‘Juliette!’ he murmured.
‘She will not answer me. Can you persuade her to come back?’
Oblivious now to the presence of his supposed enemies, Fernand crawled forward under the great overhang of rock. ‘Pascale!’ he called.
Peering past him, Melissa saw Juliette’s expression change; for a moment she appeared puzzled and then a smile of delight spread over her face.
‘Pascale, do you hear me?’ repeated Fernand with an unfamiliar note of authority in his voice.
‘Who calls?’ Juliette’s voice had become reedy and childlike, barely audible above the sound of the waters.
‘This is your master, the Lord Villars.’
‘What is my lord’s command?’
‘His Majesty requires our presence at court. We must return to Paris at once. Come.’
‘Is there peace once more in the land?’
‘There is peace. Lay down your weapon and come with me.’
Obediently, Juliette placed the golf-club carefully on the ground, fell on all fours and began inching along the ledge towards her brother. She seemed half dazed, her movements uncertain. Seeing her erratic progress, Melissa closed her eyes and retreated, swallowing hard.
A short distance away stood Hassan, his officers, the group of climbers with their equipment and finally Philippe Bonard, erect and dignified between his guards. They were as still as statues; hardly a muscle moved, hardly a breath was drawn until at last Fernand brought Juliette to safety.
Hassan barked an order for the golf-club to be retrieved; the two guards released Bonard and moved forward to take charge of the new prisoner. They wavered when they saw the look on Fernand’s face.
‘Do not touch her!’ he said fiercely. ‘I will take care of her.’
The young officers glanced at Hassan for instructions. After a moment’s hesitation he gave a brief nod and the little party, with brother and sister walking hand in hand in their midst, slowly descended the path back to the house.
Twenty-Three
‘What kept you?’ grumbled Iris. ‘Jack and I are starving. Wouldn’t order till you turned up.’
‘That’s nice of you both – sorry to be so long.’ Melissa scanned the menu. ‘I’ll have melon and a steak au poivre.’
Jack poured out the wine. ‘The whole place is buzzing with rumours,’ he said. ‘Dora and Rose went off quite put out at missing all the gory details.’
‘And the Lovells,’ Iris reminded him.
‘Ah yes,’ chuckled Jack. ‘All of them at pains to explain they didn’t want to leave without saying goodbye to you.’
Melissa frowned. ‘Anyone would think it was some sort of public entertainment.’
‘Only natural curiosity,’ said Iris. ‘Come on, Mel. Spill it.’
Melissa contemplated her glass in silence, seeking the right words. Fresh in her mind was the anguish of Antoinette Gebrec as the reason for her son’s murder sank in. Perhaps it would have been kinder for her not to know, to try instead to come to terms with the suicide theory and all its implications – although the real story would probably have come out sooner or later. How did the old French proverb express it? Truth, like oil, always comes to the surface. So be it.
‘What it boils down to,’ she began after a long pause, ‘is that Juliette killed Alain in revenge for what her family had suffered under the Occupation.’
Iris frowned. ‘Don’t understand. What could Alain have had to do with that?’
‘Juliette holds his father responsible for her brother being taken and tortured by the Gestapo.’
‘But you said his father was killed serving with the army.’
‘Madame Gebrec’s husband was killed while fighting with the Free French forces,’ corrected Melissa. ‘Alain’s father was Julius Eiche, who many people – including Juliette – believed to have been spying for the Gestapo.’ She turned to Jack. ‘The photos in the book are correctly labelled. I was so taken up with my theory that Erdle had something to do with Alain’s death that I missed the obvious. The likeness wasn’t to Erdle but to Gebrec.’
‘Of course . . . why didn’t we spot that?’ said Jack. ‘It wasn’t a very good picture, of course.’
‘No, but Madame Gebrec showed me another. The resemblance was unmistakable. Erdle made the right connection immediately. That was what was behind all the aggro he was giving Alain. After the murder, he was naturally anxious to keep it all quiet in case his relationship to Pastor Erdle came out.’
‘Then he might have been suspected of a revenge killing?’
‘Exactly.’
‘So Madame G confirmed that Eiche was Alain’s father?’ said Iris.
‘Yes, but she hotly denies the accusations against him.’
‘What accusations?’
‘Julius Eiche was a young doctor from Vienna who fled to France after the Anschluss – at least, that was his story, but later on it was suspected that he’d been planted by the Nazis as a spy. When the war broke out, he was working at a hospital in Nîmes; in 1943 Madame Gebrec went to work there as a nurse and they became lovers. The following year she had his child.’
‘How did he get mixed up with the Morlay family?’
‘He’d become associated with a group of Protestant pastors who were helping refugees to hide from the Nazis. Often they arranged for them to be sheltered in remote mountain villages.’
‘Pretty risky for the locals,’ commented Iris.
‘It was, but the people of the Cévennes had a lot of sympathy for them because of their own history of oppression and persecution.’
‘So what was Eiche’s role in all this?’ asked Jack.
‘If any refugee needed medical help, they called on him. The story is that he took the opportunity of doing some intelligence-gathering for the Gestapo.’
‘Not like a doctor to go ratting on his patients,’ commented Iris.
‘That’s what Madame Gebrec maintains – she swears he never betrayed anyone – but local legend links him with a big operation by the Gestapo, during which hundreds of people were rounded up and shot. One of them was the Morlays’ elder brother, Roland.’
‘That must have had a traumatic effect on Fernand,’ said Jack.
‘It did.’ Melissa repeated the story that Juliette had so movingly told her.
Iris shook her head in mingled pity and disbelief. ‘Poor devil,’ she sighed. ‘Feel rotten now about calling him a nutter.’
‘There’s no doubt that he’s deeply disturbed, but his way of coping with the trauma is a return to childhood and the games about the Camisards,’ said Melissa. ‘Evidently it affected Juliette quite differently. She must have been nursing a corrosive hatred against Eiche ever since for the suffering he had caused both her brothers. I’ve noticed how protective she is towards Fernand – like a mother pelican with a chick.’
‘So, when Gebrec arrived at Les Châtaigniers, she transferred her hatred to him,’ said Jack thoughtfully. ‘How did she know who he was?’
‘I imagine that at some time or other Eiche came to Roziac to attend a patient. She might even have met him.’
‘And identified Alain as his son all those years later?’ Iris looked dubious. ‘Can’t believe that.’
‘No, but once the war was over there would have been all sorts of stories in the press about people suspected of being war criminals. It wouldn’t surprise me if Juliette has a collection of cuttings with pictures of Eiche that she’s brooded over ever since, dreaming of revenge. And then, once she’d spotted the resemblance between him and Alain, she could easily have done a bit of detective work of her own. She and Madame Gebrec’s friend belong to the same church and it wouldn’t have been too difficult to find out something of her history. I’m pretty sure Juliette read that book as well – she saw me with it and recognised it straight away.’
‘So you think Alain’s murder was premeditated?’ said Jack.
‘No, I think the actual killing was opportunist, although the old hatred must have been steadily coming to th
e boil as she saw the way he was bossing her brother around. Then there was that scene with the crowbar when Fernand appeared to be threatening Gebrec. He wasn’t a violent man by nature, but he was obviously capable of anger – she might have been afraid that constantly being told how to do his job might one day send him over the edge.’
‘So when she spotted Gebrec heading for the belvedere, she grabbed one of Dora’s golf-clubs from the open boot of the Sierra and went after him.’ Jack shook his head as if he still found it difficult to believe. ‘It’s amazing no one saw her.’
‘I think that Dora very nearly did. Do you remember her saying that a little while after seeing Gebrec go through the gate into the forest, she went after him in the hope of intercepting him?’
‘Thinking he was Erdle?’
‘Right. My guess is that Juliette spotted her as she was returning from killing Gebrec, took fright and hid the golf-club in the cave, probably hoping to put it back in the car later on. The opportunity never arose but if it had, the verdict on Alain would almost certainly have been suicide.’
‘What happened to Eiche after the Gestapo raids?’ asked Iris.
‘That’s a mystery. He disappeared a week or so beforehand, no one has ever found out how or why. That’s how the stories about his being a spy started – everyone jumped to the conclusion that he’d done his dirty work and scarpered before he was rumbled.’
‘And he’s never been heard of since?’
‘Apparently not. Madame Gebrec insists he must have been either arrested and shot, or sent to a concentration camp and died there, but there’s never been any confirmation.’
For a while, they went on with their meal in silence. Melissa ate slowly, barely tasting the food, haunted by the memory of Antoinette Gebrec’s impassioned cry, ‘It is not true, my Julius was a good man, not a traitor!’ It would be a long time, too, before she would be able to forget Fernand’s face as he watched the gendarmes taking his sister away.
‘I wonder what was really on Alain’s mind when he went storming off up to the belvedere?’ mused Jack. He turned to Iris. ‘You’ve talked to Philippe since Juliette’s arrest – hasn’t he any idea at all?’
It was a question that Melissa herself had been longing to ask, but was reluctant to do so for fear of treading on delicate ground.
She need not have worried. Iris’s voice was level and matter-of-fact as she replied, ‘Been thinking of that. There’d been a bit of a tiff, but that was nothing new.’
‘What about?’ asked Jack.
‘Philippe told him off for rowing with Fernand in front of the students and being rude to Mel over the book. Alain pleaded shock over Klein’s death. Philippe said, no excuse for unprofessional behaviour. Things got heated and Alain went rushing out.’ Iris began fiddling with the cruet, her forehead puckered in a frown. ‘Philippe feels badly about it,’ she added sadly. ‘Thinks he’s partly responsible for what happened.’
‘Oh no, there must have been more to it than that,’ insisted Jack. ‘He said something like, “No one can help me”. Surely, if it had just been Klein’s death, he’d have turned to Philippe for comfort . . . or to his mother, perhaps. By all accounts they had a good relationship . . . she accepted the fact that he was gay . . .’
After a further interval in the conversation, an idea came to Melissa. She finished her steak and put down her knife and fork.
‘I wonder if Erdle had anything to do with it?’ she said.
The others looked at her in surprise. ‘How?’ demanded Iris.
‘Giving Alain such a hard time in front of us, about looking like a German and so on – that could have been the tip of the iceberg. Maybe he was being a lot more specific when there was no one else around – making cracks about his paternity, threatening to link him publicly with Julius Eiche.’
‘It could account for a lot,’ agreed Jack. ‘He must have been haunted by doubts about his father’s past . . . and terrified of the effect on him and his mother if it all came out. On top of that, the man he loves gets killed . . . and then he finds Mel with the book that started all the trouble . . . it’s no wonder he got so emotional and went charging off on his own.’
‘To the spot where Klein died. And Juliette followed him.’ Iris looked thoughtful. ‘Perhaps you were right in a way, Mel – maybe Erdle did contribute to Alain’s death.’
‘Maybe,’ agreed Melissa. The thought gave her no comfort.
‘What will happen to Juliette?’ asked Jack as Brigitte removed their plates and went off to fetch the cheese.
‘I don’t know, but I hope she’ll be treated with compassion once the court hears the full story. Maybe there’ll be a plea of “diminished responsibility” or whatever the French equivalent is.’
‘Didn’t you ask Banana Split?’ asked Iris.
‘I’m not in very good odour with him at the moment.’ Melissa smiled for the first time that day. ‘His admiration for my books didn’t prevent him giving me a bit of a roasting. Apart from muscling in on his act, I don’t think he’s forgiven me for being right about the motive for Alain’s murder. Once he knew about the cave, he was convinced he was going to pin it on Philippe, but I felt all along it had something to do with the past.’
‘Philippe’s going to pay for Juliette’s defence,’ said Iris with a hint of pride.
‘Really?’ Melissa felt as if the skies had started to clear after a storm. ‘That’s very generous of him.’
‘And he’s going to make Fernand his estate manager.’
‘Better and better.’
‘There’s one other thing that puzzles me,’ said Jack, helping himself to cheese. ‘Philippe told us that he heard Juliette shouting something about a poisoned oak tree. Any idea what she was on about?’
‘I think so,’ said Melissa, remembering the tiny acorn with which Julius Eiche had signed his paintings. ‘Eiche’s nickname among his friends and colleagues in France was Le Chêne.’
‘The oak? Was that because they thought he was strong and steadfast and all that?’
‘No. That’s what his name means in German.’
‘Why is it,’ said Melissa as she struggled to close a bulging suitcase, ‘that things always take up more space when you’re packing to go home?’
‘More things,’ grinned Iris, eyeing the books that Melissa had acquired during the week.
‘I haven’t bought as many as usual.’
They finished their packing and went on to the balcony for a last look at the mountains by night. The rain that had fallen during the afternoon and evening had died out, leaving the moist air sweet with the scents of the forest. The peaks of the Porte des Cévennes stood like twin citadels in the moonlight.
‘Lovely spot, but it can’t beat the Cotswolds,’ said Iris.
‘Glad to be going back?’ Iris nodded. ‘Me too. I suppose,’ Melissa added carelessly, ‘you’ll be seeing Jack after we get home?’
Iris smiled up at the sky. ‘Expect so.’
Melissa Craig is delighted when she’s asked to help put on a local play, until one of the cast is brutally murdered…
Don’t miss Melissa’s next case: Murder at the Manor Hotel!
Get it here!
Murder at the Manor Hotel
A Melissa Craig Mystery Book 4
Available now!
As the stage is set for a local village play in a beautiful countryside manor, Melissa Craig plays the role of detective once again when one of the cast is mysteriously murdered…
Melissa is delighted when she’s asked to help put on a play at her favourite local Cotswolds hotel. There’s nothing she loves more than getting to know the cast, who are just as colourful behind the scenes as they are on stage.
Rehearsals are running smoothly until the perpetually grumpy supporting actor is found spread-eagled at the bottom of a steep flight of stairs leading to a cellar.
As Melissa tries in vain to save his life, she is sure she can hear voices nearby and suspects there is more to this accid
ent than meets the eye. Why on earth was he trying to get down to the hotel’s private cellar? And why does the hotel manager seem so angry about it?
When the hotel floorplans deliver some unexpected revelations, Melissa is convinced that she’s dealing with a murder. But when all of your suspects are actors, how can you tell the good liars from the bad? Can Melissa find the killer before the final curtain falls?
If you’ve devoured books by Agatha Christie, Faith Martin and P.D. James, you won’t be able to resist this page-turning murder mystery!
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Also by Betty Rowlands
THE MELISSA CRAIG SERIES
Murder at Hawthorn Cottage
Murder in the Morning
Murder on the Clifftops
Murder at the Manor Hotel
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