Death at the Château Bremont

by ML Longworth

  The mistral had stopped blowing and left a fine sunny morning, with a clear blue sky, in its wake. Verlaque loved it when the mistral blew for only one day—the bracing wind cleared the pollution from the air, and then quickly left; much like the housekeeper, Antonia, who had cleaned the Verlaque family apartment in Paris when he was small. Antonia made too much noise, sang to herself in Portuguese, and moved every bit of furniture around as she cleaned, causing total chaos; but she did her job in record time, always smiling, and left the 3,500-square-foot apartment sparkling.

  The doors to the cathedral were open as Verlaque walked past it toward the parking garage where he kept his car. He stopped and turned around, watching the cathedral’s caretaker as she unlocked the dirty green outer panels of the church’s front doors with a huge antique key. A small group of excited French tourists surrounded her. He had seen only once before, also by chance, what lay underneath: an inner door that was hidden, and gloriously carved, protected from the harsh Provençal sun and wind. The caretaker had to be in a good mood to be persuaded to reveal the fifteenth-century wood sculptures, and a generous tip often helped. As she opened the green doors, a ray of sunlight lit up the exposed inner panels, more than three meters high, richly carved in dark wood. A group of six small female saints stood in miniature Gothic alcoves—each woman carved with incredible details in her jewelry, in the texture of her cloak and skirt and hair. They wore pointed slippers, hiding the toes that Verlaque craved to see. Delicately carved grapes, nuts, and leaves surrounded the figures—the bounty of Provence, as always. It was as if the sculptor had brought some of the vegetables from his garden and used them as models for his great work.

  Verlaque’s grandmother had never seen these doors, and he was sorry for that misfortune. She had died the previous autumn, and whenever they had walked into the cathedral, hoping to see the doors, the caretaker had been off duty. Verlaque had always loved to show her paintings or sculptures that he knew she’d like. He had craved her approval, and always received it. She had adored him. She, of all the members of his family, had visited Verlaque the most, taking the first-class car on the TGV down from Paris but choosing to stay in one of Aix’s simple two-star hotels, when she should have been staying at the luxurious Villa Gallici. “I want to be downtown, near you,” she would say. She had called Verlaque frequently—especially when he was dating Marine—and she liked to tease him about being involved in police work, often beginning her phone calls with “Hi, copper!”

  Any bit of warmth that was left in Verlaque he attributed to her, to Emmeline. When they were young, she had read stories to Verlaque and his brother, in English, in the gardens of her Normandy villa. She loved Normandy—she used to say she could feel England’s breezes from there: she had been born and raised in England and had met Verlaque’s grandfather in Paris when she was studying painting in Montmartre for a year in the 1930s. Emmeline had come from a poor but noble land-rich family, and in Paris she had been completely dedicated to studying art. She spent little time in the cafés and bars, like her fellow art students did, and she met her husband, a young, rich industrialist—the family money had come from flour mills—at one of the few parties she attended while in Paris.

  The curves on la route de Cézanne were a delight in his dark green 1963 Porsche. He had bought the car just for roads like this—narrow, built for horse and carriage, and lined with olive trees. He was glad to have gone to the cigar club last night, he thought as he drove past the lane that lead to Fabrice’s house—despite the slight headache this morning and the general fuzziness that came after smoking two cigars in the evening. And he was glad that Marine had called him, telling him of the suitcase. It at least gave him an excuse to call on Jean-Claude Auvieux again, and there would still be plenty of time for lunch, and then a drive to Cotignac.

  Each time he drove by the estates in Le Tholonet he was tempted to call his realtor friend, Gilles, and ask if there was anything for sale. When she died, Emmeline had left Verlaque and his brother, Sébastien, a lofty inheritance, including her nineteenth-century home in a tiny village in Normandy, Saint-Germain-le-Vasson. It was in a part of Normandy little visited by tourists, about fifty kilometers south of Deauville. The surrounding terrain was rich green farmland, covered in orchards and pastures, and Verlaque shared Emmeline’s love for the region’s rolling hills and wooden barns. One could leave the front gate and just start walking, rarely coming across a car, more often just tractors. You couldn’t do that in Provence—there were too many people, too many cars. If there were farm lanes good for walking in Provence, Verlaque had never found them. Upon receiving word of the inheritance, his brother had gone out and immediately bought a chic apartment in Paris’s sixth arrondissement. But Verlaque’s money still sat in the bank, and he rarely thought of it. Spending it never really occurred to him—it was Emmeline’s money.

  One evening last year, Verlaque had come home late from working on a complicated drug-trafficking case to find Marine and Emmeline talking about the latter’s younger days. The emotion he felt when he saw the ease with which the pair got along was not joy or happiness but, to his shame, jealousy. He wasn’t interested in the family history—he only wanted to spend time with Emmeline—the one woman in his childhood who had hugged him unconditionally. It embarrassed him that he could have been jealous of Marine: she was in fact the only girlfriend he had ever introduced to Emmeline, for the very reason that he knew that they would get along so well. He loved them both, he realized now, his heart pounding.

  In an attempt to stop thinking of them, he turned up the music, taking the curves smoothly until he arrived at Saint-Antonin.

  He pulled into the drive of the Bremont house, and Jean-Claude Auvieux was where Verlaque had expected to see him—in the orchard. “Hello, Monsieur le Juge,” Jean-Claude shouted from the heights of an almond tree. “Would you like a fresh almond?” he asked.

  “Yes, I would,” answered the judge, and he cupped his hands and caught an almond still in its thick, green, fuzzy skin. Verlaque started to peel it away with his thumbnail, and he thought of the green painted doors of the cathedral that revealed the delicious sculptures hidden underneath. He ate the nut—it was incredibly fresh and juicy.

  “I’m sorry to take you away from your harvest, M. Auvieux,” Verlaque said, “but I wanted to ask you something more about the attic.” Auvieux shot the judge a worried look and got down off the ladder. When he got to the ground he still towered over Verlaque. “It’s okay. The basket is full,” Auvieux said, smiling at his bounty.

  “Are you alone?” Verlaque asked.

  “Yes, François has gone into town.”

  Auvieux went into the cottage to fetch the keys, which were kept in a kitchen drawer, and the two men then went into the château, up the three flights of stairs, to the attic. When the door was opened, the same mirror trick happened that had frightened Marine, only this time it was the judge and the caretaker side by side in the dreamy reflection. Verlaque quickly stepped aside so as not to remind himself of his dwarflike stature next to the giant caretaker. “Let’s walk around, and please tell me if you see anything out of place,” Verlaque said.

  “But, Monsieur, I already did.”

  Auvieux turned the light on and Verlaque said, “Ah! You changed the lightbulb.”

  “Yes, your commissioner told me that the lightbulb was burnt out when he was here the other day. I usually come up here during the day, so I hadn’t noticed.”

  Verlaque watched closely as Auvieux stooped to look at the contents of various boxes scattered around the attic. They made their way over to the window, and Verlaque asked if they could open it. Auvieux unlatched the window’s wooden shutters and fastened each one to a metal clasp that was drilled into the outside wall. To do so he had to lean far out, but he held on the window frame with his free hand.

  “Do you think that Count de Bremont could have fallen out of the window by doin
g what you’re doing right now, fastening the shutters back against the wall?” Verlaque asked the caretaker.

  “No, not likely,” said Auvieux. “He’s been doing this since he was ten years old, we all have.” As he regained his balance, Verlaque noticed Auvieux’s gaze fall on the Louis Vuitton case. “Here, let me move this suitcase out of your way,” Verlaque said.

  “Wait, I’ll do it!” Auvieux exclaimed, taking the judge’s arm. Auvieux bent down to lift the suitcase and, feeling that it was empty, immediately set it down again, almost dropping it. “Mon Dieu!” he said, looking at Verlaque and now rubbing his hands up and down his thighs. “It’s never been empty. I was just up in the attic last week. Count François—” Auvieux abruptly stopped himself and stared down at the floor.

  “What is it, M. Auvieux?” Verlaque asked. “What is normally in this suitcase?”

  “I don’t know, I don’t know,” Auvieux answered, his eyes still cast downward. Verlaque didn’t reply, and so the caretaker continued, this time looking back at the judge. “François called me and asked me to find some of his grandfather’s old polo trophies, so I had to come up here and get them for him. One of the bigger trophies was down on the floor, behind this suitcase, and I had to move the suitcase to get at it, that’s all. The suitcase was heavy, full of . . . stuff . . . as it always has been.”

  Verlaque then asked the obvious, “Has anyone else been in the attic since then?”

  “No,” said Auvieux. “Except your policemen,” he added.

  “Don’t worry, my policemen wouldn’t take anything. Who else has keys to the attic?”

  “Myself, Étienne had, and François. And I think Mme Bremont.”

  “Isabelle?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you know what was in the suitcase?” Verlaque pressed on.

  “No, I don’t.”

  Verlaque stared at Auvieux for a moment. “It belonged to Count Philippe de Bremont. Maybe it had old clothes in it? He was François and Étienne’s grandfather.” Auvieux then added, as if it were proof, “Look—here’s his name on the tag.”

  Verlaque bent down and pretended to look at the tag. “Do you remember what day you were up here, getting the trophies?” asked Verlaque.

  “Yes. It was Friday. I was in a hurry to get to my sister’s for dinner. You remember me telling you. She was making a blanquette de veau.”

  Verlaque nodded. “Yes, I remember.” So that means that someone other than Étienne was in the attic on Saturday, or early Sunday, before the death was announced. Or perhaps Étienne had removed the contents of the suitcase himself, before his fall. “Let’s look around the attic, one more time, for something that could have been in the suitcase. Please tell me if you see anything that shouldn’t be here,” Verlaque said.

  “Okay,” agreed Auvieux, shrugging. He then added, “I didn’t take anything!” But Verlaque could see that they both knew that they would not find the contents of the suitcase.

  Auvieux looked as if he felt like it was his fault—as if he had a personal responsibility for all things in the Bremont château—and although he had seemed surprised that the suitcase was empty, Verlaque was convinced that the caretaker knew more about its contents than he was letting on. They drank some coffee, the caretaker’s hands trembling as he poured.

  “Is everything all right?” Verlaque asked. “You seem upset, M. Auvieux.”

  Auvieux put his coffee down and said, “You see, Judge, the count’s belongings are very important to me—that’s why I clean the library myself—those are his books in there. Did you see how many there are? He was very kind to me when I was growing up.”

  “When M. Bremont gets back from Aix, could you ask him about the suitcase? I know that he just got here, so he couldn’t have removed the contents, but he and his brother may have known what was in it.”

  The caretaker was now bustling around the kitchen, loudly rearranging the meager contents of the refrigerator. He looked at the judge as if his request had just registered. “Oui, oui,” he mumbled, now frantically scrubbing the already spotless stone sink.

  Verlaque stood up to leave, and then said, “Thank you, M. Auvieux. Maybe now you can get back to your almond harvest. I think I may have interrupted, and you certainly have a splendid crop.”

  The caretaker quickly nodded and, grabbing his hat and basket, said, “You’re right! Those almonds won’t wait all day!”

  Everything of hers is sacred too, thought Verlaque as he got back into his car. He thought of the villa in Normandy, and all its contents under white sheets until he and his brother made up their minds as to what to do with the house. Her watercolors, which graced the old house’s walls, mostly landscapes or flowers, all of them signed Emmeline, many with a dedication, “Pour Charles,” Verlaque’s French grandfather. He picked up his cell phone from the passenger seat, where he had intentionally left it. Two messages: one from Paulik and the other from Marine. He called Paulik. “My computer training has come in handy,” Paulik said as soon as he picked up the phone.

  “Oh yeah?”

  “Yes, I’m a regular Bill Gates. Listen to what I found out. The girls . . . the ones that François de Bremont favors . . . and whom you sadly thought might be opera singers, sir. They are Russian, perhaps prostitutes, and definitely young.”

  “Here illegally?”

  “No, they are here as models. Apparently everyone in Cannes knows about this except for the head of police. Or he does know and . . .” Paulik never finished his sentence.

  “Did you find all this out on the Internet?” Verlaque asked.

  “No, not all. The juicy stuff I got from my cousin Fréd, who owns a restaurant in Antibes.”

  “Ah! Restaurant owners should be on the police payroll. It always amazes me how much they know about a town and its goings-on,” Verlaque replied, laughing. “What else did you learn?”

  “Apparently François de Bremont has been causing some disturbances recently in Cannes.”

  “Maybe you should tell me about this in person,” Verlaque replied. “I’ll be right there. We can go out for lunch—I’m starving. And afterward we can drive out to the Var to see Jean-Claude Auvieux’s sister, as promised. She finally returned my phone call this morning. On second thought, why don’t you just meet me at one o’clock at Lotus.”

  “Lotus? The trendy new restaurant on the rue Frédéric Mistral?” Paulik sounded dubious. “I’m really more of a bistro kind of guy.”

  “You’ll like it,” Verlaque assured the commissioner. “I thought it was just a trendy minimalist restaurant when it first opened. But it’s actually very good—simple Italian dishes, and they have a heavenly Corsican wine that’s only available there. No one else in the south of France can get their hands on the stuff.”

  “Not Clos Canarelli?”

  “That’s the one.”

  “Hélène tasted it once, when she did a wine tour of Corsica with some other winemakers. She’s been raving about it. I’ll have to tell her. Okay, I’ll see you there. À bientôt.”

  Verlaque drove quickly to Aix and parked his car illegally on the cours Mirabeau, putting his badge in the widow. A cigar was indispensable before he met with Paulik. As he was walking toward the tabac, he saw two people arguing on the opposite side of the cours. Couples in Aix were always either openly kissing or fighting. As he neared, he recognized Isabelle de Bremont and the back of the head of someone who looked exactly like Étienne de Bremont—he knew immediately that it must be François. Isabelle was running her hands through her red hair, and he was trying to talk to her, holding her by the elbow. A closer look was impossible, without being seen.

  And then Verlaque saw him: the old man who sold nuts to all of the café clients up and down the cours Mirabeau. Verlaque had been buying from him for years, salted almonds usually, and Marine had always had a soft spot f
or the old, bald man who wore a blue apron and carried his nuts in an old-fashioned wicker basket. Verlaque regretted that he didn’t know his name, but when he walked up to him, the nut seller instantly recognized him and gave him a hearty handshake.

  “Could you do me a huge favor?” Verlaque asked him in a low voice. “It’s police business, so you’ll have to be discreet. Could you walk past that couple across the street—do you see them, the petite redhead and the man she’s arguing with?”

  “You mean Isabelle and François de Bremont?” the old man asked.

  Verlaque smiled. “Is that who they are? Yes, well, could you walk past them and try to hear what they are arguing about?”

  The old man nodded and slowly crossed the street. To Verlaque’s amazement, the nut seller’s car, a brand-new Clio, was parked beside the couple. Not bad, thought Verlaque, a new Clio for the nut seller. The old man fussed with the bags of nuts that he kept in the trunk and came back across the street after two or three minutes.

  “He doesn’t want to sell the château in Saint-Antonin,” the old man reported. “She does.”

  “She does?”

  The old man took his time replying as he put a cashew into his mouth. “Have we hired a deaf judge in Aix? Yes, she.”

  Chapter Nine

  Paulik didn’t like the look of the place. It was the kind of restaurant where everyone wears black, and they all look at you when you walk in. The food became secondary at these kinds of places—people weren’t there to eat but to see and be seen. It surprised Paulik that Antoine Verlaque would like it here; he was well known around the precinct to be a good cook and one who was fussy about food and wine. He walked up the four steps that led to the front door and looked around. Most of the tables were occupied: people in suits out for a business lunch; another table with three women who, judging by their clothes, worked at one of the fashionable boutiques in the quartier; and, next to him, two men wearing paint-splattered jeans and work boots, discussing their respective building sites and the problems with obtaining permits from the town hall. The music annoyed him. He didn’t like music in restaurants.