by Michelle Wan
“Could you at least tell me something about them?”
He considered this, then shrugged. “What is it you want to know?”
“Well, how long have they been here? What kind of people are they?”
“They’re from these parts, of course. La Binette’s father, old Rocher, was a day laborer. Took on odd jobs round about—woodcutting, harvesting. La Binette and her mother did the rough washing for the house. When I was a lad Madame Rocher and little Binette used to wheel their wooden cart up here once a week to collect the dirty things, which they’d take to the stream down below because the communal lavoir in Malpech was too far away. La Binette’s boy, Armand—the one they call Vrac—grew up simple.”
Mara found it curious that he referred to the creature she had seen on the bicycle as a boy.
“I don’t like nicknames, do you?” Jeanne de Sauvignac interjected suddenly, pulling the tablecloth tightly around her. “They can be so cruel. Poor Binette had a perfectly proper name once. I can’t remember it. Can you, Henri? Oh yes, that’s right, Marie-Claire. Such a pretty name. And to call her a thing like that. All because she had that dreadful tache on her face. She was born with it, madame, a purple birthmark over one eye. When she was a girl, she always used to try to hide it with her hand, as if she were shading her eyes from the sun.”
The old woman leaned forward, addressing Mara with gentle indignation. “Do you know what binette means, madame? Of course, most people nowadays think it merely means a hoe, the thing you use in the garden. But in the old days, it meant “ugly mug,” and also one of those big old-fashioned wigs, because of course poor Marie-Claire lost all her hair after she had her baby and had to wear that ugly old horsehair thing. I remember well when Vrac was born. Two days she was in labor. When her baby came out his head was badly deformed, and he never was right as a result, poor thing. It affected his brain. Everything shook loose. That’s why they called him Vrac.”
“I’ve seen him,” Mara ventured. “Frankly, he looks quite terrifying.”
“Oh,” the wife said softly, “you mustn’t be put off by appearances. He’s perfectly harmless, one of God’s creatures. If you tell him to go away, shoo, like that”—she waved her hand as if she were scattering chickens—“he just fades into the trees. He never bothers anyone.”
“Nevertheless,” Mara persisted, “Gaston mentioned … certain rumors.”
“Rumors?” The couple glanced quickly at each other.
“Odd behavior. I’m sorry to ask this, but I have to know. Would he have—has there ever been any history of incidents with Vrac?”
Henri, reaching for another cigarette, paused. “Incidents? I’m not sure I understand what you intend, madame.”
“Violence, attacks on people, that kind of thing.”
“Ah.” Her host was silent for some time, studying her speculatively. Finally, he asked simply, “Are you suggesting that Vrac had something to do with your sister’s disappearance?”
Mara chose her words with care. “The photo shows that Bedie was on their land. It may not be that he was involved, but he might have seen her, or else he or his mother might know something that can help me.”
“Madame …” De Sauvignac’s voice was controlled. He replaced the cigarette unlit, snapping the marocain case shut. Mara noted that his hands trembled slightly. “This affair of your sister happened many years ago. You must comprehend that Vrac can’t remember things from one month to the next. I doubt he would be able to tell you anything. In any case, as my wife said, he’s quite harmless, but simple, you see. It would be … entirely inappropriate for you to question him.”
“Monsieur de Sauvignac,” Mara appealed to him, “having come this far, I’m afraid I can’t just leave it. The pigeonnier is the first concrete lead I’ve had in nineteen years.”
“Indeed. All the same, I must ask you to avoid upsetting him.” His tone grew emphatic. “When all is said and done, Vrac is one of us. I would feel required to intervene if I thought he or his mother was being harassed.”
“I don’t want to harass anyone,” Mara insisted, “but you must understand I have to find out the truth. You see, I have reason to believe my sister came to harm on la Binette’s farm.”
“You have proof of this?” Henri inquired sharply.
“No,” she admitted. “Only the photo of the pigeonnier.”
He regarded her stonily.
“I don’t want to involve the police.” It was Mara’s only trump, a weak one. “But if I have no other choice …”
A dark stain spread slowly over de Sauvignac’s face. He spoke with cold dignity. “You must do as you see fit, madame. However, I assure you that neither you nor the police will find anything of interest in these parts.” He rose stiffly. “Now, I fear my wife is growing tired. You must excuse us if we bid you good-day.”
She had no choice but to rise, too, and follow him out. As she passed from the room, Jeanne’s voice wavered after her uncertainly: “Au revoir, madame. Do come again. For tea next time.”
The massive front door closed behind her with heavy finality. Bleakly, Mara descended the stone steps. Well, the de Sauvignacs had received her. She’d asked her questions, and they had told her nothing. She knew the house would not be open to her again. She crossed the forecourt dejectedly, making for her car. Just before she reached it, a tall figure came striding around the corner of the house. She had to swerve to avoid a collision.
“You!” Mara exclaimed.
The man stopped short with a look of startled recognition. “Ah, of course. Bonjour, madame. We meet again. I hope in calmer circumstances?” He peered doubtfully down at her and extended a large sunburned hand. “Alain de Sauvignac.”
“Oh,” she said, taking in the significance of his name. “Mara Dunn.”
They shook hands, he holding hers fractionally longer than Mara thought necessary. He had his father’s handsome face, only more square-cut and deeply weathered. His sandy-colored hair was shot through with gray. A curious light came into his dark-blue eyes. “If I may ask, how is it that you’re here? When last we met you were the frightened rabbit in the woods.” It might have been teasingly said, but his look was serious.
“I came …” She paused, uncertainly.
“Of course!” he declared, remembering. “To see my parents. Papa said something about a visitor.”
She asked a question of her own. “Then you live here?”
“Not at all. I work abroad. I’m only back for the moment, visiting the old ones.”
Mara made up her mind swiftly. “Monsieur de Sauvignac, I know it’s awfully forward of me, but I wonder if I could impose on you…?”
“At your service,” he smiled gallantly. “What can I do?”
“It’s rather complicated. You see, I—I would very much appreciate the chance to talk to you. It would mean a lot to me. But I’m afraid it would have to be in confidence.”
“In confidence?” He frowned. “What about?”
She shook her head, dug in her bag and gave him her card. “Not here. This is my number. Can you call me? This evening, if possible? And please, will you say nothing of this to anyone?”
He looked perplexed. “Is it so important? But why the mystery?”
She had no time for more. The massive front door was swinging open.
“Until tonight, then,” she said and hurried to her car.
As she backed out, she saw that Henri de Sauvignac had emerged from the house. He made no move to join his son, only stood on the terrace, like a frozen sentinel, overseeing her departure. She caught a final glimpse of him in her rearview mirror as she pulled away. His expression gave her quite a shock. His face was white, his eyes staring, his lips pulled back in a rictus of fear.
THIRTEEN
The bead curtain flew apart noisily. Mara strode into the bistro. Jazz’s entry was more sedate, snout first, a quick survey of the room, then a rambling approach to Julian, who was sipping a pastis while watching Paul do accounts at t
he bar. Julian looked up.
“Well? What happened?”
“They’re hiding something,” she cried, and hopped onto a stool beside him.
“Eh? Like what?” Paul slapped down his pencil.
She threw her hands up in frustration. “That’s just it. I don’t know. But it has to do with Vrac, and they won’t tell me because Vrac is one of them. The husband is especially secretive. He doesn’t want me anywhere near La Binette. Virtually warned me off.”
“What about the wife?” asked Mado, coming out from the back of the bistro, where she had been setting tables in preparation for the evening crowd.
“She seems sympathetic,” Mara ventured doubtfully, “but I don’t think she’s altogether there.”
“D’you mean gaga?” Paul produced glasses and a bottle.
Mara considered the possibility. “No. Just somehow slightly out of focus—or absent. I mean, as if she weren’t quite in the room with you, but listening at the door.” And she told them in detail about her conversation with Henri and Jeanne de Sauvignac, as well as her encounter with the son.
“The man we met in the woods was Alain de Sauvignac?” Julian queried. Finding Jazz’s head within reach, he scratched it.
They all fell silent as Paul filled three glasses with white Bordeaux and topped up Julian’s pastis. Mado lit a cigarette. Finally, through a screen of smoke, she said:
“It’ll have to be you, Julian.”
“Eh?”
“You’ll have to go there and snoop around.”
He gaped at her, incredulous. “What? Search the château?”
“Not the château. La Binette. The farm holds the clue to everything.”
“Why me?”
“Well, you’re the orchid expert.”
“Oh, thank you very much.”
“Mado’s right,” Mara pressed him earnestly. “Don’t you see, Julian, if we can identify even some of the orchid sequence on La Binette land, it’ll prove Bedie was actually there.”
“I thought the pigeonnier already did that.”
“Not good enough. From the angle of the photo, she could have taken it from the road.”
“You can’t see it from the road,” Julian objected.
“Nineteen years ago, there may have been less tree cover. We need to prove that she was actually on that farm.”
“I wish you wouldn’t keep saying we, when what you really mean is me.”
Mara stared into her wine and made no offer to accompany him.
“So you want me to search the whole bloody farm?” Julian glared at each of them in turn. They avoided his eye. He drained his pastis and banged the glass down in disgust. “Par pitié, make me a sensible suggestion for a change.”
“Take a shotgun with you,” Paul advised with a spark of malice.
In the end, Julian gave in. It was true that reconstructing Bedie’s path would give Mara something concrete to take to the police. Let the gendarmes do the digging, he thought grimly, and then focused on the more cheerful, if faint, possibility that, if his quest were really successful, he would have his Lady’s Slipper.
•
Alain de Sauvignac’s phone call came at ten o’clock that evening. Mara snatched eagerly at the receiver.
“Yes, hello?”
“Madame Dunn?” His deep voice had a seductive quality to it. “Perhaps now you will be kind enough to tell me what this is all about?”
Mara took a lungful of air, exhaled slowly and told him as much as she thought he needed to know.
•
His terms were simple: information conditional on lunch. He came directly to the point. “I’d like to see you again. Under more conducive circumstances.”
So now they were sitting on the terrace of La Vieille Guinguette, a little waterside restaurant upriver from the town of Maussac. Jazz dozed at Mara’s feet. The day was sunny and the fare simple, mainly traditional dishes like braised sheep’s tongues and tripe cooked with leeks. They ordered tourain, bread-thickened soup heavy with garlic and duck fat, a meal in itself. By the time they were adding red wine to the dregs à la Périgourdine, they were on a first-name basis and speaking French.
“I admit I was intrigued by you,” Alain said, pushing his empty bowl aside. “Who wouldn’t be?” He gave her a glance that was half admiring, half speculative, then retreated onto safer ground. “You speak French well. But your accent is unusual. I can’t place it.”
“Montreal,” she grinned, “and absolutely unique. We slur and drawl, flatten our vowels, and compress our sibilants. The point is, can you get us—Julian—onto La Binette land?”
“Your orchidologist friend?” Alain drew down the corners of his mouth. “I wouldn’t like to do so à la dérobée, as they say. I don’t hold much with sneaking. And what you’re asking is trespassing, after all. You also have to realize that, if you’ve already approached Papa and he refused to help you, you’re putting me in a damned difficult position.”
She shifted uncomfortably. “I suppose you think me deceitful.”
He flipped a hand in the air. “Oui—et non. If you truly believe Vrac had something to do with your sister’s disappearance, I can understand that your desire to know might override all—well, all scruples. However, you must also comprehend my father’s reticence. It might sound terribly old-fashioned to you, but Papa has a strong sense of noblesse oblige toward the people of the territoire, particularly la Binette and her son. The family worked on the estate, you know. La Binette and Vrac still do the occasional odd job. Local loyalties run deep.”
“Even to the extent of protecting a possible murderer? Other women have gone missing, too, you know.”
Alain shook his head. “No one’s protecting a murderer. Oh, I agree that Vrac and la Binette sometimes get up to things they oughtn’t, but Vrac’s not a killer. You demonize him because he’s ugly and mentally—shall we say incomplete? When really he only represents the dark side of all of us. Look, I’ve known him all my life. When my brother, Patrice, and I were little and Vrac a few years older, he used to jump out of the bushes at us, screaming and making horrible faces. He’d chase us through the woods, threatening to bash our heads in. I admit, we were terrified. However, I suppose, like most boys, there was also a side of us that relished the gruesomeness of it. I suppose you might say we turned it into a kind of game. We ran, he hunted us down. A variation of cache-cache.”
“Hide-and-seek? A rather nasty form of it.”
Alain grinned ruefully. “We took care not to let Vrac find us, let me tell you. The consequences could be pretty dire. In fact, it became a rule of the game. The hunter could do anything he wanted to you if he caught you.”
“Such as what?” Mara asked faintly.
“Oh, mainly shoves and punches. Vrac didn’t have the imagination to be very refined in his punishments. But far worse than that were his seizures. It was really frightening, watching him flail around and foam at the mouth. La Binette would have to hold him down until he grew calm again. Otherwise, he’d break things or hurt himself. But I can assure you, he never did us or anyone else any real harm. Everyone around here knows that.”
Mara leaned earnestly across the table. “Alain, that was Vrac as a child. Nineteen years ago, Vrac would have been a man of—what?—thirty? thirty-five? If he found my sister on his land, what do you think he would have done?”
Alain went silent, his gaze drifting unhappily out over the water. Restlessly, he shoved his shirtsleeves up, exposing tanned, muscular arms lightly furred with golden hairs. “In my opinion, Mara, apart from a few threats and obscenities, nothing.”
She fixed him somberly.
“And if he came across me alone in the forest? It wasn’t my imagination, you know. Someone was stalking me that day. Purposely trying to frighten me. Or worse. I find it hard to believe that a chance passerby simply happened to decide to chase me through the trees.”
Alain tossed a heel of bread to the ground for Jazz. “So do I. But only because there
were no passersby.” And when she looked puzzled, he went on to explain. “You see, you’d strayed onto Saint-Hubert terrain, the grounds of our local hunting association. My father is the association president. That day, it so happened that he asked me to do a routine check of the area, the posting of hunting-reserve and parking signs and so forth. I was on that footpath and in that stretch of forest for over two hours, Mara. During all that time I saw no one, apart from you and your botanical friend.”
Alain’s eyes met hers. In the sunlight, the dark-blue centers were surrounded by aquamarine. She held his gaze. At last, he sighed, slumping back in a gesture of defeat.
“All right. I suppose it could have been Vrac. He wanders around a lot, and the woods where you were aren’t that far from his land. But if it was he, I can assure you he would have only wanted to frighten you. I doubt he intended you any harm.”
Mara smiled tightly. “Another game of cache-cache? You don’t,” she challenged him, “really expect me to believe that?”
•
Julian’s first consideration was how to implement the search. He made it clear that this would not be so easy, since no public footpath or hiking trail gave legitimate access to La Binette terrain. Going under cover of darkness was impossible for obvious reasons—he needed light to see and photograph the orchids that Mara required as evidence. The search would have to be conducted in broad daylight and at risk of Julian’s neck.
It was Gaston who came up with the only feasible strategy. However, he played up shamefully, refusing to talk on the telephone and insisting that all of them come to “consult” with him at his house in Le Coux. He was out of the hospital by then and being assiduously nursed by his wife and seven daughters, who treated him as if he really were a battle hero. Which was only right. He had, after all, been in something very like the wars. And still was because his boss was giving him trouble, sloughing responsibility for the accident onto Gaston in order to cover up his own track record of shoddy vehicle maintenance. But if Gaston’s engine hadn’t given out, he wouldn’t have been freewheeling down the road in the first place.