise, cheese and pickle, a little assortment of cakes; a few sitting atop another few as there wasn’t room for every occupant to claim a separate place on the plate.
Melrose gave him time to shovel in several of these delicacies before continuing.
“Ordinarily, one of the times this aunt has decreed belongs to her is this—tea time—though not today.”
Mouth full, but still managing, the lad said, “So I’m guessing you don’t want her joining you. Us. For tea. This here’s a real good one. Tea. I ain’t used to more’n a cup, me.”
Melrose marveled at how quickly the boy had become part of things, watching Gerrard now clamp down on a hard-boiled egg and wondering when eggs had been introduced to the tea assortment. Ruthven and Martha might have decided to protein the boy up. Gerrard did look a little pale and undernourished. Melrose corrected the “ain’t.” “Not used to more than.”
“I gotta start talking like you, then?”
“Not for my sake, no. But your own sake might be worth thinking about.”
Gerrard, scone in hand, put his head back and closed his eyes, as if having a think.
“Not right now, for heaven’s sakes.”
Gerrard sat forward again and put more jam on his scone. “Do we eat dinner, too? I mean after this lot?”
“We do indeed. But later. You must be getting stuffed, though. Hardly enough room for another meal.”
“I always got room, thanks.” He drank off his tea, replaced his cup, shot out his arms. “Great!”
Melrose pushed the button beneath the tabletop and Ruthven returned. “Show Master Gerrard to his room, will you, Ruthven?”
“Sir.” Ruthven picked up the canvas carryall.
“Ah, wait, Mr. Ruthven. I can do that.”
“Not at all, Master Gerrard. And it’s just ‘Ruthven.’”
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“Seems kind of disrespectful,” said Gerrard, as they moved to the foyer and the stairs, making remarks Melrose understood to be, “I really liked them—those—eggs. Where’d you get ’em?”
“From a chicken, Master Gerrard.”
Gerrard laughed hard and said, “A comedian butler! Mr. Ruthven, I’m stayin.”
It appeared that Mr. Ruthven and Master Gerrard were a lock.
31
When Gerrard came back downstairs for dinner at eight, looking shiny as a brand-new button, it was evident Ruthven had been hard at work.
Gerrard’s jacket and pants, though mismatched, had been carefully brushed and his white shirt pressed. Around the collar of the shirt he wore a polka-dot bow tie.
Agatha was in the living room and was introduced to “my cousin—second or probably third, as his father’s the actual cousin.” Whereupon, Agatha stood aghast and agape. Melrose took note of “agape,” for it might come in handy if he got another goat.
“Cousin? Cousin?” She said it a third time: “Cousin?” Being in locked-in-cousin syndrome, she did not take the hand that Gerrard politely extended. “But you—” she addressed Melrose, “—don’t have—”
“A cousin? Oh, but I do. I’ve just never mentioned the family. The Gerrards of London.” As if all London were bowled over by the name. “It’s just been so long since I’ve seen them.”
Gerrard should not have taken “clever” out of the mix, for he was as good at filling in blanks, at making deductions from minimal information, as Marshall Trueblood.
“Dad was afraid you’d forgotten him. You know, Ben.”
“Forget Ben Gerrard? Never. Not in a million years. Though it’s certainly bad of me that I’ve seen so little of you all. How long’s it been …?” Melrose looked at Gerrard for help.
“Dad says maybe twelve years.”
“Oh, surely not. A few London visits ago, I’m sure I stopped by to say hello. Your family being my only blood relations, after all.”
Although Agatha was physically immobile, Melrose knew “blood” would have her mind racing at the speed of light, or at least of the wind that had raked the wheat fields around Dorothy’s cottage and spun Dorothy and Toto into the sky, as it now threatened to pull all of the beautiful objects in Ardry End with it, together with the house itself, which it would then drop plunk into the Munchkinland of North London.
The Old Success Page 13