by Susan Finlay
“All right, I won’t. I promise”
He gave her a smile and stood, returning a couple of minutes later with two cups of steaming coffee as his grandmother suddenly fluttered into the room.
“I smelled coffee.”
Dave smiled and handed one of the cups to her. He went back to the coffee to pour another cup.
“When I’ve finished my coffee, I’ll prepare my specialty,” Fabienne said. She faced Maurelle squarely. “Crêpes. I hope you enjoy them. Strawberry confiture?”
“I’m sure I’ll love them.”
“Grand-mère is the best cook in the village. Everyone was disappointed when she sold her café, but I’m lucky. I still get to eat her scrumptious creations.”
Fabienne blushed and wagged her hand toward him. “My grandson exaggerates.”
“Thing is, Grand-mère knows darn well that she can out-cook everyone around here, including Jeannette, who thinks she does everything best.”
Fabienne set her cup down on the table and walked over to the refrigerator to gather the ingredients for her crêpes.
“Is there anything I can do to help?” Maurelle asked.
“No, no, you relax. I’ll take care of everything.”
Half an hour later, as they began their meal, Maurelle said, “Dave was right. These are delicious.”
Fabienne beamed, and Maurelle couldn’t believe the change in her. Perhaps she’d misjudged the elderly woman. Of course, she told herself, it might also be Dave’s presence that made the difference—either in herself or in Fabienne. Throughout breakfast, everyone chatted and laughed, and Maurelle felt an unexpected lightness that she expected would be short-lived.
Dave whistled while he cleared the breakfast table, then filled the sink with warm, soapy water and scrubbed the dirty dishes. With Maurelle in the bathroom taking a shower, and his grandmother upstairs straightening up, Dave had time to think about recent events.
Last night, after Maurelle had gone to bed, he’d waited up for his grandmother to come home. When she returned from her evening out, they talked long into the night, mostly resolving their earlier impasse. He explained that he couldn’t walk away and not find out what was going on with Maurelle—was she a victim, perhaps being pursued by someone who wanted her dead, was she a runaway from an abusive situation, or was she a criminal?
Fabienne admitted that she still disapproved of his involvement with the girl, but she agreed to play hostess for a while because it was important to Dave. And besides, she shared his curiosity, if not his desire to play detective.
As for Maurelle, Dave had expected another escape attempt, and though he’d hoped he was wrong, he had taken the precaution of sleeping in the living room after Fabienne went upstairs to bed.
Even with Fabienne’s assurances that she would be more congenial, Dave was pleasantly surprised in the improved relationships between the women. Both were trying to get along. Fabienne had even invited Maurelle to use her washer and dryer, which made Maurelle so happy that she rushed upstairs, returning moments later with her bag full of dirty clothes.
A sudden noise behind him made Dave turn around. Fabienne had returned from upstairs, where she had gone to make her bed. She smiled, “Well, at least I’m getting something out of this. It’s about time you help with the dishes.”
“You know, I did try to help around the house when I first got here and thought you were dying. But you wouldn’t have it. You kept pushing me out the door to see Simone. I should have suspected subterfuge then.” Dave chuckled as he shook his head.
She waved her hand at him. Almost as an afterthought, she said, “If you aren’t too busy this afternoon, would you drive me to Vendome? Coralie said she’ll loan you her car.”
He frowned. “Why do you need to go there? I went to Vendome for you yesterday.”
“I have an appointment at the hospital.”
Dave stared at her in bewilderment. “Okay, now I’m confused. Didn’t you admit to me that you aren’t ill?”
She waved her arm again. “It’s nothing serious. Routine tests that I scheduled more than a month ago. Coralie was going to drive me, but her employee, Robert, called in sick and she has no else to cover for him in the store. I could cancel, I guess. Of course a woman my age can’t afford to miss too many doctor appointments.”
Dave rolled his eyes when Fabienne wasn’t looking. So she was playing the guilt card again.
He sighed. “All right. What time is your appointment?”
She clapped her hands together and smiled. “Two o’clock.”
“I’m sure Maurelle won’t mind getting out of the house for a while,” Dave said, smiling benignly.
Her face turned pink and she clenched her jaw, but said nothing.
The scenic drive to Vendome proved more pleasant than Dave had expected. At first Fabienne pouted because he had brought Maurelle along, but later she surprised him by behaving herself and even acting friendly.
Fabienne’s routine tests include a mammogram, EKG, and bone density test. While Fabienne was undergoing the tests, Dave and Maurelle sat in the waiting room and chatted and continued to get better acquainted. But they both carefully avoided the hot topics.
Before returning home, the trio did some light shopping. Afterward, Dave found a pleasant restaurant where the three of them lounged under a red and white umbrella on a terrace and talked about music, movies, and books while they ate a light dinner. Dave watched Maurelle as she relaxed, talking and laughing with Fabienne. He was amazed at the change in her. After her shower, she had styled her hair in a French-braid down her back, and dressed up in a white sleeveless blouse that nicely showed off her tanned skin, and a sky blue skirt that danced around lightly in the gentle summer breeze. But it wasn’t only her appearance that had changed over the past few days since he first saw her in the general store. She seemed calmer, more confident, and almost happy; though still she glanced round as though searching for or wanting to avoid someone.
When they returned to Reynier in the early evening, Dave dropped Fabienne and Maurelle off at the house and drove Coralie’s car back to her house.
Afterwards, hiking back to Fabienne’s, he pondered what to do for the rest of the evening. He really needed to spend time alone with Maurelle so that they could talk about her situation. But he admitted to himself that it wasn’t the only reason. He felt at ease with her and simultaneously on edge, excited in a way he never was with Simone. As he opened the arched door, a scraggly long-haired tan terrier similar to the one the other day outside the bakery, pounced on him, and he stumbled backwards, surprised.
“What the hell?” Dave straightened up and looked around, but didn’t see anyone. Bending down, he scooped up the young dog and strode into the kitchen where he found Fabienne and Simone sitting at the table drinking coffee and talking.
When they saw him, Simone stood and walked to him languidly. Leaning forward, she kissed him on both cheeks. “I see you’ve met our little guy. He’s been abandoned and I brought him for you.”
She smiled innocently, but Dave wasn’t fooled.
“I don’t need a dog.”
“But I thought you liked animals,” Simone said, “especially dogs. I thought you would be delighted.”
“Well, you thought wrong,” Dave said. “It’s not that I don’t like dogs. I had a dog for many years. But I can’t take care of a pet right now. So, I guess you’ve got yourself a dog.”
Simone pouted and put her hand on her hip. “I just—”
“Simone, I’m going back to Chicago soon. What do you expect me to do with the animal then?”
She shrugged. “I—we, Fabienne and I—hoped you might stay here longer.”
Without another word, he spun on his heel and stomped into the living room, nearly smacking into Maurelle.
Maurelle looked surprised, but said nothing.
He grabbed her hand. “Come on. Get your shoes on. Let’s go for a walk.”
She hurried to the front door where her sneakers and her sandal
s lay. After a short hesitation, she grabbed the sandals and, hopping on one foot at a time, wiggled into them quickly.
“Where are we going?”
“I haven’t the foggiest idea,” he said, chuckling. “I needed to get out of there. Did you see the dog?” He walked past a few houses and past the chateau. Café Charbonneau, which was closed at this hour, was coming up.
She nodded, giving him a sideways glance. “Was the woman Simone?”
“Didn’t my grandmother introduce you?”
“No,” she said, quietly. “When she arrived, there was a lot of activity. They laughed and played with the dog. I watched for a few minutes, trying to stay out of the way, but went upstairs until just before you arrived.” She glanced at him as he paused and kicked at a rock. “You should probably be there with them, don’t you think?”
“I’m too angry right now.”
Maurelle looked confused.
“It’s a long story. Suffice it to say I don’t enjoy being treated like a little boy.”
A small smile touched her lips. “I have a hard time picturing you as a little boy.”
Dave grasped her elbow and led her off the road near the café and onto the path leading to the troglodyte houses.
“Where are we going?”
“Do you remember the cave I told you about—the one with the fossils?”
She nodded. “I thought you made up that story.”
“I want to take you there, if that’s okay. If I’m going to be treated as if I’m a kid, I’m going to act like one.”
Laughing, Maurelle rushed ahead, but he soon passed her by, with a quick look over his shoulder. He stopped, waited, then turned and climbed a narrow steep winding path. Near the top, he reached down and took her hand to help her navigate a particularly steep section of the path, scratching his arm on a thorny vine in the process. After a couple of more minutes of walking along a section of wall, he stopped and pushed away a mass of overgrown brush branches, and revealed a small cave opening. “Sorry it’s so overgrown. It’s been a long time since I was here last.” As he let go of the branches, they fell back in place, allowing very little light to filter beyond the cave entrance. He moved the branches aside again, only this time he secured them behind a rock jutting out at the side of the entrance to let in more light, but it was still rather dark inside the cave. “Too bad I didn’t think to bring a flashlight.”
“It’s not so bad,” Maurelle said. “Your eyes will adjust quickly.”
“I forgot that you’re accustomed to caves,” Dave said. He drew a circle in the tufa dust on the floor and then found a suitable rock to sit on while he chose his next words carefully. “I’m drawn to you, Maurelle. I can’t say that I entirely understand it, but there’s something about you that makes me want to know more. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not exactly hitting on you. I just need to understand what’s going on with you.”
She sat next to him quietly atop her own rock, hugging her knees to her, with her long skirt draped over her legs, nearly touching her feet. He could barely see her face in the shadowy darkness, but he thought he detected a tremble in her body; from cold or from fear he couldn’t tell.
After a moment, Dave took a deep breath and exhaled. In the softest voice he could manage, he asked, “What happened to you, Maurelle? What are you running from?”
She was silent for a while. Finally, she whispered, “Murder. I am wanted for murder.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
The chatter of natterjack toads outside the cave grew louder, filling the sudden silence that had fallen between Dave and Maurelle with a muffled hammering sound. Dave used to love listening to them in the early evening when he was a kid. Tonight, their chattering grated on his nerves. He and Maurelle were sitting near the cave entrance, with only a trace of moonlight peeking through. She was closer to the entrance than he was. But he had the advantage since he faced the weak light filtering through the cave opening and could see her silhouette—her face turned slightly toward the exit, her chin quivering.
“Murder,” Dave said, finally.
Her skirt rustled as she squirmed and tried to stand up. Dave half rose, leaned forward, and pulled her back down.
“I’m not here to judge you. Please talk to me. I’ll help you if I can.”
“You can’t help.” She pushed his hand away.
“I know that people get themselves into trouble. It doesn’t mean they’re bad people. Let me help, whatever the problem is.”
“No. I really must leave now.”
Dave took hold of both her hands and held them tightly together. “Look, I wanted to help you even though I guessed you were on the run. You ran away the other day when the gendarmes arrived in Reynier. Should I call them or take you to the Gendarmerie and let you answer their questions instead of mine? Is that what you want?”
“You’re threatening me?” She tried to pull her hands from his grasp, but he held fast.
“I’m no longer a cop, but that doesn’t mean I can sit back and do nothing. You’re hiding from gendarmes and were living in a cave. Now you tell me you’re wanted for murder. I need to know a lot more about what’s going on. Tell me, or tell the gendarmes.”
He heard a sharp intake of breath, then felt her body slump down in defeat.
“I don’t really know where to begin,” she said, her body trembling. Dave let go of one of her hands and placed his arm around her shoulder.
“Is it too cold in here?” he asked. “We can go somewhere else if you want.”
“No, it’s all right.” She sighed, and pushed her side-sweeping bangs out of her eyes. “I just don’t know where to begin,” she repeated.
Dave wished now that he’d picked somewhere else to talk, somewhere warmer and with enough light that he could see her face and body language better. Perhaps he should have picked the old church on the hilltop. It wasn’t cold outside and with the church’s roof gone, the moonlight would have provided enough light. Too late now.
“I had been living with my boyfriend for almost a year,” she began, “until I found him in bed with another woman. I had to move out of our flat. The lease was in his name because he lived there long before I moved in with him. Having no family left, and no really close friends, I had nowhere to go, so I checked into a hotel near my job. It was very expensive. I tried everything to find another flat, but nothing affordable was available in the area. During lunch one day, one of my colleagues, a friend in the English Department, told me her sister, Elizabeth Raybourne, who was recently divorced and in need of another source of income, was looking for a boarder.” Maurelle paused a moment, the air again growing quiet except for the sound of the toads and crickets outside and a mouse scurrying around further into the cave.
“Go on.”
“At first it seemed fine. But she had a teenage son, Jared, who was a pupil at the school where I worked. He wasn’t one of my pupils and I didn’t really know him.” She hesitated, taking a deep breath. “He seemed bright but he told me his grades in maths and science were slipping. He asked me for help, and though they weren’t my subjects, I began tutoring him at the house. A couple of months later, I heard teachers talking about him in the common room. They said that his grades were slipping in all subjects, and he wasn’t trying.”
Dave shifted, and stretched out his legs which were beginning to cramp. “What’s a common room?”
“Oh, that’s where teachers meet, take their breaks, and eat lunch.”
“Ah. We call that a faculty lounge or staff room in the U.S. Okay, go on.”
“I spoke to his aunt, my friend, about what I’d heard and she confirmed it. When I confronted him, he said he loved me. That’s when it hit me that he’d used the tutoring as a way to get closer to me. Of course I told him I didn’t share those feelings. I told him we couldn’t become involved romantically. But he refused to accept it.”
She was silent again.
“What happened then?”
“I stopped tutoring, of cours
e. I avoided him altogether. But he wouldn’t leave me alone. I watched the ads for flats constantly after that, and I finally moved out a couple of weeks later, when I found a suitable flat.”
“I’ve heard similar stories back in the U.S.” He didn’t add that usually the teacher had actually been sexually involved with the student. She hadn’t actually said she wasn’t, but . . . . He shook his head slightly; it was hard to stop thinking like a detective.
Maurelle sighed. “Probably not like this case. Three weeks after I moved out, his mother found him dead in his bedroom. Someone had murdered him.”
Dave was glad now for the darkness that shielded the surprise that must be written on his face, but he remained silent.
“It was all over the news,” she said. “The police came to my flat while I was out shopping, one of the neighbors in my building informed me. From the very beginning, they were seeing me as a suspect, without even having talked to me. Then a former neighbor, an elderly man who lives across the street from the family, called. He suggested I should get away – he’d heard they were about to arrest me.”
“Why did they think you did it?”
“There had been whispers at school, whispers of an affair. The school’s governing board found out and suspended me from work until they could investigate. They suspended Jared from school also. The thing is, I had a key to the house while I lived there, but I gave back the key when I moved out.”
“And you could have made a duplicate.”
“Yes.”
“Did you do it?” he asked abruptly. He wasn’t expecting a confession, but he needed to spark a reaction.
“The police assumed I did.” She showed almost no emotion.
“What kind of evidence did they have?”
“I have no idea. All I know for sure is that I didn’t do it.”
He rubbed his face and sighed. “If that’s true, why did you run?”
“I got scared. I’ve heard too many stories of innocent people being convicted on circumstantial evidence and lies.”
“But running away was a huge mistake.”
“I know that now,” she said. “I’ve even thought about going back and turning myself in, but do you know how scary that is?” She shrugged. “It was stupid, instinctive. If they were already thinking, from the start of the investigation, that I’d killed him, what must they think after I ran away? Wouldn’t they automatically convict me?”